Shadow of the Sun

CHAPTER 7: ELDERS

  “What’d you just call me?”

  Six pairs of eyes all stared my direction, each with a different expression on their faces.

  Hercules didn’t make a single noise, not even a small huffy bark. He sat quietly, patiently, as if he could understand their words.

  The Elders surrounded me, their power pulsing through the air like an electrical current. They were all striking regardless of their different ages; I guessed that went with the territory of immortality. Their splendor wasn’t about their looks, though. It was about their presence, and they had an abundance of that. They contrasted oddly with the interior of my home. Though my house was beautifully remodeled with high-beamed ceilings and intricate wood flooring, the angels made it look dull and unimpressive.

  “Darkness Illuminator,” they all said together, their magical voices sounding like a song.

  “Guardian, you’ve done well,” an older woman said to Karen.

  Karen bent at the waist and gestured for them to sit. “This is Gabriella,” Karen said to the Elders.

  “Greetings,” said a woman with black hair down to her waist. Her voice was like honey. “I’m Carmela. We’ve come bearing news.” Her face was long, and her eyebrows arched perfectly above her diamond eyes. She appeared to be young, but her presence overpowered her looks.

  “Carmela,” I greeted, though I continued to stand.

  “Hello, my lady,” a handsome man said. “My name is Leonardo.” He took my hand and kissed it. My cheeks heated. His eyes lifted under his tousled bronze hair to find mine, and he smirked. He looked to be in his mid-twenties. “We’ve not lost many of our kind through the ages, so finding out whose bodies you stumbled across didn’t take much research.”

  “Just jump right in, Leo,” a taller man said playfully. “Don’t give her time to breathe or anything.” He turned to me. “I’m Lucio. You can call me Luke, Miss Illuminator.” He had a five o’clock shadow on his face, and he appeared sturdy, like a construction worker. His hair was a dazzling auburn, his eyes glacial blue.

  “Illuminator?” I questioned. “Why do you keep calling me that? What does it mean?” I had to stop myself before more queries could exit my mouth on my slippery tongue. I had too many questions and not enough time.

  “We’ll get to it, but first we must speak of the three lost immortals,” said a woman, her face lined with age. “I’m Eleanor, the eldest of the Elders.”

  “Only by twenty-five years,” chuckled Leonardo.

  Eleanor looked like someone who wouldn’t have any sense of humor, but her silver hair bobbed as she giggled. “This is true, Leo. I suppose it is only a small fraction of our immortal lives.”

  “Enough joking around. We have business to attend to,” said the fifth angel. He looked as if he was built of stone and had black hair down to his shoulders. His face was hard, like he rarely smiled.

  “There’s no reason to be rude to the Darkness Illuminator. She could be our savior,” Luke said. “You know, Shadow of the Sun.” The stone man ignored him.

  “You did forget your manners, Paolo,” Carmela reprimanded. “I’m sorry, Gabriella. This is Paolo.”

  I nodded, realizing that unless I was spoken to, words were not worth speaking in his presence.

  “The name of the Shadow spreads panic to the angels, so eventually we quit talking about them,” Eleanor informed me. “And we stopped talking about the three missing immortals, Andrew, Ehno, and Lucia. We thought that they were gone forever.”

  Luke’s eyes trailed across the room and bored into mine. The golden tint was unsettling, until I realized it was from tears forming in his eyes. “My twin sister,” he whispered.

  Carmela patted him on the back. “No worries, my friend. That’s why we’re here.” She turned to face me. “You have the power to save them.”

  I blinked. “I have the power to save them?” I tasted the words in my mouth, trying to swallow them. “Darkness Illuminator” flashed in my head, and comprehension dawned. “Wait, you want me to battle the Shadow of the Sun?”

  They nodded.

  “Are you insane? I barely made it out of my office alive the first time.”

  “That’s exactly why we know you’ve been chosen,” Paolo said firmly. “No human has ever survived an encounter with a Shadow. Even some angels haven’t survived.”

  “No human has survived: my point exactly,” I said rationally. “You aren’t human. You’re angels with supernatural powers. Why put this kind of duty upon the shoulders of a human? Especially one who just found out angels exist? I just learned that the tales I’ve read about angels are works of fiction made up by Karen’s brothers.” I was furious. “I’m not supernatural in nature, but you all are.” Frustrated, who me?

  Luke chuckled and elbowed Leonardo who grinned at me.

  I ignored them. “I’m not some pawn in a game you’re playing,” I added defiantly. This was all so abrupt, like a car accident in which the devastation of the catastrophe lasted much longer than the actual events that caused it. Maybe one of them had the power to erase memories so I wouldn’t have to remember any of this. Or maybe, I thought crisply, I’ve lost all my marbles and this isn’t really happening to begin with.

  Karen placed a hand on my forearm. It tingled slightly, and I wondered if she was trying to use her powers on me. I frowned at the air between us. “It’s not going to work.”

  “Please, Gabriella,” begged Leo. He got to his feet and dropped to his knees before me, taking both of my hands in his. His violet eyes were shockingly bright and pleading. “Hear us out.” Great, he was begging. Literally on his knees. How do you say no to that?

  “Yes, please,” whispered Carmela.

  When they looked at me that way with their beseeching eyes. . . .

  Paolo—or Stone Man, as I thought him—sniffed the air snobbishly. “This is a waste of our time.”

  “It can’t be,” Karen argued, talking over my head. “I saw it with my own eyes. She pulled the Nebulous Sun off Ehno and two keys from the Shadow chest.”

  “And how do we know she isn’t a Shadow herself?” argued Stone Man. “Plus, the prophecy said nothing of a human.”

  I took in a deep breath to retort but was beat to it.

  “What a ridiculous assumption, Paolo,” Eleanor chastised. “Are her eyes like fire? Is she dark as charcoal? No. She’s the opposite of a Shadow. She has sea-green eyes, and her skin is beautifully tanned. She’s not a Shadow.”

  “Thanks,” I said.

  Eleanor nodded, still staring at Paolo with a threatening glare. Power radiated off her unfaltering, inhuman force.

  “It could be a trick,” muttered Stone Man, but he was obviously forfeiting. I didn’t blame him; Eleanor clearly had supreme authority in this group of immortals.

  “Enough,” ordered Luke. His eyes had a hard and determined gleam in them. The gold tint of his tears only added to their depth. His true age seemed to resonate through the sound of his voice. “This isn’t about her supernatural status; it’s about saving those angels.”

  I was so frustrated. I had so many questions, and I could barely get a word in edgewise. “What’s a Nebulous Sun?” I practically shouted.

  Carmela pulled a tissue from the box on the coffee table and drew a pattern with her finger. When she passed it my way, there was a drawing on the soft paper. It was the same pattern and shape of the intricate design of flawless beauty that I had seen before.

  “The necklace?” I asked.

  “It’s more than a necklace,” Carmela said. “It’s a symbol for the Shadow of the Sun. The circle represents a halo of sun; the shield is the darkness that binds them. They use it to hold us to the Earth. When wearing these, we become almost helpless to their magic—as you have seen with our three family members.”

  “And what about the other symbols?” I turned to Karen, pulled the keys from my jacket pocket, and held them out for her to examine. She didn’t even look down at my hand.

/>   “Yes, that’s the angel’s symbol. The halo of the sun with spears crossing in the middle is a sign that we protect the light from the Shadow,” she explained. “It’s called Definitive Sun.”

  “Why did the Shadow chest contain two keys with the Definitive Sun symbol?” Now my interest was piqued. It was a wild mystery, intriguing yet terrifying at the same time.

  “That’s what we’re going to find out.” Karen gestured between us. Already, I didn’t like this idea. The angel universe was unique and strange—fascinating, even—but they were thrusting me into a war.

  “I don’t see how I could be of any service to you,” I said confidently. “The angels already looked as if they were alive. Every minute they seemed to be doing the opposite of decaying.” They stared at me, mouths agape—all except Karen, of course. “So,” I continued when no one said anything, “if they’re regenerating already, then why do I need to help the process? They’re doing just fine on their own.”

  “Lucia looked alive? She wasn’t a-a corpse?” Luke asked hopefully.

  “She looked like a corpse five days ago, but now she looks like sleeping beauty,” I replied, smiling.

  Now that I took in Luke’s features, I could see the resemblance between him and the female angel Lucia. Their hair was of the same deep auburn, and I bet their eyes were the same shade of the shallowest of oceans.

  “What could this mean?” Carmela piped in, her voice high pitched in incredulity, bordering on outright shock.

  So many things had left me shocked and disbelieving that when I saw the faces of the angels showing the same overwhelming jolt of surprise, I began to worry.

  “It’s the prophecy. Zola said she’d come, centuries ago,” Eleanor whispered. “Don’t you remember?”

  A few of them nodded.

  “Zola’s never been wrong,” Luke informed me.

  “Never,” agreed Carmela.

  Karen wrapped her arm around my waist, I supposed in fear that I would faint. “Well,” I hesitated. “What did this prophecy say?” The words tasted funny in my mouth. Only hours ago I was complaining about cold coffee, and now I was talking about prophecies and being completely serious about it. Any second I expected people to come in with a straightjacket. Bouncing around a padded cell would seem downright normal compared to this.

  Eleanor looked sideways at Paolo. He scowled but nodded.

  “The prophecy says”—Eleanor frowned—“three among us will perish to the Earth, bound by shadow and fire. An Illuminator will extinguish the curse and save us all, for those three hold the key to the knowledge of light. Angel guards and Shadow barriers will not hold her back, as she will have access to both sides of the realm. Beware of encroaching danger, as the Illuminator will be surrounded, but she is not thy enemy.

  “As the dark ones approach, the Illuminator should be set free, uninhibited by all Guardians. She will show us all who the enemies are and how to defeat them. Until the Shadows approach, protect her above all others, even from our kind.

  “Blood does not hold the key to light and dark. Only our souls hold that power, as the Darkness Illuminator will prove.”

  I eyed Eleanor for a considerable amount of time. Many heavily weighted minutes passed. The silence in the room was full of meaning. Luke put a finger under my chin and pushed up to shut my jaw. His touch snapped me out of my haze as his eyes seized mine, the blue holding my gaze—searching.

  “Shit.” That was the most appropriate reply I could think of.

  Luke nodded and squeezed my hand. Karen’s arm still clung to my waist, her grip firm. It took me a second to realize that she held me up. She guided me to the nearest chair. This time I welcomed any emotional climate change, yet she offered none. I sighed heavily as I regained my bearings. “How do you know this Illuminator is me?” I mumbled.

  “Because you smashed through the Shadow’s barriers like you were putting your hand through thin air,” Leo said enthusiastically, his violet eyes lighting up. “And because, well, ‘Angel guards and Shadow barriers will not hold her back, as she will have access to both sides of the realm,’ ” he repeated. “Plus, you’re a female, as the prophecy specifies.”

  There are many females in the world, I wanted to say. But how many of them had angels in their living room?

  I sighed tiredly. “Oh.” The silence in the room was deafening. “So,” I said after several moments, my voice slicing through the quiet air. “How did you find me?”

  “That’s easy.” Karen grinned happily. “When the angels were unearthed in Italy, a huge power surge shot out from Oretown. The electricity was out for hours. The FBI became aware of it but concluded it was just a power surge.

  “However, the Elders knew better. We found you when Zelko Corp. called about the bodies. It wasn’t until I was in your presence that I knew it was you. You’re very powerful, which doesn’t make any sense because you’re a human. It was as if the angels called out to you. Your body responded by sending a beacon to all the angels to come find you for help.”

  Ignoring her human quip, I said, “Oh. That was me?” I remembered that night clearly. Hercules and I had been relaxing on the couch, watching TV, when suddenly everything became really noisy, as if someone had turned up the volume on a humming fridge. Then the power went off all down the west coast. Now I knew it was my fault. Wonderful.

  “The problem was that the Shadow of the Sun also felt the growing power here,” Karen said. “That’s why I was delayed. A small group of angels were dispersed to protect you, and I was a part of that group. What I didn’t expect was for Jeff to show up in Oretown. He’s a Shadow. I would have cast him out then and there, but we had to keep our cover with all the humans around.”

  “Wait—what? Jeff’s a Shadow?” I asked. Nothing was what it seemed to be anymore.

  Karen nodded. “A very well disguised one. His power is great.”

  I remembered back to the incident in the office, the dark one squeezing the life from me—warning me. “If they’re so awful, why didn’t you just kill him?” I asked.

  “Because,” Carmela spoke up, her eyes anxious, “he is—was—a double agent.”

  “I never trusted him,” Karen interjected.

  Carmela continued. “He spied on the Shadow of the Sun for us. That was why we left him alone: he gave us pertinent information.”

  “I thought I saw fire blazing in his eyes,” I whispered to myself. Even now, Jeff Vittorio bothered me. My wrist was still sore from where he had gripped it. I would have loved to take him down in some boxer-like style. Bite his ear and knock him out. So what if I had anger issues?

  Karen giggled, pulling me from my thoughts. “Yes, he wears sunglasses a lot, and the humans give him a hard time over that. He has a difficult time controlling his anger.” Her voice turned sour. “He was fired after he grabbed you—”

  “Wait a minute. You said he ‘was’ a double agent? What happened?”

  Karen nodded. “The Elders and I took care of him.”

  “He disobeyed our orders,” Paolo interrupted, his voice deep with loathing. “I knew it was a bad idea to begin with.”

  I shuddered. “When you say ‘took care of him’ you mean . . . ?”

  “We didn’t kill him,” Paolo said, his voice hard as stone. The tone was fitting. “We can’t kill them. We can only bind them or cast them out to another dimension for a while.”

  “Dimension?” I choked on the word. It should be hard to astonish me at this point, but there it was, me all astonish-y. “What do you mean you send them to another dimension?”

  Luke spoke up. He had yet to let go of my hand and gave it another squeeze. “Your world is not what it seems.”

  Duh, I wanted to say.

  He smiled at my expression. “I know you have many questions, and we will answer them, but for now you need to pack your bags. Now that we know who you are, you need to be with the angels on that plane.” I nodded. “Karen will travel with you as your Guardian. She s
wore an oath. And now that we know your significance, we’ll be assigning another Guardian when the angels awake.”

  “But what if I can’t do this?” My voice was pleading, and I was embarrassed by the sound.

  “I know you can,” Luke said, one golden tear dropping from his blue eye. And with that statement, they all faded from my living room. Karen stayed behind.

  “What exactly do the Elders do?” I wondered.

  “They’re protectors of knowledge.”

  That sounded important. She smiled at me, leaned in to give me a hug, and then she was gone, as if she fizzled into thin air. I needed a drink.