Messenger (Guardian Trilogy Prequel 1) (39 page)

And then he was gone and my hands were empty.

“Eran?” I called out, my eyes searching toward the ceiling and back down along the walls. “ERAN?”

“I’m here,” he said, although his voice was burdened again and gurgled.

His body against the wall stirred. He brought his hand to his head, assessing the damage…or reassuring himself that he wasn’t imagining what had occurred.

“I’m back,” he sighed.

That was when I understood that Dmitrei had been correct. Those above had rejected Eran’s plan of suicide. He had died, but he had then been revived.

“Are you all right?”

He stood up and steadied himself. “I’m going to leave Dmitrei’s now.” He looked pointedly at me, where he knew I was when he had been brought back to life.

“Are you all right?” I asked. He was once again in a body that felt pain and it unnerved me.

“And in case you’re wondering…I’m fine.”

Despondency drew the life from me then as I realized I was no longer audible to him. The great divide separated us, keeping him from hearing my voice. For the remainder of his time, we would be essentially locked away from each other, and those above would have their separation between us.

Eran stopped at the ladder, one hand on the rung. “Are you here, Magdalene?”

“I’m here!” I shouted.

His head dipped and he sighed, confirming that this time my voice failed to reach him. It didn’t matter. He knew the answer because he knew me.

“I urge you to leave,” he said, his voice breaking, “unless you wish to see your burial.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE: FUNERAL

T
HE GROUND WAS HARD WHEN HE
drove the shovel into the compact earth. Overhead, thick clouds cast a gloomy grey across everything in sight and the cold air made Eran’s breath visible as he worked.

He had carried my body over farmlands and cities and across countless territories to a place I had never been. When he finally stopped, we were surrounded by a dense forest of narrow trees. It was isolated but serene.

As his feet touched the forest floor, settling onto a bed of loose dead leaves, he carried my body to a fallen log. Tenderly, he laid it across and settled my head delicately onto the wood. Patches of emerald green moss covered the trunk, contrasting starkly with the white dress I had been wearing. The hem slipped down my legs and hung in the air, drifting with the breeze, as Eran had commenced his work.

“Why here?” asked Hoffstedler, who had trailed Eran along with the rest of the messengers and guardians. Jeremiah and Hermina were the only two missing.

“She’ll be safe,” Eran said, not bothering to address him with a look. “Our enemies won’t find her.”

He bent down and took the shovel he had brought only to be intercepted by Claudius.

“No,” Eran said, “this is my duty.”

And Claudius released the shovel to stand aside with the rest of the group.

Many of them I would see soon, but they weren’t here for me. They wished to comfort Eran, who in the midst of his trial needed the support of good friends.

Eran tucked his appendages back inside, leaving his torso bare and surging with each movement. He began with a dedication to see it done, but by the end he struck the dirt with violent ferocity as his face twisted in fury and his lungs sucked in air. Two things had been stolen from him today…me and the ability to return to me. And his resentment over it showed.

When the grave had been dug, he let the shovel fall and returned to my body. Carefully, he drew it into his arms and carried it to the hole, my limp arms and legs swaying with his steps.

At the grave, he knelt down but did not drop my body in. Instead, he brought my forehead to his lips and kissed me delicately at my hairline. It was a kiss that lingered as if he knew he would need to release me when it was finished. Then, with great caution, he laid me down.

He sat beside me then for an indescribable amount of time, moving only when the raindrops stirred him from his thoughts. Pushing himself to a standing position, he moved in a trance-like manner back to the shovel, picked it up, and began scooping piles of dirt onto me, starting at the feet and moving up my body. His process told me that he was struggling with covering my face.

I could not speak to him, so I sent him silent wishes to help him through it.

“I wish for you, Eran, to cover me. I wish for you to let me go. I wish for you to begin your journey on earth, where you will find happiness and beauty, friends, and, I so desperately hope, love. Let me go, Eran. Let me go.”

Yet he paused when he reached my face, holding a scoop of dirt in the shovel over my grave. The rain continued, quietly tapping the trees and ground, and bringing a shiny sleekness to my pale face. Several long seconds passed where he showed no signs of movement, not to breath or blink or utter a word. The others glanced uncomfortably at each other. He existed there in his torment and in those few seconds
he
was the ghost. Then his nostrils flared and he tipped the shovel downward.

He worked for another hour on my grave, filling the hole and assembling a cross in which he carved my name. Once he had planted it at the head of the fresh, dark mound, he fell to his knees at the foot of my grave.

Thunder cracked overhead, pursued by a flash of lightning that hit not far from Eran. Then the raindrops quickened and the noise around us grew louder. The earth, my mound in particular, turned black.

The storm saturated Eran’s pants and streamed down his bare back, but he appeared not to notice. The others didn’t cower from it either.

Eran’s head fell forward and his tears mixed with the rain.

Thunder boomed through the forest, but he showed no sign of hearing it.

They remained there, with the rain pummeling them, until the storm had passed. When it diminished to a trickle, Jeremiah and Hermina appeared in the distance, weaving their way through the trees. And they weren’t alone.

The three of them stopped next to the group to observe Eran.

“We’ve brought someone for last rites,” Jeremiah called out.

Apparently, they had followed Eran until he stopped here only to continue on for a preacher.

Eran growled. “No stranger will speak about her.”

The man stepped forward, crossing the saturated leaves.

“Colonel,” he said, calmly, respectfully.

Eran lifted his eyes in recognition of the voice. “Vasko?”

Vasko lowered his arm to Eran who swung his hand up to grip the man’s massive forearm in greeting. I’d never seen that handshake, yet it seemed appropriate between them.

Eran released him and rose to his feet on his own. “I would like to hear what you have to say.”

Vasko nodded and stepped to the head of the grave as the others moved to encircle the mound under which I laid.

“I did not know Magdalene personally. Our paths never crossed. I am no longer one of the colonel’s guards and thus my travels have led me elsewhere. But a spirit as strong, as willful as hers does not depart this earth without leaving behind an indelible imprint. I ask that we suspend our tears, our sorrow, and perhaps our anger to remember the beauty that Magdalene brought to this earth. Even from afar, through the whispers of my friends and the Alterums who joined my congregation at church, we knew Magdalene. Stories of what she had done for us, what she survived to teach us, came to me many and often. Because of Magdalene we faced our greatest fears…and we learned. Because of Magdalene we faced our most treacherous enemies…and we survived. Now it is her time to rest. It is her time to be at peace. It is her time to do as she wishes. So farewell, Magdalene. The rest of us will see you on the other side.”

And that was when I knew that Vasko wasn’t speaking to Eran. He was speaking to me. Hermina had told him that I would be present. She made one sweeping study of the grove in which I was buried, the slightest smile of affection just barely visible across her lips. Then she turned to leave and the others followed.

Vasko paused at Eran’s side to comfort him with a hand to his shoulder. “She will stay with you in spirit now. You may not see her, but she is here.”

Again, I was amazed at the double meaning this man could utter on a whim. I wished that Eran could see beyond his grief to the other side of Vasko’s truth.

Vasko then followed the path the others had taken, leaving Eran to find comfort in the solace of the hushed forest.

No rain pattered the trees, no birds sang, and no breeze stirred the leaves. It was so silent that I could hear Eran’s staggered breathing. Then came the subtle shifting of leaves across the ground and I looked to my right to find a man and young girl.

The man’s hand was crossed over the girl, preventing her from stepping farther, as he evaluated the path where the others had gone. They were now nowhere in sight.

He dropped his arm at the same time Eran fell to his knees at my grave. Eran’s sobs concealed the man’s footsteps as he crossed the forest floor.

I should have been distraught with sympathy for Eran, but in that moment all I felt was anxious fear.

Eran was still naked from the waist up, so when his appendages sprouted from between his shoulder blades they were clearly visible.

The man came to a halt, shocked but showing no indication of fear. On the contrary, he seemed intrigued. This enflamed my concern.

Eran’s appendages unfolded, carrying with them the whisper of feathers unfurling, to lay against his back. They were blindingly white, in deep contrast to the grey, overcast forest, and their sheer size was awe-inspiring.

“Wings,” the little girl demanded, her words nearly inaudible in their wistful, delicate tenor.

Yet Eran did hear her. He lifted his head to peer over his shoulder.

Before Eran could react, the man’s hand swept below his jacket. It remained there, poised in defense, as Vasko appeared on the path carrying a coat that was clearly meant for Eran.

Vasko never saw what hit him.

The blade emerged from the stranger’s jacket and spiraled across the forest into the center of Vasko’s chest. He blinked once in confusion, flicking his vacant eyes to the stranger before tipping backwards and collapsing to the ground.

Eran sprinted for Vasko, his appendages shrinking back inside him, almost withering in shock at what he was seeing. But as Eran skidded to his knees beside Vasko, his appendages re-emerged. He used his skill to evaluate Vasko’s injuries and determine the extent of damage, but when Vasko’s final breath seeped from his lips, Eran knew.

The stranger marched by my grave, across the freezing leaves, to Vasko’s body.

I swelled with fury watching this man move so effortlessly after what he had done. I swept forward to face him, throwing my fist into his face. The man felt nothing. He didn’t even pause as Dmitrei had done.

“He…He startled me,” the man said under his breath. “It had been a reaction.”

Then I recalled what the little girl had said just second before this had happened. She had whispered, “Wings.”

The man stooped and wrapped his long, boney fingers around the handle of the blade protruding from Vasko. He yanked it free with force and turned to Eran.

“But now that I’ve done it…,” he muttered.

He stood with the knife in hand, positioning it so that the length of the blade faced outward. Without hesitation, the stranger planted the knife against Eran’s throat and drew it across.

Surging with rage and confusion, I sent my fists flying across the man’s face. Yet he didn’t fall away or pause or stop. My transparent punches did nothing to him.

Eran, who was left devastated first by my loss and then by Vasko’s, shifted to follow the knife’s flow across his neck and deflect injury. But he was too late and when the edge came away from his skin, a cut opened to reveal the depth of his injury.

Blood poured from it, down his chest, and pooled on Vasko’s body below him.

“Noooooooo!” I shrieked, only to look up and find by the man who had just killed Eran immersed in exhilarated concentration.

My limbs began moving then, hitting, kicking, clawing until my consciousness told me to stop, that it would not prevent what had already happened.

So I fell back to my own knees, sobbing in my own void, to watch Eran die.

The man stood, wiped the drool from his lips and sent his foot into Eran’s shoulder. Eran’s body hit the compact earth with a thud, his face making a concave divot in the leaves.

The man knelt over him, balancing himself on Eran’s back with one knee. He then placed the blade against the base of Eran’s left wing and began to saw.

With each grating slice, I grew more rabid, more uncontrollable, more certain that vengeance would be exacted against this man.

And then I heard Eran’s voice.

“It’s all right,” he said and I turned around.

Eran stood just a few feet back, watching the scene with detached scrutiny.

“Eran!” I shouted and ran for him. Our bodies met eagerly, sending the buzz through us once more.

As I held him, feeling his body, his healthy and complete body, I realized I had been so embroiled in my emotions I didn’t recognize he had been behind me.