“I don’t understand what this means?” Philos said. “Why should we trust you?”
The Angel sighed. “I cannot force you to trust me, but I can certainly give you aid as a...peace offering. Hold out your burned arm.”
“What are you—?” Philos yelped, pain shooting through his body as Sir Smith took his arm in his hand.
“I am an Angel,” he began. “Every Angel is gifted with a unique magical ability known as a ‘Given Power.’”
Suddenly, the burn began to fade away, ashes falling from Philos’ arm and collecting onto the floor as the young man’s arm returned to normal.
“Your Starblood won’t heal magical wounds. But do not worry. My Given Power allows me to reverse the timeline of living things when I touch them.”
“Whoa!” Alphonso blurted out, jumping from his seat.
“So that’s an Angel’s power?” Joseph scoffed, the gun still ready in his hand.
“That’s incredible!” Uri said, wide-eyed.
Philos raised his hand, extending it and wiggling his fingers, speechless.”
“What do you want from me?” he finally said.
Sir Smith donned a grave visage, his eyes piercing daggers that matched his hard, intense disposition.
“Philos. Uri.” He paused. “I want you to activate your Starblood and help me end the Morning Star Kingdom.”
“You want us...” Uri’s voice shook.
“To defeat the Angels?” Philos finished his younger brother’s sentence, his voice trilling just the same.
“Hey,” Joseph spoke up, “aren’t you an Angel yourself? Why do you wanna end your own people? What’s there to gain?”
“The power of this world is unbalanced. The Outskirts hold a treaty with the Morning Star Kingdom—the land beyond the Golden Sea. But inside the Kingdom, the other races—humans, Beastfolk, Darklings—are enslaved and used as tools, treated less than subhuman for the benefit of the Angelic race. But there is a greater problem,” he continued. “The ruler of the Morning Star Kingdom is a demented, insane Angelic king. He is no ordinary Angel. Though he himself holds immense power, it is the object he holds that allows him to rule the world as a god. With its power, he has sealed away the Aeons and thus stripped all might from the Starbreather. His name...”
Tension swam in the room like a thick and brumous phantom as the eyes of the boys locked onto the Angel.
“...is Azazel.”
Alphonse raised an eyebrow. “And you think Philos and Uri can beat this guy?”
“I believe that, if they can harness the power of the Birthright of Vespira, they might be able to rise to the challenge.”
Both Joseph and Alphonso turned their eyes to the other two young men. The two scions of Vespira held fearful expressions. They could tell that Philos and Uri’s heads were spinning.
“Sir Smith.” Philos finally spoke up. “I don’t know how I can do anything that you’ve asked of and my little brother. But.” He looked up, his reddish eyes meeting the other’s blue-gray gaze. “I need to trust you. We need to trust you.”
The Angel bowed.
“Then I take your trust. For the sake of the world!”
“But.” Philos said, looking at Alphonso, then Joseph, then Uri, “We can’t just run off. We can’t just run away.”
“I don’t understand...”
“Yeah,” Uri said. “We have something we have to do.”
“I have a deal, Sir Smith.” Philos’ voice was low, wistful. He held up his healed hand. “The man who burned me took away two of our friends. I don’t know what he plans to do with them, but we want to save them. We need to save them. And...”
“We want you to help us,” Joseph said with a smile.
“Joseph...” Philos looked up at the smiling young man.
“What?” His cat-ears twitching as he blew out smoke. “That’s what you were going to say, right?”
“We gotta give this Adonai punk a clobberin’!” Alphonso cracked his knuckles.
“We have to save them!” Uri nodded. “We’re a family!”
Philos smirked. “And we will definitely trust you more! If you help save our friends!”
The four young men held the Angel’s gaze, each rife with fire and resolve. Sir Smith stood silent, his face an image of pale shock and disbelief. Suddenly, he burst into deep laughter, his voice carrying down the hallway and causing several nurses to jump as they passed by and scurried off.
“I see...” the Angel said as he wiped a tear from his eye. Above his head, his ethereal blue halo cast an unearthly light upon the walls. “I see...”
“What’s so funny, huh, guy?” Alphonso said, irritable.
“It’s just...” Sir Smith paused. “I expected to find the two Children of Vespira, but I didn’t expect to find them in such good, impressive company.” A soft smirk crossed his face, almost belying the stoic air of who he was when he entered the room.
“Family, you say?” Sir Smith asked. “Well. I believe a favor might be exchanged for a favor. I will do it, young men! I will help you save your friends, but you must rise to my challenge in recompense.”
Sir Smith bowed and turned, reaching for the door.
“We leave tomorrow.”
“We’ll be at the coffee shop!” Uri said. “It’s over by the—”
“I know,” the Angel said as he closed the door. “I know where to find it.”
The lights within Burns’ Coffeehouse were dim. This made sense, as the staff were away—whether in the hospital with Philos or vanished like Vylet. Inside, Pal Burns sat at the seat by the window, sipping his cappuccino and humming to himself. Worry had filled his mind for a while, but when he felt that presence walk the streets, his worries somehow...melted away.
The presence he felt...there was no mistaking it.
Revolution walked the streets today.
“It’s been a while, Drew,” a deep voice said, followed by the sound of a door closing. “You should know better than to leave the door unlocked if you’re really going to close the shop for a day.”
“The name’s ‘Pal’ now. And I knew you’d come here,” the old man laughed softly. He turned to see Sir Smith walking toward him. “Tell me, Angel, what name do you go by these days?”
“Sir Smith.”
“Ooh!” Pal jeered. “That one sounds prestigious.”
Sir Smith scowled. “You’re as irritating as I remember.”
“Well, if you’ve come for my Starblood, I hate to disappoint you, but my magic is as old and weak as I am.”
“Whether your magic was weak or not is of no consequence to me, Drew.” The Angel sat across from the other man. In the darkness of the shop, the angelic halo lit the dimness. “Even if you still had power, your body is too old to wield it.”
“Hey,” Pal laughed and took a sip of his coffee. “I’m not ancient...yet.”
Sir Smith said nothing.
“You know who they’re trying to save, don’t you?” Pal said, breaking the still silence.
“I think I do.”
“Then you know who and what she is, don’t you?”
Sir Smith raised his hand, opened it, then closed it.
“I am very old, Drew. Time changes us, undoes us, outlives us. We make our choices and live with our consequences. We live our lives.” He exhaled deeply. “But we cannot control to whom we are born. It is irrelevant. Our hearts define us. No more. No less.”
“You’ve changed, Sir Smith,” Pal smirked. “I think the new name has gone to your head!”
The Angel frowned. “You’re an old fool...Pal.”
The garden was odd. Trees with blue, transparent leaves seemed to leave a sparkling, dust-like mist on the ground below them. Darkness prevailed; the only light to illuminate the strange flora was the small beams from the two crescent moons that seemed to orbit this unique place at a rather quickened speed. But it wasn’t unique to the being that dwelt within the ethereal trees.
No. To him, everything seemed just as it should.
The figure moved like a ghost through the forest, floating slightly off the ground, his stark red eyes set forward. Through his spectral skin, tiny stars seemed to swirl among his violet body. He floated onward, his eyes set upon the giant tree in the center of the garden, a marvelous plant so large that it seemed to extend into the garden’s pitch-black, star-speckled sky. The small being knew he would never tire, so he instead moved onward toward the tree. Life was strange without his strength, and the Starbreather found himself thinking about the events that happened two thousand years ago. Of course, it was obvious that Azazel had bested him, turned the Angels away in their greed and pride, but...
He thought of one in particular...
He thought of the one who now knew the way...
He wondered if Sir Smith had found Vespira’s beloved bloodline.
The thought of Vespira brought a smile to his face, his jagged teeth showing brilliantly even in the faintness of the moonbeams. She was the only hope—or rather, her offspring were. He wondered what they were like. The feeling had come to him recently, and the Starbreather knew that if Smith was successful in awakening their abilities, the Starbreather would be able to link them to his divine power...
Which wasn’t much these days, what with the Aeons sealed away. Lost in thought, he found himself at the roots of the marvelous Yggdrasil.
Oh, Azazel... the thought ran through his mind. Why did you fall away? Why did you do such a horrible thing?
He levitated to the top of one of the gargantuan roots and sat.
Oh, Yggdrasil...why must your world die so?
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