“About Mom?”
Dad sniffs, his mustache bristling. “Tread lightly, Preacher.”
“Okay then,” Pastor Noah continues. “Back when Hannah was a member of our congregation, we had a lot of interesting happenings going on ourselves.”
“Interesting happenings?”
“Well, healings and such. It wasn’t just business as usual, if you know what I mean.”
I don’t say anything, but I do know what he’s talking about. At least I think I do. Jake found some old church bulletins online the other night. The year Mom disappeared was a year of extraordinary and miraculous things here in Central Oregon.
“It all started with your mom, Brielle. She was sick. You
know that, of course, but you may not know just how hard the church lighthouse?”oute prayed for her. We prayed and prayed and prayed, and then one day she was better. The treatments started working, and the cancer seemed to be leaving her body. It spurred us on, in a way. We don’t see many miracles in our day and age, and we were just certain our prayers had helped in some small way.”
Dad buries his face in his mammoth coffee cup.
Pastor Noah plows on. “So we got brave. The people did. They started asking for prayer for all sorts of things. Not for earthly gain, mind you, but for things they may have been too proud to ask for before your mom. We prayed for everything. We prayed all the time, it seemed. And the craziest thing, Brielle . . . our prayers were being answered.”
I’ve seen Jake heal. I’ve seen Canaan and Helene do it. I’ve read about it in Scripture, but I haven’t heard much about it happening at the church here in town. In fact, I haven’t seen a single person healed there in the seven months I’ve been going.
“And then your mom got sick again,” Noah says. His voice catches and Becky moves to his side, picking up where he left off.
“We kept praying,” Becky says. “We prayed day and night, but it just didn’t seem to do any good.”
“I’m sure it did,” I say.
“No, Elle,” Dad says. “It didn’t.”
The fridge buzzes and the clock on the wall ticks away the time, but other than that the room is quiet. No one dares to refute Dad’s claim.
“When your mom . . . disappeared,” Miss Macy says, blushing at the lie she kept hidden, “the praying all but stopped.”
I blink at the words. Two, three, four blinks. “I don’t understand. You stopped praying for my mom or . . .”
“We stopped praying for the sick,” Miss Macy says, her lips set in a thin line. “We stopped believing for miracles.”
“I’m sure individuals continued to pray, Elle. Certain of it,” Noah says. “But Hannah disappearing wasn’t common knowledge;
I
didn’t even know until you mentioned it the other day. We all thought your mother died, and that almost killed our little congregation. At the very least, something broke that day. Something changed.”
I turn the words over in my mind, swishing them around, trying to make sense of them. I think of Virtue’s presence on my mom’s last day in Stratus. I think of him in that flame-ravaged school. I think of him here, in Stratus, with eleven others just like him.
“Miss Macy,” I ask, “when did you stop going to the church here in town? You drive into Bend, don’t you?”
“I do,” she says. “It was just too much after Hannah died. And then the praying stopped, and I all but shriveled up here. I’m a flower, love. I neI turn to Jakeowp0ed to be watered.”
I glance under my lashes at Noah; her words are sure to sting. But Miss Macy—ever vigilant Miss Macy—catches me peeking and pats Noah’s hand.
“Noah here was just a young buck back then. He wasn’t our fearless leader, Elle.”
“I wasn’t,” Noah says, “but I’m not sure I’d have done much better. The leaders, they did what they could, but we were all lost after your mom died.”
My mom’s been dead for as long as I can remember, but I hate that Noah assumes it’s true. Especially since the only thing we’re actually certain of now is that she was really sick when she disappeared.
“It shook us,” he continues. “Down to our foundation it shook us. A lot of things fell away when we couldn’t explain the loss. But after years of mulling it over, I think we just stopped believing.”
“In God?” It’s Dad, the incredulity in his voice nearly comedic.
Pastor Noah sighs. “Well, we believed He was there, certainly. But that He knew best? I think we stopped believing that altogether.”
Dad mumbles something that sounds an awful lot like, “Could’ve told you that,” but I don’t reprimand him. I’m tired and don’t have it in me.
“Why tell me now?” I ask.
“I tried to tell you the other day. The day your mom’s grave was desecrated,” Pastor Noah says. Well, that explains his awkward presence here that day. “Miss Macy thought it was time.”
I glance at my ballet teacher, my mentor. She sips her coffee with something of a satisfied grin on her face. “I’m glad the truth is out there, Elle. You needed to know.”
“But I’m also here because I owe you an apology,” Pastor Noah says, looking around. “
We
owe you an apology.”
“I don’t think—”
“No, Elle. We do,” he says. “We owed your generation more than we gave. We should have showed you what faith looks like when dark and inexplicable things happen. All we had to offer was disillusionment and grief.”
His words sit with us. So intimate. So real.
“It’s understandable,” I say, wondering just how different Stratus would be if they hadn’t stopped believing. If they hadn’t stopped praying.
“Perhaps,” he agrees, leaning forward on his elbows. “But it’s not acceptable.”
The room is quiet now. The ice maker dumps another round of cubes into the bucket with celestial lightinowa mechanical
clink
. Becky reaches past her husband to pick up another photo off the counter.
“Where’d you get these, Elle?” she asks.
“Dad,” I say. “Well, Jake, actually. Dad dropped the film off at Photo Depot but never picked up the pictures. Jake asked me to pass them along.”
“Where is Jake?” Pastor Noah asks, looking up from the photo in his hand.
I glance at Miss Macy. She knows something happened yesterday. Something violent. One look at the destroyed living room and the blood leaking from Dad’s head and her inner detective kicked in. She bandaged Dad up, peppering us with a zillion questions. Dad mumbled incoherencies that I’m sure she chalked up to a hangover, but I said nothing, escaping to the orchard as soon as I could. I’m not sure what Dad has told any of them, but I can’t imagine Miss Macy let him off the hook after I left.
I let my eyes settle on him.
“He’ll be back soon,” Dad says, pulling me next to him. “Right, baby? He’ll be back.”
My heart swells at—Is it faith Dad’s showing? I think it is, and there aren’t really words to describe just how big a deal it is that he thinks Jake will just turn up. Especially since Mom never came back. Mom, who was also taken by invisible forces. I pry my mind away from that train of thought. It’s not helpful, not in the least.
I’m tempted just to let his answer be, to lie to my friends and
neighbors, to convince myself I’m protecting the Celestial. But everyone in this room knows full well there’s an invisible world. Dad may not like it, but that wound on his head and the Sabres’ song he’s trying to hide from even now isn’t letting doubt take hold.
Helene and Canaan. Jake. They’re all gone, and I can’t do this alone.
I need these people.
“Jake was taken,” I say.
“Taken?” Pastor Noah asks. “What does that mean,
taken
?”
Before I answer I tug the pictures from their loose grips and close them away. Then I climb up on the barstool by Dad and take his hand. I can do this. I can.
“Last December, when Kaylee was kidnapped,” I say, looking around the room, making sure my audience is following along, “the man who orchestrated the child trafficking ring wasn’t just a man. His name was, er, is Damien . . .”
“Read that in the paper,” the pastor says, tapping a rogue picture against his chin, “but last I heard they couldn’t locate a last name or any information on him.”
“That’s because he’s a demon.”
Nothing. No gasp. No tears. No panick
{
text-align: center;
margin-top: inowed expressions. Just eight saucer-like eyes staring back at me.
I try again. “Damien’s a fallen angel. They aren’t going to find a last name. They aren’t going to find him at all. And really, it’s better that way.”
“Elle, sweetie, you can’t . . .” It’s Becky. Her beautiful face is screwed up tight with the dose of common sense she’s about to dole out.
“She’s telling the truth,” Dad says, taking my hand in his. “Damien was here. Yesterday.”
“Keith,” Miss Macy says, “you can’t believe—”
“He did
this
,” Dad continues steadily, gesturing to the bandage on his head and then yanking his T-shirt aside to expose the wound on his shoulder. “And this.”
I haven’t seen Dad’s shoulder since he interrupted Jake’s attempt to heal it. It’s no longer bleeding, but there’s a silver marking where Damien’s talon punctured his skin. Icy like the scars the demon Javan left on Olivia’s arm.
I’m angry again. Angry that the Fallen have hurt so many in their tirade of rebellion. Angry that my loved ones have suffered. Angry at Darkness.
“I’m asking you to believe something without seeing it,” I say. “I know that’s hard, but I wouldn’t ask this of just anybody. You’re people of faith. If anyone can believe that what I’m saying is true, it’s got to be you guys.”
Pastor Noah takes his wife’s hand in one of his and Miss Macy’s hand in the other.
“Go ahead, Brielle,” he says. “We believe you.”
I glance briefly at the others. Becky looks like she’s been splattered with pie, Miss Macy’s brow is tied in a million knots, but Pastor Noah? Pastor Noah looks like he’s ready to fight a dragon.
Good.
We may need to do just that.
I tell them everything. Well, not everything. I tell them about Canaan and the halo, but I don’t tell them I took a knife in the stomach last December, because that means I’d have to tell them about Jake’s gift. And as much as I need their support, that’s really Jake’s to tell. I hedge a bit when it comes to my gift as well. I tell them Canaan’s wings and the halo give me celestial sight, but I
don’t mention that I’ve started seeing the invisible on my own. I just really, really don’t want to talk about that right now.
But I do tell them about Damien’s pursuit and his defeat at the warehouse. I even tell them about Virtue and Mom’s grave. This part is harder for me to explain because it means telling them about my dreams. It also means confirming Dad’s worst fears: that the singing angels are responsible for Mom
{
text-align: center;
margin-top: inow’s disappearance. I try to soften the blow by telling them how Mom saved Olivia. I tell them about her too, about her involvement. Dad weeps through all of it. The others shed tears as well. I stutter a bit when the fear starts to flow. When it trickles from the pastor’s nose and slips down Miss Macy’s arm. They’re scared, but I think that means they believe me.
T
he pain is worse than before, a trickle of blood leaking from Jake’s mouth. He’s been unconscious for who knows how long before he wakes. His eyes and nose are crusted with a disgusting mixture of concrete, snot, and tears. But with his arms bound, there’s precious little he can do about it. He leans forward and spits the grainy debris from his mouth.
Damien’s gone, but he can’t be far. If he’s left Jake here, he’s got to be biding his time; he must be waiting for something.
“I thought”—the room spins—“thought you were taking me to Danakil?”
His cry bounces off the walls, and from its echo Damien’s voice crawls. It slinks back into Jake’s mind, cold and numbing.
“What do you know of Danakil?” The demon’s words coat Jake’s mind, icing over his vision. The room crystallizes before him. “What do you know of that place, boy?”
The cold slows Jake’s reflexes. Slows his mind. Exhausted, he leans into the wall.
“Nothing,” he admits. “I know nothing.”
A low chuck,” Dad saysow entirelyle vibrates in his ears. Gritty. Toxic. Damien
rematerializes in the far corner of the room, standing in the shadows at the foot of the staircase.
“Soon, boy. When I’m done with you, you’ll go to Danakil. You’ll meet the Prince.”
Jake’s stomach flips. “When you’re done doing
what
with me?”
Jake’s expecting an answer, needs an answer, but the demon pulls a cell phone from his pocket and snaps it to his ear.
“Where are you?” he growls into the phone. “Then come down. We’re waiting. Yes,
we
.”
Damien slides the phone into his pocket and leans against the corner, all but disappearing into the shadows.
Jake asks again, “When you’re done doing what?”
But the sound of a door squeaking open is all the answer he gets. He turns his gaze to the staircase, where a pair of red heels step into view. Two very long, very lean legs follow. Behind them, dark jeans and stone-washed Toms. With the clamor of stilettos on steel, Olivia Holt makes her way down the stairs, Marco moving silently in her wake.