Chapter 10

Solange:

“Who does he think he is, to tell me what to do or what not to? Arrogant, pompous man.”

“Who are you talking about Angel”, Patricia asked, throwing herself all over Victor. She had never acted this way before.

“It’s no one, don’t worry about. Probably you and Victor should go ahead. I will go home with Aunt Gretchen. She needs my company.” I said feeling uncomfortable with the way Victor was looking at me and Patricia was acting weird around him.

“No.” Victor said forcefully and with anger.

Both I and Patricia recoiled at his tone but then he said apologetically “I am sorry, I didn’t mean to sound so harsh. You see I am just nervous. It would be great to have dinner with Patricia and her friend.”

“Please come Angel, it would be fun.” Patricia wined, but she looked dazed and worrying for her safety I said yes. Victor was giving me very strong negative vibrations and I wanted to make sure Patricia reached home safely.

As we finally walked out the auditorium, I saw Ralf standing in the far corner looking at me directly, and then he looked at Victor. Anger and fear, both emotions crossed across his face before he masked them by tipping his hat lower to cover his eyes.

Ralf:

I stood in the corner of the auditorium and kept watch over Angel. While she was talking to Patricia, I heard her decide not to go initially until the guy intervened. While she walked out, she looked straight at me and I could see her fear and regret at going.  Knowing well, it is going to turn into a long night I followed three of them at a distance. Straight from the city hall they went to Maria’s Diner down the street.  Moving towards a dark alley I shrugged of my shirt and opened my wings. Keeping my shield up to keep myself invisible and my presence unknown to all, I kept an eye on Angel and especially on the black-one who introduced himself as Victor.

Victor:

The time was fast approaching for me to take care of the girl but the blonde was in between. She had served her purpose and needed to be discarded soon. As I watched both girls ordered dinner and suggested me to do so. As the dinner was done I compelled the blonde to convince the girl Solange to go back to blonde’s house where she will meet her destiny with devil.

Solange:

As we ordered our dinner, I noticed Victor staring at me and a ghost of smile spread across his face. The smile was not pleasant but sent a cold shiver across me and the hairs at my nape stood in attention with sense of brood forming. Knowing he was bad news, I decided to save Patricia and myself. There was something very evil about him and my internal alarm was going off crazy.

Telling Victor I and Patricia needed to use washroom I dragged her away from him. Once out of his sight, I took the back door and ran straight to the cab standing in the corner. Patricia was dazed and tried to return back to the diner. Holding her shoulders firmly and looking into her eyes and praying she would understand I said “Listen to me Patricia; it’s very important that we get away from here. It is not safe.” Patricia was still looking at diner and then slowly her eyes cleared and then saw the fear in my face and got into the car immediately.

Ralf:

Sitting on top the building opposite the diner, I noticed two girls coming out of the side door of the diner and hurrying towards the cab at the end of the road. Gliding towards the diner roof, I saw Angel, telling Patricia of the imminent danger. I was so proud of my Angel for recognizing the danger looming over their heads and also for trying to save Patricia along with herself.

Now that girls were safe, I drew my wings back in and transformed to my human appearance and walked into the diner and looked for the black-one. He was sitting at the table looking anxious. Walking up to the table I called his name to bring his attention to me. He looked up and immediately recognized me.

“Hello black-one. Don’t you think you are in a wrong place?” I said teeth clenched.

Without caring for the presence of humans he transformed and took the fight stance. Within few second all the patrons’ in the restaurant were frozen in their place in same position they were before.

“Hello Bune, We meet again.”

As I turned to see who had addressed, black-one attacked and before I could respond he was tackled by a man, hitting him square on the jaw and holding him down by his throat in fixed grip and said grinning “I see you have lost your touch Ralf.”

“Michael is that really you?” I was astonished to see him after so many decades. We all had thought he was lost to us.

“Yes brother, it is me.” Tying the black-one with ropes Michael stood up and we both shook hands in millennium old traditional, holding each other’s elbows and slapping each other’s shoulder with the other hand.

“It’s been very long brother. We looked for you everywhere?” I said looking at him and trying to believe he was actually in front of me.

“I didn’t wish to be found Ralf. It was very important. You will learn the reason in time.” Michael said and I could see sadness etched around his eyes.

“Ok. What do we do with him now?”

“Well, let’s get him up to your place and decide what to do next.” Agreeing with Michael we picked up the black-one and walked out the diner and Michael cast a spell to unfreeze all those present in the diner. Once out, we cast a shield around ourselves and flew to my house immediately.

Once we reached the house, I felt Solange’s presence and immediately went towards the door, leaving Michael and black-one in the garage. I saw her sitting on the steps trying to control Patricia, who was completely unaware of herself and her surroundings. Only thing she kept repeating was she needed to take Angel to Victor to save the world. Holding Patricia I pressed slightly on the side of her temples and cast her to sleep. Picking her up, I walked into the house towards the guest room and placed Patricia on bed. Angel helped to cover blanket over her and said “I am sorry to bother you Ralf. I didn’t know where else to go. Aunt Gretchen would have been hysterical and I didn’t know how to explain to Mrs. Martha.”

“Angel you did right by coming here. Don’t worry about Patricia, she will be fine.” Assuring her everything will be fine I walked out the room with Angel right behind me. Once we were out the room, she asked “Ralf how did you manage to quite Patricia?”

“It’s a trick I learned from my brother. She will sleep for at least next 8 hours.” I said not wanting to tell her that I had cast a spell on Patricia to calm her down. If I did Angel would think I am crazy and go away.

“Angel, why don’t go up and rest. The room is still unused after you left.”

“Ralf, I can take the couch.”

“No, you don’t have to. I have some work and won’t be in for long time, so just lock the door behind you and rest.”

“Thank you Ralf. You are a life savior”, Angel said with so much appreciation in her eyes and I wished I didn’t have to go away from her.

Making sure Angel and Patricia were safe and settled, I walked towards the garage to find it empty and then I felt Michael’s presence telling me he is waiting in the barn away from the house for the safety of girls. Listening to Michael I immediately flew to the barn to get the answers from the black-one. Why was my Angel being targeted?

As I entered the barn, I see Michael had tied both the hands of the black-one and had hung him from ceiling. He had also tied his wings by a binding spell. “Did he tell anything yet Michael?”

“Not yet, I know he has been looking for Angel for two decades now, but what I want to know is why and who is behind all these attacks?” The rage in Michael’s eyes was very clearly evident to me and fearing he might kill the black-one I suggested Michael to step back for few minutes so that I could talk to Bune.

Standing to my full height I walked up to the black-one and slowly whispered in calm voice “Bune, I know not who you are or who you work for and neither do I care, all I care is you tried to touch what was mine and for that you will suffer gravely. But before I give my treatment to you, my friend needs to know who is your master and if I don’t get the answer in next 10 seconds, then I will make every second of your life a living hell, worse than life a black-one living in hell would have experienced.”

For first five seconds Bune didn’t say anything and kept looking at Michael. I inched further closer to Bune and said “Your five seconds are over; in next five if I don’t get my answers then I will personally pluck every feather of your dark wings and dip them in acid.”

Still Bune kept silent, and then knowing I needed to punish him to open his mouth, I slowly transformed to my original archangel form and spread wings across the barn. Following my example, Michael too transformed into his gray and brown colored wings. As I lowered by hands to hold his wings, Bune broke and started saying “I don’t know who the master is, Luther asked me to find the girl. He told me where she lived and studied in the  city. He wanted to destroy her before she came to know her parentage and became aware of her legacy.”

“What legacy is he talking about Ralf and what are you?” Solange said from the open barn door. As I turned to face her, she just started at me for few seconds before fainting cold.