Authors: Christine Hughes
A shiver ran through me. The shock of how callously my grandfather had been murdered gave me goose bumps and I had to swallow my nausea.
“Considering Zachary was a Dark Angel, Sebastian was surprised to find light envelope Zachary’s body upon his death. Your grandfather had made the leap to the other side without Sebastian knowing. This knowledge angered Sebastian even further and he vowed then and there that he would destroy James and his family. And your dad vowed that he would never again follow darkness and would do whatever was in his power to hide the box from Sebastian and his followers. James spent his life to this pursuit, dodging Sebastian and the others. When he met your mother, he finally experienced the love the Light speaks of and that the Darkness sets out to destroy. He knew, one day, the angel that would restore balance to the fallen angels would return and save us all.”
It took a few minutes of breathless shock before I could process all of what Ethan had said. It sounded like a story straight out of some “repent or else” bible study class. I suddenly felt tainted by the knowledge that my family had taken part in the evil of the Exiled, yet proud that they were able to stand up to Sebastian. Could I be that strong? Could I choose right over wrong so easily? Unsure of the answer, I focused on the one thing Ethan said that I did understand.
My mother.
“I never met my mother. My father hardly spoke of her though I know he carried pictures of her in his wallet. There was a chest in the attic that contained some of her things.
Clothes, letters, books and some of her jewelry.
He wanted everything to stay locked away in the chest. Everything but the one thing he gave me when I turned 16. He told me I would know when to...As a matter of fact...”
I tore out of the kitchen, leaving the boys to gape after me. I took the stairs two at a time up to my room, threw open my closet doors and began to empty hangers.
Not there. Where
? I searched my bag frantically as I tried to find it. Where was it? Cursing myself for my lack of organizational skills, I moved to the top shelf. I wished I had a flashlight. Tumbling stacks of sweaters to the ground, I finally found it. Hidden behind the stack of clothes was a velvet pouch. I peeked inside to make sure what I was looking for was still there and ran back down the steps to the kitchen.
Looking confused, Lucas asked, “What was that all about?”
Feeling a little sentimental but knowing it may have meaning I thrust the bag at him. “My father gave me this.
On my sixteenth birthday.
He said it was my mother’s. He would never let me wear it, though. He told me I wasn’t ready but insisted I’d know when I was.
Whatever that means.”
Gently, Lucas pulled on the golden strings of the emerald pouch to open it. He spilled the bag, upending the contents into his palm and his eyes widened. He held up a thin, heart shaped pendant made of pure white opal attached to a dainty silver chain. Ethan walked over to Lucas and they both stared at the pendant and then at me, with jaws dropped.
“Pretty, isn’t it? A little dull, like it needs to be shined or cleaned. I’ve never put it on. I was hoping my father would let me know when I could wear it. I’ve been hiding it in my closet since he gave it to me, though every now and then I would secretly take it out and admire it. I never dared wear it. For some reason, I thought my father would know if I did. I like the way it looks, like it will lay nicely against my skin.
Almost as if it’s part of me.”
Ethan took the necklace and held it to the light. “Sam, do you know what this is?”
“Uh, a necklace?”
As I said it, I knew that wasn’t the answer they were looking for.
“It’s the Heart of Hope,” Ethan said. “The Heart of Hope is cut from a single white opal. This is the key to defeating the Exiled.”
“I thought the box was the key?”
“It is. The two need to be used together. We have, at least, half of what we need.”
I held up my hand. “Wait, I don’t understand.”
Lucas explained. “As long as the two, the box and the pendant, are separated, both light and dark, hope and despair, continue to thrive. If the two are destroyed, then hope is lost. If, however, the pendant is placed inside the box, much like hope was placed inside
Pandora ’s
Box, then despair and all its baggage are extinguished.”
“Then why didn’t my
father
take my
mother’s
pendant and put it in the box? He had both anyway, didn’t he? Sounds like a simple solution to me.” I mentally gave myself a pat on the back. I was just learning about all of this yet I came up with a solution my father hadn’t thought of.
“Not that simple. The question is
,
can hope thrive without despair? Will people need to look for hope if there is nothing to cause them pain? Conversely, can despair live on without hope or will humanity implode on itself?”
I shook my head in confusion. We were talking in circles. I swore a thousand marbles were banging around in my head, each with a different question and they were multiplying like rabbits. I looked to Ethan for some sort of simple, black and white explanation but he was still staring at the pendant.
I waved my hand in his face.
“Earth to Ethan.”
He whispered, “So it’s true.”
“What’s true?”
Great, another question.
“This is an extremely important piece of jewelry, Samantha,” he said. “There’s only one Heart of Hope. It can only be passed on to the true descendants of the Angel of Hope. The reason it looks so dull and plain, is that the Heart loses its shine if its owner dies. Your mother died and you’ve yet to take on full ownership. I’m sure if you try it on, the Heart will begin to shine. It becomes a beacon for the owner. And it heightens the gifts of the wearer. If worn by someone of Light, it will brighten in the presence of poison or darkness. Conversely, if worn by those of Darkness, it will extinguish any hope or faith around it, even that of the one who wears it.”
“Wait a minute. If it’s passed down from my mother to me, from descendant to descendant of the Angel of Hope as you said, then how can it ever be worn by an Exiled?”
Lucas said somberly, “Remaining on the side of the Faithful is a choice, Sam. Remember how we told you that we are losing numbers because many of our kind are jumping ship to the Exiled? It’s the same principal here. You must choose the side on which you will fight. And the fact that half of your lineage, your father, began in the dark makes your choice that much more difficult.”
“You mean because my dad was born into darkness? Why will it be harder for me? I’m not an Exiled, remember? I already know which side I’m on.”
Ethan looked at me with a twinge of sadness in his eyes. “Following the Exiled may not be a conscious choice for you, Sam. There may be too much darkness in you to fight. But if you make the choice to remain Faithful, you’ve a better chance of fighting off whatever is inside you.”
Silent and a bit dumbfounded, I took the pendant from Ethan and turned it over a few times in my hands before I placed it back in the emerald pouch. When would I know it was time to put it on and what would l do once it was around my neck?
I cast my eyes at a random point on the floor and took a deep breath. “How could I not make that choice? Look at what they did to my family. Why would I ever choose the Exiled?”
Lucas, quiet for a minute, looked at me intently. “Why does anyone, Sam?”
CHAPTER 7
The next morning at breakfast, the boys decided we needed to leave. They felt the Exiled were getting too close to me. And considering I had the necklace, Ethan thought they would be more apt to look for me at home. They weren’t sure if Sebastian would know if and when I took ownership of the Heart.
After hours spent around the kitchen table, debating where we should go, Lucas determined we should relocate to my father’s cabin. “It’s perfect,” he said. “We can go there, and hide from the Exiled while we figure out our next move. Eventually we’ll need to find the others, but for now, the cabin is a perfect place to begin her training.”
I looked up from the sandwich I was making.
“Training?
What training?” Wasn’t it bad enough they were taking me from my home?
Lucas looked away as Ethan took my hand. “When they decide to come for you, and they will, you need to be ready to fight them.”
“The Exiled will come after me.” I knew it was true but it didn’t make it any less surreal and I had to keep saying it to remind myself it all wasn’t just another nightmare.
“Yes. And Sebastian will take this personally.” Ethan slipped the butter knife from my hand and began spreading mayo on two more slices of bread. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s the one that comes after you,” he said, aiming the knife at me.
“Why is he so bad? I mean, is there a reason he’s the leader of the Exiled? What made him choose that path?”
Lucas grimaced. “Sebastian never had compassion for humans. He embodies everything darkness thrives upon and in return he thrives on everything darkness stands for.” He took a bite of the sandwich I’d placed in front of him. “He was angry when God created humans. In his mind, angels should control everything including the decisions people made. Then when God gave humans free will, Sebastian went crazy. He questioned God and warned Him that humans shouldn’t have control over their own destinies. When God didn’t budge, Sebastian did everything he could to undermine God’s decision.”
“Like Lucifer and the apple?”
“Yes, exactly.
Lucifer wasn’t working alone, but Sebastian made him the fall guy, so to speak. Over the centuries that followed, Sebastian killed and tortured humans just because he could. And he delighted in it. He wanted all to know that angels were the superior beings. What he failed to realize was that it wasn’t our place to interfere.
“Soon he had an army of angels following him and before
long,
God cast them out of heaven. Many realized they were wrong to question God’s authority but by then it was too late. So, they banded together to form the Faithful. They, we, work to atone for the sins of those who fell before us. The others, the Exiled, have taken up with Sebastian’s original mission, to do whatever is necessary to regain control of what isn’t rightfully theirs to begin with.”
“Humanity.
Free will.”
“Right.”
“And they need the box and the Heart to do that?”
“Yes. Destroying them both will erase any possibility of hope and thus free will. Putting them together will erase any possibility of despair and thus end the Exiled’s reign.”
“I know I asked this before, but why didn’t my dad and mom do just that? They had both. Why didn’t they just end it when they had the chance?”
Ethan spoke first. “Because your father knew, as many of us know, one cannot live without the other. There needs to be a balance, if you will. If everything is perfect and there is no sadness, no disappointment, what will be left for anyone to hope for? Free will would be gone as there would no longer be a need to make choices, and God’s decree would be broken. Unfortunately, there are still some Faithful who want to erase the Exiled, regardless of the consequences. They don’t understand the balance that is needed and—”
“Both ideas have merit, Ethan,” Lucas pointed out, interrupting him.
“We’ve been through this, Lucas. We’ve been taught about balance. We’ve been shown how well everything thrives as long as there is balance. Now that James is gone, another must rise up and take hold of it and not allow the scales to tip in either direction.”
My heart sank. “Who’s going to do that?”
Ethan squeezed my hand. “If we’re right about everything we’ve learned so far, then you, Sam. You’re going to be the one to do that.”
***
The following morning, after packing the jeep, we drove out to my father’s cabin. It’d been years since I’d been there. And I was going back there, not for fun and relaxation as I once had with my father, but for training and isolation.
Everyday I would train. I would focus on everything they told me. I would do all I could to prepare myself for the one thing I wanted. To face the man...angel...person, whatever, who killed my father.
The one who wanted to kill me.
I clung to Ethan and Lucas as if my life depended on it. And I was certain that it did.
CHAPTER 8
September, the Cabin
:
It had been six months since my dad was killed. Even now, I could recall that morning in vivid detail, as well as my dream. Strange, that even six months later that dream was still fresh in my mind. From the intricately carved wooden box and floating script that said
Hope
, to the look on Mac’s face as he knelt in front of me. Even now, it barely seemed real. Some mornings I almost expected to wake up in my own house and walk downstairs to see my dad making pancakes or drinking coffee while perusing the newspaper.
I wouldn’t have made it through the last six months if it weren’t for Ethan and Lucas. With Lucas the same age as me and Ethan a year older, I had always felt like I had two brothers instead of being an only child. Their father had died five years ago. Like my father, his job frequently took him out of the country so Lucas and Ethan would crash in the extra bedroom or on the living room floor at my house whenever he was gone. I could remember how distraught they were when they learned about the plane crash that had killed him. They huddled in the den with my dad and closed the doors. It was the first time I ever felt left out. It was only recently that I’d been told he was a victim of an
Exiled
attack.
For days afterward, Lucas looked wiped out as strain and exhaustion took over his body. He was tired and sad all the time. Ethan was the quicker of the two to recover. He seemed to understand that, though his father was dead, he would always be near.
Because our fathers had been best friends since childhood, it was only natural that they moved in with us after that. And ever since, we had become closer than I thought possible. It was like we could read each other’s thoughts. I swore there were times we didn’t even need to speak. We just knew. We learned to lean on each other.