Phoenix’s Refrain by Ella Summers

7

Angel Lessons

The new classroom had been renovated for the purpose of educating Legion initiates. Purgatory would start getting them soon, once all of our facilities were ready. And assuming there were still people who wanted to join the Legion.

After a recent string of rather spectacular disasters on Earth, it was safe to say the people’s confidence in the Legion—and in the gods themselves—had been shaken. What stood out most in everyone’s mind seemed to be the night the goddess Meda had stood on a rooftop in Purgatory and publicly declared that she was going to punish the Earth by purging it of most of its people.

Never mind that Meda had been controlled by one of the Guardians’ magic collars. People didn’t know that. And those who did know it were right now asking themselves how powerful the gods really were if they could be controlled like that. The truth was no one was truly all-powerful, much as the gods and demons hated to hear it.

I weaved through the rows of plain desks. The room’s decor was sparse, utilitarian. The furnishings consisted of a perfect grid of twenty-five desks, all facing a whiteboard on the wall, and a metal trashcan by the door. That was all. It reminded me of my old high school’s unimaginative, uninspired classrooms.

I was going to have a chat with the folks handling our renovation. Classrooms needed a little more spunk, a little more fun, to keep people’s spirits up. And keeping people’s spirits up would make them work harder, which would increase their chances of surviving the Nectar.

That’s how I preferred things. I wanted to help my initiates survive. Unlike most angels, I didn’t see the Nectar as a way to weed out the weak. No, that was more like Colonel Fireswift’s philosophy.

Speaking of Colonel Fireswift, he was watching me right now like I was a target he had in his sights.

“Take a seat, Colonel Pandora,” Colonel Fireswift ordered me.

“You haven’t been promoted yet, Colonel,” I told him. “You aren’t a general, an archangel. Which makes us the same rank. So you can’t order me around like I’m one of your subordinates.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” he replied smoothly. “You don’t understand your situation perfectly. You don’t understand the subtlety of the Legion’s hierarchy, or of the angels themselves. Not that I’m surprised. You never were very good at subtlety.”

I folded my arms across my chest. “Do you have a point?”

“The point is, Colonel, that I can give you orders because I am in charge of your current training. Which makes you very much my lessor.”

Oh, he liked that. He liked it very much. I could see it in the sinister sparkle in his eyes.

A comeback was burning on my lips, but I had promised Nero that I’d behave. So I kept my mouth shut and sat down.

“Good,” Colonel Fireswift said, but his sharp tone indicated he considered me anything other than good.

He set a tall stack of books on my desk. The tower cast a foreboding shadow over me.

I looked away from them. “So, Colonel, how have you been?”

His eyes narrowed to slits. “What are you doing?”

“Making smalltalk,” I replied pleasantly.

“Then let this be your first lesson in angel etiquette: we don’t make smalltalk.”

“Why not?”

“Because angels do not talk about nothing. We speak only if we have something important to say.”

“Ok, let’s say you encounter another angel and you don’t have anything to say to them.” I did my best to look confused. “So you say nothing at all?”

“If you can’t think of anything to say, there are books full of appropriate angel greetings. I will provide them to you.”

“Oh, I don’t need any books to fill awkward silences, Colonel,” I said with an easy smile. “I always have something to say.”

“I have noticed.” He scowled at me. “In fact, it seems quite impossible to shut you up.”

“You enjoyed our time together in the gods’ trials.” I allowed a smirk to shine through. “Admit it.”

Colonel Fireswift rolled back his shoulders in indignation. “I will do no such thing.”

“Come on. You know you want to.”

His mouth tightened. “Why do you enjoy provoking me so much?”

I shrugged. “I guess because you react so well.”

“You see, this is the problem with you, Leda Pandora. This is why the First Angel has sent you to me.”

“Because Nyx thinks you need a little humor in your life?” I said with a smile.

His mouth fell open in outrage. “You wouldn’t risk such insubordination if you knew I could actually punish you. But Nyx was clear. No beatings. No poisoning you. And no setting you on fire, no matter how much you might tempt me to do it.”

Those sounded like direct quotes from the First Angel.

“So you’re not allowed to maim me. How awful for you,” I said, sarcastic.

“Yes. Yes, it is,” Colonel Fireswift said, perfectly serious. “But I shall endeavor to make do the best I can within these inefficient perimeters. And you shall endeavor not to shoot off your mouth.” He set down another book on my desk.

I read the title. “Angels in Conversation: Volume 1?”

“Yes. I prefer the conversations in volume four, personally. They are far subtler. But when one is training to be a proper angel, one must start at the beginning.”

I opened the book at random and quickly skimmed a page. “Colonel, you do realize that these greetings are nothing else than smalltalk, right?”

“No,” he snapped. “They are conversation starters.”

“They are things to say when there’s nothing to say. In other words, smalltalk. Talking about nothing.”

“You are missing the point.”

I looked up from the book—and into his sour face. “Then enlighten me.” I smiled.

“The phrases in this book are deeper than they appear. They are rife with hidden meaning.”

“Innuendo?”

“I prefer the word allusion.”

“How very literary of you,” I said. “But just so we’re clear, these books will teach me to lace perfectly civilized remarks with nuanced threats, boasts, and otherwise subtly establish my dominance?”

He bristled at my statement. “To put it crudely, yes.”

“Cool.”

“If you devote yourself to mastery and reflection, rather than shooting off the first thought that flashes through your head,” he amended.

“I can do that.”

“Can you?” Colonel Fireswift snatched the book out of my hands. “We shall see. We’ll now have a practice conversation and find out. You will begin.”

I stood up. “Ok.”

I returned to the door, then turned around. I walked back to him, as though I’d just come into the room.

I nodded crisply in greeting, as I’d seen Nero do. “Colonel Fireswift.”

His nod was even crisper, so crisp I could have bounced bullets off of it. Not that I was tempted to try. No, that would have been too much fun.

“Colonel Pandora,” he said.

Your shoelaces are coming undone.

No, I couldn’t say that. That’s why straight-laced angels like Colonel Fireswift didn’t like me. Because I just said the first thing that popped into my head.

I had to pick something stately. Like work. Angels liked to talk about work.

“Nyx says you are to be promoted to general,” I said.

“Yes,” he replied, standing tall.

“But it hasn’t happened yet.”

A subtle dig that he was not currently a higher rank than I was.

Or maybe not so subtle. Colonel Fireswift gave me a sharp look.

“The world has been unsettled,” he said. “There hasn’t been time for my Archangel Trials.”

The Archangel Trials. That reminded me of something that I’d been meaning to say—and made me totally forget what I was supposed to be doing.

“I can’t believe the gods still want to go through with the Trials. After all that has happened, they—”

“Silence,” Colonel Fireswift cut me off. “You will speak no further about the Trials.”

“But I was there with Nero during his. You have to know—”

“I don’t have to know anything,” he said brusquely. “Speaking of the Trials is forbidden. You are going to get me into trouble.” He looked up, almost nervously, as though the gods were listening to us this very moment.

“I’m just trying to help,” I told him, and I actually meant it.

But he threw my concern right back in my face. “I don’t need your help.”

“Actually, Colonel, you really do,” I said. “And you really want to listen to what I have to say.”

“No, I do not.”

Gods it was like shouting at one of the Legion’s vending machines after it had eaten my money, except I at least sometimes got what I wanted out of those vending machines, if I only kicked them hard enough. This conversation, on the other hand, was going nowhere.

“It’s important,” I told Colonel Fireswift.

“Silence,” he hissed with cold menace.

Damn him, he was so stubborn. And that stubbornness would be the death of the person he loved most in this world: his wife. That’s what the Archangel Trials were all about. Sacrifice. If you wanted to be an archangel, the gods demanded you make this sacrifice. For Nero, that had meant sacrificing me, but we’d managed to wangle our way out of that no-win situation. The gods hadn’t been happy about it, however, and the next prospective archangel wouldn’t be so lucky.

But Colonel Fireswift didn’t know about that, and he outright refused to let me warn him that the Trials would cost his wife her life. And that wouldn’t just hurt Colonel Fireswift; it would hurt his son Jace too. Jace, my friend. I didn’t want him to lose his mother.

And, also, much as I didn’t like Colonel Fireswift, I was worried the Trials would hurt him too. No one deserved to feel such pain. I’d seen his face when he’d lost his daughter. Though he tried hard to hide it, he actually did have feelings.

The Legion really didn’t want to do this to Colonel Fireswift either, not if they’d just stop and think about it. An angel in pain did not make a very effective soldier. And right now, we needed all the angels we had in order to fight the Guardians. Plus, I still thought it might come down to fighting the gods and demons too. We angels had to be united and strong.

United and strong. The thought renewed my motivation to truly understand angels. I had to win over the other angels. After all, we were all in this together. I just had to convince all of the other angels of that. It was the only way we’d survive what was coming, the only way we could make the Earth safe. And the only way I could keep my daughter safe.

“You started the conversation—ok, I won’t say ‘well’, but it was adequate,” Colonel Fireswift said. “But then you forgot what you were supposed to be doing.”

“I know.” I exhaled. “And I’ll do better next time.”

“Let’s find out then.” His face was carefully, consciously blank. “Again, from the beginning.”

* * *

Colonel Fireswiftand I played through angel conversations the whole morning. Then, in the afternoon, we moved on to the angels’ political structure. Colonel Fireswift quizzed me. He had me list all the other angels and their territories.

“Nyx, the First Angel of the Legion with headquarters in Los Angeles. General Nero Windstriker, the Second Angel—”

“That is not Windstriker’s official title,” Colonel Fireswift scolded me.

Oh, right. That was just my nickname for Nero.

“General Nero Windstriker, Chief Marshal and Executive Officer of the Legion of Angels.”

I still thought my title for him was way better.

“Colonel Leila Starborn, the Fire Dragon and Angel of Storm Castle; her territory is the Elemental Expanse with its headquarters at Storm Castle. Colonel Xerxes Fireswift, Master Interrogator, Angel of the Central Territory of North America with its headquarters in Chicago. Lieutenant Colonel Jace Angelblood, Angel of the South Territory of North America with its headquarters in New Orleans. Colonel Harker Sunstorm, Angel of the East Coast of North America with its headquarters in New York City.”

“The European territories next,” Colonel Fireswift prompted me.

“General Rhydian Silverstar, Angel of North Europe with headquarters in Berlin,” I said. “Colonel Dragonblood…” Oh, crap. What was Dragonblood’s first name? “Colonel Vanir Dragonblood.” I’d just remembered it from my Crystal Falls training invitation. Not that Colonel Dragonblood had actually made it to that training. “Angel of South Europe with its headquarters in Florence.”

“Now the Australian territories,” Colonel Fireswift said.

He was jumping all over the map. He probably thought that would confuse me into making a mistake.

“General Kiros Spellsmiter, Head of the Vanguard and Angel of West Australia with its headquarters in…” Shit, if only I’d ever been to Australia. “…Perth,” I guessed. It was the only city in western Australia that I could remember. Shit, I knew I should have paid better attention in geography class back in high school.

Colonel Fireswift didn’t correct me, so I must have guessed right.

“Colonel Desiree Silvertongue, Angel of East Australia with its headquarters in Sydney,” I said, finishing up the continent.

Colonel Fireswift frowned.

“My answers were correct,” I told him.

“Yes.” His frown deepened. “They were.”

“Shall I move on to another continent? I hear Antarctica is particularly chilly this time of year.” I folded my hands together on my desk and smiled up at him.

“There is no Angel of Antarctica,” he said humorlessly.

“It was a joke.”

He just stared at me like I’d grown a second head.

“Never mind,” I sighed. “I can tell you about the angels of South America. There’s Lieutenant Colonel Oberon Stormbearer, Angel of Patagonia with its headquarters at Angel’s Steppe.”

Angel’s Steppe was a new city, created after the monsters had come to Earth.

“And then Colonel Ariadne Ravenfall, Angel of Amazonia with its headquarters in São Paulo.”

“Pandora—”

“And Colonel Brutus Heavensworn, Angel of the Andes with its headquarters in—”

“Oh, do shut up and stop showing off!” Colonel Fireswift snapped grumpily.

“You do not wish for me to continue with the exercise?” I asked serenely.

“No, it is clearly too easy. Any human could recite the Earth’s angels.”

Maybe that was true of the humans who subscribed to angel fan magazines or happened to be avid players of the Legion card game, but most humans didn’t spend their time memorizing the Earth’s angels and their territories. They were too busy struggling just to get by. Colonel Fireswift was such a sourpuss. He was just annoyed that I’d gotten his questions right, and now he didn’t have an excuse to punish me.

“Anyone can memorize a few names and titles,” Colonel Fireswift continued. “But do you truly understand what those names and titles mean? Do you know how an angel is named?”

“Of course. When a Legion soldier becomes an angel, the First Angel bestows an angelic name on him or her. Windstriker. Fireswift. Sunstorm.”

“Yes, you have already listed angel names, but you have not answered the question. How does the First Angel decide on a name to give the new angel?”

“Uh…” I thought about it—and honestly had no clue. “I guess she picks something that sounds impressive and has something to do with the angel’s powers or something important that they’ve done.”

“Obviously,” he replied impatiently. “But how are angel names constructed?”

“With great care and consideration?” I smiled.

He shook his head like talking to me hurt. “An angel name is a construction of two elements, typically references to martial or magical prowess, or sometimes acts worthy of holy recognition. In my case, ‘fire’ and ‘swift’. For General Windstriker, ‘wind’ and ‘striker’. And for Colonel Sunstorm, ’sun’ and ‘storm’.”

“So you’re saying that an angel name is always a combination of two words?”

“Yes.”

“What about Pandora?” I pointed out.

An agitated crinkle formed between his eyes. “As usual, you’re the exception, the one who broke the rules.” He looked at me like it was all my fault.

“Nyx chose my angel name,” I reminded him.

“She took it from Windstriker’s silly nickname for you. I have never understood why the First Angel picked him to be her favorite.”

“Well, Nero does kick ass pretty effectively,” I said helpfully.

Colonel Fireswift dropped another stack of books onto my desk. “To gain a deeper understanding of angel history, here is some light reading.”

I gaped at the tower of books. “Light reading?”

“Merely an overview. These books are a quick study in angel genealogy.”

“So, angel family trees and stuff?”

I took the book off the top of the stack and started flipping through it. To my chagrin, there was more text than there were pictures. If all the books were like this one, I’d still be working through the stack when I went into labor—about eight months from now.

“Yes,” he said. “Now I suggest you get started. There will be no need to talk. In fact, I insist that you keep your mouth shut.”

And with that said, Colonel Fireswift sat down at the instructor’s desk and flipped open his computer. As I started reading through the first book, I heard him muttering complaints that Nyx had forbade him from setting me on fire.

* * *

While lookingover the Legion’s angel genealogy charts, I noticed something odd. Really odd.

“Hey, Colonel, I found something.”

“You have managed to remain silent for only fifty-six minutes.” His expression when he looked at me was so searing, it nearly burnt my eyebrows off. “I expected better, even from you.”

“Never mind that now. This is important,” I said breezily. “Twenty-four years ago, there were a lot of angels’ offspring born. Like Jace.” I pointed to his family tree.

“I know when my son was born,” he said coolly.

“And all those Legion brats in my initiation group two years ago. There were eight of them, including Jace,” I remembered. “All of those Legion brats were born within a month of each other. Now, that’s just not normal. Angels are notoriously infertile, but then, suddenly, eight of them all had a kid at roughly the same time?” I looked at him. “How many Legion brats are in a typical initiation group? One?”

“If there are even that many. Most Legion initiation groups have no angel offspring in them,” Colonel Fireswift said.

“But then, two years ago, there were eight at once. You have to admit that’s weird.”

For a moment, he looked like he was considering my statement, but then he brushed it aside. “It was a fluke of magic, a one time thing.”

“I was born during that fluke,” I pointed out. “And so was Jace.”

“Irrelevant.”

“Irrelevant?” I picked up the book and showed him his own family tree. “There has to be something to this.”

“Return to reading. Silently,” he added, his words frosty.

“Don’t you ever question things?” I demanded. “Don’t you ever try to figure out why things are the way they are?”

“That there is your problem,” he told me. “Questioning things.” He sneered. “Sticking your nose in things that aren’t your concern. Digging around in other people’s business.”

Someone was still sour that I’d tried to do him a gigantic favor by telling him about the Archangel Trials.

“It’s exactly that sort of wayward behavior, Leda Pandora, that landed you in this classroom to begin with. That is the reason Nyx insisted you take remedial angel studies.”

“On the other hand, it was because of my meddling and digging that I moved up the Legion’s ranks so fast and became an angel,” I retorted. “So there is merit in my methods.”

“There is no merit in your…madness.” He bit out the last word. “You are the child of two deities. You would have become an angel nonetheless, no matter how stupidly you acted. Because it’s in your magic. In your blood.” He shoved the book back at me. “But now that you’re here, now that you’re an angel, it’s your duty to learn how to behave in a manner befitting of your station. And it’s my heavy burden to ensure that you do.”

With that said, he reached behind his desk. For a moment, I thought he might be reaching for a weapon, but instead he pulled out a thick bundle of papers.

“What is that?” I asked.

“A test to see how well you’ve been paying attention today,” he said with savage delight.

Awesome.

“Sit down.”

I returned to my desk and sat down. Colonel Fireswift set the test booklet on the desktop. It was as thick as a dictionary.

“You may begin.”

Grumbling under my breath, I set out to answer the first question, a word problem. It was a complex, convoluted situation of angel dominance that I had to suss out. I quickly skimmed through the test. The next five pages were dedicated to several almost-identical questions. I had to determine the pecking order of angels in (slightly) varying scenarios. Oh, joy.

Some time later, a quick glance at the clock—the only wall ornament in the entire room—told me that I’d been working through the test for over an hour, and I’d hardly made any progress. It didn’t seem to end. The booklet was novel-length. I might very well be sitting here all night.

It seemed Colonel Fireswift had found a way to punish me that hurt more than being set on fire.