The Rise of the Fallen (The Angelic Wars Book 2) (14 page)

“
Judge, how do we
discover the identity of the informant?” Tony asked. “Or
informants.”

Tony, their medic, had
been quiet up to this point and his slow, thoughtful way of speaking
seemed to calm the room down. Everyone looked at each other as if
waiting for an idea to emerge on how to flush out the spy. But no one
appeared to have any.

Ramona, the last staff
member to remain silent, finally raised her hand as if she was
waiting for a teacher to notice her in school. Judge Hawkes smiled
and gestured for her to speak.

“
Your honor, I have
a thought. I know how good Ghost is at this eavesdropping thing.”
She hesitated and the judge waved her on. “Well, what if we let
the information leak out to the staff that Natalie and some of us,
perhaps Beatrice and I, want to go into London to do some shopping?
Looking at dresses maybe. Make it sound like a girl's day out thing.”

Natalie rolled her eyes at
that and Beatrice grinned at her reaction.

“
Ghost can remain
nearby and monitor the castle. If someone here is leaking
information, I'm sure they'd be eager to pass that news on to Scythe
and perhaps he can determine who the spy is that way.”

Judge Hawkes looked
impressed and George gave Ramona an approving grin.

“
An excellent
thought, Ramona. Thank you.” The judge sat thinking for a
minute. Chris leaned over to Natalie with a smile.

“
Not into
girlie-girlie things, Nat?” he teased.

She snorted with disgust,
but there was a smile behind her eyes.

“
Me? Oh please. The
last time I wore makeup was years ago, for some sort of graduation
ceremony. And a dress? Ha!”

Chris chuckled and then
looked back up the table as the judge cleared his throat.

“
I think that
Ramona's plan has merit. We'll wait a few days, to put our enemies at
their ease, and to give Ghost a chance to relocate and set up his
equipment. Let's see. Today is Monday. We'll mention the shopping
trip on Thursday morning, telling everyone that the ladies will be
heading to London in the afternoon. That should instill a bit of
urgency in our spy: after all, it won't give his compatriots much
time to stage an attack. And then we'll sit back and wait for Ghost
to work his magic.”

There was some general
discussion but the consensus was that the plan was a good one. And
then Chris spoke up, pointing out the one problem with their plan.

“
Judge? What happens
if this spy doesn't take the bait?”

The group quieted down and
looked toward the judge, who acknowledged Chris' question with a
sober nod.

“
I've considered
that. Let me put it this way. If we can't flush out our mole with
Ramona's ruse, then we'll have to use a more direct approach. It will
have the unfortunate effect of letting our enemies know that we're on
to them, but we'll catch our spy.”

Chris waited anxiously for
the man to continue, and when he did, he looked directly at Natalie.

“
We'll ask Gloriel
to speak to the staff, one person at a time.”

Natalie lowered her head
and stared at her hands, but she was smiling. Chris shivered. He'd
never seen such an unpleasant smile of anticipation in his life.

* * *

Chris spent the next two
days trying to familiarize himself with the castle, and the staff
that ran it. But two days weren't nearly long enough to memorize all
of Valiant's twists and turns, its many hallways and galleries, its
endless sitting rooms and libraries. He got lost a lot.

He wandered through the
area of the castle that the public were allowed to explore and
actually followed several groups, listening to a staffer with the
amazing name of Collin McTeague Farnsworth, who was acting as a tour
guide, as he gave a history of the castle to bunches of fascinated
tourists. The man was quite short, with thin, reddish hair and a
bulbous nose.

Chris guessed that he was
at least as old as Judge Hawkes, but his twinkling blue eyes and
passionate way of speaking gave him the energy and sense of vigor of
a man half his age.

Chris learned that Valiant
had indeed been granted to the judge's family for courageous acts
that had aided the throne in a time of domestic strife; although to
hear Collin tell it, there had been very few times four hundred years
before when there hadn't been unrest in England. The judge's ancestor
had actually saved the king's life by fighting off a group of
assassins who had attacked the monarch on his way to some sort of
social gathering put on by a local lord. That lord was subsequently
hanged for conspiracy to kill the king and Lord Hawkes had been given
his estates, and had begun building Valiant.

Loving history as he did,
Chris listened to all of this intently and, after the third tour,
Collin had taken Chris aside and he'd spent an hour or so just
answering Chris' questions.

Like all the staff except,
apparently, Mr. Mahony, Collin seemed to have a deep respect for the
judge that bordered on reverence and Chris was finding it harder and
harder to believe that any of the staff members could be some sort of
plant for the Fallen. His suspicions that Mahony was the actual spy
were becoming more firmly entrenched than ever.

On Thursday morning, after
breakfast, Natalie and Chris met the other Angelics in a large, but
cozy, library. A massive fireplace took up almost a whole wall and
the floors were patterned with wooden tiles that gleamed darkly in
the sunlight that streamed through a large window. Oddly, Chris
smelled bubblegum when he walked in and realized that one of the
girls was chewing gum absently.

The four teens, two girls
and two guys, were all older than Chris; sixteen or seventeen, about
the same age as Natalie. Jamie had guided them in and introduced them
to each other.

“
Natalie and Chris,”
he said, “I'd like you to meet Anabelle, Alysa, Patrick and
Francis. Folks, Natalie and Chris.” There were exchanges of
nods and smiles and they all sat down on two overstuffed couches that
faced each other across a low coffee table.

Whether consciously
planned or not, the three young women sat on one couch and Chris
shared the second couch with the other two young men. Jamie excused
himself and left them to get better acquainted.

After a long moment of
awkward silence, Alysa, a tall slim blond girl with bright green eyes
and spiked hair, smiled at Chris and Natalie. She was the source of
the bubblegum smell.

“
Since no one seems
to be in a rush to say anything, why don't I start?” she asked
brightly and blew a bubble that popped with a quiet whoosh of air.
Anabelle, also tall and thin but with flowing brown hair and small
features, who was sitting beside her, laughed.

“
First to speak as
usual, Ally,” she chuckled. Alysa turned a crooked grin on her
friend and shrugged.

“
Someone has to.
Anyway, it's good to meet you both. We heard you flew in from Canada
a few days ago?”

“
Yes, we did,”
Natalie answered. She was smiling at Alysa and Chris knew her well
enough by now to see that she liked the other girl immediately. So
did he. There was something very open and friendly about her, and he
found himself relaxing slightly. He was always on his guard when
meeting new people.

“
Ah, that's
fantastic! I've always wanted to visit.” Alysa's eyes lit up.
“Is it true that there's always snow there? And everyone has to
wear parkas all year long? Do you have sled dogs? Can you ski?”

Chris couldn't help it; he
burst out laughing at both the questions and Alysa's obvious
fascination. She looked at him.

“
What did I say?”
she asked, looking bewildered. Her expression set Chris off again and
he just shook his head, unable to speak. Fortunately Natalie rescued
him.

“
Don't mind Chris,”
she said with a friendly smile. “It's just that some people
have some odd beliefs about Canada. I'm sure he's got a few mistaken
facts about Britain bouncing around inside that head of his as well.”

Alysa, who had looked a
bit offended by Chris' laughter, now smiled with understanding.

“
Oh, of course.
Well, we can clear up our mutual misconceptions later, I'm sure.”

“
Definitely,”
Chris chimed in. He hadn't meant to be rude and hastened to apologize
for laughing at Alysa. She waved the apology off airily.

“
Not to worry. Now,”
her expression became more somber and her chewing slowed down
considerably, “we've heard that Lord Hawkes' home in Canada,
the Hawkes Nest it's called, I believe? Yes. Well, we've heard that
it was attacked. Can you tell us anything about it?”

The wounds were still too
tender for Chris to answer her question, but Natalie began telling
the others what they knew about the attack. She held off mentioning
Jacob and Tyler, he noticed, and finished off by describing the
aftermath of the battle.

“
The Nest is
destroyed?” Francis asked in amazement. He was sitting next to
Chris and had been listening open-mouthed to Natalie's story. Taller
than Chris, with black hair almost as long as Chris' own, Francis
looked back and forth from Natalie to Chris in disbelief, his brown
eyes wide with shock.

“
We've heard stories
of the place,” Patrick, the other boy, added. Small, pale and
red-headed, with freckles dotted across his nose, Patrick looked
stunned. “I was hoping to go there one day.” He seemed
stricken. “Oh, this is bad. This is very bad.”

“
Patty, don't be so
negative. You always do that,” Alysa spoke up. He looked at her
in disbelief and she rolled her eyes. “I'm not saying that it's
not bad. My goodness, any time we lose people it's horrible. But the
Nest can be rebuilt, I assume, so who knows? Maybe you will get there
someday.”

“
Okay, that's beside
the point,” Anabelle cut in before Patrick could respond. He
glared at her, but stayed silent. “The point is that the Nest
was attacked, in force. And now we and the other safe-houses are in
lock-down.” At Chris' questioning look, she hurried to explain.
“Lock-down means no day trips to the city, no wandering the
grounds after dark and no mingling with the tourists without an
escort.”

Chris almost told her that
he had wandered freely among the tourists the day before without a
guard, but stopped when he realized that maybe Collin had filled that
role. He was suddenly suspicious that the man's interest in him and
the time he'd spent telling Chris about the castle's history had been
partly to keep him from wandering off alone. Chris hoped not, but he
had to admit that he had still enjoyed the discussion, so there was
really no harm done. Except maybe to his pride.

“
Any idea how long
this lock-down is going to last?” Natalie asked.

Anabelle could only shrug
and the group lapsed into silence broken only by the occasional pop
of Alysa's bubblegum.

“
Anyway, let's talk
about something else,” Alysa finally said brightly. “Why
don't you two introduce your angels?”

Chris stared at her. “Um,
what?” he asked.

“
You know, your
angels. Obviously that's why you're here, right? Come on, don't be
shy. I'll go first.”

Alysa stopped chewing her
gum and her face took on a vacant, unseeing expression that Chris
recognized from those times that Natalie spoke to Gloriel. The girl
reached into her mouth, took out the gum and rolled it into a small
wrapper that she then put into her pocket.

“
Disgusting habit,”
she said and Chris stared at her in fascination. The voice was the
same, but the echo that rang across the room told him that they were
now speaking with an angel.

“
Honestly, I have
told that girl time and time again not to chew gum when meeting
newcomers.” Alysa's expression was one of mixed tolerance and
irritation. “She never listens though. Ah well, it could be
worse.” She looked first at Chris and then at Natalie. “Welcome
to you both. I am Endariel, Alysa's other half. Her soul, if you
will.” She looked at the other three resident teens. “Come
now, let us be bold and reveal ourselves to our brother and sister.”

“
Yes, of course,”
Anabelle said with a small sigh. She closed her eyes and that slack,
disconnected look stole over her face. Chris looked at the two boys
beside him and saw that each of them was wearing the exact same
expression.

And then Anabelle opened
her eyes and Chris sank back into the couch. Unlike Alysa, who looked
basically the same except for her tone of voice, Anabelle's face
stayed the same but her eyes; oh, her eyes. Chris was staring at and
his stare was being returned by twin jewels. Anabelle's eyes looked
like faceted crystals, bright diamonds that gleamed in the sunlight
and almost seemed to burn into his brain. He felt like she could see
directly into his soul.

“
Bellestriel is my
name, my friends. Welcome to Valiant.” Her tone was cold and
hard and while her words were friendly enough, Chris got the feeling
that she was watching them cautiously, withholding judgment.

A hand on his shoulder
made Chris turn abruptly in his seat. He saw that Francis was staring
at him with a gentle and kind expression.