It feels like the acid in my stomach is boiling and bubbling up to my throat. I can’t seem to get enough air into my lungs.
‘He wouldn’t do that.’ My voice comes out choked and wobbly. ‘He’s not like that.’
Josiah just gives me a look filled with pity. ‘Raphael wants you to run as far away as you can. You and your family. Go. Survive.’
Then he leaps into the air and flies back toward the aerie.
I take a deep breath to try to calm myself.
Raffe wouldn’t do it.
He won’t hunt people. Slaughter them like they’re wild pigs. He wouldn’t do it.
But no matter what I tell myself, I can’t blot out the image of him watching angels fly in formation without him. All I hear in my head is someone saying that angels weren’t meant to be alone. The main reason he so desperately needed his wings back was so he could return to the angels, right? Be one of them? Take his rightful place in their ranks as an archangel?
He wants to be accepted back into the angel world as much as I want to keep my family safe. If I had to kill a few angels to keep my family safe, wouldn’t I do that?
Absolutely. No-brainer.
Then I remember the look of distaste on his face as he talked about the dissection tables at the Resistance camp. He wouldn’t want to wipe out the camp or kill anyone. I’m sure of that. But if he had to? If it was the only way to take his rightful place as an archangel and save his angels from falling?
I slide down the side of the truck and hug my knees.
I took Raffe to the Resistance camp. Knowing he was an angel, I showed him where the largest surviving group of humans was hiding.
A memory of the ruins of the Pit runs through my mind. Did the original hellions have some lovesick teenager who betrayed them too? The thought of a perfectly chiseled ex-angel falling in love with a hellion is laughable. But I’ll bet the teenage hellion didn’t think so.
I shut my eyes.
I feel sick.
Beliel’s words after he showed me what happened to his wife echo in my head. ‘I once thought of him as my friend too . . . Now you know what becomes of people who trust him.’
I climb back into the truck and sit there with my hands gripping the steering wheel. I take a deep breath and try to think things through.
My mother watches me with trusting eyes. I don’t know how much she heard, but she wouldn’t believe anything he said anyway. Even if she worked with him to rescue me, she would never trust him. Maybe I should be more like her.
Ahead of us, down the road, my sister perches on a tree branch, ready to follow my lead.
My family is here with me, and all we have to do is drive away. North or south – either way, we could be far away from the fight if we drive all day. We are about as safe in this moment as can be expected during the End of Days.
It makes perfect sense for us to head away from where the angels will be.
Perfect sense.
I start the engine. We head east. Toward the Resistance camp.
50
We see smoke in the distance long before we reach Palo Alto. Paige flies ahead with her locusts while we continue to weave through dead traffic.
The angels shouldn’t be attacking until dusk. People should still be safe. But by the time we reach the Resistance camp, I know I’m only telling myself fairy tales.
I park the truck on El Camino and get out of the cab. The buildings are intact except for one, which is on fire.
There are bodies strewn across the street. The cars and walls of the school are splashed with blood. I hope it’s not people blood, but I’m not confident about that.
‘Stay here, Mom. I’ll see what’s going on.’ I check the sky as I get out of the truck to make sure Paige hid in the trees like I told her to. She and her locusts are nowhere in sight. The Resistance probably would have seen her coming if they weren’t so preoccupied.
I walk toward the school, trying to see if anyone is alive. I only take a few steps toward the carnage before I stop. I’m afraid I might see someone I know among the bodies.
The wind blows leaves and bits of garbage. People’s hair flows in the wind, thankfully covering some of their faces. A piece of paper tumbles by and lands on a body that is staring at the smoke-filled sky.
The paper plasters itself against the body’s shoulder, right beside the pale, dead face staring blankly into the sky. It’s a flyer for Dee and Dum’s talent show.
Come one, come all
To the greatest show of all!
A talent show. Those guys actually thought we could have something as silly and frivolous as a talent show.
I scan the faces of the bodies draped across the hoods of cars, the road, the schoolyard, hoping I won’t see Dee or Dum. I walk slowly through the parking lot. A few people are whimpering, curled and crying on the asphalt.
In the school, the windows are smashed, the doors are unhinged and broken, the desks and chairs are thrown all over the yellow grass. There’s more life and motion here, though. People cry over bodies, hug each other, walk dazed and in shock.