Fallen Angels

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The creature must have known she had so many questions. After she had been sent to her room, grounded for being disobedient,  she saw it, leaning against the lamppost that was the only light on the long road up to the village. She stepped back from the window, a mixture of emotions running through her head. She looked towards the door, but her mother’s footsteps had long died out. Throwing open the window, she only thought briefly of what would happen if she got caught. 

He watched, a coy smile playing on his lips as he watched her clamber down from the window.  So clumsy, he thought, so human.

He glanced at his friend, who also grinned when the girl stopped, realizing there where two of them.

Lilly approached uncertainly. She hadn’t known there was more than one. Her angel stood on the right, his pale hair so different to the other’s shaggy brown mop. And his posture was different too. Her angel stood tall and proud, the other crouched, like an animal. Lilly trembled as she spoke.

“Who are you? What are you?” She whispered.

Her angel cocked his head.

“You don’t know?”

Lilly’s head shook.

“We are angels of death. Of fear. Of hate. Fallen angels.”

“Why are you here? Why did you kill those people?”

This time, the other angel spoke.

“Because we can.”

Callum sat in silence at the dinner table. Ever since his father had died four years ago, this was the way it had always been. But know he felt the silence even more with the absence of his sister. He loved her, and her endless chatter, but he didn’t understand her.  Why get herself grounded for no reason? Still, he slipped two sandwiches into  his pocket and headed up to her room. Just in time to see her scramble through the window. 

“What are you doing?”

She looked up, startled, her long brown hair falling over her face. 

She didn’t have to say any more. He left the sandwiches on her table and walked away, shaking his head.  

“Can you take this up to the post office for me, Lilly?”

Lilly looked up from her cornflakes, surprised. She hadn’t been allowed out of the house for the whole weekend. 

“Yeah, sure.” She grabbed the package that her mother held out to her.

“And be careful, Lilly, you hear?”

“Sure, Mum.” She pulled on her coat and went outside. 

The morning frost bit at her lips, and a cold stillness lay in the valley. She trudged up the road to the village, feeling that there was nothing alive apart from her, and the birds twittering in the bleak forest that rose up on her left. On her right, moorland stretched down to the shores of the loch, and then rose up in a steep rocky cliff, to which more forest clung precariously. On her way, she passed a band of men, dressed in tweed and carrying guns. One of them, a family friend, stopped and smiled at her.

“Start of the grouse season. The glorious 12th!” She gave a forced smile and ducked her head. Lilly didn’t like the thought of killing anything for no good reason. Her mind flicked to the angel, and she gave a jolt. If there where two, then there could be more. Many more. She shuddered and began to jog up the road. The village was soon in sight. It was small, just a collection of old houses, a post office, a greengrocer/butcher, a tiny primary school and a small church.  It was all there was for miles around. The post office was closed, so she slipped the parcel into the postbox on the outskirts, and began to walk quickly back down the hill. 

She stopped to catch her breath at a bend in the road, where the village just disappeared from sight. Suddenly she felt his breath on her neck, slow and steady. 

“You’re not afraid of me, are you?”

“No” She straightened up, but didn’t turn around. She heard him give a light chuckle.

“You should be.”

“You won’t hurt me. Otherwise you would have killed me already.”

“I don’t do the killing. That’s Lucas.”

“The other angel, the one with you on Friday night?”

“Yes. He doesn’t believe that we can live together with humans. He wants to destroy all who know about us.”

“Does that mean he wants to kill me?” Silence.

“But you won’t let him, will you? You don’t want him to kill humans. You want peace, right?” She turned to face him, but the road was empty. 

She gulped and ran back down towards the house, nearly crashing into Callum. 

“Where are you going?” Lilly asked.

“Mathews house, to work on our science project.”

“Oh, yeah. Bye.”

She looked down at their house, just on the edge of the forest. It was small, but cosy, and Lilly had lived there all her life. It was a sanctuary, she thought, against the bleakness of the rolling moors and dense forests that enclosed it. She walked down, slowly, looking out across the moors. Two figures where running down towards the loch, one crouched, the other limping. Maybe they where members of the hunting party. 

She took the spare key from under the doormat and unlocked the front door. A strong smell of burning came from the kitchen. 

“Mum, I think you’ve burnt the sausages!” No one replied, so she switched off the gas and emptied the charcoaled remains of meat into the bin. 

“Mum! You’ve burnt the sausages!” Silence greeted her. Slightly worried, she went into the dining room.

“Mu-“ She gasped at the sight of the back door, hanging ajar on only one hinge. It had been ripped from its frame, and she had no doubt as to who the claw marks belonged too. She ran outside, and squinted against the sunlight at the two figures running across the moor. She could see now that the crouched figure was pushing the limping figure along. She ran back inside and emptied the drawers of her Mum’s desk. Right at the bottom was a pair of binoculars. 

She only had to see the hunched wings and she knew who it was. Lucas.