Aila heard the call. No one had to tell her what it was even though nearly no one still alive had ever actually heard the sound.
She looked up and saw the phoenix coming down, the feathers turning into flames once more, the body transforming into a girl dressed in grey...
Benjamina.
Aila had no time to ponder what she saw. Bennie collapsed, nearly knocking the tiny fairy flat, tears still in her eyes.
Aila took Bennie inside. She knew what had happened.
Bennie did not remember much of when she got to Aila's. She only remembered a pure, uncontrollable need to sleep, the painful throb of her heart, still pounding "Perce, Perce, Perce." She only remembered the hollow thought, "I can't save him now," and someone helping Aila carry her into the house...
Shadow and fiery light... a strange tingle pulsing through her veins. She was lost, somewhere inside herself, a place she did not know. It wasn't part of her...Someone calling...
"Phoenix."
She was flying, flying over Pelanca, on wings...her feathers as golden red as the city looked to her eyes. There was no darkness here...
"Phoenix!"
Phoenix, yes...not Shadowchild. I am Phoenix.
"Ben-nie!"
She turned. She knew that voice, more beautiful to her than Reyortsed's. She thought she'd never hear it again.
"Bennie, come on down now. I need to tell you something."
Perce...
She flew down to where he stood, in their training park.
Oh, he's here! He's not dead after all!
In a wheel of fire she was Bennie again, running into his arms, sobbing with joy.
"I thought you were gone! I thought I could never get you back now!"
Perce just smiled.
"Ah, Bennie," was all he said, and led her to a bench. Bennie followed, pushing all the pain and fear she had been feeling aside with her words.
"We can call Aila, and let her know you're back safe. I'll go get Sean and Gem and we can sort everything out. We were all so freaked out, Perce, you have no idea! But..." Her voice trailed off when she saw that Perce was gazing at the stars with an unreadable, if thoughtful, expression. She didn't have to ask him what he was thinking. She already knew.
"You're not back safe, are you?" She said quietly, "This is just a dream, isn't it?"
"No," Perce said, barely above a whisper. "Not just a dream."
He turned to her, his face both happy and sad.
"We're not really here, as you said, but I'm not just your mind and heart refusing to deal with reality either. I did die out there, Bennie, but when I sent you the energy and transferred the power to you I left this imprint here for you to find, as many keepers have done before. You need to know a lot of things, and you needed to know them long before now. I was going to come and tell you the other night, but unfortunately my stupidity sidetracked me, and now this is the only way I can."
Bennie shook her head. "You shouldn't have given so much energy to me!" She stormed. "You wore yourself out and you couldn't fight off the elves or their spell! Now you're dead because I wasn't strong or fast enough!"
"No, Bennie, that's a lie," Perce said firmly, seating her on the sofa. "Reyortsed had poisoned me long before he ever contacted you. I was dead anyway; but he wanted to get the power if he could. The elf's hex was a bluff to make you think it was your fault. He never planned to let either one of us go and if I'd been straight with you from the start you'd never have been enchanted by him. You have no reason to be sorry.
"Secondly, you had to make it out of there, not me, you. And with the stunt you pulled on Gregk—which was brilliant by the way, and I'm really proud of you—but with that stunt, there was no way you could have physically handled the power transfer without a boost from me first. This sleep that you're in proves that. It's a strong thing, Bennie, and we need to talk about it.
"Yeah," Bennie said, blinking back tears. "I was kind of wondering why I was suddenly a bird flying around, and why it meant so much to Reyortsed to get his hands on this ability."
Perce laughed. But even though it was the same laugh that always made Bennie feel happy too, she only felt a pang when she knew this was the last time she would hear it.
"Oh Bennie, you can make the most serious things sound hilarious," he said, giving her a one armed hug. He sobered up when he saw she wasn't smiling. "But it's not just a shape-shifting ability Bennie, it's far more."
"Tell me."
"Do you remember when I first told you about the Guardians, and how I spoke a bit about Reyortsed's history, and about Sheyneh?"
Bennie looked at him curiously. "Yes, I do."
"I told you about her immortal power that was passed on from heir to heir through the generations, and I remember you were curious about the tattoo on my hand that matches the mark on your shoulder."
"Perce, are you telling me what I think you are?"
"Yes Bennie, you are an heir of Sheyneh."
Bennie took this in slowly. It wasn't hard to grasp, just scary. And it added a couple hundred more questions to her growing list.
"So I'm an heir, and this power is now mine, but why would Reyortsed want it? If I remember correctly you told me only the truest heir can use it fully—"
Perce was looking at her with an alarming expression. Bennie stopped.
"Oh shoot," she said. "He's the truest heir?"
"Let me explain that part a bit, Bennie," Perce said. "Do you remember that prophecy I recited? The one about the Wings of Scarlet claiming his abandoned throne?"
Bennie's heart pounded nervously again.
"I remember now," she said. "He could use it fully but he chose a different life and never knew it was there for him, so the other heir comes to use it. But Perce, that can't be me."
Perce patted her gently on the head.
"I'm afraid it is you, Bennie. The tattoo on my finger meant I carried the power of Sheyneh, I was a keeper, like your dad, and your ancestors. But the actual mark in your skin means you are the wielder. Reyortsed was marked the same way, though I can't imagine what the inner void it made in him does to him."
"Inner void?"
"Bennie, when I went inside your mind to find your abilities and a suitable Night Name, I found part of your soul that was hollow, like a box needing to be filled. When I recognized the mark on your shoulder, I knew this empty space was reserved for the ability you'd come into. It was destined to hold the power of Sheyneh and only that. Reyortsed must have the same void inside him, and since it was never filled he was driven to learn what it was. That's how he caught on to us, ten years ago."
Bennie looked at him curiously. Perce was distant for a moment.
"That's how he caught on to your father."
Bennie's heart skipped a beat.
Caleb, your dad, was one of my best friends. He was an elemental mage--controlled wind, fire, water and earth, and I noticed that one day several years after we'd met he got a strange tattoo on his finger. When the time was right he explained he was an heir of Sheyneh and the current keeper of her power. It had been passed to him by his grandfather, your great-grandfather instead of his estranged uncle because his uncle had never been a true Guardian and walked a path in the darkness, and your grandfather was terminally ill, as you probably know."
Bennie nodded. "So Reyortsed is my dad's uncle, and when he found out about the power he came after my dad to claim his right to the power." Bennie said, ignoring the fact she had actually wanted to kiss someone she was related to only hours earlier. But then Reyortsed wasn't a normal human by any standard, and he had been playing with her mind.
"And your father naturally fought to keep the power from the hands that would destroy us," Perce said quietly.
"We worked together as architects at our own company," Perce said. "I remember the night we were shutting down our last project, when Reyortsed showed up.
"I had gone to our portable to get some paperwork, and when I came back around to the front of the site I saw your father fighting back several serpentine creatures, the same kind that attacked you and Peter. I was able to help him get rid of them, but he was too far gone from their acid for me to help. We didn't have the cures Aila has now.
"Reyortsed's plan was to incapacitate and capture him. He knew Caleb couldn't die until someone else held the power, as it was self-protecting, and knew you weren't a Guardian yet. He expected to take Caleb away and torture him until he relinquished the power. But he didn't know I was a Guardian, or that the keeper doesn't have actually to be an heir, only the wielder. So I was able to take it without Reyortsed realizing until I had vanished. But your dad..."
Bennie felt a surge of anger. All those years with her father, taken away, because of the selfishness of another man, whose cause was never achieved anyway!
"I can never stop thinking about how I may have saved him that night if I had been outside with him sooner," Perce said painfully. "Yet I think it was fated that I escape with the power, though, so I could protect it, and you. Reyortsed would never stop chasing your dad otherwise.
"Caleb made me promise to take care of you, and to be there when your time came, since he couldn't be. He entrusted me to carry the power until you were ready, and then I could give it to you, and only you. The power is only-self protecting in an heir, not just any keeper, so he knew he couldn't simply torture it out of me. He'd risk losing it forever."
"That's why Reyortsed needed me there last night," Bennie said. "To make you give up the power and for me to think I could save you by giving it to him."
"Then he'd have killed us both, yes," Perce said. "He spoke the truth when he says he doesn't like killing, because every dead Guardian is a lost potential ally, but he will kill if he thinks he must, and we were certainly a must for him.
"When your father had given the power over to me and died, I magicked the scene to look like he had been injured by scaffolding that fell, and then I called 911. Naturally they pronounced him dead at the scene, asked me a bunch of mundane questions, and settled the issue as an accident. I tried to tell your mom the truth, but she didn't take it well at all and told me to leave you both alone. I shouldn't have, as you've seen, but between her demands, and the fact I needed to keep a low profile in case Reyortsed figured out what I did, I shut down the business, and moved to Pelanca, cutting off all contact with you both until the day we learned a Guardian was going to manifest in San Antonio that day. I knew it was going to be you so I got there early. But it was too late for your mom; she distrusts the Guardians and everything about them, when once it fascinated her."
"And now here we are," Bennie said, looking down at her feet. Perce sighed.
"Here we are, far sooner than any of us expected. We had no idea how serious the situation with Reyortsed was the day I came to tell you about the Guardians, please know that."
"I know, Perce," Bennie said. "You never lied to me about anything."
"But I should have told you all this before I threw in the towel," Perce said. "I hope you can forgive me."
"There's nothing to forgive," Bennie said. "You were only trying to protect me and respect my mom's wishes, and frankly I think I understand her a little more now too. We could all have done things differently."
Perce gave Bennie a proud smile.
"You've grown up into an amazing young woman" he said. "Caleb would be so proud of you."
"So what do I do now?" Bennie said, trying now to blush.
"Well, that's the key," Perce said to her. "You see, Reyortsed was born with his powers, rather than coming into them, which is unprecedented in the human race. Even with teachers from Dwendol, where many races are born with powers, he was never able to learn how to use them properly and without infringing on the rights of others. He could convince even the best teachers that he was doing no wrong, and with whatever help he got from the devil or his friends, he's made himself even more dangerous. The power he has mirrors the power of Sheyneh–aside from the fire and feathers, and he wanted the power to keep anyone from ever being able to resist him."
"So the power of Sheyneh is ultimately the power of persuasion, control over mind and spirit?" Bennie said, understanding now how some girl no older than her had saved the universe some millennia before: she had simply convinced her enemies to stop.
"Exactly," Perce said. "Since you are the true heir, and the new being of Sheyneh, you are now Reyortsed's equal. His seduction and persuasive nature are neutralized by the simplicity of your being. Once you learn how to use your new powers and your old ones to their fullest, he will have a real enemy to face."
Bennie took this in, and immediately thought of how powerless she had been to resist Reyortsed in the school courtyard and even over the internet, when she couldn't even see him.
"No," she shook her head in a panic. "I can't do this, Perce. I'm nowhere near that powerful or that evil. I can't brainwash or hypnotize someone against their will!"
She was shaking now, getting up off the bench and backing away. Perce came to her, holding her hands in his, and looking her deep in the eyes.
"You don't need to be ready right now. Time will give you all you need to learn, and as for brainwashing someone, I'd never tell you to do that. In fact, you have to promise me you'd never use the power in that way, right now."
"No problem, I promise!" Bennie said, but she was thinking "I won't use it at all."
"You don't need to force anyone into your way of thinking, Bennie," Perce said. "The power isn't a force, it's a view of the big picture—or the 'other' picture if you keep a narrow minded view, which is Reyortsed's problem. Esla will be sure to see you get a good look at the big picture so you can know just how and why to use your abilities. You won't go wrong, Bennie, not if you listen to others and trust yourself. I swear."
Bennie just looked at him, overwhelmed. She remembered that Perce wasn't going to be there with her through all these new things she had to learn. Perce seemed to know she was thinking this, but then, they were sort of in her head, after all.
"Bennie, I wish I could be there with you when you need me, but it wasn't meant to happen. You need to not worry about me or about yourself. You're going to do great, you and Sean and Gemini, everyone. You'll all be brilliant by the time this is all settled and done."
He held her hands a little tighter, and his voice began to sound thinner, as if he was talking through a thick span of nothingness. "Would you do me a favor and tell everyone I said goodbye, and that I love them?"
Bennie started sobbing aloud then, but she nodded and hugged him. He kissed her on the top of her head.
"That includes you, Ben-jay."
Bennie looked up at him as he let go of her. He was the only thing that hadn't disappeared into the strange fiery light and mingled shadows again, and he was slipping away now too.
"I love you too, Uncle Perce. We all do."
Perce nodded as the distance between them grew.
"Be well, Bennie, and before I forget, though I think you know..." He was shouting now, but still sounding farther and farther away...
"...Your real Night Name is Phoenix, so let yourself fly!"
He was gone, and Bennie was slipping out of the colorful new part of her soul, the void now filled, and back into the light of the real day.