Angels Soaring (Angels Rising Book 2) Read online

  Angels Soaring

  By

  Harriet Carlton

  Also in the Angels series:

  Angels Rising

  Copyright 2017 by Harriet Carlton

  This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is prohibited. This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. All rights reserved.

  A heartfelt thank you to my grandmother, “Jumbo”,

  who has always been my biggest fan

  and who has always encouraged me to write.

  Thank you.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 1

  Impossibility was reality. Imorean Frayneson trembled as he stared into the mirror before him. He wanted to run from this room, to get away, to escape. His throat was tight. He could barely breathe. He gritted his teeth as his eyes locked onto the reason for his horror. His reflection. It was almost normal … and that was the worst thing. The gravity of the truth crushed down on him. He was still tall for his age and lanky, as was the norm in teenagers. His coffee-brown eyes were the same as they had always been, albeit wider and more fearful than usual, and his prematurely white hair was as different as ever. No. The source of his horror was a pair of huge, white wings stretching upward from between his shoulder blades and spine where there had been none before. Imorean didn’t breathe. The monstrosity of the unconsented change on his body was stealing his breath.

  The two men standing on either side of him, Michael and Gabriel Archer, looked on in transfixed wonder. There were neither traces of horror nor fear in their eyes. A chill crawled over Imorean’s skin, leaving goosebumps in its wake. It was as though they were proud of what had happened. Only days before, Michael and Gabriel, twin brothers, had been the two professors that Imorean trusted most. Gabriel, particularly, was the one who had made the Norwegian campus of Gracepointe University feel like home. That feeling now though, had vanished, replaced only by fear and something that Imorean could only identify as loathing.

  Repressing a tremble, Imorean looked at one of the wings, willing it to move, to be further away from him. Muscles between his shoulder blade and his spine stretched painfully, but the wing moved, shifting out and away from his body and flaring. Imorean cried out and jerked away as it moved, not believing what he was seeing.

  “What have you done?” whimpered Imorean, looking between Gabriel and Michael in turn, not caring how small and scared his voice sounded. “What have you done to me?”

  “Quite a beautiful transformation, really,” said Michael, his voice betraying his satisfaction. Imorean’s eyes flicked to Michael’s massive emerald wings as he folded them down behind his shoulders. The green winged man continued. “It is unusual that one of them is complete a day early and they are totally white, too. Incredibly rare.”

  Imorean flinched away as he felt Michael run his fingertips down the primary flight feathers of his wings.

  “Already fully developed feeling in them, too. Amazing,” mused Michael.

  “I can't go home like this,” said Imorean, backing into Gabriel, who rested two hands on his shoulders and steadied him. Imorean barely registered it, glaring at Michael in blackened fury. Michael was the one who had caused this. He had been behind it the entire time.

  “I can't go home like this! Take these away. I don’t want them. I don’t want to be here anymore. I want to give up the scholarship. Let me leave! I just want to go home!”

  “I am afraid I cannot do that,” said Michael, shaking his head.

  Imorean drew a deep breath, his heart thundering in fear. “Why? Just rip them off. Get rid of them! I want to go home!”

  “Those wings are imbedded into your bone and muscle structure. If I, as you so crudely put it, 'rip them off', I would also remove your spine and it would kill you. They are as much a part of your body as a finger or a foot.”

  The blood in Imorean’s veins chilled and he fought to keep his voice steady.

  “Why me? Why us? What's your plan?”

  “Imorean,” said Gabriel calmly, “what do you think is going on? Let's hear what your thoughts are.”

  “I don't know anymore!” cried Imorean, shoving Gabriel away. He stared at his reflection and took heaving breaths as a few tears of shock welled up in his eyes. The figure in the mirror was no longer his reflection. It was a warped version of him. An alien. Imorean raked his hands through his white hair and pressed down on his head. He could feel his fingers trembling. Shock and panic seemed to be oozing out of his very skin. His blood was fizzling in his veins. He couldn’t focus. He couldn’t think. Nothing made sense. The longer he stared at himself, the more revulsion he felt. Imorean tore his eyes away from his own reflection and he looked at Gabriel. The man who brought him to Gracepointe, one of the staff members he had trusted the most. Imorean shook his head, noticing the wings, equally as large and glamorous as Michael's, rising from somewhere behind his shoulders. Unlike Michael's wings though, Gabriel's were rich, tawny brown and only had emerald at the tip of each feather. All wrong. All betrayal. Imorean drew a heaving breath. How could the staff have done this?

  “You asked earlier what we had done to you to make you fall asleep for four days,” said Michael in a voice that demanded Imorean's attention. “This is the answer. We opened a door inside you. Changed you. These wings were always there, they just had to be unlocked.”

  Imorean drew himself up to his full height and folded his arms in defense. “How?”

  “The injection we gave you in August,” replied Michael.

  Imorean thought back. The EDE vaccine that had been missing from his medical records. “But ... they said that was for my endocrine system.”

  One corner of Michael’s mouth twitched. “Dr. Hall tells everyone that. The truth is that that injection was the key to you opening your wings. It was an activation enzyme.”

  “That activated what?”

  “The gift that was bestowed upon you when you were still a baby lying in your crib. The gift that gave you your wings.”

  “Gift? Gift? You’re calling this a gift?” spluttered Imorean, looking between the brothers. His wings flared clumsily behind him.

  “Angelic DNA. You should feel honored.”

  Imorean hissed in disgust. “Honored?”

  Gabriel finally spoke up, his voice soft and calm. “All of you at Gracepointe have been handpicked, Imorean. Here, sit down and we'll tell you everything.”

  “You’ve been lying to us all this time?”

  “Not lying,” said Gabriel, putting a hand on Imorean’s shoulder. “It’s more that we haven’t been mentioning things to
you. Omitting the truth rather than lying.”

  Bile rose in Imorean’s throat as Michael chuckled very softly. Imorean shook his head and tried to pull away as Michael rested a hand on his shoulder. The two brothers turned him away from the mirror. Imorean’s chest heaved, claustrophobia rising. He wanted out. He wanted to be away from the brothers, away from this office, away from Gracepointe. He wanted to be home. But he was maneuvered back toward Michael’s desk without care or regard for what he wanted. Imorean moved on automatic, his mind reeling. Coercion and manipulation. All of it. White wings shuffled of their own accord as Imorean sat down in his chair. He curled his lip at them, disgusted and terrified by the large, feathered structures attached to his upper back. They weren’t meant to be there. They should never have been there. They were not part of him.

  “Imorean,” said Michael. “I hope you can understand that this is all part of a much, much bigger plan.”

  “I’m not an idiot! I understand that,” snarled Imorean. He raised his chin as Michael’s jade green eyes flashed, but the man went on without any comment.

  “When you and these other ninety-nine students were born, you were chosen to be part of this plan. When you were babies, I sent out a large group of my – one could call them – coworkers to visit you. When they did, they gave you our own genes. These genes are something that live in your body, under your skin, in your very blood. We then locked them away, kept your wings from being unfurled, hid them beneath your skin. An untouched piece of your genetic code designed to lie dormant until awoken. When you got here, we injected all of you with an enzyme that would become the figurative key to unlock your wings. Allow your true nature to surface. From that point onward, all that was necessary was for me to activate that gene.”

  “Why are you telling me all this now?” asked Imorean, looking from Michael to Gabriel and back.

  “Eventually, all your classmates will know this information, but you were the first to get curious, the first to be put under, the first to transform and the first to wake up afterward. My brother has also gained rather a soft spot for you,” replied Michael.

  Imorean glanced at Gabriel, who gave him a small, apologetic smile, then looked back at Michael. “Is this some mad, science experiment?”

  “No, this is not a mad science experiment. There is no madness in what has happened. Nor is there very much science, really.”

  “You’re talking about genes. Do you think genetics aren’t science?” snapped Imorean. “They’re a field of scientific study. Of course they’re science!”

  “There is rather a large difference between average human genetic code, and the additional gene strand you were given in infancy. By our consideration, it is not science, per se.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “This is your destiny, Imorean. It is not something you can fight. This must be.”

  Imorean’s brown eyes flashed. “Okay, so you’re blowing smoke about the genes. Give me a straight answer then, for once. Who the hell are you? Better yet, what are you?”

  “Who I am and what I am are really quite closely tied together and they are best answered as such. Gabriel and I are brothers, but there is no Archer family. With how quickly you caught on to everything else, I am surprised that you have not realized this yet.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Imorean, the words sticking in his throat ever so slightly. He had a horrible feeling he already knew the answer. The corner of Michael’s mouth crooked up in a small half smile.

  “I am Michael and that is Gabriel. We are brothers, but, as I said, we are not brothers from any Archer family. We are Michael and Gabriel, two of the Archangels. We are immortal. I am Michael, my father's most important warrior angel. I am the Ruler of the Order of Virtues, Chief of the Archangels, Archangel of the Sun, Prince of Presence, Prince of the Sarim, Prince of the Seraphim and the Angel of Repentance. I am the most powerful angel in all of our hierarchy.”

  “...You’re … you’re an angel?” asked Imorean, staring at the two men in wonder.

  Michael snorted softly and flared one of his wings, then pointed to his face and his open wing in turn. “Michael. Archer.”

  Imorean shook his head and turned to Gabriel. “Wait, Mr. Archer –”

  “Call me Gabriel, please. Mr. Archer doesn't exist.”

  “Right. A – and you, Gabriel, are you an … angel as well?”

  “I am one of the five main Archangels.”

  “Wait,” said Imorean, thinking back to Sunday school classes he had sat through, which seemed like a lifetime ago. “Five? I thought there were only four.”

  “Yes, and no,” said Gabriel, frowning. “That’s sort of a technicality. When we were young, there were nine of us. They are Michael, myself, Raphael – you know him better as Dr. Hall – and our brother Uriel. We were, and remain, the four main ones. The Upper Archangels. Uriel was acting as the head of Undergraduate Admissions and the Dean here, but once you all arrived, Michael took over both positions. Uriel is now between here and heaven. He is training the other three Archangels, the Lesser Archangels, to help him while Michael, Raphael and I are engaged down here.”

  “That's only seven. You said there were nine,” said Imorean, shaking his head. He felt utterly swamped by all of this. It was too much to take in. He felt that he had suddenly been thrust into another world. A world that was unrelated to his own.

  “Yes.” Michael frowned and a shadow fell across his face. “We are missing two of our number. They were lost.”

  “How exactly do you lose an Archangel?” asked Imorean.

  “One of our brothers was the fifth of the Upper Archangels”

  “One of them? What about the other one?”

  “We will get to him in a moment.”

  “So, what happened to the first one you lost?”

  “He was killed over four thousand years ago during the Battle of Babylon.”

  “Babylon? Over four thousand years ago?” asked Imorean, his jaw slightly slack. “No. But you don't look a day over thirty. How can you possibly tell me about something that happened four thousand years ago?”

  “You are not grasping the concept of immortality very well, are you? Babylon was an Akkadian city in ancient Mesopotamia. I can tell you about the Battle of Babylon because I was there. My body's outward appearance is that of a thirty-year-old male, but I myself am immortal. Angels are immortal and almost indestructible beings. It takes very specific things to kill an angel, particularly an Archangel. To this day, the brother we lost at Babylon is the only Archangel who has ever been killed. You will learn more about all of these things later. For now, we are getting off topic.”

  “Imorean,” said Gabriel. “Michael is the oldest of the nine of us. I am the fourth oldest. In age, there are two angels between myself and Michael. One is Raphael and the other perhaps you know the second as the Bringer of Light or the Son of the Morning?”

  Imorean shook his head. “No idea. Weirdly enough, I’m not super well-acquainted with any angels.”

  Who would have thought that all those long-forgotten lessons in Sunday school would someday serve a purpose? He certainly hadn't.

  “Gabriel is referring to his and my other lost brother. The second of the two we mentioned. The one who fell. Lucifer,” said Michael.

  Imorean nodded in realization and he looked at Michael. The man's face was impassive, even cold.

  “What does this have to do with me?” asked Imorean. The quick glance between Michael and Gabriel did not go unnoticed.

  “Our fallen brother and his habit of trouble making is the reason you are here,” said Michael. “You will learn the detailed history of this story later, if you do not already know it. For now, however, let us have you understand that my brother does not walk freely as Gabriel, Raphael, Uriel and I do. He is currently bound far, far below us, locked away in one of the deepest pits of hell. Just because he is locked away though, does not mean he has no influence over mankind. He is at liberty to send out his own
armies, you humans know them as fallen angels or demons, and allow them to wreak havoc. For many thousands of centuries one of his chief generals was locked away as well. Unfortunately for us, that general, Vortigern, along with a few other important demons, has escaped the prison we cast him into. This is the reason we brought in you, your classmates, and the students we have already changed. We, the angels, have been fighting a losing battle against Vortigern and his forces for several years and we need new blood in the system, along with a plan. It is a plan we have used several times before throughout history and we have found it to be effective. So, eighteen years ago, we went out and we chose our newest soldiers. You, Imorean, are now one of the newest recruits of The Host, our Father's angel army. As was said earlier, you should feel honored.”

  Imorean sat in stunned silence, subconsciously wrapping his wings tighter around himself. He didn't want this. All he had wanted was to go to college, to get an education, to get his biology degree. He didn't want to get wrapped up in angels of all things, let alone a war. He couldn't possibly have foreseen this. How was he supposed to? Angels weren't exactly commonplace. They weren’t even supposed to exist outside of religious stories. Why him? He had been an atheist since he had started high school. He had no connection with these … creatures. He wanted to go home. For the first time in many years, he wanted not only his mother, but also his late father. Stability. Support. Familiarity.

  “I don’t have a part in this.” Imorean was shocked to find that when he spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper.

  Michael inclined his head. “What makes you say so?”

  “I’m just a teenager from North Carolina.”

  “And what role does your origin play in your position with us? Do you think that such a thing matters to us?”

  “… I don't want this. Just let me go home,” said Imorean, looking up at Michael. The Archangel's mouth twitched upward in a smirk again and anger flared through Imorean.

  Michael poured a second glass of whiskey for himself and Gabriel. “I cannot do that, Imorean. No students will leave this campus for the next few months without someone supervising them. Humans by and large will not now, nor will they ever, accept you, if you even managed to reach humans after leaving the campus. Vortigern's demons would probably find you first. So far, they have not caught on to our location here, but we are worried that if any of you stray too far from the campus, they will find you.”