Now he hovered, drawing deep and slow breaths, gradually recovering. His arms, still wrapped around my waist, were loose but secure, unrelenting in their efforts to keep me close. His chest, resting against mine, expanded outward with each inhale. Our skin, damp from our exertion, peeled apart and reconnected in rhythm with each breath.
I felt his lips press down against my shoulder, a firm and long kiss, before he tilted his head up and whispered in my ear.
“
You are perfect. I could stay here forever with you.”
My appendages, which had seized helping Eran keep us aloft in my moment of ecstasy, were back to working again. I gave them a brief flap as a sign I agreed.
“
I’m so sorry I couldn’t wait…” His voice broke. “I just…you’re just…it’s been so challenging…” Finally, he gave up trying to explain, sighing, and rolling his eyes, feeling inadequate.
Slowly, a smile crept across my face. “You are always so controlled in your emotions…It was…” I paused, searching for the perfect words to explain what I felt over his spontaneous lovemaking. “It was intensely satisfying to see you lose them over me.”
“
It was?” he said, a teasing smile rising up to match mine. His arms tightened around me, moving me closer. “So what you are saying is you’d like to see it more often.”
I laughed at the understatement, the truth being so clear to me that I was astounded it wasn’t to him.
“
Much more often,” I confirmed.
“
Hmmm,” he mused playfully. “I’ll put some thought to it.”
I groaned. “Always a tease…”
He feigned offense. “How else am I supposed to keep you interested in me?”
“
Oh, you don’t need to worry about that,” I reassured him.
He chuckled, his chest vibrating against mine.
“
I think-”
My voice cut off at the first sign of them. The hair at the back of my neck began to twitch, slowly growing more irritated. Then the perspiration returned to my forehead and dampened my hands, this time for a different reason.
My eyes were now scanning the sky, searching.
Eran’s hands were on my shoulders then, as he swiveled me cautiously back and forth, trying to gain my attention. “Magdalene?”
I tried to look over his shoulder and noticing it he glimpsed around but, after seeing nothing, returned to me.
My feeling had been correct, my mind screamed. That persistent irritation that something dire would be happening, the very feeling I was trying to annul with an evening flight with Eran, had finally proven itself to be correct.
“
The Fallen Ones are here,” I stated, my eyes locking on him, the overwhelmingly euphoric feeling I’d just experienced with Eran now being replaced with the unnerved alarm that our enemies were coming for us.
His lips pinched closed for a brief second. “Stay close to me.”
Then we were falling, pointed directly towards the earth, the brisk air coursing passed us as we plummeted. Just before reaching the ground, we straightened our direction and flew just inches across the grass blades below us.
Eran found my shirt first, handing it to me in midflight. We found the rest of our clothes shortly after, scattered across a field just outside the fortress.
With clothes in hand we lifted ourselves upward a good distance and retracted our appendages just long enough to re-dress.
Our wings didn’t extend again until we’d almost reached the earth, allowing gravity to do the job for us. Our appendages snapped out just before our feet touched the ground and only to break our fall.
Campion was the first to see us land. Given that it was uncommon to find two bodies dropping from the night sky, he knew something was wrong and was the first one at our side. His hand, already on his weapon’s handle, was ready for Eran’s orders.
“
The Fallen Ones have arrived,” Eran informed him. “Alert the rest and do it quietly.”
Eran and I took up our swords where we’d left them earlier, leaned against the courtyard walls. He then took my arm and led me inside.
“
Where are we going?” I asked, urgently.
Eran’s pace didn’t slow, even as he answered. “To find your recruits.”
“
My recruits?” I muttered, thoroughly confused.
We made it to the north side, where the Alterum bed chambers were built, and hurried to one section of corridors in particular.
“
Stay here,” he said, releasing my hand.
He then began a sprint down the hall, never pausing while slamming his fist on various selected doors. There was nothing identifying these doors from any of the others. No numbers, no differentiating marks. Yet, he clearly knew which ones interested him.
Then I realized what I was watching. Eran, an expert strategist, had taken the time to locate the rooms of each Alterum we had preselected to be on our team.
They’d been given no notice, had been given no option to decline, and yet as they each stepped out of their doors, they were attentive and ready.
They’d been trained well.
What impressed me more was that these peaceful beings that had never picked up a weapon in offense before had emerged in their full fighting gear, without ever having to be told to prepare for the worst.
As they emerged, one stark detail about their assemblage stood out.
Not a single Alterum looked the same.
Unlike a typical military in which troops were issued the same clothing and weaponry, this group of fighters had selected the clothes and weapons that best fit their abilities and style of fighting. They were their own unique army.
Eran gathered them together and explained hastily, “Fallen Ones are attacking. Do not engage them unless they engage you first. Your primary goal is to keep Magdalene safe.”
The Alterums glanced down the hall in unison as I stood at the end of it feeling very much like a doll on display.
Refusing to be a helpless damsel in distress, I withdrew my sword, enjoying the grating sound of its metal edge sliding along its sheath. “You won’t be alone.”
Eran’s gorgeous face lifted in a half-smile. “And keep her out of trouble.”
With that, he ran back towards me, kissed me passionate but quick, and disappeared down the corridor towards the courtyard.
I looked back at the Alterums standing in a huddle in the middle of the hallway. They looked unsure of themselves now and I couldn’t blame them. But they were the least of my troubles. Right now, we had our enemies to handle.
The hair on the back of my neck picked up again, intensifying, and without thought to it I spun around and ran in the direction opposite Eran. Only a few steps down the corridor I heard the Alterums racing up behind me.
None of them bothered to ask where we were going. It didn’t seem to matter much to them. They had their order and were going to follow it no matter where it led them.
It led them, or really my radar led us, to the northwest side, where a short hallway jaunted off from the main one.
My radar flared again, my hair at the back of my neck standing taut and remaining straight to the tips now, and I knew Fallen Ones were close.
I’d never used my radar as a compass before, having never actually wanted to intentionally find Fallen Ones before a few weeks ago. At this very moment though, it was a technique, an ability which I appreciated.
I halted at the opening to the hallway with the Alterums so close behind me I could feel the breath of one brushing against my hair. It had been coming quickly, but slowing now and I knew he was trying to control his nerves.
Only two doors led to rooms off the hallway here. They were staggered so I stepped up to the first and waited.
The sensation on my neck didn’t change.
Stepping up the second, I stopped again.
This time, my radar responded.
I gestured to the Alterums, signaling I would be going through the door.
A few promptly shook their heads in grave disagreement. I ignored them and opened the door.
There, inside the small room that served as storage, a Fallen One stood and another was coming in from a window above.
My weapon readied, I engaged the first and quickly ended its life. The second, realizing I was in the room, quickened his entry but by the time he reached the ground I was already waiting, standing over his partner’s body.
This one was a more skilled fighter and harder to fall. The Alterums, by that point, had invaded the room and without much space in it to begin with the area rapidly became crowded. This didn’t bode well for anyone, least of all the Fallen One.
Although I was the closest to him, I got in only a few abrupt maneuvers before an Alterum’s weapon came around the side of me, a movement that didn’t require a lunge because of our proximity.
The weapon, used mainly for battering, worked as it should and with another few swift snaps, the Fallen One collapsed against the wall and slid to the ground.
The Alterums immediately began placing hands on their colleagues, offering congratulations, but I couldn’t do the same.
Even after delivering the final strike to the Fallen One, sending it to perpetual death, I knew our job wasn’t finished.
Slipping through the group, I made it to the hallway and out to the main corridor, awaiting another reaction at the back of my neck, in essence, listening to my radar.
I was then racing down the corridor again towards the south side of the fortress, heavy footsteps behind telling me the Alterums were following.
The remainder of the fortress was awake now and scattering about in frenzy. All of them carried weapons but were finding no enemies to use them on.
This stood out as strange to me but I had no time to assess what was happening. I was following my compass to the next intruders.
We made it to an empty chamber just as three Fallen Ones breached the balcony. Two of them rubbed their arms as if they were trying to soothe away goose bumps but I knew that wasn’t the reason for it. They were trying to calm the affects of their radar, one that had surely spiked in reaction to me being so near. The third one was forgoing his pain to focus on something else entirely, an initiative that actually made me pause.
He was crouched in front of the door, fingers moving rapidly around the dead bolt.
“
He’s picking the lock,” I whispered to myself.
“
He’s what?” Christianson stood beside me, just as confused. “Why would he…?”
Fallen Ones were rarely delicate about their intrusions against Alterums, typically destroying everything in their path. These ones, however, were quiet and precise in their entry of the Alterum headquarters.
Again, I was stumped.
Then the door was opened and I had no time to ponder it. Weapons began clashing as quickly as they entered.
We met the small but volatile force head on and the Alterums, despite being significantly less prepared than their enemies, responded with amazing speed and accuracy.
The time in the courtyard was paying off.
Because of this, the fight was relatively brief. I finished off the maimed Fallen Ones and we moved on to the next intrusion.
Following my radar again, it ushered us below ground, to the assembly chamber where the door was slightly ajar. I pulled it open just enough to find a hole had been dug out from the ceiling near the far corner. From it, Fallen Ones were filtering into the room.
I saw them just as they saw me, our radar preventing any of us from a stealth advance. They immediately plunged towards the door, which I shoved open to face them.
The Alterums flooded in, immediately engaging the Fallen Ones. Weapons clashed, grunts resounded off the chamber walls, blood fell in streaks from the air.
As was their intention, they came at me, but the Alterums fought efficiently, stopping them and one by one rendering each incapacitated.
I flew to the head of the tunnel, waiting for the next onslaught as the room quieted. The remaining Alterums surrounded the opening, encircling it but remaining out of sight.
Only one sound could be heard from the tunnel then…
A pair of wings flapping hard towards us.
My weapon readied, I waited until it was at the opening and at the first sign of movement brought my sword down.
It was halted midway through the movement, coming to a stop against Christianson’s own weapon. My eyes wide, I gave him a quick, furious look.
But he wasn’t paying me any attention. He was looking at the one who’d just come through the tunnel.
“
Colonel,” he said firmly with a courteous nod and then casually moved away from the tunnel’s opening.
It was not the kind of reaction I was expecting.
I’d already swiveled my head towards the intruder and found Eran smirking back at me.
“
Magdalene,” he said with a critical lift of his eyebrows. “Why am I not surprised to find you here?”
My anger had now been replaced with shame.
I opened my mouth to explain but realized there was no good reason for me to have engaged in the dangers of defense.