Questions and Answers

Welcome to the new year!  Freya is back at home and I am back with her, and we are learning how to work together in this new dynamic between us.

Now that Freya knows that I can move small objects, we have a simpler and less distracting method than the radio.  She has set a page on a table in each room with a pencil in the middle, and in a circle she has written “hello”, “yes”, “no”, “it’s complicated”, “I can do that”, “I can’t do that”, and “DANGER”.  This way, we can speak whatever she is doing.

Using this method, I have been able to answer many of the questions that Freya has.  She now knows that there are many angels, just as there are many Fallen, and that I am not the only one protecting her, only the one who has been doing so most consistently.  She knows that I am a Guardian, but that I was not always, and that this has been the cause of some struggle for me. 

But there are many questions I cannot answer this way, questions that spring from the answers I give.  Having moved past her shock, Freya wants to understand more about the universe.  She wants to know who rules, and where the Fallen come from, and what the angels do, and where our power comes from—and the best I could say is “it’s complicated”.

Until tonight, that is.

This afternoon, while Freya was at work, I joined her in an idle moment.  She jumped when she sensed me, glanced toward her office door, and pulled out one of our “spinners”.  I moved the pencil to “hello” and she smiled.  “Hey, Ace.” 

It pleases me to no end—and amuses me, too—that she calls me that.  It lends a certain familiarity to me; it is a friend’s name.

“Glad you’re here,” she murmured.  “I was stupid bored.”

Again she glanced toward her door.  Just across the hall, Sarah and John are standing in the doorway of his office, chatting.  Freya had a question, but she was worried about them overhearing her talking to herself.  Then she grinned and pulled up a blank page on the screen.

I leaned over her shoulder as she typed her question: Can you hear what they’re saying?

Even such a simple question had a difficult answer.  I thought about how to reply, and then I had an idea of my own.

I first thought that I would type the answer on the keyboard myself, but there was a quicker way.  A computer, after all, is just a device that obeys orders, and it was surprisingly easy to find a way to give it an order myself.

Freya was watching the spinner, and so she did not notice the new words appearing on the screen without sound.  I had to call her attention to it, and when she saw it, she cried aloud, “Oh, holy fuck!”

I flinched, and Sarah and John fell quiet out in the hall.  “Everything okay, Freya?” John called.

“Oh,” Freya said, glowering in my direction, “yes, I thought I saw a spider, but it’s just a ball of lint.”

“You should clean your desk more often,” John teased.

“You’re one to talk,” she shot back, getting to her feet.  “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a report to finish.”  She gave them a quick smile to hide the fact that she was shutting the door in their faces and hurried back to her desk.

“You didn’t tell me you could do that!” she hissed at me.

I didn’t know that I could. 

The words on the screen were slightly different than hers, and oriented on the opposite side of the page.  I wasn’t quite certain why, and I didn’t really care.  For the first time, we were really communicating.

Taking a deep breath, she read what I’d written on the screen. 

My hearing is no better than yours—in fact I’m certain that yours is better.  But I can be standing beside them in a moment, and of course they can’t see me.

“Cool,” she murmured. 

Her interest made me wary, and I added,

It would be wrong for me to eavesdrop without a good reason, Freya.

“Oh, please,” she said.  “You’re such a goody two-shoes.”

I am an angel, after all.

She laughed at that, and then did a little dance in her seat.  “This is awesome!  You can really answer my questions now.”

Maybe not right now. Sarah is coming.

Freya glanced up in time to catch Sarah’s knock.  She made our small conversation disappear and called for Sarah to come in.

“Any more spiders?” Sarah asked. 

Freya laughed.  “I think I’m just out of it.  Hey, do you mind if I get out of here a little early today?  I’ll make it up.”

“That’s fine, I know you will,” Sarah said.  “Hope you’re not sick?”

“No, just—I got word from a friend a little bit ago, and we’re meeting up after work.  I’m so excited I can’t even focus.”

That was true, and it was a thrill to hear me referred to as a friend.

“I’m glad it’s something good,” Sarah said.  “Okay.  If you have the Lassiter report for me—”

“Oh, I just need to print it.”

Sarah tapped the desk lightly.  “Bring it down to my office on your way out.”

Freya was finished and out of the office in a matter of minutes.  She drove a bit more quickly than I liked on the way home, but she wasn’t reckless, and after all I was as excited as she was.

The moment she had settled on the couch and a white screen came up on her laptop, I was asking,

What would you like to know?

“Oh, geez, now I have to pick a question.”  She considered, and then asked, “Does it bother you when I swear?”

I laughed, and she felt it ripple the air.  “Yeah, yeah,” she said, grinning, “but I wanted to start small.”

It depends on the words used.  I am not disturbed by the profane, particularly now that I am a Cherub, but the combination of the holy and the profane is jarring to me.

“Okay.  Non-holy fucks only, then.”  She tilted her head.  “But now I have to ask—a ‘cherub’?  Isn’t that a little baby angel?”  There was a laugh in her voice.

You are thinking of putti.  A Cherub is an angel who possesses the Lower Eye, which enables us to see and to fight the Fallen.

She grew solemn.  “The Fallen?  Those are your enemies?”

Yes.

“So that means most angels can’t see them?  Isn’t that kind of a disadvantage?”

It would be more of a disadvantage if they could see them.  To be able to see the Fallen, the horror and ugliness of them, would be wounding to most angels.

“But not you.”

I have training to offset the sight of them.

“Huh.”  She set the laptop on the cushion in front of her and crossed her legs, leaning her head in her hands.  “So there are all kinds of different angels, right?  And you’re a guardian angel.  Are all guardians Cherubs?”

No.  Younger Guardians defend humans against simpler dangers—accidents and the violence of other humans.  It is only after they have proved themselves that they are granted the Eye.

“How long did that take you?”

It was less than six months for me, but those were special circumstances.  Most take much longer.

“What special circumstances?”

I debated whether or not I should answer, and she noticed my hesitation.  “Don’t hold out on me now, Ace, we’re just getting started.”  She frowned around the room—she still is not quite able to locate me in physical space.  “Is it about me?  I can take it.”

I sighed and gave her the answer. 

One of the Readers saw that there was a Fallen who had knowledge of me, and of you.  I had become a specific target in the war, and because of that, so had you.  I needed the ability to protect you.

She studied those words for a long, quiet moment.  They made her heart beat a little faster, but her expression stayed calm.  “A Reader?” she asked.

One who analyzes the Choice Web to understand what might come in the future.  This one, Simmah, is also a holder of the Inner Eye, which grants true sight.

“Choice Web,” she mused.  “I like that.”  She rubbed her temples.  “And remind me to ask about all these eyes and about how much of the future is written, some other time.  For now, though, tell me what this Simmah said about you and me, and the one who’s after us.”

Even now we do not know much.  She is cunning, and prefers to use others to do her work.  She has sent many after you in order to hurt me, and none of them know why it is that she hates me.

“She?” Freya murmured, but then shook her head.  “Don’t get into that either; add it to the list.  So she has some kind of authority?  With all these little gremlins to do her bidding?”

There is no such order among the enemy.  They win prestige only through success in causing suffering.  Of course, we have reports that now she has gained some of that.  Before she was simply persuading others that it was in their interest to do as she wanted, but soon she will be stronger.

Freya shivered, and I put a wing around her shoulder.  She reached up to touch that shoulder thoughtfully.  “Can you beat her?”

If she would face me head-on, I am confident that I could, which is why she has not.  But you should not be afraid.  I am strong, and I am not alone.

“Tricks and cunning,” she murmured.  “But you’re stronger than she is in the light.”

It will be better now that you know.  I can stay close to you.

“Yeah, that’s another question,” Freya said.  “Why did you have to back off when I started to notice you?  Are we breaking some rules here?”

It is not good for humans to know too much of the truth.  Usually when an angel gets too close to a human, they are required to step away so that the human perception of reality is not disturbed.

Freya scowled.  “Who decided that?  I can handle the truth.”

Of course you can. 

I sent a wave of affection through her, and her scowl eased, a bit. 

But it was difficult even for you, and others are not as flexible in their worldview.  We are here to help humans, not to hurt them.  In any case, I have been given permission to answer all of your questions, so long as I do not try to force you to see or hear.

That made her blink.  “Could you do that?  Make me see you, or hear your voice?”

So I am told, though they did not tell me how.  I think it is a skill that I would learn over time.  But it does not matter, as I am not permitted to use it.

She leaned back against the arm of the sofa.  “Are you always this obedient?”

Yes. 

Then, as she raised an eyebrow, I added,

Well, unless the circumstances demand otherwise.

That made her laugh.  “You’ll have to tell me about some of those circumstances.”

Whenever you like.

She sighed and scrolled upward to read over a few of my responses.  “Do you know why she hates you so much?”

No, and it worries me.  She targeted me before I was ever a Cherub, and somehow, she knows about you, but I can’t think how she could.

“Seems like you all have spies on their side,” she pointed out.  “Is it possible that they have their spies on yours?”

What a horrible thought. 

There are no spies, or at least not in the way you are thinking.  No angel would long survive the company of the Fallen, and no Fallen can get past heaven’s defenses.  But we have ways of listening to their speech and watching their movements.  I suppose that they may have the same.  I will ask Orison.

“Is he—or she—your teacher?”

Yes.  Orison has been my protector and friend for a long time.  And I think you would say ‘he’.  We follow the lead of humans in observing masculine and feminine tendencies, though we find it strange that your culture claims all of one, or all of the other.  It is a spectrum, not a switch.

“Good to have that confirmed,” Freya said.  “So would you say you’re a he or a she?  Just out of curiosity.”

I have more masculine than you do, but less than Orison, I think. 

She rubbed her head again.  “We will have a long talk about that sometime soon, but let’s get back to this fun little conversation about the Fallen who’s trying to kill me.”

I will not let that happen.

This was twice as large as the other lines, and Freya laughed.  “Okay, loud and clear, Ace.  But you have to tell me—why me?  Were you just assigned to me?”

No.  I chose you, years before you became my responsibility.

She stared at that.  “Why?” she whispered.

Because you helped me.  You gave me solutions to problems that I could not easily solve.  And because there is so much in you to admire.  You cast your warmth to everyone nearby, and I wanted to share in it, and to help you make more and do more.  You are loving and brilliant and beautiful, and there is fire in your soul.

Freya stared at that for a long time.  Then she cleared her throat and picked up the laptop, highlighting that passage in bright yellow.  She hit “print”.

“I have more questions,” she said, wiping her eyes.

I am at your service.