Wings to the Kingdom (Eden Moore 2)

The man cowered—literally, and completely, ducking away and back. He hoisted the gun and put it into the Sentry’s face. It quivered there. “The bargain is up. ” The words were barely a breath in the clear, starlit air.

Yes. It is. I am not here because I have to be.

“Then why?”

Because I want to be.

“Back off!” he squealed, shrill and pathetic.

No.

In the course of the man’s retreat he tripped over Jamie, who curled himself as tightly into a ball as he could. That’s it, I thought. Stay down, Jamie. When the man fell over Jamie, he picked himself up and kept moving—back, back, as far away as he could get from the unrelenting sentry.

“I have a right to be here. My people fought here. My people died here too. You can’t keep me away. ” And then, when Green Eyes took one long step close, he gasped the rest. “You can’t hurt me! You’re not allowed to. You can’t harm the living, even to guard the dead. ”

This gave Green Eyes pause.

While he mulled it over, I crawled up to the very top of the stairs so that my shoulders were exposed to the night air. I stretched out my arm to Jamie, who was fetal a couple of feet away. His head jerked up when I grasped his ankle; but he knew it was me, and he’d never looked so happy to see me. The feeling was mutual. I put my finger up over my lips so he would hush.

He nodded, and slipped down low—offering his good arm out. I took it and pulled, gently but firmly. I drew him towards me, and he let me do it.

Inch by inch, I tugged him across the stone floor. Quietly, I reeled him towards the stairs. I hooked my foot on the topmost step and used it to anchor myself as I leveraged him into the stairway. “I’ve got you,” I breathed so gently he might not have heard me.

That was the bargain.

“Yes, that was the bargain!”

The Sentry looked back down at me, either for affirmation, or because he was seeing me there for the first time. The bargain has ended. I do not owe you safety.

The man’s eyes followed the Sentry’s. For a moment he wobbled and sent the barrel of the gun my way, but reason prevailed and he returned it to the greater threat. He snatched his glance away from us both, and dropped it over the edge of the Tower. Below, he must have seen the army amassed. He must have spied them through the pudding-deep mist, their upturned faces and antiquated clothes.

“You don’t owe them anything, either! This ground holds something of mine, and I want it back—and you’ve got no right to interfere. You’ve got no reason to interfere. Why don’t you just leave?”

Because I don’t want to.

He lunged, faster than any cat, and the man fired his gun directly into the Sentry’s bulk. He was too big a target to miss, but if Green Eyes felt the impact, it didn’t bother him any.

Again, and again, and again, the man fired. He almost emptied the barrel against the huge, hai

ry creature—even as he was lifted into the air. He kicked, and he jerked. He pushed his foot against the Sentry’s neck.

The shooter had one bullet left by my count, and he was running out of air.

Desperate, he flapped the hand forward and landed the last shot directly into one of those glowing green eyes, the only target that stood out in the dark.

The Sentry roared, though it sounded like no lion I’d ever heard; there was a scream underneath it, something that could have belonged to human or animal, but was certainly neither.

He lifted one great arm to clutch his face, and the other—the clenched fist that held the murderer—flailed hard. He beat the man’s body against the impassable stones of the Tower’s parapet. He thrashed, pushing the man up over the edge and releasing him.

But the man dropped his empty gun and clutched the simian arm, clinging to the limb lest he fall. “No! No!” he shrieked, his voice swaying with the pendulum swing of his body.

Green Eyes ignored the pleas, though it might not have been from callousness. He withdrew the long, sturdy arm that held the man and brought it towards him—a gesture that smashed the man’s head against the faux fortifications.

It might have knocked him out, or it might have only stunned him.

At any rate, he dropped like a stone.

I didn’t hear him cry as he toppled the seven or eight stories down onto the packed earth below. He landed sooner than I expected; if you watch too many movies you expect a dramatic delay.