A Prophecy Forgotten
Chapter Three: Rumble in the Schoolyard 

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Zephor flew through the Palace of Ezzer toward the Reconnaissance Coordination Department (RCD) hall. RCD was part of the Weapons and Technology (WET) division of the Elysian military, located deep underground in one of Ezzer’s most top-secret areas. They called it RCD Hall. Everyone knew it existed, but none save a few seraphs and RSOs knew its actual location.

Zephor sighed as he took a left toward Weapons Development. The excitement of finding the child of the Runes had finally worn off, and Octirius still had not managed to convince the Prime Minister to send more troops to the southern front. He flew until he reached a small door tucked away in the corner underneath a stairwell. He opened the door and entered a dark storage closet. He pulled his command crystal out of his breastplate and waved it in front of the wall. A hidden panel opened, and he entered a small, empty room. He flew to an old, wooden door in the back of the room, pointed his command crystal at each corner, and pushed it open to reveal a long, dark, twisting stairway.

This stairway was one of the best-kept secrets in all Elysia. It was one of the fabled palace canafs: passageways that Ezzer and his armies had carved deep into the palace tree trunks long ago. Ezzer realized that the mornachts would expect the cherubians to escape the city by air, so he ordered his soldiers and masons to carve small passageways in the tree trunks. The passageways led to a series of underground tunnels and finally out of the city to safety.

Zephor grazed his hand along the walls as he descended. They were slippery-smooth with a brownish-orange tint, almost like opaque glass. Octirius once told him it was hardened tree sap. Small glow-crystal lanterns illuminated the passage with an eerie, blue-green light. The glow-crystals, like the canafs, were over 3,000 years old, and they did not actually glow. They harnessed all available light and magnified it over 200 times. Glow-crystals were one of the few reminders of peaceful days before the Tri-Millennial War, and Elysia’s scientists had figured out how to replicate the technology only 200 years ago.

Once Zephor reached RCD Hall, he flew to another door and touched the doorknob, then the upper left corner, and lastly the door’s center with his command crystal. The door flew open, and he stared up the staircase that led to Hawk Tower. Hawk Tower was no more a tower than RCD Hall was a hall. It was actually a secret room carved in the top of one of the tallest trees in the City of Ezzer, housing Sephus the Hawk Master.

As Zephor flew up the stairs, he thought about Sephus and wondered how the poor lad managed to climb them day after day without complaining. About thirty years ago, Sephus had lost his wing in a strange accident that should have killed him. Before the accident, Sephus had been a prominent member of RSO in competition with then Corporal Picante for one of the highly coveted promotions to lieutenant. Zephor knew Davian wanted Sephus for the job. However, Picante was a pet favorite of Salla’s, and Zephor remembered Davian and Salla’s frequent, heated discussions over the promotion all too well. One almost escalated into a fight. Fortunately Zephor threw himself between the two of them—a difficult act for Zephor, who would have enjoyed watching the young Davian best the older Salla in a fight. But Davian, despite his prestige, would have still suffered Octirius’ wrath for attacking a seraph, and Zephor preferred Davian fighting mornachts to giving Salla a good thrashing and getting expelled from the military.

Before they resolved the issue, Davian found Sephus unconscious underneath a pile of what was once a storage shed. A week later, Sephus woke up with no recollection of the incident and no left wing, and that resolved the issue. Picante won the promotion, and Sephus was given the position of Hawk Master at Davian’s urging.

Zephor remembered how Sephus first approached the job. He did what Elysia required of him, but little else. His superiors said the accident calmed him down, but Zephor knew better. The accident had not calmed Sephus down; it had almost numbed him—sedated him even.

Zephor finally pulled the lad aside and told him, “Don’t lose the fire, soldier. The fire is your most important weapon. It might dwindle every now and then, but make sure you never let it get snuffed out.”

Soon after that, Sephus turned into the best Hawk Master Elysia had ever seen. Zephor shook his head; his own fire had almost dwindled to the point of no recovery. He sighed again as he reached the door to Hawk Tower and wished more than ever for a week off.

Zephor walked in and saw a soldier with muscular legs listening to the soft caws of King Arias of the hawks.

Once Sephus saw Zephor, he saluted and knelt before him.

Arias simply nodded.

Zephor carefully explained the situation concerning the boy Tommy to both of them, leaving out the reason for the boy’s importance. Arias agreed to assign a secret hawk to Tommy and alert Elysia immediately if anything unusual happened to the boy. Sephus agreed to alert Zephor in person of anything needing urgent attention. After their conversation, Sephus walked to a map of Earth that marked the locations of the hawks positioned on various humans and guards and began to mark a new hawk in Tommy’s hometown.

“No, Sephus,” said Zephor. “Do not put this child on any map—not now or ever. Do you understand?”

“Not ever, sir?”

“Not ever,” repeated Zephor.

Sephus nodded, but Zephor knew he was pondering the situation. Sephus was, after all, one of Davian’s men, and all of Davian’s men knew how to think.

“Just do it,” Zephor said. He wanted Sephus concentrating on things other than Tommy.

“Yes, sir,” said Sephus. Zephor patted him on the shoulder and flew back to the Command Chamber.

•

“Wake up, Tommy!” Lorraine yelled through the door.

Tommy groaned, rolled over, and covered his head with his pillow. Gabriella rubbed her eyes and cursed herself for practicing archery too late the night before.

A few minutes later, Lorraine opened the door and marched in.

“Good morning, Lorraine,” said Gabriella. “Are you planning on taking the car or the broom to work today?”

Lorraine walked over to Tommy, yanked his pillow out from under his head and turned on the light, shouting, “Wake up, kid!”

“Must be the broom!” continued Gabriella.

Tommy groaned.

“Downstairs in fifteen minutes!”

Tommy groaned again.

“Don’t be late!” Lorraine turned and walked out.

Tommy groaned once more and fell back asleep.

After fifteen minutes, Gabriella flew close to her sleeping charge’s ear and yelled, “Wake up, Tommy!”

Tommy woke up, looked at the clock, and uttered a loud curse. He jumped out of bed and tripped over the flashlight he had dropped the night before.

Gabriella refused to push it out of the way. Instead, she crossed her arms and said, “Serves you right for using language like that.”

Tommy raced to his chest of drawers and grabbed a shirt and some jeans. He somehow donned both articles of clothing while he laced up his shoes. He grabbed his glasses and reached inside a cedar box on his dresser. His hand came out empty, and he looked around the room.

“Where are they?” he asked himself. He scampered to the bookshelf.

“No, not there,” said Gabriella. “They wouldn’t have fallen there.”

He began to search under the fort.

“No, you built that two days ago. Wait a minute. The clothes! The clothes!” She flew up to his ear and yelled. “Check the dirty clothes!”

Tommy rummaged through the clothes and broke into a smile once he retrieved what Gabriella knew was his most coveted possession in the world: his dad’s dog tags. Gabriella remembered the day his dad gave them to Tommy. It was the day the judge handed down the custody ruling. Tommy had burst into tears when he found out he had to live with his mother. As Jim hugged Tommy right before they parted, he pulled his dog tags out of his pocket.

“Tommy,” he said, “do you know what these are?”

“They’re,” sniff, “your,” sniff, “dog tags.”

“That’s right, Tommy. When I was in the Navy, I always had to wear these babies. They were the Navy’s way of identifying us. If one of us died in combat, they would know right away that we were theirs. We had to wear them all the time, even in times of peace, and even if we went off base for leave. All the time. You see, Tommy, it didn’t matter if we were at peace or at war or on base or on foreign soil, we still belonged to the Navy.”

Jim placed the dog tags around Tommy’s neck and said, “Tommy, you’ll always be my son. No matter where you go, no matter what you do, you’ll always be my son, and I’ll always love you.”

Gabriella watched Tommy throw the dog tags around his neck and tuck them under his shirt. Tommy bolted out of the room and raced downstairs. Gabriella raced after him, wishing again that Tommy lived with Jim.

•

Gabriella loved school. Tommy had to stay seated for at least six hours, giving her an opportunity to socialize with other cherubians. She laughed as she watched Tommy kick his legs back and forth and rock in his seat as he waited for class to begin.

“Lyla, where’s Jarod?” she asked a nearby guard.

“Ashley’s home with the flu,” said Lyla, referring to Jarod’s charge. “How’s Tommy Terror?”

“He’s in one piece, so I’m certainly not complaining.”

“No stitches yet?”

Gabriella smiled. “None. If he makes it through today, he’ll break his record of thirty-seven days without a trip to the emergency room.”

“What was that last trip for again?”

“Second degree burns on his back.”

Lyla laughed. “That’s right. How did you explain that to your sergeant?”

Gabriella shrugged. “How was I supposed to simultaneously stop a bottle rocket and push things out of the way of a falling child who thought the rocket’s propulsion would send him flying to the top of the roof from the swing-set? He said I—oh, here she comes.”

Mrs. Gatch marched in with her white hair pulled back in its usual bun and those thin, tight lips that always tempted Gabriella to push a quarter through them just to see what would happen. She scrawled Tommy’s name on the chalkboard because he looked like he was thinking about talking, and then began the lesson—completely ignorant the barrage of insults Gabriella sent her way.

Mrs. Gatch delivered lessons about double digits in perfect monotones, while Gabriella and the other guards chattered away until the school bell rang, symbolizing the end of restful bliss and the beginning of the apocalypse called recess. Recess, a time when eighty hyperactive children comingle on a playground full of injury-causing, metal contraptions. Recess, the only one-word oxymoron. The guards’ wings, as well as the teachers’ voices, always ached by the end of recess.

After lunch, sounds of children playing on the playground reached all the way to Lemon Head’s office. (Lemon Head was Principal Porter’s nickname—unauthorized of course. Gabriella never knew if the nickname arose from his blond hair or his sour expression, but it was universal. Even the teachers used it.) Clouds covered the sky, and a crisp, late fall wind blew icy mist across the playground. Gabriella pulled a black cloak out of her pack, which she remembered to bring after yesterday’s dreary weather, and wrapped it around her wings and shoulders.

The girls played on the swings and sat in big circles slapping each other’s hands in strange rhythms and singing silly songs. The most skilled girls could slap each other’s hands crosswise, hit their thighs, and grab each other’s pinkies without losing the beat. Gabriella chuckled at their simple games and shot a wistful glance at the girls’ guards, who were trying their best to stay awake. Girls were very strange, but very safe. No girl ever showed up in the emergency room with a broken pinkie because she and her partner slapped each other’s hands too fast.

The boys, on the other hand, always played a contact sport at recess, and today’s bone-breaker was soccer. The boys rushed up and down the field, kicking madly at the black and white ball on the ground and rejoicing at the rare moment when someone actually made contact with the ball. Most of the time, they ended up kicking each other. Gabriella watched the boys’ guards who always ended up acting like a strange combination of a coach and a little league parent.

“Jack, watch him,” yelled one. “He’s quick!”

“Billy, are you blind?” yelled another. “It was right there! Keep your eyes open!”

“Oh, so you think you’re a big guy, eh, Josh? You kick at my Ritchie again, and I’ll distract your guard at an inopportune time!” That was Aaron, Ritchie’s guard. Gabriella considered Aaron one of the best guards she ever met, and she knew Elysia would promote him to seraph some day. He took more of a personal interest in his charges than most guards. He defended them as much as the Code permitted, and he made it his business to seek out every loophole in the Code.

Gabriella turned her attention to her own charge, playing alone in the sandbox. Her Tommy cared little for soccer. He was much smaller than the other boys, and they usually ended up mistaking his head for the soccer ball. Tommy instead preferred to set up intricate forts for his American Heroes. As Tommy’s sniper had the enemy lookout’s night vision helmet in his sights, Gabriella’s arch nemesis, Mikey, the school bully, and his entourage of pitiful wannabes crept up behind Tommy’s little insurrection. Mikey was almost five-feet tall—a height unheard of in second grade. Granted, it was also unheard of for a school to hold a boy back twice in the second grade. Mikey had earned the distinct honor of being the youngest human ever to harden in Earth’s history. He lost his guard at the age of five. Fortunately no mornacht had taken residence in Mikey—probably because he was too dumb. The mornachts valued efficiency, and they rarely found taking residence in an idiot efficient. They also knew Mikey could not cause any major damage until he grew up, and damage—especially damage that hurt humans—was their primary goal.

Mikey smiled and crossed his arms. “Hey, Tiny Tommy. Playing with your dolls again?”

Gabriella grabbed her sword hilt out of instinct and then released it in disgust, remembering her sword could not harm humans. She shouted instead “Why don’t you leave him alone, you big…overgrown …zit!”

“My, my Gabby, those are tough words from a guard of your caliber.”

Gabriella spun around and scowled at Aaron. “At least my charge isn’t following Mikey around like a love-sick girl!”

“I know, I know! I’ve been trying to knock some sense into him. Yesterday, when Mikey threw a rock at him, I didn’t even block it. You’re lucky Gabby.” Aaron nodded at Tommy. “He’s a good boy.” Aaron noticed Tommy’s newest bruise, compliments of Lorraine. “Accident prone, but basically a good boy.”

“Oh, look,” continued Mikey. “Here’s a little dollhouse for your dolls. Let’s see how it holds up to enemy attack.” With that, he kicked the carefully constructed fort until it was nothing but a sand dune. Then he picked Tommy up by his collar.

“Sorry, Gabby,” said Aaron. “Looks like it’s going to be a tough day.”

Gabriella landed on the ground in front of Tommy and prepared to protect him from as many impending blows as possible.

“You know what we do to little boys like you who play with dolls?” said Mikey. “We teach them a lesson. Don’t we, fellas?”

The other boys nodded, and the lesson began. Gabriella tried her best to stop the blows, but unfortunately they used their fists instead of sticks or stones, and she could not stop fists. Once they finished, Mikey picked up Tommy’s glasses and broke them in half. He threw them at Tommy, but Gabriella flicked them away.

“Tiny Tommy Crybaby!” Mikey yelled.

The other boys laughed and joined in. “Crybaby, crybaby, wah, wah, wah!”

Their war cry ignited Gabriella’s temper. She picked up a rock and prepared to hurl it directly at Mikey’s temple. Aaron’s sword stopped her hand. “Can’t do that Gabby,” he said. “Chapter N, Line Fifty-Nine, ‘No attacking a human without direct orders’.”

Gabriella glared at Aaron and prepared to launch the rock at Mikey again. This time, Aaron flew in her path. “Gabby, Tommy doesn’t need you court-martialed. Elysia will probably assign Lucas to him, and he’s way out of practice.”

He pointed at Lucas, a frail, sniveling guard who smiled sweetly as he presided over the imaginary tea party below. Lucas guarded Jennifer the Perfect, Jennifer the Quiet, Jennifer the Tea Party Queen. Little Jennifer had barely experienced a paper cut, and Lucas constantly bragged about her current injury-free streak of 115 days.

“Tommy would die in a week,” added Aaron.

Gabriella let the rock fall out of her hand just as Mikey turned and walked away. The other boys followed, and their guards flew behind them and scolded them for their unkind behavior. “I hope Ritchie gets the flu and dies!” Gabriella yelled as Aaron flew past.

“He didn’t really help, Gabby!”

“Oh, great! He’s nothing but a neutral faun! A nymph! A gnome!”

Aaron threw up his arms. “I can’t do anything with him. He won’t listen to his own mother, much less me.” He turned to his charge, who struggled to keep up with the rest of the gang. “If you keep this up, I’m going to stay out of your next tee-ball game!”

Gabriella knelt in front of Tommy and wrapped her arm around his shoulders. “It’s okay, big guy. You’ll beat all of them on the next test.”

Tommy wiped away a stray tear and searched for his American Heroes as best he could without his glasses. Gabriella looked at his growing pile of action figures. One, two, three—he had found six of them.

“He should have seven,” she muttered. “Who are you missing? Who are you missing? Ah! Admiral Jackson.” The admiral was Tommy’s favorite piece. “You’re not going to take it well if you don’t find him, are you?” She landed on the ground and began searching through the sand for the admiral.

Tommy wiped his bloody nose with his arm. “I’b dot a crybaby,” he sniffed, and he wiped away another tear.

“Don’t cry on me,” Gabriella said. “They’ll only laugh at you more if you cry.”

Tommy started to wail.

“We’ll find it, big guy. Don’t worry!” She found the lost admiral under a rock and threw it in Tommy’s direction.

Tommy’s eyes brightened instantly. He wiped more blood from his nose as he picked up the action figure. “Adbiral Jacksod and his teab of SEAL warriors survive yet adother vicious attack.” He gathered his men into his knapsack and struggled to stand up. Then he grimaced and grabbed his wrist.

Gabriella glanced at the teachers, who had missed the commotion, as usual. She rolled her eyes. “If I did my job as well as you, I’d be cleaning the stables of Azernoth for a year!” she yelled.

A bird sang in a nearby tree. Gabriella narrowed her eyes. It was a sparrow, and she would not be surprised if it was the same horrible sparrow that bit her the day before. She grabbed the rock she had dropped earlier and threw it at the sparrow with surprising strength and accuracy. The bird squawked—and alerted the teachers to Tommy’s predicament. They ran over to Tommy and helped him stand up. After hearing what happened, they rounded up Mikey and his cronies and sent them to Lemon Head’s office.

As the teachers fawned over poor Tommy, Gabriella detected a smell that sent chills down her spine—the putrid, burning, sulfur smell that indicated one of two things: either Mr. Fulton’s chemistry class had a little too much fun earlier or a mornacht was lurking somewhere in the vicinity. She scanned the area, and her eyes rested in the tree where the sparrow still perched, only now a decrepit monster with a pair of withered, flightless wings and leathery skin that looked as though it had dried up and decomposed ages ago sat next to the sparrow. Its eyes feasted on Tommy.

Gabriella sounded a blast on her trumpet, tossed off her cloak, grabbed her bow, and took aim. Unfortunately the Code forbade her to fire until the mornacht crept within fifty feet of her charge—a side effect of one of Seraph Salla’s peace accords. The mornachts loved the rule and often circled a human from fifty-one feet just to frustrate, or even distract, his guard.

The guards unsheathed their swords and joined her. “What’s up, Gabby?” asked Aaron. “Did someone—?” Aaron stopped as soon as the sulfuric odor hit his nose. “Where is it?”

“In that tree,” Gabriella said without taking her eyes off the mornacht. Soon the other guards arrived ready for battle.

“It’s okay,” Aaron said to the rest of the guards. “He’s just a scout, and a nasty looking one at that.” Scouts rarely attacked; they only watched and reported. “Gabby’s got her eye on him, too.”

The guards relaxed. Gabriella’s impeccable aim won every archery contest they ever held when Mrs. Gatch’s classes were too boring.

The scout realized his presence was known. He leapt out of the tree and bounded away.

“How long was he there?” asked Lyla.

“Probably a while,” said Lucas. “The wind has been blowing the other direction, and most of you were too busy worrying about Tiny Tommy Crybaby to pay attention.”

Gabriella shoved her arrow back in her quiver and donned her cloak, this time making sure to fit her wings through its wing-holes. She snapped it securely ensuring she could reach for her arrows if the mornacht decided to return. “I’m surprised you, of all cherubians, found a tea party so intriguing that you missed its foul stench, Lucas.”

“Um, guys?” interrupted Lyla. “Our charges are about to leave.” She pointed to the children, who had lined up and were beginning to walk back inside. The guards quickly turned and flew after them.

“What do you think it wants,” Aaron asked Gabriella as they flew back.

“I don’t know.”

“It’s probably scouting Mikey,” said Lyla. “The boy’s a walking nightmare.”

“Great,” said Aaron. “Just what we need. Mikey with a Morvenian sidekick.”

Gabriella kept her disagreement to herself. She suspected that the scout was after something else, and she hoped it was anything but her Tommy.

•

A hawk perched on a pine branch above the schoolyard and watched as the mornacht finally left his sight. He let out four loud caws. Soon another hawk landed next to him. He told the new hawk all he had seen. The second hawk jumped off the branch and soared high into the air and on to the City of Ezzer.

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Copyright © 2006 M. B. Weston. All rights reserved.
Revised: 02/06/09