“Yes, he remembers everything….” I answered in a barely audible voice. “And his sister?”

“Seven is still among them,” my mother answered, her eyes filling with tears. “We don’t know what happened really…. Seth was too young to offer much information, and Seven chose the Darkness. Aliah is believed to be the traitor, but whether Seven had a hand in it or not, we might never know. And maybe it’s better that way.”

“But how could she? How could she betray her parents…. her little brother?” I demanded, hot tears threatening to spill once again.

“We don’t know,” my father answered. “Except that the Darkness is very alluring, she could have been manipulated into thinking a million different things. Or…. some of us are more bent toward evil than others. Just like you’ve seen in humanity, sometimes there isn’t much of a push needed at all for a person to choose darkness over light. We are all different, all created for different purposes. Seven believed the lie that her fate was held by the Darkness.”

“Has anyone seen her since?” I gasped, wiping at a lone tear that had slipped out of the corner of my eye.

“Jupiter,” even my father’s voice shook with the pain of those circumstances. “A few years after the incident, he found her outside their apartment one night, watching Seth. He approached her, thinking she might have changed her mind and needed a place to stay, but she fought him instead. They both walked away, it wasn’t much of a skirmish; she was trying to get away from him more than anything. Jupiter thinks she just wanted to check on Seth though. If she had come to take him or hurt him, she would have brought others. She was alone and never returned after that.”

I shivered violently, thinking about the depraved fallen Star, watching her unsuspecting brother. How creepy…. like something out of a horror movie.

“Seth has been through a lot, Stella,” my father continued, and the truth of his words rang clearly in the otherwise quiet house. “He trusts you though, he let you in. I think that says a lot about his character and what he’s willing to risk for this future you two have together.”

“But she’s still out there?” I asked, swallowing the lump rising in my throat. “I mean…. somewhere, on this planet, his sister is out there?”

“Yes,” my mother replied solemnly.

“And this…. Aliah guy…. what do you know about him?” I sucked in my bottom lip, chewing distractedly until I tasted blood.

“He was a good Warrior,” my mother continued. “I fought with him before I met your father, years ago. There were no signs of Darkness, nothing in his behavior or conduct that would have given the High Council any reason to suspect him. He fought with the best. He and Ethan were very good together in the field, and when Ethan was stationed on planet, Aliah requested a closer position so that they could still work together. When or how Aliah defected is unclear, as are his intentions with Sitara and Ethan. We don’t know if he always planned to kill them or because there was a struggle he saw no other option.”

“Do you think Aliah thought Seth’s parents would turn too? Or do you think he was after Seth the entire time?” I pressed, needing answers that I knew they couldn’t give me.

“Your guess is as good as ours, honey,” my mother pulled me closer, into her so that my head rested on her shoulder.

“I just can’t imagine what he went through….” I sighed, relishing in the closeness of both of my parents.

“Thank God for that,” my father muttered, a hard line appearing in his forehead.

I stood up slowly, suddenly feeling utterly exhausted. I said goodnight to my parents and made my way up to bed. But even with heavy eyelids and a tired soul, sleep didn’t find me for a long time.

When it finally did come, I was back at Lincoln’s farm, fighting my first battle with the Shadows. They surrounded me in the dream world, thicker than smoke and more deadly than ever. I fought hard, wielding my two katanas and keeping my enemies expertly at bay.

Seth wasn’t there though, he wasn’t fighting with me or lighting up the field with his inner sun. I looked for him desperately, needing help, but more worried about him than anything.

A gurgled moan drew my attention to the tree line where a dim light lay awkwardly across the frozen field. I fought to get to it, to find out what it was and when I finally drew close I saw the broken form of Seth laying lifelessly in a pool of his own blood, his light extinguishing with every passing second.

She cackled then, her evil, taunting laugh ringing clearly in the night sky. My head snapped up to find a beautiful young woman, with flowing, golden brown hair that curled in soft waves all around her. Her clear, luminous skin lit up the dark sky around her as if she had never turned her back on the light and almond-shaped, honey colored eyes stared at me with a mixture of pure, unadulterated hate and sinister evil.

She moved lithely across the snow, her face still a haunting image of dark amusement until she stood over her brother, her pointed heel at his throat. She looked down at him with pity for only a second before sweeping down to him, pressing her mouth close to his ear. She whispered something I couldn’t understand, even in the realm of my own dream world and then lifted a dagger the size of her palm, its silver blade glinting in the moonlight.

I stood paralyzed watching, frozen by the horror of the moment. Before a scream could even rise in my throat she had sliced the dagger across Seth’s perfect neck, the crimson blood pouring savagely from his body.

I fell to my knees in agony, knowing our greatest Warrior had fallen at the hands of his sister, his own flesh and blood. And when I reached out to touch his body he turned to black, sulfuric smoke, rising up from the blood-stained snow and drifting back to the army of Shadows waiting for me.

I looked up at Seven, her amber colored eyes mirror images of her brother. A menacing smile twisted her lips and she raised her dagger slowly. I reached for the katana I had dropped next to me, but in its place was a Shadow instead. It sliced at my hand, ripping open my palm and sending dangerously cold shooting pain through every one of my veins.

Suddenly the Shadows were descending on me from every direction, obscuring my vision and tearing open my flesh. In the seconds it took for me to register the loss of my weapon, she had already walked through the wall of evil with the cool, calm, collectedness of a woman completely at ease with her surroundings. She was older than me by several years, but something in her mannerisms, in her giddy excitement with the depravity surrounding us made her seem young…. made her seem deranged. She cocked her head to one side, looking me over with a waning boredom before lifting the same dagger that killed Seth high above her head and plunging it straight into my heart. Before I felt the pain of her knife blade, I registered the sheer joy she took from destroying something. And then the agonizing pain of death swept over me, pulling me into a blackness so deep I knew there was no recovery.

I awoke, panting and shaking, gripping at the covers around me. My long hair was plastered to my face in a sheen of sweat and I swallowed against the images that felt like awful, traumatizing reality.

It was a dream.

Only a dream.

But two things were clear to me. Seven was after her brother’s life. And without Seth, I would fall.

Chapter Twelve

“Are you ready for this?” Seth shouted over the rush of air pounding past my ears.

I looked down at the obscure Earth flashing miles beneath my feet and then looked back at him. I nodded once, confidently; then I reached for the two katana swords strapped to my back and whipped them out as we slowed down midair, still hidden by cloud cover.

I could hear the sounds of battle and the movement of Serena and Nate illuminated by the soft glow of their inner lights even through the hazy fog of clouds. The strong smell of sulfur, like death and rotten eggs, drifted upward and filled my nostrils even this far above the carnage below.

Serena called us into help tonight and so Seth and I had showed up to offer backup. And she actually called us, with a cell phone. Phone communications had been previously deemed as unnecessary risks, but with the shortage in our natural communication skill we broke protocol to ensure we could communicate with each other. I called it the “Bat Phone” but nobody else seemed to get the joke. Nate and Serena were new to Earth and Seth had been raised in apparent neglect and without Nick at Night. Regardless, Jupiter kept the high-tech phone with him at all times, in case Serena and Nate needed our help or vice versa.

Seth gave me a wicked smile and then swooped toward the barren ground beneath us, his favorite cutlass, pirate swords flailing. We were meeting the temporary Protector and her Warrior somewhere over the remote villages of East Africa, currently in the process of taking on a horde of Shadows. We hadn’t even made it to solid ground before the angry demons swept up to meet us, their dark figures concealing Serena and Nate and the light the Angels fought with while we engaged in battle.

My swords glided gracefully around my body as I let my instincts take over, even hovering midair, and my skin heated with the healthy glow that would burn my attackers. I was so much more prepared this time around, my movements felt natural, strong and confident. A few Shadows snuck up on me, especially the back of my thighs and calves, which seemed to be areas of my body that were harder to protect, but I was fighting back, becoming a force to be reckoned with.

I fought through the Shadows that had come against me in the air until my feet were firmly planted on the dry African soil. Being on the ground gave me a clearer view of how Seth, Serena and Nate were doing, which was well except for the sheer number of Shadows, the foot soldiers of the Darkness.

Serena had the power to light up as bright as any Star in the sky and banish them all away, but there were after-effects to becoming a miniature version of the sun in the middle of a planet and it was safest for humanity if we fought and killed them the old fashioned way. Besides, it was always better to kill something outright than let it hide away in the darkest places of space, festering in evil, until it found another opportunity to attack. Not that our light couldn’t kill them either but it was like our version of a nuclear attack, both sides understood we were capable of it, but because our side respected and loved not only the planet but its inhabitants there was no way we would ever use our light on planet so drastically.

I sunk my blade into the chest of another Shadow and turned my head for a millisecond to avoid the black, acidic spray of sticky blood that splashed crudely when I removed my sword to sink it into another Shadow. I glanced up at Seth, never once stopping the movement of my arms as Shadows surrounded me from every direction. He illuminated the darkness around him, lighting up the night sky as his body worked and fought against evil. His strong biceps flexed with each sword thrust and met his mark expertly every time. His brow furrowed in concentration and his lips pressed together both as a sign of focus and because nobody wanted to accidentally get Shadow blood in their mouth. It was awful…. and tasted worse.

Feeling my eyes on him, he looked up at me, arms still swinging, swords still finding their marks and smiled his wide grin. His eyes twinkled with success and his skin heated even more, brightening the glow around him and sending Shadows shrieking from exposure.