A Radiant Sky

24

We stood together in the middle of the field. “The way to find a Rebel,” Devin said, “is to follow your heart.”

I paused, waiting for more. “Like, literally?”

“Yes. Rebels are guided by emotion, so the way into the Rebel realm is different for each person. You’re tied to it by what’s meaningful for you. And what’s meaningful to you is Asher.”

“Uh, I don’t get it.” Once again, we had fallen back into our same old roles as student and teacher. I grinned at Devin, to see if he remembered, and surprisingly, he grinned back.

“You have to follow a treasure map of all the places that mean something to you. The places you made special, because you were there together and for no other reason. You have to retrace the story of you and Asher. From beginning to end.”

“That’s practical,” I said.

“Well, it’s the Rebellion. They’re a faction that was founded on the guiding principle that you should let emotion guide your decisions.”

Because war forces you to make choices. And so does love. Maybe Ardith had it right all along when she said, Love can drive an angel mad.

We should have listened to her then, but it was too late now. And if I could go back to the beginning, to the night I’d turned seventeen, I’d make all the same choices. I’d fall in love with Asher all over again.

My heart was pounding out a manic rhythm in my chest. It vibrated through me, thrumming in my bones.

“Okay,” I said. “Okay. The very first time I saw Asher was on the night of my seventeenth birthday party. I went outside to get some air, and there he was.” I smiled to myself. “Standing in the shadows.”

Devin grabbed my hand.

“What are you—”

“Just trust me,” he said.

Flash, we were standing outside of Love the Bean, shielding our eyes against the morning sun. I looked questioningly at Devin.

“You have to picture it. Bring yourself back.”

“Okay,” I said, closing my eyes. I let myself remember. “It was night . . .”

He stepped into the light.

Our eyes met, and something in the way he looked at me made me pause. The blackness of his eyes was magnetic, and something strange flickered through my own in response. I had the weirdest feeling of déjà vu.

It was dark where we stood on the street, but what moonlight there was shone on his face, exaggerating the definition of his cheekbones and illuminating his smooth olive skin. His short hair was so black that it was hard to tell where he ended and the night began. “You’re Skye, right?”

“I remember everything about it,” I said to Devin, still with my eyes shut. “It was the night that changed my life.”

“So do you make a habit of ducking out of your own parties?” Asher asked.

“Only when they’re thrown for me against my will. Do you make a habit of lurking outside of other people’s parties?” I shot back.

“Without question.” He grinned, showing off an adorable dimple. “You never know who you’ll meet.”

“This isn’t the place,” I said suddenly, opening my eyes.

Devin studied me. “No?”

“No. This is only where we met. It’s only the beginning. I wasn’t in love with him, here.” I paused, thinking about it. “It’s only a memory.”

“Okay then.” Devin grabbed my hand again.

Flash, we were on the front steps of school. I closed my eyes, and thought back to that morning. . . .

“I’m Asher.”

He held out a hand. I eyed him suspiciously. Slowly I reached my hand out as well. He met me halfway. When our hands touched, a tiny wave of goose bumps trailed up my arm. I quickly pulled away.

My eyes shot open. “Not here,” I said, beginning to feel the urgency.

“Ready to try the next place?” Devin asked.

“Yes, I’m ready.”

Flash, my fingers and toes were freezing, numb, and I was surrounded by iridescent ice. We had fallen beneath the snow in the side of the mountain. We were in the ice cave.

I could feel his chest against my back, his breath trace across my neck.

“Don’t freak out.”

I stared at our hands, resting on top of each other. How could I possibly feel more freaked out than I already was?

And then.

A small flame bloomed between my palms.

I was holding fire in the palm of my hand.

Slowly, I opened my eyes to face Devin. He looked at me questioningly.

I had realized something. I wasn’t just revisiting the story of me and Asher. It was also the story of how I came to be the version of myself who was standing here today, on the edge of a battle whose consequences were unfathomable. I had begun this journey as an uncertain teenager. I was ending it confident in who I was, a powerful angel ready to face my future.

Devin grabbed my hand.

Flash, the spring breeze skirted around us. There were mountains as far as the eye could see, and below us, the field where we’d spent so many days after school, practicing. We were on my roof.

I held my arms steady on either side for balance. Asher and I had sat up here together, looked out across an inky velvet sky, scattered with stars, as we watched our breath plume out into the bitter cold night. Now, I stared out at the early summer sky.

“Come on,” I challenged. “What are you, afraid of heights?” I kept climbing.

Soon I crested the roof ledge and crawled several feet across the sloping surface. Asher was right behind me. I pulled my knees to my chest and stared out at the stars. He sat down next to me. Our breath made clouds of steam in the freezing night air.

“Is that where angels are from?” I nodded at the stars.

He chuckled. “Nah. It’s really more of an alternate realm than a city in the sky. I’ve never even been there.” He looked up. “Anyway, the Rebellion camp is somewhere else.”

“Where?”

He looked pensive. “On earth, actually.”

“Where?” I asked.

“Far, far away.”

“This isn’t it,” I said, opening my eyes and turning to Devin. The sun was rising high in the sky, and I knew we didn’t have much time. Prom was that night—and I had to find Asher first. “I know where we have to go next. The closest I’ve ever been to my angelic history. The place where I learned about the Uprising, and my parents, and the Rogues—and who I was destined to become. It was also the place where everything changed between me and Asher.”

The sun reached the very center of the sky, a golden orb. It held hope for the future, but it also held a reminder that there are some things you can never escape, no matter how hard you try. Your past is what makes you who you are—no matter what your future holds.

“Where?” Devin asked.

“The cabin.”

Flash.

The woods around the cabin were silent and still, save for the chirping of a few birds, the rustling of the breeze in the dry, cracking branches of the trees. The cabin was there, just as we’d left it.

The weathered wooden door swung open easily when I pushed it. I stood there, in the threshold, but something kept me from going inside. We must have left a window open, somewhere in the house, when we left. The cool mountain air blew through it, creaking across the stairs like a ghost.

In some ways, the house was filled with ghosts. This was where the Uprising began, but it wouldn’t be where it ended. We’d moved so far beyond it.

The past didn’t have to be my future.

Devin held the door open for me, and we walked inside.

I closed my eyes and remembered it like it was yesterday. Snuggled into Asher on the threadbare couch, while a fire that we’d lit using our powers crackled reassuringly in the hearth.

“I missed you so much,” Asher whispered into my hair, stopping my thoughts. “I thought I was going to lose you.”

I brought my hand up to his face and smoothed a stray hair. “But you didn’t,” I said. “I’m here. I’m yours.”

He took my hand in his. “Can I . . . can I ask you something?” His voice shook slightly.

“Of course,” I said. “Anything.”

He paused and took a breath. “Join the Rebellion,” he said. His voice was barely a whisper. “We’ll fight the Order side by side. Whatever’s coming, we’ll face it together. We’ll be unstoppable. Fierce.”

I opened my eyes and looked around the room. Everything was where we had left it, the morning my friends and I left to start our own faction. The spring breeze blew through the open window, a reminder that the window was still open, and I went to close it. I glanced outside, remembered walking with Asher in the snow, an orb of fire to guide us through the Rebellion’s elemental charms, the snow and the fog. It was out there beyond the cabin that he’d first asked if he could show me something special to him, that he took me to see—

I turned so suddenly to Devin that his eyes grew panicked.

“What?” he said. “What is it?”

“The waterfall. We have to go to the waterfall. That’s it. That’s the place where I’ll find Asher. I know it.”

“Where is it?” Devin asked slowly, as if he could sense that this last place was different from all the others.

“I—I don’t know.”

On earth, actually. Far, far away.

Asher had deliberately not told me where. He thought I might go looking for it. Well, he was right. That’s what I was about to do.

On earth—but where? Someplace hidden away from human eyes, someplace special and powerful. A small corner carved out of the natural world, humming with magic. I just had to follow my heart.

“Can I just show you one thing?”

“Of course,” I said.

We were at the top of a huge cliff. Water spilled down over the side in huge, driving waves, pounding into a whirlpool below.

“Do you like it?” Asher asked.

I squeezed his hand. “You made this for me?”

“I made it because I didn’t know what to do with myself.”

I tried to remember how we’d gotten there. We were inside, on the couch, and then he asked if he could show me something. And then suddenly, there was this cold mist, and we were standing on a cliff overlooking the waterfall. I’d thought it was in these woods, but now I realized exactly where he’d taken me. He showed me something only he could reveal, that was accessible only through the depths of my emotions for Asher. A place that exists in the placeless, and a time in the timeless.

“The Rebellion camp,” I said out loud.

“So follow your heart,” Devin urged me. “That’s the only way.” He took my hand. “I’ll be there with you.”

There was something I wasn’t remembering. My heart sank as Ardith’s words from the first time I woke up in the cabin flooded my brain.

“If she does wake up, her powers will be much too unstable. They’ll collide with so much chaos. It could destroy us. Or her.”

“Devin,” I said. “It’s not safe for me to go there. My powers mixed with the Rebel chaos—it’s too volatile.”

He shook his head. “You’re more controlled now. You can do this.”

“Wait.” Panic began to rise up in my throat. “What if I’m not? What if it kills me?”

Devin looked at me sternly. I should have known that as a teacher, he never took no for an answer. “If you can’t do this,” he said sharply, “then you’re certainly not ready to fight a war.” His blue eyes sparkled. “Now.” Daring me to be great. “Are you ready?”

I had lived for so long by staying in perfect control, keeping my feelings in check, closing myself off, not allowing myself to fall. And my life was planned down to the smallest detail. I knew exactly where I wanted to go to college, and what I needed to do to get myself there. Everything was perfect. But in perfection, I didn’t feel alive. The only time I truly felt my blood pulsing through my veins was the time I spent on the slopes with the wind in my hair.

That was true, anyway, until I realized who I really was.

Until the first time I kissed Asher.

Now, I knew how it felt to let someone in, to really live. The only way to do that was exactly what I’d been avoiding—to fall and let it happen. I had to find him, and then, I had to let go of everything that held me back. This was one thing I couldn’t control.

Astaroth said that love was my weakness. It would get me killed.

If I had to choose between love and life, I knew I would choose love. I would choose love every time, even if it killed me. If it meant finding a way to be with Asher again.

I slipped my hand into Devin’s. “I’m ready,” I said.