Chapter 3
Somebody Told Me-The Killers

"What did you read! What did you read?" She screamed at me and advanced quickly, her hands outstretched in anger. I glanced around wildly before my eyes rested on the tree branch. I stepped back, almost nervously until I hit into the vanity, diving down before brandishing my branch wildly. She laughed and I stared her down. She knew I wasn't crazy enough to hit her with anything, I knew I wasn't crazy enough to hit her with anything.

I could glare though, so I glared.

"What have you been hiding?" I menaced.

She immediately became defensive, crossing her hands over her chest.

"Nothing."

Well, there was logic for you.

I dropped my branch (my arms relieved at the loss of the weight) and attempted to brush past her.

"Eva. I know—I mean, I've tried…well, maybe you should just read it yourself."

I didn't really want to know what it said now, I realized. I was better off not knowing why we moved all the time. All the freaking time.

Why I always had to—

Lose all my friends.

Go to new schools.

Start all over again.

Leave.

"Give me that." I snapped, grabbing the letter she'd managed to take out from the drawer while I was meditating on my choice whether to find out or not.

I almost tore it as I opened it angrily.

I shouldn't, didn't even really want to, but I had to know.

And so I read.

Dear Liana,

My time is slowly decreasing,
I'd appreciate your help,
The age of your daughter is increasing,
She will be my little whelp.

We'll start with some odd jobs,
And then once upon a time,
She'll have to take me over,
As I slowly die.

So my dear Liana,
You've run from me all this time,
But soon after you and she get this letter,
Your daughter will be mine!

To Work!

Forever!

Ha-Ha!

Yours truly,
Hera. The (Soon to be Former!) Angel of Distress

I stared at my mother, many things running through my head. Was this a joke? Some sort of prank? Did anyone honestly write such terrible poetry?

I couldn't not recognize the title of the person (Hera, I guess) who'd written this letter. The Angel of Distress—my mother had told me about her years ago, and I'd remembered her because it was the only even faintly magical thing my mother had ever talked to me about. This in itself was strange (I've told you about my mother's obsession with the Weird and the Mystical. Totally hardcore. Not), but even more so because she'd seemed rather desperate when she told me about this Angel. Once again, it was odd, odd, odd.

"God, I knew this would happen. She just doesn't quit. Are you taking it okay, honey? I didn't want to—I mean, you're so young, but you have a right—"

Um.

They was real? Angels? I'd spent my whole life pretending (and wishing. And er, praying, just in case) that the supernatural did exist. Everywhere I'd lived I'd done research about Fantasy-types, I'd visited ghost hostels, I'd gone to mediums—and now my Mother, practical, annoyingly uptight, was telling me that the very same Fantasy-types she'd dismissed my whole life (well, at least some of them) did exist!

I didn't know whether to be ecstatic or just really, really freaked out. It was probably a mixture of both. Or just the last one.

This all ran through my head as I stared hard at the piece of paper, trying to understand what was in front of me.

Could this be real?

Or was my mother playing some sort of joke? Trying to tease me because of my beliefs? She wasn't that great a writer—this crap poem thing could have been written by her.

Should I call her out on it?

Go along with the BS?

Cry?

I settled for exclaiming, very loudly, "Are you freaking kidding me?"

She didn't even bat an eye at my language, just bit her lip and nodded.

"And what the hell is a whelp?"

She averted her eyes and started muttering, rocking back and forth on her heels as she schooled her expression into blankness.

"Oh er, nothing."

"No I mean it. She wants me to become her whelp? What the hell is that?"

"Well, you know—"

"Mom!"

"Agh! A whelp is like a—well an apprentice of an important otherworldly being that basically takes the place of said important otherworldly being at the time of said important otherworldly being's death. You know, kind of like an inheritor of the job."

"But, this Angel—God, an angel—wants me to be her whelp? Is—is that why we've moved around so much, because of these letters? I'd always thought it was someone we owed money to, or something…"

"But now you know why we have to leave! So since you're aware of this, we can just hop on a plane, I've already got tickets, and I've heard Tahiti has lovely beaches this time of year—"

"Wait, Mom." I sighed.

"Hmm, honey?" She stopped talking, her colour high as she fidgeted.

"I don't want to move."

"But darling, she'll know you've seen the letter, she'll want to start looking for us—"

Darling. What a funny word. She never used it before.

"I don't want to be her whelp. I—I love this stuff. Mythical stuff. But I don't really want to be an apprentice-thing, and why anyway? I mean why do I have to be this—anyway. I don't want to move. So can't we like, talk to her and tell her to choose another whelp?"

She smiled, and I noticed in that instant how rarely my Mother smiled. I didn't blame her. Usually around her I looked like the most angsty, pissed-off teenager in existence.

"Oh honey,"—again with the strange endearments!—"It's not something you can help! Being the Angel of Distress is your destiny. There have been AoDs since the beginning of the birth of Man. Man has always been greedy, you know. Always wanting what they can't have."

"But the Angels kill people, don't they! You told me that! They could prevent people from—from killing themselves, and they help!" I remembered every word from the story she'd told me in that instant.

"The original Angel really did want to help people. She tried hard, so hard, just to give people the riches and be done with it! But there have always been suicides, and there have always been people desperate for money. Some even try to seek the Angels out. They hear tales, myths, and they search for her, some even going so far as to attempt to kill themselves for a chance to receive the treasure. They always think they will be the one to break the chain—the one to receive the tumultuous gifts. But they aren't, of course."

I frowned.

"But—weren't they going to kill themselves anyway?"

"No."

"But they were going to commit suicide!"

"No, it is the weak-minded ones the Angel is called forward to present with the treasure. The people who wouldn't have done it, who were sketchy and wishy-washy about their plans for death. Someone could have prevented them from killing themselves. The Angel could have prevented them from doing so. But it is her curse."

"Curse? What? Where the hell did a freaking curse come from? Like five minutes ago it was all 'no these things do not exist, shut up about mythical crap, Eva' and now it's all 'shyeah angels exist! And they are cursed! How the hell could you not freaking know that?' You're telling me curses exist! God Mom, way to lay it on me."

"Watch your mouth, Eva, before I watch it for you."

I tried really, really hard not to roll my eyes. I couldn't stop the scoff, though. My mom is a total idiot.

"But you know now! You can't possibly want to go around killing people, Eva! You're a bit rude and you really can get murderous when I use your mascara—"

She does make a very good point, my mother.

"—But I don't think you'd have the cajones to take someone's life!"

Cajones. Another weird word. Kind of like moxie.

"It's not about cajones! I just don't want to kill anybody. Honestly. And I mean, would I still have to go to school if I was the Angel of Distress? I mean, surely that's in the fine print somewhere—like, teenage Angels must not be allowed to go to school…come on!"

My mother blinked. "You can't seriously be making this out to be a good thing, Eva. It's crazy and it's murder."

"But what if someone succeeds? What if they receive this great treasure—which I'm totally confused about, by the way—"

"Oh please, Eva, don't tell me you are even considering this, this massacre. Don't be ridiculous. I've got the plane tickets all arranged, and all we have to do is—"

"No."

I wasn't running away again. I wouldn't miss New Jersey if I had to leave—I hadn't even been here long enough to care about leaving. To even think about it. I just didn't want her to control our lives anymore. This sender-of-letters, who I had no idea about until just a minute ago, for heaven's sakes, was going to change my life again? She was just going to displace my mom and me for the nth time without us having any say in the matter.

No. I was definitely not running away.

"I want to talk to her." I said firmly.

She blinked at me once before smiling weakly.

"Ha-ha, Eva. You want to talk to her?"

"Yes."

"I can't let you do that, Eva." My mother stared at me, and a strange light lit up in her eyes, even as her face changed from its look of disbelief into a sudden, calculated cruelty.

Damn. How was I supposed to contact old Hera when I didn't even know her address.

"I'll find out, Mother. I'm a big girl, you can't really stop me anymore—"

"Yeah, I can, actually."

"And how exactly are you planning to do that?" I rolled my eyes big-time then, unable to show any respect for her.

Five minutes and a locked door later, I got my answer.

But I wasn't fazed. That was a mere damper in my plans. I was going to find this Angel of Distress, and I was going to ask her what the hell she really wanted me to do. I was also going to try my damn hardest not to let the stupid bitch get what she wanted.

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A/n- Ok, Chapter 3's up late, and I don't know what to say other than sorry? This one was difficult to write because of the explaining part, mostly. So next chapter up soon! Thanks again to Mister Black and Amoneus Ignis for reviewing!
-A