Angel Dust by Aurora Morgenstern (summer beach reads .TXT) 📕

"Yes", he doesn´t even deny it. I feel a sudden burst of anger well up inside me, I know it´s not his fault but he left me here all by myself and then he comes back and bosses me around.

 "Listen up Michael, we have been over this. You promised you´d keep out of my head and I am not nursing you, I was merely offering you some fucking breakfast because I was bloody making some for myself anyway. If you have a problem with me rolling my eyes you better fucking get used to it, because I am not letting you bully me into behaving a certain way. Are we clear?", I explode at him. I usually don´t curse but he just made something inside of me snap completely. I feel enraged and find that i almost blame him for the way I have been feeling, I blame him for having those pictures and I feel like generally everything is his fault. I blame him for my despair even though it isn´t his fault in the least. He didn´t decide to make me an angel. He rises from his chair and walks over to me too quick for someone who just had a broken leg half an hour ago. I back away until my back touches the wall and he is mere inches from me. There is a sudden rush of adrenaline going through me and I feel like a cornered animal between him and the wall. His eyes bore down into mine with a uncontrolled anger that isn´t like him at all. 

"I said I would try, I am under no obligation to keep out of your mind, If I wanted to I could break your little mind into pieces, I could find out about all your dirty secrets and deepest feelings but I have the courtesy not to so I suggest you calm yourself and accept the fact that I can and will read your thoughts as I please. And you will watch the way you speak to me, I am your superior. I merely extend you a casual kindness, but I will not have you question my authority or disrespect me", he barely raises his voice and yet I feel myself almost tremble under his stare. The whole situation escalated much too quickly for my taste and I really wish he would move back a little to give me some space to move, I don´t like being cornered one bit. 

"Am I understood?", he asks sternly clearly expecting me to back down and start worshipping him and his greatness. Well you can forget that, you can stick your macho behaviour where the sun don´t shine...I think grimly, clearly aware that he can hear it in my mind. It´s quite a reckless move to defy him, considering I am relient on him but I am not going to let him push me around. Archangel or not. I may be a mental wreck, but I can stand ym ground when I have to. 

"Am I understood?", he repeats and I can feel an incredible heat coming from him. For a short moment I reconsider what I am about to say but then the stubborn side of me kicks in.

"No. I will not have you push me around. And as for this entire intimidation tactic don´t ever try to threaten me like that. You have no right to expect me to bow and obey your every command and I don´t care wether you are an archangel or human. I am not letting you push me around", I hiss the words between gritted teeth.

"Felice, I understand that you ahve your principals but I suggest you keep them to yourself. Down on earth this might have been a different story, up here things are different and you will have to get used to that. I am the authority here and I can´t trust you if you defy me and disrespect me. Now as a result of your actions I won´t take you out for flying and you will not leave the house without my permission until I can trust you to obey my orders. If you don´t like the way I teach I suggest you go and find yourself a different mentor. You can be glad your punishment is only that, Raphael is by far not half as understanding", this si different from teh Michael I have come to know. He sounds ruthless and almost cruel. While I am proud and stubborn I also know when it is time to surrender. I did not expect him to get quite as angry as I did and I certainly did not expect himt o start handing out punishments. I feel like a scolded child but I swallow the remark in the knowledge that argueing would not be the most sensible course of action right now. Not after he suggested I may go and leave, I have no one to go to so for the time being I will have to swallow my pride. 

"Understood", I mutter defiantly and he finally moves out of the way. Instead of making breakfast as I planed I snatch an apple from the basket and stalk upstairs without a word. If he treats me like a teenager I might as well act like one. I feel a little better in the small victory that I didn´t get into trouble over my small gesture of defiance. I hastily scrawl a little note to Nathaniel explaining the situation that I won´t be able to leave the house for a while and ask him with Gabriel ever gets like that. Then I open the window wide and call for his little bird messenger, the bird takes her sweet time and angrily pecks at my hand before taking the letter. Nathaniels reply comes within the space of five minutes and I have a hard time getting the letter from the bird.

Sometimes, but Michael´s the bigger douchebag. Then again he´s the biggest fish around so don´t get into too much trouble with him. Take it this way, he only said you couldn´t leave the house. -N 

I send my reply, trying to avoid the birds beak this time: Something´s wrong with your bird. She keeps pecking at me! I´ll try not to get into more trouble, he seemed incredibly pissed and to be honest finding a different place to stay in is not on my list of priorities. What do you mean he only said I couldn´t leave? - F 

What I mean is that he never said I couldn´t come into the house instead. He doesn´t even need to know I´m there ;) I´ll fix the problem with the bird...she gets very jealous. -N 

He replies to me and I smile at his sneakyness. It almost feels like a small conspiracy and a big fuck you to Michael. At any other time I would play it autious but depsite the fact that I backed down I am still incredibly angry with him. 

What are you waiting for then? Why would she be jealous? She´s a bird... - F

 Mere minutes later instead of a reply there is a knock on my window and I open the window wide. Nathaniel lands gracefully in the room and shuts the window behind him. 

"I don´t think Michael saw me, but let´s keep it down anyway", he says and gives me a suggestive wink. He´s got to stop doing that...friends don´t do suggestive winks like that! He takes a seat on my bed without asking me, but then again he slept here a day ago so I suppose we´re beyond that. He pats the space next to him and almost reluctantly I take the seat, a little too close to him for comfort. 

"Did Gabriel come back today as well?", I inquire eager for information and a distraction.

"He came back in quite a state. Don´t remember the last time he looked that bad...Gabriel usually doesn´t get into these sort of fights at all, but he got ambushed when he was delivering a message"

"You should have seen Michael! What could have done that much damage to two archangels? I mean unless all the literature I´ve been through is wrong, but aren´t archangels supposed to be the strongest of the celesitial beings?", I am very proud of myself for remembering the word celestial and smile a little at what i almost consider my own brilliance. Underneath all the tragic back story and confusion, there is a different person. Someone who is a little snappier and has a bigger ego, but she rarely ever comes through at all and I´m not even sure if I like that version of me all that much. She seems almost like my alter ego, confident, almost cocky and all too careless. However unlike me, she´s brave and she doesn´t care if she´s different. She likes being different, to be the outsider. The usual me is afraid of the dark and of being along, because the shadows scare me and the silence only wakes up all those thoughts I try so hard to surpress. 

"Celstial, fancy you with your new words. Yes and they are, nothing has ever managed to kill an archangel. We´re not even sure what would happen if one of them was to die and if it is possible for an ordinary angel to ascend to the rank of an archangel. Uriel is probably the closest thing", he explains.

"So you don´t know wether they can die at all?", I ask quietly. 

"We can´t tell for sure, but if Michael´s sword has the power it is believed to have it could potentially even kill an archangel", his voice is grim and his mouth set into a hard line. I have observed these changed in his expression for a while now, he will go from flirty and cheerful to a almost harsh grimness and rarely he will display a heartbreaking sadness. 

"So if this sword is so powerful, why did he not take it with him when he left? I assume he didn´t at least, he wouldn´t have come back looking like that if it is really all that powerful!", my voice sound soverly agitated and I can´t really tell why. Is it that despite his earlier behaviour the thought of Michael being hurt angers me? Admittedly I do care for him more than I like to admit, especially considering the way he acted earlier and yet I can´t deny the connection between us. I shake my head disbelievingly, trying not to slip into forgiving him just because he has this effect on me. 

"Wielding heavenly fire takes a great strain on the user, all power has its price and heavenly fire demands a high one. I also don´t think he was expecting to run into quite such a commotion of demonic activity. But can we for once just not talk about all this terrible political stuff and Michael?", if I didn´t know better I would say he´s jealous, but really knowledge is the one thing that gives me an advantage in this world. I need to know these things and I always just assumed that Nathaniel didn´t mind me asking him about it, seems like I might have thought wrong. 

"Oh alright, I´m sorry. Tell me something about yourself then!", I encourage him with a small smile. I can see that my request gives him at least a tiny bit of satisfaction from the short gleam in his eyes.

"Let me show you something cool, instead of telling you...how about I show you?", without waiting for a response he takes my hand and a rapid succession of images nearly explodes inside my head.

A cacophony of noises around me, people talking, the sound of carriages and hooves and in the distance a train. The sounds overlap and I take a minute to adjust before I can begin to examine my surroundings. The people around me are dressed in  victorian dresses and business looking suits, obviously upper class citizens going about theur business. The houses enveloping the cobblestone road grand and