Awakening (Children of Angels) by Jessica Gibson Page A

only Angel Child that ever lived - on our side. There is another Angel Child out there, a boy. He was born before you, but he was born to them . I see you are hurt and surprised - I suppose you think I lied to you? ” she smiled wryly.

    Mia nodded, then, burst out “you did lie” she wrenched her hand back from Leonara, and sat glaring at her with narrowed eyes “What was the point of the lie? Why would it matter if there were others like me or not?”
    “ I did not lie Mia. I did not disclose certain facts, that is true, and this has upset you and endangered you and for that Mia I am sorry. But I ’ ll tell you now. I will explain it all, lay my cards on the table, as humans say. And then you can decide for yourself what it is that you want to do about it all. Does that sound fair? ” Reluctantly, Mia nodded, and Leonara continued to speak, an expression falling over her face as though she were in a dream-like trance. “ We were not the only ones who realized that an Angel Child would prove to be a valuable asset. The Others knew it too, and they tried just as hard as we did to make it happen. They succeeded before us, and we never knew how they managed it. We had no idea how many Children they had managed to create. To this day, we have only ever found one - just him .

    And so there are just you two. One boy for them, one girl for us. They kept their boy close, raised him throughout his life, taught him of Truths and of what he is - right from birth until this day. I knew he would be far ahead of you, in terms of his abilities, it stands to reason. But I did not realize he was so powerful that he could break into my Truths. That should not be.” She whispered the last, pausing thoughtfully. Mia waited a few moments, then coughed gently to prompt Leonara to continue. She did so, after briefly refocusing on Mia, then returning to her trance-like state. “We continued our efforts to create a child, the need all the greater for knowing they had managed it, and that they now held a great weapon that could be used against us at any time. We did not know how the Child would grow, whether it would age as a human, whether it would age faster or slower than a human, or whether it would simply come into adulthood as soon as it was born. For all we knew, they were already working with it against us.

    We managed to keep a track on him for a year or so, after which we lost him - they learned that we were watching, and took greater measures to hide him. Eventually it became too hard and too dangerous to track him through all the Truths. And we lost many from our cause, for wherever they were found by us, then his protectors found a way to banish us - banish our people forever, our equivalent of human death, I suppose. It was a time of great loss. In that time though, we learned that he seemed to be growing just as a human child would. That gave us some time and some hope.

    And then finally we had you, and although we had lost track of him and did not know what his powers were, how advanced he was, how strong he was, we knew that we would at least have some chance now. Once they knew that we had an Angel Child, they would not be so quick to attack. Even as a newborn baby, you would have been a good shield for us. I know, it was wrong to think we could use you like that. And of course, you know, it did not turn out the way we had hoped anyway. You were as lost to us as he was.

    We feared that you had been killed by them, as had been your mother’s plan, when she took you away from us that night. We tried to find her, but she had slipped through so many different Truths, and the trail was cold by the time we found out what had happened. They had gotten to her, poisoned her mind against us somehow - convinced her that you were an abomination, that we should not be allowed to have you. And for some reason, whatever reason, she believed them and betrayed us all.

    How the boy found you, I do not know. I am certain I was not