Realm of Wings

Flying to Lhasa airport, Tibet:

Sister Margaret had told me to open the journal when I was on the plane, to stall her some time to get ready for this call. She knew that the moment I would read that sentence, I would want to speak to her immediately.

“You already read through it?” She answered only after two rings. I didn’t respond to her question though, as she knew that I had, otherwise I wouldn’t be calling her from the plane. “I- I don’t know where to begin. This information is only transferred from mouth to mouth and you know how short sister Schmitt was in her days.” She started to excuse herself, still rather reluctant to tell me anything, even though she was going to anyway.

“Just tell me what she told you.” I told her.

“Right, well… Jade, you are not from Earth.” She started and I raised my brows. I mean, I haven’t seen or heard about anyone else that could do the things that I could, but even so… Not from Earth?

“You are what Sister Schmitt called a…” And she stopped mid-sentence, again reluctant to tell me what she wanted to say, as it must have been sounding preposterous to her. “…a fairy.” She continued in a whisper.

“A what now?” I asked her rhetorically, as I perfectly understood what she had said. Well, I had heard what she had said, but definitely didn’t understand what the meaning behind it was.

A fairy? Is she drunk from the pastor’s wine or something? Aren’t fairies like the most delicate, tiny, winged, little and cute creatures that are found in those Disney movies? Oh for fuck’s sake, I’m no fucking fairy! I can fight, have killed, never lost a battle, have scars on my face and body… I’m no freaking, delicate dragonfly!

“Yes it is hard to digest, I don’t know how to feel about it either. Yet, as your father had shown what he was towards Sister Anselma, showing his orb of light and then explaining to her that he had been alive for over six hundred years already, she couldn’t deny herself to believe it to be true when you shot your ball of light at the age of six.” She said knowing that I couldn’t argue with that.

“But who was my father? Where did he come from? Why did he leave me behind at the Conclave?” I pushed all my questions forward, at which I could hear Sister Margaret sigh. “And by the way, a fairy? Don’t fairies know how to fly? I can’t fly!” I continued and I could hear the shuffling of her feet, as she was probably walking around in her office now.

“Jade, I don’t know! I’ve had these same questions too and I guess that Sister Anselma had known the answers, but you know how Sister Schmitt was like. I still believe that Sister Schmitt has kept secrets towards me about you, but I couldn’t prove it and eventually, she died along with those secrets in the cell underneath the Conclave.” She said, blurting out something that I wasn’t supposed to hear as sister Margaret gasped her mouth shut right after.

“You’ve kept her in the cells?! You said she was persecuted and died soon after! If you had told me about her I would have come back and squeezed the information out of her myself!” I yelled at her, at which Neil sprung up in his chair, wide awake from my outburst.

It was silent on the other end of the phone, for a minute or so, before Sister Margaret started again.

“And that is why I was so reluctant to tell you more. Because I had made a mistake. I had thought that I could get the information myself, but she never let go of anything else. I’m sorry.” She apologised.

“You are sorry, of course, now everything is all just fine.” I sarcastically remarked. “So, you have no further information?” I snapped at her. “All you have given me is that I could walk this earth for another five hundred years at least; my father was also someone that could shoot balls of light; and that he is a fairy- correction, we are fairies. That’s all?” I asked her incredulously.

“Well, yes… actually.” She replied

“And I couldn’t have read the journal earlier, because…” I dragged out.

“…because I was afraid you’d yell through the basement and let every other nun know about your origin too.” She finished.

“Well, you were right about the yelling part, but I still know nothing of my origin! Other than the fact that I have a name for my being now!” I yelled again and nearly crushed my phone along with it.

Neil knew better than to argue about my volume right this moment, but he was still trying to hush me by moving his flat hand a little up and down, urging me to calm. I stood up from my chair and walked towards him, threw the phone in his lap and got myself into the bedroom of the plane. I let myself drop on the pillows and decided that I needed some sleep.

“A fairy.” I scoffed unbelievably. “And next thing I know, wings will pop up out of my shoulders!” I laughed sarcastically and forced myself to take a few hours of rest.

“Miss Jade?” Neil’s voice softly awoke me from my sleep. “We have landed at the airport.” He continued at which I groaned.

I got up from the bed, cleaned my face from my drool by just wiping it off with the sleeve of my shirt, then I put on my black leather boots, which I couldn’t have remembered to have taken off, but still stepped into again. Neil must’ve come in here to check if I were okay and then helped me to get rid of them, I suppose.

Neil had walked out of the bedroom already and when I was done I followed behind. He stood at the door of the plane, holding a thick coat with fur lining and a large hood on the back. “What is it out there, minus twenty?” I smiled. “Minus seven degrees Celsius, miss.” He countered and I cursed, I hate the cold!

I pushed my arms through the holes as Neil, as the gentlemen he is, held it up for me and then walked out of the plane. The cold wind instantly blew against my face at which I closed the coat tight against my ears and clutched the railing of the stairs to make my descent down.

“So, fairies?” Neil dared to ask when we were finally in the warm temperature of the car, which had luckily been turned on earlier. I scoffed at his remark, still not truly believing that I’m one of those mythical creatures. Sure, werewolves and vampires were real, so why shouldn’t fairies be? But shit, I’m a cursing, killing, light orbs throwing, scarred bitch! Come on!

“Yes, can’t you see my beautiful wings?” I rolled my shoulders and fluttered my eyelashes, mocking the whole idea of being a fairy. Neil put a small smile on his face, one that I had rarely seen, but apparently, he liked this banter.

The car started to hum, as soon as all the luggage, including my weapons, had been loaded in the back. It was going to be a four-hour drive, so I had taken the time to get through some documents with Neil, as we hadn’t had the time to do that yet, as soon as we had left Brazil.

“So, the house is still mine, but is being rented out to the homeless and orphaned?” I asked him and he nodded. “And the alarm hasn’t shown any intruder yet?” He shook his head no. “Good, keep the local police on our payroll as I want to keep a non-stop surveillance car at the border of town.” I continued and he scribbled down his notes.

This went on for the time being and I also called the local authorities of Shigatse as I wanted to find out why there even were soldiers in Shigatse, to begin with. The soldier in the video hadn’t been talking, only screaming and shooting, but the goggles and the looks of the other soldiers there looked rather military and non-police to me. But of course, I couldn’t get very far through the phone and only reached the chief of police, but no other true authority, like the mayor or some sort of political figure.

And this chief of police hadn’t told me a thing, as he wasn’t even aware of military people in his town. I hung up the phone, right after his cursing in Chinese became so severe that I couldn’t bother myself to listen to it any longer. If only he would be standing in front of me, I only had to look him in the eyes and he would be singing a different song.

“They are American.” Neil suddenly said from behind his laptop. He had been studying the footage and was tearing it apart, frame by frame, using different tools to lighten the dark areas up and slowing the sounds and what not more.

“Of course they are.” I scoffed, knowing that only Americans were able to mingle people throughout the planet and put their noses into every single sort of political business. Besides my dislike for Americans, the current leader of the FBI wasn’t someone I liked in particular either. He had been sending his lackeys after me as my balls of light didn’t always go unnoticed, but of course, I had shaken them off as soon as I could have. But knowing that we were following this lead into a cold and distant place, following someone who could also shoot balls of light, it wouldn’t have taken much time for them to pop up here too. They probably thought they were following me, instead of another fairy that could do what I did.

Fairies… right.

“Yes, but it’s not the FBI this time. More like a hired group of men, as they are all wearing something different.” Neil said as he showed me the cleared images.

“Great, now we are being chased by some unknown party.” I murmured.

We had reached the hotel where we were going to stay at and I took my bags from the back of the car and walked up. After a good night’s rest, after installing ourselves and for Neil to continue his research about these hired guns and calling through his network of people, I went outside. Packed and ready, to visit the chief of police.