Fallen Angel

By Matthew L Williams

Just who and what is the winged stranger that drops so dramatically into the lives of nine year old Ninah Blair, her family, and the small rural town of Haven? A messenger from God, perhaps? Or maybe he is the cold blooded killer that the eerie grey suited men pursuing him claim him to be. Seeking answers only drags them all ever deeper into a deadly game of cat and mouse with a shadowy government agency. This game will steadily grow to engulf the entire town. They're all playing for the highest stakes - life or death.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Matthew L Williams
• Release date: Sep 3, 2012
• ISBN: 9781476414287

Matthew L Williams

Matthew was born in Sydney, New South Wales in 1970. He has moved through various trades, from graphic reproduction to carpentry. His hobbies over the years have included cycling, rock climbing, scuba diving - oh yes, and writing. His favourite genre to read and write is hard science fiction, although a recent fascination with history has been interesting. He lives in Brisbane with his wife, Robyn, and their cat, Maximum.

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FALLEN ANGEL

By Matthew L Williams

Copyright 2012 Matthew L Williams

Cover Art by Matthew L Williams

Smashwords Edition

Smashwords Edition, Licence Notes

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1

Nestled in among striped fields of ochre and golden colored wheat and barley, the little town basked sedately in the warmth of the midday sun. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky; the vast blue expanse stretched unmarred from horizon to horizon.

The town was quiet for that time of day, with most of the inhabitants electing to while away the day’s hottest hours, either inside or sitting quietly on porches, sipping tea or lemonade. Ninah Blair however was not one of them.

Ninah, seven years old, going on twenty five, was a pretty girl with long, light brown hair and wide, innocent-looking green eyes that, in the past, had gotten her out of a lot of trouble that duly should have found her. This in fact could almost be said to follow a set pattern. Ninah would do something naughty, her mother would get set to rouse on her, but one look from those eyes at her father and he’d usually step in on her behalf - not always, but usually. She was without a doubt daddy’s little girl.

As it was the school holidays, and a Sunday to boot, Ninah decided she wasn’t going to waste time having the midday nap her parents expected her to have. Instead, she intended to have a tea party with her dolls in the small playhouse her father had built at the end of their large backyard. Besides, she’d turned seven just last week. She was practically a grown up, and if her older sister Donna didn’t have to have a nap, then neither did she!

Sneaking out of the back door while her parents sat talking quietly in the parlor, Ninah made her way across the backyard. The yard was actually two yards, divided by a small copse of trees that grew in the middle, both owned by Ninah’s family.

The part closest to the house was neatly mowed and trimmed, with lawn furniture and play equipment over to one side, a clothesline and small greenhouse on the other. Ninah passed all this with hardly a care. Her life, and the fantasies that compiled most of it, lay beyond the trees in the second part of the yard.

It was in essence a small paddock that may at one stage have been a pen for a horse or pony. It was full of wild, knee high unmowed grass and bordered onto a sweeping field of wheat. Sometimes Ninah would sit for a while on the back fence dividing the field from her parents’ property and watch as the wind moved and swayed the crops, as though a giant invisible hand were trailing its fingers through the plants.

In a corner of the yard down beside this fence, at the end of a trail of beaten down grass, was Ninah’s playhouse. It had once been Donna’s but that was a long time ago. It had been repainted and fixed up and now it was hers.

Ninah loved the playhouse dearly, not only because her father had built it, but also because it was just like a real house with real windows and a real door. It even had cupboards and a small sink, though the faucet didn’t work, but best of all it had a real lectric light. It didn’t have one when it was Donna’s! On top of all that it was hers, her own house. None of her friends had their own houses because unlike her they weren’t grown up yet, they were still six, and even Ninah knew only grown ups had houses of their own.

Ninah followed the path through the little copse of trees and out into the paddock beyond. Crickets chirped in the grass and butterflies fluttered lazily across her path. Mindlessly she waved away a bee droning about her face.

Slowly Ninah became aware of another sound, growing louder in the afternoon’s tranquil atmosphere, a machine-like ‘whup, whup, whup’. She began scanning the sky and shortly saw the cause of the noise as two sleek black helicopters passed by low overhead, their turbines howling. Frowning without knowing why, Ninah turned, following their path. They appeared to be headed for the town, which was just visible over a distant row of trees as a few rooftops and the church steeple. Had she been a little older, Ninah could probably have traced her displeasure to the loud, mechanical, man-made intrusion into the day’s natural serenity. But alas, she was only seven and all she could say was that to her the appearance of the helicopters just felt wrong.

Humming softly, Ninah walked up to the playhouse door carrying her four favorite dolls, three tucked under one arm, the fourth dangling unceremoniously by the hair from her other hand. She turned the doorknob and pushed the door in, stepping inside, eyes fighting to adjust to the darker interior. A split second later her dolls hit the floor and Ninah threw herself out the door. She was half way across the little paddock, breathing hard, before her mind had time to register what her eyes had seen. She had been so surprised that she didn’t even think to scream.

Now at a safe distance and with nothing, let alone something horrible, in pursuit she stopped and turned, swallowed nervously and looked at the now open playhouse door. There was someone in there! Someone, or something, was lying on the floor. She wasn’t sure, she’d only glimpsed him for a second and it was dark, her eyes still adjusting but it had looked like a naked man. A man with wings growing out of his back.

Ninah was starting to calm down now, after all nothing had happened, perhaps she had imagined the whole thing. That must be it, surely there were no people with wings, real wings, but that now left her wondering if she’d imagined the whole thing or just the man’s wings.

She bounced nervously from one foot to the other, trying to think what she should do. She could go back to the house and tell her parents ,but if it was just her imagination they would probably be annoyed at her. They would definitely be angry to find she’d sneaked out without telling them.

Ninah looked at the playhouse again. She’d left her dolls in there and wanted to get them back. Also, a curious part of her wanted to see the man-thing again, his wings!. Yet she made no move toward the open door and the shadows beyond it. After five minutes she realized that she had to do something rather than just stand in the middle of the paddock. She weighed her options and with all the rationale a seven year old could muster, decided that between her parents’ ire and what lay in the playhouse - possibly nothing at all - the latter was the lesser of the two evils.

Nervous as a deer, and ready to bolt at the first sign of movement from within, she approached the playhouse. By the time she’d reached the door, her heart was going at a million miles an hour and her hands felt sweaty. Psyching herself up she peered around the door lintel into the semi darkness. Her breath caught in her throat and her eyes widened; it wasn’t her imagination at all. There was a naked man in the playhouse and he did have wings, not small ones like in paintings but large and white, rearing up from his shoulder blades in a streamlined and symmetrical display of power.

Ninah wanted to run but she didn’t, just stood in the doorway, her gaze transfixed on the figure lying prone before her. A part of her was afraid but a part of her wasn’t, for even at her young age she realized that what she was seeing was something different, something uniquely special. It was something that Sister Mary, her Sunday school teacher, would call a miracle, for Ninah knew now what was in her playhouse. It was an angel, one of God’s own children, and he was hurt.

The angel lay on his side on the floor. He was shivering despite the fact the playhouse was quite hot, and yet sweat ran down his body making it shine. His golden blonde hair was all mussed up and there was dirt and grime on his beautiful white feathers. As her eyes adjusted she noticed his wings weren’t a uniform white. The large feathers at the wings' edges and out towards the tips were colored, white in the center, fading to a goldy yellow then to a light through to dark blue at their edges. It reminded her a little of a peacocks tail, only a little though.

Now that she was looking more closely at his wings, she noticed that one didn’t seem to be sitting right. Even to her untrained eye the angle looked wrong and part of the way along that wing the feathers were matted with something dark and red, a stark contrast against the surrounding white softness. Ninah knew it was blood, she could smell it, strong and coppery on the back of her throat.

The angel still hadn’t moved. Maybe he was dead; could angels die? Ninah took a step inside the playhouse, her head cocked to the side, listening, and yes she could hear him breathing. It was very fast and shallow, like a dog that was hot after a long run. She took another step closer, biting her lower lip as she did. Beneath her a board creaked. The angel’s eyes snapped open and moved to focus on her. Ninah froze, a little moan of fear escaping her lips.

2

The main street of Haven was seeing light traffic this afternoon, both automotive and pedestrian, and perhaps that was the reason Donna noticed them so easily. Had the street been busier they would have just blended in and she’d have walked past, not thinking more about it. But then again maybe she wouldn’t have.

The two men in their matching dark grey suits, matching sunglasses and matching stances beside a shiny black late model car sitting at the curb, stared unabashedly at Donna and her best friend Cassie as they walked by them. Once past the two men, Donna turned a curious and slightly worried expression on her friend. Cassie just shrugged and murmured the word, Creepy, under her breath.

Seventeen year old Donna Blair was a very attractive girl who was used to getting more than her fair share of male attention. But the blatant way the two grey suited men had stared at her, their heads actually swiveling to follow them as they passed like some kind of homing device, sent a shiver down her spine. Now if only Billy Kennedy would look at her that way, that she could handle.

The pair were making their way slowly back to Donna’s house after spending the morning hanging around the town square and the soda shop, trying desperately, albeit covertly, to attract the attention of the local lads, then acting aloof and nonchalant when they got it. They had actually wanted to go into the city, but try as they might, they hadn't been able to convince Donna’s father to drive them there. They’d have had better luck with Cassie’s dad but unfortunately he had to work in the store today. Thus the girls had to be content with the Town Square and its meager offerings in regard to shopping opportunities.

They turned off the main road onto one of the town’s smaller tree lined avenues, Donna unconsciously putting an little extra sway into her walk as she noticed two boys on skateboards coming down the road towards them. She quit it and wrinkled her pretty little nose in mild irritation a few seconds later as the boys skated past and she saw they couldn’t have been older than fourteen or so.

Donna was also mildly annoyed that Billy Kennedy hadn’t been at the soda shop this morning. According to Jesse, a friend of Billy’s who worked there, Billy was out riding his trail bike with the rest of his little gang. Inwardly fuming, Donna had shrugged to show Jesse that she couldn’t have cared less.

Billy Kennedy was the hunkiest guy in school and Donna had the biggest ever crush on him, as did most of the girls at Haven High. This, unfortunately, was something Billy was acutely aware of but Donna, like the rest of the girls, was prepared to forgive Billy his narcissistic attitude for the sake of a little attention from him, if not more. Not only was he incredibly good looking and hung out with the coolest people in school, but his father was the wealthiest man in town and Billy pretty much got what he wanted. He even had his own sports car, and these monetary benefits were pretty much transferable to his girlfriend. That is, whichever one he was currently with at the time.

About a block further up the street Donna flicked her long light brown hair out of her eyes and, frowning slightly, paused in mid stride. Parked across the road was a late model sedan and beside it, a man in a