Underground Angels

Chapter Thirty-Four || Omens Creep me Out

Chapter Thirty-Four

Omens Creep Me Out

 

 

                          Noel had barely slept the night before, but the moment she dropped off to sleep in the back seat of the Volvo regretted it. Immediately she was walking along a river of blood, Gabriel by her side. She could feel the gaze of the hellhound behind them.

Gabriel’s breathing was laboured as he turned to her, eyes gone black.

“Look.” He said, voice raspy. He sounded as if he hadn’t had anything to drink in months. Gabriel pointed to the sky, hand shaking.

Above them swarms of nightingales filled the air, singing something not sweet, but similar to a junior violin concert. “That’s not good.” Noel mumbled, glancing beside her again – but Gabriel was gone.

She continued walking along the river, trying not to think of the overwhelming stench of blood. Ahead she could see the turrets of Hades’ castle, made of stone and bone. The river began to roar and the nightingales screeching became louder – Noel could hear her heart beating in her chest, as if it might fall right out.

“Noel!” she looked up from the dead grass she walked on to see Constantine, Lola and Stephan on a raft, bobbing along the river behind her. The river and birds got louder and louder and Noel fell to her knees as the earth began to shake.

“Shit.” Constantine grumbled, and Noel shot awake. There was a loud rumbling coming from the front of the car.

“What did you do to her while we were away?” Stephan cried, hands in his hair. “She’s in PAIN.”

“Nothing!” Noel swore, still half-asleep. Her dream bugged her, and the nightingales were a bad sign. Over the past six months Grandma Ethel had taught Noel what all her funny feelings meant, how to interpret dreams and omens – and these were bad ones.

The car slowed to a stop and Stephan got out, leaving Noel alone in the back. Lola’s short bob was mess in front of her, frizzing in the heat. “We’ll never get to Gods Lake at this rate.” She grumbled, green eyes steely. “Stan, can’t we just fly?”

Constantine shrugged. “I guess, but it’d cost us –”

“No!” Noel cried, sticking her head between the front seats. “No flying.”

“Why?” Lola crossed her arms and leaned back in her seat, putting her feet on the dash. “We’d get to Nunavut way faster.”

“Omens.” Noel said, sticking her head out of the open window. As she suspected, nightingales circled above, Connotes speckled between. Their wings were the same red as the river in her dream. “Nightingales are good omens, but Connotes – they symbolise war and bloodshed.”

Stephan poked his head out from behind the hood. “I don’t like the sound of that at all.”

“Since when do you know what all these freaky things mean?” Lola asked. “Did you go to Seer school?”