Chapter Three — Part 2

Tester did something that surprised me. She hugged me, close and tight. “You’re my precious little girl, and you’re doing well. I love you.”

Her love was something wonderful. Tester kissed Fluff on the forehead and left him sleeping. With Tester gone, I stayed close to Tiffany. She’d walked out of her room, back outside where Kotian was waiting. She was a proud woman, with the determination to adapt to the changes.

She sauntered right up to Kotian, putting her hands on his shoulders and kissed him. “So, Sparrow, you still think I’m just a slut?” She asked, running her fingers down the back of his neck.

“I was just angry. Father acts so weird. I mean, how many fathers buy their sons a girl for his thirteenth birthday?” Kotian said.

I wanted to say that the number was significant, but I remained silent. Angels really would be annoying if we just spoke out any time we wanted to. “Why are you in this chair?” Tiffany asked.

“I was shot in the back. The doctors say I can’t walk, not even with surgery. The damage was simply too severe.”

Tiffany frowned, and I had to frown with her. She had studied medical texts as a concubine. Part nurse, part lover, mostly servant, Tiffany had chosen to be the best concubine possible. She looked at his back. The bones seemed intact to her eyes. If they had healed, Tiffany knew the nerves could be retrained.

“It could take years to recover without surgery, but I think if we work at it you will walk again.”

Kotian looked at her, stunned, and chose verbal aggression as defense against intimacy. “So, you’re a concubine. Wanna have sex?”

Tiffany smiled, as only a concubine can, and Kotian blushed. “Since your father paid for me, you will have to ask his permission.”

Fluff woke up from his lazy sleep and watched the rest of the scene with me. He smiled, “They make a cute couple, don’t they?”

I had to agree.

“Sparrow is a cute pet name.” Fluff said.

“It’s sickening, makes me want to puke.” I said. “Tiffany’s creative, isn’t she? Now what do we do?”

“What we always do. Stay invisible, watch, and give guidance when needed.” Fluff said. “My boy blames me for his accident, and he’s right. I hope this makes it up to him. It took a great deal of persuading to get Tester to let your child be at his side.”

I didn’t wonder why I’d been left out of the information loop. Being the youngest and least experienced, my angelic rank is pretty low. I mean, the angel to the Buddha is supposed to be no better than the angel to a twelve-year-old concubine, but aristocracy exists even in angelic circles.

Fluff and I waited impatiently while Tiffany and Kotian grew up. For three years we watched while Kotian grew stronger. Tiffany gently taught him to use his body again. The first year he was able to move his legs. The second, he walked, though only with braces. By the third year he was able to walk and run. He had healed, often frustrated, but always supported by Tiffany, into a strong young man.

In the three long years that followed, Kotian never had the guts to ask his father permission to sleep with Tiffany. On his sixteenth birthday, he stood before his father, sword and pistol at ready, and asked the question.

“I would like to know if you would give Tiffany permission to make love to me.”

“She’s your girl, why are you asking me?” Jodiah wondered curiously.

“Since she’s still a concubine, she insists that I ask permission of the man who owns her before I take her as my wife. You haven’t been sleeping with her, have you? She teases me.”

“Of course not. I would think that three years without sex would break her of such habits. Hmm…” Jodiah wrote a note.

“Take this to her. You’ve been teaching her to read as well as speak our language, I hope.”

“Yes.” Kotian said. It was a half-truth. Tiffany was a quick study at languages. She’d been correcting Kotian’s class assignments for nearly two years.

Though a handsome youth, he’d never actually grown tall, and he would look like a baby for quite some time. I kind of admired it, probably because I myself am stuck looking like a permanent teenager.

I read the note in passing, surprised at what I saw. It read “The below person has been relieved of her duties as a concubine and now has all the rights of a citizen of our world. She is free to succeed or fail at her own choosing, and to choose a mate. Permission is no longer needed nor is it implied for any services rendered.” It was signed and dated.

I giggled, because I knew how Tiffany would respond. She would tease him, and then ignore him completely for the next several years, then get married and have kids. Fluff disagreed with me, and we started placing bets.

“All right, looks like Koti’s finally going to get some action, maybe even get married. Cool.”

I shook my head fervently. “You don’t know my girl very well, do you?”

“I’ve watched her for three years. She wants him.”

“Bet you.” I countered.

“All right. What are the stakes?”

I paused. I never expected Fluff to take me up on it. “You’re serious? I was only kidding.”

“I still say I’m right. Your mama would agree with me.”

“Don’t you go talking about my mama.” I warned, shaking my fist playfully, letting little angel sparks flit around it. “I love you.” I said, surprising myself, and Fluff as well. Three years with somebody or a lifetime, either way love is strong.

I took his hand. “Maybe, in another time, when our duty is complete — ”

“Are you two talking about your own matrimony or theirs?” Tester caught me by surprise, and I pulled my hand from his.

“Umm, I dunno,” Fluff said, sounding confused, then added with a nervous kind of stutter, “Ma’am.”

“Just don’t let it get in the way of your duties. Remember how important their success is.”

Tester faded from view. She had never actually taken her physical form, just sort of bobbed in as a thought. I shook with relief, because I wasn’t in any kind of trouble.

“Guess we wait until something happens.” Fluff said, putting his hands behind his back. His pale cheeks were red as cherries. “Is she always so overwhelming?”

“Yes. Does Kotian know you’re an angel?” “No, he thinks of me as a friend from an alien species,” Fluff said. “I haven’t told Tiffany, but she seems to think I’m some evil spirit destined to haunt her. She calls me Demon Girl.”

“It could be worse, she doesn’t actually hate you.”

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