Well. If I thought that I would immediately excel at being a Guardian—and perhaps I did, a bit—I have learned otherwise over the past week.
Salathiel was not lying when she said that I had a great deal of missed training to make up for. I did not know how much there was. As an infant Cupid, I was taught the various ways that humans express love, the ways they resist it, and how to move their thoughts in one direction or another. Aside from that and the basic rules of heaven and earth, all I was required to do was to listen to the stories of my seniors and begin using my own imagination to plan for my work.
To be a Guardian, however, requires much more.
I thought that I knew a great deal about the Fallen, but Orison has disillusioned me of that. In three chilling lessons, he took me through the ranks of the Enemy, telling me what they are capable of, who or what they commonly attack, and how they might be defeated. “This will not be your role,” he told me, “but given your history and your strength, you will need to know what to expect.”
It is somewhat dismaying to be able to look at any one of my brothers and sisters and know what they may become if they fail in their earthly lives.
More difficult to encompass, however, is the sheer span of harm that humans can inflict upon one another. The range of violence alone is staggering. I will not begin to list the horrors here that I have learned about, but it took two lessons just to get through it all. And there is more that requires no bloodshed or battering—spite, bullying, self-harm, manipulation, envy, accusation…so much that can break the heart and damage the soul. I am exhausted just trying to remember it all.
There are many different ways that we can fight these things. Orison says that frequently we must make of ourselves a shield, taking the brunt of the damage for our charges. The trick of this, of course, is not to be damaged ourselves. He calls this ‘hardening the heart’. “You must cut yourself off from the flow of energy around you,” he explained. “Do not allow it to pass through you, but rather make of yourself an obstacle, entirely self-enclosed.”
This was a bewildering instruction, since before that Orison had spent several days trying to sharpen my sensitivity to things around me. “But you told me that I must always be aware of my surroundings, because my sensitivity is the only way to know if a Fallen is there.”
“A different weapon for a different situation,” he answered me. “I do believe you will need to watch for the Fallen. You are strong, and so they may be drawn to you, but without the Lower Eye you will not be able to see them. Your sensitivity will alert you to their presence, and it will also help you to know what it is you are dealing with in your charges and their opponents. Still, hardening is also an important skill. Without it, you put yourself at risk every time you go into the field.”
I understand the logic of that, but hardening is not something that comes easily to me. I have tried and tried, following all of the advice Orison has given me, but still his energy can cut right through my shields. I feel soft and clumsy all the time.
Physicality is difficult, too. Orison thought that I would be better at that, since I have done it a few times before. No such luck. I have not been able to move so much as a leaf in our practice. It seems my previous successes have been a result of desperation and fear, and those cannot always be my tools. Though potent, they can too easily overwhelm even an angel and turn against their wielder.
Orison has been marvelously patient with me, and he urges me to have patience in myself. “All of this can take many years for an angel to learn,” he reminded me. “You only need to give yourself time.”
But time is not on my side. The Guardians begin their year at different times, depending on the region—their advance starts at the beginning of winter, which comes to different places of the world. In the region where I have worked before and where I will be working now, winter begins in just a matter of weeks, and I want to be there when it starts.
Besides, Freya has already been alone for two weeks. It hurts me that I don’t know how she is, whether she has missed me, whether she has been attacked again.
I have no lessons today. Orison said that I deserved a bit of a rest, and that he wanted to try and think of different ways to teach me the things that I am not understanding. Part of me is glad for the respite, while another part is frustrated not to have anything to do. Just sitting here, with all the wickedness of the world in my head, is not helping me at all.
If this is what I was meant to do, then I wish I knew how to do it.