Enid was dressed up, she had put a hat on and violated her own rules about armor and had hers tucked in her pack. The dress accentuated her Sarah figure. She even put on makeup. She knocked on the Sheriff’s door and a young girl with curly brown hair answered. She was maybe six and she was looking up at Enid with narrowed eyes.

“Who are you?”

She heard a rush of footsteps behind her, and the door opened wider and the Sheriff looked surprised to see Sarah.

“Candace, I told you to let me answer the door.”

“Ms. Sarah, what can I do for you?”

“I just wanted to come by with some baked goods I made, a peace offering of sorts. Show you that I’m actually a woman and not a bandit in disguise?”

She held up a wooden box.

“You didn’t need to do that.”

“Yes. I did. What I said was hurtful, and uncalled for you’re just doing your job.”

He swallowed when he noticed Enid’s dress and how done up she was.

“I’m sorry I shouldn’t leave you out in the street like that, please come in Ms. Sarah.”

As she went inside, she opened the box revealing a pile of cookies she’d learned to bake from Eyre. The little girl looked at her father and he nodded, and she took one gingerly. She took a nibble after giving Sarah another suspicious look then she took a giant bite and another. She ran off and Enid could hear her teasing her sister that she got a cookie, and the other didn’t. There was some yelling and chasing around leaving the two looking winded as the bumped into the back of their father’s legs. The other was perhaps eight years old and looked embarrassed when she noticed a well-dressed woman in the kitchen of their home. Enid offered her a cookie too and she took one and did the same thing her sister had done.

“Would you like one Sheriff?”

He paused then took one and he smiled when he bit into it.

“You are quite the baker, Ms. Sarah.”

“I told you, I’m a woman not a bandit.”

She smiled he nodded. She gave the children another two cookies each before closing the box. The girls stood and looked between the two. Enid waited awkwardly. Finally, the sheriff looked down at them.

“Ms. Sarah and I have some business to discuss. Now you two run along and play.”

Enid sat down and crossed her legs and folded her hands in her lap. He sat down across from her and took another cookie.

“I apologize, I know what it is like to lose a spouse and I shouldn’t have gone there.”

“I accept your apology Ms. Sarah. I appreciate the cookies and the visit. Would you consider staying for diner?”

Enid thought for a few moments.

“I accept your invitation, Sheriff.”

“You can call me Ray.”

“Then you can call me Sarah.”

He nodded.

“Sarah, I… well I didn’t expect to see you ever looking like this.”

“As much as I can be rough and tumble sometimes, I am a woman and I appreciate looking pretty as much as the next woman. And If I am staying for supper, I am cooking. I have a feeling your daughters are longing for a real meal and not something involving beans.”

He rubbed the back of his neck and blushed.

“Guilty as charged, Sarah.”

She stood and tied up her hair and started poking around the kitchen for food. He had some fresh beef so she started preparing a roast. She saw his daughters peaking at her around a doorway she winked at them spun the knife on her fingers then sliced through the onion rapidly. She heard gasps. Ray was watching her as well, of course he was. She was beautiful and had gone the extra mile today to make that very clear. She had no clue why she would even bother. She had no reason to impress the sheriff. She put the pot on the stove and let it start to cook after adding water. She slid into the chair across from Ray again and the two chatted while the roast was roasted. She asked him about his wife and let him talk his ear off about her. The two girls joined them about halfway through and Enid entertained them with some card tricks and sleight of hand. Ray just sat and smiled at her as she spoke to the girls about girl things the girls who had been quite dour when she first arrived were smiling and laughing by the time the roast was done. Enid pulled it off the stove and began slicing it and plated it before passing it out. Ray pulled out a bottle of wine and poured out glasses for the pair. He took his first bite and closed his eyes.

“This is delicious. You can do this and shoot like a gunslinger.”

He shook his head.

“One does not preclude the other, Ray.”

“No, it does not, Sarah.”

The girls were busy eating their first real home cooked meal since their mother had passed and barely said two words over dinner. Enid sat with them by their fireplace long after the dinner hour had passed and when Ray started putting them to bed, she started to move to leave.

“Please Sarah stay, it will only take a few minutes.”

Enid nodded and sat back down. He was gone for a quarter of an hour before he returned and put his feet up.

“Thank you, Sarah, I haven’t seen them smile so much since their mother passed.”

Enid nodded.

“Little girls need their mothers. I am glad I could make them forget for an afternoon.”

“You’d make a good mother. I can tell just by this afternoon; I see why your sisters look at you like they do. Like you have all the answers.”

Enid scoffed.

“I spend most of my time wishing a real adult will show up and tell me what to do.”

He laughed.

“Don’t we all. Don’t we all.”

Enid stared into the crackling fire. Night had fallen she felt the hunger starting to gnaw at her. She ignored it. The sound of Ray’s pulse was driving her a bit nuts. This was the worst time of the day when the hunger first grabs at her. She began to stand.

“No just please stay for a while longer, Sarah. I wanted to be honest with you.”

“I talked to Father Milo about you, he told me that I should stay out of your way, he wouldn’t tell me why but it’s like he knows way more about you then he was letting on. I get the sense you’re here for something that is going to put you in a lot of danger. And a girl like you, as much as I think you can take care of yourself, I can’t let you risk your life. If there is trouble you can tell me about it and I can take care of it. It’s my job.”

Enid shook her head.

“Ray, I don’t need a knight on his white horse to save me. I am a soldier in a war that has been going on since the dawn of time. You are the law here, and I respect that, but I am the law for a much bigger…area of influence and right now I have a big jail break on my hands.”

“You have something to do with the church, that much is clear. I just don’t understand why they need someone like you.”

Enid sighed.

“I am not what I appear to be Ray, and you would not believe me if I told you why I was here. Just know I have been doing this for a long time and while it is dangerous, so I am I.”

“You came here for a reason, and it wasn’t just for an apology.”

“It was just for an apology. And I’ve done that. I should go.”

Enid stood up and he grabbed her arm as she tried to walk away and spun her around. Their lips met and she pulled away.

“No, I can’t do this, I can’t hurt you.”

“I’m sorry… I just.”

“Yes, I want to… But I can’t it will distract me from my duty.”

He held up his hands. Enid turned to leave but the temptation was too great, she could hear that blood rushing around his veins and she lunged at him kissing him on the lips and the pair fell to the ground. They rolled around and eventually her legs were spread and he was inside her thrusting. She rolled him over, so she was on top and had him inside her she started riding him and she leaned down and bit his neck and drank deeply of his blood. She felt him stiffen inside her and a flood of warmth. She slide her fangs back in and healed his wound he had eyes closed as he twitched underneath her she wiped the blood from her lips and got off of him. She let her dress fall down over her legs. She stumbled backwards and grabbed her purse and rushed off. Leaving a very confused Ray laying on the floor.

Enid ran all the way to the Kennedy’s home and jumped up to the balcony and went into her room pacing back and forth. She should have resisted the urge she had fed recently but the hunger won. In her mind she felt physically ill that she had given into the hunger so readily. It was like her body was at war with itself. It wanted blood but the divine part of her being was disgusted by it. It felt like soon she’d have to choose the vampire or the angel she finally collapsed on the bed and stared at the ceiling.

“Father what am I supposed to be?”

She sighed when she received no answer. She put her pillow over her face. Of course, there was no answer, she was spoiled to have heard from him so much already.

*****

Three weeks in town and not a hint of the demon. Enid woke up with the sun streaming on her face. She pulled her armor on and a dress over top. Gladys greeted her when she started down the stairs.

“I tried to ask after you last evening, but you did not answer your door.”

“I’m sorry I must have fallen asleep early.”

Gladys smiled and nodded. There was a pounding at the door and shortly afterwards one of the miners was standing in the dining room looking like he’d just come out of the mines. Malcom was already standing obviously this had him worried.

“Mr. Kennedy sir there’s been a collapse and we got some gas. We can’t blast and we can’t dig the men can’t breathe and any spark she’ll lite the mine up like the fourth of July.”

Enid looked at the girls and stood up.

“M…sis, you can’t.”

Enid shook her head to Hazel and she ran out of the house and towards the mine. Men tried to stop including the sheriff who blinked at her, she’d been avoiding him since the night she bit him. She burst through them. Once into the darkness she was at her full vampiric strength and had her senses. She rushed towards the miners who were crying for help she could hear them hitting the collapse with their picks. The gas was thick as she approached, she wasn’t familiar with mines but it looks like the breach into a natural gas pocket had triggered the collapse it was still venting into the mine. If she were human, she would be dead in minutes, but she wasn’t and didn’t need to breath. She started pulling down boulders and rocks. She realized she was too short to get the beam brace. She sighed and shifted into her angelic form and she reached up and grabbed the beam pushing it up bracing it against the stone that was threatening to fall. She broke through and yelled out.

“Stop digging there is gas!”

The picks stopped immediately.

“Ms. Sarah?”

“Yes. Just give me a few minutes pour water in your handkerchiefs and cover your faces.”

She pulled the last massive rock out of the way it must have weighed a few tons when she broke through, she knew them all from the church. Most of the miners that worked for Malcom where Catholic Scotsman he helped pay the way to Goldwater. They stared at her for a few moments.

“Don’t stand there and gawk go it won’t be long until the gas hits a lantern or the like.”

They didn’t run they started looking for something.

“Is there someone left behind?”

“No…no ma’am…your holiness we are looking for something to brace the beam.”

“Just get out I will be fine.”

“We can’t leave you.”

Enid flared her wings out and it was like her aura of power was there in her angelic form.

“Go!”

The miners started to flee towards the exit. Once she heard the cheers she let the beam lose and hopped out of the way. She shifted to her Sarah form and started rushing towards the exit but as she had predicted the gas hit a lantern and was ignited the entire mine flared up with fire. Her flesh was seared off but it started to heal almost immediately. She hit a cross section on the one side it had been sealed off and she felt this terrible twisting in her gut. Like period cramps. It was her usual flag that there was a demon around. She was in no shape for a fight her blood reserves were low after healing the damage the gas explosion had done to her. By the time she walked out of the mine entrance she was fully healed but was only wearing her Atlantean armor, her dress had been incinerated. She was still covered by a billowing cloud of black smoke when she started to hear Ray shouting.

“Where is she? Why did you leave her behind?”

There was a collective gasp when she walked out. Beyond some soot on her face, she was unharmed. The miners she had rescued were sitting on the ground except for the foreman who Ray was shaking by his shirt. He let go and stared at her too. Most of the town was there to see her exit. There

was a murmur in the crowd. Father Milo crossed himself and was praying in Spanish. Air was rushing back into the mine whipping Enid’s platinum blonde hair behind her. Helen and Hazel rushed up to her. Hazel and Helen were wiping away their tears.

“The explosion mom…we thought.”

Enid hugged them both tightly.

“I’ve survived worse. Did all the miners get out?”

“Yes. No one was in there when it went up except you.”

Enid hugged them both again. She spoke quietly.

“I’m sorry I worried you, I’m going to need help healing took a lot out of me.”

Hazel picked her up in her arms.

“I got you mom. Like I always do.”

Enid smiled at her. Helen pushed through the crowd who were milling about in confusion at what they had just seen. Enid peeled off the armor when she reached her room and tossed on the floor leaving her in a sports bra and underwear. She wasn’t in the mood to change, nor did she have the energy. She was going to need a good supply of blood. As much as her angel form despised it. She pondered going after Clayton’s cattle rustlers that would fill her up and there was an active bounty. She also sighed when she realized the whole town would be aware she was vastly different then a normal human. Enid reached into her back and started slam down synth-O after synth-O. She would need a lot…

Enid crossed her arms wrapped her gloved hands around the sides of her chest. She looked out of the curtains at the mass of people trying to catch a glance at her. The Sheriff was doing his best to keep them at bay.

Stupid. Stupid. Should have not gotten involved.

She glanced up and shook her head.

“I suppose you have no fatherly advice on this situation.”

Her words were met with silence and sighed pacing for several more minutes before leaning on the windowsill and looking outside. She let her thoughts drift back to the feeling she had in the mine. The closed shaft.

At least I know where the demonic source is. Another fallen angel and no idea how to fight it except as the angel.

She heard someone knocking at her door. She pushed herself up and glanced at it. She hadn’t gotten out of her Atlantean armor. She tapped her necklace and a dress shimmered into existence over her body. She opened the door and found herself looking up at Gladys. She seemed to be caught between awe and terror. She opened her mouth to speak but seemed incapable.

“Sorry ma’am. I did not mean to bring this circus down on your house.”

Enid motioned towards the window. Gladys seemed to find her voice.

“The men…they said you were an angel. That you had wings that looked like the nights sky…”

“Yes, people weren’t supposed to find out. I was supposed to keep myself hidden, now the fallen angel knows I’m here.”

Gladys stared at her. Enid rubbed her hands on her face and sighed.

“Was there something you needed, Gladys?”

She shook her head and walked away. Enid frowned.

God damnit.

She paced for several more minutes. She glanced at the setting sun. She felt her powers return rapidly once she was free of the sun. She glanced down and there was still a mass of people gathered. She sighed. She checked her daughter’s rooms but neither was around. She swore under her breath.

Her gift started screaming in her head she had to be anywhere but where she was. She altered time and stepped aside she saw a black cloaked form shimmer into existence out of the darkness. A silver blade had clipped her hologram dress. The figure was almost as fast as she was. Enid reached out and grabbed her wrist and twisted hard snapping the bones and pulling the shoulder and elbow out of their sockets. The blade clattered on the wooden floor. Enid wrapped her hand around the vampire’s throat. She slammed it into the wooden wall causing it to crack under the stress. Her fangs were out and her eyes were glowing with their eerie golden light. The vampire struggled in vain against the much stronger Enid. She reached up and pulled down the hood of her assailant. She was shocked to see it was Cindie, one of her seers.

“What the fuck are you doing here Cindie?”

The woman’s beautiful face went paler than it had been. Her eyes went wide with fear. She tried to pry Enid’s vicelike grip off of her throat but found it impossible. Enid dropped her and Cindie collapsed in a heap on the ground. Enid picked up the blade. Cindie scrambled away from her. Enid watched the woman’s arm pop back into place.

“That’s impossible…only I can wield that blade.”

“Not true, I told you: Only you and its creator can wield it.”

Enid threw the sword on the ground beside Cindie and shook her head at the younger Seer.

“Quit while you’re ahead before I charge you with witchcraft, old friend.”

Cindie grabbed the sword and hopped to her feet. She pointed the blade at Enid. The tip was quivering.

“What are you?”

Enid rolled her eyes and shook off the Sarah form showing her mortal face.

“I’m your second mother. And you should be dead.”

The blade’s trip hit the floor and Cindie stumbled backwards. She fell to her knees and dropped the sword.

“Please mother I did not know it was you. I would never have…Mercy!”

“Get up and stop groveling I’m not going to kill you I just thought you died. What the hell are you doing in Goldwater?”

“You sent me here, to look for Neffi because she didn’t report in, don’t you remember?”

Enid closed her eyes and clenched her fists.

“Fuck, I totally forgot.”

“Are you alright? It was only two months ago.”

“You died trying to track Neffi down and your last report said you said she was dead, but you found out what did it and you were going after it, then nothing. It was Gold Water.”

“How do you know that? I haven’t sent a message…I don’t know if she’s alive or dead.”

Enid sighed.

“Okay so the mine isn’t a Fallen One, it’s always been here. God damn it! Fuck!”

Enid heard footsteps and she gathered the shadows around the pair and put her finger to her lips. She watched as the Sheriff approached her door and knocked. When he received no answer he entered then after realizing it was empty walked back out. Enid motioned for Cindie to follow her and she led her to the barn. Then dropped the shadows.

“Okay Cindie…I’m Enid, Sarah of Savia, whatever you want to call me. But I’m not your Enid, I’m from…the future. It’s a long sordid, confusing story, but I’m here hunting something that needs to get dead. I thought it was in the mines, but that is just good old fashioned something or other. As far as I remember you die after your last message and I did not have the resources or time to hunt you down soon enough. So basically, to keep history…chugging along you’re going to have to come with me when I leave. But I will help you put whatever this thing is down. I assuming since the shit never hits the fan in Gold Water, you managed to kill it before dying. Maybe you end up buried in a collapse, I have no idea, I’m just saying, as far as history is concerned you die.”

Cindie blinked at her. She had the same gift Enid did so knew every single word was the truth.

“So, I die here?”

“No, you died here according to history. But since I’m not going to let you die…I’m going to take you forward with me, so history is preserved. But hey, the future is awesome. We just need to track my daughters down.”

“I’m confused, but I have another question. Why didn’t you burst into flames when you left the mine today? I came after you because well you showed your vampire abilities, the whole surviving a methane explosion…but then I heard… it was an angel?”

“Like I said, it’s a really long story, best bet is we just skip it for now, kill the bad thing since it likely knows something is up and then afterwards, we sit down, have a drink and I catch you up. And where the hell are the girls, they should be here. This was our fallback location.”

“We’re here.”

The pair looked at the sound of Hazel’s voice. She and Helen came in from the direction of the fields.

“Someone blew our cover big time, so we had to make ourselves scarce.”

Enid made a face at her daughter.

“It was that or let fifty men die.”

“I know mom, I’m just teasing you.”

Enid motioned to Cindie.

“Girls this is Cindie, Cindie these are my daughters, Hazel, and Helen.”

The girls and Cindie nodded to each other. Enid waited for the sisters to get closer to her.

“The mine incident was a blessing in disguise. Something is in a closed off shaft. I sensed it and we need to kill it. It’s not what we’re looking for, Cindie has proven that much. Doesn’t matter it needs to be put down”

Hazel crossed her arms and frowned.