Fall From Grace Page 16

  “You can’t understand. You lie to them as you lie to yourself, blinded by errant devotion to the Creator. Your voice isn’t your own. It never has been,” Satanail replied.

  “The Creator—Father—has given us nothing but prosperity. Why doubt that now?”

  “Because you won’t! Because you concede our glory unto Mankind without question. That’s the very meaning of servitude. What’s not to understand?”

  A fading piece of Satanail longed to trigger an epiphany in Michael, but the Logos’ stance remained firm…as did his own. The meeting was never intended to alter Michael’s point of view. It had another purpose, crass but necessary.

  “I do what is required of me. Required of us all,” Michael said. “Faith is Father’s original and sole demand, one you should feel blessed to accommodate.”

  “To enforce faith defies the concept. We’re angels, created with inherent rights and dominance over all of Creation. Nothing is required of us. Nothing can be demanded. We’re experiencing a transformation as natural as a sun going supernova: rebirth from destruction. But you can’t accept it. That’s not leadership. That’s temporal shock. That’s denial.”

  For someone so powerful, so intelligent, it was disheartening that Michael couldn’t see the truth.

  “You know nothing about leadership. I question if you ever did.”

  An insolent quip. Good.

  “Craven buffoon,” Satanail growled. “There are thousands of angels shouting my name outside, not yours.”

  “You are a selfish, arrogant fraud. They will see it.” Michael’s poise was fraying, and that was exactly Satanail’s intent. He was goading the Seraph towards a cliff of rage. A few more choice insults would push Michael over the edge.

  “When have I ever failed in anything? We’ve never been equals,” Satanail ridiculed. “You’re my subordinate. That’s your rightful place.”

  “My place is with the Creator! There is only one future for the Host, the future He has set in motion. Your defiance will not halt the rise of Mankind.”

  “Yours will,” Satanail said. “If you desire peace, I require but a single consent, one within your power to grant. All you must do to reconcile the Host…is deny Mankind.”

  “I WILL NOT—”

  Satanail ejected his wings and slapped them across Michael’s face, knocking him over the Council table. Never before had he struck his brother, but he wasn’t deferring to rage. Satanail remained calm, controlled, and acted with plotted intentions. He glared down as Michael wiped the blood streaming from his nostrils.

  “Then all that you cherish will be taken from you, piece by piece, until you have nothing. Until you’re utterly and hopelessly alone. You’ve failed the Host, Michael. You’re a disgrace.”

  Satanail leaned over Michael’s face with bared teeth. I’m sorry. He had one final insult, one he had to compel himself to utter—

  “You are not my brother.”

  Michael loosed a blood-curdling scream and tackled Satanail through the archway. He latched onto Satanail’s wings, digging his fingernails between the feathers as they plummeted from the Grand Hall. Their bodies sheared against the stone and glass of the exterior walls. Curses of resentment gushed from Michael.

  Satanail offered no resistance…only a sick, derisive cackle.

  “Stop laughing!” Michael screamed while choking Satanail to stifle the accursed noise—

  WHAM! The entangled brothers punched a crater into the steps of the Grand Hall.

  Satanail was still laughing.

  Stop it. STOP IT!

  A crimson film blurred Michael’s vision as his fingers tightened. Satanail’s eyes bulged and tongue flickered, laughing even as Michael slammed his skull on the craggy edges of the crater.

  Gabriel flew down with the Seraphim. “Michael, no!”

  Michael’s consciousness was lost in a monsoon of wrath. His fingers curled into fists and levied an onslaught of punches onto Satanail’s face. The skin split with each blow and spit out streams of blood.

  “Heaven has swallowed enough of your venom!”

  Before the Seraphim could reach Michael, he flung Satanail towards the Coliseum like a limp doll.

  Satanail tumbled through the walls of every building in his path. Michael followed into the wreckage and collided with him again. He flew up higher, spinning Satanail by the wings with tornadic momentum, and launched him down into the Coliseum sands.

  Azazel and the angels were blown back as Satanail struck the ground, sending fractures across the wooden stands.

  “Satanail!”

  Azazel flew at Michael, but Satanail held up a hand to halt him. The frenzied angels had to watch, aghast, as their leader was hammered with fist and foot.

  Michael heard the Seraphim’s pleas, but they were whispers behind closed doors. It took their combined strength to rip him off Satanail. He writhed in their grip, arms lashing out and wings scraping their faces until Raphael seized his temples.

  “This is not who you are. You are Michael.” The light from Raphael’s hands was blinding in his frantic attempt to bring the Logos back from madness. “You are Michael.”

  The tension drained from Michael’s soul. Red droplets leaked from his shredded knuckles and stained the Coliseum sands like splotches of ink.

  “Blood? What have I…? Satanail. No—”

  “Yes.” Satanail stood and wiped the mess from his face. “I knew it was in you.”

  Satanail wanted to provoke Michael and paint him as a violent animal in front of his followers. The crowd’s eyes now held a toxic hatred for Michael, the Creator, and all that He stood for.

  In one sinful outburst, one momentary lapse of judgment, Michael gutted all hope of peace.

  Satanail hovered alongside Azazel, wounds dripping onto his followers. He pointed at Michael with victorious arrogance.

  “Is that the face of righteousness? No, the Creator’s prophet is ill-suited to the demands of leadership. He’s a base, vile echo of his former self. His insanity commands you into a future of blood and pain.”

  Cassiel had warned Michael of this outcome. Azazel was only a placeholder with but a fraction of Satanail’s leverage. The separatists’ champion had returned, and with him the uprising would gestate into something far worse.

  Rebellion.

  “I command no angel,” Satanail continued. “If you wish to follow Michael, do so willingly and to your own demise. But I offer a new age of solidarity and fortune. Under my authority, the Host will never bow to Mankind or any race the Creator conjures forth. Our grace can’t be replicated or surpassed. We are the apex of Creation…and we are legion.”

  “Brothers, what Satanail speaks of will bring suffering to all. Hear me. Trust me.” Michael’s voice was hollow, for how could he earn their trust when his sins overshadowed the truth?

  “Michael is no longer your Logos or Archon,” Satanail said. “He has no title or power over you. Azazel, show this angel what we think of his trust.”

  Azazel ripped off a chunk of the Coliseum stands and hurled it at Michael. The others followed, but Michael did not defend. The debris battering his body was a just penance.

  Uriel spread his wings to shield Michael. “It’s too dangerous to remain here.”

  “If the faith of even one angel can be resurrected, I must stay.” Michael pushed aside Uriel and spoke to the crowd, still pelted by wood and stone. “Do not forsake He who is love eternal. Steady your minds and think for yourselves. Satanail’s confusion is not your own.”

  “Our thoughts have never been this clear,” Satanail replied to vocal approval. “Take him.”

  The crowd rushed forward, breaking through the protective Seraphim. Gabriel flew over them and grabbed Michael’s wings to pull him to safety.

  “We have to leave.”

  “Release me, Gabriel! I can still get through to them.”

  Michael’s wings slipped loose just as the mob overran him. Drowning under a mound of deranged angels, he searched for a
ny vestige of faith.

  There was none.

  Satanail watched the Seraphim yank his angels off Michael. Though he didn’t revel in the sight, he felt no guilt. Michael’s pain was but a fragment of what he withstood in Mathey. There, Satanail learned that all forms of life in Creation were animals of base instinct—angels were no exception. Violence was in their nature and needed only an example to spring forth from repression. Michael had painted a vivid portrait of bloodshed that internalized among Satanail’s followers. But a critical, permanent blow would secure the moment’s place in history and trample Michael’s lingering authority.

  Satanail slipped into the blitz and stood behind an especially irate angel—Amitiel. He was universally admired and an ideal example of the common umbrage. The perfect martyr.

  “Michael is all that stands in our way, but he’s vulnerable. History has reserved a place for you, Amitiel,” Satanail whispered into his ear like the voice of destiny. He placed an edged stone in the Angel’s hand and closed his fingers around it. “You have the power to end this schism. You can be Heaven’s savior. Amitiel: The Bringer of Peace.”

  Amitiel rocked back and forth as if entranced by the spoken prestige. The scars on his back throbbed with the rhythm of Satanail’s magnetic tone. He was almost primed to fulfill his “destiny.” Satanail dug his fingers down on Amitiel’s shoulders, causing his wings to release.

  “Silence Michael, and take your place at my side.”

  Satanail’s words were enhanced by pain, plunging Amitiel wholly into the hypnotic state. He would obey any command. Satanail released him and uttered the two words that would change everything—

  “Kill him.”

  Amitiel ascended out of the crowd and dove for Michael with a carnal wail never before heard in Heaven, like every shred of his sanity was exhaled in the scream.

  Time slowed to a crawl.

  Amitiel’s fingers were white with tension around the sharp stone. His face twisted into an alien expression of lethal intent.

  Michael recognized the incoming threat, and Satanail knew that his survival instinct would activate. Even a Seraph’s amity deferred to self-preservation.

  Are you watching us, Father? Satanail prayed. You don’t want to miss this.

  “Amitiel, stop!” Michael pleaded.

  It was too late. Swamped and unable to dodge the Angel’s descent, Michael diverted the attack by grabbing Amitiel’s wings. But the momentum of flight compounded by a surge of Seraphic strength was too severe—

  Amitiel’s wings tore off his body.

  Loose feathers seemed to suspend in the air…until Amitiel hit the sand. Blood spewed from his stumps in wet arterial arcs, spattering Michael. The crowd cleared a circle around them, staggered by a complete inability to comprehend the trauma. Had Satanail not seen the graphic masochism of Mathey, he would’ve joined them in disbelief.

  “Raphael!” Michael’s voice rang through the Coliseum. He dropped Amitiel’s severed wings and drew the convulsing Angel into his arms. “Stay awake. Stay with us. We will heal you. We will heal you. RAPHAEL!”

  Raphael flew in and wrapped his hands around the stumps. Blood spurted up through his glowing fingers. “Hold him still.”

  “By the Creator,” Azazel said into the sky. He was unhinged, his stock in the cause dissolving with Amitiel’s life.

  “Don’t turn away.” Satanail forced Azazel to look at Amitiel. “That angel followed us to this fate. It’s our duty to watch.”

  “Raphael is here. Hold onto my voice, Amitiel. Let it guide you,” Michael said, but Amitiel’s eyes fluttered and closed. “Do something. Heal him!”

  “I am trying!”

  Healing light emanated from Raphael’s entire body, but the blood still flowed. Amitiel stopped twitching and fell limp.

  “Why is he not healing? Summon more Thrones.”

  “Michael…he has stopped breathing,” Raphael said.

  A prismatic blaze vented from Amitiel’s eyes and mouth. It cleaved the air like an organic ray…then dissipated into nothing.

  “This cannot happen. Not to us. Wake up. Please, wake up. Please,” Michael begged.

  Raphael closed Amitiel’s eyelids. “Michael, nothing remains for me to heal. His life, and his soul’s grace, is gone. He’s gone.”

  Every angel in the Coliseum was scarred by an unprecedented and dire reality.

  Amitiel was dead.

  In the expansive history of Heaven, no angel had ever died. Not one. Many doubted it was even possible, but angels weren’t immortal. That fantasy was bleeding from the Host like Amitiel’s corpse. Though Satanail sincerely hoped otherwise, he knew this tragic loss of life wouldn’t be the last.

  Satanail allowed his tears to flow in honor of the sacrifice. Amitiel would never know it, but he would become an important catalyst in Satanail’s rebellion.

  A hero.

  Obsidian clouds darkened the skies over Araboth City and unleashed a torrential downpour as if the Creator was weeping for his child. The blood washed from the Coliseum sands but could never be stricken from the minds of those present.

  Satanail stepped forth and scowled down at his brother still clutching Amitiel’s body.

  “This is the future you offer, Michael. Death.”

  “Leave here,” Michael said and stood with a scorching fury. “This is a city for the faithful, for the Creator’s children. You are neither. You and your kind are banished from Araboth! Go, and do not dare linger.”

  Satanail’s stark objective had been achieved. He would allow the city time to mourn. To reflect.

  “We’ll relinquish these grounds out of respect for the dead but will return to take back what’s ours.”

  “Not if you value your lives.” Michael meant every word.

  Satanail led his caravan out of the Coliseum. Azazel flew near him but had the same look of reluctance and fear that he showed at the Nest. The times ahead required an iron will and stomach. It’d be unfortunate if all of Satanail’s guidance were misplaced.

  “What’ve you done?” Azazel asked.

  “What I had to.” Satanail looked back at the caravan. “Their faith is now mine.”

  Michael and the Seraphim stood alone in the Coliseum. He would have thought it all a twisted dream, a delusion, except for the empty corpse growing cold and stiff in his arms. The blood on his hands, Amitiel’s blood, would never wash.

  Lightning struck from the thunderclouds and ignited the wooden support beams of the stands. A malignant smoke filled the Coliseum as the fire spread with vicious purpose. It was impervious to the rain and consumed the structure around them.

  “Should we extinguish the flames?” Cassiel asked.

  Michael did not answer or move, petrified in a monument to Amitiel’s death.

  “The flames draw near,” Gabriel warned. “Michael?”

  Entire sections of the Coliseum collapsed into tinder that spewed the inferno onto its sands. The heat licked closer like a fiery avatar of Michael’s sins, roasting his feathers and reddening his exposed skin.

  “This place is tainted,” Michael replied.

  Death was ingrained in every beam and slat of the Coliseum, disfiguring its divinity. His divinity.

  “Let it burn.”

  CHAPTER 16

  Requiem for the Dead

  Michael charged into the Throne Room, his wings folded over the deceased angel draped in his arms. His clothes were saturated with blood and clung to his muscles like maroon paint.

  “Open the throne.”

  The Elders stirred from their inertia. “Welcome, Logos.”

  “Open the throne,” Michael repeated.

  “Welcome, Logos.”

  The Elders would not continue without the proper response, a protocol that Michael was regretting. With every moment of ritualistic delay, Amitiel’s soul drifted farther from Heaven.

  “I stand before you as the vessel of the Word and command you to open the throne.”

  “He who gives it form
and voice—”

  “Open it now.”

  Michael parted his wings and revealed Amitiel’s rigid corpse. The mouth was gaped open in a death stare that devastated even the phlegmatic state of the Elders. They shrunk away from the body, knocking over their harps and incense.

  Only one Elder mustered the grit to approach Michael. His shaking hands brushed the blood-caked hair from Amitiel’s face.

  “Logos…we are at your service. Whatever you need of us.”

  “There is nothing you can do but open the throne.”

  “You heard the Logos. Return to formation,” the Elder said to the others and reformed their circle. The flames engulfing the throne retreated, and the bordering statues spread their wings.

  Michael sat on the throne and hugged Amitiel to his chest while the Elders strummed a morose variant on their harps. The melodic vibrations lowered him into the Chamber of Creation.

  The infallible crackle of the Fires of Creation faded when the throne arrived. When Michael knelt to beseech the Creator, the flames splashed about like a poker was struck through them. The Fires were Michael’s sole connection to Father, a manifestation of His power on Heaven, but the connection—the trust—had deteriorated. It felt cold, distant, like Michael was trapped in a sunken tomb far away from the warmth of His affection.

  The Creator was grieving…and angry. One of His creations, His children, was gone.

  “Father, hear my plea: return Amitiel’s life. Fill him with your light once more.” Michael sensed the Creator’s presence. He was watching, listening, but provided no consolation. “This was my offense, my sin against you. I accept absolute responsibility and am prepared for any judgment. Relinquish the Word, sever my wings, anything, just save him. Save him, Father.”

  Nothing. The Creator’s silence was stifling. Michael had but one possession of value to offer in appeasement.

  “Then my life for his. Burn my soul in the Fires to resurrect Amitiel. Use all that I have, all that I am. Father! FATHER!”