Fall From Grace Read online

  The demonic baptism announced a horde of new names to Heaven. The rebels yearned to be freed of their former identities and resurrected, to glisten with immaculate possibility under their new Father. Each demon purified another, spreading the process across Limbo until the blackness of their wings was an infernal valley in the morning light.

  Only one rebel retained his angelic blemish. Satan found Azazel hovering alone at the borders of Limbo, staring off at the Observatory ruins. “You have doubts, my son?”

  “No, I, I don’t know. It was so clear until I saw them: angels falling from the sky, chopped into pieces, their insides spewing about. And their s-s-screams…I still hear them.”

  “As do I and always will. You were the first to understand my vision, Azazel. We knew there’d be sacrifice and pain and loss. They’re lamentable repercussions of the change in Heaven and us,” Satan said. “But taking monstrous action doesn’t make us monsters if our cause is just.”

  “Can there be no h-h-hope of reconciliation with Michael?”

  “Hope is a sentiment for those who can’t or won’t act. It’s Michael who hopes. All we can do is give him a swift end.”

  “This will become worse, won’t it?”

  “Yes. For them,” Satan replied and opened a vat. He yanked Azazel’s wings over the dye, prepared to kill him before allowing Michael to gain a valuable defector. “I’ll ask you once: what’s your name?”

  “My name? My name is…Lucifer.”

  Satan dunked Azazel’s wings, relieved that his apprentice found sense. “Lucifer, yes, I quite like that. Don’t mourn the past, my son. We’re a family again.”

  Satan and Lucifer returned to the demons. He gestured for Mammon and Beelzebub to join them in the air, forming a trinity of generals.

  “My sons, my demons, your baptism is complete. We’re now of one mind and body with a singular purpose: war. We’ll cut off our enemies’ supply lines and burn their havens to the ground. Michael will despair as village after village falls before our might and bears my standard.” Satan unveiled a black flag emblazoned with a crimson, inverted pentagram. “And when our enemies have been brought to their knees, when they pray for mercy to an absent Creator, I will answer…with blood and death! All hail!”

  “Hail Satan!” Lucifer shouted first, beginning a chant.

  The scourge of Heaven was born.

  The spirit of Araboth was as maimed as the bodies strewn through its streets. There was nowhere to turn without reliving the catastrophic attack. A stratum of glass, stone, and ash coated the city. Linens seeped through with blood were draped over piles of the dead. If any optimism had endured for the reunion of Heaven’s Host, it fell into shambles with the Observatory.

  The Seraphim were recalled to Araboth in hopes that their presence would mitigate the trauma. Uriel and his blacksmiths cleared rubble as figures of intrepid strength. Cassiel’s Cherubim generated pockets of rainfall to cleanse the filth. Gabriel rerouted manna into the city and ensured that angels displaced from their homes did not go hungry. Raphael and the Thrones erected emergency healing tents, but the injured were so profuse that many more died before they could be healed. This was only one attack in one city—all of Heaven was vulnerable.

  Michael’s wings were so damaged that he could not retract them, but he remained at the front lines of disaster to comfort Araboth’s citizens. Consoling the dying during their final breaths, and those they left behind, meant everything. Their faith and grace remained pure, and Michael ushered them to the Creator with whatever peace of mind he could offer.

  Gabriel approached as another angel died beneath Michael’s wings. “He’s gone,” he said, half-drunk and drowning his sorrow in a mug of manna.

  “I know,” Michael replied and closed the angel’s eyelids.

  “Here, regain your strength.” Gabriel offered the mug, but Michael pushed it away.

  “There are others who need it more. See that they get it.”

  “At least allow Raphael to tend to your wounds.”

  Others were listening to their conversation. No favoritism.

  “No Seraph will expend any grace on me until every angel in the city has been attended. Am I understood?”

  “Yes, Logos. Archon,” Gabriel said and took another long swig of manna. “Would that we all had your strength. You’re the heart of us, Michael.”

  “Because of you, it still beats,” Michael said but took away Gabriel’s mug. He needed the Seraph focused, not wallowing in drunken self-pity. “You saved many lives today.”

  Gabriel stared at the growing piles of corpses. “Not enough. I came as soon as I heard Satanail had entered the city, but I wasn’t…I could’ve saved more.”

  “You will.”

  Araboth’s recovery was an uphill struggle, and Michael would not let it dismantle the city. He rallied through his pain and flew to the Sanctuary spire, the sting in every feather a memorial to those Heaven had lost. The angels looked up, longing for any nugget of security.

  “Brothers! Though death has come to our city, it sheds light on the value of life that we have taken for granted. Ours is long but not infinite. Blessed is the angel who dies righteous, against whom no record of crime has been written, and with whom no iniquity is found. Those who passed from Heaven this day have rejoined our Creator. Theirs is a peace eternal.”

  Michael lowered himself to drift above the angels, speaking to individuals as Satanail had done.

  “Hold onto what has bound us together for so many ages. Do not waver in your faith, but do not condemn your brothers who have lost their way. Do not submit to what fuels their blasphemy. Hatred will not resurrect the dead nor will it reunite our family. We cannot vanquish evil with evil. It is our faith that will cleanse Heaven of this menace—faith in the Creator, faith in each other, and faith in those that have chosen a different path. Father’s arms remain ever open, and our brothers need only return to His love. Their souls can still be saved. Our belief in that truth is why we will be victorious!”

  But there was one soul who could not be saved—Satan, as he had rebranded himself, though Michael would never speak the name aloud. While Satan lived, further tragedy was unavoidable. Michael had to prepare the Host for battle or even more would die in the crossfire. But how could they fight, perhaps kill, without becoming what they fought against? Finding that balance would be the Host’s conclusive test of righteousness. They could not afford to fail.

  “Satanail’s hordes are coming for our lands, for our lives, and for our souls. Though we hold no enmity in our hearts, we will defend ourselves. We will free our brothers…even if death is their only redemption. The source of Heaven’s plague must be exterminated!”

  Michael thrust up his fist, spurring the crowd’s spirit. They wanted retribution and needed a target, a face to the enemy.

  “Satanail will answer for all of his crimes. With Father as my witness, SATANAIL WILL FALL!”

  If this “Satan” wanted a war, he would have it.

  CHAPTER 19

  The Industry of War

  The destruction of the Observatory was an irrevocable declaration of war. Satan needed an immediate follow-up strike to maintain his advantage and keep Michael’s thoughts scrambled with terror. During his confinement, Satan outlined a methodical sequence of targets to dismember Michael’s rule limb by limb, meat picked from the bones until all that remained was a societal corpse begging to be saved. But to achieve his lofty goals, Satan required more than legions of demons. Prototypes for the tools and equipment of warfare propagated in his mind. All that was missing was the equipment to see his designs actualized. Only one region contained the raw materials and facilities to process them: Zebul. By securing authority over the mines and Forge, Satan would have unlimited resources for his war effort while denying Michael the same.

  A blizzard draped curtains of snow across Zebul, obscuring Satan’s approach. A legion of demons followed, their black wings shading the milky light like an eclipse. They were restles
s with an aggressive obsession to prove their worth. Many would die, but those who survived would be calloused by bloodshed.

  Contrary to Satan’s inspiring speeches, not all of his demons were equal. He’d never reject a willing recruit, but the weak had no future among his ranks. Their destiny was to be the fodder, bodies to absorb blows aimed at their more valuable brethren. It was an act of nature, one the Host had never been subject to: survival of the fittest.

  The assault Satan was about to lead on Mount Maadim was a gambit to avert eyes from a more vulnerable front. A secondary legion under Beelzebub’s direction was making its way to the Forge through the mines—the general’s first test of leadership. Disguised in miner’s garb and smattered with soot, the demons wouldn’t draw suspicion. Beelzebub was part of the crew that had carved the winding corridors through the volcano and could navigate them with silent ease. Stealth and deception were deadly traits that all under Satan’s command had to master.

  Many would consider Satan’s tactics dishonorable, but the principles of morality had to be suspended. Rules didn’t exist in war. There was no etiquette. No honor. No respect. There was only victory by any means…or defeat, and anyone who believed otherwise would die. It had become evident to Satan that primitive savagery would always overcome civilization. Restraint led to eventual surrender. Surrender led to defeat. Defeat led to death. That was the way of Creation, the way of Father.

  Like Father, like son.

  Satan felt the heat rising from Maadim’s volcanic summit. He dove into the crater, and his legion followed like a swirl of ink scrawling the language of warfare. Snow sizzled off their bodies as they descended into the core, a powder keg coaxing the flame for ignition.

  Uriel and the blacksmiths were waiting for him in the Forge, hammers gripped with lethal intentions. “Did you really think we’d not see you coming?” he said.

  So smug. So predictable.

  “I hadn’t given it a second thought, Uriel. You’d not see the truth if it slapped you in the jaw,” Satan replied.

  Uriel tapped his hammer. “This is all the truth I need to put you down. Smiths, attack!”

  The blacksmiths lumbered forward to commence the battle, bulky angels with excessive musculature that dwarfed most of Satan’s legion. Each swing of their hammers sent demons flailing back with pulverized bones and maimed flesh, but their girth made them slow. Unsteady.

  “Time your strikes! Disrupt their balance!” Satan instructed.

  The demons used their superior aerial agility to dodge the broad swings, wobbling the blacksmiths with their own momentum. They struck back with coarse blades converted from tools, but Satan had only his hands for more satisfying, personal kills. He swiped his sharpened fingernails across the sensitive tendons behind the brutes’ ankles, dropping them to their knees for a fatal blow. Under Satanail’s precision and patience, they fell like dim-witted beasts.

  “Their meat is as thick as their skulls. Aim for their tendons!”

  “Shorten your blows! Crush their wings!” Uriel responded.

  The Seraph’s knack for strategy was greater than Satan had anticipated. He led a revised assault against the demons’ wings, larger targets that required less accuracy. Demons crumpled from the air, their wings contorted and useless. The blacksmiths’ hammers came down on their heads and mashed the remains beyond identification.

  The environment also favored the angels. Surrounding the Forge were pits that dropped into the volcano’s magma. Half-dead demons clawed at the rock walls as they tumbled into the torrid pools. Uriel, utilizing his unique biology, scooped handfuls of magma and hurled it like searing mud onto demonic faces, melting their skin down to bone. Exposed skulls gaped in silent screams while their brains liquefied.

  “Press the attack! The battle is ours!” Uriel praised.

  The boast would’ve held weight…were it not for Beelzebub. Satan’s general and his legion burst in through the mine tunnels, ambushing the Forge. Uriel’s stunned realization of defeat was a look that Satan wished to see on the face of every Seraph before the war was won.

  Beelzebub wielded a weapon of his own making with a fiendish design that tickled Satan. An extended chain ending in a metal ball laced with spikes was swung from a thick handle that could granulate the hardest stone—a deliciously creative combination of blunt and sharp hardware. Beelzebub called it his “morning star,” for it rose with his fury and set ruin upon his enemies. He wrapped a portion of the chain around his arm, swinging the ball and releasing links for length as needed. The morning star arced across the Forge in a bounty of gory executions.

  “Erastiel, stop!” Uriel pleaded as if uttering the name could revert the demon’s loyalties.

  “His name is Beelzebub,” Satan corrected. “You’d do well to remember it.” An emphatic victory now assured, he addressed Uriel’s angels. “Blacksmiths! Your efforts have been admirable, but you’ve lost. Lay down your hammers, and your lives will be spared.”

  “His tongue forges only falsehoods. Fight on!”

  Satan raised his hand, and Beelzebub ceased the massacre. “I speak of life, to those who yet cherish its value.”

  The blacksmiths’ wills were as frail as expected. The majority of survivors dropped their hammers in surrender, but not Uriel. The self-importance of the Seraphim forbade it.

  “It’s an empty victory, Satan,” Uriel said and stepped to the edge of a pit. “You won’t take me…or the Forge.”

  Uriel dove into the magma. Any other angel would’ve been incinerated, but Satan knew that it wasn’t self-sacrifice. Mount Maadim had been essentially capped to contain its broiling elixir. Uriel meant to remove the cap and release an eruption to destroy everything, and everyone, in the area.

  The mountain rumbled, awakening after millennia of sloth.

  “Retrieve him,” Satan ordered.

  Beelzebub plunged the morning star’s entire length of chain deep into the magma like he was fishing. The metal was specially coated to resist extreme heat and counter his former mentor’s trait. When the chain snapped tight, Beelzebub flew back and reeled it in link by link to claim his catch: Uriel.

  The volcano resumed its slumber.

  “A prize catch, General, but foul hooked,” Satan said.

  The spiked ball was embedded in each of Uriel’s six wings. Beelzebub yanked the morning star loose, shredding every wing from his back. The Seraph squealed like a dying swine caught in the teeth of a predator. Beelzebub looted the hammer from Uriel and raised it to claim his life.

  “Hold. I want him to report what he’s seen here.”

  Beelzebub didn’t agree with Satan but chose not to speak against him. Another test passed by the general.

  Uriel struggled to his feet. His basic mind was scrambling for some ingenious retort.

  “Don’t say anything, Uriel. Go, but your wings and dignity are mine,” Satan said.

  Uriel limped into the mines, woozy from the blood loss, only likely to survive because he was a Seraph. The precious metals of Heaven and the means to manipulate them were Satan’s alone.

  The Forge was won.

  “You all work for me, and Beelzebub is my proxy. Obey his commands or depart Heaven in bloody pieces,” Satan said to the blacksmiths. “You’re now in the industry of war. Live it. Breathe it. The tools forged here will save Heaven. We stand at the cusp of greatness. Step beyond it, and follow me to the spoils.”

  Satan was offering the blacksmiths venerable purpose and the promise of distinction. Michael offered only pain and death. Surrounded by the rent corpses of their brothers, the blacksmiths accepted Satan’s terms of surrender.

  The Forge was ready to churn out creations spewed from the bowels of atrocity.

  Michael had wasted no time in readying the Host for warfare. Preparations began on every level of society, and his obsession with the melancholy task was borderline fanatical. It was more productive to engage in his duties to the point of exhaustion than dwell upon what was lost and beyond remedy. Hea
ven’s obesity of sin was like a heap of mephitic dung seeping into the lands, the stench never abating as more and more slop was hurled onto the pile.

  The function of each Choir was revised to combat Satan’s rebellion (Michael loathed the demonic name, even in his mind). The Powers were charged with active surveillance of Heaven, their rotation randomized by Metatron, and submitted daily reports about any suspicious activity. Random attacks plagued the regions with no apparent goal other than to delight in the violence and concluded before any response team could be dispatched. Whatever Satan’s next significant move, it was held close to his chest.

  The tremendous power of the Nest had explosive potential, but the Cherubim’s limited energies were monopolized by the tornadoes defending Araboth City and their maintenance of Heaven’s weather equilibrium. Their reduced numbers were unable to provide any offensive support in the war effort. With so few Cherubs at his disposal, Cassiel was not confident that he could wield the necessary convergence of energy to coordinate a focused weather strike.

  Archangels were entrusted with the preservation of Heaven’s wildlife. They brought as many pairs of species as possible into the Reserve and routed others away from potential areas of conflict. War was the Host’s mistake, and Michael would not have the animals suffer for it. They were innocent wonders of Creation that each held their own claim to Heaven. If the angels brought themselves to extinction, at least the animals could retain their slice of paradise.

  Raphael sheltered an influx of refugees within Raqia. The belt of land was larger than any city with natural protection and bountiful sustenance. Villagers whose homes were vulnerable or could not find safety within Araboth’s walls were diverted there for asylum. The Thrones assembled emergency facilities to receive the masses of expected wounded that would require a neutral place to recuperate. Remote and with no foreseeable use in the war, Raqia was not expected to be of high value for Satan.