Fall From Grace Read online

  An unarmed demon was smacked from the air and shrieked as Uriel approached. “I surrender. Don’t kill me, please. Don’t kill me! I surrender.”

  “No surrender.” Uriel smiled and drove his hammer down at the defenseless, cowering demon—

  Raphael darted between them and halted the hammer just above the demon’s head. His knees shook from Uriel’s strength.

  “STOP, Uriel! He is unarmed. You must stop this.”

  “It’s the will of the Creator,” Uriel growled. He wrested the hammer from Raphael and shoved the handle against his throat, pinning him to the ground, not distinguishing friend or foe.

  “No…it is…not…” Raphael grasped Uriel’s face with both hands. The evil coursing through him was like a viscous poison. It was strong—it wanted to stay—but Raphael was stronger. His grace scrubbed Uriel’s soul, and the hammer began to lift from his neck. “This is not the Creator’s will. He does not want this.”

  “Raphael…?” Uriel’s eyes focused with recognition and then saw his victims. “Father, what’ve I done? What am I?”

  “Uriel. Your name is Uriel,” Raphael said. “You are my friend. My brother. You are an angel of the Creator.”

  The swift crack of Mammon’s whip split the air.

  Uriel’s neck opened like a loose seam, spraying warm blood on Raphael. Confused words gurgled from the wound as Uriel collapsed. Raphael caught him and put pressure on his throat, but it was slit from ear to ear.

  Mammon descended.

  “An eye for an eye. Do you feel it, Raphael? Give in to the hate. Stand and die fighting.”

  Raphael would not fight. He released his six wings and curled them over himself and Uriel in a shell of feathers, summoning his deepest reserves of grace.

  “Be with me, Uriel. Focus on my voice. I have seen far worse.” Mammon relentlessly whipped Raphael’s wings, but his healing did not waver. “You will live through this, Uriel (crack!) I can heal you (crack!) I can save you (crack!) I—”

  The whip slashed through Raphael’s wings and peeled them open. His vision faded into a shade of peripheral darkness. If they were going to die, at least it would be together…as angels.

  Forgive me, Uriel.

  Gabriel and the remaining chariots were successful in routing the aerial demons, but at great expense. Grounding the demons had exacerbated the battle in the streets…and he lost sight of Mammon. Where are you hiding, you pestilence? Gabriel scanned the city and saw the war machines closing in on the Grand Hall.

  “Stop those war machines,” he ordered, but the thinning chariots wouldn’t be able to destroy them all before the defensive phalanx was rolled over. Where was Uriel?

  “Tear them down!”

  Gabriel knew that noxious voice. Mammon. The slippery general waved the war machines forward while whipping at the wings of a slumped angel—the six wings of a Seraph. Mammon paused to admire his work. That momentary opening was all that Gabriel needed.

  You’re mine.

  Gabriel speared down like a missile of justice hurled from the Creator. He slashed both of his scythes across Mammon’s back, severing the black wings and pitching him through a window of the Grand Hall. A vicious voice inside of Gabriel tempted him to follow and finish the monster, but he remembered Michael’s teachings: angels fought to save lives, not take them. Raphael was holding Uriel under his tattered wings, half conscious but still healing. It was the most valiant display of familial love and strength that Gabriel had ever seen.

  “We have to move. Can you stand?”

  “Uriel…is he…?” Raphael’s only concern was for another.

  Uriel’s throat was sealed but raw. He needed more attention, and the Thrones’ safety was compromised.

  “He’s alive, but you must withdraw the Thrones.”

  Raphael struggled to his feet. Demons were coming. “There is nowhere else to flee.”

  “Leave Araboth. Seek refuge in the country,” Gabriel said.

  “But—”

  “Survive. Live, however long you can.” The Thrones had done enough. If any of the Host deserved to see another day, they did. “I’ll stay here and see it through.”

  “This is not farewell. We will meet again, Gabriel, in life or death. May the Creator be with you.”

  Raphael flew off with Uriel, only two of his wings functional. Gabriel knew most of the wounded wouldn’t survive the exodus, but it was their only chance. If they stayed, the war machines would crush them, or worse, the Forgotten would devour them.

  “Fall back through the Hall and resume formation. I want every stone, every space of air between here and the Sanctuary filled with angels. This is what we trained for,” Gabriel ordered. With Uriel down and Raphael in retreat, he was the last Seraph remaining to lead the Host. “For Michael, for Mankind, no one gets through!”

  Embrace death. Welcome it. Become it.

  Gabriel spread his wings over the Grand Hall entrance as the Host retreated. For too long, he suffered mocking comparisons to Michael. All of his detractors were right: he was not Michael. He was Gabriel the Reaper…and history would remember his name.

  In the Chamber of Creation, Satan paced around the gateway to Earth. His demons would arrive soon to begin the invasion. But where was Michael? Where was Father? Even now, He denied his son the recognition rightfully earned through blood and glory. Silent insolence.

  “I know you hear me. You’re everywhere and nowhere. How many more of your sons must I kill to earn an audience, Father? I stand at the gate to your bastard imitations, their genocide but a whim away. Have you nothing to say in their defense? Would your silence authorize their extermination as it did that of the Host?”

  What lasting effect could Satan’s rebellion have if He whom they rebelled against refused to affirm its presence? Were they so little, so unimportant to Him, like microorganisms mewling for their independence?

  Damn Him, DAMN HIM! Satan thought, ashamed of his emotion. Only Father could make him feel like a sniveling youth.

  “What Father watches his sons led to their slaughter without lifting a finger to prevent it? Where is the omniscient, all-loving Creator we’ve prayed to since the dawn of our existence? Was it naught but wasted breath? Speak, you obsolete megalomaniac!”

  “Why would He speak to you after what you have done?”

  Michael descended into the Chamber, repelling the darkness with Excalibur’s flames. Satan had never seen him appear so…magnificent. At last, he would test the limits of his body, the voracity of his soul, against Michael. Uninterrupted. To the death. Since they both came into being, side-by-side, this was to be the crossroads of their destinies.

  “What of you? All you’ve ever done is be His mouthpiece, tongue wagging incessantly with the words of another. I gave us freedom.”

  Everything Satan fought to achieve was so simple. So pure. What couldn’t he understand?

  “We were already free,” Michael responded, but he kept his distance. There was a reticence in his step. He didn’t crave the fight, didn’t need it, one of many reasons why he would lose.

  “An illusion projected over Heaven.” Satan unsheathed Wormwood and ran his finger along the crimson edge. “It’s time, Michael.”

  “I never wanted this. It does not have to be this way.”

  “It’s the only way! We can’t both exist. Creation won’t allow it. Defend yourself or be cut down as a coward,” Satan said and pulled his wings back to charge.

  “When you fall, Satanail, I pray that Father saves your soul.”

  “Father doesn’t give a damn about any of us—”

  The Fires of Creation exploded out of the darkness.

  Their bodies were yanked to the floor, rigid as the milky flames consumed them both. Satan was assaulted with images and feelings so profuse that he thought his mind would overload from the plethora of firing synapses.

  Supreme knowledge. The Word.

  Satan was linked to Michael and Father, a trinity sharing in the memories of his enti
re life. Millions of actions, conversations, and feelings—every choice Satan had ever made. A repressed sentiment accompanied the retrospective montage: happiness. He had forgotten its warmth and encompassing purview. It had allied his soul to every angel in Heaven, none more than Michael. As Satanail, when he and Michael led the Host together, their union was perfect.

  Heaven was perfect.

  Michael’s vision returned to the Chamber as the Fires of Creation released him and Satan, receding into a sphere. Father could have detained them indefinitely, but He respected their freedom. The gift of reflection was not meant to obstruct, only to offer an alternative choice.

  Tears moistened Satan’s cheeks like cracks in his demonic hatred, revealing rays of Satanail beneath. Father had faith that Michael could redeem his brother’s grace.

  “Do you see? This Satan is not who you are. Satanail is still within you. All that we have done together, we can do it again. We can heal Heaven,” Michael implored.

  “Visions of times long past. What’s done is done, for all of us.” Satan stood, the light of Satanail rapidly fading. “Father rescinded our divinity and gave it to Mankind. He’s as implicit in Heaven’s ruin as we are.”

  “We have no one to blame but ourselves. We destroyed the Kingdom. Not Father, not Mankind, but we can repent! With our guidance, Mankind can avoid committing the same sins. They are not our enemy. I beg you, Brother, stop this.”

  “It’s too late. Mankind will know my rage. My suffering. I’ll kill every last man, woman, and child.” The declaration buried Satanail’s grace so deep that not even the Creator could resurrect it. “That is my promise, Father.”

  The Fires of Creation retracted away from the brothers, their Father’s final appeal scorned. There was acceptance and sadness in the flames, for He would interfere no more. Michael had to fulfill his oath and protect Mankind from Satan.

  “I cannot let you harm them,” he said.

  “Then you’ll die.” Satan hovered and readied Wormwood. “I will not fall, Michael.”

  “You already have.”

  They were brothers in more than flesh, two souls woven from the same divine threads of greatness, but one of their lives had to end.

  CHAPTER 33

  Where All Roads End

  Satan and Michael flew at each other as if propelled by Creation’s fears and hopes, neither swerving from the imminent collision. Their speed seemed to bend time and space around them, trailing nebulous colors like prisms of suspended matter. Excalibur and Wormwood struck in a concussion of sparks that toppled the brothers to opposite ends of the Chamber. The initial blow embodied all that Satan had expected from the confrontation—combat evolved into sacrament.

  The Fires of Creation shuddered while Satan and Michael’s battle ripped through the strobe flames with personal, scathing retribution. Theirs was a grudge that spanned ages, and Satan delighted in fulfilling its promise before the only spectator of worth. He had never been so challenged, barely able to dodge Michael’s range of explicit strikes. Perfect form. Endless combinations. The Seraph was an emerald cyclone of finesse and aggression, constantly switching sword hands or feinting with his wings. But Satan excelled under the pressure to match every swing, every thrust, with equal strength and speed.

  The fight was a euphoric conflagration of emotion.

  “More, Michael! Think of what I’ll do to the humans. What I’ve already done,” Satan said, using the metal-coated bones on his wings to parry Excalibur while searching for any flaws to abuse in Michael’s technique. There were none. The Fires shone off his armor, and Michael recognized the origins of its macabre augmentation.

  “Does your deviance have no limits?” Infuriated, Michael aimed his attacks at Satan’s wings, chipping away the protection. “Death is not a trophy!”

  “No, it’s art, and Mankind is my favorite medium.”

  “Your evil will not befall them.”

  Michael crouched, heavy breaths puffing between clenched teeth. He was trying to muzzle the sin creeping around his heart and testing the smoldering waters of his soul.

  “It doesn’t have to. It’s imprinted in their cells, like us. You deny it, you call it evil, but it’s a natural part of what we are.”

  Michael sliced Excalibur across Satan’s wings, splitting the metallic bones into shards. “There is nothing natural about what you have become.”

  Satan flapped off the remnants of armor on his wings, but his feathers felt sticky and matted. Michael had drawn first blood.

  “Very good, but you’re still holding back.”

  “And you are still trying to prove yourself to Father.”

  The statement pinched a nerve in Satan. He telegraphed a stab with Wormwood but reversed it at the last moment, instead landing a clubbing fist on Michael’s cheekbone. His reinforced knuckles swelled a purple contusion and fractured the bone.

  “What’s left to prove?”

  “That you are worth saving…if not in this life, then the next.” Michael’s virtuous babble was like daggers poking into Satan’s eardrums.

  “I don’t need you to save me.”

  The violent give-and-take continued with no clear advantage for either brother, like trying to connect two identical magnets. Satan noticed how Michael dipped after each sequence of strikes, a negligible motion, but it exposed the base of his top wings. It was the chance he needed to hamper Michael’s agility and prune his title of Seraph wing by wing. When Michael ducked again, Satan locked his head under one arm and thrust Wormwood down at the pair—

  But Michael retracted his wings, causing the sword to miss and throw Satan off balance. Excalibur stabbed into Satan’s shoulder, its white flames searing his flesh. He winced as Michael twisted the blade, both spreading and cauterizing the wound.

  “I accept what I am. You can’t stop evolution.”

  Satan opened Wormwood’s nodule. The black hole sucked the flames off Excalibur. He pulled the blade from his shoulder and kicked Michael back, retreating into the comfort of darkness.

  “Nor can you command it,” Michael replied. “That right is Father’s alone.”

  “My demons prove otherwise.” In the illusory acoustics of the Chamber, Satan’s location was impossible to discern. “I’m meant to become Him. No…I’m meant to surpass Him.”

  Satan’s wings whooshed around the Chamber as he landed five successive slashes across Michael’s torso. The golden breastplate detached into pieces, revealing an inverted pentagram carved in his chest. Michael clutched the disparaging brand, blood leaking between his fingers.

  Satan reemerged within the Fires of Creation, their heatless flames highlighting his sadistic grin. “Concede, and a swift death will be your consolation.”

  “You have seen nothing of His power—” Michael lunged forward and bashed Satan away from the Fires with the hilt of Excalibur. “—Or mine.”

  The Host’s army had retreated through the Grand Hall to the Sanctuary approach, but Gabriel stayed behind to search for anyone trapped within the building. It was infested with demons and Forgotten rampaging through each of the Choirs’ corridors, fattened by the squalid nutrients of mobocracy. In their hysteria, they trashed everything in sight for the primal glee of demolition. War machines smashed support pillars and buckled the roofs. Fractures slithered from foundation to ceiling like serpents in the stone as Forgotten scurried inside the walls, weakening their integrity. The Hall could implode at any moment.

  A slab of the ceiling crumbled like rotten wood and poured Forgotten on top of Gabriel. He spun to shear the fiends against the craggy walls, but they clung on and sank their teeth into him. They’re eating me, Gabriel panicked, unable to use his scythes without stabbing himself.

  They’re eating me!

  An open atrium ahead gathered toxic rainwater into a basin in the floor. Gabriel held his breath and dove under the murky water. The Forgotten sizzled, their cries inhaling the caustic broth and dissolving their bodies from within.

  When the Forg
otten drowned, Gabriel burst from the pool. He stifled a scream as the acidic water bubbled into the bites and claw marks. Stumbling down the corridor, he noticed that the entrance to the Heavenly Court was ajar. Inside, the Irin and Qaddisin were stationary in their bench with no apparent fear or desire to leave. Mammon cracked his whip at them, delirious from blood loss.

  “What judgment would you pass on me?” Mammon took a knee to mock the judges.

  “Demon, you are not worthy of kneeling before us,” the Qaddisin said.

  “I expected sweeter words to fall from your flaccid tongues,” Mammon sneered. His whip carved into the wall behind the judges’ heads. “Or shall I remove them?”

  “Our voices—” one Irin began.

  “—Are reserved for angels.”

  “Then Lord Satan has no more need of you. He is Heaven’s judge, and I am the executioner.”

  Gabriel kicked in the doors, launching their burly wooden frames at Mammon’s back. They mashed into the general’s wing stumps and pinned him to the ground. Gabriel thought he saw a twitch of enjoyment in the judges’ eyes. In unison, all four delivered their final sentence—

  “Beat him to death, Gabriel.”

  “It’d be my honor,” he replied, sharpening his scythes against each other.

  Mammon broke loose and flung his whip at Gabriel. Sloppy. Slow. Easily avoided.

  “My death means nothing. Mankind’s death—that is everything. Satan’s Kingdom will be built on their corpses. Towers of intestines and bone with fountains of their blood.”

  “His only Kingdom is that of disgrace…and death.” Gabriel hurled a scythe into Mammon’s forearm and recovered it with a punch that beat him across the Court. Sheburiel’s rings left imprints across Mammon’s face like a posthumous signature.