What say ye, Seraph?”
I close my eyes. I let out several long breaths. I guess this is what it feels like to give up. I am flawed. I am imperfect. I don’t really believe in God, do I? I just say his name like it’s some magical chant asking him to help me, and I expect everything in return.
I’ve always believed that a true God is one of sacrifice. You get nothing unless you give, and then God is within you. You may not get anything in return, but the power is still there, the goodness, the love shared with others.
I have also always believed people put too much belief in symbols, crosses, stories, and tales told in the bible that resemble fairy tales more than they do anything meaningful to our lives. Like the Four Horsemen, silly beasts meant to scare people into believing in the end of the world and a judgment day. Sitting here and speaking to one in real life, if that is what this is, seems interesting, but is he real?
I have to assume he is. I have to assume all of this is still happening, and somewhere out there Colonel Becks and Azrael are sitting by the side of the road waiting for me to return at the right moment so we can get going again, and finish the mission. If we have time.
I can make the time, I can appear moments after I disappeared and fell asleep, and hopefully they won’t have to stop because of me. To do that, I need my wings, my power.
To get them back, I need to agree to open the book. Something tells me once I make this choice, I can’t unmake it at all, and I shall be set in my role in this prophecy. Making a decision to betray God should never be taken lightly.
So if I agree to release them, I can live.
My prayers will be forfeit, and as Tanas himself said, the world shall end. He has a funny way of not telling me the whole truth, and I need to take that into account. The things he said I could avoid are coming to pass, lies inter-weaved with truths he speaks as he tries to sway me.
In short, he’s just like any other politician I have ever met.
I open my eyes. He stares at me, sitting under the bedside lamp in the darkened room. The machines beep, their lights glowing in the blackness between us.
I nod.
And I nod again.
If it is a monster you want, it is a monster I shall be.
CHAPTER XXXIV:
He Covers My Eyes
His hand is on my eyes, and my body floats away. It is the strangest feeling, like waking up from a dream and entering another. When he removes his hand, I am standing, and I am shorter than the man.
There are no tubes in my nose, no mask on my mouth, and no stitches on my lips. I am whole again, young, and my large, soft black wings rest upon my back. My body feels good, rested, and invigorated.
The creak of leather and the smooth feel around me encase me in a powerful feeling. I inspect my hand, the black leather armored glove sheaths it, the gold-trimmed corset covers my chest, and the gold-pattered boots are upon my legs. The belts criss cross my hips, and my slightly sexist leather panties cover my hips. I’m in my armor again, the angel of death he wants me to be.
I look at my older self in my hospital bed, so helpless and alone, sick and connected to the machines keeping her alive. She looks so weak, so frail, and it’s hard to believe this is me. Her mouth is sewn up, and she is so pale. It gives me shivers looking at her. I look away because I can’t take it anymore.
“Calm yourself, she shall be fine.” King Tanas, still in his suit and overcoat, hands me my sword with a smile. “This is yours, Seraph.”
“Thank you,” I sheath my sword, and stretch the kinks out of my back, being careful not to knock over the machines with my wings. “One question, what’s with the lips? Why sew them up? It’s gross and I hate it.”
“Death’s dealings.” Tanas shakes his head, taking off his overcoat. “So prayers cannot be heard. A precaution, not necessary now. They shall be removed by the doctors in the morning, and the scars shall disappear.”
“I hate them.” I lower my head, and look back at myself for one last time. “I don’t like how any of this was done.”
“I apologize, but I assure you her recovery will be miraculous. If it is any small consolation.” He wraps his overcoat over my wings, covering me. “With you moving around so much, it was hard to find you, so measures needed to be taken with such short notice. You still have very little control. That shall improve. You shall fly, young Seraph, you shall have saved generations from the horrors of the beast.”
I look up at him, buttoning up the coat as best I can. “I know. I made my promise. I shall release you. Deal. War will be slain. I understand.”
I want to look back at myself, but I can’t. I finally let her go. Be happy Jessica. Be happy Brad. This is the end for us. I can’t come back. I can’t ever be you again. You were just one possibility for my life and how it turned out. Now, this is my life to live, and I have to live in the now and take control of my destiny.
This is it. Ends are always new beginnings. I unhook the black chain from around my neck, pull my wedding ring off, and put it in my older self’s hand and press it closed. This is yours now.
“Where to now?”
“Come and see.” He takes my hand, and we walk out of the hospital room.
I look back one last time. Please, please take care of my babies. Love them for me. Goodbye forever, Jessica.
We walk down the hall, past nurses and doctors. One nurse gets sight of my outfit and her expression turns to disgust, and I hear the words “kids nowadays” as we pass. I’m too numb to feel shame, my wings covered in the long coat, I look like any other costume-player coming to see her sick mother in something inappropriate. I don’t care, I can’t.
For someone thousands of years old, he is quite at home in a hospital, and he knows how to work the elevators. We’re together riding down, quiet in the aseptic elevator car, the ding of the floors passing the only noise between us.
I say it. “Who are you?”
“Tanas. King. A beast from the book as you suppose.” He’s quiet a moment as he chooses his words carefully. “Son of a great and powerful fallen angel, my father, cast from Heaven by God himself. Imprisoned in that book for eons for who I am, and what I could be. As you suspect, I am a monster.”
He looks over at me as the elevator comes to a stop with a ding. “Much like yourself.”
We walk through the lobby, past the front desk, past empty waiting chairs, and out the automated sliding doors. My boots click on the cement as a security guard wishes us both a nice night.
If only he knew.
A white limousine waits for us outside. Tanas opens the door, smiling at me. “My chariot. Such are the benefits of kings and men of my stature.”
I slip inside, sliding across the seats, and making sure my sword doesn’t poke a hole in the expensive leather. I let each wing take a spot on the seat to each side of me as I ditch the overcoat.
“Seraph, it has been a while.” The old man from the graveyard sits across from me, wearing his black attire. “And Tanas, it is good to see you, my King.”
“Old friend.” Tanas slips inside, sits across from me, and closes the door. “Heinrich, Henry, how is the old lion doing?”
“You know each other? Obviously.” I sit back. “Care to tell me what War wanted? When you sent me away and I was nearly killed by flying coffins?”
“Jessica.” Heinrich smiles. “You finally let go, it makes me proud you hath shown your strength and courage, twas a moment there where I had doubts, but you hath proved this old man wrong.
War? We had words, and I warn you both, I fear his suspicions of our scheming to raise a new angel of death may be giving him pause. He came to me to give voice to his suspicions.”
“What did you tell him?” Tanas hands me a bottle of sparkling water, and I accept.
“I told him Azrael could not be trusted, our hand was forced, and a new angel needed to arise from the ashes of the old.”
“So it was you that cut Azrael’s wings off?” I shift them in my seat, glaring at the two of them.
“Death’s scythe,” Tanas says, “it is the only weapon sharp enough to do so. But our plans, yes.”
I feel the pain throb deep in my wing roots.
“And I’m supposed to be okay with that?”
Heinrich shakes his head. “Don’t grow too attached to the old man, he is a fallen angel like any other, loyal only to God out of a belief in sympathy and forgiveness. Don’t forget without those wings, you would be one of the many dead and dying.”
“Like your men holding him?” I sip my sparkling water. “The ones me and my soldiers killed when I rescued him?”
Tanas smiles, and Heinrich rubs his face.
“You what?”
Tanas pats my knee, and I force his hand away. “Seraph! Such nobility. The corrupted Teutonic knights are the servants of War himself. Azrael’s wingless body was captured by War and they were holding him for War’s questioning.”
“He escaped from us.” Heinrich sips his water, his voice flat and displeased. “Death cannot hold the man, I swear.”
“I don’t appreciate what you did to him.” I rest my elbows on my legs. “And I don’t approve of stealing his wings.”
“Without him,” Tanas says, “there is no you. I would not complain too much in your position. If he trusts you, I should suppose this is part of his misguided notion this may be some test by God to get him back in His good graces. What has he said?”
I lower my head. “He wants to stop War, same as you. He wants you all back in the book too. I suppose it’s too late to take back letting you all out?”
“What’s right is right, and what’s good is good. A promise by an angel, fallen or not, is bond,” Heinrich says, “and I shall look forward to our true and final release.”
I look up at him. “Can I ask you a question? If you need to be let out of the book, then how are you here? Why am I talking to you? How is War free?”
Tanas rests his shoulder against the door, crossing his legs. “We were out the moment you opened the book. The mere fact of us speaking to you proves that you shall open the book. Your mind cannot comprehend, yet, the true measure of the power of beings like ourselves. Everything up until then is a pre-echo of the future. Once the moment is had, and the book opened, our entire power shall be revealed.”
“War seems very powerful,” I say, “if I open the book, will he be more so?”
“That is true,” Heinrich says, “but we shall stop him. Seraphim are born of fire, and therefore immune to even the heat of the sun. No matter how strong he gets, you shall always be stronger. Such are the ways of the Kingdom of Heaven.”
“So Azrael wouldn’t help you?” I say, “and that’s why you cut his wings off? To get someone who would?”
“Someone with something to lose,” Tanas says, “yes. Like you. Your prayer being heard made the choice an easy one, and one that War would play along with should he think we could cancel your prayer and end the world.”
“So what you told me about everything, those were lies?”
“Mostly, but half-truths and words for your consumption,” Tanas says, “you were told enough for you to make your mind up, and enough to keep you safe. If word of our plans were to be heard by spies, this would all be over.”
“War has spies everywhere,” Heinrich says, “especially in the camps of soldiers and men. War is secrets, and secrets are he. He needed to think you were a puppet under our control, for even he knows a Seraph would be the only tool the other three Horsemen could use against him. He came to see you in the graveyard, but I told him you were not ready, and I sent you into Death’s embrace.”
“Gee,” I say, “thanks. So this outfit was another part of the con?”
Tanas nods. “The clothes make the woman. You would be very pleasing to him, War likes the young, to be sure.”
“He never liked Azrael.” Heinrich looks out the window at the passing cars. “But he was comfortable with the man. Azrael, ever content to cross off the names of the dead, one by one, until the end of time. War kept feeding him the names.”
I rest my eyes in my hands. Here I am with two of the Four Horsemen, and we’re riding around in the back of a limousine talking about killing their associates and taking over the world like mobsters. How can this not be a dream? Could I still be in that hospital room in some fevered state, slipping in and out of reality?
I swirl the water around in my bottle, watching the bubbles cling to the sides, holding on for as long as they can before letting go and floating to the top.
“Is there a problem, Seraph Jessica?” Tanas says. “This is a moment of celebration. Your ascension to the Angel of Death is complete, and here you stand in a noble crusade to eliminate hatred and war for all time.”
“Where are you taking me?”
“Central Cathedral,” Heinrich says, “so you can ascend to the Kingdom of Heaven, look in the face of God, and open the book.”
I look down at the bottle, watching the bubbles let go, one by one. I close my eyes. I’m one of them now, I am no longer Jessica White, middle-aged housewife of two with a lovely husband and a nice home. I am some demon, some hellish avatar of death who serves the Four Horsemen in some apocalyptic plot of madness.
Everything we planned is gone. Colonel Becks, rescuing Azrael, the plans by the President, our mission to stop the scion from reaching Earth, a stupid plan to launch a missile into outer space, all of it was a lie. It’s some figment of my imagination now, just like Brad, just like the people in the diner, just like Jo-Jo and the children I brought to the church - none of it matters anymore.
It doesn’t feel like much of me is left.
Evil wins. Evil wins the world because I don’t have enough power to make a difference, to stand up, or to even comprehend what is happening to me or how to control it. I’m not even sure of who’s reality I’m in anymore, of where I am, or if anything I do or promise even matters.
Does God even hear me?
This is what it must be like to live in a world without him.
CHAPTER XXXV:
I Open My Eyes
Something hits us. Hard.
Pavement is scraping past the right side window, and it explodes in a shower of glass. Steel bends, the limousine lurches, and the entire from compartment is on fire. Before I know where we are, I’m tangled up in my black wings, lying on my side, and Tanas is sprawled across me. Heinrich’s skull-covered boot is in my face.