The Celestial Rose BoxSet

by Annalee Adams

  "Dog! I'm a fierce Lycan, not a bloody dog." He said, letting go and clearly sulking as he mumbled to himself.

  I couldn't help but laugh. It was a sound I’d missed. Not that I usually liked hearing my own voice, but to have an actual mortal voice that sounded like my own was beyond miraculous. The spiritual representation of my body was a weak one. I could feel again, see again, hear and touch. It was as though my celestial side had been dialled down so I didn't cause a mass panic with an overarching scream or a triumphant emotional breakdown. I'd been handled accordingly, and it was probably for the best, too.

  My laughter resonated through the room; damn, it was good to be back. Harland looked shocked but soon joined in, his chest rippled with excitement. Nic was already rolling around on the floor while Elisha was holding back the urge to run over and squeeze the life out of me. Even Julian had a smile across his frozen face.

  Lawrence walked in. "This is certainly a welcome addition to a mournful household." He smiled, walking over to me and kissing the top of my head. "It’s good to have you home, Taylor!"

  "It's good to be home, Lawrence." I said, chuckling and pulling Harland over for a huge necessary cuddle.

  Sitting back upright, I look around the room. Where was Lucian? Why wasn't he here by my side? Adam said he survived, he lived to breathe another day. Well, kind of. Not that he really needed to breathe, after all. I think he did that just to look human.

  "Where is he?" I turned and asked Elisha. She would be the one that would give me an honest answer. She was always quite blunt and to the point.

  "I thought he got you out? That's why you're here."

  "Out of where?"

  "Why, Hell, of course!" She said searching my eyes for any recognition to her answer. "You were in Hell, weren't you?"

  "No,” I said, biting down on my lip. “I know I have a lot to explain, but where’s Lucian? You’re worrying me. Why wouldn’t he be at my funeral?"

  Beside the living area we sat in, where the fire roared, and the sun dwindled. There was a booming knock at the front door. "Who on Earth is that? I sent the humans home!" Lawrence exclaimed as he picked up his cane and trudged his way out of the room.

  As the door opened, commotion began clambering in the doorway.

  "No, you leave this place at once!" I heard Lawrence say. I knew the voice he spoke to. Heard it recently, in fact. Smiling, I lifted myself from Harland’s grasp, left the sofa, and, wrapped in blankets, I carried my tired body over to the front entrance.

  "Lawrence, this is Gabriel. He's my protector. Like I said, there's a lot to explain." I smiled.

  "Indeed, there is, Eve... like why you're naked and cuddled with a Lycan and living in the house of her Disciples." Gabriel frowned.

  "Didn't Adam tell you who the Darkwaters were?"

  "No, he left that unfortunate explanation out." He looked annoyed. I didn't think I had ever seen him annoyed. Could Angels even get annoyed?

  "Well, they're my friends. They protect me, too, Gabriel."

  Elisha and Harland rushed to the door. “Eve?” Elisha asked.

  "He's naked, too. I don't think Adam will like this report, do you?"

  "Adam?" Harland asked.

  "What report? Why are you sending him reports?” I asked.

  “He wants to make sure we don’t screw up this time, Eve.”

  “But that was Michael, not you.”

  “Let’s just say he’s extra cautious.”

  “What’s with the Eve?” Elisha screeched.

  “Jeez, will everyone stop hounding me?" I said stomping my foot down.

  Harland laughed. "You're cute when you're angry."

  "Shut it, Harland!"

  "So, you're mating with this Lycan?" Gabriel asked.

  "What? Seriously, do you need to know that?"

  "Well, no, I'm just, just..."

  "Just what? It doesn't matter, and to answer your question, no!"

  "So why are you both naked?"

  "Look mate, I'm a Lycan. I changed form... now I'm naked. Deal with it. Taylor's soaked from the ice casket. Great idea, by the way, Jules." Harland said, looking back at an angry Julian. "She could have died in there, you know!"

  Julian stomped in. "She was meant to be dead!"

  "Yeah, well, that didn't last long, did it?"

  "Be quiet!" Elisha yelled. "We won't ever find out what happened if you lot don't shut up."

  "Thank you, Elisha. I was getting quite the headache." Lawrence said, still stood by the open door.

  Gabriel smiled at me, I smiled back. It was good to have a connection to Adam again.

  "Well, it looks as though you had better come in." Lawrence said to Gabriel.

  As he stepped forward, I flung my arms around him. "I missed you!" I said.

  "We all missed you, too!" Gabriel said smiling.

  The Darkwaters remained quiet. Even Harland kept his lips sealed, for a moment. “Bloody Angels,” he cursed as he walked into the sitting room. I laughed.

  “Woah, what’s an Angel doing here?” Nic asked.

  “I believe Taylor was just about to tell us that.” Elisha said, frowning.

  Sitting on the sofa beside the fire, I patted the spot next to me. Gabriel sat down, pleasantly admiring the décor the room had to offer. His smirk showed how little he felt for human possessions. But these weren’t humans. When you’re sat in a room with an Angel, a Lycan, a Shifter, a Femme Fatale, a Seer, and an Ice Demon, you’re surely going to have some fun. Imagine all the possibilities we could create if only we banded together. We could save the world. But no, this fractured band of misfits couldn’t even string a sentence together to tell me what happened to my beloved Lucian.

  “Well?” Elisha said, tapping her foot.

  “I don’t know where to start,” I said.

  “Somewhere, would be nice. We may have an eternity, but this is getting boring.” She said.

  “She’s delightful.” Gabriel said as Harland and I sniggered.

  “The Angel can stay,” Harland said. “He has humour.”

  “Indeed.” Gabriel said, looking Harland over.

  “Come on, TayTay, what happened?”

  “Well, I died. Ended up in a tunnel, a really long, dull, boring tunnel. Which, by the way Gabriel, that must change. It’s not right making mortals walk for so long!” He nodded in agreement. “Anyway, after the tunnel there was a lady with an axe in her head, a long wait in a crystal empire... oh, they had ticket machines, too. That was tedious.”

  “Are you making this up?” Harland said, amused.

  “No, I couldn’t make this up if I tried.”

  “She is correct. The ticket machines were a standing joke in Elysium. It’s Eve’s fault. She thought it’d be amusing.” He said looking at me.

  “Elysium?” Elisha asked.

  “Ah, yes. It is what humans call Heaven.”

  “Why does he call you Eve?” Julian demanded.

  “Because, apparently, that’s who I am?”

  “Ha! Yeah right, TayTay.” Nic laughed.

  “Err, Taylor, we’ve met Eve. Albeit briefly, but she looked nothing like you.”

  “That was another of Eve’s bodies. She has had many since her birth.” Gabriel said.

  “Are you being serious?” Harland asked.

  “Entirely. But it appears she is quite keen on this shell. I can see why.” He winked as I laughed.

  “Quit coming on to her, man. She’s with Lucian.” Nic said.

  “Talking of Lucian, where is he? I’d like to meet him.” Gabriel said.

  “I’ve been asking but no one has answered me.” I said tensing up. “Elisha, where is he?”

  “He thought you were in Hell, Taylor. He went to get you out.”

  “Eve in Hell?” Gabriel laughed. “She wouldn’t be seen dead in that place.”

  Harland choked out a laugh. “He’s got a point.” He grinned. “So back to Eve. When the heck did that happen?”

  “It didn’t happen,” Gabr
iel said. “She has always been Eve.”

  “Yes, but why didn’t she know?” he asked.

  “Because my older brother, Adam, sent me into the body of a newborn baby. He sent me there to hide me from our father who was determined to banish me to another realm.”

  “What, your god was going to banish you?”

  “Yes, he succumbed to the darkness centuries ago. He banished Lilith, my older sister, to Earth when it was only a wasteland. She created Enoch, as you know, and hid there ever since. I created humans to keep her company and the world is as it is now.” I smiled.

  “What? Lilith’s your sister?” Nic said.

  “Yes, apparently. I don’t remember much of this.”

  “How come?” Elisha asked as Lawrence sat puzzling over the story.

  “Because in this life, I took in the darkness. It corrupted my library of memories somehow, so I can’t access them all.”

  “How do you know this is real then?”

  “I saw one memory, a memory of me as a toddler. Adam was carrying me on his back in the garden of Eden, running through the woods to meet my mother and sister. Mother was going to smuggle us away as our father had been corrupted. But father got there first. He beat my mother and sent her away, banishing her. Lilith was banished later, and Adam kept me safe from father ever since. When I grew up, father wanted to destroy me too. So Adam smuggled me out and gave me the chance to live as one of my mortal creations, with a loving family, protected by the Angels, like Gabriel here.”

  “The problem with Taylor's life,” Gabriel piped in, “was that Michael was watching her, but when she turned sixteen and her light began to function you saw her and the Beast saw her and reported back to Lilith. Michael thought she had been killed in the London explosion and brought back upstairs. He royally screwed up and it’s you all that we must thank for keeping Eve safe for the further two years. She has never lived so long in one shell than she has with you.”

  “Err, thanks.” Harland said.

  “It was Lucian,” Elisha said. “He protected her and now may have given his life to save her.”

  “His life?” I said. “Where is he?”

  “He went to Enoch to plead forgiveness from Lilith, asking her to allow him entry into Hell to bring you home to him.”

  “He did what? He shouldn’t have!”

  “He loves you, TayTay. He couldn’t live alone, not without you.”

  “No, where is he? I have to help him!” I screeched.

  “He was on his way to Enoch.”

  “Where is it?” I demanded.

  “I can take you there,” Elisha said.

  “I would be extremely careful, Elisha,” Lawrence said. “We need to help Lucian, but Lilith isn’t exactly going to be over the moon to see us. Or to see her sister, if this is the case.”

  “Why wouldn’t she want to see you, Taylor?” Elisha asked.

  “I don’t know.” I said.

  “It is our belief that when Lilith lived a solitary life on this wasteland, she herself succumbed to the darkness. She did, however, learn to love again with Cain by her side.”

  “Err, isn’t Cain meant to be Adam and Eve’s kid?” Harland said.

  “What!” I said.

  Gabriel laughed. “No, the books have it all wrong. They are siblings. They need not mate to produce offspring.”

  “Okay, that does not make me feel any better!” I said.

  Gabriel smiled. “You created Cain, just as you created all of humanity.”

  “But how?”

  “Why, with the Celestial Rose, of course.”

  “The what?” Elisha asked.

  “It’s a rose my father made for me before the darkness took him. It is the centre of our light, I am part of the light, therefore I’m as eternal as it is. Apparently, I used the light to create Cain, Abel, and Seth. They’re immortals, just like you. But when it came to the creation of mankind, they were given a select lifespan with the ability to procreate and thrive on their own. Freewill was bestowed upon them, and with it, they created the society we live in today. Adam took over Elysium, where the celestial temple lies. And I believe Lilith’s son, Lucifer, took part of the darkness and built Hell, where the evil socialites go when they perish.” I said.

  “That’s a whole new history, right there,” Nic said. “So, God is your dad?”

  “Yes, but Father found Cain and Abel and banished them down to the wasteland. Cain killed Abel to appease father, but God wasn’t interested. Cain wandered the wasteland where he found Lilith and they created their own races using the darkness, which is where you all came from.”

  “What happened to Seth?”

  “No-one knows,” Gabriel said. “Adam thinks he travelled over to another planet away from all the chaos.”

  “I wouldn’t blame him,” I said.

  “I do remember when I was teaching you the history of our race. Now it appears the tables have turned.” Lawrence smiled.

  “Hold on a minute,” Harland said. “Isn’t Lucifer in pieces?”

  “Yes,” Gabriel said. “God entered Hell and murdered him, leaving bodily pieces around the world so Lilith could not piece him back together.”

  “That’s awful,” I said.

  “Indeed,” Gabriel said. “Lilith was clearly distraught and her guards have spent centuries combing Earth's lands in hope of finding the pieces so that she can reshape him.”

  “How, though?” Elisha asked.

  “What do you mean?” Gabriel said.

  “How would she reshape him?”

  “She created us, didn’t she?” Nic said.

  “Yes, but we are ‘made’, Lucifer was born.”

  “It’s a good point.” I said. “Perhaps that’s why she wants to enter the celestial temple, to use the rose?”

  “It could well be.” Gabriel said. “It would make sense, after all, she doesn’t have any light left.”

  “Well, we hope she has some left, otherwise I’m doomed.” I said. “Anyway, Adam's her twin, he has felt her, therefore they must have a connection through the light still.”

  “They’re twins!” Elisha exclaimed.

  “Yes,” Gabriel said. “Maybe she does have an ounce light left within her. I know Adam hopes so, but I doubt she believes she does. That’s why she plans to destroy the Celestial Rose.”

  “Maybe not destroy, but take?” I said. “That must be what the army is for.”

  “Wait, what army?” Harland asked.

  “The one Lilith is creating by turning humans into her own monstrous soldiers.”

  “That explains what the Beast was doing here.” Elisha said

  “Well, that and because he recognised your light magic and must have told Lilith her young sister was back.” Gabriel said.

  “This is a mind fuck.” Julian said, sitting down.

  “Jules, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you swear.” Harland said.

  “My name is Julian!” he exclaimed.

  “Yes, well, ok then. JULIAN.” Harland screeched.

  “Boys!” Elisha said.

  It was hard not to smile when they argued. Their bickering reminded me I was home. “How’s Dad and Caleb doing, Gabriel?”

  “Good. Caleb is still fearful of the change, but he has found the rose to be of interest and spends his time looking at it under a microscope. He is very bright for such a young child.” I smiled.

  “What about Dad?”

  “What, your dad and bro are up there?” Harland asked.

  “Yes.” I smiled.

  “Excellent, I’m really glad they’re happy,” he said.

  “But are they happy?” I asked Gabriel.

  “Yes, I would say so. Your dad enjoys assisting with the build of the light beams and the protective barrier Adam is encasing all of Elysium under. He constantly watches your mum through one of his rooms and I hear him laughing at her mishaps. I’m happy to report that he seems content, Eve.”

  “Thank you so much, I’m glad they are mo
ving on and living in happiness there. It’s lovely that Dad is working with Adam, too. I was hoping they would get along.”

  “Indeed.” Gabriel responded.

  “Your mum's there, too?” Harland asked.

  “No, she’s been reborn somewhere else now.”

  “Reborn?”

  “Yes,” Gabriel said. “When the mortal soul finds peace, it is reborn into the body of a newborn child, ready to live again and grow from new experiences."

  “That’s pretty neat,” Nic said as Harland raised his eyebrows in agreement.

  “So please, can we go to Enoch?” I asked. “I need to find Lucian and speak to Lilith.”

  “Yes, I’ll show you the way, Taylor. Sorry, but you’re still Taylor to me.” Elisha said as Lawrence nodded.

  “That’s okay, I’m still Taylor to me, too,” I said. “When can we go?”

  “It’ll take many moons to get there, it’s quite far away and not an easy place to get to.” Elisha said.

  “Show me the way, girl, and I will fly us there.” Gabriel said.

  “Firstly, my name is Elisha, and secondly, fly on what?”

  “I do apologise, Elisha. And fly with this, of course.” He ruffled his angelic wings free.

  The room suddenly felt a lot smaller as Gabriel grew, letting his huge wings loose. Light streamed out of the tips of the feathers as everyone around me gasped in awe.

  “Wow! Can I come?” Nic asked.

  “I’m afraid not, I couldn’t carry you as well,” Gabriel said.

  “But I want a ride!” he said, clapping his hands. I laughed, as did Gabriel. Now, if you’ve ever heard an Angel laugh, the sound echoes through the room, resonating on every object, playing back the sound one harmonic note at a time.

  “No, I just can’t. I’ll draw you a map.” Elisha asked, looking uncertain at the winged creature before her.

  “Okay.” I smiled “Quick though, please, I need to know he’s okay.”

  “Well, how about you put some clothes on first, Taylor” Elisha said, as I realised I was still only covered by her mass of blankets.

  I nodded and then headed upstairs, up to the room Lucian and I had shared on many occasions. Elisha had still stocked the wardrobe for me, clothing of all kinds. But for the time being I was a jeans and t-shirt girl. I needed to be ready for anything. I wrapped my long chestnut hair into a bun, splashed cool water over my face, and headed back downstairs, ready to save my man from the clutches of my evil sister. If there ever was a fairy tale to talk about, our fractured family had the perfect story to start from.