Surrender the Dark

by L. A. Banks

  Azrael pushed back from the table. “Forgive me for being foolish. I of all people should know that vanity is a sin.” He released a deep breath and stripped his shirt over his head. “There. You can see the scars.”

  “Az...,” Celeste said slowly, standing up as he turned to look at her and Queen Aziza. “The keloids are gone.”

  “The scars are in your mind, beloved,” Queen Aziza said in a gentle tone. “May I lay hands on you with this Divine one you’ve brought into my home? I am blessed and honored to be at the service of angels . . . to feed you both as wayfarers along your journey.”

  “No, dear queen. We are in your debt for such hospitality.” Azrael felt over his shoulder, then craned his neck to try to peer to see his back.

  “Do you have a mirror?” Celeste asked quickly. “He needs to see it to believe it.”

  “Yes, of course.” Queen Aziza rushed out of the room, then returned with a large salon handheld mirror and a compact.

  “Here,” Celeste said, giving Azrael the compact and turning him around to face the mirror Queen Aziza held. “See for yourself.”

  Both women fell silent as he stared, then tried to touch the even brown skin with his fingertips.

  “How can this be...”

  “Take him into the bathroom while I prepare your tea and soup,” Queen Aziza ordered, handing Celeste the large mirror. “He can look in this one and see better under the bright lights in the full-length mirror behind the door.”

  Without thinking about it, Celeste took the compact from him and set it on the table. “This is not vanity—it’s called sanity. You had a part of yourself amputated and the scars were a painful reminder. Come on. Let’s heal this in your head, all right?”

  He nodded and swallowed hard and followed her without a word. She walked through the bedroom, which was lit with soft candlelight coming from a fruit-laden altar that bore pictures framed in silver of elderly ancestors. The doorway to the bathroom was inside the bedroom and it stood open and dark. For a moment the memory of what had happened in a bathroom made Celeste hesitate.

  “We don’t have to do this,” Azrael said, catching her arm. “I could tell that—”

  “No. You have to see . . . and so do I.”

  She touched his face and then took him by the hand and led him into the dark room, then clicked on the light. For a few seconds her heart felt as if it would pound its way out of her chest. But in the momentary darkness, she saw nothing frightening, just Azrael’s blue-white glow before they were bathed with stark white overhead lights.

  “We have to close the door,” she said, bringing him into the room deeper as she battled her anxiety. Memories of being in tight bathroom confines under terrifying conditions when Brandon attacked her were still fresh. But she shook the feeling and focused on Azrael. “Stand here.”

  She handed him the large salon mirror and waited as he took it from her and then flexed the muscles in his shoulder blades and chest.

  “The muscles and tendons are still there...”

  “Then the wings have got to still be there in your energetic body,” Celeste said with a frown.

  “But I can’t see them,” he said, angling the mirror in a different way.

  “Wait, wait, wait.” She took the mirror from him and set it down in the sink. “I knew Aunt Niecey’s words would come in handy one of these days. How’s it go . . . faith is believing in things unseen . . . or—”

  “Yes!” Azrael turned around, giving her his back, then covered his face with his hands. “We regularly chastise humans for this offense—but it is so easy a trap to fall into. I shall forever be changed by this experience, Celeste. No wonder things have fallen into such disarray . . . where was our compassion toward humankind? How could we expect them to see evidence of death, Hell, and destruction but only give them scant examples of hope and healing to cling to and then demand blind faith?”

  His confusion was so palpable, his crisis so deep, that the only thing she knew to do was to go to him and hug him from behind. She laid her cheek against his strong back and wrapped her arms around his waist and closed her eyes.

  “Maybe, do you think that’s also why the Source allowed some of you to get trapped here . . . so that there would be an entire battalion of you guys that finally got the human condition? I was never taught by my aunt that God was cruel. Tough, yeah, but not whimsical and cruel . . . and especially if his angels fell on their swords, like why would you be locked out of going home? Wouldn’t a serious repentance and a cry for mercy be enough? And if you loved the human you’d lain with . . . I mean with all your heart and soul, would the Almighty frown on that? What if maybe, in the so-called end of days, there would need to be enough of you who’d lived here, fought here, loved here, lost here, cried here, and even died to be reborn here to know just what we were up against? Maybe that’s the big picture and it has nothing to do with guilt and punishment and rules and whatever . . . but I’m just a half-breed human. What do I know?”

  She petted his once injured shoulders, then placed a kiss against his spine between where his wings should have been, and the gasp he released shook her to her core. Testing a dawning awareness, she gently touched the sensitive spot with trembling fingers and watched him drop his head back, eyes closed, breaths becoming shallow.

  “Does it hurt?” she whispered.

  “No. It brings to mind First Corinthians, thirteen, in a most profound way,” he murmured on a ragged inhale.

  “I don’t understand.” She laid her cheek against the tender spot, trying to send as much loving, healing energy into it as she could.

  He drew in a deep breath through his nose, then spoke in a low murmur. “‘If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but I have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all that I possess to the poor and surrender my body to flames, but I have not love, I gain nothing.’ ”

  “‘Love is patient, love is kind,’ ” she said, picking up where he left off, reciting one of the four passages Aunt Niecey had forced her to learn by heart—this passage, psalm 91, the 23rd psalm, and the Lord’s Prayer she knew by rote.

  “‘It does not envy, it does not boast. It is not proud,’ ” Azrael said, his voice bottoming out with so much deep resonance that she could feel it in her womb.

  She kissed him deeply against the sensitive spot she’d found and felt his stomach tremble beneath her hands. “‘It is not rude, it is not self-seeking . . . it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with truth.’ ” She nuzzled that warm, glowing space between his shoulder blades, drawing another shudder from his body as she spoke against it, now realizing that it wasn’t a site of pain, but an erogenous zone. “‘It always protects, it always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.’ ”

  He reached back, framing the sides of her body with his palms, slowly dragging them down the length of her body. “‘Love never fails . . . but where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.’ ”

  She covered his hands with hers, feeling the painfully exquisite rush of energy that spilled from his aura. “‘For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears.’ ”

  He slowly turned and pulled her into a warm embrace. His kiss began at the crown of her head with a rough murmur. “‘When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child,’ ” he said in a deep rumble kissing her eyelids, then the bridge of her nose. “‘When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me,’ ” he murmured before capturing her mouth.

  It was the sweetest, most profound kiss she’d ever experienced. As their tongues dueled in a lazy exploration of soft and hard surfaces, ambrosia covered her palate and sweetness fil
led her lungs. Heady, she felt as if she were floating, but intense desire welded her to his body. Her hands caressed the sinewy surface of his shoulders and back, as broad, hot palms cradled her back then slid over the rise of her behind, drawing a swallowed moan from them both.

  He broke the kiss with a pained expression, then rested his damp forehead against hers and shut his eyes.

  “‘Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face-to-face.’ ” She stroked the side of his jaw with the back of her hand.

  He nodded and pulled back a bit, staring into her eyes as though seeing her for the first time. “‘Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.’ ” He kissed her again, this time harder, urgently, pulling her against him as his fingers sought her hair and he palmed her backside.

  “Is everything all right, beloveds?” a light female voice called out.

  Celeste broke the kiss and placed a hand against Azrael’s bare chest. Where her hand landed, her palm burned. His colors were beyond his body, and iridescent light covered the sink and tub and tiles. Behind his brown irises she could see a flame of blue-white light, and his expression was filled with pure agony.

  “Yes, Queen . . . thank you . . . I think his heart chakra is all right now.”

  “Good, because the tea and soup are ready.”

  “Be there in a second,” Celeste said in a distressed singsong voice.

  Azrael clasped her hand and brought it to his mouth to kiss the center of it, still breathing hard. “‘And now these three remain: faith, hope, love. But the greatest of these is love.’ ”

  “We have to leave this bathroom and—”

  “I cannot,” he said, suddenly panicked as he looked down. “This would offend our hostess. This much I am sure of; even culturally inept, I know better.”

  Celeste held his face and kissed him softly, as guilt accosted her. Earlier she’d warned him not to touch her, but the pull to him had been so strong . . . stronger than anything she’d ever experienced in her life. “I’ll go out there, you put some cold water on your face, and I’ll stall her. I don’t know what the rule system is in the Great Upstairs, but if you can’t get it to go down, then you’ll have to do what you’ve gotta do by any means necessary . . . hey . . . I’m just saying.”

  “You are definitely a healing angel.” He kissed her again hard.

  “I gotta go, and this is only making matters worse.”

  He nodded. “You’re right, you’re right. I cannot think in this condition.”

  She smiled and slipped out of his hold. He wouldn’t be the first man to experience said condition, but she wouldn’t say that to him out loud, ever.

  Hurrying out of the bathroom, she shut the door behind her, then closed the bedroom door on the way out to where Queen Aziza had set out tea and food.

  “How is our patient?” the older woman said, sitting down across from Celeste.

  “He’ll live and he’s much better, I think.”

  “How long has he been manifest?” Queen Aziza smiled and took up her green tea.

  “About a day,” Celeste said quietly, then said a brief prayer before enjoying the yam soup.

  “Then everything is brand-spanking-new to him.”

  “The soup is delicious...hmmm,” Celeste said, quickly changing the subject.

  Queen Aziza smiled. “Coconut milk, steamed yams, a little cinnamon and fresh nutmeg, a pinch of ginger. It took me many years to perfect the different life-affirming recipes . . . and then they started coming to me.”

  “The recipes?”

  “No, the angels,” Queen Aziza said with a wink. “In this era, they are not coming like they did in ancient times—as pure beings of powerful Light. They are coming to walk amongst us and to experience our trials and tribulations by our sides as they help. I think the first time they were here they came with such little compassion for the human condition and just handed out these crazy edicts without realizing what people had to go through to carry them out.” She shrugged and sipped her tea. “Now don’t get me wrong, the ones in the ether who are in-spirit guardians and guides are still active up in the heavenly realms. But people like me are seeing some of them incarnate here on earth, and some of these beings are all messed up, needing help despite all their power . . . that’s where we come in.”

  “You said you were a sensitive . . . is that why Bath Kol comes to you?”

  Queen Aziza nodded. “He gets bad news from the front—like another brother of Light going dark—and he comes to me to get his energy rebalanced. Or he goes on a bender with his Sentinel brothers, or sees some global catastrophe that the dark side created, or it could be a personal loss like an old human friend dying, and he comes here.”

  “Isda said he left them—no great mystery why—and came here for a healing.”

  “Yes,” Queen Aziza said with a weary sigh. “He came and got his chakras aligned, then I did some energy work on him and put him in an aroma-therapy room for a while so he could sleep. Isda disturbs Bath Kol’s sense of peace sometimes and is truly prone to excess.”

  “I take it he’s not here now though.”

  “No, and he could be a lot of places.”

  “Oh, brother . . . .” Celeste took several more spoonfuls of the delicious soup and fidgeted with a piece of pita bread. “So now what do we do?”

  “He hangs out sometimes at a dance club in the South Bronx, over in Hunts Point...lot of working girls on that side of town—I’m not judging, just preparing you for what you might see, but he tells me that he goes there because he likes to dance.”

  Celeste smirked. “Dance, or get a lap dance?”

  “I think a little of both.” Queen Aziza pushed the platters of tabouli and hummus closer to Celeste. “But he loves the hip-hop scene there.”

  “Hip-hop?” Celeste almost spit out her soup.

  “Not the new stuff, the old stuff,” Queen Aziza said, handing Celeste a napkin and laughing. “The old message music . . . people like Afrika Bambaataa and Grandmaster Flash—not this gangster rap now that promotes killing and misogyny. Two guesses where that came from.”

  Queen Aziza waved her hand and dismissed the subject. “Anyway, there’s a club he likes to go to that has weekend break-dance contests in the old-style way, and if you get him started about the politics of the hip-hop museum being located in the northeast part of the Bronx up on 212th Street and White Plains Road, he’ll talk your ear off. By the time he’s done giving you a philosophy lesson on the purity of sound as a medium of worldview fusion, you will want a drink, will need a drink, but have made him a happy man. He goes there when he needs joy. It’s the African and Latin drumbeats and world-music beats that resonate with him, that’s why he picked up on hip-hop so strongly in this era. When he needs to quiet his soul, he goes out to Lily Dale, in western New York, where they have the world’s largest group of mediums.”

  “Whoa . . . why would an angel go there?” Celeste sat back. “I thought there was this whole thing about false prophets at the end of days?”

  “First thing I asked the man, but he said he can see a lie as a black ring around the person as they’re speaking—since he governs prophecy. Then he gave me this quote from one of the religious texts he was carrying around in a duffel bag when he first came here. ‘Everyone who prophesies speaks to men for the strengthening, encouragement, and comfort. I would like every one of you to speak in tongues, but I would rather have you prophesy.’ ” She waved her hand again as though shooing away an invisible fly. “Has to do with instructions and knowledge, and I think he goes up to Lily Dale to be sure that little community doesn’t get besieged by darkness since they help so many people.”

  “Man . . . I’m gonna hope he’s in the Bronx because Lily Dale sounds like a full day trip by car.”

  “It is, just like when he heads out to the Native American sweat lodges, or just goes up to Canada. Sometimes he’s gone for a day, sometimes for months.”

  “Can I ask
you a personal question?” Celeste said, leaning across the table. She wanted so badly to know, how did one have a relationship with an angel, and was a lightning bolt gonna come down out of the sky if she did? She wondered if that was how the angels found out they were trapped. Was it some big embarrassing thing or did they get a termination letter from a winged messenger or whatever?

  A placid nod from the older woman sitting across from Celeste helped her gin up the courage to finally ask a small part of what she really wanted to know. “Is he, like, your significant other?”

  Queen Aziza smiled. “No . . . in this lifetime he’s just a dear friend. His heart chakra is too damaged for that. How many times do you imagine the man saw his wives die over the expanse of centuries he’s been here?”

  Celeste just shook her head. “I cannot even imagine,” she murmured, glancing at the closed bathroom door.

  “Should we go check on your guardian? He seemed pretty depressed about his loss.”

  “No, no,” Celeste said quickly. “Azrael is all right. He’s just dealing with a lot of adjustment pressure . . . he’s only been here a day.”

  “Ah. Makes perfect sense,” Queen Aziza said, standing. “Then let me bring you some lemon water and I can refresh your tea.”

  “You have been way too kind to us. Thank you . . . but how do you deal with it all?”

  Queen Aziza turned and gave Celeste a quizzical look.

  “How do you deal with knowing that there really is a side of dark and light, seeing spirits, seeing the lights . . . knowing challenges are coming your way because you are standing in the Light?”

  The older woman nodded. “You become calm, you clean out your body and spirit so that you have a strong foundation, and then you stand firmly in your power. When you do, the angels will come to you. Right now they need us to be as strong as they are in spirit.” She motioned toward the bathroom. “That brother came in here tore up about his loss . . . confused, angry, body tainted with drugs and alcohol. But compassion is what’s going to heal him, having someone to trust is going to allow him to sleep at night. Anyone or anything on this planet is here to learn lessons. This is school, boo.”