The old woman wailed for the first of men, her sad tears running down her face to water the soil of Eden.
And from her tears the most beautiful of flowers began to grow.
Malachi was paralyzed by the sight, one part fascinated, the other filled with terror over what was to come. It’s too late, he realized, knowing that he did not have the strength to face off against Taranushi and the emerging brood. Slowly he rose to his feet, careful not to arouse the Shaitan’s attentions, and started for the cover of the thick jungle foliage. He would find his cave, and there he would begin to compose his escape.
Images of the Shaitan forces invading the Kingdom of Heaven oozed into his mind, followed by the presentation of total darkness, and he had to consider the fact that perhaps there would be no tomorrow.
The thought came upon him like a shroud draped over the face of the dead.
He was just about to turn away from the horrors unfolding at the base of the Tree, when a sound from above made him stop.
He had heard this sound before when last he’d stood in the Garden.
It was the sound of God’s terrible fury taken shape.
The war cry of the Seraphim.
Remiel dropped from the sky, burning blade in hand, a scream of furious indignation on his lips.
How dare this thing taint the Lord’s Garden with its presence, the Seraphim thought as it swooped down upon the Shaitan.
The blade arced as he dropped, seeking out the muscular flesh between the beast’s head and shoulders. Remiel watched the fiery sword, anticipating the sensation of its razor edge biting into thick muscle.
But it was as if the blade passed through water.
The Shaitan’s body shifted, flowing away from the descending soldier of Heaven, to reconstitute directly across from him.
The monster smiled, attacking with the speed of thought.
Multiple sets of limbs rose, fingers like worms writhing in the air as bolts of snapping blue energy leapt from their tips. Remiel spread his wings, lifting off from the ground and blocking most of the supernatural energies with his sword, but one of them got through. The dark magick pierced his shoulder, an electrical fire igniting in his veins, causing his wings to grow numb.
He fell through the withered limbs of the Tree of Knowledge, landing on the body of Adam, the stink of the first human’s blood flowing up into his flared nostrils. He could feel the sickness of the Garden, feel the evil bubbling up just below its surface, and was almost taken to the brink because of it.
The Seraphim began to rise as tiny, white hands with claws like hooks reached up from the ground, grabbing at his armored form. Remiel watched in horror as the claws pierced the Heaven-forged armor with little effort, holding him in place as more and more of the birthing Shaitan attempted to feed upon him. He furiously beat his wings, pulling away from some of their clutches, and was able to kneel upon the churning soil, raising the flaming sword that once belonged to the sentry of Eden, and stabbing it down into the ground.
There came a muffled explosion, followed by unnatural, high-pitched screams from beneath the dirt. Remiel could feel their pain, hear the psychic screams of the injured and the dying, as the hold they had upon him loosened, and he was able to free himself.
He withdrew his blade from the earth, which was hot and sizzling with the life juices of the unborn Shaitan. Eager to see them all dead, the Seraphim readied the sword to strike again at the base of the Tree, when the newest attack came.
The adult Shaitan exploded at him, running upon all fours like a bull and ramming its bony head into Remiel’s midsection, pinning him to the side of the Tree.
Remiel recovered quickly, bringing the pommel of the sword down on top of the Shaitan. Its head seemed to break apart, flowing up the Seraphim’s arm. The damnable creature’s entire body went to liquid, oozing over Remiel’s armored form, covering him in its malleable flesh.
The angel could feel what it was doing, seeking out the weaknesses in his protective covering. He could feel the thing squirming through the openings, writhing against his divine flesh beneath the armor. The sensation was sickening.
Remiel thrashed, dropping to the ground, beating his wings, but the flesh of the Shaitan had spread onto them as well, preventing him from taking flight. He tried to use the sword, poking and jabbing at the thick second skin that had engulfed his body, but the Shaitan endured the stabs of the flaming blade, squeezing him even tighter, while forcing the armor from his body.
Pain like he had never experienced before flowed through him. The angel attempted to cry out, but his mouth was filled with the oozing, liquid flesh of his shapeless attacker. His own flesh was burning as the Shaitan released its destructive, dark energies.
The Seraphim fought fitfully as his body was completely engulfed in the constricting mass of the forbidden life-form. From all around, he heard a rumbling chuckle, as the Shaitan continued its relentless assault. The creature knew it was winning.
The monster was whispering now, telling him to give up the fight, that there was no dishonor in this defeat, for it was all inevitable.
He could feel the Shaitan inside him now, forcing itself down his throat. Remiel called upon the fire that was his gift from God, and his body started to radiate a heat as hot as the fires of creation, but it wasn’t enough.
The fire could not burn bright enough to repel the darkness that now held him in its constricting embrace.
Stealing away his light.
Feeding upon his life.
Jon was holding Izzy up by the waist, helping her move across the twisted landscape as they tried to follow Remy.
“I can’t believe he left us,” Jon said, stumbling as the ground pushed up suddenly beneath their feet, sending them both falling to the ground.
“He’s doing what he needs to do,” Izzy said, breathing heavily. She looked even sicker now; her mahogany skin had taken on a grayish pallor. She didn’t even try to get up.
“But I thought we were part of that picture,” Jon said, trying to help her to rise.
“We are,” she said, pushing his hands away.
“You have to get up,” Jon told her. He was looking around. “I can’t imagine it’s much farther. . . . How big can this place be?”
“Very big,” Izzy said. “Much bigger than you could ever imagine, and she needs our help.”
“Which is exactly what we’re going to give her,” Jon said, bending down to wrap his hands around her waist and lift her to her feet.
“No,” Izzy said firmly, her dark eyes looking deeply into his. “She needs us.”
“Well, we can’t stay here.” Jon was really annoyed now. “Remy is over there somewhere and he—”
“She needs our help,” Izzy repeated firmly. “My help . . . and your help.”
He didn’t know what she was getting at as she sat upon the ground, one of her hands again buried beneath the soil.
“I don’t . . . ,” he started to say.
“Think about who we are.” She grabbed his pants leg, attempting to pull him down with her. “Whose blood courses through our veins.”
The moist ground dampened the knees of his slacks as he knelt with her.
“She’s going to die. . . . Eden will die if we don’t try . . . if we don’t lend her some of our strength.
“I can’t do it alone,” Izzy continued weakly. “Will you help me?”
Jon didn’t know what to say at first, even though it was obvious. This was what it must’ve been all about, the true reason he had been born into the Sons.
His purpose.
“Will you help her?” Izzy whispered pleadingly.
Tentatively he extended his hand above the soil, curious as to whether or not it would hurt, and then brought it down.
Knowing Nathan would have been proud of him as he plunged his fingers into the dampness of the earth.
“Why are you hiding?”
Remy Chandler opened his eyes at the sound of the familiar voice.
&nbs
p; “Madeline?” he called into the sea of gloom surrounding him.
“Yeah,” she answered casually, her approach bringing a warm yellow glow to the nebulous surroundings. “Who else would it be?”
He pushed himself up into a sitting position. The aura around her was warm, and it felt good upon his naked skin as she drew closer.
“Are you going to answer my question?” she asked.
“I’m not hiding,” he said indignantly. “Why would I be hiding?”
“That’s what I want to know.”
Remy said nothing as he stared at the woman he loved, the woman who had given him so much.
“Do you know what’s happening out there?” she asked, hooking a finger toward the sea of black behind her.
He looked past her, squinting into the shadows.
“Not going well, is it?”
Madeline’s mouth opened in disbelief. “I can’t believe you,” she said.
“What?” Remy asked. “What can’t you believe?”
“You,” she said incredulously. “I can’t believe you. He’s dying out there, you know.”
Remy was still staring into the darkness behind her when he looked away.
“There’s nothing I can do,” he said, looking at his bare feet.
“Really?” She placed her hands on her shapely hips. God, she was beautiful. Just one look was enough to get his heart racing.
“The Seraphim is out there fighting for Eden . . . for Heaven, for Pete’s sake, and there’s nothing that you can do? What’s wrong with this picture?” she asked him.
“This is where I’m supposed to be,” he said. “There’s no room for humanity out there.” Remy shook his head.
“There’s not going to be room for much of anything once the Shaitan are born,” Madeline said. “I’m not going to ask you if you know how dangerous those creatures are, because of course you do—I’m nothing but a manifestation of your subconscious—and if I know, you certainly do too.”
“I’m here because I need to be,” Remy said. “I’m his weakness. . . . The matter of the Shaitan should be faced with a cold, divine efficiency.”
Madeline laughed, a delicate hand going up to her mouth to stifle the sound of her merriment.
“Sorry about that,” she said. “It’s just that that was really funny.”
Remy almost smiled, loving the sound of her laugh, even if it was at his own expense.
“Are you that big of a dummy?” Madeline asked.
Remy was a bit taken aback by the question.
“Excuse me?” he asked.
“I asked if you were stupid.”
“No, I don’t think that—”
“The Seraphim has gone into battle incomplete,” Madeline stated.
“You’re wrong; the Seraphim is out there . . . complete, all fiery rage and righteous indignation,” Remy explained.
“Then what are you?” she wanted to know.
“I’m what isn’t needed right now,” he said. “Which is why I’m here.”
“Which is why you’re wrong,” Madeline corrected. “You’re his humanity . . . not some useless thing that was picked up at a yard sale a few years back. Whether he likes it or not, the Seraphim has evolved . . . his human aspect is just as important as his angelic one.”
Remy didn’t know how to respond to that one.
“He’s missing something,” Madeline explained. “Like going into battle without his armor . . . without his sword.”
The darkness began to swirl behind her, growing lighter as forms began taking shape—as images of a world appeared.
New York at night . . . Chicago . . . Japan . . . Australia . . . the Boston skyline.
Remy felt his mood lighten at the sight of his adopted home.
“This isn’t what he’s fighting for,” Madeline pointed out.
The backdrop quickly changed, melding to scenes of the past. Remy saw when their relationship was young—he and Madeline walking on a beach at Cape Cod, their love uncontrollable in its growth. It would grow so big . . . so powerful.
“This isn’t what he’s fighting for.”
The disheveled image of Steven Mulvehill appeared, and for some reason the sight of the man . . . his friend . . . it hurt, made him want to reach out and . . .
Marlowe running at the Boston Common, his black fur shiny in the afternoon sun as he chased a tennis ball thrown by . . .
Linda Somerset dressed in a heavy winter jacket and jeans, clapping her hands for Marlowe to return the ball to her. Remy smiled. She would probably have a long wait. Marlowe was a ball hog, preferring to tease, running around with the prize clutched proudly in his mouth before . . .
“This isn’t what he’s fighting for.”
The following scene made him gasp, not real but torn from the imagination.
The Earth was in ruin, infernos burning that permanently blackened the sky. The Shaitan swarmed upon the world like locusts, dismantling everything that He—the Lord God—was responsible for.
“Up there, in the Garden,” Madeline said, pointing off in the distance behind them. “He fights for his Creator, and the Kingdom of Light. . . .”
Remy saw the Garden and the battle going on within it. The Seraphim was covered in the flesh of the Shaitan, being crushed . . . suffocated. . . .
“And there’s so much more to fight for, Remy,” Madeline said. “Don’t you think?”
So much more, he thought as the images of the world, of people, places, and things, fired past in staccato blasts.
Madeline came to him, putting her arms around him and drawing him close.
“Glad you agree with me,” she said with her most seductive smile as she brought her lips to his. And they kissed.
And it was like he had been awakened from a very long slumber, like the sun rising powerfully in the sky to chase the darkness away.
So much more.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Remiel had failed the Creator.
He could feel the corrosive, supernatural energies flowing from the Shaitan digesting what remained of his armor, and starting to work upon his flesh.
And there was nothing he could do.
The angel considered crying out to his Lord God, but he was too ashamed. If this was to be his fate, he would accept it. He had met a foe more powerful than he.
This realization seemed to fuel the angel’s anger, and he struggled fitfully in the Shaitan’s grip, but the darkness at the center of the creature’s being was like nothing he had ever experienced before.
It was so cold, and it was drawing the light from him.
Soon there was only shadow, and Remiel was flying in the endless night, not toward the sky, but down . . . down to where the light would never reach.
Down to where he’d cease to be, swallowed up by the endless night.
At first he believed it a trick of his failing system, flashes of light heralding his approaching death, but then he realized that something was with him.
There were shapes in the flashes, and he came to know that they were of his human persona and its deceased wife.
Come to gloat? the angel of Heaven wondered, as he drifted closer.
The woman was smiling, and he didn’t know why. For soon they would be no more . . . their life forces consumed by a horror with the potential to level the Kingdom of Heaven. He wanted to ask her why she smiled, but he was too weak, already wavering on the precipice of oblivion.
And then she reached out, taking his wrist and bringing his hand toward the other, toward the hand of the human self that had dominated his form.
“I doubt I can make the two of you kiss and make up,” the woman said, as she joined their hands. “So a handshake will have to do.”
Malachi was loath to admit it, but at the moment, he was quite in awe of his creation.
Despite the angel’s divine power, Taranushi had managed to immobilize the Seraphim, completely envelop its body, and was now in the process of consuming him.
This wa
s a design to fear, and maybe the Almighty had been right in His decision not to create the Shaitan.
But that was neither here nor there. If Malachi wanted to save reality, he had to move quickly, before the rest of the Shaitan were born. He started back into the jungle’s thickness when he heard the sound of crying. Glancing across the clearing, he saw the old woman, Eliza Swan, kneeling just before the Tree as Adam’s corpse continued to be fed upon by the emerging Shaitan. She was weeping, mourning his death, but at least he had gotten his wish: to die in the Garden.
Malachi was going to leave, but thought better of it. The woman, this descendant of Eve, might prove useful in escaping the Garden.
Quickly, he made his way around the withered Tree, emerging from the jungle at the woman’s back.
“Do not mourn for him, human,” Malachi said. “For he has achieved his heart’s desire, to return to the Garden from which he was banished.”
She turned her head to him, her face awash with tears.
“You killed him,” she spat. “This poor old soul, and you killed him like a dog.”
“You are incorrect, woman,” Malachi said as he grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet, pulling her back toward the jungle. “I did no such thing.”
He chanced a quick look back at the Tree of Knowledge, and what unfolded beneath it. Taranushi was still covering the Seraphim, moaning aloud. At first Malachi thought them moans of pleasure as the spawn of darkness fed upon the angel’s light.
But then the moans turned distinctly to screams of agony.
Taranushi had only imagined how wonderful an angel of Heaven—a Seraphim—would taste.
He had thought about it for centuries, and longer, as he searched the world for the keys to Eden. Now the power of Heaven’s warrior host flowed into him as his body continued to spread across that of the Seraphim, expanding and contracting, using powerful muscles to crush his victim, and allow the delectable juices to flow.
A Hundred Words for Hate Page 26
