by Bryan Davis
Enoch grasped Matt and his mother by their wrists. “Both of you have wondrous gifts from God. Bonnie, your eloquence will allow you to sing with words that will pierce even the most hardened heart, but they must spring from your own heart of love. Otherwise, your song will bounce off wooden ears. The lost and wandering people have heard it all before—lyrics without substance, poems without purpose, lofty platitudes that they assume no one really believes. Words of love must be matched with actions that demonstrate love. These souls must witness love in your outstretched hands as well as from your lips. Only this is true integrity. Words alone are not really love at all.”
Enoch opened Matt’s hand and ran a finger along his palm. “You have healing hands that will seal horrific wounds, and you have seen them work even for an enemy like Semiramis. Yet that miracle occurred in the relative purity of Second Eden, not on Earth. Unfortunately, the corruption in this world has diminished the range of your ability. Here, in the midst of depraved beings, your touch will be of no use unless all barriers to love are broken down. If there is the slightest stain of contempt for your patient, love will be squelched, and your touch will be nothing more than the abrasive scrape of a hardened callous.” He released Matt’s hand and sighed. “I hope you will ponder these words as you continue your journey.”
While Enoch paused, Matt let the words sink in. They were deep and profound. Time would tell how they could be put to use, but for now they swam in a pool of scattered thoughts, adding yet more mysteries to the turmoil.
Enoch rose from the bed and nudged the other suitcase with a sandaled foot. “For reasons I am not at liberty to explain, this clothing is the only physical help we can provide, but I can give you one more prophetic word.” When Mom joined him, he looked her in the eye and whispered, “Remember who you are and the seven trials you have already conquered. Your memories will be a shield of defense.”
A light sparkled in Mom’s eye, like a tiny flame that burst to life. “I’ll remember.”
“Do you have any questions for me?”
“Just one. When Tamiel kidnapped me, he said that he was able to see me because he was open and honest with me. Later I figured out that he must have been referring to the king’s cap Billy applied to make me invisible to demons. Do I still have that covering?”
“That is highly unlikely. You were separated from Billy for too long. Perhaps you are semitransparent to demons now, and Tamiel meant that he could see you clearly. For practicality’s sake, you should assume that you are visible.”
Darcy emerged from the bathroom wearing hiking shoes, camouflage pants, and a thick long-sleeved pullover shirt—beige and closely fitting her slender, toned frame. She set the suitcase down and smiled. “I did the best I could in the dark. Do I look okay?”
Matt got up and fidgeted. “Um . . . yeah. You look fine.” Assessing her appearance felt awkward. With freshly brushed shoulder-length auburn hair, a clean angular face, and bright eyes in spite of the dim room, she really was attractive, in a good way, more like a neatly groomed college student than a tramp hunting for a victim.
“Well . . .” Enoch clapped his hands together. “I’m glad everything fits.”
“Are you sure they’re not too tight?” Darcy ran her hands along her hips. “I don’t want to look . . . you know . . .”
“Like bait?” Enoch nodded. “Fear not. This is a practical design. Because of the physical obstacles you will likely encounter, baggy clothes are not advisable.”
She lifted her legs in turn, stretching the camo material. “Then they’re perfect. Thank you.”
“I almost forgot.” Enoch reached into his jeans pocket and withdrew a string of beads, each one a different color. “I recovered this for Bonnie.” He draped it around Mom’s neck and tied it in the back.
Mom touched a blue bead at the bottom of the arc. “Thank you. This is a precious heirloom.”
“Yes, I thought so.” Enoch nodded at each of them. “I have to go. My dragon transport is likely getting perturbed at my delay.”
Mom hugged Enoch. “I hope to see you again soon.”
“That is a certainty, though I know not if our next meeting will be in this world.” Enoch backed out and swung the door to a closed position, though it wouldn’t latch. The broken jamb created a three-inch gap that allowed a shaft of dawning light into the room.
Matt sat heavily on his bed and looked up at his mother. “An apocalypse?”
“Looks that way, but maybe it’s an avoidable one.”
“So what do we do?”
Mom picked up both suitcases. “We get dressed and go to the first destination.” Without another word, she walked into the bathroom and closed the door.
“Wow!” Darcy scooted to the bed and sat next to Matt. “This is really scary sh—” She cleared her throat. “Uh . . . scary stuff, isn’t it?”
“Pretty much.” He looked away but watched her out of the corner of his eye. Sitting next to her felt like cozying up to a serpent. “And don’t worry about cleaning up your language around me. I’ve heard every word in the book.”
She folded her hands in her lap. “With all that’s going on, I thought maybe I’d better . . . I don’t know . . .”
“Change your ways?”
She bent her brow. “You’re really quick on the draw, aren’t you?”
“What do you mean?”
She touched herself on the chest. “You assume the worst about me; you’re half cocked and ready to shoot.”
“When you give me a good reason not to, maybe I won’t.”
She pressed her lips into a line. “Look. I did some terrible things to you. But that was years ago. And I’m sorry. I was a stupid kid. I was jealous because I wanted my parents to myself.”
“Years ago? Tamiel said he picked you up off the street corner. Did jealousy drive you to that?”
“I had to walk from place to place.” She crossed her arms tightly. “I play piano and sing at a couple of nightclubs. And I’m pretty good at it, if I do say so myself.”
“Are you saying you never sold yourself to someone with a wad of cash?” Matt huffed. “Give me a break.”
She looked away. “I don’t have to sit here being interrogated. I said I’m sorry about what I did to you, and that’s all you need to know.”
“Yeah. Just what I thought.” Matt rose, stalked to the window, and pushed the drapes to the side. Cold air wafted through the jagged hole, but that didn’t matter. Darcy needed to cool off.
In the distance, a truck drove from left to right, framed by a layer of clouds painted red by the dawning rays, a bloody hue that seemed unearthly. The drill sergeant’s words echoed—Red sky in the morning, sailors take warning. That maxim had proven true many times, and Enoch’s warnings added a nightmarish mask to the horizon. Sunrise held no hope. Doom lay ahead—complete annihilation of the entire world. Only he and his newfound mother could stop it, and their efforts might even make things worse. It was like trying to disarm a time bomb by forcing the clock to tick faster.
Not only that, they had to worry about Darcy. She could be on Tamiel’s side, pretending to be friendly while secretly plotting to destroy their efforts. Her presence would surely hurt Mom’s song more. What other reason could Tamiel have for sending her along? Even now it seemed that she stared daggers into his back. She probably didn’t like getting exposed as a cheap hooker. But that issue wasn’t important enough to worry about. The end of the world was coming. He had to drop everything else and figure out how to stop it.
He let out a silent sigh. But how? The apocalypse seemed like a freight train, impossible to stop. And what would happen after that? Who would go to Heaven? Mom, for sure. Darcy? No way. But what about a skeptical military student who never really thought about faith until a truckload of reality smacked him in the face? It seemed that he balanced on a fragile boundary between Heaven and Hell, not knowing which way he would fall.
He closed the drapes, sat
on the bed opposite Darcy, and stared at her. She stared back, her cheeks red and her eyes expressing a blend of fear and sadness. Pitiful. Pathetic. Mom would probably say that even Darcy could change. Maybe so, but she had yet to prove that she wasn’t playing a part in Tamiel’s drama.
Matt averted his gaze. It was better to assume that she remained the soulless, evil sister she had been before. And her presence could even be a benefit. The most obvious way to Heaven was to do the opposite of what a Hell-bound prostitute would do. Maybe, just maybe, her darkness would be his guiding light.
Chapter 2
THE STORM
The First Door —The Frauds. Matt silently formed the words with his lips. The label on the phone’s GPS map seemed like an omen, a warning to stay away from the mysterious address. After Enoch’s dire words, everything seemed surreal, like they were living in a nightmare.
In the backseat, Mom lounged at an angle to give her backpack room while Darcy sat in the front passenger’s seat. Unfortunately, the clothing Enoch had provided for him matched Darcy’s, making them look like twins. Mom’s shirt, though consisting of the same materials, fit more loosely to allow for fastening Velcro attachments in the back. Without those, she would never be able to get the shirt around her wings.
As meadows and farmlands whizzed by in a monotonous collage of grass and corn stubble, Matt checked the Mustang’s rearview mirror. A midmorning haze, dim and reddish, cast the western horizon in a crimson fog, a stark contrast to the scene in their eastbound direction on this rural two-lane road. Clouds boiled into towering thunderheads underlaid with purple floors and infused with dark green. Lightning flashes highlighted the ominous colors as if providing snapshot warnings to turn away, but the GPS provided no options. Their destination lay about an hour ahead, that is, if the storm didn’t slow their progress.
Matt pressed the gas pedal. The faster they could get past the storm, the better. Still, they would have to endure Tamiel’s demonic voice a while longer. During yesterday’s evening drive, he had told them to wait until the next day to listen to the rest of his message. Any departure from his orders would be met with severe punishment for his captive, Billy Bannister.
“I guess I’d better turn the recording on.” Matt pressed the mobile phone’s Play button. An app transmitted Tamiel’s recorded message to the dashboard speakers.
“Good morning, Matt Bannister,” Tamiel said, sounding like a spy explaining a secret mission. “As you have discerned by now, I have conducted a good deal of research into your background. Since you enjoy old TV shows and potboiler genre novels, you recognize that those you call villains often tell their captives why they’re being tortured, though divulging such information unfailingly leads to the captors’ doom. Although it is risky, I, too, will explain my purpose, but I do so in order to increase the torture and further corrupt Bonnie’s song, thereby enhancing my strategy.”
“He’s such a grandstander.” Matt looked at his mother in the mirror. “I wish I could—”
“Shhh!” Mom set a finger to her lips. “No response. Not yet.”
“The person you call God,” Tamiel continued, “is the most predictable being in the universe. If you press the right buttons, you will always get the expected result. We knew of this predictability when we incited him to flood the Earth. We simply led the human puppets into temptation, provided intoxicants to take away their inhibitions, and let them corrupt themselves. And God, being bound by his overly zealous character to punish evildoers, destroyed them. If you are a well-equipped student of the Bible, you know that Balak used the same method to bring a curse upon the Israelites when he tempted them with harlotry and idol worship.”
Matt glanced at the mirror again. Mom gave him a nod. Apparently she knew that story. Tamiel was telling the truth . . . so far.
“Now that the song of the ovulum has been reduced to a warped whisper, only a tiny remnant remains loyal to God, and his hand is ready to strike.” Tamiel added a chuckle. “When the process of destroying the song is complete, even the faithful remnant will perish at the hands of those who once called them brothers. Then the wrath will come, though not by a flood of water. The angel of the abyss already awaits, and I am confident that your cognizant companion can conclude what I mean. Even if not, I won’t reveal the answer. I leave it to you to ponder . . . and worry about. The more worry, the more warping of the song.”
He added another laugh. “Humans will all be dead, the image of Elohim destroyed. Then I and my colleagues will rule this domain forever.”
Matt rolled his eyes. Nearly every word had been extracted from one of many novels. He was playing the role of the overtalkative villain flawlessly, except that he knew exactly what he was doing— mocking, taunting, and eroding faith.
“Pay careful attention as I describe your mission,” Tamiel continued. “First, you must get a metal box that is attached under the dashboard. Pause this recording until you find it, but, for your own protection, do not open it until I provide further instructions.”
Matt touched the Pause button.
“I’ll get it.” Darcy reached under the radio, patting beneath the dashboard as her hands shifted toward the glove compartment. “Here it is.”
As she pulled, something ripped, like sticky tape peeling away. She set a gray box the size of a small paperback book on her lap.
Matt tapped the phone’s Play button.
“Now that you have the box,” Tamiel said, “I should warn you that the object inside will shimmer brightly when first exposed to air. Do not look directly at it for at least five seconds. By that time, it will sufficiently dim and not cause damage to your eyes. Again, you should pause this recording until you are able to look at the object safely.”
“He’s really pushing the drama envelope.” Matt pressed the Pause button. “Let’s do it.”
Darcy set her fingers around the lid. “Everyone ready?”
Matt stared at the highway. “Ready.”
“I’m ready,” Mom said. “I’ll count to five.”
A flash lit up the car. Mom counted, and with every second, the light dimmed. When she reached five, Matt looked at the box. A silver ring the size of a palm lay in a preformed impression in a bed of purple velvet. A bluish glow spread across Darcy’s hands, making her skin appear cadaverous.
“Look.” Mom lifted her necklace. The beads glowed as well, each one emitting its own color. “They tell me it glowed like this when the dragons were resurrected in the seventh circle. It created a regeneracy dome for them. We assumed the beads have some sort of life-giving energy for those with dragon genetics.”
“Then the necklace and this ring must be related. Maybe the ring energizes the beads somehow.” Matt set his finger over the Play button. “Ready to restart?”
Mom nodded.
“One irritating demon coming up.” He tapped the screen.
“The object in the box is a key ring,” Tamiel said. “At each of the first six locations, my agents have left a key that will attach to the ring. When you find the key, it will be dull, but when you take it away from its sphere of influence, it will flash and glow. Again, be careful to avoid eye contact with the keys for a few seconds. While the key is still glowing, attach it by prying the ring apart and sliding the key on in the usual way.”
Darcy used a fingernail to separate the two parts of the ring. “It’s tight, but it works just like other key rings.”
“You are likely wondering,” Tamiel continued, “why I am pursuing this tedious methodology. I will explain so that you will be fully engaged in this quest and motivated to finish it without delay. As a former angel, I once had protective authority over these keys, but when I fell from Elohim’s good graces, the keys lost their power and became dull. The only way for them to regain what was lost is for you to retrieve them from spheres of influence that Elohim considers evil. I cannot energize them myself because Elohim also considers me to be an evil influence. Once you collect these keys,
you will be able to unlock the seventh door and finish your quest. Then I will release Billy Bannister unharmed.”
Matt glanced at Mom again. She wore the same skeptical expression that he likely wore himself. Every word Tamiel spoke could be a lie, but as long as he held Dad hostage, they didn’t have much choice. They had to follow the instructions, at least for a while.
“Now back to the addresses,” Tamiel said. “You might have noticed that the seventh address is password protected. When the time comes, I will let you know how to get there, which means, of course, you will not be able to send someone to see what awaits at the final destination. Because of this lengthy journey, be sure to charge the phone at your lodging stops. You will find a power adapter in the glove compartment.”
Darcy popped open the compartment and fished out a black cord with a plug on the end. “Got it.” She wound it up and pushed it into her pocket.
Tamiel’s tone became dark and serious. “Do not fail in this quest. At each location you will be able to do something that you will consider good and noble or at least learn something that will further your quest, which should be enough to motivate you to participate without delay. Yet still I warn you. Do not underestimate the pain I can inflict on Billy Bannister. If you depart from this path, I will see to it that he suffers greatly.”
The message ended. Matt grabbed the phone and squeezed it. “I wish this was his throat.”
“Matt.” Mom reached from the backseat and touched his arm. “You have to stay in control.”
“I know. I know.” He set the phone down and gripped the steering wheel with both hands. “I guess we just have to go along with him, unless you have a reason not to.”
