But he saw no animals, no tools, no food, no fire, and he heard no music, no singing or laughing in the distance. There was only the distant hum of voices, a hum that fell silent when he passed by. He leaned toward Azrael and said, “You’ve been to Odashena, haven’t you? Was it like this?”
“In absolutely no way,” she said. “The buildings, the people, the light, the… everything. It’s all different. Very different. I don’t like it.”
“Noted. So, when we build a house of our own, it won’t be a glowing dome deep beneath the earth beside a lake of oil.” He nodded seriously.
She smiled briefly.
When they arrived at the tower, they had amassed several hundred onlookers, most of them redheads in white. Iyasu studied the tower, found it unremarkably similar to the domes, and fixed his attention on the light streaming from a circular window near the very top.
“My lord!” their guide called out. “They have arrived.”
“Not very specific,” Hadara noted.
“I think we were expected,” Iyasu said. “Jevad must have warned them about us hours ago.”
“And so I did.” Jevad emerged from the archway at the base of the tower. “I’m pleased you decided to join us. It certainly saved us from the difficult task of carrying you here, although I do wish you hadn’t taken quite so long. It was getting a bit boring.”
“Yes, well, these things happen and…” Iyasu trailed off as a change in the light drew his attention upward. And as he gazed up at the round window, a figure emerged bathed in a fiery light that poured outward from his scarlet mane. He stepped off into the empty air and a pair of wings dressed entirely in red fire rushed out from his shoulders to hold him up, and slowly he began to descend toward them.
“That’s him,” Azrael whispered, touching Iyasu’s arm. “That’s Zariel.”
Chapter 30
Iyasu fixed his eyes on the beautiful fiery creature floating down toward them. In the dim light he could almost see the stranger’s soul swirling around his flaming hair, but Iyasu couldn’t be sure what he was seeing. “You’re certain it’s really him? It’s not another djinn?”
“No, that’s no djinn,” Azrael whispered. “That’s an angel. That’s my brother. That’s Zariel.”
The pale angel reached the ground and his burning wings vanished in a soft growl of smoke as he folded his hands behind his back and turned a cold gaze on Azrael. “Well, I’m surprised, obviously. There were so many other faces I expected to see. Michael, naturally. Jibril, probably. Israfil, maybe. But not you. I thought you would be one of the last. One of the ones I would have to pry out of some dank hole in the ground on some lonely mountainside, gibbering nonsense. And yet, here you are, and apparently sane. How are you?”
“Zariel?” She frowned at him. “We thought you were captured… tortured… dead.”
“Don’t be stupid. I’m an angel. And if you’re thinking of what happened to poor Raziel, well, he’s an idiot.” Zariel shrugged. “How else do you explain an angel losing his own body?”
“Strange things happen every day,” Azrael said quietly. “And you did disappear.”
“Yes, I did. I can see how that must have alarmed you and the others,” he said in mock sincerity. “And then you all rushed down here to see what had happened to me, to care for me, to bring me back, didn’t you? Oh no, you didn’t. No one came. No one cared.”
Silence.
He nodded. “That’s what I thought. Well, that’s in the past now. And this is the future.” He reached out, faster than light, and grabbed Azrael’s wrist.
Iyasu stared in frozen horror as he watched a wave of red flame wash out of Zariel’s hand and flood across Azrael’s arm, bleaching her skin white as streaks of bright copper blazed in her raven hair.
“Rael!” He lunged toward the angels, but Hadara grabbed him and held him back.
Now a second fire ignited, a fire of black and gold flames that spun and twisted around Azrael’s arm, swallowing and smothering the red fires until Zariel’s stern visage soured and he let go of her, and stepped back.
She cradled her wrist in her other hand until her skin faded back to its natural hue, though the fiery locks in her hair did not darken as quickly. Iyasu exhaled the breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.
He tried to change her, just like the djinn. But why would he want to make everyone like himself? To make them slaves? Why does an angel need slaves?
“You’re stronger than I remember,” Zariel said.
“I am Death,” she answered. “And a great many people have died since we last met.”
“Interesting.” He paced away from her.
She shook her injured hand and called out, “Zariel, what happened to you?”
“I am the Angel of Change, the soul of adaptation,” he said in a precise, clipped voice. “What do you think happened to me?”
“You were supposed to help these people.” Azrael glanced around at the djinn, standing rank upon rank in the curving lanes around them.
“Yes, I was. And I tried to teach them, to change them. But what I found, dear sister, was that the djinn had something to teach me about change, about the nature of change, the possibilities of change. They taught me ambition.”
“I don’t follow. What does that mean exactly?”
Zariel turned his attention to Rahm, briefly, and then gazed on Hadara a bit longer before finally settling his attention on Iyasu, but he continued to speak to the dark angel. “Think about it. Why was I sent to Ramashad?”
“To guide them,” she said.
“And why would these people need any guidance?”
Iyasu felt the angel’s fiery eyes boring into his skin, and at that moment he also felt a cold dribble of oil slither behind his ear and down his neck. He shuddered and said, “Wait, I think I know that one. Was it… evil?”
Zariel exhaled slowly, a gesture of weary annoyance. “What evil? Cruelty, greed? But that wasn’t true. Not from their point of view. They weren’t cackling monsters, delighting in the suffering of others. They didn’t indulge in evil for evil’s sake. Those are all very childish notions.”
“Childish or not, they’re all real,” Rahm said. “I’ve killed dozens of men for being evil cackling monsters.”
“Of course they’re real,” Zariel said dismissively, waving his hand as though to shoo away an insect. “But not here. The djinn were pursuing something else. Something grander. Nobler. Something very close to my own heart.”
“Pompous oratory?” Iyasu tried to smile but the oil still trickling out of his hair and into the corners of his eyes and mouth kept him wincing and wiping at his face.
“You’re very glib for a cleric.” The pale angel glowered at him.
“Apologies, Holy Zariel,” the seer said. “It’s been a long day.”
“Indeed.” The angel turned away. “The djinn wanted to improve themselves, but the djinn age very slowly, and have few children, so their ability to change, to adapt, to grow, was hampered by time, by their nature. Meanwhile, they saw the brief lives of the humans in Messenad flying by, transforming their race, growing and changing century after century while the djinn stagnated, and so the djinn chose to emulate them, in a manner of speaking.”
“How?” Hadara asked.
“By enslaving the weak and breeding only the strong.” Zariel shrugged. “To their credit, it was a notion that would have worked, eventually, but they were still victims of their nature, their long lives, their few children. But when I saw what they were attempting, I was inspired to help them in their enterprise.”
“You sank their city into the earth,” Azrael pointed out. “It certainly doesn’t sound like you were helping them.”
“But I was,” he said. “I gave them time and privacy, as well as the benefit of my own nature, my own soul. And now here we are, centuries later, and the djinn of Ramashad have indeed changed, evolved. They are ascending. Becoming stronger, in every way.”
“What for?” Rahm fold
ed his arms across his chest and gave the angel a look that said the warrior was extremely unimpressed. “What’s the point of all this strength? To fight a war?”
“Why yes, to wage a war.” Zariel nodded. “But a war to transform the world, not to destroy it. Death is such a waste.” He gave his immortal sister a long, critical look. “I don’t want death. I want change. To uplift the souls of all. The djinn, the humans, and even my own kin. Why wait for our flesh and souls to reach their apex in the natural course of time when we can reach forward and seize it now?”
“Oh, I don’t know, maybe because that’s the way it’s supposed to be?” Iyasu said.
“Supposed to be? According to whom?” Zariel cast a curious look up at the dark ceiling of the cavern. “Heaven? Heaven isn’t here. Or if heaven is here, then heaven engineered this moment and all is proceeding exactly as it was intended. Either way…”
“You sent Jevad into the west, to Maqari,” Iyasu said sharply. “He did nothing there but kill innocents. If your war isn’t about death, then why do that?”
“Ah, yes, well, Maqari.” Zariel cast a dark look back at Jevad, who seemed to shrink slightly under his master’s gaze. “I sent Jevad to ensure that the western kingdoms would not join Shivala in a war against us, when the time came to reveal ourselves. Unfortunately, he made some poor choices in carrying out those duties.”
“And the attack on Shivala?” Iyasu asked. “Hundreds of clerics died. Or was that just another djinn making bad choices?”
“Not at all. Danya did exactly as instructed. She brought down the walls of Shivala, sowing chaos and fear among the clerics,” Zariel said. “It was the clerics’ own fault for attacking her in the desert and getting themselves killed. Regrettable, yes, but I don’t blame her for defending herself. But now, I hope, the killing will soon be behind us. The age of violence is passing. Something better is coming. A new age, a new race, a new world.” He smiled and shrugged. “I really have no idea what it will be like. Isn’t that exciting?”
“Not the word I would use,” Azrael said. “Nor is it going to happen.”
“Why not? You can’t kill them.” Zariel glanced at her innocently as he gestured to his deep ranks of djinn warriors.
“No, but I can flatten your armies with a stroke of my wings,” she said. “And I can go on flattening them, again and again, until the end of time, if that is what is needed.”
Zariel’s thin smile faded. “I know you can, dear sister. At least, I know you would try, as would any of our brethren. Which is why I must insist on you joining us.”
Again he lashed out and grabbed her arm, and again their flesh was engulfed in first red and then also black fire as the two angels fought in a silent battle of wills and souls.
“Rael!” Again Iyasu moved to help her, and again Hadara held him back.
Blotches of white flesh appeared and faded and reappeared on Azrael’s arms and face as she struggled with her brother, and flashes of copper and crimson flared in her hair. Her expression quickly distorted into a mask of pain, though still she did not cry out. Instead she arched her back and released her wings, her beautiful raven wings that spread high and wide behind her.
Zariel, still calmly focused on overwhelming her without a trace of effort on his face, inclined his head slightly as his wings of red fire erupted into the cool air, splashing the faces of the onlookers with shades of blazing scarlet. Both angels rose up off the ground, hovering in the still air on their outstretched wings and bathed in holy fire.
“She’s losing.” Iyasu tried to yank free, but Hadara held him close.
“Rahm?” The princess looked at her husband.
The warrior drew his sword, and grinned. “He’s smaller than a dragon.”
Iyasu almost told him to hold back out of fear for the man’s life, but he said nothing, praying in silence that the brash and powerful warrior could somehow help his love.
Rahm took two running steps and leapt into the air with his scimitar raised and crashed down on the head and shoulder of the red angel. His blade shattered into a thousand pieces as Zariel swatted the man out of the air with his bare white arm, sending Rahm flying back again with his chest covered in scorch marks. Hadara went to his side and found him breathing, though he lay still on the ground, his eyes closed.
Iyasu stood alone, watching Azrael fight with wing and flame and soul.
He flickered. When Rahm hit him, just for a moment, Zariel’s wings dimmed and his flames guttered, and Rael nearly threw him off.
It was the weight. Angels. Strong arms, weak wings…
If we don’t do something, he’ll kill her. She just needs a little distraction, just a few seconds to overwhelm him, I know it!
He looked down at Rahm, but the warrior was still struggling to breathe as Hadara tore away his burnt clothes and dug through her bags for water and salves and bandages.
No help there.
There must be something I can throw at him, something heavy.
He scanned the crowd, a thousand strange faces all strangely lit by the glowing mosses and the fiery angels, and the seer saw them all in an instant, seeing their curiosity, their fear, their joy, and their indifference. What he didn’t see was their compassion.
He looked at the angels again.
Just a few seconds. Just a few seconds.
Oh God…
Iyasu slowly pulled off his oil-soaked shirt and held it dripping in his hand. And then he looked up and called out, “Rael… Rael, I love you!”
He charged at the two winged figures and threw his shirt at Zariel’s face, and when the angel reached up to swat the cloth away, Iyasu hurled himself between the angel’s blazing arms with his oil-soaked hair whipping in his eyes.
* * *
Azrael saw Iyasu crash into Zariel’s chest, flinging his thin arms around the angel’s neck. She saw Zariel stagger forward as the weight of the young man yanked him off balance, out of the air, crashing back to earth. And then she saw the red flames flash across the oily sheen that covered Iyasu from head to foot, saw his skin blacken in an instant, so fast he barely had time to spasm, barely had time to scream. And then the blackened flesh became whitest ash and collapsed to the ground in a heap, trailing a cloud of cinders and dust in the air.
And then she saw it all again, this time in her mind’s eye and this time from Iyasu’s point of view. In the stream of Death that poured through her thoughts every waking moment of her life, in between an old man coughing himself to pieces in bed and a young woman freezing to death in a blizzard, she saw Iyasu die.
My Yasu.
She felt the horrible pain that had lanced through his body as it was consumed by the flames, tearing him apart everywhere all at once. She felt his terror as he realized that this was his last moment of life, his last thought, his last instant of being.
But beneath that, she felt something deeper. She felt his love for her, his needs and yearnings and desires, as well as his tenderness and hope and gentleness, and…
The instant passed. Time marched on, the stream of Death flowed on, tearing that last image of Iyasu with it and replacing it with another face, and then another, and another.
Zariel flinched back from the cloud of ash in his eyes and the smears of burning oil on his arms. His wings dimmed as he stumbled on his feet. The white splotches on her arms faded.
Azrael screamed.
Maybe she screamed his name.
Yasu!
Maybe she screamed the other one’s name.
Zariel!
Maybe she just screamed. It didn’t matter.
Black flames poured out of her arms and wings, completely engulfing Zariel and extinguishing his red fire. She charged at him, no longer in his grasp but grasping him instead, hurling him back across the ground with such force that the pavement shattered and sank into a shallow crater beneath him and a dark shockwave raced outward in every direction, blasting the hundreds of spectators back against the domes and down the curving lanes. The pale an
gel lay dazed on the ground, moaning softly as his unfocused eyes searched the deep shadows of the ceiling of the cavern.
Azrael left him there and raced back to the heap of ashes behind her, and crashed to her knees. She reached down with shaking hands but stopped short of actually touching the ashes as the tears poured from her eyes and her body shook with silent sobs.
No thoughts filled her mind. No memories. No regrets, no prayers, no desperate calls for justice or favoritism from on high. She sat and stared at the warm ash that had been her love just a moment ago, and wept.
A scraping and shuffling sound told her that Zariel was on his feet again, but she didn’t turn to look.
“Azrael!” Hadara shouted. “Behind you!”
Still she did not turn. She stared at the ashes, already beginning to shift and scatter on the cool breeze, as the faces of the dead continued their relentless march through her mind’s eye, telling her the brief tales of countless endings, the illnesses, the murders, the starvations, and on and on, as she struggled to cling to her last true memory of Iyasu. Of his face and voice. Of him calling out, “Rael, I love you!”
A wave of red flame struck her in the back and threw her across the road into a wall, where she slumped and watched a flurry of white ash fly away all around her.
Gone… just gone… all gone…
She turned slowly to see Zariel striding toward her, and she straightened up, feeling her wings unfurl to their full span, and she unleashed a wall of black and gold fire of her own that struck her brother and threw him so far and high that she could not see where he fell beyond the nearest domes in the distant shadows of Ramashad.
A hollow numbness crept into her chest and she felt her wings fade away, felt her divine fires gutter and go out, leaving her smaller and colder. She looked at the place where Iyasu had died and saw that most of the ash had been blown away already, leaving nothing of him behind. Nothing to see. Nothing to hold.
Nothing at all.
A red flame lit the distant walls of the city and she stared blankly at it, not caring whether Zariel came back. Her rage from a moment ago abandoned her, scraping her muscles thin, her heart brittle, and her eyes dim. She stood and waited for the inevitable.
Angels and Djinn, Book 3: Zariel's Doom Page 30
