by Amy Vansant
In the pit of his stomach, Michael could sense another emotion. The anxiety of Anne’s distress gripped him as if it were his own. Michael’s head snapped to the left and he flew in that direction.
Michael burst from the forest into a grassy clearing. He spotted Anne running at top speed towards a female Angelus he recognized as Hildr. Hildr hovered over Meili, who lay on the ground. The Arch Angel thrashed, striking at the air above him, wrestling with an invisible force.
Con. At least Anne wasn’t here alone. Con could keep Meili busy until Anne made it across the field to help him. The problem was Hildr, who stood poised to assist Meili. Con wouldn’t last long fighting two Angeli.
With a blur of light, Michael sped past Anne and tackled Hildr, the two Angeli blasting into the trees. They rolled, tumbling until they struck a massive pine. Michael absorbed the bulk of the blow, the crack of ribs announcing their arrival.
The wind knocked out of him, Michael blinked into his energy form to heal and then returned as human. He established a position straddled on top of the still dazed Hildr, pinning her to the forest floor.
“Meili is mad; this is not your battle!” Michael screamed. Michael’s wings were present, but extended only far enough away from his body to block Hildr’s attempts to slash at him with her own.
Hildr lay beneath Michael, her porcelain skin spattered with dirt. Michael felt her body relax as her large blue eyes stared into his own. She retracted her wings.
Michael released his hold on her, his wings, too, disappearing. He eased his grip. It appeared Hildr was not a Perfidian and she was willing listen to reason.
“Now...” began Michael.
Before he could say another word, the Valkyrie found leverage and threw Michael away from her. Michael’s skull struck another pine. His head swam.
“Nothing more unforgiving than a tree,” he mumbled.
By the time his vision cleared, Hildr was gone.
Chapter Thirty-One
A blue blur streaked past Anne as she ran towards Con. A second later, Hildr crashed into the woods as if hit by an invisible freight train.
Michael.
Anne felt a wave of relief. If Michael could keep Hildr out of the fight, she and Con would have a much easier time with Meili. She had defeated an Arch Angel once before, whether she’d known it or not, and though Seth had been weakened at the time by his previous reaping, she felt with Michael and Con’s help, surely she could defeat another.
Con’s form appeared and disappeared as he continued his attack on Meili. Materializing, he showered powerful blows on the Angelus, each strong enough to kill a human man. When Meili twisted, avoiding a punch, the earth shook as Con’s fists hit the dirt.
Meili’s form flashed, but under Con’s constant attack, he was unable to heal himself by returning to his energy form.
Anne neared the spot where Meili and the shadowy figure of Con wrestled. She raised her right hand and brought forth an energy sword.
Anne leaped forward, her sword aimed at Meili, just as Hildr burst from the forest. Hildr’s glowing wings stretched out and swept through Con’s unstable form, tossing him away from Meili, past Anne and half way across the clearing.
Unable to stop her own momentum, Anne slammed her sword forward, only to have it embed into the empty ground. Freed of Con by Hildr, Meili had rolled away a second before Anne’s thrust. Already on his feet, he stood facing Anne.
Anne retracted her blade from the ground and slashed at Meili. He leapt back, avoiding her sword.
Meili stumbled and then regained his footing, visibly weakened, but healing. Beside him, Hildr remained hovering several feet off the ground, her mouth twisted into an angry snarl. Pine needles and dirt covered her body from her tussle with Michael. Hildr’s once neatly braided hair now formed a hurricane of blonde wisps around her head.
“Stop.”
Michael’s voice boomed across the clearing as he stepped from the edge of the forest behind Meili.
Hildr’s attention snapped to Michael.
Meili turned in a more measured fashion.
“You’ve escaped, I see. And…Keira?”
Michael tilted his head. “Lovely girl. I’m afraid she didn’t make it.”
Meili nodded, his expression grim, and glanced at Anne.
“I’ll have to return the favor.”
Michael clenched his fists. “I’m going to ask you to stop this nonsense now.”
“Or what?”
“I have two Sentinels with me and you have one Guardian. The odds are in my favor.”
Meili took a deep breath.
“I’m willing to fight for my cause.”
Michael offered a single nod of his head.
“So be it.”
The two male Angeli lunged at each other. Hildr made a move to help Meili. Anne leaped toward her. Hildr shot skyward, avoiding Anne’s attack, and then sped across the field towards where she had thrown Con.
The crackling electricity of Michael and Meili’s battle was deafening. The Angeli switched back and forth from their human forms, sometimes fighting as glowing blue angels, their huge wings slashing and blocking in a lightning storm of fury.
Anne swiveled her gaze towards the retreating female Angelus. She didn’t know if Con was unconscious or otherwise injured. He could be helpless and unaware of the approaching Hildr.
With a last glance back at Michael, Anne ran back across the clearing to Con.
Hildr stopped several feet from where Con should be, throwing out the electric webbing of her wings to feel for him. She swooped wildly in all directions hoping to snare him. As Anne made her way to them, she hoped Con had moved to another location, and didn’t lie invisible but unconscious beneath Hildr’s wings.
Hildr pulled back her wings to create a protective cage around herself as she scanned the area. Now thirty feet away, Anne felt a pulse as Hildr again pushed out her energy in an attempt to locate Con, much like a bat using echolocation.
Hildr’s pulse alerted the Angel to Anne’s approach. She turned to look at Anne, but had barely done so before her attention drew to the ground beneath her feet.
Hildr detected Con’s energy beneath her a second too late. Con materialized and leapt up, wrapping his arms around Hildr’s middle, like a shark dragging its prey to the depths. He siphoned with all his might. Hildr clawed at the shadowy figure gripping her waist, but her fingers passed through the Sentinel wraith. Hildr thrashed and, unable to escape, wrapped her wings around Con, siphoning energy from every part of him she could feel.
Anne closed in, sword already in hand.
“Release me!” Hildr screamed, grunting with the strain.
Con let Hildr go as Anne’s first knife passed through her chest. Two more tore through her, each taking with it precious energy.
Hildr fell from the sky. She reached to steady herself against Con but his wraith-like form offered no support. She fell back as she hit the ground, a sword in each shoulder. A split second later, she found Anne’s knee pressed against her chest. Con leaned in and placed both hands on the Angel’s arm as the two Sentinels worked together to siphon Hildr’s already weakened energy past the point of recovery. Her struggling ceased with a burst of white light.
Anne felt renewed, with Hildr’s energy flowing through her like a flash flood.
“Right now I feel like I could finish off Meili by myself.”
“I know,” said Con. “Let’s.”
A roar echoed across the clearing.
Con and Anne pivoted toward the sound.
The two Sentinels watched as a figure appeared in the center of the field. The man stood equidistant between Michael and Meili on one side of the clearing, the Sentinels on the other.
Anne’s lips parted as her jaw fell.
“Seth,” she whispered.
Con could only nod.
Chapter Thirty-Two
“Meili!”
The Angelus’ name boomed across the clearing in Seth’s rattling bari
tone. Seth blinked from his place in the clearing, reappearing a second later beside Meili and Michael. No blue streak of light accompanied the Angelus as he flew. Instead, he disappeared, and then reassembled himself like a puzzle in a new location, like a swarm of ants joining forces to form a man.
Seth appeared close enough to touch Meili, who stood frozen, but for the rise and fall of his chest. He and Michael were tattered from battle and covered in blood and dirt. Neither dared revert to their energy form in order to heal their human bodies, unsure of how movement of any kind might draw Seth’s unwanted attention. Meili blinked as a drop of blood rolled down his forehead and into his eye. Beside him, Michael licked his lip where it split, his mouth filling with the taste of salt and iron.
Each slowly retracted their wings.
Seth did not appear before the Angeli in the human form in which he had arrived. He now manifested as a black void, as if someone had cut a man-shaped hole in a sunny sky to reveal the dark space beyond. The inky darkness of his visage swirled with millions of tiny glowing particles, each coming together to mimic the features of a human face and then breaking apart again, trapped in a frenetic dance.
Meili rocked on his heels and took a step back.
“I have brought you Michael.” Meili took another step back and made a grand hand gesture, as if to imply he had delivered Michael to Seth on a platter.
Michael looked to Meili and then back to Seth, his face betraying no emotion.
“Were you looking for me?”
“No,” said Seth. His voice resonated deep and hollow. The swirling particles did a poor job of simulating lips, instead shaping a dark maw with jagged, glowing edges.
“I’m not sure why you think I was,” he added.
Seth fell silent and his mouth disappeared, replaced by the swirling plasma that formed the rest of his unfocused figure.
“Our cause,” said Meili, his voice faltering. “Michael doesn’t fit. He refuses to join us and bring freedom to the Angeli.”
“I have no cause. I do as I please.”
“Yes, you do as you please. That is our cause! To release the Angeli from their indentured servitude to the humans.”
“I have no cause,” Seth repeated. His form grew more amorphous, and then reformed. Seth took a step toward Meili.
“You say we have plans,” he said.
Meili nodded. “Yes; do you remember we spoke when you returned?”
Seth’s form stretched disproportionately tall, looming above Meili. His voice dropped lower.
“Chaos has no plans.”
Michael remained still, fighting the urge to move away as Seth became larger. A droplet of blood trickling its way through his hairline weighed down a lock of hair until it collapsed and swung to his forehead.
Seth saw the movement and turned his attention to Michael.
Michael watched as an image rose from the pool of darkness that now formed Seth’s face. It was Leo. Michael raised a hand, reaching towards this dark doppelganger of his brother. The image disappeared. Michael blinked hard and looked at Seth.
“I injured Leo.”
Michael felt a wave of sadness, as if Seth had projected remorse directly into his heart. He offered a terse nod to acknowledge Seth’s attention.
“You have his energy?” he asked.
“Some of it, yes.”
Michael took a deep breath.
“I need you to release it so that he can be whole again.”
“Another day,” said Seth. He sighed. “Perhaps.”
Seth turned his attention back to Meili, who paled. He made a move to zip away, but instead flew directly into the waiting arms of Seth, who projected himself just feet behind the retreating Angelus. His black arms wide, Seth clamped on Meili like a Venus flytrap snapping shut around a fly.
Seth held the struggling Angelus, his inky, disfigured profile pulsating. Meili strained to phase, his image flickering with blue light, but he remained unable to penetrate Seth’s hold on him.
Meili’s eyes began to bulge. He released a scream, torn from the depths of his soul. Michael took an involuntary step back.
Meili’s wail resonated with more than physical pain. It was a shriek of mental terror, an expression of sheer madness. Michael watched as steam escaped around the amorphous binds that held Meili, as if Seth’s touch burned. In agony, Meili threw his head back as if to scream again, but no sound escaped. Bits of his flesh began to peel away, each strip flowing into Seth’s vacuous black body.
A final burst of light did not signify Meili’s last moments. Sparkling traces of him spun into the void, as if Seth had crushed a star in his hand. The black hole of his visage swallowed Meili’s dying light.
Meili was gone.
Seth remained amorphous and pulsating for several seconds. Slowly, his darkness began to break apart into a swarm of inky dots. The dots gathered to form a human shape, beginning to lighten and color, until Seth again appeared as an ordinary man.
Michael did not move.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Across the clearing, Con and Anne watched in horror as Seth devoured Meili.
“He killed Meili like he was nothing,” Anne whispered.
Con remained silent.
“Con?”
Con heard Anne but knew there was something he had to do. He willed himself towards Seth and Michael, and a moment later appeared in that spot, face to face with Seth.
“Con!” he heard Anne call from where he had left her on the other side of the clearing.
Con felt his heart racing. He had just watched this half-man, half-monster swallow an Arch Angel whole. He knew if Seth had the mind to kill him, there would be little he could do to save himself, but he needed to be whole once more. Seth was his only chance.
He held eye contact with Seth for several unsettling seconds.
“We have unfinished business,” said Seth, breaking the ice.
“We do.”
With his brown hair and lanky frame, Seth appeared almost milquetoast now. No one could ever guess this man had devoured one of the most powerful creatures in the universe.
Seth smiled. “You know, Anne still has some of my energy, just as I have some of yours.”
Con scowled. “Is that why you’re after her?”
“Yes and no. I would like the part of me she kept after reaping me, but I was so impressed with her swords...”
“Her swords?”
“She grew those wonderful swords to fight me. She wears my energy well.”
“That’s where her swords come from? You?”
“Con!”
Con looked back to where he had left Anne. She was running towards them now and growing closer. He didn’t have much time. He opened his mouth to call to her, to beg her to stop, but before he could utter a sound, Seth spoke.
“I have a lot of power,” said Seth looking towards Anne as she ran towards them. “She can keep that bit for now.”
Con swallowed and clenched his jaw, steeling himself for his next question.
“Well, I’d like my energy back.”
“You’re welcome to try,” said Seth, his face betraying no emotion.
Con felt his stomach twist. He opened his mouth to respond, but before he could speak, a voice resonated loudly in his head.
“Grab him. Like a vice, grab him now.”
Con turned to look at Michael, confused.
“Dammit, man, grab him!” Michael roared. “Now!”
Impelled by the command, Con lunged forward and grabbed Seth, holding him in a bear hug, as if the fiend was his long-lost kin.
He felt pressure building, as if Seth was about to explode in his arms. Con turned his head away and saw Anne, nearly on them. Again, he opened his mouth to warn her away, but heard no sound. A tornado had swallowed his voice. He heard the sound of wind around him, until everything went suddenly and utterly black.
Slowly, a white light grew in the darkness before Con’s eyes. He felt disoriented. He heard a hum.
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“Come to me, Con, now! Here!” said a voice to his left.
Reeling, Con took a few stumbling steps towards the sound of the voice. He felt a hand grasp his own. It pulled him forward.
“Da?”
I’m dead. My father has come to get me.
Con felt a large, strong hand cradle his cheek.
“Da?”
“Hardly,” said a man’s voice.
Con’s vision cleared and he found himself face to face with Michael. The Angelus stared intently into his eyes. He cupped Con’s face close to his own.
“Are you ok? Snap out of it, man.”
Con pulled away and slapped Michael’s hands from his face.
“Are you mad? Let go of me!”
Con stumbled to a desk and, leaning on it, shook his head like a wet dog to clear the fuzziness that enveloped him. As his vision began to take shape, he found himself in a basement. It was empty, but for Michael and a large cage. The metal cage hummed with electricity. Inside, an amorphous form shifted in shape and color. The transitions were violent, but no matter how it thrashed, the form never touched the bars of the cage.
“Is that Seth?” Con asked, transfixed by the sight.
“Your embrace trapped him long enough for me to transport you both here.”
“I did it?”
“You did. On my command, nonetheless. I can’t believe you actually listened to me.”
“Me neither.”
Michael nodded toward the cage. “Luckily for you you’re still enough of a Sentinel and enough of a ghost that the cage was unable to hold you. Otherwise, you’d still be in there with Seth.”
Con turned and looked behind him. A gray cloud of mist writhed inside the bars of the humming cage. A human hand or face appeared in the swirling mix, only to dissolve into unidentifiable matter a moment later.
“Did you know I’d be able to escape the cage?” asked Con, horrified by Seth’s appearance and the thought of spending an eternity with him in a cage.
