Shattered Walls (Seven Archangels Book 3)

by Jane Lebak

  For the last millennia, only humans had stood this kind of trial, the sorting of those who should enter Heaven from those who belonged in Hell. This time, the subject was Tabris, an angel, and until an hour ago, a guardian angel. Until an hour ago, just as sinless as the rest of them.

  Without any presentation of evidence or arguments from either side, God presented to all the witnesses what Tabris had done, and what he deserved for the crime.

  Raguel could feel the guards recoil, but Tabris remained still. His hands: he kept staring at his hands.

  Swallowing against nausea, Raguel stepped toward Tabris. “Do you have a statement in your own defense?”

  Tabris didn’t look up. “No.”

  “Then I do.” Raguel turned to the throne of the Lord, his face bathed in the radiance that had dispelled chaos in the first moments of creation and acted as his beacon ever since. His heart trilled as he glimpsed infinity, but he focused himself. “I would beg you for mercy.” He ignored the tendrils of hope and outrage that swirled from the other angels. “Tabris panicked. I don’t think his crime was premeditated. If he’d thought about it at all, I’m sure he would have stopped.”

  “The boy’s dead!” shouted a voice from across the room.

  Raguel forced himself to look only at God rather than toward the voice. “Tabris’s intentions—”

  “I said—” the voice continued, closer, “the boy is dead. Regardless of Tabris’s intentions, Sebastian died. Tabris short-circuited God’s plan in the worst way possible, a plan that—if you recall—one-third of the angels were thrown into Hell for failing to fulfill. And now you want—”

  Raguel said to God, “One more angel in Hell won’t resurrect the child.”

  The accuser took form immediately beside Raguel. “That would be justice.”

  Raguel still wouldn’t turn. “Tabris is sorry. It was a rash action, not a rejection of You.”

  The accuser said, “The boy is dead. That’s all the rejection possible.”

  At that moment, the light of God took form at the head of the room as Jesus Christ. The angels bowed, but Tabris prostrated himself.

  Jesus advanced to the accuser, who looked him dead in the eye.

  Jesus said, “Your point is understandable.”

  Raguel turned for the first time to look at the accuser, who wore an icy glare and had every feather on every wing standing out, typical for a demon.

  “Understandable?” said the demon. “Everything here is perfectly understandable. Angels have only one written law, am I correct? And that law is shown to every single guardian angel before beginning his assignment, am I still correct? Including Tabris? No one forgot to show it to him because they were too busy polishing their harps and reciting your cute scripted praises?”

  Jesus waited him out. Raguel had less patience; his sword had manifested at his side, and his palms itched.

  Jesus glanced at Raguel, acknowledgment in his eyes.

  The demon cocked his head and folded his arms. “And would I still be correct if I were to recall that the law says, explicitly, Do not kill your charge?”

  Jesus said, “You have a thorough grasp of the facts.”

  The demon said, “Shocking that you even need such a written law. But your playthings want so badly to brainwash their toy monkeys and get them here, so it makes sense. Polish them to a high shine and then kill them. Ta-dah, instant sainthood.”

  Jesus said, “Again, you have a good grasp on the guardians’ desire to get their charges into Heaven.”

  “The only thing I can’t grasp is this,” the accuser said, his voice flat. “If I’m in Hell for far less a crime than he committed, I fail to see why he should receive the mercy you denied the rest of us.”

  Jesus said, “Tabris still loves me.”

  “You have to admit,” the demon said, stepping closer and lowering his voice, “that his demonstration of that love falls short of ideal.”

  Jesus turned to Raguel, who forced himself to look away from the demon. “Why are you pleading for Tabris? He hasn’t pleaded for himself.”

  Raguel folded his arms over his chest, but Jesus touched his shoulder, and Raguel looked up. “My Lord, he’s in shock. I’m convinced he had no intention of doing what he did, and given the chance, he’d change it. He’s condemning himself. I think you want better than that for one of your own.”

  Looking at Tabris, Jesus said, “How much do you believe in him?”

  “I wouldn’t challenge your judgment,” Raguel said.

  “But you want that judgment to be favorable?”

  Oh, God, Raguel thought, thank you for an opening here. He ignored the demon’s outraged huff. “Please have mercy on him.”

  He looked again at Tabris, still prostrated, still not projecting any of his emotions. Raguel wondered if maybe he’d stopped himself from reacting to his own Creator debating whether to discard him.

  “He does still love you.” Raguel’s voice turned urgent. “For that alone, you might be able to show him mercy.”

  Jesus stepped toward Tabris, who pulled his wings tighter over his head, a brown and green shield of feathers. Raguel noted both the brightness and softness in his Lord’s eyes as he studied the prostrated angel, the contemplation that stretched into a question-mark, and for a moment Raguel feared it was God lingering over a last look. Tabris himself had gone motionless, and Raguel fought panic as Tabris’s fear filled the room.

  As if voicing Tabris’s own thoughts, the demon said, “There isn’t a choice. He deserves to burn.”

  Jesus kept his gaze on Tabris. “Raguel, answer me, how much do you believe in him?”

  “Completely.”

  “Then I release him into your custody. Do with him as you wish.”

  The demon let off a flare of rage. The rest of the angels in the room reacted with simultaneous surprise and relief, tainted by confusion and anger.

  Raguel bowed. “My Lord.”

  “Tabris?” Jesus’s voice sharpened, but Tabris still didn’t raise his head. “You’re on probation. One more act of disobedience means damnation. You are clear on that.”

  Tabris projected his emotions so all could hear him: understanding, and thanks.

  Jesus looked Raguel in the eyes. “Accompany him to his next assignment.”

  Jesus vanished even as Raguel felt himself filled with that assignment’s details.

  The demon pushed past Raguel to Tabris. “They’ve only delayed it. You’re still mine.”

  Raguel put his hand on his sword, and the demon vanished.

  Tabris raised his head, then got to his feet, his eyes wide but otherwise expressionless. The other angels watched as he looked at the spot the demon had stood, then to the last place he’d seen the boy.

  Raguel touched his hand. “Come with me.” And they departed.

  Tabris still trembled with fear, with hopelessness, with desperation. He followed Raguel by doing automatically what would confuse any creature with a body, going somewhere without a destination. Angels traveled by thinking about where they wanted to be, and they arrived without passing through the intermediate space, whether the thought was “corner of 83rd and Park” or “wherever he’s taking me” or even “wherever Gabriel is right now.” This time Tabris’s intention had been the second, so he felt surprised when he found himself surrounded by the paperish scent of Raguel’s study, a familiar room in one of Heaven’s “many mansions.” Familiar because he’d gotten his previous assignment here. Being brought back at the end felt like a mockery of closure, the breaking of that long-ago promise.

  Raguel had Tabris sit. “Take a few minutes to get yourself together. I’m going to leave you here, and I think it would help if you prayed.”

  “Please—” Tabris’s voice sounded uncertain even to himself. “I’d rather you didn’t.”

  Raguel hesitated, and Tabris waited for the inevitable recoil, but instead Raguel settled on the couch beside him. Tabris inclined his body away but found himself searching out Rague
l’s eyes. What he wanted wasn’t there, of course. He couldn’t find what wouldn’t be found.

  Raguel said, “I wasn’t going to lock you up here. I wanted to go ahead of you to your next assignment.”

  “To warn everyone? That way they can resign before they have to work with a—”

  Tabris’s voice refused to complete the sentence, but the final word rang in his head like an echo in an underground cave.

  Sebastian had gotten into Heaven. Hold onto that thought. Because that was good, the only good to come from this whole disaster. It wasn’t Sebastian’s fault that Tabris had taken his life. Tabris, however, was guilty of murder, and murder cried out for nothing less than damnation, sharp and swift. If only to keep the other guardians faithful, Tabris had seen no other way things could unfold.

  He’d felt the other angels’ agitation about God sparing him, and really, Tabris himself wasn’t sure how he felt. Even here, sitting on Raguel’s couch and feeling like a homesteader after the tornado has blown past, he knew he was by no means out of danger.

  “I—” He quelled the instinctual projection and forced himself to translate into words. “I wanted to say thank you. For pleading for me. I…”

  He couldn’t continue. He wanted to push the words, but they wouldn’t come. I didn’t deserve that. Deserve. Didn’t deserve anything.

  Raguel reached for Tabris’s hand, and the reassurance flowed from him, unrestrained emotions from an unsullied heart: Raguel would have done it for anyone.

  “You did it for me.” Tabris’s voice deserted him again. He strangled down his feelings until he could figure out how to keep speaking.

  Raguel said, “I won’t be gone long. But I want to go ahead of you.”

  “I know what’s going to happen.” The inner darkness surged, and Tabris stared again at his hands. “Wherever you stick me for this next assignment—if it’s a small city, a corporation, an apple tree out in the middle of the Great Plains—no one’s going to want me there.”

  Raguel said, “I’m going to intercept their objections,” and beneath the words, Tabris sensed a tease: he hadn’t guessed it.

  Tabris looked up. “A star? I could handle that. Make it about a thousand light years from anything else.” His voice dropped. “And make sure there aren’t any black holes near by. Just in case.”

  Raguel squeezed his hand. “You’re being hard on yourself, and it’s not all about you. Stay here and get your equilibrium. I’ll be a few minutes.”

  “The reality couldn’t possibly exceed imagination.” Tabris’s eyes narrowed. “What am I assigned to?”

  “Not what,” Raguel said. “Who.”

  “What?” Tabris leaped from the couch, his wings flaring as he backed across the room, eyes round as full moons. “I hope you mean an animal!”

  Raguel shook his head.

  “No!” Tabris exclaimed. “Absolutely not! I—you can’t! The one-person rule!”

  Raguel stood. “It’s been suspended so you can guard a second human being. And you won’t be the primary caregiver. It’s a secondary guardianship.”

  “But—”

  “You can’t refuse.” Raguel’s voice turned insistent. “You cannot refuse. You’re under obedience to take it.”

  Tabris covered his face with his hands. His thoughts ricocheted like atoms in a nuclear reactor, and every attempt to get them under control only sped them up. Another person? A human being? Someone else whose life he could screw up—could end? Why would God do that—unless God wanted him in Hell all along and wanted to prove it wouldn’t have helped to be merciful. No one would plead for Tabris again. No one.

  Eventually he whispered, “What about the other guardian?”

  “He’ll have no choice. He’s under the same directive you are.”

  Directive. Oh, God, please, no. He’d had a directive! The word Sebastian was strong enough to break through every barrier Tabris had thrown up against it, and he knew when it hit Raguel like an arrow in the heart. Sebastian. Little one. Brown-eyed, clever, assertive, curious, responsible, generous, impulsive—and his. His charge. Not his charge anymore.

  Tabris groped for a chair, and then, huddled with his arms wrapped around his waist, he did everything in his power to push it down. Stop thinking. Just stop thinking. Everything had changed. He couldn’t go back.

  Raguel neared him, and Tabris shook his head. “If you’re going to do it, we should do it now.”

  Raguel hesitated.

  “Waiting won’t make it easier.”

  Tabris took a few deep breaths to steady himself, his color darkening, his wings enriching to a deep jade and an even deeper mahogany. He regarded himself momentarily, then looked back at Raguel, and in the next moment, Raguel took him away.

  Two

  “No!” the guardian angel shouted. “I won’t allow it!”

  “Rock!” Raguel tried to block him from Tabris. “Rachmiel, stand down. Tabris—”

  “—murdered the last one, and I’m not letting him get near mine!”

  Tabris backed through a pile of resin horses until his back hit the wall, and he took every verbal lash without protest. Rachmiel had drawn his sword and positioned himself between Tabris and the tiny form who slept beneath the tousled covers. In the grainy midnight, Rachmiel’s eyes and weapon shed a glow like moonlight. So far the noise and the emotions had left the child undisturbed.

  Raguel began exerting emotional pressure on Rachmiel to get control of himself even as Rachmiel tightened his grip on his sword. “If you think,” Rachmiel said, “even once, that I’m going to let him touch—”

  Raguel got between them and disarmed Rachmiel by strength of will, but even without his sword, Rachmiel had his wings spread in a battle-stance. Tabris pressed against the scant security of the bedroom wall, knowing he could have passed through it and left at any moment. He and Rachmiel wanted the same thing.

  Other angels flooded the room, a torrent of high alert and horror that swirled through the air. One of the other angels hovered alongside Rachmiel to urge calm, but he persisted. No, he wouldn’t let him near her, and this was obscene, and how could he be expected to guard her when they were bringing an enemy right into the home?

  Tabris focused on the messy room rather than the whiplash of the angel’s anger. Posters of fluffy animals, ballet slippers and piano keyboards. Beside a heap of clothing lay a teddy bear, pushed out of bed by a sleeping arm. Tabris leaned toward it, then jerked back against the wall. Not his child to guard. Not really.

  Rachmiel folded his arms. “And that’s final.” His pallor had given way to a flush, and he breathed heavily.

  Raguel said, “They’re Divine orders.”

  Rachmiel locked his teeth and blew out a long breath. His eyes glittered, sharp sparks Tabris could read as a demand for the exact specificity of how those orders were worded.

  Then Rachmiel closed his eyes and flexed his head just a fraction, and Tabris could tell he was listening to God. Rachmiel’s light turned to gold, and Tabris sensed the other angels clustering nearer to Rachmiel as the Spirit wrapped around him. Like snowflakes in the sun, his objections melted. Tabris leaned away from his corner, his eyes round as he watched their Creator’s hand working on Rachmiel’s spirit.

  He stepped forward, closer to Rachmiel—but also closer to the child. She stirred, and Rachmiel glared at him. “You,” and it was a whisper. “Out.”

  Tabris blazed from the room like a comet, but he knew—he couldn’t outrun this, couldn’t evade, couldn’t leave it behind. He couldn’t shed himself. Like a laser he streaked across the clear sky, parallel to the ground for two miles before realizing in panic that he’d been bound to the child by a spiritual tether. It snapped taut, crashing him to the ground in agony.

  He couldn’t move any further. His eyes stung and fingers clenched. He needed to move closer to his new spiritual homebase.

  Guardian.

  Tabris inched backward through the brown grass until sensation returned and he no longe
r trembled with cold. As the whistling subsided, he rubbed his temples to clear his mind. Stupid, stupid. A newbie mistake, forgetting the tether.

  When semicorporeal, as they are most of the time, angels have subtle bodies, and those bodies have limits. In their purest form they exist as unalloyed intelligences, knowing and loving God in His most profound aspects. In order to act, however, they become more solid, opting for the shapes humans recognize as winged men and women. Tabris knew if he’d persisted in widening the distance between himself and the child, he wouldn’t have died, since angels are immortal, but he’d have lost consciousness until someone pulled him closer.

  He lurched to his feet and scanned the area. Raguel had brought him to the countryside, far enough from any city that the sky looked deep, the stars distant, and the universe heartless. Fighting a gnawing sense of abandonment, he turned his gaze to the stars, remembering how a sky unpolluted by city lights looks like a dome that gets more distant toward its apex. He couldn’t recall the last time he’d seen one.

  He walked. The cricket song reminded him that not all in the world had changed. His last assignment had been in one of the modern city walls people called suburbs, the rows of identical houses with identical lawns and an identical tree and driveway, each with a picture window and a potted plant beside the kitchen sink.

  Guardian.

  That child, two miles away, he thought—and then paused. He wanted to think of it as unlucky, but he couldn’t. Its heart was pure. Her heart, he corrected himself. He knew her to be innocent. Young. The best way to help would be to jettison her and never touch her. If God wanted him to guard her he could very well do it from two miles away and, over time three, four, five, infinity. He could pray for her just as well from Jupiter as from her bedroom.

  But another part of him, the part he had to call instinct, felt compelled to fight anyone who might harm her. It wasn’t like being told to guard a bank or a country. There you wanted to do it because you wanted to do a good job. But guarding a human—it wouldn’t let you not do it. Your soul vibrated in time to the human’s soul. You fit together. It felt wrong to be apart. Be there, be near, be her defense. Guard that purity and innocence.