by Donovan Neal
The Wyvern's teeth were as his own swords and would easily slice angelic flesh if he were unfortunate enough to be grasped within. Michael floated toward the creature and it roared again, arching its back to spring upon him, but another roar sounded behind Michael. And when the Chief Prince turned to see if another enemy attacked from the rear, his eyes widened as a Phane towered over him...and Talus was its rider.
The wyvern leapt.
"YAH!" Talus said, and the Phane charged at the monster.
The two beasts made contact, Michael ducked with his hands over his head, as the giant creatures smashed into one another above him, with Wyvern and Phane tumbling backward, snapping at each other.
Talus jumped off his smoky steed, and with a grayish white sword that phased in and out of existence, launched himself straight into the mouth of the Wyvern. Razor sharp teeth bit deep into the Prince of Arelim, but the Phane grappled the beast by the neck and pummeled its snout, smashing it while it still gripped Talus, but Talus was ready, for his armor protected him from the chomp that would easily rend him to pieces. Talus lifted his sword and brought the blade deep into beast's skull. It roared in pain, releasing the High Prince from its toothy grasp, each clomp of its feet shaking the ground.
Talus, now free, fell to the ground, his sword still embedded in its skull. With a giant thud, it fell. Dirt and embers shot in every direction. The Phane turned and stood towering by the Prince of House Arelim. Talus dusted himself off while Michael looked upon his brother from a distance...a brother he had not seen for over thirty of men's years and each was moved and reached out to embrace the other. Michael pushed him back, still holding his shoulders and squeezing them gently, happy that his brother stood alive and well. Michael fought back tears as he spoke. "You were remiss to return to me as commanded."
Talus grinned, "Apologies, my Prince, I was detained. The King's business required me to feign capture that I might wear the enemy down and lead Lucifer to think victory could be won, and to also distract him from Yeshua whilst the Lord grew in stature. It was needful that all believe the enemies' diversion with me would see our Lord to success...moreover, it was needful to purge my shame that genesised the entrance of war by my hand."
Michael smiled. "And did you purge that which plagues you? Are you free of your burden?"
Talus looked about him. "To pay for one's own sin is folly when El hath already forgiven it, but I have seen what bitterness and unforgiveness of oneself acquires. I will no longer carry burdens that El hath offered to bear. Yea, my friend. I am free."
Michael smiled. "Then let us find our brethren and exit this foul place."
Talus nodded, and he and Michael turned to the back of the Wyvern's pen, and bound therein, cocooned within Hell's fiery membranes, hung Jerahmeel, Turiel, and Eskalion. Python-like coils draped over each one, constricting them while the mountain fed upon them. All three were enveloped and cried out in muffled pleas, for help, biting down upon fiery tendrils as tears streamed down their faces and maggots burrowed and fed upon them alive.
Michael and Talus peeled the coils from the membrane they were cocooned within, and Hell's tendrils slowly unraveled.
Talus pulled a tendril from Jerahmeel's mouth, as he coughed up fluid still resident in his lungs. He placed his hand on Jerahmeel's back and patted him, as the Lord of House Harrada vomited phlegm and the fluidic acids of digestion that hell had pumped into him. Coughing, Jerahmeel gathered himself and looked into his brother's eyes.
"When I saw that you and the Forge were one, I couldn't...I..."
"Shhh..." said Talus. "I know...I know." Jerahmeel reached out and pulled him close and they held each other tight.
Michael smiled as he released the other two captives, and his face contorted in alarm as he stared at Jerahmeel in horror. "My God, Jerahmeel...your eye!"
Jerahmeel felt where his eye had been gouged out and replied, "Yet I still am the best looking of the lot of you. Besides, I am still forced to suffer your ugly mug with the other eye." Jerahmeel turned to Talus and lifted his hands pleadingly. "Please, Talus, take my other eye! However, on the next mission Michael, I suggest that you donate the eye."
Talus laughed while Michael went over, smiled and hugged his brother. "I am glad to see you too, but wait...did I not send four on this mission? Where is Iblis?"
Jerahmeel grew somber and replied, "He betrayed us, and lo, he has his reward." He pointed to a cocoon behind Michael embedded within the wall of Hell. Michael followed his finger and entrapped within was the defector Iblis. Tendrils coiled around his neck and the worms which die not continued to do Hell's bidding and were about their work of consuming the angel. Michael peered deep into Iblis' eyes which were wide open and spoke pleadingly for rescue. The python-like veins of Hell filled his throat suffocated all screams. Michael winced in disgust and spoke, "Opportunity was given to return. Abandoned the straight path to redemption he has. He is where he belongs. Come, my friend. Let us go and return favor to Lucifer for the loss of thine eye."
Jerahmeel nodded, and Eskalion, Turiel, and Jerahmeel looked at one another, and then at their brethren who fought in the distance.
Jerahmeel spied Lucifer and cracked his knuckles in expectation to deliver recompense upon his rogue brother. "This is a beat down I've been looking forward to for a long time."
Each one then turned, flying as one man to do battle with Satan.
* * *
Lucifer, mounted upon gryphon-back, fended off attackers that sought to dismount him. Accosted on every side, he swung his sword while flying to get distance between him and the kiln of his own creation...the forge no longer under his control...an oven that now birthed monstrosities that attacked him and his own. Monstrosities meant to be used as weapons of war against Heaven. Monstrosities now turned against him.
As a cloud of devouring locusts, the Hosts of Heaven arrayed themselves to battle fallen angels who resided within Hell's loins and Lucifer. Lucifer surrounded himself with a spherical bubble of sound around his person. As a flying sonic cannon, he barreled into the legions of Heavens, blasting through Malakim warriors and exploding their ranks, but the legions of heaven were not be deterred. They reconstituted their lines by projecting beams of power at the bubble of sound that surrounded the former chief prince. Lightning strikes, discharges of heat, cold, and fire blasted the shield that armored Satan. Wave after wave of angels descended upon him with abandon and smashed upon him in self-slaughter, disintegrating instantly.
The dark prince found himself overwhelmed by the sheer number that sought to dismount him, and his sonic armor collapsed under the volume of attackers. The Prince of Pride fell from his mount, plummeting in a trail of fire to the floor of Hell.
As a meteorite that smashes into the Earth. Still, the angels of heaven descended after him, refusing to relent in their attacks.
He rose groggily as lightning strikes continued to rain down upon him, and angels landed to cut him down. Backing away, breathless, he looked for means to regain the upper hand and using his power over light, bent electromagnetic waves around him and disappeared, leaving false images of himself hither and yon, giving his opponents pause for thought.
"It is a trick!" some yelled. "He cannot be several places at once, so how is the thing possible?" The collective mob paused in their assault and weighed the new battle tactic used against them, while Lucifer taunted them behind the veil of angelic sight.
"Come, fools!" he mocked. "You desire the head of Lucifer? Then approach and seek your prize!"
Angels attacked the false images, each striking and wondering if they fought a doppelganger of the dread lord. Several swung their swords at an apparition only to realize the deception too late as they saw the Sword of Malice protruding from their bleeding chest. With deftness of speed, Lucifer cut them down before they could calculate why they were experiencing dissolution.
Charon however, stood afar off, ambivalent to the goings-on of all things, for his was to warden the creature Hell, and a
ll smartly stood aloof from him. All except Eladrin, who approached the giant angel, landing in twinkling lights before the one he had engaged in a stalemated battle so many centuries ago.
Charon acknowledged the King of Ophanim and bowed his cowled head to him. Eladrin returned the gesture. The two celestial giants faced one another both dubiously and with an air of mutual respect.
"Leave this realm and return home to the realm immortal," the human face of Eladrin said.
Charon lifted his head to reveal the skeletal face of a mare and replied, "Theee darrrrk Looord, holdss keyyyyys of servitude. Booound to himmm I ammm. Retriiieveee theee keyyyysssss of Deaath, and Hellll. And freeeee once more I willlll beee." He then lowered his head and his features once again became dark under cover of his hooded cowl.
Eladrin nodded and turned from the angel of death to scour the battlefield and find Lucifer. The King of Ophanim would risk all to acquire the keys and strip Satan of his power over Death and Hell.
The battle raged all about Eladrin as angel smote angel, and the righteous dead engaged in heated clashes with daemons. Eladrin's eyes then found Nephanos, the only one of his kind to ever leave the realm immortal and venture into Hell, and the Ophanim watched his peer in wonder.
The King of the Seraphim was fire incarnate, and released from his oath to stand before El, he was a dreaded sight to behold. As a floating wave, he moved through the throng before him, burning the enemies of Heaven alive. His body's composition was that of living fire and thus immune from Hell's ability to harm him, for Hell was made to devour Elohim, and the Seraphim's very substance was made from the same fires that formed the Kiln. Thus with impunity, Nephanos scorch-marched through rebel angels and daemons, cremating foes that burned and flailed helplessly while he ravaged all that stood in his path.
Where are the Lumazi? Eladrin thought. He continued to scour the field of battle, for he separated from Michael and the others during the assault. At last, his eyes found them. In the distance, various ones of the angelic council immersed in combat and fighting doggedly, skirmishing toward a common rallying point on the field. He tracked their expected destination and saw ten images of Lucifer fighting a throng of Heaven's angels, beating them back with sword, sound, and light.
The two groups will find themselves soon.
A flash caught the periphery of his eyes and he turned his four faces to find the provocation of Heaven's descent – the Lord God Yeshua.
Yeshua hovered within the shadow of Death and stood floating as a radiant bridge between Hades and Paradise. A shining light that blinded the underworld...a realm now totally overrun in battle.
* * *
The begotten Son of God was unstoppable, for the Lord God Yeshua was a marching hurricane of carnage that waged beneath the mantle of the Earth. Bright as a star amidst the dimness that was Hell, He was yet in the form of a man. Two golden swords floated about His person as wings from His back. Each was a full blade with no hilt and no hand grasped them. The Lord faced His people in Paradise, and from His position, He observed His children's actions as a general eyes all things around Him.
The flaming golden swords slashed fallen angels naive enough to accost the Lord, and the golden light of life that animated their stones floated back into Yeshua, for Yeshua was an army unto Himself. In addition to the golden blades that were as wings on His back were also four words in angelic script that floated about His person, orbiting Him. Each shimmered, and powerful, deep, rataplan notes emanated from them. Eladrin noted the four words that circled the Lord were Judgment, Death, Recompense, and Hell.
And when the Lord walked, each word transformed into one of four objects that reached out of its own accord to slay those that stood in the Lord's way. The first was a bow nocked with an arrow of fire; the second was a red sword, but much smaller than the hiltless blades that floated at his back. A balance also hovered, aglow, and transmuted from a scale into the word judgment as the Lord passed judgment on all that he surveyed, and the last was a scythe. The curved obsidian blade with a golden handle flickered one moment from the word Death to a living reaping force that harvested the life of El autonomously from everything it touched.
A storm unto Himself, dark clouds and mutterings of thunder emanated from Yeshua's presence. Lightning streaked from His person, the bolts of which slew those arrayed against His children. Booming thunder shattered the cocooned dead that Hell still held in reserve for dining.
The Lord Yeshua walked over Hell and its minions as easily as He had walked on water as a man on the Earth. The weapons and words that floated about Him as wailing spirits wiped members of the Horde who did not immediately fall to their knees in surrender. The Grigori of destroyed enemies shown momentarily between thunder claps their stenographic duties now over and released to return to Heaven.
And thus the Grigori recorded that on the day the heavenly Host invaded Hell, that Yeshua stood above the gulf that separated Hades from Paradise and unleashed a tempest of vengeance and anger. Yet, even in this was His angered tempered, lest the Earth fail from His wrath.
Yeshua and the fathers of their faith led the righteous dead to victory against the Horde. Some of the ungodly stood with their backs pushed against the cliff, unable to maneuver, surrounded and flanked by the army of dead saints. And when the Lord saw that His people were safe, He turned His eyes to his celestial children who had arrayed themselves against Lucifer.
* * *
Jerahmeel was first to enter into Lucifer's view undeceived by his brother's ruse and the Prince of Darkness mocked him as he drew near. "Hast the head of House Harrada come to surrender his other eye?" he laughed.
Jerahmeel armored his body in glistening white. Frost trailed behind him as axes materialized in his hands. He closed the distance between him and Lucifer and swung an ax at the dread lord.
Lucifer backed away, dodging his brother's blows, but Jerahmeel was not unskilled and drew close enough to his brother and hammered his forehead into his brother's, knocking him to the ground.
Lucifer fell to his rear, and Jerahmeel stopped his assault and smiled. "Surely you can defeat an angel blind in one eye?"
Lucifer scowled as Metatron and Eskalion landed behind Jerahmeel.
The head of House Harrada extended his hand to his brother and signaled with his curled opened hand to 'come here.' "Get up. We are not done yet."
Lucifer stood to his feet and wiped the blood that now dripped from a gash above his eye. His eyes narrowed, and the taunt that Jerahmeel levied against him made him pout in ire. He cocked his neck to the side and armored himself. Unsheathing the Blade of Malice, he replied, "This has been a long time coming."
Jerahmeel nodded, "Agreed, and believe me when I say I hope this will not go quick."
"Arrghhh!" Lucifer cried, enraged. The sound of his roar created a blast wave that preceded him. The audible wave of pressured vibrations burst as an explosive force across the space between them.
Jerahmeel took a step back, and Metatron stood as a shield before him. He opened his mouth and released a blast of sound that punched through the oncoming destructive wave, dissipating it into nothing. He drew his sword and flew to engage the former lord of his house. Their swords clashed, and sparks from their blades sprinkled flecks of light into the air, and however Lucifer turned, Metatron turned with him.
Jerahmeel looked on, aloof. "Pssfftt, and to think that you were once the Lord of all Draco, and yet an underling keeps thee from shutting my mouth. Your glory hast diminished in thy exile."
Lucifer, incensed in boiling anger, deflected Metatron's sword downward. With a flick of the wrist, his light blinded Metatron enough that Lucifer sought to bring his blade square over his opponent's head.
Eskalion entered the fray and drew his bo-staff, extending it and blocking Lucifer's killing blow, allowing Metatron time to recover from the makeshift flash grenade. Eskalion continued his attack with an overhead bo-strike, forcing Satan to retreat and adjust to the new form of attack.
Gabriel and Turiel gazed from a distance and fought their way to their sides. When they were close, Eskalion stepped aside while Turiel misted and moved forward. And Lucifer, thinking Turiel would succumb to his wiles as his Lord Argoth had many days before, smiled, ready to grab his misted form as he floated closer, but the Grigori was aware of his Lord's last encounter and prepared for it. Lucifer knew not that Turiel concealed Eskalion from his gaze, so Turiel inched within arm's reach of Lucifer and Eskalion jumped from the midst of his gaseous body.
Lucifer lifted his sword to fend off his attacker, but Eskalion's surprise attack was too strong. Eskalion stamped Lucifer in the chest with a four-point strike of his staff and sent the rogue angel reeling. Eskalion then stopped his advance while Turiel solidified. Jerahmeel stood behind the duo and Gabriel landed to join the fray, having fought his way through daemonic forces.
Lucifer bent over, panting to catch his breath as air wheezed through his burning lungs. He reached for his chest, rubbing his bruised sternum, staggering to stand straight, and spoke in melodious rage.
"I see that you have learned to fight as one. Good, for thou wilt die as one. As for me, I will see thine heads hanging from Hell's walls."
Lucifer then touched his necklace, and the key of Death glowed blood red.
Many of the Host and Horde had in their collective wisdom, stayed away from the Angel of Death. For Charon stood aloof from the goings on of that which surrounded him. Eying the scenes, he focused on the Lord Yeshua who also hovered over the gulf, watching the battlefield.
The Warden of Hell stirred, aroused by the Key of Death's call to him, and the great angel turned his face from the Word Made Flesh to the master who held him in bondage – Lucifer. Bound to the rogue angel, Charon in obedience stretched forth his mighty wings and lifted himself from the floor of Hell, and took flight across the battlefield.
All took note that the embodiment of Death had now been roused and made his way to Satan's side. Many trembled, for the power of Charon was known, as few in their natural state could walk the colon of Hell, let alone tame the creature to its will, and yet it was Charon who kept the creature Hell in submission to Satan...who allowed the King of Lies to twist the innards of the creature to his whims.
