by Mark Lingane
Lilith wrapped her hand around the back of Samael's neck and pulled him close. The beautiful garden stretched out in all directions. Samael looked in the direction of the studious young man examining the plants that lined the pond leading up to the great tree.
"This is wrong," he said.
"Oh, and how," Lilith said.
She sank her desires into him as he did to her. They pulled each other close, and embraced in a moment of exquisite passion.
--and swallowed. The spinning roof of the church came into focus. My ears were roaring from the pain.
Levi's fists swung in from both sides in an unrelenting barrage of pain. For the eternity of damnation the unrelenting, ferocious pounding from the madman continued against my arms, held up in the only defense I could muster.
Then he relented, breathing heavily. I lowered my numb arms and staggered to my feet.
"This is your fault," he said. "If you hadn't run off with her ..."
I stood against the wall with my head spinning and my senses on fire, feeling like every muscle had been ripped from my body. I coughed. Blood flew out of my mouth, splattered on the flagstones--
Lilith ran her hand over Samael's body, feeling the curve of his muscles. His wings were wrapped around them both as they lay by the pond under the shade of the tree.
"We can do whatever we want," she said. "It's just the two of us. It's a brand new world."
"What about ... him?" Samael nodded in the direction of a man laughing with joy as he chased a small creature through the bushes.
"Hah. He barely knows I'm alive. He just sits and counts and names things all day."
"Okay."
--and I swallowed. The world swirled. An enraged Levi charged at me again. His punch caught me on the chin and sent me back against the altar, leaving a crack through the center.
I coughed again, this time with more conviction. I felt an intense irritation at the back of my throat. I tried to clear it. A wave of coughing rolled over me, like I was being punched in the sternum, and forced me to the ground on all fours. I gasped for air. Images flashed in front of my eyes, flickering between the reality in front of me and some forgotten fantasy--
Great gates were slammed shut. Levi took the sword. The pain came down from above. The laugh of love came from the most beautiful woman on the planet. The running. The playing. The love. The regret. The understanding. The choice.
--and I coughed violently. The cough turned into an intense retching, until I was bringing up blood and mucus. In one final, violent heave, my muscles thrust me forward and I brought forth a tiny seed. It shot out of my mouth and sailed across the altar. My vision turned red. And then everything came back.
"Finally," Levi said as he stalked toward me. "This will make victory sweeter."
My back ripped open and my wings unfolded for the first time since they'd been clipped. I felt the stretch as the compression of the millennia eased away. The white wings unfurled, ruffling in the wind, with a few feathers falling free and floating away. My clothes ripped apart as my muscles filled out, and I felt for the first time in a long while the vitality of refreshed blood flowing through my veins. The power of the earth seeped up through the ground, flowing into my limbs. My hair fell around my shoulders in white strands.
I felt burning in my hand and looked down. I raised the whip of flame and cracked it over my head. The ground shook.
"Forget your mace?" Levi said.
"I don't need it for you." I closed my eyes. I could feel the vitality and the drain of eternity, both exhilarating and debilitating. Memories lost for so long filtered down. "I'll give you a choice: surrender or die."
"You can't kill me," he said. "We have the agreement. We are the same."
I shook my head. "I am fallen, but I am not evil. I'll never be forgiven, but it doesn't mean I cannot do good."
"Heaven will not kneel to take your hand and raise you from the fire," he spat. "There's no purpose in doing good."
"When you walk among humans, you learn one of two things. Both revolve around love, and how it leaves you. Just like you, I fell for love. For an angel, it was the prize and the punishment when He bestowed freewill. We all did, especially Lucy, who put us in this predicament in the first place. But we can choose how it affects us; it can lift or drown."
"Lucy could never see past the first commandment," Levi said. "She refused to love anyone else but Him, so when He said she had to worship humans, she flipped out. How dare He make us, born of fire, bow to those of clay."
"But we did bow before them," I said. "She mocked, as you do, their perfection, yet we all fell for it."
"You remember His last words, when He cast us out? 'Repentance is not possible and sins are irreversible.' How can you not be brimming with anger?"
I shrugged. "Time heals all."
"No, it doesn't," Levi cried. "I've carried this pain for hundreds of years. And I've never forgotten the countess. Every day hurts as much as its predecessor. He tricked us, He lied to us, and He punished us."
"We did it to ourselves. When he gave us free will, he also gave us consequence. The fault was, we weren't prepared for it. Humans were. That's why they're better."
"No!" Levi blinked, and in his hands appeared the flaming sword and the mace of death.
"Those aren't yours," I said.
"I take what I want."
He roared and charged forward, swinging the mace wildly above his head.
41
I cracked the whip. It wrapped around the chain on the mace and I pulled. The force pulled Levi forward, toppling him onto one knee. I twisted around and heaved on the whip, snatching it over my shoulder. The mace was ripped free of Levi's clutches and flew over my head. I lashed out at him with the whip again.
The burning rope wrapped around his wrist. He screamed in pain as the long threads seared into his flesh. He slashed at it with the sword, but the blade merely glanced along the strands. I breathed in and sent a burst of energy down the whip. Flames erupted with an explosion that ripped into Levi. The ball of flames spun around him, ripping at his flesh, draining the color away and leaving only blackened, charred remains.
The flames receded, leaving Levi standing as still as a black statue. He bared his teeth and the flesh cracked around his face, leaving glowing fissures of red and yellow across his head. Flames continued to crack, spreading over his body, and with a roar of hatred he shook free of the burnt remains, stepping forward in his true form.
The black, horned beast stalked forward, growling, flexing, and twisting the sword toward me. He towered several feet above me, but we had met before. The sword came crashing down, but became tangled in the whip's thongs. With a flick of my wrist, the sword went wide and I moved in close to him. I smashed the handle knot into his throat.
He gasped for air and his eyes bulged. I slammed my fist into his stomach and lifted him off the ground. He sailed back against the altar. He crashed against the great stone carving, cracking it in two. His arms were thrown wide and he roared in frustration. He lumbered back onto his feet and came forward. He brought the sword around wide. I stepped in, catching his hand. I swung my elbow into his throat, twisted, kicked out his knee, and brought down a left hook that drove him to the ground.
The sword fell from his hand. He swung wildly, knocking me down, then snapped out, grabbing me by the throat and lifting me up. The force made me drop the whip and I struggled against his strength. He fumbled for the sword and brought it around slowly. I clutched at his hand, trying to break free. His grip was too tight. I switched muscle groups and my arms went limp.
Levi smiled.
My wings bent around and speared down into his face. He screamed and dropped me. My wings curled around, softening my fall to the ground. I felt the muscles switch back, and feeling returned to my hands.
Levi charged. I dived for the whip and snapped it at him. It caught his arm and jarred the sword outward, flipping it into the air. It flew upward, tangled in the coils of the whip.
Then it stopped, seeming to float in the air as it reached its zenith.
I wrenched down on the whip handle, the thong tightened, and the sword speared down, driving straight between Levi's eyes and into his head. He dropped to his knees, his arms hanging by his side, his wings wilting.
Time froze. The earth started to shake, and the stone walls vibrated. The fissures in Levi's face and body glowed white. He started to vibrate, and parts of him fell away, leaving a blinding white light. The vibrations intensified.
I ran toward the others, quickly wrapped my wings around them, and looked back over my shoulder.
There was an intake of air as reality was sucked into Levi. It was a moment of healing, and possibly there was a faint smile on his lips. A tear rolled down his face and the intake exploded. The ball of energy smashed outward, taking with it the walls of the church. The roof went skyward as the power roared past us, burning the air around my wings. The others cowered inside the little cocoon, waiting for the blast to end. The sound of a million screams thundered around us and a final beam of light shot up into the black sky.
Then there was silence. Then there was stillness. Most of the church had been destroyed, with only parts of the walls remaining. Everything inside, except for the altar, had been flattened. A few errant pieces of paper, pages from the Bible, fluttered down and settled back on the floor of their home. I retracted my wings and stepped away from the group. They stirred, coming out of their trance.
"He is truly beautiful," Angelina said, looking at me.
"I think the word you're after is angelic," Mina said. She stepped forward tentatively. The rood clattered to the ground, startling everyone. "All in all, that rood has been a disappointment," she said.
"The rood channels power," I said, "but it's limited by your own worth. It takes you up or brings you down. It was only ever meant to be a conduit between the earth and the heavens. Some people got the wrong idea and saw it as a weapon, and the power as a destructive force, when it was simply an elevator. It was a foil for good. It sent Jesus skywards, that's all, and it meant to bring him down on his reunion tour."
The sword lay on the charred flagstones, flames licking up and down the blade eternally. I picked it up and twisted it in my wrist. Muscle memory flexed, and the certainty of my grip brought a smile to my face.
"But this, on the other hand, is the real deal." I turned the point down and rested it on the charred flagstones, with my hands resting on the pommel.
"You look like a king standing in that position." Mina sidled up to me, and scuffed her foot over Levi's remains. "You killed him. Pity, he would've been handy."
"He killed himself. His greed and hatred led him into a whirlpool of his own demise," I said.
"In a way. But you actually steered the sharp bit of the sword of death into him."
The sword glowed menacingly in front of us. The other red daggers paled into insignificance against the onslaught of raw power from a true divine relic.
Mina reached out for me. "Come join me by my side. You are my king."
I turned to face her and drew her in close. It was time to go home. I smiled at her. "It's now about you and me."
"It always was, honey." She raised her eyes and looked up into my face, placing her hand on my chest. "Let's do what we were destined to do."
I raised the sword into the air and held it above us.
She looked at it uncertainly. "Are you going to do something with that?"
"It's not a sword. It's a key."
I twisted it and the world dimmed. Everything drifted away and the two of us were left standing isolated in our own little piece of heaven. Levi had been using the sword at Eden Lane. He'd worked out that much, but no more. He'd stood at the gates of Eden, but had never been in and never even knew why.
Mina ran her finger down my stomach. Around us, the dimness of the world was replaced by a garden of immense beauty. A small lake lay to the north. On the far side was a great tree. A perfect one.
Mina eventually noticed her surroundings had changed. She looked around cautiously. "I ... know this place."
"Yes."
"Where have you taken us? This isn't where we're meant to be. We're supposed to be in union upon the altar. I was really looking forward to that part."
"Then what?"
"What?"
"Then what would happen? After the union?"
"We will have the power. The old will be wiped away and it will be our turn to rule. And I will reign supreme over the new world. I will birth the vampires as we did once before."
"And that's what you think you are?"
"Yes. I am their queen. I've ruled over them for millennia, waiting for this moment. You and I will create a whole new race."
"We made a choice once before."
"No, we didn't."
"We realized then that what we did was wrong, and everything suffered because of it. We made a choice. I chose this and you chose something else. You're not a vampire. You're not what you think."
"I have no idea what you're talking about. I know exactly who I am. And who you are."
"So much of your mind is a deluded mess. None of this is what you think it is."
"I'm not the deluded one who's blocked out the past. I know exactly what I've done, and I wouldn't change any of it. But let's not fight, not now."
I waited until she'd calmed down. She started to fidget, with uncertainty wrapping around her.
"Where do you think you are?" I asked her.
I twisted the sword once again and we went all the way home. Not into the limbo where Levi lived, but our real home. The birthplace. Mina gasped as the illusions around her faded away. Paradise was lost. The clouds of unreality began to clear, leaving the truth stripped bare in front of us.
I reached out to her and pulled her close before she could see too much. We kissed passionately until I felt her defenses melt away. She closed her eyes and drifted into her fantasies.
"I'll give you anything," she whispered, her voice low and seductive. "What do you want?"
"The same as you. Redemption."
I let her go and she collapsed to the ground. She convulsed violently, her stomach heaving. Something inside her twisted and started to make its way up her throat. Her skin bulged and warped with the entity inside of her that was bending her out of shape.
"What's happening to me?" she gasped. Then she gagged.
A black, twisted root, closer to a snake than a plant, writhed out of her mouth. She vomited the thing up onto the ground. It thrashed around, flailing, searching for something. Tiny shoots started to appear from the surface of the root.
"Samael?" she said.
"You return, Lilith ..."
I stepped away and allowed her to watch the landscape unfold. The vista continued to strip away, paradise melting into the background to be replaced by a sickened forest, overgrown and dying.
"... to the garden of Eden."
She looked around. A black snake with glowing red eyes coiled out along a nearby branch. She held out her hand. It glided onto her palm and wrapped around her arm.
"This is you," I said.
Her feet sank into the stinking mire.
"Every evil thought."
Deformed baby creatures staggered around on mutilated legs, biting each other as well as themselves. Desperate, beady red eyes that knew nothing more than pain pleaded for early extinction.
"Every despicable deed."
The loud clicking of insect life mixed with the fetid eruptions of putrid swamp gas. A low growl echoed through the twisted vegetation.
"Every innocence betrayed."
"No," she cried. "It was never like this. It was beautiful."
"It only ever reflected the beauty and innocence within the walls. You stayed beautiful, while the garden died. Eden is your mirror. You are of Eden, and you betrayed it."
"Don't lay this at my feet," she hissed. "You were happy to go along with it."
"I know. It's my betrayal. It's why I
fell, and I've paid dearly for it. We did this, together."
"We can fix it now."
"No. It's broken forever for me, but you can save yourself. There is redemption for you. It's your home and you can fix it."
"Why are you doing this?"
"Because I loved you once." I paused. "I'm sorry I tricked you into swallowing one of the seeds. It was meant to make you forget me. Forget the love and the pain. Do you remember Adam?"
"Yes." She was hesitant. "He was dull. With a brand new world, I couldn't tolerate being stuck with him. I loved you."
"No. I loved you. Adam loved you. You loved the idea of me. When you abandoned him, you drove a seed of loneliness into his heart and everyone's been suffering for that ever since. I couldn't see it. I was too immature. We left and it all fell apart, and Eve had to pick up the pieces."
"It's what she was good at, goody two-shoes that she was. Except she wasn't, was she?"
"I guess it runs in your blood, but it was unfair on her."
"She deserved everything she got."
"She was your sister."
"She made her own choices, just as I made mine, and I don't regret them for a minute."
"That's because you haven't had to pay for them. Now is the time. Come with me."
I took her by the hand and led her deep within the garden, through the dead marshes and darkened trees that tore at us. I stopped on top of a hill in the center of the garden. We could see the whole of existence from here, and it wasn't pretty.
"I remember this tree." I ran my hand down the ancient wood, now more stone than living material. "God knows how old it is. Still, it's older than us. Where it all went wrong."
"It was a stupid tree. It wasn't even evil. It was a showpiece, Him showing us His perfection. He overreacted like He does with everything."
"It was the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, His masterwork, where He finally got something perfect. Then you came along and kicked it all down, like a sandcastle. No wonder He was angry. Then, after Adam healed the tree, you got him and Eve kicked out. He was just a guy trying to make her happy so she wouldn't run off with the next angel that came along."
