The Armies of Heaven

by Jane Kindred

  Her dress made me blush. The translucent gown of peridot that draped her left nothing at all to the imagination, and one breast was completely uncovered; the loose fabric had slipped down from her shoulder and she hadn’t bothered to hitch it up. Beneath the gown, her feet were bare except for the dazzling jeweled anklets and toe rings that adorned them in abundance, in hues of every color. She wore similar jewels about her wrists and fingers and dripping from her white throat—and in a chatelaine about her hips that seemed the only thing keeping the dress on. Tucked within her hair was a circlet so thin I hadn’t seen it at first, but as she cocked her head beneath the starlight, it sparkled with amethyst and sapphire.

  “Your Supernal Majesty.” She purred the words with exaggerated deference. “How good of you to come for the trial. It’s about to begin.”

  The relatively empty court suddenly filled with the Unseen amidst a rolling wave of whispers in a language I couldn’t understand, and one of the leshi ushered me to my seat within a raised gallery that hadn’t been visible a moment before.

  My escort explained court protocol. “You will not be permitted to speak during the trial unless you are called upon for your testimony. And you will not be seen unless you speak.”

  “All silent for the Lady of the Green.” Another leshi stood before the chaise, speaking in angelic for my benefit. “The Ineffable Ruler of the Unseen World, Queen Aeval of the Syli and the Leshi, Protector of Bereginyi, Mavki, Samodivi, and Snegurochki, Tsaritsa of Rusalki, Vili, Vodyanoi, Domavoi, and all Nechysta Syla, Elusive Empress of the Wights of the Western Isles and Sovereign of the Seelie Court, Mistress of the Fair Folk and Grand Dame of the Aos Sí, the Daoine Sith, the Tylwyth Teg, and the Sluagh Sidhe, Patron of the Dames Blanches, the Wittewijven, and the Mnathan Nighe, and Supreme Arbiter of the Midnight Court of Man’s Transgressions presides. The Midnight Court is now in session.”

  As the court fell silent, Aeval rose onto one elbow, held her open hand before her, and blew into it, scattering a sudden burst of glittering golden dust throughout the entire hall. It fluttered down and settled upon us all like dew. This, apparently, was the banging of the gavel.

  Through an arch to the left of the daïs, two figures emerged from what had been only a grey emptiness a moment before. Misha led Kae forth in chains with a leather strap about his neck. Kae’s head hung forward, his pale hair falling over his masked face, and like the leshi, his chest and feet were bare. As Misha drew him before Aeval, his back was turned partially toward me and I saw the marks of a beating that had happened before he’d come here.

  The leshi bailiff unrolled a scroll in his hands and spoke. “The Court will hear the case of the Celestial Realm versus Kae Lebesovich Arkhangel’skov, formerly Grand Duke of Iriy, formerly Principality and Autocrat of the Firmament of Shehaqim and All the Heavens, formerly Field Marshal to Her Supernal Majesty the Queen of Heaven. The defendant stands accused of crimes against the Host of Heaven, having viciously cut down in the prime of life the Principality Helison Alimielovich of the House of Arkhangel’sk and his wife, Queen Sefira Huzievna; their children, the four grand duchesses Omeliea Helisonovna, Tatia Helisonovna, Maia Helisonovna, Anazakia Helisonovna, and the Crown Grand Duke Azel Helisonovich; having first committed a wanton and vile assault upon the person of the Grand Duchess Omeliea Helisonovna followed by the infanticide of his own offspring; and having committed numerous other crimes against the Heavens.”

  Gasps and murmurs rippled through the court as if all of this were news to the gathered Unseen.

  “How do you plead?”

  Misha stepped forward. “I speak for the defendant. The accused pleads guilty to all counts except assault and infanticide. I believe it has been established that the former crime was committed by another, and the latter crime did not occur.”

  Aeval’s lips turned up at one corner. “That remains to be seen. All evidence must be presented in due course.”

  I wanted to cry out that she knew perfectly well this was true, and that furthermore, I myself was evidence that among his actual crimes, he at least had not murdered me, but as my escort had warned, I couldn’t speak.

  The queen waved a bejeweled hand. “The Court accepts your plea of guilty on the first seven counts of murder and the subsequent mayhem these actions caused.” The bailiff crossed to a table beside the daïs and made a note at the bottom of the scroll.

  I struggled in mute outrage, leaning forward over the gallery rail. She’d promised me I would have the opportunity to make a case for his innocence and I’d been prepared to charge that she herself had been the author of his deeds. Now he was as much as sentenced before I could speak a word.

  Aeval nodded to Misha. “You may call your first witness in defense of those charges you dispute.”

  I looked toward the leshi, wondering if he could see me, trying to catch his eye. Surely he would call on me.

  “The defense calls to the stand the Grand Duke Azel Kaeyevich of the House of Arkhangel’sk.”

  My heart leapt into my throat and Kae’s head shot up in shock. From the wavering greyness beyond the arch, little Azel stepped into the court, led by a syla who curtsied before Aeval. Azel took his cue from her and gave a little bow, eliciting coos of delight from the crowd. A little silver chair like those the syla occupied appeared for him to sit in.

  Kae railed against his bonds in anguish. “Why is he here?”

  Aeval fixed Misha with a look of disapproval. “Control your ward.”

  The leshi put a hand on Kae’s arm and spoke quietly to him, and Kae hung his head once more, looking thoroughly defeated. Misha then turned to Azel with a warm smile. “Hello, Your Supernal Highness.”

  “Hello.” Azel gave him a little shrug of indifference, as if bemused by the proceedings.

  “Would you tell us who your parents are?” asked Misha kindly.

  A look of uncertainty and worry crossed Azel’s face. “I don’t know.”

  I brushed at a tear on my cheek and tried to keep myself together.

  “Was your mother Helga Semyazovna of Raqia?”

  Azel frowned. “She says she’s my mama, but I don’t believe her.”

  “But you grew up in her home.”

  “Yes.”

  “And what did Helga Semyazovna tell you was your full name?”

  “The Grand Duke Azel…” Here, he paused a moment with a brief look of confusion, and then continued, “Kaeyevich.”

  Murmurs rumbled through the hall as the heads of leshi and syla bowed together.

  “Thank you, Azel.” Misha smiled at him again. “That’s all. You may go.”

  Azel hopped down from the little chair and took the syla’s hand, and they disappeared through the arch.

  Misha looked at Aeval. “I submit to Your Majesty and to the Midnight Court that the boy’s extraordinary likeness to the defendant, along with the assertion of the former supernal nurse herself that his patronymic is that of the defendant—a name belonging exclusively to the Supernal House of Arkhangel’sk—that there can be no doubt this child is the same taken from Her Supernal Highness the Grand Duchess Omeliea Helisonovna of the House of Arkhangel’sk in the attack upon her on the night in question.”

  Aeval rested her chin in her hand, looking bored. “His paternity does not automatically make him that same child. Perhaps this is another child conceived of the defendant.”

  “By whom, Your Majesty?” asked Misha in frustration. “Yourself?”

  Her eyes flashed angrily and she sat up on the chaise longue. “You are out of order, leshi.” She stared him down a moment and then turned to the syla flanking her. “What is the opinion of the jury? Shall the child’s identity be recorded by the Midnight Court as put forth by the defense?”

  The syla whispered together and then nodded as one.

  “What about you, Your Supernal Majesty?” Aeval suddenly turned her sapphire gaze on me.

  Kae’s head rose slowly, and his uncovered eye fell on me with a look of utter betrayal as th
e gallery apparently became visible.

  Aeval raised a dark eyebrow. “Do you attest that Azel Kaeyevich, whom we have just seen, is the son of your sister Omeliea and your cousin Kae—the same child you consigned per our agreement to live forever in the Unseen World?”

  Kae’s face twisted with pain and shock.

  “I do.” Though my voice was barely audible, it carried in the utter stillness of the court.

  Aeval nodded to the bailiff. “Let it be so noted. And while there is no proof of the matter, I will accept the assumption that the supernal nurse who raised the boy is the same who delivered him by force.” She reclined once more on her side. “The Midnight Court finds the defendant, Kae Lebesovich Arkhangel’skov, not guilty on the counts of assault and infanticide and guilty on all else.” She held out her hand once more and blew another burst of golden dew into the air.

  I leapt up among the falling drops, gripping the rail of the gallery. This was not our agreement. “You said you would let me speak on his behalf!”

  Aeval smiled. “Did you not, just this minute?”

  “You know that isn’t what I meant!”

  “Don’t be tiresome. If you meant something else, you should have specified something else. I have ruled.”

  “I agreed to give you Azel in exchange for Kae!” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Kae lunge in my direction, restrained by Misha. “You cannot keep him here!”

  “Oh, I have no intention of keeping him here. He’s no longer of any use to me.” Her voice was cloyingly sweet. “After his sentence has been carried out, you’re perfectly free to return him to Heaven. Whatever is left of him.” As she flicked her hand at me in dismissal, the entire hall dissolved before my eyes and she was gone.

  The court had been replaced by a cold stone cellar, empty but for a pillar in the center, to which Kae was now chained with his hands above his head and his back to the room. Misha stood beside me.

  I turned to the leshi. “What’s the sentence? She never read the sentence!”

  “The Queen does not sentence the accused. She only judges. The sentence is predetermined.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “Are you sure you don’t know?”

  I stared at his glowing eyes, completely baffled. “Why would I know?”

  A sudden crack and thud split the air and Kae let out a shriek of pain. A long, thick line split open on his back as if a hook had been drawn through it. I cried out and Misha grabbed me before I could run to him. Another crack rang out, and another line opened on his back.

  I tore at Misha’s grasp. “What is it? What’s happening?”

  “What you wanted to happen.” Misha regarded me with sympathy while another crack split Kae’s flesh. “One hundred lashes with the Great Knut.”

  “No!”

  Another invisible lash struck. Belphagor had told me about this barbaric weapon from Russia’s past—Kae had used it on him, and nearly killed him with it. One hundred lashes, Kae told me once, were fatal, used as a de facto death sentence when capital punishment was not an option.

  “I never wanted this!” I struggled with Misha, but he held me firmly. “Please stop!”

  “It cannot stop,” said Misha. “You delivered Kae to the Midnight Court. What the plaintiff desires, she receives—if the defendant is found guilty. And they are nearly always found guilty.”

  I turned my head away, unable to watch, as another strike split Kae’s skin. There were nearly ninety lashes still to come and Kae was screaming. I wept in Misha’s arms, listening to the terrible sounds of the unseen knut and Kae’s suffering, knowing that deep in my heart, I’d wanted him to feel the worst of agonies, to feel what he’d done to them, and to my soul.

  The screaming stopped before he’d received half of his sentence. I turned, not wanting to see, horrified when I did. He hung limply from his bonds, emitting a low, continuous moan. Only this, and the involuntary jerking of his back as the knut continued to strike where there was little flesh to take, showed he was still conscious.

  I gripped my throat. “He can’t take more of this. There must be something I can do. Please, Misha.”

  He shook his head and I slid onto my knees and watched in mute horror. I had sentenced Kae to this. I had no right to look away. The hook of the knut made a terrible wet sound as it struck the pulverized flesh. Kae stopped moaning altogether after a dozen more and his muscles were still, though he was being torn to pieces. He was either dead or soon would be. I wept into my hands. I couldn’t even blame Aeval for this. This was my doing. I might as well have the knut in my own hand.

  When the lash had cracked for the final time, Misha unchained Kae from the post and held his limp body gingerly against his chest.

  The mask had slipped and Misha pulled it away. “Poor beautiful thing he is.”

  He held his hand down to me and I took it, and the cellar wavered and winked out. We were now on the same peaceful terrace by the sea under a bronze sunset where Vasily and I had once found Misha soothing Belphagor’s pain. Misha lowered Kae’s body facedown on the reclining couch and left us.

  I beheld my handiwork. Bloody Anazakia. I’d done this to him. I had willed him to suffer for crimes for which I knew he wasn’t truly responsible, to have the skin flayed from his back until he was beyond comprehension of pain. What might my sister Ola think of me now?

  I touched the side of his throat and found a feathery heartbeat, life stuttering out of him. Even if the whipping weren’t enough to kill him, his body couldn’t handle the shock. I dropped to my knees beside the couch, dizzy with nausea. How could I have wanted this?

  In childhood, I’d worshipped him, and in the wildness of blossoming adolescent desire, I’d thought him the loveliest creature in all the Heavens, burning with jealousy for a time that he loved Ola so. I’d come to understand as I matured that what we shared didn’t need to be romantic, that our bond was something beyond that; so much so that Ola had constantly fretted, plagued by the fear that one day I’d take him from her, though there had never been any danger of that. I had loved them both too much and Kae had adored her.

  And then I’d hated him with every fiber of my being for taking them from me and leaving me desolate, hated him for falling prey to Aeval’s enchantment, though I’d led him into her trap. Despite it all, I’d fought for him, and he’d returned from that unspeakable hell—but there’d been nothing left in me then but pity.

  And yet, I’d come to know another Kae since he’d returned to himself, a man who was fiercely loyal, brutally hard, and strangely fragile all at once.

  My heart seemed to stop as the terrible truth splintered the walls of the keep I’d erected around it, my last defenses shattered under the ruthless engines of my own internal war. I couldn’t love him. Not like this. Not now. A strangled moan escaped me. I’d fallen in love with the man born from the ashes of the one I’d hated. And I’d destroyed him.

  I hadn’t realized I was weeping until my tears fell against his shredded flesh, lighting where they touched in pools of luminescent radiance. Against his blood, my element had sparked our aetheric bond.

  In Heaven, I’d been unable to heal without Vasily, but I had done it once in the world of Man—I’d healed Vasily himself, our aether creating a brilliant light that had washed over his burned flesh and made him whole.

  I didn’t know if my bond with Kae would do the same, but if it were to come to anything, I would have to touch his wounds. Trembling, I sat on the edge of the couch and lifted Kae’s head to place it in my lap. As I centered my hand against the gruesome wreckage of his back, the aethereal light skittered beneath my palm and ignited in a tremendous burst like simple fire encountering a pool of kerosene instead of a pool of ruined flesh. The radiant fire that had been a pale lilac in Heaven ran up my arm in a deep indigo flare that engulfed us both. It burned like scalding water.

  I screamed, unable to let go of him as it blazed ever brighter, skating like a devouring hunger over the raw flesh of his back. But un
der the unearthly, violent glow, something was happening—flayed bone mending, rivulets of blood coalescing into new veins, ravaged sinews knitting together beneath a translucent skin.

  When it began to restore the damaged nerve endings in his flesh, he cried out, though he wasn’t quite conscious, his body convulsing with electrical impulses.

  At last the burning heat of the aether began to dissipate, though it still glowed around us for some minutes afterward, and Kae’s body relaxed. When the aether had finally run its course, he moaned softly in my lap as if waking from an ordinary sleep. I marveled at how the aether had made whole every stripe from the magical lashing, but restored the marks from the earlier beating—one Belphagor must surely have administered—as if they were now intrinsically a part of him.

  Kae opened his eyes, staring out at the amber ocean as if trying to understand what he was seeing. “Realm of the Dead,” he murmured, sounding tremendously relieved. His voice had also been restored; whatever damage to his larynx he’d received in the fire during the Solstice Conflagration had apparently healed as a magical wound.

  “No,” I whispered, stroking his hair. “I’m sorry. You’re still here with me.”

  Kae blinked at me, disoriented, and then sat up and scrambled back as if horrified to have been touching me. He put his hand over his undamaged eye, turning the unscarred portion of his face away from me. “Where’s my mask?”

  “Kae, you don’t need it. You’ve never needed it. The part you show the world is the only part that was damaged.”

  When I pulled his hand away, he turned toward me with a pained look. “This is what you call undamaged? This twisted flesh? This oozing socket?”