Gods of Shadow and Flame

by M. H. Johnson

  With a surprised gasp she forced herself to open her eyes, realizing that the searing pain and blindness she knew she had suffered were now gone. Hale and healthy as she had ever been, beholding a realm vast and beautiful. She found herself at the edge of a lush glade surrounded by stately trees on all sides, filled with brilliant wildflowers and children laughing and chasing one another in endless games, all wearing expressions of wonder and joy.

  Smiling, the young girl once known as Jezabelle and more recently Jessica shrugged off the heavy shirt of mithril mail that felt far too big for her, freeing herself of its terrible burden of memory and pain. Now garbed only in the lightest of silken garments, she gave a pleased nod of her head, gazing fondly at the two beloved companions once more by her side.

  “Midnight, Rage, we are back home at last!” She cried with delight, her great hound gazing at her with such loving eyes, barking his ready agreement. Her familiar alone looked solemn, his haunting gaze a fresh weight upon her heart.

  “Come, my Jess. It is time for us to say farewell to those who have fallen.”

  Jess shivered, suddenly afraid. She closed her eyes firmly. “I don’t want to look behind me.”

  “But you must, my dear Jezabelle,” whispered a voice hauntingly beautiful. Odd as well, for never had she heard the voice of an adult within her garden before. She turned her gaze curiously to behold the handsome man smiling so gently at her.

  “Morlekai.”

  The wingless angel nodded. “Indeed, dearest Jess. It is I.”

  Jess tilted her head curiously. “I have danced with you many times within the galas of the lives I have lived, have I not? And always you look the same.”

  He smiled gently, not denying it. “Indeed, my dear Jess. We have embraced many dances together. Friendship, love, family. All bonds we have shared, you and I.” Gently he placed his fingers upon the young girl’s shoulder. “You must be brave now, my beloved Jezabelle. It is time for us to bid farewell to those who fought so bravely, so valiantly by our side.”

  Jess nodded, gazing gently at the two children staring so intently at her. One was an incredibly beautiful girl of about ten summers, as were most children returned to the garden, her hair a shimmering mass that defied any recognizable color, for all that her gray eyes were filled with an unspoken plea. Jess could see her holding her side, sensing a terrible burden to her soul. She leaned against a young boy of similar age with a shock of brilliant curly red hair, his grin sheepish even as he too winced, bravely enduring terrible pain as well.

  “Please, my queen. Can we go to sleep? It hurts. My soul hurts, and I feel so weary.” The girl’s voice was little more than a whisper as she sunk to the lush grassy clearing beside the thick woodlands, tree branches rustling a soothing melody, as if to gently lull weary souls to slumber.

  The boy carefully eased her down, lying beside her, resting his friend’s head against his chest. He too gazed at Jess, though he tried to look brave even as terrible weariness tried to claim him. “Is it all right if we go to sleep, my queen?”

  Jess smiled fondly at the two Delvers who had fought so valiantly against the forces that would have claimed their world, shirking not when terrible fate decreed they fall even to the depths of Hell in their quest. She squeezed Morlekai’s hand, sensing his distress at having to say goodbye, before bending down to stroke their cheeks, gently willing them both to slumber. “If you wish to return to the lives you lived, you need merely will it, and be strong enough to bear the burdens to your soul and heart, and your bodies shall be renewed when you awaken once more. If you choose instead to let yourselves slip into the true sleep, and lighten your souls of all care and worry, you may of course start anew.”

  She heard her hound whine disconsolately. “Of course Rage will miss you both, if you choose to part from this life. But never forget, the choice is yours.” She smiled with contentment as they slipped into healing sleep.

  She turned then to gaze up at the man standing by her side, the only one she had ever seen enter her sacred garden as anything other than an innocent soul on the cusp of rebirth. Then again, Morlekai was no fragile mortal who had fallen to folly and vice, trapped in endless seas of torment before being rescued once more, embraced within her garden, an entire realm raised from the boiling cauldron of Hell, a sanctuary amidst the sea of abyssal chaos ever lapping at her island's shores.

  She smiled then, her memories ever clearer, filled with gratitude and love for the angel who had willingly torn free his wings so that he may fight by her side, to protect her sanctuary from the endless legions that would revel in the land sinking into purgatory once more.

  Morlekai's eyes were solemn, even grim, after he said his gentle farewell to friends now sleeping peacefully, soothed by the gentle play of sunlight upon their resting forms.

  “Thank you for rescuing my beloved companions and allowing them to rest once more within your sacred garden, dearest Jess. But now we must be brave. You and I both. For we go now to bid our love and farewells to one who has served us and this garden for countless ages. He who should never have fallen. He who gave his life willingly to save this realm that we love.”

  And with a sudden cry the young girl felt her legs buckle, collapsing as her mind was forced to accept the pain and horror that had so devastated her when she had fled her last life.

  “David!” A single word, filled with such sorrow and pain. “I couldn’t save him! I tried, Morlekai. I tried so hard!”

  “We know,” soothed her cat, gently butting his head against her tear-stained cheek. “You did your best. You reclaimed his heart and his grace. You saved his essence from being used by one who would have destroyed all that we love.” Her cat settled himself against her sobbing form. “Rest easy, beloved mistress. I can sense David’s gentle love beating within you, even now.”

  Rage barked, slavishly licking away her tears with his slobbery tongue, eliciting a burst of laughter and protest from his beloved mistress, as he had no doubt intended.

  The young girl’s gaze did not waver as she looked up and locked gazes with the wingless angel beside her. “Take me to David, Morlekai.”

  A solemn, silent nod. He gently clasped her hand, leading her deep within the forest, cat and hound quietly following in their wake, gentle shafts of light giving the four a warm golden cast as they entered the heart of Jess's sacred forest.

  Morlekai gently squeezed the young girl’s hand, as if to prepare her for what was to come, yet still Jess collapsed to her knees with a mournful cry as she beheld the broken body of David, lying quietly in a tiny clearing, his expression oddly peaceful as the golden rays of the afternoon sky bathed him in gentle glory. The wounds of devastation his immortal body had suffered were covered by a blanket of downy feathers, David’s body seeming to shimmer under the sun.

  Beside her David stood two beings who could only be angels, their brilliant wings luminous, expressions solemn and mournful, bowing as one to the young girl weeping openly for their fallen brother.

  "Hail Jezabelle, child of Lilith. We greet you who had the courage to Rise, when so many Fell," intoned the female of the pair, her tender maternal gaze bringing to mind countless mothers who had helped to fill the aching void within Jessica's soul with every turning of the great wheel.

  "Hail Jezabelle, Paladin of Yis, she who has given her realm over to the cycle of life once more." The male angel favored Jess with the most fatherly of smiles, filled with a presence and strength so reminiscent of the strong, loving men who had reared her through so many childhoods.

  The young girl, however, only had eyes for her beloved David, the gentle boy who had always been there to greet her whenever she returned to the garden once more. A boy filled with laughter and a ready wit, ever happy to humor and counsel her. A loving friend and companion, by her side in guidance and play, during endless hours spent in their eternal garden until the clarion call of rebirth cried out to her soul once more.

  Warm gentle eyes forever closed, body so terribl
y still.

  The young girl sobbed great wracking tears over her beloved friend, her trembling hand gently brushing back the curls of his hair.

  “David!” she cried, sobbing inconsolably, her arms fiercely holding his still form as tightly as she could. Yet though her heart broke with the bitter truth of it, her beloved friend had perished. Divine flesh immune to rot, his body would bear those wounds for eternity, even should he lay in her garden in peaceful repose till the end of all days.

  "We feel your pain, you who are both mortal and divine, and our hearts are touched by your love for he who has stood by your side in your eternal garden for so many ages." The angels' gazes locked gently upon Jess's own. "It is but for you to say farewell. It is but for you to let him free of your heart, and we shall take him to rest eternally in the vast Heavens above."

  The young girl blinked, even as a mad thought snuck its way within her overwrought mind. “Free him of my heart.” She braved a tear-stained smile. “David will never leave my heart. His heart is a part of me, now.”

  Solemnly the pair of angles nodded in unison. “This is true, beloved Jezabelle.”

  The young girl took a shuddering breath. “David is immortal. His heart was plucked. Had he his heart once more, it would beat in his chest, and he would live once again.”

  Solemnly the angels dipped their heads, even as Midnight hissed. “Jess! I know what you’re thinking. You will perish!”

  Jess smiled sadly at her suddenly alarmed cat, even as Rage gazed at her curiously, a look of slowly growing horror coming over Morlekai’s expression as he began to understand. “No, child. Don’t!”

  The young girl ignored them, smiling in relief as she finally understood the significance of the great tree, vast and wonderful, at the heart of her garden that David’s still form rested upon. It was the sacred Tree of Life. Her tree.

  She gazed at her friends, a smile filled with tenderest love, as she gently sat down. “Silly Morlekai. I already gave my life in service to this very tree. We are already one.”

  Ignoring her beloved friend's protestations, she stroked the rough bark of the ancient being that appeared a massive oak, feeling its roots gently twine about her legs, and with a solemn nod, as if giving leave, she felt them pierce her back. Jess clenched her eyes shut, feeling a sharp pain for just a moment, then she smiled. "I am anchored," she whispered, even as she bent over the beautiful boy beside her, solemnly removing the cloak of downy feathers to behold the utter devastation that had been wrought upon the boy's body.

  Her sigh was mournful and heartfelt. She would miss her beautiful wings. Yet she smiled, heart light and at ease, knowing she was making a decision both sacred and right. Effortlessly, she plucked off her divine wings, one at a time, to the surprised gasps and cries of her beloved friends, feeling not the slightest trace of pain.

  She nodded in satisfaction. Her wings understood their ultimate destiny, as she gently placed them upon the ravaged wounds of shattered flesh and bone where her beloved David’s wings had been perfectly mounted, before Lilith had so savagely torn them free.

  A soft glow of divine light, and once brutal wounds to shoulder blades were gone. Not the slightest scar marred his skin. Her wings, once a mixture of ebony and ivory, were now pure silken white. The wings of an angel of war purified to those of an angel of mercy by her own selfless sacrifice, and Jess blinked away her tears, smiling happily, despite the terrible loss she felt.

  She looked upwards, braving one last smile full of tender love for her eternal companions as she gathered her will for her last act of devotion. Her final sacrifice to the boy who had devoted himself to her care for so very long.

  With but a single surprised cry, eyes widening as pain turned to wonder, Jess plucked free her own heart, carefully placing the divinely glowing symbol of love and vitality within David’s own chest, her hands gently stroking closed his ravaged flesh, feeling it knit, somehow, under her gentle touch, before she collapsed atop of him, utterly still with but a gentle smile on her face even as her beloved David cried out, divine eyes filled with the spark of life once more, gazing at all with a look of utter shock, appearing as vulnerable and uncertain as any young boy brought back from death itself.

  “Jess!” She heard the alarmed cries of all her friends, happy to hear David’s voice among them all as she spiraled into stormy seas of darkness, and knew no more.

  66

  “Jess!” Midnight gazed at his beloved mistress, heart plucked free so abruptly the stunned cat had no time to stop her, could only look on in speechless horror as a shocked David held her close, tears streaming down the angel's face as he gently laid her by the foot of the great tree, careful not to strain the odd roots already fused to Jess’s body.

  “Heavens above, Jess! I did not mean for you to sacrifice yourself for me. Never that!” he cried, even as Morlekai gently squeezed the sobbing boy’s shoulder.

  "She made her choice, David. And you must stand by it. We all must." Morlekai gazed gently down at a shaken David, looking as bereft and vulnerable as any boy could, for all that divine wings graced his back once more, his wounds instantly healed with his beloved friend's final sacrifice.

  “You are tied to this realm now. Utterly one with it. Its guardian in truth. So long as you stand strong, Jezabelle’s realm and all the souls within it will survive and know peace, for all that the raging seas of chaos would seek to wash our sanctuary away.”

  Morlekai paused, wiping away silent tears of his own. "And that, I think, is what our dear Jezabelle would have wanted, when all is said and done. A safe home for all the souls that had fallen under her care. Her sacred garden an oasis of peace, even as it stands upon on the very precipice of Hades. A sanctuary where lost souls could find salvation. A place free of madness and suffering, Jezabelle's garden the final bulwark protecting the Heavens above and mortal realms below from all the hordes of Hell, for so long as winds the clock of eternity."

  David sobbed and nodded. “A place to know peace and succor, for eternity. Until the age of angels and mortals has passed, and the multiverse is reborn anew.”

  The great hound howled then, low and mournful. The pair of angels standing sentinel gazed in wide-eyed shock at the creature's plaintive wail, recognizing at last the dread origins of the ancient pair of gods that the angels of Heaven had striven so hard to consign to the Void, endless ages ago, before the great rift that had so divided their number.

  Midnight spared them but a single glance, understanding in his own way exactly what thoughts raced through their immortal minds, and allowing them to witness, for but a moment, the intense searing devotion he had for the angelic girl laying upon the roots of the great tree. She who had given her very heart to save the heavenly child she had loved all her days.

  Expressions of panic, so alien to those divine figures, quickly became ones of relief, understanding at last that though no oaths bound either cat or hound any longer, chains of love and loyalty still served to contain them.

  Once they had been known as Death of Stars and Endless Night. Ancient gods of the end times who had presaged an era of eternal darkness before a singularity had sprung forth, the universe reborn anew with the advent of new gods, angels, and man.

  And despite the dreadful chords of destiny that had used these ancient gods of destruction to catalyze the doom of a universe past, what remained was but a mournful hound and a brooding cat. For all their dread powers they had once more locked away, so as not to damage the realm of their mistress, whom they loved so well.

  The angelic pair solemnly bowed their heads, eyes shining with gratitude for the trio that had sacrificed so much, each in their own way, for the wondrous garden and the realm of souls it nurtured and protected.

  Rage, heavy of heart, gave forth another mournful howl, only to have his great maw abruptly smacked by his most ancient friend. “Silence, Hound. I am trying to catch a thought. Ah yes. How interesting!”

  The hound gazed intently, even hopefully as his curious
little friend flowed off his accustomed perch upon Rage's shoulder, slinking down to ever so carefully, ever so gently sniff his beloved mistress. His brilliant sapphire eyes peered carefully at the ever so faintly glowing star upon her brow, turning to investigate the thin roots seeming to meld into her very flesh.

  Midnight gazed up at the weeping David. “Stop that,” he huffed as angelic tears splashed his brow. “Come, David. Look closer. Not with your eyes, with your heart.”

  Calming himself with a tearful shudder, David braved a smile, gently touching the young girl’s forehead with his palm, closing his own eyes and breathing deep, even all those assembled gazing intently at the pair.

  “David?”

  The young boy nodded after a moment, gazing at the young girl with a look of awe. “She lives not as we understand it, but a tiny spark of existence flickers through her still.”

  “By Heaven’s might!” Morlekai gazed at them with a look of wonder. “She gave her life to David, freely, without reservation. The ultimate gift of one angel to another. How can this be so?”

  Midnight tilted his head, considering. "She is one with the tree, now. With this garden entirely." He turned toward David. "And if you remember the final moments of that first dread battle Jezabelle fought for the survival of her realm, her existence she had already surrendered to that which she valued more than life itself."

  David nodded solemnly, smiling through his tears. "She had given herself, body and soul, to the great tree, Paladin of Yis that she is."

  Midnight nodded. “In a sense, she has always been tied to this garden. Now, however, she truly is one with the garden.” He then curled upon his sleeping angel’s lap, gently licking her cheeks. “My poor Jess,” he sighed, his sentimentality so shocking Rage and Morlekai that they exchanged solemn stares before the wingless angel burst out laughing.