Reckoning f-4 Read online

  It’s an enormous adjustment, he told himself, watching as she walked away from him. She just needs time. He could sense the angelic essence inside her becoming stronger, and prayed for an easy merger. Hopefully it wouldn’t take much longer for the process to complete itself.

  Aaron turned and jogged toward the community center. “Lorelei is going to kill me,” he said to the fallen angel that just happened to be her father.

  Lehash had tipped his chair back on two legs and was leaning against the building’s wall. “Not sure you want to be going in there right now,” he said in the drawl of the Old West. “Folks are a mite riled up at the moment. Lorelei’s attempting to calm ‘em down.”

  “What are they upset about?”

  “You,” Lehash answered, lowering his chair legs to the ground.

  “Me?” Aaron asked incredulously.

  The fallen angel nodded. “Yep. They’re worried that yer not taking the job of savior seriously enough.” The angel gunslinger tilted back the brim of his hat and looked into Aaron’s eyes. “They want to know why you haven’t got around to savin’ them yet.”

  “Son of a bitch,” Aaron hissed as he grabbed hold of the handle and flung the door wide.

  “What’re you gonna do?” he heard Lehash call after him as he stormed inside.

  “I’m going to have a little talk with the citizens of Aerie.”

  Lehash guffawed, his chair sliding across the ground as he abruptly stood, following the Nephilim into the building.

  “This I gotta see,” Aaron heard the angel say.

  Aaron entered the meeting room through a door at the back and immediately felt as though he was in the midst of one of those bizarre go-to-school-naked dreams. He had heard them carrying on as he approached, each trying to be heard above the other and Lorelei shouting for order.

  And they did quiet down, but only because they saw that he had arrived.

  Every head swiveled in his direction, and every eye watched as he strode down the aisle to join Lorelei at the front. He didn’t make eye contact with any of them, but could sense their hostility and their frustration. The feelings were mutual.

  “Sorry I’m late,” he said quietly to Lorelei as she stepped aside to allow him her space.

  He faced the crowded room. Lehash was standing at the back, arms folded, leaning against the wall, a sly smile on his haggard features. They were all there—Nephilim and fallen angels both. And why shouldn’t they be? The citizens of Aerie were concerned about their future, a future in which Aaron played a large part. It was a heavy responsibility, and he felt as though he was beginning to buckle beneath its tremendous weight. He was doing the best he could, but sometimes it just didn’t seem to be enough.

  “Sorry I’m late,” he said again to the room at large.

  But before he could continue, Atliel interrupted. “Aerie must be relocated,” he declared, his single eye staring intensely. “We cannot risk any more lives. The dream of Aerie must survive, and it cannot if we stay here.”

  “I don’t think we need to worry about Verchiel right now,” Aaron tried to reassure the citizens. “He suffered casualties even greater than ours, thanks to Lorelei here. I believe we’re safe for now.” He looked to Lorelei for support, and saw that she was nodding in agreement.

  “You believe we’re safe?” Atliel said pointing a long finger at him.

  Aaron cringed. He didn’t want this to turn into an argument. He had wanted to come in, tell them what he had planned for their future, and then spend the remainder of the day with Vilma. “Yes, I do.”

  The angel’s expression turned to one of complete revulsion. “What right have you to tell us we’ll be safe, when you know very well what Verchiel is capable of?”

  He felt his heart rate quicken, his blood beginning to rush through his veins. He forced himself to stay calm. It was a democracy here in Aerie, and the citizens had every right to speak their minds.

  “He killed your parents,” Atliel snarled. “Turned your little brother into a monster. Killed your mentor and used your woman as bait to lure you to your death.”

  Aaron knew all this. It was with him every day, a constant reminder of how much his life had changed—of what his destiny as a savior had taken from him.

  “Verchiel is an unpredictable force,” Atliel continued. “All of us have feared his wrath since our fall from Heaven. Do not tell me that we’re safe. It couldn’t be further from the truth.”

  Aaron’s anger was growing and he felt the power of his angelic heritage course through his blood and muscle, enflaming the very essence of his being. “I’m doing my best,” he said through gritted teeth. He saw that Lehash had moved away from the wall and was approaching the front. The warrior angel obviously suspected that something was about to happen, and he couldn’t have been more right.

  “We of Aerie expect more from our savior than his best.” And with those words, Atliel spread his wings, as did some others in the community center, and they began to flap gently in unison, the close confines of the meeting space filled with the sound of feathered wings striking the air. They did it to show their displeasure, to show their doubt that Aaron was capable of fulfilling the prophecy.

  The sigils rose to the surface of his skin and Aaron knew that he could hold back his anger no longer. He let out a cry of rage as his ebony wings exploded from his back, and he too began to beat the air, harder, singularly drowning out the sounds of the others. He watched the expressions of shock and surprise spread across the faces of the citizens as he revealed to them the shape of their redeemer. His mighty wings continued to flap, forcing them back, tipping over their chairs and creating a mini-maelstrom of dust and dirt.

  And as abruptly as he had started, he stopped, furling his appendages at his back and glaring at them all.

  “Why don’t you people just cut me some slack?” His voice rumbled like the growl of a dangerous, jungle beast, filled with the potential for violence. “Do you seriously believe that I understand what it means to be a savior? Well, in case you haven’t figured it out yet, I don’t have a clue.”

  Fallen angels and Nephilim alike were silent. Even Atliel had decided that it might be best to hold his tongue. Lehash stood nearby and Aaron could see sparks of golden fire dancing around his hands, the gunslinger ready to call forth his pistols of heavenly flame if necessary.

  “All I’m asking is for you to give me a break. I know that you’re scared—I’m scared too—but it isn’t going to do anybody any good to come after me for not living up to your expectations.”

  Aaron made eye contact with them and they each looked away, accepting his position as top dog.

  “I have no idea what tomorrow holds for me or for you. But I do know that to guarantee any future at all, we have to work together. We can’t run from Verchiel; we have to deal with him.” He let his wings recede beneath his flesh as the sigils began to fade.

  “And that’s exactly what I intend to do,” he declared with finality as he strode from the room.

  “Meeting adjourned.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  The tiny rodent cowered in a pocket of shadow, watching with wide, fear-filled eyes, as its friend was tortured.

  It wanted to run, to flee the ugly scene, but for a reason its tiny brain could not begin to fathom, the mouse would not leave the man who had befriended it. Man? it questioned. Its primitive thought process grappled with the concept, for this being was far more than just a man.

  It remembered the first time that it had seen him. It was living in a monastery in mountains far, far away, and Lucifer arrived in the midst of a terrific snowstorm. The brothers who dwelt in the monastery had no idea how he had made it to their door, but they welcomed him inside, inviting him to share their evening meal. He had claimed to be a traveler, grown weary from his wanderings, looking for a place to rest and reflect upon a life filled with regrets. The brothers offered their monastery as a refuge and Lucifer accepted their offer to stay.

  The mouse w
atched as the five beings that abused its friend hoisted him up, naked, into the air, hanging him from thick black chains secured upon his wrists and ankles, his face pointed at the floor. They crouched beneath him, carefully examining his exposed underbelly.

  When first they met, the stranger had asked of the mouse a favor. Lucifer spoke to it in the language of its species and gave it a delicious piece of bread as payment. He had simply asked it to keep its eyes open when wandering about the monastery, and to let him know if it saw any strangers like himself. A relationship was born that benefited them both greatly, and soon blossomed into something larger, a mutual admiration—a genuine friendship.

  The tiny observer watched an Archon stand beneath its hanging friend, and in his hand, there formed a knife of flame. With one sudden, savage movement, the Archon cut open its friend, his blood raining down to puddle upon the floor.

  It wanted to help its friend, but instead retreated farther into the darkness of the corner. For what could it possibly do?

  It was only a mouse.

  The rite was forbidden. Archon Oraios was sure of that. But here they were, making preparations to reverse the Word of God.

  “Quickly!” Archon Jao screeched, crouching beneath the body of the first of the fallen as the prisoner’s blood poured from the gash cut into his belly. “Bring me the bowl. We cannot waste a drop!”

  Archon Domiel retrieved a golden ceremonial bowl from their belongings and carefully slid it beneath the dripping wound of the hanging Lucifer.

  “Excellent,” Jao said rubbing his long, spidery hands together as he watched the spattering of warm crimson begin to fill the bowl. “There is much to be done with this blood. Every drop must serve our master’s cause.”

  Archon Oraios turned his gaze from the unconscious Lucifer to Jao beside him. “Is that what he is to us now, brother?” the angel asked. “When first we joined Verchiel’s quest to rid the world of God’s offenders, we did so as equals, sharing the Powers’ abhorrence for those who had sinned against Heaven. But now it appears we are nothing more than servants to his rage.”

  “Careful, Oraios,” Archon Jaldabaoth warned, on hands and knees, dipping his fingers into the bowl of gore upon the floor. “Remember the fate of our brothers, Sabaoth and Erathaol. Their actions did not please Verch … our master, and for that they paid a price most dear.” Jaldabaoth began to paint a large circle of blood on the hardwood floor beneath the first of the fallen angels.

  “Why can’t you say it, brother?” Oraios asked. “Paid a price most dear, indeed,” he snarled. “Verchiel killed them in a fit of anger. It seems that our master has become quite enamored with the act of murder.”

  Archon Domiel turned away with a hiss. “I do not want to hear this,” he said, shaking his head. “Sacrifices must be made to achieve one’s ultimate goals. Verchiel’s cause is a just one, a final attempt to right a grievous wrong.”

  The air was thick with the smell of blood as Jao joined Jaldabaoth on the floor. “This discussion is finished,” he said, dipping his fingers in the collected blood of their enemy and completing the circle. “There is far too much to be done to debate this now.”

  “The killing of our Malakim pedagogue—with more to follow if we are to have what we need to complete the rite to unravel the words of the Most Holy and unleash Hell upon the world. Is that how a grievous wrong is righted, my Archon brothers?” Oraios asked, ignoring Jao.

  “It is too late to be thinking of such things,” Katspiel said quietly from the far corner. Slowly he lifted his head, the shadows of the room flowing to fill the empty sockets of his eyes like oil. In an earlier ritual he had attempted to look upon the Hell within Lucifer, and had paid the price with his sight. “Events have transpired beyond our abilities to control,” he wheezed. “We are just cogs in the great mechanism that has been set in motion.”

  “So you say we are to continue as we are,” Oraios asked his eyeless brother, “carrying out the wants and desires of one who could very well damn us all.”

  “Yes,” Katspiel said, his head slipping forward as he began to drift off into the meditative slumber that would allow him to locate the next of the Malakim. “But I would not concern yourself with potential damnation, Brother Oraios.

  “For what we have done, and are about to do, we are already damned.”

  Verchiel stood naked before the healer, allowing the blind human to administer to his injuries, both old and new.

  The rich smell of ancient oils wafted up as Kraus dipped cloths into his restorative medicament and gently applied them to the Powers leader’s various lesions.

  “I apologize for the pain I must be causing, my lord,” the human said. “But I must try a stronger remedy if I am ever to mend your wounds completely.”

  Verchiel’s injuries were extensive and were healing far more slowly than normal for an angel of such power. Some were not healing at all. Another piece of evidence that the Holy Creator has indeed abandoned His most faithful soldier, he thought bitterly, the agony of the healing oils nothing in comparison to being forsaken.

  The leader of the Powers host shuddered as his servant applied more of the medicinal balm.

  “If only I could share your pain, my master,” Kraus said as he bowed his head in sadness. “I would gladly bear the burden to lessen your suffering.”

  Verchiel gazed down upon the lesser being kneeling at his feet. “The path before us is fraught with danger,” the angel said, laying his hand upon the human’s head. “The potential for injuries most excruciating is great. Do you still wish to partake of my pain, little monkey?”

  Kraus lifted his head to gaze upon Verchiel with sightless eyes bulging white, his old face twisted in adoration. “It would be the least I could do,” Kraus said, his body trembling. “But since I cannot bear your pain, I will soothe your injuries and heal your wounds for as long as the gift of life still fills these bones and I am allowed to serve you.”

  Verchiel thought of his own master and what Verchiel had lost. How he had loved his Creator, but obviously it wasn’t enough to prevent Him from turning away—from bestowing His blessings upon the most wretched of creations, the criminals and the mongrel abominations. The angel seethed with anger. He wanted to lash out—to rend and tear, to burn to ashes anything and everything that reminded him of his loss.

  A faint wheeze pulled the leader of the Powers from his distraught reverie, and he saw that he had grabbed the blind human by the throat and was squeezing the life from his body. The monkey thrashed in his grip, but the look of rapture, of pure adoration, was still upon his face.

  Verchiel let the healer fall from his angry hand, for it was not the fault of this lowly life form that the Creator had chosen to desert him.

  The blind healer struggled for breath as he lay upon the floor of the old classroom. “So sorry,” he gasped over and over again, certain that he had done something to offend his master.

  But the monkey’s apologies—his solicitations for forgiveness—would not fall upon deaf ears, as Verchiel’s had. He would hear his servant’s pleadings, and he would answer.

  Verchiel unfurled his wings and knelt beside his quivering supplicant. “I hear your pleas,” he said as he took the frightened man into his arms and drew him close. “But you have nothing to be sorry for.”

  Kraus began to cry, moisture leaking from his sightless orbs.

  “It was my rage, my own inner turmoil, that almost caused your death,” Verchiel said to him. “And for that error I am sorry.”

  The pain of his injuries was suddenly gone and Verchiel was filled with the power of his own divinity. He knew then, truly understood what it was like to be a god—blessed with the power of damnation or absolution.

  “I will show you the depth of my regret,” the angel said, drawing the still trembling Kraus closer. Verchiel leaned his head forward and placed a gentle kiss upon each milky, cataract-covered orb.

  And the healer began to scream.

  The pain was like nothing K
raus had ever experienced.

  He fell away from his master’s embrace, stumbling about the classroom as the pain in his useless eyes intensified. He had memorized the layout of the room, as well as the entire abandoned Saint Athanasius Church and Orphanage where the Powers were gathered these days, but sheer panic and roiling pain made him careless. He ran headlong into a wall, falling to the floor in a quivering heap.

  Why would he do this to me? Kraus’s thoughts raced. Have I insulted him? He wanted to ask his master, but his distress was too great. It felt as though molten metal had been poured into his eye sockets, and instead of cooling with the passage of time, it was growing hotter and hotter still.

  He thought he was going to die.

  Kraus curled up on the floor and waited for death to take him. The torment was so great that he thought he might actually welcome the end to his pitiful existence. Eyes tightly clenched, a ball of shivering blood, bone, and flesh, he readied himself—and then he heard the voice of his master. It drifted upon the air like the notes of the most beautiful song he had ever heard.

  “Open your eyes.”

  And Kraus did as he was told. The pain was gone, but he barely noticed.

  He could see!

  He was gazing at the floor. It was wood, covered with decades of dirt and dust. And Kraus was seeing it all for the very first time, the intricacies, patterns and colors of the wood, and the accumulated filth. Somehow, even though he had never seen before, having been blind since birth, he knew what he was looking at, the identity of each thing his new eyes fell upon filling his head.

  “Lift your head from the ground and gaze upon the world,” the angel Verchiel said, his voice booming around the room. “This is my gift to you.”

  Kraus looked up, his new sight landing on the wall above the floor. It was painted a dingy gray; and above that was a blackboard, the faint trace of the last lesson taught within the schoolroom still evident upon its dark surface. Thou shall not kill, he read, despite never having learned to read.