Hell's Ascendant (Mantles of Power Book 3)

by Benjamin Medrano

  “Hm. I’m surprised… I always thought you were odd, but I didn’t think you were a coward,” Anathiel said, disappointment almost overwhelming her as she clicked her tongue.

  “What did you call me?” Javan demanded, the fire suddenly blazing brighter around Ember, blackening the stone where the tip of the blade touched the ground.

  “I called you a coward,” Anathiel replied flatly, crossing her arms as she stared at the sword, her disappointment growing stronger. “You became an archangel, one of the most powerful beings in the heavens, and what did you do? Instead of helping protect others, you hid your mantle from all but the handful of us who witnessed your ascension. You could have passed your mantle down to those who would have used it, but instead you kept it and hid yourself in a sword. Certainly, you lent a fraction of that power to wielders, but only those you thought were worthy of it, and you’ve hidden for millennia.”

  “And you didn’t hide? In the hells of all places?” Javan retorted hotly, the flames blazing intensely around his sword. “I’ve listened to everything that’s happened around me, you know, and I know a lot.”

  “I hid, yes. But unlike you, I used my power, Javan. Do you want to try me? Do you want to test me?” Anna asked, her power billowing outward as she suddenly stood, flexing her wings as the feathers hardened until they were stronger than steel, her body’s power increasing rapidly as it always did when she called upon her mantle. “I fought in five crusades. I can’t count how many angels fought and died by my side, and they were far fewer in number than the mortals or demons who fell. I remember the death of Serin even if you don’t, as her life’s blood seeped out of her and her eyes went dark, even as you slipped from her grasp and did nothing. Do you remember that, Javan? Do you remember how your granddaughter died?”

  “I…” Javan’s voice trailed off, and Anna could see the flames weaken visibly as well, which didn’t surprise her much. It disappointed her, but it didn’t surprise her. For all his brilliance, Javan had always been a strange man, both stubborn and regretful at the same time. She hated to rub his failures in his face, but it seemed like the only choice she had.

  “I remember,” Javan said at last, a hint of loathing in his voice as he almost whispered in the quiet room. “I’d almost blocked it out, but yes, I remember that. It was the closest I ever came to intervening, and I’ve wondered why I didn’t over the centuries. On the other hand, if I didn’t intervene then, why should I now?”

  Anna sighed, shaking her head and sitting back down, her expression turning cold as she did so, regret rushing through her as she murmured, “I suppose that if you’re determined to be a coward to the end, there isn’t anything more to say, is there? There are others who can heal her, though not as perfectly as you could.”

  The room was quiet again, at least for a minute, then Javan sighed loudly, sounding exasperated. “Fine, then! But I’m not going to do it quickly, I’ll have you know. I don’t want you telling anyone else what’s going on, either. Lay me across Rose, and I’ll fix her bit by bit. It isn’t going to be too fast, though, and she’ll be unconscious through all of it.”

  Anna’s eyebrows rose, a little shocked that Javan had changed his mind. Yet at the same time she couldn’t help a smile as she replied. “Truly? That’s something of a surprise… but I can’t say it makes me unhappy. Don’t worry, I’m not telling anyone about your nature. My only question is how quickly you’re going to work. We don’t know how much time we have, you know.”

  “I’m well aware of that,” Javan snapped, the fires growing more natural again as he spoke. “As for how long… I’m going to aim for a week, and I’m not planning on healing anyone else. My power isn’t limitless, you know.”

  Rolling her eyes, Anna stood and nodded. “If that’s what you want, so be it. Now, let’s get to work, shall we? I also have a few young deities to put through their paces.”

  “For someone who was tired of war, you sure seem to take pleasure out of shocking young gods,” Javan muttered, prompting Anna to laugh.

  “True, true… but it has been a long time. Sometimes you just need a break to find who you are and to look at the world with new eyes,” Anna said, taking Ember and carefully laying it on Rose’s frozen form, the hilt over her breastbone while the blade went down across her legs. The fires grew stronger, and the shimmering barrier shattered, prompting her to tense slightly.

  “If you say so. Now, I’m going to heal her, but I’ll have you know that I have no intention of talking again this century or the next. If you have questions, I’m going to ignore you,” Javan said briskly. “With any luck I can go as long without talking this time as I did last time.”

  “If you say so,” Anna replied mildly, watching as Rose’s bleeding slowly came to a stop, and she relaxed a little.

  She had worried that Rose might not get the healing she needed from Javan, but no one could do a better job than him, not for the young angel. Even if Javan didn’t realize why Anna had wanted him to heal Rose.

  Turning away, Anna decided to read for a little while before going to speak with Herbert and the others. She couldn’t have them thinking she’d managed to initiate Rose’s healing so quickly, after all.

  Hopefully the others would make it to Uthren’s Throne soon as well, as that would give her a chance to properly talk to Kitania. That was something Anna had been looking forward to for a long, long time.

  Chapter 27

  Haral staggered out of the room, barely able to stand and her legs quivering with every step. In fact, she half-fell as her foot clipped the doorjamb, only for someone else to catch her midway to the floor.

  “Easy, dear! You need to be careful after what you’ve been through,” Sorm said, his voice warm and welcome after the horrible week she’d been through, and Haral blinked a couple of times, trying to focus on the other angel through her confusion.

  “Sorm? But… why are you here? I thought you were hunting down Isalla and Roselynn,” Haral said, her fatigue almost overwhelming her, as did her hatred of the two traitorous angels. If it hadn’t been for them, she wouldn’t have been in such a horrible place for what had felt like an eternity.

  “I was. In fact, I just about got the lot of them, but had a setback. I think I took care of Roselynn but was forced to teleport away,” Sorm said, a smile flickering across his face, but it was a little strained as he continued. “I was going to go try to finish the job, but then I heard about you, and I couldn’t keep myself away. Why did you do it, love? You don’t owe Roselynn’s family anything!”

  “No, but they aren’t responsible for her actions. Nor are they responsible for the Holy Council’s weakness,” Haral replied, gritting her teeth as she forced her legs to behave and stood more fully, taking a moment to kiss Sorm gently, closing her eyes as she forced down the flicker of rage that the idea of Roselynn being dead sparked, and she sighed, murmuring, “If she’s dead, I suppose it’s for the best… even if I wish I could kill her with my own hands.”

  “That may still be possible.” Ordath’s deep voice echoed down the hall, and Sorm abruptly straightened, almost knocking Haral off-balance as he did so, but she quickly stood up as well, looking down the hall at the archangel.

  Ordath glowed with faint orange-brown radiance, and he was a little stockier than most angels, with powerful, almost chiseled, muscles and brown hair and eyes. It suited him, as he was the archangel of strength and endurance. He was wearing elaborate white and gold vestments that suited him, and by his side was the elderly elf who’d served him for longer than Haral had lived, a woman whose name Haral could never remember.

  “Your Excellency! My apologies, I didn’t realize you were here!” Sorm said, giving a deep bow as he cleared his throat, and Haral followed suit with a curtsey, though she was more cautious due to her balance being off. “If I may, what do you mean by that?”

  “The council recently received a most disturbing message from Uthren’s Throne, followed by one with more detail. Apparently, a long
-lost archangel has appeared once again,” Ordath said, cracking a grim smile as he said. “You may have heard of Anathiel.”

  Haral swayed in place, feeling like she’d been hit over the head with a mallet. Anathiel had been one of the most influential archangels in history, and her determination had been an inspiration for most angels growing up. The idea of her suddenly reappearing, after everyone had believed that she was dead, was incredibly stunning, to say the least.

  “A-Anathiel? She appeared in Uthren’s Throne?” Sorm asked, straightening as he looked at Ordath in astonishment. The archangel nodded, and Sorm frowned, then asked, “Why would you say it’s disturbing, then? Based on what I’ve heard about her, I’d think that she’d support us, not be a problem.”

  “I would have thought the same, if it weren’t for several of the details in the subsequent message,” Ordath said, looking surprisingly grim. “For one, she hasn’t interacted with the angels in Uthren’s Throne at all, and according to Rathien she’s refused any audiences requested by angels. Even worse, supposedly she had an injured angel with her when she appeared in the city, and our best guess is that it’s Roselynn.”

  “To be specific, rumor has it that Anathiel rescued an angel from the hells and took her to the temple for healing. According to reports, the angel had red hair and mostly normal-looking armor, but when I examined the timing I realized that it matched up with when your attack occurred, Sir Sorm,” the elf said, her tone brisk and detached as she looked at them calmly, prompting dread to well up in Haral. “That being the case, the odds of it being Roselynn are fair.”

  “Which is a perfectly good reason to be concerned. Oh, Anathiel doesn’t have much influence in the heavens these days, she’s been gone for far too long, but if she tried to rally support, she’d be incredibly successful,” Ordath explained, his tone and expression surprisingly grim. “Even some of the other council members are underestimating her, but I certainly won’t. She’s a blunt warrior, and always fought honorably. I think she’d never condone what we have planned.”

  “What can we do, then?” Sorm asked, his voice grim, and when Haral looked at him his face was ashen. Her face must not be much better, she realized as he spoke. “If she has Roselynn, she almost has to know what’s going on, at least some of it.”

  “Agreed. Which is why we’re going to start our plans early. The rest of the council has also insisted that we send a messenger to meet Anathiel and try to recruit her, but we’re going to set things in motion so she can’t stop us, just to be safe,” Ordath said, his tone flat. “Sorm, which of the Holy Council’s guards do you trust to assist us the most?”

  “Aserial,” Sorm said, not even hesitating as he frowned, then asked, “That said… don’t we have a quarter of the Holy Council in the society? Why would you need the guards?”

  “Because if the Holy Council is attacked, or even mostly destroyed, they need to honestly be able to say they had no idea what was coming,” Haral said, the plans she’d helped draw up coming to mind instantly, and she winced slightly, looking at the others. “Do we have one of the gatecrushers ready, then?”

  “We do. The plan is to use the prototype on the northern-most portal in Dolia,” Ordath said, looking at Haral with a bit of approval in his gaze. “You realized what we planned quickly.”

  “I helped arrange for many of the supplies, so I know rather more than most people,” Haral admitted, frowning as she thought, then asked curiously, a little dismayed that plans weren’t going as expected, “May I ask why the portal so far north? I thought that we’d begin with the ones farthest away from Ness, not the closest.”

  “There has been a good deal of debate over that, but in the end, it came down to both convenience and relative safety,” Ordath explained, obviously humoring Haral as he explained to Sorm as well. “The demons may be able to defend the portals farther south more easily, but even so they can’t stop us. We can open the gates to the mortal world where we like, and the chances of them intercepting the gatecrushers if they’re dropped are minimal. By comparison, they can strike back from the nearby portals more easily, so eliminating them first increases the safety of the heavens. A cornered rat is most dangerous, after all. Beyond that, the destruction likely to occur near the portal is liable to cause chaos, and if we time things to coincide with the attack on the Holy Council, it should lead many gods to think the demons are responsible.”

  Haral nodded, a bit relieved as she took in what Ordath was saying. If he was right, it meant that they were trying to take the safety of the heavens into account, which pleased her immensely. The mortals… well, she’d pray for the souls of the innocent, but there was little more she could do, while the demons weren’t worth thinking about. As far as she was concerned, they could all die, and should if things went correctly.

  “I see,” Sorm said, rubbing his chin as he frowned thoughtfully. “I suppose it might work, but I worry that all it’ll do is bring us farther into the open.”

  “If it does, so be it,” Ordath said, then glanced at Haral as he added, “Regardless, I’d suggest getting some rest, Haral. If things go poorly, I expect you’ll want to help fight off the traitors trying to stop us.”

  “Of course, Your Excellency!” Haral said, determination rushing through her as she stood up straighter, and Ordath chuckled, nodded, then went on his way, the elf at his side.

  “Would you like some help, dear?” Sorm asked, concern beginning to work its way into his voice, and she could see the worry in his eyes. “I’ve heard horrible things about that room.”

  “It was terrible,” Haral admitted, then smiled wanly as she added. “Some company would be lovely, though. It was a very hard week.”

  “Then company you will have,” Sorm said firmly, and he helped her down the hall toward the room that Haral usually used, his solid, warm body more comforting than Haral could express, and she quickly found herself leaning into him.

  Roselynn and the others could wait, at least for now.

  Chapter 28

  “This is more impressive than I anticipated,” Kitania said, looking around the city as her eyebrows slowly rose. “I was expecting someplace smaller, and possibly more fortified.”

  They were inside Uthren’s Throne at this point, though at least they’d managed to clean up enough over the previous three days that they didn’t draw too many stares, though their group did seem to be garnering a lot of attention. That was probably at least partially Kitania’s fault, though there were few enough elves in the crowds that Maura and Yain drew a fair number of gazes as well.

  The city was rather impressive and at least four times the size that Kitania had expected it to be. She’d only been to two cities that were larger, and both of those had been major trade ports in human kingdoms to the south. Uthren’s Throne was simply different, and she was impressed by how nice the buildings on either side of the road were, along with the rising spires toward the center of the city, along with a vast, raised area that she guessed was the temple grounds.

  “It was smaller once, which you can tell by the old fortress walls. The problem is that the city grew too quickly, and eventually the government simply gave up on trying to expand the walls since the city hasn’t been attacked in centuries,” Yain said, pointing to the right, and Kitania strained her eyes for a moment before she realized that some of the stonework peeking over the edge of several buildings were old stone walls in the distance. “I really don’t blame them, with as much work as building proper walls takes.”

  “I believe it,” Isalla said, looking around unhappily, her hand clutching Kitania’s tightly. The angel had been quite clingy the last few days, which Kitania really couldn’t blame her for, not after what had happened to Rose. Isalla paused, then asked, “Where are you planning to stop?”

  “There’s a good inn near the walls that elves favor, called the Season of Light. It’s run by elves, which is a large part of why we like it, and it’ll give us a chance to clean up before going to visit the temple
,” Yain said, the worry in her expression easing slightly as she glanced back at them, hesitating before she continued. “I think that’s the wisest decision, considering who we’re going to be meeting.”

  “Entirely agreed,” Isalla said immediately, and it was all Kitania could do to keep from interjecting again, and she firmly bit her tongue.

  The others had been incredulous that she’d suspected that Anna had been an archangel and hadn’t said anything. For her part, Kitania was slightly surprised that she truly was Anathiel, but not as much as everyone else had been, and they’d eventually accepted that she wasn’t going to reveal someone else’s secrets. She suspected her lack of surprise was at least partly because she’d spent so much time with Anna in her youth, and that experience was what made her think that Anna wouldn’t be upset by them showing up in their normal clothing. Not that the others would be willing to hear that, so she kept her mouth shut.

  “I’d almost be willing to kill for a hot bath… dare I hope that the inn has them available?” Maura asked, her tone betraying hope and just a hint of wariness.

  “Of course, though you’d best be prepared for a wooden tub, not a bathhouse. If you’re willing to risk those, there are several that you could pay to visit in the neighborhood, or there were last time I was here,” Yain replied in amusement, leading the way down the street as they threaded their way through the crowd.

  Eziel was following them with the horse carrying their things, so Kitania followed, secure in the knowledge their things would get there. If nothing else, Eziel had proven to Isalla that she was on their side, which helped ease Kitania’s worries slightly.

  A flicker of movement to the side caught Kitania’s attention, and her hand snapped out reflexively to catch the young man’s hand that’d been darting toward her coin purse. Her hand closed around his wrist with his fingers only inches from her purse, and a pair of hazel eyes belatedly widened as they rose to meet her gaze. The human boy had a slightly freckled face and dirty blonde hair, and he opened his mouth to speak, only to have Kitania interrupt.