Destined for Eternity

by Susan Illene

  Raguel kneeled at the guardian’s head, taking it between his hands, then gestured at them. “Each of you take a limb and hold it tightly.”

  Bartol and Lucas each grabbed one of Kerbasi’s legs, keeping their gazes averted since the last either of them wanted was to touch or look at the naked man. They had only volunteered for the job to see the guardian suffer and perhaps out of curiosity. Remiel and Jeriel grabbed the arms.

  “Ready?” Raguel asked.

  They each nodded.

  The archangels started to chant, using words in a language only they understood. At first, nothing noticeable happened, but after a few minutes, Bartol saw something from the corner of his eye. He glanced over to find light beginning to glow from Raguel’s fingertips. Soon after that, it flowed into Kerbasi’s head and lit his olive complexion so that it radiated golden. He lay there under their hold, gasping for breath but not making a sound. If he was feeling any discomfort, he was holding it in so far.

  The glow continued to spread and reached the guardian’s chest where it brightened exponentially. Raguel, Jeriel, and Remiel continued to chant, the staccato words coming faster and faster. The guardian began to jerk underneath them. At first, his movements were small and manageable, but after about ten minutes they became so forceful it took all of their strength to hold him in place.

  “It burns!” Kerbasi screamed, unable to contain himself any longer. “Make it stop!”

  The scars on Bartol’s face twitched. He didn’t feel sorry for the man in the least.

  Crackles sounded from the guardian’s body like fireworks going off, and he let out a loud, shrill shriek that went on for long minutes. He never even drew a breath. The screaming simply kept going, and it was all Bartol could do to withstand the sound.

  Just when he thought his eardrums would burst, the light inside Kerbasi magnified by a power of ten and blinded them. Bartol clenched his eyes shut. He could barely continue holding the leg he grasped as the skin beneath his palms became so hot he thought it would melt his hands off. Sheer willpower held him fast. He knew he couldn’t let go, but it wasn’t easy as the man underneath him bucked and screamed as if a thousand knives were stabbing him at once.

  Bartol’s vision returned moments later. He blinked and checked the others around him. Lucas was gritting his teeth as he jerked up and down with Kerbasi’s powerful kicks. The archangels were grunting where they tried to keep the guardian’s arms and chest from coming off the floor.

  “Hold him still,” Raguel ordered between chants.

  Bartol’s father had sweat beading his brows, and his golden-brown hair hung limply to his shoulders. It required an incredible amount of magic to convert Kerbasi. As they had explained to Bartol and Lucas beforehand, this process had once been handled by God, but now it was up to them. Since Raguel was the only angel who could share his abilities, he led the spell, but the other two archangels were lending their powers to boost him.

  Something rolled under Kerbasi’s skin that almost felt like snakes or large bugs. Bartol resisted the urge to look or jerk away. “What is that?”

  Kerbasi’s screams rose to the highest pitch yet, shattering the high windows of the gymnasium. Wind whipped against them, swirling the broken shards up and around to cut into them. No one stopped what they were doing or let go of the man beneath their grasp.

  Remiel glanced over at Bartol during a pause between chants and shouted, “His body is being transformed. This is the most difficult and painful part of the process. Once it is over, we’ll nearly be finished.”

  It was worse than anything he’d ever imagined. Bartol had been tortured in many ways, but he could not have grasped how much the transformation process would brutalize the person undergoing it. He’d wanted Kerbasi to suffer, but perhaps not to this extreme. The angels had warned it would be a long process and they were not wrong. The minutes ticked past into agonizing hours, and still the guardian bucked and screamed as his skin, muscles, and bones rolled and cracked. His voice was growing hoarse and not as shrill as in the beginning, but it still grated their ears.

  Lucas cursed, covered in sweat like the rest of them. “Why doesn’t he pass out?”

  He didn’t get an answer until the next break from chanting.

  “It’s the curse of our kind,” Jeriel yelled through the punishing winds beating against them. His knuckles were white where they gripped Kerbasi hard. “We do not have the luxury of deep unconsciousness for this process, so we must suffer through every moment of this.”

  “Did you know it would be this bad?” Bartol asked.

  Remiel’s lips thinned. “It’s taking longer than expected, but his caste of angels rarely moves up the ranks and certainly not into a position such as this. We could only speculate how it might go.”

  The chanting resumed for another ten minutes as they struggled to keep Kerbasi in place.

  Jeriel drew in a deep breath at the next break. “I believe this is the worst I’ve ever seen. His body is fighting the change, but he is weakening and the magic is starting to overcome him.”

  Bartol had wanted Kerbasi to suffer. He’d dreamed of it a thousand times and in a thousand ways, but never like this. No one deserved torture of this magnitude. The agony written on the guardian’s face was distressing enough that Bartol had it on the tip of his tongue to apologize or even tell them to stop. He managed to hold it back, barely.

  Raguel’s chants began to die down at the same time as Kerbasi’s bucking movements slowed. The tortured man had his eyes clenched shut and his fists balled tightly. His skin now glowed with a tint of red, but even that was fading. Bartol glanced toward the broken windows, noting the sun was now high in the sky. It had to be at least noon, and they’d started an hour after dawn. His palms were painful and sore, but he wouldn’t let go of his grasp on Kerbasi until told otherwise.

  “It is nearly over,” Raguel said, face ragged and pale. He and the other two archangels were drained to the point they barely glowed from their own powers anymore.

  The gym had grown quieter. Kerbasi didn’t scream any longer, only groaned. The wind had died down to a light breeze as well and no longer cut at them. Bartol was relieved for all their sakes that they were almost finished.

  The chants continued for several minutes more, the words changing for the first time to something else. Bartol and Lucas stared at each other from their positions across from each other. Both of them had lived long lives, done things that most would find reprehensible, and had worse done to them. Still, watching the former guardian go through the transformation process had shocked and horrified them. Lucas held the same remorseful gaze that Bartol must have showed on his own face. It would be hard to hate Kerbasi after this, though both had sworn never to forgive him.

  Everything became completely quiet and still—the chanting stopped. Bartol turned to find Raguel sitting back on his heels, no longer holding Kerbasi’s head. He was taking even, steady breaths as if to calm himself.

  “We must cover him and wait now,” he said.

  Remiel rose to his feet and grabbed a blanket he’d had waiting nearby. He carefully laid it over the former guardian, covering him completely. At Bartol’s last glance, Kerbasi had appeared ashen and dead. He did not breathe or move.

  “How long?” Bartol asked.

  His father shrugged. “An hour, maybe two. The rest of the process must be done from within.”

  “He appears dead.” Lucas lifted a brow. “Is that part of the process as well?”

  “Appearances can be deceiving.”

  Bartol hated when archangels were vague, especially when it was his father. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “Side effects may vary,” Jeriel replied with a humorous glint in his eyes. “It is not only the pharmaceutical companies who get to use that statement.”

  Lucas sighed. “If we must wait that long, then I will get us something to eat.”

  After a nod from Jeriel, the nephilim flashed away. Bartol hadn’t even considered
how hungry he was until his friend brought it up, but holding down a bucking angel for over six hours had worn him out. Not as much as the ones who’d cast the spell, of course. Who knew how exhausted they must be feeling, even if they didn’t complain.

  Lucas returned twenty minutes later with half a dozen hot pizzas from a restaurant in Fairbanks. He’d also brought a stack of napkins and bottles of water. They left Kerbasi in the middle of the gym floor, moving to a clean space away from the broken glass, and dug into the pizzas. Even the archangels took slices. Unlike most, those three had spent enough time on Earth to develop a taste for food and enjoy it.

  “It is an odd thing,” Raguel said after finishing a whole pizza. “But human food has a way of energizing me.”

  Remiel nodded. “I’ve noticed the same. I believe it is because the longer we stay on Earth, cut off from Heaven’s infinite grace, the more we need other ways to renew ourselves.”

  “It’s true,” Jeriel agreed. “That is partly how I’ve sustained myself during long assignments, and I cannot complain as long as the food is good.”

  Bartol wouldn’t have dreamed he’d ever sit with Lucas and three archangels eating pizza. Not only that, but that they would be companionable. In less than half an hour, they’d emptied every box. He stared at their unlikely group, sitting on the gym floor in relaxed, easy-going poses, unable to believe the sight before him.

  Lucas gave Bartol an ironic smile and shook his head. “I know what you are thinking and it surprises me as well.”

  “We must never speak of this day with anyone,” he vowed, a hint of humor in his voice.

  “To our graves then.”

  The floor creaked where they’d left Kerbasi lying alone. They turned to find the man rising, and the blanket falling from his naked body. Once he was fully upright, he hovered several inches over the floor, and then his previously hidden wings snapped open. They were stark white now with tinges of black at the top. Before, they’d been gray. His hair was still long and black, but his skin was more golden and less olive than before. Those were minor changes compared to what Bartol detected with his supernatural senses. The power emanating from the former guardian was far greater than he’d ever had before and was closer to the level of an archangel.

  Kerbasi’s previously silver eyes glowed with white-gold. “Where am I?”

  “You don’t remember?” Bartol asked.

  He settled his bare feet onto the floor, unbothered by the broken glass. “I do not.”

  Bartol frowned and addressed his father. “Is that normal?”

  “It happens…sometimes.”

  “What is your last memory?” Remiel asked, moving toward the newly risen archangel.

  Kerbasi frowned. He ran his gaze across all of them until it settled on Lucas and he pointed at him. “You. I remember receiving you for the first time in Purgatory when you were less than a thousand years old, and you’d been brought to me for punishment because you’d slaughtered a male sensor you’d come across in a village. By my estimation, you are far older now.”

  Bartol’s eyes rounded. Lucas was more than twenty-five hundred years, and he’d been imprisoned in Purgatory many times since his first stay. How could the former guardian have lost a millennia and a half of memory?

  Raguel appeared shocked as well. “This is unexpected.”

  “But not unheard of,” Remiel said, lips thinning. “It has happened a few times after a conversion process, though the memory gaps were not quite as long.”

  “Will he stay that way?” Lucas asked, appearing unsettled himself.

  Jeriel rubbed his chin. “Not forever…I think.”

  Kerbasi stared down at his naked form, confusion knitting his brows, then noted his altered wings. “What has happened to me?”

  “We’ve changed you into a demon slayer now,” Raguel replied, coming forward. He grabbed the folded robe the former guardian had set aside and handed it to him. “I will begin training you once you’ve had time to recover.”

  Kerbasi’s gaze studied Bartol’s father. “I do not understand.”

  His entire bearing was different than before. He stood taller and more confident, and the evil mischievousness that had once glinted in his eyes was gone. Now, the man was just raw power and lacked the personality that once shaped him. Even his voice sounded different. It was stronger, more authoritative.

  “You will come to understand with time,” Raguel replied.

  Kerbasi snapped his wings closed. “I do not wish to wait.”

  Bartol and Lucas glanced at each other, both having no idea what to make of the man they’d hated for so long. What would he become like now? They only had a couple of days until the summit with the demons, and Kerbasi had a lot to learn if he was to assist them.

  “Tomorrow,” Raguel said, exhaustion in his voice. “We must rest for the night first.”

  Chapter 29

  Bartol

  The compound bustled with activity, making Bartol wish he could be anyplace else. Seven archangels had arrived that morning to begin preparations—including Remiel, Jeriel, and Raguel—and about another dozen lesser angels had joined them to assist. In addition to that, a handful of nephilim had been called upon to provide perimeter security. Never before had the two races worked together as closely as they were that day, but everyone could agree they needed to put up a good show of force for when Hell’s representatives arrived. They’d gone over the plans for the timetable, defenses, and negotiations, drilling the details into everyone’s heads until everyone knew their part.

  Bartol and Lucas stood at the compound gate, ready to check visitors as they arrived. New protections had been placed around the perimeter fence to stop anyone—regardless of their race or power level—from entering. The destroyed chain-link fence had been replaced with a high stone wall that rose fifteen feet in the air, preventing anyone from easily climbing it or viewing the inside. Remiel was with them as well. When visitors arrived, he would lower the magical shield after Bartol and Lucas searched for weapons.

  “They’re here,” Raguel called out, barely visible at a bend in the road. It was his job to oversee the demons’ arrival from the portal they’d opened nearby and see that they came straight to the compound.

  Bartol and Lucas glanced at each other, both stiffening. This was the moment of truth. How the demons behaved upon their entrance would likely reflect how the rest of their day would go. Would they choose to start another war, or did they really want a place on Earth? No one knew for certain. One thing was clear, though—darkness had begun spreading across the land, dulling the landscape and clouding the sky. The minions of Hell were numerous and powerful enough that they affected everything near them.

  Tremors ran under Bartol’s feet. He frowned at the ground, then looked up. Just beyond the bend, dark shapes started to appear. Every instinct told him to pull his sword and run toward them, slashing at the demonic figures. They’d come in their true forms, not needing human hosts now that they were no longer bound to the old treaty. The creatures came in all shapes and sizes with some as large as elephants and just as heavy. They had black skin, red skin, horns, razor-sharp teeth, fangs, and the list went on with all the different features Bartol witnessed.

  Each one stopped to be checked for weapons. He had to inspect one that looked like a satyr except it had tusks on its face as well as horns on its head. The creature made grunting noises as Bartol performed the fastest search possible of its body. Since it had no clothes on, there weren’t many hiding places. He waved the satyr-like demon onward after finishing.

  It went on from there with only a few of Hell’s minions appearing anything like a human. Most had at least a few features comparable to animals or fables passed down through history. Lucas had been to Hell before and performed his job without showing any emotion. Bartol had a more difficult time. He couldn’t help feeling disgust and a need for a shower, but he got through the inspections as best he could, only getting jabbed once by something that looked like a
human porcupine.

  By the time the procession of demons ended, he’d counted twenty-five total—the exact number agreed upon for the meeting. At the end of the line, Raguel and Remiel followed them through the gate. The guests headed for the gymnasium since it was the largest building in the compound that could hold everyone. After finishing with Kerbasi a couple of days before, they’d worked to convert it into a proper meeting place.

  Lucas and Bartol pulled the gate shut, and Remiel sealed it with a spell. No one could get in or out without the archangel’s assistance. He’d be going inside to head the negotiations, ensuring everyone stayed there. Well, except one person who could technically escape anytime she wanted.

  “We’ve got this,” Melena said, walking up from the gym to join them with Micah following closely behind. The sensor had donned black cargo pants, a tank top, and combat boots for the occasion. Numerous weapons were strapped to her body as well. She was one of the few authorized to have pistols and knives since she had no offensive magical powers. “You guys can go.”

  She and Micah would act as guards with Lucas during the meeting. They’d chosen to have Melena there as the one person present who could nullify demon magic if necessary. The sensor had been in Hell before and fought many demons, so she was the most experienced for the job within her race. Lucas and Micah had been with her for that excursion, making the three a good team.

  “Do not get hurt or shed any blood,” Bartol warned the sensor. “We need the shield to stay up.”

  Melena rolled her eyes. “With the spells they have on this place, it would take half my blood to nullify the protection spells on the wall alone, never mind the shield. Don’t worry. I won’t be a liability.”

  That was the only problem with allowing her to be there, and why there weren’t more sensors present. The demons could use them to take down any magic spells. Lucas and Micah would both remain at the gate as well to ensure that didn’t happen, but at least this way Melena would be present should they need any magic nullified right away. They could strip the demons of weapons but not their powers.