by Bonnie Lamer
Now that our various forms don’t occupy as much space as they did a moment ago, we find that we’re too far apart for our liking. If we need to combine our power for defense this distance is unacceptable. My family shuffles closer to me, taking careful steps in case there are pockets in the magic holding us up that could send them hurtling downward. Kallen grasps my hand, and our children stand on either side of us. Kegan, Alita, and Keelan move as close as they can and grasp hands, as well. The others surround us, laying supportive hands on our backs and shoulders. Felix and Taz gather at my feet.
Around us, the Angels are quiet. They don’t dare weigh in on all they’ve heard over the last few minutes. They’re waiting to hear what the giant eyes think about it. I would like to know that myself. I’d be even happier if the giant eyes would stop staring at us like they’re reading the blueprints of our souls. Picking out each fault in the architect’s renderings. Honestly, I can’t tell which side they’re going to fall on. I wish they would just tell us already. The wait is excruciating.
I do not get my wish. Instead of telling us what they’re thinking, every giant eye closes its lids. At first, I think they’re all just blinking in unison. When they remain closed, I frown and turn to Ophaniel.
The Cherub’s explanation of the situation turns out to be more of a history lesson than anything else. “The Thrones are the Guardians of Universal Laws and Cosmic Harmony. They were the first. After the Universe exploded into life, they came together as scattering bits of light united. Their creation sparked the creation and evolution of new beings. The Thrones were there at the beginning and helped weave together the greater plan. It is their role to mete out Divine Justice as needed.”
Okay, that didn’t really answer the question that I hoped she would read in my expression. I guess I need to infer an answer. “So, they’re deliberating?” I ask.
Ophaniel nods. “Yes.”
Okay. I guess we wait then. Man, I hate waiting. Beside me, Kallen gives my hand a squeeze. He offers me an encouraging smile, and I try hard to return it.
After a few minutes, Johoel proves that he hates waiting even more than I do. Turning to his fellow Angels, he raises his voice in anger. “Are we going to stand here and let beings who have ignored us for millennia pass judgement on us?! We were the ones who tried to help the mortals. The ones who tried to save them from themselves. Where were the Thrones when freewill became not a force of good, but a way for mortals to find new and better ways to kill each other? To control one another? The Thrones slumbered while we fought. They slumbered while we were forced to watch the destruction mortals unleashed upon each other. Their inaction proves that they never cared about any of us. The Thrones are not the Keepers of Cosmic Law any longer. Their inaction, their ambiguity, prove that they do not care about what is right or wrong. If we stand together, we can show them that they have no power over us! They have no right to pass judgement on our efforts when they have put forth no effort of their own. Who will stand with me?” he shouts so even those way in the back can hear him.
I wonder how many of his fellow Angels would have stepped forth if the giant eyes hadn’t opened halfway through Johoel’s speech? The Seraph is completely unaware of this since he turned his back to the eyes to address the crowd. With all his attention focused on the Angels who are refusing to heed his call to arms, he’s oblivious that they’re watching his ludicrous rant. Because they’re not idiots, none of the other Angels are going to side with him right now. It doesn’t matter if the Thrones were slumbering or not. They obviously have enough power to stop a rebellion, even if all the Angels stood against them.
Frustrated by their lack of response, Johoel demands of his comrades, “What is wrong with you?! Why will you not fight for what is right?”
“There are several among them who would like to stand with you,” one of the giant eyes informs the Seraph. “Their desire to prolong their days will win out, however.”
The look on Johoel’s face when he realizes who is speaking to him is hilarious. Even in these dire circumstances, I need to force back a chuckle. His stricken expression makes him look like a caricature of himself. Slowly, he turns around to face the Thrones. Trying to maintain control of the situation, Johoel squares his shoulders and attempts to school his expression. With little success. His voice shaky, he says, “You will use your power to end our existence? Does that not mean you are doing the same thing I suggested with the mortals?”
The Thrones don’t bother to address his accusation. They don’t respond to Johoel at all. Instead, they focus on us mortals. “Why did you meddle in the business of Angels?” they ask. Their voices resonate around us, coming from several directions at once. They’ve decided to speak in unison again.
I’m not one hundred percent certain what they mean. I do tend to meddle, so picking just one instance of it is difficult. So, I go with the time Johoel mentioned and hope I’m right. “When we saved the Cherubim from the spell Haniel put on them?” I ask. Okay, I figure it’s best to be certain.
“Yes. The Cherubim warned you that your actions would put you in the middle of a war between the Angels. Why did you still take it upon yourselves to judge who was right and who was wrong?”
Um. Not liking where this is going. First, that’s not exactly what happened. Second, are they seriously considering siding with Johoel? Do these beings feel the same way about mortals as the Seraph does? Do they believe mortals should just mind their own business and stay in their ‘place’? Worse, do they believe that all mortals should be wiped from existence? I feel my cheeks flame in resentment at the thought. I open my mouth to speak, then snap it closed again. It’s not just me I’m putting in danger if my words are rash and offensive. I have the safety of my children and the rest of my family to consider. I should take a moment to think about my response just in case that’s not what the Thrones think.
So, I focus on the question and try to come up with a real answer. Remembering back to those moments in the cavern, I recall the Cherubim asking similar questions. Why would we put ourselves in the middle? How did we know we were taking the right side? I mentally shake my head. Honestly, I don’t have a better answer than I did then. Saving the Cherubim just felt right. So, that’s what I decide to say.
“We didn’t pass judgement on the war,” I explain. “We had no idea why the Seraphim attacked the Cherubim, or whether they deserved what they received. Honestly, we didn’t even know who the Cherubim were at the time. All we knew was that they were dying. Painfully. That was unacceptable in our minds. We couldn’t leave them to die if we could prevent it. We would have helped anyone in that position, regardless of the consequences. Helping them just felt like the right thing to do.”
“You would help anyone even if the consequence is being caught in the middle of a war between beings more powerful than you?” the eyes ask.
I glance around at my family, then back at the eyes. “The fact that we’re all standing here answers that question. When someone needs your help, you don’t stop to worry about how powerful their enemies are before helping them. You don’t look down at someone who is dying from an attack and decide protecting your own life is more important than helping to save theirs. Even if we didn’t believe at the time that the Council, on which the Seraphim sit, were coming for us, we would have helped. My family is proof of that. Not one of them hesitated to come here. Even my Dad, who doesn’t have an iota of magic inside him. Nothing to protect himself with when the fighting started. He didn’t care. He was going to come and do whatever he could to protect his family. Even if all he could do was offer us his support in our time of need.” Choking up, I stop speaking and smile at my dad.
He returns my smile with a warm and loving one of his own. “No place else I’d rather be,” he assures me.
Turning back to the giant eyes, I continue, “I’m not saying that we weren’t afraid to come here. A healthy amount of fear is a good thing. But fear of what could happen should never be a motivating force
when deciding to help someone in need.”
Moving my glance from giant eye to giant eye, I continue, “It was not our place to judge whether the Cherubim deserved what was happening to them or not. What scale would we even use for that? Would we evaluate their supposed crimes by the laws of the Fae? The Witches? The Angels? The Humans? What’s considered a mortal offence by one being may be nothing to another. Even among the same beings, laws and beliefs vary. At best, we could have judged them using our own moral compasses. But that would still mean judging them according to our own biases based on our individual life experiences. So, we didn’t even ask what their crimes were. It didn’t matter. The only question I asked was whether the Cherubim believed they deserved what was happening to them. They didn’t. That was enough for me.” Even if they did believe they deserved it, I don’t know that I could have just left them to die.
My eyes flick to Johoel. I feel the need to point out something that bothered me from the moment we discovered the Cherubim were sick. “I will say, though, that a punishment done from afar, one that is slow growing and painful but never seen by the one inflicting that pain, seems a cowardly way to kill. Even if the Cherubim had done something to deserve the wrath of the Seraphim, why wouldn’t the latter face their enemy when passing judgement and meting out justice? Is it right to curse someone and not even tell them why? Shouldn’t the one meting out that justice have the courage to face their actions? While it was not our place to judge whether the death curse was just, that was a pretty good indication that it wasn’t.”
“If you had known that the beings you helped also sat on this Council you believed to be coming for your children, would you still have helped them?” the eyes ask.
Good question. So good, I take an honest moment to think about it. Then, I nod. “Yes. It would not have made any difference. We still would have helped.” There have been other enemies that I’ve saved when push came to shove. It wouldn’t have mattered. I could never leave someone to die if I could help them.
Johoel barks out a fake laugh and sneers, “Only because she would seek to win their favor. In fact, with her Angelic heritage it is unlikely that she did not know who the Cherubim were. She is attempting to manipulate you by twisting the truth. Just as her doppelganger was skilled in such things. Do not allow her to fool you with her half-truths. Her sole purpose in helping the Cherubim was garnering their protection.”
“That doesn’t even make sense,” I scoff. “If the only reason the curse was placed on the Cherubim was to keep them from helping us, which seems to be the case, wouldn’t that make the argument that we saved them just so that they would help us a bit ridiculous?” Even I have trouble following that sentence, so I try again. Addressing Johoel specifically, I point out, “The Cherubim would not have needed our help if the Seraphim hadn’t cursed them in the first place. So, if anyone arranged all of this so that the Cherubim would help us, it was you and Haniel.”
“I did nothing to the Cherubim,” Johoel hisses. “I wanted them left out of the whole thing for that very reason. If they had not been cursed, they would never have agreed to help you. They never would have woken the Thrones.”
The Seraph stops speaking and his eyes grow wide. The hamster wheel in his brain screeches to a halt, spins backwards a few rotations, then reruns that last thought. Which gives my own mind a second or two to catch up. Realization hits us both at the same time. Mouths agape, our heads swivel in unison toward Haniel.
The mask of anger the Seraph of Joy wore earlier is gone. It’s replaced by a sly smile and a scheming glint in her eyes. She doesn’t offer up an explanation. She doesn’t try to justify her actions. She simply says, “We all had a role to play.”
Now it really hits me. She didn’t do this on her own. Haniel cursed the Cherubim because Raziel told her to. That sneaky, sneaky Archangel. Just like with the Demons, he planned for this for a long, long time.
I can’t help asking, “Is he really gone?” Maybe Raziel put plans in motion to save himself as well as us. I hope so. Because I really want to kill him myself right now for not letting us in on any of this.
Haniel doesn’t get a chance to respond. One of the giant eyes beats her to it. “The omniscient one foretold this day soon after he came into being. The day when even the oldest among us would need to rouse ourselves from our slumber and pay attention to what we helped bring forth.” The eyes narrow as they focus on Johoel. “The day when those who should be upholding them have conveniently forgotten the simplest laws of the Cosmos. The first being that Universe is always expanding, growing exponentially as time moves forward. It is impossible to stop the progression now that it has begun.”
Another giant eye takes over the conversation. “From the beginning, there has been a quest for perfection. Yet life itself is an ever-evolving process which makes perfection a dream, not a reality. Perfection as a concept is fleeting. Its definition changing with each new age. It must. For achieving perfection would mean the end of growth. An unachievable goal in an ever-expanding Universe. We must learn and adapt over time. Even we ancient ones.”
Yet another giant eye chimes in, and we all pivot in its direction to show we’re listening. “Each new type of being in the Universe endures their own unique challenges, have their own faults, and have their own strengths. Each evolving over time. Never perfectly. Some challenges are met with grace. Some are met with brutality rivaling the violent explosion that first sparked life. The role of beings who themselves have supposedly evolved past those initial growing pains is to help others do the same. We cannot stop growth. We can only guide it. Never in the process can we assume that our way is the only way, or even the best way. If perfection is an ever-changing concept, then how we perceive it now may be primitive compared to what other beings may achieve in the future. They must be given a chance to get there.”
Johoel opens his mouth to argue. Likely to say that mortals have had plenty of chances to move forward. That more often than not, we choose brutality over grace. But his words get pushed back from the tip of his tongue by a surge of power. His turn to speak is over, apparently. I suspect all our turns are over until the giant eyes finish making their point.
As a unit, we turn toward the next one who speaks. “Johoel of the Seraphim, you attempted to impose your own concept of perfection upon mortals. Yet, you cannot hear the whispering of the Cosmos as its light expands. You cannot see the patterns, the shape of things to come taking form. You know nothing of what will happen, only what you want to happen.”
The Thrones give us a glimpse into their own understanding of the Universe. Where their irises were, there are now images flowing like a movie. Anything the Universe holds is on display from the largest entities down to the smallest. Multiverses, galaxies, planets, realms, beings, animals, plants, molecules. They flash by too quickly for our eyes to make out all the details, only the general idea. But we can see that they are ever changing. Some things expand and grow, some fade away. The only constant is the energy that flows through them all. The spark of life, the light, that each living thing carries a piece of while they are alive.
The giant eye continues speaking to Johoel as the images of the past, present and future flow through its iris. “You also forgot the second Cosmic Law,” it tells him. “There is no inequality among beings. Only the order in which we came into being separates us. Nothing more. Nothing less. This does not represent a hierarchy of power, but a spectrum of knowledge. It is the responsibility of the elders to help the young. We share what we learned before they came and offer our guidance. Then we let them do with it what they will. At times, we may not like what we see. Other times, the young will teach us important lessons that we have yet to learn on our own. Either way, we do not have any claim of superiority to justify imposing our will upon others.”
The images in the giant eyes of the Thrones dissolve, and their irises return to normal. An eye farther back from the rest begins to speak, and I get the feeling we’re addressed by the oldest of
them all now. Even the other giant eyes turn their attention toward this one. In a voice that seems to carry the weight of knowledge borne at the dawning of time, she says, “Before you is an example of the mortals you claimed were in need of either control or genocide. Yet, their resolve, their desire to live and grow, and their courage all shine brighter than your own. You, Seraph, have grown stagnant. Stuck in a long forgone past where perfection had a different meaning. Would you or your followers, Johoel of the Seraphim, enter a battle solely for the love of a child? Would any among you stand unarmed against a foe, or engage if the one you faced had more powerful weapons than you? Or have you grown too accustomed to being more powerful than all others because of the simple fact that your lifeforce came first? Has it wrought a weakness in your character? Diminished your ability to reason and empathize?” Even though it’s a rhetorical question, the Throne lets that sit a moment. She uses the time to look over the other Angels present. Finally, she says, “You are not alone, Seraph. It seems several of you have forgotten what it is to be truly brave. You mistake power for superiority. You complain of the petty wars, the prejudice among mortals, but you now exhibit the same behavior. The mortals will one day grow out of their current state. The irony is, they will move forward, whereas you are moving backward.”