by Steven Brust
"Then go out, using whatever wits and skills you have, and find the truth for me. Is there opposition to the Plan? From how many? Is it organized? How does Satan really feel about all of this? What about Lucifer and Asmodai? Are they really trying to kill me?
"I need to know, Raziel. I must know. I want you to find out for me—whichever way it is."
Raziel nodded. "I'll do it, Lord."
"Thank you, Raziel," he said, feeling a semblance of peace for the first time in days.
The seas raged. Waves the size of the Southern Hold built themselves up and crashed into nothingness. Valleys of the same size opened up, almost showing the bottom. All along the shores, great waves swept up and drew trees, rocks, and flowers into the deep.
Sometimes, far out in the middle, a great head would appear and then plunge beneath again, with a flickering as the tail showed above the waves for a moment. After a time, the sound would drift back—a long, mournful wail.
Harut, high upon a rock wall above the worst of the waves, heard these sounds. Someday they would become part of a song called "The Grief of Leviathan," and it would evoke pain and beauty at once, as if they could be a single thing.
In this way, songs can lie. There was nothing of beauty in the grief of Leviathan as she sundered the ocean wishing she could have her small friend back, if only for a moment, and understanding death as only one can who has lived from the beginning and seen it from every side.
Silently, Harut mourned with her. Perhaps she knew this, and perhaps it comforted her somewhat.
Chapter Seven
I'm only a dream but I've come from on high.
To free you from the chains that bind you tight.
To give you the freedom of the clouds in the sky;
It is simpler to run than to fight.
—Nate Bucklia "The Road"
Satan and Beelzebub wandered away from the road, not going in any particular direction but heading more or less westerly. For long, slow hours they walked without speaking, each lost in his own thoughts.
They rested at times by unspoken mutual consent, and they both seemed to know when it was time to get up again and continue.
At last Beelzebub spoke: "Milord," he said, "perchance 'twere best to consider where we walk."
"All right, Beelzebub. Consider. Where should we walk?"
"Harut hath said that Leviathan wisheth to speak with thee."
"Yes. But I'm not sure she wants to speak to anyone just now."
"Mayhap thou'rt right, milord. And yet will come a time when she shall desire conversation, e'en more than she did ere this."
He shrugged. "Maybe. Well, if you think so, we can go that way."
"We do so walk, milord."
"Eh? Oh. All right, then. Do you know where to find her?"
"I think so, milord."
"All right, then."
"Milord, I...."
"Yes?"
"'Tis nothing, milord."
"I guess I'll be going, then."
"Where to, Mephistopheles?"
"I don't know, Lilith," he lied, "wherever I end up. I'm going to think all of this over."
"Where do you stand?" asked Lucifer suddenly.
"I'm sitting, now."
"I meant—"
"I know what you mean, Firstborn. You'll know sooner or later, but not until I do. If that isn't good enough," he shrugged, "here I am."
Lucifer's eyes narrowed. Lilith set a hand on his arm. Asmodai stood up smoothly and opened the door. He stepped to the side and waited.
Mephistopheles rose, inclined his head to Lilith and Lucifer, turned his back and went out the door, nodding to Asmodai on the way out.
After shutting the door, Asmodai returned to his chair.
"I don't trust him," said Lucifer.
"It doesn't matter," said Asmodai.
"No, I suppose it doesn't. And, in any case, he did give us news, as he promised."
"Yes."
"Although, in fact, I think he got more from us than we got from him."
"He's like that," said Lilith.
"That's why I don't trust him."
"In any case," said Asmodai, "what should we do?"
"About what?" said Lucifer. "About Yaweh? About Satan? About Ariel? Which one?"
"I think it's all one problem," said Lilith.
"In some ways, yes," said Lucifer. "But—never mind. All right, then; what should we do?"
"I think," said Asmodai, "that we have to find Satan."
"Find Satan! Find Satan! My whole life seems to be one long day of finding Satan! I think all of Heaven is spending its time finding Satan!" Lucifer shook his head.
"Whether he meant to or not, he started it all. We can't do anything without at least speaking to him—it would be wrong."
"I suppose. But whatever we do—"
"My Lord."
They turned to her. "Yes, Lilith?" said Asmodai.
"You both continue to avoid the subject. You keep saying, 'whatever we do,' or 'we can't do anything,' without saying what it is you're talking about."
Asmodai shrugged. "We can't—"
"Put it this way. I'm Satan. You've tracked me through all the trails and paths of Heaven. Finally you've found me. I say," she lowered her voice into a fair imitation of Satan's low, melodious tones, "greetings, my lords, may I do something for you?
"Now," she continued, "what do you answer?"
Asmodai opened and shut his mouth, then did it again. Lucifer smiled. "I think she has you," he said.
"Well, what's your point?"
"That what we have to decide is this: What are we proposing here? You were right when you said that all of these things were tied together, but tied together how? What do they have in common?"
"The Plan, of course," said Lucifer.
Lilith nodded. "The Plan; yes. Then what? I'll put it another way: what is Satan threatening that Yaweh is trying to protect, which led to Ariel's death?"
"Power!" cried Asmodai.
"Yes," said Lilith.
"Power?" said Lucifer. "I don't understand."
"Take the long view. The First Wave—all it was, was the seven of you against the flux, right? There was no confusion, no time for thinking about it, or for conversation, or art, or anything else we prize. But then there was a pause, and things started to develop. After the Second Wave there were only a few hundred of us—that much I remember. We all knew each other; we got along pretty well. But now, after the Third Wave, there are too many for that.
"Before, we were living from Wave to Wave. You know how many of us are destroyed each time—that's a big price to pay for living peacefully in between. But now, with all of the angels created during the Third Wave, we have the potential to end that—as Yaweh knows. But at the same time, that brings up the question of who tells whom what to do when. Yaweh simply did it—he was the obvious one. But now, Satan has called all of that into question. Now, the angels aren't sure just who is telling whom to do what, or who has the right to. So the real issue, when you strip away everything that's just a facade or a side point, is—"
"Rebellion," said Asmodai softly.
"Exactly."
She looked around the room. "And the Lord Satan is aware of that, whether he's admitted it even to himself or not. That's what's scaring him."
"Then why," said Lucifer, "doesn't he just come out and do it?"
"I can tell you that," said Asmodai. "The reason that he objected in the first place was because he felt uncomfortable with the idea of coercing the angels into helping with the Plan."
"So?"
"So he knows that the Plan is necessary. If he leads a rebellion, he'll only have to do the same thing Yaweh is doing. So, for him, where's the gain?"
"I see," said Lucifer. "I think I see. So where does that leave us?" He chuckled. "If we're going to revolt," he said, "it would be nice to know what we're revolting about."
"I don't think there is any, 'if we revolt,'" said Lilith. "It's too late for that. Mephis
topheles knew it; I could tell as soon as I saw him. The factor that Satan never thought of was the angels themselves—those of the Third Wave. They see this as Yaweh telling them to sacrifice themselves—you've heard the rumors as well as I. No, there's a rebellion already. If we try to do nothing until it's so obvious that everyone can see, it'll be too late to direct it. We can get out of it—maybe— but we can't stop it.
"So, as I said earlier, my lords, what are we going to do?"
Alone, with a chance to rest for the first time in days, Abdiel found himself thinking. This wasn't something he wanted to do, but he couldn't stop it.
Everything had been working well until that owl—he squeezed his eyes tightly shut and shook his head. He covered his face with his pillow, as if he could block out the memory of Ariel being hit, screaming the horrible, horrible scream, and then, nothing.
It was an accident, he told himself. The illiaster would hardly have hurt Beelzebub. How could he have known the owl would be there and misunderstand?
He couldn't, he finally decided. There was no way. His motives were certainly reasonable, and, with Satan feeling as he did, there was nothing wrong with his methods, either. Certainly, it would have caused Satan some trouble, and there might have been a small falling out between Satan and Michael, but that was natural—they were on opposite sides. Abdiel hadn't put them there.
He took a deep breath. No, he couldn't go on beating himself over an unfortunate event that had been beyond his control. He had to go on, and do what he had to do.
But now there was another problem—Raziel! Naturally, he had listened in on the conversation between Raziel and Yaweh. He was a little surprised that Yaweh hadn't accepted all of the evidence that Abdiel had manufactured for him, but it was too late now. Raziel was going to have to be made harmless.
Ha! All very well to say, but how to do it? Abdiel knew Raziel somewhat, and he would do what he set out to do, if he wasn't stopped. How could he be stopped?
A thought came to Abdiel quite suddenly. But he rejected it as he remembered, once more, Ariel screaming and vanishing. No, that would be wrong, he decided. And he'd certainly never do anything wrong.
Certainly not that.
Mephistopheles, for one, knew where Satan was going. Whatever Ariel had done after he had found Satan, he hadn't been near him by accident. And the presence of Harut confirmed it, if any confirmation was necessary.
Mephistopheles set off at once for the Western Regency. He wasn't sure where he stood on the larger issues, and preferred not to decide until and unless he had to, but there were loyalties and friendships he respected.
Satan would be going to see Leviathan. Mephistopheles might be needed there.
"Not that it solves anything," said Asmodai, "but I'm curious: Why hasn't Yaweh come after us?"
Lilith cocked her head. "He may be so interested in Satan right now that everything else comes second to him. Do we know where Satan is going?"
"I have a guess," said Asmodai. "Mephistopheles mentioned that Harut and Ariel were there. Does that suggest something to you?"
The others spoke with one voice: "Leviathan!"
"That's what I thought."
"So should we go meet them?" asked Lucifer.
"If we're right about Yaweh," said Lilith, "he'll have sent either Michael or Raphael after him."
"No," said Asmodai. "You forget the—what were they?"
"Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones," said Lucifer.
"Right. He'll send them."
"Or more like them," said Lucifer. "He won't want to leave himself undefended. After all, one of us could break in and kick him in the knee."
"Speaking of defending," said Asmodai, "we're going to have to protect Satan from whoever went after him. Will the three of us be enough?"
"I don't know. What do you suggest? Trying to raise our own host?"
"It's a thought," put in Lilith.
"I don't like it," said Asmodai. "It may come to that, but I don't want to push things to it any sooner than we have to."
"Do you have another idea?" asked Lucifer.
"Yes. If you and Lilith can stand to be parted for a while."
"Why?"
"Lilith is the fatest runner I know, and what I have in mind is going to take speed."
'Tell us about it," said Lilith.
Raziel didn't attempt to understand what he had overheard. That would come later.
He had never actually done this sort of thing before, but he felt it was best to learn all he could before trying to understand any of it. Had he thought about it carefully, he would have realized that the stories he had gotten from Michael, Raphael, and Asmodai didn't quite add up. But he wasn't ready to think about that yet. No doubt, when all was said and done, the conversation between Lucifer, Lilith, and Asmodai would be important. But not now.
Now, the only important thing about it was that it told him to head west, toward Leviathan, because that was where things were going to happen.
There were no roads, trails, or paths heading from the center to the Western Regency. This mattered little to Satan or Beelzebub, who enjoyed tramping through woods or over bare rocky ground.
They took their time, and spoke little. Leagues fell slowly before them. From time to time, they tested the air for a trace of the sea, but even Beelzebub couldn't catch the scent.
That was all right. They knew the way, and were in no hurry.
The forces of chaos gathered around them.
Lilith ran north. Her footfalls were a blur, yet her breathing was light and easy.
In a few more hours she would slow to a walk, and after an hour of walking she would stop and rest. Then she would run more.
Time, to her, was everything.
Her friends would be going more slowly, and her enemies as well, but none had so long a distance to travel. She couldn't run in a straight line; this part of Heaven grew gradually more and more hilly, until at last mountains appeared.
To her, these mountains appeared as far lumps, ahead, when her path took her to the top of hills. This happened less often as time went on, for she began to pick her way between the hills to save energy.
Lilith knew the forces of chaos were gathering around her, and responded to them. Fleetest of all the angels of Heaven, she ran on through the day, through the night, through the mountains of Heaven.
Michael took his time, but not because he wanted to. Had he been Beelzebub, he could have followed Satan's scent. Had he been Mephistopheles, he would have immediately noticed the signs of where they turned off the road. Had he been Yaweh, an effort would have brought forth a vision of them, fleeting and imperfect though it was between Waves.
But he was Michael. His eyes weren't the keenest, his feet not the swiftest. But he was determined, which counts for much.
Painfully, he read the signs. After some hours, he became certain of where they had left the road. After a few more hours, he was sure that they were heading west, although not in a straight path. He guessed that they were heading toward Leviathan, but since he wasn't yet sure, he took his time.
He wasn't aware of the gathering of the forces of chaos; he was one.
Abdiel marched at the head of two hundred angels.
Well, perhaps "marched" is too strong a word. He walked, and they walked behind him. Before leaving, Yaweh had told him, "West," so he went west.
He didn't know if he would find Satan, and more than half hoped he wouldn't, but he had his assigned task, and the risks of ignoring it were even greater than the risks of carrying it out.
Behind him, two hundred kept pace, through brush and over rocks, each with a tall sword in his hand. Some looked grim, others looked worried, others excited. They were setting out to capture a legend—a Firstborn. As they walked, the chain and the manacles made clanging sounds, so they couldn't forget why they were there.
It occurred to Abdiel that if Satan (those hands!) or Beelzebub (those teeth!) were waiting for them, he, Abdiel, would be the one in front. A
nd yet, he could hardly lead them from behind. Quite a dilemma.
After some thought, he signaled an angel to come forward. He directed the angel, whose name was Zaphkiel, to walk ahead and keep his eyes open for any traces of Satan. Zaphkiel obeyed without a word.
That much safer for his efforts, Abdiel continued westward.
Mephistopheles negotiated the boulders with lithe efficiency and found level ground again. He surveyed it, pleased with his progress. From here, the way was mostly flat, with occasional rocky areas and scattered small woods until he reached the sea. There were no obstructions in his view of—There was an obstruction. Wasn't there? Way off, a little to the left? Was it moving? Well, well! Who could this be?
He hurried to catch up, noticing for the first time that there was a faint sea-tang in the air.
"We're getting close, I think."
"Aye, milord."
"Another day?"
"Less, methinks. By dusk, perchance."
"Good. It's been a long time since I've seen her. I hear she's pretty much adjusted, though."
"Aye."
"It was horrible at first. Yaweh, Raphael, Michael and I were with her nearly every minute after the Second Wave. She tried to destroy herself once. Lucifer stopped her."
"So I've heard spoken, milord."
They walked a little further.
"Milord?"
"Yes, Beelzebub?"
"It hath been said that them and she were... close, on a time."
Satan smiled. "That was long ago, Beelzebub. Before the Second Wave. We didn't know what we were doing, then, if you know what I mean."
"Aye, milord."
Nearly exhausted, glistening with sweat, thinner, flushed and drawn, Lilith collapsed inside the cavern. Sounds filled the chamber, as of thousands of angels breathing in perfect unison. It was at the end of a tunnel, massive, yet twisted and convoluted, which burrowed down into the mountain.
There was not the least trace of light.
She lay on her back and tried not to close her eyes. She had come so far, so fast. It would be horrible to fall asleep here and be just that much too late. On the other hand, she thought, her face twisting into a mockery of a smile, it would almost be worse if none of this turned out to be necessary.
Lilith had paced herself during the run, so she was not completely exhausted—quite. She rolled over on her stomach, then fought her way to her hands and knees.