“I can’t find a foothold,” a voice shouted below. “I’m going to fall.”
“Catch that shrub. Grab it.”
“Help me!”
A scream echoed up, followed by the sound of something large—likely the soldier’s body—scraping across dry ground. She peeked out in time to see him tumbling down the slope, while Dariel and the other soldier roared with laughter.
“You couldn’t make it a quarter of the way,” Dariel chortled. “You can’t climb it. Well, neither could she.”
For several minutes they continued to talk, but Adryel could not make out what they said.
Then Dariel rose to his feet, staring up the darkened mountainside. It was all she could do not to dart inside the cave and risk him seeing the movement.
“If the others find no sign of her,” Dariel announced, “we’ll come back. Tear their cavern apart.” He swung his arm and tossed a stick upwards. It bounced off the boulder behind which Adryel sat. She clapped her hand across her mouth to stifle a gasp.
“We’ll find her, and I’ll be there when she receives what she deserves.”
After a while, the chatter died away. Peering down, Adryel saw them sprawled on the ground, seeming to be asleep.
She needed rest too. Adryel spread loose stones at the entrance to her cave so any intruder would make noise and awaken her. She moved well down the tunnel, around a bend where she could not be seen from the mouth, and she, too, lay down to sleep. The next morning she hid behind the boulder as the sun rose and she watched Dariel and his soldiers walk toward the garden. Later in the day, they set out to the east, munching on fruit, their search apparently over for the time being. Adryel kept watch until, as night fell, they crested the far hill and were lost to view.
***
Adryel stayed in the cave, fearing that if she walked on the earth, Dariel would find her. If she returned to Hell, someone would betray her, and Dariel would find her. She had nothing to do except to look out at the great plain that stretched before her, and to think.
Days passed. The air became cooler, and soon it would be cold. One morning, she explored the cave more intently. Multiple caverns opened off a long tunnel. The tunnel led her deep into the mountain. She walked slowly to avoid slipping on the smooth floor of the cave as it angled down, stopping when she reached a section every bit as steep as the slope Dariel’s soldier had been unable to climb.
She wiped perspiration from her face. She had expected the tunnel to feel colder as she moved away from the surface. Instead, it was becoming toasty. She finally decided she had descended into the mountain so far that she stood just above the lake of fire. If the floor were to give way, she would surely find herself immersed in the flames. At least she had found a warm place in which to sleep if she needed it now that the nights were getting colder.
One evening, no longer able to stomach the moss that grew inside the cave, she ventured into the garden. A sliver of moon gave enough light to find her way without fear of being seen. She spent all night walking among the trees and lying on the grass. She collected fruit—one type with hard red skin seemed to be in season—placing it in the bag she had brought with her from the humans’ camp. She bathed and washed her robe in the river.
As dawn approached and she began the trek to her cave, she caught sight of a piece of cloth caught on tree near the tumbled-down section of the wall.
“It’s a robe,” she said aloud.
She sank behind the tree and looked about wildly, expecting to find soldiers prepared to pounce, but she saw no one.
“Whose could it be? I sit at the cave’s opening almost every day. I’ve seen no one approach the garden.”
Almost every day.
She would have to be more careful.
She inspected the robe. It was made for someone much taller than she was, an angel, certainly. It was torn at the bottom. Maybe one of the angels from Hell had been exploring.
Not likely. Maybe Dariel or one of his soldiers had left it. They had visited the garden.
She looked about carefully, hoping that’s all it was.
She tied the robe at one end, filled it with dried leaves, added the fruit and nuts she had picked, and carried it with her, like a bag, up the slope. Reaching her cave, she placed the leaves in a corner and covered them with the robe. As she lay on it, she thought of her bed at home, the one she’d shared with Ramael. She cried, then, and resisted the urge to scatter the leaves and toss the robe—the bed was soft, much better than the stone on which she had been sleeping.
Each morning, the sun would peek out above the eastern hills and slowly climb into the sky as if it were trudging up a steep, rocky slope, then it would slide toward the west, until it hid behind the mountains on the far side of the plain. Darkness would descend on the earth and the stars would begin their pilgrimage across the sky. Finally, morning would come and the cycle would repeat.
Herds of antelope grazed on the plain. Elephants, giraffes, lions, even monkeys paraded before her as if they were displaying themselves for her approval.
She looked for angels and humans, but she found neither. She could not believe Michael would call off his search so easily, after so little effort, unless he had known she was listening to him as he spoke to Cain, unless he had planned for Ramael to find her and to terrify her with stories of the lake of fire, unless her true punishment was to spend eternity on the run, constantly looking over her shoulder, fearing Dariel would be in pursuit. . .If that were the case, then Ramael had lied to her.
She shook her head, crying. She raised her face to the sky and whispered, “Tell me he didn’t do that.” Then she caught herself. As if Adonai would answer her prayers anyway. . .
But maybe Ramael had lied to her. Why not? Lord Lucifer had lied to her.
He’d said her brick had been the one to strike Ramael. Perhaps it had, but others had been tossed across the wall at the same time as hers. He had told her Ramael was dead. He had said Lord Michael had refused to help him, had shoved his body into a gutter. He had told her Adonai had allowed it to happen.
All she had done since—the rebellion, tempting the woman in the garden, her cruelty to the angels in Hell, her derision of Adonai, cheering on the murder of Abel—all of it had sprung from his lies.
Did Lucifer truly need her? Is that why he had lied to her?
Perhaps. No one else, Lord Lucifer included, had raised a finger against Adonai since they had been in Hell. Perhaps he felt he did need her and his lies were necessary to secure her assistance.
Or was Dariel right? Had he simply desired her?
When she thought of Lord Lucifer’s lies, when she realized how easily she had believed him, she cried, feeling as if she had been one of the star-struck first-years at the Institute who had hung on Lucifer’s every word—silly little angels who would have believed Palace Square was paved with candy, had he said it was true. She spent an entire morning hurling rocks against the wall of her cave and screaming curses at Lord Lucifer, not caring who heard her.
Finally, she sat at the mouth of her cave and stared vacantly at the plain. If she refused to eat and starved, would anyone ever know? If she hurled herself headfirst down the mountain, would anyone care?
She began to draw again, making her own paper and ink, as she had before. Portraits of the animals, images of the garden, landscapes, and depictions of the angels in Hell, all decorated the cave. She worked for weeks on a portrait of Ramael—the Ramael she remembered, not the one with the blank face and the dead eyes. She placed it beside her bed so she could see it when she lay down to sleep and as soon as she awoke.
The world turned cold, then warm again, then hot, and, finally the cool nights she had known when she had first taken refuge in the cave returned, and she knew an entire year had passed. She visited the garden regularly. She craved meat, but even if she could kill an animal, she would need fire to cook it, and smoke could be seen for great distances.
For several weeks rain fell every day, and the gu
llies that lined the mountains became streams, and then rushing rivers. When she went to the garden she would find tiny creatures, frogs, she’d once heard them called, whose entire lives were spent during the rainy season, hatching when the first drops began to fall and laying their own eggs before they died as the rain stopped.
Early one morning, a dust cloud to the east attracted her attention. On a number of occasions during the dry season she had seen dust storms roll across the valley to the west, beyond the garden, blotting out her view of the hills in the far distance, but the cloud she saw now was smaller and it moved slowly toward her. By midmorning, she could make out what she counted as a full company of soldiers. Dariel led the way and they were marching toward Hell.
Since taking refuge in the cave, she had seen Dariel trek across the plain several times, often with two or three others, but she had never before seen this many soldiers.
The entire company followed Dariel through the portal. Shortly, she heard shouting, and Lord Lucifer’s angels began to emerge. While a few seemed to leave willingly, many struggled against the soldiers who hauled them through the portal, others argued and hurled curses, all of them covered their eyes for protection from the blinding light of the noonday sun.
She could clearly see them sitting in a circle on the ground—Beliel and Maliel, Ami and Mia, all of her former students, Beliel’s recruits, even Robiel and his followers. Hell was emptied, and all of its inhabitants were herded through the portal to Earth, thrown to the ground, and their legs bound to prevent them from running.
Lord Lucifer was the last to appear. As he stepped through the portal, the soldiers reached out for him, but he shrugged their hands from his shoulders and swaggered to the center of the group. Adryel could just glimpse the look of contempt he bestowed on Dariel as he sank to the ground.
Leaving a few guards, Dariel and the others reentered the cavern, searching for her, she supposed, inspecting every cavern, every tunnel, looking behind every rock, sticking their heads inside every crevice.
She wanted to laugh at the seriousness with which he was following his assignment. She was so close. Had two of his soldiers simply scaled the slope, she would have been their prisoner.
The fact that a massive search continued so long after Abel’s murder frightened her. She had expected Dariel to grow weary of failure. She had thought that, since she had not been located in over a year, Michael would conclude she was dead.
It seemed not.
As the day ended, Lord Lucifer and the others were driven back into the cavern, and a stone was placed over the opening. She did laugh as she watched them roll it into place.
Did they truly believe a stone would keep anyone inside? Not that it really mattered. In all of the time she had spent at the mouth of her cave, she had twice observed Ami venturing out, whether in search of Adryel or to torment the humans she did not know. No one else had even stepped through the portal. Certainly Lord Lucifer had not come looking for her.
Adryel had tried to plan for the future, but she knew little of the earth, where she might go, where she might hide. Was Dariel searching everywhere, or did he only search near the portal, returning time after time?
She frequently dreamed of Ramael and the life they’d had. His eyes had been so empty when he had told her she was dead to him. Was he happy now? Had he paired with another? Did he wonder why she had not been found? Did he think of her at all?
She had tried to tell him how sorry she felt. She had wanted to explain what had happened, to tell him she had been wrong about Lord Michael, about Adonai, and about Lord Lucifer. She had wanted him to know she loved him.
As she watched the soldiers march away, Adryel decided that telling him all this was the only thing that mattered to her any longer. She needed to see Ramael, and she needed to go to him on her own, not to catch a glimpse of him as Dariel dragged her through the palace to be judged and sentenced by Lord Michael, not to look up at him from the lake of fire as he stood beside Lord Michael, watching.
The angels had arrived so quickly after Cain’s unacceptable offering that their portal must be near the humans’ settlement, most likely in the strange little hill where Mari had seen them. She could leave a message at the portal, a promise of surrender, but only to Ramael.
Or she could use the portal herself, and find Ramael in the city.
***
The next afternoon, Adryel gathered those things she wanted to take on her journey to the city. She did not have much she valued—her water flask, her bag, and her books. During her time in Hell, she had kept an account of what had happened and what she had done. During the last year, she had recorded her thoughts about Earth, about Hell, about Lord Lucifer and Adonai, about herself. Perhaps someone would want to read them. Her drawings, she left behind. Except the one of Ramael. That she folded carefully and tucked inside her bag. If things did not go the way she hoped, at least they might allow her to hold on to this picture as she watched the lake fires rise and fall around her for all eternity.
As night fell, Adryel picked her way down the slope and set out for the garden. She knew the route well and, even in the dark, easily found the spot where the wall had collapsed. She walked deep into the garden, stopping beside the river.
As she passed the wall, the moon had risen large and round, and she could see the river and the trees along the bank almost as clearly as if it were day.
Her robe was filthy, and it stunk, so she slipped it off and scrubbed it in the river, hanging it over a tree limb to dry. The smell washed away, and much of the dirt, but she could still see the mud stain on her right knee. It had refused to come clean even though it had been washed repeatedly since she had crawled under the pile of straw to hide from Dariel. The robe itself was a dingy gray now, rather than the sparkling white it had been when she had lived in the city.
Adryel lay on the grass to sleep. She planned to spend the next day in the garden and to set out toward the east after the sun set. She expected to see no one, since the soldiers had just left, and she knew of places she could hide if anyone did appear.
She left the garden at nightfall and traveled quickly, wanting to pass the humans’ settlement before daybreak, since she would not be welcome there. She would need to locate the portal once she reached the hill. Even if she had guessed correctly about the location, she feared it would be well hidden since the angels would not want the humans—or someone like her—to pass through it, even if only by accident.
It was still dark as she approached the settlement, and she noticed a dull glow over the crest of the hill. Circling around, rather than over it‒‒she had intended to avoid the settlement anyway—she spotted an encampment. Dariel’s soldiers had not returned to the city. They slept just outside of the settlement, near the small rise where she believed the portal to be.
She stared at the encampment. The group was even larger than the company she had observed a few days earlier. It appeared to be a full battalion, four companies, at least. Dariel was quite serious about finding her.
Adryel glanced back at the settlement. The sheep were gone. Rotting stalks of grain were bent double in the field. One of the tents had collapsed and a couple of blankets lay balled up where the fire pit had been. The altar was in ruins.
She hurried to the settlement and entered the closest tent, the one that had belonged to Cain’s brother. Reaching at the opening, she froze, listening. She detected no voice, no movement, none of the sounds made by one who is asleep. The tent seemed empty.
Pulling open the curtain which hung across the entrance, she peered inside. Most of the interior was shrouded in shadow, and she could make out only a couple of large clay bowls and several blankets piled just inside. She stepped in, tugging the curtain back across the opening, hiding her from any soldier who might pass by. As she stood in the dark, wondering how she could possibly hunt for the portal in the midst of a camp of armed soldiers who were hunting for her, soft laughter floated from the shadows at the rear of the tent.
Adryel dropped the bag she was carrying and whirled around. She stared into the darkness, straining to see who was hiding there. Her muscles were tense, her right hand raised, ready to strike.
“Well, praise Adonai. You’re not dead.” Ami’s sarcastic voice made her wince. “Of all places, what are you doing here, Mistress?”
Adryel took a deep breath. Ami would willingly call the soldiers’ attention.
“Where should I be? Cornered in Hell like a rat? What are you doing here? And them,” she jerked her head toward the soldiers, “what are they doing here?”
“I’m following the soldiers. They are looking for you. Why two days ago. . .”
“They spent most of the day tearing Hell apart. I know.”
Ami raised her eyebrows questioningly.
“I was not far away. I watched all of you huddled at the foot of the mountain, blinded by the light, perspiration pouring from your bodies, nothing to eat, nothing to drink. . .Dariel is so kind isn’t he?”
Ami didn’t reply.
“Why are they still here?”
“They are here because you outdid yourself. I’ll tell you, Lord Lucifer was quite impressed when he learned of your exploits, impressed and so pleased. I was too. Truly.” She chuckled. “They really want to find you. Make an example of you so none of us will ever be tempted to play with the humans. Did you truly sleep with one of them?” She smirked. “Must have been an adventure. . .Dariel was quite vexed when he didn’t find you, and he has returned to the city for further instructions.”
“How do you know all of this?”
“Let’s just say I’ve met some of the soldiers here and I’ve been very, very nice to them.”
“Why are you following them?”
“Why? They must have a portal. I want to know where it is.” Ami looked at Adryel questioningly. “And you. Why are you here?”
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