by Sarah Mussi
Only ten days.
In ten days, Marcus would still be recovering from his wounds. He’d be nowhere near repenting.
Ten days.
He hadn’t even said he wanted to.
But even if he did want to, he was still going to need to turn his life around. How was he going to achieve that in under a fortnight? I opened my mouth to protest, but shut it again just as quickly. No un-kinder sin than ingratitude. Marcus had been given a second chance. For that alone I should be truly thankful. Amen. I was just going to have to make it work.
Straight away I started to plan. Repentance in word and deed. He’d have to go the whole way if I was going to get him into Heaven. Not just a quick ‘I’m sorry’ before Passing Over. That would only get him into Purgatorium. Even if I could swing it and get him through the Twelfth Pearly, we really should try for an early audience with St Peter. Not easy. But was it possible?
I thought about it.
Firstly I needed to get him to a priest or a pastor, a qualified representative of God on Earth at least: he could confess, receive absolution, be assigned penance: Dominus noster Jesus Christus te absolvat: Amen. That would be a great start. I’d explain it all to him; that bit should be reasonably easy.
Secondly he was going to have to forswear wrongdoing. That was going to be a bit more tricky: no more girls, no more crime (definitely no more girls), no more alcohol, no more meeting up with his gang and absolutely no more girls. All straightforward, but for some reason it made me terribly nervous.
The next bit was a lot more difficult: he needed to make recompense. I flipped my mind back to the exam paper I’d done on ‘Penitence, Recompense & the Eye of the Needle: Advanced Paper, Higher Tier’.
Access to Heaven through Penitent Recompense can be demonstrated in three ways. Please discuss:
Sacrificial and noble action
Selflessness
Taking vows of chastity, poverty, obedience.
Yes, he could show he’d changed, either by doing something noble, like saving a life by giving up his own; or by doing a lot of selfless acts over a longer period. Sadly, there wasn’t any time for the latter, and hopefully, no opportunity for the former: it was going to have to be chastity, poverty and obedience; starting by giving away all his worldly goods and ill-gotten gains (plus of course absolutely and completely abstaining from girls).
But then came the part that made me the most nervous of all: what if – even if I got him to agree repentance was a good idea – what if he still didn’t really want to do it? I mean, really do it.
That was the catch: Free Will.
If not for Free Will, I could have commanded him to. I could have flashed my eyes, blasted him with a few thunderbolts, sent hailstones to rain around him, until he did do it. That would have done the trick. It would’ve been a lot easier too.
But God had decreed repentance must be done freely and willingly. And the contract had decreed it must be done before midnight on the last day of October.
It was a lot.
One Hell of a lot.
‘Hey, Shanara,’ trilled Larry. ‘You look far away. Sweet thing, what is it? Don’t let this place get you down.’
I looked up at him and smiled, but not with the same warmth as before. He’d definitely said, ‘three weeks’. And it really wasn’t OK.
‘I just wish I had a little longer,’ I said.
‘You mean, you’ll be needing an Extension on the Extension?’ he joked.
I think it was a joke.
‘It’ll cost ya,’ he winked.
I didn’t laugh. I glanced across at Joey. Another life prematurely snatched? Another person sent here to suffer for Marcus? My feathers curled at the thought.
Poor Joey. There were two dark shapes on either side of him now, dragging him away from the girls. One of the shapes whipped round and I saw its demonic face, red eyes, gaping mouth. As he was led away, Joey glanced over his shoulder at me. His face stricken. His eyes pleading. All his toughness gone.
Even as I watched, a blood-curdling scream broke from the far shores of Styx. There was a rush of smoke, and the stench of singed hair and burning flesh belched out across the river. Someone tried to make a run for it. Another soul who only a moment earlier had been waiting patiently joined in.
The scream came again, nightmarish in its pitch. And before you could say ‘Our Father’ the whole centre portion of the queue went berserk and started running. Demons sprang from nowhere. They pounced on the souls trying to escape, sank claws and teeth into thin spirity bodies. They dragged them back, kicking, wailing, struggling.
I trembled. If I should fail? Could I leave Marcus here in less than two weeks? I remembered with a shudder all the stories I’d heard, told by candlelight, late at night, whispered under the arches of the quadrangles in the Cloisters. Stories of the things that demons did to souls in Hell: of how far a soul could be made to suffer; of the Devil, dark and squat, his horns, curved and sharp, chuckling over cauldrons of blood, of souls roasting in vats . . .
I looked again at Joey. His eyes still pleading, still begging.
Could I face that look from Marcus?
An idea struck me: I could ask Larry. Maybe he could recommend someone to mentor Marcus? After all he had said he was an Independent Celestial Advisor, and could broker all sorts of Heavenly deals. Surely saving a soul was the most important sort of Heavenly deal there was?
I turned to Larry. I outlined my idea: someone constantly at Marcus’s side to keep him on the straight and narrow, talk sensibly to him about his choices, persuade him to consider repentance, maybe even show him visions of Styx (not of the girls in the queue obviously, but glimpses of the pits in Hell where the damned were roasted, echoes of the screaming), to hammer home the point?
‘Hmm,’ said Larry. ‘Not impossible.’
It wasn’t a very confident Yes, I Can Do It, but his eyes did light up at the suggestion. I held my breath. I needed all the help I could get.
‘I think I might be able to conjure up something,’ Larry said.
I heaved a great sigh of relief. ‘I’ll pay, of course,’ I said.
Another scream rent the air, another puff of stinking smoke spewed out across Styx.
‘Oh yes, you’ll pay all right,’ said Larry, tweaking my cheek.
Serafina 11
I was so glad to leave the shores of Styx. I wanted to get as far away from it as possible: the fetid river, the wilting foliage, the awful knowledge of torture going on just over the water: the burning, the stretching, the slicing, the tearing of sinew, the breaking of bones. For even though the souls of the dead had left their corporeal bodies behind, they still had their ethereal bodies that could be made to suffer. My spirits drooped. The heat oppressed me. I felt miserable about Joey. I tried to banish the image of Marcus dragged here, abandoned to those demons. But as I winged my way back towards the mountains, towards Devil’s Pass, a different terror overcame me.
A vision of me led here in human shape, a trembling girl, dark-eyed, pale-faced, horror-struck. A vision of ghouls laying hold on my spirit, leading me away to the river. I trembled. My wings faltered. I beat the air and plummeted ten metres. I landed, shaking, on a rocky promontory.
But try as I might I couldn’t shake the image off. Yet how could it be? Was I human – to be divided from my soul by death? How could an angel ever be cast into the fires of Hell? Angels don’t die.
But the thought didn’t console me. Instead I clung shivering to the ledge. The vision was so clear. As in a nightmare, I saw my own eyes looking up at me, as two dark shapes pinned my arms and led me away.
And then a sad thought struck me: yes, angels can never be thrown into the fires of Hell. We don’t fear death. We don’t have to. Yet mortals such as Marcus must face that terror, must lie awake at night imagining it, must know beyond doubt that their lives will end and everything they love will be snatched away from them.
And this was God’s creation?
Should I thank Heaven I wasn’
t mortal, then? But if I did, how could I ever hope to do God’s work? How could I hope to save the souls of the damned when my immortality set me apart? Was I cursed to be an angel? Doomed never to understand the meaning of life?
For a split second I hated being immortal. On what authority did I judge those humans lining up by the ferry? If I were human who knows what choices I might have to make. I might be worse than the lowliest one of them.
I shuddered and curled my wings around me. What thoughts. Was I not blessed to be exempt from such a fate?
Did I say angels could never be thrown into the fires of Hell?
But wasn’t that exactly what God had done to Lucifer?
For an instant I felt a terrible sympathy with the Devil. To be thrown by the hand you love into that. No wonder he wanted to inflict the same on mankind. No wonder he waged eternal war on Heaven.
But why by the stars above was I thinking all this? It must be the effect of these vile blasts from Hell.
I should get to Marcus quickly and wholly impress upon him the terrifying fate in store if he didn’t do exactly as I said. And I must hurry.
Straight away I took to the air.
I was so preoccupied that I hardly noticed two shapes fall into flight beside me. When I looked up one of them dropped back out of view. The other was the Seraph I’d met on the road going down. I remembered her now. She was called Raquel.
She smiled at me and said, ‘How was your day? Mine was crazy. I was on Road Call. There were so many souls to take to every kind of destination, I nearly got mixed up.’
I bit my lip, swallowed my worries and said, ‘Well, next time, don’t forget you can ask for an Extension, if you’re really in a muddle.’
‘Extensions?’ Raquel said. ‘What’re they?’ (Yes, I did remember her now. Genesis House. Cell 44. It hadn’t been trumpet practice at all – it’d been the Thunderbolt Championships.)
I drew a deep breath and waved my feather tips vaguely. I decided to keep Marcus out of the conversation. I told her how a friend I’d known – aeons ago-ish – had met an angel, a Celestial Broker, on a business trip, and learned about Extensions.
‘Bit like having a credit card, I suppose,’ said Raquel. ‘You know, buy now, pay later?’
‘I suppose so,’ I said. (I imagined having a credit card. I’d like a gold one with a super-shiny little chip on it. And I’d have my very own PIN number too.)
‘What did you say your friend’s name was?’
Had I mentioned a name? Well, I was going to have to now, wasn’t I? ‘Harry,’ I said.
‘Never heard of Extensions,’ she said. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes,’ I continued. ‘I’d never heard of them before either, but Harry said apparently loads of angels do them, so I guess it’s normal. Do you think if you ever did one, you ought to report it to St Peter?’
Raquel looked at me and rolled her eyes. ‘Report it to St Peter!’ she snorted. ‘Like, only if you’re mental, unless you adore long lectures on obscure trivia that happened millennia ago, in Israel probably. You know what he’s like. Anyway, you off duty now?’
We’d left the wilted plains behind and were winging back up towards the poppy fields.
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘Want to come over to mine later? I’m hosting an amazing choir – you know, a proper ensemble and everything. Do say yes!’
‘Oh yes,’ I said without thinking. Why had I said that? I was going to see Marcus. It might take ages for me to get back to Heaven. I didn’t have time for garden parties.
‘Great,’ said Raquel. ‘It’ll get you out of those dreary Cloisters. I’ll introduce you to everyone and you can bounce the idea of Extensions around and see what they think.’ She paused. ‘I’ve never heard of any Harry, actually.’ She laughed like it was totally funny for her not to know someone.
‘He’s in business,’ I said.
‘I know all the Senior Team, all the Archangels, everyone in the City, really . . .’ She was obviously puzzled she couldn’t place him.
‘He’s got his own company,’ I said, suddenly. ‘I remember now. Claim Souls Direct.’
‘Oh,’ she said. ‘That kind of business.’
Serafina 12
I left Raquel by the Twelfth Gate, promising to see her later, and hurried to Christ the King’s Hospital. In a heartbeat, I flicked my wings and was inside Marcus’s room. It was a lovely private room. I was so glad. I wanted the best of everything for him.
There he lay as beautiful as ever. His dark hair tousled on the starched pillow. His long eyelashes brushing his cheek. There were his sweet full lips. My heart stopped. I caught my breath. There was his hand curled into a loose fist, slung outstretched in his sleep, as if even in his dreams he were waging war on the universe.
In the chair opposite sat his mother, her face crumpled, eyes bleary, knuckles pressed into a clenched ball in her lap. She couldn’t see me, and I didn’t change that. Anyway, she wasn’t looking at anything. She could barely see beyond her own misery.
I went over to her. I touched her on the hand and sent her the balm of oblivion, not permanently, of course, just so she could get some sleep.
Then I stood beside Marcus trying to decide how I should wake him. How I longed to smooth back his tangled hair, to run my finger down the sculpted lines of his cheek, to take his hand.
I tried to work out exactly what to say. How to broach the subject of Joey, for a start. Imagining how it could all go terribly wrong.
ME: Hi, just stopped by to see how you were doing.
MARCUS: Not too bad. Where’s my crew?
ME: Ah, yes, they’re probably in church.
MARCUS: In church?
ME: Arranging the funeral.
MARCUS: Why? I’m still alive.
ME: Yes, but I killed Joey off to keep you that way.
How was I going to tell him that? Not only was his friend dead, but it was all my fault and the reason he was still alive. I cringed. I really needed to think this through.
But should I wake him at all? He really didn’t look very well. All around his bed, machines beeped. Above him a bag of blood dripped slowly through a tube into his arm. He wasn’t going to be well enough to be told anything for ages.
Could I perform a miracle, then? I’d done Miracle Working as an Option at the Cloisters and got A* on the term paper. I could heal Marcus, I knew I could. It would be a textbook case. Nothing difficult or supernatural, not like turning water into wine, just hastening up healing time in normal tissue. But dare I?
I held my breath. If I was caught doing miracles, I’d probably have my wings stripped, be cast out of Heaven and sent to do five hundred years’ Community Service in Purgatorium.
I didn’t dare. Not a full miracle anyway, but I could do a Healing Hands Blessing. It would certainly speed up his recovery a bit.
I extended my hands over his heart and lightly touched his wounds. I let the power flow through me and whispered a full consecration. Immediately his breathing eased.
Then I just sat there perched on the end of his bed, nervously twiddling with a loose wing feather. He wasn’t going to like the repentance thing. I knew it. I was going to have to be very careful. Timing was everything.
And right now was definitely not the right time.
I left the hospital. I’d got no idea what to do next. It was already late afternoon, and I’d been away from Heaven for nearly twenty-four hours. Twenty-four hours. Now there were only nine days left till Halloween.
With a troubled heart, I set out for the long journey up to Heaven, for the Pearly Gates and home.
But the minute I’d climbed the Staircase and got through the last Pearly, I knew something was wrong. Very wrong.
Firstly a strange new scent wafted on the evening air. It was faint at first and hard to place, but as soon as I passed through the Jasper Arch and on to the Golden Promenade, I knew what it was: the odour of diesel engines, of boot polish and cold metal. The smell of God’s Army.
Quickly I looked around for a newspaper. Usually they’re everywhere. But today no cherub flitted by with copies tucked under an arm. I threw a coin into a fountain by the huge pieta in the Virgin Mary Square, and I made a wish. But no paper plopped into my hand.
Where was everyone? The best I could get was a half-torn copy of the Daily Trumpet, a terrible publication produced by the Saved. The headlines read: GOD’S ARMY FIGHT BACK and WE’LL THRASH LUCY WITH CODE AMBER and SATAN’S CHALLENGE SPECIAL ISSUE – FULL STORY STRAIGHT FROM HELL.
I sighed. Half the stuff printed in the Trumpet was rubbish. If only I could get a copy of the Celestial Herald. Hastily I hurried through side streets to the Cloisters. Somebody was bound to have one there.
Over the cobbles I sped, until I reached the main arch to the entrance. Then I barged through the huge doors, slamming them behind me. The place seemed completely empty. I couldn’t even hear any singing.
‘Hello? Anyone there?’
The ambulatory was deserted. My friend Celandine’s cell was locked. I hammered on her door just in case she was resting. Nothing. From far away I heard a murmuring. Had everyone gone to Devotions? Already?
I raced down the corridors and round the quadrangle to my cell. I let myself in, and bolted the door behind me. When I was safely inside I went all shivery. We were on Code Amber. God’s Army was bombing the Abyss. I shook my head. I didn’t understand.
Why couldn’t God just meet up with the Devil? Weren’t they once friends? Maybe if they both said sorry then the Devil could stop being so angry. I couldn’t see how a terror campaign was going to help anything. Plus God’s Army scare me, more than Satan. I probably shouldn’t say that – after all I’ve never met Satan, so I don’t know what he’s capable of.