Lucifer saw that she was even more beautiful in this memory than he had remembered. He watched the expression on his own face as she spoke to him, petting the dog that had again dropped the stick at his feet.
“Her name is Brandy,” she told him, and they started to talk.
He wasn’t sure exactly when the Lucifer Morningstar of old—the angel of Heaven who had led a revolt against his Creator and been cast down to live amongst the very creatures that he despised—started to die.
But he guessed that it was right around the time when the beautiful woman told him her name.
“I’m Taylor,” she said, extending her delicate hand to Lucifer.
“Taylor Corbet.”
CHAPTER TEN
Mallus looked down at the lines of the sigils tattooed upon his chest, and at the new pink scar that broke them.
“It appears that you’ve healed quite nicely,” Kraus said, leaning in to examine the wound.
“With your help, of course,” Mallus said. “And for that I thank you.”
Kraus bowed, stepping away to stand in waiting against the wall.
Mallus dipped the point of a needle into a puddle of black ink that he had made by breaking open a ballpoint pen. Then he went about repairing the sigils, hoping to restore the magick that had once flowed from them. Mallus dug the needle into the fresh scar tissue, pushing the ink below the new skin.
“Does that hurt?”
Mallus looked up to see the Nephilim Aaron observing him.
He dipped the needle into the black ink once more. “Not really,” he said, poking the scar tissue again. “But when it does hurt, I just think of the pain if the Agents find me, as it will be much more permanent.”
Mallus paused, staring at the boy. He’d heard about this Aaron Corbet. He could see the resemblance to his father almost immediately in the way that he carried himself, the way he fought in battle. He had no doubt that this was the Morningstar’s son, but Mallus saw that the Nephilim had acquired his mother’s traits as well.
Taylor.
It had been a very long time since he’d last thought of her, the human who had somehow managed to quell the Morningstar’s fury.
The human who had transformed Mallus as well.
How is it possible? he thought, continuing to poke at his flesh with the needle, injecting the ink beneath his thick rope of scar tissue. She had been human, something that he had despised with every iota of his divine form, but still, somehow, she’d manage to touch them both.
Bringing the needle back to the ink, he glanced at Aaron, unable to stop the flood of memories that poured over him.
Mallus had still been working for the Architects. He’d actually been searching for his former leader, the Morningstar, and had found him in a human city, in a park. He’d been just about to make contact, when he’d seen the Morningstar and the human woman together.
At first Mallus had believed she was some sort of wicked enchantress. How else could she have controlled and manipulated one of God’s mightiest angels? And then he’d realized there was no magick present.
She was just a woman.
How was it possible? Mallus wondered again, continuing to repair the sigil that would hide him from those he’d once served with relish.
“That’s Archon magick,” said a woman’s voice, interrupting his reverie.
Mallus looked up from his work to see a female Nephilim enter the room, walking with the help of a cane. She was accompanied by a young man. At first glance Mallus thought the woman rather old, but then he caught a whiff of magick upon her. It was slowly eating her alive.
“Malakim, actually,” Mallus corrected her, making reference to the powerful angelic beings that had taught the Archons to use the forces that would define their magick.
The woman moved closer, her eyes following the lines etched upon his flesh.
“These are amazing,” she said, reaching to touch the marks with slightly trembling fingers.
“This is Lorelei,” Aaron introduced her. “She’s our resident magick user.”
“But for how much longer?” Mallus asked softly so that only she would hear. He watched her eyes. A tiny rodent watched him from beneath lengths of the woman’s snow-white hair.
“Long enough to do what I have to,” she said, meeting his stare.
This one was strong, but fading fast.
“And him?” Mallus asked Aaron as he looked away from Lorelei at the man who had entered the room with her.
“That’s Dusty,” Aaron replied. “He’s new here.”
Mallus studied the young man, not sure what to make of him. That one would bear watching.
Mallus turned his attention back to the task at hand, restoring his sigils. It felt as though they could be working again, but he wasn’t completely sure.
A yellow dog trotted into the room, followed by three more Nephilim, one being the boy who had brought him here. Mallus caught a whiff of something coming from the animal, something that aroused his senses. Something had happened—was happening—to this animal.
“This is Vilma, Melissa, and you already know Cameron.” Aaron introduced the Nephilim, then motioned toward the dog. “And that’s Gabriel.”
Mallus set the needle down and dabbed at his chest with a damp cloth. What an interesting lot. “Are we all here?” the angel asked, knowing full well that there was still at least one more to arrive.
“Where’s Verchiel, Gabriel?” Aaron asked the yellow dog.
“I told him you wanted to see him,” the dog growled in his canine tongue.
Mallus could feel Verchiel’s approach before he’d even appeared. It came as a sudden electricity that made Mallus’s every instinct cry out to flee.
And then the angel emerged from behind his wings to stand in the corner of the room, glowering at them all.
“Glad you could make it,” Aaron said with sarcasm.
“What do you want?” Verchiel asked with a sneer.
“We need to talk,” Aaron said, looking at them all.
“I don’t think that’s wise,” Verchiel said, directing his attention to Mallus. “Especially with that one present.”
Mallus chose not to respond. The former Powers leader was seemingly still upset with Mallus for not ending his life when he’d had the chance. But if Mallus had done that, then this gathering would never have taken place, and the Architects’ machine would have rolled on.
“That one has a name,” Aaron announced. “His name is Mallus, and just a short while ago he was attacked in the infirmary.”
Lorelei immediately reacted. “But the defenses weren’t—”
“Somehow it found its way through the defenses,” Aaron cut in.
“Your defenses are nothing to an Agent,” Mallus announced.
Aaron walked over to the corner of the room, where something had been concealed beneath a blanket. He reached down, dragged the object into the center of the room, and then pulled away the cover for all to see.
Mallus watched as they saw the face of their enemy—their true enemy—for the first time. Gabriel growled.
“Who is he?” Melissa asked.
“Dude looks like a caveman,” Cameron said, laughing nervously at the sight of the corpse.
“That’s because he is,” Mallus responded. “Or at least he was, until his masters had their way with him.”
That got their attention.
“Masters?” Lorelei questioned. “And who might they be?”
“Ah,” Mallus said, pausing for a moment to consider what he was about to do. He studied them all, their expressions tense with anticipation. They hadn’t a clue as to what was happening around them, what was really happening to the world, and who—what—were responsible.
So why now? Mallus thought. Why not just keep going as he had been, hiding from his former employers, hating what was happening, but powerless to act.
Why should he risk so much now? Was there even a point?
His thoughts again drifted back to
that day in the park, to Lucifer and the woman—Taylor. He guessed that that’s where it had started, and now it would come to an end, with Aaron.
Mallus stared at the Nephilim, marveling at what he sensed in that one. Was Aaron Corbet to be humanity’s chance to survive?
They were all waiting for Mallus’s response.
“What do you know about the Architects?” Mallus finally asked.
There was no turning back now.
AUGUST, A.D. 79
POMPEII
Mount Vesuvius had erupted for two days. The air over where the great Roman city of Pompeii had stood was now filled with choking clouds of poisonous gas and ash.
Mallus found himself drawn to the scene of this great disaster.
To the site of more than two thousand human deaths.
He had flown through the shroud of ash spewed out by the volcano, listening to the sounds as the inhabitants had cried out to their gods for salvation. But there had been no one to help them as the air had become superheated and their bodies had been buried under ash and pumice.
The ash clung to him too, so he soared above the disaster and simply shook off the white-hot volcanic spew like a dog shaking off a summer’s rain.
He liked to think of these kinds of disasters as being God’s way of expressing His displeasure with humanity. But deep down Mallus knew that it wasn’t true. This was just a natural disaster.
And he should learn to enjoy it for what it was, and the damage that it caused.
As Mallus walked atop the cooling layers of lava, he tried to visualize the city as it once had been, where the bathhouses had once stood, where the markets had teemed. Now there was nothing. Everything had been buried beneath a blizzard of black snow, twenty feet deep.
Through the thick haze Mallus caught sight of movement. He knew that nothing human could have survived the still blazing temperatures and air inhospitable to fragile lungs. He summoned a sword of fire.
Using his wings to fan away the gas and smoke, Mallus charged at his unseen foe, eager to be the first to strike. He swung out with his sword of fire, aiming for where he imagined his enemy might be, and found his blade of divine flame captured in a powerful grip.
Mallus attempted to pull back his weapon, but it was held fast. His wings continued to beat the air, and finally the thick, poisonous clouds parted to reveal the strangest of sights.
It was human in shape, but it appeared to be made entirely of ash—the same ash that now hid Pompeii. Thinking quickly, Mallus brought forth another weapon, a battle mace, and smashed his opponent’s featureless face with all of his heavenly might.
The ash broke away, to reveal a blazing red eye peering out from the blackened eye socket of a human skull.
What madness is this? the fallen angel thought, just as the ashen figure latched on to his throat with its other hand and drew him close.
“Will you serve the makers of the future?” rattled a voice from somewhere deep within the attacker’s charred throat.
Mallus spread his wings, struggling to free himself from the painful grip upon his neck, but the figure held fast and slammed him against the still cooling ground.
“Will you serve the makers of the future?” it asked again.
“You speak in riddles, monster,” Mallus rasped, still fighting to be free. “I serve only my own interests now that I have been abandoned by God.”
The single eye burned brightly. “Will you serve the makers of the future?”
Understanding that this thing that held him wielded enough power to end his existence, Mallus had no choice but to answer, giving his enigmatic attacker what it sought, in hopes of gaining an opportunity to escape.
“Yes,” Mallus hissed. “I will serve the makers… the makers of the future.”
In an instant his attacker was gone, and the still seething layers of ash beneath his back began to crumble, giving way to his weight. Mallus fell.
He tried to slow his descent, but his wings were useless as he continued to plummet. It felt as though he were falling for days; the passage of time suddenly had no meaning.
Then as quickly as his descent had begun, it stopped. Mallus found himself standing in a world of total darkness. Even the divine fire that coursed through his veins could shed no light upon his surroundings. The flames that he summoned were quickly suffocated by an all-encompassing dark.
After a time the infinity of blackness was all that he knew, all that he could remember. He felt himself being taken apart, atom by atom.
And just as he felt his life about to cease, a voice called out.
“Will you serve the makers of the future?”
“Yes,” he answered, his voice strained and dry after days… months… years… of disuse. He thought he had answered the question immediately, although time had become meaningless in the black of nothing, and he realized that it might have taken a century or more for him to respond.
A golden light then shone upon him, bathing him in a warmth akin to the praise of the Lord God Almighty, and Mallus felt the atoms of his form taken from the shadows and reassembled, not as he had been before…
But better.
An envoy of a new beginning… an agent of the future.
From the darkness they emerged, like multiple suns rising to chase away the eternal dark. These globes of golden fire were covered in multiple sets of staring all-seeing eyes, and these eyes were all turned to Mallus.
“We are the Architects, and the future is ours to build.” The spheres spoke in unison. Their voices sounded like the most beautiful of heavenly choirs raised in exaltation.
Mallus could not take his eyes from the magnificent beings. He had heard of the Architects but had always questioned their existence, as did all the angels of Heaven.
The Architects were supposedly the very first of God’s creations, produced to aid Him in the task of plotting out the universe. Once they had served their purpose, the Almighty had reabsorbed the Architects into His being. Then He was said to have used them in the creation of the angels themselves.
But somehow the Architects had emerged again, and Mallus reveled in the presence of their power.
“The Architects have watched you, angel, and have seen the depths to which you have fallen.” Their voices rose in a cacophony of sound. “But we have also seen your potential.”
Mallus was speechless, and all he could do was stare.
“We see in you an ability to serve us.”
“Yes,” Mallus said, his voice barely a whisper.
“The ability to perform as one of our Agents out in the world… to serve a greater goal…”
“Yes,” Mallus said again.
The orbs of fire continued to spin in place, but the thousands of eyes were still fixed upon him.
“But first you must prove yourself worthy to serve our lofty goals.”
“Anything!” Mallus screamed, for whatever they asked of him would be better than the eternal blackness in which he’d been lost for so long.
“Your task is of the utmost importance to our cause,” the Architects said.
“Tell me,” Mallus begged.
“There is an angel second only to the Lord God,” they said. “He is the Metatron, and he is God’s voice, God’s will in the world.”
Mallus waited to hear what they required of him.
“You must kill him for us.”
* * *
Closing his eyes, Satan reached out to the shadows around the temple and beyond, entwining himself in their fabric, making himself a part of the darkness.
He knelt within the place of worship. The Sisters stood in a circle around him, their hands clasped together, lending him their unnatural strength.
The Darkstar allowed his essence to permeate the ancient rock and soil deep beneath the churning sea that had held the church in its grasp. Then he spread his arms and wings and tossed back his head as he forced his will upon the ocean landscape.
He was the rock and mud of the seemingly bottomless tr
ench, and the rock, mud, and trench was he. With a grunt of exertion Satan flexed his muscles, feeling the underwater landscape respond in kind. Careful to not damage his place of worship, he used his connection to the ocean floor and raised the temple on a volcanic plume of molten rock.
Though the crushing waters sought to enter the long-buried place of worship, he kept himself and the Sisters dry by weaving a barrier of darkness around the structure as it slowly pushed through the murky depths on a growing platform of cooling igneous rock.
The ocean around the rising church did not care for Satan’s dark influence and attempted to show its displeasure, unleashing angry seismic activity to thwart his actions. It was as if the ocean floor had gone to war. Mountains of rock jutted up through the strata as the sea grew black with swirling sediments.
The rushing waters around the church were like the chaos Satan imagined for the world when its occupants truly learned of his existence. Life upon the planet would either accept his omnipotence or pay a horrible price.
An island of smoldering black rock emerged from the roiling waters to present itself to an unsuspecting world. The bubble of darkness that had covered the expansive church disintegrated in the fading sunlight as the temple was again exposed to the air.
“It is risen,” Satan said within the halls of his church.
The Sisters of Umbra laughed with joy, raising their hands and bowing their hooded heads in praise.
“Praise be, it is risen,” they said as one.
Satan was weary from his exertion, but euphoric. Now everyone would know of him. He no longer had to hide in the shadows of the frozen earth.
The new lord and master had arrived.
And long would he reign.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
So these Architects,” Aaron asked into the silence of the room, after Mallus had paused in his tale. “Are they angels, or something else?”
Mallus opened his mouth to answer, but Verchiel interrupted him. “They’re neither,” the former Powers leader said. “They don’t exist. They’re fairy tales fabricated by overly creative minds to explain things that are unexplainable.”
Mallus turned his gaze to the angel. “And yet I served them for centuries.”
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