“I don’t know if there is forgiveness for someone like me.” He raised a fist and extended a finger, one at a time, as he recounted his sins. “I’ve taken a life; I’ve helped demons discover the means to reignite a war I still don’t understand; I was naive and participated in a battle in which I could have taken even more lives, if Alan hadn’t stopped me.”
Kyle paused to take a breath. The night was too dark to tell whether tears filled his eyes, but Alan saw Kyle drag a sleeve across his face. “After the fight, I woke up alone in a desert filled with dead bodies, ones that were there because I’d trusted the wrong people. I’ve been on my own for the last month, trying to make sense of it all. I’ve even thought about killing myself …”
Alan stood stunned by Kyle’s words. The man before him spoke as if he sat in a confession booth on a Sunday morning before service.
In the short month since the battle, Kyle had grown both physically and emotionally, and Alan was unsure what he felt for his counterpart at the moment. Was it anger, or compassion? A month before, rage would have been an easy solution to his current problem. Maybe Kyle wasn’t the only one who was changing.
“So, no.” Kyle had dropped his hand and now stared past them into the dark. “I’m not looking for forgiveness. I wouldn’t expect sympathy. I just want some answers.”
“And you came here to find them?” Danielle asked, arms now crossed over her chest.
Kyle nodded, directing his attention back to them, and more specifically, to Alan. “I … I’ve been hearing a voice. Not even a voice; a whisper. It was calling me here.”
Either Kyle had figured it out on his own, or Alan’s expression had betrayed his thoughts, because Kyle asked, excitedly, “Alan, you’ve heard it, too, haven’t you?”
In that moment, Alan decided to tolerate Kyle. He wasn’t sure he could ever use the word “trust” when it came to the man, but at least he could speak with him now.
“I’ve heard something,” Alan said. “It was just an idea first, and then a feeling, and then—” Alan struggled with whether or not to tell Kyle about the girl’s voice that had beckoned him to the Temple. He didn’t have to.
“So you’ve heard her voice, too?”
“Yes.”
Alan, Kyle, and Danielle stood quiet as more and more questions arose. Frustration began to overtake Alan again, and he could feel anxiety and anger searching for him like a familiar friend. Words didn’t need to pass amongst the trio for them to know they were all thinking the same thing: if both Alan and Kyle were hearing a similar message, then a link between the two of them couldn’t be denied.
Danielle was the first to break the silence. “So, what now? Whoever or whatever has been calling you two here has done its job. I’m not really seeing anything out of the ordinary.”
Alan wished he had an answer, but Danielle was right. They stood alone in the ruined Temple remains, and besides seeing Kyle, there wasn’t anything out of the ordinary. No monster reared its head, no angel descended from Heaven to tell them why they’d been summoned.
“No way this was a coincidence,” Alan said. “There has to be something here we’re missing.”
“I agree,” Kyle said. “We’re just not looking hard enough, or maybe not in the right places.”
“We should split up,” Danielle said. “Alan and I will search the interior of the Temple ruins. You walk the perimeter. We’ll meet back here in ten minutes.”
Eager to please, Kyle gave a quick nod and walked into the darkness, leaving Danielle and Alan to search the Temple grounds.
When Kyle’s back had been enveloped by the darkness, Danielle whispered to Alan, “Do you think we can trust him?”
“I can still hear you guys,” Kyle said from the darkness. “I’m still here. Give me a minute.”
“Oh, right,” Danielle said, a hint of unease in her voice. “I knew that. That was a test. You passed!”
Alan stifled a laugh, then waited for a few more seconds before he shrugged. He was already searching the dark stones underfoot, the broken walls and rock columns rising around them. “I don’t think so. I think ‘trust’ is a strong word. I do think he’s telling the truth, though. No matter how much I want to not like him, a part of me can relate. I was alone, too, when you and Michael found me. I don’t know what would have happened if I’d been contacted by Ardat first. I’d like to think I could have seen through her lies, but I don’t know. For now, let’s just be on our guard.”
Danielle remained quiet, deep in thought, as the two walked side by side across the square inner sanctum of the Temple. It was hard for Alan to focus on looking for something, when he didn’t even know what he should be searching for. A lever, a rock, a secret passage of some kind?
The darkness didn’t help, either. Even with his enhanced eyesight, Alan still had to strain to see past the shadows for anything he could have been missing. After ten minutes of careful observation, their search proved fruitless.
They walked back to the open area where they’d first found Kyle. Alan stood on the short flight of steps leading to the raised stone platform, while Danielle stood below him, muttering to herself in the dark. If Alan listened carefully, he could hear her aggravation. “What are we missing? There has to be something here.”
A moment later, footsteps reached the pair. It was the soft tread of tennis shoes on the stone floor. Kyle appeared from between two columns on their left, with a look on his face that already told Alan what he wanted to know. He asked anyway. “Nothing?”
“Nothing,” Kyle said.
Kyle approached them, moving to take a place next to Alan on the steps.
“Well, this doesn’t make any sense,” Danielle said with a frustrated sigh.
“Which part?” Kyle asked. “That we’re hearing a little girl’s voice in our heads, or that we can’t find anything here?”
Kyle took his first step onto the set of stone stairs—and that did it.
Rumbling shook the ground, and with startled, jerking motions, Alan and Danielle moved away from the stairs, while Kyle jumped off the steps as if they’d just transformed into something out of a nightmare.
The rumbling intensified until it was lost altogether to a new sound emerging from the very pit of the Earth itself. A deep grating filled the air as the set of steps that once led up to the stone platform had now inverted, descending into the ground.
Alan’s heartbeat picked up as he witnessed the transformation; the set of steps now led down into a dark cave.
Danielle was the first to find her voice. “Well, that was unexpected.”
Chapter Seventy-Six
“What you speak of is impossible. We all saw him die that day. The Final Day is etched in all of our memories as if it had been this very morning.”
Ardat stood chained at a podium in front of the tribunal gathered to decide her fate. Michael had stepped down from his position as head of the Sentencing Committee, due to his long, passionate past with Ardat.
In his place sat a panel of three of the most respected and loyal angels in Heaven: Seraphim, the leader of the Death Angels and keeper of the celestial weapons; Esther, a captain in the angelic army second only to Michael himself; and Gideon, a brilliant inventor whose eccentric manner was only bested by his wisdom. He had constructed the collar Ardat now wore around her neck, dampening her supernatural abilities. It was Seraphim who first voiced her opinion.
“I’m telling you the truth. An impostor lies in his tomb.” Ardat’s voice echoed in the large room. Besides the tribunal and herself, the only other people in attendance were two guards who stood in silver armor behind her and Michael. He sat quietly to her left. At his request, the tribunal allowed him to be present during Ardat’s sentencing.
He remained rigid in his chair. Although he’d refrained from opening his mouth even once as the trial progressed, Ardat could tell he was only just able to contain himself—his fidgeting hands, the way his lips were pursed as if he didn’t trust them to open. The tr
ial was harder for him than it was for her.
“I think she’s lying to save herself,” Seraphim said, and the redhead shot Ardat a grim look as she gave her unfiltered response to the two tribunal members sitting beside her.
Gideon was quiet, head lowered, eyes looking up at Ardat. The genius was deep in thought. Ardat knew them all well, having spent almost an eternity with them before the war started when she’d chosen to side with the Usurper. Her memories of Gideon were of a brilliant man, slow to speak, a bit eccentric, with wisdom in his every word.
“What proof do you have?” Esther asked. “We all saw him fall during the Final Day. We buried him with the rest. No one but the Creator himself has mastery over the grip of death. If you are saying we’re all wrong and that somehow he survived, please explain to us how this could be possible.”
Ardat had spent the entire night before preparing for questions like these. If she wanted the tribunal to believe her, she needed to first convince them of his power. “You all know that Gabriel was once a great angel. So great, he was appointed as an Archangel like Michael. He was strong, not only in spirit and body, but also in mind. Remember him. We all know this to be true. I cannot give you the specifics of his plan, only what I think he did.”
Seraphim let out a sigh and leaned back in her chair. “Great. Let’s hear what you ‘think’ happened.”
Ardat’s temper flared. Not long ago she would have had the head of anyone who dared talk to her with such disrespect. Now, though, was not the time nor the place for violence. If she was going to get out of this alive, she had to control her temper—if not for her own sake, then for Michael’s.
Ardat let her gaze drift to the side as she caught Michael’s stare. They knew each other like they knew the sun would rise the next morning, so already he was anticipating her outburst. With an ever so slight shake of his head, he warned her to control herself. Words couldn’t pass between them now, but his eyes spoke volumes.
Stay calm. She’s trying to get you to burst out in anger. She wants you to make a fool of yourself.
Ardat winked at Michael, then turned her gaze back to the tribunal. “During the last few weeks of the war, a rumor went through the army ranks, alleging that Gabriel had been seriously wounded at the Battle of Blood. The rumor was vague and quickly dismissed as we continued to see him throughout the campaign. But something was wrong; he wasn’t the same. His speeches to the men were brief, and his fighting ability was not what it’d been before. I believe another angel with the power to alter their appearance took his place during the last few weeks of the war. I believe the Gabriel you and I saw, defeated and dead, was in fact an impostor. The real Gabriel went into hiding to recover from his wounds.”
That did it. Her theory was enough to silence even Seraphim. Everyone in the room was bringing to the forefront of their minds memories of final days of the war. She could tell even the guards behind her, as they shifted from side to side, were weighing against her words what they thought to be true.
During the Battle of Blood, Michael had faced off against his counterpart. The conflict was brutal, but before it was done, Gabriel retreated in defeat. The Final Day was what everyone called the last battle of the war for Heaven—the day Seraphim and her Death Angels finally killed Gabriel, and the Usurper himself was captured.
“What do you think, Seraphim?” Gideon asked in a quiet, composed voice. “Was the Gabriel you engaged during the Final Day different in any way?”
All eyes turned to the brooding Death Angel, and Ardat had to keep a smile from betraying her. She knew Seraphim was many things, but she wasn’t a liar.
“He was—” Seraphim looked as though the words she was about to speak actually tasted vile as she forced herself to say them. “He was not his usual self. We defeated him more easily than any of us thought possible. He was not the Gabriel we’d engaged in combat during previous battles. We’d chalked this up to the injuries Michael had given him.”
“So,” Esther said, “there’s no way to prove or disprove Ardat’s information.”
“There may be one.”
Ardat smiled to herself. Leave it to Gideon to follow her train of thought. She’d laid the breadcrumbs for them as inconspicuously as she could, but they had to be the ones to discover the solution. If she gave them the answer, they may have simply discredited her theory. But, since it was coming from Gideon, they would take the bait.
Gideon’s eyes met hers in a level stare. “We could travel to the tomb and unearth Gabriel’s body. If it was him, then we’ll know.”
“That would be impossible,” Seraphim said. “His body would have been reduced to a pile of bones. On second thought, there may not even be bones left.”
“The bones will still be there,” Esther said. “And you’re forgetting about the wound Michael gave him at the Battle of Blood.”
Ardat remained quiet, allowing the tribunal to reason out the rest of the plan on their own. She’d done all she could; the rest would be up to them. She wasn’t disappointed.
For the first time, Gideon addressed Michael. “I know you don’t enjoy speaking of the fight, Michael, but we’ll need you to bring clarity to the situation. During the encounter, when you engaged Gabriel on the field of battle and wounded him, what injury did you inflict?”
Michael took his time rising from his seat. His short brown hair was neatly combed to the side, a suit giving him the appearance of a corporate executive instead of an Archangel.
The room silenced as he moved to speak. Everyone knew Michael struggled to forget the details of his fight with Gabriel. The man had been like a brother to him, so it brought him no pleasure to recount causing harm to Gabriel, despite the decisions the other Archangel had made. “I struck Gabriel with my sword across his left hand. There was an opening in his defense, and I took advantage. I severed his left pinky finger from his palm. It fell to the battlefield ground, and we continued to fight. I … I took the upper hand and injured him over and over again: a broken leg, punctured lung—”
“Thank you. That is enough.” Gideon made eye contact with the Archangel with a look said, I’m sorry I had to make you relive that moment.
“So,” Seraphim said, jumping up from her seat, her long, wavy hair scattering in every direction around her face. “We go to the tomb to see if the skeleton has a missing pinky finger. If the finger’s there, the demon is telling the truth and an impostor died in Gabriel’s place. If the body has nine fingers, then Gabriel is dead like we all believed, making Ardat the lying sack of Fallen bones I thought her to be, and we sentence her to death.”
The others nodded their approval.
---
“Are you kidding me?”
Alan looked back at Kyle with a smirk. “Oh, come on. Don’t tell me you’re scared of a little dark.”
Alan and Danielle were already at the foot of the cave entrance. As far as they could see, the stone steps descended down into a pit of blackness. Kyle was the one holding back.
“Darkness, no. What’s living in the darkness is another story.”
Danielle rolled her eyes. “Please, we’re Nephilim. We shouldn’t be scared of a little dark.”
“A little?” Kyle said with an air of disdain. “It’s a pool of inky blackness down there.”
Alan reached into his jacket pocket to produce his cell phone. Its flashlight wouldn’t illuminate any rooms, but it was better than nothing. Danielle caught onto his idea to brighten their path, and she did the same to hers.
“There,” Alan said. “Get your phone out and come on. We’ll go first.”
Kyle’s mouth dropped open again, but before he could reply with another objection, Alan turned his back and started down the stairs, Danielle beside him.
A few seconds later, the sounds of Kyle mumbling could be heard behind them. “This is a bad idea.”
The trio descended the stairs at a slow, even pace. Alan took the lead. Not to be outdone, Danielle followed by his side. The stairs held firm under
their feet and continued downward into what felt like the center of the Earth itself. Soon, the illumination of the moon and the stars at the entrance to the tunnel looked like a tiny circle of dim light. Alan had to keep himself from thinking he was looking out from the pit of a monster’s stomach, up its throat, and into the fading world on the other end. But he didn’t have to worry about his imagination making the connection to becoming some beast’s dinner, because the light at the entrance faded altogether.
Darkness surrounded them now, with a silence so thick, it felt tangible. They moved on at a slow pace, careful to plant each foot securely before they took another step.
Just when Alan was beginning to think they should call a halt and go down to one phone to conserve energy for the long expedition, he saw a light up ahead.
As each step brought them closer to their destination, the scene in front of them took shape. The stairs were finally coming to an end, opening up into a room with a large arch leading into another chamber. Two lit torches flanked either side of the archway, leading into yet another room.
Alan was still too far away to see what the next room looked like. He knew he should have been afraid, cautious, and expect anything at any moment. Yet, even the fact that Kyle was following them instead of in front where they could keep an eye on their new traveling companion, didn’t bother Alan.
A sense of peace and safety was beginning to set in, and seeping into every pore of his body was meaning and reassurance that this was where he was meant to be. It was a feeling unlike anything Alan had ever experienced.
When the unlikely group of cell phone-wielding adventurers touched down to the level floor, they stopped to examine their environment. The stones seemed to be made of the same material as the stairs. Large slabs of slate grey formed the structure for the arch leading into the next chamber.
So far, no sounds other than their walking and breathing filled the air. Until a faint humming wafted through the archway—a child’s humming.
The Complete Archangel Wars Series: A Shared Universe Series (The Archangel Wars) Page 23