“Oh, sorry. But I think I’ve got a plan on how to gain some leverage,” Caelum explained. “And it does require returning to the cemetery.”
“But—” Mikaela made to protest, but she shut her lips. Breathing out in frustration, she asked him, “Fine. What’s the plan?”
Caelum smiled at her. “Follow the trail of breadcrumbs all the way to the monsters’ lair.” Mikaela eyed him curiously as he continued, “But first, I must catch an angel to rescue the one I am interested in.”
His decision to stick with the first page of the red journal flew out the window after his latest dream. Caelum lifted his finger to the corner of the paper and flicked it while he was lost in his thoughts. Mikaela had locked herself in her bedroom for the night, yet he knew even she wasn’t visited by the sandman. With the faint orange glow from the gap beneath her door, he wondered what kept the witch busy.
Distracting himself with other things did little to help. He returned his attention to the red journal and considered his decision. Sighing heavily, he finally flipped the page to the next journal entry and read it with more hope and fear of its contents.
Sweden
October, 1708
And with the cries of children and wives
The men marched forward to offer their lives.
For a cause they see honor in
Without looking back at the trail of sin.
What started as yet another uneventful day ended with a wondering dream that brought me back to my table while the moon is at its highest. My delightful parents visited me in my dream, with such smiling faces despite how my father resented me for being a man of words. My mother had her hair in a bun as I had always seen it, calling me with her kind voice.
“Connie.”
She loved to call me by that nickname when I was young, until my brother had found a way to ridicule me with it. It is sad how something that set you apart from the crowd was to be laughed at. There are many Peters across the country and the world, but only a few had the same name as I.
In the midst of all the chaos that surrounded us, I carry the memories of the mother I once had and the love she had given me. And in her memory, I take pride in the name she bestowed upon me.
-Cornelius Wells
His fingers traced the name. “Cornelius Wells.” He mouthed the name, feeling the familiarity in it. The images of the man scribbling on the pages under the candlelight returned to him, and the name he had written. The one he hoped the woman he loved would call him.
“Cornelius Wells.”
Chapter Two: Quiet Talks
As if waiting for the A-List celebrities who frequent the establishment to come outside, countless people had gathered in front of the old, and now infamous, cemetery in Kansas. Most of the visitors were teenagers who prided themselves as so-called paranormal investigators, along with a few actual adults with the same thoughts in mind. Since the odd and sudden destruction of the church, many wondered what had happened in the area. No decent eyewitness had come to explain the phenomena, and many speculations had been made. But none had even touched on the truth.
The demon who’d had a hand in the supposed mysterious event blended himself well with the onlookers. Though his crisp dark blue suit did stand out amongst the Ghostbusters tee shirts and khaki shorts. His hazel eyes glanced over the crowd, studying each of them to find any sign of an enemy camouflaged in novelty shirts. But aside from the mortals who fed on their fantasies without considering the risks, Caelum found nothing to worry about.
That was aside from the recent reports of people losing consciousness upon approaching the vicinity. Three teenagers who’d trespassed in the cemetery on a dare yesterday had ended up on the front page of the local news after waking the following morning with no recollection of how they had suddenly fallen asleep. Though many speculated that drugs or alcoholic drinks had been involved, others gave them the benefit of the doubt.
While the souls from the graves had disappeared, Caelum wondered what had truly caused their untimely slumber. And he also wondered how a report like that had tempted more people to join the onlookers rather than repelling them.
You see danger, and you run towards it. How interestingly suicidal these humans are, Caelum thought to himself, a smile on his face. He squeezed himself between the people who flocked at the iron gates of the cemetery and successfully removed himself from the crowd.
Yellow tape prevented the audience from trespassing on the property until it was deemed safe by the city council. Two guards kept the gate locked, sitting on chairs nearby, alert. But they could not prevent the demon of Hell from entering. He circled the area, keeping a close eye on the church and the old tree that hid a doorway to his home. What sort of activity has been present here, when I see not even the souls attached to their graves?
The sun was high above his head, allowing him few shadows to hide his location. Not that he had any guarantee that he would be able to complete such a task, given his seemingly weakened state. Instead, Caelum found a loose bar on the gate and undid it, allowing him passage. He set foot on the bare soil of the graveyard, adjusting his suit to rid himself of the dust. He scanned the vicinity once more, then proceeded to the church, staying out of sight from the mortals outside.
The destroyed tombs brought back the pain in his body and the weight in his heart. Ariel invaded his mind again, how she had saved his life from her own brothers. The image of her being dragged into Hell came to him, as well as the guilt that followed it. What do they want with her? He had asked the question multiple times, but neither his mind, nor the books in Mikaela’s collection, provided him with an answer to it. Hell had many possible motives for kidnapping an angel: hostage, sacrifice, information, entertainment. Caelum didn’t know which of them were the lesser of evils.
"She’s exactly what we needed. And you brought her to us in a silver platter."
Azazel’s voice taunted him, and he cursed under his breath. Guilt has plagued him for too long since his failed attempt to retrieve the angel. Though the questions of her abduction still bothered him, another one lingered in his thoughts. Why did he care? He’d had some camaraderie with the angel for a few hours, and indeed the angel was a beauty. But since when did Caelum become tempted to throw himself into the fire for such silly things?
The red journal tucked inside his jacket hit against his ribs, as if nudging him for attention. He remembered the last time he’d trekked the area, when Ariel had confessed her sins to him. Somewhere in the depths of his soul, a tinge of attachment grew as he knew more about the angel. She was loyal and passionate. She was as fierce as she was kind and caring, despite all the times she claimed to despise almost everything around her. Ariel had threatened his life a few times, even getting close enough to slice his throat, yet she hadn’t been able to bear to watch Lili tormenting the djinn, even though the act had been to their advantage. Ariel was an oddity to him. When he learned that angels were stoic and narrow-minded, he’d watched Ariel slowly considering the situation before acting. Curiosity was what he deemed to be the reason for his attachment, though another nudge of the journal in his pocket seemed to beg to differ.
I can’t really get myself out of this anymore, anyway. Caelum reminded himself. I might as well see this through.
He reached the chunks of rubble that used to be the church, now covered with the same yellow tape warning the mortals of ‘DANGER’. Caelum weighed his options and walked to the side of the church, searching for any hidden things that may jump out behind his back. His eyes fell again on the tree, seeing the dark energy surrounding it. It beckoned him to return, to gather enough energy to make himself as powerful as he once was. But to walk towards the tree was risking himself; he may be pulled back into Hell unwillingly and unprepared.
Being prepared is the key to survival. Caelum repeated the words that Mikaela had drilled into his skull the night before. He rolled his eyes at the persistence his daughter had acquired over the years when they’d drifted apart.
He pulled his body up and swung his feet onto the tiled roof. Dusting himself off, he made his way towards the bell tower that was blanketed now by concrete dust and shards of glass. Caelum looked into the tower where the faint Holy Seal still marked the floor. His thoughts went to Ariel again, and how he had found her huddled over as her soul burned her from the inside. He hadn’t understood what was happening to the angel. But looking back to her story, the demon had an idea.
I remember now. Ariel’s voice echoed in his mind. The angel had broken the seal on her memory and it took a great toll on her. He found himself curious at what the memories entailed. When the subject first came up, the angel had feared the returning memories. She had attacked him suddenly, after claiming that his actions, specifically his kiss, had triggered the memories to return. Yet, after the battle when she’d told him that her memories had returned, she seemed to be happier than she was prior to that.
Reminiscing about the past was not the purpose of his visit. Caelum shook his head and continued towards his goal. He took a few steps back from the bell tower and stared at the top. His eyes fixed on it, seeking a trace of energy in the area. As he studied the area, he realized that far too many patterns of energy were present. A flurry of monsters and angels had been present during the battle, not to mention the former residents of the cemetery. It was a difficulty to pick the right trace from the rest. Like searching for a particular piece of hay in a haystack. He sighed.
Stepping on the ledge of the window to the bell tower, he lifted himself to climb to the roof where he remembered the hooded one had stood. He reached the top, only to have his balance thrown off by the slanted roofing. He caught himself, spreading his legs to balance his weight. His eyes scanned the area and it took great effort for him to find a very faint trace of angelic energy, though not enough for him to summon the owner.
“Well, there goes my grand plan,” he muttered under his breath.
“Such familiarity I sense in your presence. Fate has crossed our paths again, hasn’t it?” A strange voice came from behind him. Caelum turned to see a patch of shadows materializing into a faceless figure. He cocked his head to the side and leaped off the bell tower to land on the roof of the church. The shadow moved as if it had a physical form, but its body kept changing shapes as if it didn’t know what form it should take. It was like watching people from an old television set with a weak signal.
“So that’s where all the lost spirits went,” Caelum said, glancing over the empty graveyard. “You all banded together and made yourselves a wraith.”
The wraith laughed with the voices of the hundreds of souls it was composed of. Its form continued to shift, creating different faces and figures each second. “In this form, power circulates through us all. No more days of lost wandering. No more nights of hopeless wondering. With this power, we have purpose.”
“Purpose,” Caelum repeated with a chuckle. “And I bet that purpose is feeding on more souls. You were the cause of those teenagers losing consciousness last night, weren’t you?”
“Ah, yes. Those young ones had such vibrant energy in them, wasting away in their foolish antics. Delicious they were, sad we could not finish them and had to let them go.”
“Why did you let them go?” Caelum asked, curiously.
“Let’s not talk of petty things,” the wraith said. “It is a joyous occasion of our reunion, after all.”
“Reunion?”
“Do you not remember? We are surprised you do not, after the trouble you went through to create us.”
“Crea—” Caelum stopped himself as the memory returned. While taking Ariel through the gateway, Baron had sent the souls of the graveyard to attack him. The spirits had fed on his energy, rendering him too weak to fight back, much less save the angel. Souls that formed into a singular being often give birth to a ghoul, an earth-bound spirit that fed on energy. But to form a wraith, a higher form of a ghoul that could survive for centuries, the souls needed to feed on another kind of energy. “You had a taste of demonic energy provided by little ol’ me, and then, you were born.”
The wraith let out what Caelum assumed to be a snicker. “Yes, father.”
“Oh, my daughter will be so thrilled to discover she has a few hundred siblings,” Caelum said sarcastically, though his mind was running with ideas. The wraith was a leech, feeding on another soul’s energy, much like how it was created. It was a sponge of energy, and to think it had been created by his own, the demon felt a sense of ownership of the monster. And with him cut off from Hell’s buffet of energy, Caelum was in need of another source.
“Tell me,” he began. “Other than what you have been doing with the horror fans out there, has anything else happened around here? Perhaps, something about the cursed tree over there?” Caelum nodded to the tree beside the church.
“Ah, the gateway to damnation,” the wraith called it, much to Caelum’s surprise of its knowledge. “Nothing to pique our interest has happened in these lands. We are alone here, sitting on the sidelines while our food delivers themselves to us.”
“What a boring and easy life, then,” Caelum commented.
“We have to thank you for that,” the wraith added. “The battle you incited days ago woke a lot of us, and your energy brought us together, making us more powerful. The chaos you and your fellows caused attracted the source of our food, and they serve themselves to us eagerly."
“You owe me a lot, then,” Caelum pointed out.
“Which is why we are here to offer you information.”
This piqued the demon’s interest. He looked at the wraith with brows raised. “What information?”
“We know who you seek.”
“I am seeking a lot of things. I believe you need to be more specific,” Caelum demanded.
The shadows that made up the wraith formed something that stretched out. He recognized it as a sort of arm that pointed to something behind him. Caelum followed its direction, looking up at the bell tower. “The one who hid its face from the eyes of others.”
“The hooded figure?” Caelum turned back to them. “You know where he is?”
“She,” the wraith corrected him. “We know not of her location, but her name.”
A name? Caelum was skeptic of what good it would do him. A name without a face was not enough to track down or summon anything. But it was information, nonetheless. He could always find another way, and it would be easier if he discovered the identity of who he sought. “I’m listening,” Caelum told it.
“The one you seek is one all who have passed know. For she is the one who guided us, though many of us refused her. She was a memorable one,” the wraith continued. “The one you seek is none other than Azrael herself. The Angel of Death, protector of Purgatory, and the one who guides those of us who are lost.” The revelation hung in the grim air around the graveyard.
Outside the cemetery, the crew of Tim’s video blog set up to film the area. The nineteen-year-old paranormal investigator grinned from ear to ear as he read over the script he’d written last night, following the recent events of the now infamous cemetery.
“Okay, everything’s all set,” his cameraman, Justin, announced. His self-proclaimed director, Tabitha, paced the floor to make sure none of the other onlookers would interrupt their filming.
“Hey, hey, hey!” Tabitha screamed at a middle-aged man who was walking towards Tim. “We’re filming here, people! And extras aren’t required in this shot, so please! Some respec
t!” She demanded, pushing the people away and earning herself a few angry looks and obscene gestures.
“You go, girl!” Justin cheered her on rather awkwardly.
Tim rolled his eyes and moved over to the spot in front of the gates. He was thankful that the guards had allowed them to film the cemetery, after some bribing, of course. As long as they did not step inside the cemetery, it wasn’t against their rules.
“Okay, ready?” Tabitha asked him.
Tim gave her a thumbs up. He saw the red light from Justin’s camera blink and Tim placed on a smile on his face.
“Following this so-called prophecy of a certain infamous podcast host about doomsday, strange events have come to light that tempt us to think: Are there things out there beyond what our mortal eyes have seen? Ghost sightings, demonic rituals, witch hangings. Many legends have circulated around the globe about the old cemetery I stand in front of. None of them have become more than just stories passed around the campfire—“
“Hey, hey…” Justin suddenly cut him off.
“What?” Tabitha wheeled around, glaring at the cameraman.
“Guys, what is that?” Justin pointed at something behind Tim. The two, along with the rest of the crowd, looked towards the center of the cemetery, just beside the church. Something like smoke was rising from the corner. The crowd first thought of fire, but the smoke remained on the ground, spreading around the ground. Dark violet mist seeped out and was slowly blanketing the entire land. Tim inched forward, wanting to see what was happening; the rest of the spectators backed away.
“Back! Back!” The guards, who had been sitting at one corner until now, began to shoo away the crowd. The panicked audience dispersed in screams and cries while the guards fumbled with their keys to free themselves from the cemetery.
“Keep the camera on!” Tabitha snapped at Justin, who had little choice but to oblige. He watched the scene unfold from the small screen of his camera while Tabitha argued with the guards and ordered Tim to say something.
The Damned and The Pure Series: Books 1-4 (The Damned and The Pure Series Box Set) Page 23