A Gluttony Of Faith

by Steven Lindsay

  She nodded “yes, they are my friends. All that is left. I’ve been praying.”

  This was it. Prayer had called her here, this girl’s need was great, which she didn’t care about, but that need would serve her well.

  “Praying about what?” she stepped closer.

  “That they’ll get turned into Myrmidon like they did for that king.”

  “Myrmidon?” why did that sound familiar?

  She pointed to a grubby book propped open, Hera picked it up, it had been water damaged and covered in mud, but she could read that it was a book of Greek Myths. The page was open on the myth of the Myrmidon. Her eyes scanned the drawings and the story, her memories coming back. Zeus had rewarded one of his favourite kings by turning ants into people after disease had swept through his lands and killed them all. They hadn’t exactly been the most exciting Humans, but it had been a dramatic step that required great power. If he could do it, then she certainly could.

  But with a difference.

  “What if I said your prayers could be answered?”

  That one good eye lit up with hope, the ghost of a smile grew across the good part of her face. “By Zeus?”

  “No. He is dead. The Angels killed him.”

  Her face fell, and her ruined lips quivered “then who will answer my prayers?”

  She crouched down before the girl taking her face in her hands “the greatest of all Goddesses, Hera. I can grant you your wish Regina.”

  Her eyes filled with hope “I know you’re giving me one wish but may I ask to have my body fixed?”

  “I can, but it won’t be the same as it was.”

  “Could you make me like them?” she cast her eye down on the hundreds of ants around her.

  Hera smiled, schooling it into something kind even as she felt the savage pleasure run through her. “I believe that I can do that for you, in fact, I can even make you their queen.”

  A tear fell from her good eye before she closed it and took a deep breath. “I am ready Hera.”

  Violet sparked from her hands and thin tendrils wrapped around her face. They twisted around the young girl as they plummeted down to the ground and surged outwards, washing over the hundreds and thousands of ants carpeting the garden.

  Regina’s eyes darkened to black before they started to enlarge and fragment into hexagonal patterns. The scarred and smooth skin around her eyes started to ripple as flesh turned into soft white chitin. The chitin splayed outwards from her face as it restructured itself, burnt, angry skin smoothed into flawless chitin. It raced down her body as her whole structure started to shift. Her bottom grew backwards developing into an insectoid abdomen while her Human torso, with all its damage, shifted into a thorax. Another pair of limbs grew, white, segmented and ending with two graspers. Her legs and arms grew longer and thicker until they matched the other set of limbs. Her jaw had extended into insectoid mandibles. Swirls of lilac flickered through the white chitin as it started to harden, getting darker and darker until it was a purple so dark it was almost black.

  All around them both the tiny ants had started to grow and alter to match Regina’s appearance. As they continued to grow so did she, until she was larger than a car and they were Human-sized.

  Hera stood smiling in the middle of her new insectoid army. They stood there shifting on their limbs and gnashing their mandibles. They were coloured black, red or brown, after the ants they had come from, but in time, they would adjust and change.

  Regina flicked her antennae, and all the ants flicked theirs in response. They seemed slow and dull, but their intelligence would grow, especially under the telepathic control of their queen. She glanced at Hera, who nodded then flicked her antennae again. The Myrmidon exploded into activity, digging into the ground at a frenzied pace. Others started moulding the dirt into walls and structures while others started stripping apart the houses and cars around.

  Screams filled the air as looters were ripped apart and carried back. Corpses were chopped up and carried back. The amazing strength of ants was the inheritance of the Myrmidon, who wielded their phenomenal strength to create their nest.

  Hera watched passively as they dug down into the ground creating a network of tunnels around a huge central room where Regina was installed. Magic flared as they sealed up the walls and started to build mounds above the ground. Massive caverns were carved out and the gathered food stored inside. They weren’t currently hungry but with a population that large it would not take very long. Their basic ant instincts were serving them well, she was curious to see how much would change once they started having near-Human intelligence.

  Chapter 16

  Sariel descended the garden steps silently. She had learned and mastered Azrael’s spell that she had long envied. Her blue Atlantean robes made no noise nor did her boots as she walked down the path. The only sound was the wind, which up in the Avalon Palace was usually strong, blowing through the gardens and her hair.

  She turned that gentle violet gaze on the shape of Lucifer in his black clothing while he stood arms apart trying to create a ball of fire. Magic flashed and flared, but all that appeared was the sparky outline of a ball but no flames. As she approached, he tried over and over, again and again. She wondered how long he had been doing it. His frustration was plain to see, unbeknownst to him flames dance across his black wings, blonde flickered through his black hair and lightning sparked along the length of his two horns. He hated his horns and suppressed them at all times. He must be very angry.

  Which made her wonder why he had summoned her. Zenar had passed on that Lucifer was frantically seeking her, Xandelexis had passed on that he seemed most disturbed, but Lucifer had not passed onto him why.

  “Lucifer” she called out, he spun around, flames fanning up when he saw her. Now she was worried usually, his irritation and annoyance died on seeing her, this time, it had increased. “Where have you been? I’ve been trying to get in contact with you for over a week!”

  “Why didn’t you just communicate with me?” it was how all the Divine got in contact with each other.

  “Because I can’t!” he snapped at her.

  She raised her eyebrow, crossed her arms and settled her wings. She had learned a lot from the women in her life. “I will leave if you keep talking to me like this.”

  The wind went out of his sails “no please, I need you to take me to Hades.”

  “Why me? Why not Hecate or Samael?”

  “Any of you will do, you are just the first. Please, can you take me to Hades, I have to speak to him.”

  If he was this upset and angry, then it wasn’t something little. She held out her hand to him, and he grabbed as though it was going to disappear. Thankfully she had gotten the hang of teleporting, she just hoped it would work into the Underworld. She had never attempted it before.

  She closed her eyes and thought of Hades, she was well aware that each realm had its own defences, and she was very aware that she could get through each and every one. She felt like she was floating then the sensation was gone and the noises of the gardens had been replaced by startled muttering.

  She opened her eyes to see Hades glowering at her from his bathtub. She covered her smiled with her hand with a muttered sorry.

  “Sariel, what is the meaning of this?”

  “Hades, I need your help.”

  Hades turned his gaze to Lucifer “with what?”

  “You are a master of your realm, I need you to teach me how to master my realm.”

  “Aside from the fact that your powers are well beyond your control, I never take on students of any form.”

  Lucifer dropped to his knees beside the bath “please I beg of you to help me, you must teach me all you know.”

  His voice turned cold “I have never had a Protégé and have no interest. There is nothing you can say to me that will change my mind-“

  “Gabriel is stealing souls from Hell.” Sariel and Hades’ heads snapped around with such speed that if they had been mortal,
their necks might have broken. “Please, I need your help. I cannot do this alone, but she must be stopped if we are to win the war against her. We all know what Gabriel can do, she could be turning the war in her favour as we speak. The only way to stop her getting souls from Hell is if I gain mastery of it.”

  Hades hand snaked out and latched onto Lucifer’s wrist with painful force, black fire danced under his hand. His eyes had started to glow with the same shadows “this will be a hard road Lucifer, mark my words, and there will be no turning back.”

  “It must be done.”

  Sariel glanced about the ruins of Hell with interest, it hadn’t been that long since she had last been here and yet it felt like a lifetime. She had been so young and naïve when she had entered Hell. She had had no notion of the horrors and secrets it had held. Back then she could not have fathomed the cruelty she had encountered. She had changed so much since then.

  She had aged physically, she was no longer trapped in the childlike body she had been, she was fully a woman in the bloom of youth. She had also aged mentally, she wasn’t so innocent or naïve. She understood that people had agenda’s, that terrible things happened in the world for no explainable reason. That her family had dark secrets, betrayals, dangerous liaisons, countless lovers, and offspring. Her notions of perfect parents had crumbled but in its place, a more realistic understanding of the Divine had grown. She had Ascended to godhood and started to master her powers. She had unleashed the Chaos within herself, and also the woman. She watched the world through curious eyes.

  How things had changed.

  Hell was empty and gloomy, no longer did the bright lights of Purgatory light up the top of the crater. There was no great stalactite and stalagmite, no lair in between. There were not the vast cloudbanks that had once obscured all the Levels below. Screams and roars did not thunder through the air. There was not the sense of foreboding it had once held.

  It was a shell, an empty memory of what it had once been.

  She turned her gaze back to the men beside her, neither were happy or at ease to be where they were. Lucifer wanted nothing to do with Hell, he hated it, and understandably so. But it held such power over him, and he was determined to stop his sister in any way he could. He was well aware just how gifted his sister was and what she could do with souls. Hades was also only here out of duty and need. His discomfort was obvious and palpable, he had not left his realm in millennia. He had not dared venture out even with their release from the Underworld and most of the pantheon ascending to the Surface to carve out a life again.

  Eerie wails rose and fell as spirits drifted by, their blue-white lights faint pulses that disappeared over the edge and into the impenetrable gloom below. She leaned over the side watching the blinking glows disappear. She wondered what was down there now that the Levels had been stripped bare and thrown up onto the Surface. It would be a blank slate, but Hell in any shape was dangerous beyond compare.

  She could feel magic thickening the air as they tried to do something but she wasn’t paying attention. She was there out of curiosity and because her presence assisted Lucifer’s healing and ability to regain control. She was also there because Hell was such a turning point in her life, she had suffered and been betrayed, she had been attacked over and over, she had died she was sure, but Chaos had granted her power. Something she had mentioned to no one.

  There was a faint rumble through the realm, she glanced back at Lucifer, who now wore a look of satisfaction. “It does know its master.”

  “A realm always does. It knows you, perhaps better than you know yourself, and will reflect your will. But gaining mastery over a realm is far more difficult than mastering anything else in life Lucifer.”

  She wandered over to join them curious now. “What just happened?”

  Hades flicked his weary eyes to her “he made his formal claim over Hell, and it acknowledged him.”

  “How does one make a formal claim? I know Brigid has done it all over the world, but I have no understanding of what it means.”

  “Perhaps it would be easier to show you” she felt a touch against her mental barrier which she opened up. His images and understanding filtered through the link into her mind. It was something primordial, ancient and yet ever changing. It was a connection, a unique bonding with either a realm or a land. It was asserting your power over the physical and allowing it to continually have access to your powers. It could be dangerous, damage to the realm or land was felt by the God who had bonded with it. But the benefits of a controlling a realm was that it and everything under it was under your authority, even other Gods. Lands were different, but it gave you control over the races that lived within it.

  She raised a glowing brown hand and all of Hell rumbled. She looked at the other two in surprise “what does that mean?”

  “Lucifer might be the High Lord of Hell, but apparently you are its High Lady.”

  “What? How can that be? Wouldn’t it more sense for Gabriel to be its High Lady? She created it.”

  “Gabriel may have created Hell when she cast Lucifer out of Heaven and her power surged through it, but it was his power it was tied to. You broke all the ties, you severed the old matrix of spells that contained and defined Hell. In freeing Lucifer and Hell you actually formally claimed it. And it accepted the claim.”

  “Wait, what? Hell bows to my authority?”

  “Yes, Hell is yours to command though Lucifer will always be its master.”

  Hell rumbled again, and her face lit up “just wait until I tell everyone” then she disappeared.

  Hades turned to Lucifer “does it trouble you also that the greatest power in our world is held by her?”

  “You have no idea how much it troubles me.”

  Lilith looked at her sister, there was arrogant humour written all over her dark features. Her black eyes which often seemed so cold were warm with amusement. It transformed her face. “Are you sure?

  Ereshkigal laughed a little “Oh Lilith, it is perfect. I am glad that you mentioned the tale. Honestly, how mad were the men that wrote this crap?”

  Lilith and Ereshkigal’s views on a tale greatly varied. While she had not helped write the Bible and felt very little but contempt for the words on its pages she would never have called it a tale. Perhaps because it had controlled and dictated so much of the ancient Jewish and Christian people’s lives, she saw it differently.

  She had thought the Old Testament bizarre but that had been made to look almost reasonable compared to the sheer lunacy of the New Testament, particularly Revelations. She was still not sure if Great Babylon was a reference to her or not. She did have her own place in the eyes of Jews and Christians. Not that it was beyond the realms of possibilities that they had defamed her more.

  Ereshkigal seemed to have come to the conclusion that the whore was Lilith, and because of it, she had decided to name her empire Great Babylon.

  “Who knows, it could be the Angels’ fault.”

  “Very true, the Old Council certainly had some odd views. However I do like this, it will affront the New Council, and it will make them fear.”

  Lilith didn’t think it would make them fear, but she did think that it would affront them.

  Chapter 17

  James looked down at the Angels staked out before him and Zelaris. They were the Heavenly insurgents that had been undermining their progression through Timor and had staged counter assaults against Borneo and New Guinea. They had caused such issues for them both and their armies, having whipped up the Muslim defenders of Indonesia into a fanatical frenzy. The natives had been slaughtered by the thousands because they had refused to surrender or sacrifice their faith.

  If it were not for these Angels, their progress through Timor would have been much easier, along the lines of their successes in Borneo. The three nations of Borneo had tried to defend themselves, but Malaysia was fighting a battle on two fronts, and most of its military had been installed on the mainland to prevent the spread of Singapore’
s power. Indonesia was fighting many battles all across its islands as it was attacked by both the Singaporean and Australian divisions of the British Military

  Try as they might Humans had not been faring well against the magical powers within the British Military, but now the Angels had been turning the tide of battle. If there had been more of them, then the British would have had much greater losses. However, it had become the conclusion of the Empire that the Angels were spread too thin to effectively maintain control of their outer regions.

  Looking around the world, it wasn’t hard to see why. Britain had claimed vast tracts of land and was currently spreading north from South Africa and branching out across Polynesia and up South East Asia. The Heradmantium Empire was spreading down through Central America now even while it battled to control America with the Angels. The Dragon Empire was growing in the east at a steady rate, where next its hunger would turn none were quite sure after its annexation of the Philippines. In the Middle East Ereshkigal’s growing empire continued to claim more city-states and force them into line. Strange occurrences continued to abound in Scandinavia as Hel carved her mark into it. Egypt had devolved into a brutal civil war between the Angels’ worshippers and the Gods.

  And that was just the empires. The world was also full now of Greater Demons and Demons from Hell, and many Fallen Angels making their mark on the world. Central Africa was a terrifying war zone collapsing into insane savagery that was only spreading outwards. The island of Crete was disappearing under a Minotaur invasion which mainland Greece was unable to stop. Israel had been experiencing all manner of problems before the Angelic Horde came to stay. Europe too had been devolving into chaos, but now it seemed the Angels had their hands firmly on Europe.

  The Angels were claiming their strongholds, from Europe to the Middle East to the Bible Belt they were sinking in their claws deep and refusing to yield ground. There were the obvious signs of their influence throughout Europe and the Middle East. The European Union was passing less secular reforms and coming into political conflict with Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland. The Pope was traversing much of Europe, garnering believers for the Angels and sightings of Angels were ever on the rise. In Pakistan a new Prophet had been named and given wings by the Arch Angel Michael, their armies continued to consume ever more territory of India, a fact that the generals within the British Empire found puzzling. In and around Mecca there were signs that a new Caliphate was on the rise, and the Angels’ presence was strongly noticeable in Turkey and Italy.