Descent (Rephaim Book 1)

by C. L. Roman

  “Time is no longer divided. You can see past, present and future by looking into the Shift, much as the angels do. But your sight will be of your choosing and, as such, will have a clarity that theirs lacks. Be careful with this gift. Do not misuse it lest you do great harm, to yourself and to others.” The Other studied Danae in silence for several moments. “The last thing I must tell you is, in some ways, the most important. Will you hear it now?”

  Danae looked up, puzzled. “Yes,” she said, drawing out the word as if she might regret saying it, might want to snatch it back. The human stiffened her spine. Knowing all could hurt no more than not knowing enough. “I will hear it all.”

  Her companion smiled, “Well, I wouldn’t go that far, but you shall hear the rest as it pertains to you. You have always been a healer. You know the herbs, their properties and proper combinations for ointments and elixirs to strengthen the body. Now, if you choose, you will be able to heal with a touch. The fruit you have eaten is from the Tree of Life, and it does provide life, but its power is not inexhaustible. Drawing on this source to heal will deplete it, and it cannot be replaced. The greater the injury, the greater the depletion.”

  “So, if I heal with a touch, I am giving up a part of my life force,” Danae said.

  The Other nodded, satisfied that she understood. He watched as Danae frowned, then reached out and took her hand. “What is it child? Shall I take back these gifts? Is the burden too great?”

  “No,” she clung tight to his hand, “I am thankful for them, it is only…” she hesitated but he only smiled patiently. “I will not see you again?”

  “I am always with you Danae, but you will not see me again in this way or in this place.”

  Tears slipped down her cheeks and she shivered in the cooling breeze. “And I must go back?”

  He reached out and cupped her cheek tenderly. “Would you abandon all you love – your parents, your sisters and brothers, Fomor – to stay with me?”

  Danae ducked her head, at war with her own desires, and felt herself drawn to her feet and into a warm embrace.

  “Do not weep child. We will meet again, many times, in many ways. You have only to look for me and I will be there.”

  Blackness crept into the edges of the glade and Danae fought to push them back. “No,” she cried. “Wait, please! I need more time.”

  The Other kissed the top of her head and stepped away. “Remember all you have seen and heard. Remember to look for me and I will be there.”

  The black rushed in.

  ***

  “…no need for it now. She even managed to push the sheet off of her last night.”

  “And her temperature didn’t go back up?”

  “No, in fact, she’s cooler now than she was yesterday.”

  “And, if she pushed the sheet off, she is able to move again.”

  Her eyelids felt as if they were weighted with wet sand. It took most of her strength simply to open them. Keeping them open was impossible.

  “Thirsty,” she rasped in a voice so low she feared they would not hear her, but they did.

  “Danae? She’s awake. Gwyneth, can I have that cup over there?”

  A cup was put to her lips and she took a sip, the ordinary water reminding her of something sweeter. What was it?

  “Easy love, just a little at a time.”

  Eyes closed, she could hear and feel Fomor, but not see him. Still, it was enough for the moment.

  “What happened?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

  A slight movement at the edge of the bed announced Jotun’s arrival before he spoke, “We think you had blood poisoning.”

  She frowned and then groaned. Every movement required intense effort and most of them hurt. “I don’t understand. My blood was poisoned? How?”

  A small silence, then, “When you were working on Fomor, did you get any of his blood in your mouth? In your eyes maybe?”

  She tried to recall where she had heard these words before. “When he hurt himself? Maybe, I – I don’t know. It’s all so fuzzy now, like my brain is playing hide and seek with my mind.”

  “It doesn’t matter right now,” Fomor’s tone brooked no argument. “The only thing that matters is you’ve returned to us,” she felt his fingers tighten around her own, “to me.”

  “I’ve been sick,” she stated. “Unconscious? How long?”

  Silence fell over the room and she made the heroic effort necessary to open her eyes. The room was hers and her husband’s, the window open and streaming light. In the far corner, a pile of neatly folded sheets lay in an otherwise empty wash tub. Fomor sat on the bed next to her. Jotun stood just behind him. Gwyneth hovered by the window, an anxious frown marring her features.

  “What is the last thing you remember?” Fomor asked at last.

  “I was baking – here, bread for dinner and then,” she struggled to retrieve memories that wanted to slide away like fish in a pond. “And then, I…I felt you,” she gripped Fomor’s hand with remembered terror. “Something was wrong, you were hurt or… I didn’t know, but I knew I had to find you.”

  “How did you know this?” Gwyneth asked in a low voice.

  Jotun glanced at his wife, then moved to her side and put his arms around her. “How did you know he was hurt?”

  The memories were coming faster now, each one clearer than the last. “I don’t know how I knew, I just did. I ran to the village and there was smoke and people running, screaming. Jotun, you flew out of Father’s house with Magnus and Zam running right behind you, I saw you go, but I had to find Fomor. I knew he was inside the house, so I ran inside, and there you were,” she looked up at him, “on the floor, unconscious. Blood everywhere. Fire. I had to get you out so, we did and then…” she stopped. They didn’t urge her to further details.

  “The last memory I have is of relief. I was so relieved when you woke up and I was teasing you and then…something,” she frowned, the memories coming in bits and pieces, like paint on a shard of pottery. “I was in a forest, and there was a voice. What was she saying?” Her voice sank to a murmur as her eyes closed again. “Then he was gone and there was nothing – just voices and heat and pain, until I woke up here.” For a moment they thought she had fallen back asleep until she said, “So how long has it been? How long have I been sick?”

  Fomor cleared his throat, “Seven days.”

  Her eyes popped open in surprise, then slowly drifted closed again as she murmured, “Seven days? Heaven help me, and I thought Abram was lazy.” She didn’t hear the relieved laughter that flitted through the room, but smiled in her sleep as if she could.

  Chapter Seventeen

  A small black tabby cat crept through the underbrush. Stopping under the deeper shadow of a berry bush, its odd black eyes peered out of the foliage into Zephere’s village. To the little cat’s right stood a group of houses, arranged in a rough semi-circle around a central well. On her left stood the menacing black structure that must command all their attention tonight. Its enormous brass doors were closed. All the buildings were dark, the common area empty.

  The village was similar to Nephel’s except for the giant edifice hulking opposite the houses. According to Zephere, this was the temple, but he had never been inside. Where the homes were built of light colored mud brick that reflected the moonlight, the shrine seemed to be formed of darkness. Black stone walls rose at a sharp inward angle to a menacing peak. The walls themselves gave off waves of cold that were palpable even to the edge of the village. The little cat gave a soft hiss and edged back under the thorny shelter of the berry bush.

  The night remained silent and, seeing nothing else to interest her, the little animal began cleaning herself in a methodical manner, starting with the long white blaze that traveled from hip to ankle on her right side.

  “Stop playing with your sword Sena.” The command came, mind to mind, from an enormous blue-eyed bob cat.

  Sena felt her fur bristle along her spine, still unused to this
silent communication, and wished again that animals could speak human. The berry bramble was not big enough for Jotun to hide under, even as a bob cat, so he crouched behind it instead.

  “No one can see me, and it itches. And, respectfully sir, a cat licking its fur is much less remarkable than one twice the normal size.”

  A muffled snort came from the deeper shadows behind them, followed by Volot’s silent comment, “She has you there Jotun, with respect.”

  “A bob cat, though unusual in the region, is less likely to attract attention than a pig,” Jotun replied without heat. He turned a sardonic gaze on the long tusks of the form Volot had chosen. “Especially in this case. What could possibly have made you choose such an odorous form, Volot?”

  Volot pressed forward out of the shadows so that his long snout and razor sharp tusks showed in the moonlight. “Wild boar,” he corrected. “And at least in this form I can carry my knives where I can actually use them, which is more than I can say for our little Sena.”

  “Yes, well, at least no one is likely to smell me,” Sena tossed back.

  Volot pawed the ground with one hard, irritated, little hoof, but sank back into the deeper shadows at Jotun’s command.

  Moments later a fluttering in the leaves above them signaled Adahna’s arrival in the form of a goshawk. “Are we ready?” she asked.

  “Ready,” Jotun replied.

  “Wait for the signal,” she said and took flight once more.

  Sena began a stringent cleaning of her fur, trying to rid herself of the feeling of being invaded with every trade of thought speech. Volot’s chuckle slid through her mind and she hissed at him.

  “Save it for the enemy, children,” Jotun advised.

  Even in thought form, she could hear his amusement.

  Above them Adahna flew across the village proper, and came to an easy landing in a giant cypress.

  The tree was enormous with thick foliage and broad, widely spaced branches. It was a natural nesting place for any number of bird species, and the arrival of the goshawk made most of them uneasy. Since this predator, like the one already perching among them, didn’t appear to be hunting, most chose to trust their camouflage to protect them. She honored their wisdom by ignoring the few who flitted off into the night and settled on the branch next to the larger gyrfalcon.

  “All units are in place, Captain. They await your signal. Fomor?” Adahna’s voice in his mind was uncharacteristically hesitant.

  “Yes.”

  “Can we beat him?”

  It might have been a strange question, but Fomor took it seriously. “He was a commander, lower only than the archangels themselves,” Fomor replied. “He is older than all of us put together, and more powerful than any two or three of us.” His pale blue eyes stared oddly out of the falcon’s face as he turned to look at his companion. “I will not lie to you. It will not be easy, or bloodless. But yes, we can beat him.”

  Without further comment he spread his wings and leapt softly into the air, drifting in lazy circles to the base of the tree where a figure in dark homespun waited. A cubit or two above the ground, his form shivered, elongated, grew into his normal shape, and he dropped to his feet with a barely discernible thud. Straightening, he gripped the new long bow in his hand and adjusted a quiver of arrows to sit more comfortably at his hip. It wasn’t a sword, but the divellum arrowheads were just as deadly.

  “Can you see inside?” Three days of long discussions had solidified her memories of what she now thought of as her “time away,” but she fretted over every wasted moment. Visions from the meadow pond danced in her memory, increasing her sense of urgency. We have to stop them here. If we don’t…

  She shook herself free of the recollections and counted herself lucky that Fomor had agreed to her presence here tonight. The concession had not been easily won, nor was it without conditions. If he had known – but no, she would not think of that now.

  Danae frowned into the shallow bowl, balanced in her left hand. The water there rippled in the moonlight, then became still. An image formed on the surface.

  “Yes, but it is as you suspected. The walls are made of obsidian, like those rooms in Par-Adis that you spoke of. You will not be able to use the Shift to enter.”

  Fomor nodded and she continued. “There is little light, and the space is not open. It is divided into a rectangular center room with an altar, surrounded entirely by a hallway which separates the priest’s cells from the sanctuary. There is only one entrance to the sanctuary while every cell opens onto the hallway. There are no windows, no light enters.” She shivered.

  “What of Molek? Is he still there?”

  She looked again, “Yes. The place stinks of his presence but he hides himself. I cannot see him.” She took a quick, shocked breath. “There is another.”

  “Another?” Fomor shook himself. He shouldn’t have been surprised. A commander always has his aides, and even as one of the Host, Molek had enjoyed his privileges. “What does he look like?”

  “Smaller, thinner and scarred, though I think he has looked worse.” She looked deeper and shuddered, pulling back to the present again. “Yes, he has looked much worse. He calls himself…” she hesitated, frowning and staring intently into the bowl. Her voice, when she spoke again, had a deeper, hollow timbre that startled her husband more than the words themselves.

  “Benat. He is less of a threat, and more,” she said. Her husband looked at her inquiringly, but Danae shook herself as if awakening from sleep, and said no more.

  Fomor stared into her eyes for a moment, relaxing when she smiled back at him. The press of time forced him to put away the incident to think on later.

  “Two then, but this - Benat - is it?” he questioned and at her answering nod, continued, “is less of a threat? And we know his location?”

  His wife nodded slowly in reluctant agreement. “He seems to be hiding in the storage area below the altar room.”

  “The plan should work then,” he said, one eyebrow quirked inquiringly.

  “Yes,” she said, giving the word an uneasy stretch, “but I wish I could locate Molek. Knowing where he is would be so much safer than—”

  He cut her off. “Nothing we do tonight can be described as safe. There is no choice here. There is little doubt that Molek has used the time we gave him to plan his revenge, and perhaps to heal. I can’t imagine that he escaped the destruction of his idol without injury. Even so, he’ll have healed by now, just as we have. If we leave him, he will attack again, and next time, he may succeed.”

  She would have argued, but her guilt kept her silent. If they hadn’t had to worry about me...

  He reached out and lifted her head with a gentle hand. “The delay is not your fault. We were not idle while we cared for you. You know that.”

  She smiled up at him, but doubt lingered in her eyes and he leaned down to kiss her. The captain took a moment to fold back into the form of a falcon, then perched on the seer’s outstretched arm, reviewing the plan, mentally rechecking his preparations. There would be no better time. He rubbed his feathered cheek along the woman’s in token of farewell, then gathered himself and shot into the air with a long, shivering screech of rage and challenge.

  Changing mid-flight, Fomor tumbled the last few cubits through the air and landed, crouched, on the sand in front of the temple entrance. In a single, fluid motion he pulled a bowstring from his quiver and bent his long bow to accept it. His hours of practice paid off and in seconds he had strung the bow and was nocking an arrow.

  The angel raised his voice, “Molek! I challenge you, come and meet your destruction!” Come on Molek, take the bait. He stood and felt the flight feathers of the first arrow brush his ear as he drew. The temple’s brass door crashed open and a score of armed priests emerged. Sending in humans to soften me up, he thought. Just like I thought he would. But we can’t waste time on the preliminaries, must bring out the main contender. In the surrounding brush he saw shadows slipping through the foliage. Not yet
, wait for it.

  “Molek, do you really mean to send these men to their deaths and not even show your face?” Fomor taunted. “Such cowardice does not become one of the Host.”

  Seeing only one enemy, the priests moved with confidence to surround him. Fomor picked out two and sent flint tipped arrows into one thigh each. The two unfortunates dropped to the ground, howling in pain and giving the rest a healthy respect for their foe.

  Mocking laughter drifted hoarse and hollow from the interior of the temple. “Do you mean to provoke me with such weak insults?” Bitterness crept into the unseen speaker’s voice, “I am no angel now, and what a member of the Host would do does not interest me.”

  The priests looked at each other uneasily and made no further advance, though they did not retreat.

  “You speak true – for once,” Fomor said, “No angel would send humans to their deaths, but these you sacrifice willingly enough. What shall you call yourself then? Mindless minion? Gutless deserter? Base-born, blood-sucking wretch?”

  “Base-born?” The temple shook with Molek’s outrage and smoke poured from the doors. “Cowards,” he shouted at his priests, “what are you waiting for? He is only one man. Destroy him! Your god commands you.”

  The humans shuddered, shooting fearful glances between the temple door and Fomor. A single acolyte took a hesitant step forward and was rewarded with an arrow in his foot.

  “My next shot will find a much dearer mark. Make no mistake, I have been merciful until now, something your master does not understand. Persist, and taste death.”

  “He speaks true.” A massive, smoke shrouded form towered on the temple steps. “I have no understanding of mercy and will show none to the disobedient. Kill him or die yourselves by my hand.”

  They rushed toward Fomor, knives raised and screaming. In movements too rapid for the human eye to follow, the captain released additional arrows and two priests flinched back, nursing flesh wounds. The rest circled him, each one trying without success to keep both their enemy and their god in view at the same time. There was a blur of movement from the temple and the circling men stopped short.