Shimmer

by Paula Weston

  A deep sigh escapes Brother Stephen, like all the air is leaving him. Ez watches him in silence, her expression guarded.

  ‘When I was first here, my mother or my sister would come to Italy once a year from America. I would arrange to meet them when it was my turn to collect supplies from the village.’

  ‘How do you do it now?’

  ‘Mobile phone.’

  Of course.

  ‘I would tell them about Nathaniel and what was happening here: training, missions, how the Rephaim were divided into different specialities.’ He speaks slowly, as if every word costs him energy. ‘In recent decades it has been about building the photo library. Understanding who is who and what each of your strengths are.’

  ‘Why?’

  His mouth twists a little. ‘To better understand the enemy.’

  ‘You think we’re your enemy?’ Micah sounds genuinely hurt.

  ‘No, Micah,’ Brother Stephen says, ‘I have not thought so for some time.’

  ‘But that didn’t stop you betraying us.’

  ‘I always believed I could honour the oaths made to this family, and to my own. In sixty years I have done nothing to endanger the Rephaim.’

  ‘What about that room?’

  The monk brushes his gnarled fingers over the blanket on his bed. ‘I was not aware it existed. Virginia and Mya did not tell me, for my own safety.’

  ‘Your family sent Mya here to tear us apart,’ Micah says. ‘Why a decade ago? Why not send her last century?’

  ‘Because my cousin was already here in the brotherhood.’

  ‘Who?’

  He hesitates. ‘Roberto.’

  ‘Brother Roberto was a traitor too?’ Micah’s jaw tightens.

  ‘Brother Roberto was a loyal member of this order. He was also a member of our family.’

  ‘But your family was in Iowa. How did he end up in Italy?’

  The monk points a trembling finger to a glass of water, half-full, on his bedside table. Ez hands it to him. The water sloshes up the sides as he raises it to his lips. He takes a sip and hands it back to her.

  ‘Nathaniel came looking for the bastard child conceived in our part of the world. He posed as an itinerant priest offering absolution. My great-grandmother had foreseen that Nathaniel would visit, so my great-grandfather, Heinrich, was prepared. He—’

  ‘Was Heinrich the Lutheran minister?’ I ask.

  Brother Stephen falters. ‘Yes.’ He swallows. ‘He told Nathaniel his daughter Martha had lain with a fallen angel, but that both she and the bastard offspring had died in childbirth. Heinrich offered up Roberto to serve, in whatever capacity Nathaniel saw fit, as an act of atonement for Martha’s sin. Nathaniel brought him here. And when Roberto could no longer serve, I was sent to replace him.’

  ‘So,’ Micah says, ‘first Roberto, then you, fed information back to your family and they plotted against us?’

  ‘No, Micah, we gathered information. And we waited for signs.’ He raises his watery eyes. ‘And now I am old. My days here will come to an end soon. That is why Mya finally put herself in Nathaniel’s path, in preparation for my passing. Her commission was to bide her time, become a trusted part of this society; work her way onto the Council of Five and slowly sow seeds of dissent.’ He sighs. ‘Not incite a rebellion in less than a year.’

  ‘What happened to Mya’s mother?’ I ask. ‘Martha?’

  The lines around Brother Stephen’s lips tighten.

  ‘Did she die in childbirth?’

  A long pause. ‘She did not.’ He closes his eyes, the paper-thin folds of skin momentarily shielding him from us.

  ‘Brother,’ Jude says. ‘If your family receives messages from an archangel we need to understand how—and why.’

  The monk meets his eyes. ‘Dear Judah. Even without the knowledge of your past you still seek the truth. I have always admired that about you, even if your way of going about it was not always the most…efficient.’

  I lower myself beside Brother Stephen. The mattress is hard, unforgiving. ‘What happened to her?’

  ‘I only know the stories as they were told to me.’ He tries to straighten, but pain, or the weight of the moment, keeps him hunched. ‘You need to understand, Martha was my great-grandfather’s favourite daughter. Every day at dusk she walked the dogs between the crops and he would wait on the porch for her. On the Day of Great Transgression, the dogs returned in the darkness without her. Heinrich saw a strange light in the fields. The light was gone by the time he found her alone, lacing up her dress.’

  ‘The angel just left her there to deal with him?’

  ‘That is their nature, Judah. The Fallen do not take responsibility for their actions.’

  ‘Did your great-grandfather believe it was an angel?’

  ‘It would have been better for her if he had not. A tryst with a secret lover might have broken his heart, but it would not have burned his soul. Heinrich knew that an angel who lay with a human could only be among the Fallen, which meant both she and any resulting child would be despised in heaven.’

  I run my fingertips across the rough wool of his bed cover. ‘That’s a big leap—that she would fall pregnant.’

  ‘Heinrich was familiar with the Book of Enoch; he knew the last time Semyaza and the Fallen lay with women there were many offspring.’

  ‘But why did he assume the child would be despised in heaven?’ Jude presses. ‘Everyone is so convinced we’re abominations, but where is it written? Where’s the evidence? Beyond the paranoia of a shamed minister and the guilt of the fallen angel who created this place?’

  ‘Judah,’ Brother Stephen says. ‘The last time human-angel hybrids walked the earth, the archangels wiped them from existence.’

  ‘Oh.’ Jude breaks eye contact with him. He looks at me and then away.

  ‘Hang on,’ I say, ‘I thought we could only die if we’—I make a slicing action across my throat—‘and didn’t the Nephilim die in a flood?’

  ‘No.’ It’s Micah who answers. ‘They were all executed by the Garrison before the waters rose.’

  Executed. My insides quiver.

  ‘Back to Martha?’ Ez prompts and Brother Stephen nods, slowly.

  ‘She was pregnant. Heinrich was willing to sacrifice his beloved eldest daughter to prevent her bastard coming into the world, but my great-grandmother threatened to starve herself if he did. So he bided his time. He knew both had to die: Martha for her sin, and the offspring for existing. He waited until the child was born and then he took his daughter’s life.’ His chin trembles. ‘He and his brothers took the body to the field and performed a sanctifying ritual before cremating her body. They were afraid if they buried Martha any other way, her defilement would scorch the earth and kill the crops.’

  I glance at Rafa and know we’re seeing the same thing: the photos from the journal showing each stage of the burning and burial; of those men in their waistcoats and top hats in the cornfield, so grim. So self-righteous. I get a weird feeling in my chest.

  ‘Afterwards he took the baby, Mya, to the altar in the old church.’ Brother Stephen touches the fine fabric of his sling. ‘Roberto told me that my great-grandfather cut her to see if she would bleed.’

  ‘Oh my god.’ Ez finds her voice. ‘And you think we’re the abomination?’

  ‘That’s when my great-grandmother fell to the ground and received the first revelation: the child was not the only one born to a fallen angel that month and our family, alone among all of those afflicted, had been anointed to keep the offspring of the Fallen separated. The baby in her husband’s hands was the key to our bloodline fulfilling that destiny.’

  ‘And what about Mya?’ Ez says. ‘How did she feel about that destiny when she was old enough to understand it?’

  ‘Mya has had…a difficult time.’

  ‘She told me about…’ Ez hesitates. ‘An incident when she was seventeen…’

  Brother Stephen blanches. ‘I am forever shamed that my kin were responsible for wh
at happened that day. Heinrich overlooked it because the attack revealed that Mya had inherited skills from her Fallen sire.’

  Mya told Ez the truth: that her cousins tried to rape her and the trauma of it triggered her first shift. Except she didn’t leave home after it happened, like she told Ez. She lived for another century or so with the family who thought she was an abomination.

  ‘How many were there?’ Ez asks quietly.

  Brother Stephen drops his chin to his chest. ‘Four.’

  I feel sick. Ez turns away. She’s heard enough.

  ‘Great-grandmother forbade any male in the family to have contact with her after that. The only exception was Roberto, and then me, but only once I had made my vows of celibacy and was accepted into the Order here.’

  ‘Your great-grandmother must have had some clout,’ I say.

  ‘Roberto was entrenched at the Sanctuary by then. She threatened to get a message to him—have him tell Nathaniel about Mya. She was prepared for our family to forgo our destiny if she couldn’t keep Mya safe from her own kin. But my great-grandmother could not undo the damage done.’ He coughs, and his thin shoulders spasm. ‘Mya was wild, and so angry. She fought with my great-grandmother, my grandmother, my mother, and then Virginia. She would disappear for weeks at a time, and then come home with stories of her promiscuity. Worst of all, she burned down the family church…’

  I can’t get a handle on how to feel about Mya. On the one hand, there’s all the grief she’s given me in the last few days. On the other, she’s saved my life. Twice. I’m struggling to reconcile the Mya Brother Stephen’s talking about with the Mya I saw in LA. I’ve experienced a few sides of her now but nothing to make me question her loyalty to the Outcasts—especially Jude. Has that all been a lie?

  ‘Brother,’ Micah says quietly. ‘Do you think we all deserve to die?’

  He struggles to straighten his spine, his eyes shining. ‘I have lived among you for sixty-five years, Micah. I have seen the good and the bad. I have seen the confusion and the longing for answers. I believe the Fallen are the ones who bear the sin, not their offspring. No. I do not wish to see you dead or consigned to a fiery prison in the depths of hell.’ He looks at me and then Jude. ‘Regardless of what you have or haven’t done.’

  A gust outside rattles the latch on his window.

  ‘Do you think Nathaniel’s right—that delivering the Fallen to the Garrison will redeem us?’ Jude is quieter now. ‘Do you believe the only reason we’ve been allowed to live is to prove we’re useful?’

  The monk shakes his head, slowly. ‘I don’t know. But take comfort in the fact that God is merciful.’

  Jude gives a short laugh. ‘Maybe. But it’s not sounding too much like the Garrison is.’

  We head back to the commissary in silence. Wind whips around the cloister, carrying rain-sodden pine needles and dead flowers. The lamps swing; pools of light sway over pavers in a weirdly synchronised dance. Chains creak.

  ‘She cares about us,’ Ez says.

  Nobody answers, our footsteps muffled by the wind.

  ‘We’ve lived and fought beside her for more than a decade. We know her.’

  ‘Clearly not,’ Rafa says. He was conspicuously quiet in the monk’s room. I have no idea what he’s thinking.

  ‘How many times over the years has she had the chance to hurt us? She planned our missions, Rafa, she could’ve led us into a trap a hundred times over. We were never coming back here, with or without her, so why stay with us if all she wants is to see us destroyed?’

  We pass into the main piazza. We’re almost back at the commissary.

  Rafa shoves his hands in his pockets. ‘Then why won’t she talk to us and tell us what the hell is going on?’

  ‘Because she doesn’t think anyone wants to hear her side of the story,’ Jude says. The light crosses his face and I can see his own guilt again.

  ‘At least she knows what she’s done,’ I say, ‘which is one up on us. For all we know—’

  A blast knocks me off my feet.

  I land on my backside so hard my teeth bang together. My ears thud. I sit up, arms aching and hands grazed. Confused. The night spins around me. Three more blasts—I feel them through my palms. The cloisters shimmer, orange and yellow. Something metallic coats my tongue. There’s grit in my mouth. I try to focus on the building ahead, but the image won’t sharpen. And then I understand.

  The commissary is on fire.

  OUT OF THE DARK AGES

  ‘What the fuck?’ Rafa springs to his feet, drags me to mine. And then we’re running. Jude is with us, and Micah. Ez is gone, shifted; already in the commissary. Where we left Zak. And Jones. And Taya. And everyone.

  Our boots pound on gravel where gravel shouldn’t be. I breathe in dust and ash, stumble over a chunk of stone in the middle of the cloister. The air is thick, toxic. There’s shouting now. The wind brings a wave of heat, the smell of burning plastic. My mind is blank. We burst through the commissary doors and skid to a stop. The scene is too much to take in—I can only process it in fragments.

  The lights, out; windows, gone.

  Blood. Glass. Groaning.

  Tables and chairs overturned, scattered.

  The kitchen, on fire. Men in white, shouting, blasting away with fire extinguishers. The cloying smell of gas.

  The silhouette of armed Rephaim, braced in front of jagged glass. Facing the night. Buffeted by cold wind.

  And outside, white hair floats in the air like seaweed. Gatekeepers, everywhere. The black forest behind them.

  Heat and smoke.

  Fear.

  Zarael. Inky hair against the shadowy forest. Face lit orange, grinning.

  Another Gatekeeper—Leon—with a rocket launcher on his shoulder. Sleeker, shinier than ours. Russian lettering. Blue smoke twists in the wind behind and above him.

  ‘Thank you for the inspiration,’ Zarael calls out. His charred voice carries over the wind, the shouting, the hungry fire. ‘Sometimes we overlook the obvious.’ He nods to Leon.

  ‘Incoming!’ someone shouts and the Rephaim dive in opposite directions, parting like the Red Sea. Rafa pushes me down, covers my body with his. A rush of scorching heat passes over us and then, whump. The blast fills my ears, shakes my bones. Glass shatters. Another blast, louder. Hotter. Debris rains down around us. Jude is sprawled next to me, arms over his head protectively. An object, sharp and cold, digs into my hip. A fork.

  ‘What’s exploding?’ Jude yells.

  ‘Gas lines in the kitchen.’ Rafa hauls me up. ‘You okay?’ But his eyes are already back on the demons beyond the gaping hole in the Sanctuary wall. Rephaim scramble to their feet around us. I can’t find Ez or Zak. Or anyone. They’re all shadowy figures bleeding into the darkness outside.

  My stomach drops.

  ‘Stay inside!’ Daniel is at the back of the room, flanked by more Rephaim than I can count. Blades glint in violent orange light. Micah’s with him—I didn’t realise he’d left us. He jogs over, tosses swords to Rafa and Jude and then me. The hilt is rough, unfamiliar, but comforting.

  ‘What are we waiting for?’ Taya calls to Daniel. A sword hangs in her left hand, awkward. Malachi is at her side. I scour the shadows around them, no sign of Ez or Zak. A stab of fear.

  ‘Do you think they’ve broken the wards?’ I ask Rafa. My throat is cracked.

  ‘I don’t know—’

  A Gatekeeper charges at the opening, sword drawn.

  ‘Hold!’ Daniel shouts. Beside me, I feel Rafa strain against the order. Combustible.

  The demon grins and leaps at the opening in the commissary and—thunk. He bounces off something we can’t see. And then he’s flat on his back in the pine needles.

  ‘Now,’ Daniel shouts. ‘Defend the Sanctuary and get that launcher. Retreat as necessary.’

  Zarael throws his head back. ‘Reload!’

  There’s too much happening. I can’t form a coherent thought.

  ‘Stick with me,’ Rafa says and takes
off. Jude and I glance at each other and then we’re running after him. I dodge a table, jump an overturned chair. Vaguely wonder if Rafa is fit to fight Gatekeepers, if Jude is ready to face them again so soon after Iowa. If I am. None of it matters: it’s happening anyway. My heart is in my throat. I strangle the katana. Smoke stings my eyes, burns my nostrils. I can do this. I have to do this. Everyone I care about is within these walls. Maggie. Oh shit.

  Don’t think.

  Rafa leaps through the gaping window first. He blocks a strike before his feet hit the ground. I have a split second to take in the seething mass of Rephaim and demons and then I’m outside, on the wrong side of Nathaniel’s wards.

  ‘On your left,’ Jude shouts.

  I turn in time to see the Gatekeeper charge, eyes blazing, steel arcing down towards my face. I block it and my knees buckle. And then—finally—a blast of adrenaline. I burn with it, and the Rephaite strength it brings. I push back against the blade as Jude swings at the demon. The Gatekeeper spins and slashes, lightning fast. I strike again. Block. Jude strikes. Block. Sounds of fighting all around us, a blur of movement in my peripheral vision. We fall into a rhythm of attack and defence, drive the demon away from the building. Jude is intense, grim. Nimble.

  A snarl behind me. A hellion.

  Jude catches a glimpse of it over my shoulder as he ducks another attacking swing. I spin, see the hell-beast, all seven feet of it. I register yellow eyes and leathery skin over thick muscles before my eyes drop to the stump hanging from its left shoulder. It’s come for me. I took the rest of that limb when it was trying to tear Daisy apart at the cabin on Tuesday night. It still has a mouthful of long teeth and one good hand with razor sharp talons. The bite above my collarbone flares white-hot. I glance over my shoulder. Jude is working double-time to keep the demon focused on him and not me. I shouldn’t leave him alone. I should—

  The hellion charges.

  I remember the cage. My heart smashes against my ribs. I know what to do. I’ve done it before: hamstring it. It lumbers at me. Wait. Wait. Now.

  The hell-beast leaves the ground the same time I launch myself sideways. Too late, I realise it’s guessed my move or I telegraphed it. I make a split-second decision and change my grip on my katana. I drive my blade into its stomach at the same instant pain sears across my chest. I ignore it and use the beast’s momentum to direct its bulk away from me. It lands heavily, taking my sword with it. I land on a bed of pine needles. I’m not pinned by the hellion, thank god, but shards of pain radiate up my neck, down my arms. I try to get up too quick. The forest reels, I stagger sideways, touch my chest. My hoodie is torn, bloodied. It hurts, but not like in the cage. The ground settles. The fire and fighting and chaos come back into focus. The hellion is trying to sit. I scramble to pull the blade free. I feel it slide back through flesh and tendons, almost gag. When I turn, sword raised to finish it off, a Gatekeeper is between the hellion and me. Our eyes meet—his flickering orange, full of violence—and I swing down. By the time the blade strikes where the demon should have been, he and the hellion are gone. I stumble forward into empty air, barely keep my feet.