by Laury Falter
Gasps around me told me that others had seen. I disregarded them.
I knew from Eran’s scroll that not one of our enemies would kill me, an incontestable command given by Abaddon.
Now I was going to test that theory.
Elsics became riled at the smell of blood. If my blood didn’t cause them to go mad, at least it would distract and upset them, allowing the Alterums an advantage.
Ms. Barrett, who stood next to me, waited to see what I would do. She knew from our brief discussion the night before that I didn’t intend to fight alongside the Alterums. I had an alternate plan. Now I’d made her feel that much more uneasy.
Placing a hand on her shoulder, I tried to subdue it. “Don’t worry,” I said. “I know what I’m doing.”
Then, with the same conviction, I turned to my housemates. If I didn’t forewarn them of what I was about to do they would follow me and make themselves vulnerable. And it was something I couldn’t allow.
“I’m going to incite the Elsics…aggravate them until they are thoughtlessly reacting. It should buy you some time.”
“No,” Ezra demanded, reaching out to seize my arm.
The smile I gave her rose slowly. “They won’t kill me. I can walk right through them and they won’t touch me.”
And they wouldn’t. Just a simple touch of me would draw them in to a frenzy they couldn’t control. It would inevitably result in my death…against Abaddon’s wishes. They would then need to answer to him. And that was not an appealing prospect. They knew it and I knew it.
“How can you be so sure?” demanded Felix.
“Abaddon gave an order.”
Hesitantly, Ezra released her arm. Her lips pinched, nervous and in disapproval, she nodded concurrence.
Wasting no more time, I sprang through the air, over the stronghold’s wall, and towards the army assembled to murder those I love.
Despite all who surrounded me, at that very second, it was a very lonely sky.
The Elsics were already stirring at the smell of my blood and when I flew over them, just outside arm’s length, a few bold ones took swipes at me.
My flight path wasn’t unintentional as I circled the throng. I kept my eyes moving, searching. Somewhere in the midst of them was Abaddon…
The Elsics were screaming in agony now, my scent causing them physical pain. They broke rank, with a few heaving through the Fallen Ones in front and to the sides of them. This happened twice before anarchy broke loose.
Suddenly, the Fallen Ones rushed the stronghold. A mixture of grey and black wings sprang up to descend on the Alterums, becoming a blend of limbs, weapons, and bloodshed.
Only one person remained still.
Abaddon.
He stood at the back, his hands calmly folded together in front of him, as if he had been expecting the chaos.
I turned and aimed directly for him, almost oblivious to the wind shrieking in my ears.
My body never quite landed as I met Abaddon. I swooped across him, my wings carrying me in a half-circle, with just enough range to connect my fist with his face.
His head snapped back but those long, thin hands remained in place.
Then I was pummeling him, my fists hitting his face with such speed they were a blur to me. The contact felt good, Abaddon’s aged skin giving way, caving in as my blows impacted him.
I released on him the fury that only a person who has lost a loved one at the hands of another can unleash. He took my time from me and Eran, stealing it away forever, and in return I gave him pain.
The flailing continued on immeasurably, all while Abaddon kept his hands clasped before him.
Only when my body was yanked back, arms coming around me and pulling me away, did I understand why.
Abaddon was smiling.
He wore the expression of someone who knew he’d just gotten the best of another.
My appendages were now being crushed between me and Abaddon’s savior, but I still couldn’t see who it was.
Then came Elam’s voice, calmly maniacal. “Pleasure to see you again, Maggie.”
That was when I went still.
If anyone was going to disobey Abaddon’s command and kill me it was Elam, and I certainly didn’t want to give him the impression I would resist.
“That’s better,” he said when I’d settled down but kept his arms around me.
Abaddon approached me, oblivious to the bodies hurling through the air around us; his coy smile conveying his thoughts before his voice. “I won…”
“You have won nothing, Abaddon. So you sent a guardian to an infinite death. But I’m still here…And so long as I am, anyone you kill will simply get an escort to the afterlife, where they have the choice to turn around and come again to this dimension. You will never dominate it.” I grinned, taunting. “No, Abaddon…Try as you will to spin it, the fact is, you lose.”
He wasn’t the least bit concerned as he leaned in, his hands remaining together at his hips. “Dear Maggie…How can they get an escort when their guide is under my control?”
For proof of his threat, Elam released me and my body spun against my will towards the battlefield. Using the same ability on me as he had on Eran, I was frozen in place, unable to move, to enter the carnage before us and defend my friends being slaughtered.
One by one, they fell as I struggled against Abaddon’s iron grip. I had seen war before but not like this. What I was witnessing now was a massacre, with Fallen Ones pinning down Alterums for the Elsics’ feedings while simultaneously sending Alterums to their final death. The screams of horror and pain were not coming from our enemies but they blended with the ferocious screeches of the Elsics and the shouts of excitement from the Fallen Ones until the sound filled the air.
Across the field, the blue and white arm bands were now soaked with blood. Alterum blood. Streams of red flowed through the grass to pool at the bottom of the hills. Limbs and pieces of flesh scattered the ground.
We were losing this battle.
“We need help,” I whispered, unnerved by the sound of fear in my voice.
Then, as I spoke the words, as if they had been heard, the sky filled with bright, white lights. Moving with amazing speed in zigzag fashion, they descended on the battlefield.
Dominick had arrived, and he’d brought Eran’s army.
A collision of such magnitude followed, it resounded with a boom of its own across the countryside.
The battle tipped then, and Fallen Ones fell at a faster rate. Hope grew in me that this would not be the end of us.
But then I saw the balance of power shift, Fallen Ones doubling, tripling up on the Alterums, and my heart sank inside my chest.
“Watch…” Abaddon’s voice whispered in my ear. “Learn…This is how it is done, Maggie. How it has been for centuries. How it will always be. What you don’t seem to understand, is that I’m not seeking to dominate this dimension…I already do.”
The only motion I was allowed while under Abaddon’s control was breathing, and right now I was seething.
Only then did I realize there was one power I did have not in Abaddon’s grasp.
Breath.
I let the rest of it from my lungs, concentrating on pressing them back towards my spine until they were completely deflated.
Elam noticed what I was doing first. As I collapsed, he turned swiftly towards me. But I never got the chance to see what he was about to do.
I was already in the Hall of Records. The hall was silent around me, as I had always found it. The agonizing screams from the battle gone with only the hall’s constant breeze reaching my ears. Still, they echoed in my mind as if I were there.
Rather than dying bodies surrounding me, it was scrolls. The metallic smell of blood was gone too. Fresh air filled my lungs now.
The ploy had worked. I’d fainted, in effect, putting me to sleep. Now all I had to do was wait.
Wait…I told myself. Wait just long enough for Abaddon to release his hold on me.
; Wait…
Telling an impatient person to wait while her friends were being slaughtered was the greatest challenge of my existence. But it was the only way to free myself from Abaddon.
I hesitated as long as was physically possible and then I lay back down on the bench, closing my eyes.
Focusing on breathing steadily and relaxing every muscle I had worked.
When I awoke, my face was in the dirt, my body curled as if it had been kicked. The ache at the back, between my shoulder blades made me think this had happened.
Cautiously, I opened my eyes and found Abaddon alone, standing in front of me, surveying the harm he was causing.
Taking incredible care not to make a sound, I stood and pulled a blade from my suit. Only two steps…only two…
One…
Two…
Abaddon turned then, once again wrapping his grasp around me. I became frozen, my legs in a lunge, my hips twisted for increased power, my arm extended with my blade at the end of it. Although, I could no longer see it.
It had disappeared, planted now in Abaddon’s chest.
Oddly, with Abaddon’s ability to restrict my movements, I couldn’t withdraw it even if I’d wanted.
“You weren’t quick enough,” I told him, releasing a sigh, feeling some measure of reward from it.
But he chuckled. “Oh…yes, I was…”
A disconcerting feeling came over me as he tipped his head downward. Following his eyes, I found Abaddon’s blade had been imbedded in me.
“Neither of us wins,” he chocked, his lips still twisted up.
I knew this to be true as the searing pain radiated from the fatal wound, along every limb, across every part of my skin, absorbed by every muscle, through ever molecule of my body.
Then my legs collapsed and I knew Abaddon was dying too.
He’d released me.
Each of us fell to the dirt, holding the weapons we’d both implanted in each other, gasping for one last breath of air, searching for some miracle to stop what had begun.
As the battle raged on, a living, palpable darkness began to consume me. Starting from the edges of my sight, just as Eran had encountered, it quickly and steadily drew in, tightening, solidifying, harnessing me.
The dirt gave way next, disappearing all together so that there was nothing to stand on, nothing to support me, to give me bearings.
I plummeted then. Not a single thing touched me, no hands, no wind, nothing. But I was spinning, head over heels, downward.
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO: FOR ALL ETERNITY
There was no sound, not a single whisper, and entirely no light to illuminate my way.
The only thing that registered with me was the stench. It was potent, sickening, and it smelled like death.
Just as I recognized it, my body hit the ground. Hard. Knocking the air from my lungs. Because of it, I didn’t notice what I had landed on for several seconds. Only when I was able to draw a breath, fighting the tearing pain caused by inhaling after the blow, did I realized the surface of death was cold and jagged.
Cautiously, I bent my legs up and heaved myself to a standing position. From the second I stood, the cold permeated my feet, reaching through the souls of the boots I still wore, along my legs and into my torso. Huddling against it, I looked around.
My eyes adjusted slightly and I found that I’d fallen in to a catacomb of tunnels, a rock column with countless branches opening from the center, spanning the circumference from the top, where I’d fallen, to the bottom, where I now stood.
“Eran,” I called, though it came out a whisper.
After clearing my throat, I tried it again. “Eran?”
I waited then but my only response was silence.
Now I felt a little foolish. Of course, I was alone…
Consciously I expanded my wings, flapping them once for a test. They not only worked, they were stronger than I’d expected.
Pumping them rigidly against the dense air, I felt my feet lift the ground and the warmth return to them.
Trying my best to keep myself steady, I flew up towards the tunnel openings.
“Eran?” I shouted. “Gershom? Christianson? Magnus?”
I called out every name of those I knew were here and heard nothing in return.
And then I flew farther and called them again.
Nothing.
I pushed myself higher, peering inside another row of tunnels, calling again.
Then I felt him. And I couldn’t stop myself from drawing a sudden, astounded breath.
The feeling was faint but recognizable. Our bond…the one that allowed us to feel each other’s emotions worked even here, in the most desolate, loathsome place in existence.
Then I acknowledged exactly what I was sensing and unconsciously murmured his name in agony. “Eran…”
He was nearby all right but he was sad, hopeless, distraught. And it was bittersweet. I’d found him but he was not Eran.
I used it, as radar, seeking him out through the tunnels. It intensified the closer I came to him and at times I had to stop, lean against the wall, and contain my own emotions reacting to his. It hit me the hardest when I found the chamber where Eran sat.
The tunnel I was using to find him ended abruptly, at the mouth of an enormous cavern. And there at the bottom sat thousands of Alterums, messengers, newly imprisoned and veterans to this place, huddled together but without talking. Their heads bowed, their knees against their chests, their appendages wrapped around them as if they could protect them from the grief of eternal death.
The enormity of what I was witnessing took my breath away, caving in my chest, refusing me air.
Still, I shoved aside my reaction and flew downward, circling, until I found Eran.
He was hunched in the same position, and at the first sight of it a pain surfaced in my heart, latching on and burrowing in.
“Eran,” I said, as I hovered over him. There was no place to land except on others, which I would not do.
When he didn’t respond, I said it again more urgently. “Eran!”
That was when I heard it. He was moaning, a lifeless, distant whimper. And almost unnoticeably rolling his body from side to side.
“No,” I said. “No! NO!” I was screaming it now, enraged, refusing to believe this was my husband, my love, my rock when things became challenging, my guide when I needed direction, my savior when I needed help.
Incensed, I flew hard and fast towards the ceiling.
Having very little concept of what I was doing, I flew harder, faster. If I didn’t make it, if the rock above me remained firmly in place, at the very least it would make me feel better to ram something, hard.
My appendages moved with amazing power, increasing my speed until the rock walls around me became a blur. Whereas I hadn’t heard wind on my fall downward, my force skyward was creating it now. The sound of a freight train roared in my ears.
Closer…
I was almost there…
I straightened my arms and clasped my hands together, forming a latched ball of curled fingers.
Then I met the ceiling, the hard rock cave that kept my friends and loved ones held against their will, deep in oppression, giving way.
I never felt the jagged edges touch my skin. There was no impact. No tremendous pressure holding me back.
There, on the other side, I found sunlight, trees, grass, and a thunderous battle below me. Against the horizon stood the Alterum stronghold and I was stunned to learning I had breached the barrier meant to restrict me and my fellow inmates to this dimension.
Glancing down, I found that the ground was untouched.
This was when it dawned on me. My supernatural talent I’d brought with me to earth wasn’t simply the ability to visit the afterlife. That had never been it. Every messenger came with this ability. What distinguished me from the others was something I couldn’t have uncovered had I not been killed by Abaddon.
While attempting to send me to a place of death, he had end
ed up giving me life, awareness, knowledge.
Because of my death by his hands, because I was sent to eternal death, I now knew I could break through any dimension I chose.
The air was fresh, weightless in comparison to the everlasting death chamber I’d emerged from. As I sucked it in deeply, enjoying the clean feel of it, I knew I would need it for what I was about to do.
I turned and went back down.
Soaring downward, the rock face rushing by me once again in a blur, I reached Eran in seconds.
I didn’t bother talking to him, telling him of my plan. He wouldn’t hear me anyways.
Picking him up was a challenge, his body a dead weight in my arms. I drew him close to my chest and latched my arms around him, as I ascended.
The closer we came to the opening, the warmer he began to feel, the chill of the ground finally leaving his body.
At the opening, his head, which had been lolling to and fro, lifted and his eyes opened. A few seconds later, he spoke. His voice was groggy but adorned with its striking English accent.
“Magdalene?”
“It’s me, Eran.”
With that he heaved a sigh unlike any I’d ever heard. It was tantamount to taking one’s first breath, to the firm realization that life had begun again.
When we reached the sunlight, he moaned, as if he’d never experienced anything so magnificent.
“How…How did you find me?” he asked his voice clearer now. He was coming to.
“I felt you.”
“From above?”
“From below. Abaddon took my life.”
“You…You…” He couldn’t seem to find the words.
“I went through eternal death,” I confirmed.
“Went through?”
“Survived it.”
I saw Eran’s forehead furl in confusion.
“I can breach dimensions, Eran.”
His jaw fell open and he let out a stunned chuckle which quickly grew to a deep, exuberant, bellowing laugh.
While I didn’t join him, I knew what he was experiencing. Triumph. My ability would allow us to bring back the other messengers, who could escort those dying on the battlefield to the afterlife, where they could fall again.