by D B Nielsen
Repulsed, I closed my eyes. ‘No.’
At this, St. John fell forward, his hands splayed flat against the stone as his glorious wings unfurled from his back, breaking through his shoulder blades like twin curves of foamy waves capturing the last leaf of golden sunlight. They went on forever, extending behind him, gathering the muted reflection of heavenly light from Mizrael. But the feathers were matted; considerably crusted in some foul substance that reminded me of seabirds covered in crude oil.
Deeper rumbling, he groaned again. Staring at me between long, lank strands of hair, his expression shifted between madness and dread. Masterful, frail, crouching on the ground, he crept forward upon clawed hands, dragon-like. Dropping there, he moaned and snarled, and retreated shuddering. Then he lunged forward again. And, tormented, again withdrew.
‘Do you now see, Wise One?’ Belladonna goaded, cornflower blue eyes flashing. ‘The true gift of our angelic heritage is a curse.’
I did see, and painfully empathised. All who were present were witness to St. John’s savage, inner battle. Yet, throughout it all, I made no move to raise the Archangels’ sword. I remained still, not daring to move or to introduce into these tense, fragile moments a reason that would push St. John over the edge and attack. Balanced on a knife’s edge, no amount of suffering could redeem his hell.
At last, he quieted. Convulsed shoulder blades, bowed head. And the shameful desperation, the fury of the mind savaging itself. His wings splayed before me, bearing the torture and rapture of his body.
Belladonna’s endless cold jeers sought him out, searched for him in his ancient solitude.
I could wait no longer. Time was haemorrhaging.
‘St. John,’ I breathed. And, kneeling down, reached a hand out, palm upwards, towards where he grovelled before me. Somehow I managed to ensure it did not tremble as he seemed to sniff the air stirred by my slow, controlled movement like a wary beast.
I experienced a moderate mercy as I touched his cheek. Stroked. My touch was lighter than a feather but it felt like it burnt, felt like fire where it made contact with his skin.
‘This is the one who hurt you.’ Belladonna’s voice was as cold and as brittle as frosted glass, directed towards St. John, trying to provoke him to attack me.
I said nothing, ignoring her. And Belladonna seemed to expect that nothing. We were locked in the game, strategically placing our pieces on the board.
‘My love... The power is within you to make it happen,’ I told St. John, still half-blinded by unshed tears which refused to spill over in front of my nemesis.
There was a long silence – during which I was aware of time’s twistedness; of the others watching as life’s course deviated down this uncharted path.
After a measured age, St. John finally looked up. His eyes were locked on mine. One burning, alert glance. In his eyes were great, turbulent seas. The last untinged memories of his life.
‘I accept your choice in this.’ His voice robbed of all beauty. Yet, all the desperation and fury ebbed from his expression, leaving only love and empathy. He knew.
I reached for Mizrael. I reached for the Seed. And felt the devils laugh and angels weep as I braced myself for what was to come. Drawing in one swift, seamless motion the sword from the stone, my mind expanded with a searing knowledge. White hot and deadly. My pulse throbbed and the blood boiled in my veins. Deafening loud. I could hear the bubbling in my eardrums. Roaring at my heart. Panting in the throes of determined exertion that taxed me like a physical pain, I closed my eyes and thrust the sword upwards as far as I could, and felt it slice into yielding muscle, cut deeply into living flesh. It cut against my awareness with the pressure of a blunt knife driven by all the weight of the world. Enough to cauterise but not heal the wound; my own open heart surgery.
The effect was immediate and dramatic.
My eyes flew wide open as St. John shuddered and slumped to the ground with a mighty crash. Yet, his hands reached out and knitted with mine around the hilt of the blade to impale himself upon Mizrael; razor edge penetrating chest and sinuous back. His eyes burned like hieroglyphs, like the markings on the Seed; brightest green with the clarity of vivid Tahitian seas. His wings flared wide and free as if he would gain flight. Then he released a last, violent shudder.
As if called by that release, I gave a gasping sob, ‘Oh love! Oh God!’, and quickly withdrew, feeling the steel’s slick movement in my hand. The Archangel’s sword clattered to the ground unheeded as I put my arms around him, drawing his heavy head to my breast. I suddenly felt very small and solitary.
Then St. John gave a sigh that seemed to flow from the very depths of his soul like the angelic essence pouring out from his open chest wound. And, bowing my head, I whispered, ‘The price is paid.’
CULMINATION
CHAPTER NINETEEN
A scream of crazed frustration ripped from Belladonna’s throat.
I gasped as if struck and felt all my senses as they snapped to attention, consumed by a solemn, veiled force. Synapses. Every nerve ending felt sheared to oblivion. Vision and reflex merged, witnessing the passage of time behind closed eyelids. The end of all times for me.
The earth felt insubstantial beneath me as I opened my eyes – to witness the fast fading flicker of heavenly-wrought, white-golden fire illuminating the starry inlaid markings in the seraph blade. I had not known the Mizrael to have such markings as the Seed, but I innately understood that these were not the same and would adjust with the necessity of the sword’s purpose. Reaching for the hilt of the sword of the Archangel with trembling fingers, I panted in sore distress, unprepared for the rending heartbreak as the brilliance of Mizrael dwindled to a dull glow, and experienced a similar dull, throbbing ache at the ebbing of angelic essence from St. John’s deep and bloody chest and back wounds, leaving me hollow and desolate.
Laying St. John’s heavy head carefully upon the cold, hard ground, I stood, breathing hard. Duty and a solemn vow took me to a darkly brilliant place that I’d rather not have gone. And it wasn’t over yet. Blades sang through the air to the maelstrom unleashed around me. Their bell-like wailing as swordsteel sheared airborne particles and clashed, jolted all senses back to reason.
But nothing was right, nothing at all. Whatever marvel Elijah had cast to anchor stability in the moment, I had undone with the last thrust of the blade. To dismantle the elements of creation, to unstring the weft and warp of time, to erase what had been written by the Creator came at a hideous price.
Nature revolted. The cosmos churned chaotically. The stars shot their fiery arrows at the earth in retribution. The moon hid its face behind a misty veil. Thunder crackled and cracked the air, whipping atoms to whirlybirds. Sheets of brilliant white and silver lightning flared through mortar and stonework, channelled with terrifying violence, and would have immolated the museum’s artefacts had they been formed of living flesh.
The yellow fog shrank inwardly in response, disembodied beings pressured, agitated to violent retreat. Cosmic power radiated, a starlit dazzling force which pierced the miasma and caused the entities to frantically disperse beyond death’s domain.
Brazen thunder and the harsh, ringing cry of steel harmonised then fractured into discordant noise. The museum gallery resonated with powerful currents of energy, swelling with a palpable, voltaic charge. The stinging scent of sulphur and ozone, like the crisp bite of chill wind, eclipsed the salt taste of sweat, the sourness of rancid milk, and the sweetness of belladonna berries. The energies whipped and raged. The room darkened. And a bolt – a spearhead of brilliant lightning – of blued steel and scorching, sinuous white light descended to the stone altar, splitting it in two.
I did not flinch – even as rebounding stone-shrapnel plucked at my sleeve and hair.
I stood as stone. Stone-hearted.
Vengeance for honour’s sake seemed foremost in the Anakim’s mind. Two of the howling Fravashi fell beneath Pen’s sword on his renewed charge, and the one who tried to thrust at hi
s back with a vicious swipe of his broadsword fell in a heap where he was brained by the force of Pen’s cutting edge as he spun with easy, careless grace in the nick of time; an admirable feat for such a big man though completely ordinary for a Nephilim. Howls of frenzy by the enemy were punctuated by the snapping of bones as the Lamassu surged forward. And blood gushed from another swordsman’s throat where he writhed in agony on the stone floor, felled by Sariel who continued to block and thrust in choreographed motion, slaying in a dancer’s rhythmic response as he pressed his advantage against his former brother-in-arms.
I observed them all. A mosaic of single sparks, like the desperate thrusting of moths against the window pane, striking again and again at the halo of light just out of reach. Blood oozed like sap from the wounded. A pantomime of death.
But they would all heal – unlike St. John – and the futility of this day transformed to torment as I spied Belladonna, brought relentlessly into focus, dominating the arcane frenzy. I felt all the breath leave my lungs in a whoosh as if surrendering to the impact of a brutal blow. It was as if ice had driven itself into my heart and had splintered.
The Ice Queen expelled a heartless laugh. The fine hairs at the back of my neck raised to the charge of an oncoming storm as her eyes grew hard. Once cornflower blue, now palest blue rimmed in blackness; the colour of danger and manic madness shone in her bottomless blue-black eyes. No sign of human emotion in the immortal Nephilim. I realised that Belladonna was so far gone, she was shade, she was shadow, she was animated but lifeless and hollow inside.
We were matched.
‘You will fail,’ I repeated, forcing scorn into my voice to keep it steady. Even with the roaring fury surrounding us, I knew that she heard me. ‘Mizrael meted out mercy to the Keeper of the Seed but, with you, the sword of the Archangel will mete out justice.’
Something roiled and churned like thunderclouds in the blue of Belladonna’s eyes.
‘Who are you to judge me, Wise One? You were never born to the chain of command and enslaved through your birthright to fight in this eternal war. No, you were given free will under the Creator’s blessing by the simple gift of your humanity and genetics. Even now you may walk away if you wish, forsake all this, and you will be forgiven. Forgiven for your human frailty. No birthright or cursed attribute can force you to do what is not of your own choosing. But it is in our nature. Empathy. Altruism. Justice. Mercy. What you call virtues are merely a malediction. It withers us. Enslaves us. Consumes our life, our existence. Look at him.’ She gestured contemptuously to St. John’s fallen form. ‘Look at me. We are what you are not. Children of the Grigori.’
It was the most sincere Isabella had ever been. St. John would have felt empathy. But there was only ice in my heart.
Inexorably the seraph blade moved. I closed the gap to engage my adversary without heed for anything else; what lay behind and betwixt. But my primary opponent was not the Fravashi, nor the poisoned Rephaim, nor even the recoiled and dissipated yellow fog – it was the Ice Queen who faced me with a glare of burning defiance. Eyes flashed wildly and lips peeled back in atavistic loathing to show the domain where her altruism and insanity blended together, erasing reality.
I raised Mizrael and unleashed its fire, releasing all restraints on the Seed. Golden white light blazed in a starburst that dazzled and blinded, but only in warning. Again, a thunder crack split the air and lightning flared fierce brilliance across the room’s high ceiling. Mizrael struck a clean chord of purest passion, indisputable proof the cause was just.
Through its brilliant glare, I saw the Nephilim battle – but now their movements were slowed, rotating sword arms as a field of steady turbines in the wind, the ethereal wisps of light’s slanting shift dispersing like a blown flame – and I felt the weight of light and stone, sin and virtue swell within me. I learnt to move as they moved – like firework stars wheeling to burst and shower their chromatic fiery rain on the ground, captured in stop-motion photography. Too fast for human eyes to perceive – blurred images, captured light particles in the moment and instantly gone.
But I was not battling a mere mortal. And I was no longer myself, alone. My nerves were now forged – not in iron – but in Orichalcum. We were matched.
Moving swiftly forward with several graceful steps, I expected Belladonna to block my stride or, at the very least, make a running charge at me so that we would meet in a head-on clash somewhere in the middle.
But I had underestimated my opponent.
Enormous wings came around as quickly as Belladonna could execute her blow, like a steel trap snapping fiercely shut, bringing binding darkness. Feathers, as soft as down and as hard as black steel, cruelly extended to shred me apart as I spun and weaved below the sharpest poniards, and only just skittered out of reach. It was a blow that would have gutted me had I paused for thought – but all now was rhythmic reflex in the hands of the Creator as I surrendered to the power of the Seed.
The type of fighting Belladonna employed was totally alien to me as I lunged and skidded beneath another onslaught, missing their razor-sharpness by a mere hairsbreadth. The phalanx and primary feathered blades lacerated the museum floor with the shrill wail of metal cutting stone, leaving behind a row of deep indentations on the ground as if it had been gouged by a stonecutter. And the earth shook a thunderous rapport.
I could have blocked my opponent’s attack, hacked blindly at Belladonna’s wings with the seraph blade till they were nothing more than bloody stumps. I did not. This was never going to be a gory mutilation, performed out of retribution. I did not intend to destroy nature’s beauty. I only desired justice.
I was too close now for Belladonna to continue using her wings in the same manner to kill or deflect me. I thought I heard someone shout to attack or perhaps it was to retreat, but couldn’t spare the attention. No one seemed very willing to stop our fight, not even the Lamassu. The gameplay was clearly beyond the scope of Nephilistic intervention and far outside their unspoken rules.
And now Belladonna with the cold, hard gleam of fanaticism was coming at me hard. And this time there was no more room in which to dodge. An overhead slash suddenly became a sideways blow to the neck with a movement of the winged humerus; akin to a quick twist of the wrist. The razor-edge of a feather sheared my cheekbone; the cold sting ignored, even as I felt the pearling buds of blood upon my cheek. Instead, the flat of my blade came up in reflex and I caught the scissored vanes with enough strength to parry the blow. That gave me an opportunity and I was swiftly inside her guard.
I lashed out as I surged to my feet, catching Belladonna squarely on the shoulder. Her shriek of pain shook walls and ceiling; a keening exclamation of surprise and anger. Blood and tainted angelic essence wept from a wound that would never heal.
I didn’t pull back. I couldn’t risk a return stroke.
Planting both my feet, I swung the sword of the Archangel with all my might; swirling Mizrael around in an arc at incredible speed. The blade sang through the air in its seeming suspended stillness; its voice rang out in a rush of raw power as the markings shifted and sealed our fate.
The seraph blade came in fast and high, slicing deep across the side of Belladonna’s neck. Blood and dust fountained out of the visibly widening gash. It struck true. Clean through.
‘Justice.’
Thunder pealed as a blinding wave of energy engulfed the room like a conflagration. I threw my left arm across my eyes as light lanced brilliantly; snapping whips and coils that limned the room’s inhabitants with white gold radiance. In that self-same moment as the blade’s momentum carried forth, Belladonna’s head flew backwards, platinum blonde hair shimmering like mermaid’s tresses to comb the windblown waves of air. Decapitated, her head spun. Her eyes wide open and blind, dazzled by Mizrael’s justice; but caught in its burning light, a rapacious madness that long abjured all hope of redemption.
Like poison spreading, the flesh wilted as white lightning forks jagged over her body, snaking down in
writhing, twisted arrays from the cauterised wound. Squinting against the harsh glare, I saw her body flailed upon luminous patterns of tangled wire, searing and consuming viscera and sinew. A rising bloom of incandescence shot through flesh like stars in the night sky and poured forth from gaping orifices. Skin and muscle and bone perished. Grey ash filtered down from motionless air. Winnowed to charriest soot, nothing remained of the Ice Queen but a slender feather of smoke which floated up and dissipated into airy oblivion. Mizrael’s music struck one perfect cosmic chord in the moment, then its prism tones fused into silence. A requiem for a lost angel.
Closing my eyes, the adrenaline and energy from my connection to the Seed and Mizrael quickly receded and I let pity swarm me, pain splinter me, finally succumbing to hot tears. I tasted salt and blood, my own fear and folly, and could save nothing. Degraded upon my own fragments; heart cracked like shards of fragile ice crystals. All was spent and exhausted as Isabella’s pale beauty. For through it all, as Mizrael meted out its divine justice, Belladonna continued to cradle her swollen belly as a mother protecting her unborn. No weapon had touched her hands, just an instinct as old as time to hold onto all that was most precious. But there would be no record of a birth, nor of those deaths. Lamentations would be cut short as, even now, Mizrael’s burden lessened within my grip. Suddenly boneless, my fingers released the blade to let it clatter upon the stone floor; its markings already fading to dormancy.
‘If you cut off the head of the beast, the body will fall.’ Pen’s deep voice was startling in the room’s sudden silence.
After Belladonna fell, everything seemed to happen at once. I saw the countless foe who had been bitten, branded and burnt by the righteous light of the seraph blade turned into scattered mounds of ember and ash which, even now, were brushed off the stone floor by some invisible hand. Most of the Fravashi, however, had fled with the raising of Mizrael’s might. And of the Rephaim, there was no sign. It was over.