Belphegor paused, his eyes closing, and for a brief moment she wondered if he had slipped away. But then the old angel sighed, a sound suffused with disappointment. “The only thing that pains me is that I will not survive to see the outcome,” he said.
Lorelei said nothing, and the Founder read her silence.
“You believe all is lost?” he asked, and still she did not respond.
The sounds of battle drifted up to them, Lehash’s guns booming, screams of rage, cries of fear. Lorelei didn’t have to see it to know that they were losing the war, she could feel it in the depths of her soul. She could feel them dying.
“Even with Aaron, we’re not strong enough,” she whispered, nearly overcome with hopelessness.
“So you believe,” Belphegor said. “Do you even understand the true nature of what you are?” he asked, straining upon every word. “The merging of God’s two most fabulous creations into one fantastic form of life.”
She felt another of the citizens die as she listened to Belphegor’s words.
“Do you think that the Powers kill you because they think you inferior?” he asked. “They hunt you because they fear you—fear what you have the potential to become.” Painfully he raised an arm to point a blackened finger at her. “You, all the Nephilim, are the next phase in our evolution … the next best thing. But to survive—to make the prophecy a reality—you must fight. It is the last of the trials we must face to achieve absolution.”
There was strength in the old angel’s words, and Lorelei felt the power of her birthright stir. The next best thing, she repeated to herself as she watched the Founder’s eyes begin to close.
“Show them what it means to be Nephilim …,” he said, his words trailing off in a weakening rattle.
Lorelei felt his life slip away, and the world suddenly seemed to be a much colder place. “Sleep well, old man,” she said, and leaned down to place a kiss upon his blackened brow.
Then she climbed to her feet upon the shifting rubble and gazed out over the streets made into a battleground, the citizens fighting to make their dreams of a prophecy come true. The next best thing, she heard the Founder of Aerie say again, and knew that it was now her place to prove him right.
“This is for you,” she said, reaching within herself to stir a power she had believed to be nearly depleted, and she gazed up into the cloudless sky, beckoning to the elements in the language of the messengers.
And the heavens answered.
With a vengeance.
* * *
The fear was gone.
Aaron climbed to his feet, crossbow shaft still protruding from his leg, the sword of fire he had just used to end his brother’s life still in his hand. He looked upon his enemy with disdain.
Verchiel hovered over the remains of the citizens’ church, his mighty wings fanning the pockets of flame that still burned amid the rubble. As Aaron studied the creature of Heaven, a monster that had fallen farther than any of the poor beings that had taken up residence on this poisoned land, he felt only anger.
Verchiel gracefully set down upon the rubble-strewn sidewalk, his armor still glistening resplendently in the smoky, early morning sunshine. He too was holding a sword, a truly magnificent blade that Aaron had seen once before when they battled in the sky above his home, on the night his parents were murdered and Stevie was taken.
What was it Popeye always said? his addled brain tried to remember. And then it came to him, and he heard it echo through his head in the odd, gravelly voice of the popular cartoon character. I had all I can stands, I can’t stands no more. Aaron caught himself smiling, the words of the animated sailor summing up his emotions perfectly. He had been pushed beyond fear of the vengeful creatures of Heaven, and after all he had experienced in the last few hours, he did not have the ability to care.
Verchiel walked toward him slowly, a predator’s gait, full of graceful strength and self-assurance. It was obvious that he believed himself the victor. He can’t be more wrong, Aaron thought as he spread his wings wide and leaped at his foe, sword poised to strike. His body screamed, the numerous wounds recently inflicted upon it crying out in protest.
“I’ll show you a murderer,” he growled, his voice filled with the fury of the angelic essence that had become part of his nature.
“Look at what you’ve caused,” Verchiel taunted as he parried Aaron’s strike and pressed an assault of his own.
Aaron was driven back farther into the street. He had to be careful, as the angel’s savage blows rained down upon him, not to listen to Verchiel’s jibes, for they were there only to weaken his resolve and make him doubt his purpose. The heel of his shoe bumped up against something in the street and he chanced a look down to see that he’d almost tripped over Stevie’s headless corpse.
Verchiel used this moment of distraction to savagely hack through Aaron’s defenses, his sword cutting a deep swathe down the Nephilim’s cheek. Aaron cried out in pain and surprise. He had been lucky though, the wound numbed the left side of his face, but Verchiel’s blade could very easily have taken away an eye.
The Powers’ leader was laughing, toying with him like a cat playing with a mouse. Time for the mouse to give the cat a taste of his own medicine, Aaron thought. He unfurled his wings and sprang from the ground, ignoring the blaring pain of the crossbow bolt still imbedded in the thick muscle of his thigh. He flew into the Powers’ commander; his shoulder connecting with the angel’s armored midsection, and the two tumbled backward to the street in a heap of flapping wings.
“The savior of them all,” Verchiel sneered through bared teeth as they wrestled. “They actually believed that you would be the one that brought them God’s forgiveness.”
Aaron bore down on him, rage and pain fueling his strength as he held Verchiel’s wrist in a steely grip, preventing the angel from using his sword. He looked into the monster’s black, bottomless eyes, searching for even the slightest hint that this creature once served a loving God. He saw nothing but his own look of revulsion reflected in the void of Verchiel’s stare.
“Look around you, Nephilim,” the Powers’ commander said, struggling to break Aaron’s grip. “It is not forgiveness that you bring, but death and destruction.”
“No!” Aaron shouted. He reached down and pulled the blood-caked metal shaft from his leg. “I’ll show you death and destruction, you son of a bitch,” he growled through gritted teeth.
A look of utter shock spread over Verchiel’s face as Aaron drove the body of the magickally imbued bolt down into the chest plate of the angel’s armor. The pointed head pierced the armor with ease, continuing on into the angelic flesh beneath. Verchiel wailed, his pain-filled thrashings so violent that Aaron was thrown away from him.
Aaron wasted no time in pressing the advantage. Though the wound in his leg throbbed, he scrambled toward his enemy, a scream of battle on his lips, a sword of heavenly fire ready to strike. He didn’t want to give the monster even the smallest chance to recover. But Verchiel moved quickly, ignoring the shaft of metal in his chest. He summoned his blade and blocked the arc of Aaron’s weapon.
“You’ve actually begun to believe what they say,” Verchiel said, his voice dripping with contempt.
He twisted his body to the side, one of his wings suddenly snapping out, swiping Aaron across the face and knocking him away. The Powers’ commander charged, his fiery blade slicing through the air in search of a kill. Aaron moved just as quickly and felt the heat of Verchiel’s sword as it narrowly missed him.
“You’re as delusional as the monstrosity that sired you,” Verchiel retorted, hissing, his blade melting its way into the blacktop of the street on which they battled. He soared up into the air, his wings spread to their full impressive span. Fluidly he spun around and angled down like a hawk descending upon unsuspecting prey.
Aaron did not shy away, swinging the blade of flame with all his might. “What do you know about my father?” he yelled as their blades connected.
The Nephil
im’s sword exploded with the force of the blow and he was thrown back across the street, ears ringing. He scrambled to his feet to find the Powers’ leader untouched by the volatile contact. The black metal bolt still protruded from his chest, a trail of black blood staining his golden armor.
“Your weapon is as fragile as the idea that one such as you could best me in combat,” the angel spat. He raised his fearsome blade of fire. “Bringer of Sorrow shall drink deeply of your blood this day.”
“I did best you in combat, Verchiel,” Aaron angrily retorted. “Did my father as well?”
The angel recoiled as if slapped, and then a cruel smile, oozing with malice, crept across his face. “You don’t know, do you. You are ignorant to the identity of the one who sired you.” And then he began to laugh.
Aaron reacted instinctively, a weapon unlike any he had conjured before taking shape in his hand. It was a baseball bat—a Louisville Slugger formed of heavenly fire. If things hadn’t been so dire at the moment, he would have been amused.
The adversaries swept toward each other. Mere inches apart, Aaron swung his flaming club and swatted aside Verchiel’s blazing weapon. He followed with a blow at the angel’s face, the club connecting with his chin. Knocked off balance, the Powers’ leader fought to stay afloat, his wings wildly flapping. Aaron didn’t give him the chance. He brought the club down upon Verchiel’s head and watched as the angel fell to the street, wings barely softening his fall.
Aaron was beyond anger now; the idea that Verchiel might know the identity of his father spurred him on. He would have this knowledge—this missing piece of the puzzle—even if he had to beat the angel within an inch of his life to get it. He landed in a crouch before Verchiel, who was just climbing to his feet, the so-called Bringer of Sorrow still clutched in his hand. Aaron did not hesitate, swinging the bat of fire savagely down upon the angel’s wrist, forcing him to drop his weapon. The sword fell, evaporating in an implosion of fire, wisps of smoke the only evidence it had ever existed.
“You’ve taken so much from me,” Aaron spat, looming before the angel, weapon at the ready. “It’s time you gave me something in return.”
Verchiel bristled like a cornered animal. “I’ll give you nothing,” he growled, his perfect teeth stained black from his wounded mouth.
Aaron brought the bat of fire down again, driving the Powers’ commander to the street. He wanted to deliver the fatal blow, but restrained himself, keeping at bay the killer’s instinct yowling for vengeance inside him. It wasn’t easy. Here was the monster responsible for the death of his parents, of his little brother, of Zeke and Camael, broken and driven to his knees, and he longed to show the angel the same amount of mercy that had been afforded his loved ones. But not until he received the answer to the question that haunted him.
“It’s over, Verchiel,” he said, a tremble of suppressed rage in his voice. “All the misery and death you’ve been responsible for—it’s come back to bite you on the ass.”
Verchiel glared at the burning club against his armored chest, keeping him pinned to the ground. “The Creator will—”
“The Creator will what?” Aaron screamed. “What will it take for you to realize that you’re on your own?” he asked the Powers’ commander. “God isn’t protecting you!”
An expression of horror gradually crossed Verchiel’s face. And then the angel began to laugh, a high-pitched sound tainted with a hint of insanity. “Very good, Nephilim.” Verchiel giggled, looking up into Aaron’s eyes. “You almost had me. It appears that you have your father’s gift for twisting the truth.”
Aaron couldn’t stand it anymore, his fury overflowing as he lifted the bat and prepared to deliver another blow. “Who is my father?” he demanded.
But the Powers’ commander proved himself more wily than Aaron anticipated, re-igniting his sword of sorrow and abruptly stopping Aaron’s weapon. “You’ll die with the knowledge filling your ears,” Verchiel hissed as he sprang to his feet, a dagger of orange flame in his injured hand. The knife cut a course through the air on its way to the tender flesh of Aaron’s throat. “He is the one who started it all. Without his selfish act none of us would have fallen.”
The knife was coming for him, but Aaron was frozen in place by anticipation.
“Your father is …,” the angel began, but never got the chance to finish.
Tremendous bolts of lightning rained down from a roiling sky, a deluge of destructive force, incinerating everything they touched.
In the midst of combat with a Powers’ soldier, Lehash was thrown backward as a jagged strike of icy blue turned his opponent to a screaming cinder, melting the street with the heat of its touch.
It was like nothing he had ever experienced. Bolts of electrical force snapping down from the sky, striking at anything that moved. No, he corrected himself as he climbed to his feet and picked up his hat. Not anything. The Powers … the lightning was singling out the Powers host. For a brief moment he entertained the concept of divine intervention, that this was the Creator’s way of telling them that they were forgiven, but then in flash of searing white he saw her silhouette atop the rubble that had been the church.
“Lorelei,” Lehash said aloud. He watched her wield the spell of the elements, her head tossed back, arms reaching up to the sky. Tendrils of magickal power leaked from the tips of her fingers, trailing up into the heavens, into the bodies of the low hanging clouds. He had seen her weave the spell of angelic magick before, but never like this.
The lightning continued to fall, lashing out at those who attempted to escape, their ashes scattering on the blowing winds. The surviving citizens ran for cover against the electrical onslaught, but Lehash turned in the direction of his daughter. He summoned a pistol of golden fire and discharged a shot into the air, hoping to capture Lorelei’s attention. The Nephilim sorceress didn’t even flinch, continuing to stare up into the heavens, arms outstretched as she drew down the fury of the elements.
As a new succession of lightning bolts rained down from above, Lehash felt a tremor beneath his boots. The intensity of the power his daughter was unleashing, it permeated the very earth. And he remembered the tons of toxic waste buried beneath the Ravenschild Estates. He sprinted toward his daughter as he felt another vibration. He had to get her attention; he had to get her to stop before—
The air was filled with the sounds of explosions and the ground trembled beneath Gabriel’s paws. Plumes of flame, the color of tarnished sunset rose up into the sky in the distance, as if attempting to rival the perilous fury of the lightning bolts that continued to emanate from the pregnant clouds in the distance.
He had feared something like this; it was why he hadn’t wanted to leave Aaron’s side, but he couldn’t have denied his master’s wishes. Aaron had said he should protect Vilma and that was what he was going to do. The three Powers’ soldiers that had been advancing on the house stopped their progress and anxiously gazed off in the direction of the sounds of destruction, Gabriel and the girl inside temporarily forgotten.
Above the rumble of thunder, Gabriel heard Vilma’s pitiful cries from inside the house behind him. When he had reached the home earlier, he’d found the girl in the grip of what he thought to be a nightmare. But as he listened to the words she spoke, the dog came to realize that even in the midst of sleep, the girl was seeing the war being waged between the Powers and the citizens. It was her plaintive murmurings of what was happening to his friends that drove the dog from the house, and it was a good thing, too, for he would never have known they were about to be attacked.
The angels looked back to him, weapons of fire held in their hands. They must have been drawn to Vilma’s scent, he thought, to the scent of her newly awakening abilities. Gabriel crouched low and emitted a fearsome growl. Hackles rose around his neck and tail, and the power that had been inside since Aaron brought him back from the brink of death let its presence be known. Gabriel knew that he was different now, and accepted it. As Aaron had a special purpose upo
n the world, the dog decided that he did as well. It was his job to protect his master and to do his bidding. Vilma would be protected, or he would die trying.
The Powers stopped, studying the dog that blocked their advance.
“It is the animal,” said one of the angels. “The one the Nephilim altered.”
“You are correct, brother,” said the second. “And it has been made savage by the Nephilim’s poisonous taint.”
“We would be showing it a great mercy if we were to end its life,” said the last, and he crept closer. The others cautiously followed.
“Don’t think I’m going to make this easy,” Gabriel growled, his large, blocky head moving slowly from side to side, keeping his eyes on all three of his adversaries.
There were more explosions in the distance, blasts that sent powerful shock waves through the ground and shattered the windows of homes around them. Geysers of flame erupted into the sky followed by billowing clouds of oily, black smoke.
The angels were distracted. Bolts of electricity continued to drop from the sky, and wherever lightning fell, an explosion that shook the neighborhood followed. Gabriel held his ground uneasily, fearing for his master’s safety.
They looked back to him, but he could see in their eyes that the angels had lost interest. Each continued to gaze longingly in the direction from whence they had come.
“I think your brothers might need your help,” Gabriel said, hoping he could convince them to leave.
They looked at one another. The sounds of explosions filled the air.
“Are you going to waste your time fighting an animal, or are you going to help your brothers?”
The angels suddenly screamed, their cries like those of the seagulls he used to chase on Lynn beach, and Gabriel thought he had made a mistake. But they didn’t attack; instead each opened his wings and they flew off to join their brethren. Gabriel watched them glide through the air and had to fight the urge to follow. He was worried about Aaron and about the citizens, but he had made a promise that he would not break.