35
This isn’t the same as the last time I went into Beliel’s memory. This time, it hurts.
Every cell in my body cries from the pain of it. Hopefully, it’s because my physical body is actually going on the trip along with my mind.
Just when I think my eyes are going to pop from squeezing them shut so tightly, we slam onto the ground.
My stomach clenches, and my chin and chest sting where they hit the ground.
No wonder the hellions were so disoriented when they landed on Angel Island. I feel like I just got rolled as flat as pizza dough and slapped onto the ground.
I also feel like I’m baking in an oven. A very stinky oven cooking rotten eggs.
I force myself to roll over and open my eyes. There’s really no time for recovery when you’ve just landed in hell.
The sky – if it is a sky – is a cracked purple black with darker blotches. The weak light throws a purple cast over the hulking shadows above me.
Edging my vision, there are faces looking down at me.
I’m not really sure what I’m looking at. They remind me of angels, but I don’t think they are. They also remind me of demons, but I don’t think they’re those either.
Their open wings look mangy, and what’s left of their feathers look like dried leaves on a dead tree. The exposed parts of the wings look cracked and leathery. The wing bones are splintered, sticking out painfully through the edges of the wings. Many of the bone splinters have curled into a sickle shape, not entirely unlike Raffe’s demon wing blades.
The thing that shocks me the most, even though it probably shouldn’t, is that one of these guys is Beliel. It shouldn’t surprise me since I did jump into his memory – or a world in which he has a memory – or whatever. So of course, Beliel would be here.
But he looks different. For one thing, his wings are neither the demon wings I’m familiar with nor his original feathered wings. They’re half dark and half still covered with tufts of sunset feathers.
I guess since I’m physically here, I might have jumped in time and space, but that’s too much for my brain to handle without exploding. Besides, I don’t have time to think about it.
When my eyes adjust to the purple light, I see that Beliel stares in my direction with empty sockets.
Beliel is blind.
It takes me a second to convince myself that it really is him. He has deep lash marks across his cheeks and nose. He’s been whipped in the face. He also has gouge marks around his eye sockets.
The others don’t look much better. One of them has half a perfect Greek-god face and another half that looks like it’s been chewed off. Without their injuries, I can tell that they would have been perfect specimens, just like any other angel.
Between their damaged bodies, I can see we’re in a war zone or, at least, what’s left of one. The buildings are burned out, the broken trees are charred, and the vehicles are smashed and gutted. At least, I’m assuming these were buildings, trees, and vehicles. They don’t look like ours, but the hulking shapes look like they used to be inhabited a long time ago. Like a village of some kind. Something that looks like stunted cacti that have been stomped and twisted sits rooted into the ground. And there is debris strewn around that looks vaguely like wagon wheels.
A nonangel with canary-yellow feathers reaches for me. His skin has been ripped right off his arm, leaving only the glistening muscles beneath. I cringe, but he grabs me by the hair and yanks me up to my feet.
‘What is it?’ asks Beliel. ‘Can we eat it?’ I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anything more disturbing than empty eye sockets, especially on someone I know, even if it’s Beliel.
He puts a pointy ear in his mouth and chews on it. It looks a lot like a hellion’s ear. I wonder what happened to the hellion I rode.
Then I see what’s left of it on the ground, all smashed and torn apart. It’s hardly recognizable anymore.
Where’s Raffe?
‘It’s a Daughter of Man,’ says my captor. His voice is ominous, like those words have some deep meaning.
There’s a long silence as everyone stares at me.
‘Which one?’ Beliel finally asks.
The one holding me looks around at the others. He doesn’t ease up on my hair. ‘Is this one of yours? She’s not mine.’
‘There’s no reason to believe she would be one of ours, Cyclone,’ says Beliel. His voice is raspy as if he’d either been screaming himself raw or someone had choked him.
‘I’m through with them,’ says one. ‘The thought of them makes me ill.’
‘Yeah, maybe Big B’s right,’ says another. ‘Maybe we’re better off eating her. We could use some meat to help us heal.’
I squirm trying to get out of the nonangel’s grip. Where is Raffe?
‘Let her go,’ says another. This one has blue-tinged feathers.
‘Thermo, if we let her go, she’ll wish we had cooked her up and eaten her. Setting her free here is not a mercy.’
That’s not what I wanted to hear.
‘And is that a sword?’ Several of them lean down to look at my sword, which lies on the ground just out of reach.
One of them tries to lift it and grunts at the weight. He lets it go.
They all stare at me, scrutinizing.
‘What are you?’ asks Cyclone.
‘She’s a Daughter of Man, can’t you see that?’ says Thermo.
‘If she’s a Daughter of Man, where’s her pack of hellions?’ says a guy with black feathers and sharp eyes. ‘Where are her chains? Why does she look so healthy and whole?’
‘And how does she have an angel sword?’ asks one who has brown wings streaked with yellow.
‘It can’t be hers. Somehow, it got here. And somehow, she got here. But that doesn’t mean it’s her sword. We haven’t been here long enough to believe things that are that crazy.’ They all look at Pooky Bear with longing, but none of them tries to pick her up.
‘So whose is it?’ They all look at me.
I shrug. ‘I’m just a Daughter of Man. I don’t know anything.’
No one argues with that.
‘Where am I?’ I ask. The pull on my hair is becoming unbearable. Two of them have their scalps partly torn off, and I’m beginning to wonder if this is why.
‘In the Pit,’ says Thermo. ‘Welcome to the hunting district.’
‘Is this the same as hell?’ I ask.
The one with black feathers shrugs. ‘Does it matter? It’s hellish. Why do you care if it matches your primitive myth?’
‘What do you hunt here?’ I ask.
The angel with the brown-and-yellow wings snorts. ‘We don’t. We’re the prey.’
That doesn’t sound good. ‘What are you?’ I ask. I’m assuming they’re Raffe’s Watchers, but better to be sure. ‘You don’t look like angels, and you don’t look like . . .’ What do I really know about what demons look like?
‘Oh, do excuse us for not introducing ourselves,’ says the one with the brown-and-yellow wings. He emphasizes his sarcasm by bowing to me. ‘We are the newly Fallen. The Watchers, to be precise. And probably your executioners. Not that it’ll take more than one of us to do the deed. But you get the point. I’m Howler.’
Howler points to the one with black feathers and brown skin. ‘That’s Hawk.’ He points to the one with blue-tinged feathers, then to several others. ‘Thermo. Flyer. Big B. Little B. And the one holding you is Cyclone.’ He looks around at the others. There are too many to introduce them all, not that I’d remember their names. ‘Do we care who she is?’
‘Sure,’ says Flyer. ‘Maybe it’ll give us something to think about when we’re bored out of our minds for the next millennium. Who are you?’
‘I’m . . .’ I’m hesitant to give them my name. Raffe said names have power. ‘I’m the angel slayer.’
It sounds kind of ridiculous now that I’ve said it. It sounded better in my head, but whatever.
For a moment, they all stare at me.
Then, as if on cue, they burst out laughing.
Howler curls over his left ribs with his hands protectively covering them like they’re broken. ‘Oh, don’t make me laugh. That hurts.’
Cyclone chuckles behind me. He finally lets go of my hair, leaving my scalp tender. ‘Holy Mother of God, I didn’t realize I could laugh anymore.’
‘Yeah, it’s been a long, long time,’ says Little B.
‘The angel slayer, huh?’ asks Howler.
‘Well, that was great,’ says Beliel, who apparently is Big B. ‘Can we eat her now?’
‘He’s got a point,’ says Little B. ‘I can’t remember the last time we had a full meal. She’s scrawny, but I’m desperate for food to manage all this healing—’
Something grabs him – a tentacle? – and yanks him back. He yells and thrashes, kicking and twisting, but he can’t get loose.
It drags him behind a pile of rubble, bashing his head and shoulders on jagged fragments along the way.
The Watchers all become fully alert and ready for battle, but they’re practically hyperventilating. These guys have not fared well here.
I stand frozen. If these legendary warriors are afraid, what should I be feeling? I’m beginning to wish I had just kept my mouth shut about coming here. Being killed in a gladiator arena is starting to sound merciful now.
They all fly after Little B even though there’s more than a little stress on their faces. They kick and yank and try to pull him out of the tentacle’s grip.
Then another one of them gets sucked backward. As far as I can tell, the thing that took him was the scorching wind.
He gets yanked back through a window of a half-demolished building. Within seconds, screams erupt from inside.
The nearest Watchers rush to the window and look inside. They look away like they wish they hadn’t seen what they just saw.
Somewhere, another kind of screaming heads our way. It’s a mad shriek in the distance that sets my nerves on edge.
The Watchers back away with Little B who is kicking off the last of the tentacle that had him. They turn and begin rushing away from the building and the direction of the mad screams.
Someone grabs my arm and pulls me with him. To my surprise, it’s Beliel. ‘Stick with us. We’re your best chance.’
I notice he doesn’t say best chance at what. I bend to grab my sword off the ground, not caring if any of them see me do it. They’re too busy getting in formation and scanning for danger to pay any attention to me.
We scatter, half running with our backs to each other. These guys have worked together before. Too bad it doesn’t seem to help them much here.
Where’s Raffe?
What have I gotten myself into?