Gabriel stared ahead blankly, eyes wide open but not seeing the expanse of her blackened garden with its charred trees and rolling brown hills. The soaring cliff and the rush of water that plunged from its peak and down into the pond didn’t even register. Because all she saw was internal.

Lucifer by that babbling stream amongst the terrain of a jagged mountain. His face bowed, staring at her reflection.

She did not know how he had seen her face. For centuries she had watched him, staring through her murky pond down into the vast expanse below. As the only angel granted permission to watch over him, she had seen his every act of peace and servitude. She had seen him prove his loyalty and selflessness. But up on that mountain—something had changed.

His rugged face, with its sharp lines and prominent cheekbones below tumbling golden locks, had morphed from desperation to something dark and frightening. At once, Gabriel had rushed up from her pond, trying to escape his view of her, trying to undo what had caused the sudden shift in his demeanor. But it had been no use. His actions soon after had reflected this horrible change…when he had turned his good deeds of peace and love into an act of deception…and murder.

She sniffed as renewed streams of silver tears forged tracks down her pale face. Breathing slow and level while her unwelcomed tears fell, she concentrated on her surroundings. As she willed it, the water over the cliff froze into sheets of brown, murky glass. The gentle spray that dampened her sapphire robe and cooled her warm face vanished.

Peering down, she dared to behold the devastation below. The devastation Lucifer had spurred to life. So many united kingdoms had rallied to attack Babylon, believing too easily that Lucifer’s lies were true. Believing they were protecting the Prince of Persia and all the kingdoms. Blood had run in rivers through the streets of Babylon, and then each attacking kingdom when retaliation was initiated. Bodies were broken, silenced. Souls were shed—lost. Now the cleanup continued, the mind-controlled orders from Michael to stop this long war and focus on the dead, while he himself shifted bodies and dug graves to lay the lost to rest.

Gravesites stretched out from each kingdom, in some cases as far as the eye could see.

Though Gabriel did not know the reason for Lucifer’s sudden change of heart, she somehow felt responsible. Seeing him, as she willed the view to shift to the Persian throne, she wondered if glimpsing her had broken Lucifer. If, after all this time, seeing her up above had reminded him of how he had suffered alone when she still existed in light under the acceptance of God. Their punishments so long ago had not been equal. Lucifer’s wings had been blackened and he had been banished, while she was merely chained to her garden, cursed to watch him struggle alone below. Yet, their crimes were matched. She was equally as responsible for breaking their angelic laws, for wanting Lucifer, for inviting him to touch her, for kissing him back, for offering her bared body to him in this very garden with the desperation of needing to feel him inside her.

Now she wanted to go to him. She wanted to flee this place of eternal light and march right up to him so she could drag him up off that throne and shake some sense into him. She wanted to remind him of who he was and all that he could be…if he chose a different path. A path that was free of their mistakes in the past and his in the present. She wanted to remind him that he had never truly been alone and that his future could hold such promise if he gave in and conformed.

That was what Gabriel wanted—or at least, what she told herself she wanted.

Seeing him through the pond, other emotions battled inside her, yearning to be freed, longing to return to a place in the past, a place she should never allow—

A distinct tingling shut down Gabriel’s runaway thoughts. Her hold on the water released as a figure appeared through the scored tree yards out from the other side of the pond. Chilled spray attacked her face once more, making the sudden burn of her cheeks all the more evident. She leaped to her feet, knocking the glowing chain that sat by the bank’s edge as a reminder rather than a physical restraint. But the angel she expected to find entering her garden, with the right to judge and condemn her for her wrongful thoughts, was not Michael.

Gabriel released the breath she held, relieving her lungs of the feeling of needing to burst. “Remiel.”

The angel’s kind face tilted up, throwing back his sandy colored tresses. But the expression on his face did not lend any relief. Lips pressed into a straight line, she noticed the tight bulge of his lean arms peeking out of his white robe as he skittered around the pond toward her. His backward glance over his shoulder hiked her heart rate ten-fold.

“Remiel, what is wrong?”

Coming up close to her, his hand on her forearm was feather light. His white wings curved forward as if to protect them from being seen should someone else enter. “I would never wish for this. Though I understand the need to take action. Given the horrors below, his influence poisons mankind. It must be stopped. It must be—”

“Remiel, what are you saying?” Gabriel cut off his rant, catching his hands and squeezing them with fear.

“Lucifer will be summoned above in seven days, and if he fails to repent for his renewed sins, he will no longer be…”

When Remiel’s words trailed off, his head shaking, Gabriel tugged on his hands. “Lucifer will no longer be what?”

“I cannot…it is not my place. I should not have come, but…” His eyes darted around again as if he could sense an incoming threat. “You are the only angel who can reach him, who can influence him.” Staring at her flushed face, his eyes begged for understanding. He slid his hands free of her strong grasp. “In seven days…”

He turned away with a brush of his wings and hurried back the way he came, disappearing through the wide, skeletal tree.

Gabriel covered her mouth with her hands, reading into Remiel’s warning. For the first time in over a millennium, Lucifer would be summoned above. He would be invited back into the light. But the invitation was not to be a permanent one. It was to be an invitation of judgment on his sins. And Lucifer would no longer be?

Whatever the answer, Gabriel knew she could not remain in her garden while Lucifer answered for his crimes. She knew she could not stay away as she had for all the centuries that had passed. And she knew, more than anything, that she had to get through to him.

Regardless of the danger of repercussions, the possibility of being chained to her garden once more, Lucifer would repent to save himself. She would make sure of it.