Muse (20 page)

Lightning splits the sky above the Galleria again and I see Ryan gripping the edge of the catwalk about ten feet away to my left, people pushing and shoving past him like a living tide. His own eyes widen in shock when he sees Irina dangling like a doll in a bride’s dress and crumpled wings at the end of Gudrun’s arm.

The others don’t see Ryan vault up onto the runway, staying low. And I can’t warn him to keep away, not to try anything heroic, because Gudrun’s crushing my windpipe in her right hand, the nails blood red.

Flames suddenly burst up the sides of the runway and Ryan dives out of view. At the edges of my sight, I see the hysteria worsen as people are hemmed in by flames on all sides. They change direction multiple times, like a stampeding herd. People go down and stay down, lie still.

‘Don’t you understand?’ Luc says calmly, facing down the tip of Michael’s flaming broadsword without flinching. ‘My trap is sprung within yours. It has already closed around you all —
most holy, most high
.’ He throws his golden head back and laughs.
‘It is you who must kneel. I have a special vengeance reserved for all of you; but for you, Michael, I have something truly exceptional in mind.’

Luc raises his blazing blade aloft and light seeps up out of the mosaic floor in multiple locations, twines swiftly around the ankles of all the people pushing desperately for the exits, slides over the still bodies of the prone, before coalescing into shining shapes that move rapidly towards the catwalk and rise unscathed through fire. They gather upon the catwalk, a shining army, a score of them at least. All beautiful, all tall, all lethal. They must be part of Luc’s personal guard; the most fearsome of his legion: his
daemonium
.

They are winged as the archangels are — for that is what they once must have been. And they are still indistinguishable from us, save that most are in shining raiment that is high-necked or long-sleeved. Not for them, the glowing, sleeveless raiment of the six archangels they now surround. They are truly our opposite, in attitude and appetite.

Swords ignite in their hands as they fall upon Michael, upon Barachiel, Jeremiel, Gabriel, Uriel, until their shining forms are engulfed. I hear the sizzle as blade meets blade, and the air is a whirl of limbs, wings, ambient light.

K’el, the weakest of the six, is engaged by five of Luc’s forces at once, and immediately takes to the air, trying to shake them off. Uriel, too, suddenly ascends — as if he would protect K’el — parrying the blades of the two beings that harry him, one from each side.

People scream and point upwards as they flee.

I kick and twist within the grip of Gudrun’s crushing fist but she is like a creature of legend, a stone giantess. Darkness invades my sight once more as Irina’s body begins to suffocate, to die.

Luc turns to Gudrun and gives her the kind of smile that once would have brought me to my knees with love.

‘Give her to me,’ he says. ‘Alive or dead, I still have use for her. The moment is upon us, my dear. It begins tonight.’

Gudrun throws me down onto the catwalk, and I suck greedily at the tainted air, searching through the smoke and flames and darkness for Ryan. But he’s nowhere to be seen.

Luc’s sword vanishes into the palm of his hand and he crosses the short distance to me, looks down upon my bowed, human head.

‘I told you something once — in a fit of love-struck madness,’ he says. ‘Do you remember it?’

I close my eyes briefly and nod, remembering the two of us entwined in our secret garden, the air heavy with the scent of a thousand different blooms that no human hand could possibly have put together.

You are the best and most loved thing in my life — let nothing ever be possible, or complete, if you are not with me. And may the elements witness my vow in all their silent glory.

My eyes sting in remembrance. How happy I’d been then. I hadn’t known that happiness would be denied me, all the years thereafter.

‘That was my undoing,’ he whispers. ‘My vow
was
witnessed, and it has dogged me all of my days upon this earth. It is the supreme irony that without you, I am nothing. I have power, but only so much; a kingdom, but such a poor, mean kingdom with no hope of expansion or conquest. Until now. Now, your soul is mine again. And it shall free me.’

I recoil at his words as if I’ve been spat upon. He speaks of kingdoms and conquests when all the universe was once ours to play in. What happened to us?

Luc raises me up with one gleaming hand, and I am forced to look into his eyes, so far above me, that are so pale, so glorious, and yet contain so much darkness. I never saw that darkness when he appeared
to me in my dreams. He is indeed a liar of talent, the best there ever was.

‘Tonight,’ he murmurs, ‘I begin the reclamation of what I have lost. And you shall witness me bring the kingdoms of earth and of Heaven to their knees, so that I may be God at last, over all.’

He places the heel of one shining hand upon my forehead and I am transfixed by his touch, as if by a live current. I can neither breathe nor struggle, though my mouth is stretched wide in a silent scream.

My left hand ignites. It bursts into a searing white flame that is as coruscating as it is beautiful.

And all around me, I see an answering flame — shining from Luc, from Gudrun, from all of his winged warriors, his
daemonium
.

Each of them bears a glowing wound that is suddenly visible beneath the long-sleeved, high-necked raiment that they wear. Some bear scars at the base of the throat — as Gudrun does — some upon the shoulder, the centre of the back. Many are scarred upon their forearms, or their upper arms. Some bear one scar, others two.

Even Luc bears a glowing scar right in the centre of his broad chest, visible beneath the human clothing he has assumed. The size of an archangel’s handprint.

They are all marked, as I am.

In some way, they are all exiles, too.

But there is no time to ponder the mystery. The pain of Luc’s touch is excruciating — it’s as if my soul is being destroyed, or transfigured.

His touch reaches down into Irina’s skull, into her flesh and bones, the very matter of which she’s made. He’s drawing me out, coil by resistant coil. He’s following the switchbacks and false trails, the broken pattern that I’ve somehow been cast into. He is irradiating me with his fire, seeking to remake me, remould me.

And I see, I see —

— that final, fatal moment in which Luc and I were the epicentre of something vast, a conflagration waiting to happen, an ache in time, a breath suspended. The Eight arrayed against us, weapons of power raised, a shining multitude gathered behind them. Behind Luc and me, another shining multitude. Two halves of a people that had once been whole and united.

I remember Luc’s words: ‘Then, as an act of faith — of
goodwill
, shall we call it — take that which is most precious to me.’ His tone is final, without emotion, as he says, ‘I permit it.’

And I remember that searing pain in my left hand, feel it now. But this time the world does not go blank
and white. This time, I do not block what happened from my mind.

This time, when I relive that moment, the moment when my left hand sustained the wound that begot all wounds thereafter, my memories do not twist and shatter like glass. I live them as if that time is now, not some long ago yesterday.

My left hand was grasped so tightly in Luc’s that when he pushed me with every ounce of his indomitable strength, I was unprepared. His act of betrayal seared me forever.

He
sacrificed
me.

And I’d fallen through the canopy of Heaven itself, fallen through the night sky, screaming just one word.

Mercy!

All the horror of those days is mirrored in my eyes.

Luc curses as he meets some final point of resistance in my unravelling. There’s something caught in me, like a locked box, a hard knot. My name; my name is bound in there. My name is the anchor point. Raphael called it the last defence, but he did it for my protection, unwittingly creating a weapon to be used against me. None would be able to draw my name from me willingly, but what if my name were already known?

Luc doesn’t bother to unravel that last portion of my soul. It’s something useful to him, a means of control. He simply rips me free, and I feel more than see Irina’s body fall away from mine. She slumps unconscious, face down upon the runway in her lovely dress, her pretty tiara, her damaged wings.

I look down at my gleaming limbs, the glowing, sleeveless raiment that I always wear when I am myself. Stare down at my burning left hand, the flames fully visible in the poor light. Disoriented, disbelieving, betrayed twice over by the one I’d loved more than anything. Itself a heresy, surely.

I’m still small, still mortal-sized. So dazed to find myself inhabiting my own skin after all these long years, these interminable centuries, that I do not know how to shape-shift, to make myself Luc’s equal again.

‘Rally to Mercy!’ I hear Michael roar, defying the dark angels that threaten to engulf him, parrying their blades more swiftly than the human eye could follow. ‘She must not fall to Luc. Rally!’

The air is full of the sound of opposing energies colliding.

Luc holds out his hand to my small one. And, for a moment, I wonder what would happen if I simply took it.

‘Come with me,’ he says almost kindly, ‘and you shall live and prosper and be free. Nothing, none of the darkness to come, shall touch you. You shall always be untouchable in my court.’

I look up at him. ‘Though not your queen,’ I say softly. ‘Never your queen.’

He shakes his head. ‘That part of the history of us is done. It is over. But stay with me willingly, and every heart’s desire shall be yours. Even that boy.’ He gestures into the darkness behind us. ‘For you, I will let him live. Let him be your … pet. Your plaything. And when you tire of him …’ he shrugs. ‘Throw him away.’

I move forward towards Luc, almost hypnotised. His right hand is still outstretched, still open to receive mine. What he promises is so much more tempting than the fate the Eight have always had mapped out for me. Ryan. I would get to keep Ryan.

‘
No!
’ I hear someone roar, and K’el seems to fall out of the air to stand between Luc and me. My watcher, the one I spurned so many years ago, who loves me still, despite the torment I’ve caused him. My protector, to the last.

‘Mercy, get back!’ K’el cries. ‘The earth will no longer be enough to contain him if you submit now. Don’t you understand who he is? What he wants?’

‘He’s the Devil,’ I say simply, understanding at last, but too late. ‘He’s the one responsible for all the evil in this world, all the tribulation; who fuels the worst excesses, the darkest desires and perversions of human nature.’

‘He goes by many names,’ K’el says fiercely as he pushes me back towards the now abandoned press gallery at the far end of the catwalk, his fiery weapon all that stands between us and Luc. ‘Shaitan, Belial, the adversary — these are only some of the names he is known by. But we have ever known him as Luc, or Lucifer, the day star.’

‘The Archangel of Light.’ I laugh despairingly.

‘No more,’ Luc snarls, stalking us in long, easy strides. ‘When my
brother
Michael cast me down, I ceased to be
elohim
. The Archangel of Light is dead. And the Devil has arisen in his place.’

The air shimmers with smoke and flame and ambient heat and I scan the area around us for any sign of Ryan, but all I see littered around us are fallen bodies, overturned furniture.

We do not sense Gudrun until she leaps out of the flames beside us. K’el does not see her — so intent is he on me, on Luc — until the short, burning blade she’s holding in her hand enters his side. He looks down in surprise at the light bleeding from his pierced side in bright drifts, in errant curls of pure energy. Shock distorts his features — in some ways we are naïve, we
elohim
. Always imagining we are inviolate, so far above everyone and everything that nothing
could ever touch us. We deal in death, yes. But rarely glimpse it ourselves, face to face.

‘K’el!’ I sob, pulling the demon’s blade free and twisting my hands into the energy of which Gudrun is made. Though she towers over me still, I swing her up and over my head before sending her flying down the length of the runway with a blast of pure energy fuelled by all the hatred, envy and rage in my body.

Before she hits the blank wall at the northern end of the building, she scatters into a billion pieces and disperses.

K’el’s still looking down at the wound in his side when Luc moves forward suddenly, grabbing him by the throat with his left hand, forcing his head up with the tip of the long, burning dagger he’s now holding in his right. Before I can speak or even raise my hand, Luc hisses, ‘And the Devil always gets what he wants,’ and cuts K’el’s throat in one smooth arc from ear to ear.

I scream as K’el’s head falls back and the light leaves his beautiful eyes. His form seems to waver, grows unbearably bright for an instant. Then, without a sound, his energy simply vanishes, dispersing, never to return.

I begin to shake. There are no words to express my horror, my grief. K’el was singular, and perfect, and no one like him will ever be made again.

Luc subsumes his weapon into the palm of his hand. ‘Time presses,’ he says caustically. ‘Take my hand willingly and live. Or die — it is all one. Your soul is mine; I’ll claim it either way.’

He holds his hand out to me, palm upward, and I stare at him blankly. Unable to move, unable to believe that he expects me to take the hand that just destroyed K’el.

He makes a snarling sound in the back of his throat and moves forward. But before he can reach out and take hold of me, I catch a fleeting movement behind him.

‘Merce, get back!’ Ryan cries, and he throws something at Luc’s back then vaults clear of the runway.

An arc of clear, strong-smelling accelerant hits Luc squarely and goes up with a roar. Flames rise at least twenty feet into the air. Luc just starts to
laugh
. He is truly horrifying to behold. He could douse the fire in an instant, but instead he lets it take hold of him, his whole form burning, and within that blazing outline I glimpse all those things he once showed me
— cruelty, perversity, death and destruction — on such a grand scale that I scream and look away.

I see Ryan gesturing at me from the ground, from beyond the burning catwalk, telling me with his hands, his eyes, to go to him. And I shake my head at him in wordless horror, wanting him to run, to get as far away from me as possible if he wants to live. He deserves so much more than I could ever offer him. If he stays with me, he will be hunted down ruthlessly, like a dog. I know it.

Luc suddenly rises high into the air, arms outspread, still burning, still laughing, and ignites his long sword, ready for the killing blow.

‘No mercy for you,’ he roars, pointing his weapon at Ryan, at me. ‘No mercy.’

But then a light of such blinding beauty and magnitude that even Luc must cover his eyes fills the interior of the Galleria, sending a beacon through the glass-roofed dome into the troubled skies above.

‘
Flee!
’ I hear the Archangel Michael cry. ‘
Fly.
’

As he says the word, the arched roof of the Galleria seems to shimmer, then more
elohim
— twelve in all — drift down through the solid canopy of glass and iron in a cruciform configuration, soaring straight towards Luc.

The blinding light extinguishes and I don’t hesitate, I leap through the flames towards Ryan, moving easily, with a fierce sense of joy and purpose as if Luc’s acts of betrayal have finally freed me. And Ryan closes his arms around me tightly, resting his chin briefly atop my head so that I close my eyes at the familiar, longed for gesture. The pain in my left hand seems to burn out, though not the pain in my heart. K’el hadn’t stood a chance.

‘You feel so real,’ Ryan murmurs, looking into my eyes.

‘I
am
real,’ I reply. ‘And you can’t know how good this feels.’

I search his face. ‘But we have to move, Ryan. It’s not safe for us here.’

My sight is unerring though the darkness is lit only by fire now, by lightning. The Galleria looks as if an inland tsunami has swept through it, the ground strewn with chairs and video equipment, the bodies of the mortal fallen. As I look up at the knots of
elohim
and
daemonium
struggling and grappling in the air, I see Luc swiftly put his blade through one of Michael’s reinforcements. The
eloah
’s energy disperses soundlessly as she dies, and another of her brethren engages Luc immediately.

I hear K’el’s voice in my head.
We maintain, they destroy. That’s roughly how it works.

I grasp Ryan’s shirt in my hand and pull him around to face the south entrance. As we start to move, Luc’s voice penetrates the vast space from above. ‘I want them
all
.’

Suddenly, Gudrun blocks our way, a new, more deadly weapon in her hand. A long, twisted, flaming blade, guaranteed to cause maximum damage on entry and exit.

When Ryan and I pivot towards the western axis, another demon stands before us. Another to the east. Those that are not bent on subduing the archangels who still live, move forward to block our way. Some are male, some are female. All their scars burn brightly, no matter how they might shift to disguise them.

I embrace Ryan tightly, feeling all his unspoken terror in the hard muscles of his arms, his torso, through his familiar, beaten-up leather jacket.

Michael bellows again, his voice disembodied, desperate: ‘Fly, Mercy,
fly
.’

Then he seems to address Ryan directly. ‘Guard her, human.’ Michael’s voice sounds throughout the vast Galleria like a tolling bell. ‘Keep her safe in your human world when we cannot.’

Ryan gives me a hard shake. ‘Can you do that?’ he says urgently. ‘Fly?’

I can’t bring myself to answer him, just continue to watch, transfixed, as the reinforcements Michael has called here struggle to turn the tide of battle. Though the
daemonium
are roughly the equal of the
elohim
in number, they are extraordinarily vicious. As if they have been denied the chance to stretch their wings, to test their might, until now. One by one the
elohim
begin to go down. Each one singular and perfect, never to be made again.

Ryan is still shaking me insistently. ‘Mercy, can you? Can you fly? You’ve got no wings.’

‘Don’t need wings,’ I whisper. ‘But I don’t know if I can. It’s been too … long.’

I
know
now where my fear of heights comes from. When I recall that moment when Luc cast me out, cast me down, I feel that same terror all over again, the sensation of falling, the blinding, terrible impact. To know your enemy is to have some measure of control over that enemy — that was something Luc taught me, a long time ago. But I have no control over this fear. It seems boundless.

Luc loved me. Yet he tried to kill me. And for what?
Power.

‘Take them!’ Luc screams at Gudrun as he and Michael spin towards each other, meeting with a sound like breaking waves.

‘You have to try,’ Ryan shouts, as Gudrun leaps through the air towards us, her twisted, deadly blade raised, her perfect teeth bared, a personal score to settle.

‘Try, Mercy,’ Ryan yells. ‘For
us
.’

Us.

Though I’m nauseous and dizzy with fear, I embrace Ryan tightly with one arm, shut my eyes and leap off the ground.

No thought, just sensation. Against gravity, against every inclination, I’m
flying
.

My left hand burns and burns in agony. I make the mistake of looking at it, looking down at the ground falling away from us, and have to close my eyes again and swallow.

‘Mercy, open your eyes!’ Ryan screams. ‘We’re going to hit!’

My eyes flash open to see that majestic roof inches away from our upturned faces. It’s pure reflex what I do next.

I curve my arms around to protect Ryan’s mortal form, curve his face into the side of mine, clasp him
even more tightly to me. And I take the full brunt of the glass and iron ceiling of the Galleria upon my forearm, upon my shoulders, my down bent head. Glass and steel shriek and rend as we burst outward into the storm-tossed night.