Satan's Gambit (The Barrier War Book 3) (34 page)

“Time passes
differently here, mort.. Anolla,” Uriel said. “For every hour that passes in
your world, approximately two pass here.”

He held up his
free hand to forestall any further questions.

“Later,” he
said. “Now come, we need to catch them before they reach Medina. I dare not
teleport to them directly, lest I alert Maya to my interest.”

Brad took the
angel’s hand and clutched it tightly as they suddenly left the ground. Brother
and sister clung to each other with their free hands as they dangled beneath
their heavenly companion. The angel lifted them easily as though they weighed
nothing, and he flew confidently forward toward a destination only he could
see.

- 3 -

“The Iridescent
Gates,” Danner said in wonder, slowly putting pressure on the brake as they
approached the gleaming structure.

Even compared to
the breathtaking landscape and stunning environment, the Iridescent Gates were
singularly beautiful. They gleamed like mother-of-pearl, and pastel colors
swirled perpetually beneath the smooth, marble-like surface. Thick strands of
color spanned the gates from top to bottom to form the bars, spaced just
narrowly enough that it would take a small child to fit through. The gates were
easily fifty feet tall, but each was only ten feet wide. On either side of the
gates, a wall of gleaming white rock
[18]
towered a hundred feet tall and stretched off infinitely into the distance.

“It’s beautiful,
but a little imposing, don’t you think?” Marc commented, standing up in the
back seat. “I always thought the Iridescent Gates would have a sign that said
Welcome
.
These look more like
Do not enter.
”

“Which begs the
question, why are there gates at all?” Danner asked. “I mean, it’s an infinite
realm, so why the wall?”

“The Iridescent
Gates are as much psychic as they are physical, Danner,” Marc said. “You should
know, you helped me translate the text. The symbolism of passing through the
gates is so powerful, mortals – living or dead – quite literally can’t get to the
rest of Heaven without going in here.”

“Is
that
what you got out of that convoluted verbal torture that passed for an ancient
text?” the Blue paladin asked sardonically, looking back at his friend. “I may
have translated the words, but it doesn’t mean I understood one in ten of their
meaning.”

“Shall I take a
look?” Flasch asked from the front passenger seat. Danner waved him forward.

“Be my guest.”

Flasch climbed
out of the buggy as the rest of the expedition caught up with them. Shadow
Company had taken the lead, and when the Iridescent Gates had come into view,
Garnet sent the three of them ahead in the buggy to investigate.

“What’ve we
got?” Garnet asked, walking up beside them.

“Flasch is
taking a look now,” Danner replied.

The Violet
paladin hurried forward to the center of the gates and reached out to touch
them with a reverent hand. Then he pushed slightly and bent to examine
something on the gates. He turned and jogged back to the buggy.

“What’s wrong?”
Garnet asked.

“Would you
believe the damn things are actually locked?” Flasch replied in exasperation.
They all stared at him until finally Danner laughed at the look of sheer
indignation on his friend’s face.

“Well, go see
what you can do about that,” Garnet said.

“I just need my
tools,” Flasch replied, rifling through a pack in the back seat of the buggy.
“I brought them as a matter of habit. Never thought I’d actually have to pick
the damn lock on the gates of Heaven.”

“Think you can
do it?” Marc asked.

“Have faith, brother,”
the Violet paladin replied with a wink.

“He’s better
than I am with locks, and that’s actually saying something,” Danner admitted.
“If anyone can get in, it’s Flasch.”

“Look at it this
way,” Garnet said, his face carefully neutral, “if it works, at least you know
they can’t keep you out, no matter how much of a pain in the ass you are.”

Flasch grinned
impishly at him, then pulled out a thick leather bundle and hurried back to the
gates.

Mikal flew
overhead, circled, and came back to land in front of the buggy.

“What’s the
problem?”

“The gates are
locked,” Garnet said with a grimace. “It’ll be taken care of in a minute.”

“Locked?” Mikal
said in amazement. “Then you’ll never get in. The gates were set in place by
God Himself, the locks designed by Dem at the forge of Heaven, and I could no
more open them by force than could a small child. I can’t imagine what
possessed Maya to lock them, and I fear I’ll have to fly on alone to confront
her and convince her to open them. There’s no way we’ll be able to…”

“Got it,” Flasch
cried from up ahead, and he smiled triumphantly as he pushed open first one
door, then the other. He hurried back and tucked his bundle back in his pack.
“That was pretty tough. There were actually three different, completely
independent locking mechanisms in one, and they all had to be done
simultaneously. I need to get that design.”

Flasch saw Mikal
staring at him. “What’s with him?”

Danner smiled.
“Well, Mikal?”

Mikal leaped
into the sky without answering.

“Flasch, take
the wheel,” Danner said, following the departing Seraph with his eyes. “Garnet,
I’ll be airborne for a few minutes.”

“Go,” Garnet
said, waving him on.

Danner asolved
his wings and followed Mikal into the sky. The angel veered slightly, but
Danner caught up and held level with him.

“Alright, Mikal,
what gives?” Danner asked without bothering to disguise the irritation in his
voice.

“What do you
mean?”

“Ever since I’ve
met you, you’ve had a strange aversion to me and unless I’ve completely lost
the ability to read people, a lesser one to the denarae,” Danner said. The two
slowed and stopped in midair. “At first, you were just strange to everybody,
but over the last few weeks you’ve lightened up to everyone, especially my
uncle, but you still look at me like I’m some sort of freak. I’ve had enough of
that from the mortals I’ve encountered, and the last place I expected to feel
it again was from an angel who shares some of the same nature.

“So I say again,
what gives?”

Mikal and Danner
hovered in silence a moment while the Seraph considered his answer.

“I’m not sure
how to feel about your existence,” Mikal said finally. He looked appraisingly
at Danner, who motioned for him to continue. “You are a hybrid of mortal and
immortal beings through a manner considered impossible. Millennia – no,
eons
ago – immortals on both sides began to experiment with mortal creatures, trying
to give some of our power to them.”

“Why?”

“To use you in
our war, of course,” Mikal said with disgust in his voice. “I was not a part of
the experiments, but I knew about them all the same. In early experiments,
demons took dragons and were able to give them the gift of shape-changing,
creating the first dakkans. Many others were tried on both sides, nearly all
failed.”

“Last of all, an
angel named Samyaza tried to actually combine immortal
āyus
with
mortals, and from humans he and his flight created denarae.”

Danner stared at
him in shock.

“Yes, all of
your friends below are the descendents of an experiment conducted by immortals
on human flesh,” Mikal said grimly, “the result of which was their ability to
read minds and communicate telepathically. You’ll notice it is only possible
among other denarae and with humans. That is because of their shared origins.

“Shortly after
the first denarae were created, sentiment in the immortal plane shifted and the
experiments were shut down as an abomination against the will of God,” Mikal
said. “Uriel and I fought long and hard to make sure the experiments were
stopped, and Uriel fought to ensure that the results not be destroyed.”

Just Uriel?
Danner wondered. He let the comment slide, knowing he wouldn’t like the answer.

Again, Mikal
turned and looked at Danner.

“And here you
are, flying beside me, the ultimate achievement of an idea I fought hard to defeat,”
Mikal said. “You’re a good man, Danner, anyone can see that. You chose the hard
path of a paladin. Your uncle has told me of your life since his return, and I
must admit I am impressed, and not a little afraid.

“You have
tremendous power, Danner, perhaps someday more so even than I, though yours is
raw and wild as it evolves,” Mikal said. “I have looked into the strength of
your
āyus
; it’s a testing of sorts between two immortals called
shaishisii
.
Imagine my dismay to discover that one I considered an abomination had the
potential for even more power than I, one of the most powerful angels in all
the Heavenly Hosts. It is a hard fact to accept, and a bitter pill to swallow,
if I may borrow one of your mortal metaphors.”

“So that’s why
you can’t stand to be around me,” Danner said.

“It was a
mistake on my part to treat you so,” Mikal admitted, “and I apologize.
Immortals are not, it seems, immune from failings such as pride.”

“I think I
understand,” Danner said.

“Good,” Mikal
said. He turned and looked back behind them. “It looks as though your friends
are trying to get your attention.”

Danner looked
and saw a tight cluster of bodies he recognized immediately as all of his
closest friends, and they were clustered around a single point and shifting about
excitedly. Flasch was standing at the edge of the group whistling and waving at
Danner to catch his attention.

“Go,” Mikal said
when Danner hesitated. “If need be, we can speak some other time, but I will
try not to let my pride and past prejudices get the better of me.”

Danner nodded
and sped back down toward the ground. He flared and landed lightly, then
dekinted his wings with barely a twinge of regret. As soon as he set foot on
the ground, the cluster of bodies he’d seen from the sky started to open up,
and they were all grinning broadly. Marc and Flasch even had tears in their
eyes.

“What’s going
on?” Danner asked. “What’s got you all so…” He trailed off as two men in the
center of the group suddenly came into view.

One was a human
wearing a red paladin’s cloak; his face was horribly scarred, but he beamed
with a happy smile that seemed totally out of place on the man Danner had
known. In fact, he didn’t think he’d ever seen Gerard Morningham with such a
pleasant expression on his face.

The other with
him was a denarae wearing a green cloak, and it took Danner a moment to
register that it was, in fact, a paladin’s cloak. He stared without
comprehension at the face before him until the denarae stepped forward and
caught Danner into a rough embrace. Then the veil of shock lifted from Danner’s
eyes, and he pushed back to stare into the face of his best friend… of his
dead
best friend.

“Trebor?” Danner
croaked in amazement as his voice suddenly failed him. The denarae smiled at
him, but it seemed words were beyond him.

“Trebor!” Danner
shouted in joy as he clutched his friend tightly. Sudden tears streamed down
his face as three months of grief, regret, and self-torture were suddenly
erased by the sight of his friend. Then suddenly the rest of their friends were
around them again, joining a group hug as they enjoyed a sense of completion
they’d all been without for far too long.

The hands that divide are not divine.

- Human Proverb

- 1 -

Something didn’t
seem right, but Michael couldn’t quite put his finger on it.

“It’s amazing
here,” Trebor was saying with a smile they all remembered so well. “You can’t
imagine any place more beautiful.”

“So we’ve seen,”
Marc said, wiping tears from his eyes.

“What about the war?”
Garnet asked, turning to Gerard, who was still smiling. “We’ve been assuming
the worst, what with…” he glanced at Mikal, who was just landing, “well, some
things that have been going on, you know.”

“The war’s going
fine, lad,” Gerard said. “We’re holding our own, and any day now I think we’ll
turn the tide and push those dirty beasts back where they came from.”

Michael frowned.

“Hey, chin up,
Michael,” Trebor said, smiling. “He just said we’re going to win, not that your
kitten just died.”

Michael quickly
faked a wan smile, which seemed to content his dead friend. The Yellow paladin
shuddered. Maybe that’s what it was. Here he was talking to two
dead
men
just as calm as you please. Ignore the fact that both men had died nearly three
months ago, and it could almost be a normal conversation.

Danner, Trebor,
and Flasch stood side-by-side with their arms thrown over each other’s
shoulders, Trebor in the middle. Despite his feeling of unease, Michael wished
he had the time to sketch them and capture the image forever.

“Anyway, I’d ask
you boys to tell me how things have been since I left,” Gerard said, “but we’ve
both been keeping a pretty steady eye on you whenever we can. Can’t say as I’m
sad to have left, what with the great job you’ve been doing, Garnet. I’m proud
of you, son.”

Garnet had
managed not to cry during their initial reunion with Gerard and Trebor, but now
his stoic face threatened to crack open as he wiped at his eyes.

Mikal walked
over to their group, and Birch had appeared from somewhere and walked at the
Seraph’s side.

“You said the
war is going well?” Mikal asked earnestly.

“Yes, holy
Thanatos,” Gerard said, bowing deeply.

Mikal scowled at
him.

“Don’t call me
that,” the angel said angrily. “I am Mikal; Thanatos no longer and never
again.”