The Tenth Order (45 page)

Hunter was about to say no, but paused. Yes. There was…
something
. Just at the edge of his senses. Not smell, it was stronger, thicker than that. Certainly not sight—he couldn’t make out anything beyond the glow of the tunnel. And yet, something…
pulsed
on the other side of the door.

Hunter screwed his eyes closed, trying to isolate the feeling, than opened them and looked down at Oriphiel who was smiling weakly. Her eyes brimmed with excitement, and though her face was sallow and tired there was no hint of weakness in her gaze.

“This isn’t a Principality, is it?” Hunter asked, already knowing what her answer would be. But instead of replying, Oriphiel gently stepped down from Hunter’s arms and limped to the door.

“There should be guards,” she said, her voice strained. “But I guess they have more on their minds right now than standing watch on some old door.” Oriphiel turned and smiled at Hunter, and for a moment he saw the same sly, teasing grin she had flashed back in her room.

We’ve come a few million years since then, haven’t we?
Hunter heard a laughing voice inside his head.
A few billion.

Oriphiel turned back to the door and gently pressed the handle, pushing it open with ease. Karen passed Hunter, reaching out to assist the old woman as she stumbled through the doorway. With the door open, the dank, musty
something
that pulsed from the room flowed over Hunter, making his head swim. He blinked his eyes, his vision blurring momentarily, then, like mist in the rising sun, it was suddenly gone. Hunter stepped forward and joined the two Apkallu.

Inside was a simple square room of gray granite block, empty save for the three of them. The glow suffusing the tunnels was brighter here, but still dim enough to keep the corners in shadow. Hunter squinted, trying to penetrate the shadows of the room, but as far as he could tell it was devoid of anything other than four corners and a doorway.

“What is this, Oriphiel? You said there was a Principality; all I see is an empty room, and…” Hunter trailed off as Karen turned and glared at him.

“Are you a child,
Elohim?
You can’t sense the Ladder, even here, right on top of it?”

The Ladder?
Hunter’s vision blurred and the room tilted, the walls swimming. He shut his eyes, squeezing his palms against his lids to lock out the vertigo, and when he opened them again the room had steadied.

Oriphiel, who was studying the center of the room, turned to Hunter. “Try,” She urged.

Hunter grit his teeth and began to form the white room in his mind, searching for his Paradox. But again, just as before when he’d tried to summon his gift in the Throne’s apartment, Oriphiel shook her head and said sharply, “No!”

Hunter spread his hands. “Then
how
, lady? I’m tired of the silly looks, just give me a straight answer for once.”

But Oriphiel only shook her head and turned back to the center of the room. Softly, Hunter heard the Throne say, “A shadow. Just a shadow of what you were.”

Hunter’s cheeks burned in embarrassment, and he turned his head so the Throne wouldn’t see. Fine. Obviously the Paradox wasn’t working, so time to try something new. But what could he try that he hadn’t already? The visions had always come when Hunter was at his most vulnerable; when he was filled with emotion that overpowered his other senses. Hash said it was his flawed human shell trying to make sense of data it didn’t know how to process. That was why the Apkallu had to achieve Paradox—force humanity out by letting it in. Then, when there was nothing left but your angelic nature, your gifts would emerge.

There
was
another way. For Hunter, at least, there had to be, because the Paradox had never worked. Not really. At times Hunter had been able to force a semblance of his gift to manifest, but it never lasted for more than a few minutes, and not without constant effort.

His mind skipped back to the battle in Denver, the fight in the parking lot when the
Adonai
had overwhelmed him. Something had happened then—a white light, a memory…something had come over him.

Hunter’s eyes burned as he focused on the center of the room, doing his best to resist the vertigo nipping at his senses. He’d tried to control his powers by getting rid of his humanity, but maybe that wasn’t the answer. He was something the world had never seen before—a new order—and the old rules didn’t seem to apply anymore. Time to try something new.

He reached up and slapped his face, doing his best to deliver the blow full-strength. Karen gaped. “What the hell?”

Ignoring Karen, Hunter drew back his other arm and delivered a ringing smack that made his eyes water. His lips pulled back as the shock radiated from his brightening cheek, passing through the rest of his body. Muscles tightened, his eyes narrowed, and…

There.
There
. In the middle of the room, perfectly center, was a swirling, towering pillar of gray smoke. It stretched the length of the room, from floor to ceiling, and Hunter guessed it didn’t stopped there. If he was outside, Hunter was sure he would see the tower of swirling smoke stretch all the way to the sky.
And in the other direction as well
, he realized.

It twisted in a slow, counterclockwise direction—eddy’s of thick, dark vapor in a tight cylinder like a larger-than-life finger-trap. It pulsed slightly, and Hunter’s breath—hot and ragged—began to pull in the other direction, out through his lips and into the swirling vortex. Heat followed, drawn from his body in a wave, leaving goosebumps like tiny BBs running up and down his arm.

The floor rumbled. Distantly, so far away he barely registered the shock waves, Hunter felt the room rock. Something was buzzing in his ear—
Oriphiel?
—but he couldn’t stop staring at the swirling vortex. His hands were numb, his chest a block of ice, but all that was far away, distant as the moon. All Hunter could see was the gray smoke, and he smiled, feeling truly complete for the first time in his life.

Then the cold finally broke through, his teeth began to chatter and his anger dissolved, sloughing off like a second skin. The cylinder of smoke disappeared in a sudden haze of gut-wrenching nausea. Hunter dropped to the ground, his shins barking painfully against the rough stone, and spilled the remains of his ham dinner on the floor. Karen ran over and knelt, pulling Hunter’s head up to meet her eyes.

“It’s nothing,” he croaked. “Just not used to this stuff.”

Karen studied his face, brow furrowed. “What
are
you?” She whispered. “What did you do?”

“It’s too soon. He shouldn’t be this close to a Ladder,” Oriphiel leaned against the granite wall, watching the two from across the room.

Karen stood, helping Hunter to his feet. He turned to the Throne. “
No more secrets,” he said. “I’m so damn tired of being led around by the nose, I just want something
real
. Get straight with me, Oriphiel, or I’m not walking another step. And don’t,”
Hunter held up his hand to stop the Throne from protesting, “give me a riddle or some half-truth. I want answers, starting with what in the name of Holy
Fuck
is a Ladder?”

Karen had stepped back during Hunter’s rant, leaving him alone with the Throne, but Oriphiel only shook her head and flashed him one of those infuriating half-smiles that said
I know everything, and you’re just a dumb beautician.

“Ladder is a nickname,” Oriphiel said. “Some of the Apkallu call it ‘Jacob’s Ladder,’ but that’s not much better,” as she talked she moved away from the wall, slowly circling center of the room in a counter-clockwise direction. Hunter could no longer make out the vortex, but he was sure the Throne was barely skirting its edge.

“The humans have a legend of a man named Jacob who was crazy enough to wrestle an angel,” Oriphiel paused in her circuit and rolled her eyes. “Silly goose. Anyway,” she continued walking. “The legend goes he wanted to climb a ladder to heaven. The angel wasn’t having it, so they decided to wrestle, and—because humans are telling this, remember—the crazy old man
actually
won
. Cowed, the angel allowed him to ascend the ladder and get a peek of the beyond.
After that, the name ‘Jacob’s Ladder,’ stuck.”

“So…it’s an
agioi?
” Hunter asked.

“In a way,” Oriphiel placed a nail against her lip and nibbled. “But not really,” She examined the nail and nodded to herself. Hunter watched her make two more circuits around the room, still walking in a perfect counterclockwise circle, then finally spoke again. “An
agioi
is a thinning of worlds. A place where the realm of the physical can peer through the screen of reality and glimpse the beyond. Like looking through a flawed window.”

“But,” Oriphiel stopped and turned to Hunter, holding up a finger like a teacher giving a lecture. “Try all you want, you can’t pass through a window—you can only look.”

“Well, you can break—”

“You know what I mean,” Oriphiel stuck her tongue out at Hunter. “If an
agioi
is a window—a
flawed
window—a Ladder is a doorway. A doorway locked within a safe, hidden in a tomb, buried twelve miles beneath the surface—on the Moon
.” She grinned.

“You can cross through it?” Hunter asked. “To the beyond?”

“If you have the right key.”

“No,” Karen suddenly spoke up. “It’s not worth it.”

“Oh I don’t know about that. Everyone has their price” Oriphiel said.

Hunter suddenly realized what they were talking about, and turned to Oriphiel in horror. “There’s no Principality, is there?”

Oriphiel only looked at Hunter, her eyes sad.

Hunter shook his head and stepped forward, not sure what the Throne was about to do but intent on stopping her, when he heard a high voice pierce the room.

“My, my, my. You've found us a Throne.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Hunter roared and the sky turned a dark, coppery red.

Without thought, his reflexes kicking in so fast it bordered on precognition, Hunter turned and leapt at where he thought the voice stood. His eyes didn’t even have time to focus, he was nothing but a blur of speed and strength, his arms extended before him like spears, his legs jackknifed behind. The shapes before him weren’t human, they weren’t Apkallu—they were just enemies. His ears rang with the clash of steel in the distance, the red-haze of blood swam in his vision as his world narrowed to him and his foe.

He didn’t even make if half way.

His enemy disappeared from view, appearing at his side. Hunter barely had time to make out the perfectly manicured nails of Mika’il’s fist before she slammed it into his gut and threw him against the wall. Hunter flew backward, flailing at thin air, and before he hit the wall Mika’il was there again, a blur, her arms reaching around him and cushioning him from the blow.

“Not yet, boy. I’m not close to being done with you.”

“Run,” Hunter screamed, but over Mika’il shoulder he could see Karen wasn’t going anywhere. Three other figures accompanied the Seraphim, one the slim, feminine form of Bath, and the other two Apkallu Hunter recognized from the stronghold of the
Elohim
. Karen had already done her “Flash” thing, and was raining a thousand blows on one of the unfortunate
Elohim.
Bath watched, a thin smile on his lips.

Hunter scanned the room, trying to ignore his rising panic, and relaxed slightly when he saw Oriphiel standing alone. He’d been worried Mika’il might—

What is she doing?

The Throne walked past Karen and her assailant, ignoring Bath, Mika’il and the other Apkallu, and placed herself center in the stone room. She raised the hand covering the wound in her stomach, scattering bloody beads across the gray floor, and ran it across her opposite shoulder. Taking her other hand, Oriphiel swiped it across her wound and marked the opposite shoulder the same way. Then she turned and gave Hunter a bright smile that made his breath catch. Her eyes were clear of pain.

Mika’il’s arm suddenly slipped from Hunter’s shoulder, and she sprang toward the Throne, a scream on her lips. Again, without thinking, Hunter followed his instincts and did the only thing he could—he grabbed her retreating leg. His fingers slipped under Mika’il’s gray pant-suit and touched her ankle for just a moment.

Fire roared from the Seraphim’s skin, engulfing Hunter, racing through sinew and bone. The world was fire. The sky was flame. There was nothing but the pain, the white-hot agony of blackening skin, dying nerves.

The world shattered.

They are standing on a great overlook, the distant peaks of craggy mountains laid before them like forgotten children’s toys—disparate, unorganized, without plan.

He stands with his brother/sister on his right and his sister/brother on his left, studying the land from the height of a slim mountain peak. He knows what they have created—the mountain they look down from—is unable to form naturally on this world, but it is of no concern to him. It will collapse when he and his brothers/sisters retire, but for now it serves its purpose as a meeting place. There is a strange change in his body when he thinks of the mountain collapsing. For a moment he sees the damage it will cause, the thousands of lives it will claim, then he shakes his head, all three faces, front, back and side.