A Hundred Words for Hate

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Remiel had failed the Creator.

He could feel the corrosive, supernatural energies flowing from the Shaitan digesting what remained of his armor, and starting to work upon his flesh.

And there was nothing he could do.

The angel considered crying out to his Lord God, but he was too ashamed. If this was to be his fate, he would accept it. He had met a foe more powerful than he.

This realization seemed to fuel the angel’s anger, and he struggled fitfully in the Shaitan’s grip, but the darkness at the center of the creature’s being was like nothing he had ever experienced before.

It was so cold, and it was drawing the light from him.

Soon there was only shadow, and Remiel was flying in the endless night, not toward the sky, but down . . . down to where the light would never reach.

Down to where he’d cease to be, swallowed up by the endless night.

At first he believed it a trick of his failing system, flashes of light heralding his approaching death, but then he realized that something was with him.

There were shapes in the flashes, and he came to know that they were of his human persona and its deceased wife.

Come to gloat? the angel of Heaven wondered, as he drifted closer.

The woman was smiling, and he didn’t know why. For soon they would be no more . . . their life forces consumed by a horror with the potential to level the Kingdom of Heaven. He wanted to ask her why she smiled, but he was too weak, already wavering on the precipice of oblivion.

And then she reached out, taking his wrist and bringing his hand toward the other, toward the hand of the human self that had dominated his form.

“I doubt I can make the two of you kiss and make up,” the woman said, as she joined their hands. “So a handshake will have to do.”

Malachi was loath to admit it, but at the moment, he was quite in awe of his creation.

Despite the angel’s divine power, Taranushi had managed to immobilize the Seraphim, completely envelop its body, and was now in the process of consuming him.

This was a design to fear, and maybe the Almighty had been right in His decision not to create the Shaitan.

But that was neither here nor there. If Malachi wanted to save reality, he had to move quickly, before the rest of the Shaitan were born. He started back into the jungle’s thickness when he heard the sound of crying. Glancing across the clearing, he saw the old woman, Eliza Swan, kneeling just before the Tree as Adam’s corpse continued to be fed upon by the emerging Shaitan. She was weeping, mourning his death, but at least he had gotten his wish: to die in the Garden.

Malachi was going to leave, but thought better of it. The woman, this descendant of Eve, might prove useful in escaping the Garden.

Quickly, he made his way around the withered Tree, emerging from the jungle at the woman’s back.

“Do not mourn for him, human,” Malachi said. “For he has achieved his heart’s desire, to return to the Garden from which he was banished.”

She turned her head to him, her face awash with tears.

“You killed him,” she spat. “This poor old soul, and you killed him like a dog.”

“You are incorrect, woman,” Malachi said as he grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet, pulling her back toward the jungle. “I did no such thing.”

He chanced a quick look back at the Tree of Knowledge, and what unfolded beneath it. Taranushi was still covering the Seraphim, moaning aloud. At first Malachi thought them moans of pleasure as the spawn of darkness fed upon the angel’s light.

But then the moans turned distinctly to screams of agony.

Taranushi had only imagined how wonderful an angel of Heaven—a Seraphim—would taste.

He had thought about it for centuries, and longer, as he searched the world for the keys to Eden. Now the power of Heaven’s warrior host flowed into him as his body continued to spread across that of the Seraphim, expanding and contracting, using powerful muscles to crush his victim, and allow the delectable juices to flow.

To think that there was an entire legion of these beings to feast upon was enough to drive him mad with pleasure.

Taranushi groaned in satisfaction as the angel struggled within him. He wanted to tell the Heavenly being to cease its efforts, that it was only prolonging the inevitable, but the truth was, he enjoyed the feeling, the power that he had over this arrogant messenger of God.

The sensation of supremacy.

The Seraphim’s movements grew weaker, and Taranushi felt his own digestive fluids increase in flow. The beast was tempted to release the angel, so he could rip the flesh from its bones and stuff the bloody pieces of Heavenly meat into his mouth as the Seraphim slowly passed from life, but this form of consumption would more than suffice.

The first twinge startled the Shaitan, but that moment quickly turned to excitement as he realized that the Seraphim still had some fight in him.

More life to feed his insatiable appetite.

The Shaitan constricted his muscles all the tighter, giving his prey little space to move.

“Fight, pretty angel,” he cooed, stretching his head above the undulating mass of black, marked flesh that was his body. “It will just make your meat all the sweeter.”

The monster began to laugh, but his amusement turned to concern as he realized that the Seraphim’s movements were growing stronger.

Concentrating with all his might, the Shaitan tightened his body’s pliant muscles, just as a clenched fist savagely punched through the mass of its body, and into the air.

“Yeeeeeeeeeearrrgh!” Taranushi cried out.

His flesh flowed over the arm and drew the limb back down into his body. But another fist forced its way through, followed by the flexing of a mighty wing.

The Shaitan was in trouble, and he doubled his efforts to put his prey down, but to little avail. It was as if the Seraphim had been given a second opportunity at life.

An intervention on behalf of the divine, he almost considered, before pushing the disturbing thought away.

And that was when he began to feel the heat. The angel had attempted the same trick before, radiating the fire of its divinity, but the darkness inside Taranushi had been enough to suffocate that flame.

Now, however, hands burning white with fire hotter than the heart of a star tore through Taranushi’s flesh, the meat of the Shaitan’s body sizzling as his juices were cooked from within.

The Seraphim tore himself out from the prison of flesh, body glowing white-hot, and tossed his head back in a savage scream that informed the universe he still lived.

Taranushi recoiled, flowing away from the intense heat of the angel’s form. He was hurt, his body damaged in ways that it had never been before. Gazing down at the wounds, he considered escape, giving himself time to heal before resuming the struggle.

But the ground beneath his feet pulsed with life.

The life of his kind, and he knew there wasn’t much time before they were born, and unleashed from the Garden unto the world.

There was no choice.

The angel stood naked before him, the fluids from his captivity smoldering upon his superheated flesh. Slowly he flapped his wings, shaking off the burning residue.

Taranushi let the rage come, ignoring his pain to once more challenge the soldier of Heaven.

“Time to die, messenger,” the spawn of darkness said as he lunged for his prey.

For the fate of his kind.

There was a balance within the Seraphim now.

Before there had always been a sense of struggle, of holding back.

But now that was gone.

He had been about to die when the change had come upon him, but two opposing forces joined together to form one.

Dispelling the darkness with light.

Dispelling the darkness with holy fire.

Seraphim and Shaitan came together at the base of the Tree of Knowledge, two bodies colliding with such force and strength that the Garden trembled with the intensity of it.

They both knew that this was the moment their fates would be decided.

They smashed into the base of the Tree, tearing away huge pieces of bark, revealing the pale, oozing flesh beneath.

The Shaitan was up to his old tricks at once, his body like water, attempting to engulf his foe. But this time the Seraphim was ready. He refused to allow the malleable beast to take hold. Instead, he made his hands burn with the heat of the righteous.

The Shaitan drew back, roaring his displeasure. He shifted part of his mass into a muscular tentacle and lashed out with all his might, swatting the angel away, the intensity of the blow picking him up from the ground and launching him through the air.

Sensing an opportunity, the Shaitan slithered across the ground in pursuit of his prey.

Remiel climbed slowly to his feet, attempting to stave off the encroaching unconsciousness. He could hear the monster approaching, its breathing excited and eager, probably imagining that victory was at hand.

The Seraphim decided to let it continue to think that way, for he had found his own opportunity.

Unwittingly, the Shaitan had knocked him within inches of his weapon. He had lost Zophiel’s sword when the struggle had first intensified, but now he looked upon it, protruding from the ground, covered in winding vines and thick leaves that were constantly burning, only to regrow twice as large, and twice as thick, only to burn all over again. To the normal eye it appeared as a small tree, but to the Seraphim . . . to Remiel, it was so much more.

The blade of Eden’s sentry was crying out to him, screaming into his mind to take it up and destroy the foes of the Garden and Heaven.

Almost, he thought, the sounds of the eager Shaitan nearly upon him.

Closer.

Closer . . .

The damnable thing was almost there; he could smell the evil sweating from its pores, hear the sound of its flesh as it abandoned its shape, becoming molten, preparing to envelop him.

Remiel reached for the sword, tugging the burning blade from a scabbard of thick vines and leaves, and spun to meet his attacker with a cry of fury. Their eyes met as Zophiel’s blade hissed through the humid air on its designated course.

The Shaitan attempted to bend its body around the sword, but the blade forged in the fires of Heaven would have none of that. It was starving for the blood of its enemy.

Gouts of black, foul-smelling blood spurted into the air as the blade cut through the twisted thing’s rubbery skin. The Shaitan cried out in pain, and dropped to the ground, slithering back from its foe.

Remiel spread his wings wide and flew after the monster, relentlessly hacking at its thick, trunklike body, each blow cutting spurting gashes in the thing’s ever-shifting flesh. The Shaitan managed to reach the Tree of Knowledge, winding itself around the trunk like a serpent, and up toward the expanse of withered branches. Huge, leathery wings began to take shape from its body, beating the air, as it attempted escape.

Remiel shot up into the air, intercepting the beast as it exploded through the diseased, fruit-covered branches. He slashed one of the monster’s new wings, crippling it. It began to fall, and the Seraphim joined it, holding on, pushing the monstrosity down through the Tree’s branches to the hard ground below.

Remiel landed atop the thrashing Shaitan, raising his fiery sword and plunging it into the monster, pinning it to the ground. Screams filled the air . . . the Shaitan’s, as well as those of its fetal brethren still gestating and waiting in the soil beneath.

The Shaitan’s movements grew frantic as it attempted to right itself. Its blood flowed into the ground, exciting the young beastlings that waited below and enticing them toward the surface.

The earth began to seethe and Remiel quickly stepped back. The Shaitan struggled to be free of the sword, but it held fast, pinning the monster to the churning earth.

And then it began to scream.

The baby Shaitan were emerging, pale skinned and hungry, crawling up from the darkness into the murky light of the Garden. They shrieked angrily at the light, the sudden illumination hurting their sensitive eyes, but it did not stop them from their purpose.

To feed.

The blood of their brother had created a feeding frenzy—the blood of their brother rich with the taste of Seraphim.

It was a horrific sight to behold, and the unfortunate Shaitan survived much longer than Remiel would have imagined possible.

He was not sure how long it was before his foe was completely consumed, but the Seraphim realized that, little by little, the babies were starting to notice his presence. Those that had fed sniffed the air, zeroing in on his scent, and began to claw their way toward him across the overturned earth, dragging malformed limbs in their wake.

Hungry for their next meal.

And Remiel did not know if he had the strength left to defeat them.

The old black woman struggled in his grasp as Malachi peered through the thick jungle foliage at the battle raging before him.

This Seraphim, he thought, watching as the angel Remiel finally dispatched the Shaitan. There is something different about him now, something that wasn’t part of his original design. Something new is present.

Something deadly.

The Shaitan’s death screams spurred him to action. He began to drag the woman away, but she fought him.

“I know that one,” Eliza Swan cried. “That’s my Remy,” she said, voice trembling with emotion. “That’s my Remy Chandler.”

Malachi savagely pulled her away. All he needed was for her to draw the attention of the Seraphim—especially that Seraphim.

The ground still moved beneath each footfall, trees swayed, and plants reached weakly to snag them as they passed. The Garden was dying, but she still tried to stop those she believed had harmed her. He wondered how long she had before all the life left her.

A wall of thick vegetation blocked the opening to his cave, but the scalpel of light was more than sufficient to gain him entrance. The vines squeaked in death, and wilted away as the blade cut through their tubular bodies to expose the gaping cave mouth.

Eliza planted her feet, not wanting to enter, but the elder had little time for the human monkey’s games. He dragged her with ease, the grip upon her wrist so powerful that he could feel the frail old bones grinding together as he pulled her along.

The chamber was just as he’d left it, and he headed toward his workstation, tossing Eliza aside. The old woman fell to the ground, stunned.

Malachi ignored her, his mind abuzz. He found a deep bowl made from the bottom portion of a gourd, and plucked it from the table. Turning, he focused on a section of wall and recalled the forbidden piece of angel magick he would recite, and the sigils he would have to draw, in order to make his escape.

Now all he required was the blood to draw with.

Malachi turned toward Eliza and brought forth the ever-soversatile blade of light. “One last chore before . . . ,” he began, only to stop short when he saw that they were no longer alone in the cave.

A figure knelt beside the woman, tenderly touching her face as she lay stunned upon the floor of the cave. At first he did not recognize him, clothed as he was in a dark three-piece suit, but as he rose there was no mistaking the former Guardian angel.

“Fraciel,” Malachi said excitedly. “How nice it is to see you again.”

“Yeah,” Francis said, adjusting the sleeves of his jacket so the white of his shirt showed just below the cuffs. “And it’s Francis now.

“Bet you didn’t see this coming.”

Francis could practically hear the gears turning inside the old angel’s skull as he slowly approached.

“This day is just full of surprises,” Malachi said, dark eyes shining in the weak light of the cave. “Surprises and revelations,” he added.

The elder stopped halfway to Francis, who continued to stare in stony silence.

“The surprise, of course, being that you’re still alive,” Malachi said with a chuckle. “And the revelation that we are somehow linked, you and I.”

Francis was mildly interested to see where this would go.

“Ever since I first partook of the fruit from the Tree,” the ancient angel explained, “you have been part of the future that I foresaw. . . .”

Malachi paused.

“I had thought your part at an end with my escape from Hell, but now . . . seeing you here, I realize that our lives—our futures—are far more intricately entwined than that.”

“You gutted me like a fish,” Francis said, still feeling the excruciating pain.

“I did,” Malachi agreed. “And yet here you are. Don’t you see, Francis? We’re supposed to be together.”

Malachi was inching closer, and Francis let him come.

“The survival of this reality—of all realities—is our responsibility,” the elder stressed. “We are the future.”

“I have a job for you,” Francis heard Lucifer Morningstar say, as he balanced on the precipice of death. “If you are so inclined.”

There must have been something in his eyes, something that told Malachi he wasn’t about to buy into his bullshit. And that was when the ancient being made his move. The scalpel was out, slicing through the moist, stagnant air of the cave, as Malachi darted forward to try to kill him again.

But Francis had been expecting as much, willing the golden pistol from where it waited in the ether, to his hand, pitilessly firing a single, Hell-forged bullet into the center of Malachi’s forehead.

The elder’s head snapped violently backward, the glowing scalpel flying from his open fingers, an amusing look of surprise frozen upon his ancient features.

“Always wondered what would happen if I fucked with the future,” Francis said, watching his victim fall backward to the floor.

He walked over to where Malachi lay, surprised to see that he was still alive, even with a bullet of Hell metal lodged inside his skull.

“I have a job for you,” he heard the Morningstar speak again.

The golden peacemaker was still in his hand, and he held it above the angel’s chest, firing another round into Malachi’s black heart.

The angel twitched as the bullet entered his body, and then went still.

“If you are so inclined.”

Francis closed his eyes, recalling the offer, and the answer he gave, as he was yanked back from the edge of death.

There was a scuffling sound somewhere behind him, and he spun around, finger twitching on the trigger of the deadly pistol.

But it was only Eliza Swan.

Eliza Swan. Even thinking her name brought a smile to his lips.

Willing the gun away, he went to the woman.

She was leaning up against the cave wall, and it was then that Francis noticed how incredibly old she had become. He tried to do the math, and gave up. She was of Eve’s bloodline, and would live much longer than the average human woman, but even by those standards, she was pretty damn old.

Francis approached the woman, whose love he had remembered only a short time ago, and knelt down beside her.

“How are you, girl?” he asked, emotions that he would never admit to bubbling to the surface.

Eliza lifted her head to look into his eyes. “Pearly,” she whispered. “I never forgot you.”

She lifted a hand to stroke his face, and he leaned into it, reveling in the affection, but suddenly taken aback by the scent of blood.

“Eliza?” he questioned, taking her hand and staring at it. Her fingers were stained red. “Are you hurt?”

“You told me to leave the writing where it was,” she said, her eyes locked on his. “That if I didn’t, I would put myself in danger . . .”

Francis began to panic; the smell of blood was stronger.

“Why is it that I never listened?” she asked him. “Why did I always ignore the people I loved? My parents . . . you . . . I guess I was always bad news, wasn’t I?”

“You were never bad news. . . .”

She began to cough, and that was when he saw it.

Malachi’s scalpel protruding from her belly.

He gasped and reached to pull it free, but she caught his wrist, demanding that he look at her.

“I did this,” she told him. “If I had listened . . . if I had listened, none of this would have happened. Figured I’d best put an end to it . . . before I messed up anything else.”

He was about to tell her that she would be fine, that he would find a way to fix her, but he didn’t want to lie, not to her.

Her hold on his wrist grew weaker, and her hand eventually fell into her lap.

Francis reached for the blade, pulling it from her. He stared at it, listening to its faint hum and occasional crackle, before slipping it into the pocket of his jacket.

Claiming the weapon as his own.

Eliza’s eyes had begun to close, and he knew that she didn’t have much longer. There was so much he wanted to say, to tell her before she left, but all he could do was watch.

“I have a job for you.”

And remember what he had done to be here.

“If you are so inclined.”

Eden was still dying, but she wasn’t as sick as she had been before.

Izzy could feel the connection with the Garden now, the thrum of her life through her own body.

And Jon’s.

He had been the key to saving her, the two of them somehow providing the place with what she needed to fight . . . the strength to fight and possibly survive what was happening to her.

The ground still trembled violently beneath their feet as they pushed their way through the thick jungle, an effort on the part of Eden to fight back against her foes.

Izzy could feel where she needed to go, holding on to Jon’s hand, leading him to their destination. He believed that they were going to Remy, to assist the angel in his fight against the Shaitan, but she knew otherwise.

There was someplace else she was supposed to be right now.

She brought them to a stop before the gaping mouth of the cave.

“What are we doing?” Jon asked. “This isn’t where . . .”

“Yes,” the woman said. “Yes, it is.”

And as the words left her mouth she and Jon watched as the man in the suit emerged from the darkness of the cave, the body of an elderly woman held in his arms.

Izzy knew at once who the old woman was, and that she was dead, for the Garden was telling her this.

“That . . . that’s your mother,” Jon spoke aloud, seemingly knowing the information as well.

A pistol had appeared in the man’s hand, aimed at them both.

“You don’t have any need for that,” Izzy told him.

The man continued to stare. It had been a very long time since she’d seen either of them, but she knew this man before Eden had begun to tell her who he was.

“Don’t you remember me, Dad?”

His expression barely changed, but in his dark eyes she could see that he knew her . . . that he remembered.

“Izabella,” he said.

The gun was somehow gone; she hadn’t seen where, or how he’d put it away while still holding the woman, but it wasn’t pointed at them anymore.

Her father looked at the dead woman in his arms with a gaze so intense that she could feel the energy passing between them.

“She blamed herself for what’s happening,” her father said, lowering himself to his knees. “Said that it was all her fault. Purposely hurt herself so that she couldn’t be used anymore.”

Izzy knelt in the moving grass beside her mother and father.

“Why’d you have to go and do that,” Izzy said quietly, reaching out to cup the dead woman’s cold cheek in her hand. “Wish I could have spent some time with you before—”

A violent tremor passed through the earth, and a jab of pain like an ice pick to the skull caused her to double over.

Eden was in trouble again. Eden was in pain.

“We really don’t have the time for this,” Jon said. He was holding the side of his head, a slight trickle of blood leaking from his nose.

Her father was now staring at the man, as if noticing him for the first time.

“Who’s he?” he asked. “Boyfriend?”

Izzy smiled at the idea—after so many years of hate, the Sons and Daughters coming together again . . . here.

“No,” she told her father. “But you don’t have to worry about that.”

She stroked her mother’s hair.

“You need to get her out of here,” Izzy told him. “You need to bring her home. . . .” She looked at him squarely through the lenses of his dark-framed glasses.

“Her real home.”

Her father nodded, understanding what she was asking of him.

“We have some business to take care of here first,” Izzy said.

He stood, gently holding the body of the woman in his arms.

“It was nice to see you again, Dad,” Izzy said.

“Nice to see you too,” her father told her.

And in his eyes she could read that it was true—he was glad to see her.

Remiel held the young Shaitan at bay with the Cherubim’s sword.

The fire burned brightly as he held it out before him, the light from the blade preventing them from advancing.

But for how long?

The small monsters, no bigger than newborns, hissed and snapped at the light thrown from the blade, squinting and covering their eyes with nastily clawed hands.

The angel considered his options: He could flee the Garden, leaving the situation as bad as he’d found it, or he could attack, wading in among the pale-skinned creatures and attempting to slay them all before they reached their full, deadly maturity.

He didn’t particularly care for either choice, but running away was not an option.

The Shaitan were getting braver by the second, charging at him, teeth snapping. As one did this, the others followed suit. They were learning from one another, and it wouldn’t be long now before they came at him in full force.

His body was still weary, injuries slowly healing, but still healing nonetheless. He wasn’t even close to peak battle form, but all that would need to be set aside if he were to fight in hope of slaying them all.

One of the younglings charged with a horrible shriek, and Remiel sliced the head from its body. They had not yet learned of their shape-shifting abilities, but he guessed that it was only a matter of time before they did.

Their dead brother provided him with a little more time, the others pouncing upon the corpse and eating it before the body could even grow cold.

They were soon back, their full attention on him in seconds.

There seemed to be more of them now, even more newborns crawling up from the dirt.

The Shaitan were clumped together, a mass of snarling, snapping teeth and claws, hungry for the flesh of the Heavenly.

“Come at me, then,” he said, steeling himself for the approaching battle. And his thoughts quickly reviewed all the things that would be lost to him if he should fall, all the friendships, all the loves, and even the dislikes that would be greatly missed.

He hoped those things would give him the strength to do what was required of him this moment, the strength to be victorious.

The strength to survive.

The Shaitan flowed like a wave, and Remiel was ready, the slaughter of his foes the only thing that mattered.

He waited for them, but the earth itself reacted before he could.

Jagged teeth of rock and dirt pushed up suddenly from the ground, creating a wall and preventing the Shaitan from reaching him.

Remiel was confused, but remained ready for what might possibly follow.

The abominations screamed their displeasure, pushing against the blockade, and began to climb over. Roots like tentacles reached up from the ground, snagging them around their malformed limbs, dragging them back behind the wall.

A cacophony of bird cries filled the air, and he gazed up to see a cloud of strange, sparrowlike birds descending from the trees to peck at the Shaitan.

The wall of rocks and dirt continued to grow in thickness and in height, and began to push them, herding the newborn Shaitan back toward the Tree of Knowledge.

“You need to get out of here,” came the familiar voice of a young man.

Remiel turned to see Jon and Izzy emerging from the jungle. The two were holding hands, and he didn’t really understand until he noticed the jungle around him, and what was happening at their feet.

Where there had once been sick and wilted vegetation, it was now green and healthy, growing up from wherever they passed or stepped.

They were connected to Eden now, and this connection was providing the Garden with what she needed to fight back, and to survive.

“What happened to your armor?” Jon asked.

“Lost in the belly of the beast,” Remiel answered. “Good to see you, Jon . . . Izzy.”

“Good to see you too, Remy,” Jon said. “But you’ve got to do what we said and get out of here as fast as you can.”

“I can’t,” he said, looking back to the Tree, and to the Shaitan that were trying to escape the Garden’s attempts at confining them. “Something needs to be done about them before . . .”

“Don’t you worry about that,” Izzy told him. “That’s why we’re here.”

The Garden then shook with such force that he almost toppled.

“You’ve got to go now, Remy,” Jon said.

Remiel noticed that both their noses were bleeding, and their ears as well.

“We’re helping her fight, but I’m not sure how much longer we can keep this up,” Izzy said.

Strange, catlike animals were padding from the jungle and going to the Tree, attacking the Shaitan on the other side of the rock wall.

“You need to go and do what you did before for her,” Izzy said, her face squinted up with exertion. “You need to cut her loose by closing the gates again.”

Remiel understood what they were asking of him.

“What about you two?” he wanted to know. “I think I could fly both of you through the jungle and—”

“We’re staying,” Jon said. “Somebody has to make sure that these things aren’t allowed to escape.”

“And with our help, Eden should be strong enough to keep them prisoner here for a good long time,” Izzy added, wiping a fresh trickle of blood from her nose with a sniffle.

Remiel stared, in awe of their sacrifice.

“We’re sure about this,” Jon said, Izzy nodding beside him. “Please . . . get out of here and close the gates.”

He was about to leave when he heard the unmistakable sound of magickal energies being unleashed. They all looked toward the Tree as jagged fragments of rock and hunks of tree root exploded into the air. The Shaitan were learning about their abilities, unleashing them against the forces that attempted to keep them at bay.

Remiel lifted his sword and was heading in that direction, when Jon grabbed his arm in a powerful grip.

“Go,” the man commanded. “We have it under control, but we don’t know for how long.”

He hated to leave them like this, but the thought of the Shaitan getting out of the Garden was even more troubling.

Moving toward the jungle, he passed the sad, mangled body of Adam, and as if in response to his troubled thoughts, he watched as the ground began to draw the corpse down into its embrace, swallowing him up, returning his body from whence it came.

The sounds of heated battle erupted behind him, but he did not turn. He had a mission to perform, and there would be nothing to deter him from it.

Remiel spread his wings, leaping into flight, maneuvering through the low-hanging limbs and vines, flying toward his destination. Eden looked healthier, greener, thicker, and he believed that maybe the great Garden would survive the horrors she had been forced to endure.

And in doing so, keep the monstrous race known as the Shaitan from swarming out into the world of man. He could see the gateway up ahead, and pushed himself to fly faster. As he dropped to the ground just before the opening, so as to not overshoot his goal, excruciating pain exploded in his back as something raked its claws down his bare flesh.

Remiel fell to the ground, rolling over and lashing out with his sword.

A young Shaitan crouched there, licking his blood from its hooked claws, a malicious smile growing upon its monstrous face as it enjoyed its snack. He had to wonder if any more of the beasts had escaped Jon and Izzy, and gradually climbed to his feet. The wounds in his back throbbed in pain so sharp it was as if he were being stabbed over and over again.

He didn’t know whether it was his eyes playing tricks, his senses dulled by the incredible pain, but he could have sworn that the Shaitan was growing—maturing—before his eyes.

Finished with the blood on its claws, it obviously desired more, coming at him with a ferocious hiss. The flaming sword lashed out, but the beast was quick, ducking beneath the swing and darting forward to rake its claws along his side.

Remiel cried out.

It was all proving to be too much, his body shutting down a little at a time, not leaving him enough to work with.

The Shaitan seemed to sense this, moving in to attack again, tatters of Remiel’s flesh still dangling from its claws.

There was no mistaking the sound of gunfire.

The shot hit the beast in the chest, dead center, and tossed it backward into the jungle.

Remiel turned to see Francis, smoldering pistol in hand, standing in the gateway. Was that one of the Pitiless—weapons imbued with the power of Lucifer Morningstar? he asked himself briefly, before the sound of screaming drew his attention back to the jungle in front of him. Even with a bullet hole in its chest, the Shaitan was coming again. Remiel readied himself, sword in hand to fight.

But snaking tendrils of green shot out, vines wrapping themselves around the Shaitan’s thrashing limbs. The creature continued to squeal, struggling as it was dragged backward into the jungle.

A face that he recognized as Izzy’s took form in the bark of a tree nearby.

“Get out of here,” the face of wood commanded. “Close the gates behind you.”

Remiel passed through the gate to the world outside.

Francis was standing there, the body of Eliza Swan lying at his feet.

Remiel felt sadness come at the sight, but quickly pushed it aside to deal with the problem at hand.

“We have to close it,” he said to his friend.

Francis nodded, saying nothing as he went to one of the heavy metal gates, and Remiel went to the other.

There were noises coming from within the Garden, something that told him that more than one of the Shaitan had escaped his friends. They needed to do this, and to do this quickly.

“Ready?” Remiel asked him. “On the count of three.”

The sounds were louder now, multiple things fighting their way through the thick jungle growth.

“One,” Remiel said, taking the cold metal in his hands.

He looked across at his friend, feeling a strange combination of joy—to see him still alive—and revulsion.

He was concerned what that meant, and wondered whether it had anything to do with the weapon he’d seen in Francis’s hand.

“Two.”

“Three,” Francis grunted, pushing on his side, as Remiel joined him.

It was as if they did not wish to be closed again, but the gates eventually gave way, hinges crying out unhappily as they came together with a nearly deafening clatter.

The two stepped back, away from the locked gates as the Garden of Eden was again detached from a particular reality, gradually slipping in and out of focus as it resumed its journey behind the veil.

Cast adrift, and out into the sea of realities once more.

Jon thought he was going to die.

The power of Eden rushed through him like a raging river, threatening to pull him from the safety of shore out into deeper and far more dangerous waters.

“Got to hold ’em,” Izzy said, squeezing his hand all the tighter.

He didn’t answer, choosing instead to focus on the job at hand.

The Shaitan were trying to escape, newly acquired magickal energies shooting out at the Garden that tried to imprison them. A few had managed to escape the clutches of the jungle, but only a few. The majority still remained in their possession . . . the Garden of Eden’s possession.

Thanks to Jon and Izzy, Eden was stronger now, filled with a strength that she had not had for countless millennia.

The Garden told them how happy she was.

How happy she was to have her children back.

The gunmetal gray sky of the North Pole above their heads suddenly went to a weird kaleidoscope of colors before going completely to black . . . burning lights like stars igniting one by one, shedding their light down upon them, lending them some of their fiery strength.

“Remy did it,” Izzy said. “These nasty sons a’ bitches ain’t getting away from us.”

And Jon had to agree. He felt suddenly stronger, capable of getting the job done, now that the threat of the Shaitan’s escape out into the world had been averted.

“Let’s put them down,” he told Izzy . . . he told Eden.

And they obliged him, their combined strength pouring into the Garden. A wall of earth like a tidal wave rose up from the ground above the struggling Shaitan. The roots from the reinvigorated Tree of Knowledge had created a kind of jail, keeping them in one place, as the other aspects of the holy jungle worked at keeping the monsters from escaping.

The wave of dirt plunged down, burying the squirming beasts, as the Garden drew them deeper into herself.

“She’s going to create a place for them,” Izzy said, the sides of her head and neck stained crimson with blood. “A prison that she holds close to her heart.”

“And she’ll hold them there for as long as she is able,” Jon joined in, feeling Eden’s message to them. “For as long as she is strong.”

They stood there for a good long time, waiting for the Shaitan to reemerge, for the battle to continue, but they did not come.

For now, Eden was capable of holding them.

The Garden soon calmed: The ground beneath their feet ceased to tremble; the plants, trees, and animals returned to their natural states. It was a Garden of peace again.

A Garden of peace with a malignancy at its core.

Jon was so exhausted that he dropped to the ground, releasing the viselike grip that he had on Izzy’s hand. His head swam, and he dropped it between his legs, taking deep breaths, trying to keep from passing out. There was an annoying whine in his ear, and he reached up, plucking out the damaged hearing aid and dropping the squealing device on the ground. It was then that he realized that he didn’t need it anymore, that his hearing had completely returned to that ear.

The damage had been healed. As he had helped heal the Garden, the Garden had healed him.

“Where do you think we are?” Izzy asked him.

He looked up to see that she was staring at the strange sky above them. It was like no night sky that he had ever seen before. The stars all seemed so incredibly close.

“I haven’t any idea,” he said. “But as long as we’re away from Earth, it’s all good.”

She sat down on the ground beside him.

“Never would have seen this coming,” she said with a chuckle.

“You’re right there,” Jon answered. He picked a stick up from the ground and started to play with it. Healthy green buds began to grow upon the stick, blossoming into tiny pink flowers.

“Look at that,” Izzy said. “Looks like you’ve got a green thumb now.”

He let go of the branch and watched as it took root before his eyes. It had grown nearly twice its size before one of them spoke again.

“So, what now?” he asked, wondering if Izzy had any idea of their purpose. He glanced over to her, waiting for the answer.

Izzy shrugged. “We’re the gardeners now,” she said. “I guess we tend the Garden.”

“Makes sense,” he agreed.

“And when we’re not tending the Garden, who knows,” she added.

He looked and saw that she was staring at him, eyebrows going up and down lasciviously.

“You’re not so bad-looking . . . a little bit skinny for my taste, but . . .”

Jon couldn’t stop himself; after everything they’d gone through, this was just that last straw . . . the perfect release, and he laughed so hard that he fell over onto his side.

“What’s so damn funny?” Izzy asked, obviously annoyed.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized, trying to control his laughter. “I’m not laughing at you; I’m laughing at the situation.”

“The situation?” she asked.

“It’s not that I’m not flattered, but . . .”

She looked at him for a moment, and then it dawned on her.

“You’re . . . ,” she started, but didn’t finish.

He nodded, trying to keep from laughing again.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” she cried.

Jon couldn’t hold it back, laughing hysterically, his laughter so contagious that Izzy soon started as well.

It had been a long time since laughter had been heard in Eden.

And the Garden liked the sound.