Dancing On the Head of a Pin

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

They’d been married only a very short time.

Marlowe had yet to enter their lives, and they were living in an apartment in Somerville. Their life was good together—better than good, really.

The love he felt for her, and she for him—it was like nothing he’d ever known. But that was a lie, for he had known the intensity of a love like it when in the presence of God.

And he could not help but feel a bit ashamed—and even a little astonished—that a love so great had been so easily replaced. But when he looked at her, lying beside him in bed, or typing up invoices in the office, he knew how it could be possible, for the Almighty had given humanity a piece of Himself, and it radiated through so much more brightly in some than in others.

Madeline shone like the sun, and Remy was powerless not to be drawn to the warmth of her love, which made her sudden statement that cold Sunday afternoon all the more disturbing.

They’d been making dinner together. She was preparing a roast and was about to finish up by using the greasy drippings of the beef to make the gravy. He’d been in the process of opening a bottle of red wine when she made the statement. It was sudden—unprompted—the meaning devastating to him.

“I’m probably going to Hell when I die.”

She had just placed a few tablespoons of flour into the pan of drippings and was stirring it; she wasn’t even looking at him.

“What did you just say?” he asked with a chuckle, stopping the turning of the corkscrew midtwist.

He could see that she was suddenly upset, her eyes appearing puffy as tears began to roll down her ruddy cheeks. Remy set the bottle upon the countertop and went to her.

“What’s wrong?”

He’d come up behind her and put his hands upon her shoulders. There was the faintest of trembles there. It was chilly in the old apartment, but he knew that this had nothing to do with the cold.

She laughed, wiping away the tears running down her face as she continued to mix in the flour she’d added to the pan.

“You’re going to say I’m stupid,” she said, turning her gaze up to him. “At least I hope you do.”

He waited patiently for her to continue, rubbing his hands lovingly up and down her arms.

“Making the gravy made me think of my nana Sarah—my dad’s mom,” she said. “This was her recipe. She taught me when I was a little girl… before she got sick.”

He still wasn’t quite sure where she was going, but he kept silent, allowing her to purge whatever it was that was bothering her.

“She lived with us after she was diagnosed with emphysema,” Madeline explained as she crushed the balls of flour that floated in the bubbling mixture. “Sarah had a two-pack-a-day habit—Camels unfiltered—and it killed her to stop, even though she was so sick and could barely breathe. We fixed up a spare room, moving her in so that we could take care of her.”

Madeline had continued to stir the light brownish mixture, as if stirring up the memories of the past.

“At first it was sort of fun having her around all the time, but as she became sicker it got tense and sort of scary. Both my mother and father had part-time night jobs and would leave me home alone with Sarah… even after she’d become really bad.”

Madeline set the spoon that she’d been using down and just stood there silently.

Remy said nothing, but continued to rub her shoulders, encouraging her to continue with his silence.

“I can remember sitting in the kitchen at night… sometimes for hours, listening to her in her bedroom down the hall gasping for breath… waiting for something… something horrible to happen. I grew to hate her for what she was putting me through.”

He started to turn her around toward him. At first she fought, but she soon succumbed, melting into him as he put his arms around her.

“It must have been very hard for you,” he said understandingly. “And not the sort of responsibility that should be dropped on a kid.”

He felt the dampness of her tears seeping through the fabric of his shirt.

“You really didn’t hate her; you hated the situation you’d been put in—the illness that was taking away the woman you loved.”

Madeline’s body became rigid within his arms, and she lifted her face up to him. Her eyes were red and swollen, cheeks damp and flushed with pink.

“One night sitting alone in my kitchen, listening to her struggle to catch a breath, I wished that she would die—for God or whoever to come and take her so that I wouldn’t feel so scared anymore.”

Remy knew what had happened then, and how it had played on her childlike psyche, growing into an overpowering obstacle of guilt that she had carried with her to that day.

“She died, Remy,” Madeline had told him, her voice shaking with sadness and shame. “I wished my grandmother dead—I wished so hard that it killed her. And that’s why I’m probably going to Hell.”

Madeline pushed her face into his chest, and he felt her body shudder pathetically with sadness. He tried to comfort her, stroking the back of her head and rocking her gently from side to side.

He wanted to tell her that it was impossible to wish someone dead—to think that there was some great power out there listening, waiting to respond to such random requests—but then he remembered the life that his love had been not all that long ago indoctrinated into: an existence where a human woman had married an actual being of Heaven.

And he could see how a belief such as this didn’t seem quite as silly as it once had.

That was when he’d told her about Hell—about Tartarus—and why it existed, and that even if she had managed to somehow wish her grandmother dead, she wouldn’t have gone to Hell when she died.

Hell was not a place for humanity; it was for those who had rebelled against the glory of Heaven.

For those who had sinned against their loving God.

These were the thoughts that instantaneously danced across the surface of Remy’s mind as he clung to a precarious outcropping of ice, Karnighan’s doorway swirling and sputtering in the air above his head.

The old man’s spell had torn a hole in the air above Tartarus, and as Remy had fallen through, he’d lost his weapons as he’d frantically clawed for purchase on any surface that could break his fall. The ice numbed his hands to the point where his fingertips had cracked and started to bleed, staining the ice crimson.

Hanging on to the jagged protrusion of ice, Remy studied the area around him, searching for a sign of Madach, or any possible hint as to how dire their situation actually was.

The air of Hell was filled with swirling clouds of noxious fumes that partially obscured his vision and poisoned his thoughts with the taint of fear and desperation. But there wasn’t time for such things; he was to somehow thwart the Nomads’ plans. How this was to be accomplished, and why it had become his responsibility, were mysteries he would have to deal with another time, when there were less pressing matters to concern himself with.

There was no sign of Madach, and not having the luxury to worry, Remy began his dangerous journey down the side of the ice prison, bloodstained hands searching for any crack, edge, or divot that could be used to assist his descent.

The filthy sky above his head trembled, and he chanced a look upward to see Karnighan’s passage begin to falter. The nexus began to sputter and pulse, the magicks used to hold it open beginning to fail. Remy quickened his descent, the sharpness of the icy surface cutting into his fragile flesh, the blood from the cuts making the frigid exterior slicker than it already was.

There was suddenly a roar like thunder, followed by a powerful expulsion of air that tore him from his perch upon Tartarus’ surface and tossed him into oblivion.

Remy tumbled down, the fetid air of the place rushing to fill his lungs with its corrosive stench. The ground flew up to meet him with alarming speed, the essence of the divine imprisoned inside the cage of humanity shrieking to be loosed. But he waited too long, dreading the release of the Seraphim.

Remy struck another outcropping of ice on the way down, and the world went temporarily dark. Struggling to regain some semblance of consciousness, he found himself continuing to fall, the punch line to an old joke echoing inside his head as he waited for the inevitable.

It’s not the fall that kills you, it’s the sudden stops.

He landed atop something that partially cushioned his fall. It wasn’t as if he’d landed on a big pile of pillows, or even bags of trash, for that matter. It was like landing on a sack full of doorknobs: a little bit of give-and-take as he connected, and then he found himself bouncing off, only to sail through the air again, eventually landing on a cold, rocky surface.

Remy’s head swam with pain, a steady throb of agony that pulsed with every rapid-fire beat of his heart.

But he’d survived, not that he really had much of an option.

The atmosphere of Hell was working its magick, trying to convince him to curl up into a ball and give up, but he knew that wasn’t going to work for him. He’d landed on his back, and eventually forced his eyes open, focusing on the looming image of the icy prison before him. He had a rough idea as to where Karnighan’s doorway had dropped him off, and was disturbed to see the distance he had fallen.

Remy started to sit up, the sensation of bone rubbing against jagged bone causing blossoms of color to appear before his eyes. He lay back down on the ground, willing the agony pulsing through his damaged body to subside.

Counting to three, he managed to force himself up into a sitting position, focusing on the locations of his extreme discomfort. One of his legs appeared to be broken, lying twisted and useless upon the inhospitable earth at the base of Tartarus.

“Shit,” he hissed, pushing himself backward toward the formation of ice that jutted up from the ground. Again he saw a universe of stars, the grinding of his bones apparently caused by some broken ribs.

He leaned back against the ice, breathing through his nose, waiting for the pain to subside. A rust-colored mist hung thick, like smoke, making visibility difficult until a powerful belch of fetid air—likely from the heat-blasted landscape located in the deep valleys and ravines below the prison of ice—helped to improve the visibility momentarily.

He wished it hadn’t.

As far as he could see, the frosty ground was strewn with the dead. Broken corpses of fallen angels, Hellions, armored Sentries, and even some of the cloaked Nomads littered the ground. This was what had broken his fall.

He recalled the fields of Heaven during the war, the corpses of those slain in the conflict that pitted angel against angel. Remy had hoped to never see anything like it again.

The sight sickened him, reminding him of why he had abandoned the celestial for the earthly comforts of humanity.

The thick, sulfurous mist was stirred by a shifting breeze, temporarily obscuring his view of the dead, and he was grateful. He lay back against the foundation of Tartarus and thought about what he had to do, although in his current condition, his choices were limited.

Out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw something move. Hoping that it was a merely a trick of the mist, Remy squinted, watching the toxic fog for any sign of life. He saw it again, followed by other shapes moving stealthily about, trying not to be seen, and knew immediately what had found him.

Hellions. A small pack of the Hell-born animals had found his scent, preferring living prey over the dead.

Great, Remy thought, the day just keeps on getting better and better.

He could hear their claws clicking on the rocky surface, the low rumbling growls of anticipation as they zeroed in on his scent.

Bracing himself, Remy pushed back against the ice, forcing himself up onto his good leg. The pain was worse than before, and he knew then that he must prepare for the inevitable. Hell was a cruel and vicious place, and not at all accommodating to the frailty of human flesh.

He knew he was going to have to give in, to shed his guise of humanity, and to once again resume his true form. The pain made it difficult to concentrate, the wildness of the angelic nature fighting him, as if trying to make him pay for its imprisonment.

Through pain-hazed eyes he saw at least three of the Hellions converging. Remy let go of his humanity, opening the mental gates that held the nature of Heaven at bay, allowing the Seraphim its freedom.

But it didn’t come fast enough.

The Hellions pounced, their hungry jaws clamping down on one of his wrists, another sinking its fangs into his injured leg. Remy cried out, falling forward to the ground. He could feel the Seraphim rising to the surface, but it seemed to be taking its time.

At last his flesh began to heat, to bubble and steam, as the radiance of God’s power began to emerge. The Hellions seemed excited by the physical transformation, as if somehow aroused by the taste of his change.

They climbed up on him, fangs snapping at his flailing hands as he tried to keep them from his throat. His covering of flesh was melting away to expose his angelic form, but the Hellion attack was savage, relentless, their ferocity more than he could handle at the moment.

He actually began to consider the fact that he might die, when his thoughts were interrupted by a blast of gunfire, followed by the yelp of an animal’s pain. Remy took note of one of the beasts, its head flipping back sharply to one side as it dropped heavily to the ground.

The remaining two Hellions ceased their attack, their bony heads suddenly moving in the air as they searched for signs of the threat.

Again there came a clap of artificial thunder, another of the Hell-hounds shrieking wildly, turning tail, trying to slink away dragging a now useless leg behind it.

Another shot finished the fleeing beast, leaving only one of the attacking Hellions alive.

Remy tossed his head back in an awful mixture of sadness and euphoria, crying out as the last of his humanity was excised, and the Seraphim completely emerged.

Now healed, he climbed to his feet, golden wings unfurling from his back to beat the sulfurous air. His angelic form was still adorned in the armor of war, the armor that he had worn when he had killed his brothers in Heaven.

Through angelic eyes he watched the last of Hellions as it tensed, the exposed muscle and sinew of its body bunching together, readying to pounce upon Remy’s savior as he emerged from the shifting haze.

Remy leapt, dropping down into the Hellion’s path. The monster roared, but before it could strike, Remy lashed out with one of his wings, the strength contained within the feathered appendage swatting the Hell-hound against the side of an unyielding Tartarus.

The animal roared its anger, thrashing upon the ground before returning to its feet.

He was about to go at the Hellion again, but another shot rang out, catching the beast in the eye and dropping it onto its side, dead.

“I was wondering where you’d gotten to,” Remy said, relaxing his wings, assuming that it was the fallen angel Madach who had come to his aid.

And then he gasped, watching the man stumble as he emerged from the thick, shifting fog, the gray three-piece suit hanging on his form in tatters.

“Francis,” Remy said, springing into the air, his newly birthed wings carrying him the short distance to catch his friend before he could fall to the ground.

“You’re going to be all right,” Remy said, never even considering Francis’ condition. His friend had to be all right.

He didn’t want to consider the alternative.

“Nomads,” Francis gasped, in between gulping breaths. “Didn’t think they had it in them.”

His friend’s body shivered and Remy held him just a bit tighter.

Francis was hurt badly, the extent of the wounds that Remy glimpsed, casually checking out his friend’s condition, grave: gaping cuts, bullet holes, and sixth-degree magick burns.

It was a wonder that he was functioning at all.

“Could have kicked all their asses… and then some, but…”

The former Guardian stopped, the expression on his face telling Remy that he was experiencing a great deal of pain.

“Don’t talk,” Remy told him. “Lie here; rest. I have something that I have to do, and if things don’t turn to absolute shit I’ll be back to bring you home, and we can see about—”

Francis’ eyes opened wide, a bloody hand reaching out to grab hold of Remy’s shoulder. “They have the Pitiless, Rem,” he croaked.

Remy nodded. “I know that; it’s part of the reason I’m here. They’re going to try and use the weapons to set him free… the Morningstar.”

Francis swallowed hard, closing his eyes. “Fucking thought so,” he hissed, slowly shaking his head. “Idiots.”

He shifted his weight, slowly bringing up his other hand—still holding the gun. “Managed to drop one of the hoodies with this,” Francis said, poking fun at the Nomads’ attire.

Remy looked at the weapon, knowing at once what it was. The Pitiless pistol shone seductively in the muted light of Hell.

“Nice gun,” Francis croaked. “I’d probably be dead if it wasn’t for this.”

They were both looking at the old-fashioned Colt Peacemaker, mesmerized by the stories that it whispered, the many lives it had taken. When it had left Heaven, it was nothing more than a shapeless blob of Heavenly matter, falling through the universe to Earth, where it nestled—resting—until it was mined from the earth and processed, found by a master craftsman and shaped into something with the mastery over death.

The last times the Pitiless Colt was fired flashed within their minds. Remy saw it all play out, Francis, his clothing torn, covered in the gore of his enemies, attacking the Nomad who wielded the weapon—disarming him bloodily—and using the pistol to shoot out both the angel’s eyes. Energized by the weapon in his possession, he continued to kill, the Peacemaker shaped from the power of the Morningstar giving him the strength to vanquish foe after foe.

“It wears you out after a while,” Francis said, interrupting the violent scenes playing inside Remy’s mind. “Inspires you to kill until you just don’t have the strength anymore.”

Francis laughed, pushing the weapon toward him.

“It wants to go to you now.”

“Hold on to it,” Remy told him. “Defend yourself until I get back.”

The Guardian shook his head. “No,” he stated flatly. “I’m done.”

“Don’t talk like that. Keep the gun, use it if necessary, and I’ll be back to take you out of here just as soon as—”

“I said I’m done,” Francis said, silencing him with an icy stare. “And you don’t have a chance of doing anything against the Nomads if you don’t have something of equal strength.”

He took Remy’s hand and forced the pistol into it. “You need this if you’re going to do what you have to do.”

Remy’s mind was immediately flooded with the images of those slain by bullets spat from the gun throughout the years as his hand wrapped around the sandalwood grip.

“That’s it,” Francis said with a sigh, his body growing limp. “Time to go.”

“Don’t talk like that,” Remy barked angrily, his aggression stimulated by the weapon in his hand.

“What are you going to do? Shoot me?” the Guardian asked, and started to laugh, which turned into a nasty, wet-sounding cough.

“You’ve survived worse; you’re going to be fine,” Remy stated. He found himself distracted by the gun in his hand, the urge to kill stronger than he’d ever experienced before.

“I did it, you know,” Francis stated.

Remy looked away from the gun, not sure what his friend was talking about. “You did what?”

“I revealed myself,” he said, a limp hand rising to his mouth to wipe some blood away.

Remy couldn’t resist. “And did the grown-ups at the play-ground call the police?”

Francis laughed again, wincing in pain. “Asshole,” he managed, in between coughing spasms. “I showed myself to Linda… the waitress at the Piazza.”

Remy found himself smiling. “Wow, what moment of weakness inspired that?”

Francis closed his eyes. “Something in the air, I guess,” he said. The Guardian’s voice seemed to be getting weaker. “There came a moment when I knew I should do it… or I’d never get the chance.”

“Something to hold on for,” Remy said to him.

“No, something to do before it was over.”

“I told you not to talk like that.”

“And when did I ever listen to you?” Francis asked. “You should really think about getting in there.” He motioned limply with his bloody hand toward Tartarus behind them. “Not sure what it’s going to take to set the asshole free.”

Remy was torn; he knew his friend was right, but he didn’t want to leave him, especially like this.

Francis must have suspected how he was feeling.

“Get the fuck out of here,” he snarled. “I don’t need an audience for what’s coming.” He started to push Remy away from him. “Go on, get inside and blow their asses away. Show them the consequences of picking the wrong side.”

The Guardian pulled away, curling into a tight ball upon the ground.

“Francis, I—” he began, but he wasn’t given a chance to finish.

“You were a good friend that I didn’t deserve. Thank you.”

Remy slowly stood, staring at the body of his friend lying upon the cold, frost-covered ground in front of Tartarus. “You were a good friend too,” he said, straining to suppress his anger—to hold back the rage he was feeling toward those who had hurt his friend. “And besides, I felt sorry for you.”

Francis remained very still and quiet upon the ground, unresponsive to the verbal jab.

A steady, reverberating, pounding noise began to flow out from the melted opening in the front of the prison, capturing Remy’s attention. He could only begin to imagine the source of the sound.

He chanced one more look at his friend, and realizing that there was nothing more that could be done for him, turned toward the entrance. The pounding thrum intensified, sending vibrations through the ground beneath his feet.

Starting toward the prison, Remy stopped short as he heard the sound of his friend’s weakened voice.

“What was that, Francis?” Remy asked, turning back.

“Just talking out loud,” the fallen Guardian angel said. “Was wondering when it comes time for me… was wondering if I’ll get back to Heaven.”

Remy didn’t know what to say.

“Yeah, I didn’t think so either,” Francis said, his final words trailing off to a whisper.

Remy left his friend.

The Seraphim nature was glad to leave the fallen one behind. It was eager to fight, to destroy the unclean as it had done so very long ago.

It missed the violence. The killing.

Remy held the Pitiless pistol in a grip as tight as the one he had on his fleeting humanity. He didn’t want to lose it completely, but now that the nature of the angel had taken control, it would be so very easy to let it go.

To release the hurt along with the memories, to let it all evaporate away to where it would mean nothing.

But he would not allow that; Madeline would not allow that.

Remy entered Tartarus, passing beneath jagged stalactite teeth that had formed when the opening was made. If he’d thought the feelings of desperation and misery were bad outside, within Tartarus it was a different story entirely.

Protected within the breast of the Seraphim, his humanity shied beneath the heavy atmosphere of oppression. If he hadn’t yet shed his human guise, it would have instantly withered upon entering this place of penance.

It’s even larger on the inside, Remy thought, his golden-flecked eyes looking about the cavernous chamber as he walked deeper inside. There was death everywhere he looked, both fallen and angel Sentry alike. There was no separation here and now, the sinners’ blood mixing freely with that of their jailers.

At the end of the body-strewn circular corridor that appeared to have been bored through solid ice, Remy found the room.

For a moment, it was like being back in Paradise.

He imagined that it was a kind of testament—a monument—to why a place such as Tartarus existed. At one time, before the stink of death had infected it, this place would have been special, a tiny pocket of Heaven floating within the depths of the inferno.

The huge concave walls, now spattered with the blood of conflict, showed another such struggle; they showed the story of the Morningstar and those who had followed him, moving moments captured from long ago depicting how they had waged war against the All-Father.

Leading to their fall.

These disturbing moments of betrayal and carnage would be the first things the prisoners of Tartarus would have seen upon their arrival, as well as the last when it came time for their release. A grisly reminder of the wrong they had done.

Remy wanted to look away from the horrific scenes of warfare as they were played out but found himself held by the sight.

Is it possible that it was even worse than I remember? he thought, watching as the two opposing angelic forces clashed upon the golden fields of Heaven, and in the open sky above.

Remy stepped over the bodies that littered the ground of the entryway into the Heavenly chamber, drawn closer to the images of the Great War and the end of a way of life that had been denied him forever because of it.

The battle depicted upon the curved wall of the vast chamber went to white, the searing brightness nearly blinding. Remy lifted a hand to protect his sight.

A face suddenly appeared upon the wall, the resplendent light emanating from around his beatific features. Remy had forgotten how beautiful the Son of the Morning had been, which made what Lucifer had done all the more offensive.

He had been God’s favorite—the chosen son—the first of them all.

Remy felt an undying anger overtake him as the Seraphim was stirred by the sight of its most hated enemy. And deep inside, buried beneath the fury, his human nature bowed its head in sorrow over the enormity of what had been lost on account of this being.

Deciding that he’d already wasted too much time on things long past, Remy was prepared to go deeper inside the formidable structure, when his eyes caught sight of movement at his feet.

What he believed to be the corpses of dead fallen angels shifted suddenly, giving off the illusion of life. Remy spread his wings, propelling himself back out of harm’s way as something emerged, exploding with a bloodcurdling shriek up from beneath the bodies of those vanquished in battle.

It had once been one of his own, an angel of Heaven, but now it appeared as something else. Its robes clung wetly, the gore of those slain in combat making the angel raiment stick to the body like a second skin.

Through the scarlet taint Remy suddenly recognized the face of Uriel, the warden of Tartarus.

His wings had once been snow-white, but now were flecked with crimson. Eyes huge and wild, the warden surged at him, a sword forged from the elemental forces of Heaven crackling in his hand. Uriel raised his weapon but paused in his attack when he saw that it was a Seraphim there before him.

The niggling voice of the Pitiless pistol screamed, to be used inside Remy’s head; he could actually feel the metal of the trigger gently caressing his index finger, attempting to seduce it into action, but Remy stayed his hand, forcing the weapon down by his side.

“I’ve come to help,” he told Uriel, watching the bloodstained expression turn from one of absolute panic to one of surprise.

Slowly Uriel lowered his weapon, head tilting from one side to the other as he studied the angel before him. It was as if he truly didn’t believe his eyes.

“I’m Remiel,” he said, hating the sound of his angel name. After all these centuries, it still sounded wrong—dirty—coming from his mouth. “Of the host Seraphim. I’d learned of your situation here and have come to—”

He never got the opportunity to finish the sentence.

“Lies!” Uriel screamed, his blood-covered face twisted in unabated fury. He came at him then, sword humming like a swarm of angry bees as it cut a swath through the air.

Remy quickly moved out of the way. If not for his wings propelling him back, the arcing blade would have split him in two.

The angel was beyond talking to, the madness of this place—of Hell—having taken root. He was lost to sanity.

The warden’s blade buried itself in the cold floor of the prison lobby, passing through the bodies of the dead that littered the ground, as insubstantial as smoke.

Again the ornate pistol clutched in Remy’s hand begged to be used. It showed him how deadly it could be: multiple blasts of gunfire, multiple victims falling to the weapon’s voice.

So many victims.

“So many lies,” Uriel bellowed, tugging his blade free. “We believed it was over—the indignity perpetrated upon us by one of our own—but it was all a lie.”

The warden charged with a roar, the blade in his grasp sizzling as it cut the air in search of Remy.

Remy leapt above the sword, his wings taking him up toward the cathedral-high ceiling. From the corner of his eyes, he saw projected upon the wall of the chamber the final act to the most disturbing of dramas, the powerful Morningstar brought down by the legions loyal to the Almighty.

He saw Lucifer driven to his knees, wings shackled in restraints of gold. There was a calmness in the features of God’s adversary, an expression of peace that spoke nothing of defeat.

Of surrender.

Uriel had taken to the air, his blood-colored wings pounding as he erratically came at Remy.

“How could we have been so blind?” the warden wailed. “So complacent? Did we learn nothing?”

The burning blade descended. Reflexively, Remy lifted his gun hand, halting the sword’s arc with the barrel of the old-fashioned pistol. The weapons collided with a blinding flash, and Remy was thrown back by the powerful concussion.

Landing in a roll, he quickly got to his feet, blinking his eyes furiously, attempting to clear away the sunbursts that blossomed there, obscuring his sight. He was ready for Uriel’s next attack, but the warden was nowhere to be found. As his vision began to clear, he saw that he had been knocked into another area of the prison by the force of the blast.

He was in an enormous chamber composed of the same icy material that formed the structure of Tartarus itself. It reminded him of the inside of a hive, the walls honeycombed with circular cells. He was dwarfed by the vastness of it all, and it made him feel incredibly small.

As he was drawn farther into the room, Remy could see inside the honeycomb-like apertures. He could not help but stare in rapt amazement at the frozen shapes of the fallen angels within. Some of the chambers were open, what had once been contained inside having been freed.

How many have the Nomads managed to release? the Seraphim wondered, nearly overwhelmed by the sheer number of cells that dotted the walls. This was an awful place, and Remy now understood why Uriel had not followed him in here.

The fallen were very much alive within their icy cells, reliving their moment of betrayal over and over again for an eternity.

Or for as long as He deemed fit.

Standing there, surrounded by all this pain and sorrow, Remy again questioned the concept of a loving God. And cursed how far Lucifer had caused them all to fall.

The voice of the warden drifted out from somewhere in the room, and Remy realized that he no longer held a weapon, the Pitiless pistol having been lost in the explosion that had propelled him into the prison chamber.

Uriel flowed from the darkness, his Heavenly sword poised to strike.

Remy whirled to meet the attack, his hands catching Uriel’s wrist, preventing the burning blade from falling.

The warden was screaming, insane ramblings of a mind shattered by the magnitude of his failure. What had happened here would affect all reality, all the way from Earth to the gates of Heaven itself.

Wings beating mercilessly in combat, the two took to the air.

The Seraphim wanted to destroy its foe, to vanquish anyone who dared stand between it and the task that it had taken on.

The Morningstar cannot… will not be released.

Perhaps it was his humanity that still held on by a thread, but Remy could not bring himself to fully succumb to the angelic nature’s thirst for death. He found himself holding back, acting only in defense against Uriel’s shrieking onslaught.

The angels flew up and backward, their struggling bodies colliding with one of the cells, the impact so great that it shattered the icy covering that sealed the fallen angel inside. The fallen came suddenly awake with a scream.

The disgraced creature of Heaven wailed its displeasure as it pushed away the shattered fragments of its prison to grab at them. With ragged, clawed hands it reached out, grabbing hold of Remy’s wings, attempting to pull him inside the cell to share in his misery.

Remy beat his wings furiously while attempting to fend off Uriel’s attempts to kill him.

The warden took advantage of this distraction, freeing his hand long enough to thrust his sword, the burning tip penetrating the breastplate of Remy’s Heavenly armor with a flash and the stink of ozone. Remy roared, driving an elbow back into the face of the Tartarus prisoner, and with his wings freed, furling them tightly against his body, allowing himself to drop like a stone.

The pain was incredible, a burning sensation spreading across the flesh beneath his armor. Disoriented, Remy spread his wings to slow his descent, but landed hard, rolling across the icy surface.

The pain beneath the armor intensified. On his knees he tore at the straps holding the armor in place. It came away in two pieces, clattering to the ground. Remy gazed at the wound, the flesh around the point of penetration angry, a mottled redness starting to spread across his shoulder and down onto his chest. If not taken care of, the infection caused by the wound could prove deadly.

But this was the least of his problems at the moment, listening to the sounds of flapping wings growing closer.

The warden was coming.

He sensed the angel bearing down on him, and spun around to confront the latest attack.

Uriel dropped, gore-spattered wings fanned out to slow his descent, his sword raised in preparation to strike Remy dead.

Remy tensed, isolating the pain in his shoulder, hoping that he had what it would take to survive this moment.

Two gunshots rang out, tearing away a portion of the angelic warden’s face, a third removing the top of his head.

The angel dropped down atop him, dead weight driving him to the ground. Remy struggled out from beneath the corpse of the warden, his hand searching for the sword Uriel had dropped. He found it, shrugging away the angel’s body as he rose in a crouch to deal with this latest obstacle.

The fallen angel Madach stood in the shadows, a strange golden light emanating from the Pitiless pistol in one hand, and from the Japanese sword clutched in the other, forming a kind of halo around his bedraggled form.

“If we want to get this done, you better follow me,” the fallen angel responsible for setting this chain of events in motion said.

Remy gripped Uriel’s sword tighter as he watched Madach turn away to be swallowed up by the darkness of Tartarus.

He had no choice but to follow.

Come to find out, not only did Madach now have the Pitiless sword and the Colt, but as Remy followed him into the inky blackness, he saw that the fallen angel had—sticking out of the back pockets of his blood-soaked jeans—the twin daggers as well.

“How?” Remy called after him.

They were descending a winding path made of ancient yellowed ice. The walls around them—these too were peppered with the honeycomb cells, some with prisoners still intact, others shattered and empty.

Madach stopped briefly, turning around to speak.

“It’s weird,” he said with a laugh. “Seeing you that way.”

He pointed at him with the barrel of the gun.

“This place changes you,” Remy said, painfully aware of his angelic form. His shoulder throbbed, the infection caused by the sword wound continuing to spread. “And not for the better.”

Remy wanted to be human again, but he wasn’t sure if that could ever be possible again.

Something had happened to Madach as well. Remy could see that this wasn’t the same fallen angel that he’d first come in contact with. There was an air about him, the way he carried himself.

Almost as if he were somehow comfortable with the Hellish environment. As if he belonged.

“The weapons,” Remy said eyeing each of the pieces in the fallen angel’s possession. “How did you end up with them?”

Madach gazed down at the weapons, an expression on his face as if seeing them for the first time.

“I came through Karnighan’s passage into the middle of a battle,” the fallen said, eyes glassy as he recounted how it had been. “The Sentries were fighting Nomads just outside the entrance.” He went silent, continuing to admire the accursed weapons he’d acquired.

“I don’t remember,” Madach then said, managing to pull his gaze from the Pitiless to stare at Remy. “I’m not sure how that’s possible, but the next thing I knew, I was inside Tartarus… and then I found you.”

“And the gun,” Remy said, his own gaze fixed upon the weapon that he’d lost in his struggle. There was a part of him that wanted it back, that wanted to hold death in his hand again.

Madach looked at the gun with loving eyes, rubbing a smudge of soot from its body against his pants leg, smiling when he saw that it was clean.

“It’s as if I’m drawn to them,” the fallen said. “Maybe it’s because they know that I’m the one responsible for all this… for freeing them,” he said.

Remy could just imagine what it was like for Madach, having them in his possession, chattering away inside his head, the images of past violence and death they were so eager to show him.

The air became filled with an echoing, pounding sound, like the one he had heard earlier that had drawn him inside the icy citadel. The vibrations that followed shook the very foundation, rubble raining down on them from above.

The sound was coming from somewhere below.

“It’s the axe,” Madach said, his voice barely audible over the powerful noise.

It was the one weapon of the Pitiless that Madach had yet to recover, and the fallen turned away from him, hurrying down a descending path that led deeper into the bowels of the prison.

“What is it?” Remy asked, following.

“We have to hurry,” Madach answered. “The axe is being used. There isn’t much time.”

The words were enough for him to ignore the aching pain in his shoulder, and to drive him on. If they were too late the end result was more than he had the ability to comprehend at that moment.

They rounded the corner, their movements illuminated by the eerie yellowish glow that emanated from inside the still-occupied fallen-angel cells.

A memory from Remy’s human past flitted through his mind’s eye: a Sunday visit to the New England Aquarium with Madeline. She loved the penguins, perfectly happy to skip any of the other exhibits to watch the tuxedoed birds waddle about in the artificial environment that imitated their natural habitat.

He was suddenly, profoundly disturbed, the memory vivid right down to the penguin-house smells, but there was something horribly missing.

Madeline’s face.

Her features were blurred, as if she’d moved unexpectedly as a picture was being taken—or as if the memory of her was slowly fading away. It was something that he couldn’t tolerate, that he wouldn’t—couldn’t—allow to happen. As his humanity was squelched, pushed deeper and deeper into a smaller and smaller place inside him, his memories—the memories of his human life—were gradually being discarded, seen as useless by the angelic nature that had at last regained dominance. These fragile human remembrances were not what were needed at this time.

Now it was about the battle, the fighting skills, the fury. These were the memories that would allow him to vanquish his foe, to serve the Lord God Almighty to his fullest capacity. There was no reason for compassion, kindness, and love in a place like this.

His humanity was dying, and Remy realized that it wouldn’t be long before all the precious experiences and memories that he’d collected over the centuries he’d lived as a human would be gone.

But there was no other choice. If this was the sacrifice required of him to prevent this most heinous act from happening, then it was the price he would have to pay.

He returned his focus to the job at hand, descending farther and farther into the bowels of Tartarus. The air had become even thicker with despair, the lower levels where the least repentant of the Morningstar’s minions were kept.

He did not want to look at them, curled fetal-like within their small, icy cells, but could not help himself. Remy had known these creatures. No, it was Remiel who had called them family, his brain quickly corrected. But nonetheless, they had been part of his world at one time, and here they were confined to an eternity—or more—of suffering for their actions.

Remy had tried not to think of what had occurred after the rebellion had been thwarted, after he had left Heaven for the earthly plains. He knew it would be bad; how could it not? The Lord of Lords—the Creator of all things—had been challenged by His own creations. How could He not punish them?

Remy knew it would be bad, but he never imagined anything like this.

They rounded yet another corner, the pitching of the floor beneath their feet making it ever more precarious as they descended deeper and deeper into the prison’s lower depths.

From the corner of his eye, Remy believed that he’d seen movement from inside one of the cells. His gaze moved over the frozen wall, looking for what he’d seen, and he was about to dismiss it as a trick of the poor light when a section of cell wall to his left suddenly cracked, sounding like the snap of a bullwhip, and then exploded outward.

Remy and Madach reared back, immediately on the defensive as they were showered with razor-sharp fragments of prison wall. At first he believed it to be more of the fallen angels escaping, but he quickly came to the realization that it was something much bigger, as even more of the wall crumbled and gave way to reveal multiple Tartarus Sentries pouring into the winding corridors, locked in furious combat with recently escaped fallen prisoners.

The Sentries roared through their blood-streaked helmets, unleashing the full fury of their Heavenly weaponry as they attempted to beat back the prisoners that attacked them.

They were like locusts, swarming through the jagged break in the wall, attacking the guards in a frenzied rage. The Sentries swung their crackling swords wildly, the burning blades decimating their enemies with every swing, flaming body parts strewn into the air, but still they kept coming.

The Sentries’ attempts to defend themselves grew more frantic as the fallen numbers continued to grow unabated. Soon Remy could no longer see the giants, their armored forms covered in writhing bodies slick with the grime of confinement in Hell.

The corridor trembled from the ferocity of the struggle, chunks of ceiling dropping down to shatter at their feet.

“Go!” Remy yelled to Madach, pushing him farther ahead. But their way became blocked by one of the Sentries, who dropped to his knees to reveal fallen angels wielding jagged pieces of their prison walls like daggers, clinging to their keeper’s back like hungry ticks to a dog.

And the walls continued to shudder from the enormity of the struggle, more and more of the prison breaking away. Remy was certain the passage was about to come down on their heads, and knew that if they were going to continue on their mission, he had to make this fast.

Leaping in front of Madach he raised the sword that he had taken from the warden Uriel, lashing out at the fallen that swarmed atop the giant Sentry.

The prisoners screamed, leaping back from the devastating blade, shielding their eyes, sensitive from a millennia of shadowed confinement, from the emanations that leaked from the Heavenly weapon.

With a grunt, the Sentry clamored to his feet, reaching out to destroy anything within reach. Realizing that they too were targets for the giant guard’s rage, Remy and Madach tried to push past the Heavenly Sentry. The being’s movements were wild, out of control, as he slammed his bulk against the wall, his flailing, razor-sharp wings cutting through the air, their sharpness devastating to any who got too close.

Madach dove past the Sentry’s uncontrolled movements with Remy close behind.

They were barely able to keep their footing as they skidded down the winding, circular corridor. Remy looked over his shoulder briefly, the curve of the wall hiding most of what was occurring behind them.

There was a sudden roar and a flash of blue light, and Remy watched as the area behind him started to disintegrate. He turned away from the horrific sight, the sound of devastation at his back. He spread his wings, springing off the ground that had started to crack and crumble beneath his feet, reaching for Madach. He grabbed the fallen angel beneath the arms, lifting him from the path and into the air.

He wanted to believe that there was still a chance they could survive this. If there was one thing living as a human being had taught him, it was to believe.

There was always a chance.

No matter how bleak the circumstances.

“It doesn’t look good for me,” the man he would know as Steven Mulvehill had said, leaning back against a gray concrete parking garage support.

There was a growing patch of crimson on his belly where he’d been shot, and he was looking at one of his hands. It had been stained red with his blood.

He was dying.

Remy did not know this man; the two had not yet established their special bond.

Two cases: one that he had been hired to investigate—a possible kidnapping—had somehow intersected with that of another investigation being carried out by the homicide division of the Boston police. Revelations were made, motives revealed, and guilty parties attempted to flee justice, no matter the price.

It had been three a.m. on a rainy Sunday in a Logan Airport parking garage. A suspect in both their cases was preparing to leave the country. Mulvehill had been confused; some pieces of the individual’s story just didn’t seem to fit. He had some questions for the man—some niggling inconsistencies that needed to be clarified before he felt safe in allowing this man to leave.

Those same inconsistencies had aroused Remy’s interests as well, bringing him to the same Logan parking garage.

Mulvehill had been the first to arrive, catching the man as he unloaded a suitcase from the back of his metallic blue BMW. All the homicide cop wanted was to talk, to have a few of his questions answered, some gaps in logic cleared up, and then the individual would have been allowed to go on his way.

The violence was unexpected, the weapon hidden somewhere in the trunk. And it was the one shot fired from the handgun—the single thunderous clap that reverberated off the concrete walls and ceiling of the parking garage—that had led Remy to the man who would later become his friend.

He had found him alone, slumped against the support column, the stomach area of his shirt stained red from blood. The man was dying, and Remy found himself drawn to act.

“It doesn’t look good for me,” Mulvehill had said, looking down at the expanding stain. There was fear in his voice, fear of the unknown that awaited him if he were to die.

It was in Remy’s nature—as a being of Heaven—to comfort, and to ease the dying man’s fears. He had knelt beside the terrified man, taking his bloodstained hand in his, lending him some of his divine strength to either pass to the Source or hold on until help arrived.

He had told the man—told him that no matter what happened he would be all right. And to further ease his fears, Remy did something that he had not been inclined to do since his revelation to Madeline.

Remy could never quite figure out why it was this man, this dying individual’s fear, had inspired him in such a way to reveal his true nature.

Holding the man’s hand tightly in his, Remy had dropped the human facade to reveal the being that he truly was, and again he had told him that no matter the outcome, he would be fine.

The homicide detective seemed to relax, all the tension leaving his body. A smile slowly formed on his paling features, as he looked up into the eyes of a servant of God.

“What a relief,” he’d whispered as his life force continued to ebb away. “This makes it easier.”

The eerie sounds of police and ambulance sirens filled the parking garage, their piercing wails urging him to hang on.

The dying man seemed to be at peace, and as his eyes began to close, his grip upon Remy’s hand weakening as he succumbed to unconsciousness, he spoke the words that could very well have been his last.

“I thought I was going to Hell.”