Felix chuckled, still bent over, hands on his knees. “We should be…you trained us.”
My head jolted back just as soon as I comprehended those words. How could that be? I thought. They…They were just my housemates. I had met them only a few months ago.
“He’s right,” Ezra confirmed, walking towards me. “You probably don’t recall it.”
“No…I don’t.”
“You trained more than messengers, Maggie,” said Ezra, nodding. “And we are a few of those Alterums who participated.”
I briefly stared back towards Achan’s dismembered body, frowning. It was increasingly frustrating not to remember such important details of my past. Conceding that there wasn’t much I could do about it now, I simply replied, “I’m glad you did.”
Everyone’s breathing was slower now but we didn’t have much more time to recuperate. We realized this when a screech resounded through the cave, echoing off the wall towards us.
“Elsics…They know we’re here,” said Felix.
“Then we need to leave,” Ms. Beedinwigg insisted.
“Not without Eran,” I said, already starting to walk again, farther into the cave.
With Sarai gone, Campion was standing again, furiously wiping the tears from his face. “No, not without Eran,” he agreed.
Ms. Beedinwigg came up beside me and then stepped in front. “Stay hidden,” she commanded before turning towards the others. “Let’s move.”
The screeching continued, building to hysteria inside the cave’s corridors. The sound came from a centralized room in the heart of the mountain, where we followed it to an opening overlooking the cavern inside.
Below us, hundreds of black, winged creatures moved in waves across the room, some leaping into the air and landing on the backs of others, some crawling up the cave walls to leap into the mass below. All of them excitable beyond measure.
Only one body was not moving. He was bound to the wall, arms and legs in shackles, high above for all Elsics to see. He was swollen and bloodied but his head was lifted and he stared back at them with unshakeable determination.
“Eran,” I sighed and instantly stepped forward.
Ms. Beedinwigg held up her arm, stopping me. “A distraction,” she instructed, “will create the leverage we need in getting both of you out of here safely.”
“I agree,” said Ezra attentively. “What do you have in mind?”
“I’ll find my way to the side farthest from Eran and call their attention. With their backs turned and their interest on me, you can unbind Eran and lift him to safety.”
Ever fearless, Ms. Beedinwigg moved towards the entrance.
“Just a second,” said Rufus in his uncompromising Irish voice. “Dontcha go thinkin’ ya’ll be takin’ all the glory. Been a while since I had me a good fight. I’m overdue. ‘Sides, how’d ya plan on getting’ down there without these?” He shook the wings behind him. “I’m the fastest one here. Leave the commotion upta me.”
Without permitting anyone the chance to oppose him, he dove through the opening and soared into the cavern below. Roars suddenly vibrated off the walls, telling us that Rufus’s entrance had been noticed.
Peeking in to the cavern, we saw him circle the room and then flee through another opening across from us, into another corridor. The Elsics, spun into a circle following him like a string of bees following an intruder in the hive, and shortly afterwards the room was vacant.
“That was a better idea,” Ms. Beedinwigg pointed out.
I didn’t really care. I was now worried about two things: Rufus’s safety and Eran’s escape.
Unable to do much about the first one, I acted on the second.
“Will someone lift me and Ms. Beedinwigg down there? And Campion, Felix will you untie Eran?”
We didn’t hesitate and a moment later we entered the cavern.
Eran was already looking for us by that point. Having recognized Rufus, he knew the rest of us were close behind. Although, he didn’t count on me being there. That much was evident when his eyes landed on me.
Ezra had hold of my elbow, allowing me the opportunity to hover directly in front of him as Campion and Felix went about untying his bindings.
Every part of my being ached to hold him, to clean the blood from him, to nurse his wounds. I couldn’t believe what they had done to him.
Something itched running down my cheek and I realized I was crying. I brushed it away, enraged.
“Stay calm,” said Ezra, noticing my breath quickening. “He’ll recover.”
“Ezra,” said Eran, barely able to speak against the swelling in his face. “Get her out of here.”
“I won’t leave…I won’t leave without you.” I felt my head shaking back and forth though I didn’t feel like I had any control over it.
“Ezra,” he warned again and when she didn’t move he tried to reason with me. “Magdalene, you…” His voice cracked and he swallowed hard, the terror he felt showing through. “You cannot be here. There are too many of them. I cannot protect you. Leave.”
His pleading did no good. “No,” I replied flatly.
“My army?” he inquired, nervously addressing Ms. Beedinwigg.
She shook her head, her face tense. “Back in New Orleans… restraining the Fallen Ones there.”
Furious, Eran refocused his efforts. His hands now untied, he worked on the bindings at his feet. Felix and Campion worked with fervor too, loosening them as quickly as possible.
“You’ll be free soon and we’ll leave here together,” I said.
“Listen to me, Magdalene,” he said, not bothering to look up, his breath coming in short gasps now. “It’s a complex system of caves. There are multiple entrances and exits. If you go, you can find a way out now… before they return.”
Ms. Beedinwigg had been deposited on the floor below, keeping an eye on the cavern’s entrances and any sign of returning Elsics. She was silent until now, until she made the announcement we all hoped she wouldn’t.
“They’re coming back.”
“Go! NOW!” Eran roared.
“There’s no time,” said Ms. Beedinwigg. “There’s no time.”
Just as she released the words, a stream of black entered the cave and raced towards us.
Ezra had already placed me on the ground and lifted herself into the air. She now blocked me from above while Ms. Beedinwigg blocked me from the floor.
“Protect Magdalene,” Eran ordered, causing Felix and Campion to abort their attempt at untying him. Eran feverishly began the process of releasing himself as they came to hover on the sides of me. Rufus, still in front of the wave of black creatures, swooped in and landed a few feet from me, forming a shield with his body.
Through the white wings stretched out in front of me, I saw nothing now but a sea of black. Tainted teeth or the whites of eyes glinted in the midst of them but for the most part it was simply a chaotic inky black wave of creatures eager to tear us apart.
Something, however, seemed to be stopping them.
“Welcome…welcome, my dear captor.”
The voice of the winged being now floating down in to my view could not be mistaken but it was Eran who addressed him.
“Abaddon, you will regret anything that happens to her.”
Abaddon came in to full sight then, hovering just beyond Ezra, Felix, and Campion and in front of the Elsics as if he had somehow tamed and taken leadership over them.
“I don’t think you’re in any state to be threatening me,” Abaddon said before snidely chuckling to himself. “None of you are.”
I shifted for a better view of the prisoners, attempting to use my engaged senses to predetermine their next actions. I could foresee the next steps each one would take three deep in the group. After that, their preconceived actions became a blur.
“Don’t worry, Magdalene. They won’t make a move without my say so.”
“And how did you get them to agree to that?” I asked, trying to buy us some time.
He seemed surprised by the question. “They still have their logic. And being the logical person that I am, I explained to them if they were to attack you all at once many of them would be left out of the opportunity to take a piece off the very person who brought them here. You, my dear, are a very hot commodity. And with some Elsics having all the fun and others being left out of it…well, that leaves those who didn’t participate in the entertainment of your death with a vindictive side. And we wouldn’t want the Elsics fighting amongst themselves, now would we? Not when I have a perfectly fine plan in which we can each take a piece of you.”
“And what does this plan of yours entail?” I wondered if Eran was close to freeing himself. He wasn’t at my side yet so I was certain the bindings still held him captive. An image rose up from the back of my mind in which the Elsics attacked him as he struggled against his bindings to avoid the assault. It nauseated me and I shoved it back down.
“I can tell you that it involves the very same bindings Eran is now struggling to unleash,” Abaddon was explaining, “but don’t you worry. I’m sure you still recall my ability to control your movement. I promise not to use it on you.” He said this as if he were doing me a favor. “No, I won’t. I think they’d like to actually watch you struggle.”
Rufus groaned then. “I’ve heard enough o’ this,” he muttered, launching himself into the air.
Abaddon made several gestures and two Elsics rose up from the crowd to tackle Rufus.
“Don’t you hurt him!” I screamed and the wave of black grew more agitated, more excited.
“Now don’t fret. There’s enough of them to go around,” said Abaddon before again making several gestures.
Several more Elsics leapt up and collided with Ezra, Felix and Campion. They were dragged off to the side, held down by their limbs and winged appendages.
Ms. Beedinwigg and I now faced Abaddon and the Elsics alone. Nothing separated us but empty space.
“NO!” Eran bellowed from behind me, still fighting against his restraints. The panic in him was evident as he was about to witness me, his soul mate, be committed to eternal death, slowly and by each one of the Elsics lined up before me.
Abaddon approached first, a hideous leer rising up along with the tip of his sword. “On the contrary…oh yes.”
Ms. Beedinwigg, who had clearly been discounted as nothing more than a mere human and thus no threat at all, was the one who they least expected to bring their plan to a halt.
She turned to me and, with incredible fortitude, said, “As I told you before, I’m sorry but you are not ready for this mission.”
I felt my brow furrow in confusion as she lifted her sai high above my chest. It came down into me with amazing precision, shattering my chest bone and striking my heart directly through its center.
There was no pain. I felt no fear or animosity. There was only surprise and the lingering thought of what would happen to my loved ones now.
My body, controlled by gravity now, spun around and fell to the hard, cold rock floor, the force of it releasing my breath in a slow hiss, my lungs no longer working and frozen in exhalation.
Only my eyes worked any longer and as my head rolled to the side, I caught sight of Eran.
He was no longer focused on his bindings. Now, he was watching me, grasping for me, unable to reach me as his hands gripped only empty air. His face contorted in shock and anger and then fell to deep sorrow. Finally, his eyes emptied and he went limp. His head lolled back and his jaw fell open and the last thing I heard was his deafening howl of sorrow…just before my soul left this body.
CHAPTER TWENTY: THE RETURN
I was now dead, or in the process of dying, and trying to mentally prepare myself for the ultimate death that was to come when a force pulled me upward, an undeniable one that insisted I follow it.
In the next moment I was weightless and hovering beside my body. Campion had been right on, I realized. Our bodies did weigh us down. I found that I had again been given the ability to move my arms and legs, my head and torso, but this time they were without restriction. Was this what eternal death allowed, I wondered. Instinctually, I turned towards Eran, his head was level now. His eyes were glistening as he mouthed something to me.
“Go…” he was saying, the horror in him gone now. He was calm and accepting. “Go…” he insisted.
I was stunned. He seemed so composed about my passing now. He had come to terms with it, I reasoned, and therefore so should I.
In all my time on this earth as I visited the other side night after night, I never witnessed a bright light leading me through a tunnel, leading me home. Finally, for the very first time, I looked up and found it waiting for me.
As Eran had urged, I took it without looking back, agreeing to face whatever destiny had in store for me. Yet, even as I felt the tug pulling me onward and despite Eran’s reassuring enthusiasm, I was hesitant.
I wasn’t ready for eternal death. There was so much more I wanted to experience; children, old age, traveling, learning different cultures, conversations with Eran that had been left unfinished or never started in the first place. I already missed him, everything about him; his charm, his wit, his courage, the way he looked at me, the way he touched me.
I imagined a dark, empty place, void of any living thing. Alone for the rest of eternity.
But the tunnel did not end where I thought it would.
It opened to a gathering of people, old and young, of varying ethnicities, and both genders. They were smiling, laughing, opening their arms to welcome me. Amidst them, animals of all types, roamed through the throng and, oddly enough, I knew them.
This was eternal death? Confused, I searched the crowd for some understanding. Then someone approached me, his face so familiar I couldn’t have mistaken him. He was someone who could explain this to me, as he had done on so many other occasions.
“Gershom?” I said in awe.
“Welcome back.”
He was gleaming, taking my hand now and leading me through the group, all of whom I somehow recognized.
That was when it happened.
As my eyes landed on each one of them, the memories returned. I remembered each life, every movement, every person, every good memory and every bad one. I recognized my sister from my life in Germany and recalled skipping stones with her across the water; Monsieur Desmoulins stepped up, grinning, and telling me that I had finally gotten the peace I deserved; and there were others who I had met in the afterlife, those who I never interacted with on earth but whom I could recall visiting and holding hearty discussions.