To Reign in Hell: A Novel (29 page)

No, it was unfortunate that
be
had to be the one able to recognize what had to be done—but it still had to be done, and all the debates he could hold with himself wouldn’t change that.

He took a deep breath and set off into the night, holding a sword tight so it wouldn’t hit the ground.

FIFTEEN

Forwards! the doubt, my strength benumbing,
I won’t encourage foolishly;
For were the witches not forthcoming,
Why, who the devil would Devil be!

—Goethe,
Faust

“Well, now, who in Heaven
are you?”

Mephistopheles, half smiling, looked at the angel who barred his way.

“I am Nisroc. You cannot enter here.”

Mephistopheles raised an eyebrow and looked at the angels who were clustered before the doors to the Palace.

“That may be,” he said. “But if you find someone to tell the Lord Yaweh that the emissary from the Lord Satan is here, I expect you’ll find you’re wrong.”

Nisroc’s eyes widened a bit, then he turned his head and told an angel behind him to relay the message. He faced Mephistopheles again and said, “We’ll wait.”

The dark angel smiled, folded his arms, and began whistling between his teeth.

Soon Uriel came from the door. He saw Mephistopheles and stopped. “You!”

“You were expecting Leviathan?”

“I ought to have guessed,” he said, “that you would—”

“Dump it out, Uriel. We can exchange compliments later.”

“As you will. Follow me.”

“Right. Take me to your leader.”

They went through the halls, where Mephistopheles grinned and nodded at the Cherubim, to the throne room. He noticed the second throne set to Yaweh’s right and remarked, “You’ve been remodeling.”

“What says the Lord Satan?” Yaweh asked.

Mephistopheles approached the throne until he was stopped by a pair of Seraphim.

“He is willing to discuss it,” he said.

“Good.”

“Have you a chair?” asked Mephistopheles. “My feet are tired.”

Zaphkiel considered the situation. Why hadn’t Satan attacked? The only thing that might delay him was if he was negotiating with Yaweh. And if he was, why hadn’t they received a message telling them to hold off ? It was strange that—

“Lord Zaphkiel?”

“What is it?”

“This angel claims to have a message from the Lord Yaweh.”

Zaphkiel looked at him. “Bring him to Michael.”

“Yes, Lord.”

“Wait. You. Come here.”

“Yes, Lord.”

“What’s your name?”

“Sarga, Lord.”

“Are you a Seraph or a Cherub, Sarga?”

“A Seraph, Lord.”

“Is it an order to delay the attack?”

“I can’t tell, Lord. I’m sorry.”

“It doesn’t matter. You just did. Don’t try to hide things; you haven’t the face for it.” Zaphkiel mused for a moment. “How odd,” he muttered to himself. Then to Sarga, “Did a messenger from Satan arrive there before you left?”

“I can’t—”

“Answer!”

“No, Lord.”

“Very odd. You must have been in the room where the idea to attack was decided upon, weren’t you?”

“My lord, I—”

“Just say yes or no.”

“Yes, Lord.”

“Fine. Who suggested it?”

“I don’t know, Lord.”

“Rubbish. I know you Seraphim. You spend all your time on duty watching and listening to Yaweh’s conversations. Now, whose idea was it? Abdiel’s? I’d believe that.”

“No, Lord.” Sarga got a strange, confused look on his face. “Ab-diel wasn’t there when it was discussed, Lord.”

“What? Wasn’t there?”

“No, Lord. I . . . don’t remember seeing him at all.”

“Well, where was he then?”

“I don’t know, Lord.”

Zaphkiel leaned forward and looked closely into the Seraph’s eyes. Then he nodded. “I see.”

He turned to the Throne who was waiting. “That’s all. Take him to see the Lord Michael. Then tell all sentries to pull in and get some rest. We don’t need to worry about spies tonight, but we’ll be moving soon.”

“Yes, Lord.”

Zaphkiel stared off into the distance.

As the acting head of the highest ranking Order present, Zaphkiel should have taken charge of the final arrangements. But he was only acting head, he had no interest in it anyway, and Michael had been given the mission. In any case, Michael would not have allowed it, and Michael was a Firstborn—as well as simply being Michael.

All of which is to say that the Orders of angels and the rankings therefrom had not yet caught on, so to speak, as well as they might.

So it was Michael who stood while Yahriel, Camael, and Zaphkiel sat. He cleared his throat. “As you can see, we are on time. For some reason, Satan has chosen not to attack. We are near his lines now and
could advance at once. I had thought to wait and receive instructions from the Lord Yaweh, but he sent a message answering my question before I had asked it.”

“Of course,” said Camael. “He would.”

Michael ignored him. “A Seraph has come from the Lord Yaweh. We are to attack as soon as possible. If necessary, we may take the evening to rest.”

“No!” cried Camael. “At once!”

Zaphkiel said, “I am of like mind. We have had several hours’ rest. It should do. We want to maintain our advantage of surprise, and we risk losing it by waiting.”

Michael said, “All right. When?”

“Now!” said Camael.

“Why not?” said Zaphkiel.

“All right,” said Michael, nodding. “Ten minutes to get to your positions, fifteen minutes to arrange for battle, then we’ll go.”

“I have the smallest unit,” said Zaphkiel. “I would like the honor of being in the middle, if I may have it.”

Michael nodded. “If you wish.”

Camael glowered at him for a moment, obviously wishing that he’d thought to ask first.

Zaphkiel had been telling the truth about wanting his unit to take the middle, but he had lied a bit about the reason. The arriving Seraph had allowed him to reach a few conclusions, bringing together things he had heard or seen but hadn’t been able to make sense of before.

Raziel had spoken to him, and from the questions he asked, Zaphkiel had realized that there was something unusual in some of the movements on the day Michael and Raphael had gone to bring back Satan. Zaphkiel had been following the activities of Lucifer, Lilith, As-modai, and Satan, as well as those of Yaweh, as closely as he could. He, like Yaweh, saw a mystery there—they were not acting as he would have expected them to.

He had noticed the disappearance of Raziel, as Yaweh had, but had left it a question mark, to be resolved later.

Unlike Yaweh, who had had confidence in the angels around him until recent events had damaged it, Zaphkiel had never had confidence in anything except his own judgment. So when things didn’t add up right, he was slow to brush them aside.

He still couldn’t solve anything, but one close look into the eyes of the Seraph delivering the message had allowed him to make several deductions.

He felt no sense of outrage and didn’t stop to consider whether anything that had been done was right or wrong, but he did see opportunity when it presented itself.

Therefore he made sure that his Order was in the middle of the attacking angels. He expected that, before long, it would be his Order in name, as well as in fact.

The first Satan heard of it were the shouts from the other end of the camp. He stood to see what was going on, but others had the same idea and he couldn’t see past them.

It was night, but swords reflected well in the light from the camp-fires. And when the shouts turned to screams, possibility became certainty.

For long moments he stood there in shock, unwilling to believe that Yaweh had betrayed him. Then as angels from his army began flying past him, yelling, and many limping or wounded, he moved forward.

An angel appeared before him, shouting wildly with sword cleaving air. Satan touched the emerald at his breast. It had worked well enough with the campfire; now he would see. . . .

There was no ripping, tearing effect of illiaster exploding around him, but the angel before him stopped, made a gurgling noise in his throat, and dissolved into nothingness.

Satan picked up the sword the other had dropped, his face devoid of expression, and swung it experimentally a few times. Another angel suddenly appeared before him, but before Satan could move, Beelzebub had him by the throat. The angel dropped his sword and clutched at Beelzebub, cried out once, and was silent. Then he was gone. Beelzebub turned to him. “One apiece, milord.”

Satan didn’t answer.

Another came in front of him. Satan swung clumsily and missed, but so did the other. Then Satan brought his sword up over his head and sent it crashing down on the other’s blade. The angel fell, holding his shoulder and looking up at Satan fearfully.

But the Regent of the South ignored him. He took another step forward while more and more of his army streamed by, running from the unexpected assault.

Another came before Satan, but his blade was held low and pointed to the side. Beelzebub crouched but didn’t spring.

Satan looked at the other angel. “Greetings, Zaphkiel,” he said calmly.

“Greetings, Lord Satan. Would you mind coming with me?”

“As it happens, Zaphkiel, I would. I have never had less of a mind to see Yaweh than right now.”

“Then you are a fool,” said Zaphkiel.

Satan shrugged. “I’m obviously a fool, or I wouldn’t have believed that Yaweh dealt in good faith.”

“Yaweh
did
deal in good faith.”

Satan snorted.

“I’m telling the truth,” said Zaphkiel in a matter-of-fact tone of voice. “When Yaweh learns of this, he will be furious. As will Michael. There is one angel to blame for this betrayal, and, I suspect, a great deal more. The way to deal with him is to expose him.

“You may not know it, but Yaweh has never heard your side of many events that have happened in the last few hundred days. I think, if you come with me, you will be pleased that you have done so. But I think you should move quickly. It took some doing to arrange these moments by ourselves in the midst of a battle, and I doubt that Ca-mael or Michael will think so highly of my idea.”

Satan cocked his head. “Why are you doing this?”

“Reasons of my own, of course, that I have no wish to discuss. But, as I say, we have little time.”

Satan looked down at Beelzebub. “What do you think?”

“I believe him, milord.”

Satan nodded. “All right, Beelzebub, find Lucifer. Tell him to take
command and to bring the armies to Leviathan. If I don’t return, he is on his own. And may he make better decisions than I!”

“Aye, milord,” said Beelzebub, and he was gone.

Satan threw his sword to the ground. “I’m at your disposal.”

“Good,” said Zaphkiel.

“Maybe,” said Satan. “But how do we get there through the middle of a battle?”

“My scouts have explored this terrain. I know paths to the Palace that won’t be used. Follow me.”

“That does it, Sith.”

“What does what, Kyriel?”

“This is absurd. The way they hit us back there. Why didn’t we get any warning? You know, one of them almost had me!”

“We didn’t have any sentries posted, that’s why.”

“And why didn’t we?”

“Because Yaweh had promised—”

“So what? After all this, they believe Yaweh? Hnuh!
He’s
no fool. He knew he could sucker Satan in any time he wanted to. We had ’em, and we let ’em go. Is that how you win a war?”

“That isn’t my job, Kyriel. I’m just here to fight.”

“Then you’re as big an idiot as Satan is. Why are you just standing there looking at me? Do you
like
being in a war where everyone making decisions on your side is a fool, or worse?”

“No. But I’m on the right side, and it’s all we have.”

“The right side is the one that wins, Sith.”

“Maybe. If you think so, and if you think we aren’t going to win, why are you staying?”

“Staying with what? Where’s the army now?”

“I saw a few angels heading west, so I imagine that’s where we’re going to gather. That’s why we’re walking this way.”

“Yeah? Well then, I’m going to walk east.”

“Michael is that way, Kyriel.”

“So I’ll join Michael. Maybe I’ll be on the winning side for a change.”

“If that’s what you feel you must do.”

“By the flux, Sith! What’s got into you? You walk around like you’re asleep, and you talk like you don’t care about anything anymore.”

“I care, Kyriel. But if you want to leave, I won’t stop you.”

“By Heaven itself, I will, then!”

“Fare well, Kyriel.”

“Farewell, and good riddance!”

Beelzebub caught up to Satan and Zaphkiel half a league from the Palace.

“I’m glad you decided to join me, old friend, but it was unwise.”

“Thy orders were given, milord.”

“Good.”

“Meseemeth the lord Lucifer to think ill of thy doings here, milord. He thinks thou wilt be killed.”

“Maybe I will,” said Satan. “But not alone,” he added, touching his emerald.

Zaphkiel appeared not to notice. He took them the long way around the Palace, passing through the woods at the top of the hill. Beelzebub led them through this, pointing out trees and roots and stones in a whisper so that Satan and Zaphkiel would not trip in the darkness.

As they left the woods, the lights from the Palace set up enough illumination so that they could see their path somewhat. Zaphkiel held up his hand for them to wait.

Soon they saw a pair of angels with swords walking by. As they disappeared around the other side of the Palace, Zaphkiel motioned them forward.

They ran, as quietly and as quickly as they could, to a small door. Zaphkiel opened it and they stepped inside, shutting it softly.

They found themselves in a poorly lit hallway. This they followed for several turnings until they came to another door.

“Now,” said Zaphkiel, “act confident.”

They nodded.

He opened the door, and they stepped out into a large hall filled with angels, many of whom were sleeping. Zaphkiel strode forward, nodding to them, and went for the door into the throne room.