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.