The smells of the old building wafted out to greet him. He remembered his first day at Ken Curtis. He hadn’t wanted to return for a second, but he did, and each day he went back, it got a little easier. He also recalled the first day he had seen Vilma, and with that recollection came the realization of how much was now at stake.
He stepped into the school, and the door closed gradually behind him. Ahead, standing near the doorway of the principal’s office, stood an angel. He was clothed as Aaron had come to expect: dark suit, trench coat—as if he’d just come from a funeral—and in his hand he held a flaming sword.
Expecting a fight, Aaron created a weapon of his own and felt the strange symbols return to his flesh. It was amazing how easily the transformation came now. Maybe I’m finally getting the hang of this thing, he thought absently.
Instead of brandishing his weapon, the Powers’ soldier turned away and approached a set of swinging doors. With his free hand he pushed one side open and bowed his head.
Aaron cautiously proceeded down the hallway toward the doors, the angel watching, quelled anger in his dark eyes. But he remained silent, still holding the door for him. Aaron strode through defiantly. He could feel the angel’s stare upon his back, cold and murderous, but did not give him the satisfaction of turning to meet his gaze. More angels emerged from the classrooms along the hall, motioning with a flourish of their flaming blades for him to proceed past them.
At the top of the stairs leading down into the basement, another angel waited and gestured for him to descend. Of course he had to descend; his brain raced. Wasn’t that one of the first things he had learned in freshman English? That the protagonist must always descend to confront what plagues him before his victory and eventual ascension.
As with the others in the corridor behind him, the angel warrior at the stairs said nothing as he passed. Aaron went down the steps to the first landing and chanced a look back. The angel was watching him, a cruel smile on its thin, bloodless lips. “Catch you on the way back,” Aaron called. He had no idea what the Powers had in store for him below, but he wasn’t about to give them the satisfaction of believing he was afraid.
He continued down into the basement, the illumination thrown by his flaming blade lighting the way. The air below was thick with the smell of chlorine, and at the foot of the stairs he stopped, trying to decide if he should head toward the school’s pool or the gymnasium.
It didn’t take long for another of Verchiel’s soldiers to appear and motion him toward the gym. Aaron had never particularly enjoyed phys ed, and found it strangely fitting that the Powers would summon him there. His teacher had been a jock from way back and didn’t much care for anyone who wasn’t on the football team. “Abandon hope all ye who enter,” the Nephilim muttered as he walked through the door and into the gymnasium, the strange and disturbing vision of angels playing a game of shirts-versus-skins basketball running through his head.
But those images were soon dispelled. The room was dark, red exit signs and the swords of the angelic army that awaited him providing the only light. Aaron felt his heart sink, even with the essence inside him. How can I ever hope to fight so many? They were everywhere: on the bleachers, perched atop the basketball rims, and up above in the girder-latticed ceiling. They reminded him of pigeons, only these birds were far more dangerous.
“We’ve been waiting for you,” said a voice that made his flesh tingle as if covered with ants.
Immediately Aaron felt the wings on his back begin to stir. On cue, a group of angels atop the bleachers stepped aside to reveal Verchiel. He was reclining in the wooden seats, as if watching a game, the unconscious Vilma lying beside him. Aaron was disappointed to see that Stevie was not there as well. His pulse quickened as his wings sprang from his back. This is it, he thought, and the power inside him writhed in anticipation. The Powers’ leader watched him with eyes like shiny black marbles, and Aaron noticed that the angel’s face still bore the angry scars from their first confrontation back in Lynn.
“Let her go, Verchiel,” he said, raising his blade of fire. “She’s done nothing to you. It’s me that you want.”
The Powers’ leader gazed with disgust at the unconscious young woman. “That is where you are wrong, animal,” he said in a voice filled with contempt. “My problem has grown far larger than you.” He touched Vilma then, a gentle caress with fingertips that glowed like white-hot metal, and she cried out in pain.
Aaron surged forward, wings spread wide to lift him into the air, but something moved in the periphery of his sight, something that was beside him before his brain even had a chance to react. It lashed out at him, a gauntlet of metal connecting with the side of his face, sending him crashing to the slick wooden floor in a heap.
“What you are, what you represent, is a virulent disease,” Verchiel said from the bleachers above, “a disease that has infected this world.”
Aaron’s head was ringing and he was finding it difficult to focus. But the power of the Nephilim coursed through his body, urging him to his feet. Sensing his attacker close by, Aaron lashed out with his sword of flame. The blade touched nothing.
“But I believe I have found a cure for this epidemic.” Aaron could hear Verchiel descending the wooden bleachers a step at a time.
Another blow fell on the back of his neck with such force that he wondered if it had been broken. He rolled onto his back and gazed up into the fearsome visage of a warrior clad entirely in armor of red—the color of spilled blood.
“This is Malak,” he heard Verchiel say from somewhere nearby. “And he will be your death, body and spirit.”
And as Aaron studied the armored figure looming menacingly above him, he had a sneaking suspicion that Verchiel might very well be right.
CHAPTER TEN
The armored warrior called Malak reached into the air, and from some hidden pocket in space, removed a sword of dark metal. The light of the Powers’ flaming weapons illuminated strange etchings on the blade, similar to those on the manacles Aaron had worn in Aerie. But he had little time to consider that, as Malak brought the weapon down, intending to cleave his skull in two.
Aaron rolled to the side, then flexing his powerful wings, propelled himself upward and lashed out with his own sword. The burning blade clipped Malak’s shoulder, sending a shower of sparks into the air. Malak was already moving to counter the attack, his sword gone, replaced with a long spear made of the same dark, etched metal. He struck out with the shaft of the spear, catching Aaron on the chin. The Nephilim stumbled to the side and watched from the corner of his eye as the armored warrior lunged forward, the spear’s tip searching for something vital.
His actions almost reflex, Aaron swatted the spearhead away with his sword of fire, severing it from the body of the shaft. He spun around, the weapon in his hand now seeking Malak’s heart, momentarily amazed by the fluidity of his thoughts and movements. No longer did he feel the struggle inside him between what was angelic and what was human. But now wasn’t the time for reflection.
Malak had dropped what was left of his spear and grabbed hold of Aaron’s fiery blade, halting its deadly progress less than a half inch from his ornate chest plate. Aaron bore down upon the blade with all his might, but Malak’s strength was incredible, his armored hand glowing white hot with the heat of heavenly fire. Suddenly there was a blinding flash, and the combatants were thrown apart by the force of the powerful concussion. Aaron shook away the cotton that seemed to fill his head, coming to a disturbing realization: Malak had broken his blade. The warrior had actually destroyed his sword of fire. He quickly scrambled to his feet. Malak was already standing, flexing the hand that had held back Aaron’s sword of fire. The armored glove had already cooled, returning to its original color of ore.