“Thank you, Sergeant.”
Back in the clearing, Vonn counted his men and nodded to the witchy woman. With a snap of her fingers, she closed the Charmed Circle, and shut out all danger. They were safe—for now.
But there were too many strange things happening, all close together. There was a missing patrol and men eaten by spawn. A first-gen kylen had asked to lead his men. A licensed witchy woman—a priestess, no less—had asked to join the rescue. Thorn St. Croix was only a mountain over. The mine site they were going to close was between his camp and the tracks the battle mage was trapped on. No way was all that a coincidence.
Tears of Taharial
Summer 105 PA / 2117 AD
Faith Hunter
GARRICK’S TAKE
The seraph was perched high on the hilltop, staring into the hellhole entrance far above them. Garrick’s parents had told him about seraphs, and his grandparents. He’d seen them on TV—when it was working. But he had never hoped to see one in person. This one was called Raziel, and he had scarlet hair and wings, with teal beneath, in the place where wing and human-shaped arm met. He had red irises in a tawny-skinned face. His jaw could have been carved from marble, it was so sharp.
Garrick watched as the seraph unfurled his wings and lifted from the mountain top. The seraph circled the sky several times before diving toward the earth. He back-winged, touched down on a huge stone that towered over the clearing, and snapped the wings closed. With the motion, his scent wafted down the hillside and through the clearing, like honey and chocolate, and Garrick closed his eyes to breathe in the scent of Heaven. When he opened them again, the seraph had tilted his head, his feathers catching the sunlight, glistening almost as bright as the red-gold armor that sheathed his human-shaped legs, arms, and chest. A sword appeared in his hand, so fast Garrick didn’t see him draw it, the seraph steel blade glistening and dangerous.
Some called this seraph the chief of the supreme mysteries, one of the archangelic governors, and the angel of caves, caverns, and places of the dark, which made stone his element to call. Others said he was a herald, blowing a trumpet when the Most High came to Earth—or would if the Most High ever came so low. And he was considered the author of the Book of the Angel Raziel, though he had never confirmed it.
Only soldiers and humans on the edges of what was left of civilization saw seraphs these days, and then not often—unless a mage called mage-in-dire to protect himself from humans.
The dark-skinned Audric was a mule, an evil, immoral, half-breed, the result of a mating between a bespelled, captive human and a mage. Or so Garrick had always been taught. But this one seemed anything but debauched. He went about his duties as a bodyguard of Thorn St. Croix with attention to detail, but that was all. Unlike all her other companions, he showed no emotion towards her. He seemed neither a friend nor an enemy of the mage, just someone who was there to do a job and nothing more.
Garrick wasn’t prejudiced against mules—or neomages neither, not like his parents were. But he had no reason to trust them either. They were licentious and sinful and went into rut like animals, mating with anyone or anything that moved, especially seraphs, who were messengers of the Most High, but were also easily tempted, according to the histories. And this seraph was here because the new battle mage had called him, yet they weren’t indulging in sin.
None of this made sense to him. And the strangeness made him want to learn more.
Thorn St. Croix stood beside the massive war horses. They were both saddled and ready for riding, seeming unconcerned by the seraph who had all the humans so on edge.
The mage was dressed for battle in an outfit made for war, torn and bloodied leather, with weapons in loops and pockets, and over it all a cloak. Her red hair was braided back and up in a tight bun, with a knife hilt visible at the nape of her neck.
The mule was dressed far better, in leather armor the color of blood—the color of the angel’s wings. When the mage stepped close, he caught her knee and tossed her up. “My Mistrend, you go into battle wearing your old dobok,” he said. “May this champard know why?”
Thorn took the reins in hand and looked at the mule. “I’m saving all the pretty stuff for the priestess at Enclave. Even the battle clothes.”
The mule shook his head, swung up onto his horse and checked his weapons: several swords and a huge gun that held some resemblance to a rocket launcher. Audric called to the seraph. “I am yours to beck and call,” he shouted, his voice both a challenge and a pact, “my blood and bone and sinew.”
Garrick’s mouth dropped open. Now he knew why the mule had good armor. He was bound to the angel. And to the mage. And none of them were in rut. He had never heard of such a thing, and he knew his kirk elder would never believe it. Not ever.
The mule continued, “With sword and shield, in battle dire, I follow your behest. Never to fail, never to falter. For the length of my life.”
The seraph, Raziel, laughed and dropped from the cliff, wings spread open their full twenty-four-foot span, shadowing them all before he landed. “My servant, you are a joy to take into battle.” The seraph looked at Thorn then, and his face softened. “My mage, I am yours to command.”
Garrick’s mouth couldn’t drop any farther. He had never, ever, not once, even in fiction, heard of a seraph placing himself under the command of a mage. But this one just had. Seraph stones! He wished he had a camera, a Pre-Ap one that could zoom in for close-ups and record sound too!
The train’s conductor stepped close and held out a sword to Garrick. “A bunch of us are going in. You can come too, if you want.” He counted on his fingers. “That makes eight of us all told, I think, and the mage said she would try to keep you alive.”
Garrick took the sword, wordless with delight. He was going to battle! With a seraph! No one back home would believe him!
“You stay close to the mage,” the conductor said. “And close your mouth, boy, before flies swarm in.”
The little girl stepped off the train. He’d never really gotten close to her before, since the workers didn’t interact much with the passengers. A tiny thing—she couldn’t be more than ten. But she wore jewelry an adult might wear: a carved stone cat on a thong necklace, and a clasp shaped like an angel wing pinned to her tunic.
“Call your flames, Ciana,” Thorn said to the child.
The little girl looked at Raziel and smiled. And the angel smiled back at her. “We go into battle glorious,” he shouted, “with Mole Man’s progeny at our back!”
“Battle glorious,” Thorn muttered, her scarred face pulled into a frown.
The girl held out her arm, something clasped in her hand. She said “Yeehee” something or other. She repeated it, and seven globes of fire popped into the air. Garrick nearly dropped his sword. These were flames of the High Host. A human had called them and they just . . . appeared.
“Three and three and one, I greet thee,” the mage said, sounding all formal. “If you will, three to lead and light the way, three to harass the spawn and the Darkness as they attack us, and one to me.”
The flames rose and twirled, leaving bright blue plasma trails in the air. They divided and spun away in two groups of three, one group straight up the mountain toward the hellhole, while another three formed a whirling circle of fire in front of the mage. The last flame moved to the back of the big horse and hovered there. The mage didn’t look directly at them and Garrick looked away too, blinking away the bright lights that had burned into his eyes.
The flames had done what the mage had asked.
Garrick felt awe and fear building inside his chest, emotions tangled together, leaving him confused and breathless. He crossed himself, the action something his grandfather had done in times of danger.
Thorn St. Croix looked around at the small clearing, and down the length of the stopped train. She lifted her head and raised her voice, saying, “It’s only fair that you know why we ride into battle, underground, into the hellhole, a place where no sane being w
ould trespass. The avalanche that stopped the train’s progress was not caused by nature. It stinks of Darkness and the blood of human, kylen, and mage. If we do nothing but continue to shovel and melt the snow, night will fall, and the Darkness will emerge. And we will all be dinner to the spawn.” She smiled at the men clustered around the train. “Some of you look like you might even be tasty.” The men laughed, most of them.
“Whyn’t you jist do what you did when you melted the snow caps on the mountains?” Eford called out. He was one of the men not laughing, and Garrick could almost feel the hatred rolling off him in waves. Eford had never hidden his distrust of anything mage-ish, but this felt more like a taunt. “You call out all the power of Heaven and we kin jist be on our way.”
The mage turned to him and stared, and Eford was too brave or maybe too stupid to look away. “I don’t have access to that . . . that energy. Not anymore,” Thorn said. She looked embarrassed, and the angel—the seraph—laughed. It sounded like bells tinkling. They knew something that Garrick didn’t, like an inside joke. But then, they probably knew a lot of stuff he didn’t.
She raised her voice again. “We go into the hellhole, after the power that caused us to stall here. We go into the hellhole to free the prisoners, the humans and any mages who wish to be saved—to free the kylen and the watcher—to wage war and engage in battle in the name of the Most High.”
But to Garrick, she didn’t look happy about heading them into the hellhole. More like resigned, and maybe even a little angry.
“When we get to the entrance, all of you stay close to me. I’ll activate a Shield that will make any spawn who happen to be awake unable to scent us. You’ll stay close and hold position until I drop the Shield. Then it’ll likely be hand-to-hand.” Her horse danced under her, and the mage rode the motion with ease, despite looking like a child perched on the massive beast.
From a pocket St. Croix pulled out several small stones. She tossed one to each of the men who’d volunteered to fight with her. Garrick snagged his out of the air and looked at it. It was polished stone, like something he might have skipped across a pond when he was a child. “These are Healing amulets. If you’re injured, press it into the wound. Bind it in, if you can. But be quick about it: You fall, spawn will be on you in an instant.”
Garrick carefully tucked the rock into his chest pocket. He had a mage stone—a real honest-to-the-Most-High mage stone. His mom would never believe it!
AUDRIC’S TAKE
They were going into a hellhole to battle Darkness. Again. He had hoped that leaving the mountains of Carolina and going to the New Orleans Enclave would free him for a while from the horror of battle. But that wasn’t going to happen; not while Thorn St. Croix was near. Darkness was determined to kill the little mage, and it seemed she had strong feelings against it as well.
Audric, his heartbeat steady, his breathing deep and even, wheeled Clyde up the hill, the big animal moving with a smooth pace and muscular strength. The Clydesdale had never been ridden into battle, and he had no idea how the horse would react to the smells of the hellhole as they grew near. Most animals were terrified of the scent of blood, brimstone, noxious fumes, and old death. He hoped the Calming amulet Thorn had given him would be enough to keep the animal quiet.
Behind him, he felt more than heard his seraph take to the air. The connection between them was penetrating and compulsory, binding his thoughts and actions, his intent and deeds. Almost any other of the second unforeseen would have been ecstatic at being bound as war-partner to the winged warrior Raziel. Audric, however, was still grieving the loss of his love, Rupert, and that grief shrouded his soul like a lead blanket, leaving him unable to care, even about combat. He adjusted his swords and armor. Perhaps he would die in battle and go to join Rupert, wherever he was in the afterlife.
“You will not die today, my companion,” the seraph said.
“I am yours to command,” Audric said, submerging his grief deep inside, into the dark of his soul. “I am yours to beck and call, my blood and bone and sinew. With sword and shield, in battle dire, I’ll follow your behest. Never to fail, never to falter. For the length of my life.”
From overhead, Raziel laughed at Audric’s morose tone, his voice ringing. He called out, “I will answer your call, guard you beneath my wings, and carry you into the Light at the end of your days.” The seraph swept up and back down, wings spread in a long glide. “Though some will find the Light by nightfall, this battle will not be your end. Nor mine. Nor the little mage’s.”
Audric shuddered. Some would die. But then, someone always died in battle.
The smell of brimstone and sulfur stung his nose. They were close to the hellhole, above the snowline, and Audric dismounted, to crunch on ice. Eli swung down from the horse Thorn had commandeered from an indignant passenger on the train. Audric hobbled the horses. They’d be able to paw through the thin ice and eat the winter grass, would have ice-melt to drink. And with Thorn’s amulets hanging from their saddle horns, they’d remain calm until their riders returned.
Eli glanced at him, his eyes speculative and tense. The human loved Thorn, and would protect her when Audric’s battle-tie to the seraph might draw him from Thorn’s side during combat. Eli would stand by her no matter what. He was a good companion to have on this foray, although Audric would never say that aloud.
The ride had been without event, but for the humans slipping and sliding on snow. And now they stood at the opening into the darkness. The flames danced inside the cave opening, moving as if excited. Other flames whirled over Thorn, as if awaiting orders, and the one lone flame seemed to rest on the air behind her. They all hummed, static-crackling notes in minor keys, as if singing or speaking to one another. And perhaps they were. Who could know? With the High Host, most anything was possible.
Thorn turned, her back to the hellhole, the black entrance framing her. She threw back her cloak, revealing the scarlet lining, torn and stained and ripped by claws. Spawn claws. Her face caught the light, her scars shining white against her pale pink, glowing skin. She lifted her eyes to the seraph on an outcropping of stone overhead, the pose making her look both small and stalwart. His little mage was learning the use of the dramatic to capture and hold the attention and loyalty of humans. Had he not forgotten how to smile, his lips might have curled up in pride.
Thorn pulled an amulet from her pocket and tied it onto her amulet necklace, now worn outside her clothing, in full view of humans. “This amulet is charged with a moving Shield, one that will allow us to move over terrain, will allow bullets out and air in. It will keep the Dark at bay. But if you step outside its walls, you can’t get back inside. You’ll be on your own, and it isn’t likely any of us will risk our lives to rescue anyone that stupid.”
“You got another one of those amulets, consul-general?”
The rough voice came from the treeline.
Audric drew his sword and whirled to the rear, all in one motion, to see a group of men dressed in Army camo. And a kylen in a distant tree, his wings furled and his scent both seraphic and mage—and strong; far stronger than Thaddeus Bartholomew. Could he be a second- or first-generation kylen? Audric had never seen a first-gen. He wasn’t certain that anyone alive ever had.
Standing on the ground below the kylen was a woman, tiny as Thorn herself, dressed in silks and gauze far too thin and insubstantial for the cold. A priestess. One he knew. Audric nearly swore.
Claire wore an amulet belt of carved wood figures—leaves, flowers, various animals—tied around her waist; the Earth mage with her charms. Her left wrist was adorned with her visa. She was beautiful. And deadly. She had lain with him during a long-ago mage heat, and he had satisfied her demands. When the heat subsided, he had left her. It was an egregious insult to leave a mage-lover without being sent away. Her eyes narrowed as she recognized him, but she didn’t speak.
“Raziel,” the ebony-skinned kylen in the tree called out. “By blood and fire, in battle and praise, in the Rive
r of Time and without, I am yours to command, my brother-father.”
Raziel nodded. “The mage will lead us into battle dire.”
Claire’s head lifted and she started to smile, thinking the honor hers.
“Eldratos, acknowledge the consul-general,” Raziel said, “Thorn St. Croix.” The kylen spread his wings and dropped from his tree, gliding toward Thorn. He lit on the earth with seraphic grace.
Claire’s smile died, and the look she shot Thorn was murderous. Audric would have to keep an eye on her. He distrusted everything about Claire, from her petty jealousy and fierce temper, to her intense self-worship, to her preference for sexual violence. That violent streak permeated every aspect of her life, and was one of the more treacherous things about her, making her brutal, savage, and sadistic.
“‘Omega mage,’ I have been called,” Thorn said softly, her voice not carrying to the humans nor to Claire. “Yet I ask, not demand; I beg, not command. Will you help in this battle?”
The kylen bowed his head. “I am yours to command.”
“Yourssss to command,” the flames said, the words like the explosion of gases, the hum of electricity, and the ringing of heavy brass. “Yours.”
“Always and forever, in the River of Time and beyond, yours,” Raziel said.
“Tears of Taharial,” Thorn murmured. And none of the assembled host commented on the curse.
“My men,” Eldratos said, pointing. Thorn turned to watch the newcomers, the humans tramping across the snow. “We followed the tracks of spawn who’d attacked a military platoon to a small entrance on the other side of the slope face. They took men captive. U.S. Army bootprints were mixed in with the spawn-prints.”
“They took human prisoners?” Thorn murmured. “How long ago?”
“Two—perhaps three days,” the kylen said.