Prologue: Blood of Angels

The small, frightened angel crouched in the middle of the floor, anticipating the absolute worst. She shivered like a tiny frightened bird with her bloodied white wings pulled protectively around her frail body. On either side of her stood Mephistopheles and Alastor. Mephistopheles – the tempter of Faust, the closest thing to a companion that she had ever possessed in this desolate place. Alastor – the heartless executioner of hell. Both waited in passionless silence for the judgment that they knew would inevitably come.
They waited for what must have been at least fifty years in mortal time. Amy bit her shell pink lip until beads of bright blue blood appeared and began to drip down her pearl white chin. She tried not to keep track of the passing of time, like the minute hand of a clock, mortals were born and mortals died. And every few seconds, thousands of more souls were ferried across the river styx to meet their eternal torment. And still he did not come.
Their surroundings were changing, hell was constantly shifting. One moment they were standing in a dry desert, for which all three knew there was no relief. Mortals wandered the wilderness, moaning and crying, screaming for water, dropping left and right. Heat blisters and sore had opened on their skin and were oozing blood and pus. Every now and then, a few of the prince’s personal slaves would prompt and often force the tormented souls to pick themselves up again and continue their endless wandering. The slaves didn’t even turn to look at the three angels. The next moment, they were standing on the edge of a bottomless chasm, which dropped into nothing but suffocating darkness. Angels of lesser rank and more of the prince’s slaves pushed tormented souls over the edge. Torturing them, taunting them, some even pretending to try and lift the poor souls up. They listened to the cries, the endless pleas, the wretched screams that came wrenched from every bleeding dry throat.
And still he did not come.
Fifty more mortal years fell away. Their surroundings shifted again. This time, the world was not one constant setting, but several, one giving way to another every few seconds. The ground rocked beneath their feet, swerving, like a nightmare where one is falling, except there is no hope of waking. Souls screamed as their tender bodies were crushed underneath huge piles of debris that rose up from the ground only to vanish again as soon as they hit the ground again, dragging the souls into the depths with them. Amy closed her eyes and a single crystal tear slid down her cheek. She hated it here – she hated it! Why was she here? Why did he not come?
A soft hand, much too delicate for comfort, and cold as death touched her shoulder. Amy cringed and recoiled underneath the touch, and she heard the familiar voice slither its way off the tongue. A voice that belonged neither to a male nor a female, a genderless creature, untouched by time. The most beautiful of all God’s creations, the greatest tragedy to ever exist – the original fallen angel.
“Amy, Amy,” the voice spoke chidingly. The prince of darkness – the lord of hell – had come.
As soon as she heard his voice, felt his touch, Amy felt like weeping. She curled up into as tight a ball as she could manage with her arms folded over her head and her wings wrapped around her like a cocoon.
Mephistopheles was the next to speak. He bowed low, dropping down to one knee and bowing his head so low that his long blonde hair nearly scraped the churning ground. “Your Majesty,” he said in a voice that was so deep, so masculine, so frightening. Amy could remember when she had found a degree of comfort in that same voice. “Forgive my disturbance to your lordship’s peace-“
It was tactless, it was wrong. The prince’s beautiful face contorted into something ugly and unrecognizable as he flew at his minion, one hand raised, fingers bent like claws as if he meant to strike and rend the angel to pieces then and there.
“PEACE!” the prince screeched angrily. “I have no peace! I am Abaddon, I am Satan, I am the father of lies, the fallen prince of heaven! The original tempter! Yet I have no peace! I have no power! I am as tormented as every soul here, for I cannot leave this desolation, I cannot have real power! I can never, ever have real power!”

Amy burst into tears, beautiful angel tears, which is a heart-breaking sight to behold. She began to shake and mutter, begging for it all to be over. Oh, just sentence her already-
Mephistopheles fell back, keeping his head bowed, and not meeting the prince’s gaze. It would pass, just let him rage, it would pass.
The prince’s hand went to his face, nails digging into his flesh so that blood welled to the service. He screamed such a high piercing scream that were mortals to hear it, the sound would strike them dead on the spot. He rent at the tattered black burial shroud that served as his current garment of choice. He raged for an entire mortal hour, which is the equivalent of mere seconds in angel time, and within a second instant he was calm once more. Cool, collected, a terrifying passionless god.
“What has our pretty Amy done?” he asked, his voice was back to what it had been when he had first graced his angels with his dark presence.
It was all a game. He knew just as well as – or perhaps better than – Mephistopheles. He knew what she had done.
“She tried to get back into Heaven, my lord.” Mephistopheles spoke quietly, and without much feeling in his voice at all. Alastor had thus far not spoken a word.
The prince’s features became angry once more, but this was a different kind of angry. The twin dark pupils which rested in equally similar dark azure eyes flashed red as they turned to glare at the fallen angel. His beauty really was a travesty. Amy wondered not for the first time if God had wept when he was forced to banish the beautiful Lucifer from heaven.
Lucifer. They didn’t know him by that name, here. Lucifer was a title reserved for legends. Here, he was the prince.
“Is that true, my pretty little Amy?” his gentle voice was now full of scathing anger. “You are worse than a mortal.”
The disdain in his voice was physically sickening. Amy felt suddenly ashamed. Worse than a mortal, that was the worst insult he could have inflicted upon her. Mortals were nothing, wisps of life to be taken at a moment’s notice. Playing pieces in a greater game between God and the prince, as they battled with each other for the right to reign over all of mankind. Angels were playing pieces, too, the only difference was that they knew this. Mortals were foolish enough to believe that they had some sort of a choice in the matter.
“But I don’t want to be here!” she screamed, her frail voice lost in the great vastness of her surroundings. “I hate it here! I hate it! I want to go back, you know I do, you tricked me into coming here, you tricked me…” she dissolved into further tears.
“Do you think He wants you, little angel who hates so much?” the prince laughed harshly. “Oh, I know he’s so forgiving,” his voice was dripping with sarcasm and bitter, bitter mockery. “But you cannot serve two masters.”
It was a challenge. Did she dare rebel against his authority? Amy dared look up at him and meet his gaze. Instantly, she regretted doing so.
His gaze seized her instantly, dragging her into the depths of his madness. A strangled cry of surprise came wrenched from her throat and she tried to withdraw, but it was impossible. His gaze dragged her forward, deeper, until she felt she would drown in those deep blue pools.
He was no longer a beautiful dark angel standing before her. He was something else altogether. Magnificent, crowned in flame, taller than two full grown mortal men. He sported thirteen wings, black as a raven’s eye, that were all at least six feet in length. In his hands he clutched a sword, the blade white with heat, only his burning blue eyes remained the same.
“Do you see me?” he hissed, his voice climbing the angrier he became. “Do you see me as I once was, as I wish to be - AS I WILL BE AGAIN?” instantly, this image vanished. In its place was a wretched creature that was bound in chains, struggling vainly to break free from them, or at least rid himself a few and make his burden lighter. The creature was human in resemblance, completely pale and naked. Long curly black hair and hands slick with blood, lips ripped open and bleeding, teeth stained with the sticky red substance. It tore at its chains with everything it had in it, snarling, all the desperation of a rabid animal.
“Do you see, darling Amy?” the creature cackled harshly. “Do you see now what it is to be mad?”
Amy cried out and shrank away, shutting her eyes and covering them with her delicate white hands. The world instantly went quiet, no more howling, no more snarling. No more laughter.
The deathly touch reached her again, this time yanking her back by her golden blonde hair and forcing her to look up once more at the prince. This time, not meeting his gaze.
“You have been very bad, little angel.”
“Please,” she whispered. “Please, please, please-“
Oblivious to her pleas, the prince released his hold on her hair. As if having received some signal, Alastor, who had still not spoken a word, produced in one hand a long vicious knife with many jagged teeth and a blade that gleamed even in the darkness.
Amy’s eyes widened, and her head swiveled to glance desperately at Mephistopheles. He was looking straight at her, his eyes vacant and empty. Was she the only one who retained any sort of FEELING in this God-forsaken place?
“Don’t!” she screamed, even as Alastor seized the tip of her feathery wings and placed the knife at the very base. They very place that connected her wings to her body. “Don’t do it, Alastor! Mephisto! Don’t let him do this to me!”
Mephistopheles didn’t move. He didn’t look away.
Alastor made the first cut.
Agony ripped through her body. Had she been human, she would have passed out instantly from the pain. As it was, she was content with screaming. He cut again, deeper, and blue blood spurted from the wound. It ran down her side in abundance, pooling at her feet, coating her hands, her pearl white skin. Blood the color of sapphires. The blood of a fallen angel.
He cut again, and again, vigorously. Blood gushed forth in gallons and made everything slick. The sickeningly sweet smell of angel blood permeated the air, to the point where you could choke on it. Amy screamed, she begged in Hebrew, she pleaded further in Arabic. She tried a different plea in every tongue that had ever been known to grace humankind, and even went so far as to beg in the sacred language of angels.
None of it made a difference.
When the first wing fell, it was maddening to see the now useless appendage fall into the pool of blood, getting quite thoroughly soaked. The feathers were utterly ruined now, their beauty lost forever. Utterly useless to her.
The second wing hurt more than the first. When it hit the ground, she felt for the first time in all of her long memory – naked.
It was like she weighed nothing at all now, with the weight of her wings off of her back. Excruciating pain still wracked her body and it was all she could do to remain lying there, much less consider moving.
The prince stood there, and who knew how long the process took. A hundred years, more? Who kept track anymore. Time meant nothing here.
Her existence meant nothing here.
She tried, but it was nearly impossible. All she could think of was of the humiliation, and of how much it hurt. Mephistopheles, she knew, would have crawled, if that was all he could do, to the feet of the prince and kiss his hand in reverence. She knew Alastor would have praised the dark prince for his misery, thanking him for it even! She couldn’t do that. She couldn’t, she wasn’t like them, she didn’t serve him. She didn’t worship him. It was all a big mistake. She belonged in Heaven.
It was all very silent. Her screams had long faded into the timeless void. No one had said a word, Mephistopheles had not even given her his hand in sympathy to help her up.
She knew what they were all waiting on her to do.
Unable to control how badly she was shaking, Amy pushed herself up on her elbows and lifted herself out of the pool of blood. She couldn’t get much further than that, she was still on her knees, with her head hanging down and her shoulders high in the air. It was better than nothing at all. There was no feeling at all now, even the pain had gone numb. It was all she could do to keep her eyes part way open.
Slowly, in the span of what seemed to be an eon –she began to crawl. It was a long, painful procedure, but she managed to do so. She was angel, she was stronger than most humans, even deprived of her wings.
Her hands brushed across the tip of her broken wings somewhere during the process, and she recoiled, nearly toppling on her side. Finally, she reached the prince, and with a heavy sigh, she allowed her arms to give and dropped down onto her stomach. Kissing the hem of his robe.
“Master,” she breathed in her lovely, musical voice. “Thank you.”
The prince threw back his head and laughed.
Mephistopheles joined him, and Alastor as well. They were all laughing. The demons who tossed the souls off the side of the cliff were laughing at her humiliation, the entire Satanic hierarchy had joined in the hellish chorus. Abigor, the grand duke of hell, was screeching with delight. Baalberith, his secretary, was doubled over with mirth. Cagrino, Dagon, Zaebos, Asmodeus, Azazel – they were all laughing at her. Every one of them!
She wanted to cover her ears, but she hadn’t the strength. She was forced to listen to and bear their harsh ridicules.
Amy, poor little Amy, was never going to find her way back into Heaven.


Chapter One: The Fall

There is something wrong with me.
Heather stared at her reflection in the mirror opposite her. She looked like she had been dragged through hell. Her eyes were rimmed with red; her bleach-blonde hair was messy and clinging to the side of her face, wet with blood that was oozing from the scratch on her forehead.
There is something wrong with me, there has to be, he wouldn’t hit me if there weren’t!
He claimed to love her. He always said he loved her, he had even cried as he hit her, and said he wouldn’t do it again.
But he always did it again.
This wouldn’t happen if I were a better person. He would be so much happier if I were dead. They would all be.
She thought of all the people who would benefit from her death. Her mother was a single parent holding down two part time jobs just so that they could eat and make the rent payments. She didn’t have any time for her own life, she was so focused on just surviving.
If I were dead, then she wouldn’t have to worry about me anymore.
She was a burden to everyone. She was a burden to her friends – what few she had. Mostly, she was a loner. It was hard keeping friends and moving from school to school just because her mother couldn’t hold down a job. She had been at Fairview High for a year now, it was her sophomore year. She had known Brandon for six months…
He would definitely be better off without her.
Why live, then? End it now. Don’t make them suffer anymore, don’t let yourself suffer.
She closed her eyes, tears running down her cheeks. She hated this voice in her head. She hated it. She hated feeling like this … damn it, she wanted to die!
End it now! What are you waiting for?
A miracle.
She didn’t believe in miracles anymore. Heather hadn’t believed in miracles since her father had died when she was six.
A little white bottle of aspirin sat on the edge of the sink. Heather stared at it for a long time before reaching out and snatching it, hugging it close to her chest as if it were a child. Looking down, she read the label. It very clearly stated that one should not take more than two at a time.
She unscrewed the cap, with only the mildest of difficult, and peered inside. The precious white pills were so inviting, so tempting. The bottle was very nearly full, almost brand new.
If more than two is harmful, then what could a dozen do? Or more?
There was only one way to find out.
Her mother wasn’t home, and wouldn’t be for at least three more hours. That left plenty of time. Keeping the bottle of pills clenched tightly in her hand, Heather took a detour to the kitchen of the small trailer home. She opened the refrigerator door and found that all they had was a nearly empty jug of outdated milk and her mother’s usual half-empty bottle of Tequila. Both Heather and her mother pretended that the bottle wasn’t there, but Heather had caught her mother more than once sitting in the living late at night after work, watching movies on Lifetime and crying as she placed the bottle to her lips and tilted her head back.
Maybe when I’m dead, she won’t be ashamed to sneak around in her own house.
After a moment’s indecision, Heather grabbed the bottle and shut the refrigerator door. She was making her way back to the bathroom when something caught her eye. The dim yellow kitchen light caught the blade of a large bread knife that was lying next to the sink. She couldn’t remember why it was out, or what they had last used it for. But it was there, and so very inviting.
What could it hurt? You’ve studied this before. Just because you overdose does not mean you’ll die. You might as well make sure it happens.
She grabbed the knife off of the counter.
Now bearing the knife, the tequila, and the aspirin, Heather made her way back to the bathroom. She set all three items down on the sink and bent over to turn on the bathtub faucet, letting the steaming hot water fill up the tub. Her hands were shaking badly, and the tears were threatening once more.
Damn it, stop shaking, you can’t get anything done that way!
She took off all her clothing, sliding off first her black sweater, and then the purple tank-top underneath. Next came the black jeans, sliding down below her hips and revealing several dark green and black bruises from where Brandon had hit her before. Only one was from when she actually fell off her bike and hit the pavement.
By the time she had undressed, the bathtub was full. She went to the bathroom sink, and looked into the mirror once more. A scrawny, sad-eyed girl, her face red and swollen from crying stared back at her. Her lips were trembling, and she was still shaking. Here she was, nothing to hide behind.
What a pitiful creature you are.
“Shut up,” she choked, hating the voice. “Just shut up!” she slammed her fist into the mirror, doing little more than making it shudder. She grabbed the bottle of tequila and placed it to her lips. The burning liquid filled her mouth and nearly made her choke. She managed to choke it down, and the second swig didn’t take half so bad. This time, she filled her palm with the little white aspirin, and placed them all in her mouth at once, swallowing them down with another mouthful of tequila.
She lost count of how many she swallowed. She had reduced the bottle to nearly half of its contents, so that would have to be enough. Struggling to keep her breathing even, and beginning to shake even more violently, she grabbed the knife from the sink and slid into the warm bathtub water.
She lifted her wrist, and placed the edge of the knife blade against it. Every blue vein became visible in that moment. She knew that once she sliced open the skin, then it would well up, and turn dark red. She wondered if she could deal with the sight of her own life’s blood leaking into the water, staining her skin.
Coward. Coward!
She slammed the knife as deep as she could into her wrist. She screamed, and her hand jerked away spasmodically, slamming into the side of the bathtub. She bit her lip in pain and threw the knife across the room, watching as it hit the wall and clattered against the linoleum floor.
There was a noise in the hallway, as if someone were walking down the hall. Terrified that her mother had come home earlier, Heather began to panic, and she struggled to climb out of the tub. She made the mistake of trying to grip the side with her wounded hand, and the pain shot up her arm. She cried out again and fell back into the tub, the heated water sloshing over the side and splattering onto the floor. She couldn’t stand the thought of the look in her mother’s eyes when she saw what her daughter had been reduced to, what she had done to herself.
The door to the bathroom opened. A tiny white foot stepped onto the cracked linoleum, slippery with flecks of blood and bathwater. White robes fell over the foot, covering it completely, and a delicate body followed it. A heart-shaped face framed by fat gold curls peered in. Tears welled up in large blue eyes as they regarded the sight before them.
“Oh, Heather,” the stranger whispered, its musical voice so full of sadness that Heather burst into tears at the very sound of it. “Heather, what have you done?”
What in the hell?
Was she hallucinating? Was the aspirin already affecting her head? Was she going insane? Who was this? What was she doing here? How did she get into the trailer?
“Go away!” Heather screamed hoarsely, panic in her voice. Her heart was beating rapidly, her head was swimming, her face was flushed. She was hot – so hot! Her blood was pumping into the water and she couldn’t do a thing to stop it. “Get out! How did you get here? Who the hell are you! Let me die! Go away!” she was crying. She didn’t want this person to save her, she didn’t want anyone to try and talk her out of this!
It’s too late now, anyway, you’re going to die.
She was getting warmer. Was it simply her? She was shaking completely now, and it was getting hot. So unbearably hot. As if she was being burned.
The whole room around her was going up in flames. They burst through the floor, the roof, the walls. The tiny window shadowed, the dingy red curtains going up in an instant. She couldn’t breathe, the thick black smoke billowing all around her.
The stranger, standing in the midst of the fire, was untouched. She just stood and looked at Heather with those sad blue eyes.
The flames were coming closer. They singed Heather’s fingers and she cried again, pulling her hand back and pulling it to her chest.
“Fire!” Heather screamed. “Fire-!” she glowered at the stranger. “What is WRONG with you? Why don’t you do something? Why are you just standing there!”
Because she doesn’t care about you. This is why you wanted to die, remember?
“Idiot,” she sobbed.
The stranger in the middle of the room began to cry. It was the most heart-breaking sound Heather had ever heard.
It was also the last.


Amy wept. It is a sad thing when an angel weeps. It is sadder still when they weep over their own failures.
She had failed. As a guardian angel, she had failed. She had sworn to keep Heather safe, and now this had happened.
She wished she could have done something. She could have wrenched the knife out of the girl’s fingers if she could have – she would have done anything to prevent the girl actually killing herself! But as a rule, angels were not allowed to interfere with humans. The Almighty had granted them free will. Angels, particularly guardian angels, were only allowed to steer them in the right direction.
And she had failed.
It was the greatest shame for one of the heavenly host to fail an assignment. She had been given a particularly difficult one, this time. A soul for which the prince and the almighty both vied. A young teenage girl steeped deep in depression, possessing both a learning disability and mild insanity. There had been nothing that Amy could do to stop her from putting the razor to her wrists. Nothing. She had failed.
Failure was unacceptable.
Heather had ignored everything, and now this had happened. She had seen the look on the girl’s face during those last few moments when life still clung desperately to her body. It had been one of pure terror, a look she had seen too often on the face of many dying mortals.
The girl was only sixteen; there was still a remnant of hope. Amy waiting impatiently for the inevitable – either the Pilot angel would come, and bear the spirit away to Heaven, or one of the Fallen would appear, and whisk the spirit away to hell.
It was only a matter of who arrived first.
She remembered even now the moment the girl’s last breath left her lungs what it looked like. The body, now an empty, expressionless husk just lay there in the blood-filled bathtub. Dried up in appearance, devoid of all emotion. The poor soul staggered from its shell, pure horror the only expression that Amy could make out on the blurry face. Horror at what it had done. What it had been too late to correct.
And with a high-pitched wail, the soul covered its face and dropped to its knees, trying to pull itself as far into a corner as possible .
Oddly, the Pilot and the Fallen arrived at the same time.
The Fallen was one she recognized. It was Mephistopheles, best known for his temptation of Faust – one of his more fabricated legends. She knew him well from the days before he … fell. And she had kept up with him since then. Out of desperation, probably, or out of longing.
The Pilot angel was easy enough to recognize. Great and terrible in his beauty, Dante had not done him justice when writing about his miraculous form. He was often called the Bird of God, and well-respected amongst the hierarchy of angels.
Mephistopheles did not even spare her a glance, his focus was entirely on the Pilot angel. A fierce battle was about to begin. If the soul did not go to one or the other willingly, or managed to elude both their grasps, they would battle for it.
Mephistopheles didn’t give the Pilot angel the chance.
He lunged forward, grasping the soul by the wrist. The soul screamed, and Mephistopheles’s face contorted into a wicked grin, entirely of teeth, where his lips seemed to vanish.
His head then turned to regard Amy, performing almost a 360 degree turn. For a brief second, Amy felt terrified. This had never happened before. She was a guardian angel; she was supposed to see this death through until the end. But never, never before had either of the angels so much as acknowledged her presence.
Ice-cold hands, fingers as thin as twigs, wrapped around her arms and hauled her backwards. Amy screamed, but her voice was drowned out by another’s – by laughter.
Darkness closed in around her.


Chapter Two: Another Lost Soul

Where did I go wrong?
It was the only thought Linda had had for the past few hours, ever since she had arrived home and discovered her daughter’s body in the bathroom tub. The entire way home, she had felt as if there was a knot of despair in her stomach, as if something were horribly wrong. She nearly got a ticket speeding back all the way to the little trailer park where she lived.
Her fears had been horrifyingly confirmed when she had stumbled in through the front door. She called Heather’s name, but there was no response. Anxious and irritable, she had called again, opened the refrigerator door as she did so. Perhaps there was just a little bottle of something in there to ease the tension in her stomach.
But no, the bottle of tequila was gone.
Linda bit her lip and shut the door. So that was it – Heather had broken into her bottle and was probably passed out drunk, hanging over the toilet in the bathroom. Now, as opposed to anxious, she was livid. She couldn’t count all the times when she had told Heather specifically not to touch the alcohol!
At the end of her rope as far as stress could go, Linda ran a hand through her thick brown hair and reached for the pantry. If she was correct, there should be something left over in there, something she had not yet consumed in her desperate effort to forget all of her troubles. Unfortunately, it was often the bills she was more prone to forgetting.
“Aha,” she said softly, grabbing at the bottle of vodka that had managed to find its way in the very back of the pantry. Only a few swallows remained, it was probably a leftover from New Year’s Eve that had passed not a month ago. She couldn’t believe she had allowed it to go neglected this long.
“Heather!” she called again, just for the sake of it, while putting the mouth of the bottle to her lips. It was just the thing to take the edge off of her nerves – now she could yell at her daughter all the more effectively.
Bottle in hand, Linda stood up with some difficulty and began making her way down the cramped hallway. She called Heather’s name again, drowning it out halfway with another swallow of vodka. She banged on her daughter’s bedroom door, but there was no response. Muttering a curse under her breath, she banged the door yet again with the bottle to back her up, cursing and swearing that she would ‘break the damn door down’ if Heather didn’t ‘get off her lazy ass’.
When yelling was deemed ineffective, and the door proved to be locked, Linda abandoned the pursuit with one last curse. Her daughter would come out at some point, she had to. Linda would catch her then.
Exhausted and emotional, Linda trudged into the living room and collapsed onto the old brown couch on which she spent most of the remainders of her evenings. She usually didn’t get home until eight o’ clock, and sometimes later than that. She would sit on the couch (half of which was covered by a mountain of laundry, the other half the dog had chewed up, when they still had a dog), and watch re-runs of old sitcoms well into the unholy hours of the morning. Booze was her best friend on those cold, lonely nights. It kept her warm whenever the heat had been cut off; it kept her company whenever the saddest Lifetime movies came on.
Hours passed. Linda drifted in and out of consciousness. She woke up once when the bottle dropped out of her hands and hit the edge of the coffee table, but then she just shrugged and drifted back to sleep. She woke again by her stomach twisting itself into knots. She hadn’t eaten in several hours, and there was nothing in her stomach save vodka. This would not end well.
Struggling not to throw up, or to at least wait until she hit something she wouldn’t have to steam-clean, Linda bolted for the bathroom. She flung herself against the door and landed on her knees next to the toilet, throwing her head over the bowl and vomiting. The bile burned in her throat and left a bad taste in her mouth, and it wasn’t until she had been reduced once more to a mild dry heaving did she notice that she was bleeding. Somehow, she had managed to gash her foot open.
Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand and looking around, Linda noticed that close to the door lay a bread knife, its jagged, glittering teeth stained very faintly with blood. Her own, she supposed. She sighed. How the hell did that get here?
“Crap,” she sighed, shutting the lid to the toilet and crawling to sit on top of it. She pulled her foot up to rest on her knee as she examined the extent of the damage. Not too bad, maybe a few stitches, but the urgent care was closed at this time of night. It would be fine until morning. Until then, just stop the bleeding and go to bed.
She allowed her foot to drop and set it gingerly down on the linoleum, hissing with the pain, and prepared to stand.
And then she looked up.
Linda screamed.


The darkness was overwhelming, suffocating. It was almost tangible – as if it intended to slither down Amy’s throat and choke her. She struggled wildly to break away from Mephistopheles’s grip, but a frail bird-like angel and a lost soul were not much of a burden for him.
The transition from darkness to wood was not sudden – it was almost as if the trees sort of melted into view. Amy didn’t even notice until her feet hit solid ground with such an impact that her whole body jolted, and Mephistopheles released her, watching her tumble head-over-heels until she reached a stop.
Amy raised herself up on her elbows, preparing a scathing retort, but her words stuck in her throat.
Nestled comfortably in a grove of twisting, luscious trees, like one of the big cats of mortal earth who crouched and waited for their pray to come by before pouncing, were hell’s twisted iron gates. Amy sucked in a breath and cringed visibly in the presence of such a horror that – until now – she could only imagine what it looked like. The gate had to be over ten feet tall, stretching infinitely into nothing, and appeared to be made of heavy black iron. Above the gates in bold lettering, made of the same black iron but glowing red as if heated, read the words "Omnes relinquite spes, o vos intrantes".
“Abandon all hope, ye who enter here,” Amy whispered, close to the point of tears. She realized she was shaking like a leaf. It was Latin, yet she knew the phrase could be understood no matter what language you spoke.
Whispers. Amy twisted her head around frantically to locate the source. She had heard tales of the dark wood … but she had imagined it a cold, desolate place where lost souls wandered through without any hope of solace or company.
She was quite wrong.
They were everywhere, some had taken the wide crooked path straight to the gates, others found their way through the woods at last, after who knows how many centuries of wandering. They wept, they whispered, pleas for mercy, pleas for guidance. Some appeared to know exactly where they were, they kept their gazes fixed straight ahead, their silvery eyes devoid of all expression. Other didn’t know where they were, these were the ones crying for direction. Spirits of small children cried out for their mothers, a man ran through the undergrowth of the forest, tripping, crying out the name of some woman – his wife, his sister? – but he would never find her.
One soul screamed and tore at its eyes, blood running down its cheek, stumbling blindly down the path, running into other souls who didn’t even acknowledge its presence. It staggered towards Amy, reaching out and groping blindly with bloody fingers. Amy screamed and scrambled to her feet – though it was one of those moments when no matter how much will you have, you can’t manage to move as fast as you would like. And after what seemed to take an age she was on her feet and had bolted towards Mephistopheles, clinging to his arm and burying her face in his shoulder. He smelled of sulfur and ashes, but she knew him. She didn’t want to see the souls wandering tormented and lost. She didn’t want to see the demons that accompanied them every step of the way taunt them and hinder their way. Turning the blind ones around so that they wandered in the wrong direction, kicking, pinching, and ripping apart the ones that had collapsed to the ground and refused to move.
Mephistopheles hissed and jabbed her in the throat with his elbow. Whimpering, Amy backed away, but still didn’t leave his side. Her eyes were kept firmly fixed on the ground.
“Mephistopheles,” spoke a voice like grating metal. “The prince has been expecting you.”
“You may tell him I succeeded,” Mephistopheles replied. “On both charges.”
The voice snorted disdainfully, and Amy heard something suspiciously like a fountain pen scratching against parchment.
“Names?”
“Heather Sardis, and you can put her in category seven.”
“Hmm,” the grating voice replied thoughtfully. “Outer, middle, or inner?”
“Middle,” Mephistopheles replied.
“Hmm,” more scratching. “Proceed.”
“And Amy, you remember Amy.”
“Indeed,” she could hear the smirk. “Let us take a look at our dear Amy,” iron-like fingers seized her chin and brought it up sharply. Amy cringed and found herself staring straight into a wholly unfamiliar pair of eyes. One was bright blue, and the other was dark forest green.
“Yes,” the owner of the grating voice chortled, turning her head from side to side, examining her from all possible angles. “I daresay it is our dear Amy.”
“Let me go,” Amy pleaded quietly, “I don’t know who you are.”
A harsh cackle, and the stranger released the hold on her chin.
“She doesn’t know me, Mephistopheles!” he proclaimed in a high, mocking voice, mimicking hers. “I’m not surprised you don’t recognize me. After all, these-“ he rolled his eyes at this point, one all the way up and the other all the way down to look at her. “Are not what they used to be.”
Amy recoiled, but he kept her chin firmly gripped in his fingers. “
“Do you know why they aren’t what they used to be, little Amy?” the stranger hammered on.
“N-No,” Amy replied, biting her lip.
“The Almighty wasn’t very pleased with my performance. He didn’t believe I had any right to leave Heaven, and I believed I had a right to go anywhere I chose. So I left, of course. I reached mortal earth, I got as far as Italy when the Holy Spirit and his bloody Son caught up with me in the form of two white doves. The buggers plucked my eyes right out and carried them back to Heaven, where I was no longer permitted to enter. Of course I was in excruciating agony. Of course I eventually staggered to these very gates. Of course I had to prove myself by performing deeds for the prince himself. Eventually, I found his favor, and he gave me leave to go to mortal earth every now and again and relieve them of their eyes. He gave me back my sight.” Now the blue eye was focused on her, and the green eye had wandered to the left.
“I still don’t know you,” she insisted, pulling away.
He sighed. “Do I have to say it? I know you have been keeping up with Mephistopheles, it hurts me that you haven’t found me worthy of such effort. After how close we were? I possessed a nun in Aix-en-Provence. During the exorcism not only did I reveal my name, but the name of every other demon possessing her, as well as the name of every saint most effective in opposing us! Surely you heard of that?”
Indeed she had. Heaven had gone up in a fury. The Almighty had been livid. The name of the offending angel had been echoed as a warning amongst the heavenly host.
“It can’t be….” She shook her head slowly, as if she didn’t quite believe it. “Baalberith?”


Heather was dead. She was found lying in the bathtub, her head lolling to one side, her long blonde hair falling over one shoulder into the water, which was tinted rust red with blood.
Her skin was stone gray, and her eyes were wide open, transfixed in an expression of terror. Linda choked and collapsed to her knees next to the tub. “Heather…” she sobbed, tears coursing down her cheeks. “Heather!”
Heather had died, she had died alone and frightened, and her mother wasn’t there to help her, to try and stop her.
You’ve failed, you’ve failed as a parent!
There was no getting around it. Linda was a failure and she was paying the price. This was no better then she had deserved, after all. If only she had said ‘no’ to Keith that night when her parents had left them all alone in the house, completely trusting. Perhaps she shouldn’t have dropped out of high school, perhaps she should have given the child up for adoption. Perhaps she shouldn’t have quit the only full-time job she had ever held. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps - it was far too late for that now.
Linda fumbled in her sweatshirt pocket for her cell phone. It was nearly dead, and had only two little bars, but it was the only phone she had. They couldn’t afford a landline.
“911, what’s your emergency?” came the pleasant voice over the phone.
“My daughter is dead,” Linda said, almost frantically into the receiver. “I just found her in the bathtub… I didn’t do it to her, I swear!”
“Calm down, miss,” the voice placated. “What is the address?”
Crying uncontrollably, Linda gave the woman her address. The woman reassured her that everything would be all right, and just to stay where she was, the police would be there soon. Linda nodded and hung up before dissolving into tears.
The knot of despair tightened, and she couldn’t help but think, over and over, that she had lied.
I did it.
She had killed her daughter, without even meaning to. There was so much she could have, should have, done differently.
I killed her, I did it. I never gave her the love she needed. I did it. I did it!


Chapter Three: Welcome to Hell

God have mercy!
“Pick yourself up,” Marianne snapped. “I have been ashamed to claim you as my daughter for a long time, Linda. Ever since you dropped out of school and claimed that you were going to raise a child entirely on your own. I told you no good could come of it, but did you listen to me? No, you have never listened to your dear, old mother, who has only ever wanted the best for you.”
Linda was curled up on her mother’s couch. Marianne Sardis was a strong, independent woman, and damnably stubborn. She refused to allow herself to be seen at the ‘hovel’ that her daughter had occupied, and Linda had been forced to drive herself to her mother’s doorstep and beg to be let in. After all, Heather had just died; she couldn’t stay in the same house.
Linda said nothing as he mother continued to remind her of her every fault.
“It hurt me, Linda, when you forced me to disown you on such grounds. But what else was a mother to do? And now you come to me for aid, and God in his infinite mercy has allowed me to grant it.”
“It’s very kind of you, mom,” Linda sighed.
“Of course, I have my conditions. You are first of all to address me as ‘mother’ and nothing less than that. As long as you live under my house you will abide under my rules. No more sweat pants and tank tops. You will dress modestly and with taste. I do not want all my friends to be under the impression that you are a slut. And I will hear nothing more of Heather. As far as we are concerned, she never existed. She is dead now, and in the past. God has been merciful enough to bury your past and give you a second chance.”
Linda opened her mouth to protest, and then closed it, knowing it was futile.
“If anyone should ask, you have been abroad, and have just come home to visit me for an extended period of time.”
No one would question the story. Marianne hadn’t spoken about her disgrace of a daughter in years. Linda doubted very much that any of Marianne’s friends even knew she had a daughter.
“Yes….mother,” Linda replied through clenched teeth, her fingernails digging into the embroidered pillow she hugged close to her chest. How could her mother expect her to simply forget Heather? Forget everything she had done? She had put fifteen years of her life into that kid! She wanted to smack her mother across the face, she wanted to scream at her and tell her what a bitch she was being. She wanted to curse God. She wanted to cry.
“There’s a good girl,” Marianne replied, pleased.
Linda simmered, hating her.
Witch! Why are you doing this to me? I don’t want to be here, anymore than you may want me here! I hate you!
“Now go away,” Marianne said dismissively with a wave of her hand. “I am tired. Dinner is at seven; make certain you are on time. In the meantime, I highly recommend a bath. I will have clothes bought for you until you are decent enough to go out into society on your own.”
“Yes, mother.” I hate you more than anything.
Once Linda had been exiled from the living room, she had been left to herself to think. Vivid memories of only a few short hours ago still rose unbidden to the surface of her mind. Was it only a few hours ago that she had found her daughter, the child whom she had sacrificed everything for, dead in the trailer’s little bathroom? Was it only a few hours ago that the paramedics and the police had arrived? The police had drilled her with questions, asking her where she had been at the time of death, and what time did she get home from work? Did she know that Heather was entertaining thoughts of suicide? She answered tearfully to all these questions, and then the paramedics had announced that the presence of rigor mortis indicated that Heather had been dead for at least three hours prior to the time Linda claimed she arrived home. Linda had burst into fresh tears at the news, and said something about not being able to stay in the trailer another nice. The police calmed her, and told her they would take her anywhere she needed to go. She had nowhere else to go. There was only one place she could think of …
Her mother’s.
She didn’t think for one minute that her mother would take her in. She had fully expected to be directed towards the nearest homeless shelter. But Marianne, as vindictive as she was religious, took a special pleasure in condescending to forgive her daughter and give her a second chance.
And still the memory of fifteen years ago was all too vivid. When Linda was seventeen, and had dropped out of school. Heather wasn’t much more than a fetus at that time, but Keith had left her for another woman, and Linda was devastated. Her mother had physically hit her, calling her a slut and a whore, damning her to hell with every breath. She claimed that it was the devil that resided in her, and the devil’s child in her womb. She jabbed her finger accusingly at her daughter’s growing stomach and proclaimed its contents the fruit of all sin. Days later, Linda left the house to go and stay with a friend. She had heard from her mother only once again after that. Marianne called and told her daughter that she needn’t bother coming home at all.
“God!” Linda screamed, digging her fists into her weeping eyes. “God! Why aren’t you here? Why aren’t you with me? What have I done to deserve this! What did Heather ever do? She was just an innocent child, she never did a thing to make you hate her!” she paused to take in a shaky breath, and sighed. “If my mother is right, and you are what she says you are, then I want nothing to do with you! A god who allows innocent children to cut open their wrists and then condemns them for it is not a god that I want to worship! Do you here that?!” she stood up and proclaimed to nobody in particular. “I renounce you!”


“Dreadful, dreadful,” the slithering, serpent-like voice whispered sympathetically. “Poor, broken child. Where is her Almighty when she needs him the most? Hmm? Sitting on his golden throne in the midst of his Heavenly host? Too high above for her to touch?”
Raziel clenched his jaw, his face set in an expression of stony nonchalance as he allowed the speaker to finish their tirade.
“Because he doesn’t want you,” the voice addressed Linda now, surely as if he were a lover, whispering sweet nothings in her ear. “He has never loved you. Why should he pay any attention to you? You are a mere mortal. And he is God. He doesn’t have time for everyone, least of all a low-life wretched slut such as yourself.”
It was as if all of the thoughts were being pulled out on a string. Raziel’s fist clenched, his long fingernails digging into the flesh of his palm, but he said nothing still.
“But do not despair, my sweet,” the voice continued to croon. “I am here. I will be the god who cares for you.” With a melancholy sigh, the voice did not speak again for a while. The two onlookers waited and watched as Linda finally went back into the house. The day grew longer and the sun began to set, and still they waited, and they watched.
Finally, the silence was broken; hours into the night long after Linda had fallen asleep.
“The Almighty wishes a compromise,” Raziel spoke, his voice quavering with anger.
“A deal, a deal?” laughter, softer than satin. “Very well, Raziel, pet angel. Tell me what it is the Almighty wishes to propose. I may or may not condescend to accept.”
“You will like this one,” Raziel hissed, fighting to keep a firm grip on his patience. “Both of you win.”
“I admit that you have piqued my interest,” the voice relented. “Well, go ahead. Shatter me. What does the Almighty want?”


“Baalberith?” Amy could hardly believe what she was seeing. The Baalberith she had known was a beautiful entity, with a golden voice unmatched in the entire kingdom of heaven. It would appear that, as well as his sight, he had lost that too.
Both eyes were fixed on her now, boring a path straight to her core. He smiled, not very pleasantly.
“Is there any other?” he was perched at a tall writing desk, on a stool, looking more like a scribe than a grotesque shell of the creature that had once been her companion. He was like an actor, a mockery, sent to torment her with memories of centuries, millenniums long past.
Turning his head to face Mephistopheles but rolling his green eye around so that he could still look at Amy, Baalberith jabbed the end of his fountain pen in the soul’s direction. “Seventh circle, middle ring. Am I clear on that much?”
“You are,” Mephistopheles confirmed.
“Good. And her,” he jabbed his fountain pen casually at Amy without even turning his head. “What are you going to do with her until the prince returns?”
“Where is the prince now?” Mephistopheles growled.
“I don’t know,” Baalberith scoffed. “I only know that he’s gone. Asmodeus said he left and hasn’t told me otherwise since. Therefore, until I hear otherwise, you’re going to have to find a way to keep the little sparrow occupied.” He jotted a few things down in his book, and then turned a page. “And meanwhile, I am centuries behind in my work, so I suggest if you’re going to stand there and gape like a fish that you move!”
Obviously exasperated, Mephistopheles moved out of the way, and shoved Amy in front of him, dragging Heather’s soul by her wrist.
As soon as Amy had found her balance again, the world shifted around them. The trees melted into darkness. The souls, wailing and sighing, faded as well, into nothing. The colors ran together and dripped away, leaving behind a black canvas. Even Baalberith – who was ignoring the completely, now – had faded into nonexistence. Soon, even the scratching of his pen died down.
All was completely silent.
Amy glanced at Mephistopheles, but he wasn’t there. He too, had faded, along with Heather’s spirit. Fear gripped her insides and she looked wildly around, searching for any trace of life, color, sound, anything that would break this great black void.
Nothing.
Then, out of nowhere, she felt something touch her. Cold hands wandered up the back of her neck and stroked her face, while full, luxurious lips gently pressed against the bend of her neck. Amy froze with fear, her lips pressed together to keep them from quivering, her entire body shaking like a leaf.
A voice spoke to her, a voice soft like satin with an edge like a blade.
“So, little Amy, you have found your way to us at last.”
After an eternity of paralysis, Amy twisted away and turned to face her newfound tormentor. He stood there quite calmly, looking at her with dark azure eyes peering from behind thick black eyelashes. Besides his eyes, all she could see of him in the darkness was his face, pale as the moonlight. Brilliant eyes and luxurious crimson lips. That, and his hands – also pale, with every blue vein visible as if the skin itself were transparent, and they flitted about in every which direction as if they simply could not hold still.
“W-Who are you?” the words stumbled off of her tongue, even though she already had an inkling of who it was.
The voice hissed angrily, and the presence seemed to triple in size, bearing down on Amy from all directions, pressing against her, suffocating her. The face in front of her began to distort, the crimson lips drew back to bare sharp white teeth, a vicious snarl.
“Who am I? Who am I? This little angel has the gall to ask who I am?” the voice became deeper, darker. It magnified and echoed in Amy’s ears, worming its way into her mind, driving itself into her skull. She screamed in pain and collapsed to her knees, delicate hands pressed against her ears. “I AM ABBADON! I am Lucifer, the fallen star, the tragic, beautiful prince that fell from Heaven – and that the Almighty so despaired to lose!”
Amy closed her eyes; with the darkness it made no difference whether or not her eyes were closed. Her ears began to bleed, and the blood ran through her fingers, creating thin webs on the back of her white hands.
“I am the world!” the rant continued. “I am everything in it, everything they touch, everything they breathe. I am every temptation lurking around every corner, I am death, I am sin, I am vice! I am beautiful! They love me for it, for enslaving them, one by one! I am the prince, the prince, the prince!” the last word was spoken with such force, such bitter emotion, and such vindictive hatred, that Amy almost went reeling backwards. He spoke the title like it was a curse. It felt as if every syllable was being engraved into her flesh. The prince, the prince!
The fallen prince of heaven was now the prince of hell. Tears came to Amy’s eyes at the very thought. Trapped in hell, when one had known such splendor… what a desolation.
“Please,” she whispered. “I meant no offense.”
“She meant no offense,” the transformation wasn’t even noticeable, as the face was once more again serene, and the voice once more again silk. Even though every word that he had uttered in the past few moments still echoed strongly – maddeningly – off the nothingness. He was in front of her in an instant, though it was still too dark for her to see much more of him than his face and his hands. “No, no,” he hummed, stroking her hair away from her face. “You meant no harm, did you gentle Amy?”
“I did not,” she muttered, shaking. She felt his hands touch her face. She hated it, how she hated it – the coldness of his corpse-like touch burned through to her very bone.
“But you are here,” his voice was sweet as honey, as he stroked her cheek with his thumb. “You are here, and you do you know why?”
“Because I failed,” she replied flatly. She knew why she was here.
He laughed, like the triumphant cawing of a crow.
“Yes, little Amy, you failed. You failed to protect the soul to whom you had been assigned. Heather Sardis, wasn’t she? Such a troublemaker from the beginning, I could feel it in her blood the day she was born. And then with the dyslexia, coupled with such deep depression… well, she never stood much of a chance, did she? Such a harsh and cruel world it is.” These last words were nearly a purr as he stroked the sides of her face. Amy shivered but didn’t dare recoil.
“I have good news for you, Amy. A choice to make, and it is entirely yours, I have no influence whatsoever. It would seem the Almighty must have a say in these matters. And I, being the lowly creature that I am, must bend to his will. As must we all,” the bitter resentment was creeping back into his voice. He slipped his hand underneath her chin and tilted her head up so that she was looking into his face. But not his eyes, she didn’t quite dare meet his eyes.
His lips hovered inches away from hers, and his hair tumbled over his shoulders, creating a curtain around her face. She realized that it was jet-black, and curly and soft.
“Do you think I am a lowly creature?” he whispered against her mouth. “Or am I a beautiful prince to your eyes?”
Unable to concentrate on the question, much less answer it, Amy parted her lips but said nothing.
The prince smirked, and continued, “The Almighty and I have an agreement. If you can go back to earth, under close guard of course from both of our sides, and aid the soul of Linda Sardis, poor Heather’s mother, then you will be returned to your rightful place. Assuming, of course, that when Linda Sardis dies, her soul finds a direct route to Heaven. How do you feel about that plan, frail Amy?”
Amy didn’t know what to say. She was beside herself with joy to the point where she wanted to weep. The Almighty had given her a second chance, she was to be redeemed!”
“Will I have any help?” she asked, her voice wavering with emotion.
The prince’s mouth twisted more downward in a flash of contempt, and then he smiled again. “Yes, of course you will. Heather Sardis will accompany you on the journey to save her mother’s soul.”
Amy felt as though her heart had jumped directly into her throat. She nodded.
“Thank you,” she gasped, speaking in her heart of hearts straight to the Almighty, who she knew was not present in this dismal place. “Thank you, thank you!”
“There is just one little catch, pretty Amy.” The prince reminded her that her redemption was not going to come easily.
“And what is that?” she asked, willing to do anything.
“If you fail, and Linda Sardis is not redeemed, then your punishment will be quite … vicious, shall we say? You do not want to disappoint me, little Amy.”
Amy nodded, too elated for words. Don’t even think about the consequences, there is a chance you can be free!
The prince bent down and kissed her on the lips. His kiss burned her, it was like tasting poison, and she pulled away from it as quickly as she could.
The prince laughed again, and in moments, began to fade from her view, until only his voice remained.
“I wish you the very best of luck, pretty Amy.”


Chapter Four: Broken Wings

Long after midnight, when sleep had proved elusive, Linda stumbled downstairs as quietly as she could and headed for the kitchen. She headed straight into the arms of the only comfort she knew she could find – food.
“Please,” she begged silently, opening the refrigerator door and peering inside. “Let there be alcohol…” of course there was none. Sighing, Linda dug further, and discovered half of the strawberry pie they had eaten for dessert. Shutting the fridge door and grabbing a knife from the drawer, she sat down at the kitchen table to enjoy herself.
The first bite was remarkably unsatisfactory. She wasn’t hungry, she only ate because it gave her something to concentrate on besides thinking. Besides thinking of Heather, besides thinking of her mother. The second bite was as unfulfilling as the first, and she nearly collapsed into tears mid-chew. The misery and pain that had built up over the years was rising to the surface. It was as if her very emotions were intent on ripping her apart. This was the very reason she had taken up drinking. It was the most effective way she had of numbing the pain.
Another bite, more whipped cream than pie. Disgusted, Linda dropped her fork into the empty side of the tin and shoved it away. She couldn’t force another bite down her throat. She was going to vomit.
She put her arms up on the table and allowed her head to drop. She didn’t even notice the kitchen lights turning on.
“What are you doing awake?” Marianne rapped impatiently, as if Linda were still five years old and had stayed up past her bedtime. She used to do that so she could sneak downstairs and hug her father when he got home late at night. Marianne were give her the same look each time.
“I couldn’t sleep,” Linda muttered, as good an explanation as any.
“Are you not hungry?”
“No, ma’am,” Linda sighed, not looking up.
“Gluttony is a sin, child. You would do best to remember that. Though you have committed so many that I wouldn’t be too worried about that one. Still, it would do your figure a wonder if you gave it a thought now and then.” Disdainfully, Marianne swept the pie tin off the table and placed it back into the refrigerator. Linda still did not glance up.
“Pick up your head and look at me when I speak to you!” Marianne snapped. She tangled her bony fingers into her daughter’s hair and yanked her head back harshly. “I want to see your eyes!”
“MOTHER!” Linda cried, grasping the base of her hair with both her hands, desperately trying to keep her mother from ripping out her hair by the roots. “Stop! God!” she screamed.
Marianne released her hair and smacked her across the face with the same hand. “Don’t you dare take the Lord’s name in vain!” she hissed. “Not under my roof, or you will find yourself under it no longer! I am sick of you and your selfish, worldly ways. Your poor mother has striven for all of her life to care for you, to make certain that you were provided for. That you were taught the best manners, the most holy scripture – I taught you letters and arithmetic, and your father, poor fool, worked day and night to make certain that we could eat. And what did you do to him? He put a rifle to his head one evening and that was the end of it. I can’t imagine what you must have done, devil’s child, to your poor father to make him do such a thing. And then, of all things, you tried to kill your poor, caring mother too – by giving birth to a daughter out of wedlock! Thank the Almighty that you did not succeed, or you would be in a hard position today.”
“No!” Linda exclaimed through clenched teeth, tears running down her cheeks. “I didn’t kill father!”
“You might as well have, you evil, ungrateful wretch.”
Linda cried, silently, so as not to give her mother the satisfaction of her tears. Marianne wrung the belt of her robe with her hands and observed her daughter’s silent breakdown.
“You are charity,” she continued, piously. “Just remember that.”
“I am dead,” Linda said hoarsely. “A walking corpse. I have nothing to live for any longer. I might as well be dead.”
“You would like that, wouldn’t you?” Marianne scoffed. “What a selfish wish, to be dead! And leave your poor old mother here to waste away alone.”
“You don’t want me here!” Linda protested.
“And it’s just as well, for I see you hold no love for me.” Marianne pulled her long silver braid over her shoulder and stroked it absently. “When you find a decent job and a decent husband you can go live wherever you want and be as dead as you like. I care not. And I suppose your selfish little heart will be happy to meet your daughter once more in hell. For hell is home to all of those who have committed such a crime as to take their own life, which is a privilege only God may have.”
“Don’t!” Linda screamed in warning, clenching her fists angrily. “Never, never imply that Heather is in hell again, do you hear me? Never! My baby is not in hell!”
“She most certainly is,” Marianne said primly. “And I hope she scorches well for the misery she has put upon this family.”
You are the misery of this family! Linda wanted to scream, but she didn’t dare. Marianne had won. She knew it, too. Linda hated her for it.
“I know now why father blew out his brains,” Linda hissed. “It’s because he thought hell sounded glorious compared to a single day with you.”
“Your father was a sinner,” Marianne said tightly. “It was no surprise.”
Linda didn’t feel thirty-two anymore… she felt sixteen all over again. She couldn’t believe this was happening.
“I didn’t want to be born!” she insisted. “And you didn’t want me to be born, either. You should have killed me when I was still developing, mother, and saved yourself a hell of a lot of trouble.” With that, Linda stood and stormed from the room, slamming the kitchen door shut so loudly that it shook the door frame.
Marianne remained as still as a statue for minutes after Linda had gone. Her hand moved first, touching the chair in front of her and pulling it out from under the table. The rest of her eventually followed. She moved gracefully, as if completely detached from the rest of the world, to the refrigerator and pulled the pie tin, still with Linda’s fork, from the its shelf. Setting it down on the table, Marianne fell heavily into the chair, and stabbed at the pie with the fork.
“Oh, Arthur,” she sighed, her words like a death rattle from between her lips. She lifted the fork. Red filled dripped from either side of the broken crust, the prongs of the fork having speared the cherry straight through the middle. Blood from a skewered heart. “From where we started…” she shoved the fork into her mouth and closed her withering lips around it. A single tear ran from the corner of her eye as she did so, barely forcing herself to swallow. The rest of her words remained unspoken in the back of her mind.
How did we ever reach this point?
Outside of the kitchen, Linda leaned against the door, her cheek pressed against the cool painted wood and hot tears running down the side of her face.
Mother and daughter cried together.


To his credit, Baalberith was extremely patient. Or perhaps Amy was extremely impatient. Either way, she didn’t know how long she had been left standing at the entrance to hell, waiting on Heather to be fetched and returned to her. Amy had not yet been beyond the gates of hell and she earnestly hoped that she never would be. The souls around her continued to moan and sob and scream, sending shivers sliding along the ridge of her wings like an icy cold hand intent upon reaching her neck. This time, there was no Mephistopheles to run to. There was only Baalberith, scratching his pen over the parchment of his book.
Hours. Days. Weeks. Mortal time continued to slip away and still Heather did not arrive. Amy stayed rooted to her spot, convinced that if she strayed she would be lost forever, along with any hope or chance of getting back to heaven.
Finally, after what seemed to take ten thousand years…
“Heather Sardis,” a soft, sad voice whispered. “Category seven, middle ring.”
Amy’s head snapped up. There stood Heather, or rather, what was left of her. The spirit that stood before her did not resemble the girl that Amy had been assigned to nearly sixteen years ago. Heather’s rounded girlish figure had vanished, leaving a skeletal creature, with hollow sunken cheeks and sunken eyes that were hopelessly dulled. She hugged herself tightly, as if afraid, and looked at Baalberith as if she didn’t really believe that he was ever going to let her out. But he merely jotted a few things down in his book, he didn’t even look up.
“Checking out, I see. You can wait over there,” this time he did look up, and pointed his fountain pen accusingly at Amy. “Until Raziel gets here. He’ll take you both back to earth.” He blinked. His eyes were not in the best of condition, not at all like they had been when Amy first saw him. The white of one eye had turned completely yellow and bloodshot; the iris dulled and had lost all color. The other eye was shriveling in its socket, as if any moment it could fall right out. Or vanish altogether.
“I can’t see,” he muttered, rubbing his eyes. “I need a new pair of these. What ring did you say you were from?”
“Heather Sardis,” the soul repeated dully. “Category seven-“
“What ring, you ingrate?”
“-Middle ring,” the soul sighed.
Baalberith glared banefully and shook his head, then gestured irately for her to go stand by Amy. The soul drifted over obediently, keeping a respectful distance from the angel, not even looking up.
“Heather?” Amy asked gently. The soul slowly looked up, and tears glistened in it eyes.
“Once,” it replied, on the verge of crying.
“You don’t know me,” Amy was almost relieved. She didn’t know if she could ever bear Heather finding out how she had failed her. “My name is Amy.”
“You know mine,” The spirit replied dryly. “Though I find it strange to hear it again. They don’t call me by my name, there. It doesn’t matter there.”
“”What---“ Amy faltered, and glanced towards the gates. “What is it like?”
The soul burst into tears, releasing such a high keening wail that it would have split the ears of a softer mortal body.
“Pain!” it screamed. “Pain, pain, pain! There isn’t any relief! No, no, the only relief is the pain, it doesn’t end, it doesn’t end!” the spirit collapsed, its arms thrown defensively over its head, as if trying to drown out memories. Amy knelt down by the spirit and tried to gather it up in her arms, but what was once Heather twisted violently away, omitting a deep near bestial growl.
“What is it like?” the tears were back. “A nightmare, a nightmare. I keep dreaming of my mother. I keep dreaming that I’m at home in the bathtub and that it didn’t happen. That I didn’t succeed. There were angels… the fire…” more sobbing. “The fire – it burned me! It burned me…”
“I know,” Amy said gently, regretting having asked.
“I dream that it’s a normal day, and that I go back to school, and I am ok. And then I wake up and then it’s back there, where my feet grow into the soil and my toes spread roots, and my fingers spread and smallish twigs grow off them. The sky is dark with a small point of light and the crows land on my outstretched arms and peck at my eyes. And the pain feels good. The pain is the only relief. And I love the blood running down my face and I want more. I want more, and they don’t give it to me! They fly away and the demons weave in and out, there are lots of us, so many of us … they don’t help us, though. They are careful not to break a single thing. They love to see us suffer. Oh, how they love it!”
Amy threw her arms around the spirit’s shoulders and drew it close. Sobbing, shaking, it buried its face in Amy’s neck, unable to pull itself away. Exhausted, at the end of its rope. “Please, please, don’t send me back,” it wept. “I can’t go back, I don’t want to go back. Don’t make me go!” as it pleaded, it gripped the angel’s arms, nails digging into the perfect white flesh.
Why did Mephisto take her? Amy bit her lip and wondered, stroking the spirit’s hair. Why didn’t the Pilot angel get her? Purgatory is so much gentler… so much…
The girl didn’t deserve to suffer like this.
I am going to give her a second chance.
The woods fell completely silent. Even the shaking spirit in Amy’s arms went quiet. A great hush fell over the entire clearing as Amy glanced up to see what was going on. The spirits were no longer crying. The demons were no longer screeching. Baalberith’s pen was no longer scratching.
An angel, perfectly beautiful in contrast to its bleak surroundings, stood not far away at all from the entrance. In contrast to its background, its very aura was like white heat. The beautiful creature’s presence burned with goodness and light, and she recognized him on sight. Easily, from the heavy leather-bound tome he kept tucked under his arms, and she knew he kept with him always. It was a book he had spent eons compiling. A book that mortals referred to as the book of Enoch.
“Raziel!” she exclaimed, relieved to see him at last.
Raziel turned to face her, his expression grave as if chiseled from stone. He granted her the barest of nods. “Are you ready?” his voice was the very tune plucked from the strings of harps.
“Yes,” Amy said, standing. She pulled Heather’s spirit up with her.
“I know you know this already, but it’s procedure.” He raked his free hand through his flame red curls. “You know your role. As a guardian angel, you are not allowed to directly interfere with physical human activity. If your subject decides to say, slit her wrists for instance, you cannot pluck the knife from her hands and physically force her to stop.” This barb was directed at both spirit and angel, but only the angel winced.
“Also, you may give advice. Develop an intimate relationship with your subject and remember that you are working towards the purpose of the Almighty.” He held his chin high and glanced down at her in the way most mortals look at cockroaches. “Have you any questions?”
“No,” she breathed. She just wanted to get out. Get out of this miserable place.
“No one save Linda can see you, hear you, or even come to know your existence. Any violation of this law and you will be sent back here without a second thought. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Raziel!” Just get her out of here!
“I have a question,” Heather’s spirit interrupted softly. “What am I permitted to do?”
“As a spirit,” Raziel explained. “You can be seen or heard by anyone. But you can never manifest for long periods of time. You can only appear in places you have already been, and you cannot touch anything. You are completely insubstantial.”
“Can I possess people?” it asked, somewhat hopefully.
Baalberith cackled from his perch on the stool. “No, my dear, that’s my job!”
Raziel’s eye visibly twitched, but otherwise he ignored the Fallen. “Any more questions?”
“No,” Amy shook her head, and glanced at Heather’s spirit. It remained totally silent.
“Your deadline is until Linda’s time of death, chosen by either herself or the Almighty. We needn’t go over what will happen if her soul has not repented by then.”
Amy agreed.


Chapter Five: Guardian Angel

Raziel had arranged for Amy and Heather’s spirit to be ferried over the lake of souls. It was a single body of water that separated the dimensions of the living and the deceased. Of course, he had told them, it was a common enough way in. The thousands of tiny rowboats glided with graceful ease over the top of the water, which was completely flat and dark as tinted glass. Each possessed a glowing lantern lit from within by the active soul of its occupant. The boats only had room for one occupant, which was lay out flat on the bottom, arms crossed over its chest and all of its former worldly goods heaped around it. Whatever the family and friends piled into their coffins they carried with them as far as the other side of the lake, but there they were unburdened of both flesh and possessions. Once on the other side of the shore, the ferryman would take the lantern and break it. Once the soul was released and promptly seized by a waiting demon or Fallen, the ferryman would tap the boat with his foot, and it would sink into the sand, body and all.
Amy wondered vaguely if this was how Heather had gotten here. Had Mephistopheles had placed her soul in a little lantern and sent it over the water? Or had he dragged straight into the dark wood, as he had done with Amy?
The ferryman gestured silently for them. Amy took the spirit’s hand reassuringly and smiled. The spirit didn’t smile back. Merely, it stared out at the water with those hollow, haunted eyes. Every memory imprinted clearly in the worried curve of its mouth. Perhaps it had been here before.
The ferryman toed the sand, and from it the rowboat rose, dripping with sand and water, but otherwise ready for use. The corpse inside had long been disposed of, and only a few remnants of its worldly possessions were still there. Amy was the first to step into the boat. It rocked threateningly when she first stepped in, but once she got both feet in there and managed to sit down on the bottom, it remained still. Heather’s spirit was next. It shied away from the boat at first, but the ferryman pointed emphatically with one gleaming white bone finger. If it didn’t get on, it would be left behind, and taken straight back to the gates of hell.
With a gesture that Amy recognized as brave, the soul jumped into the boat. It rocked violently from side to side for a moment, then remained still, upright. The ferryman didn’t give them so much more than a nod as he placed his foot against the wood of the boat and shoved. Amy expected it to rock even more violently than before, possibly throwing them over this time. But the launch was perfectly smooth, and once they hit the water, it wasn’t like moving at all.
“It isn’t that terrible,” Amy whispered soothingly, trying to calm the spirit. “See?”
The spirit didn’t reply. It merely sat on the floor of the boat, its knees drawn up to its chest and dutifully ignoring the thousands of tiny spirit lanterns that surrounded them in the open, black water.
Without either of them lying down, there was just enough room for two. The boat continued to glide at the same pace. They were constantly surrounded by a thousand or more little boats, headed in the opposite direction.
Every now and then, the spirit would lift her head and glance over the side of the boat.
“What are you looking for?” Amy asked curiously.
“Anyone I know,” the spirit replied quietly.
Amy nodded her acceptance of this, and looked away.
“Who are you?” The spirit asked suddenly. “And why am I here? Why did you pull me out of that … place?” it shuddered at the very thought.
“Amy,” the angel replied. “I’ve told you.”
“Yes,” The spirit replied dryly. “But who are you, and why am I here?”
Amy couldn’t meet the spirit’s sorrowful eyes. She couldn’t bear it.
“You don’t know me. You never really knew me. I was in charge of you when you were in mortal earth. You might say I was your guardian angel.”
The spirit was stunned into a long, cursed silence that dragged on for an eternity.
“Did you ever know my father?” the spirit asked, some hours later.
“No,” Amy sighed. “I never even knew what he looked like.”
The spirit glared at Amy accusingly. “How can you be a guardian angel and not even know who my father was?”
“I was focused on other things,” Amy admitted. “Like helping you get by in school. I thought that if you did well in school then your mother would be happier, and you would be happier. And since your happiness was my main goal, that was where I put all my energy.”
“Ah, school,” the spirit sneered. “The bane of my wretched existence – that’s where I met Brandon, you know. I guess that’s where all your plans went spiraling downhill.”
“I thought Brandon was good for you,” Amy admitted quietly.
“Until he hit me?” the spirit goaded. “Was it the first, or second time around that maybe changed your mind? Or was it when the pregnancy tests came back positive that you decided that?”
“The what?” Amy asked, completely shocked. “The what came back what?”
“You’re the worst guardian angel ever.” The spirit snorted. “So there is something else you didn’t know. Yes, I was pregnant when I had my little … accident.”
“You … never … said anything,” Amy faltered, staring at the spirit in disbelief. “Not to your mother, not to The Almighty…”
“Do you think either of them were listening?” the spirit snapped. As soon as it spoke, its features slackened, as with defeat, and it sighed. “Neither God nor mother cared too much about what I wanted, or what was going on in my life. God had better things to do. Mother couldn’t support a goldfish much less an extra human in the house. I didn’t know how to tell her … I didn’t want an abortion.”
“So you killed yourself…” Amy shook her head, and looked at Heather’s spirit sadly. “Heather, did you really want to die?”
The spirit bit its lip, and shook its head, closing its eyes and pressed its forehead against its knees. “No,” the answer was barely audible. “I just wanted mom to notice me.”
“I failed you,” the tears sprung to Amy’s eyes. “Can you ever forgive me for it?”
“No,” Heather’s spirit spoke through clenched teeth. “I can never, ever forgive you. Not after that, not after you failed.”
It was like an icy dagger had been plunged straight through Amy’s chest. Forgiveness was one of the most important things in the universe, it was one of the values that the world revolved around. The Almighty weighed forgiveness and love on the same scale. That was why she was here, after all! If he didn’t temper justice so well with mercy, she would be in her own little hell and would never have had a second chance.
Neither of them spoke to each other any further for the remainder of the trip.
Eventually, they banked. Their boat hit land and barely gave them a second to remove themselves before it sank back into the sand. Had they been of more substantial flesh and blood, they might have been pulled over. As it was, they went unscathed.
The gloriously beautiful Pilot angel was waiting for them on the other side. Even as he approached them, a procession followed his path, bearing a body on top of a heavy stone slab with many hooded men following behind, each bearing some sort of earthly treasure. The procession made a beeline for the abandoned boat, and Amy stepped aside obligingly so as not to be in their way.
“Welcome back, Amy.” The Pilot angel greeted her. His voice was deep, rich, throbbing, and dark.
“It’s so good to be back,” Amy breathed. She could sense that they were nearly upon the mortal universe. It pollution hung hot and heavy in the air. Not simply the toxins and the chemicals and the smoke, but also the sins, the emotions, the fleshly odors and the smell of decay. All of them slowly dying, their bodies slowly decaying over time, and they could not even know.
The Pilot angel nodded and glanced at Heather’s spirit. He regretted not getting to her in time. There was nothing he could do about it now.
“Where to?” He finally asked, tearing his gaze away. “The Almighty has given me express orders to drop you off wherever you need to be.”
Amy had a few ideas. But before she could express any of them, Heather’s spirit interjected.
“Home,” it said. “I would like to see my home.”
“It has changed,” The Pilot angel warned. “It’s been several weeks since your death. And your mother doesn’t live there anymore.” The bird of God didn’t believe in mincing words.
“Still,” Heather’s spirit said unflinchingly. “I would like to see it. I don’t even have to go any further than that. You can just leave me there. I don’t want to see my mother anyway, I don’t know what I’d do if I did see her.”
Amy looked at the Pilot angel helplessly. He just shrugged, indicating it was her battle. The spirit looked from one to the other challengingly, as if daring either of them to say ‘no’. Finally, the Pilot angel gave in.
“I’ve no objection,” he was used to humoring the dead. “Amy can go see Linda when you’re finished. I care not.”
Heather’s spirit clenched its jaw and nodded, going up to the grip the Pilot angel’s hand. Amy sighed and went up to grip his other hand. They were surprisingly soft. From a distance, he appeared to be carved out of marble. Up close, he was soft and amazingly warm.
Moments later, a searing pain shot from her abdomen to her head, and she screamed as he pushed them through the fine lining that kept the two dimensions separate.


Chapter Six: Paradise Lost

It had been mere hours since her brother had been pronounced dead. The body had been discovered in his bedroom. The door had been locked, but Marianne’s father had a master key to all the locks in the house. Everyone knew that. Marianne knew nothing beyond that when her father attempted to wake her brother up he discovered that the boy was quite dead. He had been twenty-two. They didn’t tell her anything beyond, “Your brother is in hell now, he was given life and he abused it. Let us all keep this moment as a reminder that none of us are immortal. And death comes too quickly, even to the young.” Her father’s striking green eyes fell on her, his thin withered lips pulled into a disapproving line. “You could be next. What is to exclude you, child? Look well on that corpse and put yourself in its place. That could be you. Make your peace with God now, you might not get another chance.” And then he walked away.
She was seven years old.
Her father was the only pastor in the small town, and he would not preside over the funeral. Her mother, who was a worshipper of men and a strong believer of males leading the household, did not disagree or try to persuade him otherwise. Her brother was buried quietly and with little ceremony. Only his friends mourned for him. His family was forbidden to shed a tear.
And Marianne did not. Not once in her life did she ever shed a tear for her dear, dead brother. He was a sinner, he deserved his fate, was her path of reasoning. She had taken a look at the corpse only once. How tired he looked, how distressed. The worry lines were etched deep into his forehead and around his mouth. His face was set like stone, his skin had turned ashen. How worn he looked, and sad. How very much he no longer resembled Mark.
She didn’t know he had committed suicide until his friends told her at the funeral. They pulled up the sleeves to his suit jacket and displayed the ugly red scars running up the length of his arm. Not just one, but many, and deep. They had been sewn shut by the mortician, but even he could not hide the fact that her brother had died a long and painful death.
“Suicide,” his best friend, Brian, said disgustedly. “Look what your fucked up parents have done to him. This is their fault. He hated them, he beat himself up for it, and now he’s dead, and it’s their fault!”
Marianne didn’t believe him for a second. She had run away then, hiding behind an old tractor. She curled up, bringing her knees to her chest and burying her face. Her parents were not … whatever that word was that Brian had said. They loved her… or maybe ‘love’ wasn’t the right word. They cared for her. They certainly cared enough to warn her against the dangers of allowing oneself to succumb to temptation.
After Mark died, they didn’t have any other children save her. So all of their energy was directed towards purifying her soul. She was a perfect child up until she turned fourteen. When she hit that one rebellious year, her father took a rod – a literal rod – and switched her legs, shouting the entire time and threatening to have her exorcised. It scared her enough that she never talked back again, and the welts on her legs the next day were humiliating enough that she never strayed again from the righteous past.
“Spare the rod, spoil the child.” She could remember her father saying very clearly with each hit. The rod smacked soundly into her flesh, and was accompanied by a sob. “Spare the rod, spoil the child. Spare the rod, spoil the child. Spare the rod, spoil the child!” over and over, like an incantation.
But she learned, by the time that she was seventeen and had met Arthur, she knew how a woman should behave. Arthur was the kind of man who needed a leader, he wasn’t the kind of personality that could figure things out on his own. He was very needy, and needed someone in his life to take care of him. Marianne was the woman he needed, for she had a very strong character. No beating could take that out of her. But she hid it so very well. She supported him no matter how bad a decision she felt he was making, and she stuck to him when the results came out exactly as she predicted they would. He should have been grateful to her. But then he had to go out and have an affair… with that… that… whore…
It didn’t matter what you called them. All women who would sell their virtue even to one man before marriage was marked a whore in Marianne’s mind. And this woman was certainly a whore. She dressed like one, even. With mini skirts and high heels, tank tops and a flirtatious grin that the elderly woman so loathed. She remembered everything about that girl, down to how all her teeth were even, and her hair was dyed flaming red. Color like that just wasn’t God-given.
And the she had the gall to carry his child, when Marianne had not even given birth to one living baby yet herself. And then the woman tried to demand child support. Arthur refused to pay, but Marianne urged him to do it, just to avoid further scandal and court visits.
She had taken her feelings to a confession box months later. She had broken down crying. She wanted to die, she didn’t want Arthur anymore, he clearly didn’t want her. And oh, how terrible it all felt -! The priest comforted her. He said that God had forgiven Arthur already, if Arthur was truly repentant. He urged Marianne to do the same. But Marianne could not, would not, forgive her husband. Not after that. It was too much for her to bear.
Two years after the bastard child had come into the picture, Linda was born…

The string of memories stopped there. Marianne forced them to halt. She could not bear for them to go any further than that joyous day in the hospital when the doctors announced that the baby was happy, healthy, and alive. Marianne always stopped her memories right at that point. It was the last time she remembered being truly happy.
It was also the last time that she remember Arthur saying “I love you” and meaning it. Of course, he said it plenty of times afterwards, but it always sounded so hollow. He said it one last time in his tear-stained pitifully written suicide note. Even then, Marianne did not believe him. If he had really loved her, then why did he placed the mouth of the gun between his teeth and pull the trigger? Did he ever stop to think for one minute of what it must have been like for her to walk upstairs after hearing the gunshot and discovering his mangled body? The blood on the floor, the blood on the desk, the blood on the very walls…
Her entire world had been painted red that very evening. And all she could think for a long time was, “Hell, my husband is in hell. My dear, beloved Arthur who I loved so much is suffering eternal torment in hell. The penalty for taking his own life. My Arthur!”
And it was Linda’s fault. If Linda hadn’t announced her pregnancy, if she hadn’t been stupid enough, sinful enough to get pregnant out of wedlock in the first place- perhaps it wouldn’t have happened.
And Marianne still hadn’t forgiven him.
There were even nights when she thought she could remember seeing someone standing by Arthur’s body at the time of his death. It was impossible, of course, an illusion conjured up by the state of hysteria. But at the time it was so real, so very tangible, that she couldn’t help but be a little afraid.
Evil, pure evil, that was the impression she immediately received. The stranger was the most absolutely beautiful man she had ever seen in her life. He wore flowing white robes, similar to those of fancifully painted Roman attire. It slipped off of one shoulder, and clipped over the other with a gold pin in the shape of a twisting serpent. He had black hair that tumbled over his shoulders in glossy ebony waves. His eyes were this deep, striking azure, that lured her in and held her there. It was amazing what tiny details she could recall even after fifteen years.
And he had just smiled at her. His crimson lips curved in a perfect bow. He did not move, his expression did not change, but it was his eyes that said it all. They spoke so forcefully that she could have sworn she heard a voice whispering close to her ear, “He is dead, now, he is mine. By no one’s fault but his own.”
Marianne bit her lip and jabbed the needle through the delicate bit of muslin. Her embroidery suffered when these memories resurfaced. Everything and everyone around her suffered. Their suffering was nothing, however, in comparison to her own inner turmoil. Everyone else’s suffering was a pittance.
With a shiver, Marianne brushed the chilling memory aside. Memories hurt like the devil. She hated them, she hated with a fiery passion.
Fiery as the color of that teenage whore’s hair.
Furiously, Marianne scrapped the piece of muslin and put a new piece in her embroidery hoop. She would have to start all over again.


Chapter Seven: Ghost

It was like being sixteen all over again. Linda clutched the neck of the bottle in her hands as she recalled with a hint of disgust the good old days. It was hard being a preacher’s kid. Everyone expected you to be perfect. Everyone expected you to always have the answer, to always be on time, to make straight A’s – to turn your nose up to the offer of drugs, cigarettes, or liquor. Everyone always expected you to be on tops of things. Good and holy, an example to all of those around you. Deep down inside, Linda knew that it was all crap. Her parents held on to each other with an iron grip, even though they loathed every minute basking in each other’s presence. There was nothing good or holy about their marriage. She had noticed that her father kept a small tin flask in his suit jacket pocket that he would lift to his lips every now and again, mostly after a brief exchange with his loving wife. Marianne always told her daughter that it was his medication. It wasn’t until a similar flask had been presented to her when she was fifteen by her best friend Laurie did she have some idea of its contents.
And then of course, it was nothing like the day when Marianne had found the cigarettes that her daughter kept hidden in a drawer. She had shown them to Arthur immediately, and the two had gotten into a screaming match, which ended up with them simultaneously screaming at Linda. Her father had taken his belt and thrown her over his knee. Never mind she was sixteen. He began thwacking her well – screaming at her, her mother echoing his words.
“Sinner! Wretch!”
Linda tilted her head back and allowed the sweet almond flavored liquid to burn its way down her throat. It warmed her insides and tickled her throat, but it did little to dull the pain. She had driven her car all the way to the liquor store and now sat in the driveway of her old trailer, where she stared at the house with a strange sort of detachment. It didn’t even look like her home anymore. It was empty, dead. Devoid of anything that had ever given it life. After all, Heather wasn’t there anymore. And the absence of Heather was just the absence of … any reason for living.
That was the only reason she hadn’t killed herself when Keith left her, wasn’t it? The idea of a child – his child – to raise as her own and love. To create the family that she never had but always longed for. Every prospect of that gone now - vanished. She would never marry, and she was not going to risk having anymore children. Besides, Marianne would have a fit and Linda would be out of a place to live. They were going to haul the trailer away in a few weeks, and even if they didn’t, she couldn’t move back in. Even if the entire interior had been ripped away and restored she could still not live in the place where her daughter had taken her own life.
She sat in the driveway for an hour or two more, never quite draining the last bit of liquor from the bottle.


The linoleum was sticky underneath her hands. The whole trailer was different from what Heather remembered it. It seemed smaller, more cramped. Sadder, too, sagging as if deflated .It leaned in heavily against its foundation as if any moment it could crumble in on itself just break into pieces. She wondered if angels saw it differently, but she wouldn’t dare ask such a stupid question allowed. Amy’s nostrils flared and her perfect features twisted into something like disgust, but Heather ignored the look. She stood up, wiping the blood off on her clothes. The Pilot angel had completely disappeared. It was just her and Amy now. Joy of joys, she thought sarcastically. It is me and the stupidest guardian angel to ever exist.
The woman hadn’t even known her target (victim, whatever they called the people they guarded) was pregnant at the time of death. How bad of an angel did you have to be? There was a good reason for Mephistopheles dragging her to hell. Heather wished scornfully that Amy had just stayed there in the first place. Once this entire ordeal was over she hoped she wouldn’t have to see feather or hair of the blonde creature again.
She couldn’t stand to be in the bathroom for more than a few minutes. They had cleared the body away, but there the stench of death still hung heavily in the air, thick enough to choke on. Heather slipped through the wood of the closed door – an odd sensation – and into the hall. Amy followed quietly, respectfully allowing Heather to explore one her own time. If Heather wanted conversation, she would initiate it. Right now this was her time. She had been given what she wanted and she only had so long to remain.
Turning sharply, she walked a brisk few feet to the door to her old room. She touched the wood gently, but her hand went right through it. She sighed. The key was kept under the corner of the old hall rug, but her mother hadn’t known that. Her mom didn’t know much of anything. Heather closed her eyes and plunged through the wood of the door. It was much more unpleasant to do the second time around.
Her room had been left entirely in disarray. She blushed at the very idea that anyone might have seen what a state she left it in, but at the moment, it didn’t matter. There was only one thing she was searching for.
She hunted for a while, and finally remembered that she had placed the object of her desire inside a pillowcase. She grinned in triumph and turned around to search and find. Her hands went through not only the pillow but the bed as well. Heather gritted her teeth and tried again, with the same results. Now she was just getting frustrated.
She even tried to imitate Patrick Swayze off of Ghost, but that had about as much affect as the first two attempts. Frustrated, she let out a little scream, but she couldn’t do a thing to relieve her anger. She buried her face in her hands and tried not to burst into tears.
Gently, Amy reached into the pillowcase. Her fingers searched for a moment and then finally closed around the cracked spine of a notebook. Withdrawing it from the pillowcase, she held it up in the air and looked at Heather. “Heather,” she said gently. “Is this what you’re looking for?”
Heather looked up and sniffed, nodding. “Yes.” She said. And then, sorrowfully, “I can’t hold it.”
“I’ll hold it for you,” Amy said softly. “What do you want to read from it?”
“All of it,” Heather said immediately. “I want to read all of it.”
Amy nodded and opened the journal, allowing it to fall open on its own. “Anywhere in particular?”
“I don’t care,” Heather said. “Just read.”
Amy glanced down at the page it had fallen open to. It was dated just a few weeks before Heather had died.

Worst fucking day of my life. I can’t even begin to say how much I fucking hate this day. The pregnancy test came back positive, just in case anyone is interested, which I know no one is. I hate myself. How could I let this happen? I hate Brandon. How could he do this to me? And I hate my mother. She doesn’t give a damn what happens to me! I want to die. I want to die, I just want it all to end. I want to take a knife and stab myself. I want to take a gun and put it to my head and then pull the trigger. My mother said her father did that when she was only seventeen. When he learned she was pregnant with me he took a rifle to his head and blew his brains out. Haha, I can imagine what that would be like. Not even a minute of pain, especially if you aimed it the right way. God, I want to fucking die!

Amy cringed inwardly as she read the passage aloud. She searched for any change in Heather’s features, but there were none. She licked her lips and turned the page. “Do you want me to keep reading?”
Heather didn’t say a thing. The angel took it to be a ‘yes’.

No one understands what I’m going through. How could anyone possibly understand-

“Stop,” Heather said. “Don’t read anymore.”
Amy obligingly stopped reading. She held the book open in both hands, its writing filled pages lay bare for the world to see. Heather stared at it for a minute, and then recoiled, as if it were going to attack her.
“Close it!” she barked sharply, as if commanding Amy to do so. Sighing, Amy shut the book and tossed it onto the bed. Heather glared at the book for all she was worth, and then her features softened back to sadness. She looked at Amy and shook her head.
“You need to go find mom,” she said, running a hand through her hair. “That is your assignment after all.”
“After I find where your mom is I will come back for,” Amy promised. “You will be fine here by yourself?”
“I can’t get hurt,” Heather replied with a bitter laugh. “I’ll be fine. And besides,” she added with a note of bitterness. “Won’t God protect me?”

To Be Continued...

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Tag der Veröffentlichung: 23.03.2010

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