Chapter 2 #2
The throbbing discomfort in my chest became debilitating in less than a breath, and I dropped to one knee.
Haneul was there immediately. “Can you walk, Feather?” I held up one finger, unable to speak.
Her voice was calm, but a thread of panic was buried in her tone.
“You understand why there’s so much pain? ”
The breath I took to answer felt like razors inside my lungs, but her expression was worth it. “Gavriel… the… Goatfudger. Leader of… Loserville. Soulmate of Suck. Goddess has a mean streak.” I began to fall sideways.
Haneul sang in High Angelic as she scooped me up and carried me the rest of the way to the gate. I felt a pulse of sadness, a sense of farewell.
“Wait,” I rasped. “What’s wrong?” Wasn’t she going through after me?
She smiled tightly. “Oh, nothing. It’s just, I’ve always been a bit of an explorer at heart. I enjoyed my trip outside the Celestial Realm. Becoming a Celestial Messenger was the only way I could ever leave and return, though, so I jumped at the chance.”
“You can only enter this gate once?” Something about that bothered me.
“Yes. Messengers are given an extra share of Celestial soulfire that works as a sort of key, activated by the gate itself as I re-enter.” She pressed a hand to her abdomen. “It’s heavy to carry, but it’s the only way the gate will recognize me and allow me to come home.”
“Why not go for a quick joyride around the place first?” I suggested, nodding my head at the void beyond the cloud edge.
“If you only get one field trip, you should make it worthwhile.” She leaned close, and I whispered, “Go to Las Vegas. Trust me, every High Angelus should visit Sin City at least once.”
“Don’t tell Imriel that,” she muttered. “He’ll have a conniption.”
“Imriel? Who’s that? Does he have a stick up his ash?”
“He’s the Choir Leader, Feather.” She looked properly horrified, even though she was snort-laughing. “The head of the realm.”
“Hmmm, Choir Leader. So what you’re saying is it’s a conductor’s baton wedged in his rectum. I get it.”
She laughed so hard she almost dropped me, then hugged me close. “I’m not sure the realm is ready for you, my friend.” Lowering me to my feet, she set my hand against the bar.
My fingers trembled with weariness and fear. I was already in so much pain; I didn’t think I could handle more. “What will it feel like?”
“Like coming home, Feather,” she crooned, already humming her own name song. “You are home, most beautiful sacrifice. Home at last.”
Home. I tried not to sigh at her confident assertion. It wasn’t anything I’d felt in all my lives, though my time in Sanctuary had come close—once I’d met Sunny and Mikhail, and Righteous. Perception, Truth, and Hope. Then it began to feel like it might be where I belonged.
Maybe, after everyone I loved got here, I would start to believe I really did have a home.
Like Heaven was the right place for a smutty, beaten-up scrap like me.
I began to sing my name, each note like dragging an anchor through mud.
At the end of the final note—those extra few hateful words added in—the door-gate opened, and I was blinded temporarily.
When I blinked, the space I stood in was still empty, but the new clouds were blue-ish. And the pain in my chest had subsided considerably. Were my mates nearby?
I shouted out, “Growly? Anaconda Pants? Birch? Anyone?”
No one answered, and I realized I was between realms, somehow. No one else was here. No one but… the clouds roiled around me. Daughter? The voice from the void filled the skies with sudden music, followed by an unimaginably vast silence.
I remembered the message I had for Her. “Your son, Revel, asked me to tell you he misses you.” An immense wave of sorrow threatened to swamp me.
I struggled to think of what to say—had I made the Singer of All Songs sad?
I couldn’t bear the thought, so I opened my mind, trying to remember everything I could about the Great Gate in Sanctuary.
How he looked, and the crazy pictures that played over his surface.
Every inappropriate comment I’d made. How I’d teased Mikhail and Righteous about the gate’s thick columns, and the midnight picnics I’d had at his base.
The moment when Haneul had started counting how many golden figures on his surface were physically merging.
How he’d winked at me the first time I’d seen him.
In my thoughts, I dressed the gate up in a sparkling, glitter-covered t-shirt that read I have a gate kink.
The wave of sadness ebbed, and the world suddenly spun, as if everything flipped around 360 degrees.
I shook the dizziness away as a chorus of joyful trumpets started up. Right next to my ear.
“Crap on a crabcake, that’s loud.” My ears ringing, I sent up a prayer of thankfulness that I had been able to ease Her pain.
The trumpets grew quieter, and the voice spoke again, this time filled with a mixture of joy, surprise, and tears. Your first thought in this realm was of Me. Caring for Me. Concern for My heart. Oh, daughter, you may yet save them all.
I felt an embrace, like being smothered by a million down pillows all at once, and then the presence was gone. I took a step toward where She had gone. “Singer? Goddess, is that You?”
A honey-soaked voice, made of laughter, answered, “I’ve been called many things, little one, but not those.
’’ Slowly, a form coalesced in the fog. It was a tall, ebony-skinned Celestial, gloriously naked except for a large white sack strapped over her shoulder.
She had eyes that glimmered like the night skies on Earth, and a smile as soft as moonlight.
“I am Sabriel,” she said. “One of the First Children. I am also known as the Healer here in the Celestial Realm. I have your gifts here.”
“Gifts?” I blinked away sudden tears. “For me?” She held out one hand, and I lifted my own to take what she offered.
It was long and bright pink, with lighted circles on a control panel down one side. If I didn’t know better, I would have said it was an impressively girthy, vibrating dildo. But that would be…
“You’ve entered what you call Heaven in your thoughts, young one,” Sabriel said, using her nimble fingers to switch the vibrating feature on. “Of course there are rechargeable vibrators.”
My mouth dropped open, but I just stood there holding the buzzing sex toy in one hand.
Though it really needed two hands, if I was ever going to use it successfully.
“It’s perfect,” I whispered, my voice raspy with emotion.
I switched it off, giving it a loving pat.
“Does everyone get a dildo when they come here?”
Her breath against my ear gave me chills as she leaned forward to murmur, “Everyone gets exactly what they need to help them understand that they’ve arrived at the Fields of Joy.
” She reached into her bag, which I noticed was now squirming, and lifted out something else.
“Most only need one gift. Apparently, you required two.” She smiled, her hands full.
“For you, Feather, though something tells me this gift is more of a responsibility.”
Sabriel looked at my sudden tears with alarm, but I couldn’t stop crying.
“A puppy for me?” The wriggling white bundle was a mass of soft ears, wrinkles, and floppy paws large enough to make it obvious this little guy was going to grow into something Shetland-pony sized.
Or bigger. “What’s your name, little fella? ”
“Well, we sure as shizz aren’t going to let you name him, birch.” The voice hit my ears about a second before Sunny’s arms wrapped around me, squeezing me as tightly as possible. “You’d probably call him something pornographic.”
“Almost definitely,” I agreed, hugging her back just as hard. The movement made the vibrator in my hand come to life, and she jumped back.
Sunny’s dark eyes got even wider, and she slapped a hand over her mouth, her curls bouncing. “Feather, hide that! How did you even get a vibe into this place?”
I gestured to my entirely naked body. “Hide it? Where?” Our eyes met, and we broke into peals of laughter as we both thought the same perverted thought. “I’ll ask Righteous to hide it for me,” I wheezed, as the man in question came anaconda-bobbing through the clouds.
“Hide what?” he asked as he landed beside me, his eyes on the puppy.
“What a perfect little fellow.” Tucking a small leather bag under his arm, he scooped the puppy up, over my protests.
“Who’s the prettiest pup in the whole realm?
It’s you. Yes, it’s you, little wrinkle ball.
” He spoke in perfect babytalk, and my angelic ovaries almost exploded when the puppy licked his cheek and he kissed it right back.
“What did you get, Ry?” I asked, rubbing up against his waist with my free hand just enough to get his attention.
Then I rubbed a little more, for good luck, and also because his skin felt super silky.
Had they given him a bunch of moisturizer as a welcome gift or something?
He was supple. Even his legs felt softer, shinier…
Sunny stuck two fingers in her mouth and let out a shrill whistle. “Ew. Hands off the soulmates until I’m not around,” she complained.
Righteous scratched the puppy’s chin, who was now gnawing at one of his wing feathers, and shrugged. “The only thing I needed besides you, my love.” He held up the small bag, which I recognized instantly.
It held the ancient rose petals I’d picked for him in my first life on Earth, when I had been Tili and he Ashtad. Back when we had been friends, before we were old enough to even think about romantic love.
“The rose petals?” I swiped at my cheeks as he smiled, his heart shining in his eyes.
“They’re all I wanted. What did you receive?” he asked, eyeing my hot pink present.
I ignored the question, still teary-eyed. “I need a handkerchief. Or a tissue. A sleeve, even. Do we really get no clothes?”