Architecti
It’s been weeks.
And all I’ve learnt is that the mortal world is odd.
The air is heavier than in the Celestial Realm but cooler than in the underworld.
It sticks to you sometimes, wet and dewy.
And sometimes it clouds and mists, appearing thick and billowy when really it’s wispy and thin.
The days are short and the nights long. Such a strange place this mortal realm.
There are rumours that a monster is dwelling in the dark recesses of parks.
Which is why I find myself alone on a large green.
It’s safer in open spaces, too. There’s more time for me to clock any danger and disappear.
I lost Interitus shortly after I chased after her through the tear in the Veil to the mortal realm.
Ora City seems to be aware of our presence. Like we’re thorns in clothes or static in the walls. Angels were always welcome in this realm, but not like this—not fallen.
Sometimes I think I find her. A shadow at the edge of a street or her wings in my periphery.
I struggle to go out in the day as I haven’t quite mastered control of hiding my wings. She must have to be so undetectable. Either she has found a way to retract them for longer periods than I can, or she’s used a glamour the way the fae do to change their faces.
I keep to the night and only go out on the evenings when I convince my wings to hide themselves. It’s uncomfortable and I dislike it. Makes my spine itch and a wriggling sensation thrive like maggots in my veins.
“What are you?” a soft voice says from behind me.
I startle. And it makes my wings pop out. “Shit.”
She gasps her hand covering her mouth. “You’re an angel.”
“I was. I fell.”
She winces and says, “You still look like one to me.”
Her voice is timid, a gentle thing that needs to be kept safe.
Her appearance is pale and willowy. I suspect she’s in her mid to late thirties, though her porcelain skin makes her appear younger.
She carries an age with her, like her soul is full of memories.
Her soft demeanour and dark hair stark against her pale skin and quiet words.
She reminds me of glass and things that break. The type of beauty that you pray is eternal while recognising things that poetic never last long.
I edge away but my heart inches forward.
“Wait. Don’t go. I’m not mortal either.” She pushes her long dark hair away from her face and two horny nubs appear on her scalp. “I was here making a deal, an interesting one as it happens. A resident from Nefari City made their way here.”
She’s clearly a friendly demon, but of no use to me. I leave, but her voice halts me.
“Are you okay?” she says.
It’s the warmth in her words that makes me crack. I haven’t spoken to another being in weeks, and I crave the closeness of connection. What harm can asking for help do? It’s not like I’ll see her again.
“I’m looking for another… like me,” I say, staring at her horns. I’ve never seen a demon in real life. Only in the books the Celestial Library contains that taught us about the mortals and the demons.
I find myself suddenly closer, peering at her nubs. She smiles and tilts her head forward to give me easier access.
My wings shiver back into place as I calm down.
“You seek another angel?” she asks, bright yellow eyes staring so far into me that it makes my soul quiver.
“A fallen one.”
She tilts her head, her eyes travelling down my body as if disrobing me. It makes my insides heat. “What do your kind eat?” she says.
I frown. “What a strange question.”
“Do you eat mortals?”
The furrow between my brows deepens into a crevice. “I certainly do not.”
“What would happen if you did?” She brushes her hair back into place, hiding her horns as if she should be ashamed of them. It makes me want to reach out and scoop her hair up to display them. I swallow the urge; it makes my fingers tingle.
My mind flashes to the day we entered this realm. I swallow hard, my heart dropping. Interitus ate a shade.
“You’re talking about shades? Dead mortals, yes?”
But she shakes her head. “There are many rumours circling the city. Mortals are having their souls stolen.”
I clasp a hand to my mouth, having to suppress the urge to vomit. “Show me,” I say. Interitus wouldn’t go that far. It has to be a mistake.
She takes hold of my hand. The sudden warmth glistens between us and makes a surge of adrenaline kick around my tummy. She weaves me through the park’s ancient trees and scruffy shrubs.
“The name’s Gellara,” she says as we head towards the heart of the city.
“Architecti,” I reply and the fluttering knot in my belly bloats.
The city is darker than I expected. The low lamp lights create an orange hue that burns like sunsets over oceans.
It creates a lie. Makes the streets appear warm when really, the air is frigid against my skin. Gellara edges closer to me, whether to share my heat or because she is feeling the same frisson of electricity between us, I’m not sure.
But I don’t push her away.
She natters away about a project she’s campaigning the seven devils on. She wants to make contract terms more favourable to humans.
“They don’t stand a chance really, not once they agree. And I just don’t think that’s fair. Everyone should be given a chance to change their fate and repay their debts, don’t you think?”
That makes me falter. Do I think humans should be allowed to change their fate? I’m not sure I do. It invalidates the concept of control and destiny in the first place.
And yet, she’s right. We all should be given a chance to repay our debts fairly.
“The system isn’t fair. It’s not set up to be, and I think that should change.”
I smile at her. After so long with only my sister’s awful ways for company, I cherish her closeness, the passion she displays while talking about her mission and all the demons she’s working with.
Funny, I didn’t think angels were supposed to be friends with demons. But as she chats, I find myself taken with the way her mind works and the challenge that is providing me in contrast to my sister’s ways.
Gellara takes my hand again as we creep through city streets. Where her palm meets mine, static pops and zings. I like it but somewhere deep in my mind I know it’s wrong.
Or at least, that’s what Celestial society would tell me.
“There, look…” Gellara whispers.
I glance in the direction she’s pointing and my heart plummets. Hovering in the air are the fragments of a soul.
Half eaten.
Shredded.
Unable to heal.
There’s no corpse, which means I continue to hold hope that she can be saved. The air stinks like necrotic skin only fouler. Souls aren’t meant to decay. Hints of stale fish, old coffee and sulphur drift around me.
“Oh,” I lean forward and gag. Gellara rubs my back, but nothing comes out. Just the hideous sound of dry retching.
When I steady myself, a fundamental piece of me has broken.
“Why… why in heavens would she do this?” I whisper.
“What does she want?” Gellara asks.
“To change our world forever. Destroy fate. Create a new system where free will reigns.”
“Then she would need an awful lot of power to do that. Souls are sources of power. If she had one pure enough it might suffice, but without that, I suppose if she ate enough of the mortal ones, she may garner sufficient energy for what she’s trying to do.”
I blink at Gellara. She has so many words, so many thoughts. She’s clinical about this, sticking to the facts when this feels anything but objective. What she says lodges in my mind, though. I lock it away for later.
The shreds of soul drift on the wind. They glint translucent, almost pearlescent. Magnificent, but equally gory. The tips of the pieces are frayed and stained bloody pink. Whoever that poor soul was will never be able to return. They will never resurrect, never rest.
Gone.
Lost to whatever hideous plan Interitus has to destroy our world.
Gellara tugs my hand and leads me down another alley in silence as the weight of what Interitus has done settles on me. Surely, Interitus will be damaging her own soul behaving like this, or whatever angelic parts remain, at least.
Gellara goes rigid.
“Wh—” I start, but her hand slams over my mouth, silencing me.
She points around the corner of the next street and into another park. It’s a huge open space lined with trees that lead into a forest. In the tree line, a figure is crouched over a mortal body that is unnaturally still.
I prey to the angels it’s not Interitus and she hasn’t killed a human. I shake my head. Of course she wouldn’t.
My throat thickens; a bitter lump makes it hard to swallow.
The figure turns and my world falls apart.
It’s her, my sister.
The sound Interitus makes while consuming the soul is disgusting. It’s a shrill scream punctuated by slurps and moans of pleasure ringing around the park. The squelching sets my teeth on edge. Last, comes the scraping of metal against metal as the soul’s fibres are shredded.
My nose wrinkles at the sight of Interitus’s maw hoovering the translucent pieces up.
Her body lifts from the floor, wings fluttering as she glows like the sun on the brightest winter morning.
All I see is destruction.
She hovers there, bold, macabre and regal, embodying the angel she’s meant to be. And it makes every ounce of my heart ache.
How far she has fallen.
I can’t save her.
I can never save her.
An alarm shrieks out and the park’s field floods with officials and demons.
“STOP THERE. HALT,” an enormous demon shouts.
Gellara tugs me into the shadows.
Interitus freezes, her eyes narrowing. And from across the field, I swear she notices me. Our eyes lock for the briefest moment, her mouth curls into a sneer and then the shadows move.
I should have been quicker. Should have known what she was going to do.
Used my light to counteract her attacks.
But I stand, astonished, as she carves and tugs on shadows.
She wraps the absence of light around her, reshaping her face and bones in subtle ways until just enough of her is glamoured and what stares back at me, isn’t her anymore.
It’s me.
“Oh gods, she’s your twin…” Gellara says.
“Yes. And now the mortals and demons will think it’s me stealing souls.”
Gellara shoves me. “Run. Go. Before they find us.”
But I’m transfixed as Interitus leaps into the air, mist coiling around her figure, showing just enough of her body to look exactly like me. And then she flies, flies, flies, leaving me to take the blame for her ruinous actions.