Chapter 12
One Aeon Pre-Great War
For the second half of his Council tour, Hadri led Luc out of the Artisanal Chamber, out of the Great Hall and over to the Library.
Luc had spent the better part of his existence in this building, outside of the Lessons Hall and the dormitories, and he relaxed as they entered the main reading hall and its familiar comforts: the white and gold bench next to one window where he’d tucked himself away with news of the latest architectural advancements; the spot at one long marble table where he’d worked on his sketches and researched topics for his lessons; and the section of shelves he’d revisited so many times that he’d memorized the positions of all the scrolls and knew immediately if something new had been added.
Glancing at the shelves as they passed, he saw that something new had been added and made a mental note to check it out later.
Retrieving his architect pin from his pocket, Hadri showed Luc how to open the hidden door that led to the architect common room before noticing that Luc’s own pin was missing.
And just like that, Luc tensed again.
His pin. Lila.
Damn.
“I lost it during the celebration,” Luc said without thinking.
“I thought you left early.”
Luc paled, unused to being caught in a falsehood.
“Oh…I…”
Hadri raised an eyebrow.
“I must have lost it…going back to the dormitories,” Luc noted with so much awkwardness that Hadri surely saw through him. If the twinkle in his eye was any indication, he did see through him. He spoke, and there was no doubt.
“You know, I thought you’d be more excited on such an occasion. What’s happened?”
“Nothing.”
Hadri frowned.
“I can’t tell you,” Luc tried. It wasn’t a lie. Not only did Luc not want to discuss Lila; he literally could not without risking an inquiry.
“Hmm…then let me guess. Matters of the heart?”
Luc opened his mouth to deny it but found himself sighing and looking away instead.
“This angel is your muse, perhaps?” Hadri asked.
“She’s not my muse,” Luc grumbled, staring at a section of scrolls on herbology. He tried to imagine Lila sitting still while he painted her; he could not.
“Then, perhaps, you are hers.” Hadri laughed pleasantly.
Doubtful. Luc shot him a look.
“Right then. Don’t worry. We’ll get you a new pin before the next Council meeting. Right this way.” Hadri ushered Luc through the hidden door and pulled it shut behind them, mercifully ending the subject.
In the common room, Hadri pointed out how the scholars categorized and shelved various research texts, but Luc’s thoughts wandered.
He’d nearly forgotten about Lila earlier in the tour, but that stupid pin had whisked her back to the front of his mind.
Her, in her crisp white robes, standing tall and severe with her back to the Void.
Her, scolding him like he’d just been created.
You trust the Council. And the Creator. Well, I don’t. You think you know everything. You think everything works exactly the way it’s supposed to. Then answer me this. If we were meant to be together, why didn’t the Creator put us together in the first place?
Luc peered up at Heaven’s original blueprints, outlined in gold on the dark blue ceiling, as if the answer to Lila’s question lay above him, just out of reach.
“And here we have your own private study.” Hadri drew Luc’s attention to the far side of the room.
There, a wooden door fitted with a brass combination lock awaited him.
His mentor didn’t bother to conceal the password: hope.
With a click! the door opened. Hadri punched a button on the opposite side of the door, and the letters re-jumbled themselves.
He scrolled until the lock read ‘aaaa,’ then released the button.
“Your password. Four letters, please.” He gestured for Luc to input his own combination.
Luc swallowed. Lila’s face swam before him.
You think you know everything.
His fingers trembled, but he concealed them and the lock from Hadri. He paused, trying to think of a four-letter word, any four-letter word, besides her name.
He blanked, coming up with nothing.
Luc shook his head.
No matter. He would change his password later. As soon as possible. At the next opportunity.
He set the lock, then followed Hadri inside. The door shut behind him, and he blurted, “How soon will I meet the Creator?”
The Creator. Of course. He would put an end to Luc’s ill-timed doubt. He would answer the question of Luc’s purpose.
What did Lila know? Lila was ridiculous. A mere carpenter angel. She had no idea what she was talking about.
“First, let us go downstairs,” Hadri answered, that uncharacteristic seriousness resurfacing.
“Downstairs?” Luc blinked. Glancing around the room, he noted a desk, an armchair, an oil lamp, a cream and gold rug. Everything but a staircase.
Hadri bent over and rolled back the rug, revealing a trap door.
“Downstairs,” he repeated.
And down they went. Luc’s unease returned as they descended; he’d never been anywhere with such an absence of light. Even lit by the candles flickering along its bare stone walls, the chamber beneath the Library gave too much to the darkness. It reminded him of the Void, strange and obscure.
Though the Void had always intrigued him with its mysteries, being in the midst of it—or something like it—unnerved him in a way he hadn’t anticipated and couldn’t describe. The sudden lack of sight disoriented him.
When his eyes finally adjusted to his new environment, he noticed a plain stone pedestal standing in the center of the room; it bore a brass bowl, equally plain. Hadri walked out to this central point, passing the pedestal, then turned back to Luc. The elder’s face grew solemn.
“You will not be meeting the Creator. No one meets with Him. He has gone.”
Luc stiffened, all his plans stuttering to a halt. The dark room swallowed him up, and his skin tingled with quiet dread.
You think you know everything, Lila whispered in his ear. Her lips brushed his earlobe.
He shivered, but not from pleasure.
“Gone?” Luc’s voice sounded distant, lost in the chamber’s gaping mouth. “Gone where?”
Hadri shrugged, his body veiled by darkness.
“Who can say? I suppose even He grows weary of the same scenery so many aeons over.”
“But no one meets with Him?” Luc abandoned the periphery of the chamber, where he’d been lingering near the candles.
He charged into the room’s dim center. Rounding the pedestal, he faced Hadri head-on.
“No one? Ever? Isn’t that the whole purpose of the Council?
To communicate with Him on the angels’ behalf? ”
This couldn’t be happening. If the Creator couldn’t tell Luc who he was, and Lila refused to see reason, then who in Heaven could?!
“Do you know the purpose of the Ceremonial Chamber?” Hadri asked.
The Ceremonial Chamber? Hadri meant the annex on the opposite side of the Great Hall from the Artisanal Chamber. It had been locked during Luc’s graduation ceremony, the only part of the Great Hall the graduates couldn’t enter.
“It’s for the Creator’s use, isn’t it?”
“Yes. We are hoping that by giving Him a residence here, where He can perform signs and wonders at His leisure, He might return and dwell among us as He did in the old times.”
“Did you know Him?”
“I did. I was one of the first angels created, along with Michael, Muriel, and Raziel. But memory is a funny thing. I can recall neither the specifics of His face nor the cadence of His voice. Only that we were together once. Beyond that, everything is a blur. On purpose, it would seem. Speak to any of the older angels. They’ll tell you the same.
” Hadri paused, then said, “Anyway, on to your question.”
“The purpose of the Council.”
“Yes. Now, in the beginning—”
“Hadri, I know what happened in the beginning. Just tell me what is happening now!”
Hadri held up a palm for silence. Patience.
“In the beginning, nine and a half aeons ago, the original eighty-four angels were split by the Creator into twelve governing angels and seventy-two skilled laborers divided between twelve skills, with six angels per skill. Later, these same seventy-two angels formed the original guild councils with six members each. They became instructors and taught the new angels that were being created. The Lessons Hall was built, and so forth.”
“Yes, I know. That was all in our lessons scrolls. We had to memorize it and spit it back into the aether a hundred times.”
Hadri gave him a sharp look.
Luc swallowed his frustration.
“Continue,” he offered, not totally apologetic.
“Each half aeon, an additional eighty-four angel children appear in the Council’s midst. One by one, they come, along with their visions.
So we know He is still…about.” Hadri waved a hand at the ceiling.
“But we can no longer communicate directly with Him. That’s why this chamber is of utmost importance.
You are to tell no one that you have seen it. Officially, it does not exist.”
Luc scrutinized the chamber, which was so utterly devoid of Heaven’s general lavishness he might have laughed if he wasn’t in such a foul mood.
“Well, what does it do? Surely, you do not hope to hold the Creator here.”
“Hold the Creator?” Hadri laughed abruptly. “My dear boy, the Creator could rearrange this entire building with the bat of His eyelid. That I remember clearly. You will do well to remember it also.”
Hadri raised an eyebrow, and Luc had the good sense to look abashed, but when the older angel turned away from him, he narrowed his eyes.