That night, Kingdom of Purgatory
The green flecks set in emerald earring stone glinted back under off-white moonlight. Turning the gem, light shimmered underneath a briny sea surface. Raz, how do you feel about crowds?
Wind whispered in his ears atop navy star-scattered tile, plucks of strings pulled by a musician swelling nearby. Fire squinted at him from the dim dark miniature crested earring held in his palm. His fingers closed over the gem's sparks. Even with the night pressing in over candlelit windows and chimney-lined starstruck houses, Zadriel's words reverberated. Silvery words. Gold glitter and amber hues. Faint chiming bells and fluttering lanterns. Gentle lanterns. Fluttering, almost like the inaudible beat of a butterfly.
Silence cracked and crumbled in his ears.
He thought back to the Captain's words, foul play written all over the locket now placed safely in the Captain's office. Could it really be possible? An infiltrator in the realm of Purgatory? If so, then what would they want to accomplish by being here?
Raz tilted his head, considering the options; there were endless possibilities. But if there was an infiltrator within the realm, within the borders of the city, how had they broken in without the bureaus knowing? If so, how many actually managed to escape into the streets? Were the intruders made up of one or more? Raz's face furrowed. Certainly, it would take more than one, whatever or whoever the culprits were, to maintain secrecy and to use a magic of this magnitude. Not only that but to infiltrate the realm of Purgatory without the cherubim knowing led Razael to perhaps the question bothering him the most on the whole; were the users aware of the bureaus? If so, then that would only mean one thing; they'd had prior knowledge of how their divine magic worked, and still knew, or rather decided, to break into the borders of the city.
Simply put, these culprits weren't afraid of the cherubim and seraphim. Interesting...
"Hey," Boots slid against tile. "Ready?" Nashira asked.
Standing, he shoved the earring into his pocket. Although covered in transparency, evanescent moonlight threw a silhouette of scythed extended batwings down towards the brick layered street below. He felt Nashira come up beside him, the brush of her own wings rousing gales. "The Rigel district then?"
"Yes, we're going to have to take the low way beneath the rooftops if we want to avoid being seen."
"Okay. How much time do you think we'll need to scout the place?"
Shira looked out over the wind and sea of torch-lit chimneys, "All night."
Raz felt his wings break apart. The breeze and strings circling around to stroke all along his translucent gliders. While Razael didn't fully understand fear, or the meaning of such a human emotion, red bubbled up to his mind's surface. The sensation he remembered crawling all along underneath his core by the obsidian monolith, flashes of thunderstorms and wine-dark nebulas reverberated in his head. He'd seen red that day. Danger, it'd said. Danger, danger. It screamed.
Danger? He thought. What is this danger? Why do I... why was I so concerned with it then? Golden brown lashes closed in his mind. Why was he...
What was an emotion, and why did the humans desire them so? Perhaps that's what Zadriel had meant by being alive and that invisible notion of a heart he'd carried around with him. Razael narrowed his gaze. He didn't know much about the humans or their so-called hearts and feelings. But he did recognize something, something lingering in his breath, something he'd known only once before tugging at the seams of his patchwork scars. That word.
Perhaps he struggled recognizing, accepting. Perhaps he was hesitant to call anything an emotion or abandon his cherubim logic. But something had pulsed in his limbs that day, sending red all over his vision. Something unknown, shaking his bones. He'd encountered a word, that sound, that shape. That day still lingered in his shattered mind. So, if what he'd felt then was... the sight of 'danger', something that had felt so wrong, why had he felt it then? And why...?
Why was the same sense of danger laced delicately in the wind now?
Zephyr whined under the circling moon. He shuffled his feet. "Let's go."
Nashira's boots clomped across the hard roof tile, "Way ahead of you," She said, taking off from the edge of the apartment complex. Razael surged forward, one giant stride after another until he felt the tips of his shoes catapult from the edge of the three-story building, airborne momentarily. Leaping off, the weight of his wings pushed down, large gusts of wind carrying his body forward. Ducking down into the darkened moon and torchlit nights over pale brick roads, the rush of the breeze they rode followed them by their toes. Moments later, having adjusted their posture to a more stable, level form, the two rode alongside each other, each's gliders unveiling themselves from unseen magic. The muscles in batwings contrasting snow white feathers with every momentary beat. Parallel.
Does Nashira feel this? He wondered. No. It wasn't if she did... Can she feel this?
As they passed by each house and swerved, avoiding meandering citizens on streets, the moon bounced off the surface of Purgatory's rooftops. Locked in icy silence, Raz closed his eyes, if only for a moment. Just to stop. Just to let himself feel the drifting current, current dipped in midnight orbiting ghost stars, wash over him.
Even with the subtle hint of that strange unearthly feeling revolving the air, growing stronger each second, they grew closer to the Rigel district, Raz shook off the sound, the sensation growing in his chest. I'm sure it's nothing, he thought. After all, it's not like I can ever truly feel fear. I'm sure it's nothing, just the spiritual pressure messing with me.
Eyelashes drifted up to the cool breath of night wrapping the city. Caught in a heavenly quilt. The sky is clear tonight anyway... I'm sure... I'm sure it'll be fine once we land. The emerald earring tucked safely away in his trousers pulled on his mind. Why did he keep thinking back to that? Why was he so hesitant to get rid of it?
No. No time to consider. There was no going back to that time now. Not after all he'd become. Not after all that had changed.
Not now, not when there were possible negative spirits on the loose, when he had a job to do.
The lampposts planted along the side of each road suddenly began to flicker, illumination shuddering with each new one passing their flanks. "Raz, we're almost there."
Danger. A sudden unfamiliar wave of energy slammed into his senses. His flight stance faltered. "Nashira,"
"Yeah?" They moved faster. The voice grew louder. "... Nashira,"
Danger, red, rubble, coiling, bubbling.
The wave pressed in, formless. Unrecognizable. High pitched. Growing louder, louder, louder, until...
Danger, danger, danger.
Razael never got to ask Nashira if she felt the senses or not, or if she regretted the past like him; seeing the great invisible trap spread wide across two sides of houses, like a sticky blanket laced with poison. Laid out to taunt them, laid out to pull them down mid-flight. He gasped, trying to lay down the brakes on their speeding wings. "Nashira! Look out!" He cried out on impulse, realizing what was about to happen.
The brakes never went through.
~ ~ ~
Note from the author - Hey ya'll! Hope you enjoyed! Again, Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!
In case that was a little too out of spirit for you guys here's a fun song I found recently in a tv show I just started watching and really like. Hope you like it! https://youtu.be/6riDJMI-Y8U
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