‹ Prequel: Eyes of the Devil

The Angel of Death

Chapter Fourteen

“Where do you think he could’ve gone, mommy?”

She sighed quietly. “He’s still on earth, sweetie. He’s just on the other half of it.”

“What’s that mean?” I asked as I continued to shovel cereal into my mouth, not caring when milk dribbled down my chin. She grabbed a napkin and wiped my face with it.

“It’s a little hard to explain.”

“Oh. Okay.” I was quiet for a second, not really sure how to word my next question. The words slipped out of my mouth before I could stop them. “How come you don’t talk to Dad?”

She didn’t say anything for about a minute. “Because I can’t.”

“But I thought you could do anything,” I told her. “You’re my mommy. You can do anything.”

She laughed a little. “I only wish I could, sweetie.”

I wanted to help her so much. She looked happy, she acted like it, but I knew she was miserable without my dad. I had caught her crying alone in her room more than once, and I hated that there was nothing I could do for her. I didn’t know how to tell her that he didn’t seem to miss her at all. I wanted to help them, but what could I do? They were complete enemies, as far from each other as possible. My dad couldn’t be in Heaven, and I knew my mom wouldn’t last much longer in Hell. Even being near each other would likely tear them apart.

“What was it like when he was still here?” I asked her. “You said he had to leave or something…I think…”

“It was a long time ago.”

“Wait!” I jumped off of my chair and grabbed her hand, pulling her into the living room. If she was going to tell me a story, I wanted to make sure I would be ready. I was hoping she might find it a little funny, but she was forcing a smile as she sat in her favorite chair and lifted me onto her lap.

“You weren’t born yet when it happened,” she began. Her smile fell apart. “That was part of why I sent him away.”

“What happened?”

She took a long, slow breath. “We hadn’t been married for long, but we loved each other very much. Everything was perfect, really.” She paused again. It finally hit me how difficult it had to be for her to even think back on what had happened, whatever it was.

“I’m still not sure exactly how, but one of our friends had turned against us. He convinced as many others as he could that we were weak, that we should be overthrown. I still can’t believe how many of them bought his lies.”

“Why would he do something like that?” I asked, glancing up at her. “Friends don’t do that. Friends aren’t supposed to hurt each other.” I pushed back the memory of what had happened to Holly. I knew most of it had only been a sort of nightmare, a horrific hallucination, but I didn’t even want to think about it. Friends weren’t supposed to hurt each other.

“Because he was evil. He wanted to be more powerful than your father and I. But he couldn’t do it on his own; he had to have help.” She lifted a hand to take a tear away from her eye and continued, though her voice trembled slightly. “Gerard found out what was going on and came to warn me. I didn’t want to leave him alone there…both of us knew he would never make it…but he made me leave so nothing would happen to you.”

“Dad…actually…cared about me?” I could hardly believe it. She nodded.

“He didn’t want you to get hurt just because I was too afraid to leave him. But I had never been so scared before. I thought I would never see him again.”

“Why?”

“Well, Ray forced him to turn evil. So many of them were lost at that point, I knew I had to do something or everything here would be destroyed.”

“So you made them go away?”

She closed her eyes. “I had no choice. I had to save as much of it as I could. And I had to think of you, of course,” she added, brushing some hair behind my ear. I looked down.

“It’s my fault?” I asked. I felt terrible. I almost wished she hadn’t sent him away, even if he was evil. It was because of me.

She shook her head. “Of course not, sweetie. I would have had to do it anyway.”

“I don’t understand. Why couldn’t he just stay here? Maybe he would’ve been nicer if he was around you more ’cause you’re super nice-”

“It wouldn’t have worked,” she said firmly. Her voice softened. “I wanted to keep him here, really. But there was nothing else I could do.”

A low rumble outside made us both look through the nearest window. The clouds had grown darker, and rain was already starting to sprinkle down. I hugged my mom as tightly as I could. I really hoped she wouldn’t start crying, but it wasn’t long before she wrapped her arms around me and sobbed a few silent times. I felt bad for asking her now. I felt bad that part of it had been because of me. I felt bad that I couldn’t help her at all.

And as much as I wanted to go talk to my dad about it and tell him just how sorry she was, I knew I couldn’t leave her.

“Mommy?”

“Yeah, sweetie?” she asked, sniffling.

“I love you.”

“I love you too, Angel,” she said quietly. “So much.”

“I don’t think Dad hates you anymore,” I added. “He acts mad sometimes, but…I think it’s just because he misses you.”

“He doesn’t miss me.”

I’ve never heard her sound so cold. It was scary.

“How do you know? I mean, he’s kinda hard to talk to but he’ll listen if you say the right stuff.”

She picked me up and set me on the ground, standing up from her chair and walking over to the window. “I’m not going to talk to him. I’m never going to see him again.” She placed a hand on the glass, trembling a little. “There’s no reason to make things any worse.”

I had a feeling she didn’t want me there anymore, but I still didn’t want to leave. The little kid side of me would always love my mom no matter how stubborn she wanted to be. I knew there was probably more to her reasoning, but she was keeping it simple because she thought I wouldn’t understand. Maybe I wouldn’t.

“I’m sorry, mom…”

She turned around and looked at me, and her face softened. “I don’t want you to be upset about it, alright? Sometimes things just happen a certain way.”

I crossed my arms and frowned. “I still think mommies can do anything.”
-
I flew back to Hell with a heavy heart. I had always known my mom was sad, but she had never been so upset. I knew she couldn’t go with me, but there were times when I thought of how I might try and convince her that it wasn’t such a bad idea. Even though I always knew it was.

I landed in the library. I instantly knew my dad had to be somewhere in there, so I walked through the endless rows of bookshelves to look for him. It was unusual for him to wait so long before saying anything to me. I assumed he was just busy and didn’t care that I was there.

“Dad?”

A flash of dark energy behind me caught my ear, and I turned around. I couldn’t believe what I saw. It was my dad, but instead of his usual powerful and intimidating countenance, he looked completely exhausted. He lifted one hand, making a chair appear, and collapsed into it with a heavy sigh.

“Dad, are you okay? What happened?”

He closed his eyes for a few moments, holding a hand against his forehead. “I knew that wasn’t going to be easy.”

“What wasn’t going to be easy?”

“Going…up there,” he gasped, breathing deeply. “I had to…” That was as far as he got before he passed out, tumbling out of the chair and landing sprawled out on the ground. I wasn’t even sure how to help him. I could only stand there, staring at him and wondering what had happened.

“We’ll take care of it.”

Their metallic voices were still ringing in my ears as Fear and Regret appeared, standing on either side of my dad’s unmoving form.

“What happened to him?” I asked again. They said nothing and vanished, taking my dad with them. I flew out of the library and went to the only place they would have taken him: his room.

Until that day, I had never been anywhere near it, let alone inside. A certain chill permeated the air around it, something that always told me I should stay away, but as I closed in on it, a wave of painful cold swept over my wings and made me shiver violently, almost causing me to crash. I landed and folded my wings, surprised when ice crystals crunched together and fell off of them, collecting in small piles on the ground. I noticed it had changed as well. What was usually crimson-colored sandstone now looked like pure obsidian, black and reflective. The sharp stones had smoothed out and become shaped into a hallway, looking more structured and refined than anything else I had ever seen in Hell.

I wasn’t surprised at all when the hallway’s narrow walls suddenly disappeared from either side of me, widening into a cavern with a high ceiling. My footsteps echoed cleanly on the polished floor as I walked toward the only source of light in the room.

“Dad, are you okay? I’ve never seen you like th-”

“I’m fine, Death,” he answered coldly. The faint flicker of gray light from the torch in front of him illuminated his face. He was seated on the ground with his legs folded, staring up at me with a face completely free of emotion. Even though the flame made his hair and skin appear pure white, his eyes glittered with flecks of gold dust. He blinked. “What happened was merely a matter of my own misjudgment. It will not happen twice.”

“Why did you go up to earth?” I asked, trying to keep the fear out of my voice. “I thought you couldn’t.”

“I didn’t,” he answered plainly. “I never once stepped into their universe.”

“But…you just said-”

He sighed, and I stopped talking. “I used a reflection of myself. Mirrors are useful that way.”

“Oh…so…why were you tired, then?”

“It takes a lot of energy to go anywhere near them,” he answered, “and it is difficult for me to be any closer to Heaven than I am now. You should know that.”

“Why did you try to do something like that?”

“You will see soon enough.” He drew in a deep breath, and I saw the silver flame spark purple for a moment. “In the meantime, I have work to do.”

I took the hint and left. Warmth slowly began to flood back into me as I flew towards my room. I tried to think of what he might be planning, but nothing really made sense. I thought for a moment that it might have something to do with Gerard, but what could it possibly be? I took a chance and tried to go through the library, hoping he had left out a book that might give me an idea of what was going on, but as soon as I reached the outer wall, an unseen force repelled me backwards. I spiraled through the air and barely stopped myself from colliding with the stone floor. I frowned, feeling a little dizzy from the sudden impact. Whatever it was, he didn’t want me to know about it. It had to be important.