Total pages in book: 64
Estimated words: 62637 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 313(@200wpm)___ 251(@250wpm)___ 209(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 62637 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 313(@200wpm)___ 251(@250wpm)___ 209(@300wpm)
A burning rapture encases my body until I can barely breathe as I lean toward the cold mud and grip the bars of the window I must cross through. And then nothingness hits me as I’m brought to my feet in an instant. A hand grabs my throat, lifting me into the air.
A tear slides down my cheek. Is it over before it ever began?
The darkness is pulled from my eyes.
I see light.
Such brilliant light that I can barely breathe. I have to bow. I need to bow. I can’t, but my body recognizes what I am seeing and my spirit even more. I dare not look into its eyes.
“You,” he whispers, “are the second,” he says as he shoves me to the dirty ground, “to name me in over five thousand years.”
“Who was the first?” I asked.
His smile is sad. “My brother, Bannik, before he descended to the Abyss.”
“I’m searching for him.”
“He searches for himself as well,” Ashtaroth says cryptically. “Your journey will be short, god of the sky. You are a creation just like me, and your power is limited here, even more so in the darkness. How will the great eye see if it has only darkness?”
“Faith,” I say. “Complete blind faith. I have nothing to lose, only a really pretty fox to whom I made a promise. I will save her. Even if that means sacrificing myself.”
He nods and waves his hand at the small window. “You may enter.”
The pieces of T-shirt, muddy and torn, wrap around my eyes again as I walk through.
“For her sake,” come his last words, “I hope to see you again.” The sound of the window closing hits me with an irrevocable click. I’m lost in utter darkness walking through mud. My symphony is screams from people lost in the Abyss.
From angels suffering their fall.
I’m thankful I can’t see them as I keep walking.
“HORUS!” one shouts. “God of the sky! Save us!”
“Horus! We worship you!” another shouts.
I shake my head. “We do not ever worship the creation, only the Creator.” But my soul twists with the irony because once I enjoyed the worship of humans, and now it feels like it’s all to gain something, not to give.
“BUT YOU ARE A GOD!” shouts another.
I keep walking through mud and filth as people shout at me. As the fallen shout, I walk with my hands out until I feel something hard. Doors, maybe. The doors to the true Abyss, not the prison for lesser beings, but the one holding the remaining three fallen of the apocalypse, the ones who will one day bring about the end of the world.
The one guarded by Bannik as his punishment for falling.
I trail my fingers over the cold hard stone, and in Japanese it says, “The one who watched will watch.”
I lean my forehead against the hard stone. “Bannik.,” I whisper. “I need you.”
The stone begins to shake while the rest of the prisoners scream. I know this is unheard of. I also know I may never see light again, but I press forward as the doors creak open.
I feel nothing but a frozen cemetery around me. I keep walking. My footsteps fall hard against the cold stone, I can feel them through my boots.
“Why are you here, god of the sky?” a sinister voice asks. “Why have you disturbed my brothers and me?”
I inhale and exhale, then smile. “You miss it, don’t you?”
“What are you talking about?”
“The sky.” I nod. “You miss it. I could show it to you if you want to trade?”
“What could we possibly trade?”
I wave my hand over my head. “I’ll make you a sky.”
“You’ll make a sky in the darkness of the Abyss? For what?”
“Past lives. A Kitsune, one from your guarded area so long ago. I need her memories. I need her past lives. I need a way to set her free.”
Bannik bursts out laughing, something warm fans across my face, suddenly, flames appear, and I can see. The remnants of the T-shirt disintegrate and drop to the ground in ash, and there he sits on a throne of ice.
His eyes are black. His hair falls in darkness with red and white pieces pulled through the front toward his eyes by his temples. His smile is so cruel I want to look away. “You want to set her free for you or for her?”
“Her,” I say instantly. “And you’re the only one who knows the folklore of the past lives. You are the last fallen—” I catch myself. “The last to see the memories and myths. I can’t access it because I’m—”
“Out of your time, yes, it seems you aren’t where you are supposed to be, god of the sky. In fact, you’re so far out of your realm, I wonder how you’re even alive.”
“Love?” I offer. “Perseverance?”
“What will you sacrifice?” Bannik asks. “In order to gain these… things?”