Mission Log, Day 11, Monday, September 13th, 1999
Well, things are not going as smoothly as I might have hoped since our return to Boulder. But this is par for the course, so I'm trying to remind myself that tomorrow is another better day.
The ride back was a quiet one. I was pretty grateful, considering I wasn't in much mood to talk since that Calabite kissed my Raven arse. Upon our return in the early morning we all went our separate ways. For me, that meant hitting the streets afoot and getting to know the area and its people. Most activity that time of night was centered around the University and the downtown market street named Pearl, so I did my best to just move around, see and be seen. Actually, I should have been doing that for the past week, but this other matter cropped up, Laurence and Rook and Colorado Springs....anyway, I felt quite behind in the pursuit of Gabriel's prophecy: "Neutrality is persecuted, Chaos is sought. Let not the seller of souls take the last of those who would not choose." None of it made any sense to me yet, but I set to work establishing a role amongst the homeless in the hopes of hearing something when the Seamy Underbelly of Hell decided to make a noise.
Unfortunately, the information-gathering did not go well. Most of the people I met on the streets of Boulder were not really homeless at all, but rather young wanderers pausing in town on their way to finer places, or college students playing scum-for-a-night because it was fashionable, or street performers living as comfortably as the people they performed for. Times have certainly changed. What about days of old, when the unfortunate could only survive by resorting to beggary, or thievery, or worse? And what about public opinion, that unpierceable veil which separated the homeless from "normal" people, made them objects of fear and loathing? Instead I find happy well-adjusted homeless, "free thinkers" by choice, and basically ignorant of that Seamy Underbelly I sought. A frustrating day, indeed.
Today was a little more productive. I found a more traditional transient, a man in his thirties, dirty and bedraggled, and a little touched in the head, I might add. He didn't offer much conversation, but at least he was proof positive that Boulder was not Mercurian Central and that I just wasn't looking in the right place.
In the afternoon, events began to take a different turn. I met Matt on the creek path. Happy Matt. Dancing Matt. Ironically, that Elohite's Mercurian ways scare me more than any other angel in Boulder. Elohim only act out emotion when there is a plan afoot, and by that logic, Matt is a mastermind.
In passing, he said the Seneschal of the Tether to Destiny, Giles, wanted us to all come to the library for a meeting in the afternoon, so with much exploration, I made my way up to campus. It seemed terribly odd to me to do it on foot, but it probably did me some good. Without my wings, I had to learn the city from a completely different point of view, one I had quite dismissed.
I arrived far too early, spent the intervening hour staring out the window at the students playing in the field below until the others trickled in. Jael joined me for a while in her usual non-intrusive way, Rook seemed his normal business-like self (in spite of his brush with Nightmares), Matt ebullient, Bob pensive, and Arashiel a little reserved for her usual demeanor. Then we sat and waited some more, for the point of the gathering was to meet someone. In time a dark nondescript man arrived; I quickly looked away, eventually winning the struggle to keep any emotion from my face. We'd already met our "friend," the Elohite of the Triad of Judgment in Colorado Springs.
"We could jump," Jael muttered, still sitting beside me at the window.
I almost smiled. "Why give him the satisfaction?"
I have to say, I don't think anyone was pleased to see him. He introduced himself as Dinhabah, a name I'd missed on his first visit, and explained he would be stationed in Boulder for a time, alone, as a Professor of Ethics. And although unclear as to the nature of his mission, he claimed no one was under observation. Overall he took our cool reception in stride, although I couldn't decide whether it was sympathetic understanding or complete arrogance on his part.
And yet, I felt my own resentment and hostility so keenly, staring out the window during his short talk, that I feared he felt it too and could only add it as evidence against me. Besides, he could be genuine. So when the meeting came to an end, I stilled myself, mustered my sincerity, and went over to shake his hand. "I wish you the best."
"And you. And Arabis, I hope you would let me know if Arnu contacts you again."
I decided not to censor myself. "So long as it won't result in an automatic Inquisition."
"No, of course not. Arabis, you are an angel. You're on our side."
I weighed his words, his meanings, couldn't resist a little jab. "And you're on ours."
I didn't want to say any more; his presence made my guts churn.
We didn't break then; once Dinhabah left, Rook called us together again. I said he seemed his usual self, but I was a little off. He was his usual self to the nth degree. Time had allowed him to puzzle through some problems, so he handed out magic phone boxes and "pagers" to everyone who didn't already have one. His idea was that no one should me out of communication, and the pagers acted as warning devices which allows the Cherubim to contact their attunements when they sensed danger. Not bad ideas, certainly, but delivered with the trademarked Rook stamp-of-approval finality. But as I said, the ideas were good, so I came to possess a magic phone box.
Discussion shifted to the Tapestry, which we all agreed needed more research in the Library Upstairs to be more fully understood. And somehow in all of this, we learned that Arashiel was now serving War. As a present or punishment from Michael, I wasn't sure.
Then he started in on the skills question; What could we do? What Songs did we know? What information did we possess? Oddly enough, most of my comrades complied with his request without complaint, with the exception of myself and particularly Jael. I confess surprise at his request; I thought we'd been through all this before, in Sand Creek.
See, when you spend all your life working with other Malakim just like you in a cohesive fighting unit, people you've trained with for many years, you get used to fulfilling a role, knowing what roles your buddies fill, and taking orders for the good of God, Group, and Goal. I'd seen it happen all the time, with young angels of Laurence or sometimes Michael, when I was a combat trainer in the Groves. You get used to thinking that way, looking at things as objectives or obstacles, and your buddies as quantifiable assets. You kinda have to, when you're the dragoons of Heaven, sent in to places no one else would dare, knowing any mission might be your last. You can't afford to get attached to the people, only to the roles they play. In Heaven, I was "The Instructor" to Rook. At Sand Creek, I was "The Scout." So he wanted to know what skills I had to offer, to be put to best advantage against the Enemy. I tried to explain why I didn't want to tell him everything. What if he were captured and interrogated, and he knew all of our strengths and weaknesses? What if he came to rely upon my knowledge of a particular skill which in fact I could not deliver? What if, being a Malakite, he would expect me to do one thing when, not being a Malakite, I would actually do another? What if the careless revelation of some of my skills as a spy brought me under the suspicion of Heaven, or Hell, or both? What if I simply did not wish to feel that I was no more than the sum of my parts? We fought bitterly that day; in the end, I gave in a little, reminded him of Songs he'd seen me perform, talents he might find useful in the final battle. But I did not tell him everything then, and I would not tell him everything now. I thought this steadier, more relaxed Rook might have put all that behind him, but this new light in his eyes definitely gleamed of a fire of old, when the world made sense and his role in it was clear. Nightmares must have gotten to him, and the bastard was just pretty blessed good at hiding it.
So that threw me a little, but not as much as his next bomb. He announced he'd acquired an unwanted geas from the Lilim of Nightmares, and intended to go straight away to the Far Marches where he'd heard such things could be removed. Shock. Jael immediately protested this, but Rook insisted that he would wisely go with Arashiel.
Storms clouded Jael's eyes at that little suggestion. Maybe jealously, but I suspected more hurt feelings and a dangerous urge to hurt back. He would have none of it; with Arashiel's consent, he swept out of the room. To me, he actually seemed to be running from her, in his expressionless manner.
The meeting was obviously over. I made to leave, couldn't help but overhear Jael's venting anger, feigned deafness as she demanded of Arashiel why she would consent to his insanity. Her answer? "I thought I might see some old friends there." It took me a moment to remember her true form, the winged unicorn, and think of the Purity Crusades, long enough that I almost missed Jael mention seeing her old superior while rescuing Rook.
What?! Jael's Superior was Beleth? Bob saved me by asking whom she spoke of.
"His name is Irad, a Habbalah of Nightmares." Irad, meaning dragon, like Jael. Then my memory spat up the image of the man in the hallway outside the portal room, talking to the distracted Djinn and examining us so thoroughly as we slipped past. I tried to reconstruct the tattoos covering his body, remembered curves and sweeps, serpentine in style. Not serpentine...draconic.
I admit to looking at Jael in a new light. To have your superior Fall, the person with whom you shared the essence of a Word, a dream, a driving part of your soul, and somehow escape the same fate... She and I were more alike than I ever dreamed. Except she didn't seem to be a-hunting.
I left to get back on patrol. Poor Jael, in more ways than one. Sure, about Irad. But she didn't seem to bear him too many bad feelings, or vice versa, so the split was either somewhat genial, or so long ago that neither felt the pain of it much any more. Nevertheless, it occurs to me now that his distraction of the guard was not coincidental, but a planned intervention. I wonder if Jael somehow asked him to be there, or if he felt her presence and volunteered his help. Not that I would ask Jael such things. Too tactless and invasive.
No, my sympathy for Jael was actually about Rook. It was painfully clear that he holds a place in her heart, and also painfully clear that Rook perhaps felt something in return, yet they couldn't communicate at the other's level. Rook, all tactics and solutions, and Jael, all emotions and process. Time served together had obviously forged a bond between them, but Jael clearly had expectations of Rook which he knew little about and certainly was not of a nature to fulfill.
Poor Jael. Poor both of them. Yet another reason why angels should never get involved with each other. Too much pain involved. Too much of a window to Fall.
I felt a buzzing in my pocket and jumped. The miracle phone box. I had to find a secluded place, off the street, then pried at the thing until I managed to open it and enable communication. It was Jael. Rook was Heavenside, having left Arashiel behind and attempting to travel to the Far Marches alone. She didn't need to say more. In spite of my still damaged form, I took wing and raced back to the Tether.
What was he thinking! Going there at all was dangerous. Going alone was almost suicidal. Hmm, didn't like that little implication. Nightmares must have gotten to him. Or something happened between him and Jael.
They met me there and we ascended, my mind racing. "What happened? Why has Rook decided to go alone.
"I don't know why," said Jael, coals still smoldering in her eyes. "We argued, and then he left."
An argument? "Telling me half-truths will only make it harder to know what to say to him." In that moment I remembered Jael was quite old, far older than I, and had every right to smack me for such impertinence. But she didn't, and gradually she told me of the argument, about her repeated protests, about endangering Arashiel with his foolish behavior or some such. I don't recall all the details, because my mind was already forming a profile of his mental state.
"Listen, we all know a little of what he's just been through. He's a Malakite, Heaven's best warriors, and he was just captured and tortured by the enemy. He feels completely alone, and he's lost his self-control, and perhaps he needs to do this to reassert some measure of control over his life."
She looked a little surprised, and her rage softened. "Why didn't he just say that?"
I shrugged, as much as a Wheel could as we flew across Heaven. "Probably because he hasn't had 300 years to figure it out." It took me at least that long to figure out that I couldn't hinge my self-worth on reactionary and unsuccessful attempts to fix my mistake. Dozens of angel told me it wasn't my fault, that I was not responsible for Arnu's Fall, and yet in my mind I had not prevented it and was therefore was an accessory to it. I knew Rook well enough to know he would never explicitly exchange favors with a Lilim, but perhaps in a moment of weakness he allowed one, and now every day it weighed on him as a manacled reminder of that weakness. Not that his reaction was reasonable. Just understandable.
I tried to track him, but soon learned Arashiel knew his direction through her recent attunement. The further we went, the less I wanted to catch up to him. If he really wanted this, we should support and protect him, not prevent him.
Jael turned back at the edge of Blandine's realm. Arashiel had the Tapestry with her, and we couldn't risk taking it to the Far Marches, so Jael returned it to safety while we pressed on.
We had to talk our way past Laurencian guards on the border, then flew on into the darker corners of the Marches. Fewer dream bubbles there, time and space distorted. Without Arashiel's attunement, we would have never found him. As it was, we suddenly ended up in a lush green world, some pocket of the Marches, where creatures of fantasy abounded. His journey was long. Suffice to say he met a large smith and a one-eyed sorcerer. The huge smith predicted he would never be willing to pay the price for the geas' removal, and the Norse sorcerer confirmed that. Not that I blame him. These people (if I dare call them that) were from a different age, when an eye warranted an eye. Add to that their persecution by Uriel's mad angels, and I'm positive any bargain he struck would be far worse than the one he came to break.
I'm not sure who else he met, for we spied his ominous black form as he returned our way. I hid in my Raven form in the evergreens, but Arashiel couldn't contain herself and flew up to meet him. I didn't hear what was said, but once his surprise passed, the rage on his face was evident. Rage! He would not speak to her, left as fast as he could fly, and we reverted to following him to find our way back out of the Marches.
I confess a certain amount of irritation with Arashiel. What was the point of confronting him? Not only did it rob him of any sense of autonomy in his mission, but implied he could not be trusted, either with his goals or his safety. Plus, it proves he was followed, not accompanied. What a mess! We didn't speak much on the way back. Jael waited for us at the Tether with the Tapestry. Arashiel's irritation with his response was apparent (what else did she expect?) and Jael expressed the limit of her patience with Rook's "rejection."
I suppose it all made sense from their point of view, but I wasn't exactly feeling objective about it, and I didn't feel like listening to them talk about it, so I went back to my patrol. No one was blameless here. But I felt I should still find time to talk to Rook about his ordeal, if only I could find a way to do it without sounding like a blessed Elohite of Flowers.
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