“She is my wife’s dear friend,” the Watcher explained. “She asked me to make sure you do not come near her or the twins again.”
“This is ridiculous.” Lucius snorted. “I need to speak with her immediately.”
Armaros reached for the sword he kept against his side. “I do not want to harm one of my brothers, but we cannot force our will onto the humans.”
“That is rich coming from you,” Lucius scoffed. “And no sword is going to stop me from seeing my children.”
“They are not your children, brother. They are hers.”
Lucius felt an old anger rise in his chest, as if he’d awoken an ancient flame long put to rest. It tingled in his chest as he struggled to keep it contained. “You fool, hear me. Your god is sending a flood tomorrow to kill all of you. I am here because I intend on getting Elissa and the children out of this place before that happens.”
Armaros looked dumbfounded. “How do you know?”
“I have been sent here as a secret informer. Your god does not want a race of human and angel hybrids to exist, and has decided your annihilation is the solution.”
“Come with me.”
Before Lucius could dip out of the way, Armaros grabbed his arm. He pulled him at a speed Lucius had never experienced before, and it took him a moment to realize the angel had sprouted his wings to fly. In an instant, they arrived at the mountains. Armaros pulled Lucius past the guards, directly into their stronghold.
He was shocked to observe an entire city had been built inside the mountain. Clusters of homes were carved from the interior rock, roads stretching from one corner to the next with a small stream cutting through the center. It wove about a marketplace bustling with creatures. He discovered the Nephilim were not the repulsive giants he had been warned about, but human beings only a foot or so taller than him with angel wings. He could point out their fathers, smoothly preserved by immortality, and older human mothers hobbling about with canes. But he was most surprised to discover that many of the Nephilim were female, gathering wares at the market with their own children, a second generation of the hybrid species.
He looked up to see Samyaza, the original leader of the Watchers, standing before him with his arms crossed. He was a stocky creature with a crop of dusty brown hair, accompanied by several Watchers and Nephilim dressed in warrior attire with iron sheathed at their sides.
“Tell him what you told me,” Armaros ordered Lucius with a nudge.
“I will tell you only if you assure me that you will not stand in the way of me seeing Elissa and the twins,” Lucius shot back.
Armaros sighed, visibly annoyed. “Fine. Tell him.”
Lucius met Samyaza’s dark eyes. “Your god is sending a flood to kill you all. It will come the day after tomorrow, so I suggest you find somewhere to flee.”
A murmur of distress rose up from the soldiers, gathering the attention of the others. “Is this true?” Samyaza demanded of Armaros.
“He says he was sent as an informer,” Armaros told him. “I believe his words. He has never seemed a true Watcher, his actions suspicious. I do not trust him entirely, but I think it unwise not to take his words seriously. Why else did the Holy One send another hundred Watchers down to our village? He does not approve of what we build.”
Samyaza turned back to squint at Lucius. “Who are you?”
“I am older than all of you, born of the stars,” Lucius replied. “I have no loyalty to any Watchers, in fact, I have long grown tired of this whole charade.”
“He is Set,” a voice spoke up. Amazed to hear his true name, he turned to see a female Nephilim with rivulets of ebony hair, wearing a headdress of precious stones. A thin veil rolled down her back. She appeared only a few years older than Ashera, but was already quite tall and slender. “He was the Egyptian god of death, war, and destruction.”
Samyaza looked from the girl back to Lucius. “She is our Seer, who we have no reason to doubt. Now answer me this—why did the Archangels recruit an old Egyptian god to spy on us?”
“You know why,” Armaros said bitterly from beside him.
A crack of thunder boldly interrupted, striking so loud above them that it shook the entire mountain range. Several loosened rocks and stalagmites fell to the ground with a crash.
“You said the rains would come the day after tomorrow!” Samyaza cried out as the entire cave erupted into a panic. He did not wait for Lucius’s reply, swept away by the retreating throng of creatures.
Lucius moved to join them, when Armaros grabbed his arm. “You are either with us or against us,” he said as he thrust a sword in his hand.
Lucius began to protest before realizing how long it had been since he’d seen combat, a part of him left unsatisfied for years. He looked up, but Armaros had disappeared.
There was another deafening crack and Heaven unleashed its furious rain. Lucius climbed up a winged statue, struggling to see around the flurries of Watchers and Nephilim. He observed most retrieved weapons, prepared to fight, while the others barricaded themselves in their homes. No sooner did he leap down from his perch, was he promptly swept up by the armed throng—male, female, angel, giant—as they raced out to greet the angelic army who descended with the rains. Pandemonium exploded in a clash of steel and water as Lucius pushed through the crowds with his sword. The Nephilim lacked no skill at administering death, tossing the armored angels aside with easy sweeps of their elongated limbs. Lucius wove through the warring bodies, dodging steel and furious blows, until he made it past the battle, only to see the water already collecting in the valley below.
Lucius dropped his sword and broke into a sprint, the rising water fighting against his legs. The village had already been destroyed, the tents and huts swept away, and the last standing structures threatening to follow suit as waves crashed around them. It was then he saw the twins huddled on his roof, struggling to stay planted as surges of water reached up with greedy fists to pull them in.
Wings burst out of his back and unfurled, the sensation of ripping flesh nearly derailing him, but he pushed through the pain to soar through the torrential rain to where they were huddled. He snatched them and pushed himself back into the air, feeling their little hands gripping his skin as he fought the torrents to reach the mountains. He glanced down to see the water continuing to rise rapidly, no longer able to see any sign of life—not even the armies of warring creatures. He squinted through the raindrops until he found a hollowed cave near the apex of the mountain range, and tumbled inside.
The children were hysterical, clinging to him as he tried to set them down. He held them for a moment, trying to calm them down while being struck by his own emotions—a surge of compassion, empathy, and protectiveness he’d never felt before. He hugged them a bit tighter. “I am so sorry,” he said helplessly.
Ashera pulled away to look at him, her teeth chattering. The sight of her blue lips snapped him into action and he gently pried Abi’s fingers from around his arm. “Hug each other for warmth while I make you a fire,” he instructed them, scouring the cave for scraps of wood.
It didn’t take long for him to realize it was empty, filled with nothing but rocks and dirty puddles. The rain roared outside, echoing in the hollow chamber. He growled in frustration, not wanting to take them back out into the cold. Tartarus flashed in his mind, but they would be terrified, and he doubted they’d be able to withstand the heat. His mind worked quickly, weighing out his options, considering every possibility. And then, it came to him.
“Close your eyes,” he instructed the children, grabbing a nearby rock. “Do not open them, no matter what you hear.”
They obeyed as he carved the sharp end into his flesh, pulling his blood to the surface before it trickled down the muscles of his arm. As soon as droplets hit the ground, it trembled. He closed his eyes and pictured Cerberus clear in his mind, recalling the sensation of his fur and his playful brown eyes. He heard the portal open, filling the cave with warmth as a beast lumbered up from the opening crevice. He opened his eyes to his old friend, who looked pleased to see him.
Their reunion was cut short by the loud churning sound he brought with him, a horrible bellow that reverberated through the chamber, forcing the children to cover their ears. Lucius hurried back to them, pulling them back into his arms as the unnatural rip in the fabric of the realms let its protestations be known.
“I must go to stop the noise,” he yelled, “but I will return shortly to take you out of here. Cerberus looks frightening, but he is my old friend and he will keep you warm and protect you until I come back.”
Ashera looked suspiciously over his shoulder at the three headed dog. “Okay,” she called back.
Abi did not look convinced. “I do not want you to go,” he whimpered, startling Lucius by speaking more words in that moment than ever before.
“Cerberus will not let any harm come to you while I’m gone,” Lucius promised. “Stay close to him and I will come back with food and firewood.”
