“I do this for love,” Dina interrupted, then tilted his head at Azazel.“Babylon must fall.The nation past the bridge — Satan’s empire.Its roads are made of blood, its buildings of evil.Destroy it, and you will destroy everything that Satan has ever wanted to protect.”It was a lie, something Dina was making up now — but Kokabiel didn’t correct him, and Dina wondered if he’d arrived at the edges of truth through pure faith.“And wouldn’t you like the end of times to come, Azazel?You will never be pure again.You’re a sinner.I know how you feel because I’m a sinner too.We were sinners together.”‘But I will make everything right again.When it is all over, you will absolve me.’
Azazel visibly bit the inside of his cheeks, and he said nothing as Dina turned around, walked away slow.‘You were crying when I met you for the first time.Armoni and I discovered you, curled into yourself at the sidewalk, carrying the bruises of a forced penance.We took your hand, pulled you up.’Azazel had held Dina to him, expecting to see him weeping or protesting, but his face was empty, accepting.Many times, Azazel and Armoni had tried to convince Dina that he didn’t deserve to be hurt because he was a sinner.Over time, they’d come to know that Dina would accept any hit so long as someone touched him.
“The devil has nothing but his Babylon,” Dina said tensely, stopping, his wings unfolding again from his back, but he didn’t look at Azazel.“If you ever loved what the flood took from you — then end the devil’s world how he ended yours.”
Dina left them, and the Watchers were all silent again, even Kokabiel.
CHAPTER33
“Forgive me,” Michael breathed, “Father.”If a soul could kneel, he did it at the base of the Lord’s Throne, at His feet; and his six flaming wings consumed his form to make him nothing but a speck of bright.“For my weakness.Heaven burned again, as it did during the first war, because I could not contain the devil.”The sensation of sinking gnawed at him, and he wished he could shut his eyes and look away from God.
“I said,” boomed the Lord’s voice, “that Satan would be done away with, and Lucifer would be born again from his body.A new Jerusalem will present itself as a bride — the marriage of Heaven and worship, which has already happened and will happen again.You ask for my mercy, and you continue to sin.”Pain, now, consuming Michael.“Even with the body that will bear the resurrected Lucifer — you sin.Even after you were punished before all of Heaven for sullying your body, for your sins of flesh, you sin.”
“He,” Michael rasped quickly, “temptedme, my Lord.”
“You already know how this will end.”
Throat narrowing and warming enough to burn.‘He tempted me.He deluded me.Only because you should not be given something broken, I will refrain from ripping him in half when I see him again.But when you kill Satan, bring him such pain that the Beast will never make a home in Lucifer’s body again.Please, Father.I will do anything for you to hurt him.’
God said: “The end is written.”
Michael’s gauntlet held the handle of his sword so tight that he could feel even the divine metal of it strain to not snap beneath the prince’s strength.“Why—” he began, but then the rest of his voice fractured, and there was a sudden labyrinth of paths before him of words to say, questions to ask.“Why—” he said again, but he couldn’t remember what he’d originally meant to say.‘Why does God divine punish?Divine hurt, divine ache?Why must Satan die for Lucifer to resurrect?Why must the world end for good to triumph?Why did I save a girl only to tell her that I must kill everything that she loves?Why am I here?’’ “I’ll bring him back.”‘Why?’“And you will kill me, too, Father.”‘Why?For all that I’ve done.’He wished he hadn’t heard his own voice in his head, his own thoughts of Joana.Her face, the flickers of pain in her eyes.
‘She looks just like you,’ Satan had teased.
Within all the flames that made up the angel, there was a chest that ached, and Michael promised, “I will bring Satan back to you.”
“Why,” God echoed.
In the town bordering Babylon — Tadeo healed.He was in the plaza where Michael had captured Satan and standing where the devil had been, propped up by a crate.There were hundreds around him, the boy’s family lost among all the heads and the infants being lifted toward him.All of Tadeo’s, rather gentle and anxious, calls for them to form an orderly line drowned beneath all the shouting.Some were pleading for his healing hands, others just trying to watch — each time not believing it, each time wanting to see it happen again just to be amazed a second time.Those harmed from the strikes were supposed to take priority, but all those who’d been sick, injured, and neglected years or their entire lives rushed to Tadeo in desperation.
Nearby, Dante watched; he was standing on top of a building, no longer bothering with the phone he’d been fiddling with for the hours Tadeo had spent there.The sky had grown dark, an endless void absent the stars, while the moon flooded an ominous red glow over them all, as if to prepare them for the light of hellfire.Arms crossed over the ledge, he also saw some cars whizzing down the roads, toward Babylon, but the border was closed even for the regular trade that’d passed through when the gasoline was cut.He flexed the hand that Tadeo had returned to him, again and again.
“Here,” came a grumble from behind him, and he looked to see a water bottle and two quesadillas rolled up in aluminum being extended to him from a curly-haired young woman — Joana, the one who’d gotten him into this house, one that belonged to a ‘bad man’ according to her.As the soldier mumbled a thanks, taking the offering, Joana explained: “Electricity is out everywhere, so everyone’s out there cooking their last meals.”But it didn’t seem like she wanted to say much more — using her newly freed hands to reach into her pants and retrieve a light at the same time she shoved a cigarette between her lips.Pointedly, she didn’t look at Dante, as if doing so would drop another weight on her shoulders, another boy to look after and betray.
The soldier hesitated, then mumbled, “Cell service is mostly dead too.”She made a noise of affirmation, flickering the flame that ignited her cigarette.Though she hadn’t asked, he said, “I’m worried about my mother.I was hoping to reach her.”He couldn’t resist the allure of honesty: “Soldiers were with her.”
Below, Tadeo cured the one-eye blindness of a man, and the people cheered.
Joana blew out some smoke, then leaned over the ledge with Dante.“Is she anywhere nearby?”
“I don’t know,” he confessed.“I don’t know if she’s still home.”Joana asked where home was.“I was born in Mesbilja.”He specified the state.“We’re from there, originally, and I think she was there now.”
“Maya?”Joana asked.
“Winik atel,” Dante clarified.“But I don’t visit thepueblomuch anymore.”And then he mentioned the southern city where his mother worked as a maid.
“Sorry.”
Dante chuckled at that.“And what about you?”He nodded his head at her.“Any family?”
“Mine is safe,” Joana said.“If the strikes were really trying to hit criminals, then they wouldn’t be, though.”
“You’re from a criminal family.”He didn’t phrase it like a question.
Joana picked the cigarette out of her mouth with two fingers, exhaled some smoke again.“Not in the rich way.”Then, she rummaged through her pockets again.“My dad got involved with some bad people, dragged my brothers in.Dragged me in too.He was trying to claw his way up.”Like the food, she offered her lighter and cigarettes to him.
Dante, immediately, set his food down on the ledge, then reached for them.“Does Tadeo know?”
