Malachi stopped before a wall of vines adorned with ebony flowers. The flowers hissed menacingly, blowing puffs of some noxious, organic poison into his face. Annoyed, he slashed at the growths with his glowing scalpel, burning and cutting the thick vegetation, the stink of poison in his angelic lungs reinvigorating his determination to see Heaven reduced to smoldering ruins.
And from the ashes, a new beginning would emerge.
He had no idea how long he went on, his anger blinding him to time’s passage, stopping only when he was summoned by his servant.
“Master,” Taranushi called tentatively.
The elder whirled, blade clutched tightly in his hand and murder in his eyes.
“We are here,” the Shaitan said, pointing behind him.
And Malachi turned to see what he had endured so much, for so very long, to reach.
“The Tree,” he exclaimed, clambering over the remains of Eden’s last defense.
With a cloud of buzzing insects swarming around his head, Malachi finally stood before the Tree.
And was horrified by what he saw.
The Tree was withered, its branches sagging with the shriveled remains of fruit once filled with the knowledge of God.
Something’s wrong, Malachi thought, and then his eyes fell to the ground surrounding the base of the great Tree.
The grass was brown—dead—and the ground roiled as something stirred beneath it.
Something that he had placed there.
Something ready to be born.
For a moment, Izabelle Swan ceased to exist, and there was only the Garden.
Izzy and Eden were one. Izzy felt the Garden’s yearning, her desire to be complete again, to have her children returned to her.
But she also felt her sickness.
Something had been planted within her, something that fed upon her. It was beyond hungry . . . voracious, and it wanted the knowledge.
God’s knowledge.
And it would not be sated until it had consumed it all.
And as it grew, it fed upon the tree, suckling upon its roots, using the enlightenment of God as its source of nourishment.
The evil grew within the soft, dark womb of her earth. She tried to kill them, to abort this dangerous life inside her, but it was too strong, and the longer it was inside her, the weaker she became.
She did not how much longer she had, but Eden would fight until there was nothing left of her but dust.
Izzy threw back her head and sucked in a mouthful of air and annoying insects, gasping for breath as the thoughts of the Garden receded in her mind.
“We want to help you,” she cried out, her hands still buried deep within the soil. “Please let us help you.”
The Garden shivered, a noticeable tremor passing through the lush vegetation as the woman’s words reached the sentient jungle surroundings.
She heard the sound of coughing, and turned to see the muddy form of Jon, climbing out of a deep pool of muck, roots snaking across the ground allowing him to pull himself free.
“Thank you,” she said, feeling suddenly joyous, but that joy was short-lived as there came an explosion from somewhere above them, and something dropped to the Garden floor, still burning.
“Sweet Jesus,” Izzy said as she watched the angel slowly stand, his body burning as if doused with gasoline.
“Remy,” Jon called out as he stood, dripping thick mud.
But Izzy wasn’t quite sure it was Remy he was calling to.
The angel stood there, flaming sword in hand, a sneer of contempt upon his burning face.
“Jon, you might not want to get too close,” she warned.
The Son of Adam stopped short as the angel’s gaze fell upon him.
“Remy?” the man asked again.
The angel’s fire seemed to burn brighter, and for a moment Izzy feared for the man’s life, but the angel’s expression suddenly softened, and the fire around his body extinguished.
“Yeah,” Remy said.
“She didn’t want to hurt us,” Izzy explained, as she pulled her hands free of the twining roots and joined her friends. “Eden’s sick. . . . Something very bad is growing inside her, something evil. . . .”
Remy looked at her, and for a moment she sensed that he might have been replaced again by something far colder, and more angelic.
“Then I suggest we help her,” he said, holding out his burning sword. “And cut this cancer from her womb.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The sword burned in Remy’s hand.
The heat of the weapon radiated internally, amplifying the rage of the Seraphim, drawing it out like an infection from a wound.
Remy held on to his control, but didn’t know if he had the strength to continue. Wrapped within the constricting embrace of the thorny vines, he had let his defenses down, allowing the Seraphim to emerge without restraint.
There had been something horribly liberating about the experience, and yet terrifying. To think of the Seraphim—to think of this being of divine power filled with rage—unleashed upon this holy place . . . it scared his human side.
But their options were few, for he knew that he didn’t have the power to face the Shaitan without the unbridled fury of the Seraphim.
He could feel the scions of Adam and Eve staring at him. They were looking to him for guidance, unaware of the struggle going on inside him. It was taking everything he could muster to hold on to the leash. . . .
“What now?” Jon wanted to know, nervously looking about him. The jungle was moving, writhing as if in pain.
“We find the nest of the Shaitan, and kill them before they can be born,” Remy answered as the Seraphim howled for blood, testing his resolve at every turn.
“Then we’d better find them fast,” Izzy said. She was leaning against a nearby tree, her complexion wan—sickly. “I’m not feeling so good since hooking up to the Garden,” she explained. “Think I might be sharing how Eden is feeling . . . and it isn’t good. I don’t know how much time we have left.”
The flaming sword began to vibrate in Remy’s hand, and as if the blade had a life of its own, its tip suddenly pointed toward the earth.
Jon jumped back as Remy struggled with the unwieldy weapon.
“What’s happening?” he asked, afraid.
“I don’t know,” Remy answered, fighting the blade. The pull was incredible, his muscles straining to keep the sword from stabbing the ground.
“Let it do what it wants,” Izzy hollered. “It has a connection to this place. . . . I think it might be trying to help.”
Remy did, allowing the burning blade to drop, stabbing into the soil of Eden with a sibilant hiss. Images from the Garden began traveling through the sword and into his mind.
And what he saw filled him with horror.
The Tree of Knowledge, withered and dying, the ground beneath it churning with unholy life—as Malachi and the Shaitan looked on.
It was more than he could stand, and the Seraphim raged, charging forward to wrest away control.
Let me out, the divine power demanded.
And Remy knew he had no choice.
He let the Seraphim come.
The angel Remiel considered the humans before him.
And, finding them of no importance to the coming conflict, he stretched his golden wings and leapt into the sky.
There was evil to be vanquished.
Blood to be spilled.
Battles to be won.
All in the name of Heaven, and the Lord God.
The Tree was nearly dead.
“Master, what is wrong?” Taranushi asked with concern.
It’s been drained, Malachi thought, as he placed a hand against the dark, dry bark. The fetal Shaitan have feasted upon the knowledge of the Almighty.
They should never have been capable of such a task. They were never supposed to do something such as this.
They were not designed to do something like this.