Aerie
The Fallen series, book 3
Thomas E. Sniegoski
PROLOGUE
It never seems to rest, Alastor reflected as he shoveled the last bit of a hearty breakfast of eggs, bacon, and toast into his yawning maw. He belched powerfully, speckling his ample front with flecks of chewed food, and dropped the greasy paper plate to the floor beside his leather recliner. It was nine o’clock in the morning, and what the fallen angel had hidden in the basement of the Bourbonnais, Illinois, home was already calling out to him.
“Alastor,” it whispered like the buzzing of a housefly. “Come, Alastor. Look upon what you have cast away.”
Alastor chose to ignore it. The monkeys, Reggie and Katie, he thought as his eyes caught the clock on the wall, they’re often amusing. He snatched up the remote control in a meaty hand, scattering potato chip bags and candy bar wrappers from atop the coffee table before him. He would lose himself in the trifle of morning television, a distraction from the incessant whispers in the cellar.
“Do you remember what it was like before the war—before you listened to the seductive reasonings of the Morningstar? Do you remember, Alastor?”
“Quiet!” the angel spat. He jabbed a sausage-thick finger down onto the remote to turn up the volume, settling his excessive bulk back into the recliner. It was a cooking segment, which he enjoyed, as mouthwatering meals were prepared by world-renowned chefs with the assistance of the program’s hosts.
Reggie dropped an egg on the floor and the studio audience went wild with laughter. Alastor joined in the hilarity, captivated by the antics of the human monkeys. If the Creator had ever bothered to mention how thoroughly entertaining these fragile creatures could be, he would never have pledged allegiance to the Son of the Morning.
“Remember what you once were, Alastor of the heavenly host Virtues. Come and recall your former glory.”
The audience was laughing again and Alastor seethed. He had missed the latest morsel of primitive humor.
“Damn you, be quiet!” he screamed, driving a fleshy fist down onto the chair’s worn armrest. “I looked at you yesterday—and the day before that. I have no desire to see you now.”
The chef produced a soufflé from the oven and the audience showed their approval with a burst of applause. Feigning exuberance, Katie explained how to acquire the recipe for the delectable dish, and he thought about writing the information down, but the whispers from the cellar beckoned for his attention.
“A chance to remember how you once were—the beauty and the power…”
Alastor hauled his bulky mass up out of the chair, a rain of crumbs from his last meal sprinkling down to the refuse-strewn floor. “I am still beautiful and still powerful,” he bellowed, one eye fixed on the morning program, lest he miss something of importance. The Reggie and Katie show broke to a commercial about adult diapers and the angel turned his full attention to the taunting voice.
“What will it take to shut you up?” he growled, knowing full well what the answer would be, what the answer always was.
“Look at me,” the whispers hissed. “Look at me and remember our time together.”
Alastor turned back to the television. A dog food commercial was showing-a small human child playing with puppies.
“No matter how often I see you, it never satisfies your need,” the fallen angel grumbled, wondering offhandedly how the dog food would taste.
“And it never shall. I will not allow you to forget what we once were.”
“Even if that is what I desire?” he asked, his attention drawn to an ad for the talk show that would follow Reggie and Katie. The show’s topic would be crib death, and he smiled with the secret knowledge of things that the simple human brain could barely begin to perceive. If he were so inclined, he could tell them all why their babies die in the night. If he were so inclined.
“I have no interest in your desire,” said the voice from the basement. “Come and look upon me or I shall taunt you all the rest of the day and well into the night.”
Reggie and Katie returned, and it took all the strength that Alastor could muster to pull his eyes from the entertaining visuals. “If I spend time with you now, you’ll not bother me for the remainder of this day?” he asked, shambling closer to the kitchen.
“Yes, come and look.”
Alastor lurched into the kitchen, gasping for breath as he propelled himself toward the cellar door, eager for the promise of blissful silence.
“Anything for some peace,” he growled, in his mind planning his television viewing for the remainder of the day.
His sweatpants began to slip below his middle, and he reached down to pull the elastic waistband up over his protruding stomach.
“Peace. An unattainable pursuit since our fall from Heaven; do you ever think we’ll experience its bliss again?” the bothersome voice asked through the door as Alastor took hold of the knob and turned it, a cool dampness wafting up from below as he pulled the cellar door open.
“I’ve found my own peace,” he said irritably, leaning on the rail to carefully descend the wooden steps that creaked in protest beneath his weight. “Is it what I knew in Heaven? No, but I will never see the likes of that again.”
He stood at the bottom of the stairs and glanced around, surveying his accumulation of goods, items he had acquired in the years since deciding he would live as a human. There was furniture, enough to fill multiple dwellings; boxes of books, clothes, and kitchen implements; tools; cans of paint; three lawnmowers; at least four televisions still in their boxes; and so much more stored away out of sight.
Alastor remembered when he had made the choice. The Powers were on the hunt, and he knew that it was only a matter of time before they found him. It was all about survival, so he did the unthinkable.
“That was your second fall,” the creeping voice spoke from within the room, pulling him from the past. “When you attempted to sever our bond.”
Alastor lurched forward toward the source of his irritation, his slippered feet scuffling across the cool, concrete floor. Carefully he maneuvered around an ancient bureau. “There was no other way,” he said, almost losing his balance as he stepped over a wooden milk crate filled with old toys made from tin. “It was that, or die.” The fallen angel steadied himself with the help of a foldaway bed, and continued on toward the object of his torment. “I had no choice,” he said again, perhaps more to convince himself. “How many times must I tell you?”
Everything that had defined him had been lost during the war. Alastor had fled to Earth with others of his ilk, the fearsome Powers in pursuit. For countless centuries he wandered the planet, purposeless, hiding from his would-be punishers. He had almost decided to give up and accept his fate, when it came to him: He would hide amongst the natives. He would become one of them, renouncing everything that defined him as a being of Heaven.
It was a perfect plan. By giving up his angel’s ways and surrounding himself with all things human, Alastor hoped to mask his scent from the Powers that hunted him. The angel glanced across the basement, catching his reflection in a mirror against the wall.
“Look at you,” the voice said from close by, dripping with disdain. “Look at what has become of you.”
Alastor was fat, morbidly so, but that was all part of the mask he wore. “I’ve explained why I must be this way,” the angel said, eyes fixed upon the mirror.