SHADOW LIGHT HISTORY SERIES:

ANGEL BLOODLINES

Azrael flinched, his withered wing hung charred and useless behind him. They had received a direct hit, if it weren’t for the fact he was seeking Ariel he would have been amongst it and not on the outskirts. He brushed black dust off his tunic. Where was she?

 

Ariel Groaned and pulled herself out of the ditch, lucky she could throw herself in when the explosion occurred. She checked herself, no damage, only debris covered. She flexed her wings and rose above the burnt woodland.

They had been packing to head to the trees for transit, but she needed to take the fungus with her… Just a little would soothe her aching belly, comfort her daughter within… She knew it was foolish to leave it so late, but if they did not have the fungus on this new world she would spend the next 5 months in extreme pain and she did not want to go through that again, with it eventually ending in a miscarriage.

 

Azrael saw her rise in the distance. He sighed a relief. She was alive. He called out to her, knowing there was no way she could hear him above the din of the collapsing enclave but needed to call, for his own comfort. He waved frantically.

 

Ariel Studied the crumbling enclave. Her home, their home was a smoking pile of melted stone, collapsing within itself and glowing red. She sobbed. “Azrael, my love.” Her wings pushed her towards the glowing rubble. “Azrael!”

 

Azrael yelled as loud as he could at the same time an eruption blew skyward from somewhere deep within the Enclave. Clouds of black and red drifted over … Azrael screamed… Ariel was gone.

 

Ariel Had no way of avoiding the cloud that raced towards her from the explosion in the Enclave, she wrapped her wings around her and fell. Beat them just before hitting the ground and settled lightly on her feet, folded her wings back behind her and stood coughing in the dust. “My Love?” She sobbed… Everything was gone. Nothing could have survived that explosion even if by some miracle they had survived the initial impact. She lowered her head and said a silent prayer… No one could have survived…

 

Azrael coughed back his sobs. She was gone! His life and stillborn child… Gone! With a last glance, he turned towards the forest. Should he even bother? Why move to this new world if he were alone. Nothing, no one, could have survived through that, and he saw… He sobbed; he saw her go down in the dust cloud. Fall into the red fires below.

 

Ariel Coughed and looked around her. The woods glowed red and fires sprung up here and there, then died from lack of oxygen. She spread her wings and beat them, fanning smoke and dust away from her and attempting to clear the sky above and allow her a clear path upward.

The Enclave gave a final heave, spitting stone and rubble skyward and then collapsed within itself, a groaning splintering echo of lives lost.

 

Now it was done… But maybe, just maybe someone, somehow, had survived, maybe someone could make it to the trees? Azrael flapped his useless wing and ash fell from it. He glanced back at the final death of their beloved Enclave and the Angel Folk buried and burnt within. He sobbed for their departed souls and prayed that he would not be alone at the tree.

 

The sky belched rubble she Had nowhere to go, Ariel spread her wings above her, creating a canopy of feathers. Not enough to protect against anything large, but it would help deflect the smaller… She knelt from the impact of stones above her, dust and pebbles cascaded off her wings, then a thud of something larger… She screamed as something sharp pierced her, leaving a hole through the membrane of her wing, dust poured in… She screamed again as another impact pushed her to the ground. Dust and rubble piling up around her, choking her, burying her.

 

Azrael winced. Had he heard that? A scream? He stood amongst the shower of dust and listened. Yes… A scream… Someone was still alive. Without thought, he beat his wings and spun to fall flat on his face. Picked himself up and ran towards the red glow of their dead Enclave.

Ariel pushed herself upright, dust and debris falling off her. She fluttered her wings, creating a dust cloud around her. Nothing more for it. With sobs heaving in her chest she turned away from the carnage and the Enclave towards the forest. She would need to seek the tree and protect what remained of the Angel race. She beat her wings and rose… Do not look back… The green forest beckoned in the distance and rising clearly above it was the tree required to take her from this dying world and everything she remembered. She flew above the clouds of dust and smoke tears streaking the dirt on her face. Broken feathers flapping uselessly off her wings to spiral downward into the rubble below.

 

Blood dripped from the holes cut through the membrane of her wings and the numerous abrasions and gashes over her exposed flesh. She was wounded, minor, and healable. Now all she had to do was make it to the tree before this world became molten rock.

 

Azrael could have sworn he heard the beat of wings but could only hope, for the dust cloud obscured his vision from anything within a couple of yards from him. He searched, he spent the better part of a half-hour searching wherever he could, wherever the fires or crumbling structure allowed… He found the charred remains of several Folk, impossible to tell who. He picked his way over the rubble, stopped, and listened often… Had he heard the screams? Had he imagined the sound of beating wings? In the end, he had to admit defeat and turned his feet towards the direction of the forest, breathing deeply once he cleared the dark clouds. He gulped in the fresh air, shook dust and debris off, and set to running, he would need to get to the tree swiftly before this world ended and he with it.

 

Ariel sat at the tree sobbing. There was no one else, she was alone… Not a single Angel, or for that matter any other race waited at this tree… Was she to be alone on this new world? If so, the Angel race was doomed to extinction.

While the rumors were that the new world had a race called human that looked like the races of Parteethia, they were less advanced, and no one knew what deformity breeding with them would produce. Was her daughter destined to continue her race with the impure blood of human?

Ariel flexed her wings and rose one last time to view the dead remains of the Angel enclave and the dying rays of sunlight that peeked through the ever-increasing clouds of red dust. An eruption exploded to the East as she did so, and great billows of red and black ash tumbled towards the forest… She sobbed… Nothing, she saw nothing in the clearing between the Enclave and the forest… Nothing, and no one…

 

Azrael panted heavily as he entered the forest, the red glow behind him turning the timber and leaves strange hues of ember and brown… An explosion to the east, so close to the forest edge, it must set the woods ablaze, and it would advance fast… This world was all but dead. He sighed, if his world was all but dead, his race was dead. He picked his way through the undergrowth having entered away from the path to the nearest point he could and wished he had gone that bit further to the trail, this was going to take up precious time. He beat his wings in frustration. He missed flight already.

 

Ariel lowered herself to the ground, turned, and walked towards the huge tree. What was left would need to survive. She sobbed, the only conciliation being that she had managed to procure enough fungus to last her well through her pregnancy…

 

She reached out and touched the tree, it glowed a dim blue light and accepted her as she passed through, disappearing into the bark, the tree instantly erupted into fire as a red glowing rock split it through. The small clearing around it burnt swiftly and turned to ash.

 

Azrael saw the red glow through the trees, felt the ground quiver and the fire erupt… Oh, Gods no! He ran, barging through the woods and stopped panting at an ash clearing. The tall tree reduced to black charred remains. He screamed. Perhaps this was best, he would die with his world and his race. He sat sobbing, charred earth clenched in his fists.

A small group of Dwarven passed through the edge of the clearing to the far side. Azrael had no want to call to them, no need to involve any other race in his last moments… Maybe all races were doomed to die along with this world, maybe they were not meant to colonize the new world, to mix with the humans there?

 

Ariel coughed as she stepped from the tree into the blue rays of the new world, a cloud of red dust drifted through behind her. The tree heaved, its branches drooped, and leaves cascaded down upon her. She sobbed. She was the last to pass through this tree, it had breathed its last breath… She stood, wiped tears from her eyes, and gasped. This world was indeed beautiful, was her world ever so blue.

The deep blue sky with the occasional cotton ball of white cloud floating through, hung above a green forest swaying gently with the breeze, reflecting the sky in the center of this was a lake whose crystal waters bathed in the sun’s rays, its surface sparkling.

Ariel swayed with the breeze, closed her eyes, and sat in the grass at the edge of the slope, no one would be coming in behind her, no one was visible in front of her… Was she to be alone? She lay on her side, cupped her hands to her face, and cried, her wings hidden from sight, tucked in behind her.

 

Brent had heard it, heard, and felt the movement through the forest, something had upset the normal flow of life and now he saw it. A once vibrant healthy tree sat withered and dying on the edge of the slope towards the lake and home.

His hunting had been unsuccessful, something was disrupting the normality of the day, something had sent the wildlife into hiding, as far as he had roamed nothing stirred except this occasional upset of the flow around him.

Something! Brent stepped back into the trees, something moved at the edge of the slope. He waited; white light glistened then faded. He stepped around the edge of the trees and knotted an arrow. Hefted his hunting bow and aimed… Something moved, and it was not normal.

A woman! He sighed… But something else, something more… Brent stepped lightly towards her, she lay in the grass only partially visible in a white dress that flowed with the breeze despite her laying down. The shrubs and reeds around her appeared more vibrant, more… alive as if reveling in her presence. He heard sobs of anguish coming from her and advanced slowly carefully… This was no normal woman, this was an apparition, a ghost by the way it shone in the sunlight. He coughed just enough to be heard.