He shivered, but not from pleasure.
“Gone?” Luc’s voice sounded distant, lost in the chamber’s gaping mouth. “Gone where?”
Hadri shrugged, his body veiled by darkness.
“Who can say? I suppose even He grows weary of the same scenery so many aeons over.”
“Butno onemeets with Him?” Luc abandoned the periphery of the chamber, where he’d been lingering near the candles. He charged into the room’s dim center. Rounding the pedestal, he faced Hadri head-on. “No one?Ever?Isn’t that the whole purpose of the Council? To communicate with Him on the angels’ behalf?”
This couldn’t be happening. If the Creator couldn’t tell Luc who he was, and Lila refused to see reason, then who in Heaven could?!
“Do you know the purpose of the Ceremonial Chamber?” Hadri asked.
The Ceremonial Chamber? Hadri meant the annex on the opposite side of the Great Hall from the Artisanal Chamber. It had been locked during Luc’s graduation ceremony, the only part of the Great Hall the graduates couldn’t enter.
“It’s for the Creator’s use, isn’t it?”
“Yes. We are hoping that by giving Him a residence here, where He can perform signs and wonders at His leisure, He might return and dwell among us as He did in the old times.”
“Did you know Him?”
“I did. I was one of the first angels created, along with Michael, Muriel, and Raziel. But memory is a funny thing. I can recall neither the specifics of His face nor the cadence of His voice. Only that we were together once. Beyond that, everything is a blur. On purpose, it would seem. Speak to anyof the older angels. They’ll tell you the same.” Hadri paused, then said, “Anyway, on to your question.”
“The purpose of the Council.”
“Yes. Now, in the beginning?—”
“Hadri, I know what happened in the beginning. Just tell me what is happening now!”
Hadri held up a palm for silence. Patience.
“In the beginning, nine and a half aeons ago, the original eighty-four angels were split by the Creator into twelve governing angels and seventy-two skilled laborers divided between twelve skills, with six angels per skill. Later, these same seventy-two angels formed the original guild councils with six members each. They became instructors and taught the new angels that were being created. The Lessons Hall was built, and so forth.”
“Yes, I know. That was all in our lessons scrolls. We had to memorize it and spit it back into the aether a hundred times.”
Hadri gave him a sharp look.
Luc swallowed his frustration.
“Continue,” he offered, not totally apologetic.
“Each half aeon, an additional eighty-four angel children appear in the Council’s midst. One by one, they come, along with their visions. So we know He is still…about.” Hadri waved a hand at the ceiling. “But we can no longer communicate directly with Him. That’s why this chamber is of utmost importance. You are to tell no one that you have seen it. Officially, it does not exist.”
Luc scrutinized the chamber, which was so utterly devoid of Heaven’s general lavishness he might have laughed if he wasn’t in such a foul mood.
“Well, what does it do? Surely, you do not hope toholdthe Creator here.”
“Hold the Creator?” Hadri laughed abruptly. “My dear boy, the Creator could rearrange this entire building with the bat of His eyelid.ThatI remember clearly. You will do well to remember it also.”
Hadri raised an eyebrow, and Luc had the good sense to look abashed, but when the older angel turned away from him, he narrowed his eyes.
All this fuss over someone who wasn’t in their midst? He didn’t know who he resented more: the Creator, theonly onewho knewall,for vanishing without clarifyingall,or the Council and the instructors for propagating the belief that He was yet making all the decisions behind the scenes. They’dheld His name over Luc’s head for his entire existence, telling Luc the Creator had great plans for him, when the reality was the Creator couldn’t care less. If only Luc could rearrange buildings with a flick of his wrist, he would give the Creator a piece of his mind.
Hadri produced a folded parchment from his pocket and opened it.
“Bring me a candle from along the wall there.” He indicated the wall by their entry point.
Luc acquiesced with a sour twist of his lips.
