Luc ascended along the bare white path, but when he reached Heaven’s borders, he couldn’t penetrate them. He couldn’t even see Heaven through the golden aether, and when he flew into it, the aether spit him out in a burst of light and a sizzle of energy. That same sizzle of energy he’d felt when he’d tried to escape the barrier surrounding his home.
In a flash, Luc retrieved Lila’s crystal. He summoned fire and tried to dissolve the barrier as he’d done before.
It didn’t work. Either the barrier was too large and the crystal too small, or the barrier keeping him out of Heaven was stronger than the one that had contained him at his house. Nonetheless, he flung himself at it again and again, though his muscles ached and his head pounded and his wounds stung.
Finally, having no luck with Heaven’s borders, Luc struck out at the darkness instead. It, at least, moved when he commanded it to. It rumbled with discontent, but peeled back, revealing the blank slate beneath.
When Luc had exhausted his body and his rage and could see only ablank white expanse far into the horizon, stretching the breadth of Heaven, he stopped. Heaving from his efforts, he hung there in the great expanse, alone, suspended between Heaven and the Void.
Banished, or so it seemed, Luc couldn’t go forward; he could only go back, and after a time, he descended into the depths where the Void reigned. He descended and descended until he found a place far enough from Heaven that he didn’t have to be tormented by its sight, but close enough that he could look up and view its light in the distance.
There, he shut his eyes, reached out his hand, and began to create.
First, earth beneath his feet; then, sky above his head; then, oceans; then, mountains.
He envisioned a mixture of Heaven and Earth elements, blended into a paradise to rival both places. But when he opened his eyes, he saw no beauty at all.
His replica of the Great Hall stood in ruins, the stone crumbling and scarred. Rocky and barren, the ground bore no plants. The murky sea teemed with violent swells, and in the distance, charred black mountains spouted fire. Ash clouded the aether.
Though the ground beneath Luc’s feet was solid, everything he’d created was the color of death.
Present Aeon
When Lila came to, Eva was mopping her brow with a wet strip of linen. Her strawberry blonde hair, matted around her face, was littered with tiny fragments of glass and stone. Above her, blue and gold floral mosaics, spaced at even intervals, glimmered on a vaulted stone ceiling. The Artisanal Chamber ceiling, Lila realized, after a delay. She was on her back, extended on a thin linen mat.
“Lila!” Eva cried, stroking Lila’s face. “You were passed out for so long. I was afraid you’d never wake up. They wanted to move you, but Itoldthem you were still breathing.”
Lila twisted her head and squinted past Eva down the chamber’s length, the light paining her as it spilled through the tall stained-glass windows, some of them partially shattered.
Moveher? What did that mean?
“Why am I…” she croaked, staring at one half-destroyed depiction of a botanist tending flowers.
“We’re in the Artisanal Chamber. It took the least damage during the quake, so all the injured have been brought here.”
“The quake?” Lila tried to sit up, but her head pounded, and Eva pushed on Lila’s shoulders, forcing her back down.
She nodded, glass sliding down her limp hair.
“While you were unconscious—oh, it wasawful—the ground startedshaking, and part of it cracked open. This huge hole we almost fell into. Black smoke waseverywhere,and we could barely seeanything,and then the building started breaking apart, and all the glass was being blown out by the wind.” Eva paused, her body quivering as much as her voice. After a beat, she continued, with forced calm, “Beni and I had to move you. Thankfully, we made it in here. The Ceremonial Chamber was completely destroyed.”
The Ceremonial Chamber. The annex across from the West Wing. They were in the annex across from the East Wing.
Lila rolled over on her side, wincing. What had Eva said? Theinjuredwere brought here?
That explained the colorful mats—the ones they’d slept on during their earliest lessons—laid out on the floor of the chamber beneath angels in various states of awareness and brokenness. And bloodiness. The foul scent of blood saturated the aether, and a large, dark smear of it stained the light blue fabric of the mat nearest Lila, though the mat’s occupant had departed. Healed? Or…lost?
Pain assaulted her temple. Lila shut her eyes, shuddering.
Castor.
Castor was lost.
Tears rolled down her cheeks as she remembered him in his final moments. There had been so much blood; she still felt it coating her palms, slick and unnatural.
But why…why hadn’tshebeen lost?
“Michael said thatLuccaused the quake.” Eva’s words prompted Lila to open her eyes. The blood on the blue mat lingered, too close to her face. There was too much blood.
