What if I’m not strong enough? Aaron had asked. And the old angel had looked at him grimly and said that without the anchor of his humanity, the angelic essence within him would surely run amok and destroy them all.

At first there was only darkness and the burning warmth of the poison, but then he saw it there, writhing in the black sea of his gradual demise. When Aaron had last seen it, the power had taken the shapes of various creatures of creation. Now it had matured into a beautiful winged creature, humanoid in shape, with skin the color of the sun and eyes as cool and dark as the night. They were family in a strange kind of way, he thought, and it drew him close, wrapping him in its embrace, flowing over and into him as if liquid, and when he opened his eyes, he was somewhere else entirely.

The pain of the poison was gone and Aaron found himself standing in a vast field of tall grass the color of gold. A warm gentle breeze smelling of rich spice caressed the waving plains. Far off in the distance he could just about make out the shape of a vast city, but there were sounds nearby that pulled his attention away from the metropolis. He turned and walked toward a hill, the sound of a voice carried on the wind drawing him closer.

He reached the top of the rise and peered down into a clearing, where an army had been gathered. They were angels, hundreds of angels garbed in armor polished to gleaming, and they stood unmoving, enraptured as they listened to one of their own. Clearly their leader, he paced before them, words of inspiration spilling from his mouth, and Aaron could see why they would have pledged their allegiance. There was something about him, a charisma that was impossible to deny.

As beautiful as the morning stars, he heard a voice whisper at the back of his mind, and he could not disagree.

And then the leader, the Morningstar, walked among his troops laying his hand upon each and every one of them, and as he touched them, bestowing upon them a special gift, weapons of fire sprang to life in their grasp, and they were ready to fight.

Ready for war.

Aaron experienced a sudden wave of vertigo, as if the world around him were being yanked away to be replaced by another time, another place, and he struggled to remain standing. He was on a battlefield now, surrounded by the unbridled carnage that was war. Soldiers he had watched rallied by the Morningstar were battling an army of equal savagery. He saw Camael and Verchiel fighting side by side against the Morningstar’s army. The screams of the dying and the maimed filled the air as blazing swords hacked away limbs and snuffed out life, and angels fell helplessly from the sky, their wings consumed by flames of heavenly fire.

It was horrible; one of the most awesome yet disturbing sights he had ever seen. He wanted to turn away, to pull his eyes from the scenes of brutality, the broken and burning bodies of angels, the golden grass trampled, the ground stained with the dark blood of the heavenly. But it was everywhere; no matter where he looked, there was death.

Aaron’s eyes were suddenly drawn to the Morningstar, his sword of fire hacking a swath through the opposing forces. His army was vanquished, but still he fought on, flaxen wings spread wide, slashing his way toward a tower made of glass, crystal maybe, that seemed to go up into the sky forever. The angel was screaming and there were tears on his face. Aaron could feel his sadness, for the sorrow that permeated the atmosphere of this place was so strong as to be nearly palpable.

The Morningstar screamed up at the crystalline tower, shaking his armored fist and demanding that He who sits on high come down to face him. And with wings beating air ripe with the smells of bloodshed, he began to ascend. The skies grew dark, thick with roiling clouds of gunmetal gray, and thunder rumbled ominously, causing the very environment to tremble. But the Morningstar continued to rise, flying steadily upward, sword of fire brandished in his grip, unhindered by the threat of storm.

Aaron could feel it before it actually happened, as if the air itself had become charged with electricity. He wanted to warn the beautiful soldier, but it was too late. A bolt of lightning resembling a long, gnarled finger, reached down from the gray, endless clouds and touched the warrior of Heaven. There was a flash of blinding light, and the Morningstar tumbled, burning, from the sky.

Stay down, Aaron whispered as he watched the figure twitch and then force himself to rise.

The Morningstar swayed upon legs charred black, and another blade of fire appeared in his hand. Again he looked up at the glass tower and raised his sword in defiance. “How?” he shrieked pitifully through a mouth now nothing more than a blackened hole. “How can you love them more than us?”

With wings still afire, he leaped back into the air, but his ascent was slower than before. The heavens growled with menace, as if displeased by his defiance, and birdlike shrieks filled the world. Aaron watched as the soldiers of the opposing army attacked the Morningstar, grabbing at his injured form, pulling him back to the ground, where they pitilessly set upon him with their weapons of fire.

He could feel the Morningstar’s pain, every jab, every stab of the soldiers’ searing blades, as if the attacks were being perpetrated upon him. Aaron fell to the ground, his eyes transfixed upon the violence before him, the blood of vanquished angels seeping through the knees of his pants.

Numbness had invaded his body, and he fought to stay conscious—to stay alive. But the darkness had him again in its grasp, and it pulled him below to a place where he could die in peace, the very same place that the angelic essence had resided before it had come awake on his eighteenth birthday. This was where he would slip from life, allowing the angelic power total mastery of his fragile human shell.

For a brief moment Aaron was convinced that this was the right thing for him to do. In this deep place of shadow there was no worry, no irritating mysteries of angelic powers, there was only comforting peace. Escape from the responsibilities heaped upon him by ancient prophecy.

“Aaron! He’s hurting me!”

Aaron’s tranquility was suddenly shattered by a cry for help, a desperate plea that echoed in the darkness. He tried to ignore it, but there was something about the voice that stirred within him a desire to live.

“Where are you, Aaron? He’ll keep hurting me unless you come.”

“Vilma,” Aaron whispered within the constricting cocoon of shadow, and opened his eyes to a vision of the girl he believed he loved in the clutches of Verchiel. It was but a flash of sight, but it was enough to stir him from the comforting embrace of his impending death.

“Please! Aaron!”

The angelic essence fought to keep him submerged in the depths of oblivion, but Vilma needed him, Stevie and the fallen needed him, and he felt ashamed that he had even considered giving in. The closer he got to awareness, the more he felt the painful effects the poison had wrought upon his body, and he was reminded of, and inspired by, the Morningstar, burned black by the finger of God, but still he fought on.

Aaron came awake on his knees, now in the kitchen of Belphegor’s home, his body wracked with bone-snapping convulsions. He pitched forward and vomited up the poison. Slowly he raised his head, wiping the remains of the revolting fluid that dribbled down his chin, to see Belphegor leaning forward on a wooden chair, offering him a white paper napkin.

“What did you see?” the angel asked, a gleam of excitement in his ancient eyes.

“Vilma.” Aaron struggled to stand.

“Who?”

“I have to go to her,” Aaron said, the familiar feeling of dread he’d been carrying since his life so dramatically changed replacing the nausea in his stomach.