Still not loving my work but big things are happening again, at least.  In a subsequent draft, it should be much improved, but in the spirit of publicly posting the first draft, here you go.  If you want to read this novel from the beginning, see this article, read it, and hit the next button until you see more entries, stopping with II:V, then starting again at this one.  Meanwhile…

–

“My beautiful people.  My wounded flock.  I have, in a moment of weakness, failed you.  How is this possible?, you may ask.  An angel of such immense power, who could turn the very world you stand upon?  It is that very power that is the problem.”

Michael stood in the balcony of the Abbey, addressing the crowd who had come to accuse the assassins that day.  At one side were Cardinal Domenico and his guard, at the other his own men, Pietro and Dante.  They had let as much daylight as possible into the room, but the figures on the balcony were still cast in blue-grey.  Michael’s halo was visible, licking around the corners of his crown.

“Our souls are united in the great hierarchy of Creation, and so my heart can feel yours, and you can feel mine.  When I was in my proper place, before the terrible crime that inaugurated my regency, there was a proper distance between us, which made this connection a source of gentle love for us all.

“Walking among you has lessened the distance between us, and at a time when that love has been sullied with those mortal sins.  Dio 6 is comfortable in its star’s light, Dio 1 is a burning rock.  I am too close to you now, and must protect you from the power of my heart.

“When I came into this place the other day, the protections I had placed upon myself were imperfect, and some of you fell ill.  Whether you felt the sickness or not, you felt some measure of my darker feelings, of the great turmoil I feel at having to look upon these sinners and decide the best justice for them.

“To prevent this from happening again, I have redoubled my efforts to keep you safe, to keep my heart inside this cassock.  That will not happen again, I swear to it.”  Michael looked back and forth over the people, watching their faces for a sign of how they were feeling.  He was not exaggerating.  The day he had reduced Cristina to animal panic, the lamen he wore for routine protection had been slightly damaged.  He rebuilt it from sterner materials, immune to smudging and ripping.

His ability to read expressions had grown by leaps and bounds since he fell, in part from practical experience, in part from that dangerous proximity to the masses.  He had been gleaning knowledge from them telepathically, purely on instinct.  Now that he had to exercise greater care with his power, would his learning slow?

Just the same, Michael was satisfied that, although they still had fears and concerns about the situation, the main run of the crowd admired his beauty and power, and tried to accept everything that he said.  He continued.

“On another matter, which concerns us today, is that I must disappoint your desire to confront the assassins today.  I do see why you want to do this, why my good cardinals decided to allow this, but I have looked at the records of what happened, and must conclude that visitation by the mourning is a form of torture.

“The punishment these sinners must ultimately face may include torture, it is true.  And this may well be part of that, but I cannot swear that it will be.  Justice must be more carefully considered before it is administered.

“You gathered here today, among all of the people of Dio 6, will be the first to be informed of my final decision, of what is to befall the terrorists, and if you are to be part of it.  That I can swear as well.  Now please, go home.  In the name of God I bless you all.”

The protection magic he had woven around himself was so precise that he could extend his power through it with conscious exertion, and he teased out the love that he felt for the people, and let it wash over the crowd, ever so slightly.  Their expressions softened, their concerns assuaged — at least for the time — and they slowly left the building, with no small amount of genuflection and prayer before they let the beautiful angel leave their sight.

Domenico took his hand and said, “While we are swearing to things, let me say that I will not behave so presumptuously again.  You have my word, Pontiff-Regent.”

The creature gently withdrew his hand and said, “My sincere gratitude, Cardinal.  I will leave you to your duties and persist in my own.”  He bowed slightly and walked away, guards trailing behind him.

Domenico stood there in silence but a moment, before heading into the opposite hall with his own entourage.  Halfway into the right wing of the building he turned to face his security detail and quietly asked, “Where are the security cameras monitored?  Take me there, quietly.”

He didn’t know if the angel’s sense of hearing could reach that far across the building, but he couldn’t bear the curiosity any longer.

–
In the left wing of the abbey, Michael had gone straight to Cristina’s room.  With his newly redoubled psychic protections, the guards did not sense his coming in the same way, but parted ways nearly as quickly.  He ordered Pietro and Dante to remain outside the room, and for the first time, he closed the door to the hall.

Cristina crouched on the far side of her bed from the door, peering over the top at him.  “Come on, come on!  Why me?”  She gleamed with a thin sweat.

He looked at her, sad and kind.  “Surely you can feel the difference between this time and the last?  I have improved the powers that bind my psychic aura, to protect you mortals.  There should be nothing to harm you now.”

“That was powers last time?  I just thought I was scared of you.  I still am.”

“Please sit on the bed.  Would it help if I sat farther away?”

“Yeah, like, go back to the throne room.”

“Please.  I am not leaving, Cristina.”

She crawled up onto the bed and sat there, coiled like a spring.  “Now what?  Seriously, you freak me out.”

Michael found a stool and sat on it, more than two paces away from the bed.  His mien was of practiced calm beneficence, but if she could see his pupils expanding and contracting, catch the flicks of the eye, she might guess at something else.  “I’d like to apologize for how I’ve conducted myself around you.  Your sin was so great that it drew me out of the heavens themselves.  I’m new to the world, still finding my way.  In shock, I haven’t properly controlled my feelings.”

“You almost sound human now.  It’s a neat trick.  Again, what do you want from me?”

“Simply to understand you.”

“So you know how to torture me to death, right?  Why would I let you know anything then?”  In full view, he could see the sweat wasn’t from fear.  She must have been exercising before he came in.

Without the shock and haze of their first encounters, Cristina could finally take a more objective view of the angel.  An angel pope!  Absurd.  He looked so much like a real man, but larger than life.  His size alone felt like a threat, no matter the demeanor he put on.  He seemed as big as a horse.

He said, “It is not yet decided what your punishment shall be, only that it should stand as a reminder to all in the Stars of Weal to never transgress like this again.”

“That isn’t helping me relax, Your Holiness!”  She knotted her fingers in the blankets.

His face took a pained expression, so indistinguishable from a human.  “I’m truly sorry.  This was meant to be less torturous than my previous visits.  I am not here to inflict another cruelty upon you, child.”

Cristina stopped twisting as much, but still gripped the blankets in two fists.  “I believe you.  What if I accidentally change your mind?  You have a temper.”

“I will leave, as I did before, if you recall.”

“Yeah.  I’ll never forget that, at least until the axe falls.  So what is this about?  Why me?”

“You personally slew the pontiff.  I know your heart.”

She laughed for an instant, mirthlessly, madly.  “How can this be happening?”

“These are rather unbelievable times, in no small part due to the work of your hands.”

“Why even say anything?  You know what I’m going to say.”

“Yes, yes.  To blame it on Blasfemia.  But it is you, who designed to kill God.  There is no one else in the world like you, Cristina.  That is why I am here.  I need to understand this.”  The angel leaned forward in his seat, looking deeply into her eyes.

She rolled her eyes.  She didn’t want to but they were beyond her control on this one – on this absurd circumstance.  “You need to understand something that isn’t true.  This is gonna go great.”

“You don’t need to confess today, but please, spare me the denials.  How many people have a chance to speak directly with the Angel of the World?  I cannot imagine you have no curiosity at all about it.”

“So I can ask questions too?”

“I hadn’t considered it, but I may allow it for a time.  You will answer my own?”

“If I can.  You know there are some things a person never says, to protect themselves.”

“And for other reasons as well.  Same terms then.  We can each ask, but understand there may be no answer given.”  Michael straightened up in his seat and crossed his arms, eager.

Cristina’s mind raced.  Why did life end up being like a test so often?  “Deal.  Might take me a minute to think of a good question because you got me all jacked up.”

“Why did you do it?  I understand you each had your own motives.  The political philosophy of your former lover, the esoteric spirit lust of your theologian, the ethnonationalism of your fixer.  And you were, of all things, the Satanist?”

“You really wanna know about that?  About that?”

Michael showed his hands.  “If knowing the dark philosophy of devil worship helps me understand how you could bring yourself to this, then I must know something of it.  The motivation.”

Cristina relaxed enough to cover her face with her hands.  After she stifled a scream at his absurd delusion, she said, “Society is all about judgment.  Make sure you do this, never do that.  Even when it isn’t pointed at you, it’s always rumors and bullshit and bitching, and you just know it’ll be pointed at your back the second you turn around.”

“And because society is religious, you come to hate religion, believe it is the cause of all that you dislike in people?”

“If the shoe fits.  That’s the language they use.  And if shit comes to a head, it’s inquisitores and priests that enforce it.  How can God make me like this and then stand in judgment of me for living how he made me?  I know if he exists the way people say he does, then he hates me, and I hate him.”

“God loves all of his children, but he does hate sin.”

“That shit has never made any sense, but go off.  You’re the pope of nonsense.  Pope Nonsensius the Ding-Dong.”

It was Michael’s turn to hide his eyes, mustering the thoughts to pierce her wall of noise.

“My turn?,” she asked, and didn’t wait for an answer.  “It’s all about the magic hat, isn’t it?  If the old pope wasn’t wearing the magic hat, you wouldn’t have even noticed, would you?  Maybe low key, but not like this.”

He dropped his hands and shook his head sadly.  “You just don’t get it, do you?  You’re lost in this maze of moral relativity and philosophical materialism, when the evidence of God’s truth is right in front of your face.”

“There’s an expression where we come from.  ‘The Right of the Church is writ on the wings of the Hosts.’  Basically, that the very fact the priests can summon angels is proof they are doing God’s will, and have the right to make all the rules.”

“And you deny that because you believe… what, exactly?  That book by Chucra Colimar you read in eighth grade?  That the angels are spirits pressed into the church’s service, forms twisted by human sorcery?”

She was shocked quiet for a moment.  Then said, “You’re reading my mind.  Then why don’t you already know..?”

“I have decided not to read anyone’s mind, Cristina.  I found out every single detail of your lives, in my studies.  I need to understand why this happened, so I can keep it from ever happening again.”

“You’re telling me you memorized our library records from school?  That’s insane.”

“A Treatise on Angelic Bondage, penned by Jorge’s intellectual predecessor.”

She curled into a ball and tugged the blanket over her head.  “You knew I dated Chino.  Didn’t find that out from the library.”

“Pictures and videos.”

“But you’re not bothering them.  It’s only me…”

“Your reason.  It vexes me.”

She whipped the blanket down, but didn’t sit up.  “What’s the big fucking mystery?  Maybe I’m just mentally defective!  Maybe I’m just crazy!”  To Cristina he looked just like a man, acted just like a man.  But moreso?  He must have a superhuman mind to remember all those little details about four lives.  Maybe his powers were pushing him close to awareness of that hole in the middle.  Spirits are always missing something; she was sure of that.

True to that perception, his emotions began to crack the surface.  He stood and took one step toward her.  She barked in fear and rolled behind the bed, out of his sight.

“No!  Why must you fear me like this?  I am no more grave of a presence than any in your gaol!  Do you fear yourself?  You’re the one who has wrought your fate!”  His voice trembled.

He isn’t bothering the others but he’s bothering me.  He isn’t reading my mind because he doesn’t want to know.  He’s committed to the idea I did it, because…  of what he wants…

She made herself cry.  It was always a good stalling tactic.  Cristina wasn’t a great actress, but stress made it easy to throw herself into that spirit, to pretend she had that particular human frailty.  She was human, of course, but crying was not something she’d ever done in earnest.  Not how her body or mind worked.

Michael flew to the corner of the room, where he could look around the bed without being close to her.  “Look!  I am not close to you!  I cannot hurt you!  I wear this terrible lamen upon my chest like a curse, oppressing my powers, lest I burn the people that I love!  Do not dear me, please!”  He tugged down the collar of his cassock to reveal the new brazen symbol, hung from steel chains.

“You love me?,” she choked.  “It’s impossible!  Nobody loves me!  Angels can’t love anything!”

He had meant that in the broadest sense, that he loved all of humanity.  Hadn’t he?  Michael cried now too, though he wasn’t wracked by the sobs, or curled in a ball like she was.  “Look at me!  I love all of mankind!  I love you like my children!”  He didn’t love children, did he?  The angel felt that his words were springing unbidden, barely controlled.

Through the blur of tears she saw him, her own eyes wide with fear, but something else dawning as well.  Could he see it?  She had to be careful as hell, but it seemed to be working.  Get him off guard with emotion, then make him believe whatever he wants to believe.

“It’s alright,” she said between sobs.  “It’s not like I can make you do anything.  Just stare at me.”

“I’d sooner gouge out my own eyes than make you feel this way!”  He wheeled around and gripped one of the blinds, wings flexing in place.  His voice was erratic.

He’ll tear me limb from limb.  Don’t fucking do it, Cristina.

“Prove it.  Hold me gently, don’t hurt me at all.  If you even can.”

There was a long moment of shuddering breaths and brutal tension, then she was nearly shocked out of her mind by huge arms curling around her, pulling her up onto his thighs.  She was suddenly reminded of being held by a priest when she was five years old, but this reality was much more dire.  The metal of his strange huge amulet pressed into her shoulder, the chains snapped at her hair.  He smelled like fire, like a man who had worked a day in the fields, then walked through a haze of incense.  His breath turned to steam on her temple and trickled down her face.

“I do love you, my child.  If no love for you remains in all the stars, mine cannot be dimmed.”  His muscles tensed, and he increased his efforts to not crush her, holding his arms so stiffly.  “Why is your body so rigid?  Why do you fear me so?”

“Just hold me until it stops, please.  I can’t bear this pain.”

“Y-yes, my child.  I will.”

–
Domenico listened to their words and watched their bodies from three angles at once, trying to feel out the reality beneath the emotional surface.  The talk of love, the physical intimacy, this had to be the machinations of the Corazono heretic.  If Michael were just another human political rival, their sobbing and fumbling embraces would be music to his ears — leverage to promote himself.  He was the heir apparent to the papacy, but nothing was ever so simple where that throne was concerned.

The angel was an angel, one with power that defied all human control.  Cardinals were some of the most accomplished angel binders outside of the highest echelons of the police, but if the entire college worked together, they’d have no hope of restraining this creature.  The heretic knew she was condemned to death, so why not play with atomic fire?  Selfish bitch!

He needed her to stop, but how to achieve that?  The Pontiff-Regent had superhuman senses, preternatural cognition, and supernatural understanding.  Were she to be assassinated, he might sense who was responsible and take revenge.  If insane enough, he might just take revenge on the whole world.  Domenico could only hope any intercession was happening early enough in the monster’s infatuation that it wasn’t of mortal consequence.

Several schemes occurred to him at once, overlaying and entangling each other.  Manipulate a faithful man to assassinate her, take the blame, then die before he could be interrogated.  Give her what she wants — fake her execution and let her live in secret with a reconstructed face — at least until a subsequent assassination.  Maybe the angel could be in on that scheme, but his faith was more true than any among the cardinals, and the guilt could lead him to lash out dangerously.  Or his love could help distract him for the rest of a human lifetime, and avert apocalyptic trouble on Dio 6.

Controlling Michael through manipulation seemed too much like the foolishness that heretic had taken upon herself.  Destroying him, on the other hand..?  To even think it raised the risk of discovery.  Should the angel’s power again breach the constraint of his lamen, he could anticipate the threat through augury or telepathy in an instant.  Still, it had to be considered, for the good of humanity.  And as an advanced practitioner of divine science, Domenico was already running the math.

The creature’s energy would need to have an escape that did not damage the world, and if the source of the killing blow was an exorcism that forced him into the ectosphere with lethal force, that might be just what was required.  Like other fields of physics, divine science was not limited in scope to the power of individuals.  One could use technology to achieve greater effects, and this would surely require such a mechanism.

It would be a cannon – perhaps an ectoproton beam with subtachyonic carrier waves, possibly affixed to a satellite – and it would have to be invented nearly from scratch in a very short time.  That meant more conspirators, and more opportunities to lose it all to a telepathic moment.  Good reason to act as quickly as possible.

He left in a swirl of flowing red and black cloth.

–
It seemed like an hour before the Pontiff-Regent came out of the assassin’s room, and his guards could change from post to escort.  Dante and Pietro were immediately concerned at his demeanor, glassy-eyed and vacant, but with a nervous energy beneath that threatened to escape his shackles.  They bowed, but as he passed, they had to exchange worried glances.  Dante bared his teeth in fear and furrowed brow, Pietro swallowed a sob that was trying to form.  What had she done to that great innocent soul?

–