Fell the Angels by Joslinne Morgan (classic novels for teens txt) 📕

on Heather to be fetched and returned to her. Amy had not yet been beyond the gates of hell and she earnestly hoped that she never would be. The souls around her continued to moan and sob and scream, sending shivers sliding along the ridge of her wings like an icy cold hand intent upon reaching her neck. This time, there was no Mephistopheles to run to. There was only Baalberith, scratching his pen over the parchment of his book.
Hours. Days. Weeks. Mortal time continued to slip away and still Heather did not arrive. Amy stayed rooted to her spot, convinced that if she strayed she would be lost forever, along with any hope or chance of getting back to heaven.
Finally, after what seemed to take ten thousand years…
“Heather Sardis,” a soft, sad voice whispered. “Category seven, middle ring.”
Amy’s head snapped up. There stood Heather, or rather, what was left of her. The spirit that stood before her did not resemble the girl that Amy had been assigned to nearly sixteen years ago. Heather’s rounded girlish figure had vanished, leaving a skeletal creature, with hollow sunken cheeks and sunken eyes that were hopelessly dulled. She hugged herself tightly, as if afraid, and looked at Baalberith as if she didn’t really believe that he was ever going to let her out. But he merely jotted a few things down in his book, he didn’t even look up.
“Checking out, I see. You can wait over there,” this time he did look up, and pointed his fountain pen accusingly at Amy. “Until Raziel gets here. He’ll take you both back to earth.” He blinked. His eyes were not in the best of condition, not at all like they had been when Amy first saw him. The white of one eye had turned completely yellow and bloodshot; the iris dulled and had lost all color. The other eye was shriveling in its socket, as if any moment it could fall right out. Or vanish altogether.
“I can’t see,” he muttered, rubbing his eyes. “I need a new pair of these. What ring did you say you were from?”
“Heather Sardis,” the soul repeated dully. “Category seven-“
“What ring, you ingrate?”
“-Middle ring,” the soul sighed.
Baalberith glared banefully and shook his head, then gestured irately for her to go stand by Amy. The soul drifted over obediently, keeping a respectful distance from the angel, not even looking up.
“Heather?” Amy asked gently. The soul slowly looked up, and tears glistened in it eyes.
“Once,” it replied, on the verge of crying.
“You don’t know me,” Amy was almost relieved. She didn’t know if she could ever bear Heather finding out how she had failed her. “My name is Amy.”
“You know mine,” The spirit replied dryly. “Though I find it strange to hear it again. They don’t call me by my name, there. It doesn’t matter there.”
“”What---“ Amy faltered, and glanced towards the gates. “What is it like?”
The soul burst into tears, releasing such a high keening wail that it would have split the ears of a softer mortal body.
“Pain!” it screamed. “Pain, pain, pain! There isn’t any relief! No, no, the only relief is the pain, it doesn’t end, it doesn’t end!” the spirit collapsed, its arms thrown defensively over its head, as if trying to drown out memories. Amy knelt down by the spirit and tried to gather it up in her arms, but what was once Heather twisted violently away, omitting a deep near bestial growl.
“What is it like?” the tears were back. “A nightmare, a nightmare. I keep dreaming of my mother. I keep dreaming that I’m at home in the bathtub and that it didn’t happen. That I didn’t succeed. There were angels… the fire…” more sobbing. “The fire – it burned me! It burned me…”
“I know,” Amy said gently, regretting having asked.
“I dream that it’s a normal day, and that I go back to school, and I am ok. And then I wake up and then it’s back there, where my feet grow into the soil and my toes spread roots, and my fingers spread and smallish twigs grow off them. The sky is dark with a small point of light and the crows land on my outstretched arms and peck at my eyes. And the pain feels good. The pain is the only relief. And I love the blood running down my face and I want more. I want more, and they don’t give it to me! They fly away and the demons weave in and out, there are lots of us, so many of us … they don’t help us, though. They are careful not to break a single thing. They love to see us suffer. Oh, how they love it!”
Amy threw her arms around the spirit’s shoulders and drew it close. Sobbing, shaking, it buried its face in Amy’s neck, unable to pull itself away. Exhausted, at the end of its rope. “Please, please, don’t send me back,” it wept. “I can’t go back, I don’t want to go back. Don’t make me go!” as it pleaded, it gripped the angel’s arms, nails digging into the perfect white flesh.
Why did Mephisto take her? Amy bit her lip and wondered, stroking the spirit’s hair. Why didn’t the Pilot angel get her? Purgatory is so much gentler… so much…
The girl didn’t deserve to suffer like this.
I am going to give her a second chance.
The woods fell completely silent. Even the shaking spirit in Amy’s arms went quiet. A great hush fell over the entire clearing as Amy glanced up to see what was going on. The spirits were no longer crying. The demons were no longer screeching. Baalberith’s pen was no longer scratching.
An angel, perfectly beautiful in contrast to its bleak surroundings, stood not far away at all from the entrance. In contrast to its background, its very aura was like white heat. The beautiful creature’s presence burned with goodness and light, and she recognized him on sight. Easily, from the heavy leather-bound tome he kept tucked under his arms, and she knew he kept with him always. It was a book he had spent eons compiling. A book that mortals referred to as the book of Enoch.
“Raziel!” she exclaimed, relieved to see him at last.
Raziel turned to face her, his expression grave as if chiseled from stone. He granted her the barest of nods. “Are you ready?” his voice was the very tune plucked from the strings of harps.
“Yes,” Amy said, standing. She pulled Heather’s spirit up with her.
“I know you know this already, but it’s procedure.” He raked his free hand through his flame red curls. “You know your role. As a guardian angel, you are not allowed to directly interfere with physical human activity. If your subject decides to say, slit her wrists for instance, you cannot pluck the knife from her hands and physically force her to stop.” This barb was directed at both spirit and angel, but only the angel winced.
“Also, you may give advice. Develop an intimate relationship with your subject and remember that you are working towards the purpose of the Almighty.” He held his chin high and glanced down at her in the way most mortals look at cockroaches. “Have you any questions?”
“No,” she breathed. She just wanted to get out. Get out of this miserable place.
“No one save Linda can see you, hear you, or even come to know your existence. Any violation of this law and you will be sent back here without a second thought. Is that understood?”
“Yes, Raziel!” Just get her out of here!
“I have a question,” Heather’s spirit interrupted softly. “What am I permitted to do?”
“As a spirit,” Raziel explained. “You can be seen or heard by anyone. But you can never manifest for long periods of time. You can only appear in places you have already been, and you cannot touch anything. You are completely insubstantial.”
“Can I possess people?” it asked, somewhat hopefully.
Baalberith cackled from his perch on the stool. “No, my dear, that’s my job!”
Raziel’s eye visibly twitched, but otherwise he ignored the Fallen. “Any more questions?”
“No,” Amy shook her head, and glanced at Heather’s spirit. It remained totally silent.
“Your deadline is until Linda’s time of death, chosen by either herself or the Almighty. We needn’t go over what will happen if her soul has not repented by then.”
Amy agreed.


Chapter Five: Guardian Angel

Raziel had arranged for Amy and Heather’s spirit to be ferried over the lake of souls. It was a single body of water that separated the dimensions of the living and the deceased. Of course, he had told them, it was a common enough way in. The thousands of tiny rowboats glided with graceful ease over the top of the water, which was completely flat and dark as tinted glass. Each possessed a glowing lantern lit from within by the active soul of its occupant. The boats only had room for one occupant, which was lay out flat on the bottom, arms crossed over its chest and all of its former worldly goods heaped around it. Whatever the family and friends piled into their coffins they carried with them as far as the other side of the lake, but there they were unburdened of both flesh and possessions. Once on the other side of the shore, the ferryman would take the lantern and break it. Once the soul was released and promptly seized by a waiting demon or Fallen, the ferryman would tap the boat with his foot, and it would sink into the sand, body and all.
Amy wondered vaguely if this was how Heather had gotten here. Had Mephistopheles had placed her soul in a little lantern and sent it over the water? Or had he dragged straight into the dark wood, as he had done with Amy?
The ferryman gestured silently for them. Amy took the spirit’s hand reassuringly and smiled. The spirit didn’t smile back. Merely, it stared out at the water with those hollow, haunted eyes. Every memory imprinted clearly in the worried curve of its mouth. Perhaps it had been here before.
The ferryman toed the sand, and from it the rowboat rose, dripping with sand and water, but otherwise ready for use. The corpse inside had long been disposed of, and only a few remnants of its worldly possessions were still there. Amy was the first to step into the boat. It rocked threateningly when she first stepped in, but once she got both feet in there and managed to sit down on the bottom, it remained still. Heather’s spirit was next. It shied away from the boat at first, but the ferryman pointed emphatically with one gleaming white bone finger. If it didn’t get on, it would be left behind, and taken straight back to the gates of hell.
With a gesture that Amy recognized as brave, the soul jumped into the boat. It rocked violently from side to side for a moment, then remained still, upright. The ferryman didn’t give them so much more than a nod as he placed his foot against the wood of the boat and shoved. Amy expected it to rock even more violently than before, possibly throwing them over this time. But the launch was perfectly smooth, and once they hit the water, it wasn’t like moving at all.
“It isn’t that terrible,” Amy whispered soothingly, trying to calm the spirit. “See?”
The spirit didn’t reply. It merely sat on the floor of the boat, its knees drawn up to its chest and dutifully ignoring the thousands of