body to the outside world.
Remy tensed the muscles in his back, wishing his wings into existence to evade the blades—
And nothing happened.
He did not have time to ponder this latest insanity. The filthy angel screeched something unintelligible as it thrust with one of the knives. Remy managed to leap back, the edge of the blade catching the front of his shirt and slicing across his belly.
The angel cried out as the scent of Remy’s blood perfumed the acrid air. The other blade was eagerly coming around for more of the same. This time, Remy caught the angel’s wrist and twisted it back behind it, pulling up savagely until the sounds of snapping bone and sinew mixed with the angel’s cries of pain.
The knife fell to the ash-covered ground, and Remy snatched it up. The blade felt wrong in his grip, as if the weapon did not care to be held by anyone other than its owner. The intense burning sensation came next, causing Remy to drop the black-bladed knife to the ground as he gazed at the blistered flesh of his palm.
The angel started to cackle as it came at Remy again, still gripping the other knife, one arm now useless and dangling at its side. On reflex, Remy again called upon his wings, and again he could not summon them. The horror of his new reality grew even more oppressive as he braced himself for the angel’s further assault.
Something huge and incredibly fast suddenly moved past Remy in a blur, landing upon the angel and driving it back to the dirt. The air became filled with the sounds of growls and screams of pain, which grew louder and more intense until silenced as the monstrosity standing upon the angel’s blackened chest tore away its throat.
Remy stared with equal parts wonder and horror at the great beast that had taken the angel. Two sets of memories—the old and the new—struggled for supremacy, and he thought his skull might split.
The beast’s body was huge, the size of a great jungle cat, with short, black fur covered in filth. The color tickled his memory, and he remembered a part of his life filled with the love and loyalty of an animal named . . .
It spun its large square head around to face him, its muzzle shiny with the blood of the once divine.
“Marlowe,” Remy said aloud as he looked into the face of the demonic hound.
“What did you call me?” the animal asked, its fleshy lip peeling back in a ferocious snarl. “You’re never to call me that!”
And that was when Remy felt it all slide out from beneath him, his brain unable to handle it anymore, deciding that this would be the right time to shut it all down—
To drop the curtain.
To fade to black.
• • •
Heaven had the most distinctive of smells.
Everything else Remy had experienced since leaving the Golden City paled in comparison to the scents of Paradise.
Madeline had once asked him what it was like to be in Heaven. At first, he’d been speechless, unable to find words suitable for the human mind to comprehend.
“Okay, we’ll make this easier,” she’d said. “What’s it smell like?”
And he’d given it a shot.
“You know how you feel when you walk past a bakery and smell the freshly baked bread, or that delicious aroma of a home-cooked meal, or even the wonder of a freshly brewed pot of coffee?”
He recalled Madeline’s magnificent smile.
“Imagine all the wonderful feelings and sensations created by those awesome scents.” He’d paused, watching to see if she was doing just that, and the twinkle in her eye had told him she was. “All right, now multiply all those feelings by a million, and then a million more, and then a hundred million more.”
She’d told him that it must be wonderful.
And he’d remembered that it was—before the war, before he had abandoned his place of creation.
He’d told her that, and then they had made love with a passion far more intense than ever before, almost as if she was attempting to sate a hunger that could never be satisfied, and he trying to recapture a taste of what he’d abandoned so very long ago.
But all it had done was remind them each of what they would never have.
Now, deep in the darkness, Remy was again reminded of the glories he had left behind, the distant memories stirred by an all-too-familiar aroma.
Even deep within the clutches of unconsciousness, he could smell Heaven. The scent had caught him off guard