Legacy of the Defender (The Defender Series Book 1) (23 page)

I was stunned.  The honor given to me was greater than I could have imagined
.

"Radueriel," the right hand responded.  "I use Heavenly Father’s divine energy to create new angels.  I fell before the invasion of Heaven.  Father was in the process of creating another to replace me before hell breached the realm of Heaven and the assault on the city began.  Father had to turn his attention to defending the city." 

"Our divine sparks were given a chance to continue to serve.  Usually, this was one of the Archangels.  Then you came along, proving to be worthy and surpassing all expectations.  God granted the honor to use us in the creation of your weapons to Nathanael.  Your weapons were crafted soon after your arrival and stored in a vault, waiting for you to be ready."

"You honor me by sharing this," I said, enamored by their story.

"You may call us Saba and Radu for short should you need to address us individually.  We felt it was time to tell you but were unsure of the timing."

"You chose well, my friends.  Reflection on the events that have transpired helped me place this in perspective.  Now we must go on a mission for Father.  Shall we find out what it is?"  A warm vibration came from my blades in agreement.  I grabbed the scroll case and opened it.  A gemstone fell into my hand.  Upon contact, it flooded me with images.  I knew where I had to go.  The location was vividly clear. 

After packing some food, I took the time to meditate and reflect upon the day’s events.  Time passed as my memory recounted and absorbed learning about who Nathanael really was.  The memories were crisp and clear, as if my mind gave extra processing power to remembering them. 

My arrival at the location was uneventful.  The heavily forested area was full of leaves beginning to turn with the onset of fall.  Even though the realm was not on a spherical planet, it still had a sun and the four seasons for those that chose to live outside the city to identify with. 

It was very hard to believe that so many years had passed...and the years were definitely longer than at home.  Nathanael told me once that years here were about fifty percent longer for someone choosing to live outside the walls.  This affected me because my body functioned normally like a human.  That meant there was five hundred and forty something days passing here but inside, Heaven time did not pass at all.  I tried to count the exact number of days once, possibly last year, or the year before that.  

A creature hit me hard on the head once. I lost my memory for a few days and lost track.  It was a valuable lesson, one I intended not to repeat.  It has since been coined the "not blocking with your head" lesson.  It worked well.  Since then, however, I had lost track again and stopped.  I really had no clue how long it had been.  Whatever counted as fall or autumn was in at its full height.  The leaves on the ground made sneaking difficult.  I had problems moving about silently, whereas my foes did not.  Because it was autumn, there was no other way.  My mind refocused.  I never stopped looking around when reflecting, but it was easy to chase the rabbit and stay in a meditative loop.

The silence as I panned around was eerie.  The night before, the area was a slight bustle of activity.  Most of the creatures did not exist on earth.  I knew what to stay away from; all of them. Especially when you watch a bird attacked by what looks like mosquitoes and its bones are all that remain in moments.  My protective barrier was up when they tried to eat me.  Using my swords to ignite ability to burn them away was more than satisfying.  I swore they cried out in pain as they burned then burst from the superheated fluid boiling inside them.  It was disgusting that they existed at all.  

Other species here could not be identified either.  I was not any sort of an animal nut, but I noticed the same principles did not exist here.  There were other monster type creatures.  Sure an actual daemon in the physical sense that could fly made sense.  Large ones that looked like some sort of mythical creature like in the movies I could fathom.  Bipedal creatures with multiple limbs, in uneven numbers, placed in non-symmetrical places on its body, had me believe that this place was the home the misfits of evolution.

I even saw a bird with its head located between its legs.  Watching it walk was strange.  How it did not hit itself in the head with its knees made me scratch mine.  It had to walk bow legged.  This was comical to watch until you see it eat a critter almost as large as it was and fly away afterwards. 

It was hard to fathom things worse or even more different.  It took years before these strange creatures started to catch my eye.  Training kept me focused for so long that unless I was fighting it...it did not exist.  I was used to daemons, though.  Their ichor stunk so badly, the desire to vomit faded over the years. 

Suddenly something was not right.
  A subtle noise.  A slight buzz kept reaching a crescendo followed by a small popping sound.  All this was barely audible at first.  I thought it was a forest sound for a few minutes and perhaps the cautious nature of the forest had taken over.  The volume rose slowly and increased in tempo.  I stood up and peeked around the large rock my back touched.  A steady popping sound echoed around the area.  Changes in the air pressure worried me...but I could not see anything moving.  No motions caught my eye even with my extra sensitive abilities to perceive the "not so there.”  I could only hear it.  It made a bubbling sound kind of like what happened when you blew into a straw in your milk as a child. 

It continued this rhythmic but not consecutive pattern.  I gazed into the moonlit night, reaching out with my mind as well as my ears to find the source.  Something caught my eye.  In the distance coming down an incline, a summoner daemon approached.  These were particular nasty daemons.  I had faced these once.  It moved towards something...clueless to my presence.  My senses still could not pinpoint the sound.
 

I turned on my cloaking and moved slow, trying to get a better vantage point that offered me more information on what approached.  My path took me to more difficult terrain.  Stepping around in this area created more noise as the leaves crunched with every step.  I moved slowly, very slowly to avoid detection.  My footfalls still made noise no matter how slow I moved, but moving was necessary.

A desired vantage point was only a few more steps away.  I steadied myself and watched.  My instincts told me to wait, but the desire to kill it before it could summon more of his minions was strong.  It became harder and harder to resist attacking them...so I entered a waking meditation to check my urge.  With steady breathing and focus the urge fell into check.

Patience Tathlyn, patience.

I remained hidden and watched.  To my horror, my breath created trace amounts of steam in the night air.  My cloaking did not extend out far.  I prayed that this did not give away my position.  It would be embarrassing to fail a mission based on it being so cold and having a dire need to breathe.  My focus shifted to slower breaths making them longer and deeper.  Only time would tell if they would find me or not.  The sound came from the direction opposite the daemon.  I closed my eyes and listened, reaching out with my senses. 

After mere moments, my senses pointed my internal energy and it was definitely towards the summoner but off to the left.  Still unable to see anything, I began to feel crazy knowing there was something there and having no idea what it was.  I decided to stay cloaked and swing wide around the area the sound was coming from.  Moving in and around some of the larger boulders and rocks, I kept my eyes on the direction the summoner came from.  It was tall enough that he stood out.  

I fought a wounded summoner some time ago and he was still tough enough.  Some beasts and monsters are stronger right before they die.  This type of daemon killed angels even when outnumbered.  It was not very hard to remember that encounter.  My father Nathanael (back then he was simply Master) and I had waded in to a group of daemons not knowing there was a summoner around the corner.  The smaller ones died quickly, which was normal.  Suddenly there it was.  I saw Nathanael engage it full on and scored some critical shots before the monster rag dolled him.  A series of fast blows to his head and torso and down he went.  He did not move and I feared he was dead.  Had we prepared, the fight would have been much different.  But not knowing the summoner was there, or how tough they were, was a factor we had not considered.

I knew for a fact that Nathanael had bested two summoners before.  They were harder to beat than the big six-legged ones with four wings that spit me out like a spit wad.  I still shuddered at being in the beast’s mouth.  This one was smaller by far but still twice my size.  It was faster and used a huge crooked sword that had an eerie green glow to it.  The wounded one came at me right away after it appeared to kill Nathanael.  Logic did not guide my hand.  I came off a high guard like a giant scorpion’s tail. 

My motions were a blur to me that day, and I got a lucky shot in.  Tactics did not win the day.  I went from high to low in my stance and apparently that threw the daemon off.  It also misjudged and both of my swords found its abdomen, right under the armor plate.  They bit flesh and sunk to the hilt as I turned the energy on and yanked them free.  They might be immune to fire on the outside, but on the inside, it was still flesh and my blades cooked its insides like they were sausages.  Soft flesh boiled internally in seconds and burst the abdomen cavity.  Entrails covered the area, me included.  I wondered if I would ever get used to that.

When I turned around, Master was sitting up and shaking his head to get the blood out of his eyes.  I was overjoyed at the sight of him looking well and felt a bit stupid that it happened.  With our skill levels being equal now, the only thing that separated us was he had more experience of course.  Creativity was the answer.  This day, we simply got jumped and lucky all in the same time.  Father was surprised by my victory and thankful that I had paid attention and did not freeze up when he went down.  That is something that happens to most students when their Master falls before them.  I went the other direction and became positively enraged, slaying my enemy.   

The truth was, I lost it...and that is not how a warrior acts. 

My rage allowed me to strike my target, but skill did more than imagined.
 

As my mind returned to the present, I promised myself the terms of engagement would be of my choosing.  Summoner daemons were quite disgusting…with no obvious gender whatsoever.  There was no reproduction.  They created another of themselves over time.  Thankfully, this gestation cycle was long, for these things were the toughest. 

It stood nearly twelve feet tall, had the normal number of arms and legs but three wings.  The third wing extended to help them turn tighter and was smaller but articulated.  It had spines that could extend on every one of its joint that moved and some in places that did not retract.  Attacking one of these things head on was normally suicide.  Nathanael never had time to go over the tactics I needed to defeat one when the win merited on luck.  The only thing he said when I was helping him off the ground was a good strike to a shoulder area reduced its effectiveness. 

In hindsight, that was cryptic advice.

As it approached, the first thing I noticed was the armored carapace on its shoulders.  I did not remember seeing that on one we killed.  This one was definitely nastier.  The fear it emanated washed over me.  Serenity and balance replaced the desire to unleash on this abomination without the benefit of tactics.  Normally I had the urge to charge right into the fray, but as it stopped and chuckled, I was totally calm.  It seemed to be very pleased with itself at this moment.  It began to wave its arms around.  Energy began to coalesce in front of it and I felt strange.  Suddenly, a small twinge got my attention.

The last time I felt this was…wait.... 

I never got an answer out of my father regarding this feeling.  In fact, every time I brought it up, he changed the subject.  Being so tired of asking him, eventually I forgot and the question slipped away.  It was just a twinge, but the lingering feeling was there.  I had no idea what was going to transpire or how, simply that a summoner had come.  There was a pinching sensation in my mind that ran up from my core. 

Ignoring it, I moved my position further right of this ugly daemon.  Sure, they were all disgusting to look at, but this one was grotesque.  My cloaking held, for it would have seen me without it.  As my vantage point changed, there was something shimmering in front of the beast.  A faint line hung in the air about eight feet off the ground.  It looked almost like string that danced as it fluxed.  There was a black tinge to it, but it was opaque.  Swinging even wider brought it now into full view.  It hit me like a ton of boulders falling on my head like in the cartoons.  

This was a portal, or the starting of one. 

How could it open from here?  I had a ton of questions that no one could answer up to this point when I watched the daemon start to move his hands and arms in certain motions, tracing symbol in the air.  As I watched, those armored plates over the shoulders lifted up and energy that looked almost like smoke reached out and took a hold of the portal.  It stretched slightly.  The daemon made some sort of sound and out from under those plates flew a bunch of smaller daemons different from a normal locust daemon emerged.  They appeared and started to grow, making these horrible screeching sounds.  A chorus of daemonic language echoed in my ears and it began to hurt.  The pain grew.  The summoner began to glow.  He started to shift back and forth like he was there one second, then gone, then back again.