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DUSK HAD DWINDLED AND expired. Alone in his room and in his true form, Jediah leaned over the desk. The fifth try at his second letter to Chloe stared at him, criticizing him, mocking him. He pivoted his heel in and out on the plush carpet. He set his elbows on the rosewood, but no rest would come. Half of his team was missing. Yakum ruled the streets. Elazar thirsted for revenge, and Jediah’s mind again started that subtle climb from worry to hysterics.
Head in his hands, he ran his fingers through his hair. It seemed the only way to console his anxiety was to throw himself into trying to convince her again. Chloe needed salvation. He needed her to need salvation. As his fingers reached Chloe’s braid, horrible shame slapped him in the face.
Was all this really for Chloe? Or for myself?
Jediah jerked straight up as if the braid bit him. The motives behind his present actions clarified. “God forgive me,” he whispered.
Hands clinging to his disguise cloak, he retreated to the octagonal window in search of God’s nightly firmaments. The moon dwelt out of view. Artificial lights choked out the stars. Denied of their comfort, Jediah never felt more distant from his King’s presence. He wandered past the dresser, but the mirror gave him pause.
His pasty pallor and sunless eyes seemed more akin to the human’s ghostly fictions than a true spiritual entity, and it frightened him. That sinking feeling, the sensation of plummeting a million miles, refused to leave him alone.
Elazar’s words still administered their poison in drops, and the venom’s concentration doubled with each drip. “What would an apology fix, anyway? Nothing. Absolutely. Nothing.”
Jediah tried shaking its memory out of his head, yet the old guilt spiked.
You want someone to heal you, but you know no one will. You seek forgiveness, but there’s none. No cure. No resolution.
Jediah’s own inner voice fought back. No, there’s hope for me. There has to be.
“There is no hope for you,” Elazar’s voice answered, as though it gained its owner’s sentience. “Your God doesn’t care about you. He’d rather redeem undeserving worms than you.”
“Enough!” his inner voice commanded. “The Lord my God declared, ‘This is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit.’” Jediah calmed a little. “Surely, He has extended some mercy to me—an imperfect vessel.”
Stilling his spirit, Jediah sat down on the edge of the bed. He checked the mirror. His brown eyes still missed their golden pigment.
Then why did it all still hurt?
His heart returned to longing for the blessed mystery. To be joined to the Father. To be guided by the Spirit. To be cleansed by the Son.
***
Entering the living room, Akela adjusted his leather shoulder pads. It felt good to be back in uniform again. He stretched his wings. “Close call at the Wall, wasn’t it, Alameth?” He said. “I sure hope the others will return soon.” He stopped and bit his tongue.
Alameth sat cross-legged before the low coffee table. The silver strands of his hair glistened among his ebony locks that freely laid over his shoulders.
Akela glanced at the clock. Two minutes till midnight. He watched Alameth, wondering if he worried over their missing teammates, too. Slow and methodical, Alameth hid his hair under his hood in ceremony. His hands folded together.
It hit Akela. It was the Night of the Grey—the annual commemoration of Christ’s death on the cross. Akela rubbed his head in embarrassment. Once again, his enjoyment of the adventure had blindsided him to his brother. He reflected on the day, recounting every visible clue that should’ve been obvious. A new overpowering drive to join Alameth threw Akela’s thoughts into a race.
There has to be something I can contribute. Akela wrung his hands. His eyes fell on the dining table centerpiece. He then grabbed for the candlestick, but his hand phased through. Focusing again, he felt the weight of the copper stand and the waxen stick. Then, taking silent steps, he approached Alameth from behind. He cleared his throat. “Um, Alameth?”
The angel of death didn’t so much as fidget and said, “Now isn’t a good time to talk, brother.”
“Actually,” Akela walked around him and set the candle on the table. “I wanted to ask if I could observe the Night of the Grey with you.” Sitting himself down on the opposite side, he placed his hands on his knees.
Alameth’s eyebrows raised, and the severity in his face softened.
Akela suddenly realized he didn’t light the candle. “Oops!” he exclaimed as he jumped to his feet. “Just a sec.” He hurried to the kitchen counter and retrieved the matches. He then leaped, slid on his knees right back into his spot, and leaned forward with the packet.
Alameth, however, shook his head with a demure chuckle. “Allow me.” A sliver of fog attached itself to the wick. Its tip glowed pure white until it kindled a flame right through the dimensions.
Akela tossed the matches and plopped back down. “You could’ve just told me you could do that,” he muttered.
“You didn’t ask.”
Like the Spirit anchored to a grieving heart, the seedling of light balanced on the feeble wick. Weak orange strengthened to warm gold. The room’s shadows lingered close, yet they could not snuff out something so small. The candle lulled Akela into a place of remembrance, and his ever restless mind quieted without the need to be reined in.
Alameth’s somber humming began. Its soothing melody issued so quietly it seemed imaginary. Loose and undefined, it lacked conventional rhythm, but like the crooning of the Armenian duduk, the notes mourned the Sacrificial Lamb in fluctuating sobs.
Akela often avoided sorrow. With Christ’s greatest victory won, what need was there to dwell on how He suffered? He had listened to the angels of death sing this song countless times, yet sitting there, listening to Alameth begin it with such earnest need, Akela found this kind of sadness to be comforting. Perhaps because it acknowledged past evils without flinching and treaded despair’s valley unto dawn. It was accepting, honest, yet unafraid.
Another voice from outside paired with Alameth’s. Their harmonies melted together. Akela envisioned the second angel of death standing on their roof. His rolling mists would stream down his long grey coat, dissipating like a vapor on the garden below. His hood would be pulled down, yet he’d behold the sky. More non-projecting voices from other Destroyers merged into a substantial whole.
Alameth’s hums turned to words. Soon the whole globe would hear the Night of the Grey once more. No spiritual bystander could ignore or interrupt it. It captivated the earth. It permeated the waters. It beckoned mankind.
Mark your posts.
Paint your doors.
Let not your lintel be bare.
Death visits once.
Death visits all.
Come pour your hearts and be spared.
-
You’ve been weighed
Found in want.
Your wicked do not sleep.
Life renewed,
Lies in wait.
For justice He must keep.
-
David’s line,
Judah’s heir,
Why to you must He go?
You are sin.
Blood your price,
For You He bows so low.
-
Adam’s sons,
Do not sleep.
Your Savior suffers awake.
Sweat like blood,
Wrath’s cup poured,
Each drop He still chose to take.
-
Bloodied robe,
Thorns His crown,
His hair they did shave.
Quiet still,
Voice unheard.
No defense Christ gave.
-
God’s own Son,
What say ye?
For Him what’s worthy of trade?
Silver coins,
A criminal man,
Sold. You bartered and paid.
-
Nails in hands.
Mouth so dry,
The Father turns away.
Severed tie,
No relief,
Forsaken was He that day.
-
It is done.
Mountains quake.
The curtain’s torn in two.
Love unloved,
Love most pure,
This love He meant for you.
-
Alameth stopped, letting the moment reflect in silence. Under the candle’s glow, Akela encountered a peace upon him that defied his former sullenness.
Akela glanced out the glass door. The earlier sunset indeed shed red. He turned back to Alameth. “It’s going to be a beautiful morning.”
Opening his eyes, Alameth smiled. The corners of his lips reached so high, his cheeks drew up and revealed a shimmering light in his eye.
Touched by the sight of it, Akela tilted his head. “I knew it.”
Alameth bent his neck a little lower. “Knew what?”
“That you had the best smile.”
***
The Night of the Grey’s song echoed in Jediah long after it finished. Recounting the cost His King paid for mankind shamed him. Who was he to mistreat the sacrifice of the Son and muddy its message with his personal agenda? And who was he to endanger Chloe with his innumerable enemies seeking more ways to hurt him?
Sitting on the edge of his bed, Jediah gazed in the mirror and at the sword hilt that loomed above his right shoulder. He fingered Chloe’s braid, lingering on it as long as he could.
His hand moved from the braid to the hilt. The ‘shing’ of the blade leaving his scabbard made him feel dead inside. The vacancy in his stare befitted an executioner, but he couldn’t afford to register on an emotional level. This he knew, otherwise he could not go through with this. It was for the best.
Jediah pulled the braid upward. It emerged from the thicker hair, and he set the razor’s edge beneath it.
A cradled tear escaped from the corner of his eye.
The Lord must increase in her life... and I must decrease.
Upward thrust. He clutched a lump of hair in his hand, and the spot on his head felt bare. Jediah let go. Chloe’s braid, string and all, fell lifeless at his side.