its bounty. “We might pick some fruit from the branches that hang over the walls.”
He shook his head. “For tomorrow, maybe. But we can’t stay here. We’ll need to find shelter, eventually. More than just this tree.”
“The sun seems so much brighter here.”
“Warmer, too. Almost uncomfortable.” He sighed. “This isn’t the way I had intended it to be. I thought if we left it would be of our own free will. And with food and nuts and berries to feed us for a few days at least.”
“What is that?” She frowned at the sky. Specs of dust seemed to float and hover among the clouds. She climbed to her feet and moved out from under the tree, raising her hand to her face to block some of the sun from her eyes. They were strange motes. Many of them.
Reu came to stand beside her, shading his own eyes and squinting into the distance. “Angels.”
As she watched, more and more of the motes appeared, until they made a thick dark cloud. “Are they like birds?”
He offered her his hand, and she took it. In his mind she could see the details which the distance hid from her. Winged men, beautiful and terrible to behold, clothed all in brilliant white. Their wings were all feathered with different colors. Black and brown, gold and silver, red and even blues and greens. But one, with a flaming sword at his waist, had wings as white as his garment, and piercing eyes that saw through her even in memory.
“Michael the Archangel will lead them, with Gabriel and Raphael at his side,” Reu murmured. “It will take them time to cross the valley, but they’ll be here before nightfall.”
She had dozed off under the heat of the sun when Reu woke her with a hand on her shoulder.
“They’re here,” he said.
She blinked and rubbed her eyes as she stood up. That was when she noticed the shade. Like clouds had blocked the sun. A chill run down her spine. There were no clouds. The sky was clear and bright blue. It was the angels. An army so vast, it hid the sun and cast a shadow over the grasslands around them.
Reu took her hand and stepped forward to meet the three who were separate from the mass of winged bodies. They hovered above the earth, their pure white wings making broad strokes through the air without apparent effort.
“Michael. Gabriel. Raphael.” Reu nodded to each of them, and Eve thought he only greeted them by name for her benefit.
“We know you, Reu.” Michael’s gaze slid from him and Eve couldn’t look away as he stared into her eyes. Every moment of her life was laid bare before him, sifted through like sand falling between her fingers. Memories were lifted to the top and played within her own mind for both of them to see, and then it stopped as her lips touched the fruit of the tree. The angel’s hand hovered over the flaming sword at his belt, and she felt his anger rock through her as though she had been struck. “You have eaten the fruit!”
A cacophony of noise burst forth, like thousands of bells ringing without warning. She covered her ears to try to stop it, crying out and dropping to her knees. Dimly, she felt Reu suffering beside her, even as she thought her ears might burst.
“Silence!” Michael called.
The noise ceased at once, replaced with the soft sound of wings against the air, like the thrum of a heartbeat. She looked up at the angel, his hand still on his sword, ready to draw it forth. The way his eyes gleamed with anticipation sent another chill down her spine, her skin prickling.
“Please,” she heard herself say. “Reu only ate of the fruit because of me. To help me.”
Michael’s lip curled and she knew she had no secrets from him when he looked on her. His grip on the sword relaxed. He dropped to the earth before them and folded his wings to his back. “You are Eve.”
She swallowed, unsure of what her identity meant to the angel. “I am. And I ate of the fruit, knowingly. To save the others from Adam.”
“God’s first son has long flaunted His law. We expected better from His favorite daughter.” The angel’s eyes narrowed as it studied her, and he reached out, touching her neck with cold fingers. “Adam oppresses God’s people with violence.” That flash of anticipation rose again, and Eve shivered. “This will not go unpunished.”
At these words, the bells sounded again, louder than before. Reu groaned in pain, though this time Eve felt none with the angel’s hand still touching her.
“Quiet!” The angel’s gaze had shifted to Reu, and Eve saw him mark the black and blue at Reu’s side. Michael’s hand fell from her and he stepped back, waiting for them to rise to their feet before speaking again. “Your brother has the fruit?”
The sight of Adam, gripping the fruit tightly in his hand rose into her mind. “Yes.”
“He has lost the right to live in God’s Garden. He will be cast out, just as you have been.” The angel raised a hand and two white garments were dropped to him. He tossed the shifts to the grass before them and they lost their brilliance and purity, the white dulling into cream and gray. Michael stared at Reu. “Your sacrifice is noted, but you are still bound by your oath. Adam has twice come too close to his desire. Do not fail her when he is among you once more, for now that they have eaten of the fruit, all will be lost. We will have no other choice but to act, and you will suffer for the results.”
“I know my oath.”
The angel nodded and spread its wings, rising once more into the air. “Though you have sinned willfully, it was for greater purpose, and this will be forgiven only so that you may serve. God’s fire will mark you as the true leaders of your people.” He drew the sword of flame, swinging it to the earth like a bolt of lightning, spraying dirt and fire to reveal stone and something else, glinting in the light. “Strike the rocks and metal together over dry grass and branches, and flame will serve you. It is the last protection we will offer.”
Reu nodded. “Thank you, Michael, for your mercy.”
“The Grace of God is with you both. Protect creation and God’s law. Live and serve and give your people peace.”
They all rose higher into the sky, moving together so precisely none touched one another, but no sun pierced through their shadow. Eve watched them go, hoping that she would never have cause to meet with them again.
Chapter Twenty-four: 343 BC
Thor kept a closer watch upon Eve, then, though he had not wished to dwell so deeply on what he could not have. Loki had been as distracted by Hathor and Aphrodite as Thor had hoped, and returned to Asgard, strutting and boasting, which in turn had only driven Sif to greater levels of irritation. Somehow, he had not taken Sif’s response to Loki’s pleasures into consideration, but watching her snarl and hiss with jealousy made his stomach twist. Surely she could not have loved Loki, of all the gods. Loki, who had teased and taunted her mercilessly in the first years of their marriage, blaming her for Thor’s distance.
Or had it been something else, all along? He did not want to credit Loki’s accusations regarding Ullr, for he had raised the boy as his own and could not bear the thought that he might have been born of willful betrayal. But he did not know, now, for how long he had been cuckolded. How long had Odin known of it, or suspected, and said nothing? How long had all of Asgard laughed at him while Sif had bedded others behind his back, and he too blind, too in love, to see?
He tried to remember, to think back to those first days when Sif had looked on him with more than friendship. Just after Jarnsaxa had welcomed him to her bed. No one had been pleased with him for consorting with a Jotun, even a Sea Giant, for all Odin had welcomed Aegir into their halls with all his daughters and named him friend and ally. Had it only been jealousy that had motivated Sif, then? But surely he would have seen it, known it in her touch, if she had not truly loved him.
Thor swallowed more mead and brooded, his mood black enough that thunder rumbled overhead. None of the others in Odin’s hall dared disturb him, and even when Baldur sat beside him, his brother remained silent, but for his call to one of the Valkyries for a pitcher of mead.
It was Sif who brought it. “Drinking yourself into a stupor again, husband?”
