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He shouldn’t be here.
That is the only thing that keeps running through Liam’s mind as he traipses on an endless journey through this foreboding forest, whipping thickets of thorny branches and brambles away from his face and arms, trying his best to shield his body from the worst of the blows with his wings. His wings which have already started to take on a mottled dark tawny color, slowly and steadily blackening the longer he spends here. It won’t be long now. Before they’re fully black. Before the ether of this place has turned his very soul into something dark and twisted. Or at least those are the stories he was always told. He doesn’t know how true they are. But he supposes he’s been spared an even more wicked fate. He could be in a place much worse than here. A place full of nothing but…the most absolute vile depravities and monstrous abominations, a place full of nothing but endless suffering and torment. Here at least toes the line, not quite pure, not quite evil, but rather hovering delicately somewhere in between.
It’s his own fault though. All of it. He just couldn’t keep his stupid mouth shut. He’s always done his best to be so good. To fall in line. For so long he’s played the obedient little soldier, never questioning, never disobeying. But he just couldn’t do it any longer. He couldn’t do it. And now he’s gone and gotten himself cast out. Forever. Lost the only family he’s ever known, the only home he’s ever known. Traded it for this place, condemned to an eternity of loneliness, darkness.
He doesn’t want to cry, doesn’t want to give Father the satisfaction—because Liam knows He’s still watching, even here. But he can’t help it. He grieves for all that he’s lost, all that he’s given up in return for a life of squalor and desolation, tears sparkling at his eyes.
It wasn’t worth it.
If he could go back and do it all again, he wouldn’t. He’d keep his mouth shut, play the good soldier for the rest of eternity no matter the personal cost to him. He’d rather suffer in miserable silence the rest of his days, surrounded by his family, than be trapped here alone in this awful place, with no hope, no chance for redemption. This cold, dark place that is slowly sucking the light right out of him, leeching on all the tendrils of good still remaining within him.
Abruptly he reaches the edge of the forest, the heavy darkness ebbing away only slightly to illuminate a large clearing before him and he gasps, stopping short at the sight in front of him.
In the middle of the clearing is a creature, crouched down over another. The fog is too thick at the moment to make much out for certain but Liam can smell death in the air. Terror-struck, he darts back behind the trunk of the nearest tree.
But it’s too late. They’ve seen him.
A wicked-sounding laugh carries itself on the current of the air, almost as if tangible, as if latching itself onto the fog until it reaches Liam, sounding as if coming from right beside him. He jumps, darting to another tree, the taunting laughter somehow seeming to follow him, his own panting breaths coming short and fast in his ears. Back and forth he weaves between the trees, the laughter still seeming to echo behind him no matter which direction he goes, until finally it fades. And then a sudden thought occurs to him. He doesn’t know how much of it is the steady darkness creeping in, taking hold of him. He’s never thought anything like it before. Never had reason to before now. But he realizes that if the thing, the creature, in the clearing has killed another, then it is possible to be killed here. Not just hurt or maimed, but killed. He has never known the threat of death before. It was not a possibility for him back home, with Father.
He’d thought himself condemned to a miserable eternity here, but…perhaps not. Perhaps…there is another way out. Perhaps Father has given him some chance at solace after all. Surely ceasing to exist would be a better fate than endless millennia of this? A peaceful respite from a lifetime of loneliness and suffering, a lifetime of being consumed by immeasurable guilt and regret.
Resolute in his sudden decision, Liam steps out from behind the tree and ambles forward. If he is to meet his end today, he will meet it head on, like the soldier he was bred to be.
As he steps forward, however, the fog starts to clear a little and he realizes that the creature is not what he thought at all. Not the ghastly beast he was imagining, but a thin waif of a thing. Like him it has been made in Father’s image. Two arms, two legs, a face with a congruence of features not all that unlike his own. Two eyes, a mouth, a nose, even ears. Though, unlike Liam, it has no wings.
“What has Father sent me?” it calls out into the foggy darkness, in the deep voice of a male entity. “Come closer, let me see my gift.”
Curious, Liam steps further into the clearing, the fog wafting and parting around him, creating a path of sorts between them, allowing them to view each other more clearly.
“An angel?” the creature inquires aloud, his smile wicked-looking as he sets his sights on Liam. “Come, little angel. Don’t be afraid.”
As Liam edges closer more details start to come into view. A dead thing, more animal-like in nature, lays before the creature, body crumpled and twisted, covered in blood. It is obvious from the state of the carnage that there was a struggle, though whether this kill was for food or for pleasure, it is unclear.
But Liam is not afraid.
Moving forward still, his eyes meet the other’s, close enough to take him in fully. He is beautiful, Liam realizes. A particular, sharp, striking sort of beauty that Father only reserves for a lucky few of His creations. Already Liam was ready to meet this creature head-on, to accept whatever fate may befall him in their encounter, but strangely he finds himself being drawn in even more by the other’s gaze. His eyes are a warm brown, again not unlike Liam’s, but there is something else, something…volatile and fervid lurking behind them, something almost intoxicating in its intensity even.
Gaze still trained on Liam, who is still edging closer, the creature lifts his hand to brandish a dagger fashioned out of sharp-cut bone. He holds it purposefully in front of him, but somehow Liam can sense there is not a threat in it. Though he’s unsure if that is a good or a bad thing. A part of him wants the threat, wants the assurance of a welcome death, without the hindrance of games and dalliances. But still he moves forward, their eyes still trained on each other, the dagger still held firmly, but somehow also playfully, in the creature’s hand.
When Liam is only a few arms’ lengths away the creature’s smile briefly turns from wicked to animated—a strange, almost frenzied glee in it—before softening again, returning back to that more mischievous air as he brings the dagger toward his mouth. Eyes still reeling Liam in, he waits for Liam to get closer, closer. And then he licks the dagger, slowly and languidly, watching Liam like a taunt. And that's when Liam realizes that it's blood he's licking, all the while still looking Liam right in his eyes. Liam can’t look away. He shouldn’t find the sight so enticing but he does. This place is already starting to turn him, he realizes. Or perhaps it is whatever hidden power lies behind this stranger’s gaze. He doesn’t know, but he suddenly finds he doesn’t care.
Drawn in by those magnetic eyes, Liam stands there. Watching. Waiting. For what, he isn’t sure, but oddly he feels he could be content to watch this creature forever. Even if the creature was doing nothing at all, Liam thinks he would still want to watch.
When he has licked all the blood away, he sets the knife down and digs his other hand into the animal, pulling away neatly-cut strips of flesh that he must have already carved up earlier, before Liam arrived. Then he sticks his bloody hand out toward Liam, long strips of flesh dangling over his palm.
“To share,” he says simply.
It is nothing like the food Liam would have eaten back home, the sweet fruits that blossomed with flavor in his mouth. But he has been wading through the forest for what he is certain must have been at least a handful of millennia, if not more, and he is so hungry. He may not have view of the humans’ world any longer to help him mark the passage of time but he remembers what a millennium felt like and his journey through the forest had certainly not been a short one, even by his own kind’s standards of time.
Longingly, he drops to his knees, mouth watering, and takes the helpings offered to him, sinking his teeth in.
It is not altogether pleasant, but it is not entirely unpleasant either, and he finds it warms his belly in a rather soothing and satisfying way that the food of home never did.
When they have eaten their fill, and there is nothing left but bones and discarded scraps of skin, they settle back against the ground, faces tilted up to the sky. Through the fog, the faint twinkle of stars is still visible and it makes him long for home, a strange ache to his body. But a sudden soft touch to the feathers at the edge of his left wing startles him out of his thoughts and he abruptly sits back up.
The other creature mirrors him, sitting up to face Liam and they simply watch each other for a while before he reaches out again. Liam’s wing flinches a little, unused to such a touch from someone who is not his family.
“What are you?” Liam asks, the creature eyes still set on Liam’s face even while he pets delicately and curiously at Liam’s wing.
“I am ifrit. Born of fire.”
Liam only distantly remembers learning of the ifrit. There are some of Liam’s kind who have been around since the time of their creation, who remember when their own kind and the ifrit roamed earth freely with the humans, before there was so much separation of all the different realms. But that was long before Father created Liam, and he has never known a time of such freedom himself.
“What is your name?”
“I am called Zayn,” the creature says, still enamored by Liam’s wings. “And you?”
“Liam.”
“Liam,” Zayn repeats. “Hello, Liam.”
“Hello, Zayn.”
The fog around them has dissipated a bit more and Liam looks around, curiously. He wonders if this is the ifrit’s home. And if so where is his family? Surely there are others of his kind here that he lives among? Unless perhaps he is from another place, but has been cast out too, like Liam. He wishes he could remember more about the stories of the ifrit but he supposes it is really of no matter. They are both here now. They must make the best of it. At least he seems friendly, and willing to share.
“So soft,” Zayn says, still petting at Liam’s feathers. He smiles again but there is no seeming wickedness or deviousness to it this time, no manic excitement. Instead it is gentle, almost a wondrous, joyful sort of expression. “Father has sent me such a lovely gift.”
Liam frowns. “I am not a gift.”
“Of course you are,” he says, as if Liam is the one being silly. As if he can’t even fathom that Liam has only been sent here for punishment.
Liam sighs. Stupid ifrit. Perhaps he’s gone mad in his time here. Liam hopes that is not the fate that awaits him too.
“Where are you from?” Liam says instead, voicing his thoughts aloud. “Is this your home or were you cast out from your family too?”
“I am born of fire,” Zayn repeats.
Liam sighs again. Of course. The very moment he thinks he’s found solace in a possible companion, and it turns out Father has only cursed him yet again with a half-mad fire creature.
“Poor angel,” Zayn says sadly, still petting at him, but further down, where the feathers are still white instead of black or faded brown. “You are born of the light, but your light is fading here.”
Liam looks back at him, surprised but still resigned. He may not be all there, but at least he isn’t as dim-witted as Liam had worried he might be.
But then he dashes even that hope, saying, “That must be why Father sent you to me.”
“He didn’t send me to you,” Liam retorts. “He sent me here as punishment, and I only happened to run into you.” He’s annoyed that he even has to explain any of this, but the slow-witted ifrit just doesn’t seem to get it.
Zayn smiles, shaking his head at Liam. “Funny little angel. You were born directly in Father’s light but you still don’t understand Him at all, do you?”
Liam’s mouth drops open. How dare this daft creature insult him in such a way!
“Come,” Zayn simply says, suddenly standing and sticking out his hand for Liam to take.
Liam staunchly refuses, shaking his head and staying seated. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“Come,” Zayn repeats, more insistently, flexing his outstretched hand a bit for emphasis.
“No.”
“Would you rather take your chances alone with a full pack of those?” Zayn juts his head toward the now-bare carcass of the animal they ate. Liam blows out a breath through his nose, frustrated. He supposes Zayn has a point. He’d been lucky enough to avoid any dangerous encounters during his time in the forest. But if he lets Zayn leave without him now, he’ll be stuck here all alone in an area he’s guessing those animals are more likely to frequent, and with none of his angelic weapons—they’d been revoked upon his banishment—to defend himself with. He has no desire to die that way. He may have welcomed the idea of death before, with Zayn, but at least that would have been a warrior’s death. Not so with a pack of wild beasts.
Reluctantly, he stands, taking Zayn’s hand and they start to walk.
“Where are we going?” Liam asks when they’ve been walking for a while with no given explanation.
“Just come,” is all Zayn says, beckoning him along.
They walk and walk. And walk and walk. And walk some more. And still they go nowhere. They stop to eat or to rest for a short while, but always they get back up and just continue walking and Zayn says nothing of where they’re going, says nothing of why. Just keeps hold of Liam’s hand and keeps moving forward.
At an indeterminate point Zayn stops and turns to him. “How long were you in the forest? How many sky lights disappeared before you got to me?”
It takes Liam a moment to realize what he means by sky lights disappearing. Without view of the human world, he must measure the passage of time here by the dying stars. Liam tries to calculate about how often stars die, how often he remembers a supernova occurring over the course of human years. The humans can’t see the stars as clearly as his kind can, and of course don’t live much more than a tiny blip of his kind’s lifetimes. But by his rough estimation he’s pretty sure there was somewhere around twenty or so every millennia, if his recall is anywhere close to accurate. He tries to compare that figure with how many millennia he thinks he was walking in the forest for, how many supernovas might have occurred over the handful or so of millennia he believes passed in that time.
“I suppose I wasn’t paying all that close attention, but…maybe around a hundred?”
“How long do you think we’ve been walking for?”
“Perhaps another hundred?”
“And how long would you be willing to walk with me?” Zayn asks. That same strange tempestuous energy still lurks behind his eyes, but it’s different. There is less of a volatility to it now and more of a gentleness, like the calmness in a storm.
“I don’t know. Until we get to wherever we’re going, I suppose?”
Zayn doesn’t say anything more to this. Simply turns and continues walking.
Liam resolutely accepts his silence, more than accustomed to it by now.
An age passes. And more. And more. And still they walk, aimless and boundless. They eat, they rest, then walk some more. Then the same again, over and over.
Eventually Liam realizes he no longer really cares where they’re going. There’s a strange sort of contentment in the ceaseless wandering. A happy tranquility in the constant companionship. He realizes he’d never really known what peace was before, until Zayn. They walk, hand in hand, with nothing but more than bare ground before them, and the faded light of the stars above, and in all their time of walking Zayn has not let go of his hand, except but to kill for their food. Liam finds he does not mind.
“Do you still miss your home?” Zayn asks during a rest, not for the first time.
They lay next to each other, bellies full and sated, hands clasped together across the small stretch of space between them as they stare up at the sky, watching another star fade from existence.
“Less and less,” Liam answers.
Zayn pets softly at his feathers. He often does that when they rest and Liam finds he does not mind this either. His touch is delicate, gentle. His fingers are warm. But of a different kind of warmth than humans’. There is a sort of…spark behind it. An energetic vibration to the warmth that even his fickle memories of his few interactions with humans cannot compare to. It spreads through his body in a feeling he has only ever felt bathing in Father’s light. It used to only make him long of home even more. Now he finds more and more that he is content enough with the feeling this way. It is not the same, but it is all he will ever have now. Wanting for Father does him no good here.
“I had suspected so. There are no sad sparkles from your eyes anymore,” Zayn says.
“There is no reason to cry any longer. My cries only fall on deaf ears.”
As do his prayers. Father never hears. He may watch but He never hears, not anymore. Liam is forsaken here, though the ifrit still doesn’t seem to comprehend that.
Zayn shakes his head, fingers sifting warm and languid through Liam’s feathers, as he glances up at Liam with a small smile. “Silly angel. You still don’t understand, do you?”
Liam wants to tell Zayn that it is not him who misunderstands. But he knows that that would only fall on deaf ears as well. The daft ifrit remains convinced that it is he who knows Father’s intentions better than Liam. Despite having the same conversation an innumerable amount of times, Zayn refuses to believe Liam’s proclamation that he was sent here for punishment, that his being here is not a blessing but a curse. He doesn’t have the heart to tell Zayn that he is wrong yet again. He has grown tired of having this same argument and if it brings them both some peace he is willing to oblige Zayn in this small measure, to let him continue in his foolish belief for however long their journey remains.
“How much longer will you walk with me?” Zayn asks.
He asks this again every so often too. Liam’s answer is always the same.
“Until we reach our destination.”
As usual, Zayn says nothing more. Only stands and holds out his hand.
Liam takes it and they are back to their endless trek.
Liam’s wings droop miserably behind him. Where once they were darkened only at the very topmost feathers, now the darkness has spread down almost all the way to the tips. His light is nearly all the way gone, drained away by all the ages spent in this place. He had hoped once, naively, that dazed and confused as Zayn’s mind may appear to be at times, he might still eventually lead Liam somewhere tangible that could help. But as the eons passed, his light only steadily fading further away while they remained no closer to an actual destination, he has long since given up on that hope.
Now he simply watches and waits, until the inevitable day when his light is truly no more.
When the moment comes, Liam grows desolate. More than he has been in a very long time, since the time he first arrived here.
“Eat,” Zayn says, holding out warm strips of flesh to him.
Liam says nothing. Only sits, staring at the barren land around them, the dark shadow of his wings looming in his periphery like a taunt.
“Eat,” Zayn repeats, shoving the flesh in his face once more.
Still Liam refuses, turning his face away.
“You will grow weak and withered here if you do not eat.”
Again, Liam ignores him.
Sighing, Zayn gives up, settling back to feast on the beast alone.
When Zayn’s belly is full and he goes to pet gently at Liam’s feathers with his warmth, Liam curls away.
“Silly angel,” Zayn mutters in only mild exasperation. But he does not coax or push any further.
They walk again but the routine quickly begins to feel futile. What’s the point? They aren’t going anywhere and even if they were it is too late now. His light is gone. There is no getting it back. What use is this continued journey?
“Eat,” Zayn says, insistent, at their next rest, pushing the food right up to Liam’s mouth.
Liam keeps his lips firmly shut and turns away.
Zayn growls lowly in frustration.
“Why will you not eat? Why have the sad sparkles returned?”
Liam doesn’t answer.
“Do you long for your home again?”
Liam remains silent.
“Do you no longer wish to walk with me?”
Liam whips back around to face Zayn at this. “What is the point? We were never going anywhere! I wasted eons following you and for what? My light is gone! I followed you blindly all this time, stupidly hoping you would lead me to something more, something meaningful, but we’ve gone nowhere. You’ve led me absolutely nowhere. You think you know so much about Father and what His intentions are, but you don’t know anything, you never knew anything. You’re just as mad as the day I met you. Just a lonely, delusional little fire creature who wanted someone to string along on your aimless little adventure to nowhere.”
Liam is expecting Zayn to recoil, or at the very least to yell back, but he does none of those things. Instead he rises to his knees and leans forward, close enough that he’s less than a hand’s length away from Liam’s face.
“Look into my eyes. What do you see?”
Fighting the urge to recoil himself, Liam tilts his chin defiantly and looks. At first the only thing that meets him is the same warm, brown-eyed gaze he is so accustomed to. But then he sees a hint of that thing, that unnamable energy that always seems to lurk behind Zayn’s eyes and he looks deeper, deeper. And suddenly his gaze is engulfed in flame. Where once there were soft brown orbs, now there are only twin reflections of blazing fire staring back at him. But there is something even beyond that, behind the fire. Again, he looks deeper, feeling as if sinking into the fiery abyss of Zayn’s eyes until he is met with…himself. But not as he is now. Staring back at him in the chasm of Zayn’s blazing gaze is Liam’s true angelic form. Strong, healthy, full white wings and all—the mighty soldier that he once was.
When he pulls his mind back Zayn’s eyes have returned to their usual brown color, though that volatile energy is still roiling behind them like always.
“What…what was that?” Liam says, awestruck and rendered near speechless.
“The truth,” Zayn answers.
“But…I don’t understand.”
Zayn sighs, settling back down properly. “You see Father's doings as a punishment, a curse, but I see it as a blessing. I know you think me mad, but you are not as you see yourself. You asked me once where I was from. I told you I was born of fire. I am from a place where there is nothing known but darkness and fire. Darkness even greater than here. It is a place of fire and smoke, of endless agony, of abominations, and tortured souls. Father saw that I did not belong there. He sent me here instead, lavished me with gifts to create my own paradise with. He created the beasts so that I may have nourishment to warm my belly and give me strength, He opened up the sky so that I may see the stars as I never could in my old home. And then He sent me you, my very own angel.
“But it is not only my blessing he has bestowed. You see…in your home your light was a reflection of Father’s light, the lightest of all light. But fire is only the light of the darkness, the light of smoke.”
Liam still doesn’t understand. It feels as if Zayn is speaking in riddles and he voices as much.
“Silly angel,” Zayn says, moving forward to press his hand to Liam’s chest. “You were born of the purest of the light. I was born of the light of darkness. It is only a different kind of light. But it is still light all the same. We are like two sides of the same,” he explains. “My eyes, they only reveal the truth. And the truth is that you never lost your light. Since the moment you left the forest, it has always been with you. I am your light.”
When Liam only remains silent, too stunned to speak, Zayn looks into his eyes again, lets the blazing fire show once more. And then the image behind them, Liam’s true image.
“Don’t you see?” Zayn says. “Father has given us both the most wonderful gift of all. You wanted to be free, you wanted know what it was to experience love as the humans do. And I only wanted someone to share the rest of my eternity with. I prayed to Him and He answered. Now we both have what we want. Father has blessed me with an angel and He has blessed you with the ability to love, and to retain your light, free from all the constraints of your angelic duty. We can build a paradise here, Liam. Our very own. It is already mine, but we can walk until we’ve rebuilt this entire place into your own paradise too. You just have to be willing to see.”
There is a flash in his eyes and behind the image of himself comes another. A glittering blue paradise full of light and vibrant color, like the home Liam remembers but a place all his own. All their own.
Zayn suddenly darts forward, pressing dry lips to Liam’s. Still reeling from all of Zayn’s words and unsure what to do at first, Liam hesitates. But then Zayn reaches out to bury his fingers in Liam’s feathers, the familiar warmth spreading throughout his body and he is suddenly struck with the thought that this is enough. This is enough for eternity. This warm touch, the feel of Zayn’s hand in his, the sensation of his lips against Liam’s. Walking endlessly to nowhere and nothing, watching the stars fade as they lie together with full bellies and even fuller smiles, hand in hand for the rest of time. That has been enough for the eons past. It has been more than enough. It will be more than enough for all those to come too.
Just as abruptly Zayn pulls back and the light behind his eyes is dancing now. That is the only way that Liam can describe the sense of the energy lurking there.
Standing, Zayn holds his hand out to Liam expectantly.
“Now…how long will you walk with me?”
“Forever,” Liam answers easily, taking Zayn’s hand in his.