Fic: A History of Heaven and its Angels, as Understood by the Archangel Gabriel 1/59 PG-13
Full Title: A History of Heaven and its Angels, as Understood by the Archangel Gabriel
Author: the_dicethrower
Characters/Pairings: Gabriel; some Michael/Gabriel/Lucifer, some Michael/Lucifer (implied), unrequited on both sides Gabriel/???
Rating: PG-13
Chapter word count: 3,208
Genre: Historical/plothole explaining.
Spoilers/Warnings: Characters through Season 8. Graphic and mild angelcest. Violence. Death.
Summary: Long before humanity was born, the angels ruled in Heaven and on Earth. Gabriel lived when the world was young, when Heaven was heavenly, and Lucifer was still around. This is that story.
IN THIS CHAPTER: Earth is still young, and the Archangels are just starting to form their choirs. Gabriel has to make a choice, and Michael carries a message.
Notes: For full notes and other chapters, please see the Masterpost.
In this story, before Lucifer fell, his name was Sammael. He was not Lucifer in Heaven.
There is one other canon character operating under an OC name, but I wish for his identity to remain unknown.
Disclaimer: Supernatural is not, never has been, and never will be mine. I just snuck into their playground.
CHAPTER ONE:
Hello, Cariel
Gabriel sat alone on the peak of a mountain, all of his wings stretched out behind him, letting the wind twist around his feathers and tug gently at their spread. The whole world stretched out before him, massive, solid, alien. In Heaven, he was never alone. The songs of his brothers were always rippling through his head, an endless chatter of angelic voices. He could tune them out if he wanted, but even just the thought of cutting himself off from the choirs was ridiculous. He was stronger for his brothers’ presence in his mind.
Earth wasn’t like that at all. He could still hear his brothers, but their voices were muted, as if transmitting between the different planes actually could affect the metaphysical noise. They murmured in the back of Gabriel’s head, a comforting presence, but not one he paid any attention to.
There were no other voices on Earth. This planet was empty, a wide expanse of rock surrounded by water, shaped by fire and air. This planet spoke to the Archangels, the four celestial beings with elements at their cores. Michael was the world, steady earth, providing a base for all others to stand on. Sammael was the ocean, life-giving water, wrapping around Michael, through him, singing a message of praise and purpose to fuel their brothers. Gabriel was the core, burning fire, the heart of his brothers, energizing everyone’s actions. Raphael was the atmosphere, embracing winds, surrounding them all and holding them steady, together. God had made the Earth in their image, and they loved it.
Sammael’s oceans had held the first drops of life on this planet, tiny organisms trying to survive. Slowly, they had grown and multiplied; some even dared to creep out of the water. The Earth was changing. Plants grew on the land now, painting barren rock in greens of every hue. They hadn’t come this high yet, but Gabriel sat steady and watched time pass, watched the sun rise and fall, watched the green spread.
A rustle of wings heralded a new arrival to the mountain, one of Gabriel’s brothers. Cariel. One of the oldest of the Seraphim, Cariel was a member of Gabriel’s own choir, clever and bright. His songs were cheeky: respectful but very different. Gabriel had picked him out immediately upon his fledging, begging Michael to let him have the Seraph with the discordant tone. Michael had laughed and acquiesced, pushing the fledgling toward Gabriel with his approval. Gabriel had raised Cariel as he did all his Seraphim, teaching them the joys of flight, the thrill of song, and love, unending love, for their Father and all their brothers.
Cariel was fully grown now, taller than Gabriel (but not by much). He cut a striking figure before the Archangel, standing proud and erect, the sun shining on his face. After catching Gabriel’s eyes, Cariel bowed deeply, spreading his six wings in a display of respect and servitude. “Sir, I apologize for interrupting your contemplation.”
“Eh.” Gabriel flicked a dismissive hand and brightened his grace at his Seraph. For all their years, the younger angels were still so new, and their instinctive need to venerate the glory of an Archangel was difficult to overcome, even among his own choir. It was only funny the first few hundred times to pass a crowd of young Seraphim and have them all flinging themselves to their faces. Gabriel was bored with the whole reverence thing already. “You didn’t interrupt anything important. Stand up. I hate talking to the back of your head.”
Cariel straightened slowly, tucking his wings in neatly and risking a little peaceful glow in the face of Gabriel’s good mood. Gabriel laughed and patted the rocks beside him. “What brings an angel like you out of my stuffy tower?”
“I came with your work.”
The warm peace bled out of Gabriel’s grace at those words. “You’re kidding me.” When Cariel shook his head, Gabriel groaned. “Dammit! I came to Earth to get away from all that crap!”
Ever since God had started the creation of Seraphim, the four Archangels had found themselves tasked with thousands of responsibilities. Instead of spending their days together in song or flight, they were now each in charge of a growing choir of their younger brothers-thirty Seraphim each, with the promise of more ranks of angels to follow. Each Archangel was given a glittering tower in their quadrant of Heaven (Gabriel’s was shaped like a spiraling pillar of fire, in the West), from where they were meant to administer their realm (Gabriel was in charge of Earth and the other physical realms). While Michael, Sammael, and Raphael spent most of their time holed up in their towers, Gabriel had told his grown Seraphim to take care of the paperwork while he handled his realm in person. He called this “delegation.” Raphael called it “lazy avoidance tactics.” Semantics.
“I suppose you were the unlucky one sent to shepherd me home?” Gabriel drew his wings in tight and folded his arms. He loved Heaven, he did, but being cooped up in his tower, reading page after page of pointless reports, was not his idea of Paradise.
“I volunteered, actually, sir,” Cariel answered smoothly. “I’ve taken the liberty to compile all the work you’ve left undone, distributed those tasks that can be handled with you to the appropriate Seraphim, and summarized the rest of the reports into this.” He pulled a slim sheaf of pages from his spirit and held it out to Gabriel. “All you need to do, sir, is review this information and sign where appropriate. I can handle the rest.”
“Oh?” Gabriel relaxed his pose, uncrossing his arms to take the sheaf from Cariel. He had been on Earth for the better part of an Earth century now, and had been dreading the state of his desk. If this was all he had to do… “You consolidated this for me?”
“Yes, sir,” Cariel answered. “I thought it would be more successful to not smother you in unnecessary minutiae.”
Gabriel laughed and curled a wing around his younger brother. “Sounds like you’re angling for a promotion!”
Cariel’s wings flickered anxiously. “Well, sir, all of the other Archangels have named a Seraph as their lieutenant, their second-in-command, their right-hand angel, as it were…” He tilted his head to the side, peering over at Gabriel and trying to read his grace.
“Have they, now? That’s smart of them…” Gabriel flipped through the sheaf and stroked a wing against Cariel’s. “Let me look this over. If you’ve done as good of a job as it sounds like, then I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather have as my second.”
Cariel’s grace filled with a pleased sort of pride, toeing the line of smugness, and Gabriel laughed again. “When was the last time you’ve been to Earth, Cariel?”
The angel gave a little shiver as Gabriel spoke his name. Angels’ names had power, and could be spoken as anything from a loving embrace to a furious blow. Gabriel knew from experience that when a being of greater power spoke your name, you were helpless to not react. Cariel would feel simple joy at being acknowledged by his superior, a happy warmth no matter his own emotions.
“Not for decades, sir,” the younger angel answered.
“Well then!” Gabriel flung an arm out over the landscape below them. “Spread your wings and fly! You’ve spend way too long cooped up in my tower!”
Cariel gave Gabriel another sideways glance, as if confirming this was no test or trick, before he leapt off the rock and obediently launched himself off the mountain. Gabriel whooped along with him as Cariel’s wings caught the wind and he soared. Heaven was lovely to fly in, all wide open spaces aside from the occasional tower, but Earth was fun, with winds and updrafts and obstacles. The only thing better than the warmth of the sun on your open wings was the direct presence of the love of God, Lord of All.
Or perhaps the glory of another Archangel, Gabriel thought, looking behind him as he felt another’s grace approaching.
Michael landed pressed against Gabriel’s back, arms and wings wrapping around the smaller angel. Gabriel thrilled in his brother’s embrace, clasping Michael between his own wings. Love, pure and golden, flowed between them at every point of contact.
Angelic hugs were not meant to be intimate. Their grace was an expansive cloud of power around and within their bodies, their spirit, but even those were largely incorporeal. They could not pass through each other’s spirits and certain enemies were capable of causing them physical harm, but they could pass through non-magical obstacles without restraint or could harden their grace around them to create a solid form. They did not have nerves to register contact, so texture or contact location meant nothing to an angel. A full-spirit press was no more exciting to an angel than a brush of arms.
All angels were interconnected, their minds constantly linked together. They were not quite a collective hive mind, but they reveled in the closeness of their brothers. An angelic embrace wasn’t about the contact of spirits so much as the contact of grace. Being so close to another angel pressed their essences together, to mix their grace and offer complete love and support, reinforcing the bond between the brothers. Gabriel made a point to encourage contact with and between his Seraphim for that very reason, and with Michael and Sammael.
“You have been missed in Heaven, Little One.”
Michael’s voice was deep and solid, the grinding of tectonic plates, the rumble of an earthquake, the vastness of a cavern. He was stone and life, the angel of earth, of the north. He was so much more than Gabriel: older, wiser, and far more patient. Only Michael was allowed to call Gabriel “Little One,” his own pet name for the smallest of his Archangel brothers.
“Who missed me?” Gabriel asked cheekily, pressing back in Michael’s arms. “Did Raphael miss me? I bet he didn’t. I bet he was glad I was gone. I bet-”
Michael chuckled, flowing around Gabriel to sit beside him as Cariel had. “Everyone has missed you,” he said. After a moment, he amended, “Except, perhaps, Raphael.”
Gabriel snapped his wings against the air as he laughed. “I knew it!” It wasn’t really all that surprising. Raphael, his twin, his literal other half, his angelic partner, loathed Gabriel as much as Gabriel loathed him. An angel’s one true partner was meant to complete him, to balance him, to bring him unmatched peace and love and joy, to be placed above all his other brothers. Raphael and Gabriel’s mutual animosity was no secret in Heaven. If anything, it had become the subject of many jokes. Gabriel himself encouraged the laughter. Amusement at their predicament was better than pity for being the only angels in Heaven without the serenity that came with a beloved partner.
“I’ve missed you,” Michael sighed, drawing Gabriel close again. “You’re too far away, here on Earth.”
“You could come to visit more often.” Gabriel reclined against his brother’s chest, tugging Michael’s arms around him. Michel had a gift of focusing solely on Gabriel in a way that always made him feel thoroughly protected and adored. While Gabriel knew Michael had that effect on most angels, somehow, it always seemed most special when it was directed at Gabriel himself.
“Unlike you, I attend to my work,” Michael chided, though his grace rippled teasingly against Gabriel’s.
“Cariel attends to my work,” Gabriel said, gesturing to the Seraph skimming over distant clouds. “I’m thinking of making him my second.”
“Oh really now? It’s about time! The rest of us already find our seconds indispensable. My own has been watching over Heaven while I take the time to come visit you.”
“He is?” Gabriel tipped his head back to look at Michael. “Who did you choose for that responsibility?”
“Filiel.”
Gabriel tried to match the name to one of his brothers, but it was difficult. There were dozens of them now, and while Gabriel knew every angel in his own choir, his brothers’ were less familiar. Michael chuckled at the puzzled glow to Gabriel’s grace.
“Filiel is a fierce warrior, utterly devoted to our family.”
Though that could describe any angel, Michael touched Gabriel’s grace with his own to help the younger Archangel focus on a specific brother. Filiel. Gabriel now recalled a large Seraph with broad, sweeping wings who wielded two swords at once. Filiel had awakened in Cariel’s clutch, Gabriel now remembered, the very first Seraph. Of course he had been made for Michael’s right hand, the first Seraph following the first angel.
“Filiel’s a good choice for you,” Gabriel approved. “Who did the others pick?”
“Raphael named Marmoniel as his second. Marmoniel’s nurturing should balance Raphael’s directness nicely, while Sammael chose Azazel,” Michael named a sharp angel whose grace always shone with a golden light, “though he was tempted to name Alastair instead. But Alastair spends most of his time in my tower, helping Naomi write a code of conduct, and Sammael didn’t want his second divided between choirs.”
Gabriel knew Naomi, a word-loving Seraph who was actually Cariel’s partner. He huffed a laugh at her current endeavors. “A code of conduct? What do we need a code of conduct for? We’re angels. Our manners and behaviors were written into our spirits by God himself. We’re awakened knowing how to behave!”
“Are we?” Michael tilted his head to the side. “You’re a fine example of good behavior, avoiding your duties, skipping out of Heaven, playing pranks on Raphael…” He tweaked one of Gabriel’s wings playfully. “Naomi thought it was a good idea to have concrete directions written out as a guide. I couldn’t fault her reasoning and gave her permission to attempt it.”
“Are extended stays on Earth going to be forbidden?” Gabriel asked, already glumly picturing a drab future where all his brothers acted exactly the same. How could anything change like that?
“Of course not,” Michael assured Gabriel, hugging him tighter for a moment. “And absolutely not for you and your choir. The code of conduct would be more for the younger angels, anyway. Father started creating again.”
Gabriel looked up at Michael with curiosity brimming in his grace, and the older angel nodded. “He’s making Angels next, just regular angels, from which we are to appoint Dominions to command garrisons.”
“Where are they going to fall in the hierarchy?”
“Below the Seraphim,” Michael explained. “I believe Seraphim are expected to command anywhere from six to sixty Dominion each, and each Dominion will have at least a hundred Angels in their garrison. Or perhaps another type of angel Father hasn’t created yet.”
“But that’s…” Gabriel did some quick math, his wings twitching. “We’re looking at thousands of new brothers!”
“Father wants over a million angels before he begins his ‘greatest creation.’”
“He told you this?” Gabriel asked doubtfully, straightening up a little in Michael’s arms. Over a million? It was bad enough trying to keep on top of thirty Seraphim! Gabriel couldn’t even imagine what a choir of a quarter of a million angels would be like.
Michael nodded. “He actually did, last time Sammael and I met with him. He gave us no further details about this ‘greatest creation,’ though.”
“The Lord works in mysterious ways,” Gabriel sighed. It was already a familiar refrain in Heaven, meant to reassure angels who had unanswerable questions, but it chafed Gabriel whenever he heard it. Father should explain, not obfuscate.
“He wants to speak with you.”
Gabriel felt his grace freeze at Michael’s calm words, twisting sharply to stare at his brother. “You mean with us?”
“No.” Michael shook his head and reached out to smooth his hand over Gabriel’s spirit. “With you. Alone.”
Gabriel couldn’t even twitch a wing, so caught up was he in sudden fear. Their Father, their all-powerful, all-knowing Lord, wanted an audience with just him? He had been in his Father’s presence a handful of times before, but always with the other three Archangels at his side. Michael and Sammael did most of the talking in those instances. Father never summoned just one angel, not since Sammael awakened, at least. Even Michael wasn’t called alone. Only Sammael ever dared to spend time alone in their Father’s presence, watching over His shoulder as He created. Just as the younger angels couldn’t help but venerate the Archangels, so too could the Archangels not help but fear their Father’s wrath. “Am I in trouble?” he asked, his voice barely squeaking out.
“Oh Gabriel, you’re not in any trouble!” Michael wrapped wings and arms around Gabriel, pulling him close again. Gabriel felt Michael’s use of his name thrum down his back, releasing the tension in his wings and letting him move again, flinging himself against Michael’s chest as if his brother’s solid presence could shelter him from their Father. “Father specifically said ‘at your convenience,’ or I would have mentioned it first. He’s in no rush, so I can only assume it is good news, or perhaps He wants a report on your realms, since you haven’t been in Heaven lately.”
“I don’t have a report on my realms!” Gabriel squeezed his eyes shut. “He’s going to be so mad!”
“He won’t be.” Michael reached for Gabriel’s face, tilting his chin up to meet his gaze. “Little One, you forget: Father knows everything. He knows you’ve been here, watching the Earth grow in person. He knows your Seraphim have been running your tower. He knows, and He is not wrathful. He is probably overjoyed to know that one of His children loves the Earth as much as He does.”
“You really think so?”
“I am as certain as I can be, when it comes to Father.” Michael brushed his fingers along the curve of Gabriel’s face. “No harm will come to you.”
“I should go now, then. I shouldn’t keep Him waiting.”
“Not quite yet,” Michael said, touching the sheaf of pages Cariel had prepared for Gabriel. “Maybe you should read this first, just in case Father does have questions for you.”
“Right. But won’t He-?”
“At your convenience.” Michael brushed his grace over Gabriel one more time before releasing his embrace. “Father’s patience is endless. When you are ready, go to Him. And when you are finished, come visit us. Sammael misses you something fierce. He rants about how boring Heaven is without your fiery spirit.”
“He does not!”
“I think I’d know my own partner,” Michael pointed out. “Sammael misses you, as I’m sure your Seraphim do. Make sure to drop in, so we can all go flying again.” He stood up, shaking out his wings and beaming at Gabriel. “I shall see you soon?”
“Yes,” Gabriel said, nodding energetically. “Yes, soon. Tell Sammael I miss him too?”
“I will.” Michael touched his hand over the core of his spirit, just below his throat, before gesturing to Gabriel, an angelic salute. He spread his wings and leapt into the sky, instantly gone as he jumped planes back to Heaven.
Gabriel sank back onto the rock with wide eyes. Father wanted to see him. He was absolutely not ready for this…
Next...
Author: the_dicethrower
Characters/Pairings: Gabriel; some Michael/Gabriel/Lucifer, some Michael/Lucifer (implied), unrequited on both sides Gabriel/???
Rating: PG-13
Chapter word count: 3,208
Genre: Historical/plothole explaining.
Spoilers/Warnings: Characters through Season 8. Graphic and mild angelcest. Violence. Death.
Summary: Long before humanity was born, the angels ruled in Heaven and on Earth. Gabriel lived when the world was young, when Heaven was heavenly, and Lucifer was still around. This is that story.
IN THIS CHAPTER: Earth is still young, and the Archangels are just starting to form their choirs. Gabriel has to make a choice, and Michael carries a message.
Notes: For full notes and other chapters, please see the Masterpost.
In this story, before Lucifer fell, his name was Sammael. He was not Lucifer in Heaven.
There is one other canon character operating under an OC name, but I wish for his identity to remain unknown.
Disclaimer: Supernatural is not, never has been, and never will be mine. I just snuck into their playground.
CHAPTER ONE:
Hello, Cariel
Gabriel sat alone on the peak of a mountain, all of his wings stretched out behind him, letting the wind twist around his feathers and tug gently at their spread. The whole world stretched out before him, massive, solid, alien. In Heaven, he was never alone. The songs of his brothers were always rippling through his head, an endless chatter of angelic voices. He could tune them out if he wanted, but even just the thought of cutting himself off from the choirs was ridiculous. He was stronger for his brothers’ presence in his mind.
Earth wasn’t like that at all. He could still hear his brothers, but their voices were muted, as if transmitting between the different planes actually could affect the metaphysical noise. They murmured in the back of Gabriel’s head, a comforting presence, but not one he paid any attention to.
There were no other voices on Earth. This planet was empty, a wide expanse of rock surrounded by water, shaped by fire and air. This planet spoke to the Archangels, the four celestial beings with elements at their cores. Michael was the world, steady earth, providing a base for all others to stand on. Sammael was the ocean, life-giving water, wrapping around Michael, through him, singing a message of praise and purpose to fuel their brothers. Gabriel was the core, burning fire, the heart of his brothers, energizing everyone’s actions. Raphael was the atmosphere, embracing winds, surrounding them all and holding them steady, together. God had made the Earth in their image, and they loved it.
Sammael’s oceans had held the first drops of life on this planet, tiny organisms trying to survive. Slowly, they had grown and multiplied; some even dared to creep out of the water. The Earth was changing. Plants grew on the land now, painting barren rock in greens of every hue. They hadn’t come this high yet, but Gabriel sat steady and watched time pass, watched the sun rise and fall, watched the green spread.
A rustle of wings heralded a new arrival to the mountain, one of Gabriel’s brothers. Cariel. One of the oldest of the Seraphim, Cariel was a member of Gabriel’s own choir, clever and bright. His songs were cheeky: respectful but very different. Gabriel had picked him out immediately upon his fledging, begging Michael to let him have the Seraph with the discordant tone. Michael had laughed and acquiesced, pushing the fledgling toward Gabriel with his approval. Gabriel had raised Cariel as he did all his Seraphim, teaching them the joys of flight, the thrill of song, and love, unending love, for their Father and all their brothers.
Cariel was fully grown now, taller than Gabriel (but not by much). He cut a striking figure before the Archangel, standing proud and erect, the sun shining on his face. After catching Gabriel’s eyes, Cariel bowed deeply, spreading his six wings in a display of respect and servitude. “Sir, I apologize for interrupting your contemplation.”
“Eh.” Gabriel flicked a dismissive hand and brightened his grace at his Seraph. For all their years, the younger angels were still so new, and their instinctive need to venerate the glory of an Archangel was difficult to overcome, even among his own choir. It was only funny the first few hundred times to pass a crowd of young Seraphim and have them all flinging themselves to their faces. Gabriel was bored with the whole reverence thing already. “You didn’t interrupt anything important. Stand up. I hate talking to the back of your head.”
Cariel straightened slowly, tucking his wings in neatly and risking a little peaceful glow in the face of Gabriel’s good mood. Gabriel laughed and patted the rocks beside him. “What brings an angel like you out of my stuffy tower?”
“I came with your work.”
The warm peace bled out of Gabriel’s grace at those words. “You’re kidding me.” When Cariel shook his head, Gabriel groaned. “Dammit! I came to Earth to get away from all that crap!”
Ever since God had started the creation of Seraphim, the four Archangels had found themselves tasked with thousands of responsibilities. Instead of spending their days together in song or flight, they were now each in charge of a growing choir of their younger brothers-thirty Seraphim each, with the promise of more ranks of angels to follow. Each Archangel was given a glittering tower in their quadrant of Heaven (Gabriel’s was shaped like a spiraling pillar of fire, in the West), from where they were meant to administer their realm (Gabriel was in charge of Earth and the other physical realms). While Michael, Sammael, and Raphael spent most of their time holed up in their towers, Gabriel had told his grown Seraphim to take care of the paperwork while he handled his realm in person. He called this “delegation.” Raphael called it “lazy avoidance tactics.” Semantics.
“I suppose you were the unlucky one sent to shepherd me home?” Gabriel drew his wings in tight and folded his arms. He loved Heaven, he did, but being cooped up in his tower, reading page after page of pointless reports, was not his idea of Paradise.
“I volunteered, actually, sir,” Cariel answered smoothly. “I’ve taken the liberty to compile all the work you’ve left undone, distributed those tasks that can be handled with you to the appropriate Seraphim, and summarized the rest of the reports into this.” He pulled a slim sheaf of pages from his spirit and held it out to Gabriel. “All you need to do, sir, is review this information and sign where appropriate. I can handle the rest.”
“Oh?” Gabriel relaxed his pose, uncrossing his arms to take the sheaf from Cariel. He had been on Earth for the better part of an Earth century now, and had been dreading the state of his desk. If this was all he had to do… “You consolidated this for me?”
“Yes, sir,” Cariel answered. “I thought it would be more successful to not smother you in unnecessary minutiae.”
Gabriel laughed and curled a wing around his younger brother. “Sounds like you’re angling for a promotion!”
Cariel’s wings flickered anxiously. “Well, sir, all of the other Archangels have named a Seraph as their lieutenant, their second-in-command, their right-hand angel, as it were…” He tilted his head to the side, peering over at Gabriel and trying to read his grace.
“Have they, now? That’s smart of them…” Gabriel flipped through the sheaf and stroked a wing against Cariel’s. “Let me look this over. If you’ve done as good of a job as it sounds like, then I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather have as my second.”
Cariel’s grace filled with a pleased sort of pride, toeing the line of smugness, and Gabriel laughed again. “When was the last time you’ve been to Earth, Cariel?”
The angel gave a little shiver as Gabriel spoke his name. Angels’ names had power, and could be spoken as anything from a loving embrace to a furious blow. Gabriel knew from experience that when a being of greater power spoke your name, you were helpless to not react. Cariel would feel simple joy at being acknowledged by his superior, a happy warmth no matter his own emotions.
“Not for decades, sir,” the younger angel answered.
“Well then!” Gabriel flung an arm out over the landscape below them. “Spread your wings and fly! You’ve spend way too long cooped up in my tower!”
Cariel gave Gabriel another sideways glance, as if confirming this was no test or trick, before he leapt off the rock and obediently launched himself off the mountain. Gabriel whooped along with him as Cariel’s wings caught the wind and he soared. Heaven was lovely to fly in, all wide open spaces aside from the occasional tower, but Earth was fun, with winds and updrafts and obstacles. The only thing better than the warmth of the sun on your open wings was the direct presence of the love of God, Lord of All.
Or perhaps the glory of another Archangel, Gabriel thought, looking behind him as he felt another’s grace approaching.
Michael landed pressed against Gabriel’s back, arms and wings wrapping around the smaller angel. Gabriel thrilled in his brother’s embrace, clasping Michael between his own wings. Love, pure and golden, flowed between them at every point of contact.
Angelic hugs were not meant to be intimate. Their grace was an expansive cloud of power around and within their bodies, their spirit, but even those were largely incorporeal. They could not pass through each other’s spirits and certain enemies were capable of causing them physical harm, but they could pass through non-magical obstacles without restraint or could harden their grace around them to create a solid form. They did not have nerves to register contact, so texture or contact location meant nothing to an angel. A full-spirit press was no more exciting to an angel than a brush of arms.
All angels were interconnected, their minds constantly linked together. They were not quite a collective hive mind, but they reveled in the closeness of their brothers. An angelic embrace wasn’t about the contact of spirits so much as the contact of grace. Being so close to another angel pressed their essences together, to mix their grace and offer complete love and support, reinforcing the bond between the brothers. Gabriel made a point to encourage contact with and between his Seraphim for that very reason, and with Michael and Sammael.
“You have been missed in Heaven, Little One.”
Michael’s voice was deep and solid, the grinding of tectonic plates, the rumble of an earthquake, the vastness of a cavern. He was stone and life, the angel of earth, of the north. He was so much more than Gabriel: older, wiser, and far more patient. Only Michael was allowed to call Gabriel “Little One,” his own pet name for the smallest of his Archangel brothers.
“Who missed me?” Gabriel asked cheekily, pressing back in Michael’s arms. “Did Raphael miss me? I bet he didn’t. I bet he was glad I was gone. I bet-”
Michael chuckled, flowing around Gabriel to sit beside him as Cariel had. “Everyone has missed you,” he said. After a moment, he amended, “Except, perhaps, Raphael.”
Gabriel snapped his wings against the air as he laughed. “I knew it!” It wasn’t really all that surprising. Raphael, his twin, his literal other half, his angelic partner, loathed Gabriel as much as Gabriel loathed him. An angel’s one true partner was meant to complete him, to balance him, to bring him unmatched peace and love and joy, to be placed above all his other brothers. Raphael and Gabriel’s mutual animosity was no secret in Heaven. If anything, it had become the subject of many jokes. Gabriel himself encouraged the laughter. Amusement at their predicament was better than pity for being the only angels in Heaven without the serenity that came with a beloved partner.
“I’ve missed you,” Michael sighed, drawing Gabriel close again. “You’re too far away, here on Earth.”
“You could come to visit more often.” Gabriel reclined against his brother’s chest, tugging Michael’s arms around him. Michel had a gift of focusing solely on Gabriel in a way that always made him feel thoroughly protected and adored. While Gabriel knew Michael had that effect on most angels, somehow, it always seemed most special when it was directed at Gabriel himself.
“Unlike you, I attend to my work,” Michael chided, though his grace rippled teasingly against Gabriel’s.
“Cariel attends to my work,” Gabriel said, gesturing to the Seraph skimming over distant clouds. “I’m thinking of making him my second.”
“Oh really now? It’s about time! The rest of us already find our seconds indispensable. My own has been watching over Heaven while I take the time to come visit you.”
“He is?” Gabriel tipped his head back to look at Michael. “Who did you choose for that responsibility?”
“Filiel.”
Gabriel tried to match the name to one of his brothers, but it was difficult. There were dozens of them now, and while Gabriel knew every angel in his own choir, his brothers’ were less familiar. Michael chuckled at the puzzled glow to Gabriel’s grace.
“Filiel is a fierce warrior, utterly devoted to our family.”
Though that could describe any angel, Michael touched Gabriel’s grace with his own to help the younger Archangel focus on a specific brother. Filiel. Gabriel now recalled a large Seraph with broad, sweeping wings who wielded two swords at once. Filiel had awakened in Cariel’s clutch, Gabriel now remembered, the very first Seraph. Of course he had been made for Michael’s right hand, the first Seraph following the first angel.
“Filiel’s a good choice for you,” Gabriel approved. “Who did the others pick?”
“Raphael named Marmoniel as his second. Marmoniel’s nurturing should balance Raphael’s directness nicely, while Sammael chose Azazel,” Michael named a sharp angel whose grace always shone with a golden light, “though he was tempted to name Alastair instead. But Alastair spends most of his time in my tower, helping Naomi write a code of conduct, and Sammael didn’t want his second divided between choirs.”
Gabriel knew Naomi, a word-loving Seraph who was actually Cariel’s partner. He huffed a laugh at her current endeavors. “A code of conduct? What do we need a code of conduct for? We’re angels. Our manners and behaviors were written into our spirits by God himself. We’re awakened knowing how to behave!”
“Are we?” Michael tilted his head to the side. “You’re a fine example of good behavior, avoiding your duties, skipping out of Heaven, playing pranks on Raphael…” He tweaked one of Gabriel’s wings playfully. “Naomi thought it was a good idea to have concrete directions written out as a guide. I couldn’t fault her reasoning and gave her permission to attempt it.”
“Are extended stays on Earth going to be forbidden?” Gabriel asked, already glumly picturing a drab future where all his brothers acted exactly the same. How could anything change like that?
“Of course not,” Michael assured Gabriel, hugging him tighter for a moment. “And absolutely not for you and your choir. The code of conduct would be more for the younger angels, anyway. Father started creating again.”
Gabriel looked up at Michael with curiosity brimming in his grace, and the older angel nodded. “He’s making Angels next, just regular angels, from which we are to appoint Dominions to command garrisons.”
“Where are they going to fall in the hierarchy?”
“Below the Seraphim,” Michael explained. “I believe Seraphim are expected to command anywhere from six to sixty Dominion each, and each Dominion will have at least a hundred Angels in their garrison. Or perhaps another type of angel Father hasn’t created yet.”
“But that’s…” Gabriel did some quick math, his wings twitching. “We’re looking at thousands of new brothers!”
“Father wants over a million angels before he begins his ‘greatest creation.’”
“He told you this?” Gabriel asked doubtfully, straightening up a little in Michael’s arms. Over a million? It was bad enough trying to keep on top of thirty Seraphim! Gabriel couldn’t even imagine what a choir of a quarter of a million angels would be like.
Michael nodded. “He actually did, last time Sammael and I met with him. He gave us no further details about this ‘greatest creation,’ though.”
“The Lord works in mysterious ways,” Gabriel sighed. It was already a familiar refrain in Heaven, meant to reassure angels who had unanswerable questions, but it chafed Gabriel whenever he heard it. Father should explain, not obfuscate.
“He wants to speak with you.”
Gabriel felt his grace freeze at Michael’s calm words, twisting sharply to stare at his brother. “You mean with us?”
“No.” Michael shook his head and reached out to smooth his hand over Gabriel’s spirit. “With you. Alone.”
Gabriel couldn’t even twitch a wing, so caught up was he in sudden fear. Their Father, their all-powerful, all-knowing Lord, wanted an audience with just him? He had been in his Father’s presence a handful of times before, but always with the other three Archangels at his side. Michael and Sammael did most of the talking in those instances. Father never summoned just one angel, not since Sammael awakened, at least. Even Michael wasn’t called alone. Only Sammael ever dared to spend time alone in their Father’s presence, watching over His shoulder as He created. Just as the younger angels couldn’t help but venerate the Archangels, so too could the Archangels not help but fear their Father’s wrath. “Am I in trouble?” he asked, his voice barely squeaking out.
“Oh Gabriel, you’re not in any trouble!” Michael wrapped wings and arms around Gabriel, pulling him close again. Gabriel felt Michael’s use of his name thrum down his back, releasing the tension in his wings and letting him move again, flinging himself against Michael’s chest as if his brother’s solid presence could shelter him from their Father. “Father specifically said ‘at your convenience,’ or I would have mentioned it first. He’s in no rush, so I can only assume it is good news, or perhaps He wants a report on your realms, since you haven’t been in Heaven lately.”
“I don’t have a report on my realms!” Gabriel squeezed his eyes shut. “He’s going to be so mad!”
“He won’t be.” Michael reached for Gabriel’s face, tilting his chin up to meet his gaze. “Little One, you forget: Father knows everything. He knows you’ve been here, watching the Earth grow in person. He knows your Seraphim have been running your tower. He knows, and He is not wrathful. He is probably overjoyed to know that one of His children loves the Earth as much as He does.”
“You really think so?”
“I am as certain as I can be, when it comes to Father.” Michael brushed his fingers along the curve of Gabriel’s face. “No harm will come to you.”
“I should go now, then. I shouldn’t keep Him waiting.”
“Not quite yet,” Michael said, touching the sheaf of pages Cariel had prepared for Gabriel. “Maybe you should read this first, just in case Father does have questions for you.”
“Right. But won’t He-?”
“At your convenience.” Michael brushed his grace over Gabriel one more time before releasing his embrace. “Father’s patience is endless. When you are ready, go to Him. And when you are finished, come visit us. Sammael misses you something fierce. He rants about how boring Heaven is without your fiery spirit.”
“He does not!”
“I think I’d know my own partner,” Michael pointed out. “Sammael misses you, as I’m sure your Seraphim do. Make sure to drop in, so we can all go flying again.” He stood up, shaking out his wings and beaming at Gabriel. “I shall see you soon?”
“Yes,” Gabriel said, nodding energetically. “Yes, soon. Tell Sammael I miss him too?”
“I will.” Michael touched his hand over the core of his spirit, just below his throat, before gesturing to Gabriel, an angelic salute. He spread his wings and leapt into the sky, instantly gone as he jumped planes back to Heaven.
Gabriel sank back onto the rock with wide eyes. Father wanted to see him. He was absolutely not ready for this…
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