Angelopolis A Novel

The Seventh Circle

VIOLENCE

Smolyan, Rhodope Mountains, Bulgaria

Valko stepped into his hiking boots, bent over, and tied the laces. Spring in the mountains was cold, and they would need heavy jackets and gloves to keep warm. He went into the greenhouse and found a number of Gore-Tex parkas. He went to a metal cabinet, unlocked the doors, and began pulling out tiny lacquered boxes, spoons fashioned of different metals, a mortar and pestle, and a number of glass jars and put them carefully in his backpack. He wrapped a portable gas burner in a cloth and added it to his supplies. Everything necessary had to be brought into the cavern.

As he zipped his jacket, he turned to the others, sizing them up. He distributed the parkas, and gave everyone a cap and a pair of gloves. Both Sveti and Vera were potentially worrisome. Although trim and tanned from her work on the Black Sea, Sveti was a linguist, whose greatest physical exertion was the moving of books from one shelf to another, and—if he was a good judge of character—Vera wasn’t much different. Neither of them had the training or the strength for a real expedition.

He tried to remember that he’d been a novice himself once too, and that he needed to be patient with his younger colleagues. His first expeditions were in the Pyrenees Mountains, where he and his first wife, Seraphina, had fallen in love. They continued to find remains of the Nephilim in mountain sites in the years following their marriage. Her work in the Rhodopes had changed everything for them both. The discovery of Valkine, contact with the Watchers, the series of photographs Seraphina had taken of a dead angel, and—their greatest achievement—the recovery of the lyre: Such advances had never been made before, and although nearly seventy years had passed, he’d never reached such heights again. He had remarried twice, but he’d never forgotten his brilliant Seraphina. Maybe it was nostalgia for their time together, but he felt closer to her in the mountains than anywhere else.

They set off toward the peaks above Smolyan, walking within the thick forest. They would avoid the village roads near Trigrad and descend to the Devil’s Throat from behind. He’d done it many times over the past years, filling his backpack with a video camera so that he could record his observations about the site. Only now he didn’t pack his notebooks or his camera. He knew that this was his last trip into the cave.

The snow had melted in March, and they climbed over a bed of pine needles and rock, safe under the cover of enormous evergreens. A patch of sunlight appeared overhead, sliding between the barren branches of a linden tree and casting a golden gleam over the forest floor. He glanced over his shoulder as they ascended, noting the smoke rising from the chimney of his stone house—the smoke grew fainter and fainter, until it dissolved away completely.

The sun had climbed into the sky by the time they reached the Devil’s Throat. The rocky surface of the mountain seemed silver in the brightness. Valko led the way up the steep rise of the mountain and through a dense patch of forest. Beyond the overgrown bramble stood the large, dark cave. Once, many years before, this had been a much revered entrance to the Devil’s Throat. Thracians had created shrines here; myths and legends grew around the site. The local people believed that Orpheus descended to the underworld from the cave and that devils lived in the labryinthian structures deep below it. Anyone who entered would be cursed, lost to life aboveground, forever mired in darkness.

Approaching the entrance, Valko remembered the first time he had seen it. It had seemed to him to be just a hole gaping in the side of the mountain like so many other caves he’d seen in his travels, but of course it had been so much more. He would never forget the smile of triumph on Seraphina’s face when she returned to Paris after the Second Angelic Expedition. She had found the opening to the underworld, and she had brought back its most precious treasure. Of course, everything had changed since her death. He’d stayed in Paris, remarried, raised a daughter, divorced, buried a daughter. Only then, after Angela’s death, when the last of his connections to Paris was gone, had he made the trek to the Devil’s Throat Cavern himself. For twenty-five years Valko had climbed the sheer rock face, the sound of the waterfall crashing in his ears, and spied on the Watchers, waiting for the day when he would return. For years his life had been in that secluded valley. He’d disguised himself so well that nobody knew who he was or what he was doing. He’d married a Bulgarian woman, spoke Bulgarian like a native, mixed with local men in the village bars, and done everything he could to fit in. If the Nephilim had discovered his identity, he would be dead. But they hadn’t.

Leaning against the entrance of the cavern, he looked past his young comrades and through the tangle of birch trees beyond, letting his mind drift to the hours ahead. He threw a rope ladder over the ledge. Vera stepped to it, grabbed the first rung, and lowered herself down. The descent would be painstaking and dangerous. The familiar sound of water bounced through the gorge, echoing, filling the space with a deafening noise, and he wondered why Vera and Azov hadn’t asked for more specific information about the layout of the Devil’s Throat, why they had trusted him about Lucien, why they didn’t verify his story. It used to be that agents trusted no one.

Valko knew the mythology behind the cavern, but he also knew the cave as a geological formation. He knew the depth and the general perimeters as precisely as the contour lines on a topographical map; he recognized the sound of water that came from the river and the water that came from the waterfall. Quickly he went, letting gravity take him downward. He counted each step, positioning his feet carefully, delicately on the ladder rungs, adding them up. He looked over his shoulder, straining to see in the swirling, infinite darkness. He knew that the noise would grow louder and louder as he descended. As the shaft deepened, the darkness would become thick. He could see no farther than the whites of his knuckles wrapped upon the ladder’s rungs, and yet he knew that soon he would reach the bottom.


The Devil’s Throat Cavern, Smolyan, Bulgaria

As Vera followed Valko through the darkness, she saw a skeletal figure stretched out on the rock, its pale arms crossed upon its chest. Seraphina Valko’s photographs of the dead Watcher had taken Vera’s breath away when she’d first seen them a year earlier in Paris, and now here was the actual angel, in the flesh, its skin giving the illusion of life, its golden hair curling in tendrils to its shoulders. As they stood over its body, taking in its unearthly beauty, Vera felt a sense that she was following a path created long before her birth.

“It looks alive,” Vera said, lifting the white metallic gown and rubbing the fabric between her fingers.

“I wouldn’t touch it,” Valko said. “The bodies of angels weren’t meant to be touched. The level of radioactivity may still be very high.”

Azov bent over the body. “But I thought that they couldn’t die.”

“Immortality is a gift that can be taken as easily as it is bequeathed,” Valko said. “Clematis believed that the Lord struck the angel down as vengeance. It may be that angels live the way humans do—in the shadow of their Creator, wholly dependent upon the whims of divinity.”

Valko, who had clearly seen the dead Watcher many times before, headed off into the cavern. Vera followed the trembling glow of his flashlight into the cold, wet space. He stopped before a declivity in the wall that, upon closer inspection, was a chiseled corridor that opened into a large room. In the depths of the space, removed from the roar of water, there was light and movement, the soft scraping of a pen on paper. A figure stood and walked toward them, his thin body barely discernible.

“Lucien?” Valko said, in little more than a whisper.

“What is it?” a soft voice said.

“Lucien, there are some people I’d like you to meet,” Valko said. “Do you mind if we come in?”

The angel hesitated, and then, as if realizing that he couldn’t refuse, stepped aside and let them pass into his chamber.

A candle burned on a table in the corner, throwing a flickering weak light over loose pages and an inkwell. The cave had little in it—a bookshelf packed with books, a tattered carpet, a small table and a matching wooden chair—and Vera had the feeling that she was walking into the spare, severe, cloistered space of a hermit. Vera knew that angels could exist without the comforts of the material world, their bodies made of fire and air. Lucien had an aura of tranquility, of a being that existed outside of time. Vera felt fear and awe and reverence at once. She wanted to fall on her knees and behold the angel’s beauty.

Slowly Lucien opened his wings and, in what seemed to be a gesture of protection, as if he were too fragile to be seen by human eyes, folded them over his body. Vera tried to see the creature clearly, but his skin had the fluid consistency of candlelight. Even as her eyes moved over him, he seemed to melt away, his arms dissipating into his wings, his wings disappearing in the darkness. Vera was sure that if she placed her hand on his shoulder, her fingers would simply pass through.

She stole a glance at Azov and Sveti. It was clear that neither of them had ever seen such a magnificent creature before, either. For all their research and all their training, they were out of their element.

Lucien said, “Have you brought me more ink?”

“Of course,” Valko said, pulling a jar from his pocket and placing it on the wooden table. “You have enough paper?”

“For the moment, yes,” Lucien said.

Valko turned to Azov. “He is part seraph, and so it is his nature to sing praises to the Lord. He learned musical notation with Katya and has been writing his psalms down ever since.”

“You haven’t come here to hear my songs,” Lucien said, fixing Vera, Sveti, and Azov with his gaze.

“Not today,” Valko said. “I’ve come because I need the alembic.” Vera could see a complicity between them, as if they were embarking upon a plan they had conceived long ago.

Lucien went to his bed and pulled a beat-up suitcase from underneath. Opening the buckles, he lifted the top and removed a wooden case. A Fabergé egg was inside, a golden egg set with diamonds and rubies, and with a large cabochon diamond on top. Lucien presented it to Valko, who, looking it over, nodded in approval. Vera watched as he inserted a fingernail under the cabochon and pressed the egg open. A mechanism popped and the top sprung, revealing a number of gold toiletry utensils. He removed these items and lifted the interior lining from its casement. The vessel was smooth and transparent rock crystal.

“It’s the Nécessaire Egg,” Vera said, almost to herself. “The real one, the one that Tatiana must have copied in her aquarelle.”

“Well done,” Valko said, taking two of the toiletry utensils and holding them up for her to see. They were long, thin pipes dusted with brilliants. He fitted them into tiny holes in the egg and the crystal vessel, screwing them in place.

“It appears to be little more than a worthless bauble. But, in fact, the egg acts as an alembic, the vessel in which an alchemical formula must be mixed. The quartz lining of the egg is the perfect material for the creation of the elixir. The golden pipes move the liquid from the first vessel to the second, like a still. And the golden egg seals the potion inside, protecting it. My daughter gave the alembic to Lucien. He has kept it with him. He hid it before he was imprisoned and, after I had him released, we retrieved it.”

Vera looked at the alembic, her eyes drawn to its absurd brilliance. She could only imagine the foresight, the meticulous planning, that Angela Valko had undergone in leaving the egg with Lucien. She must have had everything planned—from finding the ingredients to assembling it to ensuring that Lucien remained close by. It struck Vera that this very egg had been touched by the empress herself. It had been the center of all M. Philippe’s—and Rasputin’s after him—schemes.

Vera touched the crystal vessel, running her finger over its smooth surface. “It is hard to believe that this led to so much searching.”

“You have no idea,” Valko said under his breath. “The progression from Noah to this cave is almost too incredible to contemplate. You have the original formula, passed down in secret through generations of magicians, alchemists, scientists, and mystics, all of whose efforts were thwarted because they lacked essential ingredients.”

“Silphium,” Azov said.

“And Valkine,” Sveti added.

“Yes, of course,” Valko said. “But, most important of all, an angelic creature like Lucien, one born of an egg, one descended from an archangel. The presence of such a creature is absolutely essential. With Lucien here, everything will come together.”

“You believe it’s really possible?” Azov said, and Vera could see the curiosity in his manner, the pure desire of a scientist at work.

“That we will soon know for sure,” Valko said. “First we need fire.” He withdrew his small portable gas stove from his backpack and, taking matches from the pocket of his parka, lit it. The hissing blue fire rose and fell to a soft steady flame.

“And now I need the formula,” he said. Vera took Rasputin’s book from her satchel and gave it to Valko. He removed the flowers from behind the protective layer of wax paper and dropped them into the vessel. The process took only a matter of minutes. Soon the flowers had been blended together into a resinous white liquid.

Valko picked up the tube and swirled it gently, until it began to bubble and melt, forming a sticky soup at the bottom. Soon a brown mixture, thick as caramel, clung to the rock crystal, solidifying and melting against the curvature of the vessel. Inserting a long copper rod, and turning it through the concoction, he said, “It is nearly time to melt the Valkine and the silphium.”

Valko removed a glass tube from his pocket. Vera saw what looked like the stamens of flowers, each no bigger than the leg of a fly, collected at the bottom.

“This tiny amount of silphium is all I have been able to harvest, even after years of growing it,” Valko said. “I can only hope that it will be enough.” After uncorking the tube, he scattered the silphium stamens into the mixture. “I must add them slowly,” Valko said, without looking up. “A few bits of resin at a time.”

With the first drops, the thick brown concoction hissed and began to thin. With the next addition, the color transformed into the golden amber of the resin itself, a rich yellow that matched the Fabergé eggs in brilliance. Valko dropped in the remaining stems of resin, watching them disappear into the brew. Vera wondered—as she stepped away from the table—at those who had spent their lives in endless experimentation, hunting for ingredients that did not exist, working out fruitless recipes, following circular metaphors, and, in the end, wasting their lives in pursuit of an unattainable dream. She couldn’t help but wonder if they were just following the same hopeless path.

“Vera, my dear,” Valko said. “I will need your help.” His eyes seemed to catch fire. “The pendant.”

Vera went behind Valko and unfastened the necklace. The metal retained the warmth of his skin.

“It will dissolve?” Sveti asked.

“Valkine is extremely soft and should melt with ease,” Valko said, stirring the mixture. Vera slid the pendant off the necklace and dropped it into the alembic.

“Now the blood,” Valko said.

“Blood?” Vera said, surprised by this addition. She glanced from Azov to Valko, trying to understand. “You never said anything about blood.”

“Why do you think we need Lucien?” Valko said. “Angelic blood—a certain kind of angelic blood—is necessary to complete the mixture. Blood from an egg-born angel is quite different from the blood of humans, or even of Nephilim.”

“Which explains why Godwin wants Evangeline,” Vera said.

“Not exactly,” Valko said thoughtfully. “They are interested in Evangeline’s blood, that is for certain, although she is simply a rare mixture, not an egg-born child, nor the product of angelophany. In any case, they cannot possibly create what we are about to create here.” Looking to Lucien, Valko gestured for him to come to the table. The creature stepped closer, casting a column of light over the alembic. Valko took nail scissors from the Nécessaire kit and sliced Lucien’s finger. The drops of blood fell into the mixture.

“Assist me,” Valko said, giving Vera a plastic vial he’d taken from his backpack. She held it between her fingers, her hands steady as he transferred drops of the thick potion into the vial. Vera secured the top with a cork and held it up to the light. The alembic, which only moments before had been coated in a sticky resin, was perfectly clear, its crystalline curves as transparent as glass.

Azov looked closely at the vial. “There isn’t very much.”

“It is extremely concentrated,” Valko said, taking it from Vera’s fingers. He wrapped it in a cloth, placed it inside the egg, and snapped it closed. “A few drops released into the water supply of any major city would be enough to affect the entire Nephilistic population.”

“If you do that,” Vera said, “what will happen to Lucien?”

Valko sighed. It was evident that he had considered the question many times, and that facing the scrutiny of his fellow angelologists made him uneasy and defensive. “I believe that it will affect only the most base qualities of angelic creatures,” he said at last. “But I can’t be certain. It is a sacrifice Lucien must be willing to make. There is, indeed, much suffering ahead. We must strike hard against angelic creatures, with all the weapons at our disposal. Noah’s medicine is one part of our attack. The Watchers—who are at the root of the entire history of evil—must be dealt with now as well.”

“You can’t be serious,” Azov said, his anger rising as he stepped close to Valko, looking him directly in the eye. “You know the potential consequences of releasing the Watchers. They could fight the Nephilim, yes, but they could also turn on humanity. You will put all of us in danger.”

Valko folded his hands on the table and closed his eyes. For a moment Vera believed he was saying a prayer, as if he were asking for divine guidance in what he was about to do. Finally he opened his eyes and said, “This was the case with our forefathers, the noble men who came here for the First Angelic Expedition, and it is our work still. Danger is something we accept in our work, Hristo. Death is something we accept. We cannot go back now.” Valko slid the vessel into his pocket. “The time has come for us to move, Lucien. Let’s go.”

• • •

The black water of the twisting river rushed by, sweeping into the darkness beyond as they climbed into a wobbling rowboat. Sitting in the prow next to Sveti, Vera saw a waterfall at the head of the river, the thick mist rising before the endless hollow of cave. She understood why legend designated the river as Styx, the river of the dead: As they glided across the water she felt a heaviness descend, a dark emptiness so complete it was as though her life had been stolen away. The living could not enter the land of the dead.

With Valko and Azov’s help, she and Sveti rowed toward the opposite shore, the boat rising and falling with the current. Lucien stood on the other side, waiting. He had gone ahead to open the door to the Watchers’ prison. In the absolute darkness of the cavern, his body seemed even brighter than it had in his room. His white wings sparkled with a strange brilliance, as if each feather had been inlaid with crystals. Vera watched him carefully, realizing that she’d never measured herself—her body, her mind, her strength, her speed—against any angelic creature before. All of her limitations, all of her human weaknesses, became clear by comparison.

The opposite bank of the river seemed empty at first, but upon closer inspection, Vera made out a cadre of glowing beings arriving upon the shore, arraying themselves in a great fan behind Lucien, their skin throwing off a tempered, diaphanous light. There were between fifty and one hundred angels, each one as lovely as the next. Their wings seemed to be made of gold leaf, and rings of light floated over their masses of blond curls. But even in their pure angelic splendor, the Watchers were no match for Lucien.

Stunned by the spectacle, Vera was torn between horror that she’d gotten herself into this situation and a desperate desire to examine the angels. It became apparent that a small number of the Watchers acted as leaders to the others. They walked among their brothers, directing them to stand in rows, organizing their legions as if preparing for battle. After they had been arrayed in perfect regiments, fanning along the riverside in bands of light, the leaders stood at Lucien’s side like royal guards.

With a clattering of wings, the angels rose to attention, their bodies blazing in brilliant bands of fire against the darkness. They were coming to the water, closing in on the boat, moving forward at a steady pace. Vera’s awe and terror swelled as the creatures approached. As the angels moved closer, the fire burnished the surface of the river, gilding the black with gold.

In a flurry of wind and wings that seemed to come out of nowhere, Lucien rose into the air, landing between the angelologists and the Watchers. He was their superior in every way. The Watchers stopped before the archangel’s son and, in a sweeping movement, knelt before him.

“Brothers,” Lucien said, “in heaven, I am of a superior caste. But here, in the wilderness of exile, we are equals.”

The Watchers stood, light undulating over the craggy walls of the gorge. Vera detected curiosity and fear and hesitation in the angels’ silence.

Lucien continued. “Your story is famous in heaven and on earth. God imprisoned you. You have waited for him to grant you reprieve, to bring you back to him. And now you are free. Come with me to the surface. We will celebrate together. We will sing praises to heaven together. We will fight and kill the enemy together.”

An angel stepped forward from the band of Watchers. He wore a silver robe, and his wings—majestic white wings that matched Lucien’s—were wrapped about his shoulders. “Brother, we are preparing for battle.”

“There is no fight between us,” Lucien said.

“Not with you, but with them,” the Watcher said, gesturing to Vera and Sveti. “They are the cause of our fall from favor.”

“No,” Lucien said. “The war is between the Nephilim and human beings. We, pure creatures, made of light at the beginning of time, do not notice the childish battles between them.”

Another Watcher stepped forward. “But the Nephilim are our children.”

“They are the result of your great sin against heaven,” Lucien said. “Accepting them is denying your guilt.”

“He’s correct,” another Watcher said. “We must throw them back, deny the Nephilim, redeem ourselves.”

“Come, now,” Lucien said, stepping toward the band of fallen angels. “We are made of the same airy material, there is no stain of human reason in you. Join me. Together we will rehabilitate you. Soon you will shine in the image of the highest angels. The creatures of the sun will meet the creatures of the shadows. Beings of the ether will fight side by side with beings of the pit. Angels, prepare! The war is soon upon us.”

Suddenly, a blinding light filled the cavern. Vera felt a wave of heat fall over her, glutinous and sticky, as if she’d fallen into boiled tar. She heard Azov cry out in pain, and then the sickening, beating movement of wings. Valko was out of the boat and wading toward the shore when a second blast of searing heat seized her, this one more intensely painful than the first, as if her skin had been peeled away in one clean sweep. Crouching to the ground, she tried to escape the pain ripping through her body. Once she’d felt tremendous fear about dying. She had tried to imagine how she would fight if she came up against one of the creatures. She had believed that she would find courage, that she would lose herself in the battle, but she felt nothing of the sort now. There was only the simple truth of her life and her death, the base reality of translating herself from one state of being into another.

• • •

The moment Vera woke it seemed to her that she had died and emerged on the other side of existence, as if Charon had in fact taken her across the deathly river Styx to the banks of hell. Emerging more fully from sleep, a seizure of pain overwhelmed her. Her body felt stiff and hot, as if she had been dipped in wax. A glowing flashlight hovered above her. She felt someone’s touch against her arm, a soft yet insistent pressure on her body, and she knew two things: first, she was not dead yet, and second, the angels had escaped.

Vera tried to sit up. The boat rocked in the still water. A wave of nausea overtook her, and she threw up over the gunwale.

“Wait a sec,” Azov said, putting an arm about her. “Take it slow.”

She knew that something terrible had happened. She glanced past Azov and saw Dr. Raphael Valko, curled upon the rock floor, burned beyond recognition. Azov walked to the body and gingerly—as if afraid to disturb a sleeping child—took the vessel filled with Noah’s medicine from Valko’s hands and slid it into his pocket.

“Dead,” Azov said, his voice little more than a whisper. “He got the full force of the light.”

“Where is Sveti?” Vera asked, glancing through the boat and beyond, into the frightfully still cavern.

For the first time in her life, she saw Azov at a loss for words. He simply gestured out over the water, his hand signifying the dark, silent recesses of the Devil’s Throat. His eyes brimmed with tears. Vera wanted to say something but couldn’t find her voice. She hoped her silence would be understood as a kind of vigil.

Azov cleared his throat. “Right now we have to concentrate on getting out of here. You’re hurt. You need medical attention.”

Azov touched her arm, and she flinched. Her body was filled with a sharp, searing pain. Slowly, and with great care, Azov helped her stand. As she leaned against him, she knew that her face was burned.

“You’re in bad shape, Vera,” Azov said. “I don’t know how I’m going to get you over the river without causing you more pain.”

A band of white light fell over the rocks. Vera’s terror at the sight of it overtook her, and she vomited again as Lucien landed. Lucien looked her over and, lifting her slowly, held her in his arms and flew over the river. She held on to his neck, nestling into the downy warmth of his wings as they made their way back to the rope ladder. The ladder twisted up into the darkness, disappearing into a fold in the rock.

“Hold on to me tightly,” Lucien said, positioning Vera’s hands around his shoulders and wrapping her arm about his waist. “I’ll bring you up.”

“No,” Vera said. “Bring Azov here first.”

Lucien considered this a moment before setting Vera down and flying back for Azov.

Vera collapsed against the wall of the cavern, her ears ringing with the sharp, rapid-fire noise of the waterfall. Without the light from Lucien’s body, the cave fell into a fathomless darkness. She strained to discern the space. She tried to stand, but her legs gave out from under her. She fell to the ground, feeling as if she might lose consciousness. She closed her eyes for what seemed less than a moment. When she opened them, a faint glow emanated from the distance. Lucien was coming back; she needed to prepare herself for the searing pain of movement. Easing herself up, she watched the light come closer. She saw a glow of white wings, the shimmer of a silver robe, and she knew that it wasn’t Lucien at all but one of the Watchers. It stood before her, looking her over with curiosity.

“You are human?” the angel asked at last.

Vera nodded, all the while staring at the angel. There was something soft in his features, something divine, and for the first time she truly understood how unfair it had been that such beautiful beings had been punished so severely. Vera wanted to understand how an act of love—because the Watchers had, after all, disobeyed God out of love—had brought so much treachery to the world. The angel had spent thousands of years in this underworld of stone and water. He had lost paradise and now he had lost his companions.

The angel introduced himself as Semyaza and placed his hand on Vera’s shoulder. A gentle burst of warmth moved through her muscles, easing the pain, as if she’d been given a shot of morphine. The relief was so profound that Vera felt as if she had the strength to stand.

“The others are up there,” Vera said, pointing up the rope ladder to the ledge high above. “Don’t you want to join your brothers?”

“I’ve decided to remain here,” Semyaza said.

“But why?” Vera didn’t understand. They were offering the angel its freedom, and it had chosen to stay in the cave in solitude and darkness.

“In the presence of other beings like yourself, one can endure great suffering. For thousands of years I’ve been a creature of hell. I don’t know if I can adjust to the light.” Semyaza smiled. “Besides, the earth belongs to humanity. There is no place for me there. I am a prisoner not of this cave but to eternal life as a fallen angel. I would like, for just one minute, to understand what it is like to be human. My memories of falling in love are so vibrant. There is nothing in my experience like it. To feel warm blood in my veins, to hold another body close, to eat, to fear death. For that, I would return to earth.”