His eyes drift closed.
He takes a shuddering breath and lets it out. He doesn’t take another.
I look up at Raffe, then at Josiah.
Josiah shakes his head at me. ‘It was too much for him. He wasn’t doing well after you guys went through him. His healing slowed down, almost stopped. He was in no condition to handle so many coming through. I don’t think biological beings were really meant to be gateways.’
Josiah sighs. ‘But if it had to happen to someone, it might as well have been Beliel.’ He turns and walks away from Beliel’s ravaged body. ‘No one will miss him. He didn’t have a friend in the world.’
46
The Watchers decide to do a proper ceremony for Beliel. We drive until the aerie is long out of sight before we stop to bury him.
‘Do we even have shovels?’ I ask.
‘He’s not an animal,’ says Hawk. ‘We won’t bury him.’
There’s an uncomfortable silence as the Watchers gently pull Beliel’s body out from the car. None of the guys will look at each other, as though stubbornly and silently insisting on something that each thinks the other might object to.
Finally, Cyclone speaks up. ‘I’ll be a bearer.’
‘Me too,’ says Howler.
The floodgates open, and all the other Watchers speak out, volunteering to be bearers.
They all look at Raffe, waiting for his approval. Raffe nods.
‘What?’ asks Josiah, looking baffled. ‘After all he’s done, you’re going to bestow an honorable—’
‘We know what he’s done for us,’ says Hawk. ‘Whatever else he’s done since then, it looks like he’s paid the price. He’s one of us. We should give him the proper send-off that we couldn’t give our other brothers in the Pit.’
Josiah looks at them, then at Raffe, who nods.
‘What do we have that will burn?’ asks Thermo.
‘We have gas, but he said I couldn’t use any more,’ says my mother, pointing to Josiah.
‘And you can’t,’ says Josiah. ‘But they need some for the ceremony.’ He walks back to the truck and climbs into the bed.
‘You brought gas?’ I ask.
‘To burn down the angels’ nest,’ says Mom. ‘I figured that once I got you out, we might as well burn it all down. But he wouldn’t let me.’
Josiah comes back with a gas can. ‘She did enough damage. She would have been caught if she had tried to burn the whole aerie down.’ He shakes his head as he puts the can down. ‘I still don’t know how she got away with doing as much damage as she did. Or how I convinced her about you being inside Beliel. I’m not even sure I believed it.’
‘Why not?’ asks my mother. ‘Did you think she was hiding inside someone else?’
‘Never mind, Mom.’ I hold her hand and pull her away from the Watchers. ‘Let them do their burial.’
Josiah splashes the gas over Beliel’s body. ‘You’re sure you want to do this?’
‘He’s earned this,’ says Howler.
Josiah nods and steps back.
My mom steps forward with a lighter and lights a strip of cloth on fire.
Thermo takes it and drops the flaming cloth onto Beliel’s soaked body.
Beliel ignites.
His hair fizzles like quick sparklers, lighting up, then disappearing. His shriveled skin and pants light up as the flames spread all over his body. Waves of heat distort the road beyond him and warm my exposed neck and face. The air fills with the smell of burning gasoline mixed with the faint scent of meat beginning to char.
Five of the Watchers step forward and grab his burning arms, legs, and shoulders.
I move to stop them, but Raffe puts out his arm to block me.
‘What are they doing?’ I ask. ‘They’re going to burn themselves.’
‘It’ll be painful. But they’ll heal,’ he says.
All the Watchers take to the air. Their wings spread and beat in unison against the sunrise.
Just as I think that the flaming body between them must be burning them to a crisp, a new set of Watchers relieve them and take over the flaming burden. The others fly, crisscrossing each other like a net far below the body. Bits of burning debris fall, much of it burning out before reaching the other Watchers. The bits that continue to fall, the Watchers catch, one by one.
‘They won’t let any part of him fall to the ground,’ says Raffe in a quiet voice. ‘His brothers will keep him from falling.’
In the distance, the Watchers weave a beautiful dance in the dawn sky beneath Beliel’s shower of fire.
47
I stand by a tree on the side of the road and scan the sky above us. The Watchers are done with their ceremony and are flying back to us.