Abigail

After paying what she owed the clinic, Abigail walked out to the carpark and found a semi-dry ledge to sit on. She waited about half an hour until Kalvin's car pulled in.

"No luck I take it?" he said as she buckled her seatbelt. "I'll take you to your place."

"You've done more than enough for me today; I can take the bus. Just drop me at a stop."

"I'll drive you home, Abby."

She shook her head. "Were you always this bossy?"

Kalvin shrugged and shifted the gears, already reversing out. It was officially peak hour now and the traffic along the main roads was heavy. When they reached the side streets, Kalvin sped up. He navigated the serpentine streets without once turning to Abigail. She was impressed he remembered the way. Kalvin had only visited a couple of times; Abigail's parents rarely wanted guests around.

When they pulled up to the house, Elias was out the front. He seemed to be waving goodbye to someone in a blue Hyundai. Abigail recognised neither the car nor the woman driving.

"Where've you been?" Elias asked.

Abigail gestured towards Kalvin. "We were hanging out."

"Kalvin, right? Good to see you again," Elias said. He strode over to Kalvin and offered the younger man his hand.

Kalvin hesitated, his gaze locked on the skin on the back of Elias' hand. After a moment, he cleared his throat and stiffly met Elias' hand with his own. "Yeah, you too. I'm so sorry about your parents. How are you managing?"

"Thank you. I'm well enough, considering the circumstances."

Abigail glanced up at the house. With Ramiel inside, it was best not to invite Kalvin in. "I'd better not keep you all day. Thanks for the ride home."

"No worries." Kalvin read the dismissal in her words. He curtly nodded to Elias and turned back to his car. Before he climbed inside, he pointed at Abigail. "If there's anything you need, call me. And, Abby, I mean anything."

When his car disappeared around the corner, Elias motioned for Abigail to wait. "What did you tell him about your face?"

"A surfing accident. What about it? I'm pretty sure he believed me."

"I bet he did until he saw this." Elias showed her the back of his hands, which were covered in half-moon scratches. "Kiara's handiwork. Judging by the way he looked at me and his attempt to crush my hand, he figured you did this in self-defence while I tried to smash your face in."

Abigail chuckled. "Didn't see that coming."

"It's not funny. I don't want people to think I'm that kind of person."

"I'll sort it out with him later, ok? Let me go get changed. Did you see what the rain was like earlier? My clothes are still damp."

"Before you do, give Ramiel this." Elias took out a small ziplock bag with about a dozen blue-tinted tablets inside. "Give him two. We'll see how he reacts."

"What is this?"

"Oxycodone. I don't know if it'll work for an angel, but it seems worth a try."

Abigail nodded. Questions about how Elias had procured these tablets and how much he paid his drug dealer could wait for later. Abigail had seen Ramiel's injuries. If it had been her in his place, she would have spent the day howling about the pain.

Once she had fresh clothes on and a glass of water for Ramiel, she knocked on the door to Elias' bedroom. No reply.

"Ramiel, are you awake?" she said, letting herself in.

The angel was, in fact, propped up against the headboard and had a yellowed paperback in his hand. He still looked no better.

"Elias says you should take these." She offered Ramiel two tablets and the glass. "Don't chew them. Put them in your mouth and drink the water quickly. Tablets usually taste awful."

She had half-anticipated a prolonged debate with Ramiel and guessed that Elias had asked her to take the tablets to him, because he didn't want to deal with the argument himself. But Ramiel simply did as instructed. Once he emptied the glass, he handed it back to Abigail with a quiet thank you.

"How are you doing?" she asked.

Ramiel shut the book and held it up for her. It was a copy of Huckleberry Finn that Elias should have returned to the school library years ago. "Your world is a peculiar place," he said. "Are you well? That bruising looks uncomfortable."

"I'm better off than you are. No one has noticed the bruises across my throat, that's the main thing." Frowning, Abigail slid onto a box that sat on the floor by the bed. "You might have guessed already, I've been trying to figure out what happened to my parents. I met up with a woman today. If my mother had been behaving oddly, she would've been the one to know. Except she didn't."

"Therefore you are convinced your parents' deaths were staged."

"Would Najran or the rest of them have a motive?"

"Nephilim blood could give one additional strength for a ritual and a human soul is a bountiful source of sustenance to a demon."

Abigail's eyes widened. "Sustenance? Demons eat souls? My mum and dad are food now?"

"Without sustenance, a demon will wither and die. They are not immortal."

Abigail swallowed the bile building up in her throat. This was all theoretical, she reminded herself. There was no proof whatsoever that demons had anything to do with her parents' fates.

"I thought demons were just fallen angels," she said.

"Pray the Archangel does not hear such blasphemy." Raphael responded dryly. "An angel and a demon are as alien to one other as humans and plankton. Heaven does not know whence the demons came. What demons themselves say about their origin is conflicting and may well be as accurate as the proliferation of human myths about the creation of the world."

"How can that be? Didn't God create everything?"

"Demons appeared after the Creator left us."

Abigail opened her mouth, but no words came out. She pursed her lips and tried again, "What? Why?"

"He simply left. I do not presume to know why," Ramiel replied in a flat, passionless tone. "You have noted I am reticent with my answers, so I will attempt to explain more thoroughly. Your planet, in fact, your entire known universe is enclosed by the ethereal planes where Heaven and Hell can be found. Beyond that is the Void. It is shapeless and no light can pierce its depths. Our father had spent so long constructing this universe, coaxing out of nothing each grain of sand and each drop of water, that we did not fathom he could ever be finished with it. Yet one day, he simply turned and headed out into the Void. Not one of us ever saw him again."

"But why?"

"Would a justification change anything?"

"So what now? God is dead, is that it?" Abigail said sharply. "And you still haven't explained anything about demons."

"Some angels braved the darkness of the Void and searched for him. All were lost to us, save one — Lucifer. He did not return alone, but brought with him a host of demons. Lucifer is..." Ramiel hesitated and stifled the shy smile that had broached his face at the mention of Lucifer. "He was proud and boastful, maddeningly so at times, but he never claimed to be the father of demons. So whence come these creatures? There must be others out there with the same power as our father. Perhaps they created the demons. Perhaps they lured our Father out into the Void and set upon him. Perhaps —"

"So you are polytheist? You, angels, are full of surprises," said Elias. He was leaning against the doorway and from his expression, Abigail surmised he had been there for much of the conversation.

"I do not claim to know anything about the Void, I merely speculate."

Abigail laughed, but it was a joyless, bitter sound. "There's no god worth praying to and the angels are as confused as humans are," she said. "What you've told us is enough to destroy every religion there is, don't pretend this is nothing."

The whole universe is... It's all a mess. How am I even a part of this? Abigail pressed her fingers against her temples. The first moments were gentle, then she dug her fingers deeper until the pain was all she could concentrate on.

"Abby?" said Elias. "Hello?"

She let her hands fall to her sides. "I'm ok. Sorry," she mumbled. "This is a lot to reconcile without having an existential crisis."

"Yeah, that heroin's becoming more tempting with each passing day," Elias replied.