Angelology(170)

perhaps a hundred winged, reptilian monsters gathered together in attack.

He strained to see the scene more clearly. The beings were a hybrid of bird and beast, part human,

part monster in equal measure. Wings were mounted upon their backs, lush and red. They were

shrouded in a light so intense it covered them in a gauze of illumination. Although Gabriella had

explained the Gibborim to him in great detail and he had recognized them as the same beings as had

seen on the train the night before, he now realized that he had not, until this very moment, believed

that so many of them existed.

Through the flames and smoke, Verlaine spied more and more clusters of Gibborim. One by one

they swooped upon the convent, their great wings beating hard and furious. They lifted high and

buoyant in the wind, airy as kites drifting down on the building. They appeared impossibly light, as if

their bodies were insubstantial. Their movements were so coordinated, so powerful that Verlaine

understood at once they would be impossible to defeat. The creatures flew in an elaborate ballet of

attack, rising from the ground in an elegant orchestration of violence, one creature weaving past the

other as the flames soared upward. Verlaine watched the destruction in awe.

One creature stood at a remove from the others, at the edge of the forest. Determined to examine it,

Verlaine ducked into the thick foliage beyond the stone wall, moving closer to the being until he was

less than ten feet away from it, hidden in bushes. He saw the elegance of its features—aquiline nose,

golden curls, the terrifying red eyes. He breathed deeply, taking in the sweet aroma of its body—

Gabriella had told him that the scent was called ambrosial by those who had the fortune (or

misfortune) to encounter it. He was aware at once of the dangerous allure the creature held. Verlaine

had imagined them to be hideous, the misbegotten children of a grand historical error, malformed

hybrids of the sacred and the profane. He had not considered that he would find them beautiful.

Suddenly the creature turned. In a sweeping motion he glanced toward the forest, as if perceiving

Verlaine’s presence among the evergreens. The Gibborim’s quick movement revealed a flash of skin

at the neck, a long, thin arm, the outline of its body. As the giant moved toward the stone wall, its red

wings shivering about him, Verlaine lost all sense of why he had come, what he wanted, and what he

would do next. He knew he should be afraid, but as the Gibborim stepped closer, his skin casting a

glow on the ground, Verlaine felt an eerie calm come over him. The harsh, scintillating light of the

fire raged, throwing a glow upon the creature, mixing with its native luminescence. Verlaine stood

hypnotized. Rather than run, as he knew he should, he wanted to draw closer to the creature, to touch

the stark, pale body. He stepped from the safety of the forest and stood before the Gibborim, as if to

give himself over. He gazed into its glassy eyes, as if searching for an answer to a dark and violent

riddle.

What Verlaine found there startled him beyond reckoning. Instead of malevolence, the creature’s

gaze contained a frightening animal vapidity, a vacuity that was neither vicious nor benign. It was as

if the creature lacked the ability to comprehend what lay before it. Its eyes were lenses into a pure

emptiness. The being did not register Verlaine’s presence. Rather it looked beyond, as if he were

nothing more than an element of the forest, a tree stump or a clump of leaves. Verlaine understood that

he was in the presence of a creature with no soul.

In a swift movement, it opened its red wings. Rotating one wing and then the other so that the fire’s

harsh glare slid over them, the monster gathered its strength and leaped from the ground, light and airy

as a butterfly, joining the others in the attack.

Adoration Chapel, St. Rose Convent, Milton, New York

Evangeline found the Adoration Chapel awash in smoke. She tried to breathe but was overwhelmed

by hot and poisonous air. It singed her skin and stung her eyes so that within seconds her vision had

blurred with tears. Through the haze she could make out the silhouettes of the sisters, arrayed through

the chapel. It appeared to Evangeline that the habits blended together, forming a single patch of

inviolate black. Soft, smoky light suffused the church, falling softly over the altar. Why the sisters

remained in the midst of the fire was incomprehensible to her. If they didn’t get out, they would die

from the smoke.

Confused, she turned to escape through Maria Angelorum Church when something caught her feet

and she fell heavily upon the marble floor, banging her chin. The leather case was jarred from her

grip, flying off into the haze beyond. To her horror, the face of Sister Ludovica stared up from the