Natalie Yacobson - Rhianon-3. Palace in Heaven

“Yes, and now I have to do with my own hands all the things I opposed. And, believe me, that’s the worst punishment.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Rhianon,” he put his hands on her shoulders, careful not to crush her fragile human bones. Strange, he could have killed her, and she was not afraid.

“God makes you do things that even from the outside you couldn’t bear to watch. He destroys you with your own hands. What a cruel way to crush a strong will.”

“Do I have a choice?”

“You would have, if after your first defeat, you hadn’t grown indifferent. All the desires in you fell asleep as soon as you lost.”

“You woke them up.”

“But you still obey his orders.”

“Do you?” He drew her to him, as if to say that he’d already broken a cardinal command by forbidden intimacy with a human. For some reason he had always put her above all humans. He did not even express it with words, only with quiet gestures of reverence, admiration, even some kind of adoration, rather than love. She had learned to guess his thoughts. He thought about taking by force something that should never have belonged to him.

One thought roused him. It was time to discard not only his sword, shield, and cloak, but also the clothes that were no longer necessary. He quickly freed himself from his armor. With his hands he helped Rhianon remove her dress. He needed her scalding kisses, as he had once prayed. He needed this beautiful toy on his bed with a human body and a consciousness close to that of an angel. If God thought that expelling him from paradise deprived him of heavenly pleasure, how misguided he was.

“This is where paradise is,” Madael whispered, pressing his lips against hers and running his fingers along the exposed curves of her body. “The paradise I was never supposed to return to, but here it is…”

All the gloomy thoughts were really gone. The crushing pain was gone, dissolved into the bliss of earthly coitus. That pain had clutched him in a vise ever since he’d fallen, and now it was gone. Perhaps when he awoke in Rianon’s arms it would resume, but at least not as much as when his bed was empty. In those days he could not sleep, sleep would not come to him, oblivion would not come, his scorched mind would rush like a fever. Perhaps that was the punishment, no one explained to him, but his mind was racing as if caged. The gloomy, empty world, devoid of any beauty, took on some color only when blood was spilled. He flew over the world and reveled in the suffering of others, only because he himself was suffering the most. Those were the ages of madness. The mind was imprisoned in fetters, like the body, and only freed with the body. Madael ran his hands over the perfect female body, too thin for a grown woman, yet it was girlish and delicate. She was as fragile as heavenly light, he thought, and could become just as sizzling if the need arose. Who knew better than he that the peaceful glow of dawn could explode in a sizzling flash at any moment. When he should have been punished, that’s exactly what had happened. But now the punishment turned into bliss. The long, sweet kisses, the nights without sleep, not because he was going crazy with the crushing emptiness and inability to sleep, but because he was making love, and the desirable body beside him that felt like it was part of you-it was worth giving up heaven for all that. He pulled away from her lips with a quick grin, but the next moment he was back on them with a long kiss. Rhianon’s fingers tangled in his hair and slid pleasantly down the back of his neck. With her other hand she caressed his shoulders, sometimes touching his wings. His feet touched his hips, his knees his back. Now he really felt like a god.

Rhianon leaned back on the bed, letting him do things on his own. She liked it very much. She had never felt as good as she did right now. Only somehow it seemed to her that there were other things going on in the tent besides the rhythmic merging of their bodies. She could hear murmurs and soft voices, some rustling, whispering, rustling noises. And just for a moment she thought she saw something creepy in front of her. Heavens ploughed with the glitter of swords, like a battlefield, squabbling and shouting, bodies like the one in bed with her now, but there they were horribly disfigured. She covered her eyelids, and when she opened them, she thought that now he himself was unconsciously emitting some kind of witchcraft to make the tent brighter. She saw his handsome face before her, covered in a slight sweat, but unusually luminous. His glistening hair came down, covering them both in a golden veil. She wished I’d never taken her lips from his.

She reached into the bed and fumbled for something delicate, slippery, slightly covered in moisture. Lilies, both water lilies and garden lilies, weren’t here yesterday, but now the flowers were scattered across the bed and the floor. They gave off a sweet smell, but not like his skin.

She straddled his naked shoulders, marveling again at how the gold engraved bracelets on them had practically become part of his flesh. The cold body still evoked a fiery passion. She felt a flash of fire inside her, perhaps a man she would have burned with her kiss, but not him, the beautiful lips remained soft. But the lilies around them began to turn black and curl up from the fire that flashed on the petals. The flowers were turning black, but the bodies woven among them remained white. Madeel’s wing would have been unburned, even if he had touched the fire. But now the slight twitching of those wings made the fires in the tent go out a little. And yet the flowers withered inexorably, withering and exuding the smell of burning. She didn’t care. Rhianon ran her hand through his golden hair, feeling the curls immediately braid her fingers like a net. Her eyelashes touched his. It seemed that in another moment she would open her eyelids and see dead sapphires in the place of his real eyes, like the beasts’ skins in a tent. So be it. Even that didn’t scare her. And the fire didn’t scare her anymore. You can burn yourself now. There would be nothing better than this moment.

“You’re like marble,” she thought, feeling him inside her again.

“And you’re made of fire,” she thought back.

Later, she leaned back on the soft white hide laid on the side of the bed. Madael gently stroked her neck and thin shoulders with his hand. She was the first to sense that there was someone in the tent besides them. Someone was trying to convey her thoughts, but it was not her lover. The one who had just wandered the bleak city and country roads was now standing at the entrance to the tent. For a moment, Rhianon saw with his eyes the scant light on the rutted roadway and the strange creature that wandered there, seemingly neither demon nor human, but something in between. It wasn’t very beautiful, but there was obviously a fairy-tale beauty slumbering inside it. Rhianon could see it even through the alien eyes of the one who was transmitting the visual images to her. It is strange why this being is now so wretched and lost and miserable. He has a great talent. She did not know exactly what was in his purse: a brush, a pen, or a musical instrument, but she was sure it was part of his talent. Beneath the skimpy garment there was light, but it was obscured by pain. This incredibly beautiful, but unknowingly vilified creature would perish if he did not find his own special way to salvation. She suddenly felt sharply sorry for him. Pain pierced her heart like a sharp splinter. This creature is part of Madael’s troops. Rhianon wanted to see something else, but she couldn’t see anything else. Only a voice could be heard now.

“It is the Cathedral of Thunder! Its path lies in the Cathedral of Thunder! Where we all die in agony, to…”