It's over, Kanaphiel tells her, as he clutches her arms to steady himself after arriving bedraggled and gasping for breath at the stone-lined beach. Raphael is dead.

Adriel cannot believe it. Raphael is the only archangel left; his power is unrivalled; he holds most of Heaven under him. They were all of them told, near-constantly, that Castiel's petty rebellion was nothing more than a crease to be smoothed out, in the fabric of their Paradise. It is inconceivable to her that…that Castiel could…have won.

She asks the question quietly, and Kanaphiel shakes his head. His vessel is a dark-haired man in his forties, who once had small wire-rimmed glasses that Kanaphiel discarded after entering the body. Adriel can feel her own vessel's long hair whipping around her face in the strong, salt-scented wind; she is still not accustomed to the idiosyncrasies of her human body, and already she may have to leave it. 'Worse,' Kanaphiel says, emotion humming behind the low-pitched human words. 'Adriel, it's much worse.'

'What happened?' Adriel asks hesitantly.

'I don't know,' Kanaphiel says, his voice louder than usual, with a whipcrack tone to it. He is as shocked and desolate and uncomprehending as she is, Adriel understands with a jolt. He doesn't know what to do. None of them do. 'I don't know what happened, there are rumours - Adriel, there are rumours that the insurrectionaries opened - '

She has never heard him stutter over words like this before. Kanaphiel has been her superior for millennia, and always he has been the same calm, gently guiding figure: her mentor, adviser, protector. He has always been the most responsible and attentive of commanders; he comforted her and guided her back to her duties when three of their garrison were killed by Castiel's rebel forces - who knows where the rest of them are now. For all Adriel knows, if Castiel has won, she and Kanaphiel could be the only ones left.

'What is it?' she says urgently. 'What did they open?

'Purgatory,' Kanaphiel whispers. Adriel is not skilled at reading human emotions, but his vessel's face is twisted into a distorted facsimile of the horrified expression his true form would be wearing. 'The rebels - Castiel opened Purgatory.'

'I don't understand. Nobody can!'

'He did, I don't know how, but he did. I saw Zadkiel, on his way to warn the other garrisons, he said that Castiel has been consorting with demons, the Crossroad King, that they opened the gate and killed Raphael, but I don't know how much is true - nobody knows - the souls, Adriel, if Castiel has breached Purgatory then the power he would have is - ' Kanaphiel breaks off, using his fingers to knead at his vessel's forehead in agitation. Waves are breaking on the shore a few metres away, pouring themselves futilely over resolute stone.

'What can we do?'

'Nothing,' Kanaphiel says, his human vocal cords cracking over the word. 'It's over, Adriel. Millions of souls, and Zadkiel said that he - We can't fight him.'

'We should - Should I return to Heaven? Warn the other garrisons? We could assemble to fight, or we could…could retreat…I suppose…' Adriel cannot think of a single instance in her memory when the forces of Heaven have fled a fight; they are supposed to stand tall and resolute in the face of danger. But they are supposed to do a lot of things. Angels are not meant to stand against their own kind. Archangels are not meant to be slaughtered.

'Yes,' Kanaphiel says quietly. 'Go back to heaven. I have to find the fifth garrison, and the eighth; Zadkiel did not know where they were…They may not know…Castiel is still on earth, for now. We have to leave. All of us, while we still can.'

'Can we hold Heaven against him?'

'Without Raphael? Against the power of countless souls?' Kanaphiel laughs hollowly, a human sound from a human throat, but there is angelic pain woven between the syllables. 'No, Adriel. We can't.'

'Then what…'

'Get back to Heaven,' Kanaphiel says firmly, and some of the old command is returning to his voice. 'Warn the garrisons that are still stationed there. Find Raphael's lieutenants.'

'You're staying on earth?'

Kanaphiel nods. 'I have to. The other garrisons…Adriel, go.'

'But - '

'It is your duty to protect Heaven. Not to follow me into danger. You have to go back and warn the others before it is too late. You understand?'

Adriel casts her vessel's eyes down to the ground, scrutinising the rounded stones with blurred human retinas, before she nods quietly. 'Yes.'

'Go,' Kanaphiel says, without a goodbye, and then with a sound of wingbeats he is gone.

Adriel can feel tears in her human eyes as she stumbles back to Heaven. She doesn't know what to do. She doesn't know how to explain the broken, incoherent story that she was told to the angels waiting for her. It seems so utterly impossible that they should have fought and lost.

Kanaphiel does not return to Heaven. Nor do the fifth and eighth garrisons. The rest of Adriel's garrison, the third, is also missing. The names of the missing angels are many, and each one that she hears sends a stab through her heart.

The fear she felt in Kanaphiel as he stumbled over words and tried to understand how Castiel could possibly have defeated them is nothing compared to what ripples through the angels still assembled in Heaven when she gasps out words like Purgatory and souls and dead, they're all dead.

Raphael's most senior lieutenants, Gadre'el and Selaphiel, attempt to organise the remnants of Heaven's forces, to raise the defences and prepare for whatever onslaught Castiel brings, but it is chaos without Raphael and without half of the garrison leaders, and still nobody understands what happened.

After three days of sickening fear Castiel concludes whatever business he has been finishing on Earth, and ascends to face the wrath of Heaven, or as much as is left of it. He stands alone before their army - a tattered, terrified army, but an army nonetheless - and for a moment of wild, leaping hope Adriel thinks that perhaps they have misjudged him, they outnumber him thousands to one; they can defeat Castiel after all, and rebuild Heaven, working with what they have left.

Then Castiel smiles, a bright, beatific smile entirely devoid of anything resembling fear, and opens his mouth and begins to speak, and as his words break over the fragmented forces of Heaven like waves Adriel understands that there is no hope left, no hope at all.