AN: Robin0203! Of course I do, frand! Always!
Song listened to: 'Never Alone' by BarlowGirl.
She remembered him, sitting next to her friend on their Father's left, staring straight ahead as though watching something and not daring blink lest she miss it. She remembered his promise, when he'd picked her for his personal led Choir, that he wouldn't leave her on her own. He'd stay with her through it all, the trials of being the youngest one in a Choir of Elders, under the distrusting and disbelieving eyes that would surely track her every move as if waiting for the slip ups to happen. And he had been, there for her, for them all, for the longest time.
And then things changed. He was angry all the time, snapping at the drop of a pin, yelling angrily when they missed a note and just barely held himself back from striking some when they missed complete stanzas.
With the return of memories came the bad ones, the ones she wished she would continue to forget, the breakup of their Choir.
But she couldn't, it played before her minds eye, the Power's corralling them together into one massive herd, pushing them forward as their Master was led before them kept captive by golden chains glowing with the runes imprinted on every link. She saw her hands, clutching at the back of Jeremiah's leg as they were herded forward, the fear and unknown swirled up inside her as it had back then. She looked up, through the memory, and saw the three remaining archangels standing at the gates, where the edge of Heaven was, and the mouth of the Abyss spread wide open for its next meal.
Her Master is yanked up the steps, forced to kneel before the Prince, and he says something to the Morningstar that she cannot hear, and the other responds in kind. The Prince nods stiffly, motioning with a single gesture for his second and third to drag the exiled archangel around, nodding the Healer forward. With a skill only she knows one of his stature can have, he break her master's wings in three places, at the joints, so that should they heal it would heal wrong and forever serve as a painful reminder of what he had lost.
Her breath quickens, hands raising to clutch at her head, and the messenger at her side turns to look down at her in concern but noticeably doesn't say anything.
They're pushed forward by Powers and Virtues, forward to stand on the edge just behind their Master, far away enough to ensure they would not fall in, and close enough to see the Pit below. Her eyes widen, she can feel it, when she sees the metal box that her Master sees as he looks down in similar fashion. The fear in his eyes brings her to a stillness unknown, it's a look she never thought she's see from him, and he says something to the Prince.
But he shakes his head with one harsh movement, gripping him between the shoulders, and makes the proclamation to them, the Choir, of what happens to those who stand against Heaven, and then he pushes.
She screams in time with her master, as she had those eons ago when they were herded closer to the edge to watch him fall into his prison and the gaping mouth of the pit close over him.
Zaveriel shakes her shoulder, concern etched on his features, and she turns to look at him with a sob on the verge of escaping from her chest.
"He promised, Zaves! He promised!"
Her friend couldn't understand what she was talking about, no matter how much he wished he could and how hard he tried and didn't know how to comfort for a distress he didn't understand.
"He said he did it all for us! But what was the point of it if he was gonna lose us?"
A sob broke from her chest, rolling from her shivering lips, and she surged forward for her friend. Zaveriel wrapped her up in his arms, trying to offer comfort for what he couldn't begin to understand, and ended up crying into her wild curls with her.
Father watched them from above with great sadness in His eyes, though they didn't see, and He wondered briefly, as He looked about His broken children, just what the cost of this war was.