Chaplain Brendan Gallagher woke to the sound of metal clanging against the bars of his cell. The young man's face twisted in discomfort and pain at the incessant clanging, but he folded his lips to keep a groan from coming out. It was what the attacker of his ears wanted to hear, and he'd punish him with sadistic fervor for vocalizing the objection. Brendan pushed up off his mattress and met eyes with the man on the other side of his cell. When Doctor Krieger or one of his staff woke him, they could be snippy and forceful, but Gerulf Hróðvitnisson was a different matter entirely. The Aryan giant with a mouth full of pointed teeth sneered at him as he beat the object in his hand—probably a bedpan—against the cell a few more times.
"Guten tag, chaplain." Even by the standards of the German accent, everything this creature said came out sharp and harsh. "Another fine day in the motherland, isn't it?"
Brendan swallowed hard and looked down to avoid eye contact as he collected his jacket and pants—freshly cleaned and pressed—along with his cap from the corner of the cell. He already knew Hróðvitnisson would allow him no privacy, so he decided not to give him the chance to mock his insubstantial body and just pulled the uniform over his sleeping clothes.
"I can smell the fear on you." Hróðvitnisson spoke nearly every word with a snarl. "It stinks like your piss and sweat. It's pitiful, pitiful like your entire infantry."
Brendan didn't know how much time had passed since he and his company were first taken prisoner by those brutes. By all accounts, Castle Hristov was supposed to have been abandoned. The general sent them in as a reconnaissance team, with that one seemingly forgotten Markovian castle, the allies could protect the River Meuse from Nazi retreat or reinforcement. Whether the general was just ignorant or had received bad information or, God forbid, was a traitor, Brendan did not know. He just knew that, as they were planning their entry, the company was set upon by wolves and the monstrous giant that stood before him.
Hróðvitnisson followed a few steps behind him, hands held behind his back in a show of mock-civility. He wore the standard issue German uniform, complete with Swastika band on one arm, but he always wore the shirt open to display the broad, muscled chest underneath. And maybe more so, Brendan suspected, to dare anyone, friend or foe, to tell him to do otherwise. The chaplain proceeded down a dark staircase out of his tower and did not dare move one step faster than the giant might anticipate. Any excuse would suit the beast to deal out punishment.
The descent from the tower to the kitchens used to leave Brendan tired and sore. But over the course of however long had passed he'd gotten used to it. His legs and feet were strong, even as the rest of him grew thin and frail. None of the cooks acknowledged him as he walked through the kitchen and collected a large pot and a few loaves of stale bread. How Hróðvitnisson could talk about a sweat and piss stink when sauerkraut soup was the most commonly prepared meal was beyond Brendan's understanding. With his face pinched in disgust, Brendan took the servant passageway down to the lockup on the lower levels.
Dark and moist, fetid smells filled the dungeon the two descended into. As he entered, Hróðvitnisson let out one of his wolfish howls. "Wake up, little wurms, the chaplain's brought you breakfast!"
Out from the sixteen men in the prison cells came an array of groans and a few curses. Brendan had long grown used to this as well, he proceeded through the chamber with mechanical stiffness as he scooped the sauerkraut slop into their bowls.
"Traitor!"
"Opportunist!"
"Goddamn mick!"
In spite of Hróðvitnisson's howling, George Henderson remained stone-still on his mattress when Brendan walked by. The chaplain was thankful, he was usually the most vocal.
Brendan was skilled at putting their words out of his head, he'd been doing it even back before they were captured. The rest of the company resented having an Irish Catholic chaplain, and even back when he was treating their wounds they took every opportunity to remind him of that fact. When Sigmund Krieger, the madman who ran the castle, was superstitious enough to insist the chaplain receive special treatment, what was he supposed to do? Refuse? Lay in the dirt like the rest? What would that accomplish? Better to take advantage of the crazed doctor's delusory nature.
Toward the end of the line was Major Jack MacEwen's cell. Back when they were a proper company, Major MacEwen was the only man who ever came to his defense, and the fact his cadets defied his order to leave poor Gallagher alone anyway spoke to how deep the disrespect ran. By that day in the castle, however, the once tall, proud major sat almost exclusively in one corner of the cell, a scraggly beard covered much of his face.
More out of ritual than anything else, Brendan said, "Major, you need to eat."
And, in a raspy mumble, MacEwen replied, "You're a disgrace."
Brendan was about to move on to the last occupied cell, which was several bars away from the rest, when a wheezing fit picked up behind him. He turned back as a few low rasps fell into throaty gasps. The noise came from Henderson's cell. Brendan's heart sank: he didn't want to go back there, he just wanted to move on. He didn't want to hear what his former allies would say, because as many times as he'd heard it, this was always when they were at their worst.
As if in response to his thoughts, the soldiers started to insult him again.
"Hang in there, Henderson, before doctor death comes back to heal you."
"You gonna kill this one too, Gallagher?"
"You just keep moving, Henderson's our mate! He doesn't need your help!"
And all the while, the repeated, choking hacks forced their way up the cadet's throat. Slowly, Gallagher turned back around, and Hróðvitnisson observed him with a satisfied sneer on his face.
As the chaplain closed the distance, furious shouts of, "Burn in hell!" "Murderer!" and, "Killer minister!" picked up. Tears welled up in Brendan's eyes as he knelt on the other side of the cell with a clear view of Henderson as he convulsed. He could try to reason with Hróðvitnisson, but the monster saw what was happening as clearly as Brendan did. If he was going to call for help, he'd have done it already.
Quietly, almost certainly too quietly to be heard over the rest of the cacophonous company, Brendan said, "I know you're suffering. Can you push through?"
Henderson paid mind neither to him, nor the shouts of his fellow army men.
"Have you suffered enough?"
The cadet didn't respond, he just wheezed blood and bile.
"Do you want me to take it away?"
"K—k—k—ack—k—huh—k—guk—"
Brendan lowered his head, tears dripped from his eyes and he shut them tight. With a sign of the cross, he muttered, "God, forgive me." He clasped his boney hands together in prayer tight enough to leave indentations as he slowly slipped into song. "Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, too-ra-loo-ra-li, too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, hush now don't you cry." The words started to slip in his throat, though as they did, it seemed Henderson's convulsions lightened. "Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, too-ra-loo-ra-li, too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, that's an Irish lullaby."
Brendan had no memory of a time he didn't know that song. The gentlest nuns at the orphanage he'd grown up in sang it. First, they'd sung to him, later to the newborns who took his place in the bassinets when he grew too old. Many of the nuns weren't gentle, of course, there was always that dichotomy at Saint Fanchea's. First there were the nuns that would sing to the suffering babes, and the ones that wouldn't. As he grew older and inevitably asked whatever became of his parents, the gentle nuns knelt at his side, ran hands through his hair, and assured him, "Your mother surely loved you, Brendan, loved you enough to let you go when she knew she couldn't care for you." And the others would tell, "Your mother was a whore, and couldn't stop whoring long enough to better herself for you. Pray you don't grow up to be another vagrant like she was."
Whether they were the gentle sisters or the nasty ones, sometimes he'd be recruited to help put the littlest tots to sleep. No one ever taught him the words to the lullaby, sometimes he sang too many too-ras and not enough loo-ras. But it never really mattered: when he sang it felt as if the wakefulness was drawn out of the little ones he held. Soon after, everyone they pressed on him fell into a calming sleep. The kindly nuns praised him for what a good little rocker and singer he was, and the aggressive nuns just grunted their approval, glad to have one more child they didn't need to settle. No one overthought this unique gift of Brendan's, they just sought how it could make life a little easier. And Brendan liked to feel useful, so he just accepted the tasks as they came.
Brendan was just nine years old when the Byrne triplets arrived at the orphanage. The home was already overcrowded at that point, the sisters refused to entertain the thought of two more little boys and a girl. It took the bishop's intercession to tell them everyone was overcrowded, why did they think they were so special they could refuse three more gifts from God? All the capable hands, big and small, were tasked with caring for the tiniest precious souls. And all quickly learned the Byrne triplets were the loudest, most stubborn children to ever enter Saint Fanchea's. Their screams would wake the other infants, and it felt like an endless cycle of screeching suffering could last for days. Worst of all, for reasons he could not piece together, it seemed Brendan's songs did not soothe them.
The gentle sisters pled, "Please, Brendan, it's always worked before, please just try again."
And the harshest sisters said, "I won't beat an infant, but I'll do to you what I'd like to do to that one if I can't get any damned sleep!"
He was a nine-year-old boy who only knew to do what the sisters told him. He was a nine-year-old boy who they threatened to punish because he couldn't grant them the calm they'd grown so accustomed to. He was a nine-year-old boy, and all he wanted was rest too.
Brendan stood in a corner of the kitchen with Thomas, the eldest of the Byrne triplets, in his arms. The sisters were trying their best to spread out the babies so one scream wouldn't wake others, but the orphanage was only so big. Late night transitioned to early morning in the time Brendan pled, "Please Tommy, please, don't you think that's enough? I just want to sleep, don't you?" Shrieking wails was all the response he got back. He'd already tried his song several times, but he gripped at it again with increased fervor. Sympathy turned to teeth clenched anger as he recited, "Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral," over and over again.
He knew there was nothing calming in his words anymore. At a certain point, he just wanted to meet stubbornness with stubbornness of his own. If little Tommy wouldn't be quiet, why should he?
Then, to his surprise, the little boy did start to settle. Brendan double took and lost the rhythm of his song when Thomas's wails lost a little of their power and that telltale sign of something slipping out began to ensue. Invigorated, Brendan picked up his tempo and drew the cries out of the little boy. Faster and faster he sang, and quieter the little boy became.
When Brendan looked back, he didn't remember if he'd felt something slip free. On the one hand, he was just a little boy elated with the prospect of a quiet baby. On the other, how could such a pivotal moment pass without his knowing? The baby went quiet and left off a bad smell, he couldn't remember thinking anything of that when he passed Thomas to one of the nuns and she excused him to go to bed. If there was any vocal reaction to the death of the eldest Byrne triplet, Brendan didn't hear it.
Less than an hour later, he was jerked out of bed by a hand yanking on his ear. Brendan cried out in pain as one of the nasty nuns glared down at him and demanded, "What have you done?"
Confused, he blubbered, "Wha—what did I do?"
"Thomas Bryne died in his sleep just after you finished with him."
"Wha—what?"
She slapped him hard across the face. "You mishandled him, and now he's gone, you little bastard. What the hell is wrong with you?" The sister kept talking, but Brendan lost track of her words as his heart sank into his stomach and his stomach's contents rose to his throat.
No comforting words were said, none of the kind sisters ever came to him about it. There was never an assurance, "It was only an accident," or, "It wasn't your fault." Never did a doubt cross his mind: he'd killed Thomas Bryne, and it was all his own doing. For the next decade he desperately sought absolution, and swore he would never sing his cursed song again.
It was another day not so long and not so different from Henderson's episode he first spoke to the man in the last cell. Calvin Davies came down with something that made him vomit blood, and he'd literally pled, "Take it away, take it away."
The chants of, "Killer minister! Killer minister!" picked up as they always did as Brendan helped him the only way he knew how.
Hróðvitnisson wasn't overseeing him that day, and Krieger's other subordinates usually just let him do his work. Brendan saw the unknown man during his first arrival: a figure with a fading barrel chest covered in worn slashes and marks, and a head of long, curly, black hair. No beard though, even then that seemed odd, considering he'd been there before Brendan's company was captured.
As Brendan walked by with his empty soup pot, the man called to him in a halting, high-pitched voice. "Why do they call you those names?"
The chaplain jumped at the sound and slowly approached the beaten figure. "Wha—what?"
"They despise you, but you're their chaplain," he said. "A chaplain should be a healer, a comfort. Why do they despise you so?" Brendan was ready to just move on and made it as far as a step away before the stranger asked, "Is that Irish I heard? Does the word sidhe mean anything to you?"
Perplexed, Brendan asked, "Eh? She? As in, belongs to her?"
"No. As in aes sidhe. As in, faerie folk."
Brendan shook his head. "I'm a good Christian, I know nothing of that pagan nonsense."
"A Catholic, I have little doubt."
Brendan pressed on out of indignation. "I suppose you want to correct me from the other side of those bars then?"
"I don't want to fight. I'm Catholic too."
The chaplain flinched. "Ah. Err, well then." He cleared his throat just to have something more to fill the moment.
"Your parents never told you any faerie stories, hm?"
Again, Brendan paused before he responded. Why was he talking about this? He didn't owe this man anything. And yet, it was… different, at least, to be speaking to someone who didn't already hate him. "… I never knew my parents. I was raised in an orphanage."
The man in the cell nodded. "Not uncommon, unfortunately. Well, regardless, I know of legends that tell of fae who could sing men to sleep and then slip away their breath of life."
Brendan stared in at him stunned for a few seconds. Eventually, he swallowed hard and walked away without saying anything more.
The stranger did not raise his voice even after Brendan slipped from his view. "It's not your fault."
Despite his resolve to walk away, Brendan froze up. Again, he asked, "What?"
"It isn't your fault how you were born," the stranger said. "But it is your responsibility to use your birthright well."
After a hard swallow, Brendan asked, "Who are you?"
"A fellow half-breed. A fellow of the nephilim. And, very possibly, a friend."
"All right, wurmv, that's enough." Hróðvitnisson grabbed the kneeling Brendan by his hair. The chaplain let out a shout as he was dashed against the floor. "Krieger wants you, you've spent enough time with your fellow volksschlading."
Brendan held the stinging area in the back of his head but swallowed a response. Without another word he turned away from his strange, solitary friend's cell and followed behind Hróðvitnisson out of the lockup. Through the servant walkways the two walked until they reached the castle's third floor. Sweat started to bead on Brendan's head and his breath grew short as they reached an old war room labeled, "Laboratory." As they approached, a muffled scream sounded from within
Although the floor was lined with decorative, marble-colored masonry instead of carpet, it felt far from the sterile space of experimentation Brendan imagined with that name. It felt more medieval than anything. Wooden platforms with leather straps to hold down limbs lined the four corners. In the center of the room laid the screamer, a half-naked young soldier, his hair still short from a crew cut, blood bubbling up on a long line across his chest. His shout was repressed by a dirty cloth bound around his mouth. Next to him stood Doctor Siegmund Krieger, with his frizzy white hair, beard, and lab coat, Brendan always thought he was the most quintessential stereotype of a Nazi scientist imaginable. All that set him aside was the anachronistic spear he always kept one hand on. The spear was smeared with blood from Krieger's gloves.
"Chaplain Gallagher, guten tag." Krieger strode past him to a rolling cart covered with all manner of torturous looking metal implements. After a quick glance, he took hold of a set of metal clamps. "Heinrich, secure a pair of these over the ribs, won't you?"
Casual as a waiter in a restaurant, one of Krieger's lab assistants retrieved the clamps and stepped up to the bound man's side. As he reached for the bloody opening across his chest, a sickened Brendan shut his eyes tight and turned away.
"His name is Piotr Dudko." Krieger picked up what looked to be a meat mallet and swung it in the air to test its weight. "Only surviving member of his platoon of dirty Russies. Poor bastard kept fighting long after the bullet fire should have finished him off." Krieger chuckled and Brendan judged by his feet he stepped up beside the bound Piotr. "Legends from his motherland tell of a figure called Koschei the Deathless. In order to cheat death, Koschei allegedly hit his soul in all manner of things, from needles to eggs to rabbits. I intend to see if there is any truth to these claims."
Piotr's screams turned harsh and shrill, Brendan refused to look upward, swallowed his own terror, and uttered a short prayer for the man's soul.
"Let's see what you're hiding—or what you're not." A moment after Krieger's words, a smash and the shattering of bones reverberated through the room. Piotr's screams slipped from audibility as more crack crack cracks followed. "Extraordinary, utterly so," Krieger said. "You should really get a look at this, chaplain."
Brendan kept his head down and said nothing until Hróðvitnisson grabbed him by his hair and jerked his head up. The chaplain cried out in pain. Leaned close to his ear, the beast snarled, "Herr doktor said look. Now look, wurm."
"Leave him be, it's not actually important for him," Krieger said.
Despite the doctor's words, Hróðvitnisson didn't release his grip and continued to sneer. "Your god tells you to embrace suffering, doesn't he? Why don't you prove your piety and open your eyes."
As best he could manage, Brendan clenched his eyes shut tighter.
"My ancestors clashed with the Æsir. My grandfather tore out Wuotan's throat and feasted on his innards," Hróðvitnisson said. "And if he got his teeth around your feeble shepherd, he'd rip him apart as well."
Brendan lost his composure, screamed, and threw blind kicks toward Hróðvitnisson's legs. As if he took the pitiful response as a reason to defend himself, Hróðvitnisson smashed Brendan against the chamber floor. The chaplain's face was rubbed into the ground against the backdrop of Piotr's screams.
"Gerulf, please." Krieger spoke like a disinterested parent. "I'm trying to operate. Mein gott! It's incredible—Fritz, keep time, Carl, take this down, he has no heart at all!"
Hróðvitnisson pulled Brendan back to his feet, the young chaplain felt sure he'd broken his nose and maybe given him a black eye. Forced to squint to see and take deep, labored breaths through his nose, the disoriented Brendan opened his eyes just enough to see Krieger and his supplicants gathered around the gored body.
"Thirty seconds, doktor."
"Sixty seconds, doktor, breaths heavy but still sustained."
"A hundred twenty seconds, doktor! No heart, no heartbeat, yet he lives!"
Out of disgusted curiosity, Brendan looked on at the sight again. Krieger bent down to look the bound man in the eyes. "Your powers would be an invaluable asset to the führer and the rest of the Aryan race. You needn't live an eternity of suffering, just tell us how you came to this power." Krieger ran one finger along the dirty rag in Piotr's mouth. "What say you?" He slipped the finger downward and pulled the gag free.
Stuttering and spluttering, the Russian man spoke in his native tongue.
Krieger frowned and turned to his subordinates. "Did any of you catch that?"
One of them said, "He didn't understand what you were saying either. I'll translate." After a few seconds of rushed, broken Russian, the agonized man on the table shouted something else. Krieger's underling said, "He does not know where the power came from, said some witch placed it on his family. He doesn't know where she is, and doesn't think someone else could just get that power." The soldier shouted something more and a twisted smile crossed the subordinate's face. "He begs you not to cut him open any further. He will desert the army and their cause, he just wants to live."
"Just wants to live, does he?" Krieger smirked as he gripped the spear with two hands. "Tell him I'll teach him an all new appreciation for that eternal life of his." The doctor raised the spear high overhead and thrust downward into Pyotr's belly. The soldier let out a last blood-curdling scream as he writhed about, but only for a moment. Thereafter his body stiffened, as if the last of his life was snuffed out by Krieger's attack. The Nazi observed the corpse-like body for a few seconds before he jerked the spear free and Pyotr gasped for breath again. With a smug smirk on his face, Krieger turned on his heels toward Brendan. "Chaplain, put him to sleep, the others will find a cell for him."
Hróðvitnisson thrust Brendan forward. With a pained swallow, he stepped up to the writhing soldier and gently started his song. Pyotr stared at him, wide-eyed and sick with terror, and just kept screaming until the chaplain's words slowly quieted him. Even after Pyotr slipped into silence, Brendan kept singing, speeding his tempo even. With enough repeats of the refrain he felt the soldier's lifeforce as it inched toward him, but the power there felt bottomless as the ocean. With a sinking heart, Brendan slowed his song.
He'd have finished himself anyway, but Hróðvitnisson grabbed him by his coat and tossed him toward the laboratory's exit. "That's enough out of you, wurm. Back to your quarters."
Throughout those first months as a captive, Brendan found a few more opportunities to talk with the strange man in the last cell. When his handlers were disinterested, he was able to interact with any of his fellow captives in the lockup, but everyone he already knew despised him as a sort of collaborator. The stranger who'd claimed to be one of the fellow Nephilim, whatever those were, was the only one to tolerate conversation with him. He offered little information of his own, but always seemed invested enough in what Brendan needed to say.
"A few years after that incident with little Thomas, the orphanage started up a new program," Brendan said. "A few of us were accepted to start studying with the clergy. I never stopped seeking redemption for that wretched day. Maybe if I became a deacon or a priest I could finally make everything right."
In a voice made strange by the combination of his high-pitched register and thirsty rasp, the prisoner asked, "How did you end up here? Ireland is neutral, isn't it?"
"Those of us who wanted to serve were given the opportunity if we supplied our own travel," Brendan said. "Never cared for the English, but they were digging themselves out of rubble. Never knew a Jew, but it couldn't be right they were being led like lambs to the slaughter. And, more than anything, I couldn't let inaction stain my soul, it had enough blood on it already."
"As chaplain, it was your duty to save men on the battlefield," the stranger said. "Yet from all you've told me and all I've observed, you've done far more to snuff them out."
Brendan scowled. The man within challenged him like that sometimes. Once or twice he'd cursed him and walked away. But he always returned, there was just no one else to speak to.
"Taking the breath of life has always been a last resort, and I still dreaded to do it," Brendan said. "If I needed to bandage a bloody limb, I'd settle them to sleep before I tightened so they wouldn't thrash about. If the medic needed to amputate a limb, I would bring the patient to slumber before the dead appendage was cut away. I'm providing an essential service!"
"You seem terribly preoccupied with trying to overcome your first brush with mortal sin, and yet you continue to commit the same one over and over again."
"I am granting mercy!" Brendan could not keep his voice down, he was truly fortunate that day for how little his handler cared what he was doing. "You're in here, you're serving someone, you're telling me you've never killed?"
"Many times." No hesitation came across in the stranger's voice. "It is hard to say, looking back, which of those were sins, which were necessities, and which were my failures."
"I didn't ask for this- this- this curse, or gift, or whatever the song is," Brendan said. "I'm just trying to do something with it. Surely you know the parable of the talents, don't you? To whom much is given, much is expected?"
"All too well," the stranger confirmed. "I feel some of that myself."
"Really? And what can you do?"
"It matters what I can't do," he said. "Death has no hold over me."
The chaplain flinched. "What?"
"I have brushed with my demise countless times, yet I have not yet gone to meet God," the stranger said. "I've never even known fear of the idea before this place."
Brendan swallowed, nervous, as if unsure he wanted further explanation. But eventually he asked, "What do you mean?"
"I was sent here to reclaim a sacred artifact the Germans stole," he said. "I take it you've seen that spear the crazed doctor carries?" When a dumbstruck Brendan nodded, he pressed on. "The almighty was once as fragile as human flesh against the edge of that spear, and even today it will reduce even the mightiest of powers to the merely mortal."
Brendan mouthed an astonished, "Oh my God," before he asked, "The— the Spear of Longinus? That's what Krieger carries?"
"Hitler had hold of it before him, he's probably only borrowing it for experimentation," the stranger said. "Supernatural entities and emerging technologies are coming out of the woodwork across the planet, enough that could crush this regime where it stands if they so please. But so long as the enemy wields that spear, countless more who could offer aid are as weak as mortal men against its power." The stranger looked down, defeated. "The madman ran me through with that spear and let his men gut me. I felt my blood and water start to separate and my organs start to fail before he slipped the weapon back out. Even my eternal life is as nothing to that spear."
After a dry-mouthed struggle for words, Brendan asked, "Yet you still resist?"
He scoffed. "I've been tortured before. If your faith is weak, you will be broken. Do you remember what Christ told his disciples? The faith of a mustard seed is sufficient to command a mountain to move. Even less than that is needed to trust in God, even when you are tormented."
Brendan was finally shuffled off by his overseer just after, but those words never stopped resonating in his mind. As days blurred to weeks and weeks blurred to months, some days he tried with all his power to have that tiny kernel of faith his friend said was all that was required. Other days, instead of prayers, he slung quiet curses at God for allowing his servants to fall to such a wretched place. Whatever thoughts he had, all he was sure of was that it was the stranger, not him, who should have been the center of faith for his fellow troops.
Brendan laid awake in bed at about three in the morning the same day the latest immortal was brought in. It was another of those nights his prayers oscillated rapidly between, "Please, God, spare your servants this agony," and, "What kind of cruel master are you to make your people suffer so?" He hadn't yet come to the bargaining stage, but being omnipotent and all-powerful, perhaps God already knew that was coming and had already, at last, decided on an answer.
An explosion outside threw Brendan out of bed. With a whirl in his head and a ringing in his ears, he struggled to his feet, shook stars from his vision, and looked out his barred bedroom window. The parapet on the castle's opposite side was obliterated, nothing but smoking remains stood where the tip of the tower once was. In a state of relief and terror for how close he'd apparently been to destruction, the pale-faced chaplain looked down toward the castle's walls as a tank rolled forward.
From down on the ground level came a mechanically amplified shout in an accent Brendan had never heard before. "Sigmund Krieger, your stronghold is about to fall. Come out with the spear and you will be spared."
Brendan shuddered as he stared, mouth agape, at the tank and the men with heavy artillery lined up around it. He hadn't seen any soldiers like them either—were they Americans? Had the Americans finally joined the war effort?
Out from one of the nearby windows, as if in response, came a powerful, high-pitched howl. The men beside the tanks searched about for its cause as soon other howls like it followed from the Markovian forest behind them. Before Brendan could consider the implications, his bedroom door flew open with a crack and Hróðvitnisson stood on the threshold.
"Get up. Now, wurm," he said. "It is no longer safe here."
With struggle, Brendan got out, "What?"
The giant beast of a man grabbed him by his nightshirt and thrust him toward the winding staircase. "Krieger still has need of you. He has an escape passageway in his laboratory, move your ass!"
Terrified and confused, Brendan followed on Hróðvitnisson's orders as they rushed first into the foyer, then toward Krieger's modified war room. Krieger's servants ran from desk to desk across the room gathering papers. Another assistant pushed on a bookcase in one corner of the chamber and revealed a dank, decrepit passageway hidden behind it. Though he didn't dare say it aloud, it felt clear enough to Brendan that Krieger's men had probably never even run protocol on this escape.
From outside the castle came a furious line of wolf calls, followed by a salvo of gunfire. A few seconds after Hróðvitnisson and Brendan entered the room, Krieger returned to his laboratory, the spear hugged under his arm. Just steps behind him, two more of his supplicants led Brendan's nameless, bruised friend with his hands manacled behind his back.
"Keep it moving, Gallagher," Krieger said. "The Americans are leading a siege. They can have this castle, but they will not take you." He then turned a glare toward the stranger. "And they will not have the secret to your immortality."
The prisoner with the high-pitched voice chuckled and said, "You'll never have it either."
"Halt den rand!" Krieger whipped the spear around and pointed at his chest. "You're just a mortal to this weapon. Don't try to—"
With a shout of, "Sing!" the stranger rushed forward and impaled himself on Krieger's spear. Even after who knows how long of emaciation and the sudden agony of the weapon piercing his pectoral, the prisoner caught Krieger off guard and forced him backward until he hit the wall.
"What the—nein, nein!" Forced back against the wall, Krieger didn't have room to pull the spear back out of his enemy. The nameless figure leaned off balance, his movements and eyes took on a drunken quality, but he did not let up.
The rest of Krieger's scientists shouted in terror and ran to assist their leader. Brendan witnessed all of this in stunned silence before he fully processed what his friend asked of him. Quick as he could find the words, he called out, "Too-ra-loo-ra-loo—"
"No you don't, wurm!" Hróðvitnisson grabbed Brendan by his throat and slammed him into the wall, the words of his song caught in his throat. The chaplain gagged and kicked as the beastly man squeezed his windpipe. "No more out of you."
From his watery eyes Brendan looked to his impaled ally. As he used the weight of one shoulder to press Krieger into the wall, he jerked his manacled hands in opposing directions. With that little thought he could allocate away from his own struggle, Brendan felt sure that was foolish. He wasn't going to just jerk free of those shackles with moves like that. However, as he started to squint in pain, he did sense something change. The stranger's already frail body seemed to lose definition in the muscles, and gain something else down his exposed arms. Wrinkles? What? Was Brendan just imagining them? How could that be, unless—
Whether Brendan heard or just imagined the crack didn't matter, the bones within one of the stranger's hands broke. At the same time that he roared in pain, he gave the manacles one last jerk and slipped the broken hand free of its confinement. And, with the broken hand to hold the other in place, he backed up to create some distance and ripped the spear out of his chest with his good hand.
"Dummköpfe, don't just stand there, restrain him!" Krieger shouted.
Three of Krieger's assistants shook themselves out of their stupor and ran toward the impaled man. By the time they reached him, his broken hand and the wound in his chest had seemingly healed themselves. With nothing but one fist, his feet, and the butt of the spear, the stranger threw himself forward and beat Krieger's men into submission. Some slashed into him with scalpels, but whatever pain he felt he pushed through as he floored each with a punch or a thrust from the spear's dull side.
One of Krieger's servants on the opposite end of the chamber fumbled for a pistol holstered at his belt. "Scheib drauf!" He took aim.
Krieger commanded, "Nein, nein!" but it was too late. His supplicant squeezed the trigger and blasted the prisoner in the same pectoral muscle he'd pulled the spear from. Then shot again. And again, for good measure. After the third bullet with his enemy still standing, the supplicant's arms went shaky with terror. He missed his final attack before the stranger rushed, closed the distance between them, and sent the shooter's belly careening into his knee. The gunman gasped as he fell to the floor.
Brendan gasped for breath as Hróðvitnisson released his grip and snarled toward the prisoner. "Worthless, all of you. I'll handle him myself."
The stranger whirled around and pointed the spear at him. "Stand down, you're just a man against this."
Hróðvitnisson cackled as he crouched for an instant and lunged toward him. The stranger took a trio of quick stabs, with each one Hróðvitnisson emitted a sharp cry, but none slowed him. He raised a hand suddenly studded with razor-sharp claws and dug a slash across the stranger's face. The assaulted man shouted and grabbed at the bloody claw marks with one hand as he struggled to force another stab into Hróðvitnisson. None of the attacks seemed to slow him, but they were doing something else, even if Brendan couldn't tell what. Hróðvitnisson's shape was changing, his tall body started to hunch, and his flesh began to blur with streaks of gray.
Brendan returned to his senses long enough to see Krieger slowly sidling toward the bookcase passageway. Suddenly confident with how the tables had turned, the chaplain rushed over to him with a cry of, "Too-la-roo-la."
Krieger's body stiffened and his eyes started to droop as he turned. "Wha— damn you, Gallagher, stop. I— I—"
The doctor fought for consciousness as Hróðvitnisson and the stranger exchanged bloody, wrenching blows. With red scratches all down his face and bare chest, the prisoner grew increasingly incensed as he demanded, "How are you still standing?" With a shout of fury, he thrust the spear straight from the giant's chest and gave it a firm twist. "You're just a man."
Hróðvitnisson's voice grew increasingly twisted and inhuman as he snarled, "No, wurm. I was never a man."
Like a moth burst from its cocoon, something enormous and gray erupted from Hróðvitnisson's body. A titanic, battle-scarred wolf pinned the stranger to the ground, and even with the spear in its belly, the beast snapped and snarled in his face. The weapon spared him a few bites, but with enough struggle the monstrosity that had been Hróðvitnisson's bit and tore off a mouthful of the prisoner's face. The immortal screamed and writhed, and the beast seemed ready to rip him apart until the end of time if he had to. With what was perhaps its last shred of consciousness, it looked down at its opponent and uttered a triumphant howl.
The entrance to the laboratory was booted down and the sound of that howl was cut off by the blast of an American GI's shotgun. A few shakes reverberated through the beast's body as it struggled to remain upright, and then collapsed. With that spear in its guts, even the grandson of Fenrir was just a wolf, after all.
The siege of Castle Heylen was, per the American record, a complete success. Its strategic position along the Meuse River proved one more advantage in the approaching Battle of the Bulge, the war criminal Siegmund Krieger was captured, and over a dozen British POWs were set free. By all estimation, they'd been captured and tormented for nearly two years beforehand. There was one man among them the GIs couldn't get a straight answer from, just a question of how he could repay them for killing the wolf they'd seen intent on ripping him apart. The infantry's commander remarked they were on special orders to retrieve a mysterious spear if they encountered it, and though he was reluctant, the stranger handed it over.
When all the fighting ceased, the prisoners were permitted more time in the biting but fresh air than they'd known in a long, long time. The GIs prepared coffee and stew, but all of the prisoners were cautioned not to eat too much lest they send their systems into shock.
With metal bowls and cups, Brendan sat down next to his nameless companion.
"So... how did you do all that back there?"
The stranger shrugged. "What?"
"We've established the spear reduces the supernatural back into the realms of mortal. But you still survived that stabbing."
"Even a mortal can survive far more, if they are determined enough." He uttered a low, mirthless chuckle after that. "I told you, I've been tortured before."
"Yes, I know," Brendan said. "And yet you can still endure all of this?"
"It is in human nature to endure. And, unfortunately, it is all too commonly in human nature to be cruel." He turned and glared back toward the castle that had been his prison for so long. "I am stronger only because I have been hardened to endure. To live in this world— to serve God in this world, that is what is necessary."
Brendan nodded slowly and, eventually, asked, "What will you do now?"
The stranger considered the question for a few seconds as he squinted toward the rest of the freed prisoners. "I don't know. Figure some things out, I suppose. Ensure no tragedy like this wretched war ever happens again."
"Do you think you can do that?"
"In these times, war is always the same," he said. "Megalomaniacal madmen drowning in their own pride. It's a sign of just how far we've drifted from God's light. Men like these— hell, all of humanity, needs a reminder just how small they are. That's how we win. That's how we save them from themselves. We make them respect the almighty again."
Brendan nodded slowly, as if he was connecting dots in his head, but was unsure what to say next. Eventually, he asked, "Will this quest of yours need a chaplain?"
"Doubtful."
He sighed and looked down.
"But I can imagine what aid a priest might give me."
The chaplain looked back up, first wide eyed, then smiled. "I owe you much, both my mind and my body stayed together thanks to your help. Did I ever tell you my name?"
"Brendan Gallagher," the stranger said.
"Ah… I did then." Brendan trailed off as if he expected some other response.
The stranger waited just long enough to make the wait uncomfortable before he smirked and said, "And mine is Kedar."
"He was a man of aspirations, perhaps. But you can see how it could all go awry, don't you?" said one voice like a dozen inhuman forces in harmony.
Sadie flinched as she snapped from passive observer to young woman standing in the courtyard of the sieged castle. This was the second time now a supernatural force had jarred her into lucidity, and it felt no easier than the first.
"Wha— what the hell?" She raised a hand to her head. All the information she'd taken in seemed easy enough to process when she viewed it as something unconscious. But the jerk into being made her brain feel so full it hurt. She turned, confused, toward a vaguely human-shaped prism of shifting colors. "You're— you're the one inside this thing?" She raised her stigmata hand. "Aztariel?"
"Indeed, I am," the prism said.
"Wait, why didn't you appear to me before, then? Why only now?"
"My prison bound to your flesh was damaged by that same spear you just saw," Aztariel said. "It has allowed me a little further interaction with you, but only your unconscious mind."
Sadie groaned. "Sounds pretty situational, but I guess we all have to work with what we've got. So, this—that guy over there. He can't really be the same Kedar we're dealing with. It's his father or something, right?"
"His father's name was Geoffrey," the spirit said. "And you saw how he evaded death's sting at every turn. The men with firearms back in the Vatican slowed him for only a moment."
"I know, but—but—this was decades ago! He doesn't look any older. So, he's got eternal youth too? I could buy those other visions weren't all that long ago, but you're telling me he's been mucking with things since before World War II?"
"Long before."
"So what are we supposed to do? Get that spear away from him and kill him with it? I don't think the friggen Bat family is going to be down for that. Are we just supposed to finish getting you out of me and then you'll just move on to a better fitting host? Can you give me a hint here, at least?"
Aztariel shifted in and out of reality for a few seconds as if it considered her question. Eventually it answered, "I only carry the wrath of the Almighty, not the omniscience. And I can sense you will soon awaken."
"Ugh, what? Really? Well, come on." Sadie spoke faster with every word. "Look, I know your boss did the whole talking in parables thing, but can't you give me something a little more direct here? I'm not even the one you wanted, I get that, so isn't there at least a message you can send back with me or something?"
More powerful than it said anything else, the spirit stated, "You understand so little." And the scene started to fade away. "Look to these visions. They have already served you better than you could know."
Sadie let out a long sigh from the backseat of the jeep. "Then I woke up."
From the front, Cassandra and Father Zein slowly digested the information as the latter drove through miles of unknowable desert. It was only the priest's practiced calm that kept both women in a similar mindset, otherwise each would probably have called out in dread for how blindly they seemed to proceed. The Sword of Salvation laid on Cassandra's lap, with the priest noting they prayed it would not be necessary to use it on anyone.
When Cassandra finally spoke, she said, "Fought immortal enemies before. Thought Batman knew most of them though."
"How do you even beat someone like that?" Sadie rubbed at her forehead.
"Carefully, but it can be done." Cassandra said. "Seraphim was immortal too."
"What?" Sadie double-took. "For real? How long was he around for then?"
"Not long, not an old one. Just—" she shuddered a moment. "Saw him shoot himself in the head like it was nothing." Cassandra sensed Father Zein turn to her with their face wrinkled in disgust. "Sorry, Father. Really happened, promise."
The priest uttered a grunt and started to slow the car. "We're almost there."
Sadie sat up and looked at the desert that surrounded them. "How can you tell?"
"Experience."
She shrugged. "All right, if you say so… you guys have a really spectacular night sky, you know that? It's beautiful, I've never seen so many stars."
Cassandra pulled out the communicator she'd slipped out of her costume and kept an eye on the corner for confirmation of reception. Eventually, Father Zein stopped atop a sand dune and gave her a nod. Cassandra stared down at the little screen in her hand and, after a few seconds of waiting, one small bar lit up in the corner.
With a deep breath, she punched in Stephanie's number. Buzzes reverberated for half a minute that felt like half an hour. Eventually, her bubbly voice said, "You've reached Batgirl's secret line, looks like I'm busy kicking butt right now. Leave me a message and I'll get back to you when I can!"
Cassandra pinched the bridge of her nose and said, "It's Angel. We're safe. Don't want to say too much here. Going to try calling Robin." She hung up and punched in the next number.
There was no wait, almost immediately she was told, "This is Red Robin. The caped crusader, not the burger restaurant. Leave me a message. And if you sing that stupid jingle I'm going to give you an earful about it later."
With a groan, Cassandra said, "It's Angel. Hope you're safe. We are. Don't want to talk about it here, will call back if I need to."
"No word from those two huh?" Sadie said. "Damn it, I really hope those two are all right."
"Hope so too." Cassandra lingered on the communicator for a few beats as she considered who to turn to next. Barbara, Dick, and Damian were all still back in Gotham and knew very little of what was going on. Maybe someone could speed over to them, maybe that would be her next attempt. Ultimately, she decided to try one other number first.
She performed a sign of the cross during the first three buzzes. But at last, mercifully, a deep, powerful voice distorted by static answered her.
"Angel?"
