The stone bore witness, its rose-red veins a testament to strength remade, and I held him, my pride a thunder muted by love’s quiet roar.
Yet the sight of his frailty had fuelled a fire within me, a wrath that turned to Mishka. I had convened the Council that dusk, my sword slamming the chamber’s stone, its walls etched with prayers I no longer heard.
“Metatron must come,” I had declared, my voice a blade of judgment. “I’ll bring charges against Mishka: insubordination and betrayal. His haste broke our sons; he’ll answer for it.”
Michael had risen, his silver wings taut, his ornate resolve a counterpoint. “Uriel, this cuts too deep,” he had cautioned.
“You’ll sever what we mend.” Gabriel’s golden gaze had softened, tender yet firm. “He’s ours to heal, not judge,” he had said, while Raphael’s reasoned calm had pierced me. “Punishment won’t restore them, only time will.”
I had snarled, my amber wings flaring. “Our relationship was damaged the day he betrayed our sons. Jeremy’s legs, Ari’s breath, Eran’s mind, all shattered by his fire. Metatron will hear it.”
They had objected, their chorus a wall I could not breach, but my wrath had held — a Speaker’s duty, a father’s pain. I had stormed from the chamber, sword in hand, seeking Mishka, when I found him at Petra’s cliffs, his silver wings a ruin, self-torn, blood streaking the stone, his dagger carving shame into his flesh.
“Mishka, what is this?” I had rasped, my voice catching, expecting defiance, not despair.
He had whispered, “Punishment enough, Speaker, more than you’d decree,” and in the nick of time, I had lunged, grasping him as he swayed.
“I’m sorry, Uncle Uri,” he had whispered, “I’m sorry, sorry . . . ” until, out of breath, he had collapsed in my arms, his silver light fading.
I had turned, seeing Michael approach, his wings a storm of dread, and I had deposited Mishka into his father’s embrace. “Mishael has scars too deep,” I had said, my gruff tone softened to a plea. “He needs our love, acceptance . . . our guidance, not punishment. I desist.”
Michael cradled him, his eyes brimming, tears tracing the lines of a face too weary for its ageless grace, and I stepped back, my sword slipping to the stone with a dull clank, my wrath a cinder snuffed by Mishka’s ruin. They staggered toward his chamber, a cave carved into Petra’s beating heart, and I followed, my wings folded tight against the ache in my chest, torn between Jeremy’s faltering steps and the boy collapsing before me.
Michael lowered him onto the stone pallet, his wings quivering as they draped over his son, a shield frayed at the edges. I stood rooted at the threshold, torchlight guttering across the blood-streaked floor, watching a father’s grace unfold, a grace I’d nearly torched in my own rage.
“Mishka,” Michael whispered, his voice ornate yet splintered, snagging on a breath he couldn’t hold, “my Mishka . . . lean on me; your fire’s not lost.”
Mishka stirred, his eyes sunken, hollow as a dead star, his chest heaving with shallow, ragged gasps. His hands scrabbled at his torn wings, feathers slick with blood, jagged stubs where glory once flared, and his voice cracked, a plea scraped from a throat too tight.
“End it, Father. Please; I deserve nothing. Exile me, call Metatron. Let him judge me. I can’t carry this anymore.” His words fell like stones, each one a sob swallowed, and Michael’s shoulders slumped, his silver gaze fracturing as a tear slipped free, glinting in the dim.
Then Mishka moved, sudden, broken, lurching from the pallet with a cry that tore the air, a wail of a child lost in a man’s frame. He snatched a knife from the ledge, its blade dull and pitted, trembling in his grip as he pressed it to his chest, poised to end the storm within. Time slowed: my breath caught, a roar building in my ribs, and I lunged, my wings snapping wide, hands seizing his wrists as the steel kissed his skin, a thin red line blooming.
Michael surged beside me, silver hands clamping Mishka’s shoulders, his voice a choked gasp, “No!”, as we pinned him, a desperate wall against his fall.
“Enough, my dear child!” I roared, my voice a thunder splitting into a sob, raw and ragged. “You’ve bled enough, so stop this! No more! No hearing; Metatron would see you as I do: beloved, Mishka, by us, by me. Am I not your Uncle Uri? Would I cast you out?”
His eyes flared wide, wet and searching, locked on mine as if I might crumble into judgment. The knife wavered, then fell, clattering against the stone with a sound like a breaking chain, and his strength gave out. He crumpled, a keening wail bursting from him — ‘Dad,’ a child-like cry, high and frail, spilling from his lips as his knees hit the floor, a boy stripped bare beneath the warrior’s ruin.