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A Wing and A Prayer

The First Book of GabrielBy Ernest Oglesby

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2011 Ernest Oglesby
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4502-4376-6

Chapter One

From a distance, they looked like large birds, playfully swooping and soaring together in the skies, disappearing one minute behind the clouds before reappearing and darting here and there in the heavens as though playing a game of tag.

Close up, it was apparent that these were not birds, but humans, albeit with wings. The Celts knew them as Elohim and feared them, their strange screeching tongue and their unnatural physiognomy. They kept to the mountains and high places, except when they foraged for food, sometimes brave enough to steal from the Celt villages.

Such beings were not natural to these shores, but the memory of their arrival was beyond generations, and only the passed-on history of the Druids revealed their full history. They flocked to these shores in advance of the Roman armies, as if fleeing before them.

The Druids instilled such hatred in the Celts for these creatures, and since the early days of their coming, some few of them had been captured and sacrificed to grim gods of the wood. During those sacrifices and ingestion of their spilt blood as part of the old rites, the Druids had quickly learnt of the regenerative powers of that blood and valued it highly. Revered by the rest of the Celtic tribes, Druids held sway and were venerated for their knowledge and leadership.

The Elohim were relatively few in number and grew more cautious of the numerous Celts, yet as the Celts watched and studied, some of these winged creatures grew careless and overconfident.

Lucifer soared, enjoying the wind through his hair, as natural in this environment as any real bird. He swooped, laughing as he raced the frightened smaller-sized birds faster than the fastest hawk; his friend Gabriel was laughing alongside him as they soared through the valleys. The wind in his feathers—was there a better feeling to be had anywhere on this planet?

The snow was light, and yet it obscured their view of the landscape, all white and covered beneath them. Treetops bowed with the weight of the snow. Strangely, the two angels hardly felt the cold when they were flying like this, muscles powering their wings as they strove to outdo each other.

Gabriel taunted him as he plummeted like a stone past him, using gravity to assist his dive, and Lucifer did the same, whooping and screeching after him, eager not to be outdone on their daily exercise. The woods, the dark woods, suddenly so close, as they sought to pull out of their incredibly steep dives to just brush the treetops, out of bravado, as they did most days, unaware their habits had been noted by the Celts.

All of a sudden, the snow-covered treetops shook, and the air was filled with hot rain, and Lucifer fell from the sky screaming, one wing pierced by one of the sharp javelins thrown by the humans hiding in the uppermost of the treetops.

Gabriel swooped lower to aid him, when the stones, hurled with accuracy by the many slingshots, began to fill the air around him, zinging around him and stinging, like bees swarming. Crying out as he was hit again and again, Gabriel fell, his wings clipping the branches as the whooping savages celebrated their catch, the weighted nets cast eagerly and skillfully to trap the two angels and heavy clubs quickly used to beat them unconscious.

Lucifer was afraid. The smoke from the fires assailed his nostrils, and the Celts busied themselves at the direction of the white-robed Druids, preparing the clearing for the ceremony to come.

He lay there groaning, wrapped in the nets with Gabriel, who was still unconscious. He nudged him discreetly. "Gabriel, wake up." They were both going to die, he was sure. The ground beneath them was wet and coppery with their blood, which still leaked from their wounds. Gabriel woke and tried to stand, gasping with the effort, but the nets and Lucifer's weight kept him on his knees. Scarcely an hour ago, the two of them had been soaring through the heavens as only the Elohim could, performing the sort of maneuvers that every other feathered creature on this planet could only envy. They were as one with the winds, which gave them lift, and flight was as second nature to them as breathing.

Careless, they had descended close to the forest, swooping close to the trees in their abandoned play, when the humans closed their trap. It had been long months since the last of their number had fallen prey to the humans. The majority of the aerie had dispersed, seeking relative safety by avoiding the lowlands.

The wounds were not fatal but would need time to heal, time the humans were not going to give them. Gabriel gritted his teeth as he strained to tear open the nets with his sharp nails, feathers and blood making his hands sticky. "Help me. We must break free of these nets." Lucifer fought not to scream as he tried to pull at the thick nets.

Around them, the woods were filled with the humans, mostly naked bodies covered in that grotesque blue mud. A few wore rough leggings. The Druids were the only ones among them to wear robes, pristine white long beards, wild and unkempt, crowns of holly in their long hair, their eyes wild with the potent drugs they knew and guarded closely unto themselves.

The drums beat loudly, sending a wild rhythm up into the night. The watch fires lit the wood, the tall hazels thick, guarding the sky. The Druids had learnt well from past mistakes, the stone altar open to the sky only in the small clearing and overshadowed by the mighty sacred oak. The Druids drew their strength from the wood, the dark cruel wood.

Lucifer looked around the clearing. Close to the large overhanging oak was a Faery ring comprised of small uneven stones, polished by the elements, seeming so natural and yet equally so sinister, avoided by all except the Druid as though the Celts were afraid to step within. Then his eyes were drawn to the roughly hewn stone of the altar, the dark stains that were still visible there. Men had died here, angels too, he knew. "It's no use," he groaned.

"Shut up, Lucifer. Just shut up and help me. Help me, damn you!" Gabriel swore, pulling at the crude nets with the last vestiges of his strength. Lucifer started to help once more, but the humans soon noticed their efforts and, with loud cries, descended upon them, wielding heavy wooden clubs and raining down blow after blow until both of them slumped almost unconscious to the ground.

When they finally regained consciousness once more, they noticed the Celts standing in close attendance to forestall any further attempts to free themselves from the nets. A tall figure in white robes and holly crown came to address them.

"Bring them food," he addressed some of the other Celts. "Mead too. I would not have them weak from their wounds."

"Why show such concern?" Gabriel asked. "Why have you captured us, if not to put us to death?"

"Your death is of little consequence to me, birdman. I would keep you alive to take from you the secret of your long life. Once done, I leave your final fate to others. Make the most of your time. Tomorrow night, the moon is full, and the altar awaits," He flourished his hand, gesturing towards the cold grey slab of stone in the centre of the clearing.

The Celts were true to their word, bringing them food and mead. Some of their strength was restored, but the nets still weighed them down, and their guards remained in close attendance. Lucifer and...