Caged by Damnation (5 page)

Tension built amongst the Hellhounds, their faces alternating between serious, worried, and terrified. Why were they terrified? What had Willow agreed to?

Death turned back to look at Willow. "Do you know what life is?" She made no indication of answering. "Life is the beginning. It's the warmth of a fire, the first sign of spring. Life is fertility and femininity."

"I don't care what it is." Her words were filled with fury, her eyes narrowed in suspicion, and she stepped forward to press against his chest. "I only care that you keep your promise.
I
am giving up everything – my friends, my family, my
life.
Stop wasting what little time I have left!" Her right hand inched up to press against his chest once more in what was sure to be one hell of a push, but he stopped her. Instead, she found her wrist locked in his and he spun her around to whisper in her ear.

"When you are asking for a
favor,
you're supposed to say
please.
”

She tried to break away but his hold tightened. A sound between anguish and irritation ground out from between her lips and she turned her head to look him in the eyes.

"
Please,
do me a
favor
and go to
Hell
." The tone in which she said it, and the fact the Willow was the one speaking that way, brought a gasp from everyone in the clearing. Death, however, didn't seem surprised.

Death spun Willow back around to face him. Her wrist remained in his possession, but she didn't try to escape him. He sighed. "I can only hope that one day you will realize what a brat you're being right now."

He let Willow go and retreated a few feet before raising his right hand. It burst into flame, the fire bathing his hand, growing from a light yellow to a darkened crimson, before being absorbed into his body. I watched while the flames moved from his hand to his shoulder, then down his body until it disappeared into the ground below.

Death's eyes didn't leave Willow's for a second. Uneasy, I backed up until I felt Ash at my back and sank gratefully into his chest. He was shaking, his breath coming in hard gushes against my neck, and his hands tightened against my upper arms. Worried, I looked upwards to his face, but he wasn't looking at me. He was staring in the other direction; in his eyes, a fear I hadn't seen before.

I followed Ash's gaze to see the fire emerging from the Earth. It wasn't a miniature flame any longer, but was building into a raging inferno around Izzy's insubstantial feet. Suddenly, the Earth shook and the flames burst upwards to consume her whole frame. I wouldn't have been worried since Izzy was already dead, but her screams were not the screams of a dead woman. She could feel that fire.

Izzy's screams continued to block out all other sound. The fire transformed her ghostly apparition into a charred body with living eyes. In them, I could see knowledge and understanding, and the pain that came with it. She was
being bathed in the flames of Hell, and Death had put her there.

I launched my body forwards and threw everything I had into challenging Death. I had to make it stop. Izzy was in agony and he had caused it. Before I could inflict pain on him, Willow launched her form against his and they flew across the clearing, slid along the ground, and slammed into a tree. She straddled his torso and began wailing her fists against him, screaming that he had to take it back.

I was surprised when the Hellhounds didn't come to his rescue, but they looked at the rest of the group uneasily, as if expecting us to attack them. Ash and Liam each grabbed hold of my arms to keep me from joining Willow's fight. It didn't take me long to realize that Death wasn't fighting back. He was simply lying, unmoving, while Willow continued her assault.

Everyone was so focused on Willow beating on Death that our focus had shifted away from Izzy. Sometime during the bizarre scene, Izzy's screams had turned from one of excruciating pain into a ghostly shriek straight out of a bad horror film.

Willow stopped mid-punch, still straddling Death, and turned to look at Izzy. The clearing went silent, as though we were caught in the eye of a storm. The charred remains of Izzy had yet to fall into a pile of ashes. Instead, they remained in the shape of a female form. She reminded me of a cracked statue that was covered in volcanic ash.

Steam rose from the ash that was once Izzy while everyone held their breath, afraid that any movement would worsen the situation and make it more real. I didn't cry. It wasn't that I didn't feel the need to, but that I was barren of feeling. I didn't have anything left to give and I think some aspect of me had to be in denial.

The soothing breeze that had swept through our group earlier was now whittling away at Izzy's mass. In sequence, everyone cried out, moving towards the remains, as if by protecting them from the wind we could somehow piece her back together. Our attempts were futile. The moment the wind brushed against her ashen form, it blew apart, and rained down to blaze against our skin.

I expected what was left of Izzy to fall into a chaotic pile. I didn't anticipate the explosion that spewed the debris in all directions. I didn't anticipate anything to be left beneath the mass of death, but when she stared into my eyes, I recognized Izzy. No longer was she her typical, teenage, gothic self, but a mature beauty that didn't resemble the Izzy I knew.

Izzy stared at us silently, seeing us, but not truly recognizing any of us. She reminded me of amnesia patients I had seen at the county hospital. There was no recognition or a sign that her personality remained.

Her graceful neck arched as she stared at each of us in turn, her crimson eyes taking in our group without processing more than the physical world. Her hair had grown to brush against her mid-thighs in a wild mass of curls. It wasn't a solid color, but an array of reds,
golds, and browns. She was enveloped in a red and black silken gauze that twitched every few seconds. Her face was beautifully sculpted with a combination of intensity and perfection, her pupils transformed from the ordinary pupil of a human to a cat-like slit. 

Death stood in the background. In shock, Willow had let him go. She sat at his feet with a baffled expression, as though incapable of stringing words together.

Liam was the first to voice the question that was running through all of our minds. "What did you do to her?"

"
I
didn't do anything. I merely sent out a message and
that
…" he pointed at Izzy, "is the answer I was given."

Willow finally jolted herself from her stilted repose and turned on Death. "You told me you would give her life, not do ... this!"

She waved towards Izzy and I wondered if she thought of Izzy as less than alive, because I was fairly sure she was living. I could see Izzy's chest moving with each breath, puffing the faintest mist of breath against the night air, though her lack of movement and voice had me worried.

Death glanced away in a manner that reminded me of Maye when she was attempting to control her anger. When he looked back at Willow, he emphasized each individual word, "I ... said ... I am
Death ...
not
Life.
" His hands reached up to grasp his hair and pulled, as though the pain from his scalp would help him regain control of the situation.

"I told you I couldn't give her back her life unless you wanted a zombie walking around town! I had limited choices." His eyes were wild. "I tried to explain before, but you wouldn't listen. Life is fire, earth ... all the things I am not."

Willow attempted to cut him off, but he silenced her, placing his palm against her lips. "She is still your Izzy, she is just ... different. She's not human anymore, and she will take some time to regain her memories." As Death neared the last of the sentence, his voice softened and he removed his hand.

Everyone watched Izzy, waiting for a sign that she knew who we were or what she was. The gauze-like substance she was wrapped in twitched again and I walked forward cautiously, afraid that I might spook her, but she barely registered my approach.

"Iz...?" Her eyes locked on mine and she looked down to notice the jacket I held in my hands. I wasn't sure that my coat would fit her, but I didn't have anything else to offer.

She studied me before reaching a hand out to take the jacket, allowing me to see that she wasn't wearing gauze; it was wearing her! She pulled the jacket to her chest and the
gauze opened to reveal her human body, exposing her
not-so-human
wings.

The wings extended out to a twelve foot radius. Transfixed by their movement, dancing in the wind, they lured me inward, obscuring the world, until all I could see was their delicate beauty.

We were all vulnerable to the song of purity that was Izzy's wings. As they swayed, a strong sound rose with them, beginning as a murmur that I almost believed to be my imagination, and building towards a searing passionate song that spoke of life, death, and rebirth. The song painted a vision of souls entwined, as they strove towards the light or dark. A vision of pain, one of being torn from the beauty of the afterlife, slashed through my abdomen, leaving me breathless.

Izzy's eyes had grown throughout her display. The cat-like slits were larger and terrifying. She had moved closer until she stood a few feet in front of me. Recognition still escaped her, and her lips opened to join in the symphony of her wings. The whites of her eyes glazed over into pure fire, causing me to think of both the flames of Hell and the fire that warmed a hearth. I saw the beginning and the end in her eyes.

I moved forward until Izzy hissed loudly and her hand snapped towards my face, claws extended. I didn't have time to maneuver away from the weapons my best friend was aiming at me, but Death blocked Izzy's assault. He moved in a way that seemed effortless. Gently, he pressed his palm against Izzy's chest, but she flew backwards with the strength of a tsunami.

I was shocked by Izzy's animalistic nature. She crouched low and hissed at our group, snapping like a viper intent on spreading her poison. She was a creature trapped in a group of foreign humans, who she thought were threats.

"Iz, we're not going to hurt you. Just ... just calm down." I spoke slowly and softly, but it had little effect on the bird-like creature that had taken over Izzy.

Death held his arm in front of me, barring my attempts to move closer to my friend. "She doesn't recognize or understand you yet," he said. He made an effective barricade since I had no desire to touch Death.

"Explain, please." Willow planted herself directly between Death and Izzy. Her narrowed eyes, clenched jaw, and crossed arms were enough to tell everyone she meant business.

Death stood motionless, his eyes darting back and forth between Izzy and Willow. When I stepped back to give them space, he dropped his arm and relaxed. Unbuttoning the top three buttons on his white cotton dress shirt, he refused to look Willow in the eyes. 

"I don't have power over life. You know the human myth about Mother Nature?" Willow nodded, while the rest of us exchanged baffled glances, and Izzy crouched near the edge of the trees. "It's not entirely a myth. The world is created in pairs, one action to balance another. Life and Death are essentially two sides of the same coin, but we only control the aspects that cause our side to land heads up."

"I still don't get it." Willow eased away with a wary expression. She forgot her back was turned to Izzy and jumped away when her movement was met with a sharp hiss.

"Mother Nature isn't a physical being, but an insubstantial energy that creates life. Occasionally, we collaborate and create something that is both life and death, though only in rare cases." He shrugged and nodded at Izzy. "Think of her as an infant who is fully capable of killing. For Izzy to live, she needed to be reborn. She's a phoenix. Every time she dies, she will be reborn from her ashes. She is still in the
jetlagged
stage, but she will regain her memories soon."

Perplexed, I walked over to a tree near the Hellhounds, far enough from Izzy that she wouldn't view me as a threat, and sat down against the trunk. A phoenix? I wasn't sure how to take this news, but at least Izzy was alive.

Aria moved away from the Hellhounds to crouch near me while Death whispered anxiously to Willow. "Are you okay?" Her brow was furrowed and she seemed genuinely concerned.

"Yeah, I think so. I'm just overwhelmed. Whenever I think my life is beginning to settle, something happens to throw it all into turmoil again. I'm not even sure what a phoenix is. I remember hearing about them, but it's all jumbled together. I can't make sense of it."

Aria cocked her head as if listening to something the rest of us couldn't hear. She sighed. "She will be fine, though she will never truly die. She'll experience death for the rest of eternity, but she will also remain in the embrace of life. She's not human anymore, and it is going to take some getting used to. Once she regains her memories, she will need to learn self control. A phoenix is beautiful, but incredibly deadly. Since the birth of this planet, I only know of a single phoenix being created, and Death locked him away. I imagine his fate is much worse than death...."

Her voice trailed off in such a way that was reminiscent of a thought that couldn't be fully absorbed. "Is that going to happen to her?" Aria sent a pitiful look in my direction.