“No, the Angel is too busy for a selfie.” Ori waved off the middle-aged woman of Afro-Caribbean descent as he returned to treating the many injured and wounded.
After leaving the clearing of the reaches to Karanno and his familiars, Ori treated the many bloody, broken humans by establishing a triage camp in the centre of the great cavern. It was a space large enough to host Wembley Stadium, with numerous stalagmites and stalactites forming pillars that made the area seem smaller than it was.
It was strange being suddenly surrounded by people from Earth. On the one hand, the familiarity of everyday conversations and shared backgrounds was a comfort—a comfort he had missed more than he realised. It was almost enough for him to lower his guard, the caution he had felt since his abduction, which had only increased during the crucible almost seemed like it could be disregarded, if only for a moment. However, those moments were fleeting.
"Why are your eyes glowing? You… really human?" asked one of the patients Ori was treating. He was a local lad from New Cross, a teenager still at secondary school who’d had his toenails ripped out and his jaw shattered. He stared at Ori with a curiosity and awe that reminded Ori of simpler times.
"I'm from Peckham, born and bred… Just learnt some magic, that's all."
"Cool, could you teach me?"
"Maybe later. Let's get out of this prison first, yeah?" Ori said.
"You know, it's like you're an Avenger – like Doctor Strange."
The simple musings of the teenager—and the realisation that his own power set was, if not identical, then at least comparable to a Marvel superhero—made Ori chuckle. "I'm a bit partial to Iron Man, personally. Look, check this out." Ori flicked his wrist, and a ghostly three-foot shield appeared beyond his outstretched arm. He gestured to his Dreamwalkers' Lesser Aegis—the silvery wrist guard coated with a faint, glowing mist when activated. "I made this."
"Wow! Really? That's so cool."
Ori smiled, allowing himself a moment to show off. "You feeling better?"
"Yeah, massively," the boy replied.
"Right, let's get you on your feet while I attend to the next patient."
The boy nodded as Ori moved on.
"Hey! Over 'ere. I think she's dying!"
Another teen, this time a girl, was brought in by several burly men. Ori made his way over, his Vision of the Progenitor seeing through bruised and battered flesh to the traumatic brain injuries beneath. The bleeding appeared to stabilise as it entered his Beacon of Regeneration; however, given the extent of damage to neural tissue, Ori’s expression turned grave.
"Put her down here," Ori said.
"Are you a doctor?" someone asked, Ori ignored. With Seraphine's Beacon in his off‐hand, Ori’s Channel Restoration focused on the incipient brain bleed and inflammation, reversing damage done to brain cells and flushing out clotting blood. A flash of Purifying Light cleaned up her appearance—a teen, or perhaps a student of Indian descent, though she was clearly rocking a punk look with heavy mascara, navy eyeliner, a lip and nose piercing, and short black hair with tips dyed neon blue. She seemed peaceful under his healing light as Ori meticulously reversed every brain injury his transcendent vision could detect.
Her eyes suddenly opened, hazy and unfocused before dilated pupils constricted and arms reflexively shielded her eyes from the light of Ori’s spell.
"Sorry," Ori said, cancelling his channelling. "You all right?"
"What? Where am I?" she asked.
"You're… could you tell me your name?" Ori asked, fearing his spells had caused irreparable brain damage or amnesia.
"What? Yeah, it's… Chloe… Chloe Kumar, but call me Raven. Are you a doctor? What happened?" she said, her slurred Scottish brogue becoming clearer as her awareness returned.
"Why don't you tell me the last thing you remember?" Ori asked gently, giving her time to look around and adjust. "Hey, guys, please give her some breathing room, yeah?" he shouted.
"It’s a miracle..."
"...all the blood..."
"...her legs were battered – and now it's all healed."
"Err, what's going on? I was just going down to the shops, and now, where am I? Has there been an accident or som’aut?"
"So yeah, if you don't remember how you got here, yeah? This is all going to sound mad, but basically, we've all been abducted by demons and shit. And now we're trying to break out of the place they've been keeping us."
"You capping yeah? You right, It does sound mad. What the fuck is going on, and why are you'all crowding me?" she growled.
"It's cool, it's all right, Raven—take your time," he said in an attempt to bring calm. "You lot, back up, yeah?" he called over his shoulder before returning his attention. "How you feeling? I haven't finished fixing your legs yet—Surprised you don't feel any pain."
"What are you on? Fixing my legs? I'm a paraplegic," Raven continued. "You a doctor or som’aut?"
"Paraplegic?" Ori asked, confused. "How? Has that been the case since you were born or something?"
"A car accident when I was twelve. Fuck me, your eyes are glowing!?" she screeched as the Vision of the Progenitor swept over her entire body, quickly detecting the old damage to her lower spinal column. As Ori had no idea how to fix this injury, he reached into his sock to retrieve Uriel’s Greater Channelling Wand of Light. Holding it in one hand and the now‐glowing Seraphine's Beacon in the other, Ori placed the wand's tip against the woman's abdomen and opened his Mana Nexus to the artefact spirit.
His split mind observed the process of healing old injuries while he communed with the artefact. Her back arched as a pulse of mana poured from Ori’s mind, through the wand, and into the patient. She convulsed, her back rising off the stony floor of the cavern as if shocked by a defibrillator. Raven’s eyes bulged, her lungs locked, and her muscles turned taut with shock. For a moment no longer than a breath, Ori feared he had broken her or caused serious harm.
Then control returned to her muscles, her chest heaving with exaggerated breaths.
"Fuuuuck me! What the fuck was that?" Raven said, her eyes wild.
"How are you feeling? Can you move your legs?"
"I..." she began before her eyes grew comically wide as her knee twitched. "What... the... fuck!?"
She quickly felt and prodded her stockings in wonder as she raised her knees from the floor and inspected her legs in detail. She looked at Ori then, as if truly seeing him for the first time. Her olive eyes glinted in the reflected light, and a mix of curiosity, wonder and joy slowly replaced her shock and doubt.
"Who, who are you?"
"I'm Ori."
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To Ori’s reckoning, it had been six hours of gruelling triage before Karanno and Freya had returned with the last of the freed. The total number of humans released exceeded three hundred—all natives or visitors to London, abducted off the streets from tares in space in and around Peckham Rye. Most had suffered traumatic injuries and, after hours of Beacon of Restoration, many healed simply by proximity. Even so, more complex wounds, poisonings and illnesses—especially curses—needed additional help from Uriel’s Greater Channelling Wand of Light. In the end, only five bodies were found without any signs of life.
With his role as leader established—thanks to his ability to heal people, speak with the Angel and his situational awareness—Ori gathered a few reliable individuals to whom he could delegate tasks and pass on information. Among them was a man called Simon, whom Ori suspected had a service background, and a burly Polish man named Wojciech, who ran a food distribution company.
After the first hour, people began to get the hint. Ori simply ignored any questions about “The Angel” or fairies, directing others instead to people with answers he had already provided.
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“Cristy and the rest are up ahead in the next reach, so now’s as good a time as any to get your people to the portal,” Karanno said, his presence commanding everyone’s attention even as Freya’s glowing sprite form flashed into a pixie that landed on Ori’s shoulder. Gasps of alarm and amazement were made, especially from those who hadn’t been present when Ori and Karanno first appeared.
“Alright, lead the way. There shouldn’t be anything too challenging up ahead, and I’d rather not be any more high profile than I already am.”
“Given how they stare at you, Ori, I’d toss any notion of being lowkey into the pond,” Freya said.
“Yeah, having a pixie dangling off my shoulder probably doesn’t help,” Ori replied.
“Your humans weird me out, so it’s just as well I take the front—”
“Excuse me, could you please ask the angel these questions? They concern matters of great importance—faith, the meaning of life, the nature of God and the afterlife.” Their conversation was cut short when a man Ori remembered healing clung to his wrist. The middle-aged Orthodox Jewish man was unmistakable by his kippah, curly sidelocks and the prayer shawl draped over his torn suit. His gaze was intense—nearly a glare—but it softened into something apologetic and uncertain when faced with the annoyed expressions of Ori, Karanno and Freya.
Ori gently removed the man’s grasp from his wrist and turned to Karanno. “He wants to ask you questions. Unless you really want to get into Earthling theology, just shake your head and walk away,” he said in Celestial.
Taking Ori’s advice, Karanno left, leaving behind a man crestfallen at losing his only opportunity to have life’s big questions answered. In truth, Ori could probably answer many of them; whether or not he’d believe or appreciate the answers was another matter entirely.
“Sorry,” Ori shrugged, then sought out Simon and Wojciech. “It’s time to go. It’s about a five-mile hike through some tunnels to the portal that brought us all here. More angels have cleared the path, so now’s the best time to lead everyone out of here. I need you to organise the strongest to carry those who can’t walk. I’ve made a couple of stretchers for the oldest. I think a few are still struggling—or mentally not quite there yet—and will need extra attention. Can you help get this done?”
“Yes, boss … I’ll see what I can do,” the men replied.
He then turned his attention to Ruenne’del and the Spriggan—whom Ori had recently learned was called Incheon. They stood hundreds of feet away by the walls as if attempting to be as unobtrusive as a pink-haired fairy and a tree man could appear.
“Time to go?” Incheon said, his deep basso rumble befitting a creature who towered over everyone with a head adorned with branches.
“Yeah, I’ll take the rear. Find me if there are any issues.”
Minutes crawled by as over three hundred people arranged themselves for a subterranean hike. Ori stood on overwatch, his attention focused on delegating tasks to the most capable. As people realised that he simply ignored all irrelevant questions, things began to settle down.
As his gaze swept across the cavern. He caught Raven standing on unsteady legs. Before her wobbles could turn into a stumble, Ori was there, his arm around her waist to prevent her from falling.
“Got you,” he said.
“Thanks,” she replied with a smile. “I’ve been pumping myself up to stand ever since—this was the first time I’ve stood on my own two legs since I was twelve. I wasn’t sure I still knew how.”
“Yeah. How does it feel?”
“Fantastic,” Raven laughed. “But I don’t think I’m up for a hike through the caves just yet.”
“No worries, let me just get—”
“Could you carry me?” Raven asked, tentatively. Before Ori could answer, Freya giggled before she, in a flash of sparks, transformed into her sprite form and buzzed away.
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“A gal could get used to this,” Raven said, her legs swinging as Ori held her in a princess carry. It had taken a while for him to shake off the anxiety of not having his hands available for combat—or the awkwardness of carrying a cute, punk art student in his arms while bare-chested. Thankfully, with Split Mind, thoughts that would otherwise have made him seem distant or distracted were delegated to one part of his mind, while the other parts maintained awareness of his surroundings and the conversation with Raven.
“Seems like you’re already right at home,” Ori said.
“Mhmmm, never was one for fairy tales, but here we are, with fairies and angels and demons and walking tree people, and wizards with magic wands.”
“Mage.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Wizards get their magic from objects or lesser creatures they form contracts with. Mages, we make our own magic with… well, our minds, basically.”
“So, you really are a real-life magician—sorry, Mage then?”
“Yep.”
“Then what else can you do? Can you do anything with magic—or, like, do you have spells?”
“I’ve got some spells, but most of them aren’t anything special. Like this light spell,” Ori demurred as he cast Light Field. Instantly, a field of tiny light orbs surrounded them, their cold white light greatly illuminating the cave and drawing curious, confused glances from further along the procession.
“Fuck me! That’s one hell of a party trick,” she said.
“Impressed?” Ori asked, unable to completely suppress his smirk of satisfaction.
“I mean, if you hadn’t already fixed my back I would have been, yeah,” she said, her gaze soaking in the field of lights as she absently kicked her legs. “You didn’t use your wand?”
“Nah, not for this.”
“Can I have a look at it? Your wand, I mean?” Raven asked, slapping Ori across his chest after he gave her a strange look.
“Can you stand, please? I just need a free hand for a sec,” Ori said. He summoned his soul-bound artefact into his newly freed hand before handing it over to the Asian art student. After carrying her once again, Ori half expected another joke or innuendo, but after a few minutes of silence, he was surprised and gratified to see her earnestly examining the object. The two-foot-long crystal, which seemed simultaneously glowing, transparent and darkly opaque, was an object whose appearance Ori took an inordinate amount of pride in.
“It tingles,” Raven said absently as she examined the object in ever-increasing detail, her hands rotating Seraphine’s Beacon in every direction. Her words caught Ori’s attention.
“Does it feel like a nine-volt battery, in your mouth I mean?”
“Ever since you did the magic with the lights, yeah – but my fingers are twitching whenever I touch it. It’s also kind of warm; it’s odd. Are all wands like this?”
“No – it might mean you’re sensitive to some kinds of mana.”
“Oh yeah? What does that mean? I can use magic?”
“Maybe,” Ori said, his tone cagey and uncertain. “You said you went to Goldsmiths —what’s that like?”
She shrugged. “Been good so far; lectures have been blegh but halls are fun – first time I’ve been away from home, especially since…” She gestured to her stocking-covered legs.
“What degree?”
“BA Fine Art. Yeah, yeah, ‘Big Yikes’, I know, but…I’m actually really good – good enough for a scholarship and stuff, so..”
“No, that’s cool.”
She regarded him as though weighing his sincerity, her scrutinising eyes concealing a hint of vulnerability. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“What about you? Were you studying medicine?”
“Engineering at Imperial.”
“Really?”
“Why so shocked?” Ori asked, genuinely puzzled.
“I’ve seen the boys who go Imperial and, well, you really don’t fit,” Raven said. Ori grimaced. “I meant that in a good way.”
“Why does she keep staring at us? Is she your girlfriend or something?”
Easy banter continued for over an hour as the group traversed the caves. After negotiating a perilous cliff's edge, the earthlings stopped to regroup and share the limited rations of water and food Ori had gathered beforehand. Less than twenty steps away, Ruenne’del stared with her large, unblinking, steely eyes. Ori frowned as she appeared agitated—the persistent twitch of her pearlescent wings coupled with a gloomier expression than her usual neutral demeanour twigged him to something off.
"It's complicated," Ori replied.
"Complicated? How?" Raven pressed.
"Well... Raven, can I trust you with secrets and stuff?" Ori asked, deciding to be open about this matter and seeking advice from someone with a different perspective.
"Trust me? Aye, ‘course. What is it?"
"Well, I could do with some advice. That girl who's been staring at me—she's sick, I mean, she's dying."
"What, really? Can't you... like fix her?"
"Yeah, I think so, but it's complicated. I've told her I wanna help, even though I don't really know how yet; but she's still deciding if she wants my help."
"Oh." Raven paused before replying, "Look, Ori, if she's that sick, you can’t just stand there mulling it over. You’ve got the gift—so why not be blunt? Tell her exactly what you can do, and that you're here to help. Sometimes people are too scared to accept aid, but you can’t let that stop you from trying. If she’s not ready, well, that's her problem, not yours."
“Hmmm,” Ori said, unconvinced. While he agreed with her on the surface, the situation's complexities always made it difficult to know precisely what to do next. Meanwhile, a creeping dread bubbled up from within as he recalled the sight of Ruenne’del’s discomfort—a feeling that only seemed to intensify as the group prepared to set off again.
“What is it?” Raven asked, noticing the shift in mood.
Just as they were leaving their latest rest stop, Ori’s heart began to hammer. His eyes shone with a cold intensity as Vision of the Progenitor sought to uncover what Ori now knew was hidden. His steps slowed, his gaze sweeping the surroundings until he found something floating—unseen and unseeable by mere mortal senses. It resembled a silent, black eyeball, a small white dot indicating the direction of its gaze as it twitched and flickered between the humans under his charge.
Scared and enraged, Ori turned, preparing to summon Flencer to pierce the astral eyeball, when a firm hand gripped his forearm and held him still. Distantly, he heard Raven—still held within his arms—gasp.
Terror and confusion made his heart leap into his throat as Ruenne’del suddenly appeared in front of him. Her eyes, a solid gold, stared at him with a blank, almost alien expression that had replaced her previous anxiety.
Before he could wonder or ask what was wrong, Ruenne’del looped her arms around his neck, heedless of the fact that he was still carrying Raven in both arms. Like steel bands, an impossible strength pulled his face downward before he could resist.
Ruenne’del’s lips met his in the most unexpected and awkward kiss he had ever experienced. Confusion gave way to panic as he wondered what the fuck was going on. Vision of the Progenitor had just enough time to catch the tidal wave of soul crashing into his own before Fate turned beneath his feet.