Angelology

Angelological Academy of Paris, Montparnasse

Autumn 1939

It was less than a week after the invasion of Poland, an afternoon in my second year as a student of angelology, when Dr. Seraphina Valko sent me to locate my errant classmate, Gabriella, and bring her to the Athenaeum. Gabriella was late for our tutorial, a habit she’d developed over the summer months and had continued, to our professor’s dismay, into the cooler days of September. She was nowhere to be found in the school-not in the courtyard where she often went to be alone during breaks, nor in any of the classrooms where she often studied-and so I guessed her to be in her bed, sleeping. My bedroom being next to hers, I knew that she had not come in until well after three o’clock that morning, when she put a record on the phonograph and listened to a recording of Manon Lescaut, her favorite opera, until dawn.

I walked through the narrow streets off the cemetery, passing a café filled with men listening to news of the war on a radio, and cut through an alleyway to our shared apartment on the rue Gassendi. We lived on the third floor, our windows opening over the tops of the chestnut trees, a height that removed us from the noise of the street and filled the rooms with light. I climbed the wide staircase, unlocked the door, and stepped into a quiet, sunny apartment. We had an abundance of space-two large bedrooms, a narrow dining room, a servant’s chamber with an entrance to the kitchen, and a grand bathroom with a porcelain bathtub. The apartment was far too luxurious for schoolgirls, this I knew from the moment I set foot upon its polished parquet. Gabriella’s family connections had assured her the best of everything our school could offer. How I had been assigned to live with Gabriella in such quarters was a mystery to me.

Our Montparnasse apartment was a great change in my circumstances. In the months after I had moved in, I basked in its luxury, taking care to keep everything in perfect order. Before I’d come to Paris, I had never seen such an apartment, while Gabriella had lived well all her life. We were opposites in many ways, and even our appearance seemed to confirm our differences. I was tall and pale, with big hazel eyes, thin lips, and the foreshortened chin I had always considered the hallmark of my northern heritage. Gabriella, by contrast, was dark and classically beautiful. She had a way about her that caused others to take her seriously, despite her weakness for fashion and the Claudine novels. Whereas I came to Paris on scholarship, my fees and board paid entirely through donations, Gabriella came from one of the oldest and most prestigious of the Parisian angelological families. Whereas I felt lucky to be allowed to study with the best minds of our field, Gabriella had grown up in their presence, absorbing their brilliance as if it were sunlight. Whereas I plodded through texts, memorizing and categorizing in the meticulous manner of an ox plowing a field, Gabriella had an elegant, dazzling, effortless intellect. I systemized each piece of minutia into notebooks, making charts and graphs to better retain information, while to my knowledge Gabriella never took notes. And yet she could answer a theological question or elaborate upon a mythological or historical point with an ease that escaped me. Together we were at the top of our class, and yet I always felt that I had stolen my way into the elite circles that were Gabriella’s birthright.

Walking through our apartment, I found it much as I had left it that morning. A thick, leather-bound book written by St. Augustine lay open upon the dining table alongside a plate with the remains of my breakfast, a crust of bread and strawberry preserves. I cleared the table, bringing my book to my room and placing it amid the mess of loose papers on my desk. There were books waiting to be read, jars of ink, and any number of my half-filled notebooks. A yellowed photograph of my parents-two sturdy, weatherworn farmers surrounded by the rising hills of our vineyard-sat next to a faded photograph of my grandmother, Baba Slavka, her hair tied in a head scarf in the way of her foreign village. My studies had occupied me so completely that I’d not been home in over a year.

I was the daughter of winemakers, a sheltered, shy girl from the countryside, with academic talent and strong, unwavering religious beliefs. My mother came from a line of vignerons whose ancestors had quietly survived through hard work and tenacity, harvesting auxerrois blanc and pinot gris all the while bricking the family savings in the walls of the farmhouse, preparing for the days when war would return. My father was a foreigner. He had immigrated to France from eastern Europe after the First World War, married my mother, and took her family name before assuming responsibility of managing the vineyard.

While my father was no scholar, he recognized the gift in me. From the time I was old enough to walk, he put books in my hands, many of them theological. When I was fourteen, he arranged for my studies in Paris, bringing me to the school by train for testing and then, once my scholarship had been secured, to my new school. Together we had packed all my belongings in a wooden trunk that had belonged to his mother. Later, when I discovered that my grandmother had aspired to study at the very school I would attend, I understood that my destiny as an angelologist had been many years in the making. As I set about locating my well-connected and tardy friend, I wondered at my willingness to trade the life I’d led with my family. If Gabriella were not at our apartment, I would simply meet Dr. Seraphina at the Athenaeum alone.

As I left my room, something in the large bathroom at the end of the hallway caught my eye. The door was closed, but movement behind the frosted glass alerted me to a presence beyond. Gabriella must have run a bath, an odd thing to do when she should have been at school. I could see the outline of our large bathtub, which must have been filled to the top with hot water. Waves of steam rose through the room, coating the glass of the door in a thick, milky fog. I heard Gabriella’s voice, and although I found it odd that she would speak to herself, I believed her to be alone. I raised my hand to knock, ready to alert Gabriella to my presence, when I saw a flash of scintillating gold. An enormous figure passed behind the glass. I could not trust my vision, yet it seemed to me that the room was filled with a soft light.

I drew closer and, endeavoring to understand the scene before me, pushed the door ajar. A mélange of clothes had been scattered about the tile Hoor-a white linen skirt and a patterned rayon blouse that I recognized as belonging to Gabriella. Twisted alongside my friend’s clothing I discerned a pair of trousers, crumpled as a flour sack, clearly thrown aside in haste. It was obvious that Gabriella was not alone. And yet I did not turn away. Instead I stepped even closer. Peering deeper into the room, I exposed myself to a scene that shocked my senses so thoroughly that I could do nothing but watch in a state of horrified awe.

At the far side of the bathroom, draped in a mist of steam, stood Gabriella, entwined in the arms of a man. His skin was luminous white and appeared to me-so startled by his presence-to have an unearthly glow. He had pressed Gabriella against the wall, as if he meant to crush her under his weight, an act of domination that she did not attempt to repel. Indeed, her pale arms were wrapped about his body, holding him.

I stole away from the bathroom, careful to mask my presence from Gabriella, and fled the apartment. Upon returning to the academy, I spent some time wandering through the warren of halls, attempting to recover my bearings before reporting to Dr. Seraphina Valko. The buildings filled many blocks and were strung together by narrow corridors and underground passageways that gave the school a shadowy irregularity that I found strangely soothing, as if the asymmetry echoed my state of mind. There was little grandeur to the dwellings, and although our quarters were often unsuited to our needs-the lecture halls were too small and the classrooms without proper heat-my absorption in my work did much to distract me from these discomforts.

Walking past the dimmed, abandoned offices of the scholars who had already left the city, I tried to understand the shock I felt at finding Gabriella with her lover. Aside from the fact that male guests were restricted from visiting our apartments, there had been something disturbing about the man himself, something eerie and abnormal that I could not fully identify. My inability to understand what I had seen and the chaotic mix of loyalty and rivalry I felt toward Gabriella made it impossible to tell Dr. Seraphina, although I knew in my heart that this was the correct path. Instead I pondered the meaning of Gabriella’s actions. I speculated upon the moral dilemma her affair thrust upon me. I must give Dr. Seraphina an account of what kept me, but what would I say? I could not very well betray Gabriella’s secret. While she was my only friend, Gabriella Lévi-Franche was also my most ardent rival.

In reality my anxieties were pointless. By the time I returned to Dr. Seraphina’s office, Gabriella had arrived. She sat upon a Louis XIV chair, her appearance fresh, her demeanor calm, as if she had spent the morning lounging in a shaded park reading Voltaire. She wore a bright green crepe de chine dress, white silk stockings, and a heavy scent of Shalimar, her favorite perfume. When she greeted me in her usual terse manner, kissing me perfunctorily on each cheek, I understood with relief that she was unaware of what I had seen.

Dr. Seraphina welcomed me with warmth and concern, asking what had kept me. Dr. Seraphina’s reputation rested not just upon her own accomplishments but on the achievements and caliber of the students she took on, and I was mortified that my search for Gabriella would be construed as tardiness on my part. I harbored no illusions about the security of my stature at the academy. I, unlike Gabriella with her family connections, was expendable, although Dr. Seraphina would never say so overtly.

The Valkos’ popularity among their students at large was no mystery. Seraphina Valko was married to the equally brilliant Dr. Raphael Valko and often conducted joint lectures with her husband. Their lectures filled to capacity each autumn, the crowds of young and eager scholars in attendance expanding well beyond those first-year students required to take it. Our two most distinguished professors specialized in the field of antediluvian geography, a small but vital branch of angelic archaeology. The Valkos’ lectures encompassed more than their specialization, however, outlining the history of angelology from its theological origins to its modern practice. Their lectures made the past come alive, so much so that the texture of ancient alliances and battles-and their role in the maladies of the modern world-became plain before all in attendance. Indeed, in their courses Dr. Seraphina and Dr. Raphael had the power to lead one to understand that the past was not a far-off place of myths and fairy tales, not merely a compendium of lives crushed by wars and pestilences and misfortune, but that history lived and breathed in the present, existing among us each day, offering a window into the misty landscape of the future. The Valkos’ ability to make the past tangible to their students ensured their popularity and their position at our school.

Dr. Seraphina glanced at her wristwatch. “We had better be going,” she said, straightening some papers on her desk as she prepared to leave. “We’re already late.”

Walking quickly, the stacked heels of her shoes clicking upon the floor, Dr. Seraphina led us through the narrow, darkened hallways to the Athenaeum. Although the name suggested a noble library studded with Corinthian columns and high, sun-filled windows, the Athenaeum was as lightless as a dungeon, its limestone walls and marble floors barely discernible in the perpetual haze of a windowless twilight. Indeed, many of the rooms used for instruction were located in similar chambers tucked away in the narrow buildings throughout Montparnasse, scattered apartments acquired over the years and connected with haphazard corridors. I learned soon after my arrival in Paris that our safety depended upon remaining hidden. The labyrinthine nature of the rooms ensured that we could continue our work unmolested, a tranquillity threatened by the impending war. Many of the scholars had already left the city.

Still, despite its dour environs, the Athenaeum had offered me much solace in my first year of study. It contained a large collection of books, many of which had been left undisturbed upon their shelves for decades. Dr. Seraphina had introduced our Angelological Library to me the year before by remarking that we had resources that even the Vatican would envy, with texts dating back to the first years of the postdiluvian era, although I had never examined such ancient texts, as they were locked in a vault out of the reach of students. Often I would come in the middle of the night, light a small oil lamp, and sit in a corner nook, a stack of books at my side, the sweet, dusty smell of aging paper around me. I didn’t think of my hours of study as a sign of ambition, although it surely must have seemed that way to the students who found me studying at dawn. To me the endless supply of books served as a bridge into my new life-it was as though, upon my walking into the Athenaeum, the history of the world lifted out of a fog, giving me the sense that I was not alone in my labors but part of the vast network of scholars who had studied similar texts many centuries before my birth. To me, the Athenaeum represented everything that was civilized and orderly in the world.

It was thus all the more painful to see the rooms of the library in a state of total dismemberment. As Dr. Seraphina led us deeper into the space, I saw that a crew of assistants had been assigned to disassemble the collection. The procedure was being carried out in a systematic fashion-with such a vast and valuable collection, it was the only way to go about such a move-and yet it appeared to me that the Athenaeum had descended into pure chaos. Books were piled high on the library tables, and large wooden crates, many filled to the top, were scattered across the room. Only months before, students had sat quietly at the tables preparing for exams, carrying on their work as generations of students had done before them. Now it felt to me that all had been lost. What would be left once our texts were hidden away? I averted my eyes, unable to look at the undoing of my sanctuary.

In reality, the impending move was no great surprise. As the Germans drew closer, it was unsafe to remain in such vulnerable quarters. I knew that we would soon be suspending classes and beginning private lessons in small, well-hidden groups outside the city. Over the past weeks, most of our lectures had been canceled. Interpretations of Creation and Angelic Physiology, my two favorite courses, had been suspended indefinitely. Only the Valkos’ lectures had continued, and we were aware that they would soon be disbanded. Yet the danger of invasion had not felt real until the moment I found the Athenaeum in shambles.

Dr. Seraphina’s manner was tense and hurried as she brought us into a chamber at the back of the library. Her mood reflected my own: I could not calm myself after what I had witnessed that morning. I stole glances at Gabriella, as if her appearance might have been altered by her actions, but she was as cool as ever. Dr. Seraphina paused, tucked a stray hair behind her ear, and straightened her dress, her anxiety plain. At the time I believed that my delayed arrival had upset her and that she was concerned that we would be late to her lecture, but when we arrived at the back of the Athenaeum and found an altogether different sort of meeting under way, I understood that there was more to Dr. Seraphina’s manner than this.

A group of prestigious angelologists sat arrayed about a table, deep in heated debate. I knew the council members by reputation-many had been visiting lecturers during the previous year-but I had never seen them all gathered together in such an intimate setting. The council was composed of great men and women stationed in positions of power throughout Europe-politicians and diplomats and social leaders whose influence extended well beyond our school. These were the scholars whose books had once lined the shelves of the Athenaeum, scientists whose research on the physical properties and chemistry of angelic bodies made our discipline modern. A nun dressed in a habit of heavy black serge-an angelologist who divided her time between theological study and 6eldwork-sat near Gabriella’s uncle, Dr. Lévi-Franche, an elderly angelologist who specialized in the art of angelic summoning, a dangerous and intriguing field I longed to study. The greatest angelologists of our time were there, watching as Dr. Seraphina brought us into their presence.

She gestured for us to sit at the back of the room, at a remove from the council members. Deeply curious about the subject of such an extraordinary meeting, I found that it took all my efforts to keep from staring impolitely, and so I focused my attention upon a series of large maps of Europe that had been posted upon the wall. Red dots marked cities of interest-Paris, London, Berlin, Rome. But what truly piqued my interest was that a number of obscure cities had been singled out: There were marks upon cities along the border of Greece and Bulgaria, creating a line of red between Sofia and Athens. The area held particular interest to me, as it was in that obscure location at the farthest reaches of Europe where my father was born.

Dr. Raphael stood by the maps waiting to speak. He was a serious man, one of the few completely secular members to rise to the level of council chair while retaining a teaching post at the academy. Dr. Seraphina had once mentioned that Dr. Raphael held the same dual position of administrator and scholar as Roger Bacon, the English angelologist of the thirteenth century who had taught Aristotle at Oxford and Franciscan theology in Paris. Bacon’s balance of intellectual rigor and spiritual humility was an accomplishment regarded with great respect throughout the society, and I could not help but see Dr. Raphael as his successor. As Dr. Seraphina took her place at the table, Dr. Raphael began to speak, resuming where he had left off.

“As I was saying,” Dr. Raphael said, gesturing to the half-empty shelves and the assistants wrapping and packing the books into boxes scattered throughout the Athenaeum, “our time has grown short. Soon all of our resources will be packed up and stored in secure locations throughout the countryside. Of course it is the only way-we are protecting ourselves from the contingencies of the future. But the move comes at the worst possible time. Our work cannot be postponed during the war. There is no question that we have to make a decision now.”

His voice was grave as he continued.

“I don’t believe our defenses will fail-there is every indication that we are ready for whatever battles lie ahead-but we must prepare for the worst. If we wait any longer, we face being surrounded.”

“Look at the map, Professor,” said a council member named Vladimir, a young scholar sent to Paris from the underground Angelological Academy in Leningrad, of whom I knew only by reputation. Boyish and handsome, he had pale blue eyes and a lithe build. The quiet, certain manner with which he conducted himself gave him the presence of an older man, although he could not have been more than nineteen years old. “It seems we are surrounded already,” he said.

“There is a marked difference between the machinations of the Axis powers and our enemies,” Dr. Lévi-Franche said. “Earthly danger is nothing in comparison to that of our spiritual enemies.”

“We must be ready to defy both,” said Vladimir.

“Exactly,” Dr. Seraphina said. “And to do this we must increase our efforts to find and destroy the lyre.”

Dr. Seraphina’s assertion was met with silence. The council members were not quite certain how to react to such a bold statement.

“You know my feelings about this,” Dr. Raphael said. “Sending a team to the mountains is our best hope.”

The nun’s veil cast a shadow over her features as she looked about the table at the council. “The area Dr. Raphael proposes is far too large for anyone-including our teams-to cover without exact coordinates. The precise location of the gorge must be mapped before such an expedition takes place.”

“With the right resources,” Dr. Seraphina said, “nothing is impossible. We have been given generous assistance from our American benefactress.”

“And the equipment supplied by the Curie family estate will be more than adequate,” Dr. Raphael added.

“Let’s look at the realities at hand, shall we?” said Dr. Lévi-Franche, clearly skeptical of the project. “How large is the area we are discussing?”

“Thrace was part of the eastern Roman Empire, later to be called Byzantium, whose territory consisted of land from present-day Turkey, Greece, and Bulgaria,” Dr. Raphael said. “The tenth century was a time of great territorial changes for the Thracians, but from the Venerable Clematis’s account of his expedition we can narrow our search somewhat. We know Clematis was born in the city of Smolyan at the heart of the Rhodope mountain chain of Bulgaria. Clematis wrote that he had traveled to the land of his birth during his expedition. Thus, we can narrow the area to northern Thrace.”

“This, as my colleague so correctly pointed out, is an immense area,” Dr. Lévi-Franche said. “Do you suppose that we can explore a fraction of this terrain without being detected? Even with vast resources and a thousand agents, it would take years, perhaps decades, to scratch the surface, let alone go underground. We do not have the funding or the manpower for such an endeavor.”

“There will be no shortage of volunteers for the mission,” Vladimir said.

“It is important to remember,” Dr. Seraphina said, “that the danger the war poses is not merely the destruction of our texts and the physical structures of our school. We stand to lose much more if the details of the cavern, and the treasure hidden there, are made public.”

“Perhaps,” the nun said. “But our enemies are watching the mountains at every moment.”

“It is true,” said Vladimir, whose field of study was ethereal musicology. “And that is precisely why we must go after it now.”

“Why now?” Dr. Lévi-Franche countered, lowering his voice. “We have hunted down and protected lesser celestial instruments while leaving the most dangerous one at large. Why not wait until the threat of war has passed?”

Dr. Seraphina said, “The Nazis have positioned teams throughout the area. They adore antiquities-especially those of mythological significance to their regime-and the Nephilim will use this opportunity to gain a powerful tool.”

“The lyre’s powers are notorious,” Vladimir said. “Of all the celestial instruments, it is the one that might be used to disastrous ends. It may be that its destructive force is more insidious than anything the Nazis might do. But then again, the instrument is too precious to leave. You know as well as I that the Nephilim have always coveted the lyre.”

“But it is obvious,” Dr. Lévi-Franche said, growing perturbed, “that the Nephilim will follow our party on whatever recovery effort we make. If we have the miraculous luck of finding the lyre, we have no idea what happens to those who possess it. It may not be safe. And even worse, it could be taken from us. Any effort we make may simply assist our enemies. We would then be responsible for the horrors that the lyre’s music could bring.”

“Perhaps,” the nun said, stiffening in her chair, “it is not as powerful as you believe. No one has ever seen the instrument. Much of the terror it has caused arises from pagan legends. There is every possibility that the evil the lyre can inflict is merely the stuff of legend.”

As the angelologists considered this, Dr. Raphael said, “And so we are faced with the choice to act or to do nothing.”

“Reckless action is worse than wise restraint,” Dr. Lévi-Franche said, and I could not help but dislike the smugness of his response, so much in contrast to my professors’ earnest attempts at persuasion.

“In our case,” Dr. Raphael said, growing more and more agitated, “inaction is the more reckless course. Our passivity will have terrible consequences.”

“That is exactly why we must act now,” Vladimir said. “It is up to us to find and protect the lyre.”

“If I may interrupt,” Dr. Seraphina said gently. “I would like to make a proposal.” Walking to where Gabriella and I sat and drawing the attention of the council members upon us, Dr. Seraphina continued, “Many of you are acquainted with them already, but for those of you who are not, I would like to present two of our brightest young angelologists. Gabriella and Celestine have been working with me to put order to our holdings during the transition. They have been busy at work cataloging texts and transcribing notes. I have found their work to be very useful. In fact, it is the attention that they have brought to the minutiae of our collection and the information they have carefully extracted from our historical papers that has given Dr. Raphael and me an idea of how to proceed at this very important juncture.”

“As many of you are aware,” Dr. Raphael said, “in addition to our duties here at the academy, Dr. Seraphina and I have been working on a number of private projects, including trying to bring more precision to the location of the cavern. In the process we have accumulated a plethora of addenda and field notes previously overlooked.”

I glanced at Gabriella, hoping to find some sort of commiseration in our position, but she only turned away, supercilious as ever. Suddenly I wondered if she understood the details of what the council members were discussing. There was the chance that she had been given inside information while I had been excluded. Dr. Seraphina had never spoken to me of a lyre, nor the need to keep it from our enemies. That Gabriella had been taken into her confidence filled me with jealousy.

“When we understood that the impending war could disrupt our work,” Dr. Seraphina said, “we decided to make certain that our papers would be well preserved, whatever happens. With this in mind, we asked Gabriella and Celestine to assist us in sorting and filing research notes. They began some months ago. The labor of their efforts has been taxing, the menial work of collecting facts, but they have shown ingenuity and determination to complete the project before the move. We have been thrilled with their progress. Their youth affords them a certain patience with what might seem to most of us simple clerical work, but their diligence has yielded excellent results. The data have been incredibly useful, allowing us to review a massive amount of information that has been hidden for decades.”

Dr. Seraphina walked to the maps and, taking a pen from the pocket of her cardigan, drew a triangle over the Rhodope Mountains from Greece into Bulgaria.

“We know that the site we seek is located within these boundaries. We know that it has been explored previously and that there have been many scholarly attempts to describe the geology and landscape surrounding the gorge. Our scholars have been intellectually scrupulous in their work, but our organizational methods have been, perhaps, less than perfect. While we do not have the exact coordinates, I believe that if we comb all of the texts at our disposal-including accounts that have not been examined previously for this purpose-we will shed a new light upon the location.”

“And you believe,” the nun said, “that through this method you will discover the coordinates of the cave?”

“Our proposal is this,” Dr. Raphael said, taking over for his wife. “If we are able to narrow our search to a radius of one hundred kilometers, we want full approval for the Second Expedition.”

“If we fail to narrow the search,” Dr. Seraphina said, “we hide the information as best we can, go into exile as planned, and pray that our maps do not fall into the hands of our enemies.”

I was shocked to see how readily the council members approved the plan after so much heated debate had already taken place. Perhaps Dr. Seraphina knew that Gabriella’s advancement was a card she could play to win Dr. Lévi-Franche’s approval. Whatever her strategy, it had worked. Although I was confused about the nature of the treasure we sought, my ambition had been flattered. I was overjoyed. Gabriella and I had been placed at the very center of the Valkos’ search for the cave of the imprisoned angels.

The next morning I arrived at Dr. Seraphina’s office an hour earlier than our scheduled meeting time of nine o’clock. I had slept very badly the previous night, while in the next room Gabriella had moved about, opening her window, smoking cigarettes, playing her favorite recording of Debussy’s Douze Études as she paced from one end of her chamber to the next. I imagined that her secret relationship contributed to her sleeplessness, as it did mine, although in truth Gabriella’s feelings were a mystery to me. I knew her better than anyone else I knew in Paris, and yet I did not know her at all.

I was so unmoored by the events of that afternoon that I did not have a moment to consider the magnitude of the role the Valkos had assigned us in hunting for the cavern. That I could think of little other than Gabriella with her arms wrapped about a strange man only heightened my wariness toward my friend. As a result, I left my bed before the sun rose, collected my books, and set out to study through the early-morning hours in my corner of the Athenaeum.

Being alone among our texts gave me the opportunity to consider the council meeting of the previous day. It was difficult for me to believe that an expedition of such consequence could be conducted without knowing the exact location of the gorge. The map-the most essential component of any mission-was missing. Even a first-year student of average intelligence would know that an expedition could not be considered a success without complete cartographic evidence. Lacking the precise geographical location of the journey, future scholars had no way to replicate the mission. In short, absent a map there was no solid proof.

I would not have been sensitive to the relevance of a map if it were not for my years with the Valkos, whose examination of cartography and geological formations bordered upon the obsessive. Much as a scientist relies on replication to verify experiments, the Valkos’ work in antediluvian geology arose from their passion for precise, concrete reproduction of past expeditions. Their clinical discussions of mineral and rock formations, volcanic activity, the development of mantles, soil varieties, and karst topography left no room for doubt that they were scientific in their methods. There could be no mistake. If there had been a map to be found, Dr. Raphael would have seized upon it. He would have reconstructed the journey step-by-step, rock by rock.

After the sun rose, I knocked softly upon Dr. Seraphina’s door and, hearing her voice, pushed it open. To my surprise, Gabriella sat with our teacher on a settee upholstered in vermilion silk, a coffee service before them. I could see that they were deep in discussion. Gone was the anxious Gabriella of the night before. Instead I found Gabriella the aristocrat, perfumed and powdered and immaculately dressed, her hair combed glossy black. I had been defeated once again by Gabriella, and, unable to hide my consternation, I stood in the doorway as if confused about my place. “What are you doing, Celestine?” Dr. Seraphina said, a hint of irritation in her voice. “Come in and join us.”

I had visited Dr. Seraphina’s office many times in the past and knew it to be one of the finest rooms in the school. Located on the top floor of a Haussmann-style building, it commanded a grand view of the neighborhood-the square before the school, with its fountain and endlessly circling pigeons, dominating all else. The morning sun illuminated a wall of French windows, one of which was open to the crisp morning air, washing the room with the smell of earth and water, as if it had rained all night, leaving a dredge of silt behind. The room itself was large and elegant, with built-in bookshelves, fluted moldings, and a marble-topped escritoire. It was an office that one might expect to find on the Right Bank rather than its location on la rive gauche. Dr. Raphael’s office, a dusty, tobacco smoke-stained room stacked high with books, was more representative of our school. Dr. Raphael could often be found lounging in the sunny depths of his wife’s polished office, discussing the finer points of a lecture or-as Gabriella was doing that morning-drinking coffee from Dr. Seraphina’s Sèvres service.

That Gabriella had beaten me to Seraphina’s office upset me more than I revealed. I could not know her motives, but it appeared to me that she had arranged a private conference, excluding me to her advantage. At the very least, Gabriella had taken the opportunity to speak with Dr. Seraphina about the work we would be undertaking, perhaps requesting the choice tasks. I knew that the outcome of our efforts could change our individual standing in the school. If the Valkos were pleased with the results, there would be a place on the expedition team. Only one of us would attain this.

We had been assigned work suited to our scholarly strengths, which were as opposite as our appearances. Whereas I loved the technical components of our coursework-the physiology of angelic bodies, the composition ratios of matter to spirit in created beings, and the mathematical perfection of early taxonomies-Gabriella was attracted to the more artistic elements of angelology. She liked to read the grand epic histories of battles between angelologists and the Nephilim; she could gaze at religious paintings and find symbolism that surely would have been lost upon me; she parsed ancient texts with such care that one believed that the meaning of a single word had the power to change the course of the future. She had faith in the progress of good, and over our first year of studies she made me believe that such progress was possible, too. Accordingly, Dr. Seraphina assigned Gabriella to work through the mythical texts, leaving me the more systematic task of sorting the empirical data of previous attempts to find the gorge, sifting geological information of various epochs, and collating outdated maps.

From the look of satisfaction upon Gabriella’s face, they must have been chatting for some time. A series of wooden crates sat at the center of the office, their rough-hewn edges pressing upon the red and gold Oriental carpet. Each crate had been stuffed with field notebooks and loose papers, as if they had been packed in haste.

My astonishment at Gabriella’s presence, not to mention my curiosity regarding the crates of notebooks, did not go unnoticed. Dr. Seraphina waved me into the room, asking me to close the door and join them. “Come in, Celestine,” she said again as she gestured for me to sit on a divan near the bookshelves. “I was wondering when you might arrive.”

As if to second Dr. Seraphina’s remark, a grandfather clock at the far end of the office chimed eight o’clock. I was an hour early. “I thought we began at nine,” I said.

“Gabriella wanted to get a head start,” Dr. Seraphina said. “We have been looking through some of the new materials that you will catalog. These boxes are Raphael’s papers. He brought them from his office last night.”

Walking to her desk, Dr. Seraphina took a key and unlocked a cupboard. The shelves were filled with notebooks, each shelf ordered and meticulous. “And these are my papers. I have arranged them by subject and date, the years of my schooling are on the lower shelves, and my most recent notes-mostly quotations and outlines for articles-are on the top. I have refrained from cataloging my work for years. Secrecy has been a large factor, but, more important, I have been waiting for the right assistants. You are both bright students with exposure to the basic fields of angelology-teleology, transcendental frequencies, theories of morphistic angelology, taxonomy. While you have studied these at an introductory level, you have also learned a bit about our field of antediluvian geology. You are hardworking and meticulous, knowledgeable and talented in different ways, but not specialized. I am hoping that you will come to the task with fresh eyes. If there is anything in the boxes that we’ve missed, I know that you girls will catch it. I am also going to require that you sit in on my lectures. I realize that you completed my introductory course last year, but the subject matter is of special significance to our task.”

Running her fingers along a row of journals, she extracted a number of volumes and placed them on the coffee table between us. Although my first instinct was to take one of the journals, I waited, endeavoring to follow Gabriella’s lead. I did not want to appear too anxious.

“You may want to begin with these,” Seraphina said, settling lightly upon the settee. “I think you will find Raphael’s files to be a bit of a challenge to put in order.”

“There are so many,” I said, enthralled by the sheer amount of papers to go through and curious as to how we would document such a mass of information.

“I have already given Gabriella precise instructions about our methodology for cataloging the papers,” Seraphina said. “She will pass those instructions on to you. There is only one directive I will repeat: You must remember that these notebooks are exceptionally precious. They form the bulk of our original research. Although we have excerpted some of the material for publication, none of these has been copied in its entirety. I ask that you take special care to preserve the more delicate notebooks, particularly the texts outlining our expeditions. These papers cannot leave my office, I’m afraid. But as long as you work through the material in a timely fashion, you may read them as you wish. I believe that there is much to learn, however disorderly the papers may be. Indeed, I am hoping that our work will help you to understand the history of our struggle and, if we are very lucky, help us discover what we are seeking.”

Taking a leather notebook and giving it to me, she said, “These are some of my writings from my student years. There are notes from lectures, some conjectures about angelology and its historical development. It’s been so long since I’ve looked at it that I cannot fully account for what you might find. I was once an ambitious student myself and, like you, Celestine, spent many, many hours in the Athenaeum. With so much information about the history of angelology, I felt that I needed to make it all a bit more compact. I’m afraid some of my rather naïve speculations may be included, which you should take with a grain of salt.”

I struggled to imagine Dr. Seraphina as a student, learning the very things we were learning. It was difficult to imagine her ever having been naïve about anything.

Dr. Seraphina said, “The notes from later years might be more engrossing. I rewrote the material from this journal into a more-how shall I say it?-succinct account of the history of our work. One objective that our scholars and agents have tried to adhere to is that angelology is purely functional-we use our study as a concrete tool. Theory is only as good as its execution, and in our case historical research plays a large role in our ability to fight the Nephilim. Personally, I have a rather empirical mind. I am not at all adept at understanding abstractions, and so I used narrative to make angelological theories more tangible to me. It is much the same way that I order my lectures. While the use of narrative is commonplace in many aspects of theology-allegories and the like-the church eschewed such an approach when speaking of angelological systems. As you perhaps know, hierarchical systems were often constructed as a kind of argument by the church fathers. They believed that as God created hierarchies of angels, so He made hierarchies on earth. Explaining one would illuminate the other. For example: As the seraphim are superior angelic intelligences to the cherubim, so, too, is the archbishop of Paris to the farmer. You see how it might work: God created hierarchies, and everyone must remain in their God-appointed place. And pay their taxes, bien sûr. The church’s angelic hierarchies reinforced the social and political structures. They also offered a narrative of the universe, a cosmology that gave order to the seeming chaos of ordinary people’s lives. Angelologists, of course, diverged from this path. We observe a horizontal structure, one that allows intellectual freedom and advancement through merit. Our system is quite unique.”

“How could such a system survive?” Gabriella asked. “Surely the church would not have allowed it.”

Startled by Gabriella’s brazen question, I looked down at my hands. Never would I be able to question the church in such a forthright manner. Perhaps it was a detriment, my belief in the soundness of the church.

“I believe that this question has been asked many times before,” Dr. Seraphina said. “The founding fathers of angelology developed the perimeters of our work at a grand meeting of angelologists in the tenth century. There is a wonderful account of the meeting, written by one of the fathers in attendance.” Dr. Seraphina returned to the cupboard and removed a book. Turning through the pages, she said, “I suggest that you read it when you have the chance, which will not be now, as you have more than your share of work ahead of you this morning.”

Seraphina placed the book on the table. “Once you begin reading the history of our group, you will see that there is more to angelology than study and debate. Our work grew from the wise decisions of a band of serious, spiritual men. The First Angelological Expedition, the very first physical attempt made by angelologists to uncover the prison of the angels, arose when the Venerable Fathers, at the invitation of their Thracian brothers, organized the Council of Sozopol. It was the founding meeting of our discipline, and according to the Venerable Father Bogomil, one of the greatest of the founding fathers, the council was a huge success, not only in forging the standards of our work, but in bringing together the foremost religious thinkers of the time-not since the Council of Nicea had such a large assembly of extradenominational representatives gathered. Priests, deacons, acolytes, rabbis, and Manichaean holy men participated in a flurry of debate over dogma in the main hall. But a secret gathering was taking place elsewhere. An old priest called Clematis, a bishop of Thracian birth who lived in Rome, had called together a select group of sympathetic fathers who shared his great passion for finding the cavern of the Watchers. As a matter of fact, he had developed a theory of the location of the cave, positing that it, like the remnants of Noah’s Ark, were to be found in proximity to the Black Sea coast. Eventually Clematis went to the mountains to test this theory. Dr. Raphael and I have assumed-although we have no proof to bear out our assumptions-that Clematis had drafted a map.”

“But how can you be so certain that there is anything there?” Gabriella said. “What evidence do we have? What if there is no cavern and it is just a legend?”

“There must be a basis of truth in it,” I said, feeling that Gabriella was too quick in her desire to challenge our teacher.

“Clematis found the cavern,” Dr. Seraphina said. “The Venerable Father and his team are the only ones to have discerned the actual location of the pit, the only ones to have descended into it, and the only people in many thousands of years to have seen the disobedient angels. Clematis died for the privilege. Thankfully, he dictated a brief account of the expedition before his death. Dr. Raphael and I have used this account as our primary text in our search.”

“Surely the account points to the location,” I said, anxious to understand the details of Clematis’s expedition.

“Yes, there is a location mentioned in Clematis’s account,” Dr. Seraphina said. Taking a piece of paper and a fountain pen, she wrote a series of letters in Cyrillic and presented them to us.

ΓяypcκoTo Бърло

“The name given in Clematis’s account is Gyaurskoto Burlo, which means “Infidels’ Prison” in Old Bulgarian or, more loosely, ”The Hiding Place of the Infidels“-an accurate description of the Watchers, who were called disobedient or unfaithful by Christians of the era. The Turks occupied the region around the Rhodope Mountains from the fourteenth century until the Russians assisted the Bulgarians in driving them out in 1878, and this serves to complicate the modern hunt: The Muslims referred to the Bulgarian Christians as infidels, placing another layer of meaning over the original description of the cave. We made a number of trips to Greece and Bulgaria in the twenties, but to our great disappointment we found no caves matching this name. When questioned, the villagers associate the name with the Turks or say they have never heard of the cave at all. After years of cartographic hunting, we have been unable to find the name on any map of the region. Whether by carelessness or design, the cave does not exist on paper.”

“Perhaps it is more correct to conclude,” Gabriella said, “that Clematis erred and that there is no such cave.”

“There you are wrong,” Dr. Seraphina said, the quickness of her response giving evidence of her passion for the subject. “The prison of the disobedient angels exists. I have wagered my career upon it.”

“Then there must be a way to find it,” I said, understanding for the first time the full extent of the Valkos’ desire to solve the riddle. “We need to study Clematis’s account.”

“That,” Seraphina said, going to her cupboard once again, “is for another time, after you have completed the work at hand.”

I opened the volume before me, curious about what lay under its covers. I could not help but feel satisfied that my ideas were so aligned with Dr. Seraphina’s work and that Gabriella-who usually won the Valkos’ admiration-had clashed with our teacher. Yet, to my dismay, Gabriella was utterly untouched by Dr. Seraphina’s disapproval. In fact, she appeared to be thinking of something else entirely. It was clear to me that Gabriella did not harbor the same sense of rivalry that I did. She felt no need to prove herself.

Seeing how eager I was to begin, Dr. Seraphina stood. “I will leave you to your work,” she said. “Perhaps you will see something in these papers that has eluded me. I have found that our texts will speak deeply to someone or they will say nothing whatsoever. It depends upon your sensitivity toward the subject. The mind and spirit become ripe in their own fashion and at their own pace. Beautiful music plays, but not everyone with ears can hear it.”

From my first days as a student, it was my habit to arrive at the Valkos’ lectures early, so as to secure a spot among the multitude of students. Despite the fact that Gabriella and I had sat through the Valkos’ lectures the previous year, we continued to attend them each week. I was drawn to the ambience of passionate inquiry and the illusion of scholarly unity that the lectures presented, while Gabriella appeared to revel in her status as a second-year student from a well-known family. The younger students stared at her throughout the lecture as if gauging her reaction to the Valkos’ assertations. The lectures were conducted in a small limestone chapel built on the fortifications of a Roman temple, its walls thick and calcified, as if they had risen from the quarries that stretched below. The chapel’s ceilings were composed of crumbling brick buttressed by wooden beams, which appeared so rickety that when the rumbling of cars outside became strong, I believed the noise might send the whole edifice tumbling down upon us.

Gabriella and I found seats in the back of the chapel as Dr. Seraphina arranged her papers and began her lecture.

“Today I will share a story familiar to most of you in some form or other. As the founding story of our discipline, its central position in history is indisputable, its poetic beauty unassailable. We begin in the years before the Great Flood, when heaven dispatched a fleet of two hundred angels called the Watchers to monitor the activities of creation. The chief Watcher, according to these accounts, was named Semjaza. Semjaza was beautiful and commanding, the very image of angelic bearing. His chalk-white skin, pale eyes, and golden hair marked the ideal of heavenly beauty. Leading two hundred angels through the vault of the heavens, Semjaza came to rest in the material world. Among his charges were Araklba, Rameel, Tamlel, Ramlel, Danel, Ezeqeel, Baraqijal, Asael, Armaros, Batarel, Ananel, Zaqiel, Samsapeel, Satarel, Turel, Jomjael, Kokabiel, Araqiel, Shamsiel, and Sariel.

“The angels moved among the children of Adam and Eve unseen, living quietly in the shadows, hiding in mountains, taking shelter where humanity would not find them. They traveled from region to region, following the movements of men. In this fashion they discovered the populous civilizations along the Ganges, the Nile, the Jordan, and the Amazon. They lived quietly in the outer regions of human activity, dutifully observing the ways of man.

“One afternoon, in the era of Jared, when the Watchers were stationed on Mount Hermon, Semjaza saw a woman bathing in a lake, her brown hair twisting about her. He called the Watchers to the edge of the mountain, and together the majestic beings looked upon the woman. According to numerous doctrinal sources, it was then that Semjaza suggested the Watchers choose wives from among the children of men.

“No sooner had he spoken these words than Semjaza grew anxious. Aware of the penalty for disobedience-he had witnessed the fall of the rebel angels-he reasserted his plan. He said, ‘The Daughters of Men should be ours. But if you do not follow me, I will suffer the penalty of this great sin alone.’

“The Watchers made a pact with Semjaza, swearing to suffer the penalties with their leader. They knew that the union was forbidden and that their pact broke every law in heaven and earth. Nonetheless, the Watchers descended Mount Hermon and presented themselves to human women. The women took these strange creatures as their husbands and soon became pregnant. After some time children were born to the Watchers and their wives. These creatures were called Nephilim.

“The Watchers observed their children as they grew. They saw that they were different from their mothers and also different from the angels. Their daughters grew to be taller and more elegant than human women; they were intuitive and psychic; they possessed the physical beauty of the angels. The boys grew to be taller and stronger than normal men; they reasoned with shrewdness; they possessed the intelligence of the spiritual world. As a gift, the Watchers brought their sons together and taught them the art of warfare. They taught the boys the secrets of fire-how to kindle and keep it, how to harness it for cooking and energy. This was a gift so precious that the Watchers would be mythologized in human legend, most notably in the story of Prometheus. The Watchers taught their sons metallurgy, an art the angels had perfected but kept hidden from humanity. The Watchers demonstrated the art of working precious metals into bracelets and rings and necklaces. Gold and gemstones were pried from the ground, polished and made into objects, and assigned value. The Nephilim stored their wealth, hoarding gold and grain. The Watchers showed their daughters how to use dyes for cloth and how to color their eyelids with glittering minerals ground into powder. They adorned their daughters, causing jealousy among the human women.

“The Watchers taught their children how to fashion tools that would make them stronger than men, instructing them to melt metal and fashion swords, knives, shields, breastplates, and arrowheads. Understanding the power the tools gave them, the Nephilim made caches of fine, sharp weapons. They hunted and stored meat. They protected their belongings with violence.

“And there were other gifts the Watchers gave their children. They taught their wives and daughters secrets even more powerful than fire or metallurgy. They separated the women from the men, taking them away from the city and traveling deep into the mountains, where they showed the women how to cast spells and to use herbs and roots in medicines. They gave them the secret of the magical arts, teaching them a system of symbols to record their spells. Soon scrolls were passed among them. The women-who had until then been at the mercy of men’s strength-became powerful and dangerous.

“The Watchers divulged more and more of these heavenly secrets to their wives and daughters:

Baraqijal taught astrology.

Kokabiel taught them to read portents in the constellations.

Ezeqeel gave them a working knowledge of the clouds.

Araqiel instructed in signs of the earth.

Shamsiel mapped the course of the sun.

Sariel mapped the signs of the moon.

Aramos taught counterspells.

“With these gifts the Nephilim organized into a tribe, arming themselves and taking control of land and resources. They perfected the art of warfare. They began to amass more and more power over humanity. They identified themselves as lords of the earth, cutting out huge domains of land and claiming the kingdoms as their own. They took slaves and made flags to represent their armies. They divided their realms, assigning men to be soldiers, merchants, and laborers to serve them. Equipped with the eternal secrets and a hunger for power, the Nephilim dominated mankind.

“As the Nephilim ruled over the earth and men perished, mankind cried to heaven for help. Michael, Uriel, Raphael, and Gabriel, the archangels who had observed the Watchers from their first descent to the world, also monitored the progress of the Nephilim.

“When commanded, the archangels confronted the Watchers, surrounding them in a ring of fire. They disarmed their brothers. Once defeated, the Watchers were shackled and transported to a remote, unpopulated cavern high in the mountains. At the lip of the abyss, their chains heavy upon them, the Watchers were ordered to descend. Through a crevice in the earth’s crust they fell, plummeting deeper and deeper until they came to rest in a prison of darkness. From the depths they grieved for air and light and their lost freedom. Separated from heaven and earth, awaiting the day of their release, they prayed for heaven’s forgiveness. They called out for their children to save them. God ignored their pleas. The Nephilim did not come.

“The angel Gabriel, messenger of good news, could not abide the Watchers’ anguish. In a moment of pity, he threw his lyre to his fallen brothers so that they might diminish their suffering with music. Even as the lyre fell, Gabriel realized his mistake: The lyre’s music was seductive and powerful. The lyre could be used to the Watchers’ benefit.

“Over time the Watchers’ granite prison came to be called the underworld, the land of the dead where heroes descended to find eternal life and wisdom. Tartarus, Hades, Kurnugia, Annwn, hell-the legends grew as the Watchers, chained to the pit, cried for their release. Even today, somewhere in the depths of the earth, they cry to be saved.

“It has been a source of speculation as to why the Nephilim did not rescue their fathers,” Dr. Seraphina said in conclusion. “Surely the Nephilim would have been stronger with the assistance of the Watchers, and surely they would have assisted in their release if they had the power to do so. But the Watchers’ prison remains unknown. It is in this mystery that our work takes root.”

Dr. Seraphina was a gifted speaker, with a dramatic ability to animate her point for first-year students, a talent that not many of our professors possessed. As a result of her efforts, she often appeared exhausted by the end of an hour’s lecture, and that day was no exception. Looking up from her notes, she announced a short break. Gabriella gestured for me to follow her, and, leaving the chapel by a side exit, we walked through a series of narrow hallways until we reached an empty courtyard. Dusk had fallen, and a warm autumn evening settled over us, scattering shadows on the flagstones. A great beech tree towered above the courtyard, its skin strangely mottled, as if it suffered from leprosy. The Valkos’ lectures could last for hours, often bleeding into the night, and I was keen to take in the outdoor air. I wanted to ask Gabriella’s opinion about the lecture-indeed, I had grown to be her friend through such analysis-but saw that she was in no mood.

Taking a cigarette case from the pocket of her jacket, Gabriella offered one to me. When I refused, as I always did, she merely shrugged. It was a shrug I had come to recognize, a slight but insouciant gesture that made it clear how much she disapproved of my inability to enjoy myself. Celestine the naïf, the shrug seemed to say; Celestine, child of the provinces. Gabriella had taught me much by her small rejections and silences, and I had always watched her with particular care, noticing the way she dressed, what she read, the way she wore her hair. In the past weeks, her clothes had become prettier, more revealing. Her makeup, which had always been distinct, had become darker and more pronounced. The spectacle I had witnessed the previous morning suggested the reason for this change, but still her manner captured my interest. Despite everything, I looked up to her as one does to an older sister.

Gabriella lit her cigarette with a lovely gold lighter and inhaled deeply, as if to demonstrate all that I was missing.

“How beautiful,” I said, taking the lighter from her and turning it in my hand, the gold burnishing to a roseate hue in the evening light. I was tempted to ask Gabriella to tell me how such an expensive lighter had come into her possession, but I stopped myself. Gabriella discouraged even the most superficial questions. Even after a year of seeing each other every day, we spoke very little about our personal lives. I settled, therefore, upon a simple statement of fact. “I haven’t seen it before.”

“It belongs to a friend,” she said without meeting my eye. Gabriella had no friends but me-she ate with me, studied with me, and if I happened to be occupied, she preferred solitude to forming new friendships-and so I knew at once it belonged to her lover. Surely she must have discerned that her secrecy would make me curious. I could not restrain myself from asking her a direct question.

“What sort of friend?” I said. “I ask because you have seemed so distracted from our work lately.”

“Angelology is more than studying old texts,” Gabriella said. Her look of reproach suggested that my vision of our endeavor at the school was deeply flawed. “I have given everything to my work.”

Unable to mask my feelings, I said, “Your attention has been overwhelmed by something else, Gabriella.”

“You don’t know the first thing about the powers that control me,” Gabriella said. Although she had meant to respond with her typical haughtiness, I detected a crack of desperation in her manner. My questions had surprised and hurt her.

“I know more than you think,” I said, hoping that a direct confrontation would lead her to confess everything. I’d never before taken such a strident tone with her. The error of my approach was evident before I had finished speaking.

Snatching the lighter from me and tucking it into the pocket of her jacket, Gabriella tossed her cigarette onto the slate flagstones and walked away.

When I returned to the chapel, I found my seat next to Gabriella. She had placed her jacket upon my chair, saving it for me, but she refused even to glance my way as I sat. I could see that she had been crying-a faint ring of black smudged the edges of her eyes where tears had mixed with the kohl. I wanted to speak with her. I was desperate for her to open her heart to me, and I longed to help her overcome whatever error in judgment had befallen her. But there was no time to talk. Dr. Raphael Valko took his wife’s place behind the podium, arranging a sheaf of papers as he prepared to give a portion of the lecture. And so I placed my hand upon her arm and smiled, to let her know that I was sorry. My gesture was met with hostility. Gabriella pulled away, refusing even to look at me. Leaning back in the hard wooden chair, she crossed her legs and waited for Dr. Raphael to begin.

During my first months of study, I learned that there were two distinct sets of opinions regarding the Valkos. Most students adored them. Drawn in by the Valkos’ wit, their arcane knowledge, and their dedication to pedagogy, these students hung upon their every word. I, along with the majority, belonged to this group. A minority of our peers remained less adoring. They found the Valkos’ methods suspect and their joint lectures pretentious. Although Gabriella would never allow herself to be categorized with either lot, and had never confessed how she felt about Dr. Raphael and Dr. Seraphina’s lectures, I suspected that she was critical of the Valkos, just as her uncle had been in the assembly gathered at the Athenaeum. The Valkos were outsiders who had worked their way to the top of the academy, while Gabriella’s family position gave her instant rank. I had often listened to Gabriella’s opinions about our teachers, and I knew that her ideas often diverged from the Valkos’.

Dr. Raphael tapped the edge of the podium to quiet the room and began his lecture.

“The origins of the First Angelic Cataclysm are often contested,” he began. “In fact, looking over the various accounts of this cataclysmic battle in our own collection, I found thirty-nine conflicting theories about just how it began and how it ended. As most of you know, scholarly methods for dissecting historical events of this nature have changed, evolved-some would say devolved-and so I will be frank with you: My method, like that of my wife, has changed over time to include multiple historical perspectives. Our readings of texts, and the narratives we create from fragmentary material, reflect our larger goals. Of course, as future scholars, you will draw your own theories about the First Angelic Cataclysm. If we have succeeded, you will leave this lecture with the kernel of doubt that inspires individual and original research. Listen carefully, then. Believe and doubt, accept and dismiss, transcribe and revise all that you learn here today. In this way the future of angelological scholarship will be sound.”

Dr. Raphael held a leather-bound volume in his hands. He opened it and, his voice steady and serious, began his lecture:

“High in the mountains, under a ledge that sheltered them from the rain, the Nephilim stood together, begging guidance from the daughters of Semjaza and the sons of Azazel, whom they considered to be their leaders after the Watchers had been taken below the earth. Azazel’s eldest son stepped forward and addressed the endless crowd of pale giants filling the valley below.

“He said, ‘My father taught us the secrets of warfare. He taught us to use a sword and knife, to fashion arrows, to wage war upon our enemies. He did not teach us to protect ourselves from heaven. Soon we will be trapped on all sides by water. Even with our strength and our numbers, it is impossible to build a vessel like Noah’s. It is equally impossible to directly attack Noah and take his craft. The archangels are watching over Noah and his family.’

“It was well known that Noah had three sons and that these sons had been chosen to assist in maintaining his Ark. Azazel’s son announced that he would go to the seashore where Noah was loading his boat with animals and plants, and there he would discern a way to infiltrate the Ark. Bringing along their most powerful sorceress, the eldest daughter of Semjaza, he left the Nephilim, saying, ‘My brothers and sisters, you must remain here, at the highest point of the mountain. It is possible that the waters will not rise to this height.’

“Together the son of Azazel and the daughter of Semjaza walked down the steep mountain path through the relentless rain, making their way to the shore. At the Black Sea, all was chaos. Noah had warned of the Flood for many months, but his countrymen did not pay attention in the least. They carried on with feasting and dancing and sleeping, happy in the face of utter destruction. They laughed at Noah, and some of them even stood near Noah’s Ark, jeering as he brought food and water aboard.

“For some days Azazel’s son and Semjaza’s daughter watched the comings and goings of Noah’s sons. They were called Shem, Ham, and Japheth, each very different from the others. Shem, the eldest, was dark-haired and green-eyed, with elegant hands and a brilliant way of speaking; Ham was darker than Shem, with large brown eyes, great strength, and good sense; Japheth had fair skin, blond hair, and blue eyes, the most frail and thin of the three. While Shem and Ham did not tire as they helped their father load animals, satchels of food, and jars of water, Japheth worked slowly. Shem and Ham and Japheth had been long married, and between them Noah had many grandchildren.

“Semjaza’s daughter saw that Japheth’s appearance was close to their own and decided that this was the brother her companion should take. The Nephilim waited for many days, watching, until Noah had loaded the final animals onto the Ark. The son of Azazel stole to the great boat. Its massive shadow fell upon him, blanketing him in shadow as he called for Japheth.

“Noah’s youngest leaned over the edge of the Ark, his blond curls falling into his eyes. Azazel’s son summoned Japheth to accompany him away from the seashore, along a footpath that led deep into a forest. The archangels, who stood guard at the boat’s prow and hull, inspecting every object that entered and exited the Ark so that it fit God’s dictate, paid no attention to Japheth as he left the ship and trailed the luminous stranger into the woods.

“As Japheth followed Azazel’s son deeper and deeper into the forest, the rain began to fall, pounding the canopy of leaves above his head and echoing loud as thunder. Japheth was out of breath when he caught up to the majestic stranger. Hardly able to speak, he asked, ‘What do you want of me?’

“Azazel’s son did not reply but wrapped his fingers around the neck of Noah’s son and squeezed until he felt the brittle bones of the throat collapse. In that moment, even before the Flood wiped out the wicked creatures of the earth, God’s plan of a purified world faltered. The future of the Nephilim race solidified, and the new world came into being.

“Semjaza’s daughter stepped from the forest and placed her hands over the face of Azazel’s son. She had memorized the spells her father had taught her. As she touched Azazel’s son, his appearance changed: His lustrous beauty dimmed, and his angelic features faded. She whispered words into his ear, and he transformed into the image of Japheth. Weakened by the transformation, he stumbled away from Semjaza’s daughter, making his way through the forest to the Ark.

“Noah’s wife took one look at her son and knew in an instant that he had changed. His face was the same and his bearing the same, but something about his manner was strange, and so she asked him where he had been and what had happened to him. He could not speak in human language, and so Azazel’s son remained quiet, further terrifying his mother. She sent for Japheth’s wife, a lovely woman who had known Japheth from his childhood. She, too, discerned the corruption of her Japheth, but as his physical characteristics were identical to those of the man she had married, she could not say what had changed. Japheth’s brothers recoiled, fearful of Japheth’s presence. Nevertheless, Japheth remained on board the Ark as the water began to sweep the ground from below. It was the seventeenth day of the second month. The Flood had begun.

“The rain poured over the Ark, filling the valleys and the cities. Water rose to the base of the mountains and then to the peaks. The Nephilim watched as the water lifted higher and higher, until they could not see land any longer. Terrified cheetahs and leopards clung to trees; the terrible howling of dying wolves echoed through the air. A giraffe stood on a lone hilltop, water gushing over its body as it angled its nose up and up and up until the water overwhelmed it. The bodies of humans and animals and Nephilim floated like dragonflies over the surface of the world, undulating with the tides, rotting and sinking to the ocean floor. Tangles of hair and limbs sloshed against the prow of Noah’s boat, rising and sinking in the soup of water. The air became sweet with the smell of sun-baked flesh.

“The Ark floated adrift over the earth until the twenty-seventh day of the second month of the following year, a total of three hundred seventy days. Noah and his family encountered nothing but endless death and endless water, an ever-moving gray sheet of rain, a wave-tossed horizon for as far as one could see, water and more water, a shoreless world bereft of solidity. They floated upon the surface of the sea for so long that they exhausted their store of wine and grain and lived on chicken eggs and water.

“When the Ark grounded and the waters receded, Noah and his family released the animals from the belly of the boat, took their bags of seed, and planted them. Before long the sons of Noah began to repopulate the world. The archangels, acting out the will of God, came to their aid, bestowing great fertility upon the animals, the soil, and the women. The crops had sun and rain; the animals found sufficient food; the women did not die in childbirth. Everything grew. Nothing perished. The world began again.

“The sons of Noah claimed everything that they saw as their own. They became patriarchs, each founding a race of humanity. They migrated to far-off regions of the planet, establishing dynasties that we recognize even today as distinct. Shem, Noah’s oldest son, traveled to the Middle East, founding the Semitic tribe; Ham, Noah’s second son, moved below the equator, into Africa, forming the Hamitic tribe; and Japheth-or rather, the creature disguised as Japheth-took over the area between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, founding what would one day be called Europe. Japheth’s progeny have plagued us ever since. As Europeans, we must contemplate our relation to our ancestral origins. Are we free of such devilish associations? Or are we in some way connected to the children of Japheth?”

Dr. Raphael’s lecture ended abruptly. He stopped speaking, closed his notebook, and urged us to return to his next lecture. I knew from experience that Dr. Raphael halted his lectures in this manner on purpose, leaving his students expecting more. It was a pedagogical tool that I came to respect after having attended his lectures as a first-year student-I had not missed one of them. The rustling of papers and the shuffling of feet filled the room as students gathered in groups, preparing for dinner or evening study. Like the others, I collected my belongings. Dr. Raphael’s tale had left me in something of a trance, and I found it particularly difficult to come to my senses in a group of people, many of whom were complete strangers to me. Gabriella’s familiar presence at my side was comforting. I turned to ask her if she would like to walk to our apartment to prepare dinner.

Once I saw her, however, I stopped cold. Gabriella’s appearance had changed. Her hair was matted with sweat, her skin pallid and clammy. The thick black kohl she wore about her eyes-a flourish of cosmetics that I had come to think of as Gabriella’s morbid trademark-had smeared even farther below her eyes, whether from perspiration or tears, I could not say. Her large green eyes gazed ahead but appeared to see nothing at all. Her disposition gave her a most frightening appearance, as if she were in the grip of tubercular devastation. It was then that I noticed the bloodied burns that had eaten the flesh of her forearm and the lovely golden lighter clutched in her hand. I tried to speak, to ask her for an explanation for such strange behavior, but a look from Gabriella stopped me before I could speak. In her eyes I saw a strength and determination that I myself did not possess. I knew that she would remain inscrutable. Whatever dark and terrible secrets she held would never be opened to me. For some reason, although I could not understand why, this knowledge both comforted and horrified me at once.

Later, when I returned to our apartment, Gabriella sat in the kitchen. A pair of scissors and some white bandages lay on the table before her. Seeing that she might need my assistance, I went to her. In the sunny atmosphere of our apartment, the burn took on a ghastly color-her flesh had been blackened by the flame and oozed a clear substance. I measured out a length of bandage.

Gabriella said, “Thank you, but I can take care of myself.”

My frustration grew as she took the bandage from me and proceeded to dress the wound. I watched her for a moment, then said, “How could you do such a thing? What is wrong with you?”

She smiled as if I had said something that amused her. Indeed, I thought for a moment she might laugh at me. But she simply returned to dressing her arm and said, “You wouldn’t understand, Celestine. You are too good, too pure, to understand what is wrong with me.”

In the days that followed, the more I tried to understand the mystery of Gabriella’s actions, the more secretive she became. She began to spend her nights away from our shared apartment on the rue Gassendi, leaving me to wonder at her whereabouts and her safety. She returned to our quarters only when I myself was away, and I detected her comings and goings by the clothes she left behind or removed from her closet. I would step through the apartment and find a drinking glass, its rim imprinted with a smudge of red lipstick; a strand of black hair; the scent of Shalimar lingering upon her clothing; and I understood that Gabriella was avoiding me. It was only during the daytime, when we worked together in the Athenaeum, boxes of notebooks and papers spread before us, that I was in the company of my friend, but even then it was as if I weren’t there at all.

Worse, I had begun to believe that Gabriella examined my papers in my absence, reading my notebooks and checking my place in various books we’d been assigned, as if gauging my advancement and measuring it against her own. She was too cunning to leave evidence of her intrusions, and I had never found proof of her presence in my room, so I took extra care of what I left lying about my desk. I had no doubt that she would steal anything she found useful, even as she maintained her disposition of blithe apathy toward our shared work at the Athenaeum.

As the days went by, I began to lose myself in daily routine. Our tasks were tedious in the beginning, consisting of little more than reading notebooks and making reports of potentially useful information. Gabriella had been given work that suited her interest in the mythological and historical aspects of angelology, while I had been assigned the more mathematical task of categorizing caves and gorges, working to isolate the location of the lyre.

One afternoon in October, as Gabriella sat across from me, her black hair curling at her chin, I drew a notebook from one of the many boxes before us and examined it with care. It was an unusual notebook, short and rather thick, with a hard, scuffed binding. A leather strap-fastened by a golden clasp-bound the covers together. Examining the clasp more closely, I saw that it had been fashioned into the likeness of a golden angel no bigger in size than my smallest finger. It was long and narrow, with a stylized face containing two inlaid blue sapphire eyes, a flowing tunic, and a pair of sickle-shaped wings. I ran my fingers over the cold metal. Pressing the wings between my fingers, I felt resistance and then a satisfying pop as the mechanism gave. The notebook fell open, and I placed it flat upon my lap, straightening the pages under my fingers. I glanced at Gabriella to see if she had noticed my discovery, but she was engrossed in her reading and did not, to my relief, see the beautiful notebook in my hands.

I understood at once that this was one of the journals Seraphina had mentioned having kept in her later years of study, her observations consolidated and distilled into a succinct primer. Indeed, the journal contained much more than simple lecture notes. Flipping to the beginning of the book, I found the word ANGELOLOGY stamped into the first page in golden ink. The pages had been cluttered with consolidated notes, speculations, questions jotted down during lectures or in preparation for an exam. As I read, I detected Dr. Seraphina’s burgeoning love for antediluvian geology: Maps of Greece, Macedonia, Bulgaria, and Turkey had been drawn meticulously over the pages, as if she had traced the exact contours of each country’s border, sketching every mountain range and lake. The names of caves and mountain passes and gorges appeared in Greek, Latin, or Cyrillic, depending upon the alphabet native to the region. Tiny notations appeared in the margins, and it soon became apparent that these drawings had been created in preparation for an expedition. Dr. Seraphina had had her heart set on a second expedition since she was a student. I realize that by resuming Dr. Seraphina’s work with these maps, there was a chance that I myself could uncover the geographical mystery of Clematis’s expedition.

Reading further, I found Dr. Seraphina’s sketches scattered like treasures among the narrow columns of words. There were halos, trumpets, wings, harps, and lyres-the thirty-year-old doodlings of a dreamy student distracted during lectures. There were pages filled with drawings and quotations excerpted from early works of angelology. At the center of the notebook, I came across some pages of numerical squares, or magic squares as they were commonly known. The squares consisted of a series of numbers that equaled a constant sum in each row, diagonal, and column: a magic constant. Of course, I knew the history of magic squares-their presence in Persia, India, and China and their earliest advent in Europe in the engravings of Albrecht Dürer, an artist whose work I admired-but I had never had the opportunity to examine one.

Dr. Seraphina’s words were written across the page in faded red ink:

One of the most famous squares-and the most commonly used for our purposes-is the Sator-Rotas Square, the oldest example of which was discovered in Herculaneum, or Ercolano as it is called today, an Italian city partially destroyed by the explosion of Mount Vesuvius in year 79 of the present era. The Sator-Rotas is a Latin palindrome, an acrostic that can be read in a number of ways. Traditionally, the square has been used in angelology to signify that a pattern is present. The square is not a code, as it is often mistaken to be, but a symbol to alert the angelologist that a larger schematic importance is at hand. In certain cases the square alerts us that something is hidden nearby-a missive or communication, perhaps. Magical squares have always played a part in religious ceremonies, and this square is no exception. The use of such squares is ancient, and our group does not take credit for their development in this regard. Indeed, the squares have been found in China, Arabia, India, and Europe and were even constructed by Benjamin Franklin in the United States in the eighteenth century.

The next page contained the Square of Mars, the numbers of which drew my eye into it with an almost magnetic pull.

Below the square Seraphina had written:

The Sigil of Michael. Sigil derives from the Latin sigilum, which means “seal,” or the Hebrew segulah meaning “word of spiritual effect.” In ceremony each sigil represents a spiritual being-either white or black-whose presence can be summoned by the angelologist, most prominently the higher orders of angels and demons. Summoning occurs through incantations, sigils, and a series of sympathetic interchanges between spirit and summoning agent. Nota bene: Incantatory summoning is an extraordinarily dangerous undertaking, often proving fatal to the medium, and must be used only as a last and final effort to bring forth angelic beings.

Turning to another page, I found numerous sketches of musical instruments-a lute and a lyre and a beautifully rendered harp, similar to the drawings that filled earlier pages of the notebook. Such instruments meant little to me. I could not imagine the sounds the instruments would make when played, nor did I know how to read musical notation. My strengths had always been numerical, and as a result I had studied mathematics and the sciences and knew next to nothing about music. Ethereal musicology-which Vladimir, the angelologist from Russia, knew so well-had thus far completely baffled me, the modes and scales clouding my mind.

Occupied with these thoughts for some time, I at last looked up from my reading. Gabriella had moved next to me on the settee, her chin resting in her hand, her eyes moving languidly over the pages of a bound text. She wore clothing I had not noticed before, a silk twill blouse and wide-legged trousers that appeared custom-tailored to her figure. The hint of a bandage could be seen under the diaphanous silk sleeve of her left arm, the only remaining evidence of the trauma I had witnessed after Dr. Raphael’s lecture weeks earlier. She seemed to be another person entirely from the frightened girl who had burned her arm.

Examining the book in her hands, I discerned the title The Book of Enoch stamped upon the spine. Much as I wanted to share my discovery with Gabriella, I knew better than to interrupt her reading, and so instead I refastened the golden clasp of the journal, pressing the delicate sickle-shaped wings together until they caught and clicked. Then, resolving to forge ahead in our cataloging duties, I braided my hair-long, unruly blond hair that I wished to cut into a severe bob, as Gabriella had done-and began the tedious task of sorting through the Valkos’ papers alone.

Dr. Seraphina came to check on us each day at noon, bringing a basket of bread and cheese, a pot of mustard, and a bottle of cold water for our lunch. Usually I could hardly wait for her arrival, but that morning I had been so engrossed in my work that I did not realize it was nearly time for a break until she swept into the room and deposited the basket on the table before us. In the hours that had passed, I had barely noticed anything at all but the seemingly endless accretion of data, especially the Valkos’ field notes from their earliest expedition, a grueling journey through the Pyrenees, with measurements of caves, their gradations and densities of granites filling ten field journals. It was only as Dr. Seraphina sat with us and I was able to pull myself away from my work did I realize that I was extremely hungry. Clearing the table, I gathered the papers and closed the notebooks. I made myself comfortable on the settee, my gabardine skirt slipping on the textured vermilion silk, and prepared for lunch.

After arranging the basket on the table before us, Dr. Seraphina turned to Gabriella. “How are you progressing?”

“I have been reading Enoch’s account of the Watchers,” Gabriella replied.

“Ah,” Dr. Seraphina said. “I should have known you would be attracted to Enoch. It is one of the most interesting texts in our canon. And one of the strangest.”

“Strangest?” I said, glancing at Gabriella. If Enoch was so brilliant, why hadn’t Gabriella shared his work with me?

“It is a fascinating text,” Gabriella said, her face brimming with intelligence, the very passionate brilliance that I usually admired. “I had no idea that it existed.”

“When was it written?” I asked, not a little jealous that Gabriella was once again ahead of the game. “Is it modern?”

“It is an apocryphal prophecy written by a direct descendant of Noah,” Gabriella said. “Enoch claimed to have been taken into heaven and given direct access to the angels.”

“In the modern era, The Book of Enoch has been dismissed as the dream vision of a mad patriarch,” Dr. Seraphina said. “But it is our primary reference to the story of the Watchers.”

I had discovered a similar story in our professor’s journal and began to wonder if I had read the same text. As if detecting my thoughts, Dr. Seraphina said, “I copied some sections of Enoch into the journal you have been reading, Celestine.” Picking up the journal with the angel clasp, she turned it over in her hand. “Surely you came across the passages. But The Book of Enoch is so elaborate, so filled with wonderful information, that I recommend you read it in its entirety. In fact, Dr. Raphael will require you to read it in your third year. If, that is, we will be conducting courses next year at all.”

Gabriella said, “There is a passage that particularly struck me.”

“Yes?” Dr. Seraphina said, looking delighted. “Do you recall it?”

Gabriella recited the passage. “‘And there appeared to me two men very tall, such as I have never seen on earth. And their faces shone like the sun, and their eyes were like burning lamps, and fire came forth from their lips. Their dress had the appearance of feathers: their feet were purple, their wings brighter than gold; their hands were whiter than snow.”’

I felt my cheeks grow hot. Gabriella’s talents, which had once made me love her, now had the opposite effect.

“Excellent,” Dr. Seraphina said, looking both pleased and circumspect at once. “And why did that passage strike you?”

“These angels are not the sweet cherubs standing at heaven’s gate, not the luminous figures we see in Renaissance paintings,” Gabriella said. “They are fearsome, frightening creatures. I found, as I read Enoch’s account of the angels, that they are horrible, almost monstrous. To be honest, they terrify me.”

I stared at Gabriella in disbelief. Gabriella returned my gaze, and I sensed-for the briefest moment-that she was trying to tell me something but could not. I longed for her to say more, to explain herself to me, but she merely turned a cold eye on me once more.

Dr. Seraphina thought Gabriella’s statement over for a moment, and I wondered if she might know more about my friend than I. Standing, she walked to her cupboard, opened a drawer, and removed a hammered-copper cylinder. After slipping on a pair of white gloves, she twisted it, popped off a wafer-thin copper lid, and tapped out a scroll. Flattening it on the coffee table before us, she lifted a leaded-crystal paperweight and anchored one end of the scroll upon the tabletop. The other she held with the palm of her long, thin hand. I stared at the yellow, crinkled scroll as Dr. Seraphina unfolded it.

Gabriella leaned over and touched the edge of the scroll. “That is Enoch’s vision?” she asked.

“A copy,” Dr. Seraphina said. “There were hundreds of such manuscripts circulating during the second century B.C. According to our chief archivist, we have a number of the originals, all slightly different, as these things usually were. We became interested in preserving them when the Vatican began to destroy them. This one is not nearly as precious as those in the vault.”

The scroll was made of thick, leathery paper, the rubric in Latin and the words drawn in precisely articulated calligraphy. The margins were illuminated with slender golden angels, their silver robes curling against folded golden wings.

Dr. Seraphina turned to us. “Can you read it?”

I had studied Latin as well as Greek and Aramaic, but the calligraphy was difficult to make out and the Latin seemed strange and unfamiliar.

Gabriella asked, “When was the scroll copied?”

“The seventeenth century or so,” Dr. Seraphina said. “It is a modern reproduction of a much older manuscript, one that predates the texts that became the Bible. The original is locked up in our vault, as are hundreds of other manuscripts, where they are safe. We have been scavengers of texts since our work began. It is our greatest strength-we are the holders of the truth, and this information protects us. In fact, you would find that many of the fragments collected in the Bible itself-and many that should have been included but were not-reside in our possession.”

Leaning closer to the scroll, I said, “It is difficult to read. Is it Vulgate?”

“Let me read it for you,” Dr. Seraphina said, smoothing the scroll once again with her gloved hand. “‘And the men took me and brought me to the second heaven, and showed me the darkness, and there I saw the prisoners suspended, reserved for and waiting the eternal judgment. And these angels were gloomy in appearance, more than the darkness of the earth. And they unceasingly wept every hour, and I said to the men who were with me: ”Why are these men continually tortured? ’””

I turned the words over in my mind. Although I had spent years reading the old texts, I had never heard anything like it before. “What is it?”

“Enoch,” Gabriella said, instantly. “He has just entered the second heaven.”

“The second?” I asked, confused.

“There are seven,” Gabriella said authoritatively. “Enoch visited each one and wrote of what he found there.”

“Go,” Dr. Seraphina said, gesturing to a bookshelf that spanned the entire wall of the room. “On the farthest shelf, you will find the Bibles.”

I followed Dr. Seraphina’s directions. After choosing a Bible I found to be particularly lovely-with a thick leather cover and a hand-stitched binding, a book that was heavy and difficult to carry-I brought it back to the table and placed it before my professor.

“You’ve chosen my favorite,” Dr. Seraphina said, as if my choice confirmed her faith in my judgment. “I saw this same Bible as a girl, when I first announced to the council that I would be an angelologist. It was at their famous conference of 1919, after Europe had been ravaged by the war. I had an instinctual attraction to the profession. There hadn’t been an angelologist in my family before, which is rather strange-angelology runs in families. Yet at sixteen years old, I knew exactly what I would be and was not in the least shy about it!” Dr. Seraphina paused, collected herself, and said, “Now, come closer. I have something to show you.”

She placed the Bible on the table and opened the pages slowly, carefully. “Here is Genesis 6. Read it.”

We read the passage, taken from the 1297 translation of Guyart des Moulins:

And it came to pass when the children of men had multiplied that in those days were born to them beautiful and fair daughters. And the angels, the sons of heaven, saw and lusted after them, and said to one another: “Come, let us choose wives from among the children of men and have children with them.”

“I read that this afternoon,” Gabriella said.

“No,” Dr. Seraphina corrected. “This is not Enoch. Although there is a very similar version in The Book of Enoch, this is different. It is from Genesis and is the single point where the accepted version of events-those that contemporary religious scholars accept as true-meets the apocryphal. Of course, the apocryphal works are the richest source of angelic history. Once Enoch was studied extensively, but as is often the case with a dogmatic institution like the church, they found it threatening and began to remove Enoch from the canon.”

Gabriella seemed distressed. “But why?” she asked. “This material could be so helpful, especially to scholars.”

“Helpful? I don’t see how. It was only natural that the church would suppress such information,” Dr. Seraphina responded brusquely. “The Book of Enoch was dangerous to their version of history. This version,” she said, uncapping the cylinder and tapping out another scroll, “was written after many years of oral legend. It does in fact come from the same source. The author wrote it at the time of many of the texts in the Old Testament of the Bible-in other words, at the time the Talmudic texts were composed.”

“But that doesn’t explain the church’s reason for suppressing it,” Gabriella said.

“Their reason is obvious. Enoch’s version of the story is laced with all sorts of ecstatic language-religious and visionary extremes that conservative scholars thought to be exaggerations, or worse: madness. Enoch’s personal reflections about what he calls ‘the elect’ were particularly disturbing. There are many passages of Enoch’s personal conversations with God. As you can imagine, most theologians found the work blasphemous. To be frank, Enoch was considered controversial throughout the earliest years of Christianity. Nonetheless, The Book of Enoch is the most significant angelological text we have. It is the only record of the true origin of evil on earth that was written by a man and passed among men.”

My envy of Gabriella disappeared, replaced by an intense curiosity about what Dr. Seraphina would tell us.

“When religious scholars became interested in restoring The Book of Enoch, a Scottish explorer named James Bruce found a version of this text in Ethiopia. Another copy was found in Belgrade. As you can imagine, these discoveries were at cross purposes to the church’s attempt to wipe out the text completely. But it may surprise you to know that we have helped them along the way, taking copies of Enoch out of circulation and storing them in our library. The Vatican’s desire to pretend that Nephilim and angelologists do not exist is equal to our desire to remain hidden. It all works out quite well, I suppose, our mutual agreement to pretend the other does not exist.”

“It is surprising that we don’t work together,” I said.

“Not at all,” Dr. Seraphina replied. “Once angelology was the center of attention in religious circles, one of the most revered branches of theology. That quickly changed. After the Crusades and the outrages of the Inquisition, we knew that it was time to distance ourselves from the church. Even before this, however, we had moved the majority of our efforts underground, hunting the Famous Ones alone. We have always been a force of resistance-a partisan group, if you will-fighting them from a safe distance. The less visible we became, the better, especially because the Nephilim themselves had contrived to create an almost perfect secrecy. The Vatican is aware of our activities, of course, but has chosen to leave us in peace, at least for the time being. The advancements the Nephilim made under the cover of businesses and government operations made them anonymous. Their greatest achievement in the past three hundred years has been hiding themselves in plain sight. They have put us under constant surveillance, emerging only to attack us, to benefit from wars or shady business dealings, and then they quietly disappear. Of course, they have also done a marvelous job separating the intellectuals from the religious. They have made sure that humanity will not have another Newton or Copernicus, thinkers who revere both Science and God. Atheism was their greatest invention. Darwin’s work, despite the man’s extreme dependence upon religion, was twisted and propagated by them. The Nephilim have succeeded in making people believe that humanity is self-generated, self-sufficient, free of the divine, sui generis. It is an illusion that makes our work much more difficult and their detection nearly impossible.”

Carefully, Dr. Seraphina rolled the scroll and slid it into the copper cylinder. Turning to the woven basket containing our lunch, she opened it and placed a baguette and cheese before us, encouraging us to eat. I was famished. The bread was warm and soft in my hands, leaving the slightest slick of butter on my fingers as I tore off a piece.

“Father Bogomil, one of our founding fathers, compiled our first independent angelology in the tenth century as a pedagogical tool. Later angelologies included taxonomies of the Nephilim. As the majority of our people resided in monasteries throughout Europe, the angelologies were copied by hand and guarded by the monastic community, usually within the monastery itself. It was a fruitful period in our history. Outside the exclusive group of angelologists, whose mission was narrowly focused upon our enemies, scholarship on the general properties, powers, and purposes of angels flourished. For the angelologist the Middle Ages were a time of great advances. Awareness of angelic powers, both good and evil, rose to its prime. Shrines, statues, and paintings gave pervasive awareness of the basic principles of angelic presence to the masses of people. A sense of beauty and hope became a part of everyday life, in spite of the illnesses that ravaged the population. Although there were magicians and Gnostics and Cathars-various sects that exalted or distorted angelic reality-we were able to defend ourselves from the machinations of the hybrid creatures, or Giants, as we often refer to them. The church, for all the harm it was capable of doing, protected civilization under the aegis of belief. Frankly, although my husband would say otherwise, this was the last time we had the upper hand against the Nephilim.”

Dr. Seraphina paused to watch me finish my lunch, perhaps concluding that my studies had left me starved, although Gabriella-who had not eaten a thing-seemed to have lost her appetite completely. Embarrassed by my lack of manners, I wiped my hands on the linen napkin in my lap.

“How did the Nephilim attain this?” I asked.

“Their dominance?” Dr. Seraphina asked. “It is very simple. After the Middle Ages, the balance of power changed. The Nephilim began to recover lost pagan texts-the work of Greek philosophers, Sumerian mythologies, Persian scientific and medical texts-and circulate them through the intellectual centers of Europe. The result, of course, was a disaster for the church. And this was only the beginning. The Nephilim made certain that materialism became fashionable among the elite families. The Hapsburgs were just one example of how the Giants infiltrated and overwhelmed a family, the Tudors another. Although we agree with the principles of the Enlightenment, it was a major victory for the Nephilim. The French Revolution-where the separation of church and state and the illusion that humans should rely upon rationalism in lieu of the spiritual world-was another. As time passed, the Nephilistic program unfolded on earth. They promoted atheism, secular humanism, Darwinism, and the extremes of materialism. They engineered the idea of progress. They created a new religion for the masses: science.

“By the twentieth century, our geniuses were atheists and our artists relativists. The faithful had fractured into a thousand bickering denominations. Divided, we have been easy to manipulate. Unfortunately, our enemies have fully integrated into human society, developing networks of influence in government, industry, the newspapers. For hundreds of years, they have simply fed off the labor of humanity, giving nothing back, taking and taking and building their empire. Their greatest victory, however, has been to hide their presence from us. They have made us believe we are free.”

“And we are not?” I asked.

“Look around you, Celestine,” Dr. Seraphina said, growing irritated by my naive questions. “Our entire academy is being disbanded and forced underground. We are utterly helpless in the face of their advances. The Nephilim seek out human weaknesses, latching on to the most power-hungry and ambitious; then they advance their causes through these figures. Luckily, the Nephilim are limited in their power. They can be outsmarted.”

“How are you so certain?” Gabriella asked. “Perhaps it is humanity who will be outsmarted.”

“It is entirely possible,” Dr. Seraphina said, studying Gabriella. “But Raphael and I will do everything in our power to prevent it from happening. The First Angelological Expedition marked the beginning of the effort. Father Clematis, the erudite and brave man who led the expedition, dictated his account of his efforts to find the lyre. The account of this journey was lost for many centuries. Raphael, as you surely know, recovered it. We will use it to find the location of the gorge.”

The momentous discovery of the account of Clematis’s expedition was legendary among those students who adored the Valkos. Dr. Raphael Valko had recovered Father Clematis’s journal in 1919, in a village in northern Greece, where it had been buried among papers for many centuries. He’d been a young scholar at the time, with no distinction. The discovery catapulted him to the highest levels of angelological circles. The text was a valuable account of the expedition, but, most important, it offered the hope that the Valkos might reenact Clematis’s journey. If the precise coordinates of the cavern could have been discerned in the text, the Valkos would certainly have embarked upon their own expedition years ago.

“I thought Raphael’s translation fell out of favor,” Gabriella said, an observation that, no matter how true, struck me as insolent. Dr. Seraphina, however, appeared unfazed.

“The society has studied this text extensively, trying to understand exactly what happened during the expedition. But you are right, Gabriella. Ultimately, we have found Clematis’s account to be barren.”

“Why?” I asked, astonished that such a significant text could be disregarded.

“Because it is an imprecise document. The most important portion of the account was taken down during the final hours of Clematis’s life, when he was half mad from the travails of his journey to the cave. Father Deopus, the man who transcribed Clematis’s account, could not have captured every detail accurately. He did not draw a map, and the original that brought Clematis to the gorge was not found with his papers. After many attempts we have accepted the sad truth that the map must have been lost in the cave itself.”

“What I do not understand,” Gabriella said, “is how Clematis could fail to create a copy. It is the most basic procedure in any expedition.”

“Clearly something went terribly wrong,” Dr. Seraphina said. “Father Clematis returned to Greece in a state of distress and fell into severe confusion for the remaining weeks of his life. His entire expedition party had perished, his supplies were gone, even the donkeys had been lost or stolen. According to the accounts of contemporaries, particularly Father Deopus, Clematis seemed like a man awoken from a dream. He ranted and prayed in a most horrible fashion, as if touched by madness. So, to answer your question, Gabriella, we understand that something happened, but we are not sure exactly what.”

“But you have a theory?” Gabriella asked.

“Of course,” Dr. Seraphina said, smiling. “It is all there in his account, dictated at his deathbed. My husband took great pains to translate the text precisely. I believe Clematis found exactly what he was looking for in the cavern. It was Clematis’s discovery of the angels in their prison that drove the poor man mad.”

I could not say why Dr. Seraphina’s words caused me such agitation. I had read many secondary sources surrounding the First Angelological Expedition, and yet I was utterly terrified by the image of Clematis trapped in the depths of the earth, surrounded by otherworldly creatures.

Dr. Seraphina continued, “Some say that the First Angelological Expedition was foolhardy and unnecessary. I, as you both know, believe that the expedition was essential. It was our duty to verify that the legends surrounding the Watchers and the generation of the Nephilim were, in fact, true. The First Expedition was primarily a mission to discern the truth: Were the Watchers imprisoned in the cave of Orpheus, and, if so, were they still in possession of the lyre?”

“It is confounding that they were imprisoned for simple disobedience,” Gabriella said.

“There is nothing simple about disobedience,” Dr. Seraphina said sharply. “Remember that Satan was once one of the most majestic of the angels-a noble seraph until he disobeyed God’s command. Not only did the Watchers disobey their orders, they brought divine technologies to earth, teaching the art of warfare to their children, who in turn imparted it to humanity. The Greek legend of Prometheus illustrates the ancient perception of this transgression. This was thought to be the most damnable of sins, as such knowledge upset the balance of postlapsarian human society. Since we have The Book of Enoch before us, let me read what they did to poor Azazel. It was quite awful.”

Dr. Seraphina took the book Gabriella had been studying and began to read:

“‘The Archangel Raphael was told: Bind Azazel hand and foot and cast him into the darkness and split open the desert, which is in Dundael, and cast him in it. And fill the hole by covering him with rough and jagged rocks, and cover him with darkness, and let him live there forever, and cover his face that he may not see the light. And on the day of the great judgment, he shall be hurled into the fire.”’

“They can never be freed?” Gabriella asked.

“In truth, we have no idea when or if they can be set free. Our scholars’ interest in the Watchers pertains only to what they can tell us about our earthly, mortal enemies,” she said, removing the white gloves. “The Nephilim will stop at nothing to reclaim what was lost in the Flood. This is the catastrophe we have been trying to prevent. The Venerable Father Clematis, the most intrepid of the founding members, took it upon himself to initiate the battle against our vile enemies. His methods were flawed, and yet there is much to be learned from studying Clematis’s account of his journey. I find it most fascinating, despite the mystery it leaves behind. I only hope you will read it with care one day.”

Gabriella stared intently at her teacher, eyes narrowed. “Perhaps there is something in Clematis you’ve overlooked?” she said.

“Something new in Clematis?” Dr. Seraphina replied, amused. “It is an ambitious goal, but rather unlikely. Dr. Raphael is the preeminent scholar on the First Angelological Expedition. He and I have gone over every word of Clematis’s account a thousand times and have found nothing new.”

“But it is possible,” I said, not to be outdone by Gabriella once again. “There is always a chance that new information will emerge about the location of the cave.”

“Frankly, it will be a much greater use of your time if you focus upon the smaller details of our work,” Dr. Seraphina said, dismissing our hopes with a wave of her hand. “Thus far the data you have collected and organized has offered the best hope for finding the cavern. Of course, you may try your luck with Clematis. However, I must warn you that he can be a great puzzle. He beckons one forward, promising to answer the mysteries of the Watchers, and then remains eerily silent. He is an angelological sphinx. If you are capable of bringing something new to light from Clematis, my dear, you will be the first to accompany me on the Second Angelic Expedition.”

Throughout the remaining weeks of October, Gabriella and I spent our days in Dr. Seraphina’s office, working with quiet determination as we cataloged and organized the mountains of information. The intensity of our schedule and the passion with which I strove to understand the materials before me left me too exhausted to ponder Gabriella’s increasingly strange behavior. She spent little time at our apartment and no longer attended the Valkos’ lectures. Her work on cataloging had fallen off so that she came to Dr. Seraphina’s office only a few days a week, while I was there every day. It was a relief to be so occupied as to forget the rift that had developed between us. For a month I charted mathematical data relating to the depth of Balkan geologic formations, a task that was so tedious I began to wonder at its benefit. Yet despite the seemingly endless stream of facts the Valkos had collected, I carried on without complaint, knowing that there was a larger purpose at hand. The pressure of our impending move from our school buildings and the dangers of the war only added urgency to my task.

On a sleepy afternoon in early November, the gray sky pressing upon the large windows of Dr. Seraphina’s office, our professor arrived and announced that she had something of interest to show us. There was so much work before us, and Gabriella and I were so buried in papers, that we began to object to the interruption.

“Come,” Dr. Seraphina said, smiling slightly, “you have worked hard all day. A short break will clear your minds.”

It was an odd request to make-Dr. Seraphina had warned us often that time was running out-but a relief nonetheless. I welcomed the recess, and Gabriella, who had been agitated most of the day for reasons I could only guess, appeared to need a respite as well.

Dr. Seraphina led us away from her office, through a winding hallway and into the farthest reaches of the school, where a series of long-abandoned offices opened upon a darkened gallery. Inside, under the dim light of electric bulbs, hired assistants were fitting paintings and statues and other works of fine art into wooden boxes. Sawdust littered the marble floor so that in the waning afternoon light the room had the aspect of the ruins of an exhibition. Gabriella’s characteristic appreciation of such precious works drew her to wander from object to object, looking carefully upon each, as if memorizing it before its departure. I turned to Dr. Seraphina, hoping she would explain the nature of our visit, but she was wholly absorbed in studying Gabriella. She watched her every move, weighing her reactions.

On the tables, waiting to be packed away, uncountable manuscripts lay open for view. The sight of so many precious objects collected in one place made me wish that I were with the Gabriella I had known the year before. Then our friendship had been one of intense scholarship and mutual respect. A year ago Gabriella and I would have stopped to discuss the exotic beasts leering down from the paintings-the manticore with its human face and lion’s body, the harpy, the dragonlike amphisbaena, and the lascivious centaur. Gabriella would have explained everything in precise detail-how these representations were artistic depictions of evil, each one a manifestation of the devil’s grotesqueries. I used to marvel at her ability to retain an encyclopedic catalog of angelology and demonology, the academic and religious symbolism that so often eluded my more mathematical mind. But now, even if Dr. Seraphina were not present, Gabriella would have kept her observations to herself. She had withdrawn from me entirely, and my longing for her insights was the desire for a friendship that had ceased to exist.

Seraphina stayed close by, watching our reactions to the objects that surrounded us, paying particular attention to Gabriella.

“This is the point of departure for all treasures this side of the Maginot Line,” Dr. Seraphina finally said. “Once properly boxed and cataloged, they will be moved to safe locations throughout the country. My only worry,” she said, pausing before a carved ivory diptych laid out upon a bed of blue velvet, a fan of pale tissue paper crinkled about its edges, “is that we won’t get them out in time.”

The anxiety Dr. Seraphina felt at the possible invasion by the Germans was evident in her manner-she had aged considerably in the past months, her beauty tempered with fatigue and worry.

“These,” she said, gesturing to a number of wooden crates, each one nailed shut, “are being sent to a safe house in the Pyrenees. And this lovely depiction of Michael,” she said, bringing us before a glossy Baroque painting of an angel in Roman armor, his sword raised and his silver breastplate gleaming, “will be smuggled through Spain and sent to private collectors in America, along with a number of other precious pieces.”

“You have sold them?” Gabriella asked.

“In times like these,” Dr. Seraphina said, “ownership matters less than that they are protected.”

“But won’t they spare Paris?” I asked, recognizing the moment I spoke how silly the question was. “Are we really in such danger?”

“My dear,” Dr. Seraphina said, her wonder at my statement clear, “if they have their way, there will be nothing left of Europe, let alone Paris. Come, there are some objects I would like to show you. It may be many years before we see them again.”

Pausing at a partially filled wooden crate, Dr. Seraphina removed a parchment pressed between sheets of glass and brushed its surface free of sawdust. Drawing us close, she placed the manuscript on the surface of a table.

“This is a medieval angelology,” she said, her image reflected in the protective glass. “It is extensive and meticulously researched, like our best modern angelologies, but its design is a bit more ornate, as was the fashion of the era.”

I recognized the medieval markings of the manuscript-the strict, orderly hierarchy of choirs and spheres; the beautiful renderings of golden wings, musical instruments, and halos; the careful calligraphy.

“And this tiny treasure,” Dr. Seraphina said, stopping before a painting the size of an outstretched hand, “dates from the turn of the century. Quite lovely, I think, as it is painted in a modern style and focuses solely upon the representation of the Thrones-a class of angels that has been the focus of interest for angelologists for many centuries. The Thrones are of the first sphere of angels, along with the Seraphim and Cherubim. They are conduits between the physical worlds and have great powers of movement.”

“Incredible,” I said, gazing at the painting in what must have been obvious awe.

Dr. Seraphina began to laugh. “Yes, it is,” she said. “Our collections are immense. We’re building a network of libraries throughout the world-Oslo, Budapest, Barcelona-simply to house them. We are hoping to one day have a reading room in Asia. Such manuscripts remind us of the historical basis of our work. All of our efforts are rooted in these texts. We depend upon the written word. It is the light that created the universe and the light that guides us through it. Without the Word, we would not know from where we came or where we are going.”

“Is that why we are so interested in preserving these angelologies?” I asked. “They are guides to the future?”

“Without them we would be lost,” Seraphina said. “John said that in the Beginning there was the Word and the Word was with God. What he did not say is that in order to be meaningful the Word requires interpretation. That is our role.”

“Are we here to interpret our texts?” Gabriella asked lightly. “Or to protect them?”

Dr. Seraphina gazed at Gabriella with a cool, assessing eye. “What do you believe, Gabriella?”

“I believe that if we do not protect our traditions from those who would destroy them, soon there will be nothing left to interpret.”

“Ah, so you are a warrior, then,” Dr. Seraphina said, challenging Gabriella. “There are always those who would put on armor and go to battle. But the real genius is in finding a way to get what you desire without dying for it.”

“In times like these,” Gabriella said, walking ahead, “one has no choice.”

We examined a number of objects in silence until we came to a thick book placed at the center of a table. Dr. Seraphina called Gabriella over, watching her intently, as if she were reading her gestures for something, although I could not say what.

“Is it a genealogy?” I asked, examining the rows of charts drafted upon the surface. “It is filled with human names.”

“Not all human,” Gabriella said, stepping closer to read the text. “There are Tzaphkiel and Sandalphon and Raziel.”

Squinting at the manuscript, I saw that she was correct: Angels were mixed into the human lines. “The names aren’t arranged in a vertical hierarchy of spheres and choirs, but in another kind of schema.”

“These diagrams are the speculative charts,” Dr. Seraphina said, a gravity to her voice that made me believe she had brought us through the maze of treasures so that we might at last come to this very place. “Over the course of time, we have had Jewish, Christian, and Muslim angelologists-all three religions reserve a central place in their cosmology for angels-and we have had more unusual scholars: Gnostics, Sufis, a number of representatives from Asian religions. As you might imagine, our agents’ works have deviated in crucial ways. The speculative angelologies are the work of a band of brilliant Jewish scholars from the seventeenth century who became engrossed in tracing the genealogies of Nephilistic families.”

I came from a traditional Catholic family and, having been educated in a strict fashion, knew very little about the doctrines of other religions. I did know, however, that my fellow students were from many different backgrounds. Gabriella, for example, was Jewish, and Dr. Seraphina-perhaps the most empirically minded and skeptical of all my teachers aside from her husband-claimed to be agnostic, to the chagrin of many of the professors. This, however, was the first time I fully understood the range of religious affiliations incorporated into the history and canon of our discipline.

Dr. Seraphina continued, “Our angelologists studied Jewish genealogies with great care. Historically, Jewish scholars kept meticulous genealogical records due to inheritance laws, but also because they understood the essential importance of tracing one’s history to the very root, so accounts can be cross-referenced and verified. When I was your age and intent upon researching the finer points of angelology, I studied Jewish genealogical practices. As a matter of fact, I recommend that all serious students learn these methods. They are marvelously precise.”

Dr. Seraphina turned the pages of the book, stopping before a beautifully drawn document framed in gold leaf. “This is a genealogy of Jesus’s family trees drawn in the twelfth century by one of our scholars. According to the Christian schema, Jesus was a direct descendant of Adam. Here we have Mary’s family tree, as it was written by Luke-Adam, Noah, Shem, Abraham, David.” Dr. Seraphina’s finger traced the line down the chart. “And here is the family history of Joseph written by Matthew-Solomon, Jehoshaphat, Zerubbabel, and so on.”

“Such genealogies are rather common, aren’t they?” Gabriella said. Clearly she had seen a hundred such genealogies. Since I’d had no previous exposure to such a text, my reaction could not have been more different.

“Of course,” Dr. Seraphina said, “there have been many genealogies tracing how bloodlines matched Old Testament prophecies-the promises made to Adam and Abraham and Judah and Jesse and David. This one, however, is a bit different.”

The names branched one to the next, creating a vast net of relations. I found it profoundly humbling to imagine how each name corresponded to a person who had lived and died, had worshipped and struggled, perhaps without ever knowing his or her purpose in the greater web of history.

Dr. Seraphina touched the page, her nail gleaming in the soft overhead light. Hundreds of names were written in colored inks, so many thin branches lifting from a slight stalk. “After the Flood, Noah’s son Shem founded the Semitic race. Jesus, of course, emerged from that line. Ham founded the races of Africa. Japheth-or, as you learned in Raphael’s lecture last week, the creature posing as Japheth-has been credited with the propagation of the European race, including the Nephilim. What Raphael did not emphasize in his lecture, and something I believe to be of great importance for more advanced students to understand, is that the genetic dispersion of humankind and Nephilim is much more complex than it first appears. Japheth went on to father many children with his human wife, resulting in an array of descendants. Some of these children were fully Nephilistic, some were hybrids. The children whom Japheth-the human Japheth, killed by the Nephilistic creature who posed as Japheth, that is-had fathered before his death were fully human. And so the descendants of Japheth were human, Nephilistic, and hybrid. Their intermarrying brought forth the population of Europe.”

“It is so complicated,” I said, trying to work out the various groups. “I can hardly sort through it.”

“Now you’ve hit upon the very reason for keeping these genealogical charts,” Dr. Seraphina said. “We would be in something of a mess without them.”

“I have read that a number of scholars believe that Japheth’s bloodline mixed with Shem’s,” Gabriella said, pointing to a branch of the speculative genealogy and isolating three names: Eber, Nathan, and Amon. “Here and here and here.”

I leaned in close to read the names. “How can they be sure?”

Gabriella smiled, something cruel in her manner, as if anticipating my question. “I believe there is documentation of some sort but in all truth they cannot be one hundred percent sure.”

“That is why this is called speculative angelology,” Dr. Seraphina said.

“But many scholars believe it,” Gabriella said. “It is a valid and ongoing part of angelological work.”

“Surely modern angelologists do not believe this,” I said, trying to hide my intense reaction to this information. My religious beliefs were strong even then, and such crude speculation about Christ’s paternity was not accepted doctrine. The chart, which only seconds before had seemed wonderful, now upset me a great deal. “The idea that Jesus had the blood of the Watchers is absurd.”

“Perhaps,” Dr. Seraphina said, “but there is a whole area of angelological study about this very subject. It is called angelmorphism, and it deals strictly with the idea that Jesus Christ was not even human, but an angel. After all, the Virgin Birth occurred after the Angel Gabriel’s visit.”

Gabriella said, “I believe I’ve read something about that. The Gnostics believed in Jesus’s angelic origins as well.”

“There are-or there were, I should say-hundreds of books in our library about it,” Dr. Seraphina said. “Personally, I don’t care who Jesus’s ancestors were. My concern is entirely elsewhere. This, for example, is something I find utterly fascinating, speculative or not,” Dr. Seraphina said, leading us to the next table, where a book lay open as if waiting for our examination. “It is a Nephilistic angelology that begins with the Watchers, moves through Noah’s family, and branches out with great detail throughout the ruling families of Europe. It is called The Book of Generations.”

I glanced over the page, reading the descending ladder of names as the angelology moved through the generations. Although I understood the power and the influence the Nephilim had upon human activity, I was taken aback to discover that the family lines moved through nearly every royal bloodline in Europe-the Capetians, the Hapsburgs, the Stuarts, the Carolingians. It was like reading the history of Europe dynasty by dynasty.

Dr. Seraphina said, “We cannot be completely certain that these lines were infiltrated, but there is enough proof to convince most of us that the great families of Europe have been-and still are-deeply infected with the blood of the Nephilim.”

Gabriella hung upon all that Seraphina said as if she were memorizing a timeline of dates for an examination or-and this was more apt to be at the heart of it-studying our teacher to discover her motivation for bringing us to this strange text. At last Gabriella said, “But the names of nearly all the noble families are listed. Are they all implicated in the terrors they have perpetuated?”

“Indeed. The Nephilim were the kings and queens of Europe, their desires shaping the lives of millions of people. They kept their stronghold through intermarriage, primogeniture, and brute military force,” Dr. Seraphina said. “Their kingdoms collected taxes, slaves, properties, and all kinds of mineral and agricultural wealth, attacking any group that acquired even the smallest degree of independence. Their influence was so unrivaled during the medieval period that they did not even bother to hide themselves as they once had. According to accounts of angelologists of the thirteenth century, there were cults dedicated to fallen angels that were fully orchestrated by the Nephilim. Many of the evils attributed to witches-the accused were nearly always women-were actually part of Nephilistic rituals. They believed in ancestor worship and celebrated the return of the Watchers. These families still exist today. In fact,” Dr. Seraphina said, looking at Gabriella with a strange, almost accusatory look, “we are keeping very close watch on them. These families in particular are under surveillance.”

While I glanced at the page and saw a number of names, none of which meant anything in particular to me, the effect of Seraphina’s words upon Gabriella was intense. As she read the names, she stepped back in fright. Her manner reminded me of the trance of horror I had witnessed come over her during Dr. Raphael’s lecture, only now she seemed on the verge of hysteria.

“You are wrong,” Gabriella said, her voice rising with each word. “We are not watching them. They are watching us.”

With this, she turned and ran from the room. I stared after her, wondering what could have caused such an emotional outburst. It seemed to me that she had gone mad. Turning to the manuscript once again, I saw nothing more than a page filled with family names, most of them unknown to me, some of prestigious ancient families. It was as unremarkable as any page from any of the history books we had studied together, none of which had caused Gabriella any measure of distress.

Dr. Seraphina, however, appeared to understand Gabriella’s reaction exactly. In fact, from the sanguine manner in which she had assessed Gabriella’s reactions, it was as if Dr. Seraphina had not only expected her to recoil from the book but had planned it. Seeing my confusion, Dr. Seraphina closed the book and tucked it under her arm.

“What happened?” I asked, as astonished by her manner as by Gabriella’s inexplicable behavior.

“It pains me to tell you,” Dr. Seraphina said, leading me from the room, “but I believe that our Gabriella has gotten herself into terrible trouble.”

My first impulse was to confess everything to Dr. Seraphina. The burden of Gabriella’s double life and the pall it had cast over my days had become nearly too much for me to bear. But just as I was about to speak, I was startled into silence. A dark figure swept before us, stepping from a shadowy corridor like a black-cloaked demon. I caught my breath, momentarily unbalanced by the interruption. After a brief examination, I saw that it was the heavily veiled nun-the council member I had met in the Athenaeum months before. She blocked our path.

“May I speak with you a moment, Dr. Seraphina?” The nun spoke in a low, lisping manner that I found, to my embarrassment, instantly repulsive. “There are some questions we have regarding the shipment to the United States.”

It comforted me to see that Dr. Seraphina took the nun’s presence in stride, speaking to her with her usual authority. “What questions could there be at this late hour? All has been arranged.”

“Quite correct,” the nun said. “But I wish to make certain that the paintings in the gallery are to be shipped to the United States along with the icons.”

“Yes, of course,” Dr. Seraphina said, following the nun into the hallway, where a large gallery of crates and boxes awaited shipment. “They are to be received by our contact in New York.”

Looking over the crates, I saw that many of them had been marked for shipping.

Dr. Seraphina said, “The shipment will leave tomorrow. We need only to be sure that everything is here and that it gets to the port.”

As the nun and Dr. Seraphina continued their discussion of the shipment and how they had, in the increasingly tightened schedule of vessels leaving France’s harbors, secured the evacuation of our most priceless objects, I returned to the hallway. Holding back the words I’d wished to speak, I walked away in silence.

Moving through the dark, stone corridors, I passed empty classrooms and abandoned lecture halls, my footsteps echoing through the pervasive silence that had fallen over the rooms months before. The Athenaeum proved equally still. The librarians had left for the evening, turning out the lights and locking the doors. I used my key-given by Dr. Seraphina at the outset of my studies-to let myself in. As I opened the doors and examined the long, shadowy room, I felt utterly relieved to be alone. It was not the first time I’d felt thankful that the library was empty-I often found myself there after midnight, continuing my work after everyone else had left the school-but it was the first time that I had come in desperation.

Empty shelves lined the walls, the occasional volumes tipped and stacked at random. On every side I found boxes of books waiting to be moved from our school to secure locations throughout France. Where these locations might be, I did not know, but I could see that we would need many cellars to hide such a large collection. My hands shook as I went through one of the boxes. The books were in such a state of disarray that I began to worry that I might never find the one I had come for. After some minutes of searching, my panic growing at each disappointment, I at last located a box of Dr. Raphael Valko’s original works and translations. In keeping with Dr. Raphael’s disposition, the contents were arranged in no discernible order. I found a folio containing detailed maps of various caves and gorges, sketches made during exploratory expeditions through the mountain ranges of Europe-the Pyrenees in 1923, the Balkans in 1925, the Urals in 1930, and the Alps in 1936-along with pages of script relating to the history of each mountain chain. I examined annotated texts and bundles of lecture notes, commentaries and pedagogical guides. I looked at the title and date of each of the works Dr. Raphael had produced, finding that he’d written even more books and folios than I had imagined. And yet after I had opened and closed every one of Dr. Raphael’s texts, I had not found the only one I hoped to read: The translation of Clematis’s journey to the cave of disobedient angels was not in the Athenaeum.

Leaving the books scattered upon the table, I collapsed into the hard seat of a chair and tried to pull myself out of the fog of disappointment that had fallen over me. As if defying my efforts, tears welled up in my eyes, dissolving the dim Athenaeum into a wash of pale color. My ambition for advancement consumed me. Uncertainty about my abilities, about my place in our school, and about the future weighed heavily upon my mind. I wished my fate to be known, contracted, sealed, and set down so that I might follow it dutifully. Above all else I wished for purpose and utility. The very notion that I was not worthy of my calling, that I might be sent back to my parents in the countryside, or that I might fail to secure a place among the scholars I admired filled me with dread.

Leaning upon the wooden table, I buried my face in my arms, closing my eyes and lapsing into a momentary state of despair. I do not know how long I remained thus, but soon I sensed a movement in the room, the slightest change in the texture of the air. My friend’s distinct perfume-an Oriental scent of vanilla and labdanum-alerted me to Gabriella’s presence. I lifted my eyes and saw, through the wash of tears, a blur of scarlet fabric so shiny it appeared a swath of inlaid rubies.

“What is the matter?” Gabriella said. The sheet of jeweled fabric transformed, once my vision cleared, into a sleeveless bias-cut satin dress of such liquid beauty that I could do nothing but gape at it. My obvious astonishment only irritated Gabriella. She slid into a chair opposite me, tossing a beaded bag onto the table. A necklace of cut gemstones encircled her throat, and a pair of long black opera gloves rose to her elbows, covering the scar on her forearm. The air in the Athenaeum had grown cold, but Gabriella appeared unaffected by the chill-even with her thin, sleeveless gown and transparent silk stockings her skin retained a glow of warmth while I had begun to shiver.

“Tell me, Celestine,” Gabriella said. “What has happened? Are you ill?”

“I am quite well,” I replied, composing myself as best I could. I was not used to being the object of her scrutiny-in fact, she had taken no interest in me at all in the past weeks-and so, hoping to divert attention from myself, I said, “You are going somewhere?”

“A party,” she said without meeting my eye, a clear indication that she would be meeting with her lover.

“What kind of party?” I asked.

“It has nothing to do with our studies and would not interest you,” she said, ending all possibility of further questioning. “But tell me: What are you doing here? Why are you so distraught?”

“I have been looking for a text.”

“Which one?”

“Something to help me with the geological tables I have been creating,” I said, knowing even as I spoke that I sounded unconvincing.

Gabriella glanced beyond me at the books I had left upon the table and, seeing that they were all written by Dr. Raphael Valko, guessed my objective. “Clematis’s journal isn’t circulated, Celestine.”

“I have just discovered this fact,” I said, wishing I had returned Dr. Raphael’s books to the crates.

“You should know that they would never keep such a text here in the open.”

“Then where is it?” I asked, my agitation growing by the second. “In Dr. Seraphina’s office? In the vault?”

“Clematis’s account of the First Angelological Expedition contains very important information,” Gabriella said, smiling with pleasure at her advantage. “Its location is a secret that only a very few are allowed to know.”

“So you have read it?” I said, my jealousy at Gabriella’s access to restricted texts causing me to lose all sense of caution. “How is it that you, who seem to care so little for our studies, have read Clematis and I, who have dedicated everything to our cause, cannot so much as touch it?”

I immediately regretted what I’d said. The silence we had forged was an uncomfortable truce, but the artifice had allowed me to progress with my work.

Gabriella stood, took her beaded bag from the table and, her voice unnaturally calm, said, “You think that you understand what you have seen, but it is more complicated than it appears.”

“I should think it rather obvious that you are involved with an older man,” I said. “And I suspect that Dr. Seraphina believes as much, too.”

For a moment I believed that Gabriella would turn and leave, as had become her habit when she felt cornered. Instead she stood before me, defiant. “I wouldn’t speak of it to Dr. Seraphina, or to anyone else, if I were you.”

Feeling I was in a position of power at last, I pressed my point. “And why not?”

“If anyone were to discover what you think you know,” Gabriella said, “the greatest harm would befall all of us.”

Although I could not fully understand the meaning of her threat, the urgency in her voice and the genuine terror of her expression stopped me cold. We had come to an impasse, neither one knowing how to proceed.

At last Gabriella broke the silence. “It is not impossible to gain access to Clematis’s account,” she said. “If one wishes to read it, one only need know where to look.”

“I thought the text wasn’t circulated,” I said.

“It isn’t,” Gabriella answered. “And I should not help you to find it, especially when it is clearly not in my best interest. But you look as though you might be willing to help me, too.”

I met her gaze, wondering exactly what she could mean by this.

“My proposal is this,” Gabriella said, leading me from the Athenaeum and into the dark hallway of the school. “I will tell you how to find the text, and you, in turn, will remain silent. You will not mention a word to Seraphina about me or your speculations about my activities. You will not speak of my comings and goings from the apartment. Tonight I will be out for some time. If anyone comes to the apartment for me, you will say that you don’t know where I am.”

“You are asking me to lie to our teachers.”

“No,” she said. “I am asking that you tell the truth. You don’t know where I will be this evening.”

“But why?” I asked. “Why are you doing this?”

The faintest look of weariness appeared in Gabriella’s features, a hint of desperation that made me believe that she would open herself to me and confess everything, a hope that was crushed the moment it emerged. “I don’t have time for this,” she said, impatient. “Do you agree or not?”

I did not need to say a word. Gabriella understood me perfectly. I would do anything to gain access to Clematis’s text.

A series of exposed electric bulbs illuminated our passage to the medieval wing of the school. Gabriella moved quickly, her platform shoes tapping the quick, erratic rhythm of her footfall, and when she stopped, halting abruptly midstep, I stumbled against her, breathless.

Although clearly annoyed by my clumsiness, Gabriella didn’t utter a sound. Instead she turned toward a door, one of hundreds of identical doors throughout the building, each one the same size and color, without numbers or nameplates to indicate where it led.

“Come,” she said, looking to the arch above the door, an assemblage of crumbling limestone blocks that rose to a peak. “You are taller than I am. Perhaps you can reach the keystone.”

Stretching as best I could, I brushed my fingers against the grainy stone. To my surprise, the block moved under the pressure of my touch and, with a bit of wiggling, slid from its place, leaving a wedge of open space. At Gabriella’s instruction I reached inside and removed a cold metal object the size of a penknife.

“It is a key,” I said, holding it before me, astonished. “How did you know it was here?”

“It will get you into the school’s underground storage,” Gabriella said, gesturing for me to replace the stone. “Through this door there is a set of stairs. Follow it down and you will find a second door. The key will unlock that door. It is the entrance to the Valkos’ private chambers-Dr. Raphael’s translation of Clematis’s account is kept here.”

I tried to recall hearing anything about such a space and could not. It made sense, of course, that we would create a secure location for our treasures, and it answered the question of where the books from the Athenaeum were being stored. I wanted to ask more-to demand that she explain the details of this hidden space. But Gabriella raised a hand to cut off all questioning. “I am late and haven’t the time to explain. I cannot lead you to the book myself, but I’m certain your curiosity will assist you in finding what you are looking for. Go. And remember when you are finished to return the key to its hiding place and do not speak of this evening to anyone.”

With this, Gabriella turned and walked down the hall, her red satin dress catching the weak light. I wanted to call for her to come back, to guide me into the subterranean chambers, but she was gone. Only the slightest odor of her perfume remained.

Following Gabriella’s instructions, I opened the door and peered into the darkness. A kerosene lamp hung from a hook at the top of the stairs, its fluted glass chimney charred black from smoke. I lit the wick and held it before me. A set of rough-hewn stone steps fell downward at a steep angle. Each lozenge of stone was frosted in moss, making the passage dangerously slippery. From the dampness of the air and the smell of mold, it felt to me as though I were descending step-by-step into the cellar of my family’s stone farmhouse, a vast, dank underground bunker stockpiled with thousands of bottles of aging wine.

At the bottom of the staircase, I found an iron door, barred like the entrance to a prison cell. To either side of it, brick passageways opened and receded into an almost pure darkness. I raised the lamp so that I might see the spaces beyond. Where the brick had crumbled, I could make out patches of pale, unquarried limestone, the very rock that formed the foundation of our city. The key unfastened the lock with ease, so the only obstacle that remained to me was the overpowering urge to turn, walk up the steps, and go back to the familiar world above.

It did not take long before I came upon a series of rooms. Although my lamp did not allow me to see with great clarity, I found that the first room had been filled with crates of weapons-Lugers and Colt.45s and MI Garands. There were boxes of medical supplies, blankets, and clothing-the items we would surely need in an extended conflict. In another room I discovered many of the very crates I had observed being packed in the Athenaeum weeks before, only now they had been nailed shut. Prying them open without tools would be next to impossible.

Continuing through the darkness of the brick passage, the lamp growing heavier with each step, I began to understand the enormous scale of the angelologists’ move underground. I had not imagined how elaborate and calculated our resistance would be. We had transferred all the necessities of life to below the city. There were beds and makeshift toilets and water pipes and a number of small kerosene stoves. Weapons, food, medicines-everything of value resided under Montparnasse, hidden in burrows and tunnels carved from the limestone. For the first time, I realized that, once the battle began, many would not flee the city but move into these chambers and fight.

After examining a number of these cells, I stepped into another chiseled, damp space, less a storage area than a warren delved into the soft limestone. Here I found many objects, some of which I recognized from visits to Dr. Raphael’s office, and I knew at once that I had found the Valkos’ private chamber. In the corner, under a heavy cotton tarpaulin, there was a table stacked with books. Light from the kerosene lamp fell over the dusty room.

I discovered the text without much trouble, though to my surprise it appeared to be less a book than a sheaf of notes bound together. The volume was no bigger than a pamphlet, with a hand-stitched binding and a plain cover. It was light as a crepe in my hand, too insubstantial, I thought, to contain anything important. Opening it, I saw that the text had been handwritten on transparent foolscap in blotched ink, each letter scratched into the paper by the uneven pressure of a careless hand. Running my finger over the letters, feeling the indentations on the paper and brushing the dust from its pages, I read: Notes on the First Angelological Expeditionof A.D. 925 by the Venerable Father Clematis of Thrace, Translated from the Latin and Annotated by Dr. Raphael Valko.

Below these words, pressed into the pulpy surface of the page, was a golden seal containing the image of a lyre, a symbol I had not seen before but would from that day forth understand to be at the heart of our mission.

Holding the pamphlet close to my chest, suddenly afraid that it might dissolve before I had the chance to read its contents, I placed the lamp on a smooth stretch of the limestone floor and sat beside it. The light fell over my fingers, and when I opened the pamphlet once more, Dr. Raphael’s handwriting became distinct. Clematis’s account of his expedition captivated me from the first word.

Blessed be the servants of His Divine vision on Earth! May the Lord, who planted the seed of our mission, bring it to fruition!

Our mules heavy with provisions and our souls light with expectation, we began our journey through the provinces of the Hellenes, below the mighty Moesia and into Thracia. The roads, well-maintained and regular thoroughfares built by Rome, signaled our arrival in Christendom. Yet, despite the gilding of civilization, the threat of thievery remains. It has been many years since I last set foot in the mountainous homeland of my father and his father’s father. My native tongue will surely ring strange, accustomed as I am to the language of Rome. As we begin our ascent into the mountains, I fear that even my robes and the seals of the church will do little to protect us once we leave the larger settlements. I pray that we meet few villagers on our journey to the mountain paths. We have no weapons and will have little recourse but to depend upon the goodwill of strangers.

As we paused by the roadside on our way up the mountain, Brother Francis, a most ardent scholar, spoke to me of the distress that has come to haunt him regarding our mission. Taking me aside, he confessed that he believes our mission to be the work of dark spirits, a seduction of the disobedient angels upon our minds. His unrest is not uncommon. Indeed, many of our brothers have expressed reservations about the expedition, but Francis’ assertion chilled me to my very soul. Rather than question him about this sentiment, I listened to his fears, understanding that his words were another sign of the growing fatigue in the search. In opening my ear to his cares, I took them upon myself, lightening his heavy spirit. This is the burden and the responsibility of an elder brother, but my role is even more crucial now, as we prepare for what will surely be our most difficult journey. Shaking away the temptation to remonstrate with Brother Francis, I labored through the remaining hours of travel in silence.

Later, in my solitude, I strove to understand Brother Francis’ distress, praying for guidance and wisdom so that I might help him overcome his doubts. It is well known that scholars have missed the mark entirely in past expeditions. I am certain that this will soon change. Yet, Francis’ phrase “brotherhood of dreamers” plagues my thoughts. The faintest breeze of doubt begins to shake my insuperable faith in our mission. What, I wonder to myself, if we have been foolhardy in our efforts? How are we to be certain that our mission is one with God’s? The kernel of disbelief growing in my mind is easily ground down, however, when I think of the necessity of our work. The battle has been fought for generations before us and will continue for generations after. We must encourage our young men, despite the recent losses. Fear is to be expected. It is natural that the incident at Roncesvalles, ² which all have studied, is on their minds. And still, my faith does not allow me to doubt that God moves behind our actions, animating our bodies and spirits as we move up the mountain. I will persist in my belief that hope will soon revive among us. We must have faith that this journey, unlike our recent miscalculations, will end in success. ³

On the fourth night of the journey, as the fire burnt to embers and our humble party sat together after our meal, discussion turned to the history of our enemy. One of the young brothers asked how it had come to pass that our land, from the tip of Iberia to the Ural Mountains, ⁴ came to be so colonized by the dark spawn of angels and women. How did we, humble servants of God, come to be charged with the cleansing of the Lord’s Earth? Brother Francis, whose melancholy has so affected my thoughts of late, wondered aloud how God would allow the evil ones to infest His dominion with their presence. How, he asked, can pure good exist in the presence of pure evil? And so, as the evening air grew colder and the frozen moon hung in the night sky, I related to our party how these evil seeds were sowed in holy soil:

In the decades after the Flood ceased, Japheth’s sons and daughters of purely human provenance separated from the false Japheth’s sons and daughters of angelic provenance, forming two branches of one tree, one pure and the other poisoned, one weak and the other strong. Along the great north and south sea lanes they scattered, taking root in the rich alluvial gulfs. They swept over the alpine mountains in tremendous flocks, settling like bats at the highest reaches of Europa. Along the rocky coasts and the vast fertile plains they moored, sinking into the shores of river passages-the Danube, the Volga, the Rhine, the Dniester, the Ebro, the Seine-until every region had become filled with the spawn of Japheth. Where they rested, settlements grew. Despite common ancestry, there remained a deep distrust between the two groups. The cruelty, avarice, and physical power of the Nephilim led to the gradual enslavement of their human brothers. Europe, the Giants claimed, was their birthright.

The first generations of Japheth’s tainted heirs lived in great health and happiness, dominating every river, mountain, and plain of the continent, their power over their weaker brothers secure. Within decades, however, a flaw appeared in their race, as sharp as a fissure across the gleaming surface of a mirror. A baby was born that appeared weaker than the others-tiny, mewling, it was unable to gather enough air in its weak lungs to cry. As the baby grew, they saw that it was smaller than the others, slower, and had a susceptibility to illness unknown in their race. This child was human, born in the likeness of their great-great-grandmothers, the Daughters of Men. ⁵ It took nothing-not beauty or strength or angelic form- from the Watchers. When the child reached manhood, he was stoned to death.

For many generations, this baby was an anomaly. Then, God desired to populate the dominions of Japheth with his own children. He sent a multitude of human babies to the Nephilim, revivifying the Holy Spirit upon the fallow earth. In their first appearances, these beings often died in infancy. With time, they learned to care for the weak children, nursing them to their third year before allowing them to join with the other, stronger children. ⁶ If they survived into adulthood, they grew to be four heads shorter than their parents. They began to age and decline in the third decade of life, and die before the eighth. Human women died in childbirth. Sickness and disease required the development of medicines, and even when treated, humans lived for only a fraction of the years of their Nephilistic brothers. The inviolate dominion of the Nephilim had been corrupted. ⁷

Over time, human children married others of their kind and the human race grew alongside the Nephilistic. Despite their physical inferiority, Japheth’s pure children persevered under the rule of their Nephilistic brothers. The occasional intermarriage occurred between the groups, bringing further hybridization to the race, but these unions were discouraged. When a human child was born to Nephilim, it was sent outside the walls of the city, where it died in the elements among humans. When a Nephilistic child was born to human civilization, it would be taken from its parents and assimilated into the master race. ⁸

Soon, the Nephilim receded to castles and manor houses. They built fortifications of granite, mountaintop retreats, sanctuaries of luxury and power. Although subservient, God’s children were graced with divine protection. Their minds were sharp, their souls blessed, and their wills strong. As the two races lived side by side, the Nephilim receded behind wealth and fortifications. Human beings, left to suffer under the strains of poverty and illness, became slaves to invisible, powerful masters.

At dawn, we rose and walked many hours along the precipitous path to the top of the mountain, the sun rising from behind the towering stone pinnacles, casting a glorious golden emanation over creation. Provided with sturdy mules, thick leather sandals, and pristine weather, we carried forth. By midmorning, a village filled with stone mountain houses arose over a crag, the orange clay tiles layered above the slate. After we’d consulted our map, it was apparent that we had arrived at the highest reach of the mountain in proximity to the gorge the locals call Gyaurskoto Burlo. Taking refuge in the home of a villager, we bathed, ate, and rested before inquiring after a guide to the cavern. Straightaway a shepherd was brought before me. Short and thick in the way of Thracian mountain people, his beard flecked white but his body strong, the shepherd listened intently as I described our mission into the gorge. I found him intelligent, articulate, and willing, although he made it plain that he would take us to the floor of the gorge but no farther. After some discussion, we agreed upon a price. The shepherd promised to supply equipment, saying he would lead us there the next morning.

We discussed our prospects over a meal of klin and dried meat, a simple but hearty repast to give us strength for the next day’s journey. I placed a parchment on the surface of the table, opening it for the others to see. My brothers leaned close to the table, straining to discern the light shadings of the ink drawing.

“The site is here,” I said, dragging a finger over the map, along a wedge of mountains signified by dark blue ink. “We should have no trouble crossing.”

“Yet,” one of my brothers said, his unkempt beard brushing the table as he reached across it, “how can we be certain this is the correct location?”

“There have been sightings,” I attested.

“There have been sightings in the past,” Brother Francis said. “Peasants see with different eyes. Their visions most often lead to nothing.”

“Villagers claim to have seen the creatures.”

“If we follow the fantastic stories of mountain peasants, we will be traveling to every village in Anatolia.”

“In my humble opinion, it is worth our attention,” I replied. “According to our brothers in Thrace, the mouth of the cave cuts away sharply into an abyss. Deep below, there flows an underground river, much as it is described by legend. Villagers claim to have heard emanations at the edge of the abyss.”

“Emanations?”

“Music,” I said, striving to remain cautious in my assertions. “The villagers hold feasts at the mouth of the cave so that they might hear the sound, however faint, rising from the cavern. They say the music has an unusual power over the villagers. The sick are made well. The blind see. The crippled walk.”

“This is most wondrous,” Brother Francis said.

“The music rises from the depths of the earth, and it will lead us forth.”

Despite my confidence in our cause, my hand trembles at the dangers of the abyss. Years of preparation have bolstered my will, and still I fear the prospect of failure looming over me. How past failures haunt my memory! How my lost brothers visit my thoughts! My enduring faith drives me forward, and the balm of God’s grace soothes my troubled soul. ⁹ Tomorrow, we descend the gorge at sunrise.

As the world turns back to the sun, so the corrupted earth returns to the light of Grace. As the stars illumine the dark sky, so the children of God will one day rise through the haze of injustice, free at last of evil masters.

In the darkness of my despair, I turn to Boethius as an eye turns to a flame-my Lord, my excellence hath been lost to the Tartarean Cave. ¹⁰

I am a man forsaken. Through burned lips I speak, my voice ringing hollow in my ears. My body lies broken; my charred flesh oozes with gaping sores. Hope, that ethereal and airy angel upon whose wings I rose to meet my wretched fate, is crushed evermore. Only my will to relate the horror I have seen drives me to open my cankered, scorched lips. For you, future seeker of freedom, future acolyte of justice, I tell of my misfortune.

The morning of our journey broke cold and clear. As is my custom, I woke many hours before sunrise and, leaving the others to their slumber, found my way to the hearth of the small house. The mistress of the house busied herself about the humble space, breaking twigs for the fire. A pot of barley bubbled above the flames. Endeavoring to make myself useful, I offered to stir the mixture, warming myself over the fire as I did so. How the memories of my childhood flooded upon me as I stood over the hearth. Fifty years ago, I was a boy with arms as thin as saplings, assisting my mother in this same domestic task, listening to her hum as she wrung clothing in basins of clean water. My mother-how long had it been since I had thought of her goodness? And my father, with his love of the Book and his devotion to our Lord-how had I lived so many years without recalling his gentleness?

These thoughts dissipated as my brothers, perhaps smelling their breakfast cooking, descended to the hearth. Together, we ate. In the light of the fire, we packed our sacks: rope, chisel, and hammer, vellum and ink, a sharp knife made of a fine alloy, and a roll of cotton cloth, for bandages. With the sun’s rising, we bade our hosts good-bye and set out to meet our guide.

At the far end of the village, where the path wound into an ever-rising stairway of stony crags, the shepherd waited, a large woven sack over his shoulder and a polished walking stick in his hand. Nodding good morning, he turned and walked up the mountain, his body compact and solid as a goat’s. His manner struck me as exceedingly terse, and his expression remained so somber that I expected him to forfeit his duties and abandon us upon the path. Yet, he walked on, slow and steady, leading our party to the gorge.

Perhaps because the morning had grown warm and our breakfast had been pleasant, we commenced our journey in good spirits. The brothers talked among themselves, cataloging the wildflowers growing along the path and commenting upon the strange variety of trees-birch and spruce and towering cypress. Their pleasant humor was a relief, lifting the clouds of doubt from our mission. The melancholy of the previous days had weighed upon us all. We began the morning with renewed spirits. My own anxieties were considerable, although I kept them hidden. The brothers’ boisterous laughter inspired my own merriment, and soon we were joyous and light of heart. We could not foresee that this would be the last time any of us would hear the sound of laughter again.

Our shepherd walked for half an hour farther up the mountain before cutting into a copse of birch trees. Through the foliage, I saw the mouth of a cave, a deep cut into a wall of solid granite. Inside the cave, the air was cool and moist. Tracks of colorful fungus grew over the walls. Brother Francis pointed to a series of painted amphorae lined against the far wall of the cave, thin-necked jars with bulbous bodies perched elegantly as swans on the dirt floor. The larger jars contained water, the smaller oil, which led me to believe that this cavern was used as a rough and makeshift shelter. The shepherd confirmed my speculation, although he could not say who would endeavor to rest so far above civilization and what necessity would drive one to do so.

Without hesitating further, the shepherd unloaded his sack. He placed two thick iron spikes, a mallet, and a rope ladder upon the cave’s floor. The ladder was impressive and caused the younger brothers to gather around to examine it. Two long strips of woven hemp formed the vertical axis of the ladder, while metal rods, fastened with bolts into the hemp, formed the horizontal crossbars. The artistry of the ladder was unmistakable. It was both strong and easily portable. My admiration of our guide’s industry grew at the sight of it.

The shepherd used the mallet to pound the iron spikes into the rock. He then fastened the rope ladder to the iron spikes with metal clasps. These small devices, no bigger than coins, ensured the ladder’s stability. When the shepherd had finished, he flung the ladder over the edge and stepped away, as if to marvel at the distance it fell. Beyond, the roar of water crashed upon the rocks.

Our guide explained that the river flowed under the surface of the mountain, its course cutting through rock, feeding upon reservoirs and streams before bursting in a rush of pressure into the gorge. From the waterfall, the river twisted through the gorge, descending once again into a maze of underground caverns before emerging upon the surface of the earth. The villagers, our guide informed us, called it the river Styx and believed that the bodies of the dead littered the stone floor of the gorge. They believed the cave shaft to be the entrance to hell and had named it the Infidels’ Prison. As he spoke, his face filled with apprehension, the first sign that he might be afraid to continue. In haste, I declared it time to descend into the pit. ¹²

One can hardly imagine our delight upon gaining passage into the abyss. Only Jacob in his vision of the mighty procession of Holy Messengers might have beheld a ladder more welcome and majestic. To our divine purpose, we proceeded into the terrible blackness of the forsaken pit, filled with expectation of His protection and Grace.

As I lowered myself down the frigid rungs of the ladder, the roar of water rang in my ears. I moved quickly, surrendering myself to the forceful pull of the deep, hands slipping on the moist, cold metal, knees slamming against the sheer surface of the rock. Fear filled my heart. I whispered a prayer, asking for protection and strength and guidance against the unknown. My voice disappeared in the whirling, deafening noise of the waterfall.

The shepherd was the last to descend, arriving some minutes after. Opening his sack, he removed a cache of beeswax candles and a flint and tinder with which to light them. In a matter of minutes, a glowing circle encompassed us. Despite the chill in the air, sweat fell into my eyes. We joined hands and prayed, believing that even in that deepest, darkest crevice of hell our voices would be heard.

Gathering my robes, I set off toward the edge of the river. The others followed, leaving our guide at the ladder. The waterfall fell in the distance, sheets of torrid, endless water. The river itself flowed in a thick artery through the center of the cavern as if Styx, Phlegethon, Acheron, and Cocytus-the forking rivers of hell-had converged into one. Brother Francis was the first to discern the boat, a small wooden craft tied to the river’s edge, floating in a swirling haze of fog. We soon stood around the prow, contemplating our course. Behind, a stretch of flat stone separated us from the ladder. Ahead, across the river, a honeycomb of caves awaited our inspection. The choice was clear: We set out to discover what lay beyond the treacherous river.

Being five in number, and all of healthy weight, my first concern was that we would not fit into the cavity of the narrow boat. I stepped inside, holding myself upright against the violent rocking beneath my feet. I had no doubt that if the craft should tip, the merciless current would drag me down into a labyrinth of rocks. With some maneuvering, I achieved equilibrium and sat securely at the helm. The others followed, and soon we set off into the current, Brother Francis pushing the boat slowly toward the far shore with a wooden pole oar, the river sweeping us away from the entrance of the cavern and on to our doom.

The creatures hissed from their rocky cells as we approached, venomous as snakes, their startling blue eyes fixing upon us, their mighty wings beating against the bars of their prison, hundreds of impenitent dark angels tearing at their glowing white robes, crying out for salvation, beseeching us, the emissaries of God, to set them free.

My brothers fell to their knees, transfixed by the horrible spectacle before us. Deep in the hollow of the mountain, stretching as far as the eye could see, were innumerable prison cells containing hundreds of majestic creatures. I stepped closer, trying to comprehend what I saw. The creatures were otherworldly, so infused with light that I could not look into the depths of the cave without averting my eyes. Yet, as one longs to look into the center of a flame, burning one’s vision upon the palest blue core of the fire, so I desired to see the heavenly creatures before me. At last I discerned that each narrow cell contained a single bound angel. Brother Francis clutched my arm in terror, begging me to return to the boat. But in my fervor, I did not listen. I turned to the others and ordered them to rise and follow me inside.

The moaning ceased as we entered the prison. The creatures peered from behind thick iron bars, their bulging eyes following our every movement. Their desire for liberation could be no surprise: They had been chained inside the mountain for thousands of years, waiting to be released. Yet, there was nothing wretched about them. Their bodies radiated an intense luminosity, a golden light that rose from their transparent skin, creating a golden nimbus around them. Physically, they were far superior to humankind-tall and elegant, with wings that folded about them from shoulder to ankle, shrouding their tapering bodies like pure white cloaks. Such beauty was like nothing I had seen or imagined before. At last I understood how these celestial creatures had seduced the Daughters of Men and why the Nephilim so admired their patrimony. As I stepped deeper into their midst, my anticipation growing with each step, it struck me that we had made our way to the abyss to fulfill a purpose we had not anticipated. I had believed our mission to be the recovery of the angelic treasure, but I now gleaned the terrible truth: We had come to the pit to set the Disobedient Angels free.

From the recesses of a dingy cell, an angel with masses of golden hair stepped forward. He held a polished lyre in his hands, its belly rotund. ¹⁴ Lifting the lyre into his arms, he plucked the strings until a fine, ethereal music echoed through the cavern. I cannot say whether it was the particular resonance of the cave or the quality of the instrument, but the sound was rich and full, an enchanting music that worked upon my senses until I thought I would go mad from bliss. Soon, the angel began to sing, its voice climbing and falling with the lyre. As if taking cue from this divine progression, the others joined the chorus, each voice rising to create the music of heaven, a confluence akin to the congregation described by Daniel, ten thousand times ten thousand angels. We stood, transfixed, utterly disarmed by the celestial choir. The melody has been burned upon my mind. Even now I hear it. ¹⁵

From where I stood, I watched the angel. Gently, it lifted its long thin arms and stretched its immense wings. Going to the door of its cell, I unlatched a heavily calcified hook, and in a burst of force that knocked me upon the floor, the angel pushed open the door to its cell and stepped free. I discerned the pleasure the creature took in its liberty. The imprisoned angels roared from their cells, jealous of their brother’s victory, vicious and hungry creatures demanding freedom.

In my fascination with the angels themselves, I had failed to notice the effect the music had upon my brothers. Suddenly, before I could perceive that a spell had been cast upon his mind by this demonic production, Brother Francis rushed to the angelic choir. In what appeared to be a state of insanity, Brother Francis knelt before the creatures in supplication. The angel dropped the lyre, instantly halting the chorus of sublime music, and touched Brother Francis, casting a light so thick over the bewildered man that he appeared to have been dipped in bronze. Gasping, Francis fell to the ground, covering his eyes as the intense light burned his flesh. To my horror, I watched as his garments dissolved from his body and his flesh melted away, leaving charred muscle and bone. Brother Francis, who minutes before had clutched my arm, beseeching me to return to the boat, had died of the angel’s poisoned light. ¹⁶

The minutes after Brother Francis’ death are all confusion. I recall the sound of the angels hissing from their cells. I remember Francis’ horrid corpse, blackened and misshapen before me. But all else is lost in darkness. Somehow the angel’s lyre, the very treasure that had brought me to the pit, was within my grasp. With all haste, I collected the treasure from the fallen creature, cradling the object in my charred hands and placing it in my satchel, safe from harm.

I found myself sitting at the prow of the wooden boat, my robes ripped and tattered. My entire being pained me. The flesh peeled from my arms, curling away in bloody, blackened sheets. Clumps of hair from my beard had burned to the roots. It was then I realized that I, like Brother Francis, had fallen under the horrid light of the angel.

As had the other brothers. Two stood together in the boat, pushing desperately against the current with the pole, their robes singed, their skin badly burned. The remaining member of our party lay dead at my feet, his hands pressed over his face, as if he had died of terror. As the boat came to the opposite bank of the river, we blessed our martyred brother and disembarked, leaving the boat to spin down the river.

To our dismay, the murderous angel stood at the riverbank awaiting our arrival. Its beautiful face was serene, as if it had just woken from a restful slumber. Upon seeing the creature, my brothers fell to the earth in prayer and supplication, undone by terror, for the angel was formed of gold. Their fear was justified. The angel turned its poisonous light upon them, killing them just as it had killed Francis. I fell to my knees, praying for their salvation, knowing they had died in worthy service. Looking about me, I saw that there was no hope of assistance. The shepherd had abandoned his post, deserting us in the gorge, leaving only his woven satchel and the ladder, a betrayal I felt bitterly. We had required his assistance.

The angel examined me, its expression one of vapidity, as if it were little more than a medium of the wind. With a voice more lovely than any music, it spoke. Although I could not make out the language, somehow I understood its message clearly. The angel said: Our freedom has come at great cost. For this, your reward will be great in heaven and earth.

The sacrilege of the angel’s words affected me more than I would have imagined. I could not fathom that such a fiend would dare promise a heavenly reward. In a terrible burst of fury, I lurched at the angel, wrestling it to the ground. The celestial creature was taken off guard by my anger, lending me a superiority I used to my advantage. Despite its brilliance, it was a physical being composed of substance not unlike my own, and in an instant I tore at its mighty wings, grasping for the naked, delicate flesh where the appendages met the creature’s back.

Clutching the warm bone at the base of the wings, I threw the luminous creature to the cold, hard rock. Passion overwhelmed me, for I do not recall the exact measures I took to achieve my ends. I know only that in my struggle to keep hold of the creature and my desperation to escape the pit, the Lord blessed me with an unnatural strength against the beast. Wrenching the wings with a ferocity I could scarce believe came from my own aged hands, I felled the creature. I felt a crack under my hands, as if I had broken the thin glass of an ampoule. A sudden exhalation of air escaped the angel’s body, a soft sigh that left the creature helpless at my feet.

I assessed the broken body before me. I had torn a wing from its mooring, ripping the pink flesh so that the pure white feathers folded at an asymmetric angle against the body. The angel writhed in agony, and a pale blue fluid poured from the wounds I had opened on its back. A disquieting sound emanated from its chest, as if the humors, once released from their internal vessels, had mixed in a disastrous alchemy. I soon understood that the wretched creature was choking to death, and that its horrid suffocating had resulted from the injury to its wing. ¹⁷ It is thus that the breath dies. The violence of my actions against a celestial creature tormented me beyond all fathoming, and at last I fell to my knees and begged the Lord’s mercy and forgiveness, for I had laid waste to one of heaven’s most sublime creations.

It was then that I heard a faint cry-the shepherd, crouching against the rocks, called my name. Only after he had made numerous gestures for me to follow him did I understand that he meant to help me up the ladder. Creeping as quickly as my deformed body would allow, I abandoned myself to the shepherd, who, by the grace of God, was strong and able-bodied. He lifted me onto his trembling back and carried me from the pit. ¹⁸

I closed the pages of Clematis’s account of confusion. I could not fully assess my conflicting feelings upon finishing Dr. Raphael’s translation of the Venerable Clematis’s account of the First Angelological Expedition. My hands trembled with excitement, or fear, or anticipation-I could not identify which emotion took control of me. And yet I knew one thing for certain: The Venerable Clematis had overwhelmed me with the story of his journey. I was both reverent at the audacity of his mission and terrified by the horror of his encounter with the Watchers. That a man had gazed upon these heavenly creatures, that he had touched their luminous flesh and had heard their celestial music was a truth I could not fathom.

Perhaps the oxygen in our school’s quarters below the earth was too thin, because soon after setting the pamphlet aside I began to feel short of breath. The air in the chamber felt heavier, thicker, and more oppressive than it had only minutes before. The small, airless rooms of brick and weeping limestone turned, for a moment, into the depths of the angels’ subterranean prison. I half expected to hear the crashing of the river or strains of the Watchers’ celestial music. Although I knew this to be a morbid fantasy, I could not remain one minute longer belowground. Rather than leave Dr. Raphael’s translation in its original place, I folded the pamphlet into the pocket of my skirt, carrying it with me out of the subterranean storage chambers and into the delicious cool air of the school.

Although it was well after midnight and I knew the school to be deserted, I could not risk being detected. Quickly, I unwedged the stone from its secure place in the archway over the door and, standing on tiptoes, slid the key into the narrow recess. After I had fitted the stone in its place, smoothing its edges to the flat of the wall, I stood back and assessed my work. The door looked like any one of the hundreds of such doors throughout the school. No one would suspect what lay hidden behind the stones.

I left the school and walked into a chill autumnal night, following my usual path from the school to my apartment on the rue Gassendi, hoping to find Gabriella in her bedroom so that I might question her. The apartment was utterly dark. After knocking at Gabriella’s bedroom door and getting no response, I retreated to the privacy of my bedroom, where I might read through the pages of Dr. Raphael’s translation a second time. The text pulled me into it, and before I knew it, I had read Clematis’s account a third time and then a fourth. With each reading I found that the Venerable Clematis caused me more and more confusion. My unease began as an inchoate feeling, a subtle but persistent sense of discomfort that I could not identify, but as the night progressed, I was driven to a state of terrible anxiety. There was something in the manuscript that did not fit with my preconceptions of the First Angelological Expedition, an element to the tale that grated against the lessons I had absorbed. Although weary from the extraordinary strain of the day, I did not sleep. Instead I dissected each stage of the journey, looking for the precise reason for my anxiety. At last, after reliving Clematis’s ordeal many times over, I understood the thorn of my distress: In all my hours of study, in all the lectures I had attended, in my months of work in the Athenaeum, the Valkos had not once mentioned the role of the musical instrument Clematis had discovered in the cavern. It was the object of our expedition, a source of fear in the face of Nazi advancement, and yet Dr. Seraphina had refused to explain the precise nature of its significance.

Yet as Clematis’s account made clear, the lyre had been at the very heart of the first expedition. I recalled the tale of the Archangel Gabriel’s gift of the lyre to the Watchers, mentioned in one of the Valkos’ lectures, but even in that cursory account they had avoided mentioning the significance of the instrument. How they could keep such an important detail a secret filled me with wonder. My frustration only grew when I realized that Gabriella must have read Clematis’s account long before and therefore had been aware of the lyre’s importance. Yet she, like the Valkos, had remained silent on the subject. Why had I been excluded from their confidence? I began to review my time in Montparnasse with suspicion. Clematis had spoken of “an enchanting music that worked upon my senses until I thought I would go mad from bliss,” but what consequences did such celestial music pose? I could not help but wonder why those I had trusted most, those to whom I had given my complete loyalty, had deceived me. If they’d failed to tell me the truth about the lyre, surely there were other pieces of information they’d kept from me as well.

These were the doubts filling my mind when I heard the rumbling of a car below my bedroom window. Drawing aside the curtain, I was astonished to discover that the sky had brightened to a pale gray hue, tinting the street with a hazy presentiment of dawn. The night was gone, and I had not slept at all. But I was not the only one who had endured a sleepless night. Through the murky light, I saw Gabriella emerge from the car, a white Citroën Traction Avant. Although she wore the same dress she had worn in the Athenaeum, its satin still giving off all its liquid luster, Gabriella had changed dramatically in the hours that had passed. Her hair was in disarray, and her shoulders hung heavy with exhaustion. She had removed the black opera gloves, revealing her pale hands. Gabriella turned from the car to the apartment building, as if contemplating what she might do, and then, leaning against the car, buried her head in her arms and began to sob. The car’s driver, a man whose face I could not make out, emerged, and although I could not know his intentions, it appeared to me that he intended to further harm Gabriella.

Despite the anger I had felt toward her, my first instinct was to help my friend. I rushed from the apartment and down the successive flights of stairs, hoping that Gabriella would not leave before I made it to the street. When I arrived at the entrance of our building, however, I saw that I had been wrong. Rather than harm Gabriella, the man had embraced her, holding her in his arms as she cried. I stood at the doorway, watching in confusion. The man stroked her hair with tenderness, speaking to her in what appeared to me to be the manners of a lover, although at fifteen years of age I had never been touched in such a way. Pushing the door open slowly, so that my presence would not be detected, I listened to Gabriella. Through her sobs she repeated, “I can‘t, I can’t, I can’t,” her voice filled with despair. Although I had some idea of what inspired Gabriella’s remorse-perhaps her actions had at last registered upon her conscience-my astonishment was truly great at the words the man spoke. “But you must,” he said, holding her closer. “We have no choice but to continue.”

I recognized the voice. It was then that I saw, in the growing light of dawn, that the man comforting Gabriella was none other than Dr. Raphael Valko. After returning to the apartment, I sat in my room waiting to hear Gabriella’s footsteps upon the stairs. Her keys rattled as she unlocked the door and walked into the hallway. Rather than go to her room, as I would have expected, she went to the kitchen, where a clattering of pans told me that she was making herself coffee. Fighting an urge to join her, I waited in the shadows of my bedroom, listening, as if the noises she made would help me to understand what had happened in the street and what was the nature of her relationship with Dr. Raphael Valko.

Some hours later I knocked upon the door to Dr. Seraphina’s office. It was still early in the morning, not yet seven o’clock, although I knew she would be there working in her usual manner. She sat at her escritoire, her hair tied back in a severe bun, her pen poised above an open notebook as if I had caught her midsentence. Although my visits to her office had become routine-indeed, I had worked upon the vermilion settee each day for many weeks cataloging the Valkos’ papers-my fatigue and anxiety over Clematis’s journal must have been apparent. Dr. Seraphina knew that this was no ordinary visit. She came to the settee in an instant, sat across from me, and demanded to know what had brought me to her at such an early hour.

I placed Dr. Raphael’s translation between us. Startled, Seraphina picked up the pamphlet and turned the thin pages, taking in the words her husband had translated so long before. As she read, I saw-or imagined that I saw-a glimmer of youth and happiness return to her features, as if time peeled away as she turned each page.

Finally Dr. Seraphina said, “My husband discovered the Venerable Clematis’s notebook nearly twenty-five years ago. We were conducting research in Greece, in a small village at the base of the Rhodope mountain chain, a place Raphael had tracked down after coming across a letter from a monk named Deopus. The letter had been written from a mountain village of only a few thousand people, where Clematis died not long after the expedition, and hinted that Deopus had transcribed Clematis’s last account of his expedition. There was only the vaguest promise of discovery in the letter, and yet Raphael believed his intuition and undertook what many believed to be a quixotic mission to Greece. It was a momentous time in his career-in both of our careers, actually. The discovery had tremendous consequences for us, bringing recognition and invitations to speak at every major institute in Europe. The translation cemented his reputation and secured our place here in Paris. I remember how happy he was to come here, how much optimism we possessed.”

Dr. Seraphina stopped suddenly, as if she had said more than she wished. “I am very curious to know where you found this.”

“In the storage chambers below the school,” I replied, without a moment of hesitation. I would not have been able to lie to my teacher even if I wished to do so.

“Our subterranean storage areas are restricted,” Dr. Seraphina said. “The doors are locked. You must have a key to enter.”

“Gabriella showed me how to find the key,” I said. “I returned it to its hiding place in the keystone.”

“Gabriella?” Dr. Seraphina said, astonished. “But how is Gabriella aware of the hiding place?”

“I thought you might know. Or,” I said, measuring my words, anxious not to reveal more than would be prudent, “perhaps Dr. Raphael knows.”

“I certainly do not know, and I am sure my husband knows nothing about it either,” Dr. Seraphina said. “Tell me, Celestine, have you noticed anything strange about Gabriella’s behavior?”

“What do you mean?” I asked, leaning back into the cool silk of the settee, waiting with great anticipation for Dr. Seraphina to help me understand the puzzle Gabriella presented.

“Let me tell you what I have observed,” Dr. Seraphina said, standing and walking to the window, where the pale morning light fell over her. “In the past months, Gabriella has become unrecognizable to me. She has fallen behind in her coursework. Her past two essays were written significantly below her abilities-although she is so advanced that only a teacher who knows her as well as I do would notice. She has been spending quite a lot of time outside the school, especially at night. She has changed her appearance to match that of the girls one sees in the quartier Pigalle. And, perhaps worst of all, she has begun to harm herself.”

Dr. Seraphina turned to me as if expecting me to disagree with her assessment. When I did not, she continued.

“Some weeks ago I watched her burn herself during my husband’s lecture. You know the episode I am referring to. It was the most unsettling experience of my career, and believe me, I have had many. Gabriella brought the flame to her bare wrist, impassive as her skin charred. She knew that I was watching her, and as if to defy me she stared at me, daring me to interrupt the class to save her from herself. There was more than desperation in her behavior, more than the usual childish desire for attention. She had lost control of her actions.”

I wanted to object, to tell Dr. Seraphina that she was wrong, that I had not noticed the disturbing characteristics she described. I wanted to tell her that Gabriella had burned herself through some accident, but I could not.

“Needless to say, Gabriella shocked me,” Dr. Seraphina said. “I considered confronting her immediately-the girl needed medical attention, after all-but thought better of it. Her behavior pointed to a number of maladies, all psychological, and if this were the case, I did not want to exacerbate the problem. However, I feared another cause, one that had nothing to do with Gabriella’s mental state but another force entirely.”

Dr. Seraphina bit her lip, as if contemplating how to go on, but I urged her to continue. My curiosity about Gabriella was as strong as Dr. Seraphina’s, perhaps stronger.

“Yesterday, as you recall, I planted The Book of Generations among the treasures we are sending away for safekeeping. In fact, The Book of Generations is not going to be shipped off to the United States-it is too important for that and will remain with me or another high-level scholar-but I placed it there, with the other treasures, so that Gabriella would come across it. I left the book open to a certain page, one with the family name Grigori in plain sight. It was essential for me to catch Gabriella by surprise. She had to see the book and read the names written upon the pages without any time to mask her feelings. Equally important: I wanted to witness her reaction. Did you notice it?”

“Of course,” I said, recalling her violent outburst, her physical distress at the names she had read. “It was frightening and bizarre.”

“Bizarre,” Dr. Seraphina said, “but predictable.”

“Predictable?” I asked, growing even more confused. Gabriella’s behavior was a complete mystery to me. “I don’t understand.”

“At first the book made her simply uncomfortable. Then, when Gabriella recognized the name Grigori, and perhaps other names, her discomfort transformed to hysteria, to pure animal fright.”

“Yes, it is true,” I said. “But why?”

“Gabriella displayed all the characteristics of someone who has been discovered in a devious plot. She reacted like one tormented by guilt. I have seen it before, only the others were much more adept at hiding their shame.”

“You believe that Gabriella is working against us?” I asked, my voice betraying my astonishment.

“I cannot know for certain,” Dr. Seraphina said. “It is likely she is caught up in an unfortunate relationship, one that has gotten the better of her. Any way one looks at it, however, she has been compromised. Once one begins a life of duplicity, it is very difficult to escape. It is a pity that Gabriella has made an example of herself, but it is an example, one I want you to heed.”

Too stunned to respond, I stared at Dr. Seraphina, hoping she would say something to ease my anxiety. Although she did not have proof of her suspicions, I did.

“The rooms below the school are completely off-limits, their entrances sealed for the safety of us all. You must not reveal to anyone what you found there.” Seraphina went to her desk, opened a drawer, and held up a second key. “There are only two keys to the cellar. I have one. The other was hidden by Raphael.”

“Perhaps Dr. Raphael showed her the location of the key,” I ventured. I remembered the words that had passed between Dr. Raphael and Gabriella that morning, and I knew that this was indeed the answer, one that I did not have the heart to relate to Dr. Seraphina.

“Impossible,” Dr. Seraphina said. “My husband would never reveal such important information to a student.”

I was deeply uncomfortable by what I now suspected to be Dr. Raphael’s intimate relationship with Gabriella, and I was equally uncertain about the nature of Gabriella’s crimes, and yet, to my chagrin, I felt a perverse pleasure at having gained Seraphina’s confidence. Never before had my teacher spoken to me with such seriousness and camaraderie, as if I were not merely her assistant but a colleague.

Therefore it was all the more difficult to contemplate Gabriella’s deceptions. If the impressions I had formed were correct, not only was Gabriella working against the angelologists, but in her involvement with Dr. Raphael she had betrayed Dr. Seraphina personally. Whereas I’d believed that Gabriella had been distracted by a man outside our school, I now knew that her affair was more insidious than I had previously expected. In fact, Dr. Raphael might even be working with Gabriella against our interests. I knew that I must tell Dr. Seraphina, but I could not bring myself to do so. I needed time to understand my own feelings before revealing what I knew to anyone.

Finding it necessary to talk of other matters, I broached the topic that had brought me to her office.

“Forgive me for changing the subject,” I said softly, gauging her reaction. “There is something that I must ask you about the First Angelological Expedition.”

“That is why you came to me this morning?”

“I spent most of the night studying Clematis’s text,” I said. “I read it many times, and each time it left me more uncertain. I couldn’t understand why the account bothered me, and then I realized why: You have never spoken to me of the lyre.”

Dr. Seraphina smiled, her professorial serenity returning to her manner. “It is why my husband gave up on Clematis,” she said. “He spent over a decade trying to find information about the lyre-searching libraries and antique stores throughout Greece, writing letters to scholars, even hunting down the relations of Brother Deopus. But it was no use. If Clematis found the lyre in the cavern-as we believe he did-it was either lost or destroyed. Having no means to come into possession of it ourselves, we have agreed to keep silent about the lyre.”

“And if you had the means?”

“There would be no more need for silence,” Dr. Seraphina said. “With the map we would be in a different position.”

“But you do not need a map,” I said. All my worries about Gabriella and Dr. Raphael and Dr. Seraphina’s suspicions evaporated in light of my anticipation, and I took the pamphlet in my hands and opened it to the page that I had been puzzling over. “You do not need a map. Everything is written here, in Clematis’s account.”

“Whatever do you mean?” Seraphina said, eyeing me as if I had just confessed to a murder. “We have gone over every word of every sentence of the text. There is no mention of the cave’s precise location. There is only a nonexistent mountain somewhere near Greece, and Greece is a very big place, my dear.”

“You may have gone over every word,” I said, “but those words have misled you. Does the original manuscript still exist?”

“Brother Deopus’s original transcription?” Dr. Seraphina said. “Yes, of course. It is locked in our vaults.”

“If you give me access to the original text,” I said, “I am certain that I can show you the location of the cave.”

Devil’s Throat Cavern, Rhodope Mountains, Bulgaria

November 1943

We drove through the narrow mountain roads, climbing through mist and tall, clipped canyons. I had studied the geology of the region before embarking upon the expedition, and still the landscape of the Rhodope Mountains was not as I had pictured it. From my grandmother’s descriptions and my father’s childhood stories, I had envisioned villages enclosed in an endless summer of fruit trees and vines and sun-baked stone. In my childish imaginings, I had believed the mountains to be like sand castles in the onslaught of the sea-blocks of crumbling sandstone with flutes and runnels bitten from their pale, soft surfaces. But as we ascended through sheets of fog, I found a solid and forbidding mountain range of granite peaks, one layering upon the last like decaying teeth against the gray sky. In the distance, ice-capped pinnacles rose over snowy valleys; fingerling crags grasped at the pale blue sky. The Rhodope Mountains loomed dark and majestic before me.

Dr. Raphael had remained in Paris, making preparations for our return, a delicate procedure in light of the occupation, one that left Dr. Seraphina to head the expedition. To my astonishment, nothing whatsoever appeared to have changed in their marriage in the aftermath of my conversation with Dr. Seraphina, or so it seemed to me, who studied them with avid attention until the war descended upon Paris. Although I had prepared myself for the disruptions the war would bring, I could not have known how quickly my life would change once the Germans occupied France. At Dr. Raphael’s request, I lived with my family in Alsace, where I studied the few books I had carried with me and awaited news. Communication was difficult, and for months at a time I heard nothing at all of angelology. Despite the urgency of the mission, all plans of our expedition had been suspended until the end of 1943.

Dr. Seraphina rode in the front of the van, speaking with Vladimir-the young Russian angelologist I had admired from our first meeting-in a mixture of broken Russian and French. Vladimir drove fast, riding so close to the edge of the precipice that it seemed we might follow the swift slide of the van’s reflection, slipping down the glassy surface never to be seen again. As we ascended, the road narrowed into a sinuous path through slate and thick forest. Every so often a village appeared below the road. Clusters of mountain houses sprouted in pockets of vale like hardy mushrooms. Beyond, in the distance, the stone ruins of Roman walls grew from the mountain, half buried in snow. The stark, foreboding beauty of the scene filled me with awe for the country of my grandmother and father.

Every so often, when the tires fell into a snowy rut, we unloaded and dug ourselves out. With our thick wool coats and rugged sheepskin boots, we could have been mistaken for mountain villagers stranded in the snowstorm. Only the quality of our vehicle-an expensive American K-51 radio van with chains wrapped about its tires, a gift from the Valkos’ generous patron in the United States-and the equipment we placed inside, carefully secured with burlap and rope, might give us away.

The Venerable Clematis of Thrace would have envied our halting pace. He had made the journey on foot, his supplies carried by mules. I had always believed the First Angelological Expedition to have been much less hazardous than the Second Expedition-we were endeavoring to enter the cavern in the dead of winter, during a war. And yet Clematis faced dangers we did not. The founders of angelology had been under greater pressure to mask their efforts and conceal their work. They lived in an era of conformity, and their actions would have been under constant scrutiny. As a result, advances came slowly, without the great breakthroughs of modern angelology. Their studies brought them laborious progress that, over the centuries, created the foundation for all I had learned. If they had been discovered, they would have been declared heretics, excommunicated from the church, perhaps imprisoned. I knew that persecution would not have stopped their mission-the founding members of angelology had sacrificed much to further their cause-but it would have caused severe setbacks. They believed that their orders came from a higher authority, just as I believed that I had been called to my mission.

While Clematis’s expedition had faced the threat of theft and the ill will of villagers, our greatest fear was that we would be intercepted by our enemies. After the occupation of Paris in June 1940, we had been forced to go into hiding, a move that postponed the expedition. For years we’d prepared for the journey in secret, collecting supplies and gathering information about the terrain, sealing ourselves in a tight network of trusted scholars and council members, angelologists whose many years of dedication and sacrifice assured loyalty. Security measures changed, however, when Dr. Raphael found a patron-a wealthy American woman whose reverence for our work drove her to assist us. Accepting the support of an outsider, we opened ourselves to detection. With our benefactress’s money and influence, our plans moved forward even as our fears grew. We could never know for certain if the Nephilim had detected our intentions. We could not know if they were in the mountains, following us each step of the way.

I shivered inside the van, feeling ill from the violent lurching as we made our way over ice and uneven roads. I was aware that I should have been frozen from the lack of heat, but my entire body tingled with anticipation. The other members of our party-three well-seasoned angelologists-sat nearby, speaking of the mission ahead with a confidence I could hardly believe. These men were much older than I and had worked together for as long as I’d been alive, but it was I who had solved the mystery of the location, and this gave me special status among them. Gabriella, who had once been my only rival for this position, had left the school in 1940, disappearing without so much as saying good-bye. She had simply taken her belongings from our apartment and vanished. At the time I believed that she had been reprimanded in some fashion, perhaps even expelled, and that her silent departure was one of shame. Whether she had gone into exile or gone underground, I did not know. Although I understood that my efforts had earned me my place on the expedition, I was left with doubts. Secretly I wondered if her absence was why I had been selected for the mission.

Dr. Seraphina and Vladimir analyzed the detail of our descent into the gorge. I did not join their discussion however, so lost was I in my own nervous thoughts about our journey. I was acutely aware that anything at all could happen. Suddenly every possibility arrayed itself before me. We might complete our work in the gorge with ease, or we might never return to civilization. One thing was certain. In the next hours, we would win everything or lose everything.

With the wind howling in the distance and the faint roar of an airplane droning overhead, I could not help but think of the terrible end Clematis had met. I thought of the doubt that Brother Francis had expressed. He had called the expedition party a “brotherhood of dreamers,” and I had to wonder, as we emerged at last at the peak of the mountain, driving past a crag of ice-covered granite, if Francis’s assessment did not hold for us so many centuries later. Were we chasing a phantom treasure? Would we lose our lives to a fruitless fantasy? Our journey could be, as Dr. Seraphina believed, the culmination of all that our scholars had striven for. Or it could be the very thing Brother Francis had so feared: the delusion of a group of dreamers who had lost their way.

In their great passion to understand the details of the Venerable Clematis’s account, Dr. Raphael and Dr. Seraphina had overlooked a most subtle fact: Brother Deopus was a Bulgarian monk of the Thracian region who, although trained in the language of the church and fully capable of taking down Clematis’s words in Latin, was also most certainly a native speaker of the local language, a variation of early Bulgarian forged in the ancient Cyrillic of St. Cyril and St. Methodius in the ninth century. The Venerable Clematis was also a native speaker of early Bulgarian, having been born and educated in the Rhodope Mountains. As I read and reread Dr. Raphael’s translation that fateful night four years before, it had crossed my mind that in Clematis’s maddened retelling of his descent into the cave, he had perhaps reverted to the comfort and ease of his native tongue. Clematis and Brother Deopus surely would have communicated in their common language, especially when speaking of traditions that would not translate easily into Latin. Perhaps Brother Deopus had written these words in Cyrillic, his native script, riddling the manuscript with early Bulgarian words. If he had felt ashamed of such inelegant literary execution as this-for Latin was the educated language of the time-he may have recopied his transcription into proper Latin. Assuming that this had occurred, it was my hope that the original version had been preserved. If Dr. Raphael had used this copy to assist in his translation of Brother Deopus’s transcription, I could check the words to be sure that no errors had occurred in rendering the Latin into modern French.

After coming to this conclusion, I recalled reading in one of Dr. Raphael’s numerous footnotes that the manuscript had contained the stains of faded blood, presumably from Clematis’s injuries in the cave. If this were indeed the case, Deopus’s original manuscript had not in fact been destroyed. Given the opportunity to look upon it, I would doubtless comprehend the markings of Cyrillic scattered through the text, a script I had learned from my grandmother, Baba Slavka, a bookish woman who read Russian novels in their original and wrote volumes of poetry in her native Bulgarian. With the original manuscript, I could extract the Cyrillic words and, with the assistance of my grandmother, find the correct translation from early Bulgarian into Latin and then, of course, French. It was simply a game of working backward from the modern to the ancient languages. The secret of the cave’s location could be discerned, but only if I could study the original manuscript.

Once I’d explained the circuitous path my mind had taken in coming to this conclusion, Dr. Seraphina-whose excitement over my speculations grew as I spoke-brought me straightaway to Dr. Raphael and asked me to explain my theory again. Like Dr. Seraphina, Dr. Raphael approved the logic of the idea, but he warned that he had taken great care in translating Brother Deopus’s words and had found no Cyrillic in the manuscript. Nonetheless the Valkos brought me to the Athenaeum vault, where the original manuscript was kept. They both slipped on white cotton gloves and gave me a pair so I could do the same. Dr. Raphael lifted the manuscript from a shelf. After unwrapping it from a thick white cotton cloth, Dr. Raphael placed it before me so that I might examine it. As he stepped away, our eyes met, and I could not help but remember his early-morning encounter with Gabriella, nor could I help but wonder of the secrets he had kept from everyone, including his wife. Yet Dr. Raphael appeared as he always did: charming, erudite, and utterly inscrutable.

The manuscript before me soon absorbed my attention. The paper was so delicate that I feared damaging it. Sweat had streaked the ink, and flecks of blackened blood marred a number of pages. As I had expected, Brother Deopus’s Latin was imperfect-his spelling was not always accurate, and he tended to muddle his declensions-but to my great disappointment Dr. Raphael was correct: No Cyrillic letters were to be found in the transcription. Deopus had written the entire document in Latin.

My frustration might have been overwhelming-I had hoped to impress my teachers and secure my place on any future expedition-had it not been for Dr. Raphael’s genius. Even as I began to give up hope, his expression filled with exuberance. He explained that in the months that he had translated Deopus’s section of the manuscript from Latin to French, he had come across a number of words that were unfamiliar to him. He had speculated that Deopus, under extraordinary pressure to reproduce Clematis’s words, which must have been spoken at a maddening pace, had Latinized a number of words from his native tongue. It would be only natural, Dr. Raphael explained, as Cyrillic was a rather recent development, having emerged with systemization merely a century before Deopus’s birth. Dr. Raphael remembered the words well, and their place in the account. Taking a paper from his pocket, he uncapped a fountain pen and began to write. He copied a series of Latinized Bulgarian words from the manuscript-“gold,” “world,” “spirit”-forming a list of fifteen or so.

Dr. Raphael explained that it had been necessary to rely upon dictionaries to render the list of words from Bulgarian into Latin, which he then translated into French. He had searched a number of early Slavonic reference texts and found that there were indeed correspondences to the sounds represented in Latin. Endeavoring to smooth the inconsistencies over, he supplied what he believed to be the correct terms, checking each one with the surrounding context to assure that it made sense. At the time the lack of precision had struck Dr. Raphael as unfortunate but routine, the kind of guesswork one must make in any ancient manuscript. Now he saw that his method had corrupted the integrity of the language at the very least and, at worst, had led him to egregious errors in the translation.

Examining the list together, we soon isolated the early Bulgarian words that had been misrepresented. As the words were fairly elementary, I picked up Dr. Raphael’s fountain pen and demonstrated the errors. Deopus had written the word 3лOTO (evil), which Dr. Raphael thought to be 3лaTO (gold), and had translated the phrase “for the angel was formed of evil” as “for the angel was formed of gold.” Similarly, Deopus had written the word Дyx (spirit), which Dr. Raphael had mistranslated as Дъx (breath), rendering the sentence “It is thus that the spirit dies” as “It is thus that the breath dies.” For our purposes, however, the most intriguing question became whether Gyaurskoto Burlo, the name Clematis gave for the cavern, was an early Bulgarian place-name or if it had been corrupted in some fashion. With Dr. Raphael’s fountain pen, I transcribed Gyaurskoto Burlo in my remedial Cyrillic and then in Latin letters.

Γяypското Ъърло

GYAURSKOTO BURLO

I stared at the paper as if the exterior form of the letters might break open, seeping the essence of meaning upon the page. For all my efforts, I could not see how the words could have been misconstrued. While the question of the etymology of Gyaurskoto Burlo was well beyond my capabilities, I knew that there was one person who would understand the history of the name and the misrepresentations it had suffered at the hands of its translators. Dr. Raphael packed the manuscript into his leather case, wrapping it in its cotton cloth to protect it, and by nightfall the Valkos and I had arrived in my native village to speak with my grandmother.

The privilege of my access to the Valkos’ thoughts-not to mention their manuscripts-was something that I had long wished for. Only months before, I had been outside their notice, a mere student who wished to prove herself. Now the three of us were standing in the foyer of my family’s farmhouse, hanging our coats and wiping our shoes as my mother and father introduced themselves. Dr. Raphael was as polite and affable as ever, exemplifying the very embodiment of decorum, and I had to wonder if my image of him with Gabriella had been correct. I could not quite reconcile the perfect gentleman before me with the rapscallion I had witnessed holding his fifteen-year-old student in his arms.

We sat at the smooth wooden table in the kitchen of my parents’ stone house as Baba Slavka examined the manuscript. Although she had lived in our French village for many years, she had never come to resemble the women born there. She wore a bright cotton scarf tied over her hair, large silver earrings, and heavy eye makeup. Her fingers flashed with gold and gemstones. Dr. Raphael explained our questions and presented her with the manuscript and the list of words he had extracted from Deopus’s account. Baba Slavka read the list and, after considering the manuscript for some time stood, went to her room, and returned with a collection of loose sheets I soon understood to be maps. Opening a page, she showed us a map of the Rhodopes. I read the village names written in Cyrillic: Smolyan, Kesten, Zhrebevo, Trigrad. The names were those near the place of my grandmother’s birth.

Gyaurskoto Burlo, she explained, meant “Hiding Place of the Infidels,” or “Infidels’ Prison,” as Dr. Raphael had rightly translated it from Latin. “It was no wonder,” my grandmother continued, “that a place called Gyaurskoto Burlo has never been found, as it does not exist.” Placing her finger near the town of Trigrad, Baba Slavka pointed out a cavern that fit the description of the one we sought, a cavern that had long been held to be a mystical site, the place of Orpheus’s journey to the underworld, a geological marvel and a source of great wonder to the villagers. “This cave has the qualities that you describe, but it is not called Gyaurskoto Burlo,” Baba Slavka said. “It is called Dyavolskoto Gurlo, the Devil’s Throat.” Gesturing to the map, my grandmother said, “The name is not written there, or on any other map, and yet I have walked to the opening in the mountain myself. I have heard the music that emanates from the gorge. It is what made me wish for you to pursue your studies, Celestine.”

“You have been to the cavern?” I asked, astonished that the answer to the Valkos’ search had been so close at hand all along.

My grandmother gave a strange and mysterious smile. “It is near the ancient village of Trigrad that I met your grandfather, and it was in Trigrad that your father was born.”

After my part in locating the cavern, I had expected to return to Paris to assist the Valkos in preparations for the expedition. But with the danger of invasion looming, Dr. Raphael would hear nothing of it. He spoke with my parents, arranging for my belongings to be sent to me by train, and then the Valkos left. Watching them go, I felt that all my dreams and all my work had been for naught. Abandoned in Alsace, I waited for news of our impending journey.

At long last we were approaching the Devil’s Throat. Vladimir stopped the van at a dull wooden sign with a scattering of black Cyrillic letters painted upon it. At Dr. Seraphina’s instruction, he followed the sign toward the village, driving along a narrow, snow-covered road that lifted sharply up into the mountain. The incline was icy and steep. When the van slid backward, Vladimir downshifted, grinding the gears against gravity. The van’s tires spun on the packed snow, gained traction, and carried us lurching ahead into the shadows.

When we reached the top of the road, Vladimir parked the van at the ledge of the mountain, a vast snowy wasteland opening before us. Dr. Seraphina turned to address us. “You’ve all read the Venerable Clematis’s account of his journey. And we have all been through the logistics of entering the cavern. You are aware that the dangers we’re facing ahead are unlike any we’ve encountered before. The physical process of descending the gorge will take all of our strength. We must go in with precision and speed. We have no margin for error. Our equipment will be of great use, but there are more than the physical challenges. Once we are inside the cavern itself, we must be prepared to face the Watchers.”

“Whose strength is formidable,” Vladimir added.

Looking carefully at us, the full gravity of the mission etched into her expression, Dr. Seraphina said, “‘Formidable’ doesn’t adequately describe what we may find. Generations of angelologists have dreamed that we would one day have the capability to confront the imprisoned angels. If we succeed, we will have accomplished something no other group has before.”

“And if we fail?” I asked, hardly allowing myself to think of the possibility.

“The powers they hold,” Vladimir said, “and the destruction and suffering they could bring to humanity are unimaginable.”

Dr. Seraphina buttoned her wool coat and pulled on a pair of leather military gloves, preparing to face the cold mountain wind. “If I’m right, the gorge is at the top of this pass,” she said, stepping out of the van.

I walked from the van to the mountain ledge and looked over the strange, crystalline world that had materialized around me. Above, a wall of black rock rose to the sky, casting a shadow over our party, while ahead a snow-covered valley fell steeply away. Without delay, Dr. Seraphina trekked toward the mountain. Following close behind, I climbed through drifts of snow, my heavy leather boots breaking my path. Clutching a case filled with medical equipment tightly in my hand, I tried to bring my thoughts to focus upon what lay ahead. I knew we would need to be precise in our efforts. Not only were we to face the rugged descent into the gorge, it might be necessary to navigate the spaces beyond the river, the honeycomb of caverns in which Clematis had encountered the angels. There would be no room for mistakes.

As we entered the mouth of the cave, a heavy darkness descended upon us. The interior space was barren and chill, filled with the ominous echoing rush of the underground waterfall Clematis had described. The flat rock at the entrance had none of the pockmarks and vertical shafts I had expected from my studies of Balkan geology but had been mantled with a thick, even layer of glacial deposit. The amount of snow and ice packed into the rock made it next to impossible to know what lay beneath.

Dr. Seraphina turned on a flashlight and brought the beam over the craggy interior. Ice clung to the rock face and, high in the dome of the cave, bats clung to the stone in tight mounds. The light fell over the razor-shorn walls, flickering upon mineral folds, along the rough-hewn stone floor, and then, with the slightest adjustment, the beam dissolved into blackness as it disappeared over the edge of the gorge. Looking about the cavern, I wondered what had become of the objects Clematis had described. The clay amphorae would have crumbled in the moisture long ago if they had not been taken by villagers to store olive oil and wine. But the cave contained no amphorae. Only rock and thick ice remained.

Holding the case of medical equipment with both hands, I walked toward the ledge, the rush of water growing more distinct with each step. As Dr. Seraphina moved the beam of the flashlight before her, something small and bright caught my eye. I squatted to the ground and, placing my hand upon the freezing rock, felt the icy metal of an iron stake, its head hammered flush with the cave’s floor. “This is a remnant of the First Expedition,” Dr. Seraphina said as she knelt at my side to examine my discovery. As I traced the cold iron stake with the tip of my finger, a great sense of wonder came over me: Everything I had studied, including the iron ladder that Father Clematis had described, was real.

And yet there was no time to ponder this truth. In haste Dr. Seraphina knelt at the precipice and examined the steep drop. The shaft plunged in a straight, lightless verticality. As she removed a rope ladder from her pack, my heart began to beat faster at the idea of stepping away from the ledge and relinquishing myself to the dark insubstantiality of air and gravity. The crossbars of the ladder were fastened to two strips of synthetic rope the likes of which I had never seen before, most likely the very newest technology developed for the war effort. I crouched at her side as Dr. Seraphina dropped the rope into the gorge.

Using a hammer, Vladimir secured the iron spikes into the rock, pinching the rope under iron clasps. Dr. Seraphina stood over him, watching his movements with great attention. She gave the ladder a hard shake, a test to determine that it would hold. When satisfied with its strength, she instructed the men-who carried the sacks of equipment, heavy burlap bags of twenty kilograms each-to secure their packs and follow us down.

I listened to the depths, trying to determine what lay beyond. In the stomach of the cavern, water pounded against rock. Looking over the ledge, I could not be sure if the earth below me remained stable or if it was I who had begun to tremble. I placed my hand upon Dr. Seraphina’s shoulder, to hold myself steady against the nauseating spell the cavern had cast upon me.

She took me by the hand and, seeing my distress, said, “You must calm yourself before you proceed. Breathe deeply and do not think of how far you have to go. I’ll lead you. Keep one hand on the crossbar and the other on the rope. If you somehow slip, you won’t lose your footing completely, and if you should fall, I will be directly below to catch you.” Then, without another word, she descended.

Gripping the cold metal with my bare hands, I followed. Trying to find comfort, I recalled the joyous account Clematis had written about the ladder. The simplicity of his pleasure had inspired me to memorize the words he’d written: “One can hardly imagine our delight upon gaining passage into the abyss. Only Jacob in his vision of the mighty procession of Holy Messengers might have beheld a ladder more welcome and majestic. To our divine purpose we proceeded into the terrible blackness of the forsaken pit, filled with expectation of His protection and Grace.”

We formed a line, each angelologist moving slowly down the rock face into the darkness, the sound of crashing water growing louder as we descended. The air became frigid as we moved deeper and deeper into the earth. A startling heaviness began to spread through my limbs, as if a vial of mercury had been released in my blood. It seemed that no matter how often I blinked, my eyes were filled with tears. In my panic I imagined that the narrow walls of the gorge would pinch together and I would be trapped in a granite vise, fixed in a stifling darkness. Clutching the cold, wet iron, the rush of the waterfall in my ears, I felt as if I were moving into the heart of a whirlpool.

Quickly I went, letting gravity take me. As the shaft deepened, the darkness thickened to a cool, opaque soup. I could see no farther than the whites of my knuckles wrapped around the ladder’s rung. The wooden soles of my boots slipped on the metal, knocking me ever so slightly off balance. Clutching the case tightly to my side, so as to regain balance, I slowed my pace. Measuring each step, I positioned my feet carefully, delicately, one after the other. The blood rushed in my ears as I looked up at the dissolving track of the ladder. Poised at the center of the void, I had no choice but to continue into the watery darkness. A biblical passage rushed into my thoughts, and I could not help but whisper it, knowing that the crashing waterfall would wash away my voice the moment I spoke the words: “‘And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.’ ”

As I reached the bottom of the descent, the soles of my boots leaving the last swinging rung of the rope ladder and brushing the solid earth, I knew that Dr. Seraphina had discovered something momentous. The angelologists quickly unpacked the burlap sacks and lit our battery-operated lanterns, placing them at intervals across the flat rock floor of the cavern so that a fitful, oily light opened the darkness. The river, described in Clematis’s account as the boundary of the angels’ prison, coursed by in the distance, a glimmering black ribbon of movement. I could see Dr. Seraphina ahead, shouting orders, but the sound of the waterfall consumed her words.

When I reached her, she stood over the body of the angel. Upon taking my place at her side, I, too, fell under the trance of the creature. It was even more beautiful than I had imagined it to be, and I could do nothing for some time but stare, so overwhelmed was I by its perfection. The creature’s physical properties were identical to the description I had read in the literature at the Athenaeum: elongated torso, gaunt features, massive hands and feet. Its cheeks retained the vivacity of a living being’s. Its robes were pristine white, woven of a metallic material that wrapped about the body in luxurious folds.

“The First Angelological Expedition occurred in the tenth century, and still the body has the appearance of vitality,” Vladimir said. He bent before the creature and lifted the white metallic gown, rubbing the fabric between his fingers.

“Be careful,” Dr. Seraphina said. “The level of radioactivity is very high.”

Vladimir considered the angel. “I’ve always believed that they could not die.”

“Immortality is a gift that can be taken as easily as it is bequeathed,” Dr. Seraphina said. “Clematis believed that the Lord struck the angel down as vengeance.”

“Is that what you believe?” I asked.

“After its role in bringing the Nephilim into the world, killing this devilish creature seems perfectly justified,” Dr. Seraphina said.

“Its beauty is incomprehensible,” I said, struggling to reconcile the fact that beauty and evil could be so intertwined in one body.

“What remains a mystery to me,” Vladimir said, looking beyond the body of the angel to the far side of the cavern, “is that the others were allowed to live.”

The party split into groups. Half stayed to document the body-extracting cameras and lenses and the aluminum case filled with biological testing apparatus from the heavy burlap bags holding them-and the other half set off to search for the lyre. Vladimir led the latter group, while Dr. Seraphina and I stayed with the angel. At our side, the remaining members of our party examined the half-buried bones of two human skeletons. The bodies of Clematis’s brothers had remained exactly as they fell one thousand years before.

At Dr. Seraphina’s orders, I put on protective gloves and lifted the angel’s head in my hands. Running my fingers through the creature’s glossy hair, I brushed the forehead, as if comforting a sick child. My touch was blunted by the gloves, but it seemed to me that the angel was warm with life. Smoothing the metallic gown, I unfastened two brass buttons at the clavicle and tugged at the fabric. It fell away, revealing a flat chest, smooth, without nipples. A clutch of ribs pressed against taut, translucent skin.

From head to foot, the creature looked to be over two meters tall, a length that, in the ancient system of measurement the founding fathers had used, translated to 4.8 Roman cubits. Other than the golden ringlets falling about the shoulders, the body was completely hairless, and, to Dr. Seraphina’s delight-she had staked her professional reputation upon the very question-the creature had distinct sexual organs. The angel was male, as all the imprisoned Watchers had been. As Clematis’s account attested, one of the wings had been torn away and hung at an odd angle to the body. There could be no doubt that this was the very creature the Venerable Clematis had killed.

Together we lifted the creature and turned it on its side. We removed the robe entirely, exposing the skin to the harsh light of the lantern. The body was pliable, the joints limber. Under Dr. Seraphina’s direction, we began photographing it with care. It was important to capture small details. Developments in photographic technology, especially multilayered color film, gave us hope that we would achieve great accuracy, perhaps even capture the color of the eyes-too blue to be real, as if someone had ground lapis in oil and brushed it over a sun-filled windowpane. These attributes would be documented in our field notes and duly added to the appropriate accounts of the journey, but photographic evidence was essential.

After we had completed the first series of photographs, Dr. Seraphina removed a measuring tape from a burlap camera bag and squatted at the creature’s side. Placing the tape along the body, she took its measurements and converted the results to cubits, to better compare them with ancient documentation of the giants. As she calculated the measurement into cubits, she shouted the numbers aloud so that I might record them. The measurements were as follows:

Arms = 2.01 cubits

Legs = 2.88 cubits

Head Circumference = 1.85 cubits

Chest Circumference = 2.81 cubits

Feet = 0.76 cubits

Hands = 0.68 cubits

My own hands shook as I jotted the findings in a notebook, leaving a track of nearly illegible markings that I retraced, reading the numbers back to Dr. Seraphina to make certain each measurement was correct. From the numbers, I estimated the creature to be 30 percent larger than the average human being. Seven feet was an impressive height, awe-inspiring even in our modern era, but in ancient times such height would have seemed nothing short of miraculous. Such extreme height explained the terror that ancient cultures associated with the Giants and the dread that had surrounded such Nephilim as Goliath, one of the most famous of their race.

A sound rose from the cavern, but when I turned to Dr. Seraphina, she didn’t seem to notice anything except me. She was observing me as I executed the field notes, perhaps worried that the task had overwhelmed me. My distress had grown more visible. I had started to shake and could only imagine how I must appear to her. I began to wonder if perhaps I had taken ill on the journey through the mountains-the ride had been cold and damp, and none of us were dressed well enough to protect us from the mountain winds. My pencil trembled in my hand, and my teeth chattered. Occasionally I stopped writing and turned to the darkness that stretched in a seemingly endless cavity beyond. Again I heard something in the distance. A terrifying sound echoed from the depths.

“Are you all right?” she asked, her gaze falling upon my shaking hands.

“Don’t you hear it?” I asked.

Dr. Seraphina halted her work and walked away from the body, to the edge of the river. After listening for some minutes, she returned to me and said, “It’s nothing but the sound of water.”

“There is something else,” I said. “They are here, waiting. They expect us to free them.”

“They have been waiting for thousands of years, Celestine,” she said. “And if we are successful, they will wait for thousands more.”

Dr. Seraphina turned back to the angel and commanded me to do the same. Despite my fear I was drawn in by the angel’s strange beauty-its translucent skin, its soft and continual light, the sculptural poise of its repose. There was much speculation about angelic luminosity, the predominant theory being that angelic bodies contained a radioactive material that accounted for their endless brightness. Our protective clothing only minimized exposure. Radioactivity also explained the horrid death suffered by Brother Francis during the First Angelological Expedition and the sickness that claimed Clematis.

I knew that I should have as little contact with the body as possible-it was one of the first things one learned when preparing for the expedition-and yet I could not restrain myself from drawing nearer to the creature’s body. I peeled away my gloves and knelt at its side, placing my hands upon its forehead. I felt the skin, cold and wet against my palm, retaining the elasticity of living cells. It was like touching the smooth, iridescent skin of a serpent. Although it had been submerged in the depths of the cavern for over a thousand years, the white-blond hair shone. The shocking blue eyes, so disconcerting at first glace, now had the opposite effect upon me. Looking into them, I felt that the angel sat by my side, calming me with its presence, lifting all my fears away, and granting me an eerie opiate comfort.

“Come here,” I said to Dr. Seraphina. “Quickly.”

My teacher’s eyes widened at the sight of my hands on the creature-even an angelologist as young and inexperienced as I should have known that physical contact broke our safety protocol. Yet, perhaps she was drawn to the angel as I had been. Dr. Seraphina sat next to me and placed her palms upon the forehead, resting her fingertips in the roots of its hair. I saw the change in Dr. Seraphina in an instant. She closed her eyes, and a sensation of bliss appeared to wash over her. The tension in her body eased into pure serenity.

Suddenly a hot, sticky substance seeped over the skin of my palms. Lifting my hands, I squinted, trying to determine what had happened. A gummy golden film, transparent and glistening as honey, coated my hands, and when I held them in the light of the angel’s skin, the substance refracted, scattering a reflective dust over the cavern floor, as if my palms were coated in millions of microscopic crystals.

Quickly, before the other angelologists saw what we had done, we wiped our hands against the rocky surface of the cavern wall and slipped them back into our gloves. “Come, Celestine,” Dr. Seraphina said. “Let’s finish with the body.”

I opened the medical kit and placed it at her side. Everything-scalpels, swabs, a packet of straight blades, tiny glass vials with screw caps-had been strapped inside with elastic bands. I lifted the creature’s arm over my lap, steadying it at the elbow and wrist as Dr. Seraphina scraped the grain of a fingernail with the edge of the razor blade. Flakes broke from the nails, collecting at the bottom of a glass vial, chunky and mineral as sea salt. Turning the blade at an angle, Dr. Seraphina made two parallel incisions along the inner surface of the forearm and, careful not to rip the skin, pulled. A layer of skin peeled away, leaving exposed musculature. Pressed between plates of glass, the swath of skin glittered golden, brilliant and reflective in the weak light.

A wave of nausea passed over me at the sight of the exposed muscle. Afraid that I might be sick, I excused myself, apologizing as I left. At some distance from the expedition party, I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself. The air was bitter cold, filled with a thick moisture that hung in my chest. The cavern opened before me, a series of endless, dark concavities that pulled me into them. As the feeling of nausea dissipated, a sense of wonder took its place. What lay beyond, hidden in darkness?

I took a small metal flashlight from my pocket and turned it toward the cavern’s depths. The light grew fainter as I moved deeper into the cavern, as if eaten by the sticky, ravenous fog. I could see only one meter, perhaps two, in front. Behind me, Dr. Seraphina’s strong, impatient voice directed the others as they worked. Ahead, another voice-a soft, insistent, melodic voice-called me forth. I paused, letting the darkness settle around me. The river was before me, separating me from the Watchers. I had ventured too far from the others, putting myself at risk. Something awaited me in the granite heart of the gorge. I needed only to discover it.

I stood at the edge of the river. The black water rushed by, sweeping into the darkness beyond. As I stepped along its bank, a wobbling rowboat materialized, the twin of the boat Clematis had used to navigate across the river. His image, or perhaps a shade of his voice, beckoned me to follow his path. The edge of my trousers skimmed the water as I pushed the boat from the riverbank, the heavy wool darkening as it brushed the surface. The boat had been fastened by rope to a pulley-evidence that others, perhaps local historians, had ventured to the river-so that in tugging the rope I was able to pull myself across without the assistance of oars. From my perch I saw a waterfall at the head of the river, the thick mist rising before the endless hollow of cave, and I understood why legend designated the river as Styx, the river of the dead: Pulling the boat across the water, I felt a deathly presence descend, a dark emptiness so complete that it seemed to me that my life would be pressed away.

The waters brought me swiftly to the opposite shore. I left the boat, which was securely fixed to the rope pulley, and climbed onto the bank. The cave’s mineral formations grew dramatic the farther I moved from the water: There were spires of rock, clusters of minerals, crystal formations, and a comb of caves opening on all sides. The indecipherable summons that had drawn me away from Dr. Seraphina grew clear. I could hear the distinct sound of a voice, rising and falling, as if in time with my footfall. If only I could reach the source of the music, I knew that I would see the creatures that had lived in my imagination for so long.

Suddenly the rock floor dropped from underfoot, and before I could catch my balance, I fell headlong onto the wet, smooth granite. Training my flashlight over the floor, I saw that I had tripped upon a small leather satchel. I picked myself up, took the satchel in my hands, and unbound it. The worn material felt as if it might disintegrate at my touch. Passing the flashlight over the interior of the sack, I saw a brilliant metallic glimmer. I peeled away a layer of tattered calfskin and held the lyre, its gold shining as if freshly polished. I had found the very object we’d prayed we would discover.

I could think only of bringing the lyre to Dr. Seraphina. Quickly, I wrapped the treasure in the satchel and began to make my way through the darkness, taking care not to fall again upon the wet granite. The river was near, and I could see the boat lifting and falling upon the black water, when a flickering of light from within the depths of a cave caught my attention. At first the source of the illumination remained obscure. I believed that I had found the members of our expedition party, their flashlights trailing over the rocky cavern walls. Walking nearer so that I might look closer, I sensed that the light had an altogether different quality from the harsh bulbs we’d brought into the gorge. Hoping to better understand what I saw, I ventured even closer to the mouth of the cave. A being of wondrous appearance stood within it, its great wings open, as if preparing for flight. The angel was so brilliant I could hardly bear to look at it directly. To soothe my eyes, I glanced beyond. In the distance stood a choir of angles, their skin emitting a tempered, diaphanous light that illuminated the gloom of their cells.

I could not take my eyes from the creatures. There were between fifty and one hundred angels, each one as majestic and lovely as the last. Their skin appeared molded of liquid gold, their wings of carved ivory, their eyes composed of chips of bright blue glass. Luminous nebulae of milky light floated about them, ringing their masses of blond curls. Although I had read of their sublime appearance and had tried to envision them, I’d never believed that the creatures would have such a seductive effect upon me. Despite my terror, they drew me to them with an almost magnetic force. I wanted to turn and flee, and yet I was unable to move.

The beings sang out in joyous harmony. The chorus thrumming through the cavern was so unlike the demonic nature I had long associated with the imprisoned angels that my fear all but melted. Their music was unearthly and beautiful. In their voices I understood the promise of paradise. As the music drew me under its spell, I found myself unable to walk away. To my astonishment, I wanted to pluck the strings of the lyre.

Holding the base of the lyre upon my knees, I ran my fingers over the taut metal strings. I had never played such an instrument-my musical training had been limited to a chapter in Ethereal Musicology-and yet the sound that emerged from the lyre was lush and melodious, as if the instrument played itself.

At the sound of the lyre, the Watchers left off their singing. They looked about the cave, and the horror I felt as the creatures fixed their attention on me was tempered with awe-the Watchers were among God’s most perfect creatures, physically luminous, weightless as flower petals. Paralyzed, I held the lyre close to my body, as if it might give me strength against the creatures.

As the angels pressed themselves against the metal bars of their prisons, blinding light dizzied me, throwing me off balance. An intense heat came over me, hot and sticky, as if I had been drenched in boiling oil. I cried out in pain, although my voice did not seem my own. Collapsing upon the ground, I covered my face with the satchel as a second blast of searing heat seized me, more intensely painful than the first. It felt to me that my thick wool clothing-meant to protect me from the cold-would melt away, as Brother Francis’s robes had dissolved. In the distance the voices of the angels rose once again in sweet harmony. It was under the spell of the angels that I fell unconscious, the lyre wrapped in my arms.

Some minutes passed before I rose from the depths of oblivion to find Dr. Seraphina hovering above me, an expression of concern upon her face. She whispered my name, and for a moment I believed that I had died and emerged upon the other side of existence, falling asleep in our world and waking in another, as if Charon had in fact taken me across the deathly river Styx. But then a seizure of pain overwhelmed my senses, and I knew that I had been hurt. My body felt stiff and hot, and it was then I recalled how I had been injured. Dr. Seraphina took the lyre from my hands and, too stunned to speak, examined it. Helping me to sit, she tucked the instrument under her arm and, with a surefootedness that I longed to emulate, led me back to the boat.

She pulled us across the waters, gripping the rope attached to the pulley. As the prow lifted and fell with the current, Dr. Seraphina removed wax plugs from her ears. Prepared as usual, my teacher had been able to protect herself from the sound of the angels’ music.

“What in the name of God were you doing?” she demanded without turning to me. “You should know better than to have wandered off alone.”

“The others?” I asked, thinking that I had somehow put the expedition party in danger. “Where are they?”

“They’ve ascended to the cave and will be waiting for us,” she said. “We searched three hours for you. I was beginning to think we’d lost you. Surely the others will want to know what happened to you. You must not under any circumstances tell them. Promise me this, Celestine: You must not speak of what you saw on the other side of the river.”

As we reached the shore, Dr. Seraphina helped me from the boat. When she saw that I was in pain, her manner softened. “Remember, our work has never been with the Watchers, my dear Celestine,” she said. “Our duties lie with the world we live in and must return to. There is much to be done. Although I am terribly disappointed in your choice to cross the river, you have discovered the object that fulfills our mission here. Well done.”

My body aching with each step, we returned to the ladder, passing the remains of the angel. Its robe had been cast aside and the body carefully dissected. Although it was little more than a shell of its former self, the ruins of its body gave off a dim, phosphorescent glow.

Aboveground all was dark. We carried the burlap bags filled with our precious samples through the snow. After packing the equipment carefully in the van, we climbed inside and began our descent down the mountain. We were exhausted, covered in mud, and injured-Vladimir had a gouge over his eye, a deep and bloody cut from a rock ledge he had hit on his ascent, and I had been exposed to a sickening light.

As we made our way through the mountains, moving swiftly along the icy roads, it was clear that snow had been falling for some time. Drifts piled heavy on crags and new snow fell thick against the sky. Ice coated the road ahead and behind, determining our meandering pace. I looked at my wristwatch and was surprised to learn that it was nearly four o’clock in the morning. We had been in the Devil’s Throat for over fifteen hours. We were so behind schedule that we could not stop for sleep. We would only pause to refuel with petrol packed in canisters at the back of the van.

Despite Vladimir’s efforts we arrived many hours late to meet the plane, just as the sun was rising. A Model 12 Electra Junior, twin-engined and ready for flight, sat on the runway, just as we’d left it the day before. Ice hung from the wings like fangs, proof of the bitter cold. It had been difficult to fly to our destination but it would have been utterly impossible to have driven. We had been forced to take a number of detours in our flight to Greece-we had flown first to Tunisia and then to Turkey to avoid detection-and our return would be no less difficult. The plane was large enough for six passengers, our equipment and supplies. We loaded our materials on board, and soon the plane climbed through the snow-filled air, rising into the sky in a flurry of noise.

Twelve hours later, as we landed at the airfield outside of Paris, I saw that a Panhard et Levassor Dynamic waited in the distance, a luxurious vehicle with a polished grille and sweeping running boards, an object of wonder among the intense deprivations of the war. I could only guess how we had acquired such a treasure but suspected that it, like the Model 12 and the K-51, had been arranged through foreign patrons. Donations had kept us alive in the past years, and I was grateful to see the car, but how we had managed to keep such a treasure from the Germans was another question altogether, one I dared not ask.

I sat in silence as the car sped through the night. Despite hours of sleep on the plane, I was still exhausted from the trip down the gorge. I closed my eyes. Before I knew it, I had fallen into a deep sleep. The tires bumped over the battered roads, and the others whispered at the edge of my hearing, but all meaning of their words was lost. My dreams were a mélange of images of everything that I had seen in the cave. Dr. Seraphina and Vladimir and the other party members appeared before me; the deep and terrifying cavern opened below; and the legion of luminous angels, their brilliant pallor radiating about them, danced before me.

When I woke, I recognized the deserted cobblestone streets of Montparnasse, an area of resistance and utter poverty during the occupation. We drove past apartment buildings and darkened cafés, barren trees rising on each side, snow frosting their branches. The driver slowed and turned into the Cimetière du Montparnasse, stopping before a great iron gate. He gave a short honk from the horn, and the gate opened, rattling aside as the car crawled forward. The interior of the cemetery was still and frozen, coated in ice that glimmered in the headlights, and I felt for a moment that this one shimmering place had been spared the ugliness and depravity of the war. The driver cut the engine before a statue of an angel perched upon a stone pedestal-Le Cénie du Sommeil Éternel, The Spirit of Eternal Sleep, a bronze guardian gazing over the dead.

I stepped out of the car, still groggy with exhaustion. Although the night was clear, the stars glowing above in the sky, the air hung wet upon the tombstones, giving the faintest aura of fog. A man stepped from behind the statue, clearly assigned to meet the car, but all the same I started with fright. He wore the clothing of a priest. I had never seen the man before, not at any of our meetings or assemblies, and I had been trained to be suspicious of everyone. Only the month before, the Nephilim had tracked down and killed one of our senior council members, a professor of ethereal musicology named Dr. Michael, taking his entire collection of musicological writings. It was one instance of a senior-level scholar’s losing priceless information. The enemy waited for such chances.

Dr. Seraphina appeared to know the priest and followed him readily. Urging the group to come with him, the priest led us to a dilapidated stone structure in a far corner of the cemetery, one of the remaining buildings of a long-abandoned monastery. Years before, the building had served as the Valkos’ lecture hall. Now it remained empty. The priest unlocked a swollen wooden door and led us inside.

None of us, not even Dr. Seraphina, who had close ties to the most senior council members-indeed, Dr. Raphael Valko led the resistance in Paris-knew exactly where we would meet during the war. We had no regular schedule, and all messages were delivered by word of mouth or-like this one-in silence. Assemblies convened in impromptu locations-out-of-the-way cafés, small towns beyond Paris, abandoned churches. Even with these extreme precautions, I knew that we were most likely being monitored every moment.

The priest brought us into a hallway off the sanctuary, stopped before a door, and gave three sharp raps. The door opened, revealing a stone room lit by exposed bulbs-more precious supplies bought on the black market with dollars from America. The narrow windows were covered by heavy black cloth, to block out the light. The meeting appeared to be under way-members of the council sat at a round wooden table. As the priest ushered us inside, the council members stood, examining us with great interest. I was not allowed to attend the council meetings and had no method of gauging their usual proceedings, but clearly the council had been waiting for the expedition party to arrive.

Dr. Raphael Valko, acting chair of the council, sat at the head of the table. The last I had seen him had been as he drove away from my farmhouse in Alsace, leaving me in exile, an abandonment for which I could not forgive him, even though I was aware that it had been for the best. He had changed significantly since then. His hair had grayed about the temples, and his manner had taken on a new level of gravity. I would have taken him for a stranger if I’d met him in the street.

Greeting us tersely, Dr. Raphael gestured to a number of empty chairs and began what I knew would be the first of many rounds of questioning about the expedition. “You have much to report,” he said, folding his hands upon the table. “Begin as you wish.”

Dr. Seraphina gave a detailed description of the gorge: the steep vertical drop, the rock shelves that studded the lower regions of the cavern, and the distinct sound of the waterfall in the distance. She described the body of the angel, giving a list of precise measurements and outlining the characteristics she had recorded in her field notebook, mentioning with obvious pride the distinct genitalia. She reported that the photographs would reveal new truths about the physicality of the angels. The expedition had been a great success.

As the other members of the party spoke, each giving an elaborate account of the journey, I felt myself turn inward. I stared at my hands in the dim light. They were eaten raw from the cold and ice of the gorge and burned from the angel. I wondered at the sense of dislocation that had overtaken me. Had we been in the mountains only hours before? My fingers trembled so severely that I tucked them into the pockets of my thick wool coat, to hide them. In my mind the aquamarine eyes of the angel stared up at me, bright and polished as colored glass. I recalled how Seraphina had lifted the creature’s long arms and legs, weighing each limb as if it were a piece of wood. The creature seemed so vital, so filled with life that I could not help but believe that it had been living only minutes before we’d arrived. I realized that I had never quite believed that the body would be there, that despite all my study I had not expected to actually see it, to touch it, to puncture its skin with needles and draw fluid. Perhaps at the back of my mind I’d hoped that we were wrong. When the skin had been cut from the arm and the sample of flesh held into the light, I had been overcome with horror. I saw it again and again: the razor edging under the white skin, slicing, lifting. The glimmering of the membrane in the weak light. As the youngest among them, I felt that it was imperative I perform well, carrying more than my share. Always I had pushed myself to spend more hours working and studying than the others. The past years were spent proving myself worthy of the expedition-reading texts, attending lectures, equipping myself with information for the journey-and yet this had not helped to prepare me for the gorge. To my chagrin, I had reacted like a neophyte.

“Celestine?” Dr. Raphael said, jarring me from my thoughts. I was startled to see the others looking intently at me, as if expecting me to speak. Apparently Dr. Raphael had asked me a question.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, feeling my face burn. “Did you ask me something?”

“Dr. Seraphina was explaining to the council that you made a crucial discovery in the cavern,” Dr. Raphael said, examining me carefully. “Would you care to elaborate?”

Fearful that I would give away the secret promise I had made Dr. Seraphina, and equally terrified of exposing how foolhardy I had been to cross the river, I said nothing at all.

“It is obvious that Celestine isn’t feeling well,” Dr. Seraphina said, interceding on my behalf. “If you don’t mind, I would like her to rest for the moment. Allow me to describe the discovery.”

Dr. Seraphina explained the discovery to the council members. She said, “I found Celestine near the riverbank, the careworn sack in her arms. I knew at once by the worn leather that it must have been very old. There is, if you recall, mention of a satchel in the Venerable Father’s account of the First Angelological Expedition.”

“Yes,” Dr. Raphael said. “You are correct. I recall the line exactly: ‘With all haste, I collected the treasure from the fallen creature, cradling the object in my charred hands and placing it in my satchel, safe from harm: ”

“Only after opening the satchel and examining the lyre did I know for certain that it had belonged to Clematis. The Venerable Clematis must have been too stricken to carry the sack to the surface of the gorge,” Dr. Seraphina said. “It is this very satchel that Celestine discovered.”

The council members were awestruck at this news. They turned to me, clearly expecting that I would give the account in greater detail, but I could not speak. Indeed, I could hardly believe that I, of all the members of their party, had made such a long-awaited discovery.

Dr. Raphael remained silent for a moment, as if contemplating the magnitude of the expedition’s success. Then, with a sudden burst of energy, he stood and turned to the council members.

“You may go,” Dr. Raphael said, dismissing the group. “There is food in our rooms below Seraphina and Celestine, would you please stay a moment?”

As the others left, Dr. Seraphina caught my eye, giving me a kind look, as if to assure me that everything would be fine. Dr. Raphael guided the others from the room, radiating a confident serenity that I admired, for his strength of character to contain his emotions was a virtue I wished to emulate. He said, “Tell me, Seraphina-did the party members perform to your expectations?”

“It was, in my opinion, a great success,” Dr. Seraphina said.

“And Celestine?” he inquired.

I felt my stomach twist: Had the expedition been some kind of test?

“For a young angelologist,” Dr. Seraphina said, “she impressed me. The discovery alone should be enough to prove her skill.”

“Fine,” Dr. Raphael said, turning to me. “You are pleased with your work?”

I glanced from Dr. Seraphina to Dr. Raphael, unsure of how to respond. To say that I was satisfied with my work would be a lie, but to speak in detail of what I had done would be to break the promise I had made to Dr. Seraphina. Finally I whispered, “I wish that I had been more prepared.”

“We prepare all of our lives for such moments,” Dr. Raphael said, crossing his arms and looking at me with a critical gaze. “When the time comes, we can only expect that we have learned enough to succeed.”

“You were quite capable,” Dr. Seraphina added. “Your work was superb.”

“I cannot account for my reaction to the gorge,” I said simply. “I found the mission deeply troubling. Even now I have not recovered.”

Dr. Raphael put his arm around his wife, kissing her on the cheek. “Go to the others, Seraphina. There is something I would like to show Celestine.”

Dr. Seraphina turned to me and took my hand. “You were very brave, Celestine, and one day you will make an excellent angelologist.” With this she kissed my cheek and departed. I would never see her again.

Dr. Raphael ushered me from the meeting room and into a corridor smelling of earth and fungus. “Follow me,” he said, stepping quickly down the steps and into darkness. At the bottom of the stairs, there was another passageway, this one longer than the first. I felt the sharp decline in the floor as we walked and adjusted my weight to bolster myself. As we hurried onward, the air grew cooler and the smell became intensely rancid. The damp air moved through my clothes, penetrating the thick wool jacket I had worn into the cavern. Brushing my hands against the wet stone walls, I realized that the uneven fragments were not stone but bones piled into the cavity in the wall. At once I understood their location: We were moving below Montparnasse by way of the catacombs.

We climbed through a second corridor, up a stairway, and into another building. Dr. Raphael unlocked a series of doors, the last of which opened to the crisp, cold air of an alleyway. Rats scattered in all directions, leaving half-eaten scraps-rotting potato peels and chicory, a wartime substitute for coffee. Dr. Raphael took me by the arm and led me around another corner and into the street. We soon found ourselves a number of blocks from the cemetery, where the Panhard et Levassor idled, waiting for us. As we approached the car, I noticed that a square of paper written entirely in German had been fastened in the window. Although I could not make out what it said, I guessed it to be a German permit or license that would allow us to pass checkpoints throughout the city. Now I understood how we managed to keep such a luxurious car and obtain fuel: The Panhard et Levassor belonged to the Germans. Dr. Valko, who oversaw our undercover operations in the German ranks, had managed to obtain use of it-at least for the evening.

The driver opened the door, and I slid into the warm backseat, Dr. Raphael moving in next to me. Turning, he took my face between his cold hands and gazed at me dispassionately. “Look at me,” he said, examining my features, as if searching for something particular. I returned his gaze, seeing him up close for the first time. He was at least fifty, his skin lined and his hair even more flecked with gray than I had noticed earlier. Our proximity startled me. I had never been so close to a man before.

“Your eyes are blue?” he asked.

“Hazel,” I responded, confused by the strange question.

“Good enough,” he said, opening a small travel suitcase between us. He lifted a satin evening gown, silk stockings and garter belt, and a pair of shoes. I recognized the dress instantly. It was the same red satin dress Gabriella had worn years before.

“Put these on,” Dr. Raphael said. My astonishment must have been apparent, for he added, “You will soon see why this is necessary.”

“But they are Gabriella’s,” I said, objecting before I could stop myself. I could not bring myself to touch the dress, knowing all that I did about her activities. I recalled Dr. Raphael and Gabriella together, and I wished that I had said nothing.

“What of it?” Dr. Raphael demanded.

“The night she wore this dress,” I said, unable to look him in the eye, “I saw the two of you together. You were in the street below our apartment.”

“And you believe that you understand what you saw,” Dr. Raphael said. “How could I misinterpret it?” I whispered, glancing out the window at the dull gray buildings, the progression of streetlamps, the dismal face of Paris in winter. “It was very clear what was happening.”

“Put the dress on,” Dr. Raphael said, his voice stern. “You must place more faith in Gabriella’s motives. Friendship should be stronger than idle suspicions. In times like this, trust is all we have. There is much you do not know. Very soon you will understand the dangers Gabriella has faced.”

Slowly, I unbound myself from my thick woolen clothing. I unbuttoned my trousers and slid the heavy sweater-worn for protection against the icy mountain wind-over my head and wiggled into the gown, careful not to tear it. The dress was too big; I felt it immediately. Four years ago, when Gabriella had worn it, the dress would have been too small for me, but I had lost ten kilos during the war and was little more than skin and bones.

Dr. Raphael Valko went through a similar costume change. As I dressed, he withdrew the black jacket and trousers of an Allgemeine SS Nazi uniform from his case, pulling a pair of stiff, glossy black riding boots from under the seat. The uniform was in perfect condition, without the wear or smell of black-market hand-me-downs. I supposed it to be another useful acquisition from one of our double agents in the SS, one with Nazi connections. The uniform sent chills through me-it transformed Dr. Raphael completely. When he had finished dressing, he brushed a clear liquid onto his upper lip and pressed a thin mustache upon it. Then he slicked back his hair with pomade and attached an SS pin to his lapel, a small but precise addition that filled me with repulsion.

Dr. Raphael narrowed his eyes and examined me, checking my appearance with care. I crossed my arms over my chest, as if I might hide myself from him. Clearly I had not metamorphosed to his satisfaction. To my great embarrassment, he straightened the dress and fussed over my hair in the way my mother used to do before bringing me to church as a child.

The car sped through the streets, stopping at the Seine. A soldier at the bridge tapped the glass with the butt of a Luger. The driver unrolled the window and spoke to the soldier in German, showing a packet of papers. The soldier glanced into the back of the car, resting his gaze upon Dr. Raphael.

“Guten Abend,” Dr. Raphael said with what sounded to me to be a perfect German accent.

“Guten Abend,” the soldier muttered, examining the papers before he waved us across the bridge.

As we climbed the wide stone steps of a municipal banquet hall featuring a series of columns rising before a classical façade, we passed men in evening attire and beautiful women on their arms. German soldiers stood guard at the door. Compared to the elegant women, I knew I must appear sickly and exhausted, too thin and pale. I had pulled my hair back in a chignon and applied a bit of rouge from Dr. Raphael’s case, but how unlike them-with their styled hair and fresh complexions-I was. Warm baths, powders, perfumes, and fresh clothing did not exist for me, or for any of us in occupied France. Gabriella had left behind a cut crystal bottle of Shailmar, a precious reminder of happier times that I had kept with me since her disappearance, but I dared not use a drop of the scent for fear that I might waste it. I remembered comfort as something of my childhood, something I had experienced once and never again, like loose teeth. There was little chance I would be mistaken for one of these women. Still, I clung to Dr. Raphael’s arm, trying to remain calm. He walked swiftly, with confidence, and, to my surprise, the soldiers let us pass without incident. All at once we stood in the warm, noisy, lush interior of the banquet hall.

Dr. Raphael led me to the far side of the hall and up a set of stairs to a private table on the balcony. It took a moment to adjust to the noise and odd lighting, but as I did, I saw that the dining room was long and deep, with a high ceiling and mirrored walls that reflected the crowd, capturing the nape of a woman’s neck here, the glistening of a watch fob there. Red banners stamped with black swastikas hung at intervals throughout the room. The tables were covered in white linen, matching china, bouquets of flowers blooming at the center-roses in the dead of a wartime winter, a minor miracle. Crystal chandeliers threw wavering light upon the dark tiled floor, catching upon satin shoes. Champagne, jewels, and beautiful people gathered in the candlelight. The room was aflutter with hands raising wineglasses-Zum Wohl! Zum Wohl! The abundance of wine being served from one end of the room to the other took me by surprise. While food was difficult to acquire in general, good wine was nearly impossible for those unconnected with the occupation forces. I had heard that the Germans requisitioned bottles of champagne by the thousands, and my family’s cellar had been drunk dry. To me even one bottle was an extreme luxury. Yet here it was, flowing like water. At once I understood how very different the lives of the victorious were from the lives of the conquered.

From the height of the balcony, I examined the revelers up close. At first glance the crowd appeared to be like any other attending an elegant gathering. But with further inspection, I found a number of guests to have an odd appearance. They were thin and angular, with high cheekbones and wide, feline eyes, as if they had been cut from a pattern. Their blond hair, translucent skin, and unusual height marked them as Nephilistic guests.

Voices lifted to the balcony as waiters moved through the crowd, distributing glasses of champagne.

“This,” Dr. Raphael said, gesturing to the hundreds of revelers below, “is what I wanted you to see.”

I looked over the crowd once again, feeling as if I might be sick. “Such merriment while France starves.”

“While Europe starves,” Dr. Raphael corrected.

“How do they have so much food?” I asked. “So much wine, such fine clothing, so many pairs of shoes?”

“Now you see,” Dr. Raphael said, smiling slightly. “I wanted you to understand what we are working for, what is at stake. You are young. Perhaps it is difficult for you to fully realize what we are up against.”

I leaned against the reflective brass railing, my bare arms burning against the cold metal.

“Angelology is not just some theoretical chess game,” Dr. Raphael said. “I know that in the early years of study, when one is mired in Bonaventure and Augustine, it seems that way. But your work is not solely winning debates about hylomorphism and drawing up the taxonomies of guardian angels.” He gestured to the crowd below. “Your work is happening here, in the real world.”

I noticed the passion with which Dr. Raphael spoke and how closely his words echoed Seraphina’s warning to me as I came to in the Devil’s Throat. Our duties lie with the world we live in and must return to.

“You realize,” he said, “that this is not just a battle between a handful of resistance fighters and an occupying army. This has been a war of attrition. It has been one continuous struggle from the very beginning. St. Thomas Aquinas believed that the dark angels fell within twenty seconds of creation-their evil nature cracked the perfection of the universe almost instantly, leaving a terrible fissure between good and evil. For twenty seconds the universe was pure, perfect, unbroken. Imagine what it was like to exist in those twenty seconds-to live without fear of death, without pain, without the doubt that we live with. Imagine.”

I closed my eyes and tried to picture such a universe. I could not.

“There were twenty seconds of perfection,” Dr. Raphael said, accepting a glass of champagne from a waiter and another for me. “We get the rest.”

I took a sip of the cold, dry champagne. The taste was so wonderful that my tongue recoiled as if in pain.

Dr. Raphael continued, “In our time evil has overcome. Yet we continue the fight. There are thousands of us in every part of the world. And thousands-hundreds of thousands, perhaps-of them.”

“They have grown so powerful,” I said, examining the wealth on display in the ballroom below. “I have to believe that it wasn’t always this way.”

“The founding fathers of angelology took special delight in planning the extermination of their enemy. However, it was a much-studied fact that the fathers overestimated their abilities: They believed that the battle would be swift. They did not understand how petulant the Watchers and their children could be, how they reveled in subterfuge, violence, and destruction. Whereas the Watchers were angelic creatures, retaining the celestial beauty of their origins, their children were tainted with violence. They, in turn, tainted all they touched.”

Dr. Raphael paused, as if thinking over a riddle.

“Consider,” he said at last, “the desperation the Creator must have felt at destroying us, the sorrow of a father killing his children, the extremity of his actions. The millions of creatures drowned and the civilizations lost-and still the Nephilim prevailed. Economic greed, social injustice, war-these are the manifestations of evil in our world. Clearly, destroying life on the planet did not eliminate evil. For all their wisdom, the Venerable Fathers had not examined such things. They had not been fully prepared for the fight. They are an example of how even the most dedicated angelologists might err by ignoring history.

“Our work took quite a blow during the Inquisition, although we made up lost ground soon after,” Dr. Raphael said. “The nineteenth century was equally worrisome, when the theories of Spencer and Darwin and Marx were twisted into systems of social manipulation. But in the past we’ve always recovered lost ground. Now, however, I’m growing worried. Our strength is diminishing. Death camps overflow with our kind. The Nephilim have scored a major victory with the Germans. They have been waiting for quite a while for this kind of platform.”

I found that I had the opportunity to ask a question that had been at the back of my mind for some time. “You believe the Nazis are Nephilistic?”

“Not exactly,” Dr. Raphael said. “Nephilim are parasitic, feeding off human society. They are mixed, after all-part angel, part human. This gives them a certain flexibility to move in and out of civilizations. Through history they have attached themselves to groups like the Nazis, promoted them, assisted them financially and militarily, and made way for their successes. It is a very old, and very successful, practice. Once they find victory, the Nephilim absorb the rewards, quietly dividing the spoils, and go back to their private existences.”

“But they are called the Famous Ones,” I said.

“Yes, and many of them are famous. But their riches buy them protection and privacy.” Dr. Raphael continued, “There are a number of them here. As a matter of fact, there is one very influential gentleman I should like to introduce you to.”

Dr. Raphael stood and shook hands with a tall, blond gentleman in a gorgeous silk tuxedo, who-although I could not say how-was exceedingly familiar to me. Perhaps we had met before, because he examined me with equal interest, eyeing my dress with care.

“Herr Reimer,” the man said. The familiarity of his address, coupled with Dr. Raphael’s false name, signaled to me that the man had no idea who we really were. Indeed, he spoke to Dr. Raphael as if they were colleagues. “Haven’t seen you about Paris much this month-the war biting into your leisure?”

Dr. Raphael laughed, his voice measured. “No,” he said, “just spending time with this lovely young lady. This is my niece, Christina. Christina,” Dr. Raphael said, “this is Percival Grigori.”

I stood and offered my hand to the man. He kissed it, his freezing lips pressing my warm skin.

“Lovely girl,” the man said, although he had hardly glanced at me, so taken was he with my dress.

With that he removed a cigarette case from his pocket, offered one to Dr. Raphael, and, to my astonishment, lifted the very lighter that Gabriella had carried in her possession four years before. In an instant of horrid recognition, the man’s identity was revealed to me. Percival Grigori was Gabriella’s lover, the man I had found in her arms. I watched, stunned, as Dr. Raphael spoke lightly of politics and theater, touching upon the most noteworthy events of the war. Then, with a nod, Percival Grigori left us.

I sat in my chair, unable to understand how Dr. Raphael might know this man, or how Gabriella had come to be involved with him. In my confusion I chose the more prudent course: I remained silent.

“Are you feeling better?” Dr. Raphael asked.

“Better?”

“You were ill on the journey.”

“Yes,” I said, looking over my arms, which were redder than ever, as if I had been severely sunburned. “I believe I will be fine. My skin is fair. It will need some days to heal.” Wishing to change the subject, I said, “But you didn’t finish telling me about the Nazis. Are they completely under Nephilistic control? If so, how could we possibly win against them?”

“The Nephilim are very strong, but when they are defeated-and until now they have always been defeated-they disappear quickly, leaving their human hosts to face punishment alone, as if the evil actions were their own. The Nazi Party is rife with Nephilim, but those in power are one hundred percent human. That is why they are so hard to exterminate. Humanity understands, even desires, evil. There is something in our nature that is seduced by evil. We are easily convinced.”

“Manipulated,” I said.

“Yes, perhaps ‘manipulated’ is the better word. It is the more generous word.”

I sank into my velvet chair, the soft fabric soothing the skin on my back. It seemed to me that I had not felt so warm in years. Music began to play in the hall, and couples began to dance, filling the floor.

“Dr. Raphael,” I asked, the champagne making me feel bold, “can I ask you something?”

“Of course,” he replied.

“Why did you ask if my eyes were blue?”

Dr. Raphael looked at me, and for a moment I thought that he might tell me something about himself, something that would reveal the inner life he kept hidden from his students. His voice softened as he said, “It is something you should have learned in my classes, my dear. The appearance of the Giants? Their genetic makeup?”

I recalled his lectures and flushed, embarrassed. Of course, I thought. The Nephilim have luminous blue eyes, blond hair, and above-average height. “Oh, yes,” I said. “I remember now.”

“You are quite tall,” he observed. “And thin. I thought I could get you by the guards easier if your eyes were blue.”

I finished the rest of the champagne in one quick sip. I did not like to be wrong, especially in the presence of Dr. Raphael.

“Tell me,” Dr. Raphael said, “do you understand why we sent you to the gorge?”

“Scientific purposes,” I replied. “To observe the angel and collect empirical evidence. To preserve the body for our records. To find the treasure Clematis left behind.”

“Of course, the lyre was at the heart of the journey,” Dr. Raphael said. “But did you wonder why an inexperienced angelologist such as yourself would be sent on a mission of this caliber? Why did Seraphina, who is only forty, lead the party and not one of the older council members?”

I shook my head. I knew that Dr. Seraphina had her own professional ambitions, but I had found it odd that Dr. Raphael had not gone to the mountain himself, especially after his early work on Clematis. I understood that my inclusion had been a reward for uncovering the location of the gorge, but perhaps there had been more to it.

“Seraphina and I wanted to send a young angelologist to the cave,” Dr. Raphael said, meeting my eye. “You have not been overexposed to our professional practices. You would not color the expedition with preconceptions.”

“I’m not sure what you mean,” I said, placing the empty crystal flute upon the table.

“If I had gone,” Dr. Raphael said, “I would have seen only what I expected to see. You, on the other hand, saw what was there. Indeed, you discovered something the others did not. Tell me the truth: How did you find it? What happened in the gorge?”

“I believe that Dr. Seraphina gave you our report,” I replied, suddenly anxious about Dr. Raphael’s intentions in taking me here.

“She described the physical details, the number of photographic records you made, the time it took to climb from top to bottom. Logistically, she was very thorough. But that isn’t all, is it? There was something more, something that frightened you.”

“I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what you mean.”

Dr. Raphael lit a cigarette and leaned back into his chair, amusement illuminating his features. I was unsettled still more by how handsome I found him. He said, “Even now, safe in Paris, you are frightened.”

Arranging the satin fabric of the bias-cut dress, I said, “I don’t know how to describe it, exactly. There was something deeply horrifying about the cavern. As we descended into the gorge, everything grew so very… dark.”

“That seems quite natural,” Dr. Raphael said. “The gorge is deep below the surface of the mountain.”

“Not physical darkness,” I said, unsure of whether even in this I was giving too much away. “It was another quality altogether. An elemental darkness, a pure darkness, the kind of darkness one feels in the middle of the night after waking in a cold, empty room, the sound of bombs falling in the distance, a nightmare in the back of one’s mind. It is the kind of darkness that proves the fallen nature of our world.”

Dr. Raphael stared at me, waiting for me to continue.

“We were not alone in the Devil’s Throat,” I said. “The Watchers were there, waiting for us.”

Dr. Raphael continued to assess me, and I could not tell if it was an expression of amazement or fear or-I secretly hoped-admiration. He said, “Surely the others would have mentioned this.”

“I was alone,” I said, breaking my promise to Dr. Seraphina. “I left the party and crossed the river. I was disoriented and cannot recall the exact details of what transpired. What I do know for certain is that I saw them. They stood in darkened cells, just as they had when Clematis encountered them. There was an angel who looked upon me. I felt its desire to be free, to be in the company of humanity, to be favored. The angel had been there for thousands of years, waiting for our arrival.”

Dr. Raphael Valko and I got to the emergency council meeting in the early-morning hours. The location had been set hastily, and everyone had relocated from the previous meeting space to the center of our buildings in Montparnasse, the Athenaeum. The imposing and noble Athenaeum had fallen into disuse in the years of the occupation. Where once it had been filled with books and students, with the rustle of pages and the whisper of librarians, now the shelves were bare and the corners filled with cobwebs. I had not set foot in our library for many years, and the transformation made me long for a time when I had no worries greater than my studies.

The change of location had been made as a simple safety measure, but the precaution had cost us time. Leaving the ball, we had been given a message by a young soldier on a bicycle that told of the meeting and requested our presence immediately. Once we arrived at the designated point, we were given a second message, with a series of clues meant to bring us to the location undetected. It was nearly two o’clock in the morning before we took our seats at high-backed chairs on both sides of a narrow table in the Athenaeum.

Two small lamps lit at the center of the meeting table threw a dim, watery light upon all who sat there. There was a sense of tension and energy in the room that gave me the distinct feeling that something momentous had occurred. This perception was verified by the sobriety with which the members of the council greeted us. It appeared to me that we had interrupted a funeral.

Dr. Raphael took the seat at the head of the table, gesturing for me to sit on a bench at his side. To my great surprise, Gabriella Lévi-Franche sat at the far end of the table. It had been four years since I had last seen her. In appearance Gabriella was much the same as I remembered her. She wore her black hair in a short bob, her lips were painted bright red, and her expression was one of placid watchfulness. Yet while most of us had fallen into an anemic state of exhaustion during the war, Gabriella had the look of a pampered and well-protected woman. She was better clothed and better fed than any of the angelologists in the Athenaeum.

Noticing that I had arrived with Dr. Raphael, Gabriella raised an eyebrow, a hint of accusation forming in her green eyes. It was plain that our rivalry had not ended. Gabriella was as wary of me as I was of her.

“Tell me everything,” Dr. Raphael said, his voice cracking with emotion. “I want to know exactly how it happened.”

“The car was stopped for inspection at the Pont Saint-Michel,” replied an elderly angelologist, the nun I had met some years before. The nun’s heavy black veil and the lack of light made her appear to be an extension of the shadowy room. I could see nothing but her gnarled fingers folded upon the glossy tabletop. “The guards forced them from the car and searched them. They were taken.”

“Taken?” Dr. Raphael said. “Where?”

“We have no way of knowing,” said Dr. Lévi-Franche, Gabriella’s uncle, his small round spectacles perched upon his nose. “We’ve alerted our cells in every arrondissement in the city. No one has seen them. I’m sorry to say they could be anywhere.”

Dr. Raphael said, “And what of their cargo?”

Gabriella stood and placed a heavy leather case on the table. “I kept the lyre with me,” she said, resting her small fingers over the brown leather case. “I was traveling in the car behind Dr. Seraphina. When we saw that our agents were being arrested, I ordered my driver to turn around and drive back to Montparnasse. Fortunately, the case holding the discoveries was with me.”

Dr. Raphael’s shoulders sank in a clear sign of relief. “The case is safe,” he said. “But they are holding our agents.”

“Of course,” the nun said. “They would never let such valuable prisoners go free without asking for something equally valuable in return.”

“What are the terms?” Dr. Raphael asked.

“A trade-the treasures for the angelologists,” the nun replied.

“And what exactly did they mean by ‘treasures’?” Dr. Raphael asked quietly.

“They were not specific,” the nun said. “But somehow they know we have recovered something precious from the Rhodopes. I believe we should comply with their wishes.”

“Impossible,” Dr. Lévi-Franche said. “It is simply out of the question.”

“It is my opinion that they do not know what the group actually found in the mountains, only that it is prized,” Gabriella said, straightening in her chair.

“Perhaps the captured agents have told them what they extracted from the cavern,” suggested the nun. “Under such duress it would be the natural outcome. ”

“I believe that our angelologists will honor our codes,” Dr. Raphael answered, a hint of anger in his response. “If I know Seraphina at all, she won’t allow the others to speak.” He turned away, and I could see the faintest glistening of sweat forming upon his forehead. “She will endure their questions, although we all know that their methods can be horribly cruel.”

The atmosphere turned grim. We all understood how brutal the Nephilim could be to our agents, especially if they wanted something. I had heard tales of the methods of torture they used, and I could only imagine what they would do to my colleagues to extract information. Closing my eyes, I whispered a prayer. I could not foresee what would happen, but I understood how important the evening had become: If we lost what we had recovered from the cavern, our work would have been for nothing. The discoveries were precious, but would we willingly sacrifice an entire team of angelologists for them?

“One thing is certain,” the nun said, looking at her wristwatch. “They are still alive. We received the call approximately twenty minutes ago. I myself spoke with Seraphina.”

“Could she speak freely?” Dr. Raphael said.

“She urged us to make the trade,” the nun said. “She specifically asked Dr. Raphael to go forward.”

Dr. Raphael folded his hands before him. He seemed to be examining something minute on the surface of the table. “What are your thoughts about such a trade?” he asked, addressing the council.

“We don’t have much choice in the matter,” Dr. Lévi-Franche said. “Such a trade is against our protocol. We have never made such trades in the past, and I believe we should not make an exception, no matter how we value Dr. Seraphina. We cannot possibly give them the materials recovered from the gorge. Retrieving them has been hundreds of years in the planning.”

I was horrified to hear Gabriella’s uncle speak of my teacher in such cold terms. My indignation was assuaged slightly as I caught Gabriella glaring at him with annoyance, the very look she had once reserved for me.

“And yet,” said the nun, “Dr. Seraphina’s expertise has brought us the treasure. If we lose her, how will we progress?”

“It is impossible to make the trade,” Dr. Lévi-Franche insisted. “We have not had the opportunity to examine the field notes or develop the photographs. The expedition would be an utter waste.”

Vladimir said, “And the lyre-I cannot possibly imagine what the consequences of their possession of it would hold for all of us. For all the world, for that matter.”

“I agree,” Dr. Raphael said. “The instrument must be kept away from them at all costs. Surely there must be some alternative.”

“I am aware that my views are not popular among you,” the nun said. “But this instrument is not worth the cost of human life. We must certainly make the trade.”

“But the treasure we have found today is the culmination of great efforts,” Vladimir objected, his Russian accent thick. The cut over his eye had been sutured and cleaned and had the appearance of raw and gruesome embroidery. “Surely you do not mean that we destroy something we have worked so hard to recover?”

“It is exactly what I mean,” the nun said. “There is a point when we must realize that we have no power in these matters. It is out of our hands. We must leave it to God.”

“Ridiculous,” Vladimir said.

As the arguments erupted between the members of the council, I studied Dr. Raphael, who sat so close by that I could smell the sour-sweet aroma of the champagne we’d been drinking only hours before. I could see that he was quietly formulating his thoughts, waiting for the others to exhaust their arguments. Finally he rose, gestured for the group to be silent. “Quiet!” he said, with more force than I had ever heard him use before.

The council members turned to him, surprised at the sudden authority in his voice. Although he was the head of the council and our most prestigious scholar, he rarely displayed his power.

Dr. Raphael said, “Earlier this evening I took this young angelologist to a gathering. It was a ball, thrown by our enemies. I think that I can say it was quite a brilliant affair, wouldn’t you agree, Celestine?”

At a loss for words, I simply nodded.

Dr. Raphael continued, “My reasons for doing this were practical. I wanted to show her the enemy up close. I wanted her to understand that the forces we are fighting against are here, living next to us in our cities, stealing and killing and pillaging as we watch, helpless. I think the lesson made an impression upon her. Yet I see now that many of you might have benefited from such an educational episode. It is obvious to me that we have forgotten what we are doing here.”

He gestured to the leather case sitting between them.

“This is not our fight to lose. The Venerable Fathers who risked heresy in founding our work, who preserved texts during the purges and burnings of the church, who copied the prophecies of Enoch and risked their lives to pass down information and resources-this is their fight we are carrying out. Bonaventure, whose Commentary on the Sentences so eloquently proved our founding metaphysics of angelology, that angels are both material and spiritual in substance. The scholastic fathers. Duns Scotus. The hundreds of thousands of those who have striven to defeat the machinations of the evil ones. How many have sacrificed their lives for our cause? How many would gladly do so again? This is their fight. And yet all of these hundreds of years have led to this singular moment of choice. Somehow the burden is on our shoulders. We are entrusted with the power to decide the future. We can continue the struggle, or we can give in.” He stood, walked to the case, and took it in his hands. “But we must decide immediately. Each member will vote.”

As Dr. Raphael called for the council to vote, the members raised their hands. To my utter amazement, Gabriella-who had never been allowed to attend a meeting, let alone help make decisions-had gained full voting privileges, while I, who had spent years working to prepare for the expedition and risked my life in the cavern, was not asked to participate. Gabriella was an angelologist, and I was still a novice. Tears of anger and defeat filled my eyes, blurring the room so that I could only just make out the voting. Gabriella raised her hand in favor of the trade, as did Dr. Raphael and the nun. Many of the others, however, wished to remain faithful to our codes. After the votes were counted, it was plain that many were in favor of making the trade and an equal number were against it.

“We are evenly divided,” Dr. Raphael said.

The council members looked from one to another, wondering who might change his or her vote to break the tie.

“I suggest,” Gabriella said at last, giving me a look that seemed laced with hope, “that we allow Celestine the opportunity to vote. She was a member of the expedition. Hasn’t she earned the right to participate?”

All eyes turned to me, sitting quietly behind Dr. Raphael. The council members agreed. My vote would decide the matter. I considered the choice before me, knowing that my decision put me at last among the other angelologists.

The council waited for me to make my choice.

After I cast my vote, I begged the pardon of the council, stepped into the empty hallway, and ran as fast as I could. Through the corridors, down a flight of wide stone steps, out the door, and into the night I ran, my shoes striking the rhythm of my heart on the flagstones. I knew that I might find solitude in the back courtyard, a place Gabriella and I had gone often, the very place I’d first glimpsed the gold lighter that Nephilistic monster had used in my presence earlier that night. The courtyard was always empty, even during the daylight hours, and I needed to be alone. Tears softened the edges of my vision-the iron fence surrounding the ancient structure melted, the majestic elephant-skinned beech tree in the courtyard dissolved, even the sharpened sickle of the crescent moon suspended in the sky blurred into an indistinct halo above me.

Checking to be sure that I had not been followed, I crouched against the wall of the building, hid my face in my hands, and sobbed. I cried for Dr. Seraphina and for the other members of the expedition party whom I had betrayed. I cried for the burden my vote had placed upon my conscience. I understood that my decision had been the correct one, but the sacrifice cracked through me, shattering my belief in myself, my colleagues, and our work. I had betrayed my teacher, my mentor. I had washed my hands of a woman I loved as deeply as I loved my own mother. I had been given the privilege to vote, but upon casting it I had lost my faith in angelology.

Although I wore a thick wool jacket-the same heavy coat I’d used to stave off the wet winds of the cavern-I had nothing underneath it but the thin dress Dr. Raphael had given me to wear to the party. I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand and shivered. The night was freezing, utterly still and quiet, colder than it had been only a few hours earlier. Regaining control of my emotions, I took a deep breath and prepared to return to the council room when, from somewhere near the side entrance of the building, there came the soft whisper of voices.

Stepping back into the shadows, I waited, wondering who would have left the building by that odd exit, the usual course being through the portico at the front entrance. In a matter of seconds, Gabriella stepped into the courtyard, speaking in a low, nearly inaudible voice to Vladimir, who listened to her as if she were telling him something of great importance.

I struggled to see them better. Gabriella was particularly striking in the moonlight-her black hair shone, and her red lipstick defined her lips dramatically against the whiteness of her skin. She wore a luxurious camel-colored overcoat, fitted snugly and belted at the waist, clearly tailored for her figure. I could not imagine where she had found such clothing and how she could have paid for it. Gabriella had always dressed beautifully, but for me clothes like Gabriella’s existed only in films.

Even after years apart, I knew her expressions well. The furrow in her brow meant she was pondering some question Vladimir had asked her. A sudden flash of brightness in her eyes, accompanied by a perfunctory smile, signified that she had answered him with her customary aplomb, a witticism, an aphorism, something biting. He listened with all his attention. His gaze did not leave her for even a moment.

As Gabriella and Vladimir spoke, I could hardly breathe. Given the events of the evening, Gabriella should have been as distressed as I. The loss of four angelologists and the threat of losing our discoveries from the expedition should have been enough to kill all merriment, even if the relationship between Dr. Seraphina and Gabriella had been superficial. But despite everything, the two had been exceptionally close once, and I knew that Gabriella had loved our teacher. Yet in the courtyard Gabriella appeared-I could hardly bear to think of the word-“joyous.” She had an air of triumph, as if she’d won a hard-fought victory.

A burst of light scattered over the courtyard as a car stopped, its headlights streaming through the iron gates and illuminating the great beech tree, whose branches stretched into the watery air like tentacles. A man stepped from the car. Gabriella glanced over her shoulder, her black hair framing her face like a bell. The man was striking, tall, with a beautiful double-breasted jacket and shoes that gleamed from polish. His appearance struck me as extraordinarily refined. Such wealth was an exotic sight during the war, and that evening I had been surrounded by it. As he stepped closer, I saw that it was Percival Grigori, the Nephilim I’d met earlier that evening. Gabriella recognized him at once. She gestured that he wait at the car and, kissing Vladimir quickly on each cheek, she turned and strode over the flagstones to her lover.

I crouched farther into the shadows, hoping that my presence would not be discovered. Gabriella was only meters away, so close I could have whispered to her as she passed. It was at that proximity that I saw it: the case containing our treasure from the mountain. Gabriella was delivering it to Percival Grigori.

This discovery had such an effect upon me that I momentarily lost my composure. I stepped into the plain light of the moon. Gabriella stopped short, taken by surprise to find me there. As our eyes met, I realized that it would not have mattered what the council had voted to do: All along, Gabriella had planned to give the case to her lover. In that moment the years of Gabriella’s strange behavior-her disappearances, her unaccountable rise in the angelological ranks, her falling-out with Dr. Seraphina, the money that seemed to come to her from out of the blue-all of it made sense to me. Dr. Seraphina had been correct. Gabriella was working with our enemies.

“What are you doing?” I said, hearing my own voice as if it belonged to another woman.

“Go back inside,” Gabriella answered, clearly startled by my appearance, her voice very low, as if she were afraid we would be overheard.

“You cannot do this,” I whispered. “Not now, after all we’ve suffered.”

“I am sparing you from further suffering,” Gabriella said, and, breaking free of my gaze, she walked to the car and climbed into the backseat, Percival Grigori following close behind.

The shock of Gabriella’s actions held me momentarily paralyzed, but as the car drove into the tangled obscurity of the narrow streets, I awoke. I ran through the courtyard and into the building, fear pushing me faster and faster through the vast, cold hallway.

Suddenly a voice called out to me from the end of the corridor. “Celestine!” Dr. Raphael said, stepping in my path. “Thank God you haven’t been hurt.”

“No,” I said, struggling to catch my breath. “But Gabriella has left with the case. I have just come from the courtyard. She’s stolen it.”

“Follow me,” Dr. Raphael said. Without further explanation he led me along a neglected hallway back to the Athenaeum, where the council had convened their meeting only half an hour before. Vladimir had also returned. He greeted me tersely, his expression grave. Looking past him, I saw that the windows at the far end of the room had been shattered and a cold, harsh breeze fell over the mutilated bodies of the council members, their corpses lying in pools of blood upon the floor.

The sight struck me with such force that I was unable to muster any response but disbelief. I supported myself upon the table where we had voted away my teacher’s life, unable to tell if the sight before me was real or if an evil fantasy had taken hold of my imagination. The brutality of the killings was horrifying. The nun had been shot point-blank in the head, leaving her habit soaked in blood. Gabriella’s uncle, Dr. Lévi-Franche, lay on the marble floor, equally bloody, his glasses crushed. Two other council members slumped upon the table itself.

I closed my eyes and turned from the awful sight. My only relief came when Dr. Raphael, whose arm encircled my shoulders, held me steady. I leaned against him, the scent of his body giving bittersweet comfort. I imagined that I would open my eyes and everything would be just as it had been years before-the Athenaeum would be filled with crates and papers and busy assistants packing our texts away. The council members would be arrayed about the table, studying Dr. Raphael’s maps of wartime Europe. Our school would be open, the council members would be alive. But upon opening my eyes, I was hit by the horror of the massacre again. There was no way to escape its reality.

“Come, now,” Dr. Raphael said, leading me from the room, steering me forcefully through the hallway and to the front entrance. “Breathe. You are in shock.”

Looking about as if in a dream, I said, “What has happened? I don’t understand. Did Gabriella do this?”

“Gabriella?” Vladimir said, joining us in the corridor. “No, of course not.”

“Gabriella had nothing to do with it,” Dr. Raphael said. “They were spies. We had known for some time that they were monitoring the council. It was part of the plan to kill them this way.”

“You did this?” I said, astonished. “How could you?”

Dr. Raphael looked at me, and I saw the faintest shadow of sadness register in his expression, as if it hurt him to bear witness to my disillusionment.

“It’s my job, Celestine,” he said at last as he took me by the arm and guided me through the hall. “One day you will understand. Come, we must get you out of here.”

As we approached the main entrance of the Athenaeum, the numbness brought on by the scene had begun to wear away, and I was overcome by nausea. Dr. Raphael led me into the cold night air, where the Panhard et Levassor waited to chauffer us away. As we walked down the wide stone steps, he pressed a case into my hand. The case was identical to the one Gabriella had held in the courtyard-the same brown leather, the same gleaming clasps.

“Take this,” Dr. Raphael said. “Everything is ready. You will be driven to the border tonight. Then, I’m afraid, we’ll have to rely upon our friends in Spain and Portugal to get you through.”

“Through to where?”

“To America,” Dr. Raphael said. “You will take this case with you. You-and the treasure from the gorge-will be safe there.”

“But I saw Gabriella leave,” I said, examining the case as if it were an illusion. “She took the instrument. It is gone.”

“It was a replica, dear Celestine, a decoy,” Dr. Raphael said. “Gabriella is diverting the enemy so that you can escape and Seraphina can be freed. You owe her much, including your presence on the expedition. The lyre is now in your care. You and Gabriella have gone your separate ways, but you must always remember that your work is for a single cause. Hers will be here, and yours will be in America.”