Divinity

Chapter 14

"It might be nothing." Liam hastened to lower my expectations, to tell the truth my hopes were getting low. I was beginning to think the only way to get my powers back would be through dumb luck. 

I had asked Andrew to leave for a few hours so I could see my friend, promising him that I wasn't going to leave the apartment. He had seemed a little suspicious, hesitant to leave, but either way he seemed to trust me. 

"What did you find?" I asked, leaning across to look at the book he held. It was a surprisingly new looking book, and it seemed to encase pictures of the sword. 

"You still have the sword?" He questioned, flipping through a couple of the questions. I nodded, reaching across to where I had left it, propped up against my wardrobe. "Good. So I was reading this book about biblical relics and there's this section about the sword, most of the information is pretty basic, nothing we didn't know already. But there's this guy in America who thought he could translate the symbols on it, he reckons it's a language, some kind of mix between Biblical Hebrew and Sanskrit. Anyway, I looked up his supposed translation..." He fished around in his bag for a moment before he produced a website he had printed out. 

"Is this legit?" I asked, my eyes scanning the page. 

"I don't know. Maybe."

It was strange, if this was truly what those symbols meant, why didn't any of the angels know that it said that? 

"Half and half, the steel assents. Expulsion and admittance. Recompense, the graze of bruise."  I read the translation, shaking my head in frustration. "What does that mean?"

"I guess that's what we need to figure out. Half and half? I have no idea." He sighed, "What could be half and half? Is that literal or figurative? From the look of the website, the guy who figured it out doesn't have a clue either." 

"I think I know what that means." My brow furrowed in thought, half and half. That was me. Half human, half angel. But that didn't make any sense... Nephilim had existed for a long time, but as far as I knew the sword was forged centuries before Nephilim started to be born, the angels didn't even know they were possible back then. This sword was made by God, then again... was that right? Would God make a sword which read a language that the angels couldn't read? "But that can't be right. What about the other parts?"

"The steel assents," He continued, "I'm guessing the steel is the sword, assents means to express approval right? So... the sword approves something, I'm guessing whatever the half and half means, it's something the sword has to approve."

None of this made any sense! If I was right about the half and half referring to a Nephilim, why would the sword be approving one? Nephilim had been hated by angels for years, I was the first one ever to gain any sort of approval from them, and that was merely an accident. 

"Expulsion and admittance, forcing something out and permission to enter a place?" He suggested. I didn't know... indeed I had been forced out of Heaven, but as of yet I had not been allowed back.

"Recompense, reward given for loss." He carried on, no longer waiting for my response. Reward for loss? I had lost something... maybe there was hope after all?

"The graze of bruise." He finished, sounding uncertain.

"Touching an injury." I whispered, gently trailing my fingertips along the place I knew my scar was. A Nephilim banished from Heaven, injured, having suffered a loss. That described me perfectly... for the next part I needed the sword's approval... did I already have that? It had called to me... I didn't find it of my own accord, it had told me where it was. 

The next part, permission to re-enter Heaven, a reward for my loss, the graze of bruise... 

"Oh my god..." I spoke quietly. I had assumed that the sword would return my powers as soon as I touched it, but the graze of bruise... I had never attempted to touch the sword to my scar. If I mimicked the action that had taken away my powers, would it return them too?

The scar ran down from my shoulder and across my chest like a seatbelt would, though it was much slimmer. I pulled my jumper over my head, exposing my top below. Held up by spaghetti straps, my scar was almost entirely revealed. 

"Woah, Emilia, how did you get that?" Liam exclaimed as he saw the scar. 

"The sword." I replied, pulling my arm out of the straps to fully reveal my collarbone. I picked up the sword, holding it out before me. Liam looked at me in question. "The touch of bruise." 

Quickly, I swung the sword at full force, where it hit me in the exact same place that it had when Lucifer had used it. The movement sent me tumbling backwards towards the floor, forcing the air from my lungs. 

"Are you okay?" Liam exclaimed, rushing to my side. I lay on the floor where I had landed, staring up at the ceiling, barely registering his words. I could feel them... the uncomfortable pressure that resided in my back, familiar but foreign at the same time. My wings.

They had returned.

"Yeah." I took in a deep breath, focusing hard on keeping my wings safely confined within my back. I longed to release them, but I knew that doing so would reveal too much to Liam. 

"Your scar... it's gone." Liam commented, sounding surprised.

Slowly, I rose up into a sitting position so that I could inspect my shoulder. He was right - where there had once been a jagged, red, scar... now was just skin. Perhaps looking a little more perfectly smooth than it had been a couple of seconds prior. 

I felt like crying... was this really happening? Was I truly a Nephilim once again? It seemed so, I already felt stronger, capable of anything. I didn't want to stay sitting here, I wanted to go out into the world, to rejoin Heaven and no longer be an enemy of god. 

"Did it work?" He asked cautiously. I couldn't decipher the look he was giving me, he was squinting at me as though recognising that somehow I had changed, but not quite able to put his finger on what was different. 

"I... I think it did." 

"So... what does this mean?" 

I hesitated. What did it mean? For Liam? Nothing... he couldn't know about any of this, all he needed to know was that he had helped me. For me, it meant that I would (hopefully) be allowed to rejoin Heaven. For the other angels? I wasn't sure... I would have to hope that they wouldn't be in danger for helping me, although the sword couldn't hurt them anymore, so how could they really be punished?

My thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the door. I was taken off guard, the angels rarely knocked. Perhaps it was Andrew returning, trying not to interrupt my time with my friend. 

I forced myself up slowly, being incredibly careful not to move too fast as to startle Liam. 

Gently opening the door, the last person I was expecting to see stood before me. 

"Noah?" I frowned, "What are you doing here?" I was under the impression that he no longer wanted anything to do with me. 

"I really need to talk to you." He looked over my shoulder cautiously, his eyes scanning Liam. "Alone."

I turned to face Liam apologetically - he was already gathering his things. 

We moved aside for him to pass, Liam looked at me with concern but left regardless, once he was out of sight, Noah moved past me into the apartment.

He froze almost immediately at the sight of the sword which lay where I had left it, right in the middle of the room. "Why do you still have that?" He exclaimed. 

"Um... I can explain."

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