Son of Perdition (Chronicles of Brothers) by Wendy Alec Page A

then only through the Time Gates. We – the Fallen – are forbidden!’
    ‘The genome is set to the human growth cycle, Charsoc. It must be delivered in the dimension of matter by one of our own in matter. In human form. There is no other way.’
    Lucifer stepped towards Phaegos.
    ‘ Find a way, Phaegos.’
    ‘But the Time Gates . . . it is impossible, sire.’
    Maelageor grasped Phaegos’s trembling arm. Phaegos winced in agony.
    ‘What my brother means – ’ He raised his sunken features to Phaegos and gave him a dark glare. ‘ – is that there is another way, for us to enter the Race of Men in human form. One moon from now.’
    ‘What means, Maelageor?’ Lucifer hissed.
    A smile flickered on Maelageor’s thin black lips. ‘We enter by the Ascending Stairs.’
    A horrified silence fell throughout the throne room.
    Lucifer stared at Maelageor, a strange wonder on his features.
    ‘The Portals of the Fallen . . . ’ he uttered. ‘They are force fields.Each has its own inter-dimensional threshold . . . ’
    Maelageor nodded. ‘The force fields are DNA reconstructors. They are our only way of entering the Race of Men in human form.’
    Marduk, Lucifer’s chief-of-staff, approached them, his eyes yellow. He bowed and kissed Lucifer’s black onyx ring.
    ‘My Liege Lord.The traversing of the Portals by the Fallen into the land of the Race of Men is not only forbidden, it is impossible. All eight Portals of the Fallen were permanently sealed after the defeat at Golgotha. There is no way in from the Second Heaven to the earth’s atmosphere.’
    ‘There is one.’ Charsoc exchanged a glance with Maelageor. ‘One Portal that is more vulnerable, its force field between the Land of Men and the Second Heaven ruptured. Torn.’
    Lucifer sat on his throne, stroking the ice-wulf’s coarse white fur. ‘The Angelic Portal that was torn in the Tower of Babel-Nephilim fiasco,’ he murmured. A faint smile flickered on his lips. ‘The Portal of Shinar.’
    ‘Your Excellency, with all due veneration and respect,’ Marduk whined, wringing his lizard-like fingers. ‘It is forbidden.’
    ‘It is forbidden, Marduk, but it is possible.Nimrod and the Nephilim, incited by our demonic hordes, were well advanced in their plans to traverse the Shinar force field from the Land of Men into the Second Heaven.’ Lucifer’s expression darkened. ‘Then Gabriel and his Revelators sent word to the High Council. Yehovah confused their languages by day. By night Michael and his armies overthrew our battalions, took control of Shinar and sealed the Portal.’
    He flinched at the memory of his defeat. ‘The inter-dimensional force field was permanently ruptured in the battle. If we could control the Portal we could reverse the restructuring process and enter through the fissure in the force field.’
    ‘It has been sealed fast by Michael’s warriors in the Second Heaven these twenty millennia since Babel,’ said Charsoc, pacing the nave. An evil fire flickered in his irisless eyes. ‘Mulabalah, to what extent is it protected all these millennia later?’
    Mulabalah, ruler of the Black Murmurers, Charsoc’s spies, rose to his feet, a sinister dark figure in the centre of the Whispering Gallery.The incessant mumbling of the Murmurers fell to a hushed drone.
    ‘Sire. In our traversing of the time corridors, the Vulture Shaman Scouts have frequented the time lock between the Portal of Shinar and Gehenna. From the time of the uprising of the Nephilim and the Race of Men at Babel, it was defended unremittingly with a thousand of the First Heaven’s strongest battalions.’ Mulabalah hesitated. ‘And the White Winged Lions,’ he said, ominously.
    A ripple of horror ran through the Whispering Gallery.
    ‘These past millennia, however, Prince Michael reassigned the armies from Babylonia to Jerusalem, sire.’ He hesitated, trembling. ‘In 1947–’
    ‘Nineteen forty-seven!’ Lucifer hissed. ‘Jerusalem. Ashdod was