Prologue

Prologue: (Sometime in the past.)

Black smoke rose from the ground. They lifted up into the sky, mixing with the pure white of the clouds above to form a dirty grey congregation of clouds that seemed to have filled the heavens with a thick coat of grey dust. Lightning struck and booms of thunder shook the holy grounds of the Lord. The lightning struck down hitting the sweet angel's chest as a deep vibration shook the grounds. The angel cried out in pain, begging for mercy. He would beg for mercy, but would not repent. He did not, for one second, feel regret for disobeying his Lord, his father, the creator of Man. For he had a deep passion for the humans that walked underneath him.

The lightning hit him twice more. Severely weakened, he cried out in pain again, falling to his knees as the strength left his knees. His shoulders were pushed back and his chest forward as his back arched painfully, moving of their own accord as if some invisible force was forcefully bending and contorting his body. He felt the strength that only celestial beings possessed being sucked right from his body. There was an extremely sharp pain following that. One that felt unlike any other he had experienced. He howled out in pain. He couldn't even recognise the sound that had just escaped his mouth. The extreme pain had only lasted for a second, but to him it felt like minutes. As the pain subsided and left his body throbbing painfully in the aftermath, he whimpered. The lightning and thunder, the smoke and dust likewise faded away as if on command. He looked up in despair to see the five archangels standing before him, circling him, their wings shining a breathtaking shade of sparkling gold.

"Release your wings." The archangels commanded in one unified voice. He shuddered upon hearing their voices. They had warned him, they had warned all the angels of what would happen if they disobeyed. He just had never thought that it would actually happen to him. The angel sat on the ground glaring at the five of them and cursing the Lord in his mind.

"Release your wings, angel." They commanded more firmly this time. They closed in on him, forming a suffocating circle around him. He felt his breath catch in panic. He sat frozen, unable to move, immobilised with shock. He saw one of the archangels pull out a small silver rod, just long enough to fit into the archangel's hand. The archangel flicked his wrist holding the silver rod forward and a long golden whip released itself from inside the rod. The golden whip strapped him full force on his back.

The angel only gritted his teeth in pain, refusing to release his white feathery wings as the archangels had commanded. The same archangel whipped him a few more times, he cried out in pain this time, unable to hold it in anymore. The white of his flesh showed through the delicate skin that had been torn. Before long, his back was a bloody mess of red lines. The other four archangels stood around his collapsed form, watching on in solemn silence, not interfering. He could still see the golden whip and the silver rod that held it in the same archangel's hands at the corner of his eye. But now the golden whip was stained red with blood. His blood.

The angel felt his back muscles spasm from the pain. They burned like someone had placed a hot iron on his back. Suddenly, the angel's white gold wings came out in a big gust of wind. He flapped them back and forth, trying to escape from the archangels. But they had anticipated this. Seeing his wings unfold, they only closed in tighter around him, trapping in their tight circle, making even the thought of escape impossible.

The archangels closed in towards him. He had only managed to stand up so far. His body was refusing to obey his commands, his actions slow and sluggish. He was surrounded. Delirious from the blood loss, he was having a hard time thinking properly to escape effectively. He felt his world whirl around and around, as if he were in a tornado. He saw his blinding white surroundings flash a series of neon colours, blinding him. Lost in his confusion, he failed to notice the two archangels come from behind him. They gripped his wings tightly with no effort at all, their hands like manacles, chaining him to the ground. He couldn't fly now.

The angel let out a desperate roar and struggled against the two archangels' hold. But it was too much for him. He had lost too much blood and the lightning had drained him too much. Not wasting a moment, the other three archangels all grabbed hold of his wings with one hand each, pulling his wings down together with great force and power. He felt his wings tear in two. Screaming in agony from the pain, he fell to his knees again, breathing heavily. As soon as he got his bearings, he experienced another flash of intense pain, but this time it was longer than the first. It crept into every nook and cranny of his mind, leaving nothing untouched. He screamed again. Suddenly he felt his back become lighter. In the midst of all the pain that was consuming his mind, he knew that his wings were gone. He collapsed onto a heap on the ground, lacking the slightest bit of energy to hold himself up.

"The Lord has banished you from heaven." He heard the eerie unified voices of the archangels from behind his closed lids. He couldn't move, couldn't respond. He concentrated on getting the air into his lungs, then expelling it. Again and again. If he stopped thinking about moving his diaphragm, he was sure they would stop functioning. He squeezed his eyes tighter, hoping that all this torture was now over.

His wish was granted. A black hole swirled from beneath his collapsed form. The archangels stepped back and turned, promptly disappearing into thin air. He was faintly aware of the hole sucking him in before the blackness took him away. Away from heaven, away from the pain. He was gone, banished from heaven for his sins, for disobeying the Lord.

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The angel awakened. He felt icy cold air brushing against his exposed face and naked body as he fell towards Earth. A realisation dawned upon him. It had really happened. He really had been banished. He shuddered from the thought and from the cold.

He tried to unfurl his wings to fly, but his back muscles refused to cooperate. He tried again. And again. But deep down he knew the truth of what had happened. His wings had been torn out by the archangels, leaving him flightless and wingless, that was what the intense flash of pain was, his wings being torn out. He fell for what felt like hours, days, weeks even. Against the laws of gravity, a single white gold feather drifted down together with him, reminding him of the consequences of his actions whenever he tried to forget about them. He shut his eyes tight, resigned to his fate.

The angel finally landed on the ground of Earth with force so great it left a huge crater in the ground. He was now the angel who had sinned, who had been cast down to Earth. He was the fallen angel.

Here's my book cover:

Author's Note

Ignore my grammar issues. Ignore misspelled words. And please, please, tell me what your thoughts are and how you feel, whether positive or negative feedback, I am happy to receive it. I put in the image of my book cover in there because it didn't fit in that small photo pic. I also DO have a summary, but it also didn't fit neither!

Tell me what you think and how to improve!