The Sylph's Tale: The Immortals, #1

By Marta C Weeks

A tale of discovery, love, and magic based loosely on angels and virgins myths. 

In pre-historical times, a young girl escaping from a barbarian ritual encounters the Archangel of Light. He falls for her and is damned for eternity.  She has special powers and a quest guided by a mystical being. Together, and with others in her tribe, they change the culture and habits of her rudimentary society.

Warning: This story might contain elements that might not sit well with the average reader. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Marta C Weeks
• Release date: Dec 30, 2017
• ISBN: 9781386342557

Marta C Weeks

Marta C Weeks, is an author of fantasy, paranormal, speculative and historical fiction, poet, and columnist. On her website, she likes to share with others tips and articles about writing and social issues. Lives in Northern California with her husband/editor.  

Book preview

Fate Awaits

I SHOULDN'T HAVE RETURNED to Earth after, as a salamander, I slid into a river between a man and a virgin. Her screams and his grunts stirred in me new thoughts: What must it be to feel flesh on bones? The idea jolted me back to the sky.

TO EXPLAIN HOW IT ALL came to be is like trying to hold time still as it expands and contracts. Every culture and experience intermingle with the reality and fantasy of what is and is not. Every living thing comes to be with memories of how it was before and was not.

Eons before the present, or what I now call the First Age, The Almighty released multitudes of Celestials, supernatural and timeless spirits to witness the diverse processes of Earth’s evolution. A hallmark of angel hierarchy is brilliance. I, Archangel of Light, was the brightest of all spirits. We all are invisible and eternal, can take on the form of seraphs, winged heavenly messengers or any living creature, but we are not glorified human beings. Not male or female and cannot reproduce as humankind does.

From times unknown, we witnessed oceans recede giving way to land. Energy flowed and chaos became order. Random matter transformed, leaving mere traces of what had preceded. Surviving matter continued the reproductive processes.

Overcome with reverence and wonder we watched The Almighty impart humans with ethereal substance: a soul, self-awareness, reason, and autonomy. Humanity rose to splendor and fell many times. In each era, from primitive beginnings, humans evolved in a manner unlike any other living thing. Yoked with passions, humans strove for selfhood and lived, truly lived, to love, to work, to create, to war, and to ruin. They engorged the Tree of Life with pleasure and pain, sensations not experienced by Celestials.

In this First Age, in spirit, I roamed Earth. Stopped caring how other celestials reacted to mankind’s use of The Almighty's gifts. Humans enthralled me. Like a shadow or a breeze, I mingled amongst people in the throes of passions and struggles for survival. I became bored with the heavenly and consumed with human endeavors. Under the pretext of angelic observation, I watched men and women copulate, spellbound by all its aspects.

It was not long after I slid as a salamander in a shallow river between a man and a virgin that for the first time a thought came in as a whisper as if to nudge me to do, to be, to become-how must it feel to be a human. It jolted me like thunder, and I fled to Heaven's Gate, to the protection of The Almighty’s Eternal City, but I did not enter. Like a thief, I held onto my thought. Not wanting to have what I had experienced taken from me. I remained outside.

Why did I think that? Did I feel envy? I asked, in the safety of heaven’s harbor.

I cannot deny I was harvesting sparks of jealousy. However, I continued to veil a growing desire for humanity with the argument: Celestials have no judgment. We can empathize with humans, and sway events by inspiring ideas within them, but we do not feel. Yet, like a squirrel running from a hawk's shadow, I felt the heart of fear.

Not daring to enter the Eternal City, I pleaded to The Almighty Vision, In You, I take refuge. Deliver me from illusions. I beg to appear before You. I want to serve You. Have I offended You? Almighty, am I envious? I long to see You. For the first time ever, I was not summoned. No one came from behind the eternal gates.

Have my thoughts offended You? Please do not deny me Your presence. Please do not forsake me.

How can I, an Angel of Light, feel forsaken? I am of The Divine. If I have wronged You by enjoying Your miracles in the land of the living, forgive me, but please do not forsake me!

Silence enveloped me with emptiness.

For centuries, I did not return to Earth but hid in a black hole. Although celestials do not feel, best I can explain it is that I violated Holy Creeds and that realization exploded in me engulfed me in defeat, and, shriveling with the loss, I vowed, defying my purpose, never to return to earth. But, I already was linked to human feelings.

The Almighty remained silent, not because I, the Archangel of Light, was created free of error, but because The Almighty had abandoned me to my own choices, my own will.

Millennia passed until a command came, Abandon your exile. Look down to earth. Your fate awaits. Have faith, for I give you the world.