Estelle Ana Baca

Category: Hybrid Creation

The combination of two species, oftentimes one immortal and one mortal. With notable exceptions such as the Epiklasmon, the offspring typically inherits the best qualities of both parents.

  • Astaroth’s Wager, Part IV

    Back to Astaroth’s Wager, Part III.

    I hope you can forgive me for not providing a chapter last week. I am thankful that I don’t require planes for transportation. They’re so loud, slow and confining. Anyway—back to business now.

    Astaroth directed the driver of her car to take them to Market Street to placate her frustrated companion. She stared at Sitri with a mockingly pleasant smile on her face for the longest time.

    “Why are you smiling at me like that?” Sitri asked.

    “Because you’re going to lose,” she answered. “And you know it. You haven’t thought this through at all. I must say, this is your poorest effort in at least five hundred years. You’ve admirably demonstrated that the only hopeless one in this entire affair is you.”

    Sitri didn’t suffer insults lightly. He had his steel at the ready, and he drew it from its scabbard with a menacing slowness. He said nothing, but his intentions were clear from his scathing expression.

    “You’re not going to attack me,” Astaroth said. “You’re going to do better than this. Going through his life and systematically eliminating the things that are going well for him isn’t the answer. It didn’t work on Job, and it’s not going to work on him.”

    Sitri remained silent and ready to attack.

    “You want your favorite London property back, and I want that smug little primate to realize that hope is as mortal as he is. Make him suffer, Sitri, or admit defeat now and present me with a wager,” Astaroth said.

    “I’ll do fine without my property on Tottenham Court Road. You won it fairly, and I would appreciate the opportunity to win it back fairly in the future. You were right, Svipul. You can’t make a human lose hope in twenty-four hours without resorting to cliché. And you know as well as I do that the Nephil I injured back there is Itzamná’s daughter. He’ll be looking for me. I’ve got bigger problems than this petty little wager,” Sitri said.

    Itzamná, the Watcher
    Itzamná was a Watcher. He was stationed in Mesoamerica and was spotted by the Mayans. They revered him as one of their gods.

    “So you admit defeat?” Astaroth said.

    “Yes.”

    “What is my wager then?”

    “You have a month. Since you set me on this task, you’re now going to deprive that same smug little primate Thomas Carver of all hope—since he seems to be more than just a bee in your bonnet—and you’re going to get rid of Rose Nielsen and Itzamná before they find out what this was all about and come looking for us,” Sitri said. “And I’m going to lay low and let you do all the heavy lifting.”

    “And what will I receive upon success? Getting rid of an angel and his Nephil is likely to provoke an angry response from Heaven, and I’ve worked very hard to keep Michael off my back. I don’t want to end up anywhere near the top of his list again,” Astaroth said.

    The car went silent while Sitri made his offer telepathically.

    Astaroth’s smile was wickedly delicious. She squealed and said, “Are you really prepared to cede that title?”

    “If you can actually accomplish it, and get Itzamná out of the picture? Absolutely. You’ll have earned it,” Sitri said. “But I’ll warn you now: you’re going to fail with Thomas Carver.”

    “Why are you so confident of that?”

    “Because he understands something that you never will, Astaroth,” Sitri said.

    Astaroth rolled her eyes.

    Sitri demanded, “Do you find the terms of our wager to be fair, Svipul?”

    Svipul responded, “A month to get rid of an angel as strong as Itzamná? That’s hardly fair, considering that you fouled up a simple wager, Sitri. You didn’t have to attack a Nephil and bring angels into this. She needs adequate time to put a plan in place. Otherwise, we’re all going to be in for it, and I don’t want Michael or any of the Cherubim or Seraphim on my back, either. Give her at least a year.”

    “A year, then,” Sitri agreed. “I’m still going to Market Street, though. I do rather enjoy making Thomas Carver believe that gangsters are after him. He should be back at work by now. Are we agreed to the terms of this wager, Astaroth?”

    “Agreed,” Astaroth replied.

    Dominus tecum.

    On to Astaroth’s Wager, Part V.

  • Astaroth’s Wager, Part III

    Back to Astaroth’s Wager, Part II.

    Buena Vista Park, 1937.
    Buena Vista Park, near the Haight, in 1937.

    Allow me to clarify before I proceed: as I mentioned before, there are three different kinds of human hybrids. There are Epiklasmons, the feeble Nekudaimon-human hybrids; Anathemas, the children of Apokomistai and humans; and Nephilim, the children of angels and humans. Full humans have no innate means available to them to detect Anathemas and Nephilim because the hybrids look just like normal humans in every respect. The only way that they might be identified is though their superhuman strength and their extended lifespan. I will be happy to tell you more about Anathemas another time, but for now, please be contented with information on Nephilim. Like angels, Nephilim are filled with Grace, though in much smaller quantities, and that Grace is readily detectable to angels, demons and other Nephilim and one very special Anathema. Unless they are untrained in how to control the expression of their Graces, Nephilim are capable of shielding their thoughts from angels, demons and other Nephilim. They aren’t necessarily very common, for many angels have trouble with their fragility and mortality and thus cannot bear to watch their children die, but Nephilim have been a species that has coexisted among humans for many millennia.

    But now, please let us return to Thomas Carver. Or rather, Sitri in a Thomas Carver suit.

    Adelaide Grayson was an honest and very pretty young woman who lived with her mother and her grandfather at a boarding house that her family ran in the Haight. She was twenty-years-old in the autumn of 1935, when she first made the acquaintance of Thomas Carver. Thomas proposed to her on her twenty-first birthday in March, and they’d had a small wedding planned for September, on their first anniversary.

    Sitri showed up at the Grayson’s boarding house looking very much like Thomas Carver but acting nothing like him. He had to make a quick judgment on how to conduct himself to get Adelaide to break off the engagement and never see him again. He considered a number of scenarios—another woman, another man, striking her in front of her grandfather—and he had an idea in mind to accuse her of infidelity in front of her mother when he met up with her. Sitri as Thomas strode into the boarding house, issued an extremely rude statement to the widow Grayson at the front desk, and proceeded to the back of the house, where there Adelaide was hanging out the laundry in the yard. Adelaide, upon first glance, was ready to greet him with a smile and warm salutation when she saw that he who appeared to be her fiancé was in something of a temper. She inquired, “What’s the matter, Tom?”

    “You know exactly what the matter is,” Sitri replied.

    Adelaide was at a loss for what could be irking Thomas. She floundered to find a response.

    Sitri seized upon the silence, “I just met George Olivero.”

    “Who?”

    “Don’t play stupid, Adelaide. He knows you. In fact, he knows you better than I do, you cheap—” Sitri broke off. Something was very wrong. There was a stirring in the boarding house that was extremely unsettling to him. It was the distinct presence of a Nephil, and it approached with great speed.

    The Nephil descended the steps to from the back porch to the yard. She stared directly at Sitri and said, “Get away from her.”

    Adelaide said, “Rose, if you could please excuse—”

    “Who are you?” Rose ignored Adelaide.

    Sitri knew that he had been caught out. He debated calling Astaroth, but he knew that she would never let him live it down if he complained about a solitary Nephil complicating his plans. He reasoned that he was strong enough to take on the Nephil if it came to that, so he opted to continue with the ruse. “I’m Thomas Carver. Who do you think you are?”

    “You’re not Thomas Carver. Who are you?” Rose demanded. She produced a dagger made of angelic steel. “You know what this is, and you know what it can do to you. Get away from her.”

    Adelaide was extremely disturbed by Rose’s behavior and the presence of a weapon. She didn’t understand why Rose, who had been a boarder for more the previous five months, was threatening her fiancé. As far as Adelaide knew, Rose Nielsen had been a courteous and quiet young woman who worked as a stenographer. Adelaide said, “Rose, please. We were just having a—”

    Rose interrupted, “What have you done with the real Thomas Carver?”

    Sitri appraised the situation and realized that murdering a Nephil in front of Adelaide would better suit his purposes than a feeble accusation of infidelity. He produced a blade made of cursed steel and attacked the Nephil. Rose Nielsen, however, had been trained in martial arts better than Sitri had anticipated. He only succeeded in slashing up her arm with his cursed blade while Adelaide, the widow Grayson, Grayson the eldest and a few of the boarders screamed at the two of them to cease and desist with their violent skirmish.

    The false Thomas Carver ran out of the front door of the boarding house. Astaroth and Svipul were waiting in a car outside the boarding house. Astaroth remarked, “That was silly. You were almost bested by a 135-year-old Nephil. I’d be embarrassed for you if I didn’t think it was so funny. I have to wonder if you’re really trying to win this wager.”

    Sitri morphed back into a more familiar and comfortable form of an older, wealthy gentleman commanding of respect. He answered, “I still have twenty-two hours. If it’s not too much trouble, I’d appreciate a lift back to Market Street. It’s about time I visit Thomas Carver’s employer.”

    Dominus tecum.

    On to Astaroth’s Wager, Part IV.

  • Orders, Part IV

    Back to Orders, Part III.

    Ninalla’s energy had been diminished by the act of childbirth. Possessing the dead Zhou threatened to sap what little energy she had left, and she was painfully aware that she to find a new host at the soonest to replenish her own lifeforce inside a new body. The only body at hand was that of the midwife, and she leapt into the mortal’s body without any hesitation. Her first impulse was to tear the midwife’s body apart from the inside out with her phenomenal rage, but she set her mind on revenge instead. She knew that Azrael had stolen away the life of her human host and, more importantly, her child, and she was going to do everything in her power to destroy him.

    Her anger gave her an unanticipated strength, and, soiled as her host’s clothes were from the childbirth, she marched from her home and into Duke Xiao’s palace to find Jiang Xuande, tossing aside every guard along the way who tried to stop her as if they were paper dolls. When she found Jiang Xuande, he was in the Duke’s company. The guards attempted to subdue her, but Ninalla repelled all their attempts and incapacitated everyone in the room except for Duke Xiao and Jiang Xuande. The Duke took his own sword, and he issued an uncertain threat to the demon. Ninalla ignored him, and in a low and cold voice that didn’t belong to the midwife, she said, “Zhao is dead. Our child is dead. I must see Astaroth this instant to seek my vengeance for Azrael’s injustice.”

    Ninalla purposefully crushed the midwife’s spine and exited the body, and the mortal woman’s broken body fell stupidly at Duke’s feet.

    Now—the Apokomistis Astaroth has a grisly sense of fun. When Ninalla returned to her mistress with her sad tale, Astaroth temporarily feigned interest and promised scores of demons in assistance, only to revoke it moments later while rebuking Ninalla for her lack of service and loyalty over the previous fourteen years. Ninalla was awestruck, but she soon recovered her fury. She raged at her mistress, reviling Astaroth’s callous treatment after more than seventeen centuries of loyal and obedient service.

    Unfortunately for Ninalla, her anger had obscured her wiser impulses and made her forget that Astaroth is an extremely impatient demon. It only took a few moments, and after they’d passed, Ninalla was no more.

    Back at the court of Duke Xiao, Jiang Xuande publicly mourned his wife and child while secretly waiting for Ninalla’s return. He commandeered a peasant girl for Ninalla to inhabit and made every attempt to summon her, but none of his spells worked very well without Ninalla’s demon blood.

    After more than a week, Jiang Xuande had begun to despair for partner’s return. He slashed into the peasant girl’s arm and summoned the Neku Benelaba to him. He ordered Benelaba to help him summon Ninalla to him, but the Neku had other obligations. The Neku was bound in service to Sitri, an Apokomistis who had been working closely with Astaroth at that time on a rather nasty little project (for another time, perhaps).  Benelaba informed the magician that Ninalla had been killed by Astaroth thirteen days earlier for her defiance. Jiang Xuande continued to appeal to the Neku for help, but Benelaba refused, citing his allegiance to his master.

    However, Benelaba knew that Jiang Xuande’s soul belonged to Astaroth, and he knew that his master’s business partner would want to keep tabs on her investment. Benelaba referred him a Neku in Astaroth’s service who went by the name Makeri, offered an insincere apology, and promptly disappeared.

    Ishtar Gate at the Pergamon Berlin Museum. Photo by Rictor Norton, courtesy of Wikimedia.
    Nebuchadnezzar II’s Ishtar Gate was inspired by Astaroth’s palace in Persepolis. Astaroth’s palace was destroyed  in Alexander the Great’s capture of the city in 330 BC.

    Jiang Xuande considered his next move very carefully, for like his dead partner, he wanted revenge for the death of his child. Over the many years he had spent with Ninalla, she had shared with him countless secrets that mortals are forbidden to know about the world of demons, and she shared with him everything she knew about the angels, as well. He knew that if he had to take on the Angel of Death, he would need an army of demons at his disposal. In fact, he knew exactly what he needed.

    All the best to you until next Tuesday. Dominus tecum.

    On to Orders, Part V.

  • Orders, Part III

    Back to Orders, Part II.

    As you’d expect, Jiang Xuande’s skill at magics improved significantly after he joined forces with Ninalla. In fact, his skill as an alchemist and an astronomer spread throughout the land, and so it was no surprise that Duke Xiao invited him to join his royal court in 361 BC.

    If there is one force that is paramount within the Universe, it’s love. It’s the connecting thread within all our Graces. When it comes to love, there’s nothing else in the Universe that is more diverse in form and expression. There’s also nothing stronger. Love makes all the difference.

    When Jiang Xuande summoned the demon Ninalla to his side and offered his wife Zhou’s body for her to possess, neither of them had any idea of what was to come. Over the years, a curious thing happened: Jiang Xuande and Ninalla fell in love. It might seem hard to believe, but even demons can feel love. The catch with demons is that most of the time, they don’t know how to express it in a constructive way, and when love is misdirected, it has the ugliest consequences.

    I mentioned last week that Jiang Xuande had theorized that a demon’s possession of his wife’s body might alter her ability to bear children, and he was correct. A Nekudaimon possessing a human (or animal) body has a few effects. Its metaphysical energy is able to simultaneously boost and drain the physical lifeforce of its host. A Neku must have a living host in order for it to wield any power, because the bond it makes with the soul of its host is, in part, a source of power. A Neku also halts the aging process of its host and lends its adopted physical form additional brawn and hardiness. However, if a Neku remains within the same mortal body for a while—more than a few days, for example—the host dies almost immediately when the Neku departs, for the Neku will have consumed most, if not all, of the physical energy of the host. Additionally, if the host dies while the Neku is still in it on account of some horrible damage to the body, the Neku has to find a new host in order to manifest. (These rules don’t apply to Apokomistai.)

    When Zhou was Zhou and Zhou alone, she could not bear children, but Ninalla possessing Zhou was a different story. (Do note that only an Apokomistis is capable of creating an Anathema. I’d explain, but Estelle has called dibs on this one.) The offspring of a Neku and a mortal creature is called an Epiklasmon, and it’s usually a creature that is weaker than its genetic kin. Their tragedy is that they don’t usually survive very long, which is typically a good thing, for they would live a cursed existence as the children of demons if they could live more than a few days. Still, the creative will that seizes those under love’s spell isn’t enough to deter them from trying to defy the odds.

    And so it was that in 355 BC, after thirteen years together, Ninalla was with child. Everyone at the court of Duke Xiao was astonished by the news, for Jiang Xuande and his seemingly-barren wife had been a quiet (but nonetheless feared) couple who appeared resigned to being childless. It was considered a miracle, and Duke Xiao extended the boundaries of the lands of his favorite alchemist and astronomer as a gift for his seeming good fortune.

    La mort du fossoyeur by Carlos Schwabe
    “The Angel of Death” as depicted in Carlos Schwabe’s The Death of the Grave-Digger. Azrael operates more quickly than humans can fathom. He doesn’t look like this model at all, but he does really like black and green.

    But fortune is fickle.

    Among the most feared and most misunderstood of angels is the Angel of Death. His name is Azrael, and he was tasked by God to maintain the balance of life and death within the Universe. One of his specific duties was to help the souls of the dead—especially those of children who weren’t strong enough to survive infancy—return to the Earth. He was also tasked with being close at hand to make sure that the soul of a creature that was cursed wouldn’t contaminate the pure waters of Earth’s well of souls.

    Jiang Xuande’s misfortune was that Azrael was close at hand when Ninalla gave birth to their Epiklasmon on that bright spring morning. Not long after the poor creature had taken its first and only breath, its heart stopped. Azrael then escorted the dormant soul of Zhou from the plane of the physical into the cavern of the metaphysical, and then he went to an isolated corner of the Universe to contend with the curse that was present in the soul of the dead Epiklasmon.

    Azrael is typically too quick for mortal eyes and most Neku senses to catch, but, of course, the exception to the rule came to pass on this occasion. The Angel of Death’s scent had lingered just long enough for the room for Ninalla to gauge what had happened when she realized that the body of her host was no longer ensouled and, consequently, dead.

    Until next Tuesday. Dominus tecum.

    On to Orders, Part IV.

  • Orders, Part I

    Not long after we angels were created by God, He separated us into the Orders. Angelic Orders can best be described as the different types of jobs that God assigned to us. Contrary to what has been written about angels by most humans, there are more than nine Orders. Most things relating to angels come in twelves (although on occasion, you can find concepts in sevens and fours and nines), and accordingly, there are were twelve Orders in the employ of God. Each angel was assigned to his or her Order based upon his or her unique talents. The Orders gave us purpose in the Universe, and our Graces helped us to execute our mission to care for the Universe.

    detail of Michael from Beccafumi's Fall of the Rebel Angels
    Detail of Michael from Domenico Beccafumi’s Fall of the Rebel Angels. Michael prefers this likeness of himself, even though it doesn’t resemble his typical human manifestation. He doesn’t have wings, either. (None of us do, actually.)

    I, Nadiel, was assigned to the Order of the Archangels. There are twelve of us: Camael, Ariel, Gabriel, Michael, Raphael, Uriel (pronounced OOH-ree-ell, if you please), Raziel, Sachiel, Anael, Cassiel, Barakiel and me. The twelve of us are the strongest and brightest of all angels, and Michael is the strongest and brightest of all. The Archangels were given the task of envisioning how the Universe should work and unfold, and we were chosen to rule over all of spacetime from a promontory point in Heaven after everything was up and running. Within this Solar System, I was given the responsibility of the planet Mercury and everything within its orbit (space), and one-twelfth of the duration of each planet’s revolution around the Sun (time). The month of Nadiel on Earth begins at sunrise on May the 20th and ends the moment before the sun rises on the morning of June the 19th. I do love to nurture creation in full bloom, and my brother Sachiel, who oversees oversaw the transition from spring into summer before the other solstice, was kind enough to let me assist him in the Southern Hemisphere.

    Archangels’ strength and brilliance come from each of us being the embodiment of one particular type of the Graces. Just as there are were twelve Orders, there are twelve Graces. I am the truest expression of the universal concept of Inspiration, and my Graces of Adaptability, Judgment and Mindfulness extend from that concept. (Give it a good think and you’ll arrive at how each graduates to the understanding of the next.) We worked together with the other angels to put the formulae in motion for the Earth to evolve into the incredible planet it is now. Gabriel, Cassiel, Camael and I included the capacity for all living beings to appreciate beauty, along with the desire to protect it and create it within the world. I also added a bit of code, if you will, which successfully led to the creation of music.

    Matters got very interesting on Earth a little more than 20 angelic generations ago—41,398 years ago, to be exact. I shan’t go into it now, Estelle won’t let me but suffice it to say that it wasn’t only homo sapiens that caught our attention. God reassigned several angels from the Order of the Watchers to observe and report back on what was transpiring here. As you can imagine, the Watchers’ mission throughout the Universe was almost exclusively observation and documentation. (Bear in mind that the Watchers who were assigned to Earth shouldn’t be confused with the fiction that was spun in the Book of Enoch, for Nephilim have different origins, appearance and purpose that she won’t let me talk about, either.)

    Watchers were never allowed to interfere with creation unless the orders came from God, but nevertheless, God did give directives for intervention from time to time. There was one occasion in particular, in which the situation deteriorated in such horrific fashion so as to require a squadron of God’s army, the Heavenly Host, to set things right again. It all started when the Watchers Sabrathon and Kochabiel informed Michael—

    Oh dear. The sun rises. Dominus tecum.

    On to Orders, Part II.

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