The Majlis-al-Malaikah has not prepared him, Azryel, as it shall not prepare you, for the Majlis-al-Djinn, the smokeless haze, the frigid yet ardourous heat, the multiplicity of voices birthing babble, the profusion of colours creating epilepsies. The Malaks are structured, orderly, bound and with purpose; not so the Djinns, who revel perhaps like degenerates, not befitting their stature, in Freedom. And why should they not, for Allah the Merciful has, in his boundless wisdom and infinite justice, granted them this as he has granted Iblis a deferred punishment. For this they exalt Allah, as is their duty, unlike the Sons of Adam who have forgotten. Perhaps the Djinni is greater than the insaan.
It is what they first ask Azryel upon his coming to the cave, a question perhaps rhetorical. “Is the fire greater than the clay, Ashrin?
“Is it not the Fire that moulds the Clay and births the Light?”
Azryel seeks not the speaker, for they are all speakers, and he is not surprised at such a greeting, for he has received far stranger ones, but he is shocked at the splendour of the Majlis, an Earthly yet ethereal splendour, a splendour unlike that of his own kind or any he has seen among humans.
“Is your kind the Malak, Ashrin? Do you not bear the Cross of St. Dumas? Are you not the one who broke the Bane of the Demon, are you not a desecration of the name of Holy Azrael, who is sworn not to protect, only to avenge?”
“There is no plot, Djinn. We are bound yes, but if there is a plot we do not know it. Cease your tongue and halt your words, for they are unduly strong if not blasphemous.” Azryel regains his composure; he must now act like the envoy, as he has been appointed. “But to answer your question, I am not him; he is dead and he has been claimed, as has been his successor. Dumas is not and never will be a saint, perhaps fortune is his.”
“You are of the bomb, yes- in one of the Worlds we see there are no bombs.”
Perhaps the Djinn are greater than men, and perhaps Iblis was not the only one of his kind: the only whisperer, the only tempter. Do his sins reflect upon all of his kind, are sins shared, like Fard, like the prayers at a funeral? Can the One absolve the Many, then? And is this just as true for the Light as it is for the Clay and the Fire, though they be bound and not immortal beyond their purpose?
Has Azryel doomed all Malaikah?
“I have come to see these worlds, Djinn. To inspect the borders of The Lady’s jurisdiction.” Azryel is aware of his inexperience, unsure of his words, he is afraid that the Djinn will notice; and if experience were indeed his, he would not have expected otherwise.
“Your doubts are valid, Our Little Six-Winged Archangel: What use be of Malaks and Ifrits in this world of Dark Knight Demons and Sun Gods of Steel? Only Allah the All-Powerful has any jurisdiction here, and He does not truly require enforcers. And indeed, is there any World where this is not so? For they exist in all, for as a human once said, it would be necessary to invent them if they did not exist.”
He cannot condemn their blasphemy, for that would make him a hypocrite: has he not, just now, invoked the Lady’s name? What manner of jurisdiction does she exactly have in this or any World? How far beneath Allah is she? For she exists even in paradise.
“This is not an inspection, young one: This is a test. This is a baptism. We will show you the worlds, Ashrin, and you must choose your favours after.”
And they show him the worlds, as multitudinous as their voices, as eclectic as a congregation of kafir illuminators, infinite worlds where the quotidian blends with the surreal in thin slivers forming a larger whole with a pattern that he is sure is exclusive only to him, only for his eyes, and this proves that he is still more admi than Malak, for he sees worlds in which Osman’s calling is of the World and not of the Ideal and they move him, affect him, crush him as they should not, Worlds in which the Valley stood and the Lane did not go crooked, and the call did not come for Osman; worlds which are plain but have logic and make sense and worlds which are absurd but have a beginning and an end and not just a middle; Worlds where the Plot is Real.
And he burns, and he stands, as the Djinn say, “Find your purpose, Archangel: Is it Death? Is it just for you to affirm your presence in Arcadia? For you are the one who is not merely to be a Malak
“You are the one who must ask if it were more difficult for Allah to create you and create us than to create Jannah. We exalt his name, and the Children have forgotten, but is it your charge to tread the middle ground?
“Is this a test, Ashrin, or is this temptation; Are we Iblis, or are we Djinn; Are we One, or Are we many; Are we all joined in our sins, or holy in our shared innocence? Is it all the same?”
Ashrin is ready to find the Plot, and he knows that one day he, or the Lady, or Allah, must claim the Dark Knights and the Sun Gods. Ashrin’s Buraq, outside the cave, neighs, whether out of impatience or fear or anger he does not yet know. But he cannot let himself be abandoned by his steed, for then he might lose the road. Yet he still burns. There is a question that is not rhetorical, one question between him and blasphemous, decadent freedom, or perhaps true Malakhood.
“And so Ashrin, Azryel, Azrael,
“Malak ul-Maut:
“Which of His favours do you deny?”
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