Free Walking in the Midst of Fire by Thomas E. Sniegoski

has brought you here? To England?”
    Tyranus slowly chewed the piece of pheasant meat he’d put in his mouth. “Exactly, angel.”
    “And how do you plan to prevent the world from being swallowed up by this darkness you see?” Remiel asked, curious.
    “I sense that we don’t necessarily agree on the level of the threat that the good people of the world face,” Tyranus stated.
    Remiel shrugged. “It is a matter of perception,” he explained. “When one has seen true darkness . . .”
    The angel remembered the war against the Morningstar, and the lives of his brothers that he was forced to take. The taste of angel blood was suddenly in his mouth, and he quickly picked up his goblet to wash it away with wine.
    “Perhaps, but from the look I see upon your face now . . . you’ve experienced something akin to what I see out there.” The Pope pointed beyond the dining hall, out beyond the castle, out into the countryside racked by plague and things of a far more sinister nature.
    “Though my brothers and sisters of the blessed faith disagree with my methods, I believe I have found the answer to stifling the flow of evil into the world.”
    Remiel waited for the revelation, still hearing the ghostly sounds of Heaven’s war echoing in his ear.
    “By fighting fire, with fire,” Pope Tyranus confided. “Darkness used in the service of light, against darkness.”
    The angel considered this, and found the concept interesting, but still could not quite fathom why he had been summoned here. What was his part to play in all of this?
    “And my role in this battle against the encroaching shadows?” he asked.
    Pope Tyranus smiled, his icy eyes twinkling.
    “The lord in whose house we now reside summoned me with knowledge of an item of incredible power.” The old man spoke in a whisper that only they could hear. “A ring once given to the great King Solomon by the Archangel Michael.”
    Remiel immediately perked up, remembering the ring, and how it would give whomever possessed it control over the demonic.
    “I can see that you know of this item,” Pope Tyranus spoke.
    “The sigil ring,” Remiel said. “As far as I know, it was lost after the death of the wise king.”
    “And for a time it was,” the Pope acknowledged, slowly nodding. “But it was eventually found, though not by any who shared the great king’s connection to the divine.”
    Tyranus paused, playing with a silver ring upon his finger, slowly turning it around, and around.
    “The ring found its way from one eager finger to the next, as all who possessed the powerful, magickal artifact fell victim to an evil successor.”
    “And the lord who succumbed?” Remiel asked. “He had knowledge of who now possesses the sigil ring?”
    “Oh yes,” the Pope said, his voice a chilling hiss. “He had succumbed to the plague before my arrival, but that did not prevent me from . . . extracting the information by supernatural means.”
    Remiel looked at the holy man, offended by what he was suggesting.
    “Fire with fire, soldier of God,” he clarified. “Though it pained me to do so, I recalled his spirit to the earthly realm, and for the good of the world forced it to give up the ring’s current owner and location.”
    “Who now possesses this artifact?”
    “It has come into the possession of a powerful necromancer,” the Pope said. “One who has learned to harness the power of the dead and dying.”
    “Where?” Remiel asked, already suspecting he knew the answer.
    “Somewhere right outside this door, angel,” Pope Tyranus said. “Can you think of a better place for one who harnesses the power of death, than a region besieged by plague?”
    “His magick will be strong,” Remiel said.
    “But not as strong as a soldier of Heaven,” Pope Tyranus said, leaning back in his chair, again fiddling with the ring upon his finger.
    “You’re going to help me, angel,” the Pope told him. “You’re going to obtain Solomon’s sigil ring,