In an unprecedented move, Good Master appoints high-heaven Giselle as a guardian angel in preparation for an unthinkable task. Will Giselle do what she is called to do or will she
let anger draw her to the dark side?
Dearest Giselle began as a response to a literary challenge at the end of Screwtape Letters. There, C.S. Lewis suggested the need for an account of humanity from an angelic perspective as a balance to his demonic one. Though my audience, language, and purpose are different than Lewis's, I have drawn on his epistolary form and general premise for inspiration, and can only hope my final version will, as Lewis put it, contain "words that smell of Heaven."
Here are a couple of rough chapters to give you a feel. Hope to add more soon. Would love to know what you think in an email or in the chat!
One
Dearest Giselle, As chief guardian of US-Division 6, allow me to welcome you. I am Aeryandelijah and will assist you in your new role of guardian angel. Though your appointment is a surprise, I am pleased you’ve joined our team and trust you will—in time—find great contentment and joy in your position. You are no doubt aware of the highly unusual nature of your appointment. Indeed, in my thousand-year tenure, I’ve never even heard of a high-heaven angel becoming a guardian. But so it is now and though I find such an anomaly exciting, it does pose unique challenges for both of us. For me, who has never trained a high-heaven angel before, I am not accustomed to someone with absolutely no experience in low-heaven dealings. How does one teach reading to someone who does not yet know the alphabet? Not that I believe you totally ignorant. Good Master has assured me of your keen and abiding interest in godlings and their history, culture, and earth, and have spent time among the glorified ones. All that is well and good, but information is a poor substitute for experience. For you, our low-heaven ways—as well as those on earth—will be quite different than the spectacular purity and sumptuous glories of high heaven. How different we have both yet to discover, but I suspect for an angel who has spent the past five hundred years singing in euphoric worship, the comparison will likely parallel the brightest supernova and the darkest moon. Still I have been called upon to equip and will do my best. Let me begin with an overview of a guardian’s general duties. If it were not for the complexities of godlingkind in their current state, the main duties of a guardian would be simple, for there are really only two: to protect and to serve your vault (the vault being the godling you are assigned). By protect I mean it is a guardian’s place to keep a vault safe, whenever possible, from enemy forces. To serve means to help a vault in whatever manner Good Master or the vault itself prescribes. Simple enough. At least, it would be if not for the godlings themselves. What I mean to say is the unrenewed nature of the godlings can make these otherwise-routine duties highly intricate endeavors. Darling creatures as they are, godlings tend to be stubborn, rebellious, self-righteous, fearful, and hateful. In this, they are as often as much an enemy to themselves and each other as anything we might protect them from! And many times, we cannot protect them, for they are their own worst enemies, and formative ones at that. I know this, my first account of the godlings, is likely jarring. From deep heaven as you are, my report of these terra-born beauties must surely sound more irreverent than what you’re used to. And perhaps my account is. But after a millennia as guardian and chief, I find such directness necessary if I am to provide a clear description of the position. To speak otherwise would be to deceive. For if you were to take this post believing only Good Master’s report of the godlings, you would be sorely perplexed. He is incessantly generous in his praise of them—always eager to point out what makes them fascinating, beautiful, and clever—but often tardy in description of their dark and grave faults. But let me go no further. Heaven forbid my honesty would seem some slight to our most excellent master’s judgment when I know it to be quite the opposite. The Good Master’s extravagant praises of them are proof only of his unswerving devotion to the godling race. He is full of faith and hope for all of them, rebellious or not, and especially those who are his own. In short, he is the perfect Father, and however biased his view may seem, we may trust his praise of them to be ultimate truth. Therefore, you will have to uphold his view of them—a view you also currently hold—in the face of the most alarming contradictions. And though you will soon learn that the godlings, their animals, even their very planet are currently in terrifying disarray, your guardianship would require you take the long view of the situation, as he does. Despite what you will learn and experience, you will have to treat the godlings as they will be, not as they are . . . . Guide in this most uncommon adventure, Aery
Three
Dearest Giselle, I am sorry to hear that your welcome among the other guardians was not as warm as you had hoped, and that they seemed only "vaguely polite with a disappointing dash of distrust” as you so put it. If you would like to lodge a formal complaint, I will see to it. My guess is, however, that it is not distrust you are sensing; It is unfamiliarity. You must remember, most of these guardians have gone their whole existence with very little interaction with high-heaven angels. They are not accustomed to your sing-song language, innocent assumptions, or flashy wings. The removal of Elmiannne and your assignment to the post is, as I’ve mentioned before, also very unusual, and it may take some time for them to adjust. You have also, if I am to understand, freely divulged that you are training for a secret mission. Truly, I applaud your willing honesty among your comrades, but that too was likely more than they were ready to handle. Perhaps it is best not to be so liberal with that information. It is called a secret mission after all. And give them time. With that and familiarity, I believe this situation will correct itself tolerably. But even then, I am not sure we guardians will ever measure up to your criteria of “warm,” if you mean the kind of luminescent grace and ease of Good Master’s throne room. Among the guardians, camaraderie is forged not in the common pleasure of eternal joys but in the common struggle against countless enemies. We are a courser lot, perhaps, born in the air of a poisoned planet, but I promise you will find no angels so loyal and hardworking in all the galaxies. Please give them the benefit of the doubt. I am glad to hear you are boots on the ground, as we call it. I even detected some slight excitement at you finding your vault in residence at an institute of higher learning where she has been for the past month. However, your gladness comes, I am sure, from a misunderstanding of the term, higher learning. Godlings do not use the term as angels do. If Madison’s college is a good institution, it will at least provide her with the information, opportunities, and tools necessary to make her a productive and prosperous member of her society. But we can expect no more of the education it will provide her. For higher learning as we know it to be—a deeper exploration of Good Master’s thoughts, and ways—has all but ceased in most earthly institutions. Many of them started with higher learning as their purpose to be sure, and those institutions stood as beacons where elevated standards of thought and conduct were esteemed in reason and realized in practice. But now most universities bear the term higher learning in name only. As well as I can tell, the higher now refers to the elevated cost of education and the learning to schismatic indoctrination without even a nod to the creator of the ground the university sits on or the sunlight that streams through its windows. And instead of elevating godlings in mind and spirit as it should, current education often tethers them to rebellion and calls that rebellion free thought, another oxymoron when used in that context. . . . In closing, and I know I alluded to this in earlier correspondence, but I must be sure you understand that almost all of a guardian’s duties will be done from our realm and not theirs, so that is our most oft used tool is that of influence. You must become a master of whispers and subtle settings, for Good Master prefers we do our work quietly these days, though it will not always be so. And know that when these hushed methods are ineffective (as they oft will be) and you are tempted to interfere rather than to influence, you cannot without a direct command. This is often difficult for new guardians, but for someone of your ethereal sensibilities—well it may even prove problematic. But you must allow godlings to choose their own fate no matter how detrimental the result of those choices may be. Aery
Seven
Dearest Giselle, What you tell me about brackish water is fascinating, a fact that in all my years around earth I had never picked up upon! Water that is neither salt nor fresh. What an intriguing thought, and likely Good Master means some lesson by its existence, but it is a mystery to me. Of course, it must make earthly sense since the two waters would mix—sea with river—to combine into other bodies of water with their own flora and fauna, their own microbes and physical properties. I suppose such a fact to be crucial in your mapping of freshwater, for Good Master wants you familiar only with what is fresh, not what has been spoiled with some level of salinity. I must say, I am more than a little interested in this secret mission of yours. I am at a loss as to what such studies might pertain to. But as important as the pursuit of your water studies are, do not neglect your vault studies. You are still very green in your understanding, and your last correspondence about her reminds me you still have much to learn. Though no longer disgusted, your stance is still not an objective one, for your last correspondence painted Madison as more of a pet than a vault. It’s as if some adorable kitten has now suddenly delighted you by purring instead of pulling down the curtains. “She is glowing,” you praised, “all golden embers and sun/as one who has tasted of the Glorious One.” But her new “glowing” behavior—girlish twirls before the mirror, sudden smiles, secret joy—has little to do with tasting Good Master’s fare. Judging from your account of the attention paid her by that questionable bodling named Chase, I think your Madison is experiencing what godlings call falling in love. Falling in love. Now there’s a brackish business. Falling in love has always been such an ironic phrase. It is what most godlings desire above all else, yet it is compared to a sensation I daresay godlings rarely find pleasant, and that is the sensation of falling. To be fair, my general distaste for the trouble falling in love—which I will soon unfold—does not mean I wholly object to the condition. In its purity, falling in love is as holy and lovely as the hush of calm water or the brilliance of a mountain sunrise. Good Master’s plan for two godlings to become one has often included such a falling phenomenon. But tell me Giselle, in your short tenure on the earth, have you ever seen that word fall used for anything not associated with pain or danger? When godlings fall, they fall downstairs, out of buildings, or into pits and traps. They fall prey to those of evil intention and they fall for tricks. They also have falling outs with each other or take the fall for someone else. Even an avid skydiver who, thousands of feet from the ground, rejoices in the euphoria of complete surrender calls the event a free fall. As wonderful as the free might be, if all did not go as planned (and love rarely does), the fall could end—well, suffice to say, such an ending would be the exact opposite of euphoria. It seems to me that if falling in love were such a desirable state, why not call it rising in love or soaring in love or blooming in love? If not those, why not use growing or elated or burgeoning, something worthy of the great blossom of joy and importance godlings attribute to the phenomenon? Yet in truth, falling is a the more apt description of the headlong plunge into the incongruous emotions and actions individual godlings often experience with said state. As such, the phrase “falling in love” should be as clear a warning to the godlings as a yellow road sign marked Danger posted on the edge of a rocky cliff or crumbling bridge. For falling in love can indeed be as dangerous. . . . In short, by falling in love with Chase, Madison has fallen into the arms of a bodling who—from our records—will not have her best interest at heart. He is like a wolf, and your adorable kitten is now in his teeth. Look to it soberly, my friend, Aery