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"My own daughter has always had a fierce heart, yet she has come to admire your teachings, and I am not the only one to mark how this has gentled her."

Prince Melchizedek raised his eyes to take in Lilith's red dress and he could not recall the last time he had seen her wear one. He noted how her eyes seemed to be drowning in Michael and in an instant he knew what was happening to his sister. He asked, "Who are you really, Michael?"

Michael drew near to Prince Melchizekek and said, "Your Royal Highness, for years you were not to be seen in Salem but only your father knew that you were in the other world searching for a man who was not content to worship the gods of his fathers."

The Ophan was stunned to silence.

King Melchiyahu said, "My son found a man named Abram, but Abram's loyalty to his own father's well-being exceeded any loyalty to what was, to him, an unknown god. Melchizedek found no other of his like, and when he returned he reported failure."

Lilith said, "I was told nothing of my brother's absence."

"Is it not some measure of who I really am," Michael said to the prince, "that I know what even your sister does not? Yet I will offer one more sign, one far more convincing."

Bat-El had no power to open a space-time bridge in Kemen, only Elyon or Chemah, but the Abram case remained a piece of unfinished business. Communicating directly with Elyon, Bat-El demanded the appearance of a link. A bubble grew to envelop Michael and through it Earth could be seen. Desert heat seeped through the wormhole into the Cherub's throne room.

Michael stepped out of the spherical mirage and said, "Ophan Melchizedek, know that the father of Abram is dead. Now I bid you to return to the other world and complete the errand your father laid on you. Tarry not to take anything that you think you will need on Earth. I will provide them for you myself."

Melchizedek seemed to be frozen in place. Hy firt glanced at Michael, then at his father, and he had nothing to say.

His father said, "Make haste, my son. Do as Michael commands."

So Melchizedek entered the ball of distorted desert light and seemed to shrink as he walked away towards Harran.