Back on Earth, Josh grinned from ear to ear. "What kind of idiot would say no to that?" he said. "Not only are you the kindest, smartest, most beautiful girl who ever lived, but you're a literal angel as well? Of course I'll marry you!"
Penemue pulled Josh into a joyful embrace. "Thank you, Josh! You've just made me the happiest angel in Heaven! Well, I'm technically on Earth right now, but still." She dotted his face with kisses.
"I was kinda worried we'd scared you off of her with all these revelations," Rachel laughed. "This is a lot of crazy stuff to take in."
"The weirdest part is Penny being the daughter of God," Josh said. "Every authority on the Scripture says that God has only one child, Jesus."
"Only one son," Penemue corrected, "And he's had quite a few more of this since the Bible was written. God actually had a long run of daughters for a few thousand years."
"Why were you not mentioned in the Bible?" asked Josh.
"I guess my sisters and I weren't too interesting to the ancient prophets," Penemue shrugged. "You know how people could be about girls a couple thousand years ago."
"I'm pretty sure my dad thinks less of girls than they did," Josh sighed regretfully.
"I can vouch for that," Rebecca nodded, frowning as she rubbed her freshly heeled stomach.
"Besides, Jesus is the only one of us to inherit the full measure of our Father's divinity," said Penemue. "He was always going to be the most interesting one of us to write about. I was mentioned in the Book of Enoch, though. I was part of a group of angels that went down to share Heavenly knowledge with early humans (and to scout out some spouses, of course). I taught the art of reading and writing to humans. I actually got in trouble with Dad for a while, since He was worried that humans would misuse their new knowledge to do terrible things, but I convinced Him that the secrets of Heaven could just as easily be used to achieve a lot of good. Considering all of the holy books that have been written over the years, I think it's safe to say that He's adopted my point of view in a big way."
"Who's your mother?" asked Josh.
"My mother is Asherah, Queen of Heaven, Queen of the World, Queen of Angels, Queen of All Saints, Queen of Martyrs, Queen of Apostles, Queen of Prophets, Full of Grace, Mother of Mercy, Mother of the Church, Comfort of the Afflicted, Mediatrix of All Graces."
"Asherah?" Josh repeated. "Isn't that a pagan mother goddess from the Old Testament?"
"My mother Queen Asherah is neither pagan nor a goddess," said Penemue. "She's a powerful angel and the wife of King Jehovah (God's proper name). The verses you're referencing are the result of a theological dispute among the ancient Israelites over whether my Mom deserves some veneration in my Dad's temples. The ancient rabbis eventually decided that prayers should not be given to Mom, a decision upheld by modern Protestants but rejected by Catholics."
Josh's eyes bugged out. "Do you mean...?"
"...That Queen Asherah is Mary?" asked Penemue. "Yes, I do. Jesus wasn't the only Heavenly being to incarnate back then as part of God's plan. My mom did as well, and her human name was Mary. Well, it was technically 'Maryam,' but nobody uses the Aramaic form outside of Assyrian Christian communities anymore."
"Looks like I've got a serious learning curve," Josh chuckled. "Good thing I have the most amazing teacher ever!" He placed another kiss on Penemue's soft cheek.
"We have a lot of wedding planning to do, sweetie," she said. "I can take you to Heaven, and we can get everything sorted out."
"You sure you want to live in Heaven, Josh?" asked Rachel. "I know how you hated the seminary."
"I hated the specific seminary that Dad picked out for me," Josh corrected. "I was open to a life spent preaching the Word of God, but Dad's old school is more about preaching words that narrow-minded bigots put into God's mouth. Big difference."
"We'll be going straight to the source," Penemue winked. "Dad will want to meet you."
"Is it normal to be overjoyed and terrified of the same thing at once?" asked Josh.
"In this case, definitely," said Penemue. With a wave of her hand, she summoned a shimmering portal of pale golden light. "See the rest of you later!" With that, she and Josh stepped through the portal.
Astaroth turned to Charon. "So, what's this war on the Knights of the Iron Cross going to look like? Nothing with too much collateral damage, I hope."
"It should be pretty contained," said Charon. "The Knights of the Iron Cross may do a lot of damage in their raids, but we outnumber them by a wide margin. If Heaven and Hell each send a legion of warriors, we should easily wipe the psychos out."
"Why haven't we already done that?" asked Maisy.
"The Knights are very spread out," Remeila answered. "They're scattered around the world in little cells. Destroying them was too labor-intensive for either Heaven or Hell... until an Iron Knight laid a hand on God's on daughter."
"I believe my Father-in-Law's exact words to me were 'Let the man who doth smite the daughter of Heaven on the cheek perish beneath a thousand holy spears'," Charon smirked.
"Does God always talk like that?" asked Rebecca.
"Only when making official proclamations," said Remeila.
"The tentative plan is to divide two legions into small task forces to assassinate individual Iron Knights," said Charon. "Before you know it, boom! No more Knights of the Iron Cross!"
"I hope it works," Maisy said.
"I can't believe my dad was part of some demonslaying league of supervillains all these years," Rachel sighed.
"Life is full of surprises," Maisy said, putting a comforting hand on one of Rachel's wings. "Look what I turned out to be! Don't worry, I'll do everything in my power to get you through this shock."
"Now, darling..." Astaroth said, taking Rebecca's hand in her own, "we have much to do." With that, she opened up a fiery portal to Hell. "Shall we?"