by Erica Crouch
I’m close enough to him now that I can see the tension in his temple, the apprehension of having been caught. Gus has been a bad, bad ally. Maybe I should consider him an enemy again.
Though I am shorter than he is by at least a foot, Gus is the one afraid. My proximity does not bode well for him, not with my anger held tight, drawn back like an archer’s arrow, ready to be set free. Ready for the explosion of release. I open my hand in front of me, silently asking for the note he was writing. He considers me for a moment, and I see the options of what could happen swim through his head—little snippets of the future all hinging on what he chooses to do.
Snap his fingers now and send the note to whomever he was writing to. I’d snap his neck, just as fast.
Destroy the note in another way, deal with the fallout of my anger. Lose any inch of trust he had won. Start over again.
Or hand the note over. Let me see who he was writing to, what secrets of mine he felt it was so important to share. Allow me to decide if the content of his letter is enough to call for his death. It’d be a great opportunity for me to get rid of him, should I choose to do so.
He taps on his leg with his fingers. One, two, three. One, two, three. He goes with three and hands me the note. The moment I have the paper, he takes several steps back, stopping only when he hits the wall.
“We should work with him,” Gus says, “and he will be more successful if he knows everything. He’s operating with only a partial piece of the picture now, but if he sees the full thing… There is a way he could survive this. And it’s our involving him.”
I unfold the paper, not surprised when I see that it is addressed to Azael. Could be worse—he could have been writing to Azael’s sister. What would Pen do with such information? Half of me wonders if that would have been the next letter Gus wrote once this one was sent. Did he plan on filling her in on everything as well?
In the note, Gus reveals Lucifer’s death to Azael. He informs him that I am sitting on the throne of Heaven, and—as I was the one to bring him down—I have a rightful claim to all Lucifer once led. Kill the devil, become the devil himself. Herself now. I smile, reading on. Gus should take my amusement as a bad sign.
He continues to tell Azael what I’ve been up to. In a few rushed sentences, he shares his concerns of what I may do as leader. He reminds Azael that he was officially named as King of Hell, and if he still wanted a chance to rule in the underworld, it would be wise for him to abandon the mission of finding his sister—leave it to those he recruited for the task—and return to Heaven at once. To challenge me for the throne.
At the conclusion of the letter, Gus warns Azael of Jeremy’s allegiance and how he was a planted spy for me. Jeremy was never there to serve Azael or help him communicate better with us still in Heaven. That’s what Lucifer believed, too, and look where he is. It was my idea that he should accompany Azael. Jeremy’s mind is so impressionable that I knew it wouldn’t be hard to have him eating out of the palm of my hand, feeding me information, keeping me apprised of everything that happens with Azael. And when I heard that Lucifer was considering sending him back to Earth, it didn’t take a heavy hand to have him convinced that Jeremy would be an asset.
Now that Lucifer’s dead—and Jeremy stood as witness—the boy serves me even more loyally. Our shared secret makes him feel important, and he’s only too eager to rat on Azael. He lets me know every small movement they make, and it assists Gus by informing his divination. It helps me know when I should expect Azael back in Heaven, and, perhaps most importantly, it lets me estimate how much time I have before he finds out about Lucifer.
Gus almost destroyed that timeline completely.
I fold the paper up, hold it in my palm, and turn it to ashes. “Give me an excuse,” I say to Gus.
His fingers are tapping on his leg again, and he shakes his head. “Like I said, I thought if he knew—”
“Knew that he might be losing his title now that I’m in charge? Oh, he has. He is no king. He’ll discover that on his own soon enough. What I’m curious about,” I say, “is why you thought it wise to question my leadership and then expose my one source of information. Without Jeremy, how do you expect me to know what Azael is doing, where he’s going, who he’s seeing?”
“What I wrote wasn’t meant to…to endanger your plans.”
I laugh. “Sure it wasn’t.”
Gus smooths the wrinkles out of his dark shirt, and the movement exposes a second piece of paper tucked in his pocket. I eye it. My suspicions of him informing Pen next may not have been far off.
“Her, too?” I ask, raising an eyebrow.
It takes him only a brief moment to figure out my meaning. He shoves the paper deeper into his pocket.
“Now tell me, what would have been the point of that? You argued for her death to be quick, too. But you thought informing her about my rule would be beneficial?”
“She never liked Lucifer,” he says, his voice tight. “I figured…if she knew you took the throne, we stood a chance of bringing her back, as Azael wanted. And then he wouldn’t have to worry about killing his sister because they would both belong to Hell again. They would be powerful soldiers to keep in your pocket. They’re infamous now, and if they supported your new position, it would make the…transition…easier.”
“You recruit support by bashing my name?” I shake my head. “Gus, if you’re going to lie to me, at least do it well.”
He’s quiet.
“What was your plan?” I take a few steps across the room, nearing him.
He presses up against the wall again, trying to get as much distance between us as possible.
“Are you truly so foolish as to believe that Azael would return and defeat me? Replace me? He’s a puppet, Gus, and now, I’m pulling the strings. Do you know how easy it was to manipulate him into doing exactly as I wanted? And he doesn’t even realize it.”
“I didn’t say I wanted him to kill you.”
“No,” I say, “only challenge me for the throne. Which means a fight to the death. So you either wanted him dead or me. Which is it?”
“N-neither.” He looks away, and it tells me all I need to know.
“That’s what I thought,” I say, turning my back to him and crossing the room. At the door, I kick some splintered pieces of wood away. “He believes he is still serving Lucifer,” I say. “For the moment, this benefits me. It keeps him out of my way—out of our way as we decide what the future will hold for Hell.”
“The future is the very thing I’m concerned about.”
I twist and lean on the doorframe, surveying the explosion of glass and wood that litters the room. The curtains still hang from the bed’s canopy, tattered and stained with blood. It’s a very lonely sight. Azael has a way of leaving a mess in his wake wherever he goes.
“What about the future concerns you, precisely?” I ask, inspecting my nails.
“Hell has never had a regime change. The first would have been Azael, as Lucifer took up the throne here in Heaven.” Gus scratches at his rough jaw with the heel of his hand. “But if you do not choose to stay in Heaven—”
“I will not,” I say.
“—then we have to decide the best way to handle the segue from Lucifer to you. There will be those who question you.”
“They won’t for long, Gus. Not when they see everything I’m capable of, everything I’ve already done.”
“Still,” he says. “Demons don’t deal well with change.”
I laugh and leave. Walking down the hallway, I think of the stubborn ways of Heaven. How they’ve stagnated without evolving their policies, their belief system. The angels who fell from Heaven have already been through a change in leadership once, trading their God for Lucifer. And the demons Lucifer created, the ones I helped raise, will adjust better than Gus believes. Though they share no blood with me, they see me as their mother.
Lucifer may have killed the Lilim, but I still have children willing to serve. Children willing to figh
t for me, protect me. Hell loves my name.
Gus is denser than I believed him to be if he doesn’t think I haven’t begun disseminating the news. There are already those who know I am in charge. Already, they serve me. They don’t know the details of Lucifer’s death, but it was impossible for them not to feel that connection severed. It’s one of the reasons I’m so surprised Azael hasn’t caught on already.
When I killed Lucifer, there was a pulse of energy that rippled through the entire universe. The Morning Star extinguished. The planets realigned.
So many who serve Hell felt it. The snap of a thread having been cut. There were questions, excitement as to what it could possibly mean. The anticipation of news only grew, especially when the freeze that gripped the world didn’t start to thaw. It meant that Lucifer hadn’t been killed by an angel, but by one of their own. They were anxious to see who they were serving now. Who they had the pleasure of calling their king.
When they found out about their new queen, they were fast to pledge their fidelity to me. Lilith, their Dark Mother. The leader Hell has been waiting for. I’m happy to serve.
Later in the evening, Gus comes sulking back into the throne room like a wounded animal. He’s careful to keep his distance from me, but he knows he has to be here. I heard from Jeremy that the angels of New Genesis had arrived at the Tower of London. We get a front-row seat to the action.
Jeremy relinquishes control of himself, opening his mind for me to wander through. He ran away from the noise of the screeching birds that alerted the rest of the fortress to the intruders, but I asked him to stop. Instead of finding someplace to hide, I tell him to search out a vantage point where he can watch the battle.
And he does, finding a perch high up in a tower to look over the fighting. Through his eyes, Gus and I sit as spectators to the sport of war. I chew on wilted fruit whose juices are as red as the angels’ spilled blood. Delightful.
Through Jeremy’s eyes, I witness the scene below, following the movements of Michael and Pen. They stand side by side, so close, so in sync. Their movements are coordinated as if they’ve been fighting together for centuries, not weeks. An invisible thread is strung between them, keeping them connected. The way they fight complements one another. When Michael brings his sword high, Pen sweeps low—a give-and-take, a push-and-pull. It’s riveting to watch. But soon, they disappear through a door and are inside the tower and out of view.
Another angel, small and black, runs across the lawn and charges through another door. I spot Eligor behind her, checking over his shoulder, before he follows her inside. Interesting. I should have guessed that a rebellion like New Genesis would catch his interest—he’s always been vocal about his grievances with Hell—but I never expected him to fight with angels instead of against them.
“Find them, Jeremy,” I order.
Jeremy starts moving, and instead of watching the fighting outside—which we can still hear—we see hallways of stone, rooms of ancient wood. He descends some stairs, pulls himself around several corners, and slides into a room, where he abruptly stops. The room is lined in shattered display cases, jagged pieces of glass framing where exhibits must have once stood if the golden plaques are any indication. The displays, though, are stripped, the cases almost entirely empty. Behind a few undressed mannequins are pictures of soldiers in armor.
There’s an open bag on the floor, weapons spilling out of the unzipped canvas. Jeremy looks around the room, and I notice that it is littered with gear: armor, guns, blades. On the floor in front of a display sits a pile of little plastic explosives.
From the adjoining room comes a noise. Footsteps.
“Hide,” I say, and Jeremy ducks into an alcove. He pulls a bench up against the wall and disappears into the darkness. But from this angle, though he is hidden, we can still see a sliver of the room.
Eligor and the angel crash in to view.
“Well, fuck me!” the angel says, her eyes widening as she takes in the feast of weapons all left out in the open for them to take. She walks over to the explosives, takes a knee, and scoops up two handfuls. “Bombs!”
Eligor moves a small step back. “Hey, Kala, want to maybe be a little more careful with those?”
“It’s fine. I know how to use them. They don’t just”—she makes an exploding sound that sends spit flying—“for no reason, you know.”
“Yeah, well, even still. Perhaps we don’t mess with the explosives?”
“No fun,” she says, sighing and standing up. She lets the bombs fall through her fingers and they clatter back into the pile.
Eligor flinches but nothing blows up.
“All right,” she says. “Start packing.”
They go around the room, shoving what weapons will fit into the duffel bag and strapping what doesn’t onto their bodies. Eligor is covered in blades, a whip coiled around his ankle. The sounds of the battle outside intensify, and the screaming begins. Loud, piercing shouts of death. I start laughing at the noise, and Gus rests his chin in his hand, closing his eyes.
Jeremy stays still and quiet in the alcove he’s hiding in as Kala and Eligor continue working. Eligor keeps looking out the door, distracted in his work.
“Go,” Kala says.
“We’re supposed to be doing this together. That’s the plan. We get the weapons, we—”
“You were the goddamn Knight of Hell, you idiot,” says the angel. “You know how to fight, and not everyone out there does. Not like you. Go and help them.”
“You sure you got this?”
Kala rolls her eyes. She picks the plastic explosives out in fistfuls and dumps them in the bag. “Yeah. Almost done.”
With a nod, Eligor goes running out of the weapons room. I’m about to order Jeremy to sneak up on the angel and dispatch her. Surely he must have a blade on him, right? Though, knowing Azael and his mistrust of Jeremy, he probably kept him unarmed. The boy is too unstable to trust with a weapon; never know if he might turn it on himself or the others. He’s just as likely to use it against an enemy as he is an ally. But before I can even consider asking him to try to fell the angel, Pen and Michael come bounding into the room, their cheeks pink and their hair dusted with snow.
After a quick exchange, they disappear, too. Pen first, followed by Michael and Kala. Once the sound of their retreat has died down, Jeremy extricates himself from the wall. The scream of the battle is deafening, and he curls up under a wooden bench, closes his eyes, and cups his hands over his ears, humming to himself. I guess that’s all we’ll get from him tonight.
“Do you see a clear path, yet?” I ask Gus. I need to know what Azael and Pen are doing, what choices they are making.
Gus pulls a book into his lap, and it falls open to their fates. Two of the branches of text are fading away to gray. “They’ll live, as I predicted. Both of them.”
Another night for death, then. That’s unfortunate.
Gus traces more fates, his eyes rolling back in his head as he fills more blank pages with text. With wavering words that morph into pictures. He scribbles on and on into the night, never pausing. Never even blinking.
Azael calls late in the evening, or perhaps it’s early in the morning. It’s hard to tell anymore. I project through Jeremy, and it’s much easier to talk to him this way—no wading through his disastrous mind.
After he tells me that the angels got away, Azael asks if I’ve contacted the reinforcements he begged for. I tell him that I have, though I’ve only made a cursory mention of Azael’s request after informing the demons who called upon me. Those who know I’ve taken Lucifer’s throne are aware that Azael is preparing to battle with the angels, and they said that they would spread the news. Those who find out find out.
I lie to him, saying that so many are eager to help out. I don’t know that as a fact—but those I spoke to sounded intrigued. Cutting a bunch of traitors and angels down? It’s a hard opportunity to pass up. For many, it’s a great way to kill time. To stretch their muscles and their wings a
nd do something fun.
“Tell Lucifer I’ll serve him his brother’s head on a silver platter,” Azael says.
I chew down on a laugh and ignore him, distract him with some sleight of hand. Mention the reinforcements again, and he’s forgotten all about Lucifer. When he asks if I’ll be there, fighting the rebels of New Genesis with him, I turn him down.
I’m not interested in spending my time fighting the rebels. My bloodlust has been sated, and Lucifer’s rotting corpse behind me provides me plenty entertainment. War can wait. I have a throne to ready.
Pen
IT TAKES US TWICE AS long to get back. We nearly lose Eli just before we start across the ocean. We would have stopped sooner to try to treat him, but London doesn’t feel safe anymore and we want to get as much distance between us and Azael as we can. But then it happens.
Eli’s flying close behind me, and suddenly, he drops, and the duffel bag plummets fast toward the ground. I’m the first to notice his fall—the way his wings just give up entirely, folding up as he tumbles out of the sky. I rush to stop him from crashing into the hard, icy ground and just barely get to him in time. I hook my foot around a strap of the duffel, careful not to let it slip. The last thing we need is to drop a bag full of explosives. Michael flies to me and takes on half of Eli’s weight, helping me lower him to the ground softly.
Kala, Ana, and the others land.
“Is he…?” Ana doesn’t dare finish the thought. Everyone shifts on their feet, uncomfortable.
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “He’s lost blood, but not that much. Not enough, not yet.”
If we go much farther, he might bleed out, but we caught it first. He said that the wound wasn’t that bad, and he wouldn’t let anyone double-check to make sure he was really okay to fly. There wasn’t time anyway. Eli and his stubborn pride. He told us that he could make it back to New Genesis, that, by the time we landed, he’d probably be healed. What an idiot.
We can staunch the bleeding here now that we know the full extent of the injury. If he had fallen in the middle of the ocean, he probably would have died. Drowned, maybe. We very well may have lost him, too, tonight.