Chapter 21
Shekissedme.She kissed me and lived.Those thoughts kept going over and over in my head as I lay on the scorching ground of the Hell desert, waiting for Lucifer. I knew from my brothers that he would come find me and toss me home, I just had to wait. I didn't know what part of Hell this was, but I didn't absolutely hate it. There was a kind of nice solitude to it, just barren land and my thoughts.
Occasionally, a demon or two wandered my way, but I just let my death power vibrate from me when they got too close, and they would skitter off in fear.She kissed me, lived, and she liked it.
My hand rose to my lips, tracing them lightly where she’d laid hers. The way she’d kissed me seared into my soul. She’d kissed me like she was starving for me, like she enjoyed my taste and wanted all of it again and again, forever.
After she told me her dirty little trick as the portal closed, I was furious. I yelled and raged at her, kicking at the dirt and punching some Hell rocks in frustration. I realized very quickly that I was not the type to handle losing well apparently. It made sense. I had never lost a game, not once. I always achieved what I set my mind to, even having a sort of luck about myself that made me cocky and prideful. It drove my brothers crazy, but it was the one thing I did well. I was always the one who came through in the end by the skin of my teeth… and now…
Who the fuck did she think she was to cheat me? Did she fucking use magic to win? Magic that we’d both promised not to use! I was about to start planning her death for being a dirty little liar, but then I started to go over the whole game in my head, trying to figure out where she’d cheated, and I realized that not once did she use magic. I would’ve felt it, saw it with how focused I was on her. Then how did she cheat?
After going over and over the events in my head, I stopped watching her and started to look at the scene around me. I remembered the demon who was dealing had been oddly quiet the entire time. He’d also kept shifting his eyes towards her. I’d thought it was just him lusting after her, but now that I was using my head and not my overwhelming jealousy, I could see that those looks were something else entirely. More like he had been looking for confirmation. He was low enough in power for me not to really care about him, but he was a demon, and depending on what kind of demon he was, he could have used a low level of magic to change the card. It would have only taken a second, a blip that I would’ve realized if I had been paying attention to him, but I hadn’t. My whole focus had been fixed on the demoness and her trickster smile.
Why that sneaky little devil-ing!Before I got mad again, I thought about the words we’d spoken when we’d made the deal. She had promised that she wouldn’t use magic to win… But she had never said magic wouldn’t beusedfor her to win. She was a demon, after all, and making deals with sly wording was what they did best.
I barked out a harsh laugh, realizing that I had been duped for the first time in my existence by the only woman I knew who could handle my deadly kisses. Death lost for once. She’dcheatedDeath. That had to be a sign for something, right?
She was like nothing I had planned for. From the small snippets I’d gotten from my brothers, I just thought she was a fancy fling, someone who’d caught their eyes and could handle their oddities, but it was so much more than that. She could handle all of our powers. She could giggle with Con, fight with War, strategize with Fame, and deal in risks with me. That woman had wrangled the Four Horsemen around her little finger, and I bet she still didn't know it.
The way she took to our power, my power, was something I had never felt before. I remember the feeling of her sucking it down, moaning at the taste. I wondered what Death tasted like to her. She’d made it seem like it was the last chocolate bar on the shelf, but from what I’d gathered from others who’d had to endure my taste, it was chalky and coarse. The surprising part also was how my power had conceded to her, like it had its own mind, calling to her, begging her to take more, and, oh fuck, had she met that call. She’d met it and drank me down while licking her lips, enjoying everything about it.
I hated to admit it, but when the demons I had used before took my power, they made it seem like a chore and not to their liking. My visits to them became few and far between, only going when I felt like I was about to explode. Even then, I had to make sure that I kept a tight grip on it, so I didn't overload them, sparing them from having to endure me for too long. With Lillian, it was different with just one kiss. That one kiss had made me feel wanted, desired, and appreciated. I didn’t know how I felt about that.
When I killed Jenny the night I kissed her, I was devastated. I’d lost the woman that I cared about and learned something new about my power. That night, after I told my brothers, they'd taken me to a succubus brothel and had me kiss one of them, trying to prove that it was just because Jenny was a human. But the same thing had happened. As soon as my lips met hers, she yelped in pain and fell to the ground, eyes wide open and blank. Her demon form crumbled to ash before our eyes.
That night had changed me in ways that I could never have predicted. I was a monster. So I kept my distance, made sure I stayed alone and kept others safe from me. I only took what I needed when I absolutely had to.
And then Lillian kissed me.
She kissed me and lived. She swatted the power of death away like she was a kitten playing with a toy, telling it not to get in the way of her yummy meal.
I heard a familiar popping sound, and Lucifer was suddenly lying next to me. His voice came out like a child who was trying to bug a parent. “Whatcha doooing?”
I didn't answer him at first, annoyed that he was encroaching on my reflection time and thoughts about his daughter.That was weird, right?All four of us lusting after the daughter he’d sent us to get.
He settled in closer to me, wiggling his shoulders as he laughed and pointed to the red sky with clouds all around. “Over there, you can see the devil's dick, and if you squint your eyes over this way, you can make out a set of balls that are pure perfection.”
That was it. I wasnotlooking at Lucifer's cloud dick, especially when I was after his daughter.
I scrambled up, keeping my head down to make sure I didn’t get a glance of his fucked-up artwork of his fucking dick and balls. I’ll admit, it was fitting, though, to be in Hell and when you looked into the sky, you saw the devil’s sick joke. No one said he wasn't inventive.
Now that I was in front of him, I felt a question burning in the back of my mind, a question that after I’d met Lillian, I knew I wanted the answer too. I was trying to figure out how to broach the subject when it suddenly burst from my lips.
“Why do you want her here? What do you have to gain by bringing her here when she obviously doesn't want to?”
Lucifer's usually joyful and expressive face shut down. His eyes went dark, and he slowly rose to his feet, a visual cloud of menace and violence surrounding him.
“That’s none of your business, boy. Let’s go!”
He turned around, starting to walk in the direction of the fake burning sun with tense, angry shoulders. I ran after him, growing more curious the more he didn't want to tell me.
“Did you guys fight? What would make her want to abandon being a princess? What would make her want to leave her father?” I'll admit, the last one was a dig I intended to anger him into talking to me. To help me understand why we were doing all of this. That was my mistake.
I got my wish when he turned around, and his power exploded out of him with so much force that I was blown back, falling on my ass. He strode up to me, his whole body encased in flames and darkness. Shadow wings expanded from his back, making him larger than life, and his body grew threefold. The only thing recognizable from the Lucifer I knew were his eyes. He glared at me with black-and-red-ringed eyes like I was a thorn in his side.
His voice boomed out, the echoes of it hitting the Hell rocks and bouncing back, making the ground quake. “Do you think you have any power here, Death?”
I fought hard not to tremble at his words, feeling the power underneath them.
