Lucifer met his stare, and his expression lit with a hope and fondness that sliced his heart anew. Michael swallowed hard and tore his gaze away. He couldn’t do this. His resolvewas going to break, and he would be disgraced alongside his lover by failing to uphold his vows to their King. To see him there, brought to his knees by soldiers they trusted and fought beside—soldiers that he had helped Lucifer to train—dug at the wounds deep within and salted them.
Raphael shifted closer, as if sensing the tension in the way Michael’s jaw tightened, or how his shoulders went stiff. The younger man rested his fingertips lightly against Michael’s spine, and it was a gentle reminder of how he was not alone. He would not be alone, even when Lucifer was not with him.
“Lus’ior of the Morning Star, Angel of Light, First of the Seraphim, Serpent of Old and Prince of the Air,” Jehovah stirred the room with his sonorous intonation, each invocation of Lucifer’s many titles bringing a wince to Michael’s face and pain to Luce’s eyes. “You are brought here today to face trial and be charged for the crimes you have wrought on Earth. You have defied my orders and the Divine Laws of Heaven, and you have tainted the fledgling mortals beyond reparation. How do you plead?”
His eyes blazing with controlled fury, Lucifer did not speak. Did not even open his lips in an attempt to defend his actions.
Jehovah frowned, eyes narrowing. “Speak, you insolent heretic, and let it be the truth.”
Lucifer lifted his chin and stared down the King. His rich voice rang out over the silent room, even roughened as it was by days without water or reprieve from torture. “Not guilty.”
A whisper of shock swept the room; a gasp pulled from Michael’s own mouth at the audacity.
“You were seen,” Michael spat, fury boiling in his chest as his grip tightened reflexively on the hilt of his sword. “There were witnesses to your treason, yet you can so easily spread lies in this room? Have some dignity in this moment and atone, Lus’ior.”
The room went deadly quiet. Raphael pressed more insistently on Michael’s back. He cut his eyes to the side to see Jehovah’s glower focused on him.
“Are you so eager to proceed, Mikha’ael, that you forget your place?” Unfathomable depths swirled in that cobalt glare, like turbulent oceans preparing to drown him. “Stay your blade and your tongue to follow, my warrior, or perhaps you will kneel beside the Deceiver.”
Lucifer cast an alarmed glance at Michael, who could not bear to meet his eye. He was already on unstable footing with his king. Of course, he had been the first suspected of conspiring with Lucifer’s treason; Michael would have made the same assumption himself. Even though he had obediently brought Lucifer before Jehovah, despite the open agony he had carried over what he had witnessed in the Garden...
After several long days of pledging his loyalty to Heaven, to Jehovah, and to upholding the Divine Laws, he had at last been declared free of corruption. But to prove that loyalty, he had been given a task that threatened to destroy him.
The very one which he waited even now to complete.
Michael tamped down his grief and anger. “I apologize again, my lord.”
Jehovah tipped his head slightly, the only acknowledgement he would likely bestow, and returned his focus to the accused. Lucifer still knelt in place, once again defiantly meeting the King’s gaze head on. It was as if he had no shame, no regret for what he had done. Michael’s stomach twisted with nausea. How could Luce,his Luce, have become so twisted and cold?
But there was no denying what had happened in the Garden. Summoned there by the accusations of Jophiel and the will of Jehovah, Michael had seen it with his own eyes. He still felt the hard stab of betrayal at the scene they had stumbled upon, unmistakable and horrible; still felt the sword blazing inhis hand as he rushed Lucifer in a wounded rage. He gripped that same sword now as he watched his former lover stare down their King, not a trace of remorse in Lucifer’s furious expression.
“Do you insist upon denying your crimes, Lus’ior?” Jehovah demanded. “Knowing you have broken the Laws, knowing there were multiple witnesses to your crime—you will deny your very nature and feign innocence?”
“I feign nothing.” He spat, and the Seraph to his right took a half step away from the phlegm that splattered the stone floor. “Shall I apologize every time a fool makes an incorrect assumption? I have never accepted the blame or glory of another, and I will not start today.”
“So, you spit in the face of your titles, as if they were bestowed on a whim? Gifts are earned. Has Michael not risen in ranks as he has proven himself?” Jehovah flicked his wrist toward the blond, his tone still calm and measured.
Lucifer’s searching gaze when Michael’s name was tossed out left him stripped to the core. As if Luce combed through him with each second that slipped by, weighing his soul and the contents of his heart. Despite better judgement, he hoped Luce could see love there. Love and regret and loss. Because Michael knew he would follow Jehovah’s next command. Hemustfollow it. It was the right thing to do, however difficult.
“As he will prove himself again today.”
The King of Heaven was ready to end this spectacle. Lucifer would not repent, and so he would be punished. And Michael would be the one to do it, even if he wasn’t under pressure to prove his loyalty to his King. For all the love in his heart, he could not forget what his eyes had seen in that Garden. What Lucifer had done was unforgiveable; the Laws had been put in place for a reason. And to see the once dignified man here,utterly unapologetic and making such heretical claims… it only solidified his guilt.
“Do not do this, brother.” Lucifer’s haunted face twisted in grief and streaked with salt trails, but his brown eyes gleamed with determination. “It will be your biggest regret. You will curse yourself for casting me out, and you will never have a moment’s peace from your conscience.”
“You threaten me, Lus’ior? Here, in my Kingdom, with my soldiers standing at your side. What could you do, in this moment?”
“Oh, Jeho,” Lucifer smirked bitterly. “You understand so little. You understandnothing.”
“Mikha’el,” Jehovah summoned with a commanding wave. “I have need of you once again, my loyal servant.”
Michael hesitated, the briefest indication of his doubt as his feet refused to move. First the King would strip Lucifer’s titles, and then... Raphael propelled him forward with a gentle shove, and the blond forced himself not to stare at the floor as he approached the center of the room.
“From this day forward, you are no longer the Prince of the Air or the Angel of Light,” Jehovah decreed.
Lucifer’s dark eyes tracked each agony-filled step with calm resolve. He knew what would come, and he was steeling himself just as Michael was.
“You are henceforth to be known as the Angel of the Bottomless Pit,” intoned the King. “You are Lus’ior the Fallen Star, Son of Perdition. All Seraphim shall regard you as adversary, and any who choose to break bread with you will find their own angelic rights forfeit. You are banished from the Kingdom of Heaven and shall never again walk here so long as your days may be.”
