Perhaps what will come tonight is a kind of justice after all.
I land in the middle of a regal campus.Stately, and composed of a plethora of sandstone brickwork and ivy that clings to the walls like clothing.One enormous tower stands in the middle of the campus.It pierces the night sky and lances the heavens.
Finis.
As I stare at the peak of the tower high in the sky, my mouth pinches at the thought of the Celestial City and a home I’ll never see again.
My body aches for it.Yearns for the comfort of a familiarity I’ll never have again.For weather-worn paths that I could walk in my dreams.
All of it stolen.
Like Gellara.
I will spend eternity pining for a touch that will never warm me again.How cruel that I should have known it at all.There are moments where I wish we’d never met.That it is a fate crueller than death to have known her softness.To have learnt of her dreams of a better world for mortals.To have witnessed the way delight made her eyes sparkle and felt the press of her lips to my skin.Even now, it seems hard to grasp onto those memories, as if her death is making them fade too.
Tonight I ache in places I cannot reach.But it is thanks to Gellara that I have a plan.
I’m going to give a demon everything he could want… at least for now.
I push open the doors to Ignatius’s office.It’s quiet, he works by a dim gas-lit lamp and has his head buried in contract scrolls.
“Ignatius Corvine?”I ask.
He raises his head, brows furrowed.He can’t have heard me come in.
“Can I h—” He stops mid-sentence, his expression widening as he realises who I am.“Architecti?”
“How would you like to become the archdevil?”I ask.
He puts his quill down.Folds his arms and stares at me.“I don’t believe Arcadius is planning to step down anytime soon.I respect his reign.”
“Oh please, an ambitious demon like you?Wouldn’t you like to be a devil at least?You’re still a demon, are you not?”
His neck goes taut, veins standing out as he tries to suppress his emotions.He tilts his head at me, moves the quill and scroll around the desk and clears his throat.
“Why are you really here?Tell me why I shouldn’t call security and have you arrested.You decimated an area the size of a large town and killed hundreds of mortals this week.By rights you should be tried, imprisoned, and executed.”
His lip curls at the notion of execution.Vicious demon.I meander around his room; he has many trinkets and treasures on the shelves.His office is very much that of a studious professor.His accolades fill the wall behind his desk.Leather tomes on all the shelves and contract scrolls are scattered across every available surface.
“By rights, certainly.But then how will that benefit you?I’m offering you a gift…”
He raises a single eyebrow at me.
“A deal, you mean?”
“I prefer covenant…”
“I’m listening.”
“Let me tell you the story of the angel and the demon who made a promise… the demon imprisoned the angel and saved the city and lived forevermore as the hero… He was praised with gratitude and made a devil and then finally, the archdevil…”
His mouth twitches.
“And the price?”
I smile.There’s always a price and I fear he won’t like this one.
“Twofold.”
