1. Mammon
ONE
MAMMON
TWENTY-TWO YEARS LATER
I don’t live for chaos.
Unlike my brothers, who thrive on uncertainty and their own impulses, I prefer everything to be neat and orderly. If chaos just happens to be a byproduct of my doings, so be it. In disorder, I find control. Control over those who have lost their senses, control over the situation, and control over myself.
I smile as I walk down the burning streets of Juniper Ridge, watching as everything is set in flames. Shops, houses, schools. It’s all covered in a layer of fire that’s smoke blocks the sun. People scream, running from cult members who come after them with metaphorical pitch forks. It’s Hell on Earth for the citizens who thought they had picked the perfect little sleepy island to settle in.
But it’s music to my fucking ears.
This has been a long time coming for me. I planned, and I planned, and the day is finally here. All those years I was forced to listen to a withered old man spouting nothing but bullshit, I was biding my time. I was waiting for the right moment—the only moment—to seize the power that was always meant to be mine.
I knew when the time came, my brothers would choose each other over our false master. I didn’t spend the better twenty years of my life raising them, nurturing them, and earning their loyalty for nothing. But I knew I couldn’t just come out and suggest they rebel against their “creator.” So, when Aiden Walker—Lucifer—came into Leviathan’s life, it was like the perfect circumstance was dropped into my lap. Leviathan was obsessed. I had no doubt he’d choose pathetic love over the rules he was raised to live by. And I knew that when one domino fell, the rest would too.
Not every cult member immediately bowed down when I killed the false master earlier this week. Some tried to kill me, thinking they could get revenge for their fallen leader, but that was quickly snuffed out. Some figured out the new law of the land and submitted easily, going along with whatever I instructed them to do. Shit, there are a few who even felt free from their constraints, who are currently enjoying the massacre, along with my brothers.
Looking up at the burning sky, I see the faint outline of two people fucking on the roof of a building. I snort, rolling my eyes as Luc’s slutty moans and Leviathan’s deep grunts echo down to my ears. Sick fucks are getting off on this but, in all fairness, so are the others.
I glance over just in time to see Asmodeus slinking against the walls like a serpent, tracking his prey with his ax held high over his head, laughing maniacally and chasing the woman when she turns around and screams. Gore and Bel aren’t any better. Those two terror twins are holding hands and humming under their breaths as they skip down the middle of the road, stopping every now and then to snarl and nip at passing frenzied citizens. They’re not biologically related, but you really would think they’re true siblings just based on how they complement each other’s crazy.
Everything is going according to plan. The new status quo has been made, the rules changed and altered to fit my specifications, and the future is wide open to me.
All those years ago when the false master came to take me away, I never could have dreamed this would happen. I thought, maybe, I’d find satisfaction in having a small group of children who followed my every word. At most, I’d be dictating how they lived their lives. In my wildest dreams, I never imagined I would be here: surrounded by my subjects, basking in their control, and ruling over a small little island in the middle of nowhere, Alaska. My own empire. My own kingdom.
Sometimes I think back to the day my life changed. It wasn’t when the false master took me, but when my sister died. That’s when I realized what I truly wanted out of life, what I needed, what all my compulsions were steering me to, even though I knew they were wrong.
Because, after that day, I vowed to never be powerless again.