40. Sydney
Oh, motherfucking shit balls. The hot flashes were back and worse than ever. The brain fog was brain fogging, and I didn’t know where I was or how I got here. I was in a bed and appeared to have all my limbs. We had been at Lilith’s chateau trying to get my father.
Did I get my ass kicked? How embarrassing. Kujo was never going to let me live that down. I could hear people talking, but they weren’t arguing. I cracked my eyes open, and I had three demonic mother hens hovering over me.
“Is she okay?” a man demanded.
“She’s perfectly fine. The same thing happened to Kir the first time he called his Hellfire.
You aren’t okay. I can’t feed you until the potion does its thing, and I had to get it in you with an IV because you are terrible at taking medicine.
If you pull your IV out, I’m giving you crotch rot again,” Lilith said.
I looked over and yeah, we rescued Lucifer. I remembered most of it. The cage, Lilith saying the spells on it were so complex, only the person who wove them could remove them, and this weird feeling in my gut that I could just burn them away if I touched them.
I got a nice zap when I grabbed the bars, but it didn’t last long and the bars just crumbled.
“Feels like the hot flashes are back, but you’re way worse off than I am, dude, and I think she’s serious about the crotch rot.”
“Oh, she is. She’s done it before. That’s the Hellfire. It’s how you destroyed the cage. The majority of the spells on that cage were specific to me, so I couldn’t use my Hellfire to break out. I’m guessing they thought the spells would work on you too, since we share blood.”
“Except we found your diaries when we were trying to find you and I share blood with another angel too. And I’m sorry for reading your journals. I felt weird the whole time because if I knew how to give you crotch rot, I would if you read mine.”
“I can teach you.”
Nero adjusted his cock.
“What did my crotch ever do to you?” he mumbled.
“No, I’m glad you did. I would have preferred having never been kidnapped and had you and your mom here this whole time. I could have just told you about your brother and my thoughts about who murdered him.”
“Did you figure it out? Because I’m pretty sure that’s who kidnapped you and gave my mother cancer.”
“I didn’t know about your mom, but I don’t think it’s the same person who hurt Kir.
I never mentioned your mother to anyone in Hell.
I never said anything after I was kidnapped either.
If anyone found my diaries and went after her, they would have gone after you too.
Not just because you’re my spawn, but because it’s impossible to create someone like you in Hell with so few Fallen.
That would scare them. It wasn’t one of the Fallen who hurt your mother because if they had hurt her because of me, they would have hurt you too. ”
“That makes sense. We almost had you in the volcano, but someone found out about Kujo’s vision. Satan got drugged by someone hiding in your secret passages. We might be able to figure this out by you telling us who you allowed in there.”
“Not really. I originally gave all of them access. After Kir, I took it away. I gave it back when I cleared someone. Satan, Abaddon, and Mammon are the only Fallen with access to my passages, but they had ample opportunity to get rid of me. I was in a horrible place after Kir.
“I ruined my relationship with Lilith and if I wasn’t an angel, I’d be suffering lasting effects from all the alcohol I drank.
Satan, Mammon, and Abaddon took care of me when I couldn’t care for myself.
It was a dark time for me, but they helped drag me out of that hole.
I fought them every step of the way and I wasn’t nice about it sometimes.
Why would they help me at my lowest and most dickish and kidnap me when I was doing so much better? ”
Yeah, because that didn’t make sense to me either, but someone knew all our moves as we made them and I didn’t think it was possible to get the jump on Satan unless someone was hiding in a passage. Unless Satan was never drugged and it was just an excuse to be gone while the Furies came for Kujo.
But that didn’t make sense because even if Satan hated my father, he still loved his kids. That much was clear to me. And I knew now that Furies had been created to take angels out if they invaded Hell. That many Furies could have forced through Wrathhog’s mental shields and hurt her.
“So, I know I just got here and don’t know shit, but Satan and Abaddon have been welcoming and have helped me, but Mammon is a judgmental cunt and my money is on him.”
“I know he can come off that way, but he’s not completely awful. Back home, there were different choirs, but you had the same job as your choir and that was who you spent all your time with. Mammon was one of three Cherubim who joined the rebellion and he’s the only one who survived.
“The other Cherubim didn’t fight the rest of us much, but they really wanted their brothers who joined us dead.
They murdered the other two Cherubim and beat Mammon within an inch of his life.
I was the one who saved him. Satan and I are both archangels.
Belphegor, Beelzebub, and Asmodeus are from the same choir.
Mammon has no other Cherubim here and choirs have always been this tribal thing.
“I know he was probably a jerk to you, but the team of Cherubim that nearly killed him and murdered his brothers in front of him were female and they were ruthless. I’m not making excuses for him and I’ll say something to him, but that’s why he acts weird around women.”
“Dude, your brother didn’t act like he got the beat down by some women who thought he betrayed them. Something tells me there’s not a lot of fucking in Heaven and he’s acting like a virgin who can’t drive.”
Lucifer’s face screwed up.
“I kind of understand that, but really don’t.”
Oh, yeah. He basically missed my entire life and a lot of pop culture. He was going to have to park his butt in front of all seven seasons of The Golden Girls if he ever hoped to understand a word out of my mouth. There was also a whole host of movies I was going to have to show him.
Hey, look at me, planning movie dates with my long-lost father, the actual devil.
“He’s a prude, and he’s been slut shaming her over her clothes and choice of men,” Nero said.
Kujo poked Nero in the side. Yeah, Kujo, Nero, and Celix were with me when we rescued Lucifer, but as far as Lucifer knew, they were just my bodyguards.
My father didn’t even know what my favorite food was.
He probably shouldn’t learn I was really looking forwards to that foursome before he found out if you wanted to bribe me, lasagna usually worked.
And of course, Lucifer was half starved and about as clean as Lilith could get him with a sponge bath.
He couldn’t eat a proper meal or take an actual bath until Lilith’s potion did its thing.
But fuck me if he didn’t perk right up and put his dad face on when he found out I might have chosen a demon.
“Tell me more,” Lucifer said.
“Okay, so my job before I ended up here was writing romance books. I have a lot of shirts about smutty books that seem to pucker Mammon’s butthole.
Also, these three aren’t just my bodyguards.
They are mine. I don’t care that Nero and Celix are lower demons and I also don’t give a shit what anyone says that I’m with three of them. ”
“You done?” Lucifer asked. “Because I don’t give a shit about any of that either. They all feel like powerful demons. Do they make you happy?”
I didn’t hesitate.
“Yes.”
“Then keep them close. But first, we need to end this. Who knew you found me and were coming to get me?”
“Just the people in this room.”
“Good. Keep it that way. The cage and the lack of food weakened me. I’m an archangel and I heal fast. If there’s one person who can augment celestial healing and get me in fighting shape faster, it’s Lilith.”
“So, I get why you kept your new lover and child a secret from your brothers, but you shouldn’t have hidden it from me. When your brothers came asking if I’d seen you, I wouldn’t have betrayed you, but I would have known you hadn’t disappeared in another spiral. I could have kept them safe.”
“I didn’t want you to think I was rubbing it in.”
“Sir, we’ve been broken up thousands of years. I’ve had loads more sex than you have.”
I snorted because I really liked Lilith. And yeah, if he told Lilith about Mom and me, Mom might still be alive and I’d be mostly prepared for all of this. But I didn’t blame Lucifer. He thought he was protecting us and he had no way of knowing any of this would happen.
“What do you need to get back on your feet?” I asked.