Chapter 14 Lucifer
Lucifer
Lucifer turned in a slow circle, but the foyer remained both silent and empty, with no sign of Galilee. The front door hung
open, which was a rather obvious sign, but he widened his perception beyond the mortal senses anyway, just in case. She hadn’t
returned to his room upstairs, and indeed, her scent led him out of the house and into the grounds beyond, where it tangled
with other threads, curious in their difference but clearly familiar to her.
It seemed that her family had arrived sooner than he’d expected, which was mildly impressive. Someone among the Kincaids was
very good at tracking. It was a detail worth noting. Tracking entities from Hell was a deeply specific skill set, and if things
went well, perhaps he could do business with the Kincaids down the line. It was an optimistic and possibly delusional view
on the future, but Galilee felt like a beginning, and Lucifer was choosing to hold on to that, rather than the ends his princes
were painting for them. Somehow, he would find a way to fix the hellgate, once the angel behind its impairment was identified
and dealt with, and he would keep Galilee safe.
No matter what the others thought, there was no need to bring in Heaven.
The rage that filled Lucifer was eternal, bitter, and cloying, and it was all Heaven’s fault.
Humans told many lies about him, using him as a foil for their own wickedness, painting lurid pictures of his Fall, but truth be told, Lucifer was just a manager, and he still worked for God.
Stripped of his glory, steeped in quiet smoke and retired sulfur, he had one job and that was Hell itself.
Should the hellgate break, Heaven would in fact have grounds to mete out a judgment upon him.
They had probably been waiting eons for an opportunity like this.
Lucifer left through the front door and followed Galilee’s trail down to the gardens. Archways of blooming jasmine and honeysuckle
trailed above and around him, their tired blossoms carpeting the ground underfoot. Levi’s words kept playing in his head like
a haunting. The girl is a distraction. There was too much truth there because she was, she certainly was, and the extent of it bothered Lucifer. Galilee had smelled
dangerous since the moment he met her. It had always felt like she didn’t know the full breadth of it, but despite her lack
of interest in the hellgate, the timing was still too much of a coincidence to brush off. Something felt coordinated, but
he was missing a piece and so the final picture kept dancing out of focus. At least with Galilee, he could seek some truth
from the Kincaids, who had conveniently brought themselves into play, but this was all larger than the Kincaids, larger than
Galilee herself.
The breach in the hellgate had happened while Galilee was screaming his name in his arms, her soft body writhing in his bed.
Leaving even a glimmer of residue at the scene was either sloppy or the mark of someone confident that they’d get away with
their plan. Had they known Lucifer would be distracted, drowning in Galilee’s thighs while his hellgate was being compromised?
Everyone seemed to think that his attraction to Galilee made him less of a threat. Lucifer would’ve brushed it off because
he was who he was, but as the dusk approached, Levi’s words still danced around him. They sang like a bloodred warning, words
spilled over a strategy table as a quiet battle raged.
The girl is a distraction.
Lucifer cursed into the fading light as an uncomfortable possibility sidled up his spine and sank its talons into his mind.
What if Galilee was simply a trap? His lover was a weapon, that much was clear, but her innocence spoke only for her motives.
She didn’t even know what she was, and she seemed to have been conditioned away from finding out. A weapon was just
that—a weapon, and it could be wielded by someone else. Galilee didn’t have to know she was being used for it to be effective.
The thought clawed painful grooves into Lucifer, but it wouldn’t let go. Galilee was too perfectly crafted for him and even
against him. As temptation, she had been incredibly effective—Lucifer had followed her like an animal incapable of any thought
beyond lust from the moment she’d entered his path. If she had been meant as a lure, the implications were too many to untangle
in that moment, not when he still needed answers as simple as what she was, but Lucifer’s heart sank to even consider what it would mean. Not for him, but for her, to be used like that. He gritted
his teeth and stroked his form under his skin as comfort. If someone had played them both, he would hunt whoever it was to
the ends of the earth and make them suffer for tainting the sweetness of everything he’d shared with her.
Lucifer turned a corner in the garden, and there she was, the girl who burned him so perfectly, locked in a tight embrace with the two human friends they’d left frozen in her apartment.
Several feet above her head, her swarm of bees flew in a churning halo.
A cluster of armed Kincaid women stood to the side, and all of them were watching Galilee except for a barefoot girl in white overalls with cowries swinging from her short plaits.
She was watching Lucifer’s approach, her lips slightly parted and her eyes glinting.
Galilee’s grandmother stood next to her, silver hair tight to her scalp in cornrows, gaze fixed on her prodigal grandchild.
A few of the Kincaid women flanked the rest, guarding them from the forest they must have walked out of.
When one saw Lucifer, her arms were already lifting as her eyes widened, bringing up her crossbow.
She took her shot without raising an alarm, and the woman in overalls took one step to her left, reached out her hand, and caught the bolt from the crossbow in midair.
Blood dripped out from her hand, and the grandmother whipped her head around, her nostrils flaring.
“Celestial!” she cried, but then she caught sight of Lucifer, and all the color drained from her face.
Lucifer sighed and stopped walking, holding his palms up. “There’s nothing to be afraid of,” he said. “I mean you no harm.”
All the Kincaids looked in his direction and immediately raised their weapons, taking aim.
It was of no consequence. Instead, he wondered why Celestial had shed her own blood to stop the bolt from hitting him. It
was a debt now, a small one, but a smart move if her goal had been to protect herself.
Galilee peeked out from her friends’ hold. “Luci?” She sounded so anxious, and her eyes darted between him and her family,
like she was still worried he would hurt them.
Lucifer smiled at her, leaving his hands up, even though his palms burned for the want of laying them on her skin. “Galilee.”
Her friends stepped back to give her space, and Oriak? glared at him while wrapping Bonbon in her arms. “I should have shot
you twice,” she hissed.
A woman in a white linen dress hovered just behind Galilee’s shoulder, a shotgun balanced against her hip. She radiated a
motherly hostility that was echoed to various degrees by all the other Kincaids, and Lucifer made a note to ask Galilee what
happened to the Kincaid men or what had happened to her father, if she had one. Celestial’s hand was being bandaged swiftly
by their grandmother, who was watching Lucifer out of the corner of her eye.
Galilee’s mother stepped forward, the skirt of her dress fluttering around her knees. “I’m Collette,” she said, far more politely
than the look in her eyes. “We’ve come to take Galilee home, so don’t even think about getting in our way. You’ve done her
enough harm.”
“Ma, stop it,” Galilee said. “I told you I’m fine. He didn’t do anything to me.”
Lucifer would have begged to differ, but he was holding his tongue and examining the boiling resistance he’d felt at the idea
of anyone taking Galilee away from him. What was this connection the two of them had? Why did it feel so necessary?
Collette’s face clouded with sorrow. “Baby, don’t you see? We already knew you’d say that now that he’s gripped your mind.”
Lucifer saw anger flash through Gali’s eyes, her jaw tensing before she swallowed it down and turned to her grandmother. “Nana
Darling, you have to listen to me. There’s nothing wrong. Please go home.”
Her grandmother’s mouth thinned as she looked between Galilee and Lucifer. “Child, the wind already carried stories we know
to be true. Leaving you with him is completely out of the question.”
Galilee cast a betrayed look in Celestial’s direction, and her cousin shrugged apologetically. Lucifer watched the lines of
tension swirling among the family, as Oriak? and Bonbon held each other on the periphery, and he waited silently as Galilee
confronted her kin. This was his fault for being careless. He should have shielded her when he brought her to the house, instead
of letting what they’d shared together be reduced to gossip on the wind.
“The stories are none of your business,” Galilee bit out. Something new had entered her voice, a sharp buzzing texture to
the rage he could sense unfurling inside her. The swarm above her became agitated, thousands of wings vibrating through the
air. As Galilee spoke, her words began to singe some of the leaves of the hedges and willows around them. The Kincaids didn’t
notice the thin blackened edges, but Lucifer did. He kept his shoulders relaxed, his stance casual. This was between Galilee
and her family until it wasn’t. He’d get the truth of what she was eventually from them, because he had to, but if Galilee
could manage the current situation, he wasn’t going to get in her way by opening his mouth.
Her grandmother tried to soften her tone. “We know you couldn’t offer consent freely, child. You don’t need to protect him. Step aside, Galilee.”