Chapter Nineteen
Melinda Thymes
“When our powers return, we’ll try using an evil spirit like I said,” Sebastian explained, glancing around the room. His words had August and Maureen grinning like wolves ready to hunt.
Maureen nudged Jackal with her shoulder, smirking. “Think you and I could be a decent distraction for the Devil while they swoop in and steal Kitty?”
In a room full of warriors and schemers, Jackal looked at Maureen like she was the only one in existence. It was the kind of gaze that made you ache—like it had the power of a Cupid’s bow.
Before he could reply to his mate, Sebastian continued, “It can’t just be you two. It has to look like most of us are trying to break in. If he sees only a small group, he’ll know we’re up to something.”
I tried—to stay focused on the discussion, to keep my attention on the Reapers’ plan to rescue Kara. But my mind drifted. I couldn’t stop thinking about the Devil. His choices. His silence. His…restraint.
They wanted to believe this was a simple rescue. Break in. Get her. Escape. But Kara’s been entangled in something deeper for a long time now, far before the Devil dragged her to Hell.
I feared it wasn’t the Devil who doomed her.
It was fate.
And that fate had been circling her like vultures long before her capture.
If the Devil wanted to stop it, he would have acted by now.
And yet… I’d seen otherwise. Through my sights, I’d witnessed the years he tried—quietly, invisibly—to shield her.
I’d seen when he saved her from Harvest the first time she was stolen.
I saw when he intervened again, putting her to sleep to protect her the night Harvest descended on the Reapers to start the beginning of the end.
I remembered the blood in the streets of the City of the Dead.
It had rained when Kara was wounded during the human festival. And he was there. Again. Always.
The Devil might be cruel. Dangerous. Unrelenting.
But he had interfered.
Time and time again.
Despite everything, he was letting her fade now. Watching her vanish like her father had.
Why?
Why protect her all those years only to let her fade soon?
Unless… something changed.
And it wasn’t fate.
No, it didn’t make sense—and yet, it might happen.
I had placed an impossible weight on the young Reaper’s shoulders. Everything the Devil wanted was right there—within his grasp. Kara wasn’t a cherished soul to him, not a chosen one. She was a fleeting curiosity. A momentary distraction. Or, more truthfully, an eyesore he was growing tired of.
And that…made my chest ache in a way I hadn’t felt since I left Heaven.
I gave up everything—my home, my light—I questioned if it made any difference.
Did I do anything meaningful for the Reapers?
I wanted to believe I helped them. But when I looked deeper, all I saw was that I had only steered them toward their marked mates.
And now that they faded…they’d carry more loss. More grief.
Because of me.
Because I interfered.
From the moment I came into being, I could see differently than the others.
I always thought that made me special. Chosen.
That was my gift, wasn’t it? To see through the veil, to peer into the scrying glass and understand what others couldn’t.
But now I wondered if I had misunderstood the purpose of that gift.
Maybe I wasn’t meant to intervene. Maybe that was the test all along—one I kept failing.
To observe. Not to act.
My throat tightened as I turned slightly, eyes burning. I rubbed the wetness forming beneath my lashes and tried to breathe through the knot in my chest.
But the surrounding air shifted—warmer, softer, almost…reverent. I no longer heard the Reapers’ voices.
I turned back, and the room was empty.
They were gone.
And in its place…was gold.
Gold everywhere. Spun into the air itself, wrapped around my skin, glowing in the atmosphere like threads of light.
I gasped and brought my hands to my arms, rubbing them in awe.
I was home.
Heaven.
And somehow, the thought of being back brought more heartache than peace.
I blinked, and the scrying glass stood before me once more. Lucifer hovered near it, just like he had all those years ago—before his fall. Before everything broke.
A horrible weight settled in my chest. I remembered this day. I remembered the foreboding. The strange, heavy chill that had made me clutch my chest and brace myself.
Back then, I thought the feeling came from the humans.
I was wrong.
The unease hadn’t come from them at all.
It had come from here. From us. From him.
I’d missed the warning. I hadn’t seen the danger until it had already burrowed into Heaven like rot under gilded skin.
Even now, seeing Lucifer as he once was…I didn’t understand.
He didn’t look like a monster. None of us did.
We were all so full of light and curiosity, transfixed by the world God had created.
The humans had enchanted every angel. So what drove Lucifer to inject sin into that perfect world?
To awaken every sickness, pain, and wicked thing? Why desecrate something so innocent?
It wasn’t long after this moment that he tried to bring those same wicked ideas back here—to our home. And that’s when the war began. When he was cast out.
I would never understand Lucifer.
I loved Heaven. I still did.
And I would rather spend eternity watching flawed humans struggle to love than live in this place, pretending I understood it.
But just as I reached that thought, my brother’s voice shattered the stillness.
“No, no, no!” he shouted, lunging toward the well. His fingers swiped through the liquid gold like he could catch something before it was gone.
“Come back.”
His cry cracked with desperation.
And for the first time, I realized…
Maybe Lucifer never meant to fall.
Maybe he was just trying to reach for something he was never meant to touch.
I froze.
The desperation in Lucifer’s tall, trembling form shocked me. That wasn’t how we watched the humans—not with that kind of desperation. This wasn’t curiosity. It was obsession. Hunger.
But for what?
I thought he was watching the humans again. But the way he clung to the edge of the well, the way his chest heaved, said otherwise. My breath hitched when he dropped to his knees—then gasped when he began pleasuring himself.
No…
How did he know such a thing?
Angels didn’t feel pleasure. Not before Eve took the bite. Not after. Not ever. That was the point—our existence was built around peace, stillness, purpose. Lust had no place among us, not in Heaven. Even humans had to surrender their desires to reach the gates.
So how?
How did Lucifer know what no other angel ever dared to imagine?
Maybe it made sense. Maybe it was always going to be him. The first to fall. The first to crave. The first to lose himself to something other than devotion.
Maybe he saw something in that well—something no one else was meant to.
I took a step closer, drawn to the answer he’d seen in the gold.
But before I could peer inside, a voice I hadn’t heard in what felt like lifetimes wrapped around me like cold iron.
“You should have stayed where I couldn’t reach you.”
Harvest.
His voice slithered through the air like rot.
I spun around—and Heaven shattered.
The golden light was gone.
And the sickening crunch that followed made my soul cry out.
Blonde hair.
Soaked in blood.
Kara.
The ends of her hair dripped crimson, her shirt clinging to her body. A sword pierced through her chest, glinting with fresh blood as Harvest held her up like a prize on display.
“Hey!” August’s voice ripped through the illusion.
I blinked hard, and the stone walls of Grim’s castle reassembled around me.
Reality.
The Reapers.
They surrounded me again, concern on their faces, voices pressing in.
“Are you okay?” Sebastian asked, eyes narrowing.
I looked down.
I was clutching my dress near my chest like a lifeline.
Slowly, I forced myself to let go. My hands dropped to my sides.
Everything was going to go wrong.
The vision couldn’t be stopped. If I spoke it aloud, it might fracture into something worse. A new death. A darker end. Fate had to run its course, no matter how much it gutted me.
“Yeah,” I said, swallowing hard. “I’m fine.”
But I wasn’t.
I would never see Heaven again. That home was gone to me forever. I had made my choice, and this was the cost.
I took a deep breath. I knew what I had to do.
Meeting Sebastian’s eyes, I said calmly, clearly, “It’ll just be you going to retrieve Kitty…and me.”