even while knowing it was the greatest kindness I could give her now. Possibly the only kindness.
“Vyra.” She looked up at me, her eyes empty. “Do I ever sleep?”
Vyra shook her head silently.
I cursed under my breath. I would’ve slipped her a knife, told her to cut my throat while I slept.
“I know what you’re thinking, Lucifer.” She leaned her head back against the stone wall of the cavern. “I don’t know if I could do it.”
“You could. If your life depended on it.”
Not only her life, but mine. My freedom. I’d rather be dead than serving my Father like this, and yet… it was impossible to do the deed myself. Not while I held onto some small thread of hope that Melisande was out there.
It was entirely selfish, I knew. Selfish of me for wanting to stay alive for her when I was nothing but a danger to them all. I’d almost killed her once, and I couldn’t bring myself to do the honorable thing.
“We’ll get through this,” she said quietly.
I laughed bitterly. Just do it now, Lucifer. End it before she actually has a reason to beg for a quick death.
I was still laughing when she drew in a sharp breath. “Lucifer…”
There was no need for her to tell me what the problem was. I already felt it.
It started as a prickling on my skin, like thousands of tiny needles driving into my flesh over and over. My dark tattoos were beginning to lighten, the black giving way to scarlet.
Satan was awakening, and his mind was clamping down on mine.
“Do what you have to,” I hissed at Vyra, and got to my feet, striding quickly from the cavern. The farther I was from her when I lost myself again, the better.
The pain was growing, driving from my limbs and into my chest, a vise-like pressure squeezing around me and stopping my heart.
The Dragon stirred in the chasm. Enormous scales flaked away, peeled from his skin by the sharp rocks of the mountainside.
I had minutes. Maybe seconds. For a brief, desperate moment, I reached out to Melisande through the bond, hoping she was there.
There was a brief spark of light on the other end, and then the pain ate everything, washing away all trace of my mate.
“Did you bring it for me?” My father’s voice was like thunder, echoing into the sky.
I nudged the corpse with the toe of my boot. “Here.”
One of the Dragon’s heads rose above the abyss. It blinked at the body, and sneered at me, baring sharp fangs. “It is imperfect.”
“It’s the best you’ll get for now.” I drew a breath into tight lungs, barely able to stay upright, clinging to the last vestige of myself with everything I had.
“Then release me from this shell.”
Satan reared up, sending boulders crumbling down into the chasm. I picked up my spear from where it leaned against a rock and spread my wings.
The flight was agonizing, ripping through every feather and pore. I hefted the spearpoint and plunged downwards, ripping a gash through the Dragon’s chest that would’ve killed any other demon, but on him… it was barely a pinprick.
I returned to the outcropping, lowering my spear and waiting, sweat springing up on my forehead as the soul-bond pulsed inside me.
One by one, the Dragon’s writhing heads dropped, the snake-like necks going limp. Rocks squealed against each other as the reptilian corpse went slack and began to sink into the chasm. I stepped to the edge and looked over.
The wound in his chest was leaking. Gouts of blood sprayed over his scales, but the flow was eventually stemmed by something thicker.
The darkness that oozed from the wound was thick as tar. It moved like liquid at first, dripping down his pale chest, but then it moved.
A hand formed from the darkness, reaching up to grip the scales of the corpse. It was followed by a featureless head, a second hand… Satan’s essence, abandoning his body like so much trash.
It crawled upwards, over scales and through his blood, and found the chasm wall.
I stepped back as the thing scaled to the top, dragging its oozing body behind itself. Tarry fingers dragged it through the ashes, leaving a broad clear swathe behind it as he sniffed out his new body.
As he passed, he glanced at me, showing only faint impressions of eye sockets in that face. The soul-bond squeezed me tighter, growing hot as coals.
The essence climbed over the demon’s corpse, blindly peering at it, and began to pour into