Love is Always Write Anthology Volume 5

demonic tattoo, the mark of Lucifer's lordship, was gone from his skin. His binding chain had also disappeared from around Emiel's wings.
    "Now the blade," Lucifer said. Renat reached for the dimension where he kept his sword, surprised at how hard it was to reach it. He managed with some effort, though, and after a moment of hesitation handed the weapon over. Now they were completely vulnerable to the King of Hell.
    Lucifer turned the sword over in his grasp, looking at it pensively. "It still carries a piece of your original grace. How long has it existed, Beauty?"
    "Almost as long as I have been in Hell," Renat replied.
    "Which is nearly as long as I have. Your constancy could shame me, if I let it. No wonder my princes have hated you so." He turned a thin smile on the two of them. "They throng outside of this castle even now, Beauty, baying for your blood and the blood of your angel."
    "Please…" Renat breathed. It was the first time he had uttered that word since his fall.
    "I won't give you over to them." Lucifer said it with easy honesty. "They could never deserve you. But it is time for you both to leave." He glanced at Emiel. "You know the way?"
    "Yes."
    "Good. This place…" Lucifer glanced around, then focused on the kneeling statue. "I think I'll keep it for myself. It will serve as a reminder to me that even Hell can evolve." He lifted his hand toward the two of them. Emiel immediately wrapped his arms around Renat, holding onto him tightly. His wings quivered with tension.
    The last thing Renat saw before the Devil's dark energy engulfed them was Lucifer staring into the eyes of a new statue, this one tall and straight and proud.
    ****
    I am not a human being; I am a human becoming.
    ~ Author Unknown
    CHAPTER iii
    The first thing he noticed through the rising wave of consciousness was the surface beneath his body. It was soft, not ethereal like a form of energy but real. Solid. It cradled Renat's body, which felt similarly solid. He frowned in his growing wakefulness and opened his eyes. They felt gritty, and as he began to move an inadvertent groan forced its way past his lips. His entire body ached, felt sore in a way he had never experienced before. It wasn't a torturous pain, it wasn't even sharp but it inhabited him completely, made him feel as though doing more than rolling over from his stomach to his back was impossible. Renat stared up at the ceiling and…
    Ceiling. He was staring at a ceiling. Not a grand vaulted height that soared above him but a simple, off-white ceiling. There was a rotating fan attached to it, with a dangling cord. Renat only knew what a rotating fan was because some of the souls he had tormented over the years had hung themselves with those cords. He put the flats of his hands down on the soft, springy surface he lay upon and pushed himself upright. Doing so made his head spin, and he cupped his forehead in his palm and squeezed his eyes shut for a long moment. The slight pain and feeling of dizziness receded, and finally he opened his eyes and looked around.
    Renat was sitting on a large bed in a simple, elegantly furnished room. Light filtered in through a tall picture window, and the air was cool. As soon as he recognized it his skin prickled with goosebumps, prompting a shiver, but Renat ignored the minor discomfort in favor of standing slowly to his feet. He wobbled for a moment, and had to extend his arms to keep his balance. Once he had it he wandered through the door into a hallway.
    The floor was polished hardwood, smooth beneath his feet. Renat trailed one hand along the wall as he walked, noting every slight curve and bump his fingertips encountered. Thoughts were pounding in his head, a million anxious things that cried out for consideration, but he couldn't focus on them yet; something was pulling him forward.
    Renat kept going until he reached a wall of glass. Outside there was mist and the slick shine of water on wood, and an instant later Renat knew he had to be out there in it. He tried to simply step through the wall, something that should have been easy for him, but it was unyielding against the smooth skin of his palms. He closed his eyes and summoned his power, but there was…not nothing , exactly. Not necessarily a void, but an absence inside of him. Instead of the pain of a gaping hole, however, Renat felt as though something else had been put into the space where first his grace, then his hellfire had lived. Whatever it was, it had none of the