The Devil's Daughter Page 7

  After all, irritating angels was one of my favorite past-times.

  At this point, I was just glad that it was me and not Eddie or any of the others down in Hell. As much as I put the Angel Hunters through and as much as I was burning through my numbers with the war (that I had no hope of stopping now), I couldn’t bear the idea of any of them having to go through this. I took in almost all of them from situations like this already - poor Nine was still struggling with the consequences of what happened with him and he was far from the only one. Those demons and fallen - even Lucifer and his brothers and the Council members - were as much my family as Eddie was. Sure, they were all a little prickly at times and sometimes I wanted to wring their necks and burn everything to the ground, but they were my family.

  Other than Eddie, they were the things that kept me going. If suffering the abuse from the CWN was what I had to do to keep them safe, then I would do it. No other questions asked.

  I wasn’t going to be that upset if no one came to rescue me. I was doubtful that was going to be the case considering it was Lucifer that we were talking about, but the truth was that I didn’t want them to come save me. That was going to be far too risky and, behind bars, there was nothing that I could do to help if something happened to one of them. I would never be able to forgive myself.

  I was sitting in my cell, humming to myself as I tried to ignore the amount of pain that I was in. The red stripes on my back were relentlessly throbbing, though. I could practically feel them all getting infected as I sat there, but I just tried to ignore it and focus on the song that I was humming.

  Lucifer used to make fun of me for the fact that I liked music so much, but I couldn’t help it. Even as a child, I loved music and there was this one song in particular that I always found comforting.

  When my father was angry at me and I had to lock myself in my room to protect myself from him (which happened more often than not), I would listen to that song and for whatever reason, it made me feel like everything was going to be okay.

  When I adopted Eddie, I renamed her from the stupid name that the angels gave her and named her after that song. It was no secret to anyone that Eddie reignited my purpose in life, so it felt fitting. The name stuck and there were just a few people that remembered Eddie’s old name - namely, me, Lucifer, and Roscoe.

  It was Seven (after the fact that she was the seventh “Defect” to ever be born) and - though I recognized I had a Hunter who preferred to be called Nine - it felt like just another way for the angels to dehumanize her. I refused to allow that to be what continued to happen to her when she started to live with me.

  I looked up as I heard footsteps approaching my cell, though I didn’t stop humming even after Brayden slammed his fists on the bars and yelled at me to stop. I probably hated Brayden the most out of all of the angels - possibly even more than Gavin and His archangels - and I didn’t intend to stop hating him any time soon.

  “Where is she?” Brayden demanded.

  I blinked at him, “Who?”

  “You know who.”

  I sat there in silence, not willing to respond to him when he couldn’t respond to me with respect. I did come to the realization, though, that this was probably one of the things that annoyed the angels the most about me. Well, then I really had a reason to keep going with this act, didn’t I? Ignoring these angels suddenly became a lot more fun.

  Brayden slammed against the bars again. “Hello? I’m talking to you!” He hissed.

  I folded my arms across my chest and leaned back against the wall, still choosing to ignore Brayden. Was that a good idea? Nope, not at all. But was I loving every second of it? Absolutely.

  What could I say? I was a demon - if there was one thing that was actually true about us, it was that most of us had a hard time resisting our temptations.

  I glanced up as the door to the cell opened and Brayden walked in, grabbing me and shoving me out of the cell.

  “What are you going to do now? Whip me again?” I taunted, “Did I hurt your feelings? I’m so sorry if I did.”

  Brayden slammed me into the wall before continuing to push me forward. “Shut up!” He hissed.

  “Don’t I deserve to know what’s going to happen to me?” I asked, “Even I tell my prisoners what I’m going to do before I do it and I’m forced to be a torturer. You and your companions do this for fun.”

  I could feel Brayden rolling his eyes. I wished that I could turn around and see it for myself, but he had such a tight grip on me that it took me everything that I had to move in the direction that he was making me move in.

  It wasn’t that long after that I felt a piece of cloth being tossed over my eyes and tied at the back of my head.

  “Just in case you get in bright ideas while we’re going to the Celestial Palace,” Brayden mused, “We don’t want you escaping, obviously.”

  “Celestial Palace?” I asked, “Why are we going there?”

  “Why do you think, Genius? You’re going to go see the king of kings. We’ve been told that he has a number of things that he wants to say to you and - luckily for you - he finally has enough time in his very busy schedule to do just that.”

  I was surprised to hear that - after all, I had my doubts that Gavin would ever let me talk to him considering who he usually was, but I didn’t care. This was my chance - and perhaps my only chance - to tell this man exactly how I felt. I felt Brayden shove his fist into the middle of my back to force me to keep walking.

  “Now, let’s go. Before I lose my patience.”

  ❀

  Celestial Palace

  BRAYDEN WAS “KIND” enough to remove my blindfold once we entered the Celestial Palace.

  The obnoxiously bright and white decor aside, the Celestial Palace was by no means a place to scoff at. The castle was as tall as it was wide and was certainly a sight to behold with its sculptures and paintings that decorated the place. On the ceiling of the throne room, there was a mural that Lucifer once told me about, though I had only seen it once before - when I was there to try to stop what I knew would still inevitably happen to Eddie all those years ago.

  It was a painting of all the “original” royal family of Heaven. God was in the center with Gavin and Lucifer on either side of him. The mural continued to go outward with the rest of God’s biological children. On Lucifer’s side were seven young boys - the “princes” of Heaven. On Gavin’s side were the seven archangels - Gabriel, Michael, Uriel, Raphael, Saraqael, Raguel, and Remiel.

  In total, God had sixteen sons and of those sixteen, eight remained in Heaven as humble servants to Him and His heir.

  The other eight? Well, almost everyone knew the story of Lucifer. However, they didn’t know that seven of his little brothers - the seven that he was the closest to and considered more like sons than brothers - weren’t too far behind him.

  I wasn’t fully aware of the entire story, but I did know that Lucifer was always a little angry about the fact that the seven younger princes followed him after his fall. I always thought, too, that there was a part of Lucifer that blamed himself for the fact that his brothers were how they were now.

  I stood in the middle of the throne room for a while, just staring up at the mural. I would’ve been fine never seeing the mural again - especially since the angels apparently had an obsession with painting their authorities without any clothes on and didn’t discriminate against ages either - but I couldn’t help the fact that I couldn’t stop looking at it. Especially Lucifer. Though I much preferred Lucifer now, even I had to admit that there was a reason Lucifer was known for his beauty when he was in Heaven.

  “Satan, look alive!” Gavin snapped.

  I jumped and turned to face Gavin who was sitting on his throne, already looking bored and uninterested. He sat there in silence for a few moments as He stared at me expectantly. I knew what He wanted me to do, but it wasn’t like I was about to do it.

  “Kneal,” Brayden hissed as he pushed down on my shoulders and kicked me in t
he back of the knee.

  I fell forward and hit the ground with a loud thud. I looked back at Brayden.

  “Man, everytime I think I couldn’t hate you any more than I do, you do something to prove me wrong,” I mused.

  “Likewise,” Brayden smirked darkly.

  Gavin rolled His eyes and got to His feet before walking over to me. He had his wings out as if He was trying to intimidate me.

  Spoiler alert: it wasn’t working.

  “Do you know why you’re here, Satan?” Gavin asked me, circling around me. He reminded me of a vulture, but fortunately (or unfortunately) for Him, He was ugly like one, too.

  Okay, I admit that was uncalled for, but I wasn’t too interested in being nice to Him for more reasons than just who He was. He was also calling me Satan and I hated being called Satan - not only because of the connotations with the name, but also because it wasn’t my name. Satan was my father. Not me.

  Gavin might have been comfortable being referred to by His father’s name, but that was going to be another thing that we would never feel the same way about.

  “I’m going to assume it’s to listen to you talk for several hours?” I asked, “All offense intended, Gav, but I would much rather be whipped again than listen to you.”

  “That can easily be arranged if you don’t shut your mouth,” Brayden warned.

  I rolled my eyes a little. I knew I was treading on thin ice now, but the fact was that I was having fun with this. Plus, I was (hopefully) distracting them from trying to go after Eddie or anyone else again. Perhaps the angels and I needed to practice this dance a little more often.

  “Leave it for now, Brayden,” Gavin hummed, “We can teach him a thing or two about respect later on, but for now, I have too many things that I want to talk to him about.”

  “Can we get this over with, then?” I groaned.

  I was serious. If they wanted to whip me instead of forcing me to listen to Gavin, I was more than happy to oblige if it meant that I didn’t have to listen to His voice.

  “Satan, what did you come here for?” Gavin asked me, “If you tell the truth, then perhaps we will let you go.”

  I looked up at Him and narrowed my eyes. That was a blatant lie, but that didn’t mean that I wasn’t willing to tell the truth anyway. So long as He didn’t think He was going to get away with talking to me like I was a child for very long.

  “I want to end the war,” I replied simply.

  Gavin hummed as He sat back down on His throne.

  “I figured that was what it was,” He mused, “Fortunately for you, Satan, you won’t be making the deal offerings today. I will and if you’re smart, you’ll accept it.”

  I looked at him blankly, “Somehow, I think I’d prefer to be making the deals here.”

  Gavin ignored my comment and continued with what was inevitably going to be an impossibly long and boring speech.

  “Satan, as you know, there are ways that things should be done. The sun should rise in the morning and set in the evening to pave the way for the moon. Likewise, angels, demons, and all of the other light and dark-blooded creatures have their specific places on this earth - that is how my father created it to be,” Gavin mused.

  “Yeah, your father never would’ve been able to get people to listen to him if it wasn’t for my father letting Him use him as a vessel for fear, but just going. You were on something about suns and moons or something equally as stupid and uninspired?” I interrupted.

  Gavin narrowed his eyes at me.

  “I advise that you tread lightly, Satan.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” I huffed, “By the way, my name isn’t Satan - oh wait, I forgot you’re not very into naming the people that you perceive as ‘wrong’.”

  Gavin and Brayden both clenched their jaws at my last comment. I smirked a little, but I chose not to say anything else - not at that moment, anyway.

  “Satan, you know that angels don’t belong with demons and likewise - it defeats the purpose of having anything in this world that is inherently good or inherently bad because then the lines are crossed. Either the angel is no longer inherently good or the demon is no longer inherently bad - now, we don’t want that, do we?” Gavin asked.

  “Oh, no. Of course not,” I replied dramatically, not able to stop myself from rolling my eyes.

  Last time I checked, none of the angels that I knew - except for maybe the ones that were no longer angels and the one that the angels never claimed except for when it benefited them - were good at all. Perhaps, though, that was just my general bias and my “inherent evil nature”, to use another one of Gavin’s favorite sayings.

  Gavin smiled warmly at me, “Good. I’m glad to see that you finally came around to that idea. Now, I know that you’re desperate to end this war - after all, your numbers are decimated because of the war and I’m sure your ego is hurting because of it, so-”

  “Can you get to the point here, Gav? I really can’t stand listening to you talk.”

  Gavin growled and got to his feet. He started to yell at me - which I really wished he would because it would’ve given me even more of a reason to hate him more than I already did - but he recomposed himself too quickly to even begin to raise his voice, especially when he saw some of the archangels enter the room.

  Gabriel and Michael were standing there and I wanted nothing more than to get up and stretch their limbs out until they reached around the entire globe before giving them the slowest, most painful death I could ever think of, but I restrained myself. There would be plenty of time for me to exact the revenge I always wanted to get on them for the things that they did to Eddie.

  “Give us the Defect and stop with your silly idea to bring harmony between the two of us,” Gavin told me, “Those are the only things that I require if we’re to stop this war.”

  “Never,” I replied simply, not even stopping to think and not regretting that I didn’t either.

  “She deserves to be in a place where she can be safe,” Gabriel told me, “She’s clearly not where she is right now. Seriously, Satan, did you think leaving her in a palace with fifteen men was a good idea?”

  I narrowed my eyes at him, “Considering there was a time where she wouldn’t even sleep in her own room because she was afraid that you would come and get her in the middle of the night, I dare say she’s better off there with ‘fifteen men’ than she is here with people like you.”

  Gabriel shrugged, “I don’t know where she got that idea from, but-”

  “You do know where she got that idea,” I growled, “You came and kidnapped her in the middle of the night. You took her all the way to Los Angeles. You put her back in the hands of the man that never wanted her. You took part in that abuse. You’re no saint, Gabriel - none of you are.”

  I could feel myself beginning to lose control, but I wasn’t trying to fight it very hard. I wasn’t even sure if I could change into my full form. Gavin had all of my other powers stripped the night before, so I wouldn’t have put it past him if he also took my full form.

  They were a bunch of cowards anyway and, of course, Gavin couldn’t let his perfect angels see a demon’s true face. That would probably scar them to the point that he couldn’t call them perfect anymore.

  Gavin seemed to notice that I was starting to lose it, too, and looked over at Brayden and his two brothers that were still standing in the room.

  “He said no, so that’s it. Take him back to his cell or go ahead and take him... elsewhere. I have no preference and we no longer have no use for him.”

  Nineteen

  Newt Forte

  Leader of the Angel Hunters

  Palace of Sins

  PRINCE LUCIFER AND I WERE NOT by any means close or even friends, but I couldn’t help but at least attempt to help him out when I walked into the living room of the Palace of Sins and saw him sitting and brooding on the couch.

  He had a black aura around him and he was staring blankly at the television - which was turned off. Hesitantly, I sat down
beside him, noting the empty wine bottles that decorated the glass coffee table in front of us. I was, frankly, surprised to see them.

  Prince Gus and Prince Elton were known for their love of alcohol - and there was a running joke that they should’ve been grateful for the fact that they were no longer angels (demons weren’t at all affected by any type of alcohol, so those that drank it did so to enjoy the taste or the fact that some were able to “pretend” that it gave them that rush).

  However, it was common knowledge that Prince Lucifer always found drinking to be a nuisance at best. If he was drinking, there was more than likely a reason for him - usually, a feeling that he was trying to suppress.

  “Prince Lucifer... please forgive me for this, but are you okay?” I asked him.

  Prince Lucifer only glanced up at me before fixating on the black screen on the TV again.

  “Yes.”

  I raised an eyebrow, “You don’t look okay.”

  Prince Lucifer sighed, “Something tells me you’re not going to leave me alone until I tell you what’s wrong. Am I right?”

  I smirked and looked down at the marble floor.

  “Well, I did raise Athena from birth and she’s just about the most stubborn person that I know. I’ve learned a lot about patience in the past nineteen years of her life.”

  Prince Lucifer managed a small, but sad smile and chuckle in response to my comment. He stopped looking at the TV and instead leaned against the back of the couch and looked up at the ceiling instead. It wasn’t much different, but at least I knew now that he wasn’t in a trance or something.

  “Newt, tell me - you’ve lived a long time, though not nearly as long as me - do you ever stop to look back on your life and realize that, though people talk about you like you’ve had this big, grand journey, you don’t have much to show for it?” Prince Lucifer asked me.