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"I believe that is my cue to leave, my friend." Emmanuel turns to Lucifer and shakes his hand, then crosses to me. My heart beats in my ears and I feel myself shaking. "Nice to see you again, Kalliope." He smiles only feet from me. He holds his hand out, but it may as well be a blade he expects me to impale myself upon. Lucifer speaks up quickly, looking from me to Emmanuel with clear tension.
"I do have other business to attend to, Emmanuel, clearly. Let me see you out." Lucifer says, commanding, though his eyes are on me as he speaks.
"I can find the door, thank you." Emmanuel's fingers curl inwards like a flower wilting. A terrifying, furious expression crosses his face before he turns on his heel and exits. The front door audibly closes before Lucifer turns to me.
"My office. Now." He turns and doesn't wait for me. Though my body feels unsteady and unreal, I follow him and let him snap the door closed behind me.
"What was he doing here?" I ask, my voice small and quivering.
"It's complicated, and you don't need to know to understand that it was for your benefit." Lucifer gives me a cold, hard look. "I'm on your side, Allie, that's all you need to know."
"He's not." Outrage flares inside me briefly. "Everyone was so worried about Kal, but you..."
"Asmodeus." He cuts me off. "You will not use that ridiculous name in my house. I named him, and I don't care if he doesn't like it." He lets a moment slip by before he speaks again. "You are truly dense, aren't you?"
"I don't know what you mean."
"You came to my Realm, without my permission. You entered my home, again without my permission. You stand here like you belong without even the sense to apologize for your intrusions and with no consideration for the danger you put yourself in. If he had found you before I found him—"
"I wasn't in any danger, because you were talking to him here! What is going on? You said he wants to destroy me for my power. Are you trying to make that happen? Whatever just happened, you made him really happy!" I speak before I think and instantly regret when I see his mildly annoyed expression turn into one of barely restrained rage.
"You think that because you have a little bit of status, you can speak to me like I was any old sinner?" He crosses to me as he speaks and stops when we are face to face. Like Kal, he towers over me. "I rule here, and I just made a deal to guarantee your safety. What do you think would have happened to you just now if I hadn't done that? I just made Hell the only place he can't hurt you."
"You made a deal with someone who broke into Heaven twice to go after me! What makes you think he will honor some stupid deal with you? What was so important that he would let me go that easily?"
Lucifer raises his eyebrows and crosses his arms while he considers me. "You're a pathetic excuse for a future Ruler. You're not half of what Ast was. She understood the sacrifices we make for the Realms. I doubt you could comprehend it."
"You're right, I'm not like her. She's dead and I'm still here."
Oh my God, why can't I shut myself up?
"You're lucky you have Selaphiel for a guardian." His words are even, calm, and so much worse than yelling. I wish it were still yelling. He still looks angry, but his poise inside that anger is worse than seeing Emmanuel. "I assume if you didn't, you would be less likely to speak to me like this. He puts up with far too much insolence from you."
"Selaphiel isn't here, and I'm not afraid of you." I fold my arms to hide their shaking, mirroring his stance. Inside, though, I'd strangle myself if I could. This isn't me. I don't talk back like this, but adrenaline pushes through me and keeps me appearing like I believe anything I'm saying.
"Don't make me regret bargaining for you."
"I didn't ask you to."
"No one did. Be thankful regardless. Emmanuel is a terror that enjoys breaking his toys. Your big mouth would only make him that much more excited to destroy you slowly. You're safe here, even if you are an unwelcome brat."
"Don't do me any favors."
"Oh, I don't plan on it." He sneers. "I have never done anything that didn't do me more good than it did anyone else."
"What did taking the credit for the Fall do for you, exactly?" I want to die rather than continue digging my grave, but I don't feel in control of my own actions anymore. Lucifer glares at me when it dawns on him that I know what he did for Kal.
"Did Michael tell you—"
"Ast did. She... came to me in a dream. She said she's still a part of me, and it's all in her journal, anyway. Kal was right, they told me more than anyone else was willing to." I motion with the book as I speak.
"I owe nobody an explanation, and you would do well to keep it to yourself, as well as anything else she wrote down."
"I wasn't planning on telling anyone—" Voices in the sitting area outside the office interrupt us, thankfully.
"You will tell no one of seeing Emmanuel here, or anything we discussed. Do you understand me, Kalliope? What I did for you falls apart if anyone else knows. Especially my sons." His voice is hushed to keep this private.
"Yes." I agree begrudgingly.
"Show some respect and address me as 'sir'."
"Yes, sir." It takes all my self-control to not roll my eyes at him. He sighs out of annoyance and finally lets me pass him. I bolt for the door and let it close behind me as I run almost right into Kal.
"I don't want to know." Si says after the scene registers for him. He doesn't wait for anyone to say anything before he exits out the front door, leaving Kal and me alone in the sitting room.
"Couldn't you wait for me to come get you? Is everything okay?" There is concern in his voice, but he still smiles his charming grin.
"I just missed you." I can't help but smile. It's nice to be around someone actually happy to see me, even if I am about to ruin that. "Can we go up to your library? There's something we need to talk about."
"Is... everything okay?" His smile fades and my heart sinks with it. I don't want to hurt him, but Ast is right. There's no room for secrets if I'm going to get help with Emmanuel and if Kal and I ever have any hope of seeing where things could go.
"I hope so." I say, my voice quiet with the unintentional tremble left over from what happened with Lucifer. Maybe I'm no better than they are, maybe we're the same on some level, because I'm already keeping new secrets before the old ones have time to be exposed.
Once we're in the library with the door shut, Kal looks at me expectantly. All I can think about is what feels like a thousand years ago, when we were on the couch with the book of human poetry. He made me feel safe, special, and I've never felt connected with someone like this before. Now I'm going to throw it all away.
"Allie." He is gentle with my name.
"We need to talk." I say, trying to stay level and not panic about what his reaction could be.
"Did I do something?"
"Not to me." But saying that out loud sounds worse than it did in my head, and he looks confused until he seems to recognize the book in my hand.
"Allie, whatever you read, I'm not—"
"I know." I say quickly. "But Kal, Ast is a part of me, and she spoke to me. She said you have to read this, and we have to talk about the things that happened so we can all move forward."
"All? Who else read this?" I flinch at the anger in his voice, anger that had yet to be directed at me.
"Please, read the pages"—I hold the book out—"and then we can talk about it."
He hesitates, like not taking the book might make its contents not true. I sigh and close the distance between us, taking his hand in mine and putting the book in his fingers. We go wordlessly to the couch where we sit like we had before, though he doesn't put his arm around me this time. Now there feels like something thick and heavy between us and I hate it.
I watch him as he opens the book to the first entry, the first one I had read back in Purgatory. Everything about him seems to fall a little. He has no visual reaction until the pages about the rebellion. He stops there, completely still.
"Kal—"
"All she wrote about were my mistakes." He mumbles. "There's nothing here about any of the good things we did."
"She loved you. She never stopped loving you."
He doesn't respond, but instead continues reading. There's not another reaction from him until he gets to the page detailing his successful seduction of Ast. I'm not prepared for him to slam the book shut so hard the pages make a loud cracking sound and I'm definitely not prepared for him to throw the book to the floor as he stands suddenly.
"Fuck!" He yells, kicking another chair opposite us as he does. "Everyone knows about this now?" I flinch and gasp involuntarily. I can't bear to look up at him and see that ire directed at me, so I stare at the floor and hope he calms down. "As if anyone needed more reasons to hate me. Fuck!"
Si was right, this was a bad idea. “Anger issues” didn't prepare me for this. His father's warning didn't prepare me for this. No wonder no one liked the idea of him and I. He was so nice... and now... My heart races and my head is clouded.
I should have listened when I was warned not to come here with the journal. What was Ast thinking, telling me I needed to do this? Did she want me to see this part of him? I feel myself tearing up and a shake begins in my hands and arms out of fear of him, so I remain as silent as I can and hide my face to muffle my crying in my sleeves. Maybe Emmanuel winning at the party wouldn't have been such a bad thing. Maybe having those gentle moments in the garden would have been a better way to end things.
"Kal, I'm sorry." I finally say when he stops yelling, but I still can't look at him. He's quiet for a long time before he comes back and grabs the journal without opening it.
"Don't ever apologize to me again." His words are calmer now, and on the opposite side of his anger. It's not anger for me, it's anger for himself, but it's still anger and it still hurts. "You did nothing wrong. I don't... This isn't me anymore. I'm trying to make this not me anymore."
"It's fine, I just—" but he doesn't let me speak. He puts the book down, gently this time, and kneels in front of me like he had in the garden. He takes my hands in his and holds my gaze. My heart is still pounding and not from his eyes or his smile or his charm.
"It's not fine. I don't want you to be afraid of me. I don't want to be someone who hurts you."
"Kal, I'm not afraid of you." I don't like that I am trying to convince both of us that it's true. That kind of aggression over a journal, over memories and mistakes...
"I'm sorry I scared you." He holds me still so I'll listen to him. "I would never hurt you." I don't respond. If I open my mouth, I know I will start crying. He is gentle when he reaches for my face, but I still flinch under his touch as he wipes my tears away. "Please, don't let me screw this up, too. That's not me, I'm... I'm trying... I can be better than this."
"Kal, I..." I don't know how to respond to him. The same anger I saw in him in Ast's memory of the Fall, the same anger when he and Michael yelled at each other the other day, that's the same anger he just displayed. It's not gone, and it surely isn't contained. This is not trying. He holds it below the surface, and what do I do when it's me that angers him? Will I be the book next time? "I can't fix you."
"I don't want you to." He holds my hands tighter. "But I can't lose you twice. It would kill me. Let me show you that I—"
"Talk to Heath," I say quickly. "Let him be angry about what you did. Let's talk about it, then we can all move on. That's how you can start. I can't be responsible for you, not when I have to fight Emmanuel someday, and deal with Purgatory, and-and..."
"I'd do anything for you." The desperation in his voice hurts. "I know you don't remember, but I..."
"Kal," I struggle to find the right words. "I'm not that person anymore. I have no idea who she was. I have no idea who you were."
"I know." He says, "But I'm telling you, you haven't changed that much, and even if you had, I would have burned the Realms down for you then, and I'd do it for you now."
"That's a lot to put on me. All of this is a lot to put on me."
"I know, I'm sorry. I'm not used to this."
"I don't want to worry about you on top of everything else. I don't want you to prove everyone right about you."
"I'll be better, Kalliope."
"I hope so." I sigh with the weight of reality now on my shoulders, a weight no one can carry for me.
––––––––
Though he seemed to be confident on the way back to Purgatory's library, Kalav hesitates outside the doors once again. He stares at it the same way he stared at Heaven—a place from the past that he can't go back to, not without pain. I wonder which would be worse: the physical pain of returning to Heaven without the permission of the Rulers, or the emotional pain every time he returns here.
"I won't lie to you, this is going to suck." I get his attention away from the door he's been staring at for several minutes without moving. "We need to do this, so we can all get over it and work together."
"He's never liked me, I don't see how any of this is going to change that."
"This isn't going to change it, I am. He agreed to try because he cares about me." I pause, watching him, trying not to let his outburst earlier creep back into my mind. "Do you care about me?"
"Of course I do." There's no hesitation there; he says it as easily as he breathes.
"Then do this for me, because I want you to. No one needs to like each other, you just need to work together so I'm not doing this by myself. No one can heal if they don't know why they're hurt." I hear Selaphiel in my words. This isn't anything I would come up with on my own, but I'm grateful that his kindness and wisdom have made their way into my voice. Asmodeus finally leads the way inside, pulling me along behind him.
Heath is in the same place he was when I arrived earlier. He doesn't glare or comment when he sees us, he sighs and puts his book off to the side and stands to meet us. At first neither of them say anything and I feel like I'm going to be the one who has to walk them through it, then Heath makes the first move.
He takes a deep breath.
"Asmodeus." His voice is calm even as he strikes Kal in the face with a solid punch that sends Kal stumbling back and cursing. Not only am I amazed at the strength of Heath, who's just a human, I'm equally surprised Kal did not see something like this coming.
"Now we can talk." Heath doesn't look happy, but fulfilled after getting that out of his system. "Do you feel bad about any of it?"
"Of course I do!" Kal answers quickly, massaging his jaw. "Hell, you are still human, aren't you?"
"What exactly do you feel bad about? I want to know if you understand it."
"Everything... Everything I did. I regret what I did to her."
"Do you understand the position you put Ast in?" I think we both can sense the despair Heath's probably been holding in since even before she died. More than despair, it's pain, pure pain. Kal doesn't answer him. "She did nothing but put her ass on the line for you and care about you. You used her. She died because of you!"
"I know what I did!" Kal snaps, but looks at me and takes a deep breath. "I am trying to be better now. "
"You took her away from me. I've been alone since she died, every day. I haven't been able to leave here because this is the only place I feel close to her!" Heath’s words hang in the air for a moment, so heavy they are almost tangible. Then, another sigh as he runs his hand through his hair, and something I didn't expect him to say. "But now we have Allie, and if you're any sort of example, holding on to my anger won't help. I can't forgive you, but I can work on not being angry anymore."
––––––––
Michael isn't the one waiting for us as we approach the gates of Heaven this time. It's Selaphiel, and he smiles when he sees us together. He stands on the outside of the gates, a gesture meant for Kal, I'm sure.
"Look at you two." He says when we're within earshot. "I assume it went well, then?"
"Well"—Kal rolls his eyes—"that's certainly one way to put it."
"Oh?" Sel looks from him to me, and I falter under his gaze. How would he react to knowing Kal blew up at me? He's so protective, and though they're friends, I doubt it would go over well. That's not even mentioning Lucifer and Emmanuel. I promised I wouldn't tell anyone, but does that have to include Selaphiel? "Allie, what—"
"Heath punched him." I force a smile. "I thought it was going to be worse, but you should have seen it." I wait to see if that's convincing enough. Sel cracks a smile and laughs as he looks back to Kal.
"You deserved that."
"You don't have to remind me, too."
"What about Michael?"
"He took it really well, actually." I shrug. "He didn't really seem surprised."
"Well, I take it we're all friends again, then?" Sel again looks from Kal to me, but neither of us say anything right away. Is Kal waiting for me to say something about how he reacted? Would he bring it up at all if I didn't?
"Friends is mild, but sure." Kal smiles, but Sel does not. His brows furrow the way they always do when he knows someone's lying to him.
"Kalav..." Sel stares at him. "How did you react?"
"You know," I speak up quickly, "he took it well, we had a really—"
"Kalliope." Sel never says my name with that tone. The tone that tells me to be quiet, now.
"I could have handled it better." Kal mumbles like a child being scolded.
"What did you do?" Sel glares. My heart races like it did in the library while Kal was yelling and Sel doesn't even need to raise his voice to make it happen.
"Sel." I squeak out. "It's fine..."
"It's not fine!" He snaps, but not at me. At Kal. "Do you think I forgot what you're like? What did you do when you read that journal, Kalav?"
"I just got a little angry. That's all. I threw the damned thing and—"
"Did he hurt you?" Sel looks at me, his voice gentle for me only. The question stings more than if Kal had actually hurt me.
"No, he didn't hurt me." My voice is as small as I feel. Sel continues to stare me down, like if he tried hard enough he could read my mind for the things I am not saying. I wish he could, so I wouldn't have to say it out loud. I know it will sound so much worse than it was. "He just yelled, and you know I don't like yelling, so I... I just got a little scared. But I'm fine."
"Sel, if you think I'd ever hurt her—" Kal starts, but Sel cuts him off.
"Emmanuel wouldn't be your biggest problem if I found out you did."
"I'm really okay." I'm desperate for Sel to not be mad. I'm desperate for him to believe me, even if I don't completely believe it myself.
"You saw what she did at that party. She doesn't need anyone to protect her." Kal says pointedly.
"Yes, she does, and that's been me until now. You two are only allowed to carry on like this because I pushed for it. If I have to protect her from you, too, I will."
"Come on, Sel, you're acting like I'm stealing her from you! If you're in love with her, just say that—"
The sound of Selaphiel's hand meeting Kal's face is deafening. My heart forgets to beat at all. Lucifer being enraged was one thing, Heath punching Kal was almost expected, even Kal's reaction wasn't a complete shock. I've never seen Selaphiel angry. I've never seen him anything other than mildly upset. I've definitely never seen him hit someone.
"Don't forget that I know you, Kalav. I know you better than anyone. I still..." He pauses, eyes flickering to me and back to Kal, who looks less surprised than I feel. "As much as I care about you, it's not even close to being a choice. I will always choose her. Screw up one more time, lose your temper one more time, and I will know about it. It will be the last time you see her. Got it?"
"Got it." Kal rubs his face where he was hit for the second time. "It won't happen again." Kal pauses, then sighs and faces me. "Allie, I am sorry. Sel is right, it's not okay how I reacted."
"We're all on edge right now." I say automatically. "I just want to move past this so we can figure out what to do next."
"That okay with you, Sel?" Kal turns to the angel for his verdict.
"You have to take care of her." Sel still sounds mad. "I mean it, I'm not sticking my neck out for you again if this is how you're going to act."
"I'm going to be okay." I smile at him. The words are what he wants to hear and not entirely what I truly believe, but white lies like this are little sacrifices Rulers make to keep the peace, and that includes Sel's peace of mind. Lying to him in any way feels wrong, but the words keep coming. "I promise, everything is going to be okay."