Fuck off.
—the only letter on record from Lucifer to an angel
Once again, History of Philosophy has ended for the day—with the professor having promised, promised that they’ll move past the Covenant next class, which Elīya at this point does not believe in the slightest—and so Elīya opens the doors to Water’s Edge, because it’s time to meet with Yenatru.
This time he’s on the right side of the stream, the same side as where the register is. She walks right up to him; again, he’s already bought an ibrik for two.
“Shouldn’t I buy the coffee sometime?” Elīya asks. “It’d only be fair.”
Yenatru looks up at her with a strange, slight, smile. “Sure, if you get here before me.”
“Now that’s not fair,” Elīya says as she sits down. “Your class is closer to here than mine is. If I’m remembering right?”
“You are,” he says, passing her a cup.
“So what, are you suggesting I run here, just so that I can do the actually right thing and buy you coffee one of these days?”
“Basically.”
“Or, I guess, I could pay you back…”
Yenatru shakes his head. “Don’t. I really don’t mind.”
Elīya sighs. It looks like she’s going to have to run just to get a chance to do her bare minimum in this friendship. She bites her lip and resists the urge to tap her feet in irritation. She’s being such, such a bad friend…
“How was class?” Yenatru asks, interrupting her thoughts.
Elīya laughs. “Supposedly we’ll stop talking about the Covenant next time. But that claim’s been made before. I don’t trust it at all.”
“It was a big deal.” Yenatru takes a sip of his coffee and briefly closes his eyes, seeming contented.
Well, contented sure isn’t something Elīya is. “It’s not the only thing that’s ever happened in the history of philosophy.”
“The real problem here may be the attempt to cover close to six thousand years of history in one class…”
“Maybe. But then, if we were actually covering any material at all in each class, we could probably manage. If anyone except me were anything other than an idiot…”
“Have you considered switching to another program?”
Elīya groans. “People really need to stop suggesting that to me. Come on, you know me, of course I’m in the philosophy program. It just makes sense.”
Yenatru nods. Elīya looks closely at him as he takes another sip of coffee. The strange smile from earlier seems to be mostly gone, but—
Oh flames, that reminds her. This concern about who’s getting coffee got in the way of one of her most basic displays of daily ethics. “But how are you?” she asks.
And there it is again. A smile flashes across Yenatru’s face before stopping suddenly—yes, he’s definitely trying to hide it. He takes a moment before answering too. “Reasonably well.”
Elīya squints at him. “Reasonably, you say?”
Yenatru’s eyes briefly dart to the side. “Yes.”
Elīya squints harder and leans forward in her seat. She rests her head on both hands and purses her lips. If she looks at him hard enough, maybe she’ll see what’s going on.
But he’s just knitting his eyebrows at her with a bemused smirk. “What are you doing?” he asks.
“Trying to find what you’re hiding from me,” Elīya says matter-of-factly, not un-squinting her eyes in the least.
Yenatru blinks suddenly, in what might have been a flinch. If Elīya wasn’t certain before that he was hiding something, she is now.
“Uh,” he says. “I… am kind of less engaged in the general program now than I used to be?”
“Nah, that’s not it. I mean maybe, probably, you’re telling the truth there, but that wouldn’t make you smile. No, there’s definitely something going on.”
Yenatru’s eyes widen and dart to the side again. He takes a long sip of coffee before saying, “Isn’t it… not ethical, to pry about things?”
“One, that’s a desperate comment that proves I’m right. Two, uh, it can be ethical. Come on, Yenatru, I’m a virtue ethicist and my biggest things are honesty and fairness. I’m absolutely going to put all sorts of effort into finding out the truth.”
“I feel like there’s a fallacy in there somewhere,” Yenatru says.
“Not if I’m upfront about being like this! Which, despite your attempt to suggest I might not find this ethical, I totally am.”
Yenatru’s eyes dart to the side again. “Uh.”
“And, even more importantly,” Elīya says, finally letting go of the squint and sitting closer to upright. “You were part of the promise. You promised that if anything cool happens, anything at all, you tell me and Tamar. And I’m still holding you to it.”
Yenatru moans and sighs, looks down.
“You promised,” Elīya says.
Yenatru takes a deep breath. “So maybe… maybe I met someone.”
Elīya’s eyes glint. “A guy?” she suggests with all the excitement of a thirteen-year-old.
Yenatru shakes his head sadly, despite his smile. “No. No one romantic.”
“Hmm. Do go on.”
But Yenatru just keeps on darting his eyes around. He takes another sip of coffee.
“Honesty is a virtue, Yenatru.”
“Doesn’t make it mine…”
“Technically, no. But whatever, it’s a pretty cool virtue in my opinion, so I’d suggest trying it. Especially because you promised, so you have to. That’s the rule.”
Yenatru exhales deeply and runs his hands over his skirt. He puts his hands together over his mouth and closes his eyes. Then he removes his hands, opens his eyes, and says all at once, “So maybe I met Lucifer in the library yesterday.”
Elīya blinks.
And blinks again.
Yenatru nods and just keeps on nodding, eyes a little wide.
“You what,” she says.
“I…” Yenatru starts again, and visibly swallows. “Met Lucifer. In the library.”
“Lucifer.”
“Yes.”
“In the library.”
“Yes.”
Elīya blinks a few more times. And then the implications start hitting her. “Tell me more. Tell me so much more, tell me where they were, tell me.”
“Uh I… I might be… going to be friends with her?”
“This is so big. Tamar needs to know this.”
“She broke the—”
“Shh,” Elīya says. “I mean, not totally shh because I’m gonna have to hear more about this. But what I’m saying is that her breaking the promise doesn’t mean we’re allowed to so blatantly fail to uphold it in regards to her, that’d make us just as bad, we’ve gotta do the right thing.” Elīya nods to herself. “Yes, yes, I’m definitely getting some ideas here.”
“But we haven’t even seen her in—”
“That’s exactly what I’m getting ideas about. If she won’t just see us for no real reason, won’t see us just because, then, well, maybe… where exactly did you see Lucifer, again?”
“I don’t think I like where this is going.”
“Too bad, I’ve got a promise to maintain,” Elīya says. “Well, okay, I’m being a little quick about this, maybe there are other ethical considerations, okay, but, this is a long-standing promise, like of several years, and it needs to be dealt with. I have to deal with this.”
“Uh.”
“So where did you see them?” Elīya stares at Yenatru.
Yenatru looks right back into Elīya’s eyes and then shrugs. “The third floor, in the maps section.”
With that information, Elīya downs the last of her coffee. She’s only a little careful to avoid the grinds at the bottom, and her mouth ends up filled with an annoying texture and bitterness—but no matter. “Yes, thanks,” she says.
Yenatru raises his hand as if beginning some gesture that he thinks might stop her.
But Elīya turns right around and power-walks across the coffee shop and to the door. She’s got a library to go to. And a problem to solve.
How does one find Lucifer in a library? A fallen angel in a needlestack of books?
Elīya figures she has an idea: look for anyone, possibly of a suspicious nature, who doesn’t seem to be studying. Any real student would be studying hard right now, so close to finals.
She nods to herself, and gets to work power-walking around the third floor of the library while glancing in each and every direction. There’s someone putting a book back—not Lucifer. There’s someone rubbing their hands nervously—not Lucifer. There’s someone moaning over a chemistry book—definitely not Lucifer.
The third floor is just starting to seem suspiciously clear of any fallen angels when she notices someone of suspiciously ambiguous gender walking up the stairs. They meet her eyes, hair color seeming to shift in the light. They’re walking slowly and carrying three books—all about the size of standard fiction books, not the size of typical textbooks, reference materials, or even contemporary nonfiction. Even better, they’re wearing black, which complements their pale skin but is definitely not appropriate for the weather.
Elīya smiles, walking right up to the end of the stairs. “Hello, Lucifer.”
The expression that crosses their face is a slight flinch mixed with a raise of their eyebrows and a small smile. They tilt their head a little, but only a little—not in total confusion, Elīya estimates. Yes, she’s pretty sure she has the right person.
Both have stopped walking at this point: Elīya at the top of the stairs looking down, and this person—Lucifer—with one foot on the third step down and one foot on the second.
“Well, hi,” Lucifer says, amusement in their voice.
“I guess I do need to ask how you’re doing today,” Elīya says.
“I don’t know you,” Lucifer says, half-squinting at the situation but still smiling.
“No,” Elīya says, “but you know Yenatru. And so you need to know that a few years ago he made a pact with two of his friends to tell us if anything interesting or important happened, as we would tell him. I’d say meeting you counts.”
“Wait, did he tell you about me willingly at all, or—”
“But how are you?” Elīya says again.
“A little concerned,” Lucifer says, running a hand down their head and the short, fluffy hair there. “I hope you didn’t coerce him.”
Elīya blinks. “I wouldn’t say I did.”
“I’d like to hear it from him.”
“Sure. But I have things I need to say to you, and maybe some small remaining chance that I might actually make it to class afterwards, so it’d be best if I was quick.”
“Should we maybe have this conversation not on the stairs?”
Elīya shrugs and walks a few paces away, gesturing Lucifer to follow her. Once they do, she crosses her arms and looks them right in the eye. “So. There were three of us who made this pact, this promise, and I’m thinking, well, it’s got to have been my fault in some way that Tamar didn’t uphold her end. She was the other person involved.”
Lucifer tilts their head further than Elīya had thought humanly possible. “What does this have to do with—”
“Shh. What this has to do with you,” she points at Lucifer, “is, I think you’re the key to making this all right. Obviously meeting you qualifies as a condition of the promise, so Yenatru meeting you means not only that he should tell me, but also that he should tell Tamar. In fact, me meeting you now also itself is something that I am, by my own promise, essentially bound to tell Tamar.
“Only problem is, I haven’t seen her for—uh—that would be two years, right? I think it’s two years. I’m bad at time. Anyway, I haven’t seen her for a while and there’s not been much of an excuse to try contacting her. But, see, if I told her I met Lucifer—or even better, if you just show up—that should get her attention.”
Lucifer groans.
“And then,” she continues, “I’ll be able to deal with whatever it was that I did that made her break the promise, the trust I lost or whatever.”
A few breaths pass and Lucifer asks, “You done?”
“With?”
“That monologue of yours. Thought it was obvious that’s what I meant.”
“Given that there’s a chance I might make it to class, yes. But the basic norms of conversation dictate that you ought to respond to the request I implied. It’s only polite.”
Lucifer sighs and rolls their eyes. So this is what someone rolling their eyes at you feels like. Elīya’s suddenly pleased with her decision to typically close her eyes to hide it.
“Look,” Lucifer says, “I came down here because I was bored, all right? I decided to wander around, maybe even meet people, on my terms. I just met Yenatru, I think I like him, but I don’t like you. Seriously, you basically just said you want to use me.”
“There is something I need to set right,” Elīya says slowly, calmly, sharply.
“I don’t like being used.” Lucifer meets Elīya’s eyes and clenches their jaw.
But Elīya only leans back slightly. “That’s fair. And what’s also fair is for me to offer to be of use to you, in return. Would that work?”
Lucifer shakes their head. “Wow, you care way too much about righting this wrong.”
“Hey, caring isn’t a vice.”
“So you would offer to do anything for me if I help you with this, is that right?” Lucifer smiles almost pityingly.
“Yeah. Any kind of reasonably fair trade.”
Lucifer laughs, and laughs, and laughs. They press their hand to their face, only releasing it to grin at Elīya
“So, will you do it…?”
“Fuck no,” Lucifer says.
Elīya blinks.
“It was just… funny how bad you planned this, like I can so easily imagine someone else doing something really terrible to you, with an offer like that. But—no. No way. I certainly don’t like using people myself, and I hate leading, and really hate using people, and did I mention, using people isn’t something I approve of?”
“But—”
“I said no. Haven’t you read whatever they’re saying about me in history books these days? Assuming it’s accurate. I might need to check into that.”
“You’re the first angel to fall and you built the morning star?” Elīya says. That doesn’t seem like the information they’re looking for, though. “That’s about as far as it goes.”
“Huh. Not wrong, but could be better.”
“I think there are also some anecdotes about you out there?”
“Okay. Anyway, as I was saying, just… no.”
“But could we make some other agreement?” Elīya says, her words fast, desperate. “Is there something else that could work?”
Lucifer squints. A moment passes. And then they ask, “So, who are you, would you say?”
Flames. Elīya’d forgotten to tell them her name.
“My name’s Elīya. Sorry that I forgot to mention.”
Lucifer tsks. “Okay, whatever. What I asked was,” and something about the way they look at her turns intense, their eyes fixed closely on her, their voice quiets and seems almost solid, “who are you?”
“Well,” Elīya starts, not sure at all how to respond. “I… I try to be ethical. With virtues. I focus on honesty and fairness a lot, though people keep telling me I should try out patience too.” Elīya takes a moment to think about the conversation she’s just been having. “Although apparently it isn’t taking.”
Lucifer’s eyes soften again. “Ah, I do pity you.”
Elīya starts to open her mouth to ask what in the flames they mean, but Lucifer raises a hand and cuts her off.
“I know no one wants to be pitied. Although, then again, if you value honesty…” They trail off. “But actually, this means you’re in luck.”
Elīya raises her eyebrows.
“I’ve thought of something you can do in trade for my help with finding this Tamar,” Lucifer says, grinning.
Elīya sighs in relief. “Thank God.”
“Don’t,” Lucifer says. Then their voice lightens again. “So I’m sure you’re going to ask me what the trade is.”
“Of course.”
“You,” they say theatrically, pointing at her, “are going to learn Theurgy.”
“Theurgy? That’s—” for other people, she wants to continue. For someone else. Not something she’d do.
Lucifer’s smile turns soft. “That’s what you’ll do, is what it is.”
Elīya knows she technically can—nothing exactly prevents anyone from learning it, but it’s never seemed worth her time and effort.
But if this is what it takes to set things right with Tamar. If this is what it takes to find out if she truly did fail her friends, and if so, how to fix it. If this is what it takes.
“Okay.”
Briefly, Lucifer’s smile widens. “Good. You can get along to class now; I’ll be around. You should report back to me in two days. Tell me if you’ve learned anything or made any progress.”
“And when will you uphold your end?”
“Well,” Lucifer says, “that depends on you.”