Chapter Twenty-Five

 

 

 

They felt it at the same time. Jehovah knew from the way Lucifer flinched as though connecting with an electric shock. At once, a brilliant burst of nothing to something, and had it not been for the loud silence purchased by her absence, Jehovah might have not realized right off that something was wrong.

But he did. The signature beating a familiar tune through his veins was indeed the former Hell Queen’s, but it was diluted somehow. Tainted. Weaker and vulnerable.

A horrible sense of foreboding permeated every inch of Jehovah’s body. And he knew with the same horrid certainty he suspected befell mortal parents when they couldn’t reach their children. He knew whatever was about to happen would shape the rest of eternity.

Nothing Lilith had done thus far had been without design.

“Something is off,” Jehovah said. “Luc—”

“I’m going.” Lucifer pushed off the cavern wall, his expression wild. “End this while I can.”

The unease in his belly intensified. “That is likely precisely what she wants.”

“Her signature is weak. Tell me you feel that.”

Jehovah nodded, raising his hands. “I do. But do not be so quick to judgment, old man. Something is very wrong.”

Lucifer seemed to consider, then shook his head. “At the very least, going to her will prevent her from coming here.”

A retort formed and died on his tongue, and Jehovah forced himself to swallow his argument. There was no sense trying to communicate with the man when his mind was made up. Even if nothing about this felt right. For Lilith to broadcast her position, especially if she was weakened, made precious little sense.

Unless she had been weakened and could not control her signature. Perhaps one of her devotees had turned on her.

Or perhaps that was the sort of sloppy thinking she hoped they would succumb to.

A long beat passed, and some of the desperation in Lucifer’s gaze faded in favor of the calm rationality Jehovah had come to rely upon. “We should try, at the very least,” he said. “Try to stop her before she comes here. If we can end it without spilling more blood, it’s worth that.”

Jehovah swallowed and nodded. His skin felt hot and twitchy, and he didn’t like it. Not once in an eternity had he experienced a moment of what the human world would call anxiety. There was, indeed, a first time for everything. “She has been one step ahead of us. Do not forget.”

A tragic smile played with the devil’s lips. “I cannot forget.”

Then Lucifer blinked away, leaving Jehovah to the quiet.

For approximately five seconds.

“Hello, Jev.”

Every muscle in his body tightened, the nervous ball of energy in his gut pulsing to new, terrible heights. Jehovah blew out a breath and turned, meeting Lilith’s expectant gaze. Her eyes were sparkling diamonds, her blood-red lips pulled into a twisted smile. The air around her was flat, crinkling only with the faintest residue of a signature.

Sometimes, being right was a burden he wouldn’t wish on anyone.

“Well,” Jehovah said. “That was predictable.”

“What? Oh, Luc rushing off?” She tsked and waved a dismissive hand. “He’s a little cross with me.”

“Threatening his children would do that.”

“Some people are so touchy.”

Jehovah slid his hands into his pockets to stave off the urge to throttle her. His mind plunged full-speed ahead. “Your signature.”

She lifted a shoulder. “Good friend in Portland. She decided to hold onto it for me.”

That such was even possible should have floored him, but Jehovah just blinked in acceptance. He hadn’t the luxury of indulging in shock. “No human can bear the weight of your signature,” he said. “It would destroy them.”

“Oh, don’t think so small.” Lilith’s smile curled. “She is what the mortal world would call a witch.”

Witches were the diluted product of demon and human offspring, but that didn’t ease his concern. Different demons produced different children, with different subsects of powers. None of which would be capable of playing host to the power of a demigod.

“Witch or not,” Jehovah said, “you condemned your friend to…what, get Luc out of the way?”

“Don’t tell me you feel for the girl,” Lilith chided, taking a step forward. “You have pawns, don’t you? So do I. And my pawns are very loyal. Sweet Hannah will keep Luc entertained…long enough, at least for me to do my work. This is what I consider the last straw. A tiny push.”

“For what?”

Lilith smirked. “Oh, you know. I’m standing on my grave, Jehovah. The only thing that makes winning sweeter is knowing Lucifer will have to live knowing he lost to me. Twice.”

He stared. “You want him to kill you.”

“It’s an honor he deserves, don’t you think?”

“You truly hate him this much. I thought it was me this entire time.”

She shrugged. “I have enough hate to go around. In the meantime, you and I have unfinished business.”

Jehovah flexed hands that wanted to murder. It was perfect—her special, twisted form of perfect. She knew she wasn’t making it out alive, and she wanted to make sure she died in a way Lucifer would spend all eternity regretting. That one last piece of himself he had yet to lose. Were it not for his own word, the promise holding him hostage, he would have denied her that triumph.

He’d definitely have to rethink his promises in the future.

“Unfinished business,” he echoed instead. “Do we?”

The way her eyes glittered made him think she knew what he wanted to do to her, and that she’d consider either a victory. “You know what I’m here for.”

“Indeed. And I suppose you think I mean to step aside and let you end my world?”

Lilith tilted her head. “You made the world for me, remember? Me and Adam. Dear, sweet, stupid Adam. Never quite grasped the concept of gift giving, did you? It’s mine to end. I am merely taking my due.”

Jehovah sighed. “For all that has been done, I have few regrets. Adam was one of them. Had I known—”

“You would never have created me in the first place,” she snapped. “But this was a lesson you shouldn’t have had to learn, Jev. It should have been ingrained. You meant for inequality to exist between the sexes.”

“How many times do you want me to say I’m sorry?”

“Oh,” Lilith said, tapping the ground with the toe of her boot. “Just one more time should suffice.”

The air behind him grew thick. Jehovah whirled around as a familiar face came into view above the Seal. Anger chased the betrayal that pierced his gut, and he felt himself swell with the righteous anger of generations past.

Humilitas, his Virtue.

His Virtue.

“Humil—”

“This world has corrupted too many,” Humil said, shaking. “Now it ends.”

“Not the best fuck-you speech,” Lilith said. “But, you know, beggars, choosers. No complaints from me.”

It was only then Jehovah realized the Virtue’s wrists were slashed open, and blood dripped onto the Seal below.

 

* * * *

 

The call had come so hurriedly, he hadn’t examined it. Jev would claim that a failing on his part, and perhaps that was fair. Yet when one found themselves in a completely new situation, it was hard not to be reactionary. The instant Lilith’s signature had gone live again, he’d been helpless but to follow.

Now all he could do was stare, for the girl trembling before him was so crippled with Lilith’s weight she looked within seconds of collapsing in on herself. For perhaps the first time in all his existence, Lucifer was completely and utterly dumbfounded, and the experience was so unsettling he thought the floor beneath his feet might turn traitor.

The girl was on her side, curled into a tight ball, her arms hugging her belly as her small body shook. Her face was a collage of reds and purples, dampened in a sickly sweat that left her brown hair plastered to her flesh. She looked at him with a mixture of terror and triumph, which only served to perplex him more.

Lucifer didn’t move. Lilith’s signature burned its familiar path through his veins. If Lilith was here, though, she had mastered the art of invisibility.

Though in looking at the girl, something told him his ex-wife had instead mastered the art of something far graver.

At last, his voice returned to him. Lucifer cleared his throat and forced himself a step forward. “My dear—”

The girl shrieked with force he wouldn’t have thought her capable. The walls shook on impact, spilling a shelf of thoroughly pedestrian knickknacks to the ground. One, a ceramic cat, shattered, sending tiny glass shards across a rugged wood floor.

Lucifer found control returning to him in slow, even doses. “Sweetheart, I am not going to do you any harm. If you tell me what she did, where she is, I can—”

The girl sputtered another protest, though this one lacked the punch of the former. Fat tears squeezed from her eyes, and she rolled onto her back. “Long,” she panted, “live. The Queen.”

Lucifer blinked, then understood.

And immediately, black rage clouded his vision. Lilith had, over the centuries, developed her own slew of worshippers. Those who regarded her as the ultimate symbol of female empowerment, having heard various alterations of her famous story. Yet those who built altars in her name were on the fringe of religious conviction. It was no surprise she’d found a way to exploit even her allies, as she had certainly done it before.

But this?

This poor girl had accepted a death sentence, all for an ancient grudge.

His feet forgot to wait for permission and stomped forward. He forced himself to ignore the twisted gargling protests that sputtered from her sick lips, and knelt beside her.

“You took her signature,” he said, then placed a hand on her burning forehead. “Not enough to wage war on me, or even Jev. She’s mad.”

“It—worth—it.”

“This pain is worth serving your goddess?”

“Man—die.”

Lucifer shook his head. “I am such a fool.”

Of course he saw it now. The truth in what Jev had told him seconds before he’d torn away. She had neglected nothing in her planning. One deity with a grudge would be hard to defeat, two near impossible. Yet she didn’t need her powers to win. She just needed a window.

A window for her traitor to dive through and end everything.

And as her parting gift, she condemned a poor girl to suffer the impossible weight of her power.

Somewhere deep within himself, he felt it. The final Seal. It was too late.

“You poor, stupid girl,” he said, settling in beside her.

The girl blinked at him. “Y-you… What…?”

He brushed sweat-drenched locks of hair from her eyes. “Too many people will die alone tonight,” he told her. “I can’t be there for all of them. So, if you don’t mind, I will spend the apocalypse right here.”

She shook her head—or rather, he thought she did. It was hard to tell through her tremors. Then she spoke, and he had his answer, “N-no. Y-y-you’re s-supposed t-t-to…” She stopped then, her brown eyes going wide.

“What?”

She shook her head and blinked a fresh wave of tears. “No.”

But he didn’t need her to tell him. His mind was quite capable of guessing, and knowing Lilith as well as he did, determining her agenda didn’t take much. After all, if everything went according to plan, Lilith would be dead tonight as well. That she was so willing to part with life hadn’t surprised him—winning was more important to her than living. And the only way to die well was if she knew she’d made it hurt.

She’d intended for him to kill her, because she knew what the burden of that would do to him. She’d known just how to play it too.

Jev loses his world. Lucifer loses his wife. The ex, in this case, wasn’t important. Killing Lilith, fun fantasy has it had been in the past, simply wasn’t in his makeup. She had come dangerously close to that edge when she’d attacked his children. Had he gotten his hands around her neck then, he doubted he would have regretted it. Because then—in the heat of the moment—such actions were understandable.

This, though, was different. Lilith knew how much he hated enduring the suffering of others. To see what she’d done to this girl…this nameless, confused slip of a soon-to-be memory. That black cloud of rage that had come over him had nearly done it. He’d felt capable of murder then. Tired enough, defeated enough, to let his baser urges control his actions until he had done something from which there was no recovery.

This girl was doomed. Killing in her name, whatever it was, wouldn’t make any difference to her. Either way, she was going to die. Lilith would thrill in the satisfaction of having pushed him over the edge.

Only he wouldn’t give it to her. Lilith would leave this world as she’d come into it. Human. Powerless. Alone.

She didn’t need him to save her. She never had.

Lucifer sighed and placed his hand over the girl’s. “It’s okay, sweetheart,” he said. “Just squeeze when it hurts.”

The girl blinked at him, beads of sweat rolling into her eye. There was disquiet there, pain and fear. She didn’t know what to make of him. That was just fine. Right now, he didn’t know what to make of himself.

Yet when she threaded her fingers through his and squeezed, he felt a piece of him come back, and the world around him—dark as it was—lightened.

“You’re not alone,” he told her. “You won’t die alone.”

“Hannah,” she panted. “Hannah.”

He smiled. “Hannah. You are not alone.”

She nodded, looking drugged, then hissed and thrashed.

And he held on.

 

* * * *

 

They were too late.

A second, maybe a fraction of a second. At this point, the degree of failure seemed irrelevant. All that mattered was that they hadn’t arrived in time.

It took a moment for Invi to reconcile what she was seeing. In that moment, though, a thousand things occurred. Someone was screaming, but not in pain or battle, rather horrified outrage. The voice was shrill and unyielding, and it wasn’t until Cassie stormed ahead that Invi even recalled the Virtue was present. The moment she’d felt the ground beneath her feet give was the same she’d forgotten all but the man at her side.

“The end has come,” Roman whispered. “Invidia, you must leave.”

Leave? The word made no sense. She shook her head and turned to him slowly, feeling as though her body had been submerged in Jell-O. Everything seemed to be moving at a snail’s pace. “No. I’m with you.”

“I am not worth dying for. Take your sisters and go.”

Invi blinked confused eyes. But before she could answer him, make sense of the nonsense he spoke, another sound sliced through the air. The same as before.

Cassie.

Cassie was screaming a chorus of “Traitor” and had shoved her way past Lilith, who seemed off for reasons Invi couldn’t comprehend, but didn’t explore. She couldn’t. Her attention was fixed on Cassie.

Cassie had pinned the unknown man at the Seal against the slab stone wall. Her fists flew into his chest.

“It was you? It was you?”

Invi looked to Big J, who seemed to be coming out of a stupor. Though she hadn’t met the deity but a couple of times, seeing such uncertainty on his face made her own convictions harden into cold acceptance.

“Too late,” Lilith said, her voice shaky but triumphant. And Invi knew what was wrong—what was missing. The demigod had no signature. “Nice of you to come to the show, though,” the former Hell Queen continued.

No. That couldn’t be right. The man was still standing, wasn’t he? Ira hadn’t been—he’d been cold on the floor, an eerie picture of death. It couldn’t be too late. “No. There’s still time,” Invi said. “There has to be.”

“If he bled on the Seal at all, we have lost,” Roman said.

“The more you give, the faster it comes.” Lilith looked stronger by the second. Her smile was twisted, maniacal. “But I like a nice, drawn out finale. Why rush a good thing? Pull up a seat, and welcome to the end of the world.”

Big J gave himself a shake, then turned his attention to his raging Virtue. “Cassie, you need to get out of here.” He turned toward Invi—toward all of them. “You all do. Go now.”

Cassie didn’t seem to hear him. She was staring at the man she’d pinned, her face a mess of tears. “Humil…you… You…traitor.”

“Me a traitor?” the man—the Seal opener—retorted. “You abandoned us for Hell, Casitas! Our Almighty bent his will to the Prince of Lies. He didn’t even fight for you—”

Big J was at their side in a blink. “Cassie,” he said, loud enough so his voice carried, but with a sort of intimacy that made it certain his words were solely for her. “Cassie, you must leave. It’s over.”

“No,” Invi said. The rock floor trembled beneath her feet. Stone began to chip from the walls, clattering to the ground with hollow sounds of impact. “No, we end this.”

Lilith shook her head, grinning. “You don’t get it, do you, girly? You’re too late. Jehovah has decided the world is not worth breaking his word. His word for the world. He—”

Her words were cut off on the tail end of a lightning blast. Lilith flew to the ground, a charred, gaping hole in her belly. The air filled with the coppery scent of blood, chased by the odor of burnt meat, thick, pungent and unmistakable. The movement was so sudden it took a few seconds for Invi to understand what she’d seen, and by the time her brain relayed the message, another ball of fire had flown free, eating into the flesh of Lilith’s leg.

Invi started and whirled, her gaze colliding with Ava, whose face was a stone mask of fury, her still-smoking hands outstretched and steady.

“Anyone else notice how suddenly she’s all breakable?” her sister said.

Breakable. Invi turned back, her hands coming up, electric wisps of static dancing between her fingertips. Yes, yes. The world might be ending, but by god, the bitch wouldn’t get the satisfaction of watching.

“Ava!” Big J yelled. “Invi, Luxi. All of you, take Cassie and get out of here.”

His words were punctuated by another quake. Invi staggered, but Roman kept her upright, his hand a hot band on her arm.

“Leave,” her Guardian whispered hotly, his breath caressing her ear with familiar intimacy that made her stomach tighten. “Do not die for me, Invidia. Get out of here and live.”

No. No. That wasn’t the plan. Invi shrugged him off. “You stay, I stay.”

“We’re all staying,” Ava said, her gaze locked on Lilith.

Luxi nodded and raised her hands. “Either we all make it, or we go out in a blaze of fucking glory.”

Invi’s muddy mind was present enough to kick up a degree of protest, but she knew voicing her dissent would have as much effect on her sisters as Big J’s and Roman’s commands had had on her. She didn’t understand—couldn’t—why Luxi and Ava would commit themselves to dying here when they had everything to live for, when they had their lives waiting for them—Dante, Grayson and Ira almost assuredly having figured something was wrong now. How they could conceive to leave all that behind for a cause everyone knew was lost. Why, instead of living their eternities with the men who loved them, they would consign themselves to doom alongside their pesky little sister.

She couldn’t examine it. Wouldn’t. That, along with all the other things that would never be, she set aside for the ever-lofty tomorrow. That magical place she would never see, but would die reaching for nonetheless.

Invi’s chest tightened and her eyes stung. At least she would go out with the ones she loved. And she wouldn’t leave Roman. He had lived his life alone—she wouldn’t let him die that way too.

Roman seized her shoulders and twisted her to face him.

“I love you,” he said, then kissed her. Hard and swift, all lips and teeth. It wasn’t kind or soft, or anything she had come to expect from him, but she clung to it just the same. His warmth and familiarity, his large imposing frame pressed against hers, his hands squeezing her flesh.

This was goodbye. They were too late, and he was kissing her goodbye.

“I do, Invidia,” Roman whispered against her lips. “I love you. Now…please get the hell out of here.”

He shoved her back so hard her spine collided with the cavern wall, then his warmth was gone. She watched as her Guardian sprinted down the corridor and threw himself toward the Seal, which ruptured with the roar of untold Hell Demons, and the steady cadence of the end behind them. What he hoped to accomplish, she couldn’t say. Only she would do whatever she could to help him see it through.

Invi looked then to Lilith, whose expression had melted from dazed, albeit wounded triumph to rage.

“Roman!” the demigod screeched. There was panic there—a vibrant bloom that filled her eyes.

Invi’s heart lurched. “He doesn’t answer to you,” she said. She became steadily aware she was crying—when she had started, she didn’t know. The tears made silent treks down her cheeks.

Lilith seethed for a moment, then turned her eyes on Invi. The air between them grew thick and toxic, and despite the ground, which tossed and revolted, the seconds ticking by with sick finality, everything seemed to slow. Then a cold smile twitched Lilith’s lips, and it was like the wound at her gut and the other at her leg weren’t wounds at all, rather painted discolorations.

“No,” Lilith said, pulling herself up. Even that she managed to do with an air of grace. “Not anymore. But he did. Talk much of that, did he? Did baby show you how he likes to be touched?”

Invi clenched shaking fists, sparks of electrical fury dancing off her sweat-drenched skin. It wasn’t at the words, or even the imager they brought, or the stab of ownership she felt for Roman. He belonged to her, yes, but jealousy where Lilith was concerned seemed a wasted effort. No, it was the thought of Roman himself, lost to the darkness, centuries of solitude, given one bad thing in the guise of something good—a thing that had set them on his terrible journey, yet brought him to her nonetheless.

Lilith had used Roman because doing so was easy. Because making victims out of the unknowing was simple.

Invi became aware of her sisters then, how hotly each seethed, their bodies tight with tension, and the full scope of Lilith’s crimes hit savagely home.

The victims she’d created were too numerous to count.

Lilith must have sensed it too, for her grin turned even nastier. “If I am to die, I’d like it to be in good company,” she said. “I’m honored, Avaritia, Luxuria, that you would think to join me. Did the thought of rotting away for eternity tethered to your men drive you batty? I couldn’t say I’d blame you.”

That got a rise, but not from Invi. The next thing she knew, Ava had torn forward and her fist disappeared in a flash of motion into the hole at Lilith’s gut. The demigod wheezed and doubled over, only to have her chin knocked back with a bunted knee. Luxi was there in a blink, her hand around Lilith’s throat.

“You are a weak, pathetic excuse of a woman,” Luxi spat, and slammed her against the stone wall with strength that seemed foreign, at least in viewing. Invi hadn’t been in Lilith’s presence but a couple times, and never this close, but a part of her intuitively recognized that this was a person one shouldn’t be able to manhandle.

Whatever she’d done, she truly was powerless.

Breakable, as Ava had said.

There was a hand on her shoulder. Invi whirled. Big J stood behind her, Cassie under his arm. The girl wore an expression beyond despair—she looked thoroughly broken, from her red-rimmed eyes to fists she had balled and shaking. Fists drenched in blood.

“She must go now,” Big J said, nodding to Cassie. “She cannot be here. None of you can.”

Invi looked over his shoulder. The Seal was fully open now, and Roman knelt over it, an orb of energy pulsing between his palms. Ready to fight to the last, even when there was nothing left to fight for. Every fiber of air was heavy with finality.

Behind Roman lay the still body of the man Cassie had attacked. He, too, was covered in blood, but much more of it.

“Please,” Big J continued, jarring her back to him. And she realized he was shouting, not talking at all, because a horrible cacophony of screams sounded from where the world was ending. Where Roman was ready to die.

Invi nodded numbly. Then she turned, her movement detached from the rest of her. Luxi still had Lilith by the throat and was delivering a steady stream of increasingly sloppy blows to the woman’s face. Not that it mattered—Lilith’s consciousness looked to have left the building. Her head flopped, and under the growing mask of purple and black bruises, her eyes appeared closed.

Big J was right. They had to get out of here.

Her sisters couldn’t die for her.

“Luxi!” Invi shouted.

Luxi froze in mid-swing. She and Ava whirled in sync, both glossy-eyed and radiating rage—rage Invi didn’t think she would have understood a week ago. It was clear then, so very clear why they had insisted on coming. Why Cassie had wanted to come. This was more than sisterly love—though that was there too, she had no doubt. But they weren’t just here for her. They were here for Dante, Grayson and Ira. For Campbell. For the world, which might be ending, but not before its defenders had claimed their owed pound of flesh.

Her sisters had come to fight because they loved. Her, their men, their world.

But they couldn’t stay.

“It’s over,” Invi said. “Take Cassie. Get back to Hell. Do it now.”

“We’ve been over this—” Luxi began.

“I know, but it’s over now,” Invi replied calmly. “Everything is about to be very over.”

“You’re coming,” Ava said. It wasn’t a question. Her amber eyes were set and determined. “All of us or none of us.”

Invi’s heart twisted. “No. I’m not.”

A throat cleared behind her. “Invi,” Big J interjected, “there is nothing to be gained by—”

“This is my decision,” she said loudly, not turning. “Of my own free will. I won’t let Roman die alone.”

For the first time since they’d found her in the caverns, her sisters appeared genuinely concerned. They exchanged a look—a look so like the one they had exchanged when they’d announced they were coming with her. Only there was no tease behind this one, only horror and resignation.

“Invi, no,” Ava said, stepping forward. “No, you’re coming with us.”

“You barely know this guy,” Luxi added. “Don’t die for nothing.”

“I’m not,” she replied, feeling remarkably calm. “I just… I’m staying. He’s been alone so long. He should die with someone who cares for him.” She smiled, a fluttery, light sensation sweeping through her body. “And you need to go. Don’t make Grayson live an eternity alone. Or Dante. Or Ira. Go.”

Now there were tears in Ava’s eyes. She sniffed miserably and drew Invi in for a tight hug. “I love you.”

Invi shivered and squeezed her eyes shut. “I love you too.”

Then it was Luxi’s turn, though she seemed damn near hysterics. “Invi, please, don’t do this.”

“I gotta.”

“No, you—”

“Ladies!” Big J shouted. “We don’t have time—”

Luxi didn’t give any indication that she had heard. Instead, she choked a sob and pulled Invi into her arms. “We didn’t have enough time,” she cried into her hair. “I’m so sorry for everything.”

The words would have broken her if she’d allowed them. “I love you, Lux. And the others. Tell them.”

Luxi squeezed her tighter. “I will. I will.” She lingered a moment longer, then pulled away and wiped at her eyes. “You crazy bitch.”

Invi laughed in spite of herself. “Have a good eternity.”

At that, Luxi looked like she might lose it all over again. She might have, had Ava not tugged on her wrist.

“Now, we gotta go now,” Ava said. And that was it. They had Cassie between them the next second, the Virtue’s wide eyes full of sorrow, guilt and terror. There were goodbyes there—an endless vat that could have gone on an eternity itself, but that time was gone.

There would never have been enough.

And the next instant, Luxi, Ava and Cassie were gone. Invi inhaled a shuddering breath, then turned to Big J, who was watching her with mournful eyes.

“It’s my choice,” she said.

“Luc will never forgive me.”

She lifted a shoulder. “Nah, he knows me too well. He’ll understand you didn’t stand a chance talking me outta it.” Then she licked her lips, smiled, and went to join her Guardian.

 

* * * *

 

In the end, it came down to a simple thought, and that thought was, why not?

Why not try something he had no hope would succeed? The obvious answer was there was nothing left to lose. The outcome here would be the same should he be proven wrong, and Jehovah didn’t want to face what came next if he couldn’t at least say he’d given it a try.

He watched as Invi joined Roman, as Roman regarded her with first anger at her insistence, then slow, even thankful acceptance. Never could he have conceived what he witnessed in the Guardian’s gaze. When the Guardians had been created, it had been without thought of what they could become, or more accurately, complete ignorance that they could become anything at all. These were not simple creatures, rather those as capable of love and growth as any other. And Roman loved Invi. What Invi felt for Roman, Jehovah didn’t know—she was a harder one to read, which came as little surprise, given her father figure. But she felt enough for him that she wanted to stay, that she would sacrifice everything to see the end of the world alongside a man who had not known the comfort of touch for the bulk of his existence. That meant something.

For them, for Lucifer, for the world itself, it was worth a try.

When constructing the rules for ending the world, neither he nor Lucifer—to his knowledge—had considered what might happen if they opted to call the whole thing off. The end of the world was supposed to be just that, and the fact that there were Seven Seals, all of which needed to be opened in order to secure the world’s ending, had seemed a strong enough failsafe. But if there was a way to end the end, so to speak, Jehovah had to believe his younger, hastier self would have considered it, even subconsciously.

Jehovah entertained a rush of what he assumed his favorite creation called adrenaline, and fastened his gaze on Roman.

“How long?” Invi asked, and though he didn’t look to her, Jehovah knew she was speaking to him.

The ground seemed to roar in response, and tossed up in protest. The last of Hell’s prisoners were but seconds away from erupting toward freedom, then the world would be gone for good. Jehovah had never thought to have such a front row view of his creation’s ruin, and for a moment, he cursed the idealistic fool that had so easily decided this fate was a worthy one for something so precious. The man he’d been then had matured into something else over the centuries. He had never foreseen himself becoming so attached, or thought that losing this world would tear at him so.

“I haven’t the slightest,” Jehovah replied. “This is my first apocalypse.”

Invi sighed, and there was a tremble in the sound. “What do you want to do tomorrow?”

The question caught him off guard. He turned to her, but found her lost in Roman’s gaze, a small, sad smile upon her face.

“All you mentioned,” Roman said. “And more. I owe you a date.”

A knot tightened Jehovah’s throat. “I’m sorry,” he said.

They both looked at him. He held out a hand, then made a slicing motion through the air, and Roman collapsed with a surprised groan.

Invi’s eyes went wide, and she crashed to her knees beside him. “Roman!”

The Guardian was split at the gut, a fountain of red spilling from his torn flesh. Invi began to scream, though Jehovah didn’t think she was aware of the sound—it was pitiful and strained, the sort that made the throat hurt just for hearing it. She lowered trembling hands to Roman’s gaping wound, but the damage was done and irrevocable. Blood pulsed and poured, spreading from him in thick pools, and falling into the open abyss of the final Seal.

“I’m sorry,” Jehovah said, meaning it, though he wasn’t sure if Invi heard. He wasn’t sure he wanted her to hear.

“Roman!” Her hands, soaked in blood, splayed across Roman’s open abdomen. “Oh shit. Oh fucking shit. Breathe. It’s… I’m here. It’s okay.”

Jehovah inhaled sharply, and turned his attention to the Seal. To the rumbling ground. The crumbling walls. He looked to the blood he’d given the marker, and wondered idly who the gods were to pray to when they needed guidance. Nearly all the Guardian’s blood would be needed to stop the end, if such were possible. Either he had just stolen the last few seconds of a man’s life for no reason, or…

The next time I make a world, I’m going to be smart about it.

“You killed him,” Invi sobbed. Her voice was cold and dark. He felt her glare without needing to see it. “You son of a bitch, why—”

“Just wait.”

“He’s dying! You—”

“He was always meant to die, Invi. I just needed to see if I was smart enough.”

“Smart enough?” she screamed. “You took his goodbye. That was all he had, and you took it!”

“I needed to see if I knew then…” Jehovah held out his hands, his gaze on the ground, his heart threatening to break his chest in a mad dash of freedom. The tremors continued, but seemed softer now, farther away. And he had a moment’s rush of foolish hope.

The Seal was consuming blood that had been taken rather than given in heavy, generous swallows. As many things as had changed over the centuries, there were several principles Jehovah had held true.

Armageddon wouldn’t come if the keys were forced to bleed.

And at once, everything—the rumbling ground, the roar in the air, the crumbling walls, and the pounding in his head went dead quiet. The shift was so pronounced it nearly knocked him off his feet, and Invi’s rage-filled eyes rounded in confusion, her anger fading to a slackened shock. As though someone had slapped her hard enough for her brain to jostle, and her system needed a moment to reboot.

“W-what?” she said, looking around with timidity that didn’t suit her. “What the—”

Her words were eaten in an explosion of pure white.