Chapter Thirty-six: Looking for Lucifer

Chapter thirty-six: Looking for Lucifer

Over the following weeks, Benzosia realized that her existence had moved from "protected" to "under audit." It was no longer just Basileus’s habitual surveillance—the usual predatory oversight he performed for Asmodeus. Now, the margins of her life were crowded with unindexed attendants. Imps trailed her like persistent, twitching footnotes, their sulfurous scent a constant, stinging reminder that she was a guest who had stayed far too long in a hostile archive. Even in the supposed sanctuary of her private quarters, Basileus had a way of conveniently materializing in the shadows, his presence a heavy, silent entry in the ledger of her day that she could neither delete nor ignore.

The walls were closing in, the parchment of her freedom thinning until it felt like it might tear under the slightest pressure. This constant monitoring made it impossible for the Queen to step out of line—or so the imps likely reported to their masters. But today’s missive, delivered by the only imp whose loyalty she had painstakingly verified through a series of subtle, intellectual traps, carried a sense of urgency that caused her internal clock to accelerate into a panicked rhythm.

Forget the audit, her heart hammered, the sound finally drowning out the clinical buzz of her scholarly thoughts. This wasn't a move to be calculated or a record to be filed. Her brothers were within reach, and she wasn't going to let a few shadows or a ledger of rules keep her from them. She had to go. Now.

Escorted by her primary imp, she moved through the palace with a brusque, administrative purpose. She didn't just walk; she marched with the weight of a woman carrying a death decree. She needed any observer to categorize her movements as "official business." She navigated a labyrinthine path—a complex series of turns designed to shake any secondary tails—before darting toward the garden gates. Once she was certain the perimeter was clear, she dismissed her imp with a sharp, dismissive nod and slipped through the heavy iron.

Levistus was pacing near the entrance, a shadow against the flickering starlight. He was dressed in the sharp, high-collared attire of a court function, his hair pulled into a severe, neat tie. At the sight of him, a sudden, electric thrum ignited under Benzosia’s skin— It was a physical jolt, a spark leaping across the cold margin between them, reminding her that he was the only anchor she had left in this shifting hellscape.

“Make haste, Benzosia,” Levistus said, his voice a low vibration that seemed to pull at the very air. He caught her hand, his skin searingly hot against her chilled fingers as he pressed his lips to her knuckles. “I’ve found a backdoor to the pocket realm where Lucifer has archived himself. The access window is entirely dependent on today’s solar event in the mortal plane. It’s a tear in the fabric that won't hold.”

“You’ve found him?” Her heart expanded, a sudden, violent warmth flooding the cavities of her chest. Lucifer. The brother who had been the first entry in her book of heroes, before he became the first entry in the book of traitors.

Levistus gave her a grave, intense look. “I’ve known the coordinates for some time; I simply lacked the cipher to bypass the primary seals. I have reason to suspect Azadiel is there, and if so, he must have been in possession of a key.”

“What key?”

“Come.” He tugged her to his side, his arm a possessive weight around her waist as he guided her through the shimmering distortion of a portal that led directly to his fortress in the stygian tundra.

The transition was a sharp, icy bite. Within moments, they stood before a roaring fire in his study. Levistus was already at his desk, his fingers ghosting over a massive, ancient volume. On the desk lay a parchment inscribed with a complex seal, the ink still wet and shimmering with a dark, iridescent sheen.

“I’ve mapped the trajectory,” he murmured. “The seal is blood-bound. The key is your blood, Benzosia. It will act as the beacon—the genetic signature to trigger the lock.”

“That’s why Azadiel could find it, but not you.” Benzosia felt a sudden, sharp surge of resentment. To the universe, she was neither angel, scholar, nor queen; she was merely a key forged from someone else’s fire. She offered her wrist to him, a cold, resigned gesture. “Draw the ink, Levistus. Let’s stop wasting time.”

Levistus looked at the offered wrist, then up at her, his expression hardening. He didn't reach for a blade. Instead, he took her hand in both of his, his thumbs tracing the delicate blue lines of her veins.

“I will not mar the manuscript just to read a single page,” he said, his voice dropping an octave, thick with a possessiveness that wasn't about the seal, but about her. “I did not bring you here to bleed you dry, Benzosia. I brought you here because this fortress is nothing but a hollow binding without you.”

He reached for a small, silver needle on the desk. With a surgeon’s precision and a lover’s care, he made a tiny, almost microscopic prick on the pad of her thumb. A single, perfect bead of crimson welled up.

“I need your heart to harbor mine,” he whispered, leaning in until his shadow swallowed her own, his heat a sudden, breathless contrast to the tundra outside. “Without you to anchor my soul, Benzosia, my existence only knows torment.”

He guided her thumb down, pressing it firmly against the center of the ink-painted seal. As her blood met the wet ink, the parchment didn't just absorb it—it ignited. A low, choral hum vibrated through the desk, and the air in the room began to spiral inward toward the sigil.

The passage that followed was a brutal experience. Reality felt like a hailstorm of jagged meteorites, followed by a temporal warp that required her to wade through a pressure so immense it felt like wringing the air out of her lungs.

When her breath finally returned and her senses ceased their frantic, jagged screaming, Benzosia let out a long, shuddering gasp. It was the sound of a system rebooting in a vacuum. She looked around the pocket realm, and for a moment, her scholar’s mind failed to find a category for it.

It was an anomaly. It was beautiful. It was a sanctuary carved with surgical precision out of the surrounding chaos.

A radiating warmth permeated the space, pulsing from a low-blazing hearth that smelled of cedar and smoke—a scent so achingly familiar it felt like a remembered dream of the First Garden. The walls weren't stone or shadow, but shelves—glorious, floor-to-ceiling architectures of knowledge. They were cluttered with the debris of a life lived in exile: salt-encrusted keepsakes, vials of bottled lightning, and curios that looked like they had been plucked from the bedside tables of sleeping gods. It was a library, but one that felt lived in, messy and vibrant.

The floor was made of dark, polished wood that hummed with a low frequency against the soles of her feet. Two empty wingback chairs sat before the fire, a table between them holding a tea service that remained, for the moment, a quiet footnote in a very heavy room.

Benzosia felt a tear prick at her eye—a hot, salt-heavy drop that blurred the wood-grain vision of the shelves. It was the first thing in Hell that felt like it had been written in her own hand. This was a sanctuary mapped by a mind that understood the necessity of order, but the inherent beauty of a spill.

“After all these years, you really haven’t changed,” she whispered.

She didn't need to see him to confirm his presence. She sensed him in the atomic structure of the realm, a psychic gravity that pulled her internal filing system back into its original, ancient alignment. He wasn't just standing in the room; he was the room’s intent.

“No, sister, I did not,” a voice answered. “But you have. You’ve added several footnotes and a rather tragic epilogue to your story since we last spoke.”

The voice was like a heavy leather volume closing in a vacuum—resonant, final, and thick with a power that made the air feel like velvet. Benzosia turned. Standing by the hearth, the Morning Star looked less like a fallen king and more like the author of a world she was only beginning to read. He looked tired, but his eyes held the clarity of a star that had seen the end of the night and decided to stay awake.

“Hello, Lucifer,” she said, her voice finally steadying. “Have you seen our brother?”

Lucifer reached out, his long fingers hovering near the tea service. “The one with the sword and the temper? He tore a hole through the perimeter. He’s still a hothead, I’m afraid.”

Relief flooded through her with the weight of a physical blow, nearly unmooring her from the spot. The smile that tugged at the corners of her lips felt foreign—a genuine, uncatalogued emotion that had been out of circulation for so long it felt like a beautiful forgery.

“Well,” she replied, stepping toward the fire and the second chair. “Neither of us are in a position to cast stones, are we?”

Lucifer looked at her, a wry, knowing glint in his gaze. “True. But I believe you'll find the tea is still hot, and the chairs are exactly where they were three thousand years ago. Sit, Benzosia. Tell me which chapter we’re in now.”

“Tell us where Azadiel is, Lucifer, we don’t have time for your word games.” Levistus stepped in front of her, between her and the brother she hadn’t laid eyes on in centuries. With a neat step she averted his interception and stood at his side.

“Levistus.” Lucifer nodded brusquely, looking between the two of them with a glint of curiosity Benzosia knew well. The nostalgia of it took her breath away. “How quickly Micheal has everyone convinced he’s shed his heavenly skin.”

“His wings are black. Or, were.” Benzosia finally gathered herself and took a seat in the offered chair, nodding when Lucifer gestured towards his steaming tea service. “Its not something that can be feigned.”

Lucifer pointedly looked at the pitch black of her own wings. “It’s true there is no way to fake the wings. However, there is nothing saying that you're giving your soul to the Hells when you take on the mantle of fallen. Tea, Levistus?”

“Tea? Just tell me where he is so I can tend to him while your sister convinces you to claim your throne.” 

“My throne.” he sighed gustily, pouring tea, avoiding eye contact. “Asmodeus fumbling now that he finally has the part he’s longed for since his creation?”

Benzoisa hissed in a breath, her tea sloshing onto the saucer when her hand trembled, Lucifer casting her a sharp look before his features schooled back into their usual impassive expression.

“Azadiel,” Lucifer stressed the name with such exaggeration his displeasure was obvious. “Is having a nap in yonder room. Wake him if you must. Benzosia and I have some catching up to do it seems.” he waved Levistus off, then turned to face Benzosia with intent scrutiny.

She fortified that inner steel that had been keeping her upright and waited for the imminent attack. Not a literal one, but one that would tear her to shreds nonetheless.

“Is it everything you’d wished for?” Lucifer’s cerulean eyes held a banked glow that spoke of high emotion. Which emotion, she wasn’t sure. “At least enough to make it worth it?” he took a sip of his tea, not breaking eye contact.

“You have to take up your throne.” her eye contact remained steady, her inner resolve strong. “Lucifer, Asmodeus is… not the same being I fell in love with. He’s… terrible.” a vast understatement, yet a proper description of Asmodeus eluded her.

“Asmodeus is the same as he ever was. You were just too infatuated to see his ambition that eroded his morality.” Lucifer averted his gaze, tightening his lips to end his words.

“He was never like this. He’s a monster,” still an understatement, “he’s twisted my daughter–”

“You have a daughter?” Lucifer’s posture of nonchalance slipped at this.

“Lucifer! What have you done to your brother?” Levistus shouted, running back into the room. “What spell have you locked him in that he won’t awaken?”

Lucifer continued to stare at her, ignoring the blustering Levistus.

She notched her chin, not to be cowed by the likes of her eldest brother, not after surviving Asmodeus as long as she had.

“Yes, I… Glasya. My daughter.”

“She is Asmodeus’ whelp?” Lucifer leaned forward.

“I demand you awaken him, right this moment.” Levistus barged between the two of them.

With a sharp exhale, Lucifer straightened in his seat and turned to glare down Levistus. “Azadiel won’t be going anywhere today. Since he’s lost his wings and been bound to the Hells, it’s not like he can carry out whatever foolishness he’d planned, yet I would still like to know what his intent was.” Lucifer stood, brushing his hands down the sleeves of his jacket, straightening out the creases as he stared benzosia down with an unreadable look.

“I’d advise you both to take your leave now before any of this can be traced back to me.” Lucifer started walking out of the room and in a desperate grasp, Benzosia grabbed his sleeve and spun him to face her.

“I’m not leaving without my brothers!” she shouted, Lucifer's raised brows the only emotion showing on his impassive face. “I’m tired, Lucifer. Of being the last bastion of compassion in a realm bereft of morality. I can’t keep Asmodeus’s ambition at bay, I can’t guess where his next steps lay when he’s leagues – nay! – centuries ahead of me. I’m laying my pride at your feet. Return. Please.” her words died off on a dry sob that made her chest burn.

Levistus wrapped his hand around her arm and tugged her to his side, holding her up as she gave up on being strong. For too long, she’d held her head high, looking towards a day her brother took up his crown, a day she now knew would never come.

“Looks to me like you have a sturdy shoulder to support you.” lucifer shrugged, turning towards the bookcase closest to the hearth and plucking out a well-worn leather tome. “This lists our genealogy, all of our father’s natural born offspring. Surely there's one suited to hold up the Hells if something unfortunate were to happen to Asmodeus. Heard from Gabriel recently?” he passed her the book then resumed his seat, turning towards the flickering flames.

“You’ll live to regret this, Lucifer.” Levistus said coldly, his arm wrapped snugly around Benzosia’s shoulders. “When the tyrant king upends the balance the Hells keep–”

Lucifer held up his hand, stopping Levistus’s rant. “I have regrets enough Levistus, too many to add the balance of the universe onto my shoulders. You can see yourselves out, yes?”