Angels, Demons, Donuts and Pixie Tea

Brittle Things

It had taken a while before Lucifer could feel Baltha calming down enough to have a rational conversation with. The moment he had sensed his general awake and on the warpath, he had made it quite clear that Baltha wasn't to approach Lucifer until summoned into his presence.

Lucifer's own temper was frayed, and he understood that the two of them may do something they didn't intend in their mutually antagonistic states. Lucifer had remained in his study, watching the eternal flames of his hell fire hearth, sipping on his ancient bourbon and forcing his temper to cool off.

Baltha could have done many things, from travelling to another realm to burn off his anger, fighting something that needed killing, to outright refusal to listen. The options were pretty endless for a demon.

Instead, the demon had sought out Ferya.

And Lucifer's granddaughter had calmed the demon down somehow.

Still, Baltha appeared in an angry flash of demon fire, garbed in his armour nearly the moment he had been summoned. Lucifer didn't move, didn't blink. He just watched his general with an outward calm that chilled the room.

"My lord." Baltha's hands clenched and then unclenched as he looked around the room, then turned to regard Lucifer.

"I know you are feeling better, but are you going into battle so soon?" Lucifer raised his glass and took a slow drink, offering a smirk.

Baltha growled but let his armour go, standing before him in a more subdued outfit than Lucifer had grown accustomed to recently. "No."

"You don't have your buckle on." Lucifer took another drink before twirling the glass, watching the liquid absently.

"It's for Torix." Baltha was being stubborn, watching him with a dark look in his eyes that nearly hid the pain his general was in.

Pain was dangerous. Specially pain that was as deep as what he felt from Baltha. Pain could cause violence, anger, poor decisions if it wasn't properly addressed. Those who weren't used to showing it in any other way often expressed pain through anger.

Lucifer put the glass down and strode from his spot at his mantle to stand in front of the man who had served him longer and more loyally than any of the rest of the dark kin. "I need you to listen to me, my friend."

It was Baltha's permission to be more than a loyal general.

To offer more than a rigid agreement to his lord's commands. It relaxed the demon, but it also caused a tremor of uncertainty to run through his eyes. "I am listening."

"I am convinced that Uriel did not act alone. That he and those angels on his side were not the only players in the game. I have spent the last few months evaluating all my mistakes and I do not believe I made as many in my judgements as events would have us believe." Lucifer needed to get this out of the way. Even if Baltha didn't care, the demon understood that these words were important, and Lucifer could see the tactician's mind was already working behind those flame filled eyes as Lucifer continued. "Perhaps it is arrogance. But I believe my mistake came from not understanding all the players in the game."

Baltha offered a brief shake of his head, his expression getting thoughtful. "No. Uriel wasn't as stupid as we all made out, but that charm was complex. It required extensive knowledge of the darkness, more than I had."

Which was concerning in and of itself.

Baltha had spent a lot of his life acquiring every bit of information he could get his hands on. He hid the wisdom well at times, but there was a reason people summoned the demon into their realms and homes to answer questions. No angel could understand the darkness better than Baltha.