Sol blew in alright—though, lamented her heart for not striking back. The brunet, orderly only in the moment he had taken her to the car, healed her. It was conflicting. He didn't believe he should ever use these powers again, not after hurting one with them. But mending the girl, it felt right. Was the Lord accepting him back?
Howbeit, that wasn't washed up as silt in his mind, not right now.
Steps slowed on the baked path, as if taking the perpetual heat from the broken building. The apartment. Construction workers in neon, cranes in yellow and fencing steel all the way to the rock wall. It had been demolished, replaced with timber frames and metal poles.
"They still haven't rebuilt it, huh?"
"Yeah..." Luka bit his lip. A sad ending for such a building that gave them a happy beginning.
"Come on," the raven-haired nudged, unlatching the pointed black gate breaking the uneven wall.
An invisible portal they went through, and they came out smiling. Hand in hand, swinging as verdant trees seemed taller around them, apples blooming on some. They had journeyed to every place they went together. Each café—even the one Mammon followed him to. Each restaurant. Nina's shop. And finally, this forest. A strip of land, streams of fresh water, more grass than creatures; intentional, for their love could live uniquely here.
"I've...missed this place." The brunet pressed circles upon his skin.
"Me too. 'Thought about us here more than I should have."
They trekked down the eroded path before helming away, lowering under tangled branches and kissing leaves.
"Y'think you can beat me in a race?"
The throne grinned, "Of course!"
"Alright then. One. Two. Thre-"
Luka started running before he could finish, sticky grass on his new jeans essaying to stop him.
"You fuckin' cheater!"
He guffawed at the words rushing behind him, and he hastened. It had turned to a race getting away from him.
"Get back here!"
"You'll never catch me!"
The throne was moving hell for leather, nearly tumbling onto tree barks, but the sound of gushing water zipped in his ears and he knew he was close. The sun shone on the empty glade. He jumped back to look at his partner, triumphant. "I win!"
"No, you cheated!"
"You wouldn't be able to catch me anyway!"
"I only let you ahead 'cause I'd feel bad takin' away your dream of winning."
"Yeah, right-" Luka spun around, and a gasp belayed him. A familiar indigo blanket, mounds of grass under it yet some flattened with the woven basket. The broad dun tree stood at it, like it was their server for the day. Joy depended in his stomach like light wisteria. "Mammon..."
"You like it? I did it all m'self this time," he confessed, wrapping his arms over his shoulders.
The throne felt teary as they ambled closer. "I love it!...Thank you."
He went to sit down, but the raven-haired stopped him, pulling him up by the hands.
"I've waited too long for this..." Mammon took a breath. "You know when I left that day? To Nan's?"
Luka nodded, worry snaking down the wisteria branches.
"I planned to tell her about us, everything. Demons, angels, Heaven, Hell." His grip grew stronger, as if Luka would turn tail. "When you asked about leaving, I jus' needed to tell someone. I needed someone to tell me what to think."
His brows furrowed in confusion.
"But the further I drove, the more I want to fucking turn...and drive back to you. Even when she was talking, I couldn't stop thinking about you...and your weird ice cream tastes. But I...realised my answer."
The raven-haired let go of his hand, carefully dropping on one knee. He drew a dark green velvet box from his denim pocket. Tears began diving to kiss the demon as it popped open. Chirping birds began to girth them, flowers of bright colours opened, heavy branches swayed—an angel's happiness.
"The only place I belong to, is your arms, and I wanna' stay in them forever." A tensioned silver band gleamed at him, a glassy diamond in between. "Will you marry me, Luka?"
The brunet fell to the blanket, embracing him and his lips in an impassioned kiss. "A thousand times yes!"
Mammon slipped the ring, cold yet warm with love, onto his finger. Their foreheads met, as they laughed away tears.
"I can't believe it...," the angel whispered, gazing at the twinkling ring. Was this really happening?
He shut the box. "Well, you better believe it 'cause we're getting married..."
"So this means...you're going to Heaven with me?"
"Wherever you go, I go." Mammon grinned. "Now, can we eat? Being all smooth got me hungry, and I want you to try my food."
Luka nodded happily, crawling over to the basket and taking out the plates as birds dispersed to leave them eat. Until a thud he heard.
The box sunk, and then his hands. "No..."
"Mammon?..."
His eyes shot up at him, no longer grey. A pulsing maroon, scattering through the white. The brunet's breath hitched. Fear rolled over his dark contorting features. Holes burned through his clothes whilst an inky black hied up from his fingertips. Mammon mouthed something to him, but he didn't need to stay to make what it was.
Run.
The brunet tossed back, wings lengthening, lopping trees as he rose above in the sickening heat. He stared at the sky, the sun across. Luka let tearless sighs go. He didn't understand what was happening, but he hoped the Lord would fix it.
It was supposed to be a happy moment, their happy ending.
Birds lost their harmony. Black fanned the trees. Leaves shrivelled up. Arms thinned.
Whilst, his anger thickened. The angel couldn't let this happen. He wasn't going to allow this...thing to ruin it.
He was going to kill him.
Luka swooped down, clenching his teeth with newfound rage. He whipped the darkness with spiked ivy, watching as it burst into the air. The shrouded creature hissed, before a tall man walked out of it. His hair curved on his pale chest, as though tartarean snakes. A white cloth sheathed his lower half. The throne alighted on a tree. How could an angelic man like him possess?
"My hair, is longer than I remember." The man hummed, sharpened nails tracing the coils, threatening to cut. He looked up, eyes painted a tacky gold, and just then, Luka realised who it was.
"You!..."
"O, divine youth...," the man purred, and Luka felt himself being haled forward. He grasped the branch suddenly. "I have waited long for this day."
Why had he called him that?
His eyes went round in terror.
"Lucifer..."
"Always I admired how you said it, little wren."
Luka glanced down at his blanching hands wringing the branch. Memories roiled atop the high banks of his mind. His gaze flittered as he searched for coherence. It was him all this time?...
"Little wren, let my voice untangle you, the way I had before."
He felt sick at the sights. He couldn't have possibly laid with a man like him. He couldn't have.
"I swore revenge upon you, little wren, but you know I could never pluck a hair off your head."
Luka shook his head. "I don't know you."
The man stepped to him. "Then, you shall."
"I was young. You were to be King. You know my words had no true meaning."
"But they did, little wren, no matter what you voice now. You will obey your King, like you promised." His lips formed a smile, and he extended his arms.
"No." A hushed word that fled before he could think.
Deceptive eyes narrowed. "What was that, little wren?"
"I said, no!" Luka screamed. Leafy ivy swarmed, a piercing lash bringing blood on his chest. "I refused you then, and I shall do the same now!"
"You're making a mistake, little wren," his deep voice rumbled around him with clouding thunder.
Water of the stream erected a barrier skirting the forest. He tore off his shirt as crazed eyes bulged out of every inch of his skin, and wheels left the ones on his wrists. This was no ordinary demon—Lucifer. The one who was put closest to God. The first fallen. The first sinner. The first tempter. The first evil. The throne would have to knead himself dry in order to win, in order to get Mammon back.
A mistake, for the one he loved.
Lightning struck the ground aimlessly as he somersaulted through the air, returning every fiery attack his way to the demons scrabbling out of the scorched ground.
"You have gotten stronger, little wren." That same voice hovered.
"Fight me yourself, and you shall see!" he hissed, and a blink manifested Satan before him. His muscle-bound body was white, but veins of onyx posted up his lower half. Shadowy wings came out of his hips, but he was supposed to have six—a pair at his head and a pair at his back, though all that was left was eddying fog.
He was still preparing his powers!
"Show me then, Luka!"
His green eyes flashed with epiphany, and he redirected the water to fall on the demon. Trees took to the air speedily the second Luka looked, yet they skewed towards him abruptly. The throne gasped as it scratched deep into his leg, curvetting over and striking his back with golden bands.
Lucifer hissed.
Dug, dried gashes on his shoulder blades, like someone had spooned out his skin.
That was it, he thought. That was his weak spot!
"If your father couldn't beat me, what makes you think you will!"
A blurring attack that sent the throne tumbling back through the chapped trees, and desolation. This beast had taken my parents, he thought, heaving himself from the nest. He couldn't let him take Mammon too.
He needed to get close, blind him with attacks, and then target his wings!
The throne set upon him, plying every attack he could think of. Water moons. Mind's eye. Wheels within wheels. Carnivorous plants. Numbing venom. But the demon just kept getting stronger, and stronger.
Luka cut the chord of each attack, and promptly did he hug his ghastly body. Motion stopped, Lucifer stopped, as though lethal ash sailed.
"I'm sorry." Salty tears were impelled out of his eyes. "You know what they would do if I were to return to you, my King..."
Gloomy arms lapped him. "I have waited millennia for you, little wren. What makes you think I will not fight for you?"
Lucifer twisted the ring on his finger before throwing it. "You have searched for me too. In this demon you found comfort, because he reminded you of me."
A bat Mammon was inside this cave, and that sound of words rebounded to him. It ached in his ears.
The brunet looked away. "I didn't want to admit it..."
A long branch, spear-like, levitated near.
"Admit it to me." Obsidian talons teased his chest. "Tell me what your core desires."
Luka brought himself closer, his breath near his sharp ear, and the wooden spear in his hand. "You, my King."
He gripped it, hard, gritting his teeth as his fist plunged to his back.
But a voice thwarted it all.
"Luka!"
Silas.
Lucifer growled, lunging at the young angel, who had become frozen in sheer panic, but in an instant started himself.
No, no, no!
"Silas, move!"
"I can do it!"
The throne flew after him, the potent speed sending feathers off of his wings. The smacking air told him to hold back, but how? Clawing arms were ahead of the demon, his resolve obvious and black. The young virtue couldn't fight it.
A final, shattered breath Luka vented before he careered between the two.
"O divine youth...," he would speak lazy but well, hovering over crumbling stones like moons. His hand would unroll, porous and torn wings arcing from a back invidious. "Come."
The youth would stumble back on cold ground. Roots of paling terror in his core—craven, which what comes with young age.
A voice would start small. "I must not defy the Lord..."
"Your Lord, is I. You know that well."
O Lord, his core would cry out. Strike him down for he talks ill! Too, strike me down for this fray I play part in!