"You look affright."
Samael sheds his suit coat and the velvet material shines against the pillars of his otherworldly palace. The walk back has been a quiet one, and I'm in no mood to confront the difficult circumstances I've placed myself in.
I'm irritated. I'm shocked. I'm overwhelmed.
And it's only been two days.
Samael is finding pleasure in my discomfort. "You ran off pretty quickly when Akan reached you. You know, it probably took him quite a while to find you with that limping. Where was your goodly compassion?"
Ignoring his teasing, I head for the stairs. "I'm guessing that's enough excitement for one day?"
He doesn't reply right away, but that doesn't prevent me from scaling.
"I made a mistake earlier, and I'm sorry."
"Whatever," I mutter, continuing on, my steps lagging.
There's echoing music coming from somewhere, but I haven't seen enough of this place to be able to locate where.
"Cassandra, I swear, I thought it would be a release for you. I thought it was something you wanted."
"To kill someone? To torture them?"
"They tortured you. They nearly killed you, more than once. I've watched you. I've seen the impact the foster system did to you. If I were you, I would have wanted to hurt them with my bare hands and I don't think that's a sign of evil. I think it would be justice."
Elijah said something like that once.
I tighten my hold on the railing as I turn to face him. "You say you've watched me since then? All my life?"
He nods from his place at the foot of the stairs. "Yes."
"You claim to love me, so tell me... how could you have watched me go through that and not intervened? And don't say it was for the greater good."
"But it was."
I point at him, grimacing. "And you wonder why I love him. He didn't ask. He didn't consider anything. Elijah promised he would make them pay. He promised that after less than a week of knowing me. He killed them for what they did expecting no praise, no acknowledgment in return. He didn't even tell me he'd done it. That is love, Samael."
"He didn't have worlds to balance. He didn't have gods to attune to or kingdoms to run. I wasn't allowed to intervene, to touch you... to try and make you love me like a regular man. I had to wait. There is an order to things, Cassandra! Even to our rule!"
I shake my head low as he moves up the steps.
"And for the record, I didn't make you. I begged for a companion and my brother created you for me, in the image of a woman I'd desire. I didn't reach into different jars and pluck out personalities and appearances. I just wanted someone worthy of divinity, and someone to make this endlessness just slightly more bearable."
"Why would he do that for you?"
"Because for it, I was willing to compromise space and time... the order of the universe."
Dubiously, I wait, watching him grow more and more passionate hanging on these words. He takes the last step to reach me, almost warily.
"I gave him a millennium of light in order to bring you into existence."
His eyes plead for me to understand as he removes his glove, taking my speechlessness for compliance. His fingers are reaching to graze my face when I hear a clearing throat.
Instantly, my feet are carrying me across the room with startling speed.
Before I'm around the bend, I hear Samael address the intruder with an agitated hiss.
"What was so important, Roman?"
"You were supposed to be back ages ago, that's what."
"Yes, well... there were complications."
Yes, complications is right.
I find my way through Satan's labyrinth, throwing myself behind the door to my room, slamming it shut. I sink to the floor, allowing the moments of the day to rush at me all at once.
The underworld.
The staggering subjects.
The confrontations of my past.
The information Samael has dumped into my brain.
Akan.
I hold my head in my hands, trying to absorb it all without going insane.
The door nudges hard into my back as someone tries to get in, knocking while they do it. I'm on my feet hastily in order to spare myself the pain. Donatella charges through, her arms full of garment sleeves.
"I have brought you the clothing you have asked for, as well as something to quench your tastebuds."
She orders the two men dressed in satin to the available surfaces of the room, where they deposit fragrant wine and sliced pomegranate on one, dotted truffles and stew on the other. It's a showy display of his material wealth, one I can't help but roll my eyes at.
"I saw that," she says, hanging the pieces into the wardrobe beside the gowns. "No matter if it's needed. One should always indulge themselves every so often."
The men, now empty-handed and on their way out, flash a smile in my direction, anything but reserved like their master. Donatella chuckles at their prolonged ogling.
"The entire place is buzzing over your arrival. Preparations have begun for your introduction to the heavens."
"Introduction? What does that... entail?"
"You and the master will join the gods for a night. You will meet Jehovah in Heaven, his comparably dull brother. And after, you will return for a real party, here."
Heaven... with Samael.
I cannot imagine it.
"Will you need anything else? A bath? A shoulder to lean on? Someone to sleep beside?"
I blanch at her bluntness, amused. "No, I'm fine. Thanks."
She nods, showing herself out, thoroughly rejected. I sigh with relief when I'm alone, behind closed doors. It's been a tiring day, one I hope I will forget. I saunter to the closet, sifting through the garments tailored for me.
While I'm not sure how Samael will receive my style of leather pants and belt harnesses, I am relieved to have something in my possession which doesn't look fit for a queen. I shed the one I'm wearing and place it over a velvet chair, imagining Elijah's day.
The world is crumbling around him, the vampire's ready for war.
The weight of the world on his shoulders.
Something prevents me from calling to him, a distracted mind unable to focus on one thing. I pour myself a glass of wine, needing to dull my senses. I doubt I will sleep tonight.
Time passes as I sit by the pitcher, drinking away my sorrows.
There is no sense of night here, other than the rare sound of silence from the rest of the palace. And unfortunately, as much as I want to turn away my thoughts, they are plaguing.
Akan's face when I turned away from him.
His legs, wasting away from Polio, just as Elijah had explained to me in Russia.
Why has he reverted back to that form? Why was he trying to locate me?
Slightly drunk and unable to think about lying down, I make a decision. Probably a stupid one. I head for the wardrobe and start pulling out clothes.
***
Terrance is the only guard on duty when I approach the gates of hell.
I was surprised how easily my legs led me to the winding hills and eventually, to this opening to the underworld. He greets me with a dutiful bow.
"Mistress."
"May I pass?"
"It is your haven. I am merely it's keeper."
Feeling uncomfortable when he begins to internally wonder where Samael is, I answer his question, hoping my ability to read him will unravel him.
"I saw a... old friend earlier. I wanted to find him."
"Of course. Is the master aware you've gone?"
I could lie, but I don't really want to. "No."
"So this is a secret visit?"
I smile, tilting my head curiously. "I'd like it to be."
Equally as coy, he gestures to the tunnel. "Your secret is safe with me, Mistress."
"Maybe you could you call me Cassandra?"
He chuckles, oddly. "When the master isn't around, perhaps."
I pass him, surprisingly unafraid of my destination. I'm buzzing from the warm liquor, and I have a mission at hand. It shouldn't be too hard to find Akan.
All I have to do is imagine his location, after all.
Sensing him, I enter hell alone. There is no change between day and night. It is always the same. The sky is the deepest blue I've ever seen, lacking any stars, any moons or planets or galaxies unlike Samael's own dwelling. This is a true pit of darkness.
Like earlier, I'm watched adamantly as I submerge myself into the crowds of lost people, shocked to hear laughter, normal chatter as if I were on a busy street in New York. My eyes scan the buildings carefully, seeing bars and decrepit homes. There are no transports here. Everywhere must be reached by foot.
Dressed in tight leather from neck to my feet, I look very different to them than I did coming through with Samael. I'm comfortably on edge in this clothing, as I should be in a place of uncertainty. Everywhere my eyes roam are people. People laid out, people drowning their sorrows, people wreaking havoc on others.
It's a realm of chaos.
It's unnervingly honest and wild and to my shame, it excites.
My restlessness is dulled by the constant movement, the spikes of icy coolness. The emotions are high, the energies vibrating through my flesh as if each person were part of me, linked directly with my mind.
Reliving Samael's careful teachings, I hearken to the souls of the dead, soaking in their fears, their desires and sins. I'm unable to remain undetected. As if I were carrying a tracker, they gravitate to me. They reach out to touch me, to get my attention. I could turn away fearfully, but remembering how little Samael feared them, I bear through it, opting for kindness instead of resistance.
I murmur softly to them, hoping they will remain calm. While some eyes have dulled with resign, others are more frantic. Their desperation is relatable. Eventually, they give me my space to walk on. The encoded tracker in my brain leads me through the narrow pathways, down stairs and around bends until I feel an end to the pull.
I'm where I need to be.
I hesitate on the doorstep, anticipating the conversation that is about to take place, the unspoken questions that will be answered. Akan is someone I trusted, who became someone I feared and then someone I hated.
I can't tell if what I feel now is hate.
I pound on the wooden door once, and then another time when there is no answer.
When the door finally opens, I realize it's pity.
Hunched and in pain to be on his feet, Akan looks startled to see me.
"Hi," he says.
"May I come in?"
He shuffles back. "Sure."
I enter his small room, consisting only of a twin-sized bed and a table with a single chair tucked underneath. There is no color in the room, no life. Here there are no picture frames to perch, no artwork to hang, no colors to paint.
I catch him staring once he has the door closed, adjusting to the changes he sees in me.
"I was blindsided earlier. First by Samael, then you. That's why I didn't want to get into anything just then," I admit, watching him walk to the bed.
He half-laughs. "I figured. You looked overwhelmed... and I doubt you were particularly glad to see me."
Any answer to that would be cruel, so I switch course on subjects.
"What's going on here?"
It takes him a few beats to realize I'm asking about the deterioration of his legs. He manages to sit, grimacing in the straining. "One of the downsides to the afterlife. Vampires revert to what they were before they were changed."
"Polio?"
He nods. "You know about it?"
I cross my arms, focusing on my feet. "Elijah told me once."
And there it is. His name.
The foil of our differences.
The tension, already high, amps up a notch when my eyes flicker to his. I'm sure he knows what I'm here for. Clearly stalling, he reaches under his pillow, pulling out a carton of cigarettes.
"Can I offer you one?"
I shake my head. "No."
He pokes the stick through his lips, tucking the carton into his breast pocket, patting around for a lighter. I walk to him, extending my arm. I unwind my slender fingers to reveal fire, flamed in the center of my palm.
Stunned, he observes my power like most do, with apprehension, and warily leans in, holding the nub of the cigarette in the flames. Pulling back, the flames in my hand die out and he makes a disbelieving grunt, breathing in the fumes.
"So you've settled into your divinity then?"
"I'm learning."
"I didn't believe it at first, when I heard Samael's mate had finally joined him. I convinced myself it would be someone else, although I suppose I knew better."
"I didn't join him willingly. We made a deal."
"A deal with the devil... risky business."
"Tell me about it," I grumble, still reliving the situation the jackass put me in earlier.
He flicks his cigarette away from him. "He's not what I expected. Nicer."
"I haven't played into that act yet. I've seen hints of rage in him underneath all that pleasantness."
"As far as I've heard, he's been out of his mind waiting for you."
"So he's said."
"You don't believe him?"
"I believe he's been missing something and he truly thinks I can fill that void. He will eventually see I'm not all he's made me up to be."
"I think you sell yourself short."
"Says the person that spent over a decade plotting my demise."
"That had nothing to do with you and you know it."
I chuckle, shrugging arrogantly. "Is that right? You know what? A lot about you is a mystery, Akan. Any trust I tried to keep for you disappeared when you tried to murder the man who created you."
Shame moves through his gentle features. "I regretted that the moment I did it."
"Yeah, because it got you killed."
"No." He shakes his head. "No, that isn't why."
"Well, I'm listening."
"I lost sight of everything. Cassandra, I'd strived for this for so long. I sensed him swaying and I couldn't fathom the reason why. I didn't want to... Achille was promising so much, everything I ever wanted and I made a choice. It was the wrong one, not because it killed me... but because it severed me forever from my master, from Damien and Paris."
Holding the cigarette between two fingers, he gestures to his chest, grimacing.
"My heart hadn't beaten for a century and yet, I felt when the cord of creation snapped. It felt like my heart broke. I woke up here, like this, with an ache so deep in my chest that I couldn't move. That pain was the loss of him... the loss of my father."
I stare at him, unmoved by his pain. "You deserved that kind of pain. For betraying him, you deserved worse. He didn't deserve to endure that agony again."
"I know."
"You knew what happened with Angelica. You knew how that almost destroyed him. How could you even think of it?" He looks down, breathing heavily as I unload onto him. "You drained the life out of him. He couldn't move, literally. He didn't for days. He blamed himself. He wondered if he reacted too fast, if there was another way to make you see the light."
He holds up his hand pleadingly, closing his eyes. "Please, I don't want to hear this."
"I could give a fuck what you want to hear, Akan. You're on my shit list."
"Nothing could be worse than this hell."
I shoot him a threatening glare. "Don't tempt me to prove you wrong. Don't push me. You will regret it."
He heeds my warning, falling silent. I shuffle through the small room, refocusing my anger on the ceiling, my hands digging in my hips.
"I am not the woman you knew."
"I can see that," he says, his voice strained. "I can remember when you served me coffee in that diner all those years. God, things were so different then."
"Yes... they were."
"Do you miss those days? Do you ever wish you could go back to that very day and do things differently?"
"Sometimes, but not to spare myself... I wrecked Elijah's life by going to him. Sometimes I imagine him, secluded in Russia, safe, and I wonder whether he would have been better off if I'd never shown up in the first place."
"I've spent countless hours trying to imagine the outcome of the prophecy, if he could succeed in preventing it. He said something like that. I didn't really understand it. Didn't care to at the time."
It dawns on me now that Akan doesn't even know what we've gone through.
He doesn't know about any of it.
I prepare myself for the difficult realities I've lived through.
"We sought refuge with Erika, Caderia's sister," I divulge reluctantly.
"I know her."
"Damien and Paris stayed with us through it all. So did she."
I know he can hear the nippy judgment in my voice because he diverts his eyes tentatively from my gaze. "I'm glad they did."
"Before they could sacrifice me, with their help, Elijah killed all of them. The whole tribunal."
Akan's eyes widen with disbelief. "What?"
"He did it so easily. He was furious. They didn't stand a fucking chance."
"So you got away? How did you assume your power then? How did that lead you here?"
I pull out the chair, taking a seat in it. "In order that I wouldn't claim my power, he stayed behind to fulfill the rest of the prophecy. A sacrifice had to be made. Mine for darkness... his for light."
"What does that mean?"
He looks truly fearful. I understand that fear.
"They tortured... and killed him."
"No," he chokes out in horror. "No. There's no way. They couldn't."
It's strangely comforting to see him genuinely affected, tears building in his tired eyes.
"They burned him at a stake, took him down before he was dead, and then cursed him from The Book of Omens so that he could never be at peace. It took him weeks to die."
He covers his mouth, like he's about to be sick. "How... how do you know that?"
"Because I freed him from the grave and brought him back to life."
Akan's mouth hangs, speechless. I stare at him, feeling emotional myself.
"I couldn't live without him, couldn't function. I went six months before I found him, where they buried him... I had to make a choice. In choosing him, it meant ending my life as a human. The woman you knew died that day."
"And you assumed your life as a god?"
I nod. "In doing so, I allowed Samael into my life permanently. I fed the darkness in me, which at times feels impossible to ignore." I chuckle, cracking my knuckles. "Oh, and I started the Apocalypse."
"My god."
Humming, I agree. My story is insane. "Yeah."
"And Elijah?" Unused to saying his master's given name, the word sounds foreign coming from his mouth, especially laced with so much concern. "Is he okay? He's still the same?"
"He came back with green eyes and serious PTSD, but other than that, he's the same man. He'd fight to the death for anything he cares about."
"You?"
"I'm the enemy, Akan," I whisper. "He won't admit that. He cannot stand to see the humans die because of what I did to bring him back."
"Are these his words or yours?"
I tug on the end of my braid, uncomfortably. "I know him, Akan."
"He killed me to save you, Cassandra. I knew he wanted you, but I didn't know the extent until then... and now that you've told me the rest, I... I've never heard of such devotion. You shouldn't doubt him... and he shouldn't doubt you."
"He's right to," I argue bluntly. "I'm here."
"So the deal was forever?"
I shake my head. "No. Three months."
"That's not bad."
"It is when you're made up of darkness," I hiss as if someone else were listening in on us. "I feel different here. I feel lost. I ache for Elijah but I'm pulled here. There's a sense of purpose, one I've never felt before. I'm scared I'm going to lose myself."
"You will make the right decision."
"And you know this how?"
"I've watched you grow up. I've seen your strength first-hand."
"I'm up against the devil, Akan."
He smiles, amused. "True. Guess you're just fucked then."
His smile is contagious, and as much as I came here with every intention to make him rue the day he died, it's nice to have a connection to my former world... to Elijah. Someone who can understand what it's like to love someone so great, so out-of-reach for our dark souls.
Conceding, I pull myself out of the chair, plopping down beside him, pulling the carton from his pocket, sliding a cigarette out for myself.
"It's been fucking forever since I smoked a cigarette. I usually hate them," I say as I light it myself, sucking in the smoke, forcing breath in order to blow it out.
"Me too. For stress, it was either this, liquor, or hard drugs. Everyone here is on something. Have to be in order to get from one day to the next."
"Is it really that bad?"
"It can be a prison of the mind. Even if the place itself isn't so bad, the memories that are forced on you make it so."
"Samael told me about that. Do people really just go unconscious, wherever they are? I saw people lying on the roads."
"Yes. It's an episode, usually lasts a few hours... just long enough to traumatize someone."
"So, you've had them?"
"Mmm."
"What's your vice? What torments you?"
He looks at me vulnerably. "What do you think I see?"
It can't be. "Him?"
"I'm not at peace... because I haven't forgiven myself," he says uncomfortably. "And I want the torment because it keeps his memory alive for me. It's all I have in this godforsaken place."
Maybe I'm desperate for a friend.
Maybe I actually believe in his repentance. Maybe I don't.
Either way, I feel his loneliness, and can easily match it. I nudge his side with my elbow gently with a restrained smile.
"You have me."
"I was terrible to you, Cassandra. You don't need to do this, to say anything. I'm not asking you to."
"Believe me, you are the furthest ally I could have possibly imagined. I came here planning to torture the fuck out of you."
He chokes on smoke, coughing and laughing at the same time. "That's nice to know."
I chuckle at his sarcasm, laying my head on his broad shoulder. "And if you betray me again, I will make you regret it."
"Consider me sufficiently warned."
He puts out his cigarette on the headboard of his bed, uncaring on where the ashes fall. I bring the drag to my mouth, breathing in. Silence grows between us as the need to converse fades. In his company, I'm reminded of another time. It was anything but simple, but it led me to the happiest days of my life. I hearken in on those feelings, letting the warmth fill the barren holes life has burdened me with.
"He loves you, you know. Still," I confess softly.
It takes me a few minutes to realize the shaking happening in my cheek is his shoulders moving, that his lack of words are a reaction to man losing himself to his emotions. It's such a human thing to do—to sob. Watching Akan break down, holding his hand to his face to conceal it from me, all I can do I stare, relieved that I can still experience pity... and forgiveness.
I always expected there would be tears in hell. But I couldn't have possibly guessed why they'd arise. I rub his shoulders, pressing my chin into the hard muscle.
There have been moments I've wanted to scream at this man.
Moments I've wanted to kill him.
Moments I've overheard him speak that I wish I hadn't.
And yet, right now, trapped in a completely foreign dimension, I can look past it all.
I want to make the pain go away, for the both of us.
That's mostly impossible.
But it's what Elijah would want.
I want to be like Elijah right now.
Akan's cane remains perched against the bed, his leg crooked and unnaturally slender, depleted of tissue and strength. His other leg has begun to shrink as well, but isn't as affected yet. I bend my body, stumping out the cigarette beneath my boot and not wishing to second-guess myself, I reach over and place my hand against his knee.
My energy seeps through my palm into his flesh, and a tingling sensation begins.
"What are you doing?" Akan gasps, now looking at my hand, which begins radiate warmth. The natural glow to my skin brightens as I transfer intention into him. The significant amount fills me with anticipation, so much I begin to feel dizzy.
I pull back my hand as the radiance dulls, enveloping us back into relative darkness.
However now, when we both peer down, we witness a miracle.
He's healed.
His legs are straight, and fill out his clothing. He is healthy. He can move them.
I watch with an exhilarated smile as he rises to his feet without the need for support, sputtering incoherent sounds.
"Wha... I don't... how?"
"I didn't know if it would work!" I laugh, experiencing a thrilling rush when he walks across the small room, testing their agility. Wildly, he looks at me after he strides from one side to the other, his mouth hanging in disbelief.
"Cassandra..."
He bounds across the room and drops to his knees, grabbing my hands, pressing his lips to the both of them deeply as someone would deep in worship before he lets them go to embrace me with a crushing force.
"I... I don't know what to say," he chokes out.
Against his shoulder, my smile cannot be contained.
Because in a time of doubt, I'm in touch with the woman I used to be, if only for a moment.
Even though I cannot see him, Elijah's with me.
And that is worth rejoicing.