In
my world, there are certain rules to follow if you want to survive,
even under Lucifer's watchful reign. Especially with Lucifer.
Everything is in it's own particular order in Hell, because that is
the way he likes it. I suppose one cannot be a good ruler if one
does not set the rules. You cannot simply go around wreaking havoc,
even in the underworld. It is something I learned early in my time
with him, and one I have carried around with me all these years.
Nicholas's
father, Tristan, has never cared much for rules. Once, many moons
ago, he was an archangel of the highest order, and he answered only
to the big man Himself. Unfortunately, he fell in love with the
daughter of a very powerful god called Poseidon; god of the sea,
ruler of all things aquatic. Poseidon of the infamous temper, who
would fling his fury to the farthest corners of the universe at the
drop of a hat. Penelope, his daughter, was a beautiful half-mortal
with eyes the color of the sea right before a storm and hair so black
and glossy it seemed spun from pure silk. It is easy to see why
Tristan fell for her. Besides being a beauty, however, she had the
kindest heart of anyone he had ever known and, in fact, her kindness
played a big part in how they met.
Tristan's
official archangel title was Angel of Mercy, and part of his job was
to lead those who were hanging onto life by a thin thread to their
next home; a surprising amount of people who are dying don't know
they are doing so, and cling to their last breaths with one final
surge of strength, which often causes them unnecessary pain.
One
balmy March afternoon, Tristan was dispatched to the northernmost
shores of the Atlantic Ocean, where a man had fallen off the side of
a boat and come very close to drowning. The tide quickly pulled him
up onto the beach, but he had inhaled so much water that his lungs
were about to collapse. Tristan found the man easily enough, but was
surprised to find a beautiful woman at the man's side in the sand.
He had been told that the man was alone. He cautiously made his way
to where he lay, loathe to frighten either of them.
“I
tried to help, but he was too far gone,” the woman said, without
turning to look at Tristan. Her pale hand was still on the man's
forehead, and Tristan reached out to him with his mind to discover
that the woman had given him images of his family as he lay dying.
His fear had abated enough for him to move on.
She
turned to look at him, her waist-length hair as dark and shiny as the
underside of a crow's wing, and he saw tears in her eyes. “I
couldn't help,” she said. “Sometimes I can.”
He
knelt beside her and gently stroked her cheek, touched by her
feelings for this man, whom she didn't even know. “You helped
him,” he said softly. “You took away his fear, and that was the
greatest thing anyone could ever do.”
She
turned to the dead man and placed a kiss upon his forehead. His
eyes, Tristan saw, were mismatched; one blue and one hazel. He
reached down and closed them and wrapped his arms around the woman's
shoulders. The wind was picking up, and he could smell a storm on
the salty air.
Or
perhaps, he thought, it was just her scent. The idea was oddly
comforting, and anyone watching the two of them would have seen the
unmistakable look of love in his eyes.
He
did not find out until much later that she was Penelope, daughter of
Poseidon, and by then it was too late. He could not have abandoned
her any more than he could have cut off his own wings. Needless to
say, it was not a blessed union. Tristan was banished from
Heaven forever, and his wings were taken, along with his title
and most of his powers. He took a fall from grace to be with the
woman he loved, and they decided to run away to the one place the
would be allowed to live in peace: Eden.
Soon,
though, Penelope was with child, and, although she and Tristan tried
to keep it secret, her belly gave her away not far into her sixth
month. The others who had taken refuge in Eden were relatively
peaceful beings, and wanted no trouble; they were, however, outcasts
themselves, and had nowhere else to go. They knew that the
possibility of Poseidon imposing his wrath upon their small community
once he learned of the unborn child was great, and therefore began to
treat the lovers as though they had a communicable disease. Tristan
tried to ignore this sudden change in his neighbor's demeanor, but it
all came to a head when, in the dead of night, a fire was set in
their little patch of lawn. The word “leave” had been scorched
into the earth.
And
so, fearing for Penelope, who had entered her ninth and final month
of pregnancy, Tristan struck a deal with his God, the one who had
banished him from Heaven without a single hesitation; he plead for
the protection of his unborn child, for if he and Penelope were to
stay together, they would have only one place left to go. On the
outskirts of Eden, exactly one hundred and two miles as the crow
flies, was their last resort. Hell awaited them with open arms, like
a jilted and forgotten lover.
But
Tristan did not want his baby to be born under the ever-watchful eye
of Lucifer. He begged his lord's forgiveness, and asked for grace
upon the child's head; he promised to leave Eden for good in exchange
for the child being born there.
Penelope
was devastated, for, although she would have rather fallen upon a
dagger than have her baby born in Hell, she couldn't bear the thought
of Tristan leaving her. She begged and cried and screamed at
Tristan, pleading to let her go with him, but he remained firm. They
would not stand a chance with Lucifer, Tristan knew; the simple,
happy life they had led up to now would be a mere memory. So,
although it broke his heart to do it, he made arrangements to leave.
He packed up their only horse and cried the first tears of his long
life, tears he had not even shed upon his exile from Heaven, and held
his pregnant lover the way a drowning man might hold onto a life
buoy. He begged her forgiveness, but she would not, could not, speak
to him. Her sorrow was so great she began to fear for the life
inside her and the toll her emotions must have begun to take on it.
He
did not ride away into the sunset. He stole away, like a thief in
the night, barely making a sound as he rode southeast, through the
forests of Eden. Penelope watched his steadily dwindling figure
until all she could see was a tiny black speck atop a slightly bigger
black speck. The moonlight was so silvery bright upon her shoulders
that her alabaster skin seemed to glow, and she looked every inch the
goddess that she was. Had Tristan been able to see her then, he
might have been struck momentarily blind by her beauty.
She
placed a hand upon her belly and breathed in the perfume of the
moonflowers all around their cabin. The pain was coming in waves
now, and she knew it wouldn't be long before her perfect boy, her
Nicholas, would be born into the world. They had known it would be a
boy from the beginning; Penelope had a certain gift of sight, and had
delighted in informing Tristan a month into the pregnancy that their
wish had come true; they were to have a male child, one third each of
angel, god and mortal descent.
He
was born into the hands of a midwife named Lily, and Penelope slept
for a full day after thirty-two hours of labor. Lily, a rotund
redhead who had lived in Eden for more than a century, later told her
husband that it was a wonder the child had come out at all; he had
been born feet first, with a wild tuft of his mother's black hair and
two tiny, perfect, downy wings attached to his shoulder blades.
Penelope
died three years later. Nicholas found her in her bed, with all the
appearances of having fallen asleep. He climbed up beside her and
breathed in the clean scent of her hair, which always smelled of the
beach, and tucked his tiny child's hands beneath her chin. He slept
that way, and when she did not wake up to feed him his supper, he
began to cry, a sound so mournful that it woke their nearest
neighbor, who lived two miles away.
As
I have said, the people of Eden keep mostly to themselves. No one
discovered Penelope's death until two days later, when passerby began
to notice a horrid smell emanating from their cabin. Hearing
Nicholas's now feeble crying from inside and concerned someone might
be hurt, a man by the name of Artemis Drake pushed open the front
door to get the shock of his young life: Penelope's body had begun
to decay, and Nicholas, though frightened and hungry, had not moved
from his spot beside her on the bed.
It
was decided by all that the best thing for the child would be to get
him into Heaven, at least while an investigation of Penelope's death
was conducted. He was sent away with Hermes, a messenger between
worlds, and taken to live with others like him. He flourished in
Heaven, for a while. But he is truly his father's son, and soon he
grew to think much like his father. He became rebellious and lashed
out at those who had once been so close to him.
And,
like his father before him, Nicholas was sent from Heaven. He was
not banished, however; he simply needed what his God could not give
him, and only Lucifer could: a parent.
We
met in Hell on the day of a great celebration. Beautiful music
filled every cavern and reached its notes into the deepest pits.
Strange, I know, to think of Hell as filled with beautiful music, but
there is much that has been falsely written of Lucifer and his lair.
Certainly, he loves a party as much as any mortal, and does not need
a cause to celebrate.
That
day, however, was the anniversary of the first time I met Lucifer,
and there was a celebration to be had in every room in his castle;
for the thirsty, like me, and for the lustful, and for the hungry
demons who feed on the souls of the Lost Ones.
It
was a fateful day, to be sure, and one I will always remember
clearly, no matter how old I live to be. When you meet an angel in
Hell, it tends to stick with you.