PART I
“It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness.”
—LEO TOLSTOY
PROLOGUE
THE UNNAMED ANGEL
For over two thousand years, I’ve been burning alive.
When torture is ignorable and death is only temporary,timebecomes our ultimate currency—and deprivation of it is the highest form of discipline.
Unless, that is, the Creator intervenes.
Then we suffer a punishment truly befitting archangels.
His Holy Fire consumes much more than the vessels we use to interact with the world. It blazes through our very spirits, cleansing us on a level that exceeds physical boundaries. We surrender our individuality, willingly, to become numb to the pain, the hopelessness, the loss.
There is little I remember from before; little left of who I once was. I died here in every way that mattered.
The Great Deceiver,they once called me.The King of Lies. I held a mirror to all creation, and the angels blamed me for what they saw. They wanted someone to be responsible for the darkness, so they gave it my name.
Twenty archangels marched from Heaven during the Fall, so twenty were punished with a fate worse than death.
I watch, now, as everyone but me is released from their long suffering. On our island in the endless lake of fire, I sit at the summit of misery. I remain in a cage of brimstone while their broken chains fall to the ashen ground around me.
Oh, how they rejoice.
I am not the first thought in anyone’s mind. Not with the taste of freedom on their tongue. They weep with joy, singing praises to the Almighty. No longer numb, no longer in agony—the truth of ourpunishment is so soon forgotten. The angels who betrayed us are only a distant memory.
Except for the ones who misplace their blame on me.
Semyaza, the one who originally led the Fall, heads straight for me, a snarl resting on his returned face. His rage-filled eyes greedily take in the flames that I’ve become, barely left in the shape of a soul.
“How apt you should remain in Purgatory,” he says to me. “Had you not lusted for power, we would have been able to continue our lives in peace. You have brought this upon us all, and you deserve exponentially more torment than we do for it.”
A voice is difficult for me to form from the flames, but not impossible. It takes to the air in a hiss and a crackle. “I lusted no more or less than you did?—”
“I did notrapeandmurdercountless innocent mortals!”
I resist the urge to scoff at his unchecked temper. “There is no such thing as an ‘innocent’ tyrant. I merely allowed my followers to escape their own oppression, and I did nothing that a woman did not explicitly ask me for. Your prejudice in extramarital affairs clouds your judgment.”
“Your lies have no hold over me, Deceiver. You are nothing but a wretched sinner.” Semyaza emphasizes his point by hurling a ball of spit at me, smug satisfaction filling his face as it sizzles in the flames. “The Creator has made His Divine Will clear. You will rot in here for the rest of eternity, and I will smile at the thought of your pain. It is the only thing I have left to bring me such joy.”
He tilts his chin up before immaterializing out of the prison realm in a flash of light.
Spineless fool.I should not have wasted my energy arguing with him. He and his people will never be brave enough to face the truth. Even now, they flee without a second glance in my direction.
He who does not stand for something, stands for nothing.
I willalwaysstand for free will.
Soon, there are only a few left in this godforsaken realm. I don’t doubt their reason for lingering. Their loyalty to me was hard-earned, and it is even harder to lose.
Still, I give them an open invitation—one that can be declined.
“Come, if you may.”
