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Agrat leans toward me. “So…you don’t evenknowif these are God’s words.”
“Whose else would they be?”
She makes face, mouth turning downward as she shrugs. “Some angel with a hard-on for power.Idon’t know if Satan was even in the room. This is just what you were told, what we’ve all been told. There’s no proof.”
“To demand proof is to question God,” I snap. “I’m not like you.”
“Ask yourself if God would really want this,” Agrat says, gesturing to the demon and Katie. “If He would really want Hisperfect creationto be brutalized this way. Especially by a demon. A perfect, beautiful human, using her God-given gifts and talents to not only better but save the world and mankind. Mankind—His beloved creation.”
Her words drip saccharine-sweet, and the underlying mocking tone isn’t lost on me.
But that doesn’t make what she’s saying…untrue.
“You…you are trying to deceive me,” I spit. “Serpent.”
“That hurts,” she coos, a pained expression on her face. Then it smooths. “The facts are plain before you. No deception needed. Youknowwhat the right thing to do is.”
I stare at Katie. I see what her future is on her current path. She will be dead in approximately three minutes. Her body will be devoured by this demon and two others that will join him, who are currently walking toward this room. She will be reported missing in two days’ time. Her family will be destroyed at the news, though her parents and brother will never give up the search for her. Her father will take his own life in seven years. Her brother will be in and out of jail until he finally succumbs to the darkness that will begin to devour him as soon as he hears of his missing sister and commits murder, which will land him in prison and ultimately death row. Her mother will be the sole survivor of Katie’s immediate family, though in seventeen years’ time, she will become a casualty in the first wave of the infection as it spreads across the country before collapsing the globe, killing billions.
As for her soul, she will be stolen down to Hell. She will spend an eternity on this board, being flayed and devoured over and over and over again. Undeservedly. Like so many before her, and so many after her.
And even if she didn’t have the power, the destiny, to save mankind, everything happening to her now is still undeserved.
There are so many humans who have suffered and been dragged to hell when they don’t belong there. Some we’ve been able to extricate. Others are lost due to the politicking and red tape that plagues our realms. In this moment, it’s not only about Katie, the brilliant virology student who can save the world. It’s about one of God’s precious creations being taken and tortured by the enemy.
He would never want this.
And a darker question that troubles me greatly:Does He know about this?
Agrat’s questions about the origins of the treaty linger in my mind. I am loath to admit it, but they feel less like attempted demonic deception and more like real, valid questions.
Iwasn’tin the room where the treaty was—supposedly—drafted and signed by the two representatives of Heaven and Hell.
I have never heard the words of the treaty spoken from the mouth of God Himself. I have never even seen God in person, or heard His voice. I take orders from my superiors, who take orders from their superiors, who take orders from theirs, and so on, in a seemingly endless chain of command. The assumption, the belief that drives us all, is that these orders originate from the Most High King.
How much of these operations are being kept from God?Arethey being kept from God? Is He truly what the enemy has tried to make us believe all along—that He’s a cruel puppet master and we are all dancing on His string for His amusement?
“Blasphemy!” I moan, stumbling back a couple of steps. An almost physical pain resonates through my body, an alarming feat in and of itself—my body is a projection, a manifestation of the image I want to portray while out of the realm of Heaven. I cannot feel pain as a human does; this is a spiritual pain, the deepest nerve of truth and righteousness being confronted within me with a hard, angry pluck from a giant, unseen finger. But this is not confirmation that my thoughts are blasphemous.
This is confirmation that my thoughts…are true.
Panting, I lift my gaze to the frozen demon, arm cocked back to deliver the kill strike, saliva dripping from its mouth, eyes ablaze with evil delight and lust. Then to Katie, the young woman who never meant to be in this position, her lips nearly bloodless, her weakening eyes holding onto one last spark of terror, of understanding that her life is over and that an eternity of hellfire awaits her—just because she swiped right on the wrong profile.
I see the ripples of what her loss will cause—damage. Death. Disease.
My gaze shifts to Agrat, who has an arm wrapped around the back of the board holding Katie upright. The hand that snakes over Katie’s shoulder plays with bloody locks of hair, and Agrat leans into her, sniffing her razed skin deeply.
She flashes me the wickedest of smiles and nods upward at the demon. “I won’t tell if you don’t.”
Our eyes meet, lock, and a simple beat of energetic understanding passes between us, something I never thought I’d share with a demon. In the single breath of an instant, I raise my sword. Agrat unfreezes time. Katie’s scream pierces the room. I slash off the demon’s arm holding the dagger. The demon roars in agony and whirls to me, eyes wide, viscous black blood spurting from the stump of his arm.
I snarl and plunge the blade directly into his throat. His eyes blacken, his face melts, and his body dissipates into heavy black smoke.
Agrat leans over and spits on the remains, and it ignites in flame before extinguishing and leaving behind a smoldering, greasy smudge on the floor.
Katie’s going into shock.
“Time to use that heavenly power of yours, angelface,” Agrat says, loosening the straps binding the human woman to the board with a wave of her hand.
