Chapter 1

Bête Noire

Noise filled my head and I screamed in hopes that it will drown out the voices. People were yelling, begging to be set free. What they wanted to be liberated from is something I have yet to know. Nonetheless, I am terrified. I turn to my coffee table and slowly walk over to it. I began contemplating on if I should bash my head through it, forcing my head through the glass table and watch as all of glass splatters onto the floor all while blood is gushing out of my head and spilling into a puddle before me. But would that had stopped the screams of agony? Or would I had been haunted by them? Forever trapped in a place that I too would be forced to cry for mercy.

The screams start to merge into one, and then stop. A deep, charming, and quite frankly lovely voice had replaced the hellish voices.

"Behind you!" They exclaimed.

I would have been frightened but the owner of the voice was so relaxing. I almost melted into each word they said. But, as the voice implied they were right behind me. I turned and was met by a man. His golden blonde hair almost lit up my dark room. His features were cascaded by the darkness until his eyes shown a powerful red. I jumped back because there was something about how his eyes glowed that unsettled me. I know of demons who's eyes become flooded with black ink and apparently angels glow a sea blue, but this man's eyes were something else, a bit more sinister honestly.

"Who are you?" were the only words I could muster.

"Morningstar to few, Lucifer to many, Satan to a whole lot more," Lucifer answered.

"Satan? Fucking Satan?" I said, almost screaming at the ridiculousness of it.

"I prefer Lucifer. But yes, I am essentially Satan, Father of lies, whatever you wanna think of me. And you're Lada."

"Yeah. What do you want with me?"

"Oh Lada. You can't be that stupid. Miss Prophet here cannot come up with a single reason why I wouldn't seek her out?"

"Prophet?" I stammered. I mean talking to the big guy upstairs? Not something I do often.

"You must be that stupid then. My mistake," he scoffed. The eye roll that escaped Satan was infuriating. "You know, Lada, those voices you hear are angels. Usually... Those screams you hear I'm not so sure about. Though I wish it was my doing."

"You know nothing of me" I spat. I wanted to walk away except I felt glued to where I was standing. As I tried to fig-it I realized that I was stuck in place. I attempted multiple times to at least move my fingers, yet no luck. From across the room you could hear Lucifer laughing at the situation.

"How's it going over there?"

I said nothing. My face curled into the most unpleasant grimace as I continued my futile attempts at escaping. To see his satisfaction of my current state sickened me. He thought this was all a game, a game in which he was the player moving all of his chess pieces to where he saw fit. He wouldn't care who was hurt in the process, the amount of pawns that would inevitably be taken, but as long as his king was safe, all men could go.

"You know... If you swear your undying allegiance to me I could un-paralyze you."

I was pulled from my thoughts and placed back into the real world. I saw Lucifer grinning at his little comment. The inflection of his voice clearly showed his confidence. He thought that he had won my support.

I laughed in his face. "Undying allegiance? How cute…"

"You will serve me," he growled. His entire personality had changed. What had been a light, 'fun' atmosphere was quickly morphed.

I finally felt the tension in the room and I realized who I was actually dealing with. This was no low-grade demon, this was the head honcho himself. Beads of sweat formed at my forehead. Despite me wanting to keep a calm facade it was increasingly harder to.

"Whatever you want I won't help you," I murmured. I quickly shifted my eyes to the side, unable to make eye-contact with Lucifer.

Honestly, I did not want to upset Lucifer anymore than I already did. He held my life in the palm of his hand, ready to crush it at any moment he so desired. And I hated that he had such power over me while I could do nothing. I was expendable, I held no place compared to him and that mortified me. Everyone learns that Satan is this big bad guy, but that he could do nothing to you so long as you didn't fall into his temptations. Satan really wasn't that strong; yes, he could entice you with such wonderful sounding words, but if you kept yourself on this path of light, you were protected. Yet, here he is, in the same room as me, wanting me to stray from said path. And even if I said yes, I agreed to help him in whatever devious plans he had, what would happen to me?

Lucifer put his head down into his hands and shook it upon hearing my words. Once he let go of his head, his eyes again glowed red, which made my heart skip a beat. He began strolling up to me. He took his time, relishing each second it took, all the while seeing me flounder in place. The confidence he let out with each step was awe-inspiring; he had me right where he wanted. Finally, he stopped in front of me and glared down. He let out a sneer and raised his arm. I watched as his hand tightened into a fist and the pain that followed was indescribable.

I writhed in place for a few seconds. Screams similar to those in my head escaped me; I was begging, pleading for him to stop. But he didn't; he forced me to continue suffering. Suddenly, though, I was no longer paralyzed. I immediately dropped to my knees, but this horrific, agonizing spell still held over me. The only thing I had control over was holding back my tears.

I clasped my hand into a fist and slammed it onto the ground, "Go to hell," I screeched. While I couldn't help but find irony in what I said, Lucifer didn't.

Lucifer only sighed and watched me writhing for a few seconds more, before releasing me. The largest wave of relief washed over me, except, I was still in the presence of my tormentor. I began shuffling away, and almost was able to get myself off the ground and break into a sprint. However, as I was, Lucifer got ahold of me and swung me to the ground. He pinned my shoulders to the hard, wooden floor. It felt cold on my arms, so cold that goosebumps appeared on them. I noticed Lucifer's gripe on me becoming weaker, probably because he thought I was not going to fight back after that, but it was the perfect time for me to. I took my leg and kicked him with all of my might in his stomach. He lost gripe of me and stumbled back, which allowed me to scramble to my feet. I began to make my way towards the door, pushing over everything in my path to leave the room.

"You humans really are annoying pests," I heard him grumble from behind me.

After hearing those words I was hurled into a wall. The impact left me unable to come back up, so I was left laying on the ground once again. I heard his footsteps echo throughout the room before I saw him above me. He crouched down and grasped onto my chin, yanking me from my laying position to sitting up. I attempted to retaliate against him, but he still forced my eyes to meet his dark, sickening eyes.

"I can make this little confidence thing you have going on disappear quick. Watch yourself," he paused and smirked. "You are my little bitch."

I gazed bewilderedly into his eyes. What words could follow something like that? Oh I'm the Devil's bitch. The Devil? Satan? Never-mind that, just being anyone's bitch is disgusting.

"I am not your bitch."

"You're not?" he questioned. That same, hideous, self-loving smile never left him. "How are you not? Don't you see what I did?" he further pursued. He took my head and spun it to see the wall he had indented with my body. "I have full dominion over you. The things I can make you do are so overwhelmingly vile that your little head could never conjure up what I have in store. It's just a matter of when I—"

He was ready to spit more words at me. But he was interrupted by this pure white, blinding light. It devoured the room in its radiance and a high pitched noise rang throughout. Lucifer cursed under his breath and slammed his fist into my face, which seemingly angered the noise, who began to sound off even louder that the house tremored.

Lucifer, for whatever reason, was unable to bear the phenomenon. With a huff, he vanished.

I sat there for a few seconds. My stomach churned with all that he had said. I felt my eyes begin to burn. They watered and stung, but I did not want them to spill over. Except, they did. I laid there just crying out of the intense terror that consumed me. I didn't know what was going to happen to me. And the uncertainty that devoured me made me hate myself; what will come of my interactions with Lucifer?

Yet, that light… that light was my savior. It had delivered me through so much trauma. In times of desperation I saw it and felt good, felt that all would be okay. Now it comes to me again, warding off evils for my sake. Keeping me alive to battle another day.

I knew what had to be done.