"If I make you a body, I'll only ever ask one thing of you," Issa said. "Tell Edvardiel the truth."
Compared to her offer, her request was nothing. She could only imagine the lengths she'd have to go to retrieve his remaining body parts and the energy she'd need to expend to create an entire body—and one for an angel, no less. She had no idea if she'd manage it.
She half expected him to laugh and ask her where the catch was but Lucifer went unnaturally still.
He was quiet for so long that she began to second-guess herself.
Why? He stared at her with those bright eyes, his torn feathers drifting to the ground.
The question set her teeth on edge. Because Edvardiel deserves to know the truth? Because you're his damn father and you owe it to him? She bit her tongue. "Edvardiel thinks Michael kept him alive out of fatherly concern."
Something shifted in Lucifer's eyes, and his angelfire flared for a moment before it died again. His wilting wings were stiff. If it pleases him to think so, I see no need to correct him.
"You want me to finish off Michael." Issa tried not to think about what that meant. "How am I supposed to do that now?"
Lucifer shrugged. He likes you. I imagine it won't be difficult to earn his forgiveness.
That was the last straw.
She glared. "Why won't you just tell him?"
A flash of irritation crossed Lucifer's face. The boy is finally doing well. Why would you throw a distraction his way? Did meeting your father bring anything good into your life?
He gave her no chance to answer.
For months, you were inconsolable. Your glory became so unstable that my endless favours to Eve were reduced to keeping you in line. You hurt the humans around you. You hurt yourself. He glowered at her. Meeting Michael nearly ruined you.
There were so many things she wanted to ask him—what happened to Eve and Adam, how she'd ended up in Hell, why he'd owed Eve so many favours…
She forced herself to focus on the matter at hand. "You're not like Michael."
No, I'm not, he agreed. And I plan to keep it that way.
He melted away.
"Lucifer!"
Her eyelids flew open and she was on her bed, drenched in sweat.
God the seraph was impossible.
"You realise letting Michael take your place is worse than actually telling him the truth?" she hissed furiously into thin air. "You're a coward!"
Bloody feathers floated in her vision.
Worse in what way?
She paused, startled. She hadn't expected him to answer. He sounded impatient but she could sense his curiosity—it seemed he truly didn't understand. Issa found it mind-boggling.
She picked her words carefully.
"You're letting Edvardiel care for someone who doesn't care about him," she said. "By not being there, you're letting Michael do to Edvardiel what he did to me."
Silence.
"You were a better father to me than Michael ever was," she snapped. "At least you didn't try to kill me."
More silence.
"When you were with me, I eventually stopped destroying things, didn't I?" She was guessing now, desperate for an answer. "And you were nicer than Eve." She waited. If the bloody feathers weren't swimming around the room, she'd have thought he'd disappeared.
To her relief, Lucifer answered.
I told you, I'm always nice. His dryness was back but she thought he sounded rather flattered.
Issa tried not to roll her eyes.
Of all her comments, this was the one he'd latched onto. Being nicer than Eve. It shouldn't have been a compliment.
Lucifer's feathers fluttered. Very well. I agree to your terms.
"You'll tell him?" Issa could hardly believe what she was hearing.
After you give me a body. Lucifer enunciated each word slowly, as though he, too, were being careful. Not before.
"Sure," Issa said enthusiastically. If he had a body, he could help them with the Apocalypse. Having a powerful angel on their side could only be a boon.
Lucifer paused. If you wish to do this you must do it soon. I cannot help you. I've expended too much energy—I will return to my slumber to give you more time.
By energy, did he mean life force?
"You mean all this time, you've been using what's left of your life force to talk to me?" Issa said incredulously, thinking back to all of their inane conversations.
Had I left you to your whining, what's left of my life force might have died with you, Lucifer retorted. One last thing, child. Do not bother with Heaven. A human body will suffice.
With that, the feathers vanished.
Issa stared at the ceiling in disbelief. He'd agreed. He'd fucking agreed. Now she just had to figure out how to create a body. Too excited to rest, she jumped out of bed and raced down the stairs.
"Edva—," she began, and stopped.
Her angel was fast asleep on the sofa. He was curled on his side, his wings wrapped around him completely like a fluffy quilt. She stared down at him, wondering how he managed to look so angelic and human-like at the same time. His right wing twitched, a glow flaring in his sleep and she reached to touch him before pulling her fingers back.
He looked utterly exhausted.
Well, of course he was. He'd made two glory gates, fought a horde of demons, threw a bunch of people into the dungeons, tried to fly to Heaven, and then spent the last few nights looking after her. All that after mere hours of getting his wings back. She wondered if the Eden fan club had been chasing after him too.
Quietly, she crossed the room and picked up the book that Mike had left on the table. A Complete Guide to Angels. She frowned. Wasn't this the same book she'd found in the antique store? There was the picture of Michael's explosive flames with a brief description of the king of angels. She searched for Lucifer but the entire section on fallen angels had been torn out. As for the other seraphs, no one's glory except Michael's was described in much detail.
So much for being complete. The book didn't even list its author. For all she knew, it could be utter crap. Without much expectation, she turned to the glossary.
Eve.
What was her mother's name doing in a book on angels?
Issa flipped to the page and found Eve in a section called Descended. It was all the way at the back, right before the torn-out Fallen section.
Eve: Guardian of Earth. Gift of Life. Life is a finicky gift. It requires a great deal of energy and oftentimes fails without a source material.
Issa rubbed her neck. How was she supposed to get source material for a body? She'd grown Edvardiel's wings but she supposed the source material had been his wing bones. What kind of source material did she need for Lucifer's body? Were his feathers enough to make a whole body?
She put down the book.
There had to be more information than this. Mike must've gotten the book from somewhere. Was there a library in Eden? She glanced at Edvardiel's sleeping form and didn't have the heart to wake him.
She left him a note and slipped out, silent as a shadow, through the open window. The sun warmed her skin and the wind blew pleasantly against her face. The grass was soft beneath her bare feet and bird calls echoed peacefully through the trees. When she reached Edvardiel's rose-gold gates, the glorified metal allowed her flesh to pass through like a shadow.
It was strange how such a small thing moved her close to tears.
For once, she didn't feel like an intruder in this beautiful garden.
She could bring Edvardiel's father back. She could force Lilith back to Hell. The power was at the tips of her fingers, she just had to figure out how to channel it. For the first time in her life, she felt a bright spark of hope.
She'd barely wandered a few feet away from the inner gates when her Acolyte senses caught the distinct whiff of weed.
Jacob?
She followed the scent through a meandering path that led to a row of beautifully flowering trees. Leaves rustled in the wind but there was a stillness in this place that made the hair on the back of her neck prickle.
"Issa?"
She nearly jumped out of her skin.
Jacob sat cross-legged against one of the flowering trees, a joint in his hand. "Fancy meeting you here." He blew a cloud of smoke into the air, looking, as Jessica had said, high as a kite.
"What are you doing?" Issa asked, her heart racing. Her hands were curled into fists, burning with unleashed glory. She could've killed him.
Jacob took another drag of the joint. "Just exploring Eden's graveyard." He gestured beyond the tree he was leaning against, and sure enough, marble headstones peeked out from beyond it. "Do you realise how many angels are buried here?"
The Fallen. The ones who'd turned into demons once their glory had run out.
"I found my angel ancestor," Jacob said. "Samyaza, the watcher angel. There's a guardian angel somewhere up the line too, but I don't know their name. I wonder which one they are. There are so many dead guardian angels. Rows and rows of them."
His eyes were bloodshot—and it didn't look like it was all weed. He looked like he'd been crying.
She came closer. "Jacob. Are you all right?"
"Eden's grave is there too, you know," Jacob mumbled. "Right at the back. I wonder if they'll make a grave for us if we die."
Issa took the joint out of his hand. "I think you've had enough."
Jacob looked up. A soft glow of something that wasn't quite glory shone in his eyes as he took her in. He had the look that Alice sometimes had—as though he knew something he couldn't quite put into words. "You're looking for something," he said. "Tell me what and I'll help you."
Issa gave him a once-over. "Why don't we help you first?"
"Because helping you will help us all." He staggered to his feet, swearing as he stretched out his stiff legs. "I saw the glory in the skies. You're Michael's. You can help us stop all of that." He gestured at the headstones again.
She quirked a brow. "Who told you that?"
"Samyaza was a watcher—they're the angels of knowledge. When I'm… relaxed, some of that knowledge flows into me. That's why I need this." Nimbly, Jacob took his joint back and took another puff. "If you mix watcher powers with a guardian angel's instincts, you get someone useful like me." He flashed her a grin. "Tell me what you're looking for."
Issa considered her options. She didn't have time to waste and her gut feeling told her that Jacob could help her. Plus, he probably wouldn't remember what she said.
"I need to know how to make a body," she said.
As expected, Jacob was too high to be fazed by the question. "What kind of body? Human?"
"A body that can hold an angel."
Jacob rubbed his eyes. "Huh. Then you're better off making a Nephilim body. You could add wings to those." He jabbed his joint towards the graveyard. "Should be enough parts in there for what you need."
Issa didn't know whether it was the watcher or the weed talking. "Okay."
Jacob rubbed his neck. "Hold on. You also need Eve. You need the power of Life." He took another pull and then squinted at her. "Hold on, hold on. You grew that cherry tree…" He blinked a few times as though trying to put two and two together. "If you combine the power of Life with glory, you could potentially make something close to an angel body. Although it's never been done before…"
Issa was convinced. High or not, Jacob seemed pretty spot on.
While he was lost in thought, she headed for the gravestones. There were lots of names but no indication of whether the buried person was angel, Nephilim or human. She glanced back at Jacob, who'd gone back to sitting down and smoking. She didn't have watcher powers to tell her who was what. She wasn't going to risk using demonised angel parts. Using human parts seemed risky too—could human parts truly hold an angel? That left Nephilim parts.
She knew only one Nephilim for certain.
Slowly, she made her way to the gravestone at the end.
Eden.
Edvardiel's mother had a gravestone like any other. There were flowers on it that looked a few days old—Issa wondered if Edvardiel had left them there. Issa stood in front of the grave for a long time, feeling conflicted about what she was about to do.
"You would've wanted him to know the truth, wouldn't you?" she murmured. "And Lucifer doesn't seem so bad. I think he'd help us stop the Apocalypse."
As she set to work, she hoped neither Lucifer nor Edvardiel were going to ask her how she'd made the body. The rich, soft earth parted easily beneath her fingers as though the garden itself were giving her permission. Issa had barely started to dig when she reached something wooden.
The coffin had been buried surprisingly close to the surface.
Strange.
Issa brushed the earth away from the latch and removed the pin. Taking a deep breath, she raised the lid, only to find the coffin empty.
For several long seconds, she stared, stupefied.
The crunch of branches echoed behind her. "You went straight for Eden's grave," Jacob marvelled, the joint between his teeth. "What's…" He blinked blearily and then pointed at something lodged at the edges of the coffin's cushion. "What's that?"
Issa pried it free and held it up.
It was a finely wrought choker. The material vibrated in her hands, glinting the unusual gold of glory. Perhaps most telling was the fiery feather hanging from it like a pendant. When she touched it, shards of memories entered her mind, sharp and unpleasant.
"Your key, Eve." Long fingers draped the choker around her neck, Michael and Eve watching each other in the mirror as the jewellery was absorbed into Eve's flesh.
Eve touched her now-bare collarbones. "I wouldn't need a key if you'd Descended with me."
Michael turned his back to her. "How could you ever ask me to Fall?"
The scene changed.
Eden's face twisted with rage. "I trusted you. For years, you knew I was looking for my son and—"
"You don't know that he's in Heaven," Eve said.
"You strung Lucifer along!" Eden shouted, beside herself. "All along, you've had a key to Heaven and yet you kept making my husband useless earthly wings that would disintegrate at Heaven's gates while extracting favour after favour—"
"Unlike you, Eden, I have no means of controlling the Nephilim in my care," Eve said delicately. "I did what I had to."
"You could've asked for help," Eden said. "I have glory too. I would've helped you with your daughter. But it's so much more convenient for you to leave my son—" She flushed gold, speechless with anger. "You're heartless. You and Michael deserve each other. You both belong in Hell!"
"You're right," Eve said. "I prioritised my Nephilim over yours. She's far more powerful and far more useful for the future."
"Shut up!" Eden's hair crackled with lightning. "If you say another word, I'll kill you where you stand. You will go to Heaven. You will find my son. Don't even think of getting out of this, Eve. I will find you and I will turn you to dust."
There was a clap of thunder and the circle of trees surrounding them were reduced to ashes.
Eden's eyes burned with fury.
"You are no longer welcome in the Garden."
Issa dropped the necklace as though it burned her.
She was sweating, and she looked wildly around to see if Jacob had touched the feather. If he'd seen what she'd seen. But Jacob had left her side, busy scouring the other graves, taking deep puffs of his joint as he did so. Finally, he stopped at one grave. "I think these remains would work," he said, turning to her, his eyes unfocused and gleaming with a watcher angel's knowledge.
Issa wiped the sweat off her forehead and, with trembling hands, she stowed her mother's necklace into the angel dress. She'd think about it later. Right now, she was on a mission to make a body.
A quick family tree recap: Eden and Lucifer are Edvardiel's parents. Eve and Michael are Issa's parents. Eden is a Nephilim herself—she's the daughter of Samael (a seraph) a human woman named Annalise.
Thank you to JoVersify for helping me a ton with this chapter! And thank you guys so much for sticking around and reading and commenting. Can't tell you how much I appreciate it. Sorry for the late update, I'm still getting used to having four 24h shifts a month, it's been pretty tiring and yesterday I was in surgery until 2 in the morning.
