Chapter 165 The Weight of Gold
The words wouldn't stop. They hammered against the inside of Selena’s skull, rhythmic and cruel. You are the only one that can set her free. She looked at the thing standing in the center of the room. It wasn't Lilith not the Lilith who tripped over her own feet and made tasteless jokes until Selena doubled over laughing. This thing was a hollowed-out shell, a statue of obsidian skin leaking thick, oily ribbons of smoke.
Lucifer’s voice remained, a cold oily residue in her mind. You are the only one.
"Lilith?" Selena’s voice cracked. The silence in the room was heavy, smelling of ozone and burnt sugar. Lilith didn't blink. She didn't breathe. The dark smoke rolled off her shoulders, pooling on the floor like spilled ink.
Selena took a step, her boots clicking sharply on the stone. "I’m sorry. God, Lilith, I’m so sorry." She stopped, her hands hovering in the air between them, trembling. "I was blinded. I let the anger take over... I wished for you to be gone, but I didn't mean this. Never this."
The demon remained a statue. No heartbeat, no recognition. Just the slow, rhythmic pulse of the shadows clinging to her skin.
"I know you’re in there," Selena whispered, her voice growing desperate. She closed the distance, her heart thudding against her ribs like a trapped bird. She reached out, her fingers brushing against Lilith’s hand. It felt like touching dry ice searingly cold and unnatural.
Selena didn't pull away. Instead, she lunged forward, throwing her arms around the smokey figure, burying her face into a shoulder that felt like stone. "Come back to me. You’re the only one who ever made this life bearable. You’re human, Lilith. You’re kind, and you’re stubborn, and you’re mine."
Hot tears spilled over, soaking into the dark, misty hide of the demon. As the droplets touched the smoke, something shifted. The salt and grief ignited. The tears didn't just wet the skin; they began to glow, turning into molten gold that raced like wildfire across Lilith’s chest.
Lilith’s back arched. A sound tore from her throat not a human cry, but a screech of grinding metal and dying shadows. She slammed her palms into Selena’s shoulders, throwing her backward. Lilith hit the floor on all fours, her body convulsing as the gold light chased the smoke away, burning it into nothingness.
The room went still. The smoke vanished.
Lilith stayed on her knees, gasping for air as if she’d been underwater for years. She lifted her head, her eyes finally clear, searching the room until they landed on Selena.
"Where... where am I?" she rasped.
Selena didn't move, a shaky, tear-filled laugh escaping her lips. "Welcome back."
Monica stepped back, her hip hitting the edge of the wooden table. "A child? I think you’ve confused me with someone else."
Monica’s gaze swept across the room, desperate to anchor herself in the familiar. She saw the dust motes drifting lazily through the shafts of afternoon sun and heard the rhythmic, domestic hum of the kettle on the stove. This was her life. It was a life of silence and soft edges, a solitary existence that fit her like a well-worn glove.
"I’ve lived here for years," she said, her voice small against the weight of his stare. "Just me. No children have ever walked through that door. There are no echoes here but mine."
Michael didn't flinch. He remained standing by the hearth, watching her with a pity that felt sharper than any insult. A ghost of a smirk pulled at his lips, but his eyes remained cold and analytical, tracking the frantic pulse in her neck as if he were looking at a machine he was about to recalibrate.
"Memory is a fragile thing, Monica," Michael said. He took a slow step forward. The air in the cottage seemed to thicken, the walls pressing inward as his presence expanded to fill every corner of the room. "Especially when my brother is the one who took it."
Monica shook her head, her back pressing harder against the table. "Your brother? I don't know what you're talking about. I don't know who you are."
"I know," Michael murmured, his voice like the low vibration of a bell. He raised his hand, his fingers steady. "But I can’t let his lie continue. I won't let you live in a house built of smoke."
She moved to bolt, to scramble toward the door, but he was faster. His palm connected with her forehead, his skin radiating a heat that felt like a sunburst against her skull. A blinding surge of white light swallowed the kitchen, the sunlight, and the stove. The quiet of the cottage was drowned out by the deafening roar of a thousand rushing rivers crashing through her mind.
In the suffocating depths of the City of Dis, the air suddenly turned to ice.
Lucifer’s hand flew to his chest, his fingers clawing at the fine silk of his doublet. He buckled, his knees slamming into the obsidian floor of the throne room with a crack that echoed like a gunshot through the empty hall.
A sharp, metallic tang flooded his mouth. He lurched forward, a violent convulsion racking his frame until he coughed, a spray of dark, crimson blood spattering the polished marble beneath him. He stared at the red droplets, his breath coming in ragged, shallow heaves.
The tether was gone. He could feel it the intricate, delicate fog he had woven around Monica’s mind had been incinerated in a heartbeat, burned away by a light he knew all too well.
"Michael," Lucifer hissed. He forced himself upright, his boots slipping slightly in his own blood. He wiped his chin with the back of his hand, his teeth stained pink as his eyes ignited with a renewed, lethal fire. "How dare you touch what is mine."
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