Chapter 171 A Taste of Light and Ash
The air between them felt thick, charged with the static tension of a gathering storm. Dream let his eyes fall to the hand hovering in the space between them. It was a limb carved from marble and malice, steady as a heartbeat, yet it seemed to radiate a coldness that seeped into Dream’s marrow. When he looked up, he didn't find a brother; he found two twin abysses reflecting his own ruined state back at him.
"Help you with what, exactly?" The words scraped out of Dream’s throat, dry and jagged like broken glass.
Lucifer didn't flinch. His lips peeled back, exposing a smile that felt less like a gesture of warmth and more like the baring of a blade. He leaned in, catching the scent of Dream’s fear a sharp, copper tang that cut through the sulfurous air. To Lucifer, it was the smell of victory. He could almost see the threads of reality fraying, the veil between worlds thinning into a fragile, crimson mist as the ancient nightmare he had once put to rest began to stir in the dark.
"I will give you the details when we are moving," Lucifer’s voice dropped, becoming a low, rhythmic thrum that vibrated in the stones beneath them. "But for now, the question remains: Are you ready to help me put Michael in the ground?"
Silence stretched, heavy and suffocating. Dream moved with the agonizing slowness of a man under water, pushing himself off the stone seat. His bones groaned, a dull ache radiating from a weariness that predated the stars. He stared at that pale hand, his stomach turning. For eons, he had walked the opposite path, fleeing this specific shadow, only to find himself standing in its very center, begging for the dark to keep him warm.
He reached out.
When his fingers finally locked around Lucifer’s, the contact felt like a lightning strike. It was a cold, iron-clad promise a pact signed in the shadow of the gallows.
"I am ready," Dream said, his jaw locking so tight the muscle leaped in his cheek. "As long as Michael’s design is shattered. Heaven and Hell are built to endure their own wars, but the humans... they are fragile. I won't let him burn their world just to prove a point in his."
The Dreaming recoiled at Michael’s presence. The walls of the Nexus once fluid and melodic stiffened into jagged, unnatural angles as he moved. The very atmosphere seemed to sour, turning thick and rancid around the brilliant, mocking gold of his wings. He stood at the center of the convergence, a fracture in the dreamscape, holding an ornate urn that felt heavy with the silence of the dead.
With a sharp, dismissive jerk of his wrist, he tipped the vessel. The remains of Abyssara didn’t fall so much as they hung, suspended in the stagnant air. They were gritty, charcoal-gray, and began to emit a low-frequency hum that set the floorboards beneath Michael’s boots into a frantic, rhythmic vibration.
Michael didn't hesitate. He pulled a jagged blade from his belt, the metal dull and hungry. He dragged the edge across his palm in one swift, violent motion. There was no crimson spray; instead, a liquid light, fierce and blinding, welled from the gash. It fell in heavy, luminous globs, sizzling as it struck the suspended ash.
"Rise," Michael hissed, the word snapping through the hollow hall like the crack of a bone. "I have broken the seal. I have paved the way."
He lowered himself over the churning slurry of celestial ichor and dead soot, his pupils dilated until his eyes were nothing but twin circles of manic white fire. "I, Michael, the Prince of War, claim you. By my blood, you are forged. By my word, you are bound. Wake and serve!"
The Dreaming screamed. A tectonic groan ripped through the floorboards as the Nexus began to buckle. The walls bled shadow. The ash didn't just move; it knitted, weaving itself into a frantic tapestry of obsidian scales and hollow bone. A silhouette began to bloat, expanding until it hit the vaulted ceiling, a darkness so absolute it seemed to swallow the light of Michael’s own blood.
Then came the roar a sound that wasn't heard so much as felt in the lungs. It was the sound of a thousand years of starvation finally finding a throat.
As the echoes curdled in the air, the massive, ink-black shape began to collapse inward. The obsidian scales melted into soft, pale skin; the great leathern wings snapped and folded, tucking themselves into the curvature of a human spine. A man slumped in the center of the wreckage, his chest heaving as he lunged for air gasping, choking on a world he hadn't touched in an eternity.
Abyssara looked at his trembling hands, the flesh new and terrifying. He looked up, his gaze locking onto the Archangel.
"Why?" The word was a tectonic shift, a sound of stones grinding in the dark. "You are the Golden Son. The shield of the Throne. Why bring back a plague like me?"
Michael didn't flinch. He stepped forward, his shadow stretching long and thin over the shivering creature. He leaned into the resurrected beast’s space, his voice dropping into a whisper of poisonous silk.
"Because I want to see the look on Lucifer’s face when his favorite pet bites back."
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Thank you all so much for reading Chapter 171! This was a heavy one to get through. I really wanted to pull back the curtain on just how desperate Dream has become and how far Michael is willing to go to get his way.
Watching the brothers finally shake hands felt like a massive turning point, didn't it?
If you’re enjoying where the story is headed, please don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe! Your support keeps me motivated to keep writing every day.
i have a question for you all: Do you think Michael can actually control Abyssara now that he’s brought him back, or has he just unleashed something that’s going to turn on him too?
I truly appreciate every one of you for taking the time to follow this journey. See you in the next chapter!