Chapter 102 Ashes
Cain set the pyre on fire herself.
No one else wanted to do it. They all stood around arguing about ceremony and tradition and what their father would have wanted, voices rising in the courtyard until Cain walked up to the massive wooden structure and let flames pour from her hands.
The fire caught immediately. Her father’s body, wrapped in his finest robes and laid on a bed of wood that had taken hours to build, began to burn.
“Cain, we were not ready,” Azrael said, his voice tight.
“He is dead. We burn him. That is what we do.” Cain did not look away from the flames. “The rest is just performance for people who need rituals to process grief.”
“He deserved better than this,” Lucian said.
“He deserved to not be stabbed in the back by someone he trusted.” Cain finally turned, and her eyes were bright with more than just reflected firelight. “He deserved to die in battle or in his sleep surrounded by family, not bleeding out on a carpet while his murderer escaped. But we do not get what we deserve. We get what we get.”
No one had a response to that.
Lilith stood at the back of the gathered brothers, watching smoke rise into the Vestibulum’s perpetual twilight. She should not be here. This was family business, private grief. But Azrael had told her to come and she had not known how to refuse.
The smell was worse than she expected. Not unpleasant exactly, but thick and heavy and impossible to ignore. She tried breathing through her mouth but that just made her taste it.
Belphegor was not here.
He had refused to attend, had locked himself in his chambers with Morpheus’s silk-wrapped body and would not open the door for anyone. Mammon had tried. Asmodeus had tried. Even Azrael had knocked and received only silence in response.
“He will come out when he is ready,” Beelzebub had said. “Leave him alone.”
But watching six brothers stand around a pyre that should have had seven felt wrong in ways Lilith could not articulate.
“We need to talk about what happens next.” Azrael’s voice cut through the crackling flames. “The kingdom needs leadership. Armageddon will attack soon. We cannot afford to be disorganized.”
“We just lit our father on fire five minutes ago,” Mammon said flatly. “Can we have one hour before diving into politics?”
“We do not have an hour.” Azrael turned away from the pyre to face his brothers. “Every moment we delay is a moment Armageddon uses to prepare. We need a plan.”
“The plan is simple.” Cain crossed her arms. “We find Malachi. We find Sera. We kill everyone responsible. Then we burn their kingdoms the way we are burning Father.”
“That is revenge, not strategy,” Lucian said.
“Revenge is a perfectly valid strategy.”
“It is an emotional reaction that will get people killed.”
“People are already dead!” Cain’s voice rose and flames licked up her arms. “Our father is dead. That sprite is dead. Sera is missing. How many more people need to die before we are allowed to react emotionally?”
“I am not saying we should not react,” Lucian said, his tone careful. “I am saying we need to think before we act.”
“I am done thinking. Thinking did not save Father. Thinking did not prevent any of this.” Cain looked at each of her brothers. “We were too busy thinking and politicking and playing games while Malachi walked around our home planning murder. Maybe if we had acted instead of thought, he would be dead and Father would still be alive.”
“That is not fair,” Azrael started.
“Fair?” Cain laughed, sharp and bitter. “You want to talk about fair? Lilith told us Malachi was the traitor. She said it clearly. And we ignored her because we had already decided it was someone else. We executed Theron for crimes Malachi committed. That is not fair. That is us being stupid and arrogant and now Father is paying the price.”
Every eye turned to Lilith. She wished she could disappear.
“She was right,” Mammon said quietly. “We should have listened.”
“Hindsight is useless.” Asmodeus was leaning against a pillar, watching the fire instead of his brothers. “We made a mistake. A catastrophic one. Dwelling on it will not bring Father back or tell us where Sera is.”
“Then what do you suggest?” Azrael asked.
“I suggest we stop pretending we know what we are doing and admit we are terrified and angry and completely out of our depth.” Asmodeus finally looked at them. “Father held this family together. Without him, we are seven individuals with conflicting goals and no unifying force. That is a problem.”
“We have a unifying goal,” Beelzebub said. “Destroy Armageddon.”
“Do we though?” Asmodeus pushed off the pillar. “Because I am hearing a lot of different priorities. Cain wants immediate revenge. Lucian wants careful planning. Azrael wants organizational structure. Mammon wants to grieve before making decisions. We all want different things and without Father to mediate, those differences will tear us apart.”
“So what, we just fall apart?” Cain demanded. “Let Armageddon win because we cannot agree on strategy?”
“I am saying we need to decide right now what matters most. Finding Sera. Preparing for war. Establishing succession. We cannot do all three simultaneously with the resources we have.” Asmodeus looked at Lilith. “You were closest to Father at the end. What did he say? What were his actual last words?”
Lilith’s throat went dry. Every brother was looking at her now, waiting.
“He said Armageddon was coming. He said to unite the kingdoms. He said I was right about binding the seven.”
Silence fell. The pyre crackled.
“He was dying,” Cain said finally. “His mind was probably not clear.”
“His mind was perfectly clear.” Azrael’s voice was hard. “I was holding his hand. He knew exactly what he was saying.”
“So what, we follow the dying wishes of someone who was wrong about his most trusted advisor?” Mammon asked. “Father’s judgment was clearly compromised if he missed Malachi’s betrayal.”
“That is different,” Azrael said.
“Is it? We ignored Lilith when she told us the truth about Malachi. Why should we listen to Father when he tells us something we do not want to hear?”
“Because he was our father,” Lucian said.
“And Lilith was right,” Beelzebub added. “She was right about Malachi. Maybe she is right about the binding too.”
“Or maybe she is wrong and following that path will destroy us.” Cain looked at Lilith. “No offense, but you are asking us to completely restructure how kingdoms have functioned for centuries based on a vision no one else saw.”
“I am not asking anything.” Lilith’s voice came out steadier than she felt. “I told you what the prophecy means. What you do with that information is your choice.”
“Convenient,” Cain muttered.
“Enough.” Azrael’s voice cut through the rising argument. “We are not making decisions while standing around Father’s pyre. We will reconvene tomorrow when emotions are less raw.”
“And in the meantime?” Mammon asked. “What about Sera?”
“We keep searching. Every resource, every contact, every method we have.” Azrael looked at each brother. “But we also prepare for war. Armageddon will not wait for us to find our missing and mourn our dead. We need to be ready.”
The pyre was burning down now, flames lower but still hungry. Lilith could see her father’s shape beginning to collapse inward as wood gave way to heat.
This was wrong. All of it. They should be unified in grief, not fracturing into arguments. They should be focused on finding Sera, not debating politics. They should be better than this.
But they were not better. They were just people, even if some of them had wings and others had fire in their veins. They were scared and grieving and looking for someone to blame and Lilith had the horrible feeling that person might end up being her.