Risen: Beginning of a Legacy

Chapter Twenty Nine: Satan

Three weeks. For three long weeks, Satan had withdrawn. His followers and faithful legions of Horde had remained mainly within his seven realms of Heh-el. The realms themselves were now bursting with the restless Horde. He waved his hand and a vheil to the happenings on earth opened up before him. He watched impatiently as it focused and the image cleared. As all his recent viewings had done, the vheil fell upon the oldest two academies.
     It seemed that still only he and his brother were completely aware of the great shift in their ongoing chess game. For once, all the pieces were on the same board. Satan waited, his index finger tapping against his lower lip, the only outward sign of annoyance, as the image in front of him shuddered into sharp focus.
     The girl he had thought dead at infancy filled the screen and he cursed, the dark language acid on his tongue and the menacing ripple that came with it caused the great cavern he stood in to rumble and the ground crack open.
     Since the storm his pupil had unleashed, almost two months had passed and the Angelus Academy seemed to be opening its doors to new options. This made the mystic element of his brother's earthly army more proficient. More irksome.
     The girl he watched now was transforming, and those closest to her were likewise blooming. Their advantages had begun to rise and Legacy indeed threatened him and his oncoming Judgement.
     Legacy.
His brother's infernal loophole in their agreement, the secret failsafe the Primordial had forged so long ago, was a sting Satan couldn't abide. He hated that in this one thing, his brother had outsmarted him. By ensuring the full truth of what Legacy was had never been written down, never told to just one soul, but to three and then the clues scattered into the world like rare gems dropped into a vast ocean of stones.
     He had only one piece, locked safely away until all his Vessels could unlock it's secrets. However, where the other two were... only time and the work of his brother's pieces in their long game, would they be revealed.
     'Uriel... Lucifer. Come to me,' he snapped.
Irritation bristled in each word. Within his playne, if he so wished it, his voice would resound throughout all of the realms at once. As he turned away from the vheil, two matching flashes of distorted light heralded the arrival of his two finest acquisitions.
     'What do you require of us, Master?' Lucifer asked, his head dipped in respect.
     'Legacy. As you know, it draws close.'
     'And with it Judgement, your chance to take back the playnes denied you.' Uriel offered.
Her words came fast and Satan saw her eyes lock onto his and assess the level of irritation in his chest, revealed by the stormy look of his gaze. But her words did soothe him a little as intended, reminding Satan of his own insurance policy.
     'Yes, that also is closing in on them all.' Satan smiled, 'Alecto's power is growing, but if he is to be my sword in this oncoming Judgement, I believe he needs to see the power and enjoyment aligning with me can bring.'
     Satan glanced over his shoulder again at the vheil. Within it, the newest group of candidates; Warrior, Demi God and Angyali alike were untarnished by his brush. It was time they all came face to face with a fraction of what he could do, all he could unleash, and what they had foolishly signed up to face.
     'Can we have some fun, then?'
Uriel's dark pleasure aroused him instantly. Her hunger for malice and pain were outstripped only by his own. Lucifer released his wings with a willing smirk, the dark venom in his look brought a soft laugh to Satan's lips.
     'Make sure Alecto aids you, but also include him in the chaos. The time for his revelation has not yet come. And he needs to be tested...' Satan commanded, 'if he succeeds in this, and Cassida...' He paused, his thoughts shifted but as he watched a couple of the Angyali candidates laugh together, he sensed his Hunger and his Death tense at the mention of Cassida. Satan chuckled; they were right to be nervous of War.
     'That one from her collection,' he began, his finger pointing out a blonde haired, lavender eyed danger he had somehow not accounted for. 'She is a complication, necessary, for now, but let's diminish her somewhat... Enjoy this, and see it done.'
     His two best weapons bowed low and in a shared flash of onyx and silver lightning they shifted from Silence Glade, away to a place unprepared for their vengeance. 'As they suffer, Legacy will be delayed... Most pleasing.' Satan whispered to himself.
     In the image he'd opened, his disciple, cloaked in the shadows he'd now mastered, watched the female of his desires parry and spar with another candidate. Alecto's soul was soiled but as long as he was drawn to the female angelus to be, he could be redeemed. And that, Satan would not allow.
     'Legacy shall rise, unless all hope falls, and falls and falls. When their souls' true light dies. Legacy shall rise, or it shall fall. Until nothing but War, and Famine, Death and Pestilence destroys them all. Legacy shall rise, or it shall fall.'
     Satan chanted his own failsafe to himself, once, twice and a third time, his mirth and murderous intent filling every word. After five thousand years, the impasse was dying, waning away as the cycle of the moon did. His finest hour of darkness, his reign would come soon now and as he looked at the face, her face, he was glad that her death had not happened. For now, he could finally unleash all that he was, wanted and intended to be.
     'Evangeline,' he shivered, speaking her name for the first time, 'I will enjoy, watching the destruction of you.'
     Satan knew a time would come when either she would fall from the light, or Alecto would have to give her up. Either way it went, Satan relished the knowledge that one day, he would be able to kill another favourite of his brother's ArcAngyali.

He lived for the moment he could rip her heart from her chest and parade it to all that put faith in her.

                                                              ~