The Seed || A Madam Spellman Story

The Lovers, Reversed

"Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it." 

Proverbs 4:23 

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Loving was like breathing, Zelda remembered reading somewhere. Except it wasn't a finished phrase, because trying to breathe without oxygen was impossible. What this mystery author should have written was; "loving was like trying to breath when you are running from the worst parts of it, and you are not particularly athletic."

That made more sense, it was a fuller depiction of what Zelda was feeling in the moment-if she could begin to define it. Trying to breathe on the edge of a war, in the middle of a prophecy, and with a person- a woman, who she was so incredibly angry with and yet, felt guilty for being angry with at all.

Because Zelda understood, or rather, had come to understand that Lilith was fiercely protective of what she thought was hers, and Zelda was hers in almost every sense of the word. Her High Priestess, her friend, her godmaker: and in that totality of being "hers", Zelda thought that she was beginning to lose ownership of herself.

In the breadth of her life, she knew, that it was too easy for her to fall into the pattern of being someone else's time and time again. And it was no different now, no matter the intentions. Zelda was losing herself to being Lilith's, and with it, she had lost her choice over her own life.

As she waited in the same clearing where events often turned on their heads and journies began, soft rain patting around her like sticky dew, falling on her hair in diamonds full of glory she was made to build for others- she waited: contemplative, and angry, and so full of love.

"You'll catch a cold standing out here in the rain like this." Lilith appeared with a worried smile, dressed in the fatal clothes of Hell, a small diadem settled on her head. Not her normal crown, but it was enough of a symbol for anyone to understand her status. 

"It's not so bad. I think it's quite beautiful today." It truly was, the warm rain that came when late spring went to early summer. It would storm later, and maybe Hilda would collect the sparks in jars.

"I suppose it is. It's always nice when the seasons change."

And Lilith was beautiful too, like the changing of the seasons. She contrasted with the softness of everything around her. Plucked from Hell as she was to be put in the center of Eden. Lilith was all fire, heavenly, hell: all flame. Zelda was so very tired of carrying that fire within herself. Couldn't remedy the difference between their first meeting in her dreams: in the garden, and the distance between them now.

"Has something happened, Zelda? You never asked for me after defeating the other two princes of Hell: Aziza and Asmodeus. I would have come."  Lilith seemed on the brink of saying more but chose not to. Zelda almost wished that she would.

"May I ask you something specific, my queen?" Her brow raised at Zelda's formality but enticed her to ask anyway.

"Ask anything of me."

"What are your throne and crown worth to you?" It was a funny question, Lilith laughed.

"They are worth everything to me, of course. This is what I have wanted for thousands of years. What an odd question, Zelda?"

"And there's nothing that would be worth the risk to gamble all that you have now?" She pushed.

"There is very little in the world that would encourage me to sacrifice my place as the Queen of Hell if that is what you're asking." She came closer, holding onto Zelda's hands. It was such a casual gesture, so practiced-their hands together like this. "If you are worried about Lucifer, you shouldn't be. He is my cross to bear, and I will not let him hurt anyone else."