Of Light And Shadows

Chapter Twenty Two...

Mammon caught her just in time as the other Devils were released from Satan's hold. Her legs refused to support her any longer so she leaned on him as she sobbed.

"He'll be okay," Asmodeus said. He was the next one to reach her and he took her hands in his as she trembled in Mammon's grip. "Lucifer can't be killed by that. He'll wake up in a day or two." She watched as Bee and Levi lifted his broken body and vanished, leaving nothing but a pool of blood and the stained knife behind.

"I've got her," Mammon murmured. He lifted Jia carefully and hopped into the shadows as they rose up around him, stepping out of them in his bedroom. He sat on his bed, keeping her against his chest like a small child as she continued to cry.

"I told you to close your eyes, doofus," he murmured, stroking her hair back from her tear stained face. He'd been right. She should've listened to him. She wanted to tell him that she was sorry but she couldn't get it out around the sobbing. "Ssh. It's alright. The worst bit's over now."

Eventually she stopped crying and just sat there for a while. He waited patiently, still stroking her hair as he let her compose herself and process the awful, horrible things she'd seen. She could feel Lucifer's blood where it had dried on her cheek.

"I should have listened to you," she said hoarsely. "You were right. I'm sorry."

"You don't need to apologise. I understand why you wanted to be there." He shuddered gently. "Satan's punishments are always horrible. We're just lucky he didn't obliterate Lucifer's body or he'd come back as a child again." His shoulders rose and fell as he sighed. "Asmodeus was telling the truth when he said Luce would wake up in a few days. He'll be sore for a while but he'll be alright."

"It was just so horrible to watch."

"He takes a beating better than the rest of us," Mammon muttered. "Anybody else would've died when their skull got stood on."

"I heard his bones break," she choked out.

"Don't torture yourself." He lifted her off his lap so he could stand, and she watched as he disappeared into his ensuite and reappeared a moment later with a damp cloth. He dabbed her cheek clean before he spoke again. "What happened to make my father come here like that?"

"It's complicated. Lucifer wanted to keep it from you and Bell because he didn't want you to get in trouble. I understand now why he was so worried about it." She cast her eyes downwards and sat back on the mattress, twisting her hands nervously in her lap. "During the Uprising my mother was kidnapped and enslaved by a Demon."

"Your mother is Seraph Lauviah, right?"

"Yeah. And Abaddon is my father. He's held her captive since Satan led the rest of you against God. He was forcing her to give up her energy to give him more power and using her for his own entertainment." She frowned.

"And he's been doing that since the Uprising?" She nodded and Mammon grimaced in disgust. "Ouch."

"She fell pregnant and I was born. Right from the moment I could understand, I knew he hated me. As I got older he started to hurt me and use me as a slave while he kept my mother trapped. The night I lost my memory he tried to kill me. I was twelve and I was so terrified, I rejected everything that had happened to me. I ran and the first thing I remember is walking barefoot through the streets in the cold."

"So Lucifer took that beating because he went back with you to free your mother?" Mammon asked softly. "Is Lauviah safe now?"

"He called Archangel Michael here to collect her," Jia nodded. "I think if Satan had known about that he might have actually obliterated Lucifer."