“How may I be of service?”
Lucifer bowed as he took my bloodied hand in his and licked up the blood. A wide grin was plastered on his face.
I wasn’t usually one for mental freak outs but I felt like this was a good moment to break that habit.
Lucifer was in my bedroom. This man appeared out of thin air. The logical side of me argued he could’ve entered through my window, but even then, that side couldn’t explain how he climbed into the window on the second floor.
And did he just lick my blood?
I yanked my hand back and wiped my palm against my Chat Noir pajama pants.
“What do you want?” I glared even though my heart was pounding rapidly within my chest.
“You tell me,” he smirked. “You’re the one who summoned me.”
I felt my face burn. Why did my brain decide to stop functioning right now, of all times?
Someone, please kill me now.
“I need answers, and you’re going to give them to me,” I said like someone out of a cliche action movie or something.
A perfectly groomed eyebrow raised. “Oh? And what’s in it for me?”
“Information doesn't require anything to be given,” I said, sounding far more confident than I felt. That was good.
“Not quite,” he said, crossing his arms. “I don’t need a life or anything, but I do require a favor. After all, I’m taking time away from my schedule to be here.”
I bit my lip. What if his favor was awful and cruel? Would I be able to do it?
“Fine, I’ll owe you a favor if you do this for me.”
“No can do.”
“What?” I exclaimed, jerking back at his words. “Why not?”
“There’s nothing you could offer me that would be worth my while.”
The familiar black and blue smoke— which had been swirling aimlessly around him— began to rise.
“No, wait!” I panicked. “I’ll make a deal with you!”
Movement paused.
“I’ll make a deal with you to… to…” My mind went blank and I grasped at the first thought that made itself known. “I’ll make a deal with you to pay off my parents’ debt.”
That wasn’t what I’d had in mind, but I took it and ran.
“My parents won’t pay the price you gave them, it’s too much. But I— we can negotiate something, come to an agreement? Please, tell me how I can save them. Is there another way they can keep living without having to kill anyone?”
Lucifer took in a deep breath. “What will you give me if I answer?”
“My life.”
The words hung between us like an oath.
“You really care about them, don’t you?” Lucifer asked.
“Yes,” I said. “I’d do anything for them.”
I felt like I was watching myself from somewhere far away. I couldn’t do anything as I sold my soul to the devil.
“Even ruin everything they’ve already done for you?”
His words cut through my self-sacrificing mindset. Ruin everything? I was setting it straight, undoing their wrong.
Wasn’t I?
“Look, I made the deal with them all those years ago,” Lucifer said. “They damned themselves to keep you alive. They knew exactly what they were doing. Now here you are, ready to make that all be for nothing by offering me your life in order to save them. There’s nothing you can do.”
“You’re lying!” I accused.
“Enough!” He bellowed. I folded into myself. “They’re going to die anyway, because of me or old age, so why does it matter to you? Who are you really doing this for?”
His words were like punches straight to my heart.
I bit my lip and met his gaze. Despite his harsh words, his eyes were swimming with sympathy. I shook my head— my mind was drowning with so many uncertainties.
“I will not go back on the deal I made with them,” he said softly, as if knowing that anything louder would break me.
“I can’t live without them,” I whispered, looking down at my hands.
“You’re going to have to learn how to unless they pay the price I asked of them. They could’ve bargained, anyone can when making a deal with one of us, but they didn’t.”
“They didn’t even let you finish speaking.”
I looked at him when he didn’t reply but he was staring out my window. My heart sputtered at the way the light seemed to wrap around him in an embrace. He was too perfect for this world.
He was trying to take my parents away from me.
No, that wasn’t true. It was just easier to blame him for my misfortune that it was for me to accept that my parents willingly gave up their lives for me.
It was too much to handle.
“Please leave,” I breathed out.
Lucifer’s attention snapped to me. His glare was vicious but within seconds his smoke engulfed him and he disappeared.
The stinging in my eyes had me blinking rapidly as I made my way to the summoning circle. I blew out the candles and took them back into the bathroom.
Not bothering to clean up the salt, I took a black hoodie from my closet and made my way out of my room, out of the house without any trouble.
I breathed in the night air and started walking.
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