Twilight of the Gods ✔️

Chapter 32: The Favorite

A God's Favorite was not always the most obedient angel of the pack. This was something Ezra knew too well when Anhel declared that he would possess the honor of being the best.

He wasn't chosen for being the tamest out of all the demons they domesticated. Perhaps that was the Pantheon's first mistake, a perilous one that would inevitably lead to their demise. No, he was chosen because he was intelligent, a highly unusual trait for a demon even after their domestication changed them into an angel.

But Ezra was nothing like his brethren. He still retained demonic traits after the transformation, such as his blue eyes and sharp teeth. And, even though it wasn't obvious, he also kept his free will.

People, whether they be mortals, angels, demons, or Gods, feared what was different. At first, Ezra relished the feeling of being unique, delighting in the way his appearance frightened his brethren. But as Anhel's Favorite, he had duties, specific responsibilities that required his fellow angels to like him. So, despite what he wanted, he took painstaking efforts to blend in with the pack. After all, his God commanded him to do so. And who was he to deny his master's wishes?

His sharp teeth were the first to go, filed down by serrated strips of iron. It was painful, having his bits of calcium shaped into an unnatural form. He was annoyed at how it made tearing at pieces of meat difficult. He was no longer able to eat with the same gusto as before, an inconvenience that bothered him less over time when he reminded himself that he needed to deal with multiple annoyances daily to convince his God that he was fully stripped of his free will.

"What his master wanted, he desired" was a mantra he repeated to himself often. If he didn't have that mental cue, he would've gone mad from the first day of his domestication.

His eyes were the next thing his master wanted him to change. Anhel said that their "hateful blue" shade bothered him and often requested that Ezra kept his eyes downcast so that he would be more physically pleasing to look at. His God had offered to pluck out his insolent blue eyeballs in exchange for docile gold ones, but he ultimately granted Ezra a minor glamour that fooled the other angels into believing that the effects of his domestication had fully kicked in.

"A cosmetic procedure shouldn't have to be so gruesome," Anhel had said. "Blood should have a greater reason to be spilled."

Ezra didn't care what his master's justification was. As long as he got to keep his real eyes, he had nothing to fear beyond the usual cruelties his God subjected him to. And as long as he remained at the top of the celestial food chain, the pain was meaningless. Power was the only thing that mattered. If it didn't, all of his sufferings would be meaningless.

Of course, this made concealing his free will difficult. He always walked the fine line between doing what his God wanted and following his own path. It made his position as the Favorite precarious, up for grabs at the whims of his master if he misbehaved.

Which was why Ezra shouldn't have been devastated when Anhel declared Uriel to be his new Favorite. He saw the news coming from a mile away, but the announcement still crushed his soul. He wanted to murder his replacement where he stood and gouge out his eyes just as Anhel threatened to do to him.

Instead, he kept a complacent smile on his face. Let the Gods still think he was their obedient angel. Even if Anhel doubted his abilities now, he would change his mind in no time. Being a celestial servant taught him patience that rivaled that of a monk.

So he bided his time, redoubling his efforts to hide any sign of his free will. He obeyed every order, suppressing any form of protest within. He knew that waiting would yield rewards greater than he could ever imagine.

As cracks started to appear in the Gods' hold over their universe, he saw those very rewards unfold before him.

Predictably, unrest had started with Odi's angels. He was always the crueler one of the two Chaos Gods, letting himself be dominated by his violent impulsiveness. He claimed that it made him more in tune with the strands of fate that bound all Gods to their singular universe. Ezra thought it was a poor excuse for his abusive behavior.