Radicle (Terminal trilogy #2, can stand alone)

4: Lessons in astrology

 I could recognize the zodiac. This became very useful in identifying the many demons who sat in the meeting room- they all wore small pins to identify their standing, or else had their astrological sign engraved on their nameplate. The Pisces immediately ushered me to sit down at the table head, and the rest of them simply stared me down.

There were five men and five women. Some of them seemed to ring in my mind, from paintings and stories that I had long known- that man, the one who had the sign of Libra on his nameplate but not his lapel, wasn't he of the famous aviinox? The two demons who tore through angels like paper and wore our blood on their faces? The man next to him, the Virgo, seemed to be his partner. But it was hard to tell. They cleaned up nice.

And the women- I was still adjusting to the sheer quantity of them- well, one of them seemed to echo in my mind. But I couldn't place her anywhere, not with a clear moral conscience, at least. And her name, Moll Manly, was utterly false and unknown to me.

"Sit." Said Pisces after a moment.

I gestured to myself. "Nichael."

A few of them looked confused. But there were so many of them that I couldn't be bothered to take note of each one's feelings.

"Glenn Illuzi." Said Pisces, taking my hand into hers and shaking it. She was a horrifically scarred woman. Someone had taken a knife and an hour to her face in the worst sort of way. Still, she seemed confident.

"Nichael." I said, settling down. I didn't understand her need to introduce her name in this situation. As long as I could refer to these demons by their associated zodiacs, I didn't need their names. Sure, it was impolite, and I felt a bit bad about that. But I made an exception for demons.

The man next to the Pisces, the Aquarius, took a moment to shake my hand next. "Logan Doyle."

Was I going to have to do this with all of them? "Nichael."

Someone laughed. It was the Scorpio. He took my hand next. "Michael Withers."

I frowned. That sounded like some sort of revolutionary propaganda. I decided to tell the Scorpio this.

"Michael will never wither. He is strong. He is immortal. He will gather your soul and make it into wine and drink it. Your armies will watch, and quake."

Scorpio let go of my hand immediately, and then looked at it like it had just told him the secrets of the universe.

"Oh dear." Said the Leo. "I think you've upset him." Was she talking to me or Scorpio? "Nichael, he didn't mean to make you angry. His name is Michael Withers."

I flinched at the unwarranted use of my name by her. "I knew that."

"Let's do business." Said the Virgo. There was a sort of collective glance to the Libra when this was said, and he sighed. He had a large grey scar stretching from his mouth to right below his eye. Many of these demons had scars, it seemed. Angels didn't have scars. Raphael healed us all.

"It's been five years since we've tried this sort of thing. And hopefully, this time it'll go better. We're not sure how much you know about the last meeting, but unfortunately there is little to catch you up on. Nothing happened. That's the end result. But since there's been a nice gap period, I guess we've decided to go ahead and give peace another shot."

"I wouldn't say we're giving peace another shot-" Said the Gemini.

"Shut up Marie." Said Sagittarius.

"-More as getting it shoved down our throats, again. The Few almost split in half last time we even thought about peace talks. And also, five of us died. Why are we tempting fate like this? Or have you forgotten what happened the last time we let an angel inside Hell?"