The Devil's Assistant (Watty Awards Finalist 2011)

Devil's Assistant [31]

Epilogue

Smiling down at the little boy in my arms, I watched as his eyes became glazed, instantly transfixing upon the flaming candle atop the cake. Lucius was slowly walking towards the table, his eyes fixed on us with a  huge smile plastered upon his face as he hummed the birthday song under his breath. My lips pressed into a thin line to keep me from laughing, he really was sweet when he wanted to be which seemed to be a lot of the time during the recent weeks. He made up one part of my family that now consisted of a small number of people who had become close to me over the last few months. Unfortunately all of the angelic members were gone and probably for a long time. It would be an understatement to say that I missed them but they deserved to go home so I plastered on a smile and waved them off when He had called them back.

Glancing once more at Lucius, I then turned my attention to the other people at the table. Kirsten, who had been at Satani media the day after the battle was wearing considerably more clothes than I was used to but she had some bad experiences due to the effects of the blasted books. She had been held hostage and questioned by cold eyes, most of the time degrading her by making her do immodest things to try and break her spirit. It also meant she had inadvertently learned who her boss truly was but had decided to stick around anyways. I admired her for her bravery but, as comes with knowing about the real world, she was now sealed in a watertight contract like myself and was now my lucky next door neighbour. Lucius had decided he wanted to be close to us so that he could ‘protect’ us so he now lived on my other side. I don’t even want to know how he managed that.

My whole being was in awe that I had even reached this point; I never would have imagined myself sitting here in front of the table with my family waiting to blow out the candle on top of the Bob the Builder birthday cake. I never thought I would be here to see my little boy’s first birthday, I thought I would be gone and the world in tatters while being ruled over by some petulant child with a God complex but here I was and I couldn’t be happier. My face dropped as my thoughts drifted to the consequences of the battle.

It was still so hard to sit on the chair and watch the news.  The world was still mourning over the strange events that had occurred simultaneously over the world. They had explained it away but only those at the battle truly knew what happened. The angels took care of that for the most part. The survivors were given a choice, to remember or to forget. Some chose the former but the majority chose blissful ignorance. Unfortunately for me it wasn’t an option considering my mind had already been altered once before. Apparently too much alteration can be detrimental to a person’s wellbeing. At least that was the excuse that Lucius used for disallowing Gabriel to give me the gift he had bestowed on so many others.

Briefly my mind flitted to Phil. No one had seen hide nor hair of him since the battle. The last they saw of him he was walking towards Zeke and I just as the Book of Eve was destroyed. The most probable answer was he was dead yet I hoped that he was still alive somewhere. After all, his betrayal was only because he loved someone above all else, even if they didn’t return the sentiments. The young teenage girl who I had watched fall to her death was in actual fact his daughter. I suspected she was the reason behind his entire involvement with their little group but still it hurt that he had betrayed us like that. Being a mother and understanding his standpoint however, I tried to sympathise with him. If it was Danny in that position, well I would probably ground him for the rest of his life but if it came down to it, I would do anything to protect him, even if it meant standing by and watching as he did something of questionable moral value. He would get grounded for the rest of his life but, if there was nothing to stop him, I would be there to catch him when he fell because that’s what mothers do.

Catching Lucius’ worried gaze, I painted a smile upon my face and focused my attention of the cake that was sitting before me now, thankfully out of reach of Danny’s eager hands.