Heaven and Hell

TWELVE

D E V I L ' S  P L A N

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THAT NIGHT, LUCIUS felt particularly sour. The bones beneath his skin ached, mind throbbing as a thousand thoughts raced across them, and no matter how much he tossed and turned in his sheets, sleep was an escape that he could not quite reach. Begrudgingly, Lucius sat up straight in his bed, pulling his knees closer to his chest as he ran a frustrated hand through his hair.

Even though the moon was already high up in the air, surrounded by the sparkle of a million stars, Lucius had yet to set out on his journey to the sacred spot in which he met up with Adelia on most nights. In fact, Lucius had not even wanted to do such a thing.

After all, what would be the use of it?

The angel of night was an entity that could never belong in his arms. She was the magic of the wind, caressing his face but never within his grasp. If she was the wind, Lucius would have to be the trees. No matter how strong the trees were, they still bent in the direction of winds fierce and wild. One look from her would send Lucius weak at his knees, crumbling his entire being into nothing more than fragments of what he once was.

Heaving a great sigh, Lucius carelessly threw his covers off of his body, swinging his legs off the bed in which he rested on. All of his life, Lucius had never felt his body as heavy as it was now. It seemed to pull his entire soul down deep beneath the ground, filled to the brim with dread and fatigue that Lucius had never thought was humanly possible.

If there was a pain more severe than what he was feeling at the moment, Lucius did not know of it. All he could think about was the crack that split his heart into two, separating both sides and crippling his soul at the very core.

However, there was still an annoying voice that spoke at the back of his mind. It begged and pleaded him to go to the very spot in which he had spent most of his existence loitering around. If he was digging through even the minutest of corners to head there before he had witnessed what he did during the day, he was doing the exact opposite now by attempting to convince himself not to go to Heaven's Falls.

However, whatever argument he had put up with himself was all to no avail. Lucius was drawn to Adelia like a moth to a flame. Wherever the fire burned, he wanted to be near it even if it meant that he would be burnt by the heat.

In no time, Lucius found himself moving like clockwork. He had thrown on a simple white cotton top, pulling the sleeves up to his elbows before rushing out of his quaint little hut and taking off to the skies. It took him less than five minutes to reach Heaven's Falls.

No matter how many times he had already been at the sacred little spot, he still found the view breathtakingly beautiful. If the North Garden was hailed as the most magnificent garden of all of Heaven, the Heavens Falls would be the grandest icon of the realm. Like the North Garden, not a lot of angels dared to venture so near the edge of the realm. They all had one common fear.

They feared the fall.

The process of losing their wings and turning into a monstrosity like nothing before was never a thought that angels entertained. Loitering so near the edge of Heaven was to flirt with death, a concept that immortals never fancied. Yet, being so near to the possibility made Lucius alive.

There was no other location that could rival the view that Heavens Falls provided. It was the heaven in Heaven.

Before Lucius's feet had even grazed the emerald grass, Adelia had already turned around to look at him. Slowly, the light in her eyes sparkled in the dark, dancing like a brazen flame which knew no limits. Her red lips slowly curled into a sirenic smile, hands reaching up to comb her long black hair backward before she gracefully rose to her feet with a powerful flap from her wings.