The Devil & Me

6. The Sky and Stars

6 The Sky and Stars

Delilah

It was a while before we made it to our destination, and the whole time was spent in silence while I trailed behind his leading figure… his tall, dark and mysterious figure. It wasn’t all that hard to keep up with him, nor did I trip up very much, and it was still the middle of the night during a new moon. So there was no light, and I could see fine. Oh, crap: Was I really not human?

Up until this point I had never really given much thought or scrutiny to the fairy tale my uncle James told me, but thinking about it, I guess normally, people can’t see anything when it’s this dark with no trace of light, nor are they able to keep their footing in such thick underbrush. But I could, and I bet anything Mr. Mysterious could see even better if the way he was walking through these woods was any indication.

I could finally start to see a clearing up ahead, and thirty seconds later he and I were walking into a grassy meadow much more magnificent than that of my own. There was a narrow cobblestone pathway across from us leading out of the meadow and he kept walking, continuing on the path through more trees while I followed behind him. Again, we left the cover of the forest, only to be met by a grand expanse of gardens, many more cobblestone paths and even a small fountain some distance away, leading up to a gazebo that could easily hold twenty people. Even further in the distance was a mansion at least a hundred feet long. I couldn’t tell how wide it was from here, but it had to be huge.

The whole time I was taking in my surroundings, my eyes were wide and my jaw had dropped. Then something else caught my eye—I stopped to look up at the still dark sky to find the billions of tiny lights that together, were somehow brighter than the sun. The entire Milky Way was visible. I had never seen anything like it before, since the view from my meadow was so limited—but this view seemed to go on forever. I was star-struck—literally—to say the least. I could watch this sky forever.

Lucifer

I couldn’t hear her walking behind me anymore so I stopped to turn around and look for her. I was pleasantly surprised to see what I did.

She was entranced with the view of the landscape, and then she was lost in the stars—and I was lost to her. No one had ever looked more beautiful than she did to me at that moment, her feathery black hair raining down behind her with her head back, a look of pure wonder on her face while her eyes mirrored the stars. Her lips parted as she searched the night sky, amazed, revealing the white unblemished skin of her neck to me as my eyes trailed down her body.

I want her.

But I can never have her.

At least not if I want her to be safe, have a real chance to live the life she wants, the life she deserves. Both of these desires are more powerful than anything I have felt before. One of them bound to eventually win out over the other.

She was the only one that could cause me to act on impulse and do anything that it would take to keep her safe and alive… and potentially keep her happy. But she was also the only one that made me want to protect the innocence she still held, and if she was with me, she could never go back to the life she had.

 I want her.