Page 66 of Anarchy
“Thank you for doing this,” she whispered.
She also snuck in a pinch to my bottom when she hugged me. I’d always loved aggressive women, and Ripley was just perfect. They disappeared to find the perfect spot of grass with a good view of the stage.
Lilith was created after me with different gifts. I didn’t presume to think she was less powerful than me because she was younger. I didn’t consider her less than me because she was a woman either. I was pretty sure Lilith was created around the same time as the god who bullied her, and he was trying to make himself look more powerful by being an ass.
This was her realm. Lilith created it and kept all of us out unless she wanted us here. She used unique magic than we did when we created the universe. As a result, there were several of us pooling our powers and contributing something different. I was happy to do whatever she needed me to do to heal her realm.
Samael appeared with another basket. He kissed Lilith’s forehead, handed her the basket, and went to join Lucifer and the others on their blanket.
“Tell me what you want me to do.”
Lilith pulled a jar of what looked like blood out of the basket. She painted a sigil in the middle of a circle and stepped back.
“There are candles in the basket. Can you help me put them on each point of the sigil? I’m going to need to share your magic the way Ripley and Ravyn do.”
I wasn’t even angry about that. Ripley and Ravyn did it all the time, and it was beautiful to watch. If Lilith just needed me to stand there in this circle painted from blood while she used me like the device Balthazar always had on him to keep his cell phone charged, I’d be honored to do it.
It didn’t take long to place all the candles. Lilith snapped her fingers and lit them. Was that sandalwood and lavender? It was lovely. Lilith stood at the center of the stage and addressed the crowd.
“Everyone, this is a significant moment in our history. Samael and Lucifer are the only people here who were alive when I created Hell. Today, all of you get to see Reyson, and I fix a dying sun. All of you are now free citizens. Enjoy the moment, but look at us, not the sun. There’s bound to be an occurrence that hurts your eyes. One shouldn’t look directly into the sun, even if it were dying like ours. Just feel the warmth on your skin and enjoy it.
“Use this moment to move past anything you were holding onto. That goes for Hellhounds and demons alike. I know plenty of you want vengeance. Some of you deserve it. I’m asking you to please, for the sake of this realm, to put it aside. Let this new sun usher in an era of prosperity and peace.”
The demons looked uneasy at first, but all the Hellhounds started clapping. I wouldn’t have blamed them if they wanted to kill their oppressors, but all the Hellhounds were here, and demons vastly outnumbered them. The demons I’d met might not want to admit when they had lost, but the Hellhounds seemed to not even want to risk anyone for the sake of revenge.
The demons looked around like they had just hit the plot twist of a gripping novel. They looked like they couldn’t believe the Hellhounds were clapping for peace instead of shifting and trying to fight them. That must have been quite the propaganda slam when they started smearing the Hellhounds here.
The demons got into the clapping too. I was betting some of them knew full well what they were doing was wrong and was against all this because they thought there would be a reckoning if we freed them. If there was, it was going to be from Lilith. The Hellhounds just seemed to want to enjoy their freedom and find their families for now.
Lilith let the applause die down and stepped into her circle. She held out her hands and nodded to me.
“Are you ready?” she asked.
I was always ready to help out most of the other gods.
46
Bram
Ipulled Ripley into my lap and winked at Balthazar to snuggle close. I wrapped an arm around her waist and used my other hand to play with Balthazar’s hair. Talvath was sitting on the blanket with us. Talvath’s seer Anod rarely left the house because he said people gave him bad vibes that sometimes triggered visions, but he was here too. Everyone I cared about was here to watch this with me.
I looked around with a small smile. I wasn’t the only one. You just didn’t go through what these Hellhounds went through with each other for that long and not start developing feelings. Some of the younger Hellhounds had paired up and were snuggling.
None of these Hellhounds knew who their parents were or where their children were, but that didn’t mean another Hellhound hadn’t stepped up. There were older Hellhounds on a blanket looking proudly at some that were snuggling, and there were some pups out there that didn’t know if they were allowed to play or not.
Two elderly Hellhounds had a blanket with four pups laying on it. While Lilith and Reyson were setting everything up, they took them by the hand and introduced them to all the other pups out there. I was hoping to see them wrestle and play, but it didn’t take long for Lilith to set up what she needed and address the pile. The pups were adorable as they dog piled on their adoptive parents. They were still young enough to not quite have everything beaten out of them yet.
I didn’t think I’d ever see this day. Hellhounds were sitting among demons as equals, and the demons weren’t doing a damned thing about it. They weren’t even scowling at them. Instead, they were enjoying a picnic in Lilith’s amphitheater while something pretty major happened. Some of them even shot smiles to some of the younger Hellhound pups when they got a little loud.
Lilith gave her speech, and Reyson stepped into the circle with her. They joined hands, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up at the power pulsing from the stage. I’d seen Reyson use some of his gifts before, but I knew that was nowhere near the extent of what he was capable of.
It was pretty much an honor for everyone here to be witnessing this. There were countless different religions on Earth right now, and some had some pretty devout followers. They prayed, asked for guidance, and gave those gods credit for every good thing that happened in their life. There was all this devotion, and I was certain Lilith wasn’t the only god who had briefly retired. Likewise, Reyson wasn’t the only god who spent ages in the Aether not listening.
It was honestly a total mind fuck meeting both of them. Yeah, they were powerful, but they were also… normal? Reyson fiercely protected those he cared about like I did. He could be passive aggressive when he wanted to be, and he had a twisted sense of humor. There were countless ways to kill Dorian that didn’t involve coating Felix in glitter, but he went there anyway. I’d been in the room when Felix and Balthazar were trading barbs, and it was pretty fucking funny.
Lilith had been flexing her powers without telling us much of her plans, but she had plenty of love to go around. It was obvious when she looked at Samael. She could have asked me to stay and be her representative. I would have done it because it was the right thing to do. Instead, she found a better alternative because she wanted me and everyone at the library to be happy. She didn’t give birth to me, but she still considered me her child.
The black candles surrounding Lilith and Reyson flared several feet in the air, then the two of them started glowing with an almost blinding light. I could only see their outlines and couldn’t look directly at them without hurting my eyes.
