“Are you sure I’m enough to make it inside?” I ask skeptically.
“You have enough archangel blood in you to close the gates. You’re one of us.” Lucifer’s hand lands on my back. “Just don’t touch anything, okay?”
“As long as there’s no flashing buttons, I should be good.” I give him a tight smile and glance at Julian, who nods. Lucifer and I walk together through the archway, and the enchantment that prevents anyone but archangels feels like we’re walking through freezing cold mist. The sensation passes after only a second or two, and when I turn, I see Julian standing just feet from us, looking worried.
“I’m fine,” I assure him, but he doesn’t respond.
“He can’t see or hear us anymore.” Lucifer adjusts his collar. “Neither can demons if they were to enter the hall. Yet another fail-safe. You’ll come to find Hell is very secure.”
“Stop trying to convince me to stay. I revoked my Queen of Hell status, remember? And besides, wouldn’t it be really obvious that Hell had a new ruler? It would be a giveaway to my murderous aunts and uncles. They’d fly right down here and kill me.”
“Not if they thought you couldn’t escape.” Lucifer shrugs. “They can lock you up just as they did to me.”
“But you escaped, though…maybe…maybe they want you to escape,” I say, thinking out loud. “I mean, if they wanted you really truly trapped, wouldn’t they be able to? There are a lot of archangels but only one of you. If they wanted to keep you locked up forever, wouldn’t they have done it?”
“I’m not sure what your definition of forever is, but centuries alone in a god-forsaken place makes you realize where that phrase god-forsaken comes from, if you know what I mean.” He flicks his eyes up. “Thanks for that, pops.”
“I do, and I don’t think it’s fair that you’re stuck here.”
Lucifer’s pace slows, and he turns, looking at me with pinched brows. “Yet you want me to stay.”
“Someone has to, and I don’t know what the solution is. I’m sorry, okay?”
“I know you are, and…and thanks.”
I run my hand right above a golden railing as we go up the stairs. “Who locked you up the first time?”
“Most of my siblings at the direction of our father.”
“And the most recent time?”
“Your loving father and our sister Haniel.”
“My father?”
“I don’t blame him,” Lucifer says, but I’m not quite convinced. “He had to follow orders or others would suspect something was up.”
“Haniel,” I echo. “How many aunts and uncles do I have?”
“You have fift—fourteen—aunts and uncles.”
“Right. Remiel is…is…hidden down here somewhere?”
“Not anymore,” Lucifer informs me. “The story of Bael killing him was believed by the others, and his body was recovered.”
I go up a few more stairs, mind whirling. “You know, I thought getting knocked up by my vampire husband would be the most unbelievable thing that would ever happen to me, but being here and having this conversation takes the cake.”
Lucifer chuckles. “It’s not the life any of us imagined for you,” he says softly. “From the first time I held you in my arms, I knew you were something special, just like your mother.”
His words hit me right in the heart. Right, Lucifer helped my parents hide me after they asked him for help. “Thank you, again. I also never thought I’d be thanking you as much as I have.”
“We’re family, Callie. That matters to me.”
“Me too.”
He looks at my stomach for a second. “Speaking of family, how are things with those horrible Martins? Did you think about how you want to torture them yet? You might not be the queen, but if I’m here by the time they check in, I’ll give you free reign.”
“I haven’t thought about how I’d torture their souls, but I, uh, have thought about various was to get revenge.” I smile, though I know I shouldn’t. “Not that long ago, I crashed Scott’s engagement party and slipped everyone truth potion. There were a lot of politicians there, along with so-called friends. Though I doubt they are friends anymore after I asked everyone what their honest opinions on Scott were.”
“Clever,” Lucifer tells me with a grin. “You’re more brain than brawn. Never underestimate the power of psychological warfare.”
I almost laugh, but recent events are way too sobering. The Horseman War is on the loose, and that game is right up his alley. “Lucas says I’m too merciful on them. The Martins, I mean.”
“You are.”
“What am I supposed to do, though? Turn Scott back into a cat and actually follow through with getting him neutered…and declawed on all four feet?”
“Ohhh, in a twist of events, physical torture may be your thing after all.”
“What can I say? I’m a double threat.” We make it up the stairs, and a fire suddenly starts in a large fireplace before us, lighting up the area. There are seven small doors, looking almost out of place in the grand hall the fancy stairs lead us to. A large book is on display in front of the fireplace.