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A lot happens in a very short time at RAD.
You make your first pact with a demon within a week. You’re nearly killed by another within two. Two weeks, two pacts, the evidence of your bonds with these people who are still all but strangers permanently writ into your skin. Now, as you lie awake in a bed that is not yet familiar to you, you trace the lines of their sigils, the swirls still foreign to you. Avaritia. Invidia. They didn’t hurt when they appeared, although they itched a bit like a healing tattoo. They no longer itch and still don’t hurt, even though your sprained wrist does, the bruise that blossoms over it sore and tender to the touch. You were lucky to come away from your fight with Leviathan with only that injury, you know.
Or perhaps “luck” is not the right word when it was not fate that intervened but rather another demon. Lucifer, despite all the coldness he has shown you so far, still saved you when you needed it.
Honestly, you don’t blame Leviathan for attacking you. Not really. That was your goal, after all, to work him into such a fury that he unleashed it upon you. The beings you’re living with are demons; you knew that from the start. Still, being confronted by the full force of one was a different experience entirely compared to simply knowing that they could attack and kill you at any moment. You aren’t scared of them, but…
It is difficult to get the memories out of your head.
The way Leviathan’s eyes flashed cold as he lunged at you. The snarl of his mouth, jagged teeth bared. He apologized for his actions later, and you forgave him and meant it when you told him you wanted to be friends with him. But still, as you lie awake tonight and stare up blindly at the darkened ceiling above, you replay the events of a few days prior. Over, and over, and over, until you can nearly imagine a soundtrack to go along with them.
Your thoughts grind to a halt. Your finger pauses in tracing Leviathan’s sigil.
You do hear music: a faint, lilting piano melody that sneaks through the crack beneath your door. It’s probably Leviathan, you think, unable to sleep either and playing a video game a bit too loud. The music speeds up, largo to allegro, faster, faster; then it falters, a single missed note that throws the whole piece off, and you realize it isn’t a recording. Human error—or demonic, as it were. Whoever is playing fixes the melody and resumes its pace, and this time, they make no mistakes. The music swells; your heart does too. Then it slows, quiets, and the steady pulse of your heart acts as metronome.
You listen as the song comes to an end, the last few notes too faint for you to make out. You think with no small amount of disappointment that the pianist is done, but they start to play again after a few moments. This time, the song is lighter, softer, sadder somehow. The chords seem to strain like a voice fighting grief. It bids you rise from bed and so you do, a child of Hamelin stirred from sleep by the Pied Piper. You wonder who is playing as you head down the stairs and toward the music room. Asmodeus, perhaps? He seems like the sort who would consider the piano to be an elegant instrument that suits him. Or maybe Satan, already so worldly from his reading and born with an anger deep inside of him that could be turned into music to soothe him.
But the person you see when you step quietly into the room is the very same one who saved you mere days ago.
It’s Lucifer.
His cloak is folded next to him on the bench, his tie loose, his hands bare to better feel the vibration of the keys beneath his fingers. He didn’t hear you come in, you realize, as he doesn’t hesitate in his playing. You chance a step closer.
Lucifer looks different—sounds different, as if the notes he plays were all the words he leaves unspoken. His back is as straight as ever, his head held high, but his touch is impossibly light on the keys, and there is something entirely unguarded about the way he sways slightly in time with the song he plays. The emotions you felt before—the sadness, the regret—you feel them from him, now, as if he is channeling some long-buried pain through his fingertips and into the music. Yet you do not feel only sadness; the song is not melancholic but rather bittersweet. It is a half-remembered dream of a loved one lost long ago. It is a eulogy written to offer comfort to the bereaved. A prayer for peace.
The strings of the piano tug at your heart. They pull you closer until you can clearly see his face. Lucifer does not look mournful, despite the song. He simply looks calm. His brows are not furrowed, his mouth not downturned. His dark eyes are soft and warm, their red not the color of angry flames but of a candle burning in the night to guide one home. When the song ends, he closes his eyes, dims their gentle fire, and lets the last note linger in the air. As it fades, he opens them again.
Then he jumps.
“Sorry!” you blurt as Lucifer stares at you, startled. You nearly trip over the table in your haste to back away, your hands raised cautiously. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I heard music and wondered where it was coming from, so I—”
“It’s alright,” Lucifer interrupts. His cheeks have gone faintly red; he looks more embarrassed than angry. “Your presence is unexpected. Not… unwelcome.” He turns his gaze back to the piano, setting his hands atop the keys once more. “I don’t mind. You can stay if you wish.”
You do.
You wait a moment to make sure he’s serious. When he ignores your presence and starts to play a new song, one more light-hearted than the last, you make your way over to the couch and settle in, pulling a cushion into your lap as you fold your legs beneath you. This time, you don’t watch him; it feels like an invasion of privacy despite his invitation for you to stay. Instead, you close your eyes. You listen. The sound of the piano rings out effortless around you, the notes soothing and somehow warm. You rest your head against back of the couch and feel the music blanket you. Within minutes, you are sound asleep.
You wake, some hours later, to the foreign stars of the Devildom sky still shining in its ever-blackness. You wake, too, to Lucifer’s cloak tucked in around your shoulders. The man himself nowhere to be found, and after a moment, you nestle down deeper into it. You breathe in the earthy smell of him that lingers on the collar. His cloak is even warmer than the music, and with it covering you, you feel, for the first time since you’ve arrived here, like you’re home.