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It was late evening and somehow quiet enough in the House of Lamentation to study in the common room. You were steadily working through your assignment, but you were getting tired. It was hard to concentrate since this was your least favorite course.
You perked up when you heard some footsteps. A break! It was even better when it turned out to be Satan, holding a book and humming happily.
“Did something good happen?” you asked.
He laughed. “You could say that. How about you? Studying?”
You indicated your textbook. “I wouldn’t say studying this is something good happening to me.” You pulled a disgusted face.
“Well, maybe what’s good for me will be good for you,” he said, plopping onto the couch next to you. He held out his book for you to take.
It was a moderately thick tome with a leather cover dyed a deep emerald color. The edges were a bit worn, but it was still in good condition. You ran your fingers over the filigrees stamped into the leather. “Everything You Didn’t Know You Didn’t Know and Everything You Do,” you read the title aloud. “Sounds fishy.”
“It’s a magic book that holds all the knowledge you don’t have! You’re supposed to be able to open it up and learn about anything.”
“Why didn’t it just say ‘Everything’ instead of that weird title?”
He shrugged. “I guess the creator didn’t bother using the book for advice about titles before deciding.”
You turned it around, inspecting it. “It doesn’t look big enough to hold the sum of all knowledge.”
“It’s a magic book,” Satan said matter-of-factly. “Probably, when there’s something to learn, the pages hold what you need to know about that topic. When you need information on something else, the pages change.” You loved that he explained things without condescension and never looked down on you for asking questions.
“Well,” you said, holding the book out to him. “What are you going to learn first?”
He sighed. “I’m having trouble deciding. There’s so much to know. Should I go with something I have absolutely no knowledge of? Or should I try to study something I already know so that I can understand it more deeply?”
You jiggled the book you still held out, hoping he would take it. “Why not try studying something you like first? So you can be familiar with how it works before committing to something less enjoyable.”
“Something I like?” he looked at you, cheeks pink. “Sometimes it’s better to learn about something you enjoy gradually, bit by bit. Knowing everything right away takes the sweetness from it.”
“Oh,” you said, heart squeezing. “W-well, the title mentions things you aren’t even aware that you don’t know, right? Why don’t you ask it to show you the gaps in your knowledge and maybe something will catch your eye.”
“That’s a good idea.” Satan scooted close until his thigh was touching yours. “I’ll try it.”
You held the book while he placed his hands upon it. “Oh, Book of Knowledge Known and Unknown, hear me! I, Satan, the avatar of Wrath, call upon you to reveal the truths hidden, the knowledge outside our purview. Hear my command!”
As he spoke, light began to emit between its pages. It grew warm against your hands. After he finished the incantation, the glow stopped abruptly and the book suddenly felt several pounds heavier.
“Whoa,” you said, moving the book to the table in front of you. “Do you think it worked?”
“Only one way to know.” He reached forward and pulled open the cover. The first page was blank, so he quickly flipped to the next one.
In a large, green script, “The Lesson to Learn is the One that Covers Your Heart” filled the next page.
“Hm.” Satan brought his hand to his chin to think for a moment. “I’m not sure what that’s referring to. Hopefully, the next pages will have some insight.”
He turned the page and you were blinded by a bright light. It was typical for a spell or curse, but using this magical book shouldn’t have had that effect. Even if it did, it should only affect the caster, not anyone nearby.
There was nothing to do but wait for your vision to clear. It started slowly from the edges and worked its way in until you could see the comm—
A long aisle stretched before you, between rows and rows of bookshelves marching off into the darkness. The area where you stood had several tables with candelabras, papers, and full inkwells. Over your shoulder, you saw a large green door stretching from floor to ceiling. The words from the first page were written upon it, but backwards.
Satan was here, too, looking around just as you were, blinking the light out of his vision.
“Satan,” you said carefully. “Why am I here?”
He brought his hand up in thought again. “It seems that I was wrong and instead of the information appearing on the page, we’re brought into the book to find it for ourselves.”
“Okay, but Satan,” you said, stepping in front of him and putting your hands on his shoulders. “Why am I here? An invocation like that should only affect the caster.”
“Ah.” He blushed. “I may have accidentally said ‘we’ instead of ‘I.’ And since you were touching the book also…”
“Accidentally? We?” You took a deep breath. “It doesn’t matter. It’s already done. So, now that we know how the book works, let’s get out, and then you can come back for something else.” You strode over to the green door. “Looks like it’s this way.”
Even though the door stretched up to what seemed to be 20-foot ceilings, the handle was at head height. You reached up and pulled. Nothing happened at all. You looked for a locking mechanism, but the door hadn’t felt locked. It felt solid like the handle was just mounted to the wall. “Satan, help me?”
He was next to you immediately, placing his hands with yours. Thankfully, he couldn’t see the embarrassment on your face from this angle. “Okay, pull,” he said.
Again, nothing happened. You sighed. “So we’re stuck.” You pushed a hand against your head. “I still have so much studying to get done.”
“Well, I do have good news,” said Satan with a smile. He raised an arm, indicating the library. “Anything you don’t know yet will be here.”
You sighed. “Satan, really? You want me to study while trapped in a cursed book?”
“I’m being serious. I’ll work on how to get out of here while you study.”
“Seems like my best choice.”
You and Satan walked towards the bookshelves. They stood from floor to ceiling and were so crammed with books some of them were stacked horizontally across the main row. You couldn’t count how many bookshelves there were because of the gloom. It seemed endless. The tables closest to the shelves had lanterns instead of candelabras. Satan grabbed one that was already lit.
“It looks like the shelves are alphabetical,” he said, inspecting the placard on the end of the first row. “So let’s go.”
The two of you walked down the aisle, looking about. It was slightly cold here, and dark, but not dusty or musty. All you could smell was leather and paper. Your footsteps were softened by a modest grey carpet. Indeed there was no sound at all but the ones you made.
After a few minutes, you glanced at a placard. “Acc-Ace?” you exclaimed. “We aren’t even through the A’s yet? How are we ever supposed to find what we’re looking for? It will take hours to walk through the alphabet. Even days!”
“What if we need to look up ‘Yak Breeding?’”
You shoved Satan’s shoulder lightly. “That’s not helpful.”
He laughed, clearly enjoying himself. “I’m sorry, but we’re in an infinite library! Everything you could ever hope to know is here. Aren’t you excited, even a little?”
His boyish grin did make you happy. “I’m excited that you’re excited,” you admitted. “But forgive me if being trapped in a cursed book makes me a little uncomfortable.”
Satan stopped laughing and brought his hand up to his chin thoughtfully. “I understand. Let’s think about this rationally. Rather than wandering aimlessly, I wonder if there’s a magical way to find what we need? Let’s start with information about this place. Let’s see, we need to go to Cursed Books—” No sooner had the words left his mouth than a tremor ran through the floor of the library. You and Satan reached for each other for balance as bookshelves whooshed past you at dizzying speed. A moment later it stopped as abruptly as it began, although your lantern still sputtered.
Satan checked one of the shelves. “Cur-Cus,” he said. There was a ladder at the beginning of the row. Satan dragged it along, looking at titles. “Cursed Dolls and Dollhouses, Cursed Carousels, hmm hmm hmm….. Cursed Books.” He began to climb the ladder, scanning the titles as he did so. “Here,” he called down to you, “catch.” He dropped a book into your outstretched hands and kept looking, “This… this one… probably not this but we’ll take it anyway…” One by one he tossed books to you until your hands were quite full.
You walked back to the center aisle, and this time Satan put his arm around you to steady you. “We need to go to the Entrance,” he said and the bookshelves sped past the other direction until you were standing amidst the tables where you’d started. “Fascinating,” he murmured.
You placed your books on the nearest table. “Okay, you get started and I’ll go get something to study.”
Satan was already halfway into his chair, but he paused. “Do you want me to go with you?”
“No, I think I can handle it. Just please work on getting us out.”
It was daunting to go alone, but since you already knew what to expect it was straightforward at least. Just a few minutes and you were already back with a couple books of your own.
“Anything?” you asked Satan.
He shook his head and kept reading.
You settled in at the same table, dragging some papers, ink, and quills over to help you take notes. Most of the books were real publications, although one of the books you’d found didn’t have an author, and was just simple text outlined in a book. You figured this was knowledge informally written that either hadn’t been discovered or at least wasn’t deemed necessary to include in the other books. You had grabbed it for curiosity’s sake, but since you’d found a copy of your textbook you decided to use that one first.
The library was quiet, but the crackling of the candles and lanterns combined with the sound of pages turning kept it from becoming unbearable. Studying was actually going really well, and soon you were looking over the next chapter as well, trying to get ahead.
At last, you closed your textbook and stretched. “Did you find anything?” you asked Satan.
He had gone for more books apparently because the table was now covered in them. “I discovered that if you’re done with a book you can set it on that cart,” he said, motioning over to the aisle of the library, “and it will disappear, presumably to go back onto the shelves. Or, if you’ve learned it, to disappear entirely.”
“About how to get out, Satan.”
He sighed and rubbed his eyes. “I’ve learned a lot, but I’m having trouble understanding it. We can’t get out until we Learn the Lesson that Covers our Hearts, as the door says. But I can’t find any information on what that really means. I haven’t the faintest clue what kind of lesson would cover my heart, but all that these books say is that it’s something important for us to know.”
“But how do we know what’s important for us to know if we don’t know it?” you asked.
“Exactly. And unfortunately, the subjects contained in the library right now are so broad, there isn’t a good way to narrow it down.” He looked at you levelly. “I’m really sorry, but it looks like we’re going to be trapped here for a while.”
“No, I’m sorry,” you said. “I know this is like a dream come true for you, but now you have to worry about me. You would be able to enjoy it more if you were on your own.”
“Hey.” He reached over to grab your hand. “There’s no need to apologize; I’m glad I got to experience this with you. I know not everyone loves to learn at my level and that’s okay. You have your own strengths.”
You smiled wistfully. “I don’t want to hold you back, so once we figure out how to get me out of here you can stay as long as you want. We have to try to find our Lessons, right?” You rubbed a hand over your face. “I don’t know where to start.”
“Hm, the books said that it is something important to us. Something we need to know about ourselves? Should we check to see if there’s any literature about us in here?”
“It sounds good to me.”
Together, you put the books Satan had finished back onto the book cart. Just as he’d said, they vanished as soon as you placed them.
“Should we start with you or me?” Satan asked once you stood in the aisle again.
You shrugged. “I’m just a human and I haven’t lived very long. You’ll actually have something written about you.”
“Don’t underestimate yourself,” he said, but he put his arm around you and said, “Take us to Satan, Avatar of Wrath,” anyway.
The bookshelves sped past, the wind blowing through your hair. You spared a glance at Satan. He looked exhilarated, and your heart squeezed. This was something he truly loved. You were thankful that you were able to witness it. Still, guilt felt heavy in your stomach. All he’d done so far was look up how to get you out. He hadn’t had a chance to learn about anything that interested him personally.
It took only a few seconds for everything to stop, and true to your prediction there was almost an entire section dedicated just to Satan. He picked out a few of the older, more obscure ones to start.
Then you went to your name. At first, it didn’t seem there was anything, but then you noticed two small, unmarked journals with your name on the cover. “This should be short,” you said blithely.
“Don’t worry,” said Satan, rubbing your shoulder. “I’m sure there will be plenty written about you in the future. You’re hardly an ordinary human anymore.”
You weren’t sure how to feel about that, so you shrugged it off. Together you went back to the sitting area and began on your respective piles.
You opened up the first book only to have your own words staring at you. Everything you’d ever written about yourself was compiled according to age. Self-introductions, journal entries, ranting letters that you’d burned, even some rather telling notes about the demon that sat next— you slammed the book closed in a hurry, lest he looked over and saw anything.
“Something the matter?” he asked.
Your face burned. “No, just something I hadn’t expected to see,” you said, trying to laugh it off. If you hadn’t let him see them in the first place you weren’t going to hand them over now.
The second book was full of things other people had written about you. Reports from teachers, texts between your friends at RAD, even some things in a script you couldn’t read, but recognized as angelic. You browsed the things your housemates at the House of Lamentation had written about you. Most of it was things you already knew, but the extent of it surprised you. There was one section that you skipped, though. You couldn’t bring yourself to read what Satan had written.
It might be nice things, after all, you were fairly certain that he thought well of you, that he even liked you. But what if those feelings never went any deeper? Or, what if he had a lot of complaints? You weren’t as clever as he was, and not as well read. Studying in the devildom was a struggle but it seemed to be second nature with Satan. You didn’t really think that he would judge you on this, but it was hard when you knew that learning was so important to him.
You closed it and stretched. Satan was still reading, but he’d gotten through a few of his books already. You tapped him on the shoulder. “Anything?”
“Nothing I don’t already know.” He rubbed his hands over his face. “How long have we been here?”
“I think hours, but I can’t tell for sure.”
You picked up a book. “Do you want me to take a few of these? I can summarize anything that seems unique for you to look over later.”
He smiled. “That would be a big help. We make a good team.”
You pulled some paper and ink over and got started. There was actually a lot for you to learn in these books about who Satan was and who people thought he was. But there wasn’t anything earth-shattering. One of the books was similar to the one you’d had, filled with notes from people who knew him personally. You managed to slip that one over to your pile surreptitiously. Sure enough, the notes from your book about him were duplicated here. You made a few notes from the other sections, leaving out yours. You were tempted to look at Satan’s section about himself but refrained. That seemed much too invasive. After you were done, you made sure to bury the book in the To Be Returned pile. You didn’t want him to learn your feelings from a book. At least not one that had everyone else’s notes in it, too.
The two of you continued to study with small breaks to stretch and return useless books. Your internal clocks told you that you’ve been here a very long time. Neither of you felt hungry or sleepy, but the mental fatigue was starting to show. Focusing was harder and your eyes were dry.
After the books about yourselves didn’t yield any knowledge that made the door open, you began tackling bigger topics. This was the perfect opportunity to learn the secrets of the three realms.
However, most of the items about the celestial realm that had the real secrets appeared to be written in an old archaic script that Satan couldn’t read. There were a few nice revelations about the devildom, but there were too many books about it to possibly learn everything. The oldest tomes were unreadable as well. And the human realm books held a lot of interesting things you’d never heard of before, but nothing that opened that door.
Soon you found yourself nodding off. It wasn’t that your body was tired, but your mind was absolutely shot.
“Go ahead and sleep,” said Satan. His words dragged and you looked over to see that he was resting his chin on one hand as he read. His eyes looked as weary as yours felt. “At this rate, we won’t get out of here even if we work constantly. Besides, your mind clearly needs a reset.”
“Only if you get some sleep too,” you said, already clearing a space on the table for you to lay your head down.
“Later,” he drawled, turning a page lazily.
You shrugged and got as comfortable as possible. “I’ll hold you to that.”
Satan muttered something but your eyes were already closing. “Hm?” you asked, barely holding on.
“Nothing, nothing, get some rest.”
The next thing you were aware of was that the hand you’d rested your face on was wet. Your eyes shot open and you looked for Satan. Thankfully, he was facing slightly away from you, so you sneakily wiped away the drool before sitting up. Satan’s jacket fell from your shoulders.
“How did you sleep?” he asked, turning towards you with a knowing smile. He had to have seen you drooling especially when covering you with his jacket.
You blushed. “Good enough to keep going,” you said. “Have you found anything yet?”
“I did, in fact.”
“Oh?”
He held up the unmarked journal about you. You forgot to return it before falling asleep.
“Oh.” Your stomach clenched. That had a lot of embarrassing stuff about you. And your feelings. “And it’s something… important?”
“I’d say it’s very important. Is this true?”
This was not at all how you wanted the revelation of your feelings to happen. To take some of the pressure off, you turned it around on him. “Why were you reading that anyway? I’d already looked through it so you should have put it away.”
He started, cheeks pink. “I wanted to learn more about you. You got to read mine, after all,” he said, picking up his journal as well. Then his blush spread over his face entirely, even to his ears. “You read mine.”
“I didn’t read what you wrote about yourself,” you protested.
He hesitated a moment, then held his journal out to you. “You should.”
You accepted it. It started out with thoughts about his origin and his relationship with his brothers, rants about his wrath and other emotions, and the like. You wanted to read these in detail, but you thought he meant for you to look at something else. So you flipped pages until you found your name. At first, his thoughts reflected how he treated you when you first came to the House of Lamentation. But over time the language changed. It became warmer.
“I don’t know what to do about this,” said one entry. “Every day I think that I can’t love them any more, but each new day proves me wrong. I can barely keep myself from telling them all the time, but I don’t want to scare or hurt them. I need to know more about how humans date.”
“I was really ticked off today, but the way that they smiled at me after I helped them with their assignment… made it feel like all of my studying up to that point was just for that moment...”
“I’m not ready to tell them how I feel. It’s too early. They deserve the best partner, the one who can help them and support them. I still have so much to learn before I can be worthy enough to make them mine…”
“I haven’t found a single book to tell me, unequivocally, how to love someone. I can’t get this wrong, they’re too important to me. If only there was a magic book that could tell me what I need to read. Actually, maybe I did hear…”
You flipped back and forth through the pages, unable to believe what you were reading. Far from a list of complaints and shortcomings, everything written about you was all praise and warm feelings.
You felt Satan’s eyes burning into you, but it was hard to meet his gaze. “I never knew you felt like this,” you said at last.
“The same applies to you,” he said. He turned in his chair, placing long fingers on your cheek and gently tugging your face upwards until you were looking at him. “Why didn’t you tell me? Is it just what you’ve written, that you feel inferior to me? Because you’re not and I hope I’ve never led you to believe that you are.”
You placed a hand on top of his. “No, you never have! You’ve always been so kind to me. But I know that I’m not at your level. No,” you said when he opened his mouth, “I’m not just putting myself down. I’m not dumb, but I’m not like you. I feel like you deserve someone who really gets you.”
“Getting me doesn’t mean you have to love things at the level I do. Or at all. You always make me feel understood and important.” He rubbed his thumb on your cheek. “I love you the way you are.”
“What about you?” you said, tapping his journal with your free hand, “What’s this about learning how to love someone from a book? Not all knowledge can be written down, you know.”
He frowned and blushed. “It seems we both suffer from some insecurities in this area,” he said. “I want to do it right.”
You snorted softly. “There’s no right way. It’s fine to not know everything in the beginning. You learn as you go. Besides, it’s different for everyone. You and your partner have to work together to figure out what works for you. That’s part of a healthy relationship. I’ll still love you even if you make mistakes.”
He smiled at you warmly. “See? You have plenty to teach me. Please don’t feel like the gap between us is too wide.”
Your heads drifted together until your foreheads were touching. “No,” you said softly, “I feel very close to you right now.”
A loud thunk startled you from looking into each other’s eyes. Together you looked towards the door; the words were gone and a glowing line shimmered along the edges.
“Is it open?” you asked in unison. Without another word, the both of you rushed over to the door.
“Together,” said Satan. You put your hands on the handle with his and pulled.
Once again the light blinded you, and you waited patiently to see where you would end up. The blurry edges of the common room came through and you sighed in relief. After a few blinks, your eyes returned to normal and you were once again sitting on the couch with Satan. But this time you held hands.
You glanced at the clock; it seemed that no time had passed at all. “We figured out how to use the all-knowing book at least. But I don’t know if I want to deal with that again.”
“I guess you could say we ‘learned our lesson,’” Satan said, smirking.
You gave him a flat look and said, “Really?” Then you smiled and squeezed his hand. “I’m glad we did though. It really was something important about our hearts. It was a tough time, but I’m satisfied.”
“Me too. I got everything I wanted from it and more.” He kissed your hand. “But, I might use it again.”
“You want to get trapped in a cursed book a second time?”
“No,” he shook his head slightly. “The first part is just a test the book gives you. After that, it works normally.” Satan placed his hand on the cover again. “Devildom Dating Spots,” he commanded.
When he opened the cover you closed your eyes tightly, but there was no light this time. You peeked but were still in the common room. The book was open to a page about Ristorante Six.
“What do you think?” he asked. “We didn’t get hungry in the book, but I feel famished now. And I’d like to celebrate. Will you join me on a date?”
“Absolutely.”