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The most benevolent feeling Lillith could feel towards a human was pity. They did not deserve anything more. Pity was debasing and demeaning and it was care, but a conceitful kind of care that did not mean equality between her and the lower beings she turned her gaze upon.
She could almost hear a reproach in her head, the voice of a thousand shards of glass asking about her “favourite”, and how that benevolence could be extended to him in a form that was clearly beyond that of pity.
But her favourite was not as human as he thought, and all the humanity he had gained had been gone for a long time; he had been touched by madness and the vast reach of darkness and for how deep is humanity, his body, his blood, his every atom was not that of a mortal. Not to her.
It stood to reason that when she found herself cradling in her hands the soft cheeks of an Ardor, the pang in her chest was pity.
It had to be.
But she was furious. She knew she was.
Everyone got used, exploited, tortured and killed to serve the whims of others.
Her father used to be Azathoth's perfect little soldier. She could not be sure if he still served the Idiot God, but with Nyarlathotep it was always impossible to tell. Whatever he thought of himself now, her father too had been used, just like her, just like everyone.
But this mortal, suffering a fate by no means unique… her condition enraged Lillith.
She was herald, judge and reaper, and by all means she should have dealt the Ardor a death just as painful as that of her companions, but she could not stand to be the last in the long line of the young woman's persecutors.
Though so very discordant with her nature, she did consider letting her live, but what life could she give her? She could communicate well enough for being blind and mute, but she could not survive alone, even if she may have liked such a life, something Lillith found to be unrealistic at best. But what community would have her? Who could share Alia’s life lacking ulterior motives?
Death seemed the only option.
A sweet death. But first, a dream.
Lillith found herself in a vibrant meadow. She could feel everything that existed within her dreams, every leaf curling and every breath of air, so she knew that Alia had not regained her vision. Still, the Seraph’s mind had conjured up such a beautiful world in vivid detail.
Dreams were an art, pulling from one's memories the appropriate places and people to get them to break, and while Lillith still had much power and experience, Scratch had perfected the art when applied to humans.
The fragment that was her and yet wasn’t would have revelled in Alia’s fear, would have plunged her in a sea of darkest sorrow from the moment the dream began.
Perhaps he would have plucked the scattered images of when they took her sight, too young to remember properly but too old not to, or the first time all the voices and pleas and screams of horror reached her ears from those lands beyond her world, when she first perceived the cacophony of terror and knowledge that left her constantly reaching for air, just below water, unable to breathe for longer than what was strictly necessary for her survival.
Worse, he could have given her sight and speech, and let her witness her companions, her fellow frightened Ardors, as their eyes bled and their brains drained from their nostrils under the strain of the seeking, relentless and cold, without anchors or support.
But Lillith was master of this dream, and she had not created it to cause further suffering.
She wanted to know .
She let her mind wander through Alia’s thoughts, and found a face, or rather a voice, that would suit her.
Alia adjusted the bandages on her eyes. A nervous reflex more than a necessity, but it made her feel as though she was more prepared to face whatever could come next.
She could feel the sun on her face, and the air was less humid than she remembered it being last. It was a small grace, avoiding the damp, heavy breeze that had been a near constant in her life.
She remembered a day like this. She was not sure if this was a memory, a dream, or something else entirely, but the perfect sunbeams, the smell of grass and the rare warmth were familiar. She could almost hear the voices that should have been around her. Wilmot, their keeper, who sometimes sneaked her and the others out from the convent; Maude, a girl a good five years younger than her, who was still studying and still had her speech and sight, and her companion in all…
Edith, could you pass me a daisy?
She found herself asking, her hands finding their way to a board and chalk she could not recall having placed near her, playing out a memory long since gone. She remembered asking for daisies, though she did not remember what for. She never really enjoyed their smell, nor had she found them pretty when she still could see. But they were Edith's favourite, and the girl could see them, so she probably was glad for the excuse to pick them up.
Alia could swear she heard a ruffle of feathers when a daisy was placed on her palm, but her hand brushed against Edith's, and it was just her.
“Do you think they'll let us stay out past sunset?” Edith's voice was light, vibrant and almost like a chorus it seemed as though multitudes sang in her words.
“It's already hard to get you out,” spoke Wilmot from a little ways away. “We can't push our luck.”
Don't dwell on having to leave, we still have some time before we go. Alia offered.
“Time before we have to go…” it was Edith's voice, but it wasn't. Alia heard the faint noise of bones cracking and a smell of lavender and rot pervaded the air, until what was before her, the other Seraphs, the grass, the sun, they all were changed.
She had dreamt such a dream, so full of normalcy she might have called it a good omen were it not for the fact that in waking she remembered her journey.
“Is anything the matter, m’lady?” Antoine asked her, pacing closer to Alia. She looked disheveled, but calm.
Just a strange dream.
Alia managed to write after a couple minutes of trying to fight off the pull of sleep, the siren song growing dimmer, but not gone.
Rain was drumming a gentle pattern on the canvas of the carriage, and Alia waited to hear Antoine burrow closer into the quilt he had brought with him for the journey. He was always ready to get his hands dirty and to help even when it was unnecessary, though, when just the two of them were left to judge, he allowed himself small comforts and a little respite.
The shuffling came.
Alia smiled. It’s not like the stitches pulled anymore. Even if they did, Antoine was worth it.
“Soon it will be dawn, and we will have to start our efforts anew”
Alia nodded and absentmindedly scratched at her face under the bandages.
“Are you hurting?” Antoine asked, ever the watchful, mindful soul.
The weather.
It rarely happened these days, but sometimes she could still feel her every scar. Her eyes would feel like they were engulfed in flames, even though she no longer had them. Her skin would feel like it were trying to peel off her face.
Suddenly she felt the warmth of a hand hovering close to her face.
“May I?” Antoine had seen the whole of her face maybe twice, and he was still the only one who seemed unbothered by her marred eyelids, haphazardly stitched close on her hollow sockets.
You may .
She beckoned Antoine closer, leaving him the space to properly untie her bandages. She could do it herself, it was an easy task, but that was far beyond the point.
For a second, Antoine's hands around her face seemed alien, feather light in an attempt to be much gentler than his strength would allow, though it had also been one long year since they had been this close. Though last time…
As her bandages fell, Alia felt a warm sensation on her hands. Like hot water gently poured on her palms.
Oh.
It was simply a vision of days to come. She dispelled the impression and tightened the grip on her scalpel.
At the time, Antoine had been laying on a stone slab, a large canvas sheet under him, completely conscious but unfeeling as Alia had inhibited him from perceiving any pain through a spell that, as she would tell him weeks later, she had used many times on her fellow Seraphs when they were made to become Ardors.
He had been following every line she traced on his chest, the reverence with which she kept at her task reminding him why she was, above all, a healer.
Lillith, now laying in his stead, could feel it all.
The sharp blade digging into her chest, flames of searing hot pain caressing her ribs.
Every point of contact felt incandescent, though the sensation did not bother her. Quite the contrary, it seemed that with every centimetre of skin that was separated from her body she felt herself much, much closer to both herself and the woman before her.
Alia moved her head in her direction, maybe trying to understand why the figure under her blade squirmed.
The woman furrowed her brow, then hastily returned to her previous position. From what Lillith could gather, Antoine had asked Alia to have full view of her face, maybe something to do with trust, and the Seraph was now thinking very loudly about the possibility of having scared the young man unraveling under her hands with the uncaring openness of her expression, the uncanniness of it all.
Maybe he could handle it worse than he promised he would.
Lillith smiled wide, regardless of the fact that Alia was unable to see it she could only hope she could sense it.
The way the Ardor was carving through her chest, there was a gentleness there that Lillith had not been afforded in a long time. She felt more deeply connected to this stranger in a moment of carnage than she had with her kin for eons. And most of all it was a gentleness that neither Alia nor Antoine had been afforded… ever.
She had always been a tool, he had always been a servant.
It was an act of recognition. Of care. From the only person who would appear genuine in such an act.
Alia's fingertips traced the skin as she followed with the blade, and the pain was so freeing.
Lillith let herself be lost in the moment, in the dream she had created herself.
She could feel being Antoine so vividly. Know things she had no reason to know, and so necessarily generated from what Alia knew.
She felt his anxiety, his desire to be useful, his fear, the dread feeling of a wrong body and the relief in knowing that if he could not look how he felt, at least his body would be marred beyond recognition and left to rot in some forgotten land, so that none could look at his remains and assume anything about who he was.
His every desire and fear that the Ardor was aware of, she felt.
A blooming sensation of sympathy and something else that Alia feared but did not find entirely unwelcome.
Lillith was losing herself in this dream, in a way. She forgot what her purpose was in this. Her mission. Her goal.
Ever since she had been freed she had kept on stalking, scheming, running not to lose sight of the ones that could give her answers and power.
But here, now, she could breathe.
She could focus on the single point of contact between her and the Ardor carving her open, she could lose herself in the drops of blood that adorned the woman's fingers, every trace.
She was no longer scattered across and outside time and space, she was just here, in this moment, with Alia.
She didn't even notice when she set the scalpel down.
When she faintly smiled and walked away.
When she returned with something in her hands.
A shiver ran through her that was more resigned than anything, a product of what the Seraph remembered of Antoine rather than how Lillith's form was genuinely reacting to the realisation.
The Black Stone. Right there before her, within her grasp.
A thought: she now knew where the Black Stone was, and Alia could give it to her. And another thought: she didn't care.
Alia was still doomed.
Lillith had already killed her.
She could do so many things, she could torture and maim and make the blind see and the seeing blind but she did not have all of the Crawling Chaos’s gifts. Once her rage tore through a body and freed a soul from mortal life she could not bring them back.
The strangest feeling, knowing it wasn't the impossibility of using the Seraph as a puppet to get the Black Stone that hit her.
She felt so very human in this one second of clarity, when she realised what it was like for little children fond of spiders to accidentally step on one. She had killed this marvelous, luminous being, without even understanding how that would hurt her.
Silver drowned in tears, a choked sigh escaped her.
Alia set down the Black Stone and reached to cup her cheek. She nodded. She knew what this was. It didn't matter whether she felt Antoine beneath her palm or if she understood the raw power that lay just below the skin of the body on the slab. It didn't matter, because Alia smiled.
Lillith dispelled the dream.
She got to her feet, brushing the dew from her garments. Alia was encased in vines. Lillith placed a kiss on her forehead, and found she was still smiling.
Perhaps her death had been a kind one.