Page 4 of Sin of the Saints

“Lilith has been claimed by neither! She is her own entity, whom the creators themselves fear!”

“So you’re saying…” I choke on my words.

“She could bring forth worse creatures into the lands of Adam than Satan himself. More like her. Entities that answer to neither higher nor lower powers. Angels are created by our God, but Lilith’s sin was arrogance, and she sought to create on her own. She is the creator of demons, and accursed Eve and all the women of Adam were infected with the same sin. She will bring Armageddon upon us, a world without faith. We must banish her from the lands of Adam before she brings the end of all things down upon us.”

Enraged voices echo in the hall, and my head is spinning.

Did Lilith try to entrap me? I reexamine the aura around my palms. What does it mean? Is this aura a testament to her failure?

“How do we do it?” Ellis asks the question running through my mind.

The Pope’s aura moves, but the Cardinals’ hysterical voices don’t die down. He strikes the table with his fist and shakes the walls of the hall itself.

“Silence!” he yells, and everyone immediately falls silent. “We don’t need lust of the flesh for that. We will shed her blood in the manner in which she exposed her secret to us, and we will banish her to the void from whence she came.”

“How?” I look directly at him.

“Fortunately for us, we’re equipped for precisely these situations.” The Pope clears his throat and Ellis rises from his seat. I hear his steps as he walks across the room. I follow his aura and return to the Pope as he continues speaking. “The toolsare a bit rusty, but it hardly matters. History has proven their efficiency.” What the hell is he talking about? I try to decipher his words. Damn it, I can’t see anything but vague auras. Ellis returns to the table but I can’t see what he’s doing. The sound of metal landing on the table sends chills through my body. “The Pear of Anguish,” the Pope answers, and slowly moves towards Ellis. Every step wears on my nerves until I’m sure I’m about to explode.

He takes the object; I hear the metal move. The sharp tremor of a metallic slice turns my stomach.

“After you take her blood using this device, we will stone her and send her back to the inferno from whence she came.” The satisfaction in his voice nauseates me to my core.

“Yes!” Cardinal Josef rises to his feet and my gaze jumps to him. His excitement stirs up the other Cardinals, and they rise one after the other, cheering.

I watch them in shock. Suddenly they no longer seem quite so holy to me, but more like unrestrained demons, thirsty for blood, awakening at the thought of their victim’s suffering. Their dim auras slowly go cold as impure thoughts flood through them.

They claim I tasted evil and my soul will be redeemed, but all evil has been revealed to my eyes in the holiest place in the world.

Her name strikes my still heart like a drumbeat, quickening my blood and reviving my dead body. My aura flickers at the same rhythm as her name.

Belle.

Chapter Three

Bellcolor

I’m hurled onto the pristine marble floor. I open my eyes, and beyond the blurriness a painting on the ceiling of the hall is revealed to me – the Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden. A serpent twines around the trunk of the Tree, its upper body that of a woman.

“Lilith,” my lips voicelessly whisper her name.

“Tell me what she’s thinking!” Libretto’s voice echoes between the stone walls.

“I’ve already told you, Libretto, I haven’t been able to access her thoughts since the day she sent Liam to the creator.” That’s my father, or my former father, Othello Fermi. But I know he’s lying. He’s lying to the head of the Council for me, and I don’t know why.

“Three years! Three years have passed and still she won’t give in!” Libretto’s voice thunders.

No… can it have been three years?

“It’s those damned angels.” I hear his footsteps as he paces the room.

“She’s tasted the blood of two angels, Senoy and Semangelof.” That’s Alfredo. I recognize his voice.

“Her power increased because she fed on them, it’s their blood, the three cursed ones whose souls we stole.” More footsteps. Footsteps here and there. Behind my head, to my right, beneath me. He’s fucking everywhere.

Finally he stops and I can smell his stench approaching.

I contort my face and press my lips together with the last of my strength.Get away from me!I scream deep within me. My father winces next to me, but says nothing. Why won’t he say anything?Save me from the monsters, Daddy,I plead in my thoughts, but he doesn’t move.

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