Page 118 of All's Hell That Ends Well

And then my mind snagged on something.

I closed my eyes to tune into it more, to grasp that fleeting thought, while Azazel quietly argued with Metatron about Lucifer’s power of death.

When I caught the idea, I opened my eyes, meeting Shekinah’s surreal white gaze. “Can he pass it on?”

A dazzling smile sparkled on her face. “There it is.”

Metatron and Azazel hadn’t heard me, so I turned to them and said more loudly, “What if Lucifer gives it to someone else?”

Their quiet conversation stopped, and both faced me with expressions of varying degrees of surprise and disbelief.

“Give what to someone else?” Azazel asked.

“The power of death. That”—I waved my hand vaguely—“essence.”

Azazel grimaced. “I don’t think that’s possible.”

Metatron scoffed, his black eyes resting on me. “What gave you that idea?”

I put both hands on my hips and shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe I’ve read one too many fantasy books and that’s given me a naive view of what’s magically possible, but just now when I thought of how Lilith ripped a piece of her own essence, power, whatever, out of her and gave it to me, I was like, wait, if she did that, wouldn’t it possible for Lucifer to remove the death power from himself and pass it to someone else? I mean, before she did that, no one had done anything similar, but she just had this idea and rolled with it. So why wouldn’t a demon, or Lucifer, be able to do the same?”

Shekinah still smiled with all the brilliance of moonlight glistening on diamonds, while Metatron wore a skeptical scowl.

“God himself was not able to separate Death from Lucifer,” he said. “What makes you think?—”

“One cannot undo what the other did,” Azazel said quietly, paraphrasing Metatron’s earlier words, and as he spoke, his face slowly lit up with hope. “That is the limitation, yes? It doesn’t say anything about either of them being able to undo what they themselves did.”

Shekinah nodded vigorously even as I bounced in place with a surge of excitement.

“Yes,” I blurted. “God can’t separate Death from Lucifer, but what ifLucifercould separate the power of death fromhimself? If we tell him who—what—he truly is, he’ll shed those limitingbeliefs about himself and will be able to access his full powers again, right?”

“Which is precisely what we have been preventing for eons,” Metatron drawled with a surly note.

“Well, yeah, out of fear that he could use all that might against God to retaliate or take revenge or just be mean or whatever,” I said. “But he wouldn’t do that, not when he learns that he needs to rid himself of that power in order to be with Lilith. If there’s one thing I’ve come to understand about him, it’s that he puts Lilith and his love for her above anything else. Using that power against God won’t even be on his agenda once he knows it stands in his way of reuniting with Lilith.”

“Speaking of his love for Lilith,” Azazel interjected with a note of caution, “there are a few uncertainties here. If Death was so enamored with Lilith that he personified himself in Lucifer, then wouldn’t removing the power of death also remove the part of Lucifer that loves Lilith? Since it was such an integral factor of Death’s being before he made himself corporeal? In other words, how much of Lucifer is inextricably intertwined with the power of death, and how much of his identity and who he is would be left if that essence were to be extracted?”

I grimaced. “Good question.”

“Belief shapes reality,” Shekinah murmured, her expression untroubled. When we all looked at her, she spoke more loudly, “The answer lies in Death’s own might. When he crafted Lucifer’s identity and lost himself in it, he bound himself, his body, and his powers to the metaphysical laws that apply to angels. All parts of him that yearned to besomeonebecame Lucifer. Note that he did not have a soul until he willed one into being. All of him that could be personified, he poured into Lucifer. That is what will remain. It works the same as when an angel or demon stays too long on Earth and slowly loses their powers—that does not change their personality, or who they areat their core; it only means they become human in strength and mortality. For Lucifer, it means that thewhoof Death has merged with him to the point that they are inextricable, but thewhatof Death—that essence that is the counterpart to Life—is one of his powers now and as such could be removed without killing him or alteringwhohe is.” Her smile was gentle. “Once you tell him and he remembers, he will know how.”

“Hopefully,” Azazel muttered.

Metatron was silent for a long moment while the night wind whipped at us and carried the sounds of the city to and fro. With a heavy breath, he eventually said, “And to whom would Lucifer pass the power of death?”

I closed my mouth with an audible click, exhaling through my nose. Well, damn. I hadn’t thought that far.

“Who would carry that burden?” Metatron continued. “And the question is not only one of willingness, but of capability. Who would be strong enough to hold that kind of power?” He shook his head. “This is no small thing we are talking about. It is different from the power of a demon or an angel. This essence is one of the two founding forces of the universe. Lucifer could contain that kind of energy because he was crafted specifically for it by Death himself. A regular demon is either a fallen angel or descended from them, and angels are creations of Life. I fear if any of them were to hold that power, it would disintegrate them.”

“Unless”—Shekinah half closed her eyes and hummed—“they were his blood.”

Metatron whipped his head around to stare at her.

“Elaborate,” Azazel said with quiet sharpness.

“Did he not sire children?” Shekinah asked, her knowing gaze now resting on Azazel. “He is Death incarnate, and he procreated. First, he created his own body, and then he created life from himself, and by doing so, he passed on part of thatwhich makes him able to hold the power of death. If anyone but him is capable of containing that essence, it would be one of his children.” She still held Azazel’s gaze, her expression intense. “Ortheirprogeny.”

Oppressive silence reigned after that revelation.

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