Galactic Standard Date: 152,323.05
Orbit - Haven-3
Prime Minister Lucifer
Lucifer
“Master … can you hear me?”
“Mmmmmffff,” Lucifer groaned. His head hurt. Another migraine? He vaguely recalled taking a transport to the royal palace to be refused an audience by his father, but not what he'd done afterward. “Where am I?”
“On Lucifer’s diplomatic carrier, Master,” Zepar said in a reassuring voice. “Don't worry. I'll dispose of the evidence.”
He felt as though he were buried alive, the heavy black dirt pressing down upon his body. He fought the sensation, trying to make his body move. The dirt pressed harder, trying to suffocate him.
It felt as though a small, bright light had just been extinguished in his heart, a tiny echo of a feeling he hadn't felt since the day his mother had died. A name came into his mind and was buried forever by the dirt. Loss. He fought the heaviness, struggling towards Zepar's voice, trying to reassemble the jumbled, nightmarish fragments that danced through his brain and didn't make any sense.
Someone called to him, whispered regret. Forgiveness. Goodbye. He tried to follow, but the dirt held him there. Trapping him. Buried him alive. All of a sudden, he found a slender pathway, leaving him weak and nauseous. Voice? What voice? The voice he'd struggled so hard to follow was gone, leaving nothing but emptiness in his heart.
Was he hung over?
Zepar's words began to register in his mind. Evidence? What evidence?
The stab of pain that greeted him the moment he tried to move his eyelids made him shut them again. His hand registered the squishiness of a comforter and a body lying next to his. He was in his bed with a female. Had he blacked out during one of his mating appointments?
“She was unimportant,” Zepar said. “Ki's watchmen usually are. Nobody will come looking for her.”
It felt as though he were fighting his way through a painful green fog. Try as he might, he just couldn't get his brain to work. A coppery scent assailed his nostrils. He couldn't get his wings to move in unison with the rest of his body, as though all of a sudden he'd forgotten how to use them. He grabbed at the female lying next to him. She didn't protest his awkward grasping or move to get out of his way. Her skin felt … cold.
“Zepar? What are you talking about?"
“Oh. It's you.”
“Zepar?”
“Don't worry, Sire." Zepar's tone of voice changed. “You've had another migraine. I'll give you something for the pain. Go back to sleep and when you wake up, everything will be back to normal.”
Lucifer felt the prick of a needle in his neck as Zepar gave him whatever concoction he always used to alleviate these horrific migraines.
'Trust Zepar. He is your most trusted advisor…'
Yes. He trusted Zepar. Zepar had picked up the broken pieces after his mother had died and Hashem had abandoned him … and the Alliance … to fend for themselves.
Lucifer slid back into unconsciousness.
Chapter 50