We weren’t ready.
We’d been training for weeks – months – learning our companions, learning to use the reliquaries we carried with us, learning to use or own strengths and weaknesses. We’d nearly fallen to a much less important enemy more than once.
We were in no way ready when the Devil walked into our training session.
He laughed at us, though it sounded friendly. I could see both of his faces – the handsome dark-haired man with the charming smile, and the huge red-skinned demon with the horns so big they defied belief. I could hear both of his voices, the friendly businessman banter and the smoky growl.
There were five of us there. We’d been training together, and though we were getting better, none of us were ready.
I don’t know why he focused on me. I might have been talking back a little more than the others. When you’re terrified and believe you’re going to die, stalling seems like a good idea. Maybe something can happen. Maybe the bad guy will change his mind. Maybe a miracle will come down from the heavens.
He certainly thought we had no chance. He stepped up towards us – the floor shook in this abandoned house we were training in – and grinned. Then he hesitated, just for a moment.
“Are those reliquaries you wear?”
He reached towards mine, which looked like a swirl of colors in a glass pendant. He seemed far too pleased that he could touch the string.
“No. They’re decoys. We wouldn’t wear the real thing in training.”
Still, it bothered me he could touch it, although I couldn’t tell you why. It bothered me more to have that black claw, that huge red hand, that close to me.
Then he grabbed me with both hands, one on each shoulder, and pulled me close. In that moment, he was all demon; I was terrified.
Then he was a man, the handsome businessman and another man, a man I’d known – it had to have been in dreams, it had to have been in visions – known intimately.
And he kissed me.
All of my fear melted away, because the devil had placed himself in the hands of a sainted one. Into the kiss I murmured blessing after blessing. I held the image of him in my mind and I blessed his kisses and his body. I blessed his touch and the top of his head, and still he kissed me – still I kissed him. I could hear that it was not so much hurting him as burning him away without pain.
I blessed his shoulders and the curve of his bottom, the way his calf muscles looked when he stood on his toes and the way the back of his heels looked. I blessed his horns and his hooves, that long tail and its point. I blessed his touch. And still we kissed.
There was concern behind us. Our teacher, who did not like me, was saying something. But when Lucifer has you in his hands, you can only lean in, you cannot pull away.
And I held the blessing of love inside of me, the glow of compassion and the fire of passion. I held the sunshine of kindness inside of me, and I blessed the Devil’s gentlest caress and the way his eyes squinched up when he was pleased.
The blessings were whispered into the deep red cavern of the Devil’s mouth and murmured against Lucifer’s soft lips. They were breathed between us, and nobody else could hear them except the Power Omnipresent.
But I was glowing, I knew it, and he was steaming. His red skin was letting off steam and smoke as if someone had poured water over it – because, in a sense, I had.
Not water, but love.
His hands were on my hips. I could feel every black claw, and yet they were gentle. He picked me up against him, this giant of a demon, this tall and lanky man, and pressed my glowing benediction against him.
The Power Omnipresent had granted me this shining light for a reason. I had thought it was to fight monsters, and I’d been failing.
Now I understood. It was to love monsters. No, not monsters.
It was to love the devil himself, and through him, to love so many more.
I kissed him again. This time, I didn’t need to say any blessings. This time, everything I needed to say was in the kiss.
Forever and ever.
Amen.
This story more or less comes from the end of a dream which was even weirder than the ending.
For instance, it featured “Kanye West’s less famous younger brother” who was of the Very Rotund and Short variety and sang beautiful R&B. It also featured cats, witches, abandoned houses…
…and then kissing the Devil.
The Devil here is played by: a) Tom Ellis as in his role as Lucifer MorningStar.
b) Josh Dallas as in his role as Prince Charming. (third picture down)
c) the demon from Dungeon Keeper? Actually, I think it was Satan from the match.com ads referenced recently on my Patreon.
The title is sort of a backhanded reference to the children’s rhyme Georgie Porgie.
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