“That’s a shame.” Lucifer racked his brain for some other topic of discussion, just to have an excuse to linger. Although why he wanted to stay was a question he dared not ask himself.
And why had he mentioned the pooka? He hadn’t learned Puck’s true identity until after his disappearance from Olympus. Lucifer had vowed to let the creepy man-monster live in peace and hadn’t thought of him again until this moment.
“Mommy! Mommy!”
Lucifer’s head swiveled in the direction of the high-pitched voice. A mortal boy, no taller than a newly sprouted stalk of corn, wobbled over to Kidada who had gone ashen at his entrance.
Her arms reached for the toddler, tucking him behind her skirts, one hand gripping his upper arm to hold him there. Still, the boy peeked out from behind her with golden flecks swimming in his mahogany brown eyes and a mischievous grin lighting up his tanned face.
Lucifer reached out to encourage the boy to come out, but his mother’s grip held him in place despite the child’s struggles to break free.
“And who have we here?”
Kidada took a giant step away from him, presumably to keep her child out of his reach. Lucifer guessed any parent would attempt to protect their offspring from strangers, but the overwhelming urge to scoop him up and twirl the youngster around caught him by surprise.
“My son.” She offered no other information. No name. Her facial features had all shut down into hardened and stern lines, her jaw was clenched and a nerve twitched under one eye. A bead of sweat slithered down her forehead and over her nose.
They stared each other down. Neither relenting until another, more masculine, voice boomed from the same direction the child had come. “Get away from my family!” The man was of above average height with wavy black hair that covered his eyes and a machete held over his shoulder, ready to strike out.
Under normal circumstances, Lucifer would’ve cut anyone down who dared to threaten him in an instant. All he had to do was snap his fingers at this point and the man’s neck would’ve cracked like a twig. But—strangely—the desire for violence had seeped out of his soul in this place.
Instead, he faced the newcomer with his hands raised. “I mean no harm. I am just a stranger passing through.”
The man stalked to stand in front of the woman and child. “Then be on your way.” He held the machete in front of him, aimed for Lucifer’s torso.
A sad smile crept up Lucifer’s lips. His time here was indeed over. Why he’d come at all had been nothing but a way to torture himself more about his own losses. Seeing this tiny, closely knit family only pushed the dagger into his heart further.
“My apologies, my lady.” He nodded, then winked at the adorable child, still desperate to get out of his mother’s iron grip.
Without bothering to wait until he was out of sight, Lucifer waved his hand to open a swirling portal. He didn’t care where it took him now, just as long as it was... away.
HER KNEES GAVE OUT and her butt smacked onto the cold, hard dirt. For some unknown reason, air refused to travel to her lungs no matter how deeply she gasped.
“Mommy, Mommy!” Her child, her sweet boy wrapped his arms around her neck. It was the very thing needed to break the paralysis of shock.
“How in the bloody hell did he find us?” The man kneeled beside her, no longer an average peasant hunter living on the outskirts of a rough civilization. His red eyes peered at her with fear etched into their depths.
“I... I don’t think... he knew it was us. I... as soon as I felt his presence, I put up a magical spell to transform my appearance, but it was almost as if...”
“As if what?”
“In a way, he knew, but dared not acknowledge it.” She shook her head to clear her haphazard thoughts. “Do you think...”
Puck’s face was grim, his lips drawn into a pale, thin line. “There’s no way to know, but... we can’t risk staying here.” He nodded toward the small boy. “If Lucifer ever finds out about him—”
“That cannot happen. Ever!” Diana’s entire body shook.
It was why she’d gone to so much trouble to hop through time, space, and dimensions until she was so far away from Lucifer and Olympus that he’d never suspect to find her again.
After she’d been hauled away by her family upon her return to her home with Lucifer, everything had changed. Apollo, her beloved twin, had warned her of her father’s fury and plans to use her dalliance with the archangel to bring him down low, so low that the Creator himself would shun him. When Olivier, Lucifer’s own brother and friend, had come to her chambers and explained how the Creator could only forgive so much, it’d sealed her resolve. He had assured her that the Creator’s love for Lucifer would grant him some leniency but not unless she was no longer an obstacle to his redemption.
The truth had hit her hard. Lucifer loved his father more than all else, including herself. How could she stand in the way of their reconciliation? How could she deny the man she loved his greatest wish? When Olivier had assured her that this was indeed what Lucifer wanted, but he was too ashamed to beg her forgiveness, Diana had taken matters into her own hands and left without word to anyone—except Puck, who had been instructed to report to her on Methuselah once all business was finished and Lucifer was long gone.
When Puck finally met up with her a short time later, Diana had been horrified to learn Lucifer had exacted vengeance against all of her family, and he’d destroyed Olympus itself. And the once Archangel of Light had fallen from grace to become an entity more monstrous than any ever known before. That was when she’d taken Puck’s hand and had jumped into the first portal she’d found within the liminality and kept going until they’d ended up here—millennia into the future and as far from her past as she could get.
Her mind raced now. How best to protect her child—their child? For certainly, if Lucifer discovered he had a son, he’d whisk him away to corrupt him. Diana could not allow that to happen.
The child’s breath warmed her cheek as he snuggled against her. He smelled of a sweet sweat produced by small children, and lavender—he must’ve been playing in the meadows while Puck fished in a lake a few kilometers from here. Her son. To be without him would kill her, but reality pierced the fog in her weary brain—he was safer away from her. If Lucifer found her again and she was either unable to put up the disguising spell or if he saw through the illusion, he’d know about his son. And that could never happen.
