Author's Preface
Ten years ago
That night was cooler than the previous ones. Sudden summer rains accompanied the subtle transition from spring to the warm June evenings. They left the asphalt wet, with puddles at every step, reflecting the streetlights. A few wispy drops still fell, creating a thin and humid blanket over the sleeping town.
Emma’s feet ached. She had been walking for two hours, staring at her surroundings as if she were a tourist seeing the old buildings for the first time. She knew she looked ridiculous, but she was too tired to care. Not many souls haunted the streets at that late hour.
Emma spared a second to admire the peacefulness of it all. It wasn’t often that she saw the city at midnight- undisturbed, silent, holding its breath. Silver droplets raced down the windows. She breathed in the earthy aroma of wet pavement.
Between the houses whose lights were turned off was a small children's playground, hidden like a clearing in the middle of the forest. It was scarcely equipped. The wind moved the two swings, filling the silence with a faint creak. Next to it were a wet slide and a little merry-go-round. Emma grimaced, remembering the nausea that the endless spinning in that cursed thing caused her.
She sat down lightly on one of the swings. As she swung back and forth, she wondered if she was making a mistake. Was she being fooled? Had she stepped right into a trap?
She walked halfway across town, but she didn’t find him. She was cold and afraid her mother would notice she wasn’t home. Ophelia was already stressed out about Evil. She didn’t want to worry her anymore.
Just as she was about to leave, she felt a tingling touch on her leg. Emma jumped in surprise. She pulled her leg back in fright and looked down, only to see the orange head of a cat staring blankly at her.
“You almost gave me a heart attack!”
The cat let out a careless “meow” and rubbed its furry head against her leg. She lowered her hand to pet it.
“Be careful not to let it scratch you.”
Emma turned around as if burnt. Behind her was a stranger whose features Emma couldn’t distinguish at first. The mysterious silhouette advanced with a lack of urgency. When it got close enough, Emma breathed a sigh of relief.
“Zachriel.”
The angel gave her an apologetic smile. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
"Couldn't you show up in my backyard again? I've been walking for hours!"
"My apologies. A brief message was all I've been able to send."
"A vague one at that…"
"You showed up nonetheless. I take you place your trust in me."
Be it trust or stupidity.
"Why did you want to see me?"
"The last time we saw each other, I told you that I needed more time to give you the explanations you required."
"I'm listening."
"Not here," Zachriel warned.
"More walking?" Emma whined.
He grabbed her hand. A strong light enveloped her, hindering her vision.
The light faded gradually, leaving behind a trail of strange shapes floating around aimlessly. She blinked a few times to will them away.
They were no longer in the park, but in the midst of a temple—a ruined palace. It was taller than any church Emma had ever seen. She got dizzy just by looking up. The roof had collapsed, with chunks of it lying in piles of stone at every turn. Green, twisting weeds grew along the walls, trailing over the immense windows—shattered into thousands of colorful fragments. Emma wondered what stories the stained glass concealed.
The pebbles lay along the marble floor, torn apart from the cruelly broken bricks. The damage hadn’t been done recently. Fog surrounded the ruins like the lost soul of the place, haunting its remains. She tried to step over the debris without stumbling and made her way deeper inside.
A massive statue divided the temple in two. It had long since fallen—a magnificent woman with the fairest features and the warmest smile. Her eyes, once bright and confident, had eroded with the passage of time. Cracks spread all over her face like the signs of disease.
Emma timidly reached out, afraid her gesture might be seen as an insult, yet the magnetic pull was too strong to resist. She touched the statue’s nose—which was larger than she was—and traced the line of its head until she reached the crown. Emma knew of this precious monument from paintings; it was crafted from stone and marble, topped with a white-gold crown adorned with real rubies. She wanted to touch the patterns, to feel the ancient inscriptions she had read so much about, but she could not reach them, and her wings had not yet sprouted.
It wasn't meant for her to touch, after all. Although she felt an invitation deep within, Emma told herself it was merely excitement. The statue gazed at her with empty eyes, an unspoken sadness hidden beneath the smile—sculpted with such adoration—which now appeared chipped and lackluster.
The statue left Emma with a hollow ache in the pit of her stomach. As the initial excitement faded, an immense grief took its place.
“Caeles,” Emma whispered.
Caeles.Goddess, deity, creator of the world.
She’s had many names. Exorior, meaning “to rise,” "to be born”. Mother of all.
“This,” Zachriel gestured, “is one of the oldest temples in the realms of saving. “One of the oldest temples dedicated to Caeles.”
“Why did you bring me here?”
Zachriel took a deep breath. He turned to look at Emma, an eerie expression carved into his face.
“Caeles is dead, Emma.”
“Dead?” Emma asked, her voice pitched too high for her liking. “That can’t be. I know she’s missing but-”
“Missing, dead, be it as it may,” Zachriel sighed, sitting on a rock with his hands clasped as if in a strange prayer. “She hasn’t been seen in centuries. She might as well be gone.”
Emma backed slowly until her back hit the statue’s cheek. The hard edges of the rock dug into her skin.
“But she might… she might come back,” Emma tried. It came out as more of a question than a statement. Her voice was laden with anxiety. “You can’t say she’s dead unless you know for sure.”
No one knew what happened to the lost goddesses. Emma had been born long after their disappearance. Some believed the demons had killed her; others believed the goddess of death herself had stolen Caeles and hid deep in the inferno.
She only knew of Caeles as a myth, but put all her trust in her return nonetheless. The tales of her wisdom and kindness crafted Emma into the angel she was. She’d dreamed of the day Caeles would return, and the realm would be peaceful once again.
The balance of the world had been thrown into the pits of madness. People had lost their leader and turned to new, made-up gods and rising prophets spewing lies about The Great Return of Caeles, or The Day of Doom, when everything would burn and be purified of sin at last. Faith was fickle. People grasped at straws. The barricade wouldn’t resist for eternity.
“Ever since her disappearance, the motivation had been sucked out of our warriors. The angels aren’t fighting anymore, and demons are increasing the level of chaos.” Zachriel’s grim face reflected the poor state of their surroundings.
Emma found it hard to believe the angel's words. Angels were warriors—their ambition would not die in the face of the injustices committed by demons. Emma had spent her entire childhood admiring these fantastical figures who risked their lives for the good of humanity.
Suddenly, nothing made sense anymore.
“What does that mean?”
“I’ll show you.”
Zachriel snapped his fingers, and an unwelcome dizziness overwhelmed her senses. They no longer stood inside the fallen temple, but on the same playground they had come from. She blinked away the tears pushed out by the feeling of nausea. “Please, stop doing that.”
The angel kept his eyes on the empty swings. Before Emma could ask what he was looking at, a child stepped out of the shadows. He was no older than seven, dressed in a school uniform with a navy backpack, decorated with pins. The tears on his face betrayed a terrible misfortune on his head.
Emma instinctively moved to help him. Zachriel's strong arm brought her back without much effort.
“What are you doing ?!” Emma demanded, revolted. The child was lost and possibly in danger.
“Do you know what Guardian Angels are?
Of course, she knew. The angels assigned the task of protecting humans. She frowned in response, hoping to inspire the offense she took.
Zachriel, however, remained focused on the child. “Look closely behind him.”
Behind him, an unnamed object appeared, resembling a giant ball of wool standing on the cement. The more insistently she looked, the more the mysterious sphere began to take shape. A humanoid shape.
Its face was veiled by the scant hair remaining on its head. Entire patches were missing, and the remaining strands were sparse and thin—gray and devoid of vitality. They fell across its face, a curtain of gray barely masking the dark, putrid blotches beneath. The body was riddled with holes, and it wore only a white robe that barely clung to its frail frame. On the left side, over its heart, Emma recognized the golden staff topped with the symbol of an eye flanked by wings—the symbol of Caeles.
The figure stood freakishly still. It pressed its knees to its chest, and a low, sinister cry came from it.
The child seemed oblivious to it all. He couldn't see her or Zachriel either, which was why he made a desperate attempt to find any sign of life in that dead corner of town.
Behind him, another revealed itself. She couldn’t make out anything but a black cloak dancing in the wind. His whole body was covered, safe for the hand that played carelessly with a pocket-knife.
“No!” Emma screamed and reached out, but the image dissipated like smoke.
“It’s not real, don’t worry.”
“What are you talking about?!” she shouted, scared and confused.
“It’s a memory. A memory this place holds.”
“This actually happened?” Zachriel nodded in response, and Emma’s sickness just got worse. “The kid-“
“Did you see the figure behind him?” he cut her off.
“Of course!” Emma shouted, angered by his calmness. “Of course,” she repeated again, in a smaller voice.
“That was a guardian angel.”
Replaying the images in her head one by one, she decided that the thing she saw didn’t match her mental image of a guardian. “Didn’t look like one.”
“This is how many warrior angels look nowadays. Vegetative, corpses ready to crumble. Ghosts of what they once were.”
Emma shivered at the thought. Death would be the gentler fate for her kind. Death is more forgiving to the pained.
“This, Emma, is our fate. Every angel’s fate, unless we stop it. Stop them .”
She stared at the empty street where the little kid had once been murdered in cold blood right under his guardian’s sight. She pictured the angel in her mind and its ghostly figure- its lifeless body sucked of all power, and she pictured herself in that position. Powerless, dead.
“I’ll help you. I want to make this right.”
“It won’t be easy,” he warned.
“It’s my destiny. I’ll do what it takes.”
***
“You’re Evil, right?” The girl grabbed her forearm with both hands, regaining her attention. She flashed Evil a captivating smile. “I’m Fey!”
Evil could have sworn she was the most beautiful girl she had ever seen. She stared at the stranger, trying to take in every feature. She had a heart-shaped face and high cheekbones that drew attention to the upper part of her face. A small nose descended from her forehead in a straight line to her thin, rosy lips. Everything came together perfectly, like molten gold. Evil couldn’t look away.
“Why are you so startled? You don’t like it here?” she asked and chuckled.
Her laugh coated Evil’s ears like honey. She shook her head and tried to hide the mix of emotions she was feeling- to keep a cool appearance for the sake of her reputation.
The girl grabbed her hands with an enthusiasm that took Evil by surprise. Her hands were smaller than Evil’s, with slender fingers and an elongated look thanks to long nails painted in at least five different colors. She interlaced her fingers with Evil’s so intimately that Evil froze, unsure how to react.
“I’ve been dying to meet you!” the girl declared, swinging their joined hands excitedly without ever letting go. She was so close that Evil could see the glitter on her eyelashes.
“Me… too?” Evil replied uncertainly. A wave of embarrassment washed over her the moment the words left her lips.
The girl pulled her into a tight hug, giggling. Evil’s face suddenly flushed hot.
“I’ve wanted another girl in the group for so long!”
Evil awkwardly wrapped her arms around the girl’s back.
Standing behind them was the boy Evil had seen at the hospital. Was his name Kian? He was wearing a red T-shirt featuring the logo of a band Evil had never heard of, along with baggy black jeans adorned with chains attached to the pockets. Today, he wore simple earrings—thin strands with small stones—that made his androgynous face appear more feminine. He wore the same annoyed expression, as if trying to make Evil explode with his mind, though it was even more pronounced now than it had been at the hospital. A clear sense of irritation radiated from his brown eyes, and Evil suddenly felt very self-conscious. Had she done something to offend him? Was it because of her bad jokes about the dress?
Evil met his gaze. The space between his straight brows creased more deeply. He turned to his friend and whispered something. Evil couldn't read his lips; she could only see him chew on his lip ring and wondered whether it hurt.
His friend shrugged indifferently at what was said. He had a royal appearance. His skin was smooth, warm-brown, adorned with expensive silks. Long blue hair spilled like tides over his shoulders, braided and tied back in a half-up style. He was taller than the other boy, yet thinner and more slender.
Evil felt much smaller than she’d like to admit. Their cold stares on her skin pulled her into a bathtub full of ice. But she had to swallow her fear.
Fey let go of her embrace but kept holding her hands. She smiled warmly, and Evil almost forgot she was in a room with strangers who didn't seem to like her. For a few seconds, she decided to let herself get lost in the girl's golden eyes.
“You’re going to love it here!” she exclaimed. “We do lots of fun things. Daddy will show you the ropes.”
“Daddy?” Evil asked, confused. “You mean Lucian? Is he your father?”
“Duh!” Fey laughed. “Can’t you see the resemblance?”
In truth, Evil didn't really see it. Fey was much shorter and slighter, with a darker complexion than his fair skin. Her glossy hair was a dazzling platinum blonde, contrasting with his pitch-black hair. Yet, there was something in her face—her small, feline eyes, her nose, and her high cheekbones—that mirrored Lucian’s sharp features.
“Sort of…”
Fey laughed heartily again, as if Evil had just told the best joke she’d ever heard. “Yeah,” she said once she’d calmed down, “I take after my mom.”
Kiran rolled his eyes.
“Don’t you get tired from talking all day?” he asked.
“Who asked you?” Fey snapped without turning around. “Ignore him; he’s a grumpy jerk with no manners. Don’t talk to him.”
“Shut up!”
“Insects are loud this time of year, don’t you think?” Fey asked Evil cheerfully.
Evil wasn't sure if she wanted to get involved in their little feud, however amusing it might look from the outside.
She was saved from the uncomfortable situation by the door's creak. Lucian made his entrance, this time dressed in a black coat instead of the white hospital gown. His heavy footsteps echoed throughout the room. The sound of heels on cement froze the blood in your veins.
He lit a cigarette as he walked and took three puffs before reaching the chair in front of them. Unconsciously, all four of them straightened their backs.
“There you are, Daddy!” Fey was the first to break the ice. She walked excitedly to him and took him in her arms. The hug was only returned with an arm thrown carelessly around her. Lucian’s eyes were on Evil.
“I’m glad you could make it, Evilyn,” he said and offered her a polite smile.
Evil nodded her head, tense. She was the only one standing, like an entertainer on stage. She could feel their eyes on her and the expectation that she would say something.
“Me too,” she said at last, embarrassed again by how weak her voice sounded.
“Evil will be joining us today,” Lucian announced. The tension in the room was palpable. The air was thick with uncertainty.
Fey's high-pitched voice soothed Evil's anxiety. “Woo-hoo! So we get to keep her? Thank you, Daddy!” She kissed Lucian on the cheek, like a child excited about her birthday present.
“She’s not a dog, Fey,” the blue-haired boy reminded her. Fey waved him off and ran back to Evil, hugging her as well.
“You only said you were going to train her. You didn’t say she was going to join us,” Kian reproached, with a hint of panic in his voice.
“Maybe I wasn’t clear enough. I’m going to train Evil, and she’s going to join you from today on.” Lucian said without even turning to the boy. Cigarette ash fell down gracefully with just two taps of a finger. Smoke quickly traveled the room, yet nobody was bothered by the smell.
“And why is she joining exactly? Who even is she?”
“You could ask me directly,” Evil told him.
Kian ignored her. “Are you willing to waste time on a weakling? She’s too old already.”
Lucian didn’t look at him. “She could grow to be more powerful than you.”
“But I-”
Evil felt an emptiness in her stomach when Lucian turned to Kian with a murderous frown. Kian slumped back in his seat, quieting down immediately.
“We need all the help we can get.” The blue-haired boy said.
“Elias is right. Demons are on their way to win the war.”
Were demons winning? The Hesperus said that both sides are created to be equally powerful, and thus the war would be a never-ending conflict. A trolley advancing on a circular lane, stuck in an eternal loop. Anything other than that meant disturbing the universal balance.
“What about the balance? How can one of two equally created teams overpower the other?”
“You’re a smart one.” He smiled. “That’s true. Or was, back when the concept of universal balance still existed. It all turned to ashes now.”
“How?”
“Nox and Caeles are nowhere to be found.”
“I know that-”
“I assume you know the story behind the creation of the world?”
Evil nodded.
Long ago, Nox and Caeles coexisted like two halves of a whole. The two created the universe together, crafting life out of the love they had for the world.
The deities rose their kingdoms. Nox ruled over the darkness and death, and Caeles ruled over light and life. The two of them were unadulterated symmetry, balancing each other as they bore the weight of a new world upon their shoulders. They adored their creation and wished to share it, so they sprinkled the seed of life and fashioned humans from stardust and the earth.
Evil remembered the first painting she had seen of the goddesses. Two women stood facing each other. One was clad in a floor-length gown of flowing fabric, a black so deep it resembled a portal to the eternal night; her long, dark hair cascaded to the ground like a curtain. Caeles wore the same style of silk, yet in a white so blinding it seemed to radiate light itself; her white hair draped over her face like a bridal veil. She wore a sun-shaped crown upon her head, while Nox bore a crescent moon turned upward, its tips giving the appearance of horns.
They needed assistance, so they created beings to serve as their right hands: "the keepers of order"—also known as angels—and "the workers of death"— known as demons. Angels and demons worked in harmony, each understanding their role in the cycle of life. The work of each was essential.
Over the centuries, the creation acknowledged the presence of a god. Legends began to emerge, and the truth was lost in translation. Humans feared death and, consequently, came to fear Nox. They wrote stories about the loving Caeles and believed Nox to be a monster.
Nox had been rightfully enraged and demanded that Caeles set things straight. But she didn’t.
Caeles began to get greedy and selfishly bathed in the praise. She believed it fair and began to feed off people’s lies, forgetting the truth. The angels followed their leader’s example and did the same, thinking they represented the absolute good. Angels started to call demons “the rotten ones” and forgot every bit of their past together.
For them, demons were disgusting creatures of chaos who dirtied their hands with the soil of the dead, while they basked in glory and sang hymns about life and prosperity. The moment angels began killing demons, a war broke out.
Caeles was always depicted smiling, surrounded by angels singing of her virtue and kneeling people who applauded until their palms were raw. She radiated a warm, welcoming light, despite the massive sword at her hip—an accessory that only began to appear in her imagery after the war started.
Nox had no face in most paintings; in its place was a simple black void where traces of constellations could be glimpsed. In the majority of depictions, her face was hidden behind a black mourning veil or rendered as a terrifying monster that frightened Caeles’s followers. The few who followed Nox portrayed her as a young woman with blue-purple hair, possessing solemn features yet the forgiving smile of a mother.
Evil never found it fair.
“Angels are prideful and greedy creatures,” Lucian said. “They painted themselves as the victims in a conflict they created.”
“What could have happened to Caeles?” Evil asked.
“Nobody knows.” Lucian’s heel squashed the cigarette butt mindlessly. “One thing is for sure: as proud as they are, angels are nothing without their leader. Nox could’ve killed Caeles to give her children a better chance at winning. Their warriors are giving up, turning into lifeless vegetables tied to pitiful human lives.”
“Wouldn’t Nox still be around, in that case?”
“The Goddesses are two halves of a whole. One can’t be without the other. Perhaps Nox perished once she killed Caeles.”
“It’s our chance to turn things around,” Fey told her, the most serious Evil had seen her since she’d arrived.
“Lucian trains us as soldiers. As fighters,” Elias explained.
“Do you…hurt people?” Evil asked.
“ They made us the bad guys. We’re only playing their game,” Fey responded. “If they believe us to be rotten, why bother to prove them wrong? We’ve tried. It’s futile.”
“Angels are the villains here, Evilyn, “Lucian looked at her in the eyes, “not us.”
“But killing angels-” Cold sweat covered Evil’s body. “I can’t kill-”
“Yes, you can.” Lucian came closer and grabbed her by the shoulders. “Feel the pain and anger. Isn’t it unfair how you’re forced to live such a terrible life just because you were born the way you are? That you are less than them? That they have it so much easier? They always win.”
Because she was born a demon.
“Why should you die simply because you were born as a demon? Why should you suffer more than fate has already forced you to?”
“I don’t want to die…” Evil choked, staring at the floor. She felt the weight of Lucian’s crazed gaze on her. She felt his anger burn her skin.
“Then fight back. Reclaim your power.”
Evil knew she was cursed. Her fate was to suffer all throughout her life up to her death and most likely after that, all because she had been born this way. A monster.
That is what the Hesperus had taught her. That is what the preachers shout in the streets.
You can’t defy fate. Demons are rotten. Creatures of fear.
Evil always wondered how that could be right. How could she feed on fear when she was always scared?
She should be a wolf among sheep.
But in reality, she was a wolf devouring itself.
She hated being a demon. And that hatred boiled inside her, like a volcano about to erupt. About to spill the lava, the disgusting bubbling substance that at its core was simply loathing.Loathing life. Loathing herself.
She just wished to be at peace.
But peace always has a price.
“Will I be cured?” Evil raised her head. “Do you promise?” she asked, voice shaking.
“I promise,” Lucian smiled.