Barlowe, Wayne - God's Demon

She slid the long lid from a plain silver case that Eligor had brought to her and saw, lying upon the finest, iridescent Abyssal skin, Sargatanas' sword, Lukiftias-pe-Ripesol. The tempering that had brought its souls together was impossible to break, and so a sword it would stay. In Sargatanas' hand it had been light and deadly, but in hers it would be a two-handed weapon. While she was not so proficient in the Art Martial—what little she knew she had learned had been with Sargatanas—Lilith was comforted just knowing that it was coming with her. And she suspected there would be more than ample opportunity to work on the craft in the Wastes. She kept the sword wrapped in its skins and tied it to the outside of her pack, easily accessible but not obvious.

A rustling in the next room brought a smile to her face. The miracle of Sargatanas' Passage had brought Ardat back to Lilith, and there was nothing short of destruction that would separate them ever again. Ardat appeared in the doorway wearing the skins Lilith had once worn, and her heart was filled with warmth for the handmaiden. It seemed Lilith's world never stopped changing around her.

"Mistress, I have prepared your skins. Are you finished here?"

Lilith looked around her chambers, making sure everything was in order; she did not want to unseal them when she returned and find them in disarray. Her eyes fell back upon her small worktable and the two figures that stood upon it. One was the small bone figurine of herself, taken from the dome by Eligor. It was relatively crude—an example of her earliest work, executed before she had found her voice as a sculptor. Next to it was a piece she had only just finished, a representation of Sargatanas fashioned of many pieces of the purest white Abyssal bone that she had begun back in Dis. It was intricate and yet strong, a work of subtlety, grace, and power reflecting, she thought, all of his attributes, and she regarded it as her very best sculpture. Originally, she had planned to keep them together, but on impulse she picked them up, carefully wound a scrap of skin around them, and placed them in an outside pocket of her pack. She hoped Eligor would like them.

"Yes, Ardat, I am."

Epilogue

When he put his quill down it was atop a large stack of neatly arranged leaves of parchment. It had taken him over two full cycles of Algol's transit to complete his reminiscences, two cycles in which he had wandered far to collect the fullest accounts of the events surrounding Sargatanas' Rebellion.

In that time, the palace, the city's focal point and arguably most unharmed building in Adamantinarx, had been tirelessly repaired. No longer was it open to the tempests of Hell; no longer could he so easily hear the murmurings of passing demons through holes in the walls. He could hear the hammers of artisans—demon and soul alike—as they brought the wounded friezes back to life. Even now, he could see the barges heavy with native stone as they docked, manned by souls who wanted to work rather than had to. It was a new time in Hell.

The Rebellion was over and yet it continued on in its new reforms. While he was aware of the changes in those wards and cities that had been closest to the battles and survived, he also knew that there were many regions as yet unaffected. This, he thought, would take time. Already there were some who did not fully understand Sargatanas' gift, who thought to simply take up arms and indiscriminately rid Hell of their own concept of evil. Theirs would be a long path.