Lucifer soared down through the twinkling sky, resembling a perfect falling star. Though unlike his fall from grace over a millennium ago, this downward sweep under the muscular flap of his black wings filled him with hope.

This night was the night God would finally listen.

This night he would prove love was all that the world needed to be saved—and he would once more be enveloped into the glorious light above.

He would be welcomed home where he belonged, where he yearned to be, where Gabriel, his Gabriel, awaited his return.

Slicing down through the tall canopy of trees, Lucifer’s bare feet shot down. The draping red and white layers that clothed him rushed up, falling only as he touched the rocky ground. Between a lower dip in the mountain, the cool air became still. The sounds of babbling water drew him closer to the river’s edge and had him kneeling and joining his palms. It was here in this quiet place, below the propelling moon that cast a broken orb onto the running water, that he felt closest to Above. As it lent light to the dark wilderness, the eerie glow, although cold, reminded him of the halo that had once graced his tan skin. It reminded him of Above, and that even in darkness all could be seen.

After visiting this place for what felt like an eternity, Lucifer hoped his tireless efforts had been seen. Especially in these last few days. With the power of his eyes and words—a power that had begun and strengthened with his actions below—he had stopped a war. The worst to threaten God’s humans in decades. And he had done it with love—convincing the king to betroth his son to gain rather than steal the power he coveted.

And now he was here, after all the wars he had put a stop to, after all the lives he had saved, proud and redeemed.

Finally, he had proved God’s angels were worthy of their ability to love.

With his satiny wings draped over the hard ground behind him, Lucifer craned his head up to the starry sky. “Do you see me, God? Now and all the days before this night, do you see all I have done? Is it enough…” His face dropped, a blip at his temple pulsing. Deep down he feared nothing he ever did would be enough. But he could not stop now. He had to know. Clearing his throat, he whispered the words. “Is it enough to welcome me home? To welcome me back into the light?”

Lucifer waited in perfect stillness, only his broad chest moving as his lungs squeezed with his shallow breaths. He needed so desperately to be heard, to be seen. To be allowed to soar above to the place that contained the one thing he still needed, even after all this time, to make his existence worthwhile. His eyes fell shut, his hope failing him. He needed to see…

The sudden stillness of the whispering trees that surrounded Lucifer had his eyes opening wide—to glimpse a reflection in the tumbling water. “Gabriel,” her name left his lips before he could choke it back down. The archangel that was his undoing. The archangel he had never forgotten—not even for a second. All they had been through: Lucifer’s infatuation, Gabriel’s returned feelings, their stolen kisses, saving her immortal life, being separated only to be drawn right back to each other every single time, and then committing the ultimate sin of love between a man and a woman…until the powers that be had intervened. It was like a vivid dream that never left his waking mind.

And then he felt her undeniable presence.

With a flutter of his wings, Lucifer whirled up. His mouth gaped at the sight behind him as a slow-moving figure all but glided his way in a sapphire robe under a full moon’s light. She was every bit as breathtaking as he remembered. Her silver-flaxen hair gleamed, swaying with her nearing steps. Her blushed lips parted as if desperate to speak his name. And the hope she had always harbored for him in her silver-blue gaze blazed with excitement.

Now, this was his reward. For all his subservience. For all his good deeds over a millennium, he was being forgiven, welcomed home by the one and only angel he had never stopped loving.

Staggering forward, Lucifer fell to his knees before Gabriel, his arm coming around her soft waist as he pressed his face to her stomach. He wanted to weep at his banishment being over, at finally being able to go home. He wanted to cheer at his belief in love for all beings being rewarded. But even more than all of that?

Rising up fast to peer into the endless pools of her soulful eyes, Lucifer wanted to crush her to him, to take her mouth with his own, to taste her on his tongue, and to never ever let her go. “God, I have missed you, Gabriel. More than you will ever know.”

Gabriel’s soft expression fell—and then she vanished.

Staggering back, Lucifer struggled to breathe. Confusion and fear made his racing heart sprint. His eyes darted, hearing the rustle of tree leaves as air movement returned. But she was gone, nowhere in sight. Like she had never even been there at all.

Lucifer screamed suddenly, feeling like a hand was inside his skull and squeezing. He collapsed down to his knees, his racing heart suddenly boiling as a flare of light struck through the trees.

God’s impacting light shook the ground with an explosion of dirt, grass, and rocks. The resulting orb pulsed, emanating searing heat with words that blasted leaves and bark from the trees and punched into Lucifer’s head. “You have not changed, Lucifer. In over a millennium, your actions are driven only by your need to reclaim what is forbidden to you. And I will not allow it. Not then. Not now. Not ever. She is not yours to want. In all your good deeds, your lustful thoughts betray your servitude. They forced my hand then, and they force my hand now.”

Lucifer gasped, clawing across the dirt, fighting the blistering heat to get closer, desperate to plead for God to listen. But he could not speak. He could not beg God to reconsider, to trust his devotion to be better, to be worthy. Invisible hands squeezed around his throat as if God himself was strangling the breath of life from his body—as if he was calling Lucifer’s bluff.

“I see straight through your dishonesty, Lucifer. Your unspoken lies are only fooling yourself. Your heart that raced at the sight of her, your thoughts that shifted from duty to desire, they are your truth. And this is Gabriel’s…”

Flung across the ground, Lucifer landed at the riverbank. Agony burned him on the inside as he choked, and he could barely push up onto his hands. His struggles to turn and beg the blistering light beaming behind him suddenly died. The water had frozen stiff, and in it he saw her face once more. But this time, so much more was in view. As if looking down upon her, Lucifer saw Gabriel at the edge of her pond—peering down at him right here in this moment. Unable to see her face from above, he could not tell if the view of him sweating on his hands and knees as his body shook from internal pain affected her. But then, he did not need to. Her legs unfolded from beneath her and she stood…and walked away. Gabriel was unchained, free to come and go as she so desired.

“My messenger’s containment was short-lived.” God’s words felt like punches of fire in Lucifer’s head. “Now do you see, Lucifer? Do you see how tranquility and peace exist without your selfish influences?”

God’s light vanished suddenly with a blinding explosion, returning the eerie darkness to the forest and the chattering current to the unfrozen river. Lucifer slumped, his face hitting stones that jabbed and cut flesh at the riverbank’s edge. Breath slowing, the racing of his heart was replaced with a deep, unsettling ache.

God had been right in so many ways. It was all a lie. He knew it deep down to his very soul, deep down to every fiber of him that reacted to the mere thought of her, and every inch of his physical body that longed to see, touch, and taste her. In over a millennium, his love for that one ethereal being had never wavered. But it seemed his love, the thought of the one being that had kept him on this righteous path for so very long, was the real lie.

Gabriel had forgotten him. She had forsaken his love. She had truly given up on him.

Wiping the sweat from his brow, Lucifer finally allowed himself to feel the one thing he had never allowed himself to feel before this very moment. Alone. In all the years beside her, or even watching from afar before his fall, he had never succumbed to this loneliness, this deep burden of abandonment. All the other archangels had shunned him. Judged him. Despised him. Yet she never had. Gabriel had always been his saving grace, his soft place to fall, knowing she would catch him, knowing she would build him back up. But no longer.

Lucifer sat upright, his wings that fanned out along the ground drooping from his shoulder blades. Silver tears turned his view of the tumbling river hazy.

After a millennium, reality had finally settled in. The truth was undeniable.

Lucifer…was alone.