Hope
....
“Ava.”
He stood, dipping his head as a gentleman might.
“Welcome, my dear.”
The only response I could muster was a stare, wary as I was of his courtesy.
“Please,” he went on, “take a seat—and allow me to pour you a drink. I suspect you could use one at the moment.”
A beat passed in silence. When his gaze didn’t waver, I gave a curt nod. The corners of his mouth lifted in answer.
As I strode slowly forward, my footfalls echoing through the room, he turned to his sideboard, decanting a clear, amber liquid into a pair of tumblers. Once I came to a halt in front of his desk, he held one of them out to me. I accepted the proffered glass with a surprisingly steady hand.
“So,” I managed, sinking into the chaise he’d made available and crossing my ankles in a motion that reeked of childhood conditioning. “Am I to understand that this is Hell? Because, if so, it would seem I’ve been grievously misled.”
Lucifer chuckled as he took his seat, eyes full of amusement. “You don’t have to understand anything, my dear. You’re here, regardless."
“Unless, of course, this is some sort of dream or hallucination on my part,” I countered.
“I think the length of time you’ll be spending here will soon disabuse you of that notion,” he told me, utterly matter-of-fact.
I hummed in what was neither an acceptance nor a denial of his words—merely an acknowledgement.
“Did you really think,” he asked, “that after all you’ve done, you’d be able to escape my notice?"
My answer was wry.
“I’d hoped so.”
He laughed—oh, how he laughed.
“Ah, yes, I should have known. Hope,” he mused, “the greatest vice of them all.”
There was a pause.
“Pardon me?”
“You heard me,” he insisted. “Hope, in my opinion, is the deadliest of sins. In fact, that conviction was once widely agreed upon, though it was lost, I think, over the ages. The Greeks tried to pass it down, you know.”
I quirked a brow, intrigued in spite of myself.
“Tell me: in your lifetime, did you happen across the myth of Pandora’s Box?”
My eyes widened of their own accord.
“You did,” he surmised, approval flitting through his gaze. “Then you know what was last to escape it.”
"I do, yes."
Lucifer smiled.
"Nothing, Ava," he told me, "has greater potential for destruction than hope. Hope drives people to lengths that no other vice could rival—not fear, envy, greed, not even hatred. Hope is just as likely to bring out the worst of someone as it is to inspire that person's best. And when it is false, hope is all the more deadly for the devastation it will wreak.
"But you knew that already." He paused. "I daresay you know it better than anyone."
As his lips pulled back ever so slightly, Lucifer's teeth glistened. He looked to my reaction with relish.
I pursed my lips, deliberating, and took a sip from my glass to stall. The flavour of the drink took me by surprise, all tart and heady as it flowed over my tongue.
Apples, I realized.
It tastes of apples.
And then I knew. I knew he knew.
I set my glass down on the desk and promptly lounged back into my chair, dropping all pretenses with a lazy, decadent smirk.
"Let us dispense of this game, then," I chided him, allowing fondness to seep freely into my voice. "How long have you known, old friend?"
He leaned forward, eyes as startlingly yellow as the day we'd first met, all those years ago, albeit in different forms.
In his regard, amid all of the usual mischief and scheming, a spark of warmth winked at me.
"Longer than you might expect," he answered, grinning. "You weren't exactly hiding, my dear.
"Welcome back, Eve. I've missed you terribly."
....