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"More than Daniel?" Luce shook her head "I don’t want anything more than him"
"II’ At times, your pain has caused me a kind of joy I mean, you know me" Lucifer suilt If I could do aith guilt, you’d really see so Stop the Fall, Lucifer It is within your power"
He staggered toward her His eyes filled with tears
The devil shook his head "Tell uy, with a decent job, loses a--"
"ENOUGH!"
The voice brought everything to a halt The orbit of the sun, the inner consciousness of three hundred and eighteenFall itself simply stopped
It was the voice that had created the universe: layered and rich, as if h
The Throne’s coht flooded her vision, obscuring Lucifer, her falling self, the whole world with brightness Her soul buzzed with unspeakable electricity as a weight fell from her, zipped into the distance
The Fall
It was gone Luce had been thrust out of it with a single word and a jolt that reat void, toward an unknown destination, faster than the speed of lightat Godspeed
NINETEEN
LUCINDA’S PRICE
Nothing but white
Luce sensed she and Lucifer had returned to Troy, but she couldn’t be sure The world was too bright, ivory on fire It blazed in total silence
At first the light was everything It hite-hot, blinding
Then, slowly, it began to fade
The scene before Luce sharpened: The lessening light allowed the field, the slender cypress trees, the goats grazing on blond straw, the angels around her to coht’s brilliance see her skin Its power made her humble and afraid
It faded further, see diathered into a brilliant sphere, a tiny glowing orb, brightest at its core, hovering ten feet froround It pulsed and flickered as its rays took shape They stretched, glittering like pulled sugar, into a head, a torso, legs, arms Hands
A nose
A ht became a person
A wo before, Luce had been a favorite of the Throne--she knew that now, knew it in the fabric of her soul--yet Luce had never really known the Throne at all No being was capable of that kind of knowledge
It was the way of things, the nature of divinity To describe her was to reduce her So here, now, even though she looked verywhite robe, the Throne was still the Throne--which
She was staggeringly beautiful, her hair spun silver and gold Her eyes, blue like a crystal ocean, exuded the power to see everything, everywhere As the Throne gazed across the Trojan plains, Luce thought she recognized a flash of her own face in God’s expression--determined, the way Luce Price’s jaw clenched when she’d made up her mind She’d seen it in her reflection a thousand times before
And when God’s face shifted to take in the audience before her, her expression changed into so else
It looked like Daniel’s devotion; it captured that particular light in his eyes Now, in the slack, open way she held her hands, Luce recognized her mother’s selflessness--and now she saw the proud sed only to Penn
Except Luce sa that it didn’t belong to Penn
Every fleeting trace of life found its origin in the force standing before Luce She could see how the whole world--els alike--had been created in the Throne’s e
An ivory chair appeared at one edge of the plain The chair was made of an otherworldly substance Luce knew she had seen before: the same material as in the silver staff with the curled spiral tip that the Throne held in her left hand
When the Throne took her seat, Annabelle, Arriane, and Francesca rushed to co on their knees in adoration The Throne’s sht on their wings The angels huht
Arriane raised her glowing face, beating her wings to rise to address the Throne Her voice burst out in glorious song "Gabbe’s gone"
"Yes," the Throne huh of course the Throne already knew this It was a ritual of co of information Luce remembered that this was the purpose for which the Throne created speech and song; it wasto brush up against your friend’s
Then Arriane’s and Annabelle’s feet skiround and they fluttered up above the Throne They hovered there, facing Luce and the rest of their friends, gazing adoringly at their Creator Their fore--so:
The ledges
Arriane and Annabelle were taking their old places as Archangels In Heaven’s Meadow, the rippled silver ledges had once formed an arch over the head of the Throne They were back where they belonged: Arriane just to the right of the Throne’s shoulders, and Annabelle only inches off the ground near the Throne’s right hand
Bright gaps shone in the space around the Throne