"It wasn't like that… initially maybe… but then it changed. He loved me… he told me and I felt it… it was real!" I shouted, my voice echoing through the trees.
Druitte and Vine moved on either side of me, trying to calm me down.
"My Lady, we are approaching the boundaries soon,. It would be in our best interests if you kept your voice down," Sitri flashed a grin.
"Would you all please stop calling me 'My Lady'! Just call me Laurel, okay? It's too weird. People would think you were crazy in my world."
"Yes. The girl is right. We don't want any unforeseen attention," Vine agreed.
The stone borders emerged, and once we crossed past them into the Courtyard, I felt the brands burning hotter than before.
Each of the once-condemned demons beside me stepped up onto the stone pillars, remembering the day of their redemption.
Kind Vine, the most regal of the four, had a philosophical manner about him, his complexion worn with the ages of time. He began reminiscing, his eyes fixed blindly into the distance.
"Never during my enslavement, no matter what words of God were forced upon us, would I reveal Lord Dantalion to King Solomon. I told him of the visions… the things I foresaw of a brethren demon who would sit at the throne of the third heaven, but never revealed who it was."
Count Halphas, also worn with the ages, looked across the pillars at his younger brother Count Druitte. Halphas still held a bitter resentment toward anything angelic..
"I was the first Solomon called on to build his temples, giving him gold as offerings to his God. Never would I think of standing here free," his deep voice filtered across the Courtyard.
I shifted my weight on the pillar, slinking my body into a crouching position, listening to the demons tell their stories.
"At least you rebelled against Solomon, brother. I was caught in the cross fire… a casualty of war. I was grateful to become part of Lord Dantalion's thirty six legions," Druitte said proudly. "We battled against Satan's infernal realm and are now free men."
"Allow me to interrupt brothers, but every demon of the Goetia knows of The Summoning of the Four Kings of Hell. It was only a matter of time Lord Dantalion would be called upon to sign the oath. We all knew this," Prince Sitri preached arrogantly.
"You know Sitri- they should have diminished your arrogance along with your demon body!" I stood up on the pillar shouting at him. "Just because you look like him doesn't mean you can act like him! Dantalion was coveted as an angel of God for a reason. He was worthy of immortality. He sacrificed everything for all of us." With each word the demon brands took their hold on me, possessing me more, little by little, burning hotter, scorching me from the inside out.