Sobbing erupted from the middle balconies as they caught a look at his once-beautiful face, his dislocated wing, blood still streaming from his nose and ears. His wings looked like tree trunks in late autumn, his feathers burned off and leaving the limbs bare except for a few scorched feathers which still clung to them like dead leaves.
“I swear,” Lucifer looked up at his people, and then turned to the Speaker of the Commons. "Did you get the envelope?"
"I did," the Speaker of the Commons said. "I kept the matter confidential, as you requested, until we had brought you before the general court for questioning." His hand trembled as he pulled out a large, white envelope and slid out a Legislative Bill. A warning bell went off in Jophiel's mind.
The Speaker of the Commons turned and held out the paper like an accusation, holding it above his head as though he were the Emperor pulling down lightning from the heavens to smite an enemy. Jophiel knew what was coming, the nightmare which woke her up each night in a cold sweat, the charge which would fracture this Alliance in a million pieces and leave the Eternal Emperor with no empire left to rule.
“We have before this joint session of Parliament a resolution,” the Speaker of the Commons shouted, “filed by the Prime Minister, alleging that the Eternal Emperor Hashem did knowingly and willfully, with harmful intent, withhold knowledge regarding the discovery that humans, the root stock for all four hybrid races, did still exist, despite knowledge that withholding this information would cause three of those four races to become extinct. Do you swear, Prime Minister Lucifer, that the allegations you filed in this resolution are true?”
“I do,” Lucifer said.
His eyes met hers. This Bill had been drafted a long time ago, before Kunopegos wife had died. Before he had been arrested. It had been his plan all along, and she suspected that even under torture he had withheld this piece of information because, if the Emperor had known what he really had planned here today, he would have never let her bring his disgraced son before the legislative body that he ruled.
“What evidence do you intend to bring forth to support these allegations?” the Speaker of the Commons asked.
The cacophony of the mob grew louder. Cameras flashed. Master Yoritomo stepped forward, not sure whether to put a stop to this three-ring circus, but Jophiel waved him off. Whether or not Kunopegos wife was dead, she, too, was a daughter of this new Alliance, the one which Lucifer had sired. The one which said everyone, and not just the people the Emperor felt like having talk, deserved their day in court.
His eyes met hers. She felt the compulsion and she blocked it, and then she gave him what he asked for anyways. Whether or not Lucifer spoke, the Emperor was damned. She would let Lucifer have his day in court. He turned back to his audience, a demonic maestro conducting his orchestra.
“And furthermore, I allege the Emperor denied Parliament the opportunity to even consider this issue because the human homeworld resides in the Sata’an Empire and is still a pre-technological society.”
Lucifer's eyes were cold and hard like a viper about to strike a rat. His lips curled up in a sneer as he went in for the kill.
“After using hybrids for cannon fodder against Shay’tan for the last 150,000 years, he unilaterally chose to let the armies which defend you die out rather than come down off his high moral horse.”
The chatter grew deafening as Parliament, the reporters and witnesses all spoke at once. Lucifer's sorry condition only bolstered his claim that there was a conspiracy, for it had taken mob rule too great even for a god to defeat to get him here today.
“You allege that humans exist,” the Speaker of the Commons said, “yet you have not shown us a single human. What proof can you give us?”
Hatred streamed off of those eerie silver eyes like heat waves. He stood here now, not disgraced as the Emperor had intended, but a victor, and she was the conquered.
“I call the Emperor’s commander-in-chief of the four hybrid fleets," Lucifer stepped towards her and jutted out his arm at her as though it were an accusation, "Supreme Commander-General Jophiel."
“The witness may approach the bench,” the Speaker of the Commons said.
Jophiel's heart raced as she stepped up to the platform. The tinge of dried blood caught her eye, on his collar, through the rips in his shirt, on his face. The bruises. The place where the Emperor had ordered the Cherubim to dislocate his wings to get information out of him. Where was that Happy Bird now? That little bird which had sung to him whenever he was lonely? The one she had not believed in until she had run out into the Garden to the Eternal Tree to weep and heard that bird sing for herself? Her lips trembled. Dead human or not, nobody deserved what the Emperor had done to him.
She could not say that without betraying the Emperor. She schooled her face into her customary unreadable mask. The ice princess. That is what they called her. She was the ice princess once more.
“Prime Minister Lucifer,” the Speaker said, “You may ask your questions.”
“When did the Eternal Emperor first become aware humans still existed?”
Lucifer did not pace as he usually did when making a speech, but stood in front of her, close enough that he could lunge for her throat if the urge so took him.
“That information is classified.” Jophiel forced herself to maintain her stone face.
“General Jophiel,” the Speaker of the Commons directed. “Might I remind you this is an investigatory hearing of the duly elected legislative body of the Alliance?”
“And might I remind you that I serve under the pleasure of the Eternal Emperor, not Parliament,” Jophiel said, her back as stiff as a ramrod as she stood there in her uniform, so many medals of valor plastered across her chest they threatened to make her fall forward. “Parliament has no authority over the military except the power to declare war and appropriate funding.”
“Funding that could be cut off,” Lucifer gave her a predatory grin that did not meet his eyes. "Now answer the question, because I'm sure my Father wants his entire empire to know just how badly his disgraced son fucked up."
The Speaker of the Commons gasped, but did not bang his gavel or demand order at Lucifer's use of such vulgar language. The delegates perched off the balconies above him chittered like rats about to swarm in and pick the trash, gleeful at his abandonment of niceties and protocol and eager to hear him speak the course vernacular of the people and not the two-tongued speech of the elite.
"I received a distress call from the Syracusia," Jophiel did not let go of that silver-eyed gaze, "asking for the Eternal Emperor's help saving the life of a foal that had been born prematurely. When we got there, we discovered the mare was not Centauri as we had first assumed, but a human female."
Parliament exploded. Cameras flashed. Reporters pressed forward and were rebutted by the Cherubim.
"And in what condition was the human female?" Lucifer asked.
"She was … deceased," Jophiel said. Anger over the condition they had found the poor woman in burned through her flesh, causing the next words to erupt from her mouth as though she were spitting. "General Kunopegos said you told him his wife could safely birth a Centauri colt if they took it eleven weeks early and put it in an incubator."
Lucifer gave her a victorious grin.
"And how big was this human female?" Lucifer asked.
"My size … no … around 20% smaller," Jophiel retorted. "Only without the wings." Too late she felt the noose tightening around her neck. She realized the absurdity of Kunopegos accusation even as she spoke the words.
"So this human was smaller than an Angelic female," Lucifer whirled to face his audience. "Let's say, oh, maybe one hundred twenty pounds, mated to a twelve-hundred pound Centauri stallion. You want us to believe I would tell General Kunopegos such a thing? Or that, even if I had, that any sane person would believe such a thing was even possible?"
Whispers moved through Parliament, undulating snakes of accusations, each viper whispering in the ear of a delegate who i
n turn spoke with the voice of billions of people.
A Centauri stallion?
He's ten times her size!
Why the hell would anybody do something that stupid?
Jophiel's mouth opened. She forced herself to shut it before she blurted something stupid, such as the fact those had been the Emperor's exact same words to Kunopegos?
“I’d like to bring you back in time several weeks to a certain meeting between myself, the Emperor, you, and the emissary from the Sata’an Empire, Ba’al Zebub,” Lucifer's eerie silver eyes glowed brighter, picking up the light from the skylight and reflecting it into her own eyes, dual daggers that would cut away the lies. “Do you recall the aforementioned meeting?”
“Yes.” Jophiel felt sick to her stomach.
“What was discussed at that meeting?” Lucifer looked like a Leonid about to pounce on a prey animal
“That’s classified,” Jophiel felt the noose pull tighter. She began to rock back and forth, trying to anticipate his next question, trying to think. He was out here to hang the Emperor today, and she was his prize witness.
Lucifer turned and staggered, weak from three days of abuse and torture, although it appeared the lightning-blasts to his wings had happened only this morning, and nearly fell. The Speaker rushed to lend him an elbow. Lucifer's physical weakness only accentuated his strength of will as he waved the Speaker off so he could continue tightening the noose around her throat and compel her to speak the truth.
“Isn’t it true Ba’al Zebub offered to open the human homeworld to trade?” Lucifer asked. “And allow the immigration of humans to Alliance Territory under the same terms Shay’tan offers to all new sentient homeworlds?”
“That’s classified,” Jophiel felt the floor drop out from under her.
"General Jophiel," Lucifer leaned forward, so close that she could see the stubble of his charred hair. "Were you aware that in the Sata'anic language, there is no such verb as to lie?"
Jophiel swallowed. "I wasn't aware of that."
"The Sata'anic lizards have words such as to obfuscate, to obstruct, deflect, deter, bewilder, dim, and cloud," Lucifer said. "But they have no word for lie. Do you know why that is?"
"No."
"Because if you ask the old dragon a straight question," Lucifer's battered lips seeped blood as he mocked her, "Shay'tan will not lie. So I will remind you now that you are under oath, and that just because you are a representative of the Eternal Emperor does not exempt you from telling the truth!"
"I … I'm …"
Lucifer spun to face his audience and held up his arms as though he were reaching for the sun. "Who here is satisfied with her excuse that she is exempt from answering the people?"
The hall grew silent. Nobody jumped to her defense.
"Who here would vote to cast the Supreme Commander-General out of this building, out into the mob, and let them ask her their questions?"
Shouts of 'throw her out … throw her out' echoed through the building. Outside, the mob watching the proceedings on the video monitors shouted the same thing, as were trillions of people in the galaxy watching live on their televisions.
Jophiel clenched her jaw. Lucifer wasn't the only one who could speak pretty words!
“Ba'al Zebub inquired about the pillaging of a protected seed world!" Jophiel shouted. "And by the Sata’an charter you mean slavery! Shay’tan forces all new homeworlds to give over all young adults of a certain age for 20 years of forced servitude. Including forced marriage!”
“Wouldn’t you agree that paying the bounty to purchase the contracts for these … indentured servants …” Lucifer asked, “and then freeing them to become Alliance citizens upon meeting certain terms and conditions, for example, to marry an Alliance citizen, would be preferable to slavery in the Sata’an Empire?”
"You’re talking about purchasing human slaves and forcing them to bear our children for 20 years!" Jophiel shouted.
“How many children have you borne the Empire?” Lucifer asked.
“Twelve,” she lifted her chin, proud of her offspring.
“Your youngest lives with you on your command carrier, does he not?” Lucifer asked.
“He suffers from the wasting sickness,” Jophiel said. “He needs a certain number of hours of physical contact with one of his parents or he fails to thrive.”
“How many other children are on your command carrier,” he asked.
“None,” she said.
“Why do you get special privileges that other members of the military don’t?” Lucifer's eyes were cold as he snapped shut the maws of the trap.
“The Emperor couldn’t spare me,” she said.
“So you get to spend time with your children,” Lucifer said, “but the rest of us have to fork them over and never see them again?”
"That's unfair!" Jophiel shouted. "I had special circumstances."
"Let me rephrase it, she who has borne this Alliance twelve babies and given them up at birth," Lucifer leaned so close he almost whispered the question in her ear. "How is the forced breeding the Emperor compels our species to do to fill his ranks any different than what Ba'al Zebub proposes to do with humans? Only at least they would only have to serve as breeding stock for twenty years versus the five hundred that we are obligated to serve him?"
He toyed with her, that gift she realized now had been there all along, the reason he had been able to crawl into her mind and make her flesh sing unlike any other man. He toyed with her, projecting his memory of what it had been like to lay down with her and rise towards ecstasy together, and then just as they had cuddled together for pillow talk afterwards, a knock on the door, disappointment, off to another mating appointment, forced to fill the Emperor's ranks.
She sensed that, for some reason she could not fathom, that he was the one who had felt betrayed…
“I object to the form of your question,” Jophiel's voice trembled
“Answer the question,” the Speaker of the Commons directed.
“Isn’t it true that General Jibril has visited your son via needle once per week until a few weeks ago?” Lucifer asked.
“Yes,” Jophiel said.
“Why does he get special privileges?” Lucifer asked.
Jophiel squirmed in her seat, this being the question she dreaded coming. “Because our son needs him,” she said very softly, no longer the highest ranking officer in the fleet, but a mother.
“Don’t you think all children need their parents?” Lucifer asked.
“Yes.”
“Then why, why, why have you forked over 12 of your children the minute their umbilical cord was cut to be raised by strangers?” Lucifer pounded his hand upon the table each time he said ‘why’ to emphasize his point.
“Because the Emperor requested it,” she said.
“Why don’t you just say no?”
“Because it is the law," she whispered. "If we don’t bring our numbers up during this generation, within three generations, we will become extinct, as happened to the Wheles.”
“Wouldn’t you agree, then, that infusing the hybrid races with humans should be the highest priority our Alliance has.”
“It is the highest priority!” Too late, she realized this statement sounded empty without betraying Raphael's mission, but she did not dare speak of it lest it tip off Shay'tan they were closing in.
“Then why did Hashem refuse a trade deal with the Sata’an Empire?” Lucifer asked.
“The Sata’an Empire offered no formal trade deal,” Jophiel said, forcing her demeanor back to the icy, unemotional one most people were familiar with. “They only … it’s classified.”
“If Shay’tan were to offer such a formal trade deal,” Lucifer swept his hand up towards the delegates, who had the power to ratify all trade deals, “would the Emperor accept it?”
“I don’t know.”
"Don't play coy with me, Jophiel!!!" Lucifer slammed his fist down upon the slender railing which separated him from her. "I will
remind you that you are under oath. So now I will ask you again. What was the Emperor's response when Ba'al Zebub offered his hypothetical trade deal, and I asked him whether or not he would accept it?"
Jophiel swallowed. Her voice came out little more than a whisper.
"He said that he would let our species rot in hell before he would give one inch to the old dragon."
Parliament erupted in a roar of outrage. Outside the building, the mob could be heard even through the thickness of the outer building. She heard the sound of sirens, explosions, broken glass.
“Thank you, Supreme Commander-General Jophiel,” Lucifer hissed. He waved his hand at her as though she were beneath him. “I have no further questions for you today.”
He turned back to his audience, his orchestra, his hellish mob.
"I now call Angelic Air Force General Abaddon, also known as the Destroyer."
Jophiel realized the Eternal Emperor was screwed…
Chapter 51
Galactic Standard Date: 152,323.10 AE
Haven-3: Halls of Parliament
Angelic Air Force General Abaddon
(aka 'The Destroyer')
Abaddon
Sarvenaz melted into his wings, a feathery grey alternative to the burqa she had abandoned back on the Jehoshophat. He kept one arm around her shoulders, the other clutching her hand, shielding her from a world so thoroughly alien it terrified her. Was he doing the right thing, announcing his marriage in a forum so large it dwarfed the imagination, crowded with species she found nightmarish, all surrounded by a murderous mob shouting for the Emperor's blood?
"Lucifer … Lucifer … Lucifer …"
Shit! The kid had pulled it off. If anyone had ever told him things would go down like this, he would have called them a liar and sent them someplace to have their head examined, although he doubted that even Lucifer had predicted how bezerk his constituents would go when the Emperor showed his hand.
"Are you ready for this, Mo ghrá?" he whispered into the wing he'd kept curled around his left side to shield her from prying eyes, leaving his right side free to draw his sword if any dared come too close.
Sword of the Gods: Prince of Tyre (Sword of the Gods Saga) Page 54
