Original Stories Fan Fiction ❯ Romancing Lucifer ❯ Contract 2: Sacrificial Ritual ( Chapter 2 )

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Romancing Lucifer

Contract 2: Sacrificial Ritual

By: Melissa Norvell

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"I don't know...I think I need to calm down before I make a decision like that." After a few minutes of blind anger, the Nepali boy finally calmed down enough to think to himself rationally. He didn't want to do anything risky, no matter how much the strange blonde before him tried to convince him to do otherwise.

"It would save a lot of that anger of yours. As soon as you get even, then things are usually resolved in your life. It's in human nature to be spiteful," Yaone educated him. Satisfaction was only human to feel after one had been done wrong, the sense of justice that all of humanity used could easily be turned into sin if reflected strongly enough.

"It's a sin to be spiteful." When he thought about it, the idea sounded worse and worse.

"Somehow, I thought you'd say that." Well, that was a damper to her plans.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Yaone sounded disappointed that he didn't want to sin. What was her deal? Why was she so hung up on him opposing Sajani so much? Did she have some kind of personal motive against her?

"You religious types are always so over dramatic like that," the girl continued to be displeased with the Nepali boy.

"Muslim is not like Christianity," Seraj didn't really know what religion she was, but it was hardly like his own. If he committed such a sin, he would be killed and claimed impure by his society. It would be an ultimate betrayal of his God and his parents would be more than angry. His father already thought that he was possessed by evil spirits; he didn't want to make it true by any means.

"Well, I'm not either one," Yaone noted.

"You don't seem religious at all," Seraj pointed out. Otherwise, why would she state what she had prior to his comment about the 'religious types' being overdramatic?

"I have a religion," the blonde was offended that he'd call her an atheist. "Just think about what I said, okay?"

With that last question, the bell rang and everyone began to head to class. Glancing around herself, the girl walked off, leaving Seraj alone with his thoughts to accompany him.

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In the middle of a lecture, the tan-skinned boy sat at his desk and glanced down at his hand, which held something on the end of a ribbon-type necklace. He slowly opened his appendage, revealing a silver ring. Brown eyes stared at it with great concentration and after a few moments of silence, the boy sighed.

'Sajani...'

Thinking of his arranged love, he recalled the very day that he had received the ring.

''These are promise rings,” he had told his dark-haired lover when they were in their pre-teen years.

The girl held the silver ring in her hands and smiled at him, flattered and grateful for the gift that she had received. "It's so beautiful, thank you!" Sajani told him happily.

“This is a promise that we'll be together, forever.” Seraj took her into his arms and moved in closer to her face, kissing her gently. The two shared a passionate kiss, filled with the promise of their new relationship.

The memories of that day soon faded as Seraj found himself towards the end of his lecture. 'I can't believe that this is happening to me...Sajani, how can you betray me like this, after everything we've been through?'

Somehow, he could not forget the sins that she had committed against him. She had cheated on him and led him on to believe that she still loved him. Not only that, Sajani didn't want to return to Nepal after the school year was over, and she was carrying the child of one of his classmates. It was absolutely unforgivable and it violated all terms of their arranged marriage.

Just thinking about it enraged him.

'I can't wait to be your bride. I want to have a beautiful sari (1) for my wedding.'

What a time for that memory to haunt him! It was like she had been getting her own little form of revenge by assaulting his memories with vivid, sentimental images of the past to remind him all that he could have had.

That very factor alone made him sick with anger.

Irritated and disappointed, the Nepali boy narrowed his eyes and frowned as he clenched the ring tightly in his hand. 'Damn, I hate this.'

Soon, the bell rang. Seraj didn't seem to notice or even hear the bell. He was off in his own little world as his eyes stayed transfixed on his clenched hand. Yaone soon neared the motionless boy and looked down upon him. When she noticed the spaced-out look on his face, it soon hit her that he obviously hadn't noticed the bell that signed the end of class.

"Hey, Seraj," Yaone spoke up, trying to snap the boy back into reality.

"Huh?" Seraj startled into reality as he jumped a little. His gaze shot straight up to his classmate, who looked as tranquil as ever, despite the two of them being the only two in class. In fact, he wondered why she was still by his side.

"Time to head out to your next class," the girl stated her purpose, which made Seraj feel just a little stupid for still sitting in an empty classroom. He had apparently dazed out because his mind was so full of nostalgia over what had happened between he and Sajani. It had been taking a toll on his mind for a while and he could do nothing but think about the past and present as he tried to piece together what happened and why things turned out the way that they had.

"Oh, sorry...Just thinking about what happened earlier," the boy told his friend, his voice was still distant as the last of his memories faded.

"My offer still stands. You can always choose to get revenge," Yaone offered to him once again as the two of them headed out of class and down the hall. The more that Seraj had thought about it, the more it didn't seem like such a bad idea.

'She's not making this any easier on me,' the disgruntled boy released a sigh as he made his way down the slowly crowding halls of the school he had been attending. Male and female students intermixed as over one hundred conversations all seemed to take place at once. As he made his way down the hall, his glance soon fell on an ominous, yet familiar figure. It was Sajani, the girl that he dreaded even laying an eye on at that moment in time.

It was the girl that he didn't want to face for fear of his growing wrath against her. He stopped, dead in his tracks as he stood face-to-face with the Nepali female, staring her down.

"Hello Seraj," Sajani closed her eyes and smiled warmly at his ex-lover.

He was silent.

"Please talk to me," the girl's voice went from gentle and composed to worried. She knew that she had done him wrong and yet, she hoped that he would understand. Sajani knew that the men from her culture weren't the understanding types, especially regarding things of this nature but she wanted her ex-lover to know where she came from.

Seraj said nothing.

"I know what I've done was wrong but I can't take it back now," the girl stood a few feet away from him as she glanced down with a stern frown. At this moment in time, she was ashamed to face him.

He still didn't respond.

Thinking quickly of anything to get his attention, she pulled out the ring that they had given each other when they were younger and looked up at him boldly. "I still have this. I've kept it all this time and-" Sajani was cut off from the last desperate thing she held on to for conversation's sake as Seraj simply walked away from her. "Seraj?"

'Damn it to hell! I'm so pissed off that I just want to kill her and I can't stop thinking about what Yaone said about getting revenge.' Seraj's thoughts berated him. His anger was now heightened to an all-new level with that girl using the ring that he had given her a long time ago against him. 'Should I do it? Do I really want to...I mean, I'm still angry and she does want to be my friend...but I can't forgive her. She still cheated on me and I will never forgive her! How can she go on smiling and laughing while I'm so miserable? It's like she doesn't even have a conscience about it. It's like she doesn't even care! Am I really that insignificant? Does our childhood friendship really mean nothing?'

Filled with rage, he savagely grabbed the ring that lay around his neck and clenched it hard enough for the piece of metal to make an impression in his skin.

"Need a hand?" A calmed, feminine voice asked from nearby.

"What?" Seraj questioned as he turned to see Yaone, who simply smiled a small, cool smile.

"Why do you always show up out of nowhere like that? Didn't anyone tell you that it's creepy when you do that?" The Nepali boy fumed. She always had a knack for showing up at either the most opportune or inopportune times, depending on one's interpretation of the event. It was almost as if she timed things like this.

"That's why I'm a woman of mysterious reputation," Yaone winked playfully as she held up a leather brown book with metal clasps on the binding.

"What is that?" Seraj asked, almost afraid of whatever plan that she was stirring up in that blond head of hers. The book wasn't irrelevant, Yaone knew exactly what she was doing and planning and there wasn't a doubt in his mind about that factor.

"My tool of revenge, are you still up for it?" She knew that he had declined her previous offer but she wasn't about to give up now. This boy had all of the potential that she had been searching for and she wasn't about to back down simply because of one refusal. Yaone knew that there were other ways to test Seraj to see if he fit her specifications. The blonde could not afford to screw up the plans that she had set into motion.

"What is that?" He didn't get it. How could be book be that important?

"It's something that can either make your life wonderful, or make it a living nightmare," the girl explained darkly.

"A single book can do that?" Seraj was a little skeptical and for a few moments, he doubted her sanity.

"This is a very special book. This book contains connections to the spiritual realms and can do things that you'd never dream of. The power will be in your hands if you chose to follow my direction and take the course of revenge. After all, she's over there acting as if you were never in her life. What's even more of an insult is that she still wants to be your friend after she cheated on you and lied to you. Are you really going to give into that and act like everything is fine between you two?" Yaone questioned, and the more she brought up his integrity, the more the wheels in his head turned as he pondered on her idea. For some reason she was really set on revenge against Sajani. He knew that she would continue to ask him until he agreed. When Yaone had her heart set on something, she carried through with it beyond the shadow of a doubt.

"I'm not a pushover." After a speech like that, he felt a little belittled by the blonde so he had to reaffirm his manhood. There was no way that he would let any woman run over him! It was almost like she was challenging his authority and ability as a man.

"Then take the plunge," the offer, for some reason, sounded a lot more enticing then before.

"What does that require?"

"You have to want revenge and you have to be willing to lead. Can you handle it?" Yaone wanted to make sure that he had no second thoughts on the subject, for if he had one doubt, he would be turned down from taking a plunge like this one.

"What kind of guy would I be if I said no?" Of course Seraj wouldn't turn it down now, not when his manhood was being threatened. He wanted to show Yaone that he could be strong in all cases, and the offer of revenge seemed more and more tempting when he thought about it.

"Then follow me home after school and I'll show you something that will blow your mind," the girl's voice promised something great in store for the boy. Many questions ran through his head and a small part of him wondered if he was truly doing the right thing. However, he had already nodded and told her that he would before he could let his doubt push him in the other direction.

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After school, Yaone went straight home and sat her book on the kotatsu in the living room before she walked into the kitchen and got herself something to snack on. The girl re-entered the living room and sat at the kotatsu, glancing around at all of the statues of different angels that adorned the room.

The angel statues were not like normal holy images that one would see in any religious house. They were morbid in nature and many of them had black wings. Some were in shackles and some depicted a fallen angel, while others had red or blood-stained wings. They were all male; no female angel statues were present in her house.

Yaone didn't believe in female angels. It was said in Jewish Text that angels weren't allowed to assume the form of the female gender and she believed a lot of what the old texts had noted on that subject.

Soon, she heard a knock at her door and rose up to answer it. As she walked to the door, the girl opened it to reveal her guest- it was Seraj. Half of her was happy that he had come, while the other half was still a bit skeptical on whether or not the boy would be of any use to her.

"So, you've come after all," she gazed into the boy's eyes.

"Yes, I thought about what you said," Seraj replied.

"Come in and follow me," Yaone let the Nepali boy into her house.

As Seraj stepped in, he glanced around at his surroundings- all were strange. Everything was neatly in place and seemed untouched by time. It was like no one even lived in the house, aside from the shoes at the door and plate of half-eaten sea breeze salad on the kotatsu. The walls were a light blue and scarce of portraits or art of any kind and the floor was a royal red and seemed velvet in texture. The place was riddled with simple black shelves that displayed the numerous statues of angels.

'What's with this place? What is this place...and what's with all of the angels?' Seraj wondered.

They soon came upon a door that led to what looked like a basement. The girl opened the door as the two of them descended the stairs with a flashlight as his only guide to what may lay below.

"It's through this door," Yaone told him.

"Where does this lead to? What is it?" Seraj wanted to know where he was going before he went there.

"It's my basement. Why? Are you afraid?"

"No, I can handle it."

When the two finally reached the floor, his eyes widened at the sight before him.

There was a long, low-lying table with two black mirrors on either side but that wasn't what really drew his attention. Candles adorned the wall and before the table, there was a large statue of an angel with its wings outstretched.

It was a beautiful creature, sitting on its pedestal with one leg bent and an elbow on one knee with a hand on his forehead while he stared down in grief. The statue conveyed great suffering in expression. The angel in the statue was dressed in a short, Romanesque robe and possessed shackles on his neck, wrists and ankles and in one hand he held a crown of thorns. The statue was beautiful, with the body of Adonis and what he could see of the angel's face, it was beautiful. It could make even the straightest of men tempted to think otherwise. The angel's hair was fluffy with a single, long ponytail that trailed to the top of his buttocks.

There was only one thought that came to him at a time like this.

'Oh my God, she's Satanist.'

All he could do was staring, transfixed by that magnificent statue's face and the many white candles that lay at his feet.

"What's wrong?" Yaone didn't know what the big deal was. Had he never seen a statue of Lucifer before?

"You're into the occult?" He was not that surprised.

"You have no idea. Welcome to the worship room of my lord," the blonde held out her hands in pride. She had created this room with her parents, who followed the same religion. It was their place of worship and praise to their dark deity.

"You worship angels?" Seraj wanted to be sure before he outright claimed that she worshiped Sataniel.

"Not just any angels, the angels of the Seventh Heaven, more specifically, this one," she gestured to the solemn-looking angel statue. "Isn't he gorgeous?"

"Which angel is that?" He had a feeling that she knew a lot about Lucifer for a reason.

"This is...Lucifer a.k.a Satan or Sataniel, the King of the Eastern Skies and fallen angel of heaven. My lord and savior." Yaone stated with a small smile on her face.

"Lucifer? How can you worship such a sinful creature?" She was truly misled. Seraj didn't see how she could bow down to someone that defied everything that was just. Lucifer was the ultimate evil and in his opinion, deserved no worship.

"Sin is merely an opinion. What's good in one place is bad in another. What's good in one person's eyes is bad in another's. Being held down by the rules of other religions restricts your freedom of expression as an individual," Yaone explained. "Lucifer is about that freedom, as opposed to all of the rules and commandments of your holy religions. Lucifer doesn't want you to think of him as ultimate, he wants an equal relationship with his followers."

"You make it sound so good. What are you planning?" Seraj was definitely skeptical of her and whatever plan she had cooking inside of her head. He had a feeling that this would be anything but good.

"Planning? I'm here to make you an offer. With Lucifer's help, you can gain the power to get revenge against Sajani for what she'd done to you." The blonde told him once again. It was really a simple plan, at least to her.

"This is against my religion," Seraj really had a feeling that he shouldn't have even come to her house.

This had all been a mistake.

"You think so? I suppose that you really are a pushover. Now that you know what you're dealing with, you want to back out?" Yaone seemed a little irritated with him as she furrowed her eyebrows. "Do you doubt my ability as a spell caster?" The school girl picked up the book.

"It isn't that. I just don't believe in this," the black-haired boy tried to explain.

"If you don't believe in it, then why should there be a problem to do it? Nothing will happen, right?" In the strangest ways, her statements made a lot of sense to Seraj but that was not to say that he was still not skeptical.

"I don't think I want to make that choice," he closed his eyes and replied in doubt. He knew that Yaone wouldn't like it, but as for right now, he was thinking of his own personal happiness.

"You came all this way to just turn down this opportunity in fright? You can't be serious," Yaone was irritated. What a huge waste of time he was.

"You're just tempting me," she was every bit as good at it as Lucifer himself.

"It's not tempting unless you're at least thinking about it," the girl pointed out. Part of Seraj seemed to want this. After all, he didn't take off and run when he realized what she truly was.

Just then, a realization hit Seraj and his brown eyes widened in shock. 'Am I thinking about this?' Could this by why he had been feeling so much pressure? Was this why a decision was so hard to make?

"You told me once that your parents thought you were possessed by evil spirits, right? What better way to find out then with this? Besides, if they are right then it would be more effective. Why not harness that power instead of trying to abolish it?" The girl continued to persuade.

"It's not holy. I can't do this," Seraj refused.

This sparked the girl's anger. "Then get out, coward. Maybe Sajani had a good reason to get away from you."

Her second guesses seemed right. Seraj was truly just some spineless weakling who didn't deserve to be in front of her God, much less be a sacrifice to his cause. Lucifer would be offended if he were offered such a miserable sacrifice.

He was not the one she'd been looking for.

"What?" The Nepali boy was a little shocked that she'd just throw him out for something as small as that. Also, he was offended that she called him a coward. He was not a coward! He was being true to his religion.

"You obviously are a weakling who doubts his religion. What's wrong? Is your God not strong enough to shield you against mine? Looks like the conformist religions have followers of little faith and weak minds," the blue-eyed girl knew exactly how to crawl underneath of his skin and make him question all he thought he once knew.

It seemed that Yaone had a talent for rubbing him the wrong way.

"Fine! I'll do it!" He agreed out of outrage and anger. The boy didn't know what else to do. He felt trapped between being labeled as a coward and the doubt of his religion and simply leaving to remain pure.

He decided to take the plunge.

"Because your God will deliver you, right?" Yaone remarked, scoffing the one in which he believed in. The boy was slowly breaking down; it was only a matter of time.

"Don't mock me. Be glad I'm doing this," Seraj grumbled.

"Damning me for being your friend?" The blonde asked with a coy smirk. She finally got him, hook, line and sinker.

"Yes, if you must know," the boy continued to grumble.

"Isn't that a sin?"

"Shut up, tell me what to do," he had felt as if he'd been mocked and teased enough. Why didn't she get right down to the point before he changed his mind? A part of Seraj damned himself for his decision. He had a feeling that it would all come back to haunt him in some way or another. The Gods had a funny way of laughing at his pains. They call them trials and tribulations but Seraj begged to differ.

Aside from that, he knew that Yaone was taking some kind of sadistic joy in this whole situation.

Maybe she was the one possessed by evil spirits.

Better yet...Maybe she was the female incarnation of Lucifer.

"Strip," the blonde ordered.

"What!?" That caught him off guard. Why would she want to see him naked? What kind of sick fetish was this ritual?

"You agreed to perform this ritual, so strip. You can't leave unless you go through with this," the girl demanded. Like a spider with an innocent fly trapped in its web of terror, the girl had Seraj right where she wanted him and she would not let him go for any reason. "Failure to perform the ritual will result in haunting, possession or even death." She advised and hoped that it would scare him into following through with her wicked plans.

"You roped me into this," Seraj narrowed his eyes. He had the sinking feeling that he had just crossed the road of no return.

"You agreed."

"If you weren't my friend, I'd-" He began to warn but before the boy could complete his sentence, Yaone cut him off.

"Idle threats are useless and you know it. I have the power of persuasion and logic by my side." It was true, when it came to verbal and psychological battles, the school girl had him beat. He was only forced with one option- hang his head in defeat and continue with the ritual.

"You're underhanded," Seraj replied as his black school uniform fell to the ground at his bare feet as the boy stripped before the dark alter. He turned his sights away from the girl in both embarrassment and defeat as he slowly and unsurely walked towards the alter. The Nepali boy then asked what he should do now. He had never preformed any kind of ritual before so he was clueless as to how they actually worked.

"Lay on the altar," she instructed as she then held a small dagger out to the boy and instructed that he slit his own wrist. "All that is needed is a small amount of blood to perform this ritual."

The black-haired boy slit his wrist with ease and lay on his back, flat on the wooden table that Yaone affectionately called an altar. From where he laid, he could clearly see the face of the saddened Lucifer statue. He wondered why he looked so melancholy. Even if his eyes were made of stone, they seem to have a pain that was preserved in stone. They stared upon him, unmoving. Even though it was merely a statue, the boy felt as if it was staring straight through him, into the very depths of his soul and judging him for the actions he was about to take.

From her position at his side, the blond flipped open her book and began to read the specified page that she had been searching for. It seemed to be a chant of some sort and no matter how intently Seraj listened in, he could not make any sense of it. It was as if the words had been spoken in a dead language that no one seemed to know but her.

'I feel so strange...What's happening to me?' The boy wondered, still transfixed on the statue of Lucifer and for some reason, he couldn't take his eyes away from it.

Suddenly, one of the bright torches on the wall burst into flames.

Yaone smiled at her accomplishment, happy with the results. 'It has begun. Lucifer, come fourth and accept my gift unto you. I hope that you enjoy him, my Lord.'

"Huh?" Seraj's glance jerked to his wrist as he saw a small amount of blood stream from it and dive into the fire, consumed by flames. The combined substances soon took the form of two wings that encased an indefinite figure. The fire seemed to burn off, giving the wings a pitch black color, darker then the deepest depths of any cave. Then, the two wings separated and were thrown to either side to reveal what appeared to be a man with light skin, mint-green hair and white eyes with black sclera, the color that reflected the deepest depths of hell.

The strange winged man gazed at him with those eyes as he stood stock-still a few feet away from him.

Yaone smiled. 'It worked.'

Seraj slowly sat up and stared at the man before him.

He was simply beautiful. The man's wings were large, with pitch black feathers that reflected the colors of an oil spill. His skin was a rich white and flawless in nature. He possessed all the beauty of a renaissance angel. The tufts of muted, mint green that adorned his head seemed as if they were made of pure silk and his long, slightly wavy ponytail cascaded down his back with smooth fluidity. His physique was lean and muscular, not overly so but enough to show that he had physical power. The angel was dressed in a black, Victorian-style suit with black slacks, a red, button-up under shirt and black tie.

"Who are you?" Seraj dared to ask after about ten minutes of doing nothing but staring in awe and trying to figure out how it was possible for a man to be born from flames and blood. It was as if a miracle was being preformed right in front of him.

The angel spoke in a deep, masculine voice, "my name is Lucifer, King of the Eastern Skies."

...To Be Continued...

NOTES:

1. Sari- A Sari is a wrap around dress worn by Hindu and Muslim cultures as well as countries in the middle east. It is a form of traditional dress for the females.