Free Black Spring by Christina Henry Page A

didn’t want to wait to find out. I waved the messenger ahead of me as I waddled my way out of the seating area and past the bar where the ice cream was prepared. The stares of everyone who had witnessed the scene pressed into my back.
    Nathaniel moved up beside me as we followed the messenger out to the sidewalk. As soon as we were outdoors, Lucifer’s errand boy turned to me with the envelope. I snatched it from his hand but did not open it. The Ghirardelli store was next to a Topshop and only half a block from Michigan Avenue. There were a ton of people walking back and forth, and a lot of women giving both Nathaniel and the messenger admiring glances. A little privacy was necessary.
    We crossed Pearson and went into the little park next to the water tower. There were several benches with people on them, checking their phones, reading magazines, eating potato chips. I looked for a semi-secluded area where I could read what was in the envelope. Anger and embarrassment coursed through me. I was beyond tired of having every decent moment in my life ruined by Lucifer, and I was in a bad enough mood to take it out on the messenger.
    “Are you one of his kids?” I asked as I tore the seal from the envelope.
    I really did not want to see what was inside. Every time I received a letter from Lucifer he asked (read: ordered) me to perform some crappy task that would endanger my life and create more enemies.
    “One of whom’s?” the messenger asked.
    “Lucifer’s, of course,” I said. “You’ve got that look. What’s your name?”
    He seemed surprised. “My name is Zaniel, and yes, Lord Lucifer is my father.”
    “Who’s your mother?”
    “Ariell,” he said with a trace of stiffness in his voice.
    I’d started to unfold the paper but stopped at the name, staring at Zaniel in surprise.
    “Ariell the psycho? Ariell who I—” I stopped, realizing what I was about to say.
    Zaniel finished for me, his green eyes stony. “Killed. Yes.”
    That meant this character was Samiel’s half brother. They shared the same mother. And while Samiel had come around pretty quickly to the idea that the world was better off without Ariell, there was no guarantee Zaniel would feel the same.
    “What’s Lucifer’s game in sending you to me?” I asked.
    “I do not understand what you mean,” he said.
    “Are you normally his errand boy, or is this a new thing?”
    “This is the first occasion in which Lord Lucifer has entrusted me with—”
    I cut him off. “So he sent you here for a reason. I just need to figure out what that reason is.”
    “It is not for us to know Lord Lucifer’s ways,” he said.
    “It is for me. I’m the one who’s always getting screwed over by his plans.”
    While Zaniel and I had our little exchange, Nathaniel took the letter from my hand, opened it and read it.
    “I do not see that you are ‘getting screwed,’ as you say. Lord Lucifer showers you with honors far beyond your status. You are only a distant heir in the bloodline, not even an immediate child.” There was a strong note of jealousy in his voice.
    “You want my ‘honors’? You can have them. Every time Lucifer has some shit job he wants done that involves bloodletting some freaky monster, I get the privilege of handling it.”
    “That is the right of the Hound of the Hunt,” he said. “By making you, one of his own bloodline, the Hound, Lord Lucifer sent a clear message to all his children that you are preferred.”
    “Yeah, well—” I started, but was cut off by Nathaniel.
    “Madeline,” he said.
    I looked at him. He handed me the paper without a word, and I finally read the missive that was so important that Zaniel had to interrupt my day.
    I’d been wrong. It wasn’t an assignment from my darling great-grandfather.
    It was an invitation.
    And boy, I did not want to attend this party.

5
    It read, in fancy italics:
    You are cordially invited to share in our joy
At the marriage of
    Lucifer Morningstar, First of the