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The brimstone smell that had disappeared is back, but when I wrinkle my nose, he passes a hand over himself and it’s gone.
He looks up at the image painted on the wall. It was once two angels dancing in a ballroom that looks too much like his own to be a coincidence.
Without a word, he sweeps me into his arms and twirls me down the room.
He spins me and the smoky dress swirls around our legs.
The Devil likes to dance.
It’s not just a ridiculous game to determine who’s punished. It’s a chance to do something he enjoys…. Something he otherwise doesn’t have a partner for.
I tuck that away at the back of my mind. I’ll dance with him any chance I get.
“She burned you from this memory.” I say, not looking at the vandalised paint.
“She did, but the angel on that wall and I are so different from each other, you would not recognise him as me…. I’m not even sure I would recognise myself now.”
“I like you this way.”
His smile is faint and fleeting.
“Do you still want to complete your list?” he asks, drawing his hand up my leg, and splitting a slit in the smoky skirt.
“Of course.” I meet his eyes as he draws me into his arms again, and faint music floats to us from some distant place. “You might be willing to let them go for the price of a random kiss. I am not.”
“What a strange little saint…. Wicked and cruel.”
“Only so far as I have to be.”
He turns away from me, somehow managing to make it so that we both walk out of the dance and into the hallway.
But he doesn’t let go of my hand.
The warmth flooding through me has nothing to do with the flames outside.
“Shouldn’t you have handed me a pitchfork and sent me out to walk a line as well?”
“I could… but I like you. And besides, you’re not the type of sinner I punish.” He glances at me as his thumb brushes the back of my hand. “I don’t want to punish you.”
Perhaps I should worry it’s a trick.
But maybe I’m naïve… I don’t believe any of this is.
Not for me.
“I was always told ‘the Devil is a liar’ and yet….”
“You’ve given me no reason to deceive you.” His fingers wrap around my neck. One gentle squeeze later, his hand falls away. “You’re giving me everything I want.”
“I don’t plan to stop.”
“Do you trust me, little fool?”
“At least you’re straightforward about who you punish and why.” I look beyond him to the fiery Hell on the other side of those windows and then glance up. “She has pitfalls and trapdoors aplenty. What’s the point of a rule when breaking it means one thing for some and another for others?”
He draws me to a stop at the steps that lead to the pit again and he slides his hand behind my leg, lifting my knee so the skirt falls away from my skin.
His pupils shift around each other as he reads them over.
