Once Zarathoz left the room, Luzbel and Morgan were alone.
Silence fell abruptly, heavy and suffocating. Both looked in different directions, avoiding each other's gaze, and whenever it seemed like they were about to make eye contact, they quickly looked away.
The room remained like that for a long while.
The air between them was uncomfortable in a way that hurt. It wasn't anger. Not exactly. It was something harder to name.
It wasn't until Morgan finally found the courage to speak that the silence was broken.
He slowly sat down on his knees, as if thinking twice about it. He took a breath. Then, in a soft voice, barely above a whisper, he said:
"I'm sorry."
Luzbel, who had her back turned, seemed to shrink the moment she heard those words. As if that simple apology had taken something from her. She slowly placed a hand over her chest and clenched her clothes in her fingers, as though she were holding her heart in place to keep it from slipping away.
"Forgive me for everything. I'm sorry for saying those things."
The guilt was obvious in every word, in the way he spoke them, in the weight he gave them. And with every apology, Luzbel's heart seemed to grow smaller and smaller, tighter and tighter. It felt like needles were being driven into her one by one, because she knew. She knew perfectly well that none of it was his fault. Not a single bit of it.
"Stop."
Luzbel spoke softly, her voice full of pain.
"I'm sorry for running away. And I'm sorry for making you fight with her."
But Morgan kept going. As if he couldn't stop. As if every apology was a desperate attempt to fix something he didn't know how to fix any other way.
"I'm sorry for dragging you into all of this."
On the verge of tears, her voice already trembling, Luzbel said it again:
"Stop."
Her whispers reached no one. They vanished into the air.
"And I'm sorry you had to witness such a horrible scene."
Morgan said it with a forced smile, scratching the back of his head as if that could somehow soften the situation.
Luzbel snapped.
"STOP IT!"
The blow of her fist against the floor echoed throughout the room. Morgan jumped slightly in fright and froze where he was, not knowing what to do with himself.
And through tears, with a voice that was falling apart, Luzbel finally let everything out:
"Why are you apologizing? Don't apologize. Can't you see that all of this is my fault? Don't carry something that's beyond your control. Everything happened because of me. Only because of me. And hearing you apologize in my place... it hurts. It hurts so much. It hurts more than it should."
She spoke through sobs, unable to hold herself together any longer.
Morgan didn't know what to do. He simply stared at her, speechless and motionless. He had thought apologizing was the right thing to do. That it would open a path forward. That it would ease the burden they both carried. That it would lead them somewhere better.
Instead, he had only made things worse.
Without meaning to. Without realizing it.
He had hurt her even more.
Again.
"Ah... what do I do? What do I say? What am I supposed to do?"
Morgan muttered under his breath, desperate, speaking more to himself than to her.
"Tch."
The click of a tongue came from Xol.
He was already walking toward Morgan with that usual irritated expression of his, as though the entire situation was a waste of time that he was going to solve himself anyway.
He stopped in front of Morgan and looked him up and down with his usual calm annoyance.
Then, without saying a word, he sat down and slowly sank into his shadow, disappearing into it as though it were water.
Morgan stood there, unable to fully understand what had just happened, until he heard Xol's voice inside his head, in that place only he could hear:
"Move aside. Leave this to me."
Morgan's body dipped slightly, as though gravity had suddenly increased for a brief moment, but he recovered instantly without touching the ground.
As if nothing had happened.
Xol had taken control.
And while Luzbel continued crying with her back turned, her shoulders trembling, Xol spoke.
His voice was serious, steady, devoid of sympathy and with no intention of offering any.
"Yes. You're right. This is all your fault."
Those words, cold and sharp as a clean blade, left Luzbel stunned.
She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and slowly turned around. She looked at him. Studied him.
Then, with a voice still broken, still trembling, she asked:
"Huh?"
And Xol, with that same coldness, that same harshness that never apologized for existing, replied:
"You heard me. Or rather, you heard exactly what you wanted to hear, didn't you? That it's your fault. Yours and yours alone."
End of Chapter.
Next Chapter: Mistakes.