A Dead Language

You sigh to yourself as you step through the doorway of your bedroom. Your bag hits the floor with a thump before you throw yourself haphazardly onto your bed. Face smushed into the mattress, you groan. It had been a long day, and you were thankful that it was finally over.

Beep.

You groan at the notification sound, knowing that it’s just a reminder about your Latin test the next day. Impending dread ticks at the back of your mind; you were hopelessly unprepared and had planned to study that night. But, after a whole day of school drudgery and a few hours of work, all you wanted to do was let the mattress absorb your tired body while you waited for sleep to claim your senses.

After around ten minutes of debating how bad an F would actually be, you finally sit up. Another ten minutes and you finally manage to drag yourself over to your desk and pick up the flashcards you’d been so proud to make last week. You take a moment to hate yourself for picking Latin as your required “foreign language” before looking to your flashcards again. You mouth the words along with the recording you’ve been using to study. Maybe if you just say it enough times, your lips will remember how to form the sounds. Muscle memory works like that, right? After three times doing that, you set the card down and try it with just the recording. It sounds fine, so you try it by yourself.

And, then you slam your head on the table.

“It’s one sentence!” you exclaim to no one in particular.

You try it again. Wrong. Again. Wrong. Again. That didn’t even sound close. Again. Now you’re not even trying. Again.

Groaning, you slump on to the desk, face buried in your elbow and muttering curse words. If this were a test in profanity, you’d surely pass with flying colors. You sigh. You’re so tired physically and your mind is numb with stress. Sitting there, you almost feel like you’re vibrating, body so fatigued it doesn’t even know how to stay still.

No... wait…

You aren’t vibrating. You’re shaking. The desk is shaking too, and you sit up, staring. There’s a water bottle next to your head and it is definitely shaking. The contents swish around inside, and you grab it in confusion. It doesn’t stop. The desk is shaking now and you stand, faltering when you feel the ground shaking too. You stumble to a knee, the violence of the tremors increasing every second. You try to stand up again when suddenly the window to your right shatters, glass shards bursting into the room. You scream, dropping down in a panic and rushing under your desk. You curl up there, shutting your eyes as wind whips into the room. You open your mouth to scream, but you aren’t sure anything comes out. Or maybe you can’t hear it over the sudden roar of wind and something else.

Then all of a sudden, it stops. The shaking stops. The wind stops. Eyes still closed, you’re surrounded by silence, and it’s chilling. When you finally open your eyes, you take a deep breath and peek out from under your desk. The room is in shambles and it takes a few more moments of just breathing before you slowly crawl out, strangely not wanting to disturb the quiet. You wince suddenly as you accidentally lean on a piece of glass. The sting wakes you up a bit more and you stand, looking at the thin cut across your palm. Cursing your own carelessness, you walk shakily out to the hallway. There are bandaids in the bathroom if you remember...

You stop. You’re not even two steps into the hall before you stop. You’d expected the same wreckage out here in the hallway, but the hallway looks fine as if there wasn’t just a horrible earthquake. The picture frames still hang on the wall, not fallen and shattered as you thought they'd be. From where you stand, you can kind of see into the living room which also looks perfect. Down the hall, you can hear your parents’ television playing Wheel of Fortune. If you listen very closely, you can even hear your dad’s typing as he worked from home. It occurs to you that during the earthquake, you hadn’t head him yell at all. He also hadn’t come to check on you.

“What the hell...” you mutter to yourself.

You back up into your room again, shaking your head. Beneath your feet, you can feel and hear the glass shards. When you look, your flashcards are scattered as you left them. What just happened—

“Well, this is surprising...”

You jump, turning to the sound of a voice. You find yourself facing a young man. He looks around 20 or so if you had to guess. Snow white hair adorns his head, the sunlight pooling in through the window giving the illusion that it’s glowing. It almost looks like a halo. He’s sitting on the edge of your bed, leather-clad legs crossed and slender hands folded over his knee. The sleeves of his red coat hug his body well and the black v neck underneath displays what looks like a tattoo winding up from his chest. Your eyes meet his, and you let out a small gasp. They’re bright red.

“I was so curious to see who was summoning me after all these years…” he says, smiling and sending a shiver through you, “Quite a little thing, aren’t you?”

You don’t answer, something about his aura silencing your tongue. He stands, walking over to you. In a panic, you back away. When he notes your fear, he pauses, a small smirk growing on his lips.

“Come now, I think it’s a little too late to be fearful, little one.” He chuckles and steps towards you again.

"S-stop," you manage to choke out. Your hip bumps your desk and you stumble, holding out a hand toward him off.

“Oh…” he says, pausing and looking to your hand, “Let’s take care of that.”

He grabs your hand, pulling you forward. In fear, you let out a small sound like an animal getting stepped on.

"Shhh," he says softly, gently rubbing his thumb over your wrist, eyes fixed on the cut across your palm. In the chaos, you'd forgotten about that.

You’re about to pull away when his eyes suddenly go from just being strikingly bright to actually glowing. You’re speechless as he touches his hand to your bleeding palm. When he pulls away, the cut is gone.

“What the hell...” You back away from him, clutching your previously injured hand. You stare, head spinning so much you think you might pass out. “What... what did you do?”

He stares at you blankly. “I healed you.”

You turn away from him, staring at your perfectly healed palm. You shake your head, pacing. Your mind is buzzing. That did not just happen. That did not just happen!

“I have to say, I’m surprised,” he says, interrupting your thoughts, “I could understand a lesser demon. They’re fairly easy to call on. Perhaps even a normal demon would make sense. But to summon me?” He shook his head and laughed. “I’m impressed!”

Summon? Demons? What the hell was this guy talking about? Still reeling from the magical healing, you back away. You try to find a way to speak. When you finally do, you sound like a child.

“Who... who are you?” you ask.

“Funny,” he says, smirking. He stares at you a few moments, and then suddenly his smile fades, being replaced with realization. He looks down, eyeing the flashcards at his feet. There’s a moment of silence before he looks to you again, dangerous amusement in his eyes. “Oh...”

You start to shake under his dark gaze, trying to melt into the wall as he steps closer.

“You truly don’t know,” he says, voice like honey as he stops in front of you, “You foolish, foolish thing...” He sighs. “What a happy little accident, then...”

“I..." You swallow. "Who are—”

“I have many names,” he interrupts you, smirking again, “I suppose I’ll go by the one you used in your accidental incantation, hm?” He leans in close to whisper in your ear, voice velvety.

“Call me Lucifer.”