After they finished breakfast outside the cabin, the three of them walked down to roughly where the stone had landed. There was a large, black, horsedrawn carriage. The horse was white with a mane of blazing flames.

  “Cool.” Isla said.

  “I hate horses,” Eli responded. The stone now dangled in a wire necklace Isla had scrapped together. It hung uncomfortably at Eli’s neck, but she made it for him.

  Even if it was literally evil.

  “I shall travel beside the horse.” Lilith said simply.

  Emerald met turquoise.

  They got inside the carriage. A few moments of silence later the carriage began to move as they departed toward the Garden State from Baltimore.

  “Eli,” Isla hedged. “I have been thinking and I think it's best if we just…” she turned away, “keep things as they are.”

  “What do you mean?” He asked.

  “It's just,” she looked at her hands, “Venus seems so unhappy.”

  He reached for her hand and she took it.

  “I don't know if we are friends or more,” she said, “but whatever it is I can’t lose you.”

  “Why does it have to be either or?” Eli asked.

  Isla shrugged. “I am just… uncertain. That’s all. I can’t do it all at once.” He squeezed her hand.

  “We don’t have to be like Venus and Mars,” he smiled at her, “we can just stay on Earth and be somewhere in the middle.”

  She laughed at him. “Eli, that's not fair to you.”

  He laughed and squeezed again.

  “When did sex stop being part of a relationship and start defining it?” he asked.

  Turquoise met emerald.

  “I could spend every night, trapped in superposition with you,” he said.

  She made a stifled, mixed laugh. Tears formed on her cheeks.

  “Besides,” he said, “the best rides have the longest lines.”

  She hit him harder than gentle in the shoulder. He smiled at her. She returned it.

  The carriage stopped suddenly.

  “Children!” Lilith hissed from outside. They gathered their gear and climbed out of the carriage.

  A tall, goatman came striding from the treeline of the Woods. He was twelve feet tall. His torso was that of a sculpted man, his loose pants of scarlet were draped over his hooved legs. His head was that of a goat, but with a carved, inverted pentacle in its forehead dripping in blood.

  His eyes were gold flames.

  The three mages stood before the would-be Devil. He erupted into a pillar of hellfire. When subsided, a man in a white suit and red tie was before them. His skin was coppery oil.

  The gold flames condensed into his irises.

  "Ahh." Azazel said. "How blessed you are this day to come into the graces of Lucifer."

  "You are not Lucifer, Scapegoat," Lilith barked.

  "Not yet." The Scapegoat said. "Do you know why I am here?"

  “Got lost going to cliche convention? ,” Isla snapped.

  “I have come to make lemonade out of your rotten fruit,” he laughed. Isla rolled her eyes.

  "No," all three of them said at once.

  "They all say that at first.” He gave a rotten diamond smile. “I really don't do anything. I was not even in the Gar—"

  "We know," Eli and Isla said, cutting him off.

  "We all saw your speech in the news after the Voice," Eli said.

  "We didn't buy it then either," Isla added.

  The would-be Devil just laughed in response.

  "I appreciate your opinion," the Scapegoat said like chocolate, "but I am here to win."

  "Win?" Eli asked.

  "The Stone belongs to the true Devil. I am the true Devil."

  From the earth a table of stone arose in a grinding tear.

  "I'll never give you this kind of power over people," Eli said.

  "I can have no power over the Nephilim," the Scapegoat laughed.

  Eli's brow furrowed. "What?"

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  In response, the Scapegoat reached down and pulled from nowhere a black box, thinner on one end. He placed down on the stone and flicked it open. Eli's face lit gold.

  "Really?" he said, deadpan.

  "When in Rome…" the Scapegoat said.

  "We're not in Rome," Isla said.

  "Or Georgia," Eli said.

  "No," the Scapegoat said softly. "That's very true."

  He smiled slowly. "What is your heart's desire?"

  Everyone got very still.

  "The Might of Hell is Infinite” He intoned. “Suffering is Infinite. Cruelty is Infinite. But you can choose how to wield it."

  Eli went pale.

  "All of your hearts' desires can become reality, with all the effort of a phantasm, when you wield the Might of Hell."

  Emerald met turquoise.

  "You are dust endlessly suffering in the dust," the Scapegoat said, "where no one can see or touch you."

  Eli's thoughts slid against each other, slippery and wet.

  "But I can offer you pleasures and wealth beyond anything you can possibly imagine," the Scapegoat said.

  "N-no," Eli managed. Isla said nothing. Lilith twitched.

  "You are right, mortal—you are welcome to the Stone. As well as my protection of your claim to it." He beamed at Isla. "You would become the new Queen of Hell."

  A strangled laugh came from Isla.

  “Bold,” Lilith snapped, “for one who needs the Stone to ensure victory.”

  “I don’t need the Stone to win,” the Scapegoat said. “Now that the Proceedings are underway, there are less eyes on me,” he licked his lips.

  Eli’s stomach sank to the floor.

  Gold met emerald.

  "Ferromancer, trapped in her own vacuum."

  Isla looked sharply at him.

  "Do you wish for objectivity?” the Scapegoat smiled. “We can manage that."

  "What?" she gasped.

  "With the Stone, you define good and evil. Real, but intangible definitions. True, nonphysical constants. Absolute, objective reality."

  Isla went still.

  Gold met turquoise.

  "Of course, empath, when wielding infinite cruelty, you have the ability not to wield it.” He said with a sneer and a drawl. “Who are you to allow suffering to continue?"

  "Do you think we are stupid enough to make a deal with you?" Eli snapped.

  "No," the Scapegoat said, extending his hand. "So give me the Stone and you won't have to worry about it anymore."

  “Fuck that guy,” Isla said looking down at the business card as the would-be Devil sauntered back to the Woods, rejected.

  Eli looked down at the Stone. Then back up at Isla.

  “B-but?” Eli said. “What about good and evil? I though—“

  She barked out a laugh in response. “I had a roommate in college that threw these at me all the time,” she said, “how does the Stone decide?”

  “What?”

  “If I, say, get annoyed at a pixie, will it damn all Sidhe?” She asked, “At what point does the Stone decide I have determined something is evil?” She continued. “It has an arbitrarily drawn line somewhere.” she said, “But more importantly, I would still only have my own subjective meaning.”

  Eli stared at her. Then at Lilith.

  “She could free everyone else of her curse, but not herself,” Lilith explained.

  “Okay but in actual reality–” Eli began.

  “You cannot have objective truth in a subjective reality,” Isla cut him off, “Think about what we were saying last night. The only truth you can trust is the one you can see yourself.” she explained, “But physics, the only true absolute reality that we have, says it is inherently subjective. So the ‘absolute truth’ is that the ‘truth’ is subjective.”

  “I don’t understand. There is what happened and there is what did not.”

  “Sure, but how fast are you moving right now?”

  “I am not, I am standing still.”

  “True,” she said. “But only relative to me. I can change how I measure your speed and direction based solely on what I am doing without you having to do anything different. I can make you move in perfect circles, or straight lines, or anything, and we would still both be right.”

  “I guess,” Eli said, “But still there are only so many ways you can walk around me? Just in circles and forward and backward. I will even give you up and down.”

  “Very generous,” she laughed. “If I were on the Moon you would be above me, if I were the Sun, you would be spinning around me, all the while you would still think you are just standing still.” She said, “You are stuck in your own frame of thinking unless you intentionally try to step outside it.”

  She shook her head. “This is my entire problem,” she continued, “If your measured truth is the only thing you can rely on, and the only objective truth we have says your measured truths are subjective, you must accept that your reality is fundamentally subjective to where you are yourself.”

  Eli blinked. “So when I am only thinking about possibilities of motion on Earth, I have limited my points of view without realizing it…” he finished nodding

  “Exactly.” She continued, pointing at him, “Just as you will never be able to simply force yourself to Mars, you must put in the actual work to change your perspective if you want to truly change your reality.” she said.“The truth is a team effort.”

  Eli nodded, understanding. “B-but The Might of Hell? We know it works and it's real?” he said. “Gallows said it connects the Horsemen to their domains. Shouldn’t I–”

  He looked at the Stone very carefully.

  “No, boy,” Lilith said firmly.

  “Who am I to allow suffering to continue?” he asked.

  “Who are you to claim dominion over it?” Lilith asked.

  Eli’s jaw opened then closed.

  “Think about it,” Isla said, “it's not possible to do by its own constraints.”

  “What?”

  “Congrats, you got rid of all the suffering” she deadpanned, “What do you continue to power it on to prevent further suffering?” She said, “All you have done is given up what power you had.”

  Eli blinked again.

  “Doesn’t the Scapegoat know,” Isla started, a thought pressing in, “that we know he would just use the Stone to set off the Rapture if we give it to him?”

  “Of course he would not,” Lilith laughed, “then there would be no one to blame.”

  She squared herself at them.

  “You do not want such power over objectivity and suffering.” Lilith said. “That is how you end up like Him.”

  settle for awhile?

  Do not declare war upon the American Wizard. For he is not subtle, and quick to violence.