continued from here with @empyraeal
“It’s no triviality. You know that.”
Had they extended that justice to themselves, they would have never been able to save the souls they swore to protect. After wrestling with centuries of guilt and bitterness, Azrael no longer believed in the facade of justice in Heaven.
“I will not deny what I have done, but neither will I apologize for it. Do I deserve punishment for breaking laws that were never just in the first place? I may have believed that once, but I do no longer.”
Although it was a mere assumption, Azrael felt that Abdiel understood their position more than he let on. They had been preparing themselves for confrontation for centuries, but had expected to be met with steel, not words. They cut just the same.
Azrael had always turned pain into rage, used it to fuel emotion into action. It was their rage, cold and violent like a bitter winter storm, that had given them the strength to survive the war. They used it now to look their brother in the eye, faced with his anger at yet another betrayal from one of their siblings. If they stopped exchanging words and began exchanging blows, they knew that they would lose. Pride still begged them to give a voice to their thoughts.
“I’m not asking for your forgiveness.”
but it was a triviality. do the right thing, or don’t. it was so easy! but alas; azrael had not done the right thing.
he thought, oh, that’s good. he wasn’t the one azrael ought to be asking forgiveness from; it pained him, but he would not give it. it was not, though the seraph, his place to forgive this trespass, so against the father’s authority.
abdiel recalled so long ago he had encouraged lucifer and all the others to ask father’s forgiveness. they had scorned him, they had laughed, they had threatened. then they were lost. must this happen again? must he lose another sibling?
“it’s not your place to decide what is or isn’t just, just like it’s not my place to forgive you,” the seraph snapped. from him, the one who loved mercy far more than he loved justice. the one quicker to embrace than to meet one with cold steel.
he studied them coldly. “it’s father’s.” it was impossible for abdiel to save everyone. but he had to try.