Lucifer moved through the garden as though it had always been measured for him. The paths did not widen, nor did the air grow thin, yet there was a quiet sense --felt rather than seen -- that the space made no argument against his presence.
He crossed it without hurry, without display, like a man accustomed to rooms yielding their proportions without needing to be asked.
He came to Yosef first.
"The clan," he said, and the word carried no need for clarification. There was only one.
It settled between them as a fact long known and only now spoken correctly.
"Finder." He gave the second word as Gabriel had once given it -- without comfort, without ceremony, as one might place a stone into its proper place in a structure that had been standing crooked for too many years.
Yosef did not answer. His hands rested in his pockets, his shoulders neither tense nor at ease.
