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Green waves teeming with life rose and fell; small white flowers swayed in the breeze. A figure in a red dress sat beneath the tree, turning pages of the Divine Comedy, letting another uneventful afternoon pass through her hands.
“Excuse me—what are you reading?” A male voice emerged from the other side of the trunk. Eva turned her head and saw only the single tree that stood in her secret place.
“Oh! Good afternoon. I hadn’t noticed you at all. I’m reading the Divine Comedy—the Paradiso. Would you like to read together?”
The man behind the tree lowered his head, as though considering. “I would very much like to. But—forgive me for declining—you would be frightened, or something else might find you.”
“What a pity. I can read it to you, then.” Eva turned another page. The man said nothing more, and she smiled.
This little planet is adorned with spirits
whose acts were righteous, but who acted for
the honor and the fame that they would gain:
and when desires tend toward earthly ends,
then, so deflected, rays of the true love
mount toward the life above with lesser force.
When she finished reading, the man fell quiet—and then exhaled something that sounded almost like grief. “Must true love be selfless?”
Eva’s laughter was soft and brief. “I think love is always selfless. Regardless of species or station.” She leaned against the tree. Sunlight slipped through the gaps between the leaves and settled warmly on her skin, gilding the afternoon.
“Even for a demon?”
“Even for a demon.”
“…Can a demon love something at all?”
“If demons cannot love anything—wouldn’t they be terribly sad?” This gentleman has a rather charming way of speaking. Like a newborn capable of conversation—a pure soul.
“How novel.”
“By the way, I never asked your name.”
“Sparda.”
She was mildly surprised, and opened her previously half-lidded eyes. “The same as the one in the legends. You must have been born under a blessing.”
The leaves rustled where Sparda stood. A tall figure slowly rounded the tree—and as Eva looked upon the glowing crimson of his eyes, upon the vast outline of his form, a certain suspicion began to take shape in her mind.
He bent down. Pulled back his hood. And showed her his face.
“My name,” he said, “is Sparda.”