* * * *
Regret.
Fear.
Selfishness.
Greed.
Lust.
The sins of mankind hadn’t changed in centuries. Simply the means, Rue mused. He sentenced the woman in front of him to the pits. She deserved a century of punishment for the corruption of over a hundred children – children lured into drugs and prostitution because of her and her compatriot. He frowned for a moment, searching for her partner’s soul and nodded with satisfaction. He’d dropped straight as stone through water into Hell. Vaguely, he wondered what sort of Hell these humans believed in. Were they still caught in the Dantean fire and brimstone? Or had humanity evolved to some new tortures?
A flash of gold beyond the gates caught his eye. Asmoday grinned from behind the flaming iron bars. He turned to ignore the demon, bent his concentration on the next soul in line. The familiar face rocked him back on his heels. “Mackey?” He reached out to grab the soul by the shoulder. His fingers passed through.
Mackey wheezed out a laugh. “Hell’s bells, Rue, you dead too?” The spirit’s hollow eyes widened, his mouth dropped into an “o” of astonishment at the sight of the wings framed in the flames behind him. “Guess not,” he murmured.
Yariel glared when Rue focused his will to grab Mackey from the line, ushering him to an alcove off to the side. Mackey’s eyes rounded as they traveled around Hell’s Gate taking it all in. Reaching out again, Rue shook him. “Mackey, focus!”
Those wheeling eyes settled back on the angel. “I died, right? The tall black dude come and got me. Never seen wind like that in October, Rue.” The spirit shuddered, rubbing his shoulders in memory of the cold, “It’s goin’ to be one early nasty winter.” He nodded to himself then sighed, squared his shoulders and tipped his face up to the angel. “I done bad. I know I did.” He smacked his lips. “Lost my Mary, lost my house and business to booze and bad decisions. I hated my no-good thieving nephew, woulda tossed him off the pier with cement shoes on could I’ve gotten away with it.” He shook his head. “Intent, the priests say, they say if the intent’s there, the sin’s there.” He looked back over his shoulders at the shimmering black gates. “I was just wondering if I could see my Mary one more time before I got to go down and grab a shovel and pick for the demons and devils to start savin’ my soul.”
Rue frowned, reached out to snag Mackey’s soul, weighing it, reading it. Greed and anger, yes, but the deepest stains were despair and a loss of faith. Doubt stained this soul. “You are weighed,” Rue intoned, “you are judged.” He tightened his grip on the spirit so it wouldn’t flit from his grasp in response to his will. “Fina?”
Mackey focused on him on that whispered, desperate word. “In a bad way.” The spirit hung his head as sorrow weighed him down. “I gotta tell you.” He pressed a hand to his chest. “I am happy this old soul went before her. She’s wasting away in front of our eyes.” His anguished eyes filled with phantom tears. “I don’t think she’ll make Christmas.”
She wouldn’t, Rue knew. The numbers on Azrael’s calendar loomed in his mind’s eye. “What date was it there?”
The spirit began to fade, the weight of the judgment pulling toward his eternal reward. Rue firmed his will, the soul stretching like rubber. Mackey’s face thinned, the mouth opened, “November 1st,” he whispered, then with a pop disappeared bound for the fields of Purgatory. Rue hoped he’d find his Mary soon.
* * * *
It took all her willpower to stay on her feet. She swayed, checked herself, and grabbed the front of the pew. Dan stiffened beside her, but didn’t reach out. Old Mackey’s casket lay draped in orange lilies and white carnations in front of the altar at St. Sophia’s. Mackey’s no-good-dirty- rotten nephew had come through in the end, claiming his uncle’s body and arranging the funeral. Mackey hadn’t been quite so alone in the world as they’d all thought.
She looked around the small church. Pews halfway back were filled, mourners dabbing their eyes and exchanging whispered confidences. Why would Mackey have been happier on the streets of Chicago than in the residential facility his nephew had found for him after Aunt Mary had died? Why had he died on the streets, where Dan had stumbled across the old man’s body curled under the fire escape behind the buildings? Tears, warm and salty, slipped down her cheeks across her lips. Her insides quivered at the memory of her cousin, white faced and shaking, running in the back door to grope for the phone. She’d demanded to know what was wrong. He could do nothing but shake his head and shiver, his hand white-knuckled on the phone as he dialed 9-1-1.
The tickle of smoke and incense stirred in her heart and mind. Memories from a childhood thought long forgotten; her father taking her to church while her mother “suffered” in bed from a migraine. The dim colored light, the scents of wax and dust, the comfort of a routine she’d left behind so many years before. Rubbing a hand on the worn wood of the pew in front of her, as the priest intoned the final phrases of the requiem mass at the front, she wondered if everyone returned when they saw the end of the their own roads?
Mass ended. “Do you want to go to the cemetery?” Dan’s raw voice brought her out of her reveries.
She shook her head. “I’m going to take a little walk, head back to the shop.” She ran her hand down his arm. His eyes still looked desolate. Chloe clung to his other arm, her look more worried than sad. She saw the command in his eyes, beat him to it. “I promise I won’t open the shop, just go upstairs and take a nap.”
He nodded, then turned with Chloe to follow the mourners out to their cars. She stayed put. Silence fell after the organist and cantor left. She sank to her knees, rested her head on her folded hands and prayed that she could find the words to pray. Her heart hammered in her chest, her pulse leapt. She could almost feel her blood running a frantic race in her veins as if every part of her knew that her time was growing shorter. Clocks had been turned back two days ago. She wished it was that easy to gain time. She tipped her tear- stained face up to the crucifix above the altar. Was this how it felt to know that your breaths were numbered? The statue stayed silent.
Chill wind blew down from the Canadian border, withering mums and icicle pansies. Frost painted delicate patterns on windshields around the city and every white-puffed breath reminded her of the promise she’d made to the Angel of Death all those months ago in her spring- scented living room.
After the first snow.
Possibly any moment now. Chicago had boasted Thanksgiving weather fit for both basketball and bobsledding in the past, so that first snow could happen tomorrow or in another few weeks, though it was inevitable.
With a shake, she stood, tugged her coat closed around her. She would face what needed to be faced when it needed to be faced. Shoving hands in her pockets, she pushed out of the church to squint in the bright sunlight that flooded the parking lot. She’d walk to the shop. It really wasn’t all that far away; take that nap she’d promised her cousin. She’d take each day as it came—for however many she had left.
Settling sunglasses on her nose she headed off towards the Loop. She just wished she’d be able to see Rue one more time before she went.
* * * *
Frail. The first word that sprang to mind when he saw her. Invisible to mortals, still in the world between worlds, he watched her. He longed to reach out, take her in his arms assure her that all would be well even though he knew the words would be a lie.
Unless....
He faded from the mortal world, back to the antechamber at Hell’s Gate. He settled into the line and with an absent look weighed the next three souls in line. Two for purgatory, one for the fires.
“November 1st.” His eyes traveled blindly along the long line of souls stretching from the flaming gate to the smoke-smeared horizon. Asmoday leaned against the bars, impervious to the fire, a smirk on his perfect face. Power sparked from Rue’s fingertips to dance and spatter on the rough stones.
He strode to the gate, reached through the bars to snag
Asmoday’s perfect tie—grinning white skulls on black silk. With a jerk he dragged the demon to the gate, catching his head between two flaming bars. “We need to talk,” the angel grated. “Now.” He dropped the demon, who stepped back, smoothing his clothing.
“Well, since you ask so nicely.” He snapped his fingers. Deimos rolled his ruby eyes, but opened the gates causing the souls still standing in line to shriek in terror. A trio of dogs black as night with coal-red eyes leapt from the portal. They ran and snapped at the souls, nipping heels and clawing unsubstantial flesh. Their growls echoed like the demonic laughter in Rue’s ears.
“Call them off,” he instructed.
Asmoday shrugged, his eyes still on the scattered souls and the hounds. Two of them had caught one soul in their teeth, engaging in a game of a terrible tug of war, the soul stretched impossibly between them. The third had chased a soul up the nearest stalagmite. It perched at the top, balanced on the very point while the dog snarled and jumped. “Deimos,” Asmoday jerked his chin in the dogs’ direction, “Let them play for another ten, then call them off. We wouldn’t want to make the judges feel sorry for the souls and let them off easy. The Master hasn’t been happy that construction in the new section’s slowed. We need the labor.” Deimos grunted in assent.
Rue followed Asmoday’s beckoning hand. “Let me give you a tour.” He grinned around at the grim antechamber to Hell. “It’s been about two centuries since the last of your kind came over.”
“I’m not here for a tour, but for answers.”
The demon nodded. “I know, but indulge me.” He kicked a few souls scrubbing tiles out of the way. “I know things don’t change all that much on the other side –” he rolled his eyes “ –being perfect and all, but things are always changing around here.” He scratched his chin. “Wish the new construction was finished. It’s turning out beautiful, looks just like the Senate gallery.” He shook his head. “I love humans. They have such wonderful imaginations. Every few centuries it’s time to rip up pavement and lay out a new Hell. Though, we’ve had this whole Judeo-Christian thing for a few too many centuries. The boss is getting a little tired of being red with horns and hooves.”
They passed through the stark antechamber of Hell. The paved black walk opened up to a huge cavern, the ceiling lost in low scudding gray clouds. A black river wound through the cracked landscape, rapids roiled into a white froth around the jagged teeth of rocks protruding from the water. A long low barge, the bargeman’s skeletal hands chained to his pole, bumped to the shore. Asmoday gestured Rue aboard. “I remember when there were souls six deep all clawing at my hem trying to get free passage on Charon’s barge.” He hopped aboard, making the shallow boat dip. He slanted a look up at the bargeman. Rue could see the empty hollows of its eyes glow a sickly yellow in the wan light. “Freeloaders, huh, Charon, buddy?”
The bargeman ignored the demon, his pole cutting through the surging river.
“I need to see Semiazas,” Rue said, his eyes fastened on the far shore of the Greek Hell. In the distance he could see the silhouette of Sisyphus rolling his boulder up his hill. He recalled these halls, remembered the Greek and Roman souls in line begging for mercy, gold coins clutched in their hands. Fare for the ferryman.
“Sem, huh?” Asmoday clucked his tongue. “That’s pretty far in.” Rue looked over. The demon seemed to come to a decision. He shrugged. “Up to you.” He smoothed his wrinkled tie. “The boss asked me to show you around anyroad. So, no skin off mine.”
He wanted to ask why, but knowing Asmoday, he wouldn’t get a truthful answer. Or he’d get a truthful answer and not believe it anyway. If he’d had a heartbeat still, he knew that it would have galloped at the thought of being in Hell. He’d never walked its slimy halls, but had known those who had. Very few of them had ever returned.
They passed through the darker halls of Tartarus. Kronos, once worshipped as a god, then feared as a titan, roared his displeasure and hatred to the stony limits. The unholy shriek would strip the flesh from a mortal, drive them insane if they did survive and make them wish for death. Immune as he was, Rue felt his skin shiver as they skirted the edge of his ice-rimed hole. He recalled fighting one of the Greek Kaos’ minions in an alley in Chicago before he’d regained his wings. A minion Asmoday had summoned to test him or kill him. Rue had never been able to figure out which. He looked over at the demon strolling along at his side as though he were strolling through a lovely meadow. As if feeling eyes on him, he turned. His angel black eyes flashed red when they met Rue’s gaze as though daring him to ask. He remained silent.
They left the Grecian Hells behind them. Tantalus cursed them from his pool, weeping as he bent for water. The path wove downward along a thick wooden walk, twisting until it was clear they no longer walked a road, but rather the twisting roots of a great tree, a tree so huge its roots rested in Hel and its highest branches supported the furthest vaults of heaven.
Water gurgled and splashed. Rue looked around. Water flowed from between two huge roots to pool into a shallow gray basin. Something gleamed in the water. Asmoday shrugged when the angel cocked his head at him in question. “The well of knowledge.” He bent, picked something off the ground, tossed it to the angel. Rue snagged it out of the air. He stared at the tiny seed for a moment before recognition set it. An apple seed. “It’s where I got the idea.”
A scrabbling in the shadows at the edge of the pool had Rue bracing for an encounter. He willed his sword into being. The silver light from the blade penetrated the darkness. Three women, grey, twisted and bent with age, their long hair lying in tangled hanks around withered faces, hissed at the sudden light. Their eyes, dark pits in their faces turned in his direction. The one to the left, the one most twisted, reached into the tattered rags over her breast. She keened, one long low moan, as she pressed her hands to her face. When her hands dropped, she looked at Rue with one bright blue eye. Silver lightning shattered the blue iris and pinned the angel in place. “The Nordic Hel,” he whispered.
“We are the Norns,” the crone intoned, as her sisters trailed skeletal fingers through the silvery water pouring into the fountain. “We tend the fountain of knowledge. We see all.” Her sisters crooned in awful counterpoint behind her. “We know all. Ask.”
Asmoday tossed a rock in the pool. The harridans hissed, narrowed their hollow eyes at the demon. “They’re frauds.” He flicked an apple seed. It landed with a little splish. “You can go ahead and ask anything, but you’ll get as much truth from a Magic 8-ball.”
“Ask!” she shrieked.
He felt torn. It had to be a lie. Demons always lied. Would they know about the vial of miracles? Did it exist anywhere other than in the hands of the king of the dark angels?
“Time has passed.” She turned, tucking the lightning shot eye – Odin’s eye if he recalled his legends— into her rags and turned back to her sisters.
“Let’s go. Leave these crazy broads,” Asmoday reached out as if to take Rue’s elbow, paused. Rightly so. Confusion and fear met in Rue, ignited angry sparks from his fingertips. The Norns disappeared amid the Yggsdrasil roots, fleeing his wrath. He fisted his hands at his sides. Struggled to pull in all the rogue emotions he’d been feeling ever since he’d had his wings returned. He hadn’t felt all these things before. He’d felt disgust, anger and brief flashes of joy. This welter of feelings, tugging, yearnings made him long to wheel on the demon and blast him into atoms.
He took a deep breath, drew on the light in his heart. The deeper he walked into Hell, the easier it was to fall prey to his own fears, the darkness that dwelled in every soul. He needed to get to Semiazas, ask his questions and get back as soon as possible. He closed his eyes, tipped his head up. He knew, unlike the mortals that walked the earth, that heaven wasn’t “up” but everywhere at once. He knew that, but like the mortals, he felt right now, in the depths of the darkness, that he needed that reminder. He asked for blessings, for strength, for wisdom. He turned back to the demon, gestured him to
lead on wondering how many prayed here in Hell?
Long fingers groped at bars, empty eyes followed him as he walked on. How many souls prayed in Hell? Probably most of them.
They twisted through the edges of the Nordic Hel, past the vast battlefield of those who died peacefully in their beds doomed for eternity to fight the battles they lost or avoided. Despair floated thick on the fetid wind, coating his throat. The wooden roots of Yggsdrasil faded and pale sandstone took its place.
A dry breeze replaced the sea salt wind of the Nordic Hel. Smoothly fitted bricks lined the walls. Hieroglyphics carved themselves into the stones as they walked. He could read hieroglyphics, even though he had never judged the Egyptians. Asmoday paused in the judgment hall to scratch Ammit’s hippopotamus ears.
They left the Egyptian Hell behind, a strange place, Rue thought—nothing more than the judgment hall with the odd little hippo-crocodile creature that tore into the souls, not, Rue admitted, that many souls had passed through the hall in eons. He’d actually felt a little sorry for the little creature. It had run to Asmoday, wagging its hippo tail so hard its chubby hindquarters shook with excitement, its crocodile mouth agape in almost dog-like joy. He couldn’t object when the demon decided to throw a battered rubber ball for the animal a few times. “I try to come by at least once or twice a decade,” he’d explained, whipping the ball down the narrow tomb corridor. “I’ve been busy the last thirty years or so.” He picked up the slimy ball Ammit dropped at his feet and threw it again, ricocheting it off the hieroglyph grafitti’d walls. “Poor little guy doesn’t get any attention since Anubis left. Bastard decided to take off a couple centuries after the boss let go of his Osiris gig, thought he’d have some fun in the mortal world scaring the natives.” He snorted, whipping the ball again. “Idiot got himself cursed into a sarcophagus. Still there for all I know.” After another throw, he pulled a huge rawhide out of a pocket it could never have fit in, rubbed the hippo’s ears, and stood. “Let’s go. It’s getting late.” He held out the rawhide—Ammit took it eagerly, and ran off to a corner to enjoy his treat, his tail swishing happily.
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