“God has abandoned us all.”
“No,” said Lucas. “There is more to things than you understand. You may have lived forever, Judas, but you are a mere ant on the ground. You cannot see what the eagles see.”
Judas glared into Lucas’s eyes. “I know that existence needs to change. This one is full of pain and suffering. I have witnessed it all for thousands of years, and I can stand it no longer.”
Lucas grabbed the man’s arm. “Let me help you, Judas. I did this to you. Let me make it right.”
Judas raged and threw off Lucas’s hand. The aswangs hissed and snapped angrily, forming up on both sides of the two men.
“You were supposed to die upon my altar, Satan—a gift to the Red Lord. Your celestial soul was to power His entry into this world and earn my ascension. I was to be released, free to serve the new ruler of a glorious existence. Twice now you have prevented me from gaining my deserved reward. I want what’s coming to me!”
Lucas frowned. “You speak of the Red Lord? Why is that name so familiar?”
“It should be! You have opposed him for too long now, and His patience wears thin. Your celestial soul would have provided Him the power to invade directly, but you have caused Him inconvenience yet again. A human soul is worthless to Him. But after waiting so long to end you, revenge is worth pursuing merely for its own ends.”
Suddenly, things made sense to Lucas. Gladri hadn’t made him human to punish him, but to prevent Judas from sacrificing his celestial soul and bringing forth this Red Lord. Heaven had foreseen a threat and prevented it. That Lucas had been caught in the middle was sheer bad luck—not a heavenly vendetta against him. The relief actually brought a smile to his face.
“You’ve been defeated, Judas. Heaven knew what you were planning, and they turned me human to stop you. Your plans are ruined, so stop this right now, and I shall do all I can to help you.”
Judas allowed his anger to simmer for a moment, and without his righteous sneer he seemed vulnerable. “There is no help you could give me. I betrayed God’s own son. I have spent two-thousand years awash with sin. Its embrace is too tight now to ever be clean.”
“You can come back from this, Judas. Be something else. Change!”
Judas looked at Lucas now, not with anger but sadness. “You sound like a man I once knew. But why is it so wrong to just be who I am? I vow to you, Satan, I shall not stop until I have reduced your soul to ash. I shall leave you in this place forever, unable to die, unable to feel anything but misery and regret. It is what you deserve, and the only justice I shall get. First, I must ensure you suffer here alone. Welcome to Hell, Satan, and its name is solitude.”
Lucas didn’t understand, but then he saw the aswangs take off up the hill. Towards the pub. He shouted at the top of his lungs, “Run! Get away from here.”
Vetta and the others panicked as they saw the aswangs coming for them. They turned back towards the alleyway, but thorny vines shot up from the ground and blocked their path.
They were trapped.
Judas grinned unkindly at Lucas, hands rubbing together with glee. “You should never have left my pub, Satan. Out here, you are truly powerless.”
Lucas raced up the hill, knowing he would never make it there in time.
Lucas raced towards the pub. Vines erupted in his path and whipped at him, thorns slicing his face and snagging his clothing. He fought his way free of them again and again, but it slowed his progress to a crawl.
Vetta screamed in terror as the aswangs set upon her. Simon yelled for help, his machismo faltering as he faced certain death. Nearby, Shirley fought to keep Jake upright on his wounded leg. They were all going to die.
Lucas tripped and fell into a bunch of grasping vines. He tried to get free, but this time he couldn't. “Judas! Stop this! I beg of you!”
Judas strolled among the vines, hands clasped in front of his waist. “Did you take pity on me, Satan?”
“No, I didn't. But you can be better than me. These people have done nothing to you. They are innocent. She’s a good person, damn it.”
Judas looked back at Lucas curiously now. “You said she? Who do you speak of specifically, Satan? The crone or the strumpet? Hmmm, I see little chance of it being the former. Could it be? Is The Devil smitten with a lowly human? Does your newly beating heart yearn for love?”
The aswangs stopped their assault and surrounded Vetta and the others, corralling them in front of the pub. Vetta looked down at Lucas, fear in her eyes. Lucas reached out to her, wishing she were closer—close enough that he could grab her and keep her safe. More vines sprouted from the ground and held him in place, forcing him to watch the events to come.
“Why are you doing this?” Shirley shouted at Judas. “We have done nothing, you-you... you arsehole!”
Judas smirked at Shirley, as if her fear were an aphrodisiac. “Welcome to God’s paradise, where the innocent suffer, and the wicked play.”
“Please, mate,” said Jake. “Just let us go, yeah? This is between you and Lucas—The Devil or whatever.”
“Alas, The Devil seemingly no longer exists.” Judas said it sadly, as though he had been hoping for some grand battle instead of this worthless challenge he had been presented with.
Simon spat at Judas. “Screw you!”
Judas ignored the insult and strolled towards Vetta. He examined her as if she were a trinket. “Are you the pretty little thing who has cast her spell upon The Devil himself?”
“Lucas is not The Devil,” she said defiantly. “He is good man. Better than you.”
Lucas tried to speak, but a vine encircled his throat and choked the words out of him. Judas seemed amused by Vetta, and he reached out and brushed her cheek fondly. She flinched and turned her head, but her disgust made Judas chuckle.
“Do you know how many young girls I’ve defiled in two millennia? Too many to count, I assure you, but few were as beautiful as you. It’s true, isn’t it? You have a kindness most do not—I felt it when I was inside of you.” He seemed to relish that memory, and it made him shudder. “It is the innocent, like you, my sweet, who suffer most at God’s indifference. Proof that something better is needed.”
“Just kill me,” she said, forcing herself to stare her abuser in the eye. “I am not afraid of you.”
Judas paused and let a leering grin creep across his face. “Oh no, you have more value to me than simply killing you. Come, let us take the tour of this place. You may leave your innocence behind, you won’t need it where we’re going.”
Vetta moaned as Judas reached out and grabbed the back of her head. He forced his lips against hers, grinding a kiss into her face.
Lucas fought, the vines holding him, but there was no chance of getting to her in time. It made him realise how his former powers had been a quick fix for everything. Without them, he was useless, and forced to see the consequences of his actions play out.
More vines burst from the ground and spiralled around Judas and Vetta as they embraced. Soon it became impossible to see them through all the thorns and leaves.
Lucas fought a vine away from his throat. “Vetta!”
The vines around Judas and Vetta retracted violently back into the ground, like they were being yanked from underneath. The thorns tangled around Judas and Vetta and pulled them downward—the pavement opening up and devouring them. The ground snapped back into place and they were gone.
She was gone.
Vetta…
Lucas got an arm free and clawed at more vines around his throat. He bellowed after Julian, but his words went ignored. The only reply he received were the hungry snarls of the aswangs as they set upon the others.
The people he had been trying to protect.
Shirley went down first, blood arcing from a wide gash in the side of her neck. Jake collapsed on his bad leg as the older woman fell away from him. Simon fell too, stumbling onto his knees as an aswang slashed his side open.
The aswangs were excited, scuttling about like hissi
ng spiders, hungry for more blood.
No! No, I can’t let this happen! Lucas ripped one of his arms free of the vines and managed to yank the iron nail out of his pocket. Panicked, he sliced into the vines erratically, and they started to singe and burn away at the slightest touch, like butter being sliced with a red-hot knife. The vines slackened, and Lucas got his legs free, restrained now only by his left arm. He fumbled with the nail, trying to get a better grip on it as his palms began to sweat.
It slipped through his grasp.
“No!”
The iron nail tumbled down the hill for several feet before coming to rest on the pavement. Lucas strained at the vines wrapped around his wrist, but without the nail, he couldn’t get free of them. It lay only inches away from him, but he could not reach it. More vines broke from the ground and began to ensnare him anew. They dragged him backwards, even further away from the only weapon he had.
The screams at the top of the hill taunted him.
I can’t do this! I can’t be human. It’s too difficult. I’m too powerless.
“Here!” came a voice. “Take it!”
Lucas looked up to see Shaun standing a few feet farther down the hill. At first, he couldn’t believe it, but then Shaun was shouting and thrusting something at him—the iron nail. He had picked it off the ground from where Lucas had dropped it.
God bless that man.
Lucas snatched the nail from Shaun and set about slicing the vines around his wrist. Finally free, he clambered up the hill towards the pub. The aswangs hissed at him, but he launched himself right into the centre of their mass, burying the iron nail into the eye of the first one to attack him. The creature howled in misery as smoke billowed from its skull, and the other aswangs backed off immediately.
Their eyes blazed with anger. And fear.
Lucas waved the nail at them threateningly, warding off the ravenous pack. They seemed to understand that the dull lump of iron in his hand could mortally wound them. Even after an eternity of torment, aswangs could still fear death. “Now get!” he shouted at them. “Get!”
The aswangs retreated, not turning their backs but skittering away with their eyes glaring at Lucas. This wasn’t over.
Once it was safe, Lucas twirled to face the others. Jake was bleeding all over, but he managed to drag himself over to Shirley and place his hands on her neck wound. He tried to stop the bleeding, but it seeped between his fingers as Shirley stared wide-eyed up at the sky. She coughed and spluttered. Simon slumped on the ground behind her, blinking slowly and muttering to himself. He was in shock.
“This is all wrong,” said Lucas. “You shouldn’t suffer for what I have done.”
Shaun came up beside him. “You have to help them, Lucas.”
“I can’t.” He knelt beside Jake who was still desperately trying to help Shirley. The woman was done for, and she knew it—the panic was clear in her eyes. Lucas wiped some of the blood from her face and smiled. “Don’t be scared, love. I’ve seen Heaven, and it’s real. Only love and understanding awaits you. Eric will join you there before you know it.”
Shirley smiled at the mention of her husband’s name. Lucas might lack omnipotence now, but he could tell that, behind Shirley’s jokes, was an absolute love for this man, Eric. Her panic was at the thought of never getting to see him again—at never getting to say goodbye—but now that he had dispelled that fear, she could go on her way in peace. All fear left her eyes. Her body went still. The bleeding from her neck eased.
She died.
Jake was weeping, hands trembling in pools of Shirley’s blood.
“It’s okay,” said Lucas, putting a hand on his back. “You can let go now.” But Jake didn’t let go. He held his hands in place as though he couldn’t dare remove them. Lucas had to pull his hands away forcibly. “It’s okay, lad. It’s finished.”
Jake finally let go. He slumped onto his side, broken and distraught.
“Help me!” Simon called from a few feet away. Shaun was already at the big man’s side—his face a sickly pale as he looked at his friend. Simon’s wounds were mortal, but not immediate. A great slab of his guts protruded from beneath his ribs, but most of the bleeding was internal. Slow and painful.
“H-Help me, man,” he grunted again, mouth thick with blood and saliva. It stained his beard.
“I can’t help you,” Lucas told him, cursing Julian for taking both Shirley and this brave man. “I’m sorry.”
Simon shook his head, grunting in pain. “No, I mean help me to my feet.”
“Oh!” Lucas thought about telling the man to stay down and take it easy, but at this point, there was no further harm he could do to himself. So, he carefully pulled the big man to his feet, and steadied him against the wall of the pub. The vines there rattled as if annoyed, but Simon ignored their scathing thorns. Lucas was impressed, the man hadn’t passed out from his wounds.
Shaun started to apologise to Simon, weeping at his own words. “I left! I’m so sorry. I—”
Simon pushed off the wall and stunned Shaun with a huge punch to the jaw. Shaun twirled majestically before collapsing to the ground with a thud. He was unconscious for about thirty-seconds before Lucas was able to help him back to his feet. It took another thirty-seconds after that to get him focusing straight. He rubbed at his jaw and moaned. “Please, Si, just listen to me.”
“I get it,” said Simon. “You were scared. You ran. But you came back. We’re even.”
Shaun stared at him disbelievingly. “Seriously?”
Simon shrugged, then winced as another inch of his insides slipped out. He held them in place with a thick palm. “You can’t help not being brave in the face of danger, Shaun. You let us all down, but you didn’t ask for any of this shit to happen to you. We’re all victims here, whatever happens.”
Shaun had tears in his eyes. He nodded to his friend’s ribs. “You’re hurt bad!”
“No shit!” Simon turned to Lucas. “Tell it to me straight, man. Am I going to make it out of this one?”
Lucas wished Simon hadn’t asked that question because answering it was hard. “I’m sorry. I don’t think so, big man.”
Simon didn’t give any reaction, but Shaun blubbered. “Calm down,” Simon said, nudging him with his elbow. “You can have my car.”
Shaun tittered beneath his sobs. “I don’t want your sodding car. I want my mate.”
“Nah, you’re better off. Things were getting weird anyway, two middle-aged men shacked up together. Just take my car and don’t look back.” He looked at Lucas again. “So, what’s next? I have a bit more fuel left in the tank, and I want to put it to good use.”
Lucas had already thought about what to do next. He clutched the iron nail tightly in his fist and stepped up to the vines entangling the pub. He cut one of them, and the entire length withdrew, uncovering part of the front door. “We go inside and have a drink,” he said. “Then we decide how we’re going to crucify that sonuvabitch, Judas.”
Blackout
Entering the pub was like coming home. The warmth of the fires washed over them, and the air itself smelled of life. They were closer to true reality, and the effects of Hell wore off quickly. Their limbs were no longer heavy, and their stomachs were no longer famished. Despite that, when Lucas tried to heal their wounds, he could not. Somehow, whatever power he had latched onto was gone—or maybe just expended. Julian’s grip on this place was getting tighter, and soon the dead atmosphere from outside would creep inside. Then there would be no way of ever making it back.
Lucas realised now why the aswangs had snatched Max from the outside—they couldn’t enter the reality of the pub. They must remain outside of it, close to Hell. That meant they were safe inside for a little while, and Lucas intended to make the most of it.
They poured themselves a drink and sat down at the bar. Simon grabbed an entire bottle of whiskey while Shaun and Jake split a bottle of Vodka. Lucas visited the beer taps, but then decided to grab a bottle of orange juice instead. H
e sipped it at the bar.
“What happened to Vetta?” asked Jake, as if he could read the worry on Lucas’s mind.
“Judas took her. To torment me.”
“What’s he going to do to her?”
Lucas had a fair idea. “Twist her into something awful and taunt me with her suffering—the most unspeakable things he can think of probably. He wanted my celestial soul, but my endless suffering will do. He has nothing else to strive for. Two-thousand years can make a person pretty bored.”
Jake downed his vodka and placed his tumbler on the bar. Shaun filled it back up again dutifully and then nodded to Lucas. “You sure you don’t want a proper drink, man?”
Lucas shook his head. “Not right now. That stuff has been keeping me from thinking clearly.”
“Yep,” said Jake as he downed his second vodka. “It’ll do that alright”
Lucas studied the lad for a moment, deciding he quite liked him after all. The wickedness he had sensed last night seemed to have truly gone, and while Jake wasn’t without sin, it was easier to see the good in him now. “You’ve done some pretty bad things, Jake.”
His expression grew serious. “I know.”
“Are you really any different, or will you go right back to being a violent thug if you get out of this in one piece? Because I gotta tell you, I’m not much interested in saving the life of a lad who goes around beating people up and assaulting women.”
Jake raised an eyebrow and stared into his glass. “Don’t think anyone is getting saved here, do you?”
Lucas sighed. “Okay, you have a point there. Let’s just say then, that I don’t much fancy dying alongside a thug who hurts people for fun. Is that still you?”
The question prompted a moment’s thought from Jake, and he seemed to experience several emotions before he answered. “I know I’m bad—a worthless piece of shit—but I never wanted to be that way. It just kind of happened. I did a couple of bad things as a kid without even thinking about what I was doing, then the shame would make me drink and get high until I did more bad shit, and the cycle just kept repeating. It was like being on a ride, except this one would never stop and let me off—just kept spinning me in the same circles. Before I knew it, I was a total mess. Most mornings, I wake up hoping it will be the day someone pulls a knife out and cuts my throat. Guess the day finally came.”
Blood on the Bar (Lucas the Atoner Book 1) Page 14