Divah

by Susannah Appelbaum

  It was all I could do to hold myself back, and, seeing this, Laurent smiled cruelly.

  The professor cleared his throat. “Yes, as a rule their eyes don’t reflect light. But within the blackness, there is a glint, at times. A fire. Come closer,” he urged Maurice. “She won’t bite.”

  René and I exchanged looks, but Maurice had slipped in closer.

  “That’s right. You must move about the head to see it. The eyes flare, ignite even, flame like dry kindling. The term, my lords, is coruscate. A quiver. A flash. But by then, often, it is too late.”

  “If it is a demon, the disguise is good. The babe as well?” Maurice asked Guillotin.

  “I assure you. The two. The Hermès Institute captured them yesternight.”

  “Surely today’s demonstration”—again I waggled Nicolas’s heavy head for all to see—“was sufficient? Must we reduce ourselves to such baser instincts as those of men—as the bloodthirsty crowd today?”

  “As it happens, I like blood,” Laurent stared at me coldly. “A little bloodletting before a feast of souls. N’est-ce pas?”

  I charged Laurent then, without thought or reason, but he stayed me with one flick of his wrist. Defeated, I slumped to the floor, staring at Maurice, my head ringing from the blow.

  “Feast of souls?” Professor Guillotin repeated uncertainly.

  “We are all outlaws here, monsieur,” Maurice snapped. “We play for high stakes. Eternal stakes.”

  “Still—you are angels.”

  “There is nothing pious about angels,” Maurice growled. “Pious is a word created by man.”

  “If not pious, then what be you?” he asked. “Certainly you are no demons, for they are your sworn enemy. Is this not war?”

  “We are soldiers,” Laurent stated coldly. “Warriors. But we answer to no one. And we do all that is necessary to win.”

  “Professor,” I said, standing shakily. “Open your eyes. Be it angel or demon, you will end your days with one of us. We are all just soul stealers.”

  “Well,” said René. “We are prettier.”

  “I will not be a party to this.” I pushed past him, cradling Nicolas.

  “You’re such a bleeding heart,” Laurent sneered.

  “Would that I had one.”

  50

  Gaston was leaning against the stone archway where we had left him, picking at his teeth with a wooden splinter. He smiled at me when he saw me emerge, staggering into the yard.

  “Is it everything they say?” He stretched, his wide, angular wings unfolded, articulating along bony joints that ran along the top side. Midway, at the joint, a sleek talon jutted from the neat feathers, a long and lethal claw. Gaston’s wings were smaller than mine had been; flecked with shiny copper, they were wide and silent, made for speed.

  “Yes,” I said dully.

  “Well, that’s something.”

  “Is it, Gaston?”

  “You’ll have your wings again—isn’t that what this is about?”

  It’s about desperation, I thought bitterly. It’s about downfall. But most of all, Itzy, it’s about the ravages of love.

  I looked around the boneyard. Torches marked the entry to the catacombs, but shadows drifted at our feet, and I could just make out the few remaining funeral carriages. Above us was the sign for Hell’s Gate.

  “I wonder. Do you think she’ll let this all go so easily?”

  “She’ll have no choice without a head.”

  I found the driver where I left him, his chin propped against his chest, flask in hand.

  I cleared my throat loudly. He awoke with a start, grunting in protest.

  “Couldn’t bear to part with your friend?” he said upon seeing Nicolas.

  “That is no final resting place,” I said of the catacombs. “It is no place of rest at all.”

  The driver shook out his reins. “Eternal rest is hard to come by,” he said.

  The stair creaked as I mounted the carriage to recover my seat. “Take me to Père Lachaise.” It was a rambling old cemetery, and my favorite. I threw another silver coin at him, and as it arced through the air, his eyes followed it greedily. But as I watched, a deep shiver overtook him and the coin clattered to the floor, unclaimed.

  “I cannot,” he said, his voice suddenly a low baritone.

  “There.” I tossed another coin at him. “If you drive your carriage like you drive a bargain, we’ll be there in no time.”

  I peered into the gloom expectantly, but the driver had not stirred. When he turned his face to me, I saw his eyes. They flashed in the low light like a beast’s.

  I stepped down and looked over my shoulder for Gaston, but there was nothing but the night.

  “On second thought—” I said casually.

  “You. Are. Summoned,” the man said in a voice from the grave.

  It was folly to run, for there was no escaping her servants and spies. I turned, my dead wings burning on my back, and I sprinted with all my might.

  Run, Itzy, when you cannot fly.

  51

  The world spun by in a dark blur, the teetering slums and tiny alleys a grim smudge to either side of me. The road was a ruin, rutted with wagon wheels, muddy from the rain. It wound its way haphazardly through this part of Paris, never straight for long. A small market was being erected in the passage ahead, stalls of canvas and tent poles, sleepy merchants piling turnips and hard disks of cheese. Someone from a floor above was emptying a bucket, and its foul contents rained down on the roof of a fruit vendor, nearly splattering his wares. He shouted something with a raised fist, but his complaints were answered with another shower of filth.

  I dared glance behind me and rejoiced that there was no sight of the carriage or its driver. Slowing my pace to a stroll, I slung Nicolas over my shoulder by his hair. Before me, a young woman in an apron emerged from a narrow bakery. Seeing me, she blushed.

  She was flushed with her work with the ovens and covered in flour. I smiled in return, stopping entirely.

  “Bonjour!” I smiled. “Comment ça va?” I angled closer, Nicolas in the crook of my elbow, leaning against the doorframe casually.

  We talked in low tones, punctuated with occasional bursts of her laughter.

  It pains me, Itzy, to recount to you what happened next. She was regaling me with some tale, now lost to my memory. Her face sparkled, her cheeks flushed—when a change overtook her complexion. She stared at something just over my shoulder, and her round face turned from confusion to fear.

  A great rending filled the air.

  “Mon Dieu!” she whimpered.

  The ground trembled beneath me. Suddenly, the sleepy market had come alive; the vendors were scurrying about their wagons and their stalls, a wheel of cheese loping idly, boules of bread scattering into the dirt beneath their feet and disappearing into a growing smudge of darkness in their midst.

  A vast hole was opening in the center of the market.

  As I watched, the very earth buckled, and a yawning black orifice tore the small square apart, swallowing anything and everything that had stood there but an instant before. The street was gone, the market gone, and several teetering homes all toppled into the hungry abyss. The entire market square had vanished beneath the earth in a giant, deafening gurgle. There followed a moment of utter silence, where it appeared as if the sodden earth had finished its ugly business. The world was still. For that instant, I dared hope.

  It was a small sound at first—a slippery plink. A soft whoosh. A quickening symphony of further gurgles. Chunks of the earth—of Paris—were slipping away rapidly into the sinkhole’s mouth as the dark hole grew. The soil, soaked from the unceasing rains, would not hold—the world itself was slipping away. I watched as a chunk of roadway sloughed off into the growing pit, a cart and a tethered horse fell next, and I heard the shrieking of the beast. Tenements crumbled as if made of matchsticks, soiled lace curtains fluttering in the open windows as they tumbled into the void.

  I looked for the young
baker-girl, but she had vanished from the doorway—the doorway itself was gone.

  When I turned my head back, the creeping hole had reached my boots.

  All that remained of the market was the fruit vendor and his soiled tent, clinging with desperation to the crumbling wall behind him. He huddled beside his pile of apples—polished like garnets. The gaping black sinkhole had gobbled up all before him.

  “Hold on! Attendez!” I called. I looked about desperately. He was so close—if only I could fly. I darted along the jagged edge of the sinkhole, each step, the very ground beneath my feet falling away, my boots squelching in the Paris muck.

  The vendor’s grip on the wall was failing—he floundered desperately, his hands grabbing a crooked iron hook that once secured a shutter. One by one, his polished apples tumbled into the gaping hole. I skidded to a halt—the tip of my boot jutting out over nothing but air. Steadying myself, I held out my hand, leaning out over the divide.

  “Here, monsieur!” I called. “Grab my hand!”

  He shook his head helplessly, frozen.

  “Do it—or you will fall!” I commanded.

  A terrible tremor shook the ground, and I fell back, watching as the entire wall to which he clung gave way. Down he went with the last of his apples. Down amidst the rubble and debris, the darkness. As he fell, his head lashed back, searching me out. He opened his mouth—his last words.

  “You. Are. Summoned,” the vendor said to me, deep and guttural, and then he was gone.

  A dank breath of moist air engulfed me. I stood there, on the precipice, staring into the bowels of Hell.

  No. Not Hell, I realized, as I watched him fall. This was not Hell, Itzy. This was the catacombs. Hell was feverishly hot, I knew, and this was cool—cold even.

  Looking into the sinkhole, I could just make out the tunnels of the old quarry that wormed their way beneath the city streets—beneath all of Paris. Everywhere there were bones. The ancient tunnels of the catacombs were undermining the street, the very ground the buildings stood on was swallowing them whole. A city built on shifting bones.

  I looked up from the pit. The crooked slums of this section of Paris had blotted out the sky, but where once there were buildings, now there was nothing but open air. Wisps of clouds floated by, like fingers of the grim reaper. It was a beautiful sight, Itzy. There are no clouds in Hell.

  From the head, still clutched in my hand, came a voice from the grave.

  “You. Are. Summoned,” Nicolas spoke, dangling from my hand. I raised him up so he was level with my face.

  “Et tu?” I asked.

  “You. Are—”

  “I know, I know. I am summoned.” My shoulders sagged. “When?”

  “The dead can speak, and they can dance. July fourteenth. The Shadowsill Ball,” said the head.

  This was it, I realized. July fourteenth. This was when she meant to do it.

  “You—” He began his message again.

  “I’ll be there,” I said, as if I had a choice. I tossed Nicolas into the sinkhole in disgust.

  52

  I stumbled blindly through the winding streets as dawn gave way to morning. As I neared the city’s center, the crowded apartments were replaced by more stately homes, the tiny rues widened into boulevards, but still the stench of the city stung my nostrils. The Seine was the worst, by far, as I crossed it at the Île de la Cité, and my stomach recoiled as raw sewage and slaughterhouse filth floated beneath me.

  At the end of the small rickety bridge, I was jostled by a wild mob—farmers, perhaps, judging by their scythes and pitchforks—rushing by with riotous shouts. Further along, as I neared the Cathedral of Notre Dame, I saw a pair of bodies hanging from lampposts, still twitching. At their feet a ghastly word, scrawled in something thick and red.

  DÉMON

  I shaded my eyes, staring up at them. One was still alive, the rope having been carelessly flung about his neck to include an arm. These were no demons, I saw—just unfortunates.

  The demon was lurking in the shadows of the hanging men. I saw it then, a tiny thing against the backdrop of Notre Dame. The hellhound. Her Majesty’s small dog.

  “Bonjour, Mops,” I called pleasantly, removing my knife from my cloak. It had been a gift from Marie Antoinette—the handle was carved from bone, inlaid with rubies. The dog growled, baring its teeth. “A glorious day, wouldn’t you agree? Formidable.”

  The dog’s hackles were raised and it began a dangerous-sounding snarl. I brandished the dagger. “Just a knife here, you see, Mops? No tricks.”

  I sawed roughly through the hemp rope.

  “Seems these poor fellows have been mistaken for your kind. Et bien. Who can blame them? The city is filthy with demons, wouldn’t you agree?”

  I returned my attention to the rope. The blade from Marie was a pretty thing, but duller than dirt. When the hanged men finally fell, I forgot the hellhound.

  I recognized the survivor of the lynch mob. He was a priest named Foune.

  53

  The smell of your cathedrals, Itzy, I have always loved them. The rank, dense scents of hope and misery, wax and burned herbs. The stones are polished by the worn knees of the devout, permeated with the human condition. Sadly, that is all there is—such smells, and ponderous silence. Whatever purpose built these vast halls is lost on my kind. I am more at home in hotels, Itzy. We angels are solitary creatures, not adept at life upon this mortal sphere. The convenience of room service cannot be overstated.

  I carried the priest carefully in my arms as I wandered the checkered stone floor of the nave, the clacking of my heels echoing off the vaulted ceiling. Notre Dame was deserted at this hour of the morning, and stone statues gazed down at me, saints and kings.

  I laid Foune down on the high altar gently, beneath one of the famed rose windows. The poor man was pale, his skin mottled about his neck where the rope had been tightened.

  “Foune,” I called gently, and his eyes fluttered open, once, twice, and then remained closed.

  Birds—doves or larks I guessed—roosted on the upper halls and were flying softly from one balustrade to the next, their wings rustling. I heard one land behind me.

  “Luc,” someone said.

  I knew that voice. My throat went dry.

  “Anaïs.”

  54

  I knew your mother as one knows a movie star—that is, intimately, and not at all. She was untouchable always, and rarely earthbound—until she had you, Itzy. There are consequences, you see, for lying with man—just as there are for consorting with demons. Still, it was your mother they turned to when things got rough. Your mother was a fixer, a member of the cavalry. She appeared when mistakes were made. Her job in the realm of angels was to make things right, to prevent war at all costs. Her presence could only mean one thing: someone had messed up badly. And, Itzy, that someone was me.

  Your mother was not alone that day in the Cathedral of Notre Dame. Two more winged creatures sailed down from high atop the choir, circled, and alighted on the floor.

  “Sabine. Colette.” I nodded at them. “Always a pleasure.”

  Their faces were chiseled like the statues above them as they flanked Anaïs. A brightness emanated from them, a cold light like that of Laurent’s staff. Their wings, great arched things, swept up from their shoulders and brushed the floor.

  Your mother was wearing tailored silk atop tight riding pants and tall black boots from the Hermès Institute. Sabine held a leather riding crop in her hand, and Colette a coiled whip.

  “You’re looking well, ladies. The pinnacle of cutting-edge fashion. Speaking of cutting-edge, I saw your friend Guillotin today,” I said to Anaïs. “Remind me, what is it that you like about men?”

  “Remind me, what is it you like about demons?” your mother asked.

  I noticed a slight smile on Sabine’s icy features.

  “Well, for a start, they don’t answer questions with other questions.” I shielded my eyes. “Turn it down a notch,” I complained to the
ladies. “You’re hurting my eyes.”

  “Where are you staying?” I turned to Anaïs. “I hear the Basilla Athénée is good this time of year.”

  “Too many devhils.” She wrinkled her nose.

  “I can inquire for you at the Saint Honoré, if you’d like,” I said politely.

  “I have made my own arrangements,” she said.

  I shrugged.

  “What happened here?” Anaïs indicated Foune.

  “A priest—they thought he was a demon.”

  “Things are getting out of hand, Luc.”

  “Maurice has a plan.”

  “Yesterday’s news, Luc.”

  “She means to open the Gates, Anaïs.”

  “Now we’re talking. How far along is she?”

  I hesitated.

  “Luc,” your mother said impatiently. “Do you recall the three things the Divah needs to open the Gates to Hell?”

  “First the Divah needs a body, to be incarnate.”

  “Check.”

  “Right,” I sighed. “I suppose she has one—the whole Queen-of-France thing.”

  “And?” your mother prompted. “The second thing?” I cringed as a note of frustration crept into her voice.

  I frowned. “Um. An angel’s feather,” I hemmed.

  “What’s that?” She cupped her hand to her ear.

  “She has my feather,” I said meekly. I tried to ignore Sabine and Colette as they glowered at me.

  “So now she has an all-powerful talisman to use for her feverish desires. Very careless of you, Luc.”

  I looked at my shoe.

  “And, Luc, what’s the final thing the Divah needs to open the Gates of Hell, releasing the legions of damned upon the earth, leaving nothing but torment and suffering in their wake?”

  My eyes darted around the cathedral, searching for the nearest exit. They fell, in the end, on Foune and the altar.

  “She needs a sacrifice!” I whispered. “To unlock the passage between the realms and imbue her with everlasting power.”

  “Très bien. Does she have one? An innocent to sacrifice before the Gates?”