Waltzing into Damnation

by Rita Stradling

  She doesn’t say anything for a moment, then tugs her wrist out of my grasp and folds her arms across her chest. Tapping her blood-red fingernails on her arm, she considers me. “And if I agree, you’ll go up against Babylon the Great yourself?”

  “That’s my plan,” I say.

  “I agree to your terms for one crew member and one alone. But I think you’ll likely die, and so no matter what, this deal will bring me satisfaction. Name the crew member.”

  “Not until I succeed,” I say, knowing I didn’t agree to any protection for Santiago in the time before I get Madeline to take off.

  I know it’s the right answer when the skin around her eyes and mouth tightens with clear annoyance. “A deal is a deal—if you somehow survive.”

  “A deal is a deal.”

  She unlocks the door. “Here is the room of the woman May.”

  I grab the door before it swings closed and slowly push it open. Inside, I find nothing but a run-of-the-mill cabin.

  I take one step in, and I’m on fire.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  The Last Day Before

  Fire licks up my body, burning my legs and thighs. I jump out of the spurt of flames and into the room, batting at my sizzling clothing. My tennis shoes singe away, along with the bottom of my shorts, but my skin is fine.

  Hellfire.

  It’s a hellfire trap. I don’t know much about the substance, except it seems to exist whenever the demons travel to or from hell and doesn’t burn me.

  Looking around, the room still appears empty. I search the bathroom and all the cabinets but don’t find a single sign of Madeline’s baby. Hesitating, I do what I’ve been avoiding since I came into the room, but I have no time for squeamishness. The bed is too low for a baby to fit under, but it’s definitely not too low for a snake.

  Lying down beside the bed, I whisper, “Please don’t bite me.” And I lift up the bed skirt. “Hh-hello.”

  Two shiny yellow eyes peer out at me from under the bed, and a little-forked tongue darts out into the light.

  “Hi, baby,” I say, my voice coming out really high-pitched. “I’m here to take you to your mommy, your real mommy. I promise I won’t hurt you, okay?”

  Even though I know the baby won’t understand me even in his human ten-month-old form, I wait a second for him to crawl out.

  I expect this to feel wrong somehow, me kidnapping a baby, but it doesn’t feel wrong, and that steadies me.

  “Um… rock-a-bye baby on the treetops . . .” I start to sing, though I’m not sure if I should treat him like an infant or lure him out with a dead mouse. As there are no dead mice handy, I keep singing and slowly moving my hand toward him. “...when the wind blows, the cradle will rock.”

  Cringing a little from expecting a bite, I run my hand over his snake head.

  He slithers out and sets his head on my hand.

  Carefully, I pet his little leathery head with my free hand, and his eyes close. “I’m going to pick you up, okay, baby?”

  Wrapping my hand around his body, I scoop him up and onto me. I’ve never been particularly fond of snakes, but even with knowing I’m cradling the antichrist, I’m not afraid as I pull him to my chest. Everything about this situation freaks me out, except, somehow, the child.

  The snake slithers up my wrist like an arm-sized bracelet, his dry little scales moving over my skin. I rise slowly.

  As I approach the door again, the fire billows up, and Madeline’s snake-baby squeezes. Pain shoots through my arm, and I immediately feel tingles in my fingers. “You’re afraid of the fire, aren’t you?”

  The realization only makes me more certain of my course. May left a ten-month-old baby alone in a room with hellfire its only babysitter. Medusa-Madeline may be the equivalent to a greater demon of hell at this point, but she loves this baby.

  Holding my arm over my head, I rush through the fire, throw open the door and run into the hall, slapping at my clothes with my free hand. The snake-baby loosens on me as soon as we’re free, continuing to climb up my arm to settle onto my shoulder. His snakeskin is cool against the back of my neck.

  “I’m taking you to your mama, baby,” I whisper as I stroke his little triangle head.

  The stern-side pool deck sits deserted as I rush out of the jagged hole that was once fancy glass doors. Holding onto the baby with one hand and the boat with the other, I lean over the side.

  Bloody branches undulate in every direction, with bits of flesh hanging from thorny stalks. Madeline and her dragon fight halfway up the boat. Thick wooden tentacles grip bodies—some only torsos or arms. On top of the earthen dragons’ backs, Andras thrusts his flaming sword down at Madeline. She stands about twice the size of Andras, dwarfing him even with his massive wingspan.

  The roots web around her like a giant ball gown that lifts her into the air. As three of the dragons lunge for him, Andras hacks through its head, sending the decapitated head to fall apart into plant matter and plunge into the sea. Immediately, another dragon forms out of boulders and vines, baring massive thorn teeth, and attacks.

  “Madeline,” I yell down. “Madeline, I have your baby, and I want to give him to you.”

  Madeline spins, her full attention on me as blood-red vines snap about her head.

  “He’s here with me, Madeline,” I call.

  I’m so fixed on her and so, so idiotic, because I don’t see the attack coming at all. One moment I’m leaning over the railing, and the next May is on me.

  She barrels me over to the floor, her hands on fire.

  “You are not stealing my son,” she screams at me. Her hands blaze with hellfire, and she presses them into my stomach.

  Pain lances through my body as the quivering snake-baby tightens around my neck.

  “He’s afraid of fire!” I choke and cough while gently but firmly trying to unwind him from around my neck. But he’s too scared; he squeezes me so tight, blackness immediately encroaches on my vision.

  “Of course he’s afraid of fire,” May says as she raises her fire-sheathed hand toward the snake. “Fire is a great teacher. Here I’ll teach you both a little lesson.”

  She presses her flaming hands down on my face.

  For a small eternity, I know nothing but pain.

  The coils around my neck loosen, and the baby slithers away.

  The thought that he’s probably terrified and tRäumatized thrums through my mind, a distant drumbeat, and I realize I’m not entirely alone inside my head. The strange deep emptiness that dwells within me splits open like a gaping maw, and instead of pushing May away, I grip my fingers into her sides and pull her closer to me. Opening my eyes, I whisper, “Go to Hell, witch.”

  Just like the time in Copenhagen City Hall, something deep within me opens, and I feel my mouth stretching inhumanly wide. My eyes sink into my head, and I no longer feel whatsoever human, I feel like skin and sinew stretching around a black hole—a vacuum in space.

  May screams, but suddenly I don’t have ears to hear it either. Her hands bat at what’s left of me, scorching my skin everywhere they touch.

  I don’t release her.

  I grip her all the tighter, so tight that she sinks through me. For one moment more, I feel her presence, and then she’s falling down into my abyss.

  Suddenly, there’s only the emptiness and my consciousness bouncing around the edges of it.

  “Raven.” My own voice coos from deep within the black hole. “Raven, I’ll take her from you, but I want something in return.”

  “No.” I think at the voice, and the thought echoes on into the deep, dark tunnel. “You’re just going to take her. You have no power over me.”

  “The angels are going to win, Raven. The instruments of infernal judgment should always have been mine. Come to me, and I will destroy Andras forever and give you Stephen Tapper,” my own voice says.

  “I’m never coming to you,” I say. “And I don’t believe you at all. There are no easy solutions. Your lies don’t even temp
t me anymore.”

  My consciousness pulls back into some semblance of my body. Grabbing the rubber folds of my mouth, I pull them up, trying to close the vacuum.

  “The angels plan to end all human existence on Earth. Do you not want to stop them?”

  I push that voice from my head, thrusting it down and away from me, deep into the abyss.

  Yes, I want to stop the angels from destroying the world, but I’m about to team up with Satan to do it. Lines I won’t cross, this is a big old fat one for me.

  My eyes grow, forming as my vision returns in a blurry mess. The bones of my jaw harden and solidify under my fingers into the familiar sharp structure sheathed in skin.

  A little baby’s face appears before me, his hands gripping my hair.

  “You’re okay?” I cough out as I try to untangle his little hands from my hair.

  His lips sticks out, and he whimpers.

  “It’s okay, baby,” I whisper as I somehow find the ability to sit and take the little guy into my arms. The baby’s solidity breaks apart as he again unwinds into a snake. Snake body quivering, he slithers up into my hair.

  As I blink, the ship comes into focus around me in a mess of colors. Muffled screeching and cries grow louder, and I look up to the side of the ship to find a tunnel made of roots and vines just above my head.

  Green and brown woven stalks clot in what is very clearly an entrance to some sort of vine passageway.

  Well, Madeline has the ‘come into my lair’ act down pat.

  Climbing to my feet, I hesitate at the railing. Everything in me screams not to go into the tunnel, but I know I don’t have a choice.

  My only option is forward—forever onward. Madeline won’t kill me while I hold her son— or would she? I’m taking a hell of a lot on faith that there’s some trace of the true Madeline still left in the creature that is now Babylon.

  Taking a steadying breath, I jump the rail of the cruise ship and climb into the tunnel. My bare feet and knees hit the thick, uneven weave of vines.

  The moment I’m inside, the vines sew closed behind me. Only faint glimmers of light shine through at the cracks between stalks. Standing, I hold my arms out, feeling along the sides. The tunnel is about four feet wide and stretches to a foot above my head. When I take one tentative step forward, I find a short drop about a foot down onto smooth wood. The next step produces the same result, and I realize Madeline created a tree staircase for me.

  Counting paces, I descend slowly. Fifteen steps down, the hallway levels out. A faint rustling sound follows me down the stairs, but it stops when I do. Feeling back, I find what I expect, a solid wall of vines.

  “Madeline?” I shout up.

  The vine wall behind me smacks into my back, and suddenly I’m shooting forward. I shout unintelligible words as my feet fly out from under me, and I land hard on my butt.

  Light opens up around the space as the vines push me out into a giant cage made up of trees and a web of branches between them. A resounding boom has me spinning away to find Madeline carried on a wave of rolling earth, closing in fast, as her thorny medusa -hairdo undulates around her head. Behind her, Andras fights three dragons, slicing through them with a desperate intensity.

  She passes the branch cage, and it bends out to receive her before snapping back into place. With a resounding boom, Madeline lands before me, sending bits of stone flying out in all directions. Her red eyes burn into mine. When the branches fall away, she wears a garment of what looks like bark, though it only strategically covers her nudity. Standing to her full height, she towers over me, likely twelve to fifteen feet tall.

  The snake-baby around my neck slithers along my shoulders and peeks out from where he’s tangled in my hair.

  “Give me my baby,” Madeline calls down, her voice low and grating, like rocks rubbing together.

  “Do you love him?” I call up at the giant creature that was once a young woman I sort of new. I don’t know where I find the courage to speak my mind, but I somehow force myself to do it. “You might be really powerful, but so are May and Andras, and I sent them both to Hell. Are you still capable of loving a baby?”

  Instead of attacking, which I ninety-nine percent expect her to do, Madeline falls to her knees before me. Tears fall from her red eyes as she bellows out, “I love him.”

  Whatever Madeline is now, she isn’t a demon yet; the fact that she can say the word ‘love’ proves it, and this cinches the deal for me.

  “Hey, little guy,” I say, holding my hand out to the snake around my neck.

  He slithers out, and when Madeline reaches out, the baby slithers up and onto her arm. He wraps himself around her shoulders, closing his eyes as if finally he can nap.

  “Goodbye, baby,” I whisper as I drop my hand to my side.

  Madeline has her eyes closed as if she too can rest after a very long trial.

  “Madeline, I don’t know how much you remember or how much of you is in there, but there’s only one person in the world who knows how to save Stephen and kill Andras permanently, and he’s on that boat.”

  Madeline’s red eyes snap open and fix on me. She bares sharp teeth as her eyes burn with intensity. “Liar.”

  “I’m not lying,” I tell her. “That’s why I’m here. I summoned a demon with Cassidy Dixon, and he sent me here for the information. If you don’t sink this ship, the man who has this information will help me. If you do sink it, I’ll be dragged to hell, and the information will be lost forever.”

  Something twists up my ankle, and I try to kick it away, but then another long, hard tendril winds up my other leg.

  Looking down, I find that the branches have consumed me to my ankles and they keep twisting up.

  “I’m not lying,” I shout, but her eyes only burn hotter.

  I sink lower, and the wooden tentacles squeeze my ankles. I consider killing Babylon like I did May, but she’s hopelessly far away. Also, Antichrist or not, I’m not about to send her baby to hell with her. He might have been born to do evil, but right now he’s just a baby.

  The tree branches pull me down to my knees, and I scream as the crushing pain radiates up my legs.

  In the distance, Andras still fights his way toward me—but one after the other, the dragons overtake him.

  There’s a sudden flash of movement, and I look up to see Madeline’s baby bite her quickly once in the chin. As soon as he withdraws his fangs, the baby slithers back into her hair, disappearing in the tangled stalks.

  With a sudden release of pressure, the crushing boughs around my legs loosen, and I sag forward with the relief from pain.

  “You saved my baby and brought him to me,” Madeline says as she lifts one of her clawed hands to her chin and touches the blood there. Pulling her hand away, she inspects it. “I’ll let you continue on your pointless mission. Don’t let Andras come after me again—or I’ll kill you and everyone who stands in the way to you.”

  I climb out of the hole and push up to my feet. A pain like Charlie horses from hell squeezes my calves, and I stumble to grab the nearest tree trunk, just to stay vertical. “Madeline,” I breathe, “I’ll give you the only promise I can. I will attempt to stop Andras, but physically and in powers, he outmatches me exponentially. But I don’t think he’ll come after you. May is dead, and your baby needs a guardian. He’s only fighting you now because he thinks you’ll sink the ship and won’t stop until he’s dead.”

  The tree cage around me pulls away, creating an entrance back into a tunnel of vines.

  “Go,” Madeline says as she gestures back.

  Swallowing hard, I head toward her but pause when I’m feet away. “I’m really sorry about what this war has turned us all into. If I ever find a way to help, I will.”

  She doesn’t respond, and there’s really nothing left to say between us, so I hobble back into the tunnel, knowing today’s grim task isn’t even close to over.

  After climbing probably fifteen stories of tree branch stairs, I tumble back onto the cr
uise ship’s deck, and I’m in Andras’ arms. It’s really the last place I want to be, but he doesn’t give me much of a choice. Andras scoops me off the deck, holding me to his thankfully-clothed chest.

  “Never do that again,” he growls into my face.

  I want to scream at him. “Let go of me,” I say as I beat at his shoulders and punch his wing as well. “Stop treating me like I’m precious to you. I’m not.”

  I’m going to kill you—I’m going to kill you tonight—but I don’t say that part. I can’t say that part.

  Thankfully, he sets me on my feet, only to lean down and stare into my eyes. “I have to hold you. We’re leaving right now.”

  I glare right back, then I push his shoulders from me in case he gets any grabby ideas. “You said you’re kidnapping me tomorrow, so you’re doing it tomorrow.”

  He takes the hit as if he doesn’t even feel it, and when I walk away, he thankfully does nothing to stop me.

  I hurry across the deck and toward the broken glass doors in search of the cruise director.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Last Day Before

  Caroline glares up at me from her desk as she drips blood onto the last line of the form. With a flourish of her manicured hand, she dips a quill into the bead of blood and signs her name.

  “Thanks,” I say, grabbing it out from under her hands in case she has some plan to wiggle around our deal by destroying it. I blow on the blood, hoping to dry the document. “And as agreed, you’ll instruct all the necessary crew members to let Santiago leave?”

  She doesn’t make any response for almost a minute when she finally concedes, “I will immediately instruct all my crew members responsible for punishing defectors to let Santiago leave and that he is released from duty.” She grits her teeth. “And I will immediately follow all the other provisions of our deal.”

  “Good,” I say. Rolling up the paper, I stick it into the back of my jean shorts and pull my shirt over it.

  When the security guard at the door doesn’t look like he’s going to let me out of Caroline’s light-wood office, I glance back at Caroline.