Prospero in Hell

by L. Jagi Lamplighter

  “And you invited him here?” Theo cried, outraged. “What happened to ‘O Brother, he insulted my honor’?”

  “I . . . we thought we should hear his side of the story,” I stammered.

  “Then, we all went for Italian food, and he tried to kiss Miranda. It was romantic! Those inkies sure know how to woo women,” Mephisto chimed in happily.

  “Don’t tell me the ice princess fell for an incubus’s tricks?” purred Erasmus.

  Mephisto shook his head loyally. “Nope, she was as cold as stone.”

  “That, at least, is to her credit,” admitted Erasmus, and Theo looked slightly mollified. My cheeks burning, I left it at that. No one need know about my second meeting with the fake Ferdinand at the mansion.

  Cornelius had sat down on one of the stools and was leaning against the nearest pool table, resting his head on his hands. Without looking up, he spoke up in his customary calm voice. “All this family history is no doubt fascinating, but do we not have a more pressing matter to discuss, Brothers and Sisters?”

  “Let him come.” Theo hunched his shoulders and his lined face broke into a harsh grin. “I’ve got a few questions for him.”

  “What if he brings his friends?” asked Cornelius. “Will it be safe for the guests? Should we cancel the festivity?”

  “We must cancel.” Erasmus tipped his head back and looked at the ceiling. “This party is a Boston tradition. There are hundreds of people present. If we let them stay and our uninvited guests harmed even a single one, I would never forgive myself. Ah, what a shame, and we haven’t even served the salmon mousse yet.” He turned on me suddenly. “You did this on purpose, didn’t you? To ruin my evening?”

  This was too much.

  “Oh yes, Erasmus,” I fumed. “I sent engraved invitations to the Three Shadowed Ones asking them to come by and collect our staffs, as we are going to be all gathered together in one place. This was after I cut off Father’s head and framed Ulysses for Gregor’s murder, which I secretly committed myself. Tomorrow, I plan to destroy the Earth with my fellows, the other wicked children of Sycorax, but not until I’ve irritated Theo into having a heart attack. Can’t leave any stone unturned. Satisfied?”

  “Glad to hear you’re willing to admit some of your sins,” Erasmus replied, as cool as ever. “It’s a start. A few more outbursts like that, and maybe we’ll get the truth out of you.”

  I pressed my fingers against my temples, which were beginning to ache. “You are incorrigible, Erasmus.”

  “So,” asked Logistilla, who was looking at me oddly. Too late, I remembered I was not supposed to mention the Ulysses matter. “The plan is to send the guests home and then pig out on Erasmus’s food until our nemeses arrive? And then what? Defend this rickety old place as best we can?”

  “That’s about the face of it,” replied Erasmus.

  “Oh, goody!” Mephisto cheered. “A fight!”

  I stood on the narrow flat center of Erasmus’s roof, leaning against the small railing that surrounded it, and gazed out over the steep sloping sides, through the darkness and across the pale snow-covered fields below. The air, while chilled, was surprisingly balmy for a snowy Boston night. The silhouette of the single gargoyle, hunched above the main entrance on the far side of the roof, was my only companion.

  After our talk, Erasmus dismissed his guests with some story of a sudden breakout of an infectious disease. Meanwhile, Theo, Mephisto, and Cornelius posted themselves in various strategic positions to guard against the approach of the Three Shadowed Ones. Even Logistilla was given a guard post, to her great consternation. Only I, whom Erasmus refused to trust, was at loose ends.

  Not wishing to encounter any of my relatives, I had gathered my cashmere cloak and, after a brief chat with the local Aerie Ones, gone directly to the roof. Now, standing in the chill of the night, I contemplated all I had recently learned.

  It was as if someone had shredded the tapestry of my life.

  A scant month ago, my days had been pleasant and unruffled, my life following the same smooth course it had continued along for centuries. I was the cherished daughter of a noble man and his long-departed true love. As C.E.O. of Prospero, Inc., I worked diligently to maintain the company my father had created and to uphold its purposes and principles: protecting mankind from the ravages and depredations of the supernatural world. True, one of my brothers was dead, another was mad, and a third had broken with the family to follow a path toward his own destruction, but I knew my family would never do one another any true harm, never betray one another. The only sour note in the melody of my life had been that I had not been making progress in my effort to rise to the rank of Sibyl.

  Then came the fateful day in early December, less than a month ago, when I held Father’s journal up to the Phoenix lamp and received his cryptic message, a message that had apparently been intended for Erasmus.

  And now?

  I stood at the railing, staring into the darkness, feeling as if I stood at the edge of a precipice, gazing down into the utter blackness below. It was as if the brink were still before me, giving me an illusion of safety, but I could feel my feet slipping. If I could not regain my balance, my descent into the chasm below would be certain . . . and there was nothing I could grab to slow my fall.

  Erasmus’s accusations echoed in my thoughts. Sycorax. Her name alone evoked revulsion. Goose bumps rippled along my arms. How she had terrified my child self! I recalled running across a field, chasing my ball. I must have been about eight. As I entered a glade of orchids, a sudden shadow eclipsed the sky. Hovering over me was a vulture of an old woman whose body was as bent as a question mark. She smelled of brine and rotting flesh as she scowled down at me, breathing putrid breath. Reaching out for me with crooked bony fingers, she muttered in a singsong voice: “Pretty child, lovely child. Tasty, I wager, to fill an old witch’s hunger.”

  At that moment, Father appeared, amidst a thunderclap, and chased her off with his staff. That was the last time I saw her, for she died soon after. Only now, as I looked back, did I realize that she must have smelled so terrible because she was deathly ill.

  Could that horrible harridan be my mother? Could Father have lied to me all these years, merely pretending I was the daughter of his beloved Lady Portia, the kind and loving soul who had provided the guiding star of Father’s life, transforming him from a petty duke into a noble enchanter? I would have sworn not, but then I would have sworn Father would never have sent my first love bodily into Hell . . .

  But he had not!

  Uncle Antonio had killed Ferdinand. Father was innocent! Relief buoyed me, and the brink receded, only to draw suddenly near again as I considered the false Ferdinand. Despite the night’s chill, I could feel the burning in my cheeks. Incubi seduce schoolgirls out of convents, not worldly enchantresses, such as myself.

  Yet, when, during our conversation by the fire, he had spoken of suffering centuries of torment for the innocent love of a chaste maiden, I had been completely taken in. It was as if some façade had been ripped away, revealing the true torment of his soul. I had believed him entirely. What acting skill Seir possessed, to fool someone as experienced as I! Even now, when I recalled it, I felt impressed by his sincerity. His protestations had seemed as sincere as my father’s description of his great love for Lady Portia. . . .

  Had that been a lie, too?

  My knees gave way, and I sank to the rooftop, resting my forehead on the cold metal of the railing. After Erasmus’s revelation, I had feared I might not be the child of Father and his great love. Now, a worse possibility occurred to me. This great love of Father’s, to which I compared all others and found them wanting . . . might that, too, be a deception? A tale woven from faerie dust to entertain a troublesome girl-child?

  If so, perhaps I had been taken in by Seir because my standard for sincerity was a sham.

  If my own judgment was suspect, then only the grace of my Lady had kept me from doom all these years. If I were to lose her guida
nce, I would be utterly lost, a babe in the woods. No wonder Theo thought me a guileless thing.

  Shivering under my cloak, I remembered Osae the Mab’s attempt at rape and knew fear.

  Time stood still as icy terror gripped my heart. The night closed in around me, frigid and menacing. Finally, I gathered my cloak tightly around my shoulders and retreated toward the stairs. Perhaps due to the disturbed state of my thoughts, the presence of only one gargoyle on Erasmus’s roof suddenly struck me as ominous. Were not gargoyles usually posted in pairs? Cautiously, I began inching my way back toward the door behind which lay safety and the warmth of the house.

  Silent as an owl, the gargoyle’s many-horned head swiveled toward me. Sapphire eyes gleamed against the pitch-blackness of the silhouette.

  I screamed.

  “Good evening, Fair Sister,” said a familiar deep voice.

  “Mephistopheles?” I gulped hopefully. “What are you doing here?”

  The sapphire eyes vanished as the demon returned his gaze to the road below. “I await my enemies, the Three Shadowed Ones.”

  Clutching my cloak tightly, I briskly walked the length of the roof and stood beside my brother, the Prince of Hell. Glimpses of obsidian black skin were visible through the rents in what had been my brother’s fine tuxedo. The Staff of Summoning lay beside him, still cuffed to his wrist.

  “Any sign of them?” I asked cautiously.

  “I smell no infernal scent.” He sniffed, then abruptly continued, “Sister, this news you brought sits not well with me.”

  “How so?” I asked, my voice rising unnaturally. Silly mad Mephisto had believed my innocence. Was his demonic alter ego about to side with Erasmus?

  “Ulysses’s behavior stinks of Hell’s touch,” he said grimly. “The Staff of Transportation can go anywhere it has been. Where has it been? And, most pressingly, can it bring our foolhardy brother to locations from which he cannot escape—not without selling some essential he might otherwise prefer to keep?”

  “Such as his soul?” I asked, shivering involuntarily.

  “Such as,” agreed the demon. “And yet, the buying of souls is overrated.”

  “How so?”

  Mephistopheles fixed his gleaming eyes upon me, bathing my face and hands in an eerie blue glow.

  “Demons may ask a man to give up his soul. No matter what the man agrees to, however, the denizens of Hell cannot compel him to keep the bargain. Men are not the keepers of their souls. Souls belong to God in Heaven. The Demons have no means of collecting their collateral, unless the person who does the selling follows up on the sale by leading a wicked life.

  “If a man who promised his soul to the Devil were then to lead a virtuous life, the Devil would gain nothing. No. When demons make bargains, they must continue to work to ensure their clients live up to them. They do this by coercing them into committing wicked acts—such as killing one’s favorite brother.”

  I started to ask another question, but Mephistopheles cut me off.

  “They come! I must return to my lack-witted self lest worse fates befall me. See to your safety, Sister. I go.” Spreading his wings, he leapt from the roof and vanished into the night.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Auld Lang Syne

  I leapt down the stairs two at a time, pausing only to grab my flute. When I reached the last stair above the balcony, I halted. Creeping silently to the rail, so that those below would not notice me, I looked down upon the ballroom.

  My siblings were bunched together in the middle of the floor, clutching their staffs, except for Theo, who was empty-handed. Behind them were a dozen Orbis Suleimani security guards. These dapper agents had their hands over their heads and their backs pressed against the wall, a pile of guns at their feet. Nearby, Logistilla’s bear stood on its hind feet with its paws extended, like a grizzly exhibit in a museum. Had I not seen it moving but an hour ago, I would have taken it for stuffed.

  In the center of the ballroom, an exceptionally tall man in a scarlet turban stood on one of the long tables. Trays of food and broken pieces of an ice swan lay strewn across the floor beneath the stranger, where he had apparently kicked them off the table. Even up on the balcony, I could smell the spilled duck pâté.

  The stranger had a .45 trained on Theo’s head.

  My heart in my throat, I examined the gunman more closely. He wore long arcane robes embroidered with dark cabalistic symbols. His vaguely Arabic features were unnaturally placid, with one eye huge and swollen, and the other small and squinty. I recognized his face immediately. I had seen him huddled in a doorway in Chicago the day I first met the false Ferdinand. What was he doing here?

  As I studied him, my skin began to crawl. I felt as if I had turned over a sturdy log and found the bottom rotted and writhing with maggots. It was not that his deformed eye unnerved me. Rather, his expression was wrong, as if a colony of ants, or spiders, had hollowed out a human corpse and were trying to move the face to express emotions they could not comprehend.

  Repelled, I jerked backward and stepped quickly into the upper hallway, shivering with distaste. Nothing this abhorrent could be a mere lackey! This was Baelor of the Baleful Eye without his Egyptian death mask. So, I had been right. The enemy had read my mind and ripped from it intimate secrets about the workings of Prospero, Inc. and my personal idea of Ferdinand’s appearance. The stranger on the side of the street whose eyes I had glanced into back in Chicago had been the demon mind reader!

  I contemplated the scene below, my mind racing. Most of us had the stamina to survive a gunshot wound or two, assuming we were not killed instantly. The Water of Life made us hardy. I feared for Theo, however, as I doubted he had the strength to endure a serious blow of any kind. So, how best to protect him?

  Neither Logistilla’s nor Cornelius’s staffs could stop bullets. Cornelius might be able to convince a weak-willed human not to shoot, but that was not likely to help us here. Erasmus’s staff could age a bullet in midair, but only if it was fully warmed up, and this took time. Currently, it lay dormant and still, a wand of black and white. That meant the matter of our defense was in my hands.

  Normally, this would not trouble me. I was used to having to rescue my younger siblings. However, a stuffy ballroom was hardly ideal terrain for me. With only one window open, and that one merely cracked, there was not much air to command. On top of which, there was the fact that Erasmus was very touchy about his belongings. If I were to call up a whirlwind, for instance, and it damaged his house, I would never hear the end of it; never mind that it saved his brother’s life. While this would not stop me, of course, it did dampen my enthusiasm.

  I was not entirely unprepared. During my chat with the local Aerie Ones on my way to the roof, I had issued them instructions. A single toot was the signal for them to form a protective cushion of air that was thick enough to deflect a bullet. Such a wall was not a natural occurrence, which made it difficult for the Aerie Ones to maintain. They would only keep it up as long as I kept playing. If the music stopped, the protective barrier would fail. Also, I could only produce it in one place, which meant I could not protect both my siblings and myself.

  My current view, from where I stood in the upper hallway peering around the corner onto the balcony, allowed me to see the table where the demon stood but not my siblings. As I contemplated what to do, a large ruddy bear with beady gray eyes lumbered across the ballroom. Below, Logistilla snickered. Apparently, Osae the Red’s version of a grizzly did not impress her.

  The reddish grizzly shivered and shrank, becoming Osae the Red dressed in a gray suit. His red hair stuck out in wild spikes crusted with human blood. Stepping up beside the table, he glanced about the ballroom and asked in his raspy voice, “Where is Seir?”

  To my eternal shame, my heart began to race at the incubus’s name. Truly, the incubus had brought about my total humiliation. I glanced at the portion of the ballroom visible from my position but could see no evidence of Seir . . . or Ferdinand.

 
Baelor shrugged, his huge horrible eye never moving from its target.

  Osae leered toward my siblings. “Theophrastus the Demonslayer! After all this time. Three hundred years, we spent trapped in the depths of Hell, thanks to you. Finally, your day of reckoning is at hand.”

  There came a clatter from near the front door. Creeping forward a bit, I could see that Mephisto, dressed in the shreds of his once finely tailored tux, had pushed his way inside and was struggling to draw an antique sword from its scabbard. As he did so, he lost his balance and crashed backward into a coat rack, his staff, still cuffed to his wrist, flailing upward as he fell. Coats rained down upon him. The Cavalier’s hat Father Christmas had given him, which I had only this afternoon returned to him, fell off the rack and flopped over his face. It was a pitiful sight.

  Osae the Red laughed. “What can a madman with a rusted sword hope to achieve against the might of the Three Shadowed Ones?”

  A floorboard creaked behind me. Mab came up beside me, his fedora low over his face, his expression grim. He gave me a quick nod, crouched down, and crept across the balcony on his stomach, straining for a better view. I hissed softly. When Mab turned, I held up the flute and tapped my ear. Mab quickly inserted his earplugs.

  Theo jerked suddenly into my line of sight. His face had gone slack, and his body rigid. His mouth opened, and a deep, jarringly inhuman voice issued from his lips. Baelor of the Baleful Eye had taken control of my brother!

  “Pathetic flesh worms. Surrender now, and I shall allow my own servants to whip you and rape your women, rather than deliver you to the Torturers of the Tower of Pain—where far worse fates await you.”

  “Nice options,” muttered Mab.

  Theo’s face contorted in sudden anger. He was not able to speak himself, but he shook his head fiercely. Nevertheless, the inhuman voice continued to issue from his throat.

  “Ah, Theophrastus, once called Demonslayer. My old adversary. Turned your back on the occult to save your soul, did you? Yet, so long as you keep the STAFF OF DEVASTATION, you are guilty of the sin of thievery. Return it to us and rid yourself of this burden. ”