“Listen very carefully, Myla. I want you to make sure you tell me the truth. As his father, I have a right to know. Has the Devil been giving him wightdust?”
Silence. Then a sob. Then her confession. “Yes. I didn’t want it. He promised me he wouldn’t, but Aiden wanted it. The Devil wouldn’t let me say no. He’s almost turned. He might be a wight already, I don’t know.”
I take out my knife and put it into the lock. Then I snap the point off.
I sheath the knife and aim again at the workers. I keep firing until my magazine is empty. Then I load another, and fire some more.
“Stop! I told you where he is. Killing these people won’t save your son, Cris! Stop!”
“You’re right, my love. I’m not killing these people to save Aiden.”
I only stop when the last of the workers in the chamber are dead. Then I remove Allen’s bag of corpsedust.
“What are you doing?” she shouts, her voice almost gone.
I shove the bag through the gate. I hold it by its end with two fingers and then fire my bullet through the back of the bag. The corpsedust descends like a fine snow down upon the dead miners.
She shrieks unintelligibly. One of the bodies starts to twitch. Then another, and another. Her shrieking cuts in and out as her voice cracks. A worker rises as a corpse on shaky legs.
Myla runs into the open, her eyes wild, her blood red hair spread out around her like cobwebs in a breeze. “Kill me. Shoot me down. Don’t let me die like this.”
I holster the pistol. “I loved you, Myla.”
She rushes through the mass of twitching dead and throws herself at the gate. Frantically, she pulls out the key and tries to open the lock—but the point of my dagger has jammed it.
She reaches out to me, shoving her arm through the bars. “Kill me, Cris! Fucking kill me!”
My eyes are stinging with sudden tears. I love this woman—this woman who had borne my son. This woman who had lain with me through the dark nights of my damnation. I owe her this one mercy, this one last mercy . . . but altruism ain’t worth the bullet.
I turn my back on her. “I loved you.”
The light of the room casts her shadow down this long hallway. For a moment, all I can hear is the dead.
“I love you, too, Cris,” she says.
The shadows of the rising corpses come alive around me as I walk away.
I hear the song of the rebellion as I head toward the crucible room. I hear them singing and dying. The Devil’s armor is stripped off, and he’s bleeding, so perhaps the workers thought that they could hurt him. Perhaps that renewed their interest in fighting back. Maybe they were just struck by common sense, or bravery, or maybe they’d been fighting all along. It doesn’t matter, they’re long dead by the time I come to the crucible room.
The Old Lady’s fully loaded with slugs, and I’ve got three shells left after that—two buckshot and one slug. It won’t be enough to kill the Archdevil, he’s taken far more than that already, and he doesn’t look like he’s hurt very badly.
He stands beneath the crucible amidst a pile of broken bodies. One of those bodies is a dark haired man with a blue shirt. I remember that he was the one who sang with me when I’d started the rebellion.
Hagar stands above, ready to pull the chain which will tip over the crucible and pour its contents onto the waiting Devil.
The Devil looks at me. At some point I’d caught my second wind.
I sit down on a stone. “Go on,” I tell him. “I wouldn’t want to fight you when you were not at your strongest. No pride in that.”
HAGAR, THE RITUAL.
Hagar pulls the chain, grinning like a hyena. He’s weak, so he has to jump up and add his bodyweight to the effort. Slowly the crucible tips. A brilliant yellow light shines out as the molten rock begins to crest its stone container, but the substance stops there, motionless, perfectly balanced on the lip. Hagar readjusts his grip on the chain and leaps again, pulling it farther down with his weight. And then, like a dam breaking, the waves of molten rock pour out over the lip of the crucible and cascade down the cliff. The Devil raises his hands as the brilliant liquid stone falls to meet him. Then he screams. The scream tears at my mind. At first it’s of shock and pain. In time it turns into anger. Then despair. I watch his thrashing frame liquefy before me. His eyes boil, his face melts off. Because of the bright color of the Devil, it is difficult to pick out where the substance ends and where he begins. As the molten rock dissolves his body, that distinction eventually becomes impossible to make.
The heat takes my breath away. I feel my skin burning as if I’d spent too long in the old world’s sun. The Devil’s long cry ends, his body now nothing more than a twisted shadow amidst the pool of liquid rock. As the smoking stone cools, it continues to let out light.
Hagar’s smile has frozen on his idiot face, but his eyes show his confusion and horror. He lets go of the chain. It clinks as it’s pulled back upwards and the crucible rights itself. He puts his hands on his head.
Of course, whatever substance the Devil usually melted to sheath his body in armor was not what was in the crucible. The miners I had commandeered earlier had finished their task. At least one of them was even lying dead on the floor in this very room, covered in the same cooling rock that had killed the Devil.
Finally, the rictus smile fades from Hagar’s face. He looks at me, eyes still wide in shock. “Why? How? He was immune . . .”
“Come here, Hagar.”
Slowly, his legs shaking, the terrified Hagar makes his way down the steps.
“Hagar, do you know the way to the Devil’s chambers?”
He nods, and even his head is shaking. “They’re in . . .” his voice cuts off with his fear, “in the sanctuary compound.”
“Take me there.”
My son’s face has changed. It is no longer the round face of a child, but the angular face of a pre-teen. Even so, I recognize him immediately. His features are lit only by Hagar’s torch. His eyes are two perfect ovals of obsidian darkness. I see the red firelight reflected in them. I hope like Hell the lighting makes it look worse than it is. It’s entirely possible that he is already a wight. That he cannot be salvaged . . . that I killed everyone for nothing.
I look at Hagar. I suppose one more death can’t hurt.
“Hagar?”
“Yes?” he answers.
“Tell your master that when I die, I’m going to come find him and kill him in the next life too.”
Hagar’s stupid eyes narrow. “But I can’t speak to him now. You killed him.”
“Give it a minute.”
He’s confused. I point the gun at him overtly so that the last thought that goes through his brain isn’t one of confusion. He’s probably lived his whole life that way. He deserves a little clarity at the end.
I gun him down. Actually, I wanted to beat him mercilessly, but I felt that might set a bad example for Aiden.
As it is, Aiden watches the man fall with disinterest. I can’t see his eyes move, so the only way I know that’s where he’s looking is because of the way he tilts his head slightly.
“Mother was right, father,” Aiden says. “We have to adapt to Hell. You can’t hope to protect me from evil.”
“Son, maybe you haven’t been filled in on current events, but I don’t think evil can protect you from me.”
He shrugs. “It doesn’t matter. We’re in Hell. There’s always more evil.”
“Aiden, come with me.”
“I do not love you, father,” his voice is as emotionless as the marble man’s was. “Nor do I wish to associate with you.”
Pressure builds behind my eyes. My son may already be dead.
“Perhaps. Or maybe those are only your mother’s words. But it will help you to follow me either way, son. If I can’t convince you that my way is better, I won’t kill you. I’ll take you to another Archdevil so that you might serve him.”
This is a very problematic offer. One, I don’t know if I c
ould do such a thing. Two, I have no idea where to find another Archdevil. Three, even if I were to find one, there would be no guarantee that he’d want Aiden. He’d be just as likely to kill him as raise him.
It’s good enough for Aiden, though. “Very well. I will come with you.”
I pick up Hagar’s torch before his spreading blood can douse it. Aiden walks toward me. He accepts my offered hand.
“Is mother . . .”
There is emotion in his voice. He seems sad, worried. Maybe it’s not all over yet.
“I’m sorry, son.”
“Was her death . . . painless?”
“No. No it wasn’t.”
He nods. Together, hand in hand, father and son at best and father and wight at worst, we make our wandering way out of the city of Maylay Beighlay.
Q and I stand waiting by a woodstone door. Jenner, curled up in the fetal position, sleeps gently by the exit of the chamber. I couldn’t leave her behind. After all, she wanted to marry Aiden.
“Trust me,” Q says, “if he’s human enough to be saved, El Cid can save him. She’s very powerful. I wouldn’t have brought you if she wasn’t.”
I bite my lip. “You said she was young.”
“Younger than I, but it takes no effort for me to accept her as my leader.” He rubs a hand over his bald head. “They say she once shared the Infidel’s bed. Don’t know if it’s true, but it wouldn’t surprise me.”
I nod.
“What happened in there, Cris? You killed an Archdevil. No mean feat for anyone, even El Cid would be proud if she did such a thing. I’d think you’d be happy.”
“My son,” I say.
He shakes his head. “I don’t know if you are lying to me or to yourself. Something else happened inside there, my friend. I’ve known you for a long time.”
“I killed Myla, Q.”
“Did she deserve it?”
I really don’t know. Maybe she’s right. Maybe in Hell, the right thing is to do evil. I certainly did enough of it while I was in that rotting city. “Maybe. Maybe . . .” I intend to say more, or at least I think I do, but the door opens.
El Cid emerges, leaving Aiden inside the room. She closes the door behind her.
She’s a slip of a girl. She might be over five feet tall—might. Her face is oddly calm, though, and I find something about her incredibly interesting. Her hair is jet black, but her eyes are a very light green.
“Can he be saved?” I ask.
Her intense gaze focuses on me. She crosses her skinny arms under her flat chest. I take a second look at her arms, though. The doubletake reveals to me how well muscled they are. For a five foot tall girl, she must pack a hell of a punch.
“He’s very far gone,” El Cid says. “It will be difficult—”
“I don’t give a damn how difficult it is—” I’m surprised by how frustrated I sound.
Q puts a hand on my shoulder to calm me.
El Cid is unmoved by my emotional outburst. “Cris, you must understand that an Infidel Friend does not list difficulties as excuses, but to warn others of the trials ahead. To set you at ease, I feel I should inform you that I have no intention of denying your request.”
I take a deep breath. I cover my eyes for a moment and then run that hand down my face and across the beard I’d grown while healing in Maylay Beighlay’s little temple.
“It will be difficult for him to survive the transition from partial wight to fully human. He’s struggling with the pain even now. It will get far worse before it is over. After that, however, will come the truly hard part. People who recover from such an affliction rarely lead normal lives. It’s entirely possible that he’ll spend the rest of his life either fighting the urge to become undead, or searching for a way to get back to the state he was in. I have spoken with Jessica and Eagan, and they agree. The only people we’ve ever known to recover from this and be emotionally okay are well trained Infidel Friend. It is for that reason that I ask your permission to adopt your son. Let me raise him as one of us. It will not assure his recovery, but it’s the best I can do. It is, as a matter of fact, the only way I know how to go about treating him for the long term. There may be other ways, but I do not know them. It is like the old saying ‘if you’re a hammer, everything looks like a nail.’”
I feel my shoulders slump. “I could try and raise him.”
El Cid gives me a sad smile. I’m struck suddenly by how intelligent she seems.
“That is your choice,” she says, “and if you choose it, I will wish you well. Still, I wouldn’t recommend it. And it seems also like Aiden responds better to feminine authority figures. That will be one of the things we have to correct, but in the short term, male guidance might prove ineffective.”
Fucking Myla, striking at me from the grave.
“You’d do that, you’d adopt him?” I ask.
“Cris, I would. I would do it for anyone who needed help this badly.”
I begin to cry. I feel like a fool, crying in front of such a strong woman. I feel like a fool crying in general. “Take him, then,” I manage.
She nods and motions toward the door. “You had better tell him.”
When I open the door I am greeted by Aiden’s obsidian eyes. In the light I can see just the faintest hint of blue in them. His mother’s eyes.
I walk in. “Did El Cid tell you about . . .”
Aiden’s small face nods. “She said she would need to raise me. It won’t help, Father. She is wrong, just like you.”
His hands are shaking. That’s the beginning. If Q is right, if El Cid is right, the worst is coming. It might well kill him.
“Okay, I just thought I’d let you know. Goodbye, son. I hope someday we can meet again.”
His eyes stare at me blankly. No emotion. His soul has been so flattened by his mother and that Devil . . . or maybe it’s something else. Maybe he’s been poisoned against me. Maybe even if he were completely human he wouldn’t want a damn thing to do with me.
I walk to the exit of the room.
“Wait,” he says as I put my hand on the open door.
I stop. He’s crying too, just like his father.
“Wait,” he repeats. “Don’t go. You’re still wrong. But don’t go. Stay with us.”
I turn to El Cid.
She looks me up and down, hungrily, like a man might look at a prostitute. I find it . . . titillating.
Her arms cross again. “Well, what about it, Cris, you want to earn a right to wear that symbol you carved into your hand?”
I have to stay with my son, but I don’t know if I can be an infidel. “I don’t know if I can,” I say. “I really don’t. Before I entered Maylay Beighlay Q recommended that I abandon Aiden, that I leave him behind and start another family elsewhere. I don’t think I could ever make a choice like that.”
El Cid smiles. “Being an infidel doesn’t mean you have to make heartless decisions, Cris. It only means that you have to consider them without an a priori judgment. I’ll be honest, Cris. Q has spoken with me about you many times. He’s long thought you belong with us. That’s why he’s been coaching, training you.”
“I hate authority,” I tell her.
“And I hate those who don’t question it.”
Aiden has come to the doorway. “Please, Father. Stay.”
For a moment, I think about life and death and all of the things that matter to me.
I look over toward Jenner. “Wake your new sister, Aiden. Let her know we’ll be traveling with these people for a while.”
A smile splits the pale face the Devil had plastered over the face of my son. He rushes over to Jenner like a boy should, brimming with excitement.
He wakes her with his shaking hands. “Guess what! Guess what!”
I am a damned man. I have murdered the mother of my only child. That child has been poisoned by the will of an Archdevil and the dust of wights. I have no hope of redemption. I have no chance at heaven. I have no possibility of finding a happy resting place
for my soul.
I am a damned man, and when now I look at my exuberant son, my heart soars.
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Aiden must live!
Cris’ son has been slowly poisoned over the last three years, and the toxin has rooted itself deeply into the child’s soul—so deeply that even infidel medicine isn’t strong enough to cure it.
But there is still hope.
His boy’s last chance at salvation lies in a city that fell dark nearly two thousand years ago. It’s a place on the very edge of Hell itself. A place called Soulfall.
Look for Soulfall and continue exploring the Hellsong Universe!
Like a character? Want to follow them through the Hellsong universe?
Cris appears in Even Hell Has Knights and March till Death.
El Cid, Q and Aiden appear in Knight of Gehenna and March till Death
Shaun McCoy lives in South Carolina. He is an accomplished Pianist, Cage Fighter, Chess Player and Writer. You can check out his fan page at www.facebook.com/shaunomccoy
Affliction (Hellsong: Infidels: Cris Book 1) Page 13