by Tracy Sharp
“That demon was meant keep her in hell until it was too late to pull her back up. It may be too late.”
Panic flashed over me, and I felt frantic. “Pull her back!”
Strummer turned and walked onto the bridge. “I will do my best.”
I followed him onto the bridge, with Raven and Fiona close behind. I felt an unspoken dread between them. It felt like it was less than a long shot to get Candace back. Of course the demon had been a distraction. Why hadn’t I realized that and just jumped into the lake, and gone after her?
Strummer held his hands out and began chanting. The water began churning.
Fear clutched at me, and the feeling that it was pointless threatened to paralyze me. I couldn’t just wait here. I had to go after her.
I climbed over the railing, and Strummer stopped chanting. “Ezra, don’t do it.”
The water continued to swirl, showing me exactly where I need to fall. “I can’t leave her down there. I have to bring her back.”
“You might not come back.” Strummer said.
And I knew he was right. Chances were that I wouldn’t.
But I jumped anyway.
22
Candace
Candace ran. She ran through the woods for what seemed like forever, sweat making her t-shirt cling to her chest and back, her heart pounding so hard it felt like it would just give in, and finally came to a clearing.
Strange plants jutted out of the ground, waving and wiggling in the heat. She glanced behind her to make sure nothing was sneaking up on her, and then began walking into the clearing It smelled strange. Sulfur and misery. Insanity and rage.
As she took her first few steps onto yellowing grass, something flew above her. A bizarre bat-like creature with the head of a man. It laughed at her, a screechy cackle as it swooped low, clutching at her with long, sharp claws.
Candace screamed as it grabbed hold of her shoulders and began lifting her off her feet.
Something grabbed her ankle from below.
A hand reaching from out of the ground. They were not plants waving and wiggling in the heat. They were hands. Wiggling fingers, grasping and clutching hands.
She yanked her foot back and the sharp fingernails grasped at her, digging into her flesh and leaving deep gouges on her lower leg and ankle.
Sharp pain sang through her leg, and when the bat like creature lifted her up and away from the wormish hands and grabbing fingers, she felt an odd mix of relief and dread. Candace looked up, and the wild-eyed humanoid face looked back down at her, screeching again, revealing a mouth full of razor-like fangs.
Oh, sweet Jesus. Was this thing taking her to some weird nest where it was going to eat her alive? She didn’t want to be dropped into the hands that wanted to pull her down into the devil knew where, but she didn’t want to be eaten alive, either.
Yup. I’m in quite a pickle, she thought hysterically.
When she looked down, fear gripped her entire body. The man-bat was now circling a huge, deep crater in the ground. It looked like a bottomless hole. A never ending pit of darkness.
Oh, God. Please don’t drop me in there. Please. Her long forgotten fear of being in enclosed spaces reared up and screamed in her mind.
The bat circled lower and lower, and Candace knew it would either take her down into that hole, or drop her in it.
She tried to brace herself, but terror gripped her in a vice, and she felt herself shaking so hard she thought the bat might lose its grip on her.
There was no getting away, now. She was going in that hole.
And she did.
The bat thing let out a shriek-like cackle and opened its claws, dropping Candace into the darkness of the pit.
Candace screamed, abject terror cutting loose, and in that moment she felt she was very close to insanity. She hoped her heart would stop. She wanted to die before she hit the bottom, because the idea of facing whatever was down in the blackness was so much more frightening than anything else could ever be.
She fell for what seemed an eternity, the seconds drawing her fear out, stretching it to near snapping point. The air whipped past her, and her hair flew around her face. Her arms flew out, grasping for anything to hang on to, to stop her descent.
Her fingers closed around something leathery, and it moved, its claws scratching her and its teeth sinking into the back of her thumb. She screamed in pain and disgust, opening her fingers and shaking the bat off.
Great. Where there was one, there were surely more.
And there were. She felt hundreds, or maybe even thousands of leathery wings brush her body as she fell into them. They hit her trying to fly past her, and some flew close, curious. Or maybe just hungry.
They definitely had teeth.
With a shock, her body finally hit something liquid. It was warm and thick, and it cushioned her fall and absorbed her body like a huge, warm pool of pudding.
But it didn’t smell like pudding.
The smell was both tangy and organic. The faint scent of wet pennies.
Blood. She realized it just before it splashed over her like a huge wave, covering her face and filling her nose and mouth. She continued to scream as it bubbled down her throat, and then frantically kicked and moved her arms, swimming upward toward air.
Sharp things nipped at her limbs as she swam. Just one here and there at first, and then they multiplied, until her entire body was being ravaged by tiny teeth.
Her face broke the surface, and she swam, coughing and sputtering, and letting out little screams of abject horror until she felt the ledge of what felt like rock. Candace gripped the ledge with both hands and pulled herself up onto it, scrambling on all fours until she could push herself up. She stood, blinking the blood from her eyes, feeling the agony of the multiple bites on her flesh, but so relieved to have the awful needling stop .
Finally, her vision cleared, and she saw that it wasn’t completely dark around her. The place had an orange glow, and she saw that she was in a huge, deep cave. The walls looked ancient, with strange tubular formations like icicles made of rock. She saw weird shaped holes and crevices all around her. There were what looked like caves within caves, and she shuddered to think what was waiting in each one.
I have to get out of here. Candace looked up and around, assessing the sturdiness of the formations. She’d always been a pretty good climber. As a kid, there wasn’t a tree she couldn’t climb, and she’d spent time mountain climbing with friends back in high school.
A shrill screech sounded above her, and a fear almost froze her in place, but there was no time to waste. That man-bat thing would be back to eat her if she didn’t get out of here. She really didn’t want to die in this cave, being eaten alive.
She’d have to go through the bats again. Good times.
Candace shoved the fear and pain from her mind, and started to climb.
Ezra
Candy’s going to be pissed. I walked cautiously through the strange, tangled woods. At least there were no hellhounds waiting to chew my ass off when I’d landed in hell. A kid with a weird boat offered to take me across the lava, and I’d given her a twenty. I was sure they didn’t use the same currency in hell as we did up above, but it’s the thought that counts.
She seemed okay with it. Took me where I needed to go; which, apparently, was this weird, multicolored dock that led to a spooky, black treed forest.
But the dock was moving. I stood still, peering down at it. What were those things?
Realization slammed into me and fear shot through my body, making me feel weak and nauseous. “No way.”
The dock was covered in centipedes. Billions of them. The biggest centipedes I’d ever seen. Blue ones, black ones, red ones, yellow ones, brown ones. Revulsion rolled over me. Of course the dock was covered in centipedes. It was hell, after all, which knew my deepest fears. The dock wouldn’t be covered in kittens and puppies.
Raising my hand, I focused on intent. Fry the little buggers.
En
ergy and heat grew deep in my belly, and then radiated through my chest and my arms. I focused on the squirming mass, and then closed my eyes and felt the energy burst from my hand. When I opened my eyes, the centipedes had grown to twice their original size.
I blinked, horror gripping my chest. “Oh, snap.”
Using magic was a twitchy situation for me, and apparently it was twitchier still when attempting to use it in hell. Best not to try it again until I knew better what I was doing.
“So, that happened.” I’d managed to make the situation a little worse for myself. Perfect.
I considered calling the kid with the boat back, and screaming for Strummer to pull me back up. But then Candy would still be in mortal danger and I’d be nothing but a sissy. Definitely not hero behavior.
But there were centipedes. Like, a ton of them. What was I supposed to do with that?
The truth was that I almost preferred to do a back flip into the lava and cook myself to a crispy critter rather than walk over centipedes.
“Come on, Ez. Get a grip.” I took a deep breath, felt myself make a disgusted, dread-filled face, and started running.
The crunch and splat sounds of my sneakers squishing them made me want to gag, but I kept running. My feet slipped and slid as I kept pumping my legs, and twice I skidded dangerously. If I fell into those centipedes, I might start screaming and never stop.
And then it happened. I lost my footing and my feet slid out beneath me, and I fell to my knees, my hands shooting out to stop me from going face first into the squirming, skittering freakishly big centipedes. My hands sank into a pile of writhing shell-like bodies, the broken wrist grinding back, the pain so intense the world went gray for a few seconds. And then I felt teeth sink into my flesh, and fresh terror brought me back to myself again.
My horror was complete. My mouth was open but I couldn’t even scream.
I launched myself up, my hands momentarily sinking deeper into the mass of ropey bodies and legs. Somehow I got back up and started running again. I heard myself shrieking as my legs pushed to move and keep my balance. The bank seemed like a million miles away as I ran over the scuttling bodies. Some that were now rearing up, far bigger than I’d remembered from moments ago, to jab me with their curved fangs.
I screamed louder, and started kicking the ones that jumped at me, running and kicking, and holding my broken wrist against my chest. It took precious seconds to kick at them, but I didn’t want to get bitten. Those teeth felt like little fish hooks through my skin.
Finally, I made it to the bank and staggered onto it, turning to take a last glance at the dock. I placed my hands on my knees, bent over and gasped for air, and noticed that my legs were full of bloody gouges.
My stomach revolted at the sight and pushed out everything I’d eaten in the past day. It felt like everything I’d ever eaten in my life. I squinted and thought I saw the gum I swallowed when I was ten years old.
No time for reminiscing. I took a few steadying breaths, staggered a bit, and then turned, sprinting toward the woods, flicking my gaze between the ground and the twisty, black trees. For the moment, it seemed the way was clear. But I shivered to think what might be waiting in the woods for me. But then, what could be worse than a billion giant centipedes with fangs?
I slowed when I was a few steps before the trees. Looking down at the ground, I searched for Candace’s tracks, but there were none. Nothing was normal in hell. Tracking her wouldn’t be easy. In fact, judging from the centipede escapade, it would be hellish.
Taking a breath, I stepped into the woods, looking for a path to follow. There was none. Strange, warped looking black trees grew everywhere, and there was no sign of Candace having moved through this forest at all.
But then there was. A lock of her caramel hair billowed from the end of one gnarled branch. I reached out and pulled the strands from where they were caught on the black bark. I raised them to my nose and breathed her fragrance in. I caught the faint scent of her citrus shampoo. The strands were definitely hers.
It appeared that I was on the right track, then.
I tucked the strands of her hair into one of my pockets and continued on, watching for more centipedes, or anything else that might scare the hell out of me or try to eat me.
And there it was.
I felt my bladder loosen.
There was one thing I hated more than centipedes.
And it was looking at me right now.
“Oh, hells, no,” I breathed, and heard the tremor in my voice. My entire body began to tremble.
It took a step toward me with one leg, and then the other seven legs followed. It was the biggest, hairiest, most muscular spider I’d ever seen. And all of its shining eyes were staring back at me as it came for me. In the gleam of those strange orbs, I saw the abject terror on my face, and it pulled me from my paralysis.
The thing was larger than a car. A big car. Not one of those little roller skate type cars. We’re talking military Hummer type big. It was slowly heading right toward me. I took several steps back, trying to shake the fear from my brain.
A weird clicking sound from behind me made me turn around, and a little bit of pee escaped. Another giant spider was coming up behind me. I screamed, then, reedy, high-pitched sound, and gave zero fucks that I’d done it.
I had no choice but to try magic, and hope to God I didn’t make these things any bigger.
Turning sideways, I raised both arms, each arm aimed at a spider. Accept the broken hand wouldn’t aim right. It flopped sadly.
Before I could bring my magic up, the first spider jumped at me. I screamed, high and shrill this time, as I ran beneath it. I got a glimpse of its curved fangs and then of its black, hairy underside as I scrambled through its legs before it could land on top of me.
I grabbed my demon dagger from its sheath and looked up in time to see the other spider jump over the first, coming at me from above. I raised my dagger, waiting for the horrible thing to drop over top of me. As it came down, I realized two things. The first was that I’d have to tear my way out of the thing after I killed it. The second, and this dawned on me as it dropped on top of me, was that the underside of this one had a huge, sickly grayish, undulating sack beneath it.
Oh, dear God.
I had a death grip on my dagger, and it sank deep into the sack, tearing through it as the spider fell on top of me. Fear and panic rolled over me as I tore through the membrane, feeling baby spiders the size of cats scuttling over my face, chest, and back. Little legs scratched at my arms. I kept cutting and swiping through the thing’s belly, feeling warm, stinking liquid slide over me.
Finally the monster spider sagged, and then disintegrated into reddish dust all around us. Me and the remaining baby spiders. So many baby spiders.
They scattered and scurried in all directions.
The other, larger spider seemed afraid, taking a few steps backward before the babies overtook it, climbing all over it, and sinking their hungry mouths through its flesh.
I watched in a kind of horror struck awe for a second. “Screw this.”
I turned and ran, past dark, contorted trees that looked somehow like petrified humans, and then not. It seemed they were changing shape before my eyes. Hell was messing with me, in a big way. If I made it out of here alive, I’d be lucky to be sane.
The trees thinned out and I came to a huge meadow. Large red and orange flowers stretched their faces to the fire above us. The surface of the lake was a lake of fire and lava. The flowers looked like Gerbera daisies, but the size of trees. They swayed slowly in the hot, stifling air.
Large, misshapen mounds dotted the meadow. Their brown paper appearance looked familiar, and I felt dread again, rise up from my belly. My shock-addled mind knew it should be afraid of those things, but for the moment I could barely string two coherent thoughts together.
“What fresh hell is this?” I murmured, taking a few slow steps into the clearing.
Seconds later, my question was a
nswered by a low, droning, hum.
The hum grew louder, and the sound of overlapping buzzing rose from everywhere at once. I knew that sound, and my heart reacted by battering my chest. Fear shot through me.
Gripping my demon dagger, I looked around wildly, searching for the source of the sound, but really, really not wanting to see it.
Flying shapes rose above the flowers and hovered, all turning toward me, their freakishly large wings moving so fast they created wind. The flowers waved faster, and my hair flew around my head. I felt my eyes widen in absolute fright as I watched the giant hornets study me.
It was like some kind of stand-off.
And then, the longer, almost ant-like figures emerged from the paper bag-like globules scattered around the bizarre meadow, and my entire body went cold. I felt my skin actually crawl along my bones. “Oh, come on. This is bullshit.”
I couldn’t use magic on all of them, assuming it would even work the way I intended.
An idea came to me, pushing through my fear. I grabbed onto it like a hungry cop to a donut.
Maybe I could use the magic to change myself. I hoped and prayed, because if this didn’t work, I’d be a human pin cushion for these monstrous things.
I focused on my intent and pulled all of my fear up into a ball, squeezing my eyes shut, because I could hear them getting closer. The droning hum and buzz grew louder, and I could feel the fan-like breeze from their wings as they came at me.
I raised my hands and screamed into the suffocating, hot air, and imagined what I wanted; believed with my entire being that it would happen. That it was happening.
All at once I felt an electrical force field around me, and heard the crackling as it walled me off from the demon hornets and wasps. I heard a zap and sizzle, and opened my eyes to see the first of them fall to the ground, smoking, its body caving into itself and dissolving into dust.
I laughed, the sound loud and crazy, and kept my hands ups, feeling the energy flowing from them to keep the force field around me. “Come on, you ugly flying freaks! Come and get some of this!”