The Devil's Secret

by Joshua Ingle

“Hold up,” Brandon said, motioning for Heather to back off. He spoke in a tone more congenial than hers. “Pastor Noyce, even if what you say were true, Virgil’s been helping us. He risked his life fighting Shannon so Heather and I could get to the boardroom.”

  “And his actions got Tim killed.”

  The mention of Tim silenced Brandon, but Heather took up the slack. “His actions also let the rest of us escape to the golf cart. And if he’s so evil, why did they shoot him? Virgil’s on our side. The evidence is right in front of your eyes if you’d choose to believe it.”

  “And I say the same thing to you.”

  “We can split up, then. You can stay here, and we’ll help Virgil out.”

  “Nuh-uh. I’m not taking my eyes off of him. Whatever his plans are for you two, whenever he chooses to strike, you’ll need a Christian there to ward him off.”

  “Whatever. We’ll vote on it. All in favor of having the police meet us at the clinic?” Both Brandon and Heather raised their hands, and Thorn feigned Virgil struggling to raise his.

  Heather eyed Karen expectantly. Karen frowned.

  •

  Brandon set Virgil down as gently as he could in the back seat of the golf cart, but the man still groaned in pain. He was pale white, and fading fast. Brandon recalled countless mission trips and youth retreats when Virgil had been part of the team. Every Sunday morning for as long as Brandon had lived here, Virgil had sat in the back of the chapel, the loyal A/V guy working the service’s projectors and sound system. He even came along with Tim a couple times when Tim was first teaching Brandon how to fly.

  The man had been good friends with Tim, so Brandon wasn’t about to let him die too. Tonight’s chaos took everything from me, but I still have these three. Even Karen, who’d all but ostracized him and his wife, felt like family to him now, under these critical conditions.

  Heather paced out of the church behind him. “She’s wrapping up with Antoine now. The Canadian guy. She should be out in a minute.”

  “Good.”

  Brandon’s grief must have been plain to see, because Heather frowned sympathetically, then hugged him: a tight, protective hug. “I love you,” she said.

  “I love you too,” he said. He nearly choked on the words after realizing for the first time how fiercely he meant them. This woman was a vital lifeline for him. If she weren’t here now, he wasn’t sure he could have gone on.

  “This is the worst night of both our lives, but we’ll make it through,” Heather whispered. “Okay? Tomorrow’s gonna suck, and every day for a long time is gonna suck, but I’ll be here for you. And before you know it you’ll be back studying bio, and I’ll be back at school too, and we’ll have a normal life again. In that life—in our future life—this is all just a memory. A horrible memory that we’re living through right now. But it’ll pass. It’ll pass.”

  What a role reversal from earlier on the pier, Brandon thought. Now I’m the one breaking down and Heather’s the strong one, just like she wanted to be.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you were taking medicine?” he asked her. “I wouldn’t have cared.”

  She leaned out of the hug so she could look him in the eyes. “Tim would have cared. Karen and all your other friends from Bristol would have. I didn’t want to look crazy in front of them.”

  Brandon forced himself to lighten up and grin at her. “Too late for that.” Heather laughed.

  Karen strode out of the church. She chided them with a castigating gaze. “Bless your hearts. I’m glad you two find our predicament funny, but it’s time to go. If we’re gonna do this, let’s do it.”

  •

  The three live humans drove at the behest of the dead one, through darkness and over bumpy hills. Thilial effortlessly kept pace with the golf cart, beating her powerful wings alongside it.

  Thorn tried to devise a way out of his impending execution, and when he couldn’t, he tried not to think about it. I’ve made a deal with the devil, and she has puffy white robes. Would Thilial’s presence keep the other devils away… or draw them in for another attack?

  To take his mind off it, Thorn decided to make conversation with Brandon, who was seated next to him, his hair rumpled and his bow tie undone, hanging on his neck. “So you’re studying biology?” Thorn asked through Virgil. When he’d learned that Heather and Brandon had met as undergraduate biology majors, he’d felt the comfort of familiarity… and a pang of guilt. Amy had been a bio major.

  “Uh, yeah. Well, I was. I’m taking some time off for the wedding. And soul searching and all that.”

  Soul searching? This version of Brandon truly was a whole new person compared to the Brandon Thorn had met in the last Sanctuary. That Brandon would rather have partied than soul searched—and rather have overdosed on drugs than enslaved himself in a marriage. Thorn briefly wondered if an alternate version of himself had lived sometime before, and if such a demon would carry a temperament as different from his own as Brandon’s was from his old self’s. Perhaps in another life, I chose to accept God’s offer of redemption. Perhaps in another life, I’m an angel right now, and Amy is still alive.

  “You should be proud to have studied science, and you should continue on with it,” Thorn said. “It’s a noble pursuit, learning how the world around us works. Lately I’ve been learning a bit of the same.”

  “Yeah, well, after tonight I think I’m just gonna crawl into a corner for a while. No offense.”

  “None taken. I just want you to know that I support you.” And I need you to trust me enough to follow me into the transit door at the clinic.

  “Thanks. Yeah, science is great and all. I just don’t know if it really serves a point. I mean, what’s the ultimate goal of science? To make humanity better? Humanity is a pile of shit, Virgil. You saw that for yourself back at the country club. Senseless killing. Running over the weak on our own rush to safety. We’re a stain on the earth.”

  “All the more reason why science is necessary. To make us better.” Saying these words felt strange to Thorn, since demons’ relationship with science had always been confused. On one hand, parts of science seemed to oppose the Enemy and His Holy Book. But on the other hand, science promoted knowledge, technological progress, and humanitarian ethics, and demonkind zealously tried to keep humans away from such prosperity. Most intelligent demons had seen the conundrum and had chosen to simply ignore science. Thorn, as a former Angel of Reason, had always suspected some hidden value in science. But unlike Wanderer, Thorn had usually been too caught up in his own power schemes to learn much about it.

  “Stop talking to the humans,” Thilial said, breaking Thorn’s train of thought.

  “I’m sorry,” Thorn said in the spirit realm, trying to discern the intent of Thilial’s demand. Did she suspect his plan to enlist the humans’ help in reaching the Judge?

  “I’m an okay guy,” Thorn said, hoping his casual tone would ease Thilial’s apprehension. “I’m not the cold-hearted murderer other demons make me out to be. And I’m certainly not the unapologetic sinner that God says I am. I’m good. I’m trying to become good, at least.”

  “‘Trying to become good’ is not the same as ‘good.’”

  God clearly doesn’t demand perfection from His own angels, if you’re any indication, was what Thorn wanted to say. But provoking Thilial would result in Thorn’s sudden lack of a head, or so he’d been told. So instead he opted for an apology. “For what it’s worth, Thilial, I’m deeply sorry for Ezandris’s death. I know it was only three months ago, but that was a different demon who killed him. Not me.” Thilial’s grim expression persisted. She kept her eyes on the darkness ahead, her blade aimed at Thorn. “At least he’s in a better place now, in whatever paradise God has prepared for him,” Thorn said, hoping he hadn’t broached a topic that would send her into a rage.

  But instead of a tantrum, Thilial actually laughed. “Ezandris is not in paradise,” she spat. “Where do you think angels go when we die? Back to Heaven? Or do you think
there’s a separate Heaven just for us?”

  “I—I, uh…” Thorn had never given thought to the matter.

  “When we angels die, we go nowhere. We cease to exist. When you killed Ezandris, you extinguished his light from the world, permanently. There was no happy ending for him in a mystical paradise. He died.”

  Absolute death? The idea was unconscionable to Thorn, despite his own fear of the alternative, of Hell. He supposed that absolute death would be better, but still… “How could a perfect, loving God do that to His own servants?”

  “We’re happy to serve until we die. It’s what we were created for, and we ask for nothing more.” Very quickly, Thilial said a soft prayer under her breath. Thorn could barely distinguish the words, which were likely meant to be private:

  “Lord, I am Yours. Keep me safe and give me Your strength.”

  Thorn ignored the random prayer, since Thilial’s view of death had made him curious. “Doesn’t knowing that your death will be permanent make your life meaningless? Knowing that all this toil and suffering leads nowhere? That no matter how unfair your life, you won’t be rewarded in the afterlife?”

  “On the contrary,” Thilial said. “Knowing that only nothingness awaits me after death makes me cherish life immeasurably. It’s what impels me to action now, while I’m still here. If my toil and suffering make the world a better place for those who come after me, then my life will have had meaning. My life will have been worth it. Unlike the lives of you demons, who live only for temporary, selfish gain. Knowing I may only have a limited time to do good makes me want to do as much good as I can, now. To make us all better, like you said.”

  Before Thorn could censor himself, he said, “Then why don’t you want to help me become better?”

  Thilial chuckled somberly, and shook her head. “You really don’t remember me, do you?”

  “From our encounters in Atlanta? Of course I remember you.”

  “No, from before then. Long before then.”

  “When?” Thorn asked.

  Thilial drew nearer, her robes fluttering in the night air. She told him a story.

  8

  1540 A.D.

  Thilial was nineteen days old when the first white men entered Tugaloo. They were Spaniards, bringing with them swords, metal armor, and a fearsome repute. In recent months, rumor had spread across the land of the Real People that a war party from a strange yet powerful new tribe was crossing through Mvskoke territory, into the Real People’s territory. Some even said this tribe of white men had come from the other side of the big water, though such a tall tale was only believed by children and mystics. These men had ridden to Tugaloo on dogs bigger than any dog the Real People had ever seen, and they carried with them fire sticks that could kill a man from a distance, like a bow with an invisible arrow.

  Young though she was, Thilial had been created fully formed, with much knowledge of God’s world and its peoples. Naturally, she knew that these men were European conquerors, riding horses and carrying arquebuses, but seeing these foreigners for the first time filled her with fear as much as the Real People standing around her. These villagers made a show of staying calm, but she could see the terror in their eyes, each one of them hoping to survive this encounter with these brutal men who had slain so many in other tribes.

  Thilial drifted down to Tree Frog and whispered in his ear. “Do not be afraid.” The tension in his muscles eased a bit, and Thilial smiled to herself. He’d run through the wilderness all day and all night to warn his town of the coming Spaniards. The impulsive boy would want to fight the white men, she knew. Tree Frog had the brashness of youth in him. He wanted to fight everything. She’d made it a point to teach him patience and calm during the nineteen days she’d been alive. He was a wild one, though. She would have to work much harder if Tree Frog was ever to become a sensible adult.

  The Spaniards continued their walk through the town’s entrance: a narrow passageway of logs, four meters high on both sides, formed by the overlapping ends of the circular wall surrounding the town. The dismal sight felt like the end of Thilial’s world, but she was at least grateful that the pompous Feasting Wolf had allowed no more than ten of these Spaniards inside the refuge town of Tugaloo. She was surprised that the other priests had let him admit even that many. Most of them had wanted to wage war against the Spaniards. The argument had lasted all morning.

  “The Wolf Clan has protected our borders for hundreds of years,” a priest from that clan had protested. “You cannot ask us to let an enemy pass into the heart of our territory. They will slaughter us.”

  “They seek metals and trinkets, not bloodshed,” Feasting Wolf had argued. “We have pearls, and a bit of copper. I will offer it to them, treat them well, then point them toward our enemies’ territories. ‘The Iswa have gold,’ I will say. Let them deal with these white men.”

  Feasting Wolf’s decision had caused substantial controversy among the common people, but in the end, the high priest had had his way. Except that…

  Many more than ten Spaniards were coming through the entrance. Why had the guards not stopped them? Thilial unfurled her wings and flew up above the town. What she saw beyond the walls left her dumbfounded.

  Hundreds of white men stood just outside the town. Dozens of horses carried armed soldiers, and hundreds more carried packs of food and supplies. A few men rested on travois, though Thilial couldn’t tell whether they were wounded or sick. A small army of pigs loitered in the distance behind the throng, escorted by several black-skinned slaves.

  Worse, a vast multitude of demons traveled with the men. European demons. Thilial had heard tales of their kind: brutal, savage, and far more formidable than their local counterparts. Having parted from Eurasian demons long ago, the demons on this continent had developed their own culture: one just as vile and cruel as that of their foreign counterparts, yet more passive, less dogmatic, and easier to repress when necessary. Local demons preferred solitude, eschewing groups and hierarchy in favor of more personal, intimate destruction of human life. But Thilial’s peers had warned her that these European demons, much like their pet Spaniards, went on actual conquests, so she’d hoped to avoid dealing with them until she’d grown more seasoned.

  Who was leading them? She looked around for the demon lord, and did not have to look long. His arms raised in a pose of ultimate authority, he drifted proudly above the men who were now entering Tugaloo.

  “Demons of the New World!” he bellowed in a mellifluous bass that turned the head of every angel and demon in the town.

  He speaks the trade language! Thilial could see her own panic written on every angelic face in the town. If the foreign demons had already learned the local language, they could wrench control from the local demons in days, if not hours.

  The leader continued: “I am Xeres, demon lord of Iberia. This land beneath us is now my territory. You shall submit to me, or you shall be exiled.”

  Tugaloo’s demons fretted nervously and exchanged uneasy glances. The angels did the same—all but Thilial. It was not her place to take action, but since the higher-ranking angels were just drifting idly as the takeover commenced, she chose to fly down to Xeres herself. From centimeters away, she whispered to the imposing demon with as much compassion as she could muster: “It is not your place to control other beings. Think about your life and your future. Forget power and prestige. What is it that you really want?”

  If Xeres heard her, his actions gave no indication of it. He continued his proclamation to the local demons. “You shall surrender all of your Indian charges to me and my followers, or you shall be exiled. In addition, you shall direct us to the nearest angel sequestration area, so that we may proclaim our triumph to the angels there.”

  Thilial’s heart sank. The sequestration area ruse had worked in Europe and Asia, but had never before been needed in the New World. Now she and her compatriots would have to establish quarantine regions on this continent too. But of course, she would do whatever her Heav
enly Father deemed necessary. He knew best, so if He wanted the demons to think they’d won the war against His angels, so be it.

  Near the town’s entrance, Tugaloo’s priests stood in a long line to welcome the “guests.” Standing in the center of the line, Feasting Wolf gestured a greeting. “Travelers from far away,” he said in the trade language, “we receive you gladly. We bring you gifts.”

  Two women from the Wild Potato Clan brought forward a small basket full of pearls and copper: both crude and formed varieties. They set it before the leading Spaniard, and Xeres above him. And then—what was this? Seven girls were coming out of the priest house, each escorted by two strong men and several invisible demons.

  “Our girls are young and unspoiled,” Feasting Wolf said to the Spaniards. “You will enjoy them.”

  The men and women in the crowd murmured their horror. Thilial was stunned as well. The priests were known for their tyrannical rule, but never before had they so thoughtlessly violated the sovereignty of their own people. Near the back of the crowd, Tree Frog spat on the ground, spun, and tramped off toward the river.

  At the same time, one of the local demons, floating above the girls, made an offer to the demon lord: “We are but worms beneath your feet, O mighty Xeres. Accept this small vice as our offering to you. We will follow you for all time, if you allow it.”

  Xeres seemed pleased by that. “The depravity of these Indian priests impresses me. And I see how you have used their authority to subjugate the others. You have done well, and you and your followers may join my own.”

  This situation was becoming too atrocious. Thilial flew through the town’s wall and scoured the crowd outside for any sign of potential help. She descried a few European angels, but their faces seemed dejected, beleaguered, and devils far outnumbered them. “Angels from Spain, who is your leader?”

  “I am,” said a large, stately angel who looked like she could have taken Xeres in direct combat. “I am Gleannor, an Angel of Peace.”