A sound came from everywhere at once. It was a low, ominous, unsettling noise, like the hum of a million bees. Donny felt it in his ribs and spine. It made him want to stick his fingers in his ears.
Some of the people below stood, some knelt, and sometimes all Donny saw was an arm that rose up with fingers bent and grasping. None of them moved, even when striking awkward poses that should have made them topple over.
“There,” Zig said, pointing. Not far from where they stood, something tunneled through the fog, causing the vapor to bulge where it passed. It was like watching a snake crawl under bedsheets. As it slithered its way toward where they stood, Zig put his arm around Donny’s shoulders.
Donny held his breath and bit his lip as the thing drew near. It finally rose out of the sea of fog just below where they stood. It seemed to be made of fog itself, until it solidified before Donny’s eyes and formed a tall, wormlike figure, ghostly white.
The thing had no legs, just a tail of insubstantial fog that turned solid near the waist. There were three delicate arms on each of its sides, its hands clasped in front. The face was something like a goat’s, with white whiskers sprouting from the chin and horns curving from its skull. Where the eyes should have been, there were only vacant holes.
“This is a sorrowmonger,” Zig-Zag said quietly.
Donny tried desperately to keep his fear from showing, but his shivering legs betrayed him. He clutched his stomach, afraid he might get sick.
“A living mortal,” the sorrowmonger said. His voice was a whisper but somehow easy to hear. Vapor drifted from his mouth when he spoke.
“A friend,” Zig-Zag replied. “Here to understand.”
The sorrowmonger nodded. Without another word, he turned and drifted back down the slope toward the frozen figures. With one of his six hands, he beckoned for them to follow.
There were spaces between the people, but not much. As they passed among the petrified crowd, Donny got a better look at their expressions. Everywhere, he saw anguish, sadness, terror, or pain.
The sorrowmonger paused beside a man who was on his knees, his hands raised to ward off something terrible. Donny looked at the wreath of mist around the man’s head and saw that it moved and swirled like a thunderstorm blooming. There were fingers of vapor that plunged into the poor fellow’s eyes.
“What do you see?” the sorrowmonger said.
It took Donny a moment to realize that the sorrowmonger had spoken to him. He bent closer and peered into the mist. The face of the frozen man was contorted. His mouth twisted, and his eyes were squeezed halfway shut. “He looks . . . afraid. And guilty, I guess.” Donny said. When the sorrowmonger said nothing in return, Donny added, “Why is he afraid?”
“Because he understands what he has done. From the outside looking in, you see the mist that surrounds him. But from the inside looking out, he experiences the pain he has caused. Imagine the worst moment of your life, mortal—the time you were most afraid, most anguished.”
That was easy for Donny. It was when he was in the brewery, heartbroken, his life ruined. Even before the fire had nearly killed him, that was the darkest point. His heart had felt like it was rotting inside his chest.
“Now,” the sorrowmonger said, “imagine that lasting a hundred years. And when that is over, another terrible fraction of time replaces it. That is what this man will feel. But it will not be his anguish. He will know the terror his victim knew—bottled up inside that instant as if he were the victim himself. Never will he become accustomed to the feeling or grow numb to the fear. The last second will be as horrible as the first.”
Donny stared at the man. He couldn’t imagine it. Is this really so much better than the fire? he wondered.
“But that is only part of what the dead will know,” the sorrowmonger said. “They will also understand the things in life that formed them—the things that made them the way they were.”
Donny stared at the man’s face and wondered what terrible vision he perceived in the mist. As he watched, he noticed that the man’s eyelids were closing, but moving as slowly as the minute hand of a clock. He was blinking. Donny turned his head and put his ear by the man’s face. This close, he heard one specific sound that he could pick out from the eerie hum that was everywhere at once.
The man was screaming.
The hairs on Donny’s neck stood up as he realized that this was just one of the countless voices, one buzz in the hive. That awful pervasive noise was the grand total of every one of them screaming, wailing, or weeping in the slowest of motions.
Donny looked around at the countless figures. He tried to imagine how many more must be deeper inside, trapped in their own terrible moments. Were there hundreds of thousands? Millions? Sure, each had done wrong in their lifetime, but how much pain would they endure before they moved on? He thought suddenly of his father, Benny Taylor, the killer for hire who was destined to become one of these frozen figures. Would his father see the pain he’d caused? Would he become one of his own victims and stare down the barrel of a gun?
Donny covered his eyes with his palms. “Zig, can we go, please? I’ve seen enough.”
Zag was awake now, frowning at his surroundings. He and Zig nodded together and led Donny back toward the tunnel. The sorrowmonger melted into the fog. Of all the beings and creatures he had seen, that ghostlike figure had filled Donny the most with dread. “How many of those sorrowmongers are there?” he asked.
“As many as there need to be,” answered Zig.
“Or perhaps only one,” said Zag. “The fog and the sorrowmongers may be one and the same.”
That idea sent Donny’s brain into a tailspin. He couldn’t get out of those caverns fast enough, and so his heart sank when he looked down the tunnel. The dead from the barge were marching toward them, and they filled the tunnel from side to side. He and Zig-Zag had to stand with backs pressed to the wall to let them pass. There was a ferryman at the head of the group and another behind, looming over the crowd.
Donny didn’t want to look at the faces of the dead, but he would have felt like a coward if he didn’t. It surprised him again that so few of the people seemed old. Once again, they were dressed in everyday clothes, except for the occasional work uniform, although the uniforms did not look entirely familiar. What would Dad be wearing? he wondered. Somehow he knew it would be one of those sharp Italian suits his father loved.
The dead plodded along, their arms limp by their sides. They walked almost in lockstep, without bumping into one another or trying to turn and run. Donny was sure they were under some sort of spell cast by the ferrymen. Only their heads seemed free to move at will. The dead looked around and strained to see what lay ahead. They talked to one another with panic in their voices, but in a language Donny did not understand. That was why the uniforms looked unfamiliar, he realized. They were not American.
Some tried to talk to him, asking questions he couldn’t answer. “I’m sorry,” he told them, and he held up his hands in a helpless gesture. “I don’t speak your language.”
A few heard him and called to him in accented English.
“What is happening to me?”
“What will they do with us?”
“Where are we?”
Zig-Zag stepped in front of Donny. “Don’t trouble the boy,” said Zag. “You will see soon enough what’s to become of you.”
CHAPTER 28
They were back in the chariot again. Donny stared at the barge in the river nearby. It was empty of the dead, thick ropes mooring it to the landing. When the ferrymen returned, it would move on and vanish into mystery at the far end of the river.
More clusters of lights floated out from the tunnel, like swarms of fireflies. They drifted to the river and joined its course, hovering a few feet above the water. It made Donny feel a little better to see those souls moving on. But after how long?
“What d
o you think of the Caverns of Woe?” Zig asked.
“They were terrible,” Donny said.
“I agree,” said Zag. “They should all be back in the Pit of Fire, as it was meant to be.”
That wasn’t exactly what Donny had meant. As bad as the caverns were, the pit must have been worse. In the caverns, a soul might eventually move on. In the pit, there was nothing but hopeless torment, forever and ever.
“Well,” said Zig, “what shall we show you now, young mortal?”
“The fungus farms? The quarries? The Infernal Sea? Another pillar city?” asked Zag.
Donny shook his head. “Can we go back to Angela’s place? I really need to talk to her.”
“If you must,” said Zig.
They had just set out again when Donny felt a great weariness come over him. It was hard to keep track of time, with the nonstop daylight of the clouds, and the leaps between hours as they had ventured from Sulfur to New York. But it had been a long while since he’d slept. He rested his head on the back of the bench and let the motion of the chariot lull him to sleep.
• • •
Shouts and mutters woke Donny from a deep slumber. He lifted his head, blinked at the harsh light, and wondered where he was. The Pillar Obscura loomed overhead, but they’d stopped in the city, a short distance away. The diner was nearby. A crowd of imps and other denizens had gathered around an alley that was choked with debris from the long-ago war. He saw Zig-Zag among them, staring at something.
“GRGL?” asked Arglbrgl, still beside him.
“I don’t know what’s going on,” Donny said.
Cookie, the cook from the diner, stepped out of the crowd and dabbed the corners of her eyes with the bottom of her apron.
Donny cupped his hands around his mouth and called to her. “Cookie!” She saw him and came over to the chariot.
“What happened?” Donny asked.
“An awful thing, a terrible thing,” she said.
Donny heard a mournful cry, and then the crowd parted. A tall imp walked forward, a familiar form cradled in his arms.
“Poor Sooth,” Cookie said.
There was a terrible deep wound across Sooth’s skull. The imp who carried him raised his head and howled to the sky. Other imps in the crowd did the same. Beside Donny, Arglbrgl joined in. The chorus sent shivers down Donny’s spine.
“Was it . . . Was it an accident?” he asked, raising his voice over the din.
Cookie wagged her head while she blew her nose into the apron. “I don’t think so. You see that cut on his head? Somebody killed Sooth. Hid the body in the rubble. Who would do a thing like that to such a harmless imp?”
A murderer, Donny thought. In his mind, he saw the loathsome, smirking face of the Jolly Butcher. A murderer would do a thing like that. But why?
CHAPTER 29
Tizzy told me Sooth was acting strangely,” Donny said as the chariot rolled on.
“Sooth was always a strange one,” Zag said.
Donny looked back toward the street where the imp had been murdered. “Yeah, that’s what Angela said. But maybe Tizzy was right. He was down from his column. He seemed nervous.” The imp’s riddle had almost slipped his mind, but it came back to him and he said it aloud. “After the light comes the fall.”
The question was still on his mind when the chariot stopped at Pillar Obscura. Was it just a coincidence that Sooth had been killed after behaving strangely? He looked at the luminous clouds. They still burned, but not as brightly, and they showed signs of breaking up. Here and there he caught glimpses of the stony ceiling as gaps appeared between the clouds. Sooth’s final riddle, the one that seemed so urgent to the imp, echoed in his head. After the light comes the fall.
“I’m going to find Angela,” he told Zig-Zag.
Zig-Zag nodded. Arglbrgl was still on the bench. The imp gripped his head in his hands and moaned softly, mourning the loss of Sooth.
Donny ran up the path that curved around the pillar. First he wanted to beg Angela for forgiveness. But it was more than that. A feeling had grown in his mind, gathering strength. Something was wrong. He just wasn’t sure exactly what.
After circling entirely around the pillar, he arrived at her door, out of breath. There was a huge brass knocker on the door, big enough to fit a dinner plate inside. He raised it and slammed it against the metal plate three times. Then he stepped back and listened for footsteps.
None came. He looked at the windows above the door in time to see Tizzy pop her head out. Her mouth opened in a wide smile, and she waved. “Hi, Donny!”
“Hi, Tizzy. I need to talk to Angela.”
Tizzy shook her head. “She’s not here. Plus I think she’s really mad at you. Did you do something bad?”
“Something dumb,” Donny clarified. “Where did she go?”
“There was a council meeting and she didn’t want to go but she had to go ’cause it was important but it was the last thing she felt like doing and she went.”
Donny looked at the white dome perched on those low hills across the river. “Okay, thanks!”
Nanny’s ridiculous wig emerged from the window, followed by Nanny’s scowling face. She looked at Donny, bared her teeth, and growled.
“Gotta go,” Donny said.
“See you later!” Tizzy cried.
“Hope so,” Donny called back. He wasn’t so sure he would ever be welcomed back.
When he got back to the street, the chariot was gone, and Zig-Zag with it. Arglbrgl moped on the curb, staring at the street, his head in his hands. Donny thought about asking the imp to come but decided to leave him to mourn in peace. He jogged down the road, heading for the bridge that would take him over the river and to the Council Dome.
Along the way, he slowed to give his lungs a break. He stopped, his chest heaving, his hands on his hips. Ahead of him, the clouds parted for a moment, and he caught a fleeting glimpse of the ceiling.
“What was that?” he muttered to himself. The image was fixed in his head. He closed his eyes and studied the memory, trying to make sense of it.
Up there, thousands of feet above, he thought he’d seen a fine white-hot line running across the width of one of the great stalactites. It wasn’t part of the cloud—it was on the rock itself. He rubbed his eyes, opened them again, and stared at the spot, hoping for another, better look. But the clouds had rolled back in. He wouldn’t see it again soon.
Something else emerged from the cloud for a moment. It was little more than a speck from that distance, but Donny was sure he’d seen that shape before. It looked like a shreek, one of the nasty flying imps that Angela hated. The thing quickly wheeled and hid itself in the cloud again, heading back toward the same stalactite.
Donny looked at the tip of that enormous dagger of rock pointing down from the cloud like the tip of a spear. Then he looked down to see what was directly underneath.
It was the Council Dome.
Things connected inside Donny’s brain. A handful of clues, oddities, and incidents. Taken separately, none of them made sense. But when he considered them all together, it added up to something terrible, and he couldn’t imagine it meaning anything else.
He might still be wrong—epically, idiotically wrong. And he was in enough trouble with Angela already. Their relationship was in ruins, and the thought of angering her further was enough to make him waver and doubt. He stared up again, but everything was hidden by the clouds of fire.
“What if I’m right,” he said aloud, and when he said it, he pictured it happening. The image sent electricity through his veins. He ignored the pain in his lungs and started to run again.
The bridge was ahead. The dome was maybe a half-mile beyond it. He raced onto the bridge, which arched over the river high enough to allow barges to pass below. With his eyes raised up to the clouds that covered the stalactite, he barely saw the ma
n who stood in the middle of the bridge, gazing the other way. But the fellow heard Donny’s footsteps and turned to see who was coming. With a look of surprise, and then dark delight, he spread his arms wide.
Donny almost stumbled into the embrace. Then he staggered backward and held up his hands to ward the man away.
The Jolly Butcher giggled. “Angela’s pet! Where are you rushing off to without your master?”
CHAPTER 30
Donny looked to the right and left of Butch, but the madman had positioned himself in the middle of the bridge. It was just wide enough for a chariot to cross, with precious little room on either side.
“Let me go by, please,” Donny asked. “It’s important.”
“Go right ahead,” Butch said. He raised his arms a little wider.
Donny shook with fear and anger. “Seriously. Step aside.”
Butch didn’t move. “Can’t you stay and chat instead? Come, enjoy the view with me. I’m sure we’d have lots to talk about.” The mouth was grinning, but his brow was lowered cruelly, shading the butcher’s eyes.
Donny was ready to scream. It would cost him a half an hour to run to the next bridge up or downstream, and he felt sure time was running out. He eyed the spaces beside Butch one last time. Maybe if he feinted in one direction and darted in the other. But he was already tired. And who knew how quick Butch was?
There wasn’t really any choice. He took a few backward steps and crouched a little, ready to sprint. But then he saw something to his left that gave him another idea. He turned and ran back down the bridge the way he’d come.
“Where are you going?” cried Butch. “I thought there was something important on the other side!” Donny heard the butcher’s boots stomp down the bridge in pursuit.
“Oh no!” shouted Butch. He had guessed what Donny had in mind. “You can’t be serious!”
A barge came down the river, full of souls. It looked the same as all the others, gaunt ferrymen at the front and the back, and souls packed in the middle. Donny raced along the bank, and he leaped toward the middle of the barge.
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