Donny's Inferno

by P. W. Catanese

  He knew it was ludicrous, but he shouted, “Excuse me!” as he was in the air. He came down with his feet on the deck but slammed into two of the dead. Ordinary ­people would have toppled over, but these were souls in the thrall of the ferrymen. They kept their feet planted on the deck while their upper bodies toppled over, nearly sideways, defying the laws of physics. Then they straightened up again, and Donny clutched their arms to keep himself upright.

  “Sorry!” Donny told them breathlessly. The men he’d jumped into were Asian. All of the dead on this barge were. When they saw him, they shouted at him in their native tongue. Donny didn’t understand the words, but he sensed the fear and confusion in their cries.

  He looked back and saw Butch on the shore, doubled over with his hands around his waist, hardly able to talk through his laughter. “Ha! Ha-ha! Nobody’s ever tried that before! And they call me a madman!”

  Donny gritted his teeth and started to push his way across. The dead were packed tight and rooted to the deck like trees, but he could grab their arms or shoulders and part them, stepping high to get past their legs.

  He wondered if what he was doing would anger the ferrymen. The answer came in a terrible hissing sound. When he looked to the front, he saw one of those cloaked figures moving his way. When he looked to the back, he saw the other ferryman doing the same.

  There was no need for those two to shove their way through the crowd. The souls before them stepped right or left to clear a path at the ferrymen’s silent bidding. Donny was halfway across the barge, and he fought harder, shoving and shouldering the dead aside. He raised his voice, though he knew it meant nothing. “Coming through! Excuse me! Pardon me!”

  Butch taunted him from the shore. “The ferrymen will get you! I wonder what they’ll dooooo!”

  Only a dozen souls stood between Donny and the side of the barge. He fought madly, squeezing between their torsos. From the corner of his eye he saw the dead to his right step aside, and a ferryman appeared in the gap and reached for him. Donny slithered through another pair of souls and felt bony fingers brush his back, almost getting a grip. “Let me go!” he shouted. “I need to get to the shore! I’m with Angela Obscura!” He slid his arms between the last pair ahead and pushed them right and left. The side of the deck was right in front of him, and the other bank just beyond. He stepped onto the low rail and jumped.

  A hand closed on his collar and yanked him back. He spun around, coming face-to-face with a ferryman. Inside the shadow of the cloak, there was a ghastly head. He looked away instantly, because it would have paralyzed him with fear if he’d gazed any longer. There was only the briefest impression of an ancient visage, hairless and infinitely wrinkled. Milky eyes quivered inside glistening red sockets. The lips had shriveled away to bare, broken gray teeth. The ferryman’s other hand came up, pale and long-fingered, and clamped around Donny’s neck.

  Donny tried to speak, but the words were choked off. His eyes bugged. He raised his hand, trying to tell the ­ferryman to stop and listen. The grip loosened, and Donny saw those ghastly eyes focused on the palm of his hand, where Angela had imprinted her symbol.

  The ferryman stared for a moment. Then he spoke with a slow, chilling voice. “Don’t. Do. That. Again.” He hurled Donny backward, out of the boat and onto the far shore.

  Donny landed on his heels and tumbled onto his back. His head hit the ground next, and he fully expected to crack his skull on stone, but the springy black moss growing there cushioned his fall. He rolled one more time, his legs flying over his head, and came to rest on his stomach.

  “Thank you!” he shouted, giddy with relief, but he only got another hiss from the ferrymen in reply. Butch gaped on the other side of the river. He was no longer amused. Donny fought the impulse to taunt him back. Butch was dangerous enough without further provocation.

  Donny turned and ran, grateful for the distance he’d put between himself and the butcher. He wondered why Butch was on the bridge to begin with. Butch had seemed surprised to see him, because his attention was focused elsewhere. He was looking toward the council dome.

  The highest point of the bridge. That would be a good place to watch something happen, wouldn’t it? Donny thought.

  His lungs burned again, but even so, he ran faster.

  CHAPTER 31

  He made it to the dome at last, with so much pain in his lungs that he stopped at the bottom of the stairs, unable for a moment to take another step. His breath came out in a ragged wheeze, and he felt the metallic taste of blood in the back of his throat.

  Chariots were lined up at the bottom of the hill, the runner imps at rest beside them. Up ahead, in the arches between the columns that supported the dome, massive guard imps stood, armed with brutal weapons. Donny’s approach had caught their attention, and they turned their enormous heads to watch him.

  A sound came from above as something struck the top of the dome. It bounced along the rounded roof until it pinged off and skipped down the steps a few yards to his right. Donny furrowed his brow as he stared at the object. It was a fragment of rock. He looked straight up just in time to see the clouds part again for a moment.

  Before, he had glimpsed a line of white-hot light. Now it looked like a wiry circle of fire that almost surrounded the stalactite, directly above.

  Go! Donny screamed to himself. He climbed the steps with his hands as well as his feet, too exhausted to run. One of the arches was unoccupied, but Donny didn’t head for that one. He went to where Echo stood.

  “Echo!” he said, barely able to gasp out the words. “It’s me, Donny!”

  Echo leaned forward. “Donny?”

  “Get Angela! I have to warn her!”

  “Warn?”

  Donny gathered his strength, took a deep breath, and shouted as loud as he was able. “Angela! Everybody! Get out of there!”

  The council members had been talking inside, but the chatter fell silent. Every guard stared. Echo looked uncertain, but still he unshouldered his weapon and held it sideways across his body to block the opening. “Angela,” Echo boomed, much louder than Donny could manage.

  It felt like broken glass was stuck inside his throat, but Donny shouted again. “Get out of there! You’ll all be killed!”

  Something in a dark red robe appeared over Echo’s shoulder. Donny looked up, ready to tell Angela more, but the being who looked down on him was not what he expected. It was a demonic face covered in purple-red scales with fierce eyes, elfish ears, and pointed fins sweeping back across the skull like a tiara. It was both terrifying and beautiful, the way a tiger or cobra could be. And at the same time, there was something strangely familiar in those features.

  Out of that reptilian mouth came Angela’s furious voice. “Donny, have you lost your mind?”

  At any other time he would have been too astounded to respond, but there was no time to be dumbstruck. He pointed straight up. “The roof is coming down on you!”

  She squinted at him. “Try making sense.”

  “The clouds are hiding it!” Donny panted out the words. “They weren’t released by accident. It’s covering up what the shreeks are doing! And the fire that eats through rock was stolen, right? This is why—they’re cutting through the rock up there! And that’s why Sooth was killed!”

  Her scaly head rocked back. “Sooth is dead?”

  “Yes, they killed him because he knew what was coming! His riddle wasn’t a riddle—it was a prediction! After the light comes the fall!”

  Angela turned back and looked at the council members inside the dome. “Havoc isn’t here,” she muttered to herself.

  “Well, now you know why.” Donny jabbed his finger straight up again. “Angela, just look!”

  “Excuse me, Echo,” Angela said as she squeezed past the massive imp. She gave Donny a doubtful glance, then craned her neck to peer at the clouds.

  “Keep looking, please,�
�� Donny begged. Drops of perspiration swarmed his face. Torturous, agonizing seconds passed. And then Angela didn’t need to see anything, because a sound rumbled down from above. It was unmistakably ominous: a thunderous crack as something colossal broke. The entire stalactite began to descend. It looked like slow motion at first, but only because of the size of the object, and its distance above.

  Angela sprang back to the dome. “Everybody, run! You’ll be crushed!” She shoved Echo as she passed, and the huge imp tumbled down the steps, nearly taking Donny with him.

  Donny glanced up again to see the dagger of stone, as big as an ocean liner, accelerating toward them. “Angela, get out of there!” he screamed. She had vanished into the building. He heard her shouting and saw archdemons and guards running. He took a step toward the dome, but realized it was death to wait another moment before turning. Even his momentary pause might have sealed his own fate. The atmosphere seemed to change as pressure built from above. He turned to run, and then Angela was beside him. She swept him up with an arm around his waist. They covered three steps in one of her strides as a monstrous shadow fell across the dome, and the loudest sound Donny had ever heard assaulted his ears.

  It was an explosion and an earthquake all at once. The ground splintered, and rocks flew like popcorn. The stone below was suddenly a trampoline, and Angela and Donny were hurled into the air. Donny landed on his shoulder and rolled, knocked from Angela’s arms. As he tumbled, he saw that the point of the stalactite had utterly demolished the dome and its steps. Chunks rained down and slammed into the ground all around them.

  Donny rolled to a stop and looked back again. Not far away, one of the other guard imps raised an elbow helplessly as a house-size rock fell on him—he was gone in an instant under tons of stone. Something massive still loomed, and Donny saw what was left of the stalactite, at least half of it, waver in the air and start to tip.

  In their direction.

  This time Angela threw him across her shoulder, bent at the waist. Donny was able to lift his head and watch the race between her and the broken column of stone that was about to crush them like ants under a boot. She didn’t run straight from the falling rock—they could never have made it that way. She angled right, shockingly fast, as Donny flopped like a rag doll. The stone hit the ground so close, he felt like he could have touched it. The sheer mass of it blocked everything else from sight.

  The impact sent them flying again, but Angela was ready for it this time. She landed at a crazed angle but somehow stayed on her feet long enough to run three, four, five more long strides before she lost her balance. They spilled across the ground. The remainder of the stalactite disintegrated. Chunks rumbled past them, and one might have crushed Donny in its path if Angela hadn’t grabbed his ankle and hauled him aside.

  The sounds of stone cracking and rolling seemed to last another full minute. The noise rebounded off the walls of the cavern. Donny rolled onto his back and sat up, staring at the mountainous pile of rubble they had barely escaped. The air was choked with dust, and he coughed some more. His arms were covered with bloody scrapes.

  He saw Angela beside him, scrambling to her feet. “Echo!” she shouted, her hands cupped around her mouth. “Echo, where are you!”

  “Echo,” boomed the reply. A beastly shape hobbled out of the dust. Angela embraced the imp, barely getting her scaly arms halfway around. Then she turned to Donny. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her lizard lips pressed tightly together. She put her hands on his shoulders. “How did you know?”

  “I . . . I just guessed. I had a feeling,” Donny said. It was hard to look at her this way. He gritted his teeth and averted his eyes.

  “Oh yeah. Sorry,” Angela said. She reached into a deep pocket of the robe and pulled out her bracelet. As soon as she clasped it around her wrist, the skin above the wrist began to change. The lizard scales smoothed and turned to the color of flesh. But the hand itself remained the same below the bracelet. Donny remembered the single glove she always wore.

  As the change swept over her, Angela lost inches in height. The robe loosened around her body. Donny looked at her face in time to see the transformation sweep up her neck. The features softened, the sharp points and fins retracted into her skin, and suddenly it was the Angela he knew again. But this time the hair that sprouted and spilled past her shoulders was so blond, it was almost white. That was another mystery solved, he realized, remembering how her hair had already changed from black to auburn.

  “So, that was the other me,” she said with a shrug. “Too scary?”

  “I didn’t expect it, that’s all.”

  “Those of us who can change take our demon form during council,” she said. She exhaled heavily. “And speaking of the council, I need to make sure everyone got out.”

  “Angela,” Donny said as she turned to head toward the wreckage. She looked at him. “Why wasn’t Havoc in there with the rest of you?” he asked.

  Her jaw slid from side to side. “I guess we’ll ask when we see him.”

  Donny pointed back at the river. “Butch was standing on the top of the bridge. I think he was there to watch.”

  Her nostrils flared. “If Havoc did this, he was trying to wipe out the whole council. I think he failed, for the most part. But I need to know. Echo, take Donny home and keep him safe.” She turned and hopped nimbly up the piles of stone.

  “I want to help,” Donny called after her.

  “Nope!” she shouted back.

  “Safe,” thundered Echo from a mouth the size of a garbage can. He took Donny by the arm and led him away.

  CHAPTER 32

  Hours passed. Donny sat in the big room by the front door of Angela’s home. He read Dr. Seuss books to Tizzy to keep them both distracted until she fell asleep beside him on the sofa.

  Once she was dozing, an awful vision played over and over inside his head. He kept thinking about that poor guard imp crushed under the stone. Who else didn’t survive the disaster? If he’d gotten there a little sooner, he could have saved them all.

  Finally the front door opened, and Angela walked in, exhausted and grim. Tizzy woke in an instant. She ran to Angela and hugged her.

  “I’m fine,” Angela said. She picked Tizzy up, and Tizzy wrapped her legs around Angela’s waist, gripping her like a koala.

  “Your new hair is nice,” Tizzy said into Angela’s shoulder.

  “Thank you, sweetness.” Angela plopped onto the sofa, and Tizzy curled up on her lap. “Where’s Nanny?”

  “Echo carried her away because she tried to bite Donny,” Tizzy said.

  “Whoops. Last thing Nanny heard, I was pretty mad at you,” Angela told Donny.

  “That’s okay,” Donny said. “But how did it go?” He wasn’t sure he really wanted the answer.

  Angela patted his knee with a fist. “The first thing I should tell you, Cricket, is that the council is very grateful. You saved most of them.”

  Donny bit his bottom lip. “Most?”

  She answered quietly. “Most. We lost three council members and four guards.”

  Donny winced, and his head sagged back. “I’m sorry. I wish I’d been faster.”

  “Don’t say that. What you did was amazing. Really.”

  He closed his eyes. “Were those your friends?”

  “Sort of. Friends isn’t the right word. We argue a lot on the council. One of them I liked very much, though.”

  The words pierced Donny’s heart. “I’m so sorry. I wish . . .” His mouth twisted, and he couldn’t talk anymore.

  Angela clutched his knee. “Stop that. I won’t allow it. We owe you a lot, Donny. If it wasn’t for you, Havoc would be the only council member left. He’d have the pit back in flames by morning, and invite the Merciless up for milk and brownies.”

  Donny sniffed to keep his nose from running. “What will happen to Havoc?”

  “I hate Havo
c,” said Tizzy.

  “Me too, dollface,” Angela said. She looked at Donny. “That remains to be seen, Cricket. He turned up a little while after you left, acting perfectly shocked and grief-stricken. It was a good show; I’ll give him credit for that. I was ready to lock him up on the spot, but there was a disagreement among the rest of the council about whether we could assume he was truly guilty. They want to have an inquiry.”

  “You should ask him why Butch was on the bridge,” Donny said.

  Angela laughed. “Maybe you can ask him. The inquiry begins tomorrow, and you’re going to testify.”

  Donny gaped. “I’m going to what?”

  “It’s weird how your hearing comes and goes. You have to testify. You’re the only one who saw it coming. I don’t know if they’ll believe you, since they don’t put much stock in what mortals have to say. But you have to try.”

  CHAPTER 33

  Angela drove the chariot over the tall bridge where Donny had encountered Butch. Ahead was the enormous heap of rubble where the council dome once stood. Her crimson robe waved like a pennant behind them. Arglbrgl leaned over the side of the chariot, drool spooling off his flapping tongue.

  “Why do they want to meet there?” Donny asked. “Nothing’s left.”

  “This is an inquiry into what happened,” she replied, “and the evidence will be all around us. Now, don’t be nervous. They’ll call you up, ask some questions, and then dismiss you. Nobody will hurt you, although someone might try to intimidate you.”

  Great, thought Donny. “Who are they?”

  “On the council? Infernal beings, of course. Archdemons from the eldest families. Some of them can look human, like me, but we’ll all be in demon form when we meet. That’s traditional for council. You want names? The head of council is Formido. He’s the one with a head that looks like a nautilus shell. I’m on the council, as is Havoc—Havoc Arcanus, if you want the whole name. Umbrosus, Afflictio, and Tristitia are dead, somewhere under all that rock. That leaves Gravis, Caligo, Fumo, Morsa, Torto, and Devoro. Oh yeah, and Oblivium. I always forget about Oblivium.”