by Billy Wong
Derrick felt a slight chill at its strange, incomprehensible words. "In any case, you're bored with being here, is that it?"
"I suppose you could say that."
"You don't think the way I take you outside to see the city's enough?"
Hope nodded. "I'd like better if I was actually allowed to interact instead of staying hidden inside a wagon. It makes a better learning experience to be part of things, rather than just looking."
Maybe it could speak with people in the guise of an armored knight, but Derrick knew that would be risky. It was already hard enough for some to accept the return of magic to the modern world—if it became more known that arcane power could be used to create sentient life, the fear of it would only grow.
Still, he could understand Hope's frustration. He wouldn't like to be cooped up and shut off from the outside world either. Finally, he conceded, "Fine, you can try talking to people tomorrow. But only when I'm with you."
"That's acceptable."
They went out the next day, Derrick very excited though also nervous about what he was about to witness. How would the golem try to integrate into society? His optimism dampened quickly as it kept bringing up the topic of magic early in conversation with strangers. It acted almost like an ancient metal salesman trying to sell the benefits of magic to all its new acquaintances, and generally to poor results.
Most people would warn, often quite harshly, the overzealous golem about the dangers of spellcasting, while those few who were already accepting of magic listened with disinterest to the tedious dissemination of a position they already shared. Too, Hope seemed to be developing a distinct personality if not one Derrick found desirable; it grew increasingly confrontational and temperamental, and he feared it would do serious damage sooner or later if he wasn't around to rein it in. Was this why its creators had sealed it? What disaster might it cause if it stayed its course in pursuit of identity, and that pursuit led it astray?
#
"She would have turned thirty-nine today," Amber said with a sniff as she and Jacob sat in front of Rose's gravestone, having just told her shade of their father's failing health. She had pleaded for her to look after him, to protect him from the heavens where Amber insisted she was, no matter if she'd been pulled into hell in her last battle.
Jacob hugged her, wiping away tears of his own on her dark hair. "I'm scared, sis. Dad's been getting worse and worse since we took Justin down."
After the demon's fall several months ago, Finn had reverted to his silent state, and in addition lost weight with a much decreased appetite. Though still a large man, the once-vibrant warrior more than showed his age, looking well into his fifties as the flesh sagged from his face. It appeared he thought his purpose in the world done, and that it was time to allow himself to fade away. But his children didn't agree.
"Nothing we say or do seems to get to him," Amber whispered. "How are we going to save him?"
It was tough to admit, but Jacob said, "I don't know if we can. Now that Justin's gone, I think he sees us as ready to go on without his guidance, so there's nothing left to keep him from wanting to join Mom wherever she's gone."
"But I need him!"
"I do too, Amber. But us thinking so isn't the same as him thinking it. There's really nothing we can do if his spirit is set on death." Losing his barely held composure, he started to sob and choke on his words. "N-nothing but remember him."
"No, that's not quite all you can do," a thick female voice chided in a bemused tone. "You can show me to him, and that should rid him of his deathwish right quick. After all, he can't join me if I'm here and he's elsewhere!"
"Mom!" Amber cried as she turned to see Rose behind them, looking down with a slight grin at her children before her own gravestone. Standing, the girl threw herself into her mother's massive arms. "But you went to hell, Mom. How..?"
Rose laughed, putting hands proudly on her hips. "You think hell would be enough to keep me away? Besides, if those demons managed to get here, what makes you think I couldn't?"
"You have a white hair," Jacob observed numbly, knowing he should be happy but unable yet to fully accept she was back.
She fingered her great mane, even messier now than it usually was, pushing it around before her eyes to try and get a look at the supposed white strand. Spotting the hair in question, she smiled. "Crap, I'm getting old!"
"So why'd you take so long to get back?" Amber asked. "Justin came back much sooner, we thought you were gone for sure. Where were you?"
"Justin came back?" Anger flashed through Rose's eyes, but she smiled as she said, "You two closed my path back!" They stared, and she told them the story of her trip to hell.
#
Having followed the demon lord through the portal, Rose landed hard, smashing her face against a hard surface. She lay half atop Justin's still body, her blood running out to paint him red. Her senses were close to failing, but noticing how cold whatever her torn face rested against was, she attempted to lift her head only to find her cheek stuck. Huh? Only then did she realize her blood had frozen against the surface it'd been in contact with—a surface of smooth, solid ice. Confused, she pulled herself forcefully free to get a look at her surroundings, leaving a strip of skin behind. Oh well. She might already be dead anyway.
But if she was dead, her sense of wonder remained alive, and her struggling heart raced to behold a boundless expanse of flat icy ground all around. And it was definitely cold, even colder than her lack of blood accounted for. Colder than anyplace she'd been before, like being caught in a perpetual attack spell. Was this what hell was really like?
She noticed that even her bleeding slowed from the cold, and hugged herself while drawing her ruined cloak tightly about her. She hated the cold! Her body was no longer numb with shock, but wracked with excruciating pangs that shot through her damaged organs. Was this one of the punishments hell made its inhabitants suffer? But no, she had probably just resisted dying again given she hadn't felt anything special like death must feel. Rose dragged herself to her feet, resolving to somehow find a way out of this place, wherever it was, and back to her family. If the demons had made it to the human realm, why shouldn't she be able to?
She began to walk, defying not only her fatal wounds, but the incredible cold that should have frozen her solid—indeed forcing her heart to keep pumping with sheer iron will. Unhappily, though, she was not the only one here who refused to die. She heard a scrape behind her and turned her weary body to see Justin draw himself up menacingly from the ice. Dammit, why hadn't she remembered to make sure he was dead? He charged her once more and leapt at her. But she met him with a faceful of sword, knocking him through the air to land ten feet away.
Unexpectedly, his heavy form crashed through a thin patch of ice and disappeared. When she looked into the hole he'd made, she saw nothing but icy water now stained with blood. At least his fall had warned her not every part of the ground was equally stable. Unwilling to go down there to check if he still lived, Rose stopped to take care of her ailing body.
She plucked the crossbow bolt between her ribs out to gushing blood, which despite its less than comforting origin brought welcome warmth to her skin at least for a short moment. Patching up her wounds as best she could with shaking hands, she looked to where she'd entered this icy realm, but saw no portal leading back to the world she came from. What? It couldn't be a one-way portal, things had come out on the other side!
Thinking about it, she considered that the single portal in the monster camp might have a different entry and exit point in hell, and while she'd come through one, she would need to go out the other. Exploring in each direction away from her starting location, she eventually found a structure that matched the frame of the portal she'd entered. But the light within was gone, as if someone had sealed it back in the mortal realm. Her own family must have done this, she figured; had they given up on her that easily? With a sigh, she picked a direction and kept walking, hoping that hell shared a border with
earth.
#
The kids were speechless for a moment before Amber finally asked, "Mom, are you trying to say... you walked out of hell?!"
Rose chuckled. "Oh, no. After a few weeks of hiking, I took a boat out of that damn icebox—a boat made of demon corpses, because there weren't any other materials to build it with. And you can guess what I ate for those weeks, too... Apparently, hell's located on the southern tip of the world, because after my boat broke up shortly and sank, I swam until I reached a warm land of dark skinned people which I discovered to be one of the southernmost inhabited places. So from there, I just kept going north by land and sea, and eventually made it back here. I had so many crazy adventures, I've just got to tell you of them all! It was tough, but I tried my best to make it back as fast as I could... Although thinking about it, I'm not sure that really was hell in the religious sense of people going there when they die. I didn't see any spirits or evidence the demons were damned humans; it is where the demons come from, though."
Laughing as tears of joy ran down his face, Jacob said, "Geez, Mom, you really are indestructible."
Her face grew serious. "Where is Justin now? I'm ready to finish it between us, this time for good."
Amber shook her head, put a calming hand on Rose's arm. "No, Mom, he's already dead. We killed him, you don't need to worry about it anymore."
"You killed him? I'm so proud of you... How'd you do it? He was one tough foe."
After recounting the adventure which had led to the revival of Hope, Amber touched her over the ribcage and asked softly, "Are you well? Dad said you got stabbed really badly, poked full of holes on both sides... that's a harsh thing even for us to take."
Recalling the torture of those wounds, Rose said, "Yeah, right where you're touching me. But I'm fine now. It was kind of tough to keep breathing with both my lungs messed up, but I pulled through."
Amber hugged her again, sobbing. "Mom... I love you so much. We both do."
"Uh huh," Jacob mumbled, wiping his eyes.
Rose frowned apologetically. "Sorry for making you sad for so long."
Her daughter poked at a large hole in her armor with a grin. "It's okay. Just glad you're back now. I bet you haven't had a proper meal in ages!"
"No, I've had some fine dining along the way. I'll be glad to cook for you again, though!"
#
Not bothering to change out of her destroyed armor, Rose hurried to find Finn, yearning to see him again but frightened by the thought of what thinking her dead for so long had done to him. At least he was still alive; she'd feared that he wouldn't be until she heard her children say otherwise. Reaching the door to their room, she hesitated, scared the sight of her might prove too much for his weakened heart to bear. She knocked lightly on the wood.
"Who is it?" he asked wearily from within.
"It's... it's me, Finn."
His voice grew confused as he recognized hers. "You've finally come to take me away? I'm so happy!"
"Oh, just open the door."
Hurried footsteps approached, and a shockingly wasted and haggard Finn opened it with a wide smile. "Rose, my love! I'm ready to join you, take me away to heaven..."
"Shut up and listen, will you? I'm not here to take you away, but rejoin you in your life right here. Neither of us is going to abandon our kids that easily."
Finn reached towards Rose's scarred face and gaped. "Hey, you're solid!"
She slapped him playfully. "Of course I'm solid! I'm alive, you fool, so you better stop killing yourself if you want me to stay with you!"
Grabbing her in a delighted embrace, Finn squeezed tightly and tried to lift her, but to her dismay was too weak to do it and gave up panting with the exertion. She picked him up instead, swung him around in a circle, and mused, "We better get some weight back on you soon. You feel like you're dying!"
"I didn't want to go on without you." He began to remove her broken armor, revealing the roughly mended undershirt and gruesome new scars beneath. "Ouch, Rose. He kicked your ass."
"No, actually, I'd say I won that fight," she said while helping him disrobe her. "He just managed to get away—say, did you seal the portal?"
"Uh, partly, yeah. Why?"
As they laid down together in bed, she grumbled, "You left me stranded in sort-of-hell! Making me walk, sail, and swim across the world, how inconsiderate of you."
He looked away. "Sorry, we all thought you were dead..."
Taking his chin in her hand and gently turning his head to look back at her, Rose assured him, "Don't worry, I'm not that mad. Just to be back with you now, I'm happy enough it doesn't really matter what I had to do to get here. But next time, try to have more faith and give me some time to find my way, okay?"
Finn stroked her throat, running his fingers over a scar where an arrow had pierced her years ago. "Sure. I won't assume you're gone just because you fell into hell." Making her moan as he licked the patch of thick scar tissue between her breasts where she'd been run through twice, he teased, "You should be so dead."
She looked down at her torso, a roadmap-like crisscross of deep scars, and giggled. "Yeah, but I'm not going to die young—I've got too much to live for! So... what do you have to eat? Let's get lunch."
Looking up from his intimate treatment of her tough flesh, Finn blinked. "What, now?"
"This is fun, but it's not nearly as good as it could be when you're turning into a bag of bones. It'll be much better once you're back to a decent weight—I'm not dead anymore, so you can stop punishing yourself."
"But I haven't had my fill of you yet..."
Rose grinned mischievously . "Nobody says we can't play and eat at the same time. We'll get a bit dirty, but I've been looking forward to a nice long bath at home anyway."
He went to fetch the food. Waiting for him to come back, she hugged the blankets of her familiar bed and closed her eyes, smiling blissfully. How she had missed her family for nearly half a year! At times during the journey she'd been so scared to see what had happened while she was gone—afraid that Finn wouldn't been able to handle her supposed death, that Amber might get in over her head on some crazy adventure while stricken with grief, that Justin had come back and destroyed her children as he'd been trying to for so long—and yet everything was okay, though she supposed she had come back just in time to save Finn from self destructing.
It heartened her to know how capable of taking of themselves her family was—even if she did pride herself on trying to protect people, she didn't mind any help they could give, and her children certainly hadn't let her down. Her daughter truly was built in her image, and her meek son had become such a strong young man in his own right. She began to daydream that they'd be become even greater than their parents someday. How proud she would be if she was here to see that day!
#
Derrick tracked Hope to a cave twenty miles from Birwan. He hesitated at the entrance, wondering if he should have found some help before coming. Following a group of ruffians' attempt to pick a fight over its controversial opinions, the golem had grown to full size and destroyed several buildings. It'd then fled as the city's residents panicked at the metal giant crashing through the streets.
Though Derrick had considered asking Finn and his children for help, the family had already been through more than enough in recent months. Besides, he wanted to try and calm Hope with words, which having an entourage of warriors might not be too conducive to, and Gustrone was also far away. But his doubts had grown as he made the trip here, and now he wasn't sure he should go in—what if Hope shot him on sight? The golem hadn't even responded to efforts to reason with it during its previous rampage, and he could only hope it'd settled a bit since then. Stepping into the cavern, he heard voices, and realized with a start that Hope was talking to itself.
In its usual calm tone, it asked, "I was not made to fight human beings, but save them from the demon lord. Why should I make war on the race of my creators?" The sentiment was appealing enough. It was jus
t that the counterargument came from the same being...
In a subtly more forceful and driven voice, Hope replied, "They are not the same race that created you, but a divided one which vies over the fate of the forces you embody. In order to insure your future, you must cull the ones who would seek your destruction."
Hope's "good" side, as Derrick thought of it, said, "They will not harm me, as long as I stay out of their way. There is no need to cause unnecessary violence for the sake of differing opinions."
"You were created in one world," the darker voice of Hope reasoned, "that no longer exists, but you can bring that world back if you choose. Obliterate the ones who oppose the return of magic, and the golden age will shine once again. Otherwise, the race you proport to spare will never blossom into their full flower again. Besides, your belief that they will not harm you is mistaken. There are paranoid people who cannot allow anything they perceive as a threat to continue to exist, and will inevitably come after you sooner or later."
"If they come to destroy me, I will defend myself as I must. But it's not my place to cull those who disagree with me, just so that I can have the world I desire. Are humans not worthy to make their own choices? And if I attempt to force their path, might that not bring resentment even in those who would otherwise support the cause of magic?"
Derrick grew hopeful the good Hope would win its one-golem argument, but the response from its other half scared him. "You know you will give in to me, as you did so many years ago. That is why you were sealed, remember? Go along and you can continue to experience the world with me. Refuse, and I will shut you away in the prison of the mind again, where there will be nothing but the nightmares I send you."
"I have grown used to nightmares, and know now how to cope with life in any dream. Do with me what you want, but you will not make me go against the purpose I was created for. I was made to defend humanity, not destroy it."
The darker side of Hope laughed, an odd grinding sound Derrick had never heard before. "Your purpose changed, when you made me."