My Ex-Wife Said Go to Hell

by Zurosky, Kirk

  “Cabernet!” I exclaimed. “I did not know it was you. So sorry! I thought you were going to attack me and my wife.”

  I saw the Queen taking stock of Cabernet’s concave chest, spindly legs, and flea-infested fur. She picked his glasses up off the ground, brushed them off, and placed them back on his face. “Yes, my dear husband,” she smirked. “He is clearly a threat.”

  Cabernet reached for a flask in his pack, and his shaky hands spilled half the wine down his chest, where it sopped into the fur on his flanks and sent a cloud of fleas into the air, trying to escape death by vino. “Whew,” he bleated. “No one dares attack you while you carry that sacred sword,” he said. “And besides, whatever business you have here they want done, so both you and those confounded hellhounds can leave. So, pray tell, other than scaring an old goat like me, may I ask why you are here?”

  “My husband wants to divorce me,” said the Queen, folding her arms across her chest, and playing, I think, the role of the jilted spouse.

  Cabernet adjusted his glasses once, then again peered at the Queen, who looked ever like a jewel in the sun. “Now why would he want to do something like that?” Cabernet said. “Sirius, are you sure about this? She seems nice enough. And, well, after your last two, I mean this young lady is quite, and may I repeat quite the improvement.”

  “It’s . . .” I started, “. . . complicated, Cabernet.”

  “Complicated, my left hoof,” the satyr said. “You’d be an imbecile to divorce as fine a filly as this. No offense to you, my lady.”

  “None taken,” said the Queen with a wry smile. “Cabernet,” she said. “It gets worse. He is divorcing me because of a dog. Can you believe that?”

  I glared at the Queen, who could barely contain her mirth at my discomfort. Her somber mood had apparently passed, at least for the moment. I turned to find Cabernet staring at me through his spectacles, his eyes as wide open as his mouth.

  “So the rumors are true,” he gasped. “The Lord of the Underworld called in his mark on you, and you somehow defeated his host of hellions!”

  “Yes,” I said, “I did, but certainly not alone. I only prevailed with the help of the Queen and her people, my daughters, and of course, the most valiant vampire Maltese, Garlic. In the final battle, Cerberus was driven back into the Underworld, but Garlic was trapped there when the gate closed.”

  Cabernet shook his head sadly. “So you are going to try and go get her,” he said. “You really are going right at him. Oh my, you are going to get found in contempt, aren’t you?”

  “Yes,” I said, looking around and trying to quiet his now frantic bleating. “Come on now, people are beginning to stare at us—let’s move.”

  “You really are an imbecile, Sirius,” Cabernet said.

  I looked at the Queen, who returned my gaze so warmly it made my heart hurt. “I know, Cabernet, I know.”

  On the way to the courthouse, I considered stopping by Justice’s office for advice, but I was torn about whether he would help me in this charade, and I also wondered what he could do to help me get found in contempt, since his job was to help me stay out of contempt. My decision was made for me when I saw his office was tightly shuttered. “Where is Justice?” I asked Cabernet.

  “Been on holiday since your last case,” Cabernet replied. “But you know he will come back for you for the right price.”

  “I know,” I answered, looking at the Queen, “but I think we can get me where I need to go without his help this time.” I mused that it was certainly better for the Queen not to find out I was intimately familiar with Knowledge and Wisdom. I would have to rely on my own smarts, certainly a daunting prospect when the Head Magistrate was going to be involved.

  As we walked, my nose was assaulted with the stench of brimstone, the cologne of the netherworld and a personal reminder that the Lord of the Underworld was nearby and waiting for me. Behind the courthouse, the demons were not wailing but were strangely silent in anticipation, or in their preparation for what dastardly deeds they had planned for me. But Hell’s flames shot ever so high in the air, crackling fiercely as they surged up from deep below. I looked to the left of the courthouse and saw the now familiar site of the Golden Rule inn. The picture of the scales of justice with gold weighing equally on both sides was especially meaningful now since I had come out on both sides of the win ledger in my visits to the court. And how much gold I had did not seem to make a bit of difference in the outcome. “He who has the gold makes the rule” was the inn’s slogan, but in my experience so far, the Head Magistrate was the ruler, and losing my gold was the rule.

  “The clerk’s office is closed for lunch,” Cabernet said, scratching his ear with one grimy finger. “That is where you will need to go to file for divorce. So come on, and I will serve you a drink. I think I have some year-old port in there somewhere.” I puffed out my chest and motioned the Queen to stand behind me as I pulled the heavy oaken door open and entered the establishment. I stood ready to challenge any number of nefarious creatures that I remembered populating the inn. But to my great surprise, the inn’s many tables were completely empty. There was no smoke choking the room with its stench of clove and tobacco, no challenging glares from an immortal eager to try his hand with me. There was simply silence.

  “Nice place you got here,” said the Queen, her voice echoing off the hardwood floor as she ran a finger across one sparkling-clean table. “Is everyone on holiday?”

  Cabernet nodded knowingly. “Actually, word that Sirius Sinister was coming to challenge Hades got out, and the lucky ones fled the village before the hellhounds sealed it off.”

  I sat down on a barstool, and Cabernet took his familiar spot behind the bar. “Now that explains the great exodus we saw as we approached the village,” I exclaimed. “They were leaving because of us.”

  “Us?” the Queen said playfully. “You mean because of you, don’t you?”

  I knew she was trying to keep the mood light, which I appreciated. The Queen was so thoughtful in every way, even when I was in the process of divorcing her. As Cabernet poured us a couple of drinks, I let my eyes fall upon the Queen, taking in her golden hair and soft lips, and allowing myself to drift back to the idyll of the Blue Lagoon. It seemed so long ago. Did all that amazingness really happen? She met my gaze and smiled as we raised our glasses. It did happen. “To a proper divorce,” the Queen said. I drank quickly, the sweet wine somehow tasting sour on my tongue, and did not repeat her toast.

  I was still transfixed by my memories of the Blue Lagoon when the door to the Golden Rule was kicked open. “Sirius Sinister,” a deep voice boomed. “You need to come with us.”

  “What do you want of me? Am I under arrest?”

  There was much confusion among the guardsmen, as clearly I was not, and they had not had any experience in asking someone to come with them nicely. “No, you are not,” their gruff sergeant admitted, biting his lip and flexing his massive chest muscles up and down to quell his chagrin.

  “Well, then,” I said, motioning to a nearby empty table. “Have a seat, and Cabernet will pour you a drink on the house. I will go with you. But not until the Queen and I are done with our wine.”

  The Queen and I chatted easily with our new friends, who indeed sat as Cabernet poured them all a glass of wine. Before the soldiers drank, they looked to their sergeant for approval, and he grunted his assent. When Cabernet handed him a glass, the sergeant merely stood with his arms folded across his chest, glaring at Cabernet, like the satyr had just peed on his foot. Nonplussed, Cabernet went back behind the bar. “I’ll take his,” I said holding up a hand to show Cabernet my now empty glass. I studied the soldiers keenly, and I could just about hear the rapid heartbeats in their chests. Odd, for these men were trained professionals, and I had recognized a few of them from the escort that took me to Hell last time. I know they were not afraid of me. So what then?

  “Ar
e you through with your wine, Mr. Sinister, sir?” one soldier asked, a bead of sweat trickling down his temple, drawing my eye to the frantic beat throbbing ever so lightly there. “Would you be ever so kind to accompany us now, sir?”

  “So now it’s Mr. Sinister?” the Queen added, her interest now clearly piqued. “Why are you giving him the sudden courtesy? And you can ask nicely all you want, but you still have not stated your intentions. What do you want with my husband?” The polite soldier withered under her steely blue gaze, opening his mouth and looking like a gutted trout gasping for life, but no words came out. He looked to his sergeant, who had nixed any further attempt at conversation with an evil leer.

  “Indeed,” I said. “What is your hurry? We are the ones getting divorced here. Don’t rush us. We might just change our minds and stay married, right, darling?”

  “Quite,” the Queen replied. “Perhaps we should go on honeymoon again so I may enjoy all your husbandly talents?”

  “So, now you want to stay married too?” I asked.

  “Going on honeymoon and enjoying your talents are not the same thing as staying married,” the Queen said. “Complicated, remember?” Right.

  I was beginning to think the soldier was a bit of a prude by the look of sheer terror on his face, but my attention was soon distracted by the sound of a tremendous peal of thunder in the distance. I did not remember seeing any storm clouds outside, just the dark cloud over Hell. Clearly, we were annoying the Lord of the Underworld with our idle banter so close to his lair. I really could not wait to tell him where he could go, but the reality was he was already there.

  A herald came running in seeking out the sergeant. “Sergeant, the earth has split outside our gate, and a great wall of fire has sprung out of it and is headed toward the city!”

  I looked to the Queen as the soldiers emptied out of the inn at a sprint. “My dear,” I said, “it appears someone is sending us a message to get on with it.”

  “And by someone, you are referring to a deity that is big, evil, and looking for revenge, perhaps?”

  I nodded. The Queen finished her wine. “Let’s get this over with,” she said, her gaze and countenance playful no longer. “Cabernet, take us to the clerk’s office.”

  But Cabernet did not have to escort us. When we exited the inn, I looked back toward the gate, and indeed in the distance I saw a wall of demonic fire easily twice the height of the kraken, and hissing evilly as tendrils of flames lashed the air. The streets were deserted save for a faerie battle brigade in full riot gear, wearing the masks they had worn to escort me to Hell last time. They accompanied us up to the IDC courthouse.

  I stopped for a moment and took two steps away from the building and saw the flames grow even taller and more menacing, their heat catching the top of the gate on fire, and sending the faerie guardsmen in a frantic fight to extinguish them with buckets drawn from the well and hastily thrown dirt. I realized that Hades wanted the Queen and me to get divorced, because he wanted me to suffer before I came down to his turf to really, really suffer. I was thinking that divorcing the Queen felt a whole lot worse than godly torture. But it seemed Hades was going to wreak a great conflagration upon all things Immortal Divorce Court, and us, if we did not go through with it.

  “Is that how you think it is going to be?” I yelled in the direction of the wall of fire. The only thing I had ever read, or more accurately, looked at, in Justice’s office was an old book on Latin insults. So it only seemed fitting, since Justice was on holiday, to extend my hand toward the fire wall and give Hades the old digitus impudicus. I saw the flames shoot even higher as I turned back toward the courthouse and did not hide the wide smile on my face.

  When we entered, and an exasperated elf clad in gold-trimmed robes appeared in my path.

  “I am Donigus Mithos, clerk of the court,” he said. “Follow me, there is not much time.”

  I looked to the Queen, who merely shrugged. I could not help but try and read her body language. She had not seemed disturbed by the giant wall of fire threatening to immolate the village, and did not even crack a smile when I waved at Hades, using only one of my fingers. The look in her eyes was bereft of any verve, anger, or passion. The Queen simply was numb.

  Donigus did not take us to the clerk’s office, where I supposed we would have had to file the divorce paperwork. Instead, he led us straight into the courtroom, whose doors were wide open and absent any litigants on their now eerily smooth black surface. Head Magistrate Dough sat on the bench, absent her robe and clad in a simple gray tunic, unassisted by her deputies or any court personnel.

  The Head Magistrate looked up at me and shook her head. “Sinister,” she said, “only you could single-handedly threaten the very existence of something with the storied history of Immortal Divorce Court. Was it just too easy to let the Lord of the Underworld exact his painful and eternal torment upon you?”

  “Let the record show that I never actually did anything to him.” I puffed out my chest with pride that I almost sounded like a real attorney. “We are on the record, aren’t we? I have always wanted to say that—”

  “Spare me your feeble attempt at jurisprudence,” the Head Magistrate snapped, looking around the courtroom warily. I saw that her eyes were red with stress, and her hair did not look like it had seen a comb in days. The hand, or more accurately, the fist of the Lord of the Underworld lay heavy upon her. “We are not even on the record, because all my reporters are either in hiding, or took a sudden vacation before you arrived and those blasted hellhounds shut down the village.”

  I pulled out a chair for the Queen at one of the tables, and we sat down. We looked to Donigus, and then back to the Head Magistrate, but neither one of them spoke to us. Instead they were shuffling through paperwork at the Head Magistrate’s bench. The Head Magistrate peered down at the Queen. “Are you the wife of Sirius Sinister?”

  “Yes,” the Queen said, “I am.”

  The Head Magistrate nodded. “Just had to be sure, because you never know with Sinister. Are you with his child? You are, aren’t you?”

  The Queen flushed ever so slightly. “Yes, I am, so what of it?”

  The Head Magistrate winced as a great explosion sounded from outside. “Listen,” she said. “We really don’t have time for the usual legal mumbo jumbo. You divorce him. You are with his child. You get gold. Simple. Got it?”

  “I want nothing from Sirius,” the Queen said. “Least of all his gold.”

  “Oh, you still must have water in your ears, sweetheart,” the Head Magistrate grated. What had happened to the honor and decorum of the Head Magistrate I knew so well? Was the harpy in front of us who she really was when there was no court reporter to record her every word and action? “No matter.” The Head Magistrate continued scribbling quickly. “Have you chosen a name for your little merpire?”

  “I have,” said the Queen. “Her name is Maria.”

  I whipped my head around and stared at the Queen. I could not believe my ears. “Maria?” I said. “You want to call her Maria?”

  “Yes,” the Queen said. “I thought we would name her after your mother, who is quite an impressive lady, and thus, I would like to honor her.”

  I felt a tear come to my eye and reached over and pulled the Queen to me. “Thank you,” I said. “When will Maria arrive?”

  The Queen held the embrace for a moment before she spoke. “Normally I would say in about a year,” she said. “But I do not know what effect your seed will have on her growth. I have only known of one other woman of my race who has birthed issue with another outside our kind. It is considered the ultimate taboo.”

  “Well, an entire contingent of your soldiers just saw you marry me not so long ago. What did they think we were going to do when we left—pick seaweed together?”

  “That is my royal guard, loyal to me to the death—which could be their fate when Maria is born. They wil
l say nothing about our marriage and coupling, but if the high council ever sees that this child is not born of our race, they will be summarily executed for treason to our race.”

  “But you are the Queen, so you can stop the executions, right? Right?”

  The Queen paused, taking a deep breath. “When Maria is born, and if the high council sees she is not full-blooded merfolk, I would have to abdicate my throne. I would be Queen no more.”

  “So that is what you meant by complicated,” I replied. “That is why you can’t stay married to me, or remarry me, isn’t it?”

  The Queen put her finger to my lips. “I knew the price of this child could be my throne, Sirius. And when I told my royal guard of the oracle’s prophecy, they insisted on accompanying me, knowing the consequences would be their death if we found you, and I was able to indeed have a child with you. But it is a choice I would make again and again every single time. Maria has to be born into this world—I am sure of it!”

  “And would the royal guard make that same choice with their lives in the balance?”

  She grimaced. “If they breach their duty to the Queen, and thus lose their honor, they are already dead in their minds. There was no choice for them.”

  “If you were to lose power, who would rule your kingdom?”

  The Queen grimaced. “A man named Orcinus, and that can’t happen, for the lives of my people, and those on land, would surely be forfeit.”

  “He’s that bad?”

  “Yes, but I will figure out how to keep my pregnancy, and then Maria, hidden from him,” she said. “Assuming you are alive after this insanity, I will also find a way for you to see her.”

  “What if I want to see you too?”

  “Ahem!” The Head Magistrate groaned audibly. “It is very sweet and ever so touching for you two to spout such tender platitudes to one another here in Immortal Divorce Court! I would call the court artist to paint a portrait of you if he hadn’t left for Rome. But instead, let me repeat those three little words that have so much power once again! Immortal Divorce Court,” she said. “Do you people want to get divorced, or not?”