Читать книгу Reforming Hell - Marilyn "Mattie" Brahen - Страница 8

CHAPTER 5

Into the Abyss

In the utter darkness—(Lucifer recalled the terror of their arrival in Hell)—he heard screams, wails and calls by his followers to their friends and family and to him. Lucifer once again took command. He called back to them, his voice booming above their fearful babble. “Everyone be quiet! Everyone! This is Lucifer!”

He had chosen his people well. Their cries died down to silence. “I am going to call out the names of my leaders one by one, who must answer me and then call out the names of their own charges, who must answer them and alert us to their presence. And once we have done that, I will call for my family. In this way we will know if we have all arrived here intact, that none of us are missing.”

He started with Dagon, the only spirit master who had rebelled with Lucifer.

His eldest subcommander answered him, his voice hoarse as the gravel beneath their feet. “I am here!” Dagon called out the names of those under his command, who called out their presence in the darkness.

Lucifer then called out the names of Moloch, Adrammelech, Chemosh, of Behemoth, Mammon and Belial, of Thamuz, Phoe­nix­ious and Cimeries. All responded as did the folk under their guidance. Adrammelech complained of the suffering of his seven year old son Marech, and his mother, Maura, Adrammelech’s wife, called out shakily: “He will not speak sense to us! The child utters nonsense words, and shivers, as do I in this black void.”

Lucifer spoke soothingly to her. “We will find light, and we will ease your son’s shock, Maura. For now, let me continue to identify us all. I call for Naamah. Answer me, lady, if you be here.”

“I am here,” came her voice, faintly, from what seemed like a distance from him. “Those who are under me, I will call out your names for your acknowledgment. Answer me swiftly!”

Her charges did so quickly, trusting Lucifer’s only woman subcommander and voicing no complaint.

Lucifer continued: “Lothan, I know that you, your wife, Tia, and daughter, Sharlan, must be here.” They all three raggedly voiced their presences to him. “Now call out to those angelfolk who serve under your command.”

Lothan’s strong, deep voice rang out: “Answer me, my folk, as I call your names.” His charges did, all accounted for.

Lastly, Lucifer called out, “Nergal! I call you last. Are you and Shadella and your group of angelfolk safely accounted for?” Silence greeted his question. “Nergal? Nergal! Shadella was with child. Are you both here?”

A loud masculine wail shattered through the blackness. “Damn our Creator, who has stolen Shadella’s unborn child from her very womb! We are here, but our child is not! Shadella’s womb is flat, as if it had never blossomed with my seed! Daughter or son, I know not, but know that I have been robbed and my wife’s heart torn into pieces of pain.” A woman’s incoherent wail matched his cry.

“Nergal!” Lucifer shouted above their outcry. “Nergal! My heart grieves for your and Shadella’s cruel loss. But you must calm her and yourself. You are also indebted to the folk you took as your charges. They will be like your children now, until you and Shadella can again conceive. Put aside your grief until there is time for it. Call out to your people!”

“My people?” Nergal’s voice sounded drained of emotion. “Very well. Until there is time for grief.” He called his charges. They answered not only with their names, but with murmurs that consoled him and Shadella.

Lucifer nodded to himself, invisible in the blackness. “Lastly, I call to my own. Affaeteres?”

“I am here, Lucifer, but I cannot see where you stand.”

“No one can see. Ashtoreth?”

“I am here, Father. And Mother is beside me. We arrived here together. I was holding her. Protecting her.”

“And your brother? Bael?”

No answer.

“Bael?!” Lucifer waited, wondering if his second son had been taken from him, just as Azmodeus, his youngest, had been. “Answer me, if you are here!”

A second more of silence, then a soft mutter. “Bael is present, but his heart is lost.”

* * * *

Lucifer looked up, mid-memory, glancing at Leianna, who asked, “If there was a volcano in the distance, wouldn’t its lava flow create some light?”

“It didn’t freshly erupt until perhaps an hour or two later. Time was difficult to judge. And then we had a better sense of place and space.”

Bael added: “There are stars in the Netherworld, a cold, faint light, but no moon. We later found that the volcano, one of many which originally dotted the landscape, had erupted earlier and the ash in the Netherworld sky obliterated the weak starlight.”

His father spooned up a bit of mousse, savoring the taste, then said, “Why don’t you tell of the rest of that first night and morning in Hell? After all, you were the star of the show! Despite your distraught state of mind, you acquitted yourself honorably. It was the catalyst that caused me to name you my second-in-command and heir.”

“Immortals need no heirs, Father.”

“I am less sure of that now than when I bestowed the honor on you. However, you still carry the title. And I again request that you continue the story for Quatama and Leianna. I weary of telling it.”

Bael sighed, wondering about his father’s real motive, and reluctantly continued the tale of their arrival in Hell.

* * * *

He felt as if the blackness entombed him, that his father and the others spoke to him from an immeasurable and unreachable distance. He knew that a part of his very soul, his Leianna, had been taken from him, and if a foreseeable future awaited him, she would never share it. Before Lucifer’s fall, during the events leading to it, the elven matriarch Chamira had warned Leianna and Bael: do not allow yourselves to be separated. But perhaps Chamira knew that their best efforts to safeguard their love, to not be torn apart, would fail. Perhaps that was why she had Elijah, the young spirit master, speak of a prophecy to Bael, Leianna and Ashtoreth.

If the prophecy was valid, countless eons would pass before he and Leianna could reunite. Until then, she was lost to him.

He had forced himself to answer Lucifer. He didn’t want to be here in this astral wilderness, he didn’t want to face this horrid exile. He wanted to die, as those earthly mortals did, and forget he ever existed.

And then he heard the screaming, a woman’s high-pitched wail, sounding somewhat familiar. Her voice gave proof to some unseen horror afflicting her.

He heard a man call: “Sharlan?! Where are you, daughter?” Bael knew it was Lothan’s daughter whose cries pierced in the black void. Another woman cried out, “Lothan! Our daughter! Help our daughter!” He heard the sound of Tia’s hysterical weeping, fearful and not knowing what danger their daughter faced.

“Something has hold of me, Father! Something with scales, standing upright! And claws! They cut me! Oh, Creator!” Sharlan screamed again.

Bael moved towards her, trying to gauge her voice, calling, “Try to get away, Sharlan! Try to find the rest of us. Curse this darkness!”

He brushed against another body. “Who is it?”

“Ashtoreth. Mother is beside me.”

Their mother spoke in a resigned whisper. “If only we had light. Dear Creator, do not abandon us completely!”

Peals of thunder louder than any they had ever experienced drowned out all other sounds. And then they knew it was not thunder, but the rim of a mountain top, perhaps as distant as a valley’s length from them, bursting outward and upward with fire, smoke and what seemed a river of burning water, the color of bright flames, sweeping out in wide swathes and thick rivulets down the mountainside.

Its heated glow produced a faint visibility, and they saw what creature attempted to drag Sharlan off. It was small, reaching only to her shoulder, and reptilian, a sort of upright lizard, its tail snapping back and forth, the thin lids of its eyes shutting and opening rhythmically, turning towards Bael, as it pulled the struggling girl along.

The fallen angels clustered near one another in a loose circle, but at its perimeter, Bael saw other lizard creatures. They huddled and watched the progress of their bolder member’s attempt to capture the screaming Sharlan.

Lothan, his daughter’s distress now visible, grabbed the creature furiously. He attempted to pull it off. But its thick claws were embedded in Sharlan’s arm, tearing her flesh. “Stop it, Father!” she shrieked. “It’s tearing me apart!!” But Lothan didn’t seem to understand, Sharlan’s arm hidden from him, between her and the creature. And now one of the other creatures moved stealthily towards another of the women angels.

Bael rushed forward, facing Lothan. “Stop pulling the creature. Its claws have a hold of her arm.”

Bael raised both of his hands and dug his fingers deeply into each of the creature’s eyes. It howled, a furious honking sound, and released its short but powerful forearm’s grip on Sharlan, its small paws sweeping up to its ruined sight and then blindly outward to attack Bael with its claws springing out again. He clenched his teeth against the pain it caused to his own arms and withdrew his fingers from the reptile’s eyes, now pounding its face between its nostrils until he heard a crack. The creature stilled, sinking down to the rock-strewn ground, twitching.

He felt Sharlan touch his back. She wept, her long, black hair tangled and disheveled. “Thank you! Oh, sweet friend, thank you!” She touched the wound on her injured arm carefully. “I will need healing.” She looked at Bael’s own arms, lacerated in ugly, parallel rips. “So will you, again,” she said, reminding him of his earlier injuries, before the Seraphim exiled them from Eliom, when he tried to reach Leianna and met an invisible barrier that burned him.

Other shouts echoed from the rim of the clustered circle of angelfolk. The men had found large stones and were aiming them with deadly intent at the lizard creatures, targeting their eyes, skulls and necks. One, nearly upon a woman it had chosen as a victim, went down, yellow fluid spraying from its torn neck. The other creatures retreated now, running off shrieking into the murk until they disappeared from view.

Tia’s hand hovered over Sharlan’s wounds; Affaeteres and Ash­toreth attended Bael’s injured arms. They sent their healing energy over Bael and Sharlan. The torn skin stopped its blue flow of lost skane, the angelic equivalent of mortal blood, and drew together, the wounds closing, the scars fading to faint pink marks.

Lucifer joined them, his expression grim. “What is this place? What were those things?”

Affaeteres said, “Whatever they are, they are part of our world now.” She glanced at the fiery mountain. “A dangerous world. We must guard against them.”

Bael touched each of his arms gingerly. “I am glad now to know that Leianna was not sent to this world. But my heart is still sick with worry. Did she survive breaching that fiery barrier, trying to reach me, just as I first tried to reach her before the Seraphim lifted us up and flung us into exile here?”

Lucifer answered him bitterly. “I wouldn’t worry about your precious betrothed. Our Creator, I’m sure, has plans for her. She was deliberately separated from you. Worry more about yourself and our people here!”

“He did!” Sharlan defended him fervently, standing beside him, as tall as he was. “He saved me from that beast!”

Affaeteres folded her arms. “He rescued you, yes. But the fire mountain saved us all, lifting the darkness, exposing our attackers.”

Sharlan added: “It did, after you called out to our Creator for help. Perhaps you were heard, however distant we are from Eliom, our homes and the Garden.”

Affaeteres shrugged. A tall woman herself, taller than Lucifer, she looked at him coldly. “What shall we do now, husband?”

He gazed about at the other angelfolk waiting for his response. “The only thing we can do. Explore this world. The Creator was very explicit: we were to be taken to a place where we would be granted free will, even the free will to disobey, a right we were denied in Eliom. Free will implies choice; choice implies things to choose from, decisions to make, here in this harsh world. But it is not a place to die in! We must learn to live in it, with its challenges, punishments and rewards. Oh, yes, our adventure is upon us!” He paused, studying the fire mountain. “I think those fluid streams are on fire, made of molten rock from the mountain and a danger to us below. We must seek higher ground away from it and hope this darkness is merely night in this wilderness.”

The way still was difficult, but they noticed a lower cahn or hill, leading upward and followed it away from the vulcahnoh, the name they gave to the fire mountain.

In their language, Eliomese, vul meant “fire,” although they had never tamed it nor had a use for fire in their lost home world. In Eliom, they only ate the fruits, nuts, vegetables and grains of their fields and orchards, and they heated their cooking and baking alcoves and warmed their residences with their own radiant energy. And as winters passed mildly in Eliom, they built no fireplaces nor knew of such things. The word vul—fire or flame—was reserved for the rare display of lightning and the even rarer lightning strike igniting a bush or tree. Never in all the angelfolk’s experience had a dwelling or person been struck, and so they considered the sky’s vul a display that only the Creator understood.

The word cahn meant “hill” and the word oh meant “great size.” And so they dubbed the fire mountain vulcahnoh, the fire hill of great size, and feared it, knowing the blessings of Eliom were denied them in this hard world.

Unlike the Seraphim, they had no wings, but while in Eliom, they had the special gift of lifting, a discipline of levitation and traveling through meditative thought, off the ground a ways and flying low on air currents to their destination. They quickly found this ability stripped from them in this world.

The most extraordinary trait of the angelfolk—thought transference, an intense concentration that allowed instant travel from one place to another—was only used during spiritual learning and ceremonies conducted by the Seraphim. Adam and his sister Eve had misused it when they thought-transferred to Earth for a forbidden glimpse of Earth’s surface and were stranded on that planet.

No one would dare to thought-transfer in this horrid wilderness. Creator knew where it would land them. And so they had yet to test if that talent still remained.

It seemed that the only safe gifts of Eliom left to them were their healing powers . . . their radiant energy . . . and their minds and bodies. They trudged wearily up the smaller cahn. Both men and women gathered whatever sharp stones could be culled from the rubble beneath their feet, for crude weapons, should the lizard creatures return.

When they reached the hill top, they gazed back across the valley below to the vulcahnoh and what appeared to be a dim mountain range beyond it. The vulcahnoh still spewed forth its streams of fire water, its crown a molten, bubbling mass against the dark sky.

They then turned their gazes in the opposite direction, but their eyes were unable to see beyond the murk.

Lucifer called the women to the center of a circle and set the men around them. “We cannot see the way ahead. I hope that I am not merely optimistic when I suggest that we have arrived in the dark night of this world and that there will be a day and it will bring more light. This hill offers some protection, but we must be prepared to fight if those creatures or others attack us. Yet perhaps we will be lucky in a luckless land.”

“What luck?” Nergal said, his bulk imposingly visible now. “Is our Creator so harsh, simply because we would not incarnate and save the inferior mortals of Earth from what Eve and Adam wrought, to heave us into a land with no sustenance, no shelter or safety, and no means to find such?”

Dagon, now their only spirit master, came slowly toward them, a thin bald shadow in the half-light. “Our Creator will not let us waste away in this barren place. It would neither satisfy nor amuse the One to see our punishment as short-lived as the mortals we disdained.”

“Perhaps it would,” Lucifer said. “It would lend irony to the price for our disobedience. But I also cannot believe the Creator would set us upon such a path. That would invalidate the promise made to us. The Creator must keep that promise, providing us with the means to continue and face our lives with conflicts and choices involving free will. Perhaps our Maker has no inclination to ease us on our way. If so, so be it. We will do whatever is needed to survive. For now, let us rest. I wish to perform an experiment.”

Lucifer bent down and began to select large rocks from those strewn on the ground. He piled them carefully, one supporting the other until they rose a few feet upward. He then knelt and held out his hands to the stones.

Dagon and Lothan, realizing his intention, lent their own radiant energy to the rock pile. Sharlan came over, reaching out her own hands, but Lucifer waved her away, saying, “Wait until we discern the nature of these stones.” She backed away.

A slight burning smell tinged the air, and the brown rocks under Lucifer and Lothan’s hands began to glow a dull purple. But under Dagon’s hands, the uppermost stone changed rapidly from grey to dark red and suddenly burst into flame. Dagon scuttled back, but not before the hem of his robe caught a spark and flames licked its edges. Dagon knelt quickly, suppressing his radiant energy, and pounded the burning cloth with his hands, turning the fabric over and smothering it out.

Some of the remaining rocks also ignited in a shower of leaping flames, the less volatile stones now heating more, turning from purple to bright, glowing lavender. They lent light in a circle a good many yards around the folk.

Lucifer studied the different stones and picked up another cold, grey stone from the ground. “This is our fire starter,” he said, pleased. “We must pile the darker stones first, then add the lighter ones in alternate layers, carefully heating the fire starters in the pile to burn and heat the darker rocks.”

Lothan held out his own hands, his radiant energy contained now, to the glowing rocks for warmth. “There is a chill in this place that our robes bring little comfort from.”

“Then let us gather these stones as new tools and show our people how to safely build these little fire hills, these vulcahnahs, for warmth and for light, and perhaps to assist in food preparation, once we find sustenance.”

Sharlan held out her own hands beside her father’s. “That will be good,” she said, glancing worriedly both at Lucifer and Bael. “The folk have never gone without food and drink. Can we angels survive without nourishment or will we die like the mortals of Earth?”

Bael put his arm around her shoulder, hugging her loosely. “We will find water and edible plant life. The Creator did not fling us into a totally lifeless world. We have simply begun this challenge in a less hospitable part.” He hid his own uncertainty from her.

Sharlan leaned against him, allowing the comfort of his embrace for one moment more. “Thank you for your words of hope.” She broke away gently. “Many of the folk are weary, cold and afraid. With these vulcahnahs, perhaps we can rest for awhile. Their fires may even drive the lizard creatures away.”

Bael nodded, beginning to comb the ground for more of the precious rocks, and he and Sharlan spent the bulk of the night teaching their people how to use their first weapons against the cold, the darkness and the monsters hiding within it.

* * * *

Bael broke off from his tale, helping himself to more wine. “The vulcahnahs did bring hope to the exiled angelfolk that first dark night in Hell.”

Leianna touched his hand, her fingers entwining with his. “It almost sounds as if you’re still saying volcano.”

“The last syllable is ah, which means small, tiny or perhaps even miniature in Eliomese. Vulcahnah: tiny fire hill. Vulcahnoh: great fire hill. There are degrees of meaning in Eliomese, just as there are in other languages, depending on context. Ohah means normal size, average, medium.”

Leianna shook her head. “I’m afraid I don’t remember my Eliomese.”

He squeezed her hand. “It may come back to you eventually. For now, it doesn’t matter. For now, I will say that the exiled folk wandered on and found that the terrain rose steadily upward into an immense circular plateau with another steadily rising set of hills leading to a vast mountain range at its center. That second rise led to a new, vast circular plateau with an extensive range of connecting mountains at its center that led upward to another seemingly endless circular plateau. These vast plateaus have centered mountain ranges rising ever upward, totaling seven in all, which took us over a millennium to explore and civilize. They are known in lore as the Seven Circles of Hell. Domain, of which Tandour, as you now know, is the capitol, is the ruling country of the Netherworld and is part of the first level of Hell.”

“We don’t call them circles,” Ashtoreth said, speaking softly, almost to himself, “although Dante found that description worked for him, and many mortals have decided that his description, which has nine circles and sinks downward into pits instead of rising upward, is the only one.”

“And that Lucifer,” Lucifer said, “stands in a frozen lake in the ninth circle, ruling Hell from there, while he lunches on traitors.”

“I think you’re interpreting Dante’s Inferno a bit loosely, Father.”

Leianna shook her head. “I’ve never read Dante; perhaps I should.”

Lucifer shrugged expansively, his expression comical and dismissive.

“From your description, Bael, it sounds like six of those circles each sit atop another like the rings of a tree, except three-dimensionally, each ring developing a new center hub or base upon which to build the next ring of land. And the bottom or seventh circle serves as the foundation for all the upper circles. Or maybe a tree isn’t such a good example. It sort of also sounds like a world shaped like a Chinese pagoda with seven stories from bottom to top.”

“We call them levels,” Bael corrected her. “The first level of Hell, the fifth level of Hell, etc. We don’t call them circles, rings or stories.” He rubbed his chin, amazed that she had pictured his world as well as she did. “But your description hits somewhat close to the mark. A better way to envision Hell is to imagine each level as a vast, round terrace rising to a new and slightly less vast terrace and that leads to another until you reach this first level, and, yes, the seventh level is the foundation of Hell.”

“Just how vast are these circles—I mean, levels?”

“The first level, which is topmost and the smallest, contains five principalities or countries. There is a lake between three of them, called Lei Lello or Star Lake, for it reflects the only natural light in Hell. Bordering it is Keth, Allonia and Domain. The edge of Gollame marks the eastern border of the first level, neighbored by Keth and Allonia, and Absaliom borders the western border of the first level and Domain is its inland neighbor.”

“I must admit that your description of the levels as “terraces” sounded incongruously pretty.”

Bael snorted, sipped his wine and stared at the half-full glass. “Most of it is not, I assure you.”

“I’m sure it’s not. Tell me more of these seven levels. I’m assuming that some of the levels are livable, as this first one seems to be, but that others, as you imply, aren’t pleasant.”

Bael gave her a slightly condescending grin and raised his brows. “Very well, I’ll attempt a quick nutshell description for now. Below this level is the second. The expansive waters of Lei Lello, through connecting rivers, flow downward to it, so intensely from Keth and Domain, that they create the second level’s Great Lakes. We were so amazed when we discovered truly fertile land and sources of water from the third level up, that we named these lakes reverently: Lake Hope, Endurance Lake, Hidden Lake, and Lake Blessing. The second level also holds forests, farms and livestock ranches that now feed Hell.

“The lakes are bordered by a mountain range that climbs down­ward and covers nearly a quarter of the third level. We call that territory the Cahnohiom, the Great Hill Land, and Hell mines precious metals and jewels from it. The mountains are flanked on one side by Ajan Helvert or the Dark Green Wood and on the other side by Ajan Morvert or the Gray Green Wood. On the far side is a territory called Talith which means wonder in Eliomese. We named it after discovering it held a wealth of wild but edible vegetation and fruit, growing with barely any daylight, hence, our wonder.

“Below that, on the fourth level you’d be quite uncomfortable. The horrific aspects of Hell begin here: the dwellings of the damned, the demons and Hellspawn creatures; Sin City, where demons and fallen mortals who are serving us are permitted to entertain themselves; and our military barracks and prisons for souls incarcerated behind sturdy, psychic bars.

“After that it steadily gets worse. The fifth level is a punishment plane with burning deserts, suffocating quicksand, immense barren stretches of land with volcanoes, and vast facilities filled with torments and horrors to terrorize fallen sinners in need of intensive correction. The sixth level of Hell is where my father and our people landed when the Creator flung us here, a primordial world with more volcanoes, swamps, salt marshes and sparse vegetation that was barely edible. Had we been mortal, we would have starved in that world, but our angelic bodies allowed us to survive.

“And lastly, we descend to the final, seventh level, the foundation of Hell, a world of frozen waste with ice glaciers and steppes and tundra, and also a curiously cold, nearly endless stretch of beach that we call the Barren Sands. Surrounding the seventh level is an ocean the likes of which you have never experienced, not made of water, but of mist. When we finally explored all of Hell, those who ventured into the Sea of Mist soon became lost and were never seen again. We could hear them calling to us, but those who went in after them were also swallowed by the mist. At one point, only a century or so ago, we had an expedition venture into this sea with ropes tied around their bodies and one end of those ropes held firmly by others on the shore. We were able to bring those explorers back from the Sea of Mist this way, but they never found any of those who had previously been lost. Those who entered the mist had been horrified by it. They said it felt as if it were a plane of nonexistence, and once within it, as if they, too, didn’t exist. We sometimes sent the irretrievably damned into the Sea of Mist. There’s very little maintenance; it’s an excellent garbage disposal for souls too evil for even Hell to bear, sucked away and never again seen on our unsacred shores.”

“That’s horrible, Bael!”

“This is Hell, Leianna.”

“Yes, Bael, it is, but we’re supposed to be working for a possible alliance, through which reforms and improvements can be made in Hell.”

Across the table, Azmodeus spat out his wine in a rude spray, laughing hysterically. Red splatters dotted the white table cloth. “Excuse me?! Did you say you want to improve Hell?! For whose benefit and by what authority have you embarked upon your lofty enterprise? Bael! Ashtoreth! Are you planning to mutiny against dear old Dad?”

Ashtoreth’s fingers tapped against the stem of his wine glass. “No, Az. We’re simply here to discuss a possible reconciliation, pending Father’s approval, to mutually benefit both Heaven and Hell.”

“What could we possibly offer Heaven?”

Leianna cut in. “The redemption of lost souls.”

Az studied her incredulously, no longer a recalcitrant, lanky boy dogging her and Bael’s footsteps to surreptitiously watch their love-making and failing in his quest. He had grown tall, although Ashtoreth was taller and Bael even more so, but Az was as trim and firmly muscled. A man now, handsome with his waves of blond hair, his green eyes, he could play the young Apollo. But his comeliness was marred by his sneers and scowls, the emblems of his perpetually adversarial nature. He leaned toward her now, elbow on the table, hand cupping his chin. “Why? Does Heaven lack its quota lately?

She looked to Quatama, taken aback. He pushed away his untouched dessert, cupping his hands on the table. “Leianna speaks too soon. But you could offer forgiveness.”

Lucifer sat up straighter, his anger plain. “Forgiveness?! What sin has Heaven committed that demands our absolution? Does Heaven even consider itself partially to blame for the events leading up to the exile of my people, after crushing my peaceful rebellion!”

Quatama turned to the right, facing Lucifer while he answered him, a gesture of respect, and held up his hands palms outward. “We would ask you and your folk to forgive us for abandoning you for so long, for not healing the rift between us sooner, and for being closed to compromise.”

Lucifer leaned slowly back in his chair. “What changed your mind? And let me ask a second question: what does Heaven want of me after I forgive you, yours, and our Creator? Do you propose to serve in Hell now and usurp me, making those improvements Leianna so innocently wants?”

“Not to usurp you, but to restore you. We hope to rehabilitate the souls of Hell, as Leianna said.”

Lucifer smirked, clearly befuddled by Quatama’s proposal. “And will she wear a name tag as she works: ‘Welcome to Hell! My name is Leianna. I’m your social worker?’”

Leianna ignored his joke. “Father Lucifer, don’t you want to return to Heaven?”

Lucifer gaped at her, then pushed back his chair and rose. “This initial meeting of the dubious alliance committee is concluded by my say so. I’ll think upon your offer and perhaps lay down some terms and conditions for Heaven, if I seriously consider it. After all, this is my world now, built by my people and our toil, with no thanks to Heaven, and I would protect it from Heaven’s frivolous dichotomy. Heaven may know the difference between right and wrong, between good and evil, but Hell enforces it!

“You will both be escorted safely by Bael and Ashtoreth beyond the borders of Hell. Good night.” He held up his hands. The force field around the table flared briefly for a moment, then disappeared.

As he walked away, Leianna spoke: “I would like to stay awhile to visit with Mother Aff . . . Affaeteres.”

“As you wish,” Lucifer said over his shoulder. “I’m sure it would do her some good.” He left the dining room.

Affaeteres was staring at her, both her resignation and emotional hunger plainly showing. “That would please me very much.”