by Tad Williams
I left a message on the phone number Sam had given me, then got on with my other post-Hell errands. I went down to the Compasses to see my angel friends and made up crazy stories about where I’d been for the last three weeks. (Yep. It turned out I’d only been gone three weeks. Like I said, time runs differently in Hell. They sure could pack a lifetime’s misery into twenty-something days.) But I was so pale from lying in a closet all that time that I had an inverse suntan, so I told them I’d gone up to Seattle to visit a friend. Monica, who knew me better than anyone now Sam was gone, treated this fiction with the contempt it deserved, but she didn’t press me for the actual details. She probably assumed I’d been shacked up with someone. I had a few questions for her, however, and waited until we had a table to ourselves for a few minutes while Young Elvis and Teddy Nebraska arm-wrestled at the bar and everyone else made fun of them.
“What about Walter Sanders?” I asked. “Has anyone heard from him?” I knew they hadn’t because I knew where he still was, which was serving as purser on The Nagging Bitch, sailing the seas of Hell and spreading the Lifters’ message, but I was curious what people thought about his disappearance.
To her credit, Monica looked worried. “No, nobody has. I asked The Mule, but he says he thinks he’s been transferred. It’s just shit trying to get information out of the Big House.”
“Amen.” Which reminded me, I definitely had to talk to Temuel soon. The archangel deserved at least an edited report on what had happened to me, since he’d been more instrumental in getting me there (and back) than anyone else, and I in turn had quite a few questions I needed to ask him. “And you, kiddo. How are you doing?”
I just meant to be affectionate. We’d been through a lot together, Monica and I, and if much of that time I’d been trying to escape having a proper relationship, well, that wasn’t her fault. But as soon as I said it, she started looking furtive, even guilty. “Okay, I guess. Why? I mean, you don’t usually ask, Bobby.”
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to break any rules . . .”
I never got to finish my thought, because just that moment, to everybody’s surprise (mine even more than the rest) the door of the Compasses swung open, and my dear old friend Sam Riley walked in. I nearly fell out of the booth.
Monica jumped up and ran to hug him. Within moments almost every angel in the place was swarming him like bees come to watch the honey-dance. Sam laughed and shook hands, even accepted some hugs and kisses, which wasn’t much like him. At last he shouted to Chico to get him a ginger ale, then let himself be backed against the bar while the rest of his chums threw questions at him.
Chico the bartender looked almost as nonplussed as I was, as if he knew about Sam’s real current status with our bosses, but he kept his mouth shut and kept the ginger ales coming. As far as I knew, Clarence was the only other person besides me who knew that Sam was officially a Traitor to Heaven, but I was still so surprised to see him there, I could hardly speak. What was Sam doing? Was he trying to force our bosses’ hands, somehow?
I hung back while Sam spun some crazy tale to the Whole Sick Choir, hinting that he was on some kind of super-secret undercover mission (which raised the question of what he was doing here, in broad tavern-light, but nobody bothered to ask). With a notable lack of interest in his own safety, my old buddy sat in the Compasses for nearly an hour, answering questions (or, to be more honest, pretending to answer questions while lying through his teeth) and acting pretty much like the same old Sammariel that everyone missed so badly. At the end of the performance he finally slid past the others to me, draped one of his large arms over my shoulder, and suggested we go grab a late-night bite.
The residents of the Compasses lined up to say goodbye like Sam was visiting royalty. They made him promise not to be a stranger and reminded him of several upcoming events that, in other times, he would have been part of. Sam laughed and promised he’d do his best to make each and every one. That part was a lie too, but I think most of the angels knew that. They might not have had any idea of the true reason, but Sam’s return had the distinct air of someone who had moved on—who was only back for a visit.
As soon as we got outside, I was up in his face. “What are you doing here, man? Really? You’re just going to waltz in like nothing’s wrong? What if Clarence had been there? He would have tried to arrest you again.”
“I knew he wasn’t there. As for me showing up at all, well, think of it as my plan to keep our bosses guessing.”
“What do you mean, ‘our bosses’? You’re on the Enemies List, remember?”
Sam looked up and down Main Street. “You know, I wasn’t making that up about being hungry. I’m starved. One thing about living in a pocket universe and not wearing a mortal body most of the time, you get really nostalgic for food. Is that Korean place on the edge of Spanishtown still open late?”
“Bee Bim Bop? Yeah, I think so.”
We got there and found a small line of hipsters blocking the door, but it didn’t take too long to get a table, even on a Friday night. I had rediscovered beer since I had returned from you-know-where—that was one of the things I had been thinking about the whole time, how good a cold beer would taste instead of one of the weird root-based drinks they served up in Hell. Hellbeer might get you shitfaced even quicker than the earthly stuff, but it was about as refreshing as drinking lukewarm bathwater after a fat guy’s gotten out of it.
I ordered a bowl of the stuff the restaurant’s named after, rice and shredded meat and fried egg. Sam had his usual order of inexplicable soup, followed by several kinds of hot, spicy stuff, and we mostly concentrated on eating and drinking—tea, in Sam’s case. By the time I was working on my second beer I finally felt ready to talk, so I started with my meeting at the Museum of Industry with Temuel, then gave him the rest of it—abridged, of course, or we would have been there for days.
“Well, B, I don’t want to say ‘I told you so,’ so I’ll just say, ‘What a dumbshit,’ instead.” He shook his head. “I did try to tell you not to go there, though.”
“Yeah. And I want a little credit for how hard I had to work to ignore you.” I leaned back and signaled for another Sapporo. We were close to the only patrons left in the place now, the hands of the clock reaching for midnight like a stick-up victim’s, but I leaned forward and lowered my voice anyway. “I’m gonna tell you something, Sammy-boy.” I was definitely feeling all those beers. My body had gotten out of practice while I had been filtering Inferno-booze through demonic kidneys. “Yeah, it was probably stupid, but that’s not what’s bugging me. It’s the whole setup. Hell. Heaven. I mean, you should have seen it. It was horrible, but they were alive, Sam. They were doing things, making plans, struggling to get by. Shit, in some ways it wasn’t that different from San Judas.”
“I could have told you that, and I’ve only been to Jude.”
“I’m not joking.”
Sam smiled. “I know you’re not. And I know tomorrow morning you’ll think you were telling me really important stuff, BD. But just remember this when you’ve pissed all that beer out of your system: I already figured this shit out.”
“Huh?”
“Why do you think I parted company with our original corporate sponsors? Why do you think I’m living in exile in a hole in reality that both Heaven and Hell will be happy to disintegrate back into the ether as soon as they find out where it is? Because I can’t put up with this shit anymore. Who knows, maybe our bosses are right.” He frowned. “Maybe they’re telling the truth about everything, and maybe sheer nastiness really is the only way that Good will ever defeat Evil. Maybe by bowing out of the Cold War I’ve just doomed you and the rest of my friends when the Last Trump starts blowing and the dead get up and salute.” He looked flushed, as if he’d been drinking something other than rice tea, but after a moment I realized it was something else, a deep, deep anger. “But you know what? I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t just keep pushing an agenda I didn’t believe in. And if you ever get to feeling the
same way, Bobby . . . well, just let me know.”
I stared at him. It was strange, seeing this Sam. I knew about his change of heart, his decision to act on his principles and join the Third Way—hell, I’d had it rubbed in my face on that night at Shoreline Park—but somewhere deep down I’d never quite let myself believe it, as if all this political stuff was just a lark for him, like a pop musician who suddenly wanted to play real roots music. It wasn’t just a lark, though. And if I thought about it long enough, it began to make sense.
I couldn’t afford to think about it that long.
“Yeah, but what I need from you now is something a bit more specific, pal.” I picked up the check and looked it over, then put a couple of twenties and a ten on top of it and set it back down on the little tray. “Yes, I’m buying. That’s why you’re going to earn your meal. I need a place to make the exchange. Any suggestions?”
“With Eligor?” He shook his head. “Of course with Eligor. Right.” He drew circles with rice tea on the tabletop as he considered. “I’d say you have to pick a public place, for safety’s sake, but the more I think about that the less certain I am.”
“Why?”
“Because someone might recognize you. You’re already walking a tightrope with the Big House folk. All they’d need is a report that you’ve been meeting up with Eligor the Horseman, and you’d be headed for a Deep Audit.” Which was a way of saying I’d have my soul taken apart by Fixers, fleck by fleck, and everything I’d ever felt, thought, said, or done would be delivered to people like the Ephorate, at least one of whom was probably my sworn and deadly enemy. From the rumors I’ve heard, Heaven’s interrogators are as thorough as the torturers of Hell, just a bit more subtle. “Well, where then?”
“I don’t know. I’ll figure it out and call you. I’ve got a few things to take care of while I’m here in town, but I’ll be thinking about it.”
“Things?”
“Jeez, Dollar, you’re not the only friend I have in the real world, you know.” He picked a toothpick out of the bowl on the front counter. “You might be the only one who’ll go out to Korean at eleven o’clock at night, though, so I’ll do my best to come up with a location that will improve your chances of surviving. Fact is, I think I better come with you on this little mission.”
I finished the last of the beer in the bottle, then caught up to him as he went through the door. “Last couple of times you’ve come along to help me we almost died. Almost died ugly, too. Let’s try to do better next time.”
He saluted me with an imaginary glass. “Confusion to our enemies, sport!”
“Yeah.” I walked out beside him, but he held up his hand.
“Don’t worry about me,” he said. “Like I said, I’ve got some other stuff to do tonight. I’ll call you. Tomorrow at the latest.”
I watched him saunter off, hands in his pockets and big shoulders rounded. It had gone cold, especially for a July night, and I was just considering whether I wanted to stop back in at the Compasses or head home when someone softly cleared her throat just behind me.
I spun around. Standing in the garish light of the Korean restaurant’s window was an old Hispanic-looking woman, a stranger. She extended a hand toward me, and I saw she was holding a slightly ratty bunch of carnations with a rubber band around them.
“No thanks,” I said out of reflex, but even as I did so I realized I had done a dangerous thing, walking out into the night with my guard down. And just as I realized this, I realized I had seen this woman before, but not as a woman. Something in the face was familiar, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
“You’re not going to buy a flower from a nice old lady, Bobby?” She smiled, showing me some authentic-looking, small-town Mexican dentistry. “How about taking a stroll with me, then?”
I had my hand inside my coat, groping for the butt of my FN, before I realized who it was. “Temuel?” I whispered. “Is that you?”
The archangel nodded and rearranged her headscarf. “And I really would like to take a little walk.”
forty-six
the funniest racist i know
IT WAS about midnight, but the Camino Real was still pretty busy. We walked south, past the clubs and liquor stores of the mixed-up neighborhood that had grown between Spanishtown and the rich, might-as-well-be-private streets of the Atherton District. We walked more than a few blocks, and Temuel didn’t seem in any hurry to start talking.
Meanwhile I was doing my best to figure out where my archangel and I stood. There were some things I was definitely going to tell him, including how I delivered his message in Hell, and what happened because of it. There was some other stuff I thought I should mention, but carefully, like the fact that Walter Sanders was now working as an accountant on a religious missionary’s pirate ship in Hell. But there were other things I felt much less comfortable discussing: Caz was one of them, of course, but so was a lot of the stuff about Smyler, most definitely including the fact that I now felt pretty sure the crazy little monster was sent by Anaita, a high-ranking angel who just happened to be one of Temuel’s own superiors.
Someday I’d love to be able to have a conversation with somebody who has no secrets or subtext, just to see what it’s like. I bet it would be fun. At the very least, it would be less exhausting than what I usually have to go through.
It was probably only coincidence, but as we passed an Episcopalian church, Temuel finally began to talk. I could see the lights inside, but since there was a janitorial service van parked in front, and I could hear the loud moan of a vacuum cleaner, I guessed the church was open for cleaning rather than for a late-night spiritual crisis.
“I’m glad to see you back, Bobby,” Temuel said. “I was worried about you.”
“Thanks. I was worried about me, too.”
“Were you able to deliver my message?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact.” I told him the whole story of my time with Riprash—well, most of it: I hadn’t mentioned Walter Sanders yet, and I didn’t go into a lot of detail about my own itinerary before and after delivering Temuel’s message, but I’d been strangely touched by the Lifters and felt he deserved to hear about it. “Am I right in thinking you’ve traveled there yourself?” I asked.
“Yes, but I’m not free to talk about it.” That was unusual right there—a higher angel who didn’t give you the truth wrapped up in a lot of fortune-cookie vagueness. “Now, let me ask you a question, Bobby. The ideas these Lifters have—do you think Riprash will be able to spread the message?”
I had no idea whether the missionary work was a project of Temuel’s own conscience or whether it was part of a larger heavenly strategy, but I answered him as truthfully as I could. “The system is so weighted against him and his message that I can’t be real optimistic. But if anyone down there’s able to do something with it, Riprash is the guy. He’s strong as an ox, smarter than most of the other folk, and has a pretty good heart for someone condemned to an eternity in Hell.”
Temuel nodded, then looked down at his phone, which I realized he’d done several times. “Are you expecting a call?” I asked.
He gave a little laugh. “I’m just looking for cell phone signatures from Heaven-issued phones. I keep getting a ping from one pretty close by.”
I wasn’t used to this side of Temuel. It was like watching your sweet old grandpa turn into Q from the James Bond movies. And I’m guessing about that since I didn’t know my own grandfather any more than I knew Alexander the Great. “Do you think you’re being followed?” I asked him. “Watched?”
“I’m not worried about that so much as about bumping into one of your co-workers.”
I looked at him and tried not to laugh. “Um, but you look like some lady who runs a corner bodega. How are any of them going to recognize you?”
He gave me a slightly disappointed look, as though I’d failed a test. “It can’t hurt to be careful.”
It occurred to me that other than the occasional visit to Hell, and this
, his second offsite with me, The Mule might not get out of Heaven very often. “Okay. You know best. But now I’ve got to talk to you about some other stuff.”
I gave him the rundown about how I’d met Walter Sanders in Hell. Temuel listened without comment, except to ask me what Walter, who the Mule called by his angel name, Vatriel, had remembered of his transition from off-duty advocate to infernal accountant.
“Nothing, really.” I was leaving out my interactions in Hell with Smyler and any suspicion of Anaita’s involvement, of course, which was a lot to leave out. There was a perfectly good chance Temuel was on my side—a mere archangel wasn’t supposed to be personally messing with Hell anymore than I was, so he certainly had secrets from our bosses—but angelic politics were too murky for me at the best of times, and the last few months had made them even freakier. “The whole thing’s pretty much a mystery. Someone tried to stick a knife in me outside the Compasses, as far as I can tell, but Walter got stabbed instead. Next thing you know, Walter’s in Hell with amnesia.”
“Vatriel was talking to you when it happened,” Temuel said shrewdly. “Maybe someone was trying to send you there instead.”
Which was pretty much what I’d thought myself, until Walter told me the last little bit he remembered, the sweet, angelic voice asking him about Bobby Dollar. The first attack might very well have been about me, but I was pretty sure now Walter really had been the target. Again, I kept this from Temuel. Damn, it was frustrating to have this kind of open access to a higher angel and not be able to take advantage of it. Still, those who know me would probably say whatever keeps me from rushing in headfirst is a good thing, and I really was trying to learn how to keep my mouth shut and my ears and eyes open.
“So, after all this, where are we?” I asked by way of changing the subject.
Temuel looked up from his phone and glanced around. “I think we’re coming up to Oakwood Road.”
