“Trust me. I have time.” She returned to her frightening gallery of instruments, considering them carefully. One looked particularly Medieval, with three metal claws. Iago cringed as her gaze lingered upon it.
“I was born in Hell,” Iago said.
“Born?”
“Yes,” said Iago, “to breeders, demons who do nothing except create other demons. And we are born in the mire, screeching and wailing and creating that tremendous cacophony which helps make Hell such a frightening place.” Though his vocal cords were still quite capable of creating that demonic yelp, he couldn’t conceive of doing it now. It was hardly dignified and had little use outside of Hell, or perhaps a pig-calling contest.
“And your mother and father?” Viola asked, settling upon an otoscope which she promptly thrust into Iago’s ear.
Iago winced. “I cringe at your use of those words. Some female demon birthed me, dropped me there in the insufferable muck and left to find another male with whom she could copulate. Needless to say, I have no attachment to dear old Mom and Dad. The demons who wail and screech the loudest will find themselves promoted to loftier positions in a century or so.”
“And that’s what happened to you, I presume,” Viola said as she moved to the other ear.
“Indeed. I became a torturer’s apprentice on the fifth circle of Hell. I hated it. Torturers are such poor conversationalists.”
“I can imagine so. Your ears are very clean, by the way,” Viola admitted, and Sofia’s pencil raced in a flourish of note taking. It seemed his personal hygiene was of greater import to her than his experiences in Hell.
“Um… thank you. And so, I crawled my way out of the place. My superiors saw my potential. They said I was a thinker.” He could not recall whether or not they actually paid him such a compliment at the time, but he liked to think they had. “Four hundred years ago, I was given this human body and knowledge of every tongue and dialect of Man. Then, I was sent to Earth to tempt and spoil him. I started in Europe and traveled here some time later. I was in Salem, you know,” he said proudly.
Iago could vividly recall the moist dirt between his fingers and under his nails as he pulled himself from one of the many passageways between Hell and Earth. He ripped himself from the ground, looked upon the muddied, pale hands which were now his and saw only opportunity. Shortly thereafter, a group of mowers kindly informed him that he would have to put on clothes if he were going to blend in on Earth.
“This human body, you say…” She trailed off as she returned the otoscope to its place on the table.
“Yes. We are given one to inhabit before coming to Earth. Not that we have any say in the matter. I might have liked to have been just a wee bit taller.”
“Can you describe your true form, Mr. Wick?”
“Nightmarish, I assure you. This human form allows me freedom on Earth, but in my true form, I am quite a fright.”
“Can you show me?” she asked with wide eyes and an uncharacteristically childlike wonder. A desire for knowledge, Iago thought, was still as much a weakness as any other desire.
He affected a suitably meek and bashful smile. “Not in my current state. Your lamb’s blood has done its job well. I’m weak. Not myself, I’m afraid. After walking around in this body for centuries, it’s not easy to portray my true self.”
“I have read only brief descriptions of demons in their original forms. I should like to see you, truly see you.”
“Oh, I’m certain you would. Alas,” he sighed mournfully, “it is an impossible feat at the moment.”
Viola took a thumb to thoughtfully stroke the spot where usually she sported a moustache. “But it is possible if your strength is returned to you?”
Iago leaned coyly against the pole to which he was lashed. “Do you think that would make it easier to send me back to the pit? If you saw me as the monster I truly am, it wouldn’t be difficult at all.”
Viola puzzled over this a moment before answering. “I will allow you to recover your senses entirely, but know that I still have the upper hand. Should you try to escape, I will not hesitate to shoot.”
He gave as profound a bow as he could muster. “Lovely. We have an agreement.” He drew a deep breath and continued, “And what about you, Viola? I gave you my story. The least you can do is tell me yours while we wait for my strength to return. Your dear older brother sold his soul for you, didn’t he?”
Viola’s cold expression spoke for her.
“I only feel you owe me your tale,” Iago continued and noticed Sofia Atchison shift uncomfortably in her seat. “What sort of man was your brother? The brave fool or the desperate drunk?”
Viola pressed her knife to Iago’s chest once more. “Do not tempt me. The only Thomas Atchison you need ever know is standing before you now. Speak of any other again, and I will cut you open from throat to navel. In the name of discovery, of course.”
For a moment, there was only her gaze, icy and intense. Then, she flicked the blade away once more. She continued, “Now! Tell me about your time on Earth. Do not skip a single detail! We must pass the time fruitfully. I think you fancy the sound of your own voice, Mr. Wick. You should enjoy this.”
XII.
If there was one thing Iago did well, it was talk. And so, he did.
Conveniently removed from every story of his long existence was one Dante Lovelace. It would do no good to alert the Atchisons to his presence. Iago told Viola that demons lived and worked alone, always alone, and the Powers Below liked it that way. She needn’t know Iago was quite defective in that sense.
He spoke of centuries on Earth, of a multitude of souls and sins. He spoke of his time in Marlowe. He spoke of holy water and witch hazel. He even answered outrageously embarrassing questions while Viola didn’t dare blush.
“Some demon hunters fear a demonic infiltration of the human race. Could you impregnate a human woman if you wanted?” she asked flatly.
“Yes, I could, but why in Hell would I want a gaggle of half-demonlings scurrying around the parlor?” he asked.
Sofia recorded each answer word for word. She seemed to disapprove of the details of some of his bawdier escapades (orgies in the name of Lucifer were always a little more legitimate if an actual demon or two attended), but she was dedicated to her task.
Eventually, once the golden-red glow of an October sunset sifted in through the slats of the cupola, even Viola ran out of questions. She retreated to the work table where she examined the notes her wife had taken.
Iago settled upon the ground whilst they combed through the details of his existence. As his strength returned to him a little at a time, he considered a plan for escape. His true form might, to some people, be frightening enough to send them running to the hills with no forwarding address, but he had a feeling Viola would not be so moved. At his strongest, he had the power to burn the barn to the ground, but how detestable it would be to put the Atchisons in real danger. There was no fun there!
No, he would very simply have to find a way to escape. From where he stood now, however, he could see nothing simple about it.
He was planning his departure when he looked in Viola’s direction and caught her chilly gaze. She admired him as one does a zoo animal: something which left her awestruck, but which must be caged and studied.
Their eye contact was broken by a sudden, loud bang from outside the barn. Viola soundlessly perked up like a cat on the prowl. It sounded very much like a gunshot, Iago thought, a development which had the potential to be unbelievably fortuitous or simply dreadful.
“What was that?” Sofia asked, but her wife held a finger to her own lips.
And so, they waited.
And so, no other sound was made within or without the barn.
Until Iago sighed, that is. “If you don’t mind my asking, where are we? There isn’t much I could do at the moment with that tidbit of information. You might as well tell me.”
Viola hesitated a moment longer before answering softly. “The Cu
nningham homestead. The house burned down some time ago. All that remained—”
“Was the barn,” Iago finished. Oh, he’d had quite enough of The Cunninghams after Kit’s whining and eventual murder at the Ackle mansion. “I am aware of the tragedy. And so, here we are?”
“I needed a place to hide you. No one has been on this land for months. I’ve always admired this barn for its eerie architecture. The cupola, for example, is quite foreboding. Reminiscent of a haunted house, one might say,” Viola answered.
The inventor crept to the padlocked door, a pistol in one hand and a ring of keys in the other. She unlocked three locks before cracking the door open so that she might peer out. Her rigid posture slackened after a moment. The coast was clear.
Iago moved on. “Sofia, you’re such a prim and lovely young woman. How did you become involved in this unpleasantness? Surely this isn’t what you consider fun.”
Viola locked the door again and returned to the work table. Sofia smiled warmly, benevolently. The last time Iago saw a smile so utterly righteous, it was framed by a habit. “I am helping my wife, Mr. Wick. She saved me once. The least I can do is assist her in her work.”
“Saved you?” he asked. “From one of the nasties which stalk about in the dark?”
Her eyes became suddenly somber. She shook her head. “Not exactly.”
“Sometimes,” Viola Atchison said, her voice cutting through the conversation like a knife, “humans are the monsters, Mr. Wick. We shall leave it at that.”
“Hmm,” Iago hummed. “Has your wife always been so dedicated to her work, Sofia? This all seems more stimulating that crafting a Mechanical Valet.”
Sofia answered, “She told me once that to live without passion is to not live at all. It’s a waste of a life.”
“I just wonder what it was that inspired such ardor in the first place.”
“What inspires you, demon?” Viola spat and didn’t bother to look up from her notes. “The truth? Isn’t that what you told me last night?”
“A desire for a man to be his truest self, yes. If he becomes the property of Hell in the process, wonderful. We don’t create sin. Man is very good at that. We merely give the necessary push to those who are already waltzing down that path.”
“And what precisely puts a person on that path?” Viola asked.
Which holidays one celebrated or the building in which one worshipped—if one worshipped—had nothing at all to do with it. These were common misconceptions often perpetuated by those in positions of religious power and their misguided flocks.
“To wrong your fellow man,” Iago answered. “To wrong him and then to do nothing about it, to feel no remorse. Then to do it again and again and again until… well, either Hell’s already claimed you or you find me at your doorstep looking to finish the job. Of course, the occasional good Samaritan does conjure a demon to sell their soul for the sake of someone else.” Iago looked thoughtfully upward. “I wonder… was that your brother’s story, Viola?”
Viola tossed the book of notes to the table and walked toward him. He was still weak, but perhaps he could urge her with a Hellish gaze to tell her story. Iago looked her deeply in the eye. Her mental defenses were down. It had been a long day.
She softened. “My brother.”
“Yes. Thomas Atchison. What of him?”
It was a strange embrace conjured by the gaze of a demon. She frowned, but she did not resist. “My brother, Thomas, was a drunk, a gambler, and a thief.”
“Charming,” Iago said. “Sounds like someone I’d love to meet.”
“Obviously. He attracted one of your kind.” She looked Iago in the eye. He took her hand for a stroll into the past, whether she liked it or not. “He stole from his own parents. His gambling debts were monstrous by the time of his death. We weren’t fond of each other, even as children. He enjoyed the baser pleasures in life while I always enjoyed the intellectual pursuit. We grew up in Bedbury, Ohio, a speck of a city full of the backward and dull. But when I was eighteen, I fell ill with fever. They thought I should perish.”
“And yet, you didn’t,” Iago said gently.
“I shan’t bore you with the details,” she said bitterly. “It’s a story I’m certain you’ve heard a thousand times before. One of your kind was charged with retrieving my brother’s soul. That idiot sold his soul to save me, and of course, he told me so. His hubris always was a foul and bloated thing.”
Iago clucked his tongue. “You resent him for saving you.”
“I required no such sacrifice!” Viola snapped. “Certainly not from him. And when he died suddenly and mysteriously in the corn fields behind our house six months after my recovery, it made my skin crawl knowing that his reprehensible soul had been spirited to Hell for me. The day he died was the day I left home. Does this satisfy your curiosity, Mr. Wick?” she asked. Sofia still sat quietly at the work table, testing a blood sample from their captive demon.
“In the case of such Faustian bargains, what a man does with his soul is his business,” Iago explained and was suddenly aware of a high humming coming from somewhere. He ignored it.
“Wrong,” she growled, “because I am the one who must go on living.”
“Yes,” Iago said, “living with the knowledge that the brother you despised was not as wicked as you thought. Every one of the damned has that iota of good. Deep down, you’re grateful. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have taken his name.”
And that was enough to inspire her fist to make merciless contact with Iago’s jaw.
Viola returned to her work in silence. Somewhere that high humming continued, and at once, Iago realized what he was hearing. An angel. The Atchisons were no incognito angels, of this he was certain, but the unmistakable hum still reached his ears. Had his sticky predicament garnered the attention of an agent of God? How terribly flattering. But it would do no good to rely on some hidden angel for rescue.
“How easily you coaxed my past to my lips. Your powers are obviously returning more quickly than I thought,” Viola said stonily, rebuilding the wall in her mind. “I shall soon see you for the foul thing you truly are.”
He smiled. Such a clever creature.
It was not unlike Iago Wick to miss an engagement. He frequently forgot or became too involved in his work to join Dante for dinner or whatever else they might have planned for the evening. Should Iago appear on time, it was usually cause for celebration.
But this time, something felt wrong. Dante hoped to find him poring over Atchison’s history, pridefully crafting his final temptation, but a quick walk to the immaculate apartment Iago called home revealed he wasn’t there. Dante tried—and failed—to assure himself it was nothing to worry about.
There was a dark force placed within demons when they assumed the duties of a catastrophe artist, a ball of concentrated unpleasantness and woe seated just below the heart. Dante affectionately called it his melancholia. Catastrophe artists drew upon the bank of sorrow lodged within them as inspiration in creating their tragedies and disasters. It was to be controlled, to be used as necessary. If allowed to flourish, it caused only acute misery for the unfortunate catastrophe artist. Dante was normally quite adept at keeping that shadowy beast at bay.
Still, there were occasionally times it triumphed, and he desired very much to be alone. In such instances, Iago had always been so very compassionate.
That evening, however, Dante did not wish to be alone with his darker thoughts. After considering his beloved tied to a railroad track, locked in a cell, on his merry way back to Hell, and a dozen other horrid possibilities, he decided he would need something to distract himself.
Dante tried planning for the ship he would soon board and sink. He tried playing the piano. He tried reading The Divine Comedy, a work for which he had a terribly strong affinity. None of it could assuage that sickening feeling that something was wrong.
He once again found himself distractedly stumbling through Alighieri’s tale when he heard a high humming. It wasn’t
unfamiliar, but he couldn’t imagine why he would have such a visitor. Catastrophe artists did not get along with angels. At least a tempter targeted those already on their way to damnation. The events Dante conjured were messes to the angels called to spirit away the souls of those who perished and were good enough to pass through Heaven’s gates.
Needless to say, he didn’t often invite those of a Heavenly persuasion into his parlor, and they certainly weren’t extending the olive branch, either.
A rosy and shimmering light blossomed in the corner of the parlor. It grew until he could see a face in its midst. There were flashes of golden eyes and high, regal cheekbones. Swaths of white cloth flowed in some breeze of indeterminable source, and Dante found himself growing a mite impatient. Angels labored under the delusion that they still lived in a world where it was normal to grandly appear before unassuming members of the public to inform them of acts of God, the Heavenly agenda, and so forth. Everything was overdone and self-indulgent, but a demon was hardly the creature to criticize someone for that.
Soon, the light dissipated, and he had an angel in his parlor.
“Gloria Ambrose,” he greeted and stood. “Does Heaven not believe in doors?”
The angel shook her head. “I feel this makes a grander impression, don’t you?”
He couldn’t deny her that.
“What brings you here, Miss Ambrose? Don’t you have a harp to play somewhere?”
Her fearsome eyes narrowed. “How humorous. Your partner is coloring your own personality, Mr. Lovelace. That’s not necessarily something to be embraced.” She looked in disgust to the dead vulture over the fireplace. “Indeed, your partner is the reason I’m here.”
Dante admitted that angelic intervention was not one of the foul fates he had considered throughout the evening. “Iago?”
“Mr. Lovelace, I wouldn’t normally meddle in the affairs of demons, but your Mr. Wick was kind to me recently when he didn’t need to be. I can’t risk intervening myself, but I feel that I owe him this. Mr. Wick is in trouble.”
The Last Temptations of Iago Wick Page 16
