Diary of a journey through Hell

by Trudie Collins

  We walked through a small wood, exiting onto green fields. The sun was shining overhead, though I knew it couldn’t be the real sun. I asked Kris about it and was informed that it was just another illusion, as most of the underworld was, created from the imaginations of the gods that built it.

  When the sun was directly above us, indicating it was midday (at least it would if we were not down here), Kris announced it was time to have some lunch. After what I had seen in the ‘torture’ buildings, I wasn’t hungry. I was, however, exhausted and collapsed wearily onto the ground. My feet were killing me. I felt like I had walked a marathon.

  Kris opened his bag, put his hand in without looking and withdrew a can of coke. He held it out to me, but I shook my head. “Do you have any water?” I asked and was surprised when he delved back into his bag and produced a bottle of spring water. I was even more surprised to find it was cold. Robert took the coke as Kris withdrew a package full of sandwiches. There was a variety of white and brown bread and each seemed to have a different filling. Ham and cheese, tuna and cucumber, roast beef with mustard. Where had they come from? His bag had looked almost empty earlier.

  Kris chivalrously allowed me to choose first and frowned at me when I shook my head. “We have a long way to go,” he said. “You need to eat. Would you like something different?”

  I explained that I was not hungry and the reason why. Those torture rooms had completely killed my appetite. He did not seem happy, but did not push me.

  All too soon we were heading off again. As the sun began to set it seemed almost like we were taking a pleasant stroll through the countryside. As we walked I spotted deer, the occasional rabbit and small birds flying overhead. It was easy to forget where we really were.

  “We should set up camp soon,” Kris suddenly said. Camp? We had no camping gear with us. What was he talking about? “If we continue on for much longer we will reach the mountains and it is always best to approach them during the day.”

  “Why don’t we keep going till we get there then sleep in the foothills,” Robert suggested, as though he knew the area better than Kris. He has a habit of doing that sort of thing which, while useful some of the time, can be really annoying.

  “Trust me. We don’t want to be too close to the mountains at night. Ogres live there.”

  Ogres? Nobody warned me there would be ogres. Aren’t ogres dangerous?

  “You’re winding us up, right?” I asked. Kris shook his head. “Here seems a nice place to camp,” I said. I did not want to go any closer to ogre territory thank you very much.

  Kris smirked at me. Was he laughing at my reaction? “Either of you know how to put up a tent?” he asked.

  Robert has been camping since he was young and is pretty adapt at erecting tents. Kris went into his bag once more and withdrew tent poles, closely followed by the ground sheet and canvas. I’m not kidding. He ended up pulling three complete tents out of his backpack. I was beginning to think it was a magic bag, but when I made the suggestion to Kris, he laughed. He didn’t, however, provide any other explanation.

  Once the tents were set up, along with sleeping bags and pillows (they also came from Kris’s bag, obviously), Kris sent us in search of wood for a fire. There were no trees nearby, so imagine my surprise when I found a large pile of logs not far away. They looked as if they had been cut by an axe. We picked up a couple each and returned to the campsite, only to find that Kris already had a good fire going.

  “What is going on?” I asked as I dropped the logs beside him.

  “Gods live here, remember. This entire realm has been designed to provide you with what you need, when you need it.”

  That sounded good. “So if I wished for a bubble bath, one would appear in front of me?” I asked hopefully.

  “No,” Kris replied. Damn. I could have done with a nice long soak. “I said what you ‘need’, not what you ‘want’. There is a big difference.”

  So here I am, writing in my diary, alone in my tent. Kris and Robert are by the fire, roasting something that Kris caught. I don’t think I want to know what. Kris told us that we would not actually be crossing the mountains, thank goodness, but instead would be skirting around them. It is still going to be a long day tomorrow, so hopefully I will be able to get some proper sleep.

  Robert has just called to me so I had better go. Hopefully I won’t be eating any of the rabbits I saw, but having skipped lunch, I am now so hungry I will eat almost anything.

  Day 2

  I have given up on using the correct date. Kris explained that time works differently down here, so I have no way of keeping track of the real days. I could continue to label the days chronologically, but it would cause a lot of confusion once we leave here, so I think just keeping track of the ‘days’ spent down here is a better idea. Of course, I am assuming that we are going to escape from Hell. (Sorry for keep calling it Hell Kris, I can’t help it.)

  I couldn’t sleep last night. I tossed and turned for ages before giving up and leaving the tent. The fire was still glowing, so I sat beside it, staring at the flames. I have always found fire relaxing; it’s kind of hypnotic. I almost screamed when I heard a voice behind me ask if I was OK. Guess I was not the only one who couldn’t sleep.

  “Can I get you anything?” Kris asked when I explained why I was still awake. I jokingly asked for hot chocolate and was surprised (though I shouldn’t have been) when Kris removed a mug from his bag, along with a container of milk and a bar of chocolate. He placed the mug in the fire, filled it with milk then dropped in some chocolate. It was soon boiling, so he removed it and handed it to me without burning his hands. Somehow the contents were hot, but the mug itself was still cool.

  I have to be honest; it was the best hot chocolate I have ever tasted. Kris and I talked while I drank. He is a nice guy, easy to converse with, but evasive when asked anything personal. I have no idea what he is doing in Hell and he refused to tell me. Maybe he is a criminal and looking after visitors is his punishment, but I can’t bring myself to believe that.

  He asked about me and Robert and I could not stop myself from laughing when he thought we were a couple. I ended up telling him all about Bill; how we got together and how things were going really well until he got the opportunity to go to a university in Japan for a year. I explained that it was the chance of a lifetime and Bill would have been a complete idiot not to go, but Kris did not seem to understand, so I gave up and went back to my tent to attempt to get some more sleep.

  Eventually I must have dropped off as the next thing I knew I was being woken up by the smell of frying bacon. I didn’t ask where it had come from; I’m sure I would not have liked the answer. Things appearing in Kris’s bag is beginning to freak me out.

  As soon as we had finished eating, Kris and Robert packed up the tents. Yes, they did fit back into Kris’s backpack without any problems. I have given up asking him about it.

  A short time later the mountains came into view. They were either very small or very far away. Taking into account what Kris had said about not camping too close to them I decided it must be the former. I wasn’t wrong. It did not take us very long to arrive at the foothills and I was not impressed.

  “You call these mountains?” I asked disdainfully. “More like large hills. They are not even big enough to have snow on the top.”

  Poor Kris looked embarrassed. “They serve their purpose,” he said quietly. “What would be the point in making them bigger? No-one would ever be able to climb to the top.”

  I was about to make some comment when I heard a noise that made the words die in my throat. It sounded like a growl, deep but loud. One word filled my mind. Ogre.

  “Does anyone else hear that?” I asked in a shaky voice.

  Kris had the audacity to smile. He knew what I was thinking. “It’s just the wind. This part of the mountain is full of caves and the air rushing past their entrances causes them to emit those sounds.”

  Caves? As in where ogres live?

&nb
sp; “Besides,” he continued. “Ogres do not usually come out during the day.”

  Usually? I wish he would not use words like that. ‘Usually’ is not a good word to use when discussing the chances of meeting an ogre. ‘Never’ would be a better word. I glanced at Robert. He, too, looked nervous, but remained silent.

  “We need to circle round for a while before continuing north,” Kris said, then headed off without waiting to see if we were following. Robert ran to catch up with him and took the lead. He had no idea where we were going, but I was confident that Kris would soon yell at him if he needed to change direction.

  The day wore on and I began to tire. I couldn’t keep up the gruelling pace that Robert was setting and I began to fall further and further behind. I heard what sounded like another growl and froze. That sounded close. I looked around me. I could not see any sign of any caves and there was no trace of a breeze, let alone wind, so what was making the noise this time?

  Before I could ponder this any further, I felt something grab my waist. I let out a scream as huge hands hoisted me into the air. Kris turned to see what was wrong and watched as I was thrown over the shoulder of whatever had hold of me. The son of a bitch did nothing, absolutely nothing. He just watched as I was taken away. Eventually he turned to call to Robert, but I have no idea what he said as his voice was drowned out by my continual screaming.

  I beat on the creature’s back with my fists, but the only effect was to make my hands hurt. Tears streamed down my face as my terror mixed with frustration at my helplessness. It did not take long to reach the animal’s cave and I was still screaming when it placed me gently on the floor. Sunlight streamed through the entrance and I quickly backed away into the shadows.

  “Do not be afraid. I will not hurt you,” I heard a gravelly voice say. The monster was talking? Or had my terror melted my mind?

  I continued to edge backward until I felt the wall of the cave behind me and I could go no further, then I curled up into the foetal position and sobbed while shaking uncontrollably.

  I heard the creature move deeper into the cave, then a few moments later it approached me, holding out what appeared to be a stone cup.

  “Please drink.” It sounded almost concerned for me. “It is only water, but will help to calm you down.”

  “Are you an ogre?” I stammered.

  “Of course,” it replied, surprised by the question.

  “Are you going to eat me?” I didn’t want to hear the answer, but could not prevent myself asking the question.

  “Yuck,” it said, pulling a face. “What a disgusting thing to suggest.”

  I took the cup from its hand and sniffed the contents. It did appear to be water, so I took a tentative sip. It was cool and refreshing and as it is next to impossible to cry and drink at the same time, it did calm me down a little.

  The ogre slowly moved away from me into the lighter part of the cave. It did not look like I expected it to. I imagined ogres to be big, ugly and vicious looking, but this one wasn’t. It was big, yes, but not especially ugly and it definitely did not look vicious. It must have been twice the height of an average man, well-built and very muscular. Its skin (or should I call it hide?) was like that of an elephant, except it was brown not grey. All of its facial features seemed too big for its face; the ears, nose, mouth, eyes, even the chin. This, however, had the effect of making it comical rather than ugly. I can think of a few humans that looked far worse than this ogre, but I won’t name names.

  And it was completely hairless. Whenever I heard the word ogre, I pictured large ears with tufts of hair growing out of them and was almost disappointed that this turned out not to be true. It was looking at me with sorrowful eyes.

  “I am sorry I scared you,” it said.

  I should have said ‘that’s OK’ or ‘don’t worry about it’, but this thing had scared the shit out of me; I couldn’t bring myself to be nice to it.

  “Why did you take me?” I asked. The answer surprised me.

  “Hades told me to.” What? The god of the underworld told an ogre to kidnap me? What did I do wrong?

  “It is part of a test,” it continued.

  “A test?”

  “Yes. For your friend. Hades is testing his bravery. If he comes to rescue you then he has passed the test.”

  “And if he doesn’t?”

  “Then he will not be allowed to travel any further and must return to his home.”

  “And what will happen to me?” The ogre had turned his nose up at eating me, but had not yet told me I would be free to go no matter what Robert did. I had every confidence that Robert would come after me, but there was no harm in finding out the alternatives.

  “You will be free to go with him, of course, should you choose to do so. You will remain here as my guest for two days. If your friend has not come looking for you by then, he will not be coming.”

  OK, so I was a guest not a prisoner. That was good at any rate.

  “My name is Perceval,” the ogre continued. “May I offer you something to eat?”

  “That depends.”

  “On what?”

  “What ogres eat.”

  It started to emit a strange sound and smiled at me. I’m sure it was chuckling. Its smile actually made it look quite sweet; for a monster anyway.

  A short while later we were both seated at a stone table (well Perceval sat at it, I sat on it) eating an assortment of fruit. This supposedly vicious monster was a vegetarian. Who would have thought?

  “I’m Rachel,” I said, before taking a bite out of something big and green that tasted like a really sweet version of a lemon. Sounds disgusting, I know, but it wasn’t.

  “Do you have faith in your friend?” Perceval asked.

  “You mean Robert? Of course I do.”

  “He does not know this is a test. He will not know that he cannot travel any further in this realm if he does not at least try to rescue you. Are you really sure he will put your well-being above getting back his girlfriend?”

  Put like that, I began to have doubts, but I wasn’t going to let the ogre know that. “He will come,” I said with a confidence I no longer felt.

  “Does Kris know why you took me?” I suddenly found myself asking. It bothered me that he had just watched as I was kidnapped. He could at least have tried to help me.

  “Yes.” The reply was simple and straight forward, without any unnecessary words. At least I could put my doubts about one of my travelling companions aside. I could not have been certain he would have reacted any differently had he not known I would be alright, but I allowed myself to believe it anyway.

  “Would you like to bathe?” Perceval surprised me by asking once our meal was finished.

  “Yes please,” I said, envisioning the nice warm bubble bath that Kris’s backpack would not produce. The reality was very different.

  Perceval lit a candle (don’t ask me how ogre’s make candles, I have no idea) and led me deep into his cave. I began to hear faint sounds of trickling water and we seemed to be heading toward them. We turned a corner and I gasped at the sight. We had entered a large cavern, the roof of which towered above us. A gap at the top allowed sunlight to pour through, illuminating walls which were covered with some kind of white crystal that gleamed in the sunlight.

  It was beautiful. It was also warm. There was a large pool in the middle and I could see steam rising from it. Looking closely I saw it was continuously being fed by a small waterfall at one end. This must have been the source of the sounds I had been hearing.

  I raised a questioning eyebrow to Perceval. “How?” I asked.

  “The water flows from deep underground where it is much warmer than here,” the ogre explained. “These caves are riddled with such pools and we ogres make our homes as close to them as possible.”

  We ogres? How many more of them were there? Did I really want to know?

  “Are there many of you?” I found myself asking. Apparently my subconscious wanted to know the answer even
if I didn’t.

  “Quite a few,” Perceval said. Well that was helpful. Not. “Though the majority of the tribe live on the other side of the mountain.” That was good news at any rate, though that did not mean there weren’t hundreds of ogres nearby. I found myself wondering if they were all vegetarians or just Perceval, but forced my mind away from those thoughts. If I was going to survive living in this cave for the next day or so I would have to convince myself that I was not going to end up on the menu if one of Perceval’s neighbours decided to visit.

  There was a pile of furs in one corner of the cavern, which Perceval brought to my attention. “Use those to dry yourself when you have finished bathing,” he instructed. Was he a he? I had no idea, but he didn’t come across as female so referring to him as male feels right. Was there even such a thing as a female ogre? That was a question that could wait until later. Right then, warm water was calling to me.

  Perceval placed the candle he was holding in a hole in one of the rocks that could almost have been made for it. “I do not need the light to return,” he continued. “When you are dressed once more, follow the tunnel through which we have come. You cannot get lost.”

  Without saying another word he turned around and left. I was now completely alone in a cavern under a mountain in Hell, but I felt strangely at ease. Without worrying if there were other ogres around spying on me, I stripped off my clothes and dipped my foot into the pool close to where the water was trickling into it. Did I say warm water? This was hot. Not unbearably, but hotter than I would feel comfortable bathing in for long. I walked around the edge and tried the temperature further away from the source of the hot water. This was much better and I slowly walked in.

  The water was perfectly clear, allowing me to see that the sandy bottom was completely free of rocks. It sloped down gently so that I could sit comfortably at the edge and wash myself or if I ventured deeper I could float and swim.