“Yes, that is the River of Souls. When a soul comes to Hell, that is their final resting place. They are moved on the whims of Hell. They have no control, no input in their being. They just are. And they are aware of it all,” he added with great relish.
“Your mother is there. She is living out her final days, the rest of her days, as a small piece of the River of Souls. Like so many other humans, she is only useful in being a part of something bigger.” His voice was malicious. “Unlike you, she did not survive the journey. Or she would have been here next to you. It’s a pity, but at least not a complete waste.”
I will not cry. I will not, I thought. Not in front of this asshole. I knew he was taunting me, wanting to get a rise out of me. That’s how demons are. They enjoy hurting, and causing pain.
Which is why the thought of Granny making a bargain with this douchebag was as painful as anything else that was happening to me. I finally glanced down at my feet. They were not on fire, but they itched and burned terribly. I wanted to scratch them and never stop, but I couldn’t move.
“You feel it, do you not?” His voice was close to my ear, whispering, filled with glee. “The fires of Hell? It’s different, I am told, when one is actually dead. When a human is brought to Hell, in their human form, the very auspices of Hell rebel against it. This is a place for demons, for the fallen, and for souls that belong here. Humans were never meant to be here, much as some of you deserve it. So when you are here, your being, and the powers of Hell know there is something wrong. I will keep you human, third Desdemona, until your human form fails. Once that happens, your soul will still be here, still be mine.” He laughed. “Life has been rather boring. This will bring some excitement into it. Once I have your soul, I will find the next Desdemona.”
“There isn’t another one. I’m the last.”
“Is that so? There are other Nightingales. One by one, I shall have them.”
“You have me and Mee— my mother. That’s what you said you wanted!”
He laughed. “It was. But when a bargain agreed upon is not fulfilled, I am no longer bound to my agreement. Thus, I have decided that I will have all the Nightingales.”
“That’s not what you said!” I whisper-shouted. It hurt too much to speak louder.
“I did not share everything with you in the moment, no.” Seeing my look of fury, he laughed some more. “I always win. No matter what you humans try, I always win. You will not be lonely for too long.”
Smiling, with his hands on his hips, he turned away from me. “Get in here!” he bellowed.
There was silence, and then a scurrying of limbs, along with small whimpers. What fresh hell was this? As I watched, my feet still itching, and tears leaking from my eyes, an assortment of creatures hurried in. I couldn’t see any one creature. They moved en masse, bowing and scraping. The fear from them was a palpable stench.
There was a lot of weird hair, and odd colors, and claws, but I felt pity. These creatures were consigned here as much as I was, and they were afraid of this asshole. The way the fear was coming off them, they lived in fear. The fear had come into the room before they did. And Ashlar stood there grinning like a proud parent.
He really needed to die. I put that on my To-Do list. Once I got out of here, his ass was mine.
“Watch her. She does not sleep. She does not move. She does not do anything other than stay awake and observe. If you see that she is beginning to move about, you are to immobilize her. Is that understood?” Ashlar asked.
The herd of little demons all nodded and bowed and made assenting noises. “I will return, and I expect her suffering to have increased. Take it in turns. She is never to be alone.” Ashlar stared down at me. “There, you see? I am an attentive host. I shall return.” He walked away from me and then disappeared.
All the small demons looked at me with wide eyes. They began speaking among themselves. Whatever they were saying, I couldn’t understand it. But whatever it was escalated, and they were rolling around on the floor, shouting, kicking, biting.
When the dust—helldust?—settled, one small demon, with a long nose, big eyes, and arms that hung to the floor was left. The other demons hurried away, and it was just me and the little guy. Like everything else here, he radiated suffering. Sadly, he waved his hand at me.
I felt my body press down against whatever I was lying on.
I had to get out of here. But how? I’m generally an optimist, but things were looking rather bleak. If I did nothing, I would die here. Not for a long time, according to Ashlar the Tour Guide, but I would die. I would never see my family again.
At the thought of my mother, tears fell down my cheeks. They dried up before they reached my jaw, and the salt in the tears made my face itch. Everything itched. My feet were still the worst. A shuffling noise next to me made me turn my head—slowly—and see what the little misery demon was doing.
His eyes, if it was possible, were bigger. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was about to burst into tears.
“What’s next on the agenda?” I got out. Wiggling my upper body allowed me to scratch my back and ease some of the itching.
His eyes widened, and he said, “Beeval.”
“What? I don’t speak Hell.” I didn’t even know if there was a Hell language.
He peered around, his movements fearful. Then he crept closer, laid one long-fingered claw on my hand, and pet it like you’d pet a cat. “Beeval,” he said. He looked directly at me, and used the other hand to point to himself. “Beeval.”
“Your name is Beeval?” I asked.
The corners of his mouth turned up, and he got all watery-eyed again. “Beeval, Beeval,” he repeated.
“Desdemona,” I said. “I’m Desdemona.”
“Desimo?” Beeval sounded it out slowly.
“Close enough. Beeval, can you help me?” I tried to sit up, but I was bound to this board, or whatever I was lying on. The hospitality around here sucked.
His hand slid off mine and he took a couple of steps back. His hands flew to his mouth, and he shook his head violently.
“Beeval, do you like Ashlar?”
Beeval clamped his hands on his mouth, his eyes wide over the top of them. Slowly, he shook his head again, but much less violently.
Jeez. This guy Ashlar was a douche to everyone. This guy, or mini-demon, or whatever he was—he wasn’t much taller than my chicken Evil. He was also scared to death.
“Beeval, if you help me get out of here, I will take you with me.”
“With you?” His lip trembled.
I nodded. The small action made every part of my body hurt, and I wanted to scream out. I ground my teeth and stifled my scream. This was my only chance, my only hope.
Beeval scanned the room once more, obviously frightened, and turned and ran off.
Shit. That was my only hope, and it had hightailed away from me. My head fell back against the whatever it was I was on, and I let my body sag into it. I was not going to get out of here. My mother was gone. I stopped that train of thought. I couldn’t afford to get on that right now. I’d be a hopeless, quivering mess.
Shuffling from the tunnel where Beeval had run off to caught my attention. Beeval came through it breathing heavily. “You go,” he said.
“I want to, but I can’t.” I strained my arms and legs to show him I was magically bound.
Beeval snapped his fingers, and I fell off the table/board/whatever.
“Holy hell!” I swore softly, hissing with the pain. The itching that my being here brought on was now given the pain cherry on top by having a burning sensation where my body touched anything of Hell. “This place is one big social disease,” I muttered.
“Hurry,” Beeval said. “We hurry.” He came over next to me and tugged on one of my hands. “Hurry,” he said again, and I could hear the fear in his voice.
I scrabbled to my feet, wincing at how much this hurt. Beeval clamped onto my arm and dragged me along. Instead of the tunnel he’d just come through
, he led us off to the right, and there was a faint line in the wall. He wiggled his claws, and the line began to glow. After about ten seconds, the glow was gone, and Beeval pushed the wall. A small door opened.
“Here. This take you out.”
I crouched down, feeling all of my hundred plus years old. “You go first. We go together.”
“No, no! You go, I follow.” He moved behind me and pushed my back. “Go now. Go now.”
“All right, but you follow me,” I said. I got onto all fours, and stuck my head in. I barely fit. Good thing I kept it low key with the Saloon 10 burgers. It was a tight squeeze. “Hey, what am I looking for?”
He ducked down near my foot. “There is opening. You push through. Take you home.”
“OKAY. Keep up, Beeval.” I couldn’t see around me very well. I had to look down and behind me between my legs. Completely uncomfortable.
I felt his claws pushing at my feet and I started to crawl. For all that Hell was making me miserable, it sure didn’t want to let me go. It felt like the tunnel was closing in. I yelped when something cut into my left arm. From my shoulder to my wrist, a searing pain made me bite my lip so hard it bled.
“I am going to kill Ashlar. I’m going to kill him.” I tried to check things out behind me but I couldn’t tell if Beeval was there. “Beeval?”
Nothing. Shit. Was this a trap? Everything felt off-kilter. I couldn’t tell. If I was going to die, I might as well do it balls to the wall. I’d count Beeval as an ally until he gave me a reason not to.
“Beeval, keep up, please! I don’t want to lose you.” The red light behind me dimmed, making the tunnel darker and closer. My hair caught on things I didn’t even want to try and imagine, and yanking the hair free made tears come to my eyes.
Smoke began to fill around me. “Oh, for Pete’s sake!” I screamed, and stopped when the acrid smell hit me, making me choke. My hands went to my neck, and I coughed and coughed. I put my head down and tried to cover my mouth and nose with my shirt, which didn’t seem to be in good shape.
Finally, it cleared, and eyes watering and throat burning, I started crawling again. I could feel things catching against my arms. When I made it out of here, I would be a mess. Which was putting it nicely.
My head bumped into something. I fell back a little and peered in front of me. It was blocked. “What the hell?” I yelled. Had Beeval tricked me? Was this a trap? Where was he? I bent my head down and peered into the darkness behind me. He wasn’t there.
It was a trap. Ashlar had cooked this up to make me think I was getting out here. “No,” I whispered. “I will not stay here.”
How long I sat there, crouched on all fours, trying to figure a way out, I didn’t know. I wanted to use magic, but I was afraid to draw any attention to myself. Magic calls to magic. If I used my magic, Ashlar would find me and drag me back. I pushed on the dirt and rock in front of me, but it didn’t move. Still, I kept pushing, scrabbling with my fingers, getting a rock free and using it like a shovel, anything. Sweat ran down every part of me and the rock slipped from my hands as I tore off a nail.
“Damn it!” I yelled. I pushed at the rock and dirt barrier once more, and then banged my head as I flew backward. Well, as much as you can fly backward with six inches to spare all around you. My hands burned as flame shot out of them.
I’d never done that before. The flames were so bright I had to cover my eyes—it wasn’t the flames. The flames, flames that I’d shot out of my hands, like a dragon or something, had broken through the barrier and the light I was seeing was from my place. Earth. It wasn’t the glow of Hell. It was moonlight, shining so pure and bright above me that it made my eyes hurt.
I pulled the rest of the barrier apart, hardly knowing what I was doing, until I was able to squeeze through. I fell onto the ground crying. I’d made it.
“Beeval!” I sat up. The hole was still there, although it looked weird. “Beeval!” I shouted as loud as I dared. There was no answer, and I didn’t expect it. Somewhere along the way, he’d disappeared, if he even followed me at all. I didn’t know if he was a good guy, or a bad guy that had set out to trap me, and I’d beaten it—but he’d saved my life.
As I watched, the hole shimmered, and shrank. I couldn’t stop staring as it covered itself over. “I’m so sorry, Beeval.” I cried some more. The pain and suffering that was visible on him hadn’t been fake. I knew that. He’d risked himself to get me out.
Ashlar had to die.
But first, I needed to get home and get a shower. And some burn cream. And probably another shower. Maybe even a third. I got up. “Time to get your ass in gear,” I muttered.
Chapter Five
I fell back onto the grass. Never before had I been so grateful to lie in the grass. Even though I really needed to be up and moving, this felt like the best thing I’d ever experienced. It was about a thousand degrees cooler, and as my body adjusted to not being slow cooked, all the things that hurt in me began to make themselves known. I lifted an arm and cast a soothing spell over myself. I didn’t have time to fool with this now. When I got home, Meema and my sist—my thought stopped. Meema would never be there again. There would only be the three of us. Deana, our fourth sister, had died, and even though I hadn’t seen her much after she ran off to Los Angeles, I missed her. She wrote, and kept us up to date with all that happened. When she passed away, her daughter, also Deana, took over the letter writing. They still had three generations going: niece, grandniece, and great grandniece. But in Deadwood, it would be just us.
The first and the last.
Okay. Enough of the pity party. Yes, things were depressing at the thought of Meema being gone. Moping wouldn’t get me home, or kill Ashlar. And those were the priorities, in that order. I stood up, and staggered.
I needed to cast some sort of concealment spell over myself. If I saw me walking by, I’d call the cops. I had to look terrible, given the way I felt. With a shaking hand, I cast one, and straightened. I had to figure out where I’d come out of Hell into.
This wasn’t Deadwood. Crazy as it sounds, I could tell. Our magic was tied to Deadwood. Must have been part of the deal that Ashlar made with Granny, yet another part that he didn’t bother to tell her. Jerk. When we left it, our magic disappeared. We became fully human and lost our immortality.
I couldn’t make shoes appear, sadly, so slowly, carefully, I made my way toward the road. Once I figured out where I was, I needed to make a note of this place. So that we’d always know there was a tunnel that opened up here from Hell from their side.
Squinting up at the moon with eyes that were still sensitive, I noted that it was full. Funny. It wasn’t supposed to be full for another four days when I left. Which meant I’d been gone at least four days. Or a month and four days. I wouldn’t know until I made it home.
There wasn’t a lot of traffic here. I needed to find a main road. You’d think, in this day and age, it wouldn’t be a big deal to get around. But when you have no phone, no money, and no shoes, it might as well be the wild west. Looking around, I stopped and gasped.
I was in the Mt. Rushmore National Memorial. That meant I was an hour from home. I could be home in a couple of hours.
If I could find a ride. I was so tired, I didn’t know how long or how well my concealment spell would hold up. It didn’t matter. This had to work. There was no other choice. A ranger station might be my best bet. The memorial was to my right, so I needed to walk away from it. That’s where most of the tourist stuff was. Everywhere had been built to make sure you could see the memorial. I did almost a one-eighty and I could see the amphitheater and all the buildings. Oh, please, let there be a night guard or something.
Limping along, I marveled at how quiet, how peaceful it was at night. I couldn’t believe there was a tunnel to Hell here.
Shock, or something else overtook me. It was a thought I was reborn, and it wasn’t better. Reborn out of Hell. Hell born. I started to giggle. This meant I needed to sit down, drink some tea,
and get taken care of. I was on the edge of falling apart.
As I walked down the stone-lined path, I saw a building off to the side that said ‘Ranger Station’ on the side of it. There was a light on. I blinked a few times, adjusting my eyes to the light. I thought they were all right. But this was great. I didn’t want to break into the place if I could avoid it. I pulled open the door.
“Hello?” I called.
The squeak of chair wheels on the floor came from behind a wall, followed by footsteps. An older man, with graying hair and a park ranger’s uniform, came out, his mouth dropping open when he saw me.
“Can I help you miss? What in God’s name happened to you?”
I laughed at little at his phrase. God had nothing to do with this. “I got into a fight and lost.”
“With what? A bear?”
“No, sir, with a douchebag of guy. Would it be possible to use your phone?”
“If you call an ambulance.”
“I’m from Deadwood. If I can make a call to my sisters, they’ll come get me and we’ll go right to the hospital.”
He was inspecting me. My concealment spell must not have been holding up well. “Yeah, I think you’d better put that first on your list. Where is the guy? How did you get in the park?”
I sighed, readying myself to lie when he held up a hand.
“Don’t answer that. Let’s get your family called, and then you can tell me about it. We’ll call the police. Come on back.”
“Could I get some water, please?” My throat was so dry, from Hell, from the dust, from the screaming, everything.
“Course you can. What’s your name?”
“Desdemona. Desdemona Nightingale.”
That made him stop. “That’s a beautiful name. Hey, are you related to Nightingale’s Tea and Herbs?”
“That’s my shop, well, my family’s shop.” I dropped into a chair in front of what I hoped was his desk.
Hellborn Page 4
