by Tim Marquitz
The wizard nodded, and I told him where I wanted to go. After a round of goodbyes, we went our separate ways.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Back in Iran, I was starting to wonder how many more times I’d be able to pop up outside Eden before word got out that I was the son of Satan. I can’t imagine I’d be very welcome after that, not that I was now. Fortunately, this time, I’d phoned ahead for Duke Forcalor. I didn’t want to play pat-a-cake with Uriel. I think he already knew who I was, which was probably why he was so hostile. Can’t say I blame him.
As I stood on the hot desert sand waiting for the duke to drop down from Heaven, I picked up another familiar essence alongside him. Narrowing my eyes, I raised my hand to shield them from the sun and stared upward. Two golden trails spiraled down toward me, one a good distance ahead of the other.
My pulse raced as I watched them descend. I had to turn away as the first of the angels hit, dirt kicked up into my face. It didn’t matter. I knew who it was the instant she grabbed me by the back of my neck and pressed her sword against my throat. I was amused until I felt the point of her blade.
“Is that a sword at my neck, or are you just happy to see me?”
“What did you do, Frank?” Scarlett screamed.
She was alive. I took a tentative breath, doing my best not to help her slit my throat, and smiled. “Glad to see you’re alive, cousin. We’ve been worried you.” Forcalor landed behind her.
“I’ve been in Limbo, looking for Azrael.” She pressed a little harder against her blade. “Where is he, Frank?”
My first instinct was to plead innocent, seeing how she hadn’t asked if I’d killed him. His body should have been right where I left it. Since it obviously wasn’t, I didn’t see any reason to take credit for killing her prisoner. “I don’t know.”
It’s hard to think being bad isn’t inherited at this point. At least, technically, I didn’t lie to her.
Scarlett glared at me. “Don’t tell me you didn’t have anything to do with his disappearance. There was blood and a bunch of bullet shells, DA slayers to boot, all over the place.”
“Hey, don’t get me wrong, I matched stubborn silence with violence, but I don’t know where’s he’s gone.” That was the truth, if you don’t count the twinge of his essence I’d stolen after I shot him in the head. I certainly didn’t know where his body went. “I didn’t get the answers I was looking for and he wasn’t talking. We left it at that.”
She stared at me for a long, frightening moment, before she pushed me away with an angry grunt. “Then he could be anywhere in Limbo, by now.”
I didn’t think he could get far with a hole in his head, unless something came along and scooped him up. Given all the unknown things that lived in Limbo that was a distinct possibility. I could only hope something had eaten the bastard’s body and shit him out on the other side of the way station. Scarlett shook her head and sheathed Everto Trucido. I felt better already.
“What was it you needed, young Trigg?” Forcalor asked as Scarlett fumed, scuffing holes in the sand with the toe of her boot.
I pointed at my cousin. “The alien told me he’d taken Scarlett to lure Lucifer out of hiding. Clearly, that isn’t the case.” He must not have been able to find her in Limbo, the dimension unformed and resistant to probes from the outside world. That’s why we couldn’t get a hold of her. Gorath probably told me he’d taken her to get under my skin before I died. That was nice of him.
She turned and glared at me. “What alien?”
Not looking to explain the whole, sordid fiasco from the start, I motioned to Forcalor. “He can explain the details, but there’s an inter-dimensional demon who’s looking to use you to find where Lucifer is. We’ve got his servant locked away and we’re going to find out where his master is hiding soon enough and hand him his ass. Just stay in Heaven and you should be fine…and call Katon, while you’re at it.”
“Oh, great, Frank. What have you gotten me into this time?”
I raised my hands. “Not me, cuz. You can blame this one on great Uncle Lou.”
Scarlett spit on the sand. I figured right then wasn’t a good time to tell her about the unexpected shift in our family tree. She wouldn’t take it well.
“Is that it?” Scarlett asked. Before I even completed the nod, she was gone, winging her way back into the sky.
Duke Forcalor grinned and gave a half bow. “I’ll keep an eye on her for you.” He stared up after her. “She’s more like Lucifer than she would ever dare admit.” He laughed and clapped me on the shoulder. “Be well, young Trigg.” A moment later, he was gone.
Glad that Gorath had been full of it, I reached into my head to find the psychic link to Michael. “Hey, Mike, you around?”
I heard the mental static kick up a few seconds later. “I’m here.”
“Tell Katon that Scarlett has been found, and that she’s fine and I passed on a message for her to call. She was in Limbo the whole time and is now in Heaven. I guess Gorath was just yanking our chains.”
I heard Michael pass on the message, but couldn’t hear Katon’s response. I figured he was happy. “Katon says thanks.”
“Tell Rahim to hold onto E.T. for a bit, and let me know if y’all figure anything out. I have to take care of something. I’ll check in when I’m done.”
Michael passed on the affirmative, and I gave him the coordinates I needed Rahim to send me to. Once that was done, I shut down the connection and felt the tingle of Rahim’s magic take hold. I was whisked away a second later.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Not wanting to draw any attention to Karra, I had Rahim drop me off several blocks from her house, and I walked the rest. I was worried about the DSI tailing me, so I kept my senses running and my eyes open. It didn’t look like they’d caught on to Karra, or at least to where she lived. That was good. I didn’t see anything that made me think they were around.
After waiting as long as I possibly could before my patience exploded and gave me an aneurysm, I walked casually up to the house and knocked. There was no answer. I expected Longinus to open the door and punch me in the face for offending his daughter, but after about the fifth time I’d hit the doorbell, even that fleeting comfort was gone. No one was home.
I ramped up my senses but there wasn’t any trace of Karra or her father nearby. How pissed could she be?
After spending close to twenty minutes banging on the door, the not drawing attention thing out the window, I finally left when a neighbor came out of her house and threatened to call the cops if I didn’t take off. I hissed at the old hag and rushed my ass back to Hell.
Once I was there, I ran to the God-proof room to see if CB had heard anything. I hoped Longinus had taken matters into his own hands and had carted Karra off to realms unknown to protect her from her own stubbornness. Fingers crossed, I burst into the room and shouted for Chatterbox. I wanted to hear good news.
There’d be none.
Chatterbox sat on the table where I’d left him, but he lay on his side. I ran over to him and picked him up. His skin was strangely warm, where it’d always been cold. I noticed the sour stench of decayed flesh, which hadn’t been there before. His tongue lolled from his mouth as I looked into his eyes to see a pool of maggots in each. Their little white forms were piled motionless at the bottom of his eye sockets. The blackness inside was absolute. Chatterbox was dead again.
“Karra!”
I set Chatterbox down as a wave of nausea struck me, and fell to my knees. He was gone, his link to the world severed. That could only mean one thing.
Karra was gone, too.
About the Author:
Raised on a diet of Heavy Metal and bad intentions, Tim Marquitz has always been interested in writing, but it wasn't until about 1995 the urge became a compulsion. However, it would be many years later before the ability matched the interest. Fortunately, the two have reconciled...mostly.
Writing a mix of the dark perverse, the horrific, and the tragic
, tinged with sarcasm and biting humor, he looks to leave a gaping wound in the minds of his readers like his inspirations: Clive Barker, Jim Butcher, and Stephen King.
A former grave digger, bouncer, and dedicated metalhead, Tim is a huge fan of Mixed Martial Arts, and fighting in general. Involved in the Live Action Role Playing organization, Amtgard, since he was fifteen, he derives great pleasure from bashing people into submission.
He lives in Texas with his beautiful wife and daughter.
http://www.tmarquitz.com
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