by Cege Smith
Lillian’s hands covered his fist and a chill ran down the length of his arm. At that proximity, it was almost impossible for him to tear his eyes away from hers. “My poor David. Had I known what an impure and unworthy soul Ellie Coulter was, I wouldn’t have allowed Mikel to use you to draw her to us.”
David pulled his hand out of hers and took a step back. “It wasn’t Ellie’s fault. She thought she was saving me. How was she supposed to know that Mikel could possess my body? He was wearing my face when he interacted with her, how could she not feel something for him?”
Lillian raised an eyebrow. “He didn’t act like you though, did he? And yet, Ellie went along with him. Regardless of what Little Ms. Innocent says, she was drawn to Mikel, the real Mikel. He was encouraging her to embrace her darker gifts, and that is an incredible temptation. In a way, I understand it. He certainly is quite handsome and charismatic. But for a woman who was supposedly already in love, I found her behavior to be quite off-putting. Really you’re better off forgetting about her. I just wanted to warn you that she would be there.”
“You’re right,” David said. He felt a small measure of pleasure seeing Lillian’s jaw drop. He sensed that she wasn’t surprised often. “I did what you wanted me to do, which was draw her in so that you could siphon her energy. She proved herself to be fickle at best. I have a much larger destiny, and that is what I need to be focused on. Not some two-faced Guardian bitch.” The words tasted bitter, but he got them out.
Lillian slowly nodded and David watched the confusion dance in her eyes. “That’s right. I have to admit, David, that I am surprised at this sudden about face. You’ve been quite set on our little Ellie.”
David prowled the small room, eager for the chance to put some space between himself and Lillian. He was afraid she’d be able to see right through him. He sighed heavily. “I’m ready to get out of here. I’m ready to move on. Ellie is the past. When are they going to make a decision about my future here?”
“Soon, David, soon. Once I have taken Mikel’s position I will be able to speed that decision along. You have to trust me. I have no intention of leaving you in here for eternity.”
“Why can’t they let me out now? It’s not like I can go anywhere.”
“Braz feels it’s safer for you here. There are others out there who would do you harm, and the rumors have already begun to spread.”
That news drew David up short. “How?” He thought that he knew, but he was sure that Lillian wouldn’t admit to it. It would be just like Lillian to stir up trouble hoping to find an advantage that she could use to her benefit. “I thought this was all top secret, hush-hush.”
“Braz is pretty upset about it,” Lillian said shaking her head. “He can only assume that one of the guards said something. But it’s a good thing, in my opinion. This forces them to move faster than they might have before.”
“What exactly do the “others” think they can do with me?” It was the question that had plagued David since his arrival in Purgatory. He didn’t think that Lillian would tell him the truth because Lillian didn’t know how to tell the truth, but he still had to ask.
She looked away from him as if deep in thought. David knew that she was calculating exactly what to tell him, weighing each word for its potential impact, and trying to decide what information would ensure his continued cooperation. Then her blue eyes met his full on, piercing him deep. “If the wrong people got their hands on you, David, they would use you to poke a hole into the very fabric of the Afterlife and reach through to the Other Side.”
Chills ran down David’s spine listening to Lillian’s words. “The waypoints already do that.”
“The Council rules the waypoints and all things that touch them. The entry of souls into the Afterlife, and out of it, is carefully monitored and controlled. Imagine the power someone would have if they didn’t need the waypoints. They just needed you.”
He wished he could tell if Lillian was telling the truth. “How could someone do something like that? And if that was the case, why didn’t Mikel do that?”
“Mikel already had access to the waypoints. He was saving you for other purposes. Plus Mikel is smart. He was looking to stage a coup of the Afterlife. But who knows? Once he accomplished that he may have planned to use you to move to the Other Side.”
Like drawing Ellie in, David thought.
“I still don’t understand how that is possible,” David said. “Everyone keeps saying I’m not supposed to exist, but clearly I do. I am a person, a human being.”
Lillian glided to his side and put a hand on his arm. His muscle twitched, but he resisted the urge to pull away. “You’ve never been human, David. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
As her words rolled over him, he felt the wild desire to strike her. He wanted to wipe her fake sympathetic smile off of her face. He couldn’t reconcile what she said with his image of himself. It didn’t fit, which is why he refused to believe it. Just as he was getting ready to retort, Lillian’s head cocked to the side. A frown blossomed on her face.
“Braz is on his way. He is likely coming to tell you about Mikel’s trial. Remember what I said, David. The sooner we get Mikel’s trial out of the way, the sooner I can help get you out of here. Be cooperative. You only need to speak the truth, and I’ll make sure to take care of the rest.”
David was surprised when Lillian stepped close to him and wrapped her arms around his chest and pulled him close. He didn’t return the embrace, but didn’t push her away even though he wanted to. He smelled lavender. It was Lillian’s signature scent. Goosebumps spread across his forearms.
Then she pulled away from him with a slight frown and then faded away right in front of him. David shook his head, wishing that he had imagined the last hour. Between Ellie’s hurt and Lillian’s manipulations, he felt like he was going to go crazy.
“How are you today, David?”
David saw Braz’s friendly eyes looking at him through the slit in the door. Braz stopped by every day. As much as Braz was his jailor, David was coming to like Purgatory’s representative to the waypoint Council.
“I’ve got a lot on my mind,” David said honestly.
The door swung open, and Braz’s stout figure filled the doorway. “Let’s take a walk then, shall we? Give you a chance to stretch your legs and maybe clear your head.”
“I thought it was dangerous for me to be outside,” David said suspiciously, although he wanted to leap at the chance to get outside of the room. If even a small portion of what Lillian said was true, he had to be on the lookout.
“We aren’t going far,” Braz said, gesturing toward the hallway. “C’mon, kid. I’ve got some things I need to talk about with you.”
Suddenly David had the sense that his day was about to get a whole lot worse.
CHAPTER SIX
Ellie felt like her soul was being ripped from her body. As the heaving sobs rolled across her chest she buried her face in Lucy’s neck. To Lucy’s credit, she let Ellie bawl until the tears finally started to subside. It was only as Ellie raised her head and saw the view over Lucy’s shoulder that she realized that they had not returned to the waypoint. Judging by the dark hallway steeped in shadows in front of them, they were somewhere else entirely. Ellie felt like they were at the entrance to a medieval tunnel.
“El, I’m not trying to rush you since you obviously had to get that out of your system, but we need to get moving,” Lucy said in a hushed whisper. “This hallway isn’t going to be deserted forever.”
“Where are we?” Ellie asked. A strange heat licked her skin, and she jumped. A sinking suspicion rolled through her mind. “Please tell me that we aren’t where I think we are.”
“If you were going ask if we were in a jail in Hell, then I can’t do that,” Lucy said with a sigh.
Ellie shot to her feet, looking around fearfully. “Why would we be in a jail in Hell?” Her heart pounded in her chest as she searched Lucy’s face.
Lucy
winced. “Look, El. I don’t know what happened back there with David, and now’s not the time to fill me in. You wanted to find Max Turner, right?”
“Max Turner’s in Hell?” Ellie said warily. She still wasn’t sure exactly what it took to land someone in Hell, but she knew that it had to be bad. But to end up in a jail cell in Hell? That could only be reserved for monsters.
“No, not Max Turner,” Lucy said as she avoided Ellie’s eyes.
Ellie’s stomach churned. She knew now who Lucy had brought her to see. There was only one other person it could be. “Why are you taking me to see Mikel, Lucy?”
Lucy’s words came out in a rush. “I have been all over the Afterlife looking for the guy, Ellie. He was eccentric at best, and so most people pretty much forgot that he was even still here on this side to begin with. I know for a fact he hasn’t been reincarnated. He asked specifically not to be, and, unfortunately pretty much every person I’ve found who has seen him in recent memory, which by the way was a long time ago, said that he was with Mikel. Now he’s nowhere to be found. Mikel is the only person who may know where he is. I don’t like this any more than you do.”
“I can’t ask him for help,” Ellie shook her head. “You may not remember that look he gave me when he figured out that I played him, Lucy, but I sure do. He wanted to kill me. He’s not going to help us.”
“He will help you,” Lucy said. “I told you that I’ve known Mikel for a long time, El. He’s a bastard, no doubt about it, but there was something about you that softened him up. He cared about you.”
“All the more reason that, if anything, he hates me now,” Ellie said stiffly. She didn’t want to be reminded that someone as dark as Mikel could have feelings for her. She also didn’t need the reminder that Mikel wasn’t the only one who had been “softened”.
“You’re kind of stuck if finding Max Turner is a key part of your grand plan,” Lucy said crossing her arms. “Everything I’ve found and everyone I’ve talked to says Mikel is the one who knows where he is. It’s your decision. If you want to go back, we’ll go back. But I can’t guarantee that if you change your mind later that I’ll be able to get us back here.”
“Why?”
Lucy’s fingers danced in the air. “I’m sure this flies in the face of all of your physic lessons from the Other Side, but where we are right now doesn’t stay put. Its location changes all the time. Think of it like a natural deterrent for anyone trying to escape. If you don’t know where you are, it makes it pretty hard to find the way to somewhere else before you’d get caught again.”
“How did you find it?” Ellie asked.
“I have my ways,” Lucy said evasively.
Ellie was certain now that Lucy’s errand while Ellie was talking to David had to do with finding out the location of the place where they now stood. The warm air licked her skin again, and she felt goose bumps flash across her arms. She bit her lower lip. She didn’t want to see Mikel, but it seemed that she was going to be forced to in order to find out what she needed to know. Her feelings on seeing him again were a jumbled mess.
There was a small part of her that would be relieved to see that he was okay. She was having difficulty reconciling the demon that terrorized her and led her down the path of murder with the man she saw he could be on the last evening they were together. A voice in the back of her mind nagged at her that nothing in life, or the Afterlife, was black and white. There were many shades of grey.
Lucy’s foot started to tap on the floor, bringing Ellie out of her thoughts.
“Okay, okay. I’ll try talking to him,” Ellie said with a deep breath. “I still think this is a bad idea.”
“It’s the only idea we’ve got right now,” Lucy said. She turned and pointed down the long hall. “He’s in the cell at the end. I can pop you inside the door, and then I’ll be right outside waiting. Yell when you are ready to go.”
“Why aren’t you coming in with me? Why can’t we talk to him from outside the door?”
Lucy sighed. “Cells here aren’t like what you saw in Purgatory. This is Hell after all. Plus I think you’ll have an easier time of convincing him to spill the beans without me hovering nearby.”
“Do I have anything to worry about?” Ellie asked with a worried frown. “He can’t hurt me, right?”
“I’ll be protecting you with a spell,” Lucy said, sidestepping her question. “You’ll be fine. Get in, ask your questions, and get out. Yell if you need me.”
“I’m not feeling very reassured here, Lu..” Ellie’s voice was cut off as Lucy stepped up to her and drove a knife deep into Ellie’s side. Ellie started to scream, but Lucy slammed her hand over Ellie’s mouth, looked deep into her eyes and started to chant. Ellie felt the ripples of pain race through her body even as a sense of power seemed to grow from her middle. Then the familiar white light enveloped her, and Lucy vanished.
Ellie fell heavily to her knees gripping her side as her eyes adjusted to the gloom in front of her. She could make out only swirls of greys and reds that fit the idea of steam in her mind. It was unbearably humid, and beads of perspiration immediately broke out on her forehead.
She looked down at her side and gingerly pulled apart the sides of her torn shirt. She swore because she couldn’t see it, but her fingertips told her that her skin was whole. Lucy’s need for Ellie’s blood to do her magic appeared to be growing ever more ruthless.
A howl broke the stillness of the air and brought Ellie to her feet. She backed up and her back met with hot metal. Even through her shirt the burning sensation was instantaneous. She cried out and leapt away. She turned and found herself facing what she decided must be the door that Lucy mentioned. She couldn’t see a slit or any way to see through to the outside, but the edges were illuminated by glowing red lines. Ellie wanted to call out and assure herself that Lucy was truly on the other side, but she had a suspicion that the less noise she made inside the cell the safer she would be.
The howl rose again, and Ellie whirled around, trying to make out where it was coming from in the darkness. It seemed to reverberate off of the walls and hurt her ears. As it trailed off into a long moan, Ellie caught a whiff of something burning. It had the acrid, awful smell that told her told her it was hair. She started to shake.
Ellie was in way over her head. She was in the bowels of Hell, getting ready to try to convince a man who had proven himself to be a minion of evil to help her to do something good. It was insanity, and yet Ellie knew that she didn’t have any other choice. It was either this, or going back to the waypoint like a coward and declaring defeat.
It was a defining moment for Ellie. She had lived in the shadows for so long, always the victim, and down on herself, that the feeling that filled her now was almost unknown. She was tired of being the victim. She was angry that she felt like her destiny was out of her hands. She resolved that she wouldn’t accept that fate any longer. She wouldn’t prove Lillian and David right. She wasn’t weak.
Squaring her shoulders, she took a step away from the door and knew what she had to do. She closed her eyes and paused for a moment, letting her breath slow and her heartbeat return to normal. She needed to be able to see, so she focused on that idea. Light gleamed inside her eyelids. When she opened her eyes, although it was still dim, Ellie could make out more of the room in front of her.
It seemed cavernous. She looked up, but found that she couldn’t even determine if there was a ceiling. The swirls of grey and white filled the air above her, obscuring anything there from sight. If there was someone or something perched up there watching her, she would have no warning before it was too late. Ellie had to trust that the protection spell that Lucy gouged her for was wholly intact.
It was impossible to tell how deep the room was from where she stood. Ellie wondered why such a large space was needed to contain one man. Of course, she had no idea the extent of Mikel’s power. The glimpses of it that she had seen were more than enough. A man who would betray the powers that ruled Hell mus
t be either mad, or powerful, or both. In their interactions, Mikel had appeared to be completely sane, so Ellie could only assume that it was his power that gave him his arrogant confidence.
Ellie moved deeper into the room. She felt her throat tighten as it seemed like the darkness surrounding her pressed close to her body. The pressure grew with each step. It felt as if the air wanted to press her into a thin pancake. She sensed a dark energy hiding somewhere on the edges of her awareness. She was certain now that she was not alone, but she had no idea what inhabited the darkness with her.
When the shrieks of pain came again, this time Ellie moved faster to try to locate where they came from, aware that there was only one person who could be making them. Ignoring the sweat dripping down her face, Ellie stopped just as a huge structure materialized from the mist before her eyes. It loomed over her, and she could make out the outlines of heavy chains, hooks, and a multitude of ropes and pulleys attached to it. Her mouth fell open as she watched one rope spin upwards toward the swirling grey ceiling; its hook coated in a thick red liquid.
She gulped. Surely this thing in front of her couldn’t be what her imagination said it was, but as other pulleys started to whirl and more chains shot up into the darkness she thought for sure it was. It was some kind of massive medieval torture device. Of course, she would encounter this here. She mentally berated herself for thinking that she would find Mikel in a small, clean cell just like the one that David occupied. Mikel was evil and because of that it would seem fitting that the ones that commanded this part of the Afterlife would dream up a kind of punishment that would befit such an overstepping of his boundaries.
The smoke around her feet cleared, and a path opened up before her. A body fell from above and landed with a hard thud onto the black ground before her. Ellie scooted forward, and then saw the tangles of red hair that still remained on the blackened skull of the still form. That red hair haunted her.
Ellie didn’t say anything for fear of drawing the attention of whatever demented jailor waited in the wings. She needed to find out the information she needed from Mikel and get out. She couldn’t allow herself to have sympathy for him. She tried to shut off her emotions. Whatever was being done to him was something that Mikel had brought upon himself.
