Parry turned away.
"Then roast, bugbrain!" the man screamed.
Parry was abruptly in the flames. They hurt terribly, but did not actually burn him because he could not be physically damaged here. No one could; pain and humiliation were all that Hell offered. He bore it; he had no alternative.
Certainly he was not going to give that child-torturing slob the secret! Such a monster might be evil, but he was no good for the running of Hell. He was evidently spending all his time gorging and torturing, not even trying to organize Hell or see to any larger purpose.
Yet despite his current agony. Parry had some satisfaction. Ozymandias and Lucifer and Mephistopheles refused to cooperate with the new Incarnation, and Nefertiti had spit in his face! Of course their attitude was routine; every new Incarnation had to earn his place. Still, it had been good to hear.
But still his major strength was in his love. He had given up his office for love of Orb, and he would do it again, though he burn in the flames forever! While his mind was on her, he did not feel the flames. He only hoped that the other Incarnations would be able to prevent his replacement from doing too much harm.
Another figure came. This time the flames did not abate. Parry took this as a signal that this was not an official visit.
It turned out to be a spider, swinging on an invisible thread. The flames did not seem to affect it.
Only one spider could penetrate here: Fate. Parry tried to speak, but could not. Neither could he move. It seemed that only when he was brought out by the current Incarnation of Evil could he talk or act.
The spider formed into Niobe. "Found you at last, son-in-law," she whispered. "He hid you well, but you have friends among the damned souls, and they told me."
What was she doing here? Why should she have searched him out? He could not ask.
"As you may know, your successor is not a nice person," Niobe said. "We have learned something about you. The demoness is one of ours now, and she explained some things, and JHVH volunteered some things, and our recent experience confirmed them."
So he was to be stripped of his remaining secrets, too! Yet Niobe was not the type to gloat. This excursion had to be risky for her. What was her purpose?
"My daughter loves you, and she is your wife," Niobe continued. "So there does seem to be a certain familial obligation. There can never be a true union between the Incarnations of Evil and of Nature, but mere may be another way. The others of us have concluded that we would prefer to deal with the old, familiar Evil, rather than the new and ugly one. Of course none of us would care to state such a thing openly."
What was she saying? Parry hardly dared to believe!
"And I would not care to have this repeated, but there is a question in some of our minds whether the one we serve is, well, paying attention. We have operated on the assumption that He who is Good remained disengaged because He was honoring the Covenant, while He who is Evil violated the Covenant freely. Therefore we redressed that inequity by siding with the honorable one. But now we are uncertain. There is a certain interpretation that would reverse some implications."
She shrugged. "At any rate, the trial period for your successor is drawing to a close, and he has not found the spell he needs. He is apt to be replaced by another just as bad, unless . . .
Unless Parry resumed the Office! He alone of the former Incarnations of Evil could do that, because he had not yet yielded his life and become a damned soul.
Niobe left her thought unfinished, knowing that he understood. But she had a qualification. "Yet a person needs to be in an appropriate situation to assume an office. If he were, for example, lost or mute, he would be unable to step in before the office sought the greatest evil it could find. It seems that the Office of Evil may be either grasped by the one who seeks it or will drift to the most evil. The applicant who is closest to the one who releases the Office has the first chance. Therefore it is important that an aspirant not be incapacitated at the key moment."
She was right. The Office had to be grasped at the moment it became available, or it would be lost. He had Lilah's guidance the first time, so had seized it without quite knowing the significance. He could not do so from the incommunicado confines of this dungeon.
"So I have brought a thread to lead you out," Niobe said after a pause, to let him think it through. She stretched out an invisible line. "Follow it, and-"
"Ha! Caught you, old bag!" the Incarnation cried, appearing between them. "I may be finished, but he'll never profit by it!" He struck at her with a flaming pitchfork.
Niobe became the spider, and the spider vanished. She was an Incarnation, but this was Hell, and she could not oppose the Incarnation of this domain.
"And now you, pinhead!" the Incarnation cried, turning on Parry. "You'll never get out!"
Magic flared, and Parry was carried away, helpless. The Incarnation had not learned the demon-banishing spell, but he had evidently picked up some of the lesser magic. Parry drifted through swirling smoke for what seemed like an eternity before coming to rest in a stifling environment.
He seemed to be in an aspect of chaos. Apparently the Incarnation had discovered how to incorporate a bit of the Void in Hell, and buried him in it. He knew Parry could not escape it. The Incarnation was evil and ugly, but he had a certain cunning about his own survival.
The thread had been lost. The Incarnation had struck at the key moment, allowing Parry the torture of dawning hope irredeemably destroyed. He would never find his way out in time now!
Yet it was not a total loss. Though he would not resume his office, he had the comfort of the knowledge that the other Incarnations had a change of heart about him, and that Niobe herself accepted his status as husband to Orb. It was a meaningless marriage, destined never to be consummated, yet that acceptance buoyed him immeasurably. Perhaps he had, in his downfall, accomplished part of what he sought: to gain some improvement in the processing of good and evil from souls, minimizing the suffering of the mortals involved.
It could have been a second or a century, but it seemed closer to the former. Another visitor came to him. This one was neither woman nor spider, but rather a nebulous form reminiscent of the nature of the Void. It overlapped him, and then he recognized it.
Nox! The Incarnation of Night, she who knew all secrets and preserved most of them. Parry had not known she could navigate chaos, but it made a certain sense in retrospect. She was closest of all the Incarnations to that state herself.
"Here is what you lost."
Something touched his hand. Then the ineffable presence departed.
Parry considered what she had brought him. It was an almost invisibly thin line of a web, the kind a spider might spin. What had caused Nox to take the trouble to bring such a thing to him? What could be her purpose? She was aloof from most mortal and immortal concerns, and her business with him, by her own assessment, remained unfinished. Yet she had not chosen to complete it now.
Then he understood:
It was the thread!
He followed it. The thing was silken, perceptible only because he was attuned to it, hardly more than a thought. But it led through the swirling randomness, even as Fate's thread had guided Niobe through the Void. It was the single aspect of diminished entropy in his vicinity. He followed its essentially uphill guidance.
As he made progress through chaos, some anomalous formulations occurred. There were shapes of objects in no particular order of classification. The outline of a rock drawn in pastel, a squashed beer can, the curve of a naked woman's hip, the stem of a rose, a crooked ray of starlight, the left eye of a harpy, a sprouting grain of wheat, one drop of rain, a purpling bruise on the shoulder of a rabbit, a torn page of a calendar marking Friday the thirteenth. He passed it all, diverted by none of it, following the thread.
Then land appeared, a shore, and he was swimming in a disgustingly polluted stream. It was the River Acheron, the waters of woe that coursed around much of Hell proper, having no true egress. But i
t was familiar; now he knew approximately where he was.
He landed near the station of the three Judges, and there they were, dispensing the justice of the infernal region to arriving souls, classifying the difficult cases. Minos, formerly King of Crete, who had the Minotaur, the terrible offspring of his wife's passion for a bull. Rhadamanthus, his brother, noted for his fairness. Aeacus, formerly the King of Pydlia, noted for his piety. They were good judges, and Parry had left them in place, extending their authority.
Parry could not return to Hell proper with out passing by the Judges; he himself had organized Hell this way, so that no damned souls escaped proper classification. Some who came to Hell were actually destined for Heaven, and the Judges had unerringly identified these and assigned them to mock Heaven until they were willing to travel on. Most of them had done so, at the time of Parry's wedding ceremony, but more souls arrived constantly, and the business of the Judges was never finished.
They could not fail to recognize him, no matter what form he assumed, for the Judges read not the physical appearance but the soul. If they turned him in ...
He joined the line of souls, and followed it gradually to its head.
Minos glanced at him. His gaze paused momentarily, then moved on, as if there were nothing out of the ordinary. "Pass to Limbo," he said tersely.
They were not giving him away! Parry passed on, as if he were one of the regular damned souls.
He came next to Cerberus, the three-headed dog he had assigned to be the guardian of the main gate. It had been some centuries since he had contact with the huge beast, and since the Judges passed him, he should be able to walk by without challenge, unrecognized.
"Ha!"
It was the Incarnation again. The cunning slob had been watching the main entrance, just in case.
"After him, dawg-destroy him!" the Incarnation cried.
Cerberus, not knowing any better, obeyed the voice of authority. He launched himself at Parry.
Now Parry wished the dog had remembered him! He had to escape-and that was no easy thing to do. Cerberus could not kill him, of course, but he could tear Parry's apparent body to bits, and it would be a day before those bits reformed. That could be too long; the Incarnation was near the end of his trial period, and could be ousted at any point. If Parry wasn't ready-
Parry dived back into the River Acheron. Cerberus followed, intent on his prey. One head watched above the surface, another looked back, and the third plunged under the surface to watch there, too. He was a good strong swimmer; in a moment he would overhaul Parry and chomp him.
Parry changed into a dirty brown fish. Now he had camouflage to match his environment, and was able to outswim the dog.
"Ob, no, you don't!" the Incarnation screamed from the bank. "I'll take you out if it's the last thing I do, you wait!"
He leaped into the water himself, and became a great while shark.
This was bad news! Parry had not realized that the Incarnation had learned shape-changing. It was not difficult, in Hell, for one in authority; he just had trusted that the Incarnation would have spent too much time in gorging himself and raping child souls to master it. Perhaps someone had provided the Incarnation with good advice, just as Lilah had for Parry in the early days. There were always damned souls eager to gain preferred treatment by pleasing the Master. Hell was hardly the place for honor or principle.
The shark was gaining on him, and its teeth were ready. He could not escape it by diving low, and it would be useless to remain on the surface. He would have to change form.
But there was a problem here, because it took proper concentration to change form, and his body would stop swimming for a moment while he did it. The shark was now so close that it would snap him up at the first pause. Also, he would have to change to some form that could handle the water, or else launch into the air as a bug-and the Incarnation would simply change, too, and continue the pursuit. Because Parry now had the effective status of a damned soul, he could not match the Incarnation in direct combat; his strength, agility and speed would be less even if the forms were identical.
But he could change to some similar type and size of fish with little pause, and the water was as good a way to travel through Hell as any. If he could just slip away into some bypath, so that the Incarnation would lose him . . .
No, suddenly he had a better idea! He could lead the Incarnation into a special trap, and settle the matter immediately. He surely had a better notion of the river channels than the Incarnation did, for Parry had dictated their courses. He had inherited a Hell that was archaically and inconsistently organized, and seen to its improvement; even though he had not paid much attention to such details in centuries, he knew as much as he needed to.
He shifted to a slimmer, faster form of fish, and began to gain. Here in the polluted water that was enchanted to prevent damned souls from fleeing Hell, conjuring magic did not work well; that was why Parry could not escape that way, and why the Incarnation could not banish him back to the Void. They had to settle matters right here.
The Incarnation saw this, and modified his own form. He became a slimmer, faster shark. He began to gain again. He was probably enjoying the chase, believing that the end was inevitable. After all, there was nowhere within the confines of Hell that any soul could escape the Incarnation of Evil.
But Parry knew where he was going. He dodged and turned, staying just ahead of the shark's jaws, then abruptly swerved into a tributary stream.
This was the Phlegethon, the River of Fire. Flames hovered over its surface, and its waters were boiling hot. But even as he entered. Parry modified to the form of a firefish, which thrived in such heat. The Incarnation, caught by surprise, paused, then did likewise, simply copying Parry's form.
That strategy would enable the Incarnation to follow him anywhere, and the Incarnation's greater strength would ensure a closing of the gap between them. But Parry had gained a critical bit of time. Perhaps more important, he had established that he had to be closely followed, and by a like form, or he would escape. That would gain him a reprieve, but not victory; the Incarnation would simply reorient on his soul and chase him down again, like a cat playing with a mouse. Assuming the Incarnation had mastered the soul-tracing magic. If by chance he had not-
He looped swiftly back, swimming downstream and giving the Incarnation the temporary slip. But in a moment the other fish was back on his trail. Obviously the Incarnation had a lock on his identity, and could sniff him out anywhere. So much for that faint hope.
He reentered the Acheron, modifying his fish form again. The Incarnation followed, matching both course and detail.
Then Parry dodged into the Kokytus, the frozen river. He modified his form to handle the cold, becoming a small ice fish. The Incarnation did likewise, hardly losing time.
This time Parry did not double back. He forged upstream, under the ice, dodging boulders in the water, trying to hide in the tricky nether currents. But the Incarnation was not to be deceived. He followed every bypath, coming steadily closer. There could be no escape into the headwaters, for Parry would be slowed, or he would have to change form and leave the river, and would be caught when he tried.
As he swam, he made a spell. It was a quiet one that did not affect his form or his nature, and he hoped it went unnoticed. This was the critical stage; if the Incarnation caught on to where Parry was leading, or what the effect would be, or how to nullify it as Parry had just done, then all would be lost. But the Incarnation lacked experience in Hell; Parry was counting on that.
Abruptly he swam into a new tributary, one whose waters were not frozen. He intensified his spell, though the effort slowed him.
The Incarnation followed, his jaws opening. Once he caught hold. Parry would not be able to escape. They both knew that. This was the finale.
Then the Incarnation slowed, seeming dazed. He began to swim aimlessly. He moved to the side to nibble at a succulent bit of vegetation.
Was it a ruse? Or was it the
finish? It would soon enough be evident.
Parry reversed, and swam downriver. There was no pursuit. He came to the River Kokytus needing no further modification for the cold. He swam all the way back down to the River Acheron before venturing to the shore and changing back to his human form.
He climbed to the bank. "I, Satan, reclaim My office," he proclaimed. He felt the power returning to him. He had been in time. He was once more the Incarnation of Evil.
He conjured himself to the center of Hell. Ozymandias looked up from his desk. "My Lord, You have returned," he said respectfully, as if it were a routine occurrence. "But if I may inquire-?"
"I led him into the River Ledie," Parry explained. "I used a spell to protect myself from its property of forgetfulness. It may be that he did not know that spell, or realize where he was."
"That may be," Ozymandias agreed. "Have You new orders, Satan?"
"Revert to My standing ones," Parry said. "Whatever damage the usurper has done, reverse it."
"As You wish." Then, slowly, Ozymandias smiled. He was glad to have the old order back.
Thanks to the help of Niobe and Nox, Parry was back in office. That was a considerable gratification-yet there was emptiness, too, for he knew that his change in circumstance could not restore to him his love. He had lost both Jolie and Orb; that had been understood when the other Incarnations helped him to recover. He had a mission to accomplish, and he would try his best, knowing the others would give no further quarter and expected none. But he would have traded it all for the other. Indeed, had traded it all for the other, one month ago.
After a busy day of reorganizing and reestablishing. Parry retired alone. He did not need sleep, but he hoped to obtain some anyway. Perhaps it would help dull the emptiness.
Then someone came to him. He realized immediately that it was an undamned soul, for it shone in a manner no damned soul could. How had it been admitted to Hell? The guardians should not have permitted it, and Ozymandias would never have authorized it. Only another Incarnation could-
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