by G. P. Ching
In the blink of an eye, a dark figure blocked her path. Her first thought was disappointment. She desperately tried to step around the dark silhouette. But curiosity got the best of her and she looked up, way up, into the figure's face. A blood red toga wrapped around his body, in stunning contrast to his espresso-colored skin.
"Do you challenge me?" he said.
"Who are you?"
The man tipped his bald head, giving her a better view of his face and his large gauge ear piercings. "I am Time. Do you challenge me?"
"Aldric?"
"That is the name some call me." He met her eyes.
Mara squared her shoulders, and silently weighed the choice before her. Heaven was clearly paradise and she had no idea what becoming Time meant, not really. A moment ago, she'd been ready to move on.
She played with Henry's ring on her finger. Heavy. Squeezing. What was God's purpose, having Henry tell her the story of how he became Death? Could it be for her benefit instead of his? She thought of the ring she'd made for Henry, an hourglass. There was more she wanted to do, more she wanted to be.
The loving light behind Aldric tempted her, warming every particle of her being with joy. She closed her eyes to keep it out. Heaven could wait. It would still be there when she was the one being challenged. This chance would never come again. The chance to be with Henry might never come again.
"Have I chosen unwisely or do you challenge me?" Aldric whispered.
"I challenge you," she said.
At once, God appeared on her right, again in Mara's likeness. Lucifer's platinum-blond illusion appeared on her left.
The devil's red face spewed an obscenity she could hardly comprehend. "I have things to do. Let’s get this over with," he hissed.
God smiled. "Is the timing not convenient for you? It was your hourglass that marked the minute of her crossing over."
"Yes, a process that shouldn’t have involved me. Surprising there should be a challenge now." He rolled his eyes.
"Why? She is clearly worthy."
"On with it then. Aldric, the coin."
Aldric produced a large golden disc and tossed it into the air. Mara watched it spin, noticing one side was engraved with an all seeing eye, the other with a horned beast. Aldric caught it and flipped it onto the back of his hand.
"God," he said, exposing the all-seeing eye.
Lucifer groaned. "Trial or consequence?"
For a moment, God seemed to be weighing Mara with her eyes, taking her in from head to toe, looking into her soul.
"Consequence," she said. "If Mara does not succeed or dies during the trial, her soul is mine."
Mara breathed a sigh of relief.
"Humpf." Lucifer scanned Mara with equal interest. Each part of her body burned where his gaze touched her, a red-hot poker testing her soul. He waved his hand and the warm glow of heaven disappeared, replaced by a rural landscape. A vast field of corn stretched as far as she could see.
Aldric shifted, glancing from Lucifer to the field. "What is this game?"
"If I get to choose the trial, there sure as hell will be some entertainment value, Aldric." Lucifer shrugged his shoulders. "Don’t be concerned. Should either of you die, you are guaranteed a spot in heaven, after all." He sighed deeply. "Although there may be some suffering." The corner of his mouth curled.
"What do we have to do?" Aldric’s hands tightened the knot on his toga.
Flashing a grin that seemed to hold too many teeth, Lucifer pointed his hand toward the cornfield. "Simple. Find the scroll within this cornfield. Read it and you become or remain Time."
"What’s the catch?" Mara asked. "Is the field so large that I’ll die of old age before I reach it? Is the scroll hidden inside an ear of corn?"
God shook her head. "The trial has to be possible to navigate. This field is five miles square and the scroll is on the ground within it."
"No more helping!" Lucifer snapped. "Or I will demand a retrial."
He kept talking but Mara couldn’t hear it. A whisper echoed through her brain, God’s whisper. Beware. The field is filled with hellhounds. Kill them to survive.
Aldric held out his hand. "I am allowed a weapon." A sickle formed in his palm, out of the ether.
Mara didn’t give Lucifer a chance to argue. She held out her hand and knitted a short sword. "Me, too," she said.
"Fair," God said firmly.
Lucifer narrowed his eyes. "On my count. Three, two, one, go!"
By the tone of his voice, it was obvious that Lucifer wanted her to race into the corn, but Mara noticed that Aldric stepped cautiously into the stalks. She did the same. It didn’t take long for her to figure out why Aldric hesitated. The leaves of the corn had thin, sharp edges. By moving slowly, the leaves bent against her weight. Even so, she already had several paper-cut like red marks on her bare shoulders.
The gray dress and sandals that had seemed symbolic when she’d stepped through Henry’s door now seemed like a ridiculously poor choice of dress. But how in the world could she have foreseen this? She attempted to conjure jeans and a flannel shirt but the magic didn't work. Apparently, the knife was the only tool she was allowed.
Mara stopped short. Why did Aldric offer her the challenge? Henry was with her the entire time. He couldn’t have had anything to do with it. Was it God? Someone else? No immortal offered a challenge without expecting they would lose. She needed to know why Aldric was willing to sacrifice himself for her.
Veering left, Mara hoped to intersect Aldric’s path. If he truly intended to give her immortality anyway, then why not work together to find the scroll?
Chopping at the stalks, she envied Aldric's sickle. Her straight blade required her wrist to turn awkwardly and made for slow progress. She walked at a diagonal, toward where she thought Aldric's path would lead. The point where she'd entered the field was a distant memory. The corn loomed above her head against a purple and red sky. Twilight. How long before she'd be lost in the dark?
Breathe. Just breathe. Mara tried not to slow her racing pulse. There was a reason that Lucifer had chosen a cornfield. Having grown up in trailer park near the city, Mara had no experience with rural life. Cornfields had always held an exotic creepiness. The farther she journeyed into the stalks, the more the corn seemed to crowd her shoulders and steal the air around her.
She couldn’t help it. Fear gripped her by the lungs. Whacking at the stalks with her sword, she cleared a circle around herself. She needed air. She needed the corn to stop touching her. Whack-whack-thwack. She chopped at the field. It wasn’t enough. She couldn’t breathe. She was going to die!
Launching herself down a row, she raced through the corn, letting out smothered yelps as the stalks sliced at her face and shoulders. Bright red blood oozed down her arm. She swung the sword haphazardly in front of her, somehow knowing she shouldn’t scream but finding it impossible not to. A loud rustle to her right stopped her in her tracks. She lifted her sword toward the noise, trembling.
"Aldric?" she whispered.
A stalk whipped forward, forcing her to dodge left to avoid it. No one. Silence. Another loud rustle, closer now, behind her.
"Aldric?" she asked again.
Shadows lurked at the base of the corn. Mara stared at the dark patch of dirt to her left. A bit of her blood dripped from one of the leaves onto the earth. That small drip grew wider, like oil bubbling up from a hole. She watched in horror as the oil grew into a wolf-sized black beast with more teeth and claws than body. It blinked glowing green eyes and licked a drop of her blood from its jowls.
All rational thought abandoned her. Mara's scream pierced the twilight. The thing pounced. Wielding her blade, she lost her balance, falling between the rows of corn. Her back slammed against the rock hard dirt. Somehow, she managed to slap her blade against the creature's side. It rolled over the stalks next to her.
Mara leapt to her feet, pointing her sword at the creature's throat. It paced in front of her, driving her back into the corn. Crack! An
other hellhound appeared behind the stalks. The first hound closed in. She dodged diagonally but the second hound was already there. They herded her. Hunted her.
As good as dead, Mara reached deep inside, to that place she’d called on the day she’d picked up the bell that had changed her life. With a warrior’s howl, she swooped down on the first hound, a whirlwind of slashing sword and dodging feet. Her blade landed in the creature's throat. A spout of oily blood poured from the wound. She yanked the blade free, somersaulting over the first hound to avoid the claws of the second. From flat on her back, she stabbed upward, skewering the second hound through the chest. The beast exploded above her, its black contents raining down.
From out of nowhere, a third hound leaped at her from the side. She scrambled to get to her feet and wedge her blade between herself and the creature. Claws thrashed at her face. Her body fell to the ground once more.
A hooked blade whistled from the right, throwing the hound from the air and simultaneously slicing off its head. Aldric stood above her, turning in a circle, scanning the corn.
"Get up!" he ordered. "With all the blood, there will be more."
Mara scurried to her feet. "I’m a bloody mess, Aldric. What do I do?"
He tore a strip from the bottom of his toga and tied it around the deepest gash on her arm. "Don’t let the blood touch the earth." He motioned toward the crimson trails on the corn.
She didn’t waste any time. Ripping the bottom of her dress, she wiped the remaining blood from her skin as best she could, and then tucked the gray cloth behind a corncob so that it wouldn’t touch the ground. "Let’s go."
Moving slowly, carefully, Mara followed Aldric into the stalks. The one bonus of the attack was it had moved her beyond panic into survival mode. Heaven or no heaven, Mara would not be a victim of Lucifer’s trial. She owed it to Aldric, to Henry, and to herself to survive.
Chapter 27
Jacob and Malini
Jacob dreamt he was in an earthquake. He held Malini’s hand while buildings crumbled around them. Everything inside him told him to run, but Malini wouldn't budge.
She was saying something over and over. "It’s time. It’s time."
He woke with a jolt, Malini shaking his shoulder. "It’s time, Jacob. Dr. Rahkmid is pulling out of his driveway. We need to follow him."
He shook his head and reached for the keys.
"No. Wait. Don’t start the car until he’s a few blocks up. I don’t want him to suspect anything."
Forcing his lips to form words, Jacob mumbled, "What if I lose him?"
"You won’t." Malini dug in her purse and handed him what looked like a piece of candy. He unwrapped it and popped it into his mouth.
"EWW! This is horrible. What did you feed me?"
"It’s a Swedish cough drop. The horehound root will help wake you up."
Jacob manipulated the hard lump to the side of his mouth. "How about a Red Bull instead?" He rolled down his window and spit the lozenge onto the road.
Malini laughed. "No time to stop."
Jacob turned the key and pulled onto the road as Rahkmid’s car hooked left up ahead. "There are a few behind your seat, along with some snacks."
Checking the six-inch area behind the bench of Jacob’s truck, Malini gave an appreciative squeal. "Jacob Lau, you prepared for this. You planned for something in advance."
"I did."
"When did you become so responsible?"
"Oh, I don’t know. Sometime between being expected to save the world and wanting to spend the rest of my life with a Healer."
Silence.
Jacob glanced toward Malini who was gaping at him. "What?" he asked.
"Did you just say you wanted to spend the rest of your life with me?"
"Well...yeah. Obviously that wasn’t a proposal or anything." He laughed. "That would be the lamest proposal ever."
He heard her shift in her seat. "But you think about it?"
"Sure. I mean, after all we’ve been through, it’s kind of ridonkulous to think we’d end up with anyone else. Could you imagine breaking someone new into this life?"
Silence.
Jacob groaned. "That came out wrong. That’s not why I think about growing old with you, Malini. I love you. We’ve tried the apart thing and it does not work for me."
The force of the kiss she planted on his cheek almost made him swerve off the road.
"You are the best boyfriend ever," she said.
"Yeah, I know."
The crumpled wrapper from the cough drop hit him in the temple. "Jacob, look, he’s turning onto the highway."
Jacob followed the professor up the ramp and merged into early morning traffic. "This is good," he said. "He won’t notice we’re following him with the other traffic."
Hours ticked by with nothing but the hum of the engine. Jacob forced himself to concentrate on the road, guzzling Red Bull to stay awake, while Malini dozed against the passenger side window. It wasn’t helping that Rahkmid’s car drove at a steady two miles under the speed limit. No unnecessary or sudden moves to wake Jacob up. It was early, much too early.
As the sun broke the horizon and stretched its golden rays across the countryside bordering the highway, Jacob couldn’t stand the silence a moment longer. He reached over and shook Malini’s shoulder.
"Look Malini, the sunrise."
She opened her eyes and stretched. "It’s beautiful."
"Yeah. That’s why I woke you up and not just because I was bored out of my mind following this guy."
"Do you want to know something weird about the sunrise?"
"What?"
"The name Lucifer means literally light-bringer, or morning star."
Jacob grimaced. "That’s the misnomer of the year."
"Some people think that it was his name before the fall, when he lived with God, but the truth is he invented that name after he came to Earth. It’s part of his illusion."
"Sneaky."
Rahkmid turned his blinker on and exited toward the Chicago suburbs. "It’s about time," Jacob said. He dropped back, following the blue Honda Accord as the suburbs melted into a more rural landscape. In the distance, a herd of large animals grazed in a field.
"Those look like—"
"Bison. Pull over, Jacob. I know where he's going."
Malini reached for her cell phone and his mom’s face filled the screen before she hit the call button.
"What? Where are we?"
"Lillian," Malini said. "Fermilab...Can you bring the others? ...Yes. Send Grace and Master Lee...Perfect." She tapped end call.
"Malini! What is this place?" Jacob placed a hand on her shoulder.
"Fermilab is a government laboratory that studies subatomic particles. They accelerate and smash pieces of atoms together to see what will happen. They discovered the top quark here."
"Uhuh. Maybe you should skip to the part that explains why Lucifer is here with a team of physicists."
Malini brought up an image of Rahkmid’s diagram on her phone. "Look at the picture, Jacob. Lucifer is trying to create a way to bring an army of Watchers into this reality. To do that, he has to rip a tunnel between Earth and Nod. Fermilab is the home of the largest particle accelerator in the world next to CERN in Switzerland. It’s called the Tevatron. For years scientists have tried to use particle accelerators to replicate the conditions of the Big Bang, you know, the force that started it all. But it’s never worked because scientists don’t have God to produce the magic that made the collision happen in just the right way." Malini pointed at the sketch of human sacrifice on her screen. "I think Lucifer has figured out a way to tap into that magic. Only, if we’ve learned anything about Lucifer, this Big Bang won’t create, it’ll destroy."
A lump formed in Jacob’s throat. "How do we stop him?"
"The same way we always do. Kill anything or anyone that bleeds black."
Most of the time the finer points of Malini’s plans escaped Jacob. It wasn’t that he was unintelligent but that he kn
ew where his strengths were. He trusted Malini with the details and brought the muscle when she needed it. But this time, a tone in her voice tugged at a sore spot deep within his chest. He turned away from her and rested his forehead on the steering wheel.
"I can’t kill her, Malini. Dr. Silva bleeds black and we both know she’s fallen off the grid since we got Dane back. You haven’t said anything to me about her, but I can put two and two together. I won’t kill her. I can’t. I just can’t."
Malini placed a hand on his shoulder. He turned his head, surprised that Malini was weeping in the passenger seat.
"It’s not you who has to," she said, her voice trembling. "But you won’t be able to save her."
At the words that sealed Dr. Silva’s fate, an involuntary sob escaped his throat. He accepted Malini’s hug, their tears mingling where his cheek touched hers. "I hate knowing the future," he said.
"Me, too."
Jacob nodded and wiped under his eyes. By the time they’d pulled themselves together the sound of a firecracker signaled Lillian’s arrival, her enchanted staff in hand.
* * * * *
Deep beneath the earth, within a four-mile long tunnel, Abigail watched a group of influenced humans build the altar necessary for the sacrifice. She had no idea if their work was accurate or why Lucifer was oddly missing from the construction. Whatever distraction pulled him away must be of ubiquitous importance, and she knew it would probably never happen again.
The muffled sobs of Stephanie Westcott were audible, despite the girl’s gag. Her hazel eyes, so like her mother Fran's and brother Phillip's, begged for release. Abigail had known Stephanie since she was a toddler racing through the aisles of her parent's grocery store.
With a wave of her hand, Dr. Silva veiled the girl from the workers, even though she was sure in their influenced state they would never notice what she was about to do anyway. Placing her finger over her lips, Dr. Silva signaled for the girl to remain silent. She smoothed the dark brown hair from Stephanie's face and pulled the gag from her mouth.
