by Nicole Thorn
“Anastasia Amarus,” the girl said.
I was the last one on the bus. She led me off and started walking.
“Oh.” She grinned. “You’ve been assigned to my castle.”
“Your castle?” I repeated.
She stopped. “We share them. A few dozen per.”
“Is this your sentence?” I asked. “Bringing people to purgatory?”
“No.” She shook her head. “I just do this to pass the time. I died a long time ago, but since my dad’s the Devil, I get to spend eternity in as close to paradise as I can get.”
“Your dad’s the Devil?” I said in a breath.
I had to accept the concept that Heaven and Hell were real. And that I was dead. And in Hell… I ate a cupcake for breakfast this morning and now I’m in Hell. I’m never going to see my family again. Never going to get to make one of my own. Never see Poppy, Oswald, Elisa…
“Yes.” The girl ripped me out of my own head. “One of many of his children. We run around topside, and when we die, we get sent here.” She gestured to a castle. “It’s not so bad. Some of my siblings are nice. I have friends… sort of. I get to talk to my mom sometimes.”
“Your mom?”
“My sister,” she corrected herself. “Dad gives us to a sibling when we’re born. She’s the only mom I’ve ever had. She’s still alive, but I send her letters. She pops down on occasion, and I get a few minutes with her.”
“Can I—”
She shook her head somberly. “I’m sorry. But you were human, no contact with anyone topside. You’re dead. That means more for you than it does for me.”
“Okay.” I accepted it with a broken heart.
“Don’t be sad. In—” She looked at her clipboard. “—ten years—if you behave—you get to go to Heaven. You’ll feel peace and love. Nothing will hurt anymore, and you’ll have your family again one day.”
A thought came to mind. “Why am I not there now?”
She looked at my information again, and her eyes widened. “You died while practicing blood magic. That’s heavy stuff, dearie. Not meant for mortals. But it’s all you’ve done, so your sentence is far shorter than most. We don’t get many under a hundred.”
“When my friends die, will they get ten years too?”
She shrugged. “Unless they do something while they’re alive to make up for it or make it worse. The life you lead is what decides sentences. When you die, your soul takes you up or down. Not even Dad or The Big Guy do that. It’s inside of you.”
Something in my soul had darkness in it, and somehow, being here for a while would fix it.
Okay. I could accept that. Ten years, and I’d be in Heaven.
“What’s my job?” I asked.
“Maid. You clean the castle.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it.
She brought me inside—the kitten following behind us—and showed me where I’d be… living? Staying.
The foyer had a massive staircase on either side of the room leading up. She brought me to the bottom of it and opened a small door that led under the stairs.
“I’m sorry, but this is where you’ll be spending the next ten years,” she said.
I looked at the small, dark room. No bed. Just an armchair and a small shelf next to it. A bare bulb with a string attached lit up the small space.
“You don’t sleep, so no bed,” she added. “You can take books from the library or swim in the pool when you’re off duty. This place is like a freaking TARDIS.”
“What?”
She rolled her eyes. “It’s from Doctor Who. It didn’t come on till after I died, but we get DVDs and cable down here. It means ‘bigger on the inside’. Some kinda voodoo stuff Dad worked out. The population grows and though Hell is huge, it will fill up sooner or later. So, the castles are bigger on the inside to accommodate us.”
“I just clean the castle and that’s all I do?”
“Yeah. Every day, like a nine to five. Then the rest of the time is yours. You’re on light duty, due to the nature of your crime against, well, nature. Just keep your head down, do your work and all will be well. Most of my siblings won’t talk to you unless they’re asking for something. Do what they want, and they won’t torture you.”
That was terrifying, but they were children of the Devil. I shouldn’t expect less.
“I’m Caroline by the way.” The girl reached out to shake my hand.
“Annie.” I took her hand. “My friends called me Annie.”
***
Death wasn’t so bad. The work was tedious but easy. Surprisingly, the antichrists didn’t get too messy. I was surprised to find that two of the residents owned cats. I cleaned their litter and tidied up rooms.
No one in this place made their beds. I didn’t even know why they had them.
I started my day by working my way through the rooms. A good amount of the antichrists had some kind of job, so the castle stayed empty for most of the day. The busses went twenty-four seven, so some did night shifts. Though the light never changed. Time didn’t really mean anything here.
Caroline was nice to me. After work, we’d sit in the Beauty and the Beast library and talk. She told me about her mother—Aubrey. I told her about my life.
I crawled out of my hidey-hole after I changed into my uniform of scrubs.
“What’s up, Harry Potter?” I heard a male voice.
I looked up and saw a man with curly blonde hair. He towered over me, but his green eyes looked friendly.
“Funny,” I said.
“I thought so. Jonah.” He held his hand out.
“Annie.” I shook it.
“Can you do me a favor? My cat shredded this.” He held up a sock. “Can you tell one of the laundry girls I need more? It’s the fourth one this week.” He handed the sock to me.
I did my best gravely goblin voice. “Master has given Dobby a sock! Master has presented Dobby with clothes. Dobby is free!” I held the sock above my head.
Jonah laughed.
Sadly, a sock wouldn’t get me into Heaven.
He stood up straight as the laughter died. “Thank you. So many of my siblings don’t get Harry Potter. It’s upsetting.”
“I love those movies. I was almost done with the books when I died.” I frowned and pulled at the sock in my hands.
“We have copies in the library. I made sure of it. What brought you Down Below?” he asked.
“I died in the middle of a blood magic spell.”
His eyes brightened. “You’re a witch?”
“Sorta. Nothing we ever tried worked.”
He shrugged. “It’s the thought that counts.”
I smiled.
“Sorry, but I’ve gotta go. Dead people waiting.” He waved as he walked away from me, a tiny cat trailing him.
After I dropped off a new bundle of socks for Jonah, I went about my business. Caroline promised to teach me how to play poker after work, and I didn’t want to be late. She said her normal poker buddy had headed to Canada and I needed to make up for his absence.
I entered the arcade room and found a few teenaged antichrists going to town on a Pacman game. They screamed and hit it because one of the ghosts got them. I rolled my eyes and started vacuuming the room. I weaved through the dozens of machines in record time.
“Turn that off! Can’t you see we’re in the middle of something?” one of the boys shouted at me. I guess the noise distracted them from the important game. Surely it was more important than me trying to work my way into Heaven.
I had finished anyway. I unplugged the machine and started rolling up the cord.
A shoe hit me in the head and fell to the floor. I heard the boys laughing, but I didn’t react. I didn’t want them to have the satisfaction of seeing me upset.
I took the vacuum and walked out of the room.
The rest of the day went by rather quickly. I didn’t know the time—not that time really existed down here.
I wondered
how much time had gone by topside. Days? Years? Enough that my friends didn’t think of me anymore?
I couldn’t go down that rabbit hole. If I let myself think of the life I left behind, I wouldn’t be able to pull myself out. I needed to remember that everything would be okay. I’d have peace soon.
The last thing I had to do was scrub the foyer floor. Dust and dirt got tracked it, and I had to clean it twice a week.
I set down the bucket of soapy water, and started on one end, making my way to the other.
“Mmm.” I heard a low mumble from behind me. “What do we have here?”
I sat up on my knees and turned to the open front doors to see a man. He was tall, hair cropped short, and he wore a suit. I didn’t like the way he looked at me.
“Hello?” I said to him.
He started walking over to me. “Are you new?”
“Um, I’ve been here a little while.”
He took a deep breath. “Lonely?”
“Not really.” I went back to scrubbing.
“Well,” he said. “I find myself surrounded by my siblings and very little other company. Perhaps we can enjoy each other’s company.”
Gross. Even if this guy didn’t radiate evil, I wouldn’t have gone for it.
“Uh, I, um, I have work to do.” I shrunk down and kept scrubbing.
Please go away. Please go away. Please go away.
I saw him kneel down in front of me.
“No?” he said.
I looked up. “No.”
“I don’t really like being told no. Especially by some girl.”
“Sorry,” I said.
He nodded before grabbing me by the hair and pulling me to him. My knees slid across the soapy floor.
“I don’t think you heard me,” he said. “I—”
Something struck him in the head, and pulled him back, and I scooted away.
“Donald,” I heard Jonah said. “What are you doing here?” He didn’t let him answer before hitting the guy again. Then again. And again.
Jonah dragged Donald out the door and threw him.
“Sorry about that,” Jonah said as he walked back. “You okay?” He took my hands and hauled me to my feet.
“Who the Hell was that?” I still felt a little shaky when I stood.
“He’s the guy who killed me.”
I looked up at him, and my mouth dropped open.
Jonah continued. “He took me away from my little brother and sisters. Then they hunted him down and killed him.” He grinned with nothing less than pride.
“Oh. Well I’m glad they killed him.”
“Me too. Now I get my turn with him and my family lives in relative peace.”
“Did you raise them?” I remembered Caroline telling me about her mother.
“Yeah. Luc, Blair, and Blanche. They’re doing all right. They’ve got girls now. They make them happy.”
“That’s nice. Do you see them?”
“Working on it.”
“I hope you see them soon. If there’s anything I can ever do for you, let me know.”
He smiled down at me. “Thank you, Annie.”
***
“No, I never wore a poodle skirt.” Caroline had her eyes narrowed at me as we sat in the corner of the library.
“Don’t act like it was a dumb question. You died in the fifties. It wouldn’t have been weird for you to have.”
“Shut up and shuffle.” She slammed the deck of cards down in front of me.
She’d been training me for… well, I didn’t know how long. It felt like a long time. I still hadn’t won a poker game with her, but I had gotten close.
Quinlinn hopped up on Caroline’s shoulder and fell asleep with half of her on Caroline’s chair and the other half still on Caroline.
I shuffled, and dealt the cards. When I dropped one in front of Caroline, I felt a strange twinge in my head.
“You okay?” she asked me.
I rubbed my temples. “Um, yeah. Just a headache.”
Her eyebrow went up. “We’re dead. We don’t get headaches.”
The twinge came back for a second, and I dropped the rest of the cards. Caroline got up and rushed over to me. Quinlinn dropped, and blinked with confusion.
“Annie?” Her hands went to my shoulders.
“It’s over,” I said. “I don’t know what it was.”
Caroline looked a little scared. “I don’t know what to do here, dearie. But this isn’t good.”
“Let’s just play,” my voice sounded weak for the first time since I died. Like I just didn’t have the strength to make it louder.
Caroline cautiously moved back to her seat. She picked up the cards and shuffled for me. We started our game, and my head cleared a little.
I lost the first hand, and Caroline took great joy in taking my chips from me. We didn’t even have real money to play with, so I didn’t know why she was so excited.
I threw down my hand of cards and got a snarky comment loaded into my barrel. Before I got the chance to say it, I felt my body twitch, and I stood up.
Caroline’s blue eyes filled with worry.
My hands went to my head as it started swimming. “I can’t… I can’t think…”
Everything felt weird. More than normal. It wasn’t pain, but something else.
“How do you feel?” I felt hands on my shoulders again as I swayed on my feet.
“Wrong.”
I heard her breathing heavily. “I don’t—there aren’t doctors in Hell… this doesn’t happen. I can’t help you.”
I felt something pulling on me, but I didn’t know what. “I… I…” Nothing came out.
“You’re gonna be okay.” Caroline pet my hair.
“No…”
Something felt so, so wrong.
I tried walking around, but I just ended up on the floor. I stared up at the ceiling and a blurry Caroline.
“Stay with me,” she cried.
Could I die twice?
Caroline took my hand and held my face. “HELP!” she called. But who could help me? I was dead already. Dead and dying again. Was there another other side? Could I slip farther into oblivion?
White. I saw white all around me. I could still hear Caroline crying out for help, but it was too late.
Chapter Two: The File
Ezra
I’d been tracking this bastard for nearing a month. Twice, twice I’d almost killed him and he just slipped away from me. Sadly for me, the demon I tracked had the ability to bend the light around him and make himself almost invisible.
But where I would send him, that wouldn’t be an issue anymore. One stab from my dagger, and whoever I sunk it into went straight down to Hell. And good ol’ Lucifer had even been nice enough to give it the ability to turn the body to ash, so I wouldn’t be stuck hiding corpses in my free time.
Thankfully, Lucifer made my job as easy as he could. Not for any affection he might have for me, but because the easier it was, the quicker I could collect souls for him.
I’d been doing this job since the day I died. I was one of his hellions; a demon—more or less— who had to find specific people that Lucifer needed or wanted dead. And I killed them.
Simple enough.
Days like these made me love my job. Something about chasing a person down and winning a fight. Made my long dead heart beat again. If only for a little while. Normally, I got a day or so reprieve from my typical numbness. Sometimes, I welcomed it.
“Can I help you, sir?” I heard the voice of a woman from behind me.
I turned from my plant camouflage, and saw a short brunette in a tank top and jeans, holding a watering can.
I found myself in a plant nursery. My target currently shopped for a new companion of the rose bush variety. Whatever floats his boat, I suppose.
“No thank you, miss,” I said slowly, letting my Scottish accent do its charm. I watched her eyes turn glassy, and I knew it did the trick.
Ah, yes, little girl. Pay no attent
ion to the man hiding behind a cactus. Just let my voice soothe you into a stupor… as close to a Jedi mind trick as I’d ever get.
“Okay.” She beamed. “Just let me know if you need anything.” She twirled her hair between her fingers and put extra emphasis on anything. God, this was almost too easy.
“Sure thing, love.” I winked and listened to her heart flutter.
She stumbled away, and I went back to crouching behind a cactus. I pulled my shirt and jacket farther down to make sure my dagger stayed concealed. Humans tended to get a tad weirded out when they saw a man with a dagger walking around. I tried as hard as I could to stay hidden. Always moving, never leaving any piece of myself behind.
Though that might be a bit of a lie.
I had one place I went. Sometimes I had a few weeks between cases—and on a rare occasion, months—and I needed a place to call my own. I built a cottage in Scotland. It was small but mine. Nothing else made me feel at home.
Thankfully, I had the ability to pop down to Hell anytime I wanted and pop back out wherever I needed to be. One minute, I could be in Hawaii and the next, Greenland.
The target picked up a potted plant and made his way to the check out area. I stayed in my hiding spot while he bought his roses. I needed him away from witnesses.
“Just this?” the girl behind the counter asked the demon.
“Yes, thank you.” He nodded. Oddly polite for a man who had a habit of killing young girls in public places. He loved to hide himself and slit their throats so he could watch people panic over how it happened.
When the news stories started, I got the assignment.
The man—Ichabod—paid for his plant and started walking toward his motorcycle. I followed close behind. Before I left, I flashed that girl a smile. Her mouth fell open and I took off.
I had a rented car—a boring hybrid of some kind. It looked expensive, since I had a special credit card attached to a bank account that never seemed to dry out. Lucifer owned a lot of businesses, including several widely known and successful banks. He used some of that money for the allowances he gave his children and the salaries of his employees—those who knew they worked for him.
I trailed behind the man until he stopped at an apartment complex. He didn’t live there, according to his file. I didn’t know why he went there. Maybe he had a girlfriend.
