To Hell and Back

The gods, in this slice of the world, were mostly Old Graecian. Hermes with winged sandals and helmet, Héra in Her place of primacy, Apolo's small statue next to the more massive Artemisa Hekat holding a bow and touching the head of a sleek marble greyhound. Hades was there, shadowed by Persephonica, with Her basket of flowers echoing Demetre's horn of plenty. Âres crouched behind His shield, shortsword thrusting belligerently up. Aphroditas swooned on a long couch, Her naked body glowing triumphantly.

There was another long gallery of gods, mostly Old Perasiano, along with a round shield of calligraphy for the remnants of old Islum, enduring its last death here in a part of the world it once ruled, just like Novo Christianity. The Religions of Submission had a good run, but once the Awakening had happened and people could speak directly and reliably with gods… well, they just didn't make sense anymore.

At least, to most reasonable people.

I'm not really up on my Old Perasiano, but I recognized Ahra Mzda, as well as Ah'rman, His destructive shadow-twin. There was a rough carved stone for Allat, who hadn't been Perasiano but who made sense, given the once-popularity of Islum in this part of the world.

It was beautiful in a way only sacred space can be. For just a moment the spell of beauty and belief closed around me like a warm bath, almost dispelling the twitching heaviness in my belly. But the emptiness of my naked face, my emerald still twinkling u

What was I doing in a house of the gods, now that my own god had asked me for more than I could give? I had always been so certain, so sure of being cradled in Death's hands. Now I couldn't even look at Hades's dour shadowed features under his anachronistic crescent-peaked helm. He was just another of Death's faces, not the slender canine head of my own personal psychopomp, but my eyes skittered away from Him all the same.

I couldn't look Death in the face anymore.

I tore my eyes away and paced into the temple, Japhrimel's step soundless behind me. He was alert and wary, the cloak of his Power against my skin drawing together more and more tightly, covering me with a mantle of warmth.

I was grateful for that, even as I shamefully averted my eyes from one of Death's faces. Our little group made next to no noise except for the creaking of the blasted new rig, a

Kyphii filled my nose. Gabe Spocarelli had always been burning the stuff, its fragrant bite filling her house. Except now her house was empty, everything inside it searched and possibly broken, and Gabe was dead.

Another reason not to look Death in the face. If I went into the blue land where my god resided now, would I meet my oldest friend? Would she ask if I was protecting her daughter, like I'd sworn to? Would she ask me if I had avenged her death?

Would her soul believe me if I told her I'd tried?

The temple spun around me, a spiked wheel of sanctity and belief. I took a deep breath of kyphii-laden air, the Power contained in those thrumming walls bleeding out in organ-tones of deep red and deeper violet just at the edge of hearing, rattling my bones. The floor clicked underfoot, permaplas mosaic tiles distressed to look like old chips of silica glass, and in the middle of the vast empty bell of the deserted temple a monstrous cramp gripped the lowest regions of my belly, sinking its rusty teeth right through me.

Japhrimel's arm circled my shoulders. "Dante?"

Va

The temple shivered like a parabolic mirror swiveling on jeweled bearings. The Power in the walls turned to streaks of oil on a wet surface as I collapsed, only Japhrimel's sudden clutching hand keeping me from spilling writhing to the ground.

What the hell it hurts oh no now what?

I felt it, the thrumming in this building even older than the Republic of Gilead. A darkness lived at its very roots, and as fresh pain gripped me I bent over without even the breath to scream. My emerald sparked once, twice, green glimmers in the gloom.

Pain eased, in dribs and drabs. I hung from Japhrimel's hands, limp and wrung-wet, sweat standing out in great clear drops on my skin. «-ohgods-» I managed, in a very small voice. "I think I'm going to…" Throw up. Pass out. Something.

"Do what you must. I thought we had more time." Japhrimel's hands were gentle. Too gentle. I would have preferred him to use the iron-under-velvet strength he was capable of, because if he was being this exquisitely careful, something was most definitely wrong.

"More time for what?" I gasped, my legs shaking. The only other time I'd felt this unsteady was when I had my worst bout of reaction fever after landing in a slagheap on a bounty in Hegemony Suisse. I'd thrown up so hard I'd been weak and shaky for days and almost burst a few blood vessels.

Back when Doreen was still alive.

I didn't need that thought. I had enough keeping me occupied. "I think I'm all right." I shook Japh's hands away — or would have, if I could have stood up on my own. My legs refused to obey me. They'd turned into wet noodles.

Is it me? Am I not allowed in temples anymore? Anubis, my Lord, my god, why? What have I done? I spared the traitor You wanted me to spare.

But I'd cursed Him, hadn't I? I had cursed my god bitterly, down in the very roots of my being. I'd thought it could not matter. I had been sure it would not matter. I had also lied, broken my sorcerous Word, and betrayed everything I held dear.

No wonder sacred space did not want me.

The voice came from nowhere, skittering through the temple's shadows like thousands of pairs of decorative insectile feet, pricking hard and hurtful against shivering skin. "Kinslayer." It spoke Merican, but the accent was pure demon, twisted and wrong. "How dare you enter this place?"

I managed to raise my head. Shadows gathered between the swords of dying sunlight, and the house of the gods rustled with currents of uneasy Power.

Japhrimel's sure steady grip on me didn't change. "Sephrimel. I greet you."

"You greet me. How courteous. How dare you enter here?" The insect feet turned to pinpricks of fire, and Sofya's entire interior shuddered. It was a demon's voice, but somehow wrong. It was a voice of casual power, full of a demon's terrible alie

Japhrimel sounded just as he usually did. Calm, quiet as a knife slipped between ribs. "I have come for what you stole. It is time."

The owner of the skittering voice stepped out of shadows that shouldn't have held him as casually as a human might step from one room into another.

He was tall and gaunt, as starved-looking as I've ever seen a demon. Golden skin drew tight over bones as architecturally beautiful as Sofya's own grace. His hair was an amazing shock of clotted ice, twisted into dreadlocks pulled back and looped several times with hanks of red silk. The hair looked like it had drained the life from him, and his baggy black robe, belted with a length of frayed rope, didn't help. Narrow golden feet, callused and battered into claws, rutched against the mosaic floor. His hands were skeletal, the claw structure built into finger tips and wrist musculature clearly visible with no extraneous flesh to disguise it.