Dancing on the Head of a Pin (25 page)

He could see that she was suddenly upset, her eyes appearing puffy as tears began to roll down her ruddy cheeks. Remy set the bottle upon the countertop and went to her.

“What’s wrong?”

He’d come up behind her and put his hands upon her shoulders. There was the faintest of trembles there. It was chilly in the old apartment, but he knew that this had nothing to do with the cold.

She laughed, wiping away the tears running down her face as she continued to mix in the flour she’d added to the pan.

“You’re going to say I’m stupid,” she said, turning her gaze up to him. “At least I hope you do.”

He waited patiently for her to continue, rubbing his hands lovingly up and down her arms.

“Making the gravy made me think of my nana Sarah—my dad’s mom,” she said. “This was her recipe. She taught me when I was a little girl . . . before she got sick.”

He still wasn’t quite sure where she was going, but he kept silent, allowing her to purge whatever it was that was bothering her.

“She lived with us after she was diagnosed with emphysema,” Madeline explained as she crushed the balls of flour that floated in the bubbling mixture. “Sarah had a two-pack-a-day habit—Camels unfiltered—and it killed her to stop, even though she was so sick and could barely breathe. We fixed up a spare room, moving her in so that we could take care of her.”

Madeline had continued to stir the light brownish mixture, as if stirring up the memories of the past.

“At first it was sort of fun having her around all the time, but as she became sicker it got tense and sort of scary. Both my mother and father had part-time night jobs and would leave me home alone with Sarah . . . even after she’d become really bad.”

Madeline set the spoon that she’d been using down and just stood there silently.

Remy said nothing, but continued to rub her shoulders, encouraging her to continue with his silence.

“I can remember sitting in the kitchen at night . . . sometimes for hours, listening to her in her bedroom down the hall gasping for breath . . . waiting for something . . . something horrible to happen. I grew to hate her for what she was putting me through.”

He started to turn her around toward him. At first she fought, but she soon succumbed, melting into him as he put his arms around her.

“It must have been very hard for you,” he said understandingly. “And not the sort of responsibility that should be dropped on a kid.”

He felt the dampness of her tears seeping through the fabric of his shirt.

“You really didn’t hate her; you hated the situation you’d been put in—the illness that was taking away the woman you loved.”

Madeline’s body became rigid within his arms, and she lifted her face up to him. Her eyes were red and swollen, cheeks damp and flushed with pink.

“One night sitting alone in my kitchen, listening to her struggle to catch a breath, I wished that she would die—for God or whoever to come and take her so that I wouldn’t feel so scared anymore.”

Remy knew what had happened then, and how it had played on her childlike psyche, growing into an overpowering obstacle of guilt that she had carried with her to that day.

“She died, Remy,” Madeline had told him, her voice shaking with sadness and shame. “I wished my grandmother dead—I wished so hard that it killed her. And that’s why I’m probably going to Hell.”

Madeline pushed her face into his chest, and he felt her body shudder pathetically with sadness. He tried to comfort her, stroking the back of her head and rocking her gently from side to side.

He wanted to tell her that it was impossible to wish someone dead—to think that there was some great power out there listening, waiting to respond to such random requests—but then he remembered the life that his love had been not all that long ago indoctrinated into: an existence where a human woman had married an actual being of Heaven.

And he could see how a belief such as this didn’t seem quite as silly as it once had.

That was when he’d told her about Hell—about Tartarus—and why it existed, and that even if she had managed to somehow wish her grandmother dead, she wouldn’t have gone to Hell when she died.

Hell was not a place for humanity; it was for those who had rebelled against the glory of Heaven.

For those who had sinned against their loving God.

These were the thoughts that instantaneously danced across the surface of Remy’s mind as he clung to a precarious outcropping of ice, Karnighan’s doorway swirling and sputtering in the air above his head.

The old man’s spell had torn a hole in the air above Tartarus, and as Remy had fallen through, he’d lost his weapons as he’d frantically clawed for purchase on any surface that could break his fall. The ice numbed his hands to the point where his fingertips had cracked and started to bleed, staining the ice crimson.

Hanging on to the jagged protrusion of ice, Remy studied the area around him, searching for a sign of Madach, or any possible hint as to how dire their situation actually was.

The air of Hell was filled with swirling clouds of noxious fumes that partially obscured his vision and poisoned his thoughts with the taint of fear and desperation. But there wasn’t time for such things; he was to somehow thwart the Nomads’ plans. How this was to be accomplished, and why it had become his responsibility, were mysteries he would have to deal with another time, when there were less pressing matters to concern himself with.

There was no sign of Madach, and not having the luxury to worry, Remy began his dangerous journey down the side of the ice prison, bloodstained hands searching for any crack, edge, or divot that could be used to assist his descent.

The filthy sky above his head trembled, and he chanced a look upward to see Karnighan’s passage begin to falter. The nexus began to sputter and pulse, the magicks used to hold it open beginning to fail. Remy quickened his descent, the sharpness of the icy surface cutting into his fragile flesh, the blood from the cuts making the frigid exterior slicker than it already was.

There was suddenly a roar like thunder, followed by a powerful expulsion of air that tore him from his perch upon Tartarus’ surface and tossed him into oblivion.

Remy tumbled down, the fetid air of the place rushing to fill his lungs with its corrosive stench. The ground flew up to meet him with alarming speed, the essence of the divine imprisoned inside the cage of humanity shrieking to be loosed. But he waited too long, dreading the release of the Seraphim.

Remy struck another outcropping of ice on the way down, and the world went temporarily dark. Struggling to regain some semblance of consciousness, he found himself continuing to fall, the punch line to an old joke echoing inside his head as he waited for the inevitable.

He landed atop something that partially cushioned his fall. It wasn’t as if he’d landed on a big pile of pillows, or even bags of trash, for that matter. It was like landing on a sack full of doorknobs: a little bit of give-and-take as he connected, and then he found himself bouncing off, only to sail through the air again, eventually landing on a cold, rocky surface.

Remy’s head swam with pain, a steady throb of agony that pulsed with every rapid-fire beat of his heart.

But he’d survived, not that he really had much of an option.

The atmosphere of Hell was working its magick, trying to convince him to curl up into a ball and give up, but he knew that wasn’t going to work for him. He’d landed on his back, and eventually forced his eyes open, focusing on the looming image of the icy prison before him. He had a rough idea as to where Karnighan’s doorway had dropped him off, and was disturbed to see the distance he had fallen.

Remy started to sit up, the sensation of bone rubbing against jagged bone causing blossoms of color to appear before his eyes. He lay back down on the ground, willing the agony pulsing through his damaged body to subside.

Counting to three, he managed to force himself up into a sitting position, focusing on the locations of his extreme discomfort. One of his legs appeared to be broken, lying twisted and useless upon the inhospitable earth at the base of Tartarus.

“Shit,” he hissed, pushing himself backward toward the formation of ice that jutted up from the ground. Again he saw a universe of stars, the grinding of his bones apparently caused by some broken ribs.

He leaned back against the ice, breathing through his nose, waiting for the pain to subside. A rust-colored mist hung thick, like smoke, making visibility difficult until a powerful belch of fetid air—likely from the heat-blasted landscape located in the deep valleys and ravines below the prison of ice—helped to improve the visibility momentarily.

He wished it hadn’t.

As far as he could see, the frosty ground was strewn with the dead. Broken corpses of fallen angels, Hellions, armored Sentries, and even some of the cloaked Nomads littered the ground. This was what had broken his fall.

He recalled the fields of Heaven during the war, the corpses of those slain in the conflict that pitted angel against angel. Remy had hoped to never see anything like it again.

The sight sickened him, reminding him of why he had abandoned the celestial for the earthly comforts of humanity.

The thick, sulfurous mist was stirred by a shifting breeze, temporarily obscuring his view of the dead, and he was grateful. He lay back against the foundation of Tartarus and thought about what he had to do, although in his current condition, his choices were limited.

Out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw something move. Hoping that it was a merely a trick of the mist, Remy squinted, watching the toxic fog for any sign of life. He saw it again, followed by other shapes moving stealthily about, trying not to be seen, and knew immediately what had found him.

Hellions. A small pack of the Hell-born animals had found his scent, preferring living prey over the dead.

Great,
Remy thought,
the day just keeps on getting better and better.

He could hear their claws clicking on the rocky surface, the low rumbling growls of anticipation as they zeroed in on his scent.

Bracing himself, Remy pushed back against the ice, forcing himself up onto his good leg. The pain was worse than before, and he knew then that he must prepare for the inevitable. Hell was a cruel and vicious place, and not at all accommodating to the frailty of human flesh.

He knew he was going to have to give in, to shed his guise of humanity, and to once again resume his true form. The pain made it difficult to concentrate, the wildness of the angelic nature fighting him, as if trying to make him pay for its imprisonment.

Through pain-hazed eyes he saw at least three of the Hellions converging. Remy let go of his humanity, opening the mental gates that held the nature of Heaven at bay, allowing the Seraphim its freedom.

But it didn’t come fast enough.

The Hellions pounced, their hungry jaws clamping down on one of his wrists, another sinking its fangs into his injured leg. Remy cried out, falling forward to the ground. He could feel the Seraphim rising to the surface, but it seemed to be taking its time.

At last his flesh began to heat, to bubble and steam, as the radiance of God’s power began to emerge. The Hellions seemed excited by the physical transformation, as if somehow aroused by the taste of his change.

They climbed up on him, fangs snapping at his flailing hands as he tried to keep them from his throat. His covering of flesh was melting away to expose his angelic form, but the Hellion attack was savage, relentless, their ferocity more than he could handle at the moment.

He actually began to consider the fact that he might die, when his thoughts were interrupted by a blast of gunfire, followed by the yelp of an animal’s pain. Remy took note of one of the beasts, its head flipping back sharply to one side as it dropped heavily to the ground.

The remaining two Hellions ceased their attack, their bony heads suddenly moving in the air as they searched for signs of the threat.

Again there came a clap of artificial thunder, another of the Hell-hounds shrieking wildly, turning tail, trying to slink away dragging a now useless leg behind it.

Another shot finished the fleeing beast, leaving only one of the attacking Hellions alive.

Remy tossed his head back in an awful mixture of sadness and euphoria, crying out as the last of his humanity was excised, and the Seraphim completely emerged.

Now healed, he climbed to his feet, golden wings unfurling from his back to beat the sulfurous air. His angelic form was still adorned in the armor of war, the armor that he had worn when he had killed his brothers in Heaven.

Through angelic eyes he watched the last of Hellions as it tensed, the exposed muscle and sinew of its body bunching together, readying to pounce upon Remy’s savior as he emerged from the shifting haze.