Donny's Inferno (13 page)

“As many as there need to be,” answered Zig.

“Or perhaps only one,” said Zag. “The fog and the ­sorrowmongers may be one and the same.”

That idea sent Donny's brain into a tailspin. He couldn't get out of those caverns fast enough, and so his heart sank when he looked down the tunnel. The dead from the barge were marching toward them, and they filled the tunnel from side to side. He and Zig-Zag had to stand with backs pressed to the wall to let them pass. There was a ferryman at the head of the group and another behind, looming over the crowd.

Donny didn't want to look at the faces of the dead, but he would have felt like a coward if he didn't. It surprised him again that so few of the people seemed old. Once again, they were dressed in everyday clothes, except for the occasional work uniform, although the uniforms did not look entirely familiar.
What would Dad be wearing?
he wondered. Somehow he knew it would be one of those sharp Italian suits his father loved.

The dead plodded along, their arms limp by their sides. They walked almost in lockstep, without bumping into one another or trying to turn and run. Donny was sure they were under some sort of spell cast by the ferrymen. Only their heads seemed free to move at will. The dead looked around and strained to see what lay ahead. They talked to one another with panic in their voices, but in a language Donny did not understand. That was why the uniforms looked unfamiliar, he realized. They were not American.

Some tried to talk to him, asking questions he couldn't answer. “I'm sorry,” he told them, and he held up his hands in a helpless gesture. “I don't speak your language.”

A few heard him and called to him in accented English.

“What is happening to me?”

“What will they do with us?”

“Where are we?”

Zig-Zag stepped in front of Donny. “Don't trouble the boy,” said Zag. “You will see soon enough what's to become of you.”

CHAPTER 28

T
hey were back in the chariot again. Donny stared at the barge in the river nearby. It was empty of the dead, thick ropes mooring it to the landing. When the ferrymen returned, it would move on and vanish into mystery at the far end of the river.

More clusters of lights floated out from the tunnel, like swarms of fireflies. They drifted to the river and joined its course, hovering a few feet above the water. It made Donny feel a little better to see those souls moving on. But after how long?

“What do you think of the Caverns of Woe?” Zig asked.

“They were terrible,” Donny said.

“I agree,” said Zag. “They should all be back in the Pit of Fire, as it was meant to be.”

That wasn't exactly what Donny had meant. As bad as
the caverns were, the pit must have been worse. In the caverns, a soul might eventually move on. In the pit, there was nothing but hopeless torment, forever and ever.

“Well,” said Zig, “what shall we show you now, young mortal?”

“The fungus farms? The quarries? The Infernal Sea? Another pillar city?” asked Zag.

Donny shook his head. “Can we go back to Angela's place? I really need to talk to her.”

“If you must,” said Zig.

They had just set out again when Donny felt a great weariness come over him. It was hard to keep track of time, with the nonstop daylight of the clouds, and the leaps between hours as they had ventured from Sulfur to New York. But it had been a long while since he'd slept. He rested his head on the back of the bench and let the motion of the chariot lull him to sleep.

•  •  •

Shouts and mutters woke Donny from a deep slumber. He lifted his head, blinked at the harsh light, and wondered where he was. The Pillar Obscura loomed overhead, but they'd stopped in the city, a short distance away. The diner was nearby. A crowd of imps and other denizens had gathered around an alley that was choked with debris from the long-ago war. He saw Zig-Zag among them, staring at something.

“GRGL?” asked Arglbrgl, still beside him.

“I don't know what's going on,” Donny said.

Cookie, the cook from the diner, stepped out of the crowd and dabbed the corners of her eyes with the bottom of her apron.

Donny cupped his hands around his mouth and called to her. “Cookie!” She saw him and came over to the chariot.

“What happened?” Donny asked.

“An awful thing, a terrible thing,” she said.

Donny heard a mournful cry, and then the crowd parted. A tall imp walked forward, a familiar form ­cradled in his arms.

“Poor Sooth,” Cookie said.

There was a terrible deep wound across Sooth's skull. The imp who carried him raised his head and howled to the sky. Other imps in the crowd did the same. Beside Donny, Arglbrgl joined in. The chorus sent shivers down Donny's spine.

“Was it . . . Was it an accident?” he asked, raising his voice over the din.

Cookie wagged her head while she blew her nose into the apron. “I don't think so. You see that cut on his head? Somebody killed Sooth. Hid the body in the rubble. Who would do a thing like that to such a harmless imp?”

A murderer,
Donny thought. In his mind, he saw the loathsome, smirking face of the Jolly Butcher.
A murderer would do a thing like that. But why?

CHAPTER 29

T
izzy told me Sooth was acting strangely,” Donny said as the chariot rolled on.

“Sooth was always a strange one,” Zag said.

Donny looked back toward the street where the imp had been murdered. “Yeah, that's what Angela said. But maybe Tizzy was right. He was down from his column. He seemed nervous.” The imp's riddle had almost slipped his mind, but it came back to him and he said it aloud. “After the light comes the fall.”

The question was still on his mind when the chariot stopped at Pillar Obscura. Was it just a coincidence that Sooth had been killed after behaving strangely? He looked at the luminous clouds. They still burned, but not as brightly, and they showed signs of breaking up. Here and there he caught glimpses of the stony ceiling as gaps
appeared between the clouds. Sooth's final riddle, the one that seemed so urgent to the imp, echoed in his head.
After the light comes the fall.

“I'm going to find Angela,” he told Zig-Zag.

Zig-Zag nodded. Arglbrgl was still on the bench. The imp gripped his head in his hands and moaned softly, mourning the loss of Sooth.

Donny ran up the path that curved around the pillar. First he wanted to beg Angela for forgiveness. But it was more than that. A feeling had grown in his mind, gathering strength. Something was wrong. He just wasn't sure exactly what.

After circling entirely around the pillar, he arrived at her door, out of breath. There was a huge brass knocker on the door, big enough to fit a dinner plate inside. He raised it and slammed it against the metal plate three times. Then he stepped back and listened for footsteps.

None came. He looked at the windows above the door in time to see Tizzy pop her head out. Her mouth opened in a wide smile, and she waved. “Hi, Donny!”

“Hi, Tizzy. I need to talk to Angela.”

Tizzy shook her head. “She's not here. Plus I think she's really mad at you. Did you do something bad?”

“Something
dumb
,” Donny clarified. “Where did she go?”

“There was a council meeting and she didn't want to go but she had to go 'cause it was important but it was the last thing she felt like doing and she went.”

Donny looked at the white dome perched on those low hills across the river. “Okay, thanks!”

Nanny's ridiculous wig emerged from the window, followed by Nanny's scowling face. She looked at Donny, bared her teeth, and growled.

“Gotta go,” Donny said.

“See you later!” Tizzy cried.

“Hope so,” Donny called back. He wasn't so sure he would ever be welcomed back.

When he got back to the street, the chariot was gone, and Zig-Zag with it. Arglbrgl moped on the curb, staring at the street, his head in his hands. Donny thought about asking the imp to come but decided to leave him to mourn in peace. He jogged down the road, heading for the bridge that would take him over the river and to the Council Dome.

Along the way, he slowed to give his lungs a break. He stopped, his chest heaving, his hands on his hips. Ahead of him, the clouds parted for a moment, and he caught a fleeting glimpse of the ceiling.

“What was that?” he muttered to himself. The image was fixed in his head. He closed his eyes and studied the memory, trying to make sense of it.

Up there, thousands of feet above, he thought he'd seen a fine white-hot line running across the width of one of the great stalactites. It wasn't part of the cloud—it was on the rock itself. He rubbed his eyes, opened them again,
and stared at the spot, hoping for another, better look. But the clouds had rolled back in. He wouldn't see it again soon.

Something else emerged from the cloud for a moment. It was little more than a speck from that distance, but Donny was sure he'd seen that shape before. It looked like a shreek, one of the nasty flying imps that Angela hated. The thing quickly wheeled and hid itself in the cloud again, heading back toward the same stalactite.

Donny looked at the tip of that enormous dagger of rock pointing down from the cloud like the tip of a spear. Then he looked down to see what was directly underneath.

It was the Council Dome.

Things connected inside Donny's brain. A handful of clues, oddities, and incidents. Taken separately, none of them made sense. But when he considered them all together, it added up to something terrible, and he couldn't imagine it meaning anything else.

He might still be wrong—epically, idiotically wrong. And he was in enough trouble with Angela already. Their relationship was in ruins, and the thought of angering her further was enough to make him waver and doubt. He stared up again, but everything was hidden by the clouds of fire.

“What if I'm right,” he said aloud, and when he said it, he pictured it happening. The image sent electricity through his veins. He ignored the pain in his lungs and started to run again.

The bridge was ahead. The dome was maybe a half-mile beyond it. He raced onto the bridge, which arched over the river high enough to allow barges to pass below. With his eyes raised up to the clouds that covered the stalactite, he barely saw the man who stood in the middle of the bridge, gazing the other way. But the fellow heard Donny's footsteps and turned to see who was coming. With a look of surprise, and then dark delight, he spread his arms wide.

Donny almost stumbled into the embrace. Then he staggered backward and held up his hands to ward the man away.

The Jolly Butcher giggled. “Angela's pet! Where are you rushing off to without your master?”

CHAPTER 30

D
onny looked to the right and left of Butch, but the madman had positioned himself in the middle of the bridge. It was just wide enough for a chariot to cross, with precious little room on either side.

“Let me go by, please,” Donny asked. “It's important.”

“Go right ahead,” Butch said. He raised his arms a little wider.

Donny shook with fear and anger. “Seriously. Step aside.”

Butch didn't move. “Can't you stay and chat instead? Come, enjoy the view with me. I'm sure we'd have lots to talk about.” The mouth was grinning, but his brow was lowered cruelly, shading the butcher's eyes.

Donny was ready to scream. It would cost him a half an hour to run to the next bridge up or downstream, and he felt sure time was running out. He eyed the spaces beside Butch
one last time. Maybe if he feinted in one direction and darted in the other. But he was already tired. And who knew how quick Butch was?

There wasn't really any choice. He took a few backward steps and crouched a little, ready to sprint. But then he saw something to his left that gave him another idea. He turned and ran back down the bridge the way he'd come.

“Where are you going?” cried Butch. “I thought there was something important on the other side!” Donny heard the butcher's boots stomp down the bridge in pursuit.

“Oh no!” shouted Butch. He had guessed what Donny had in mind. “You can't be serious!”

A barge came down the river, full of souls. It looked the same as all the others, gaunt ferrymen at the front and the back, and souls packed in the middle. Donny raced along the bank, and he leaped toward the middle of the barge.

He knew it was ludicrous, but he shouted, “Excuse me!” as he was in the air. He came down with his feet on the deck but slammed into two of the dead. Ordinary ­people would have toppled over, but these were souls in the thrall of the ferrymen. They kept their feet planted on the deck while their upper bodies toppled over, nearly sideways, defying the laws of physics. Then they straightened up again, and Donny clutched their arms to keep himself upright.

“Sorry!” Donny told them breathlessly. The men he'd
jumped into were Asian. All of the dead on this barge were. When they saw him, they shouted at him in their native tongue. Donny didn't understand the words, but he sensed the fear and confusion in their cries.

He looked back and saw Butch on the shore, doubled over with his hands around his waist, hardly able to talk through his laughter. “Ha! Ha-ha! Nobody's ever tried that before! And they call
me
a madman!”

Donny gritted his teeth and started to push his way across. The dead were packed tight and rooted to the deck like trees, but he could grab their arms or shoulders and part them, stepping high to get past their legs.

He wondered if what he was doing would anger the ferrymen. The answer came in a terrible hissing sound. When he looked to the front, he saw one of those cloaked figures moving his way. When he looked to the back, he saw the other ferryman doing the same.

There was no need for those two to shove their way through the crowd. The souls before them stepped right or left to clear a path at the ferrymen's silent bidding. Donny was halfway across the barge, and he fought harder, shoving and shouldering the dead aside. He raised his voice, though he knew it meant nothing. “Coming through! Excuse me! Pardon me!”

Butch taunted him from the shore. “The ferrymen will get you! I wonder what they'll
dooooo
!”

Only a dozen souls stood between Donny and the side
of the barge. He fought madly, squeezing between their torsos. From the corner of his eye he saw the dead to his right step aside, and a ferryman appeared in the gap and reached for him. Donny slithered through another pair of souls and felt bony fingers brush his back, almost getting a grip. “Let me go!” he shouted. “I need to get to the shore! I'm with Angela Obscura!” He slid his arms between the last pair ahead and pushed them right and left. The side of the deck was right in front of him, and the other bank just beyond. He stepped onto the low rail and jumped.

A hand closed on his collar and yanked him back. He spun around, coming face-to-face with a ferryman. Inside the shadow of the cloak, there was a ghastly head. He looked away instantly, because it would have paralyzed him with fear if he'd gazed any longer. There was only the briefest impression of an ancient visage, hairless and infinitely wrinkled. Milky eyes quivered inside glistening red sockets. The lips had shriveled away to bare, broken gray teeth. The ferryman's other hand came up, pale and long-fingered, and clamped around Donny's neck.

Donny tried to speak, but the words were choked off. His eyes bugged. He raised his hand, trying to tell the ­ferryman to stop and listen. The grip loosened, and Donny saw those ghastly eyes focused on the palm of his hand, where Angela had imprinted her symbol.

The ferryman stared for a moment. Then he spoke with a slow, chilling voice.
“Don't. Do. That. Again.”
He hurled
Donny backward, out of the boat and onto the far shore.

Donny landed on his heels and tumbled onto his back. His head hit the ground next, and he fully expected to crack his skull on stone, but the springy black moss growing there cushioned his fall. He rolled one more time, his legs flying over his head, and came to rest on his stomach.

“Thank you!” he shouted, giddy with relief, but he only got another hiss from the ferrymen in reply. Butch gaped on the other side of the river. He was no longer amused. Donny fought the impulse to taunt him back. Butch was dangerous enough without further provocation.

Donny turned and ran, grateful for the distance he'd put between himself and the butcher. He wondered why Butch was on the bridge to begin with. Butch had seemed surprised to see him, because his attention was focused elsewhere. He was looking toward the council dome.

The highest point of the bridge.
That would be a good place to watch something happen, wouldn't it?
Donny thought.

His lungs burned again, but even so, he ran faster.