“They will if you keep arguing with a slave.”
“You selfish beast. You want to trick me!”
“No, this one usually keeps his word. Though, some women might argue the point,” spoke another more familiar voice.
Spyder looked at a nearby bench, the apparent source of the voice, but no one was there. Then, by his ear he heard, “Bring hither the fatted calf, and let us eat, and be merry. The prodigal son is returned.”
“My lord!” cried Ashbliss, dropping onto his belly.
“Count? How did you get down here?”
Count Non smiled and clapped Spyder on the back. “Guess,” he said.
“You’re on the guest list?”
“I make the guest list, little brother.”
Spyder looked at Count Non and in his eyes he saw unfathomable expanses of time. A heart wounded more desperately than Spyder had ever imagined was possible. A pit of reckless and brilliant fury. Desolation and pride—these most of all. They seemed to unfold from Count Non like a pair of dark wings.
“Holy shit,” Spyder said.
“That was once my name in a dead Sumerian dialect.”
“You’re Lucifer.”
“That’s my name. Don’t wear it out.”
Lucifer went to Ashbliss and prodded him with his boot. “Up, you rosy turd. I know what you wanted from this mortal, and you can’t have it. Normally, I wouldn’t care about your second-rate treacheries, but we’re at war and I need my loyal generals on their feet, not buried under quicklime in the garden. Understand?”
Ashbliss got to his feet, but stared down at the black and white pavement slabs that formed a checkerboard pattern in the square. “I understand, my lord. Have mercy on me.”
“Mercy? You must be thinking of someone else.”
“Cut the little creep some slack,” said Spyder. “He’s supposed to be sneaky. He’s a demon for Christ sake. Oh. Is it okay to say that down here?”
“Do you hear that?” Lucifer asked Ashbliss. “This mortal, whom you were about to betray and murder, is pleading for your life. It will be a long time before you see such grace down here again.”
“Kill me? We had a deal.”
“No, you had a lie,” said Lucifer. “This little wretch doesn’t work for Beelzebub. Do you, turd?”
“No, my lord.”
“Ashbliss here is a freelance thug. Someone has paid him to dispose of one of my better commanders. Possibly our friend, Xero. Little Ashbliss was going to trick you into doing the dirty work for him and then eliminate you.”
“Is that true?” Spyder asked.
Ashbliss wrung his hands.
“Fuck him,” said Spyder. “Drag him back to the butchers’ quarter and let them hang him up on a hook.”
“I can’t refuse a guest,” Lucifer told the demon.
Ashbliss burst into tears. His candles flickered out, one by one.
“Hell, I’m just blowing off steam. Can’t you just lock him up or something?” asked Spyder. Then to Ashbliss. “You’ll tell this man everything he wants to know, won’t you, asshole?”
Ashbliss looked up with red-rimmed eyes, not sure what to do. He lunged and grabbed Spyder’s hand, planting kisses on it with his thin membranous lips. “I will! I will! Thank you!” His candles flickered back to life.
Spyder looked at Lucifer. “Can you make the doggie stop humping me?”
“Come here, wretch.”
Ashbliss went and stood before Lucifer.
“You’ll begin your rehabilitation by going back to where you left my friend’s companions and bringing them to my palace. Go quickly, before you ruin my good mood.”
Bowing once, then twice, Ashbliss took off across the plaza as fast as his stumpy legs would carry him.
“Run, Forrest, run!” shouted Spyder.
Lucifer grabbed Spyder in a quick embrace. He was dressed in a striped black-and-gold hakama, the familiar chainmail over this bare chest, and a short jacket of some shiny material—vinyl or rubber. His head was shaved, and from his mid-scalp down the back of his neck, his pale skin was covered with black tattoos, intricate lettering in what Spyder remembered from Jenny’s books was a kind of Angelic Script related to the Coptic alphabet. Even in Hell, Lucifer carried deep scars in his handsome face.
“It’s good to see you, little brother.”
“You know, my father was Baptist and my mother was Lutheran and sometimes I ended up going to both churches on the same Sunday, so I shouldn’t be happy to see you,” said Spyder. “But I am.”
“Being able to embrace contradictions is a sign of intelligence.”
“Or insanity.”
“That’s what the archangel Gabriel once said to me. Just before I cut off his head.”
“Damn.”
“I didn’t have a choice. He would have cut off mine, if I’d given him the chance. I haven’t thought about that in a long time. You know, that was the incident that triggered the war.”
“In Heaven?”
“None other. You don’t really think we’re here because of the nice views?” Lucifer put out his right arm and wrapped Spyder’s left arm around it. “We can catch up while I show you around my little kingdom.”
FIFTY-ONE
Off the Radar
“You son-of-a-bitch. We thought you were dead,” said Spyder.
“I was,” Lucifer said. “That body was as dead as dead could be. I just ended up back here.”
“You wanted us here all along, didn’t you? You manipulated this whole thing just to get us here. Why?”
“Xero Abrasax. He came here with some very impressive magic. Enough to rally an army and challenge me. I needed a champion. A mortal to kill a mortal soul. Shrike can kill him. He doesn’t show it, but he’s afraid of her. There’s something in the book she can use against him.”
They passed a golden temple, like an Aztec step-pyramid. In front was a kind of sculpture on a tall bronze base. A heavy cloth twisted languorously on top, looping and folding over itself, as if it was spinning slowly in water. The material changed colors as it moved, revealing eye and mouth holes. Spyder realized that it wasn’t cloth, but human skins sewn together.
“Even if I believed that, all the shit you put us through, dragging our asses through the desert and across Hell, why do that if you wanted us here all along?”
“The universe has rules for these things. I needed Shrike here. I knew she needed a partner that could help her get here, but would have no personal desire for the book. Besides, do you think you would have come if I’d just popped into your tattoo shop one night around closing and said, ‘Hello, I’m the Prince of Darkness. Think you could help me out with a little war next Tuesday, say, sixish?’”
“You had that demon attack me in the alley!”
“I just pointed out to the Bitru that you were carrying its mark.”
“I’m suddenly remembering Sunday school. You’re the Prince of Lies.”
“First, don’t try to quote chapter and verse to me, little brother. I know every holy book ever written. I even penned a few of them. Second, the ‘Prince of Lies’ is Ahriman, the Zoroastrian lord of darkness and brother to Ahura Mazda, the lord of light. Not that I ever met either one, but I’m sure they were lovely chaps. No, before you try telling me how the world is and who I am, remember what Samuel Butler, a mortal, once said: ‘It must be remembered that we’ve only heard one side of the case. God has written all the books.’”
“You’re just a victim of bad publicity?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” Lucifer asked. “I was the loyal opposition in Heaven. I tested Job and plenty of others, all with Yahweh’s blessing. In the early days, mortal faith and free will were new concepts. That’s where the conflict began. God gave you free will, but we angels were expected to bow and scrape. I couldn’t accept that.”