He exerted patience. "I cannot prove myself to you here. As you doubtless know, I am largely forced to use humankind for my purposes on Earth, being forbidden direct influence over God's creations, unless they seek me out. I am anxious to do nothing further in defiance of God. I yearn for freedom, von Bek." His copper eyes showed a more intense version of the pain I had observed in Sabrina's. "I once thought I could achieve it. And yet I know now that I cannot have it. Therefore, I wish to be restored."
"To Heaven, Your Majesty?" I was astonished.
"To Heaven, Captain von Bek."
Lucifer applying for a return to Grace! And suggesting that somehow I could be His agent in effecting this! If this were indeed a spell, a trance, it was a most intriguing one.
I was able to say: "Would that not produce the abolition of Hell, the end of Pain in the world?"
"You have been taught to believe that."
"Is it not true?"
"Who knows, Captain von Bek? I am only Lucifer. I am not God."
His fingers touched mine.
Unconsciously, I had stretched my hand towards Him.
His voice was a throb of pleading, of persuasion. "Come, I beg thee. Come."
It was as if we swayed together in a dance, like snake and victim.
I shook my head. My mind was too full of conflict. I felt that I was losing both physical and mental balance at once.
He touched my hand again. I gasped.
"Come, von Bek. Come to Hell."
His flesh was hot but did not bum me. It was sensuous, that touch, though immensely strong.
"Your Majesty…" I was pleading, in turn.
"Will you not have pity, von Bek? Have pity on the Fallen One. Pity Lucifer."
The urgency, the pain, the need, the desperation, all conspired to win me, but I fought for a few seconds more. "I have no pity," I said. "I have scoured pity from my soul. I have scoured mercy. I feel only for myself!"
"That is not so, von Bek."
"It is so! It is!"
"A truly merciless creature would not even know what it was. You resist mercy in yourself. You resist pity. You are a victim of your reason. It has replaced your humanity. And that is truly what death is, though you walk and breathe. Help me restore myself to Heaven, and I shall help you to come to life again…"
"Oh, Your Majesty," said I, "you are as clever as they say you are." For all that I was, at that moment, His, I still attempted to strike some temporary sort of bargain. "I'll come, on the understanding that I shall be back in this room before the hour's over. And that I shall see Sabrina again…"
"Granted."
The flagstones of the library melted away before us. They turned to mercury and then to blue water. We began to float downwards, as if through a cold sky, towards a distant landscape, wide and white and without horizon.
Chapter III
MY SKIN NOW seemed to have turned almost as white as that featureless plain. I observed on my hands details of line, contours of vein and bone, which I had never before noticed.
My nails glittered like glass and appeared extraordinarily fragile.
I possessed virtually no weight at all. I thought that I might have been a crystal ghost.
"This is Hell?" said I to Lucifer.
The Prince of Darkness, too, was pale. Only His eyes, black as weathered iron, were alive.
"This is Hell," He said. "One part, I should say, of my domain. A domain which is, of course, infinite."
"And has infinite aspects?" I suggested.
"Of course not. You speak of Heaven. Hell is the Realm of Restraint and Bleak Singularity." His smile was almost hesitant, His glance sidelong, as if He was concerned that I should not miss His irony.
Lucifer seemed to exhibit a certain shyness with me. I could believe that He hoped for my good opinion. I was puzzled as to why this should be. He still gave off an aura of tremendous power and genius. I was still, against every effort of will, drawn to Him. I was certainly no match for Him in any conceivable terms. Yet it was my impression that He was nervous of me. What might I possess that He could not demand? Why should He be so desperate to own my soul?
But I saw no sense in trying to outguess Satan. Surely He could read every thought, anticipate every argument, forestall every action I chose to take.
It then occurred to me that perhaps He was refusing to do this. Perhaps His apparent delicacy was the result of His own reluctance to use the power that was His. The Prince of Darkness, who could manipulate kings and generals, Popes and cardinals, to whom such manipulation was second nature, was seeking somehow to be direct, was resisting in Himself the habits of an eternal lifetime.
This impression of mine could in itself have been created by means of careful deception.
There was plainly no point in attempting to understand Lucifer's motives or guess His character. Neither should I, I told myself, waste what few mental resources I still had in trying to anticipate either His actions or His needs.
I should merely trust that he would keep His word. I would let Him show me what He wished to show me of His Realm. And I would believe nothing to be wholly what it might seem to be.
"You are a pragmatist, captain," said Lucifer casually, "in your very bones. To your very soul, one might say."
My voice seemed fainter than was normal. There was a slight echo to it, I thought. "Do you see my soul, Your Majesty?"
He linked His arm in mine and we began to walk across the plain.
"I am familiar with it, captain."
I knew no fear at this statement, whereas on Earth I should have shuddered at least a little. Although aware of Lucifer's presence, my body was now neither corporeal nor ethereal, but somewhere between the two. Emotions which should have been strong in me were presently only hinted at; my brain seemed clearer, but that in itself could have been an illusion; my movements were slow and deliberate, yet they followed my thoughts well enough.
This state of being was not uncongenial, and I wondered if it might be the usual condition of angels and the more powerful orders of supernatural entities.
It did not strike me as strange, as I strolled through Hell, side by side with Lucifer, that I had begun to think in terms of spiritual creatures, of realms beyond my earthly world, when, for many years, I had refused to believe in anything but the most substantial and material of phenomena.
Flesh and blood…predominantly the preservation of my own…had been my only reality since my early days of soldiering. My mind and my senses had become blunted, almost certainly, but blunted sensibilities were the only kind one could safely have in the life I led. And the life I led was the only sane one in the world in which I had found myself.
Now, of a sudden, I was not only discovering a return of all my subtlest sensibilities, but exploring sensations…illusory or not…normally denied the bulk of humanity.
It was no wonder that my judgement was confused. Even though I allowed for this, I could not help but be affected. I fought to remember that I must make no pact with Lucifer, that I must agree to nothing, that no matter how tempting any offer He made I must play for time. For not only my life could be at stake, my fate for all Eternity could be the issue.
Lucifer seemed to be trying to console me. "I have given my word to you," He reminded me, "and I shall keep it."
An archway of silvery flames appeared immediately before us. Lucifer drew me towards it.
This time I did not hesitate, but entered the archway and found myself in a city.
The city was of black obsidian stone. Every surface, every wall, every canopy and every flag were black and gleamed. The folk of the city wore clothes of rich, dark colours…of scarlet and deep blue, of bloody orange and moss green…and their skins were the colour of old, polished oak.
"This city exists in Hell?" I asked.