Page 18 of Devils and the Dead
“Hades. Sir.” The demon who’d been poking Sarpedon with a pitchfork stood at attention. “Are you here inspecting the modifications?”
The lack of new heretics meant that the sixth circle didn’t need expanding, but it was in serious need of a remodel and updates to the punishment areas. I’d been mulling over the changes. Something new. Something creative. The whole lava and pitchforks thing was so overdone.
“No, I need a moment with Sarpedon, if you don’t mine.”
“Not at all, sir.” The demon moved to the side.
The damned soul lifted his head at that, then swung his legs around to sit on the sofa. I waited for him to slip on his sandals, stand, and smooth a hand over his robes before I activated the walkway that would allow him to step from the platform without having to tread on the red-hot rocks.
“Sorry to be disrupting your punishment,” I said to the soul. “I have a few questions I’d like to ask you about the necromantic arts.”
Sarpedon waved a hand. “It’s fine. Different day, same pitchfork. I’m actually glad for a change. It’s not the punishment that gets to me, it’s the boredom.”
“We’ll be working on that soon,” I promised him. No soul should be bored in hell. The demons might be in the business of eternal punishment, but they weren’t monsters.
We made our way around the ring, me nodding to various demons while Sarpedon waved and greeted souls he knew. This was a long shot. I’d already interviewed thirty necromancer souls residing here in hell. Sarpedon was my last hope.
None of them had known anything about the incident. Nor had any of them been able to point me toward any living necromancer who might be responsible. After Sarpedon, my next step would be talking to the crossroads demons to see if any of them had made deals with a necromancer who might have enough power to yank all these souls out of their respective afterlives.
After a few blocks, I spoke up. “When you were living, you were well known as someone who could communicate with the dead,” I said. “Can you tell me about that process?”
Sarpedon folded his hands together, his robes swishing as he strolled. “I used incantations and focus items to reach through the veil. The focus item is key. Without it, the soul could be anywhere and it’s incredibly time consuming to grope your way blindly through all the different afterlives trying to find the person you seek.”
“Do you communicate with the soul where it resides, or do you remove it from the afterlife and bring it to you?” I asked.
Sarpedon halted, his eyes wide as he stared at me. “Souls cannot be easily removed from the afterlife. That…that requires magic far beyond my knowledge and ability—far beyond almost every necromancer’s knowledge and ability.”
“But you have this skill,” I reminded him. “Many non-European practitioners bring forth souls to animate the dead.”
He waved his hands in the air. “I had no knowledge of those people during my lifetime. Academically, itispossible to extract a portion of the soul to bring some sentience and self-control to a risen corpse, but not the whole soul. It’s not needed. And it’s dangerous.”
“Dangerous how?” I asked.
Sarpedon blew out a long breath. “Sending a tiny portion of a soul back when you’re done isn’t a problem. Sending an entire soul backisa problem. Sometimes they don’t want to go back. It’s an entire soul. That risen corpse, that zombie with an entire soul, is not under the necromancer’s control. They are under no obligation to do as you say.”
It was my turn to stare at him. “So a zombie with an entire soul can’t be returned?”
He held up one hand and wiggled it back and forth. “If they don’t want to go? There are some spells to kill them again and send their souls back, but those take an enormous toll on the necromancer. Those spells might even kill the necromancer.”
“Interesting.” We continued walking while I mulled over what Sarpedon had said. Perhaps this other necromancer had been able to return most of the souls, but had died and been unable to return the final one. If so, then I was going to have to deliver some very unwelcome news to heaven’s angels.
And everyone would need to be aware that there was potentially a zombie with an entire soul walking around among the humans. Neither of those were ideal situations.
I returned Sarpedon to his punishment, thanking him for his assistance, then made my way clear through the circles of hell to the river Styx. Charon was just docking his ferry, ushering new souls off. The welcoming committee waited, clipboards in hand as they called out the names of the recently departed, grouping them into general categories for transport to the appropriate circle of hell.
I searched through the crowd, spotting who I’d hoped to meet. Bluochol was a reaper. Technically her job was done when she’d untethered a soul from their dead body and handed transport of the spirit over to a nearby psychopomp, but Bluochol was more than a little obsessive about her duties. If she couldn’t supervise the transport personally, she came to the arrival zone of whatever afterlife the soul was headed for, and checked the names of her dead off her list. For Bluochol, a soul was never fully reaped until it had crossed the pearly gates. Or infernal gates. Or purgatorial gates.
“There’s Eileen Louisa Moalle,” she whispered. “And Richard Wilmer O’Connell.”
“Two today?” I asked her.
“Four,” she muttered, still focused on her list.
A perfect record. This reaper had never lost a soul. She’d never even had a soul show up late. I waited until she’d checked the other two passengers off and stowed the checklist in her voluminous black robes before I spoke again.
“I was wondering if I could have a few moments. I’m working on a special project and wanted to ask you some questions.”
She turned to me, her face shadowed by the dark hood. Reapers seldom showed their faces, and when they did, it was revealed to be only a skull underneath their hood. A skull wasn’t their true face, but whether it was privacy or a flair for the dramatic, that’s all anyone ever got to see.
