For A Few Souls More (Heaven's Gate Book 3) (13 page)

The boy nodded but his face was still terrified as he turned and ran away.

“You mortals freak easily,” said Biter with a laugh. “You’d think you came from a world where there was only one species.”

“In all fairness,” said Forset, “and correct me if I’m wrong, but you do all come from Hell?”

“The Dominion of Circles,” Biter agreed, “yeah. So what?”

“Well, traditionally your role has been to torture human souls, has it not?”

“You’ve got a lot to learn, boy,” Biter replied. “I ain’t saying everything from the Dominion is sweet as sugar but it’s never been our ‘role’ to do anything. We ain’t your slaves your know.”

“That wasn’t quite what I meant.”

“Oh, I know what you meant but we’ve got more important things to do than poke your sorry asses with toasting forks and shit. What you kinky sons of bitches like is your own business, we’re not judging you, but we’re not being blamed for it either.”

“So mortal souls aren’t sent to Hell,” Elisabeth corrected herself, “the Dominion of Circles, for punishment?”

“Nah... nobody’s soul is sent anywhere, you can go where you like. The fact most of you chose the Dominion of Circles says a lot about you as a species. Why you can’t just live a simple life I don’t know. Do what you do and accept responsibility, it ain’t difficult, it’s how most of us get by after all. But no, you have to look to a higher power to judge everything from your poetry to your bowel movements. If nothing else, all of this is going to change that.” He waved around his head. “Now we’re all on a level playing field, you’ll just have to accept your own natures, won’t you?”

“I’m not sure it’s
our
natures that will be the problem,” said Elisabeth, watching as an obese, feathered woman vomited into the upturned mouths of her squawking young.

“Sure,” said Biter, “feel superior, then go and squirt milk at them from your titties.”

Forset grimaced at his crude tone but had to concede his point. “You are right that we shouldn’t judge. It is a failing of man.”

“We believe ourselves refined,” said William, “but we just keep our horrors on the inside.”

“That’s the last place you should put something unpleasant,” said Biter. “Bury something rancid and it’ll only slowly start to smell worse.”

They looked either side of them at the stores and the people. The people, in return, stared right back. Everyone is strange to somebody.

The stores seemed designed to appeal to a market none of the party could ever imagine having existed. Windows filled with everything from string puppets to dried flowers, doll’s house furniture to leather goods that didn’t look designed to fit a horse.

William looked through the open doorway of the barber’s shop, watching for a moment as the bony creature inside dragged its razor-blade fingers over its customer’s cheek. In a sudden chatter of movement, its off-white teeth chewed at the man’s hair, sending great flurries of it into a cloud around their heads. As it settled, William was forced to admit the creature had left its client with a perfectly respectable short back and sides.

The client wasn’t happy though, dabbing at his ear. “You fucking bit me!”

“Never did,” the skeletal barber insisted. “I am the definition of professional. Show me blood or pay in full.”

William chose not to linger to see the result of the argument.

“Herbs for life?” an elderly woman asked Elisabeth, proffering a bunch of dried leaves. “Herbs for death? Herbs for sin? I sell all the herbs.”

“No thank you,” Elisabeth replied, “though I’m sure they’re lovely.”

“Everything from the bedroom to the mortuary my dear, you just stop by when you know what you want.”

“We should call in at the general store,” said Biter, waving the old woman aside. “Just to make sure the Annelide isn’t causing problems.”

He crossed the road and Forset looked to their left, where the street opened out into a small square dominated by a large house. It was an intimidating construction in the mid-Atlantic colonial style. It loomed over the square which was empty but for a carved wooden statue of a Native American that stood in its centre.

“That’s charming,” Forset said, walking towards it.

“Charming?” Biter changed direction and led Forset over to the statue. “That’s my damned deputy. Say hello, Branches.”

The statue remained silent, for all the world a solid piece of wood. It possessed a deputy’s badge, hammered into its chest like a piece of absurd decoration. Forset looked to his daughter who had joined them.

“Damn it, Branches,” shouted Biter, “stop making me look like an idiot. Say hello to the folks.”

Still, it refused to move.

“Screw you then, you stiff,” Biter said, smacking it on its chest.

He turned around and marched back in the direction they’d been walking in in the first place. “He’s kind of quiet,” he said, “doesn’t really move unless we have some kind of emergency.”

Billy raised an eyebrow as the Forsets passed but they kept quiet, not wishing to offend their guide. William was staring towards the general store which had begun to gather quite a crowd.

“You just can’t beat fresh Annelides young,” said one of the bystanders. At least William assumed he was a single individual, it was difficult to tell as he seemed to be built from several inert human bodies, a profusion of spare limbs and dull, inanimate heads sprouting from all over his body. “Come on!” the creature shouted towards the store, “some of us have got a lot of mouths to feed.” He looked back at William and chuckled at his own joke. “It’s not true,” he said, as if William had asked. “I shove food in one of these puppies and there’s no saying where it’ll turn up. Trust me, you haven’t experienced discomfort until you’ve forced your appendix to try and digest steak.”

William couldn’t think of a single thing to say, so he just smiled and hoped he appeared sufficiently in agreement not to risk being eaten.

“Come on folks,” said Biter, “there’s nothing to see here, get about your business damn it or I’ll be forced to start roughing some of you up.”

“You think you can take all us of on, you mutt?” came a shout from the crowd.

Biter snarled. “Sure I do. Then I’ll have a nice chat with the governor about how deep to bury your sorry asses.”

“The governor?” Forset asked, not wanting to distract Biter from the crowd but too intrigued to keep silent.

“Sure,” said Biter, “he’s the one who lives in the big house you were just looking at.” He raised his voice so others could hear clearly. “He’s the one who gave me my damned badge too, which some of you would do well to remember, sorry sons of bitches.”

He stepped inside the general store, followed by Forset’s party.

“Mind your feet,” Biter warned.

“Mind their feet?” came an aged voice, “who gives a cup of warm milk and rat turd about their feet? It’s my stock I’m worried about.” A tiny man appeared from behind one of the shelves, three foot tall and looking as old as a twenty-years-in-the-earth corpse. He was holding a mop that was longer than him.

“Ben Abernathy,” said Biter, “store owner and misery.”

“Misery? I’m as merry as Christmas when my shop ain’t drowning in worm guts.”

“Oh Lord.” Elisabeth had cleared the edge of a row of shelves and now found herself face to face with the Annelide. It was a fat worm, coiled into a pyramid about four feet high, its skin ridged and glistening with mucus. Its tail, poking out at the top of the pyramid, had parted like a flower revealing a slick orifice that was in the process of pumping out miniature, coiled versions of itself. The offspring came in sacs filled with gobbets of purple and gold goo. As the sacs hit the floor they popped, uncoiling the baby worm and splattering the goo liberally. A good portion of the store was now slick and wriggling.

“If you’re going to upchuck,” Abernathy told her, “go outside, I’ve enough problems without you adding to the mess.”

“If you mean vomit,” she said, “I’ve a stronger stomach than you give me credit for.”

“I’m not sure I have,” admitted William, stepping back towards the door. “Maybe I’ll just grab a little air.”

“Pussy,” Abernathy muttered. He poked at the Annelides with the handle of his broom. “You’d better be of a mind to pay for the damages here, damn it, I’d only just got the place stocked before you decided to fill it with your stinking muck.” He poked at a pile of the goo. “So disgusting,” he moaned. “I’d chew my own fingers off before I got a drop of it on me.”

“Annelides mucus fetches high prices,” Biter told him. “The higher castes use it as an aphrodisiac.”

Abernathy dropped to his hands and knees and began scooping it up in his hands. “Don’t just stand there!” he turned to Billy, “fetch me a couple of buckets.”

Billy looked around, making sure Abernathy wasn’t talking to someone else.

“Would you have an old man do all the work?” Abernathy said. “They’re in aisle three, bring the cheap ones not the galvanised.”

Billy wandered off in search of them while Abernathy scooped the mucus into a mound. “Fetch a shovel too!” he shouted after him.

“It’s amazing,” said Forset, “I’ve never seen a creature the like of it.” He squatted down as close as he dared, scrutinising every detail of it. “It’s like a worm but clearly not subterranean, the pigmentation’s too dark.”

“If words cost dollars you’d be one of my favourite customers,” said Abernathy. He looked to Elisabeth. “Don’t suppose you’ve got any dollars have you? I hear they’re all the rage with mortals and if I want to do business outside this town I’d better get the hang of ’em.”

“I have some back at the Land Carriage,” she told him. “Maybe I’ll let you keep one or two of them in return for some supplies.”

“Explain to me how the damn things work and you’ve got yourself a deal.”

Billy returned with three buckets and a shovel. “Get scraping, boy!” said Abernathy. “Do a decent job and I’ll cut you in for a percentage.”

The Annelides had finished its birthing as William returned, looking pale. “Folks out there are beginning to clear.”

“Good,” said Biter, “saves me having to whup ’em till their ears bleed.”

“You have a very percussive turn of phrase,” said Forset, scowling slightly.

“Why thank you,” said Biter with a grin, “good of you to say.”

He paced up and down, surveying the brood of young as they began to curl and wriggle. “I guess we should probably gather these up so we don’t lose any.”

“They’re rather sweet,” said Elisabeth as one poked at the toe of her boot.

“Damn right,” Biter agreed, “like honey dipped in sugar. That’s why they were gathering outside. Annelides young are a real delicacy.”

“That’s awful, how could they eat the poor thing’s babies?”

“Well, in my lawless youth, I might have turned a blind eye to one or two,” Biter admitted, “but I’m a man of responsibility these days.” He grinned, taking pride in the fact. “And I can guarantee you that no son of a bitch is swallowing these puppies ’cept the mother herself.”

“I beg your pardon?” Elisabeth backed away slightly as the large Annelides began to uncurl from its pyramid, its blind head probing around for its young.

“That’s the life cycle,” said Biter. “Annelides can’t eat nothing but its own young. If it don’t have a big enough litter to satisfy itself it’ll start chewing on its own tail and I don’t have to tell you what a mess that makes when it meets in the middle.”

The Annelides began sucking up its babies, slurping them whole into its distended, toothless maw.

“I’m just going to get a bit more fresh air,” said William, dashing towards the door.

“How does it propagate its species?” asked Forset. “Surely if it eats all of the young the line can’t continue?”

“It’ll spare a couple every few litters,” explained Biter, “then, once they’re mature, it’s off we go again.”

“That’s horrid,” said Elisabeth.

“That, my little bundle of sweetness,” explained Biter, “is nature.”

7.

W
ILLIAM SAT ON
the boardwalk trying not to listen to the glutinous sounds coming from inside.

He watched the inhabitants of Wormwood going about their business. He wondered what his old brotherhood would have thought of the place. No doubt they would have made the sign of the cross and run off to find a dusty reading room to hide in. He had never really belonged in their order, he decided, he was too active to exist in such a passive regime. He wanted to experience the world, not sit in the dark and imagine it.

What about God? What would He have made of the beings that populated this halfway-house between worlds? If Biter was to be believed, the population of Hell were not the prison wardens traditional Christian study marked them out to be. They were just different. More of His creations living out their lives according to their own beliefs and desires. Perhaps it was his childhood, growing up on streets where even the cruelest, most violent gang member had something to redeem them, be it a sense of fraternal honour or doting love for his mother or dog, but William found he could see the bigger picture when he looked around him. He also knew that most would not. When these beings moved beyond Wormwood, stepping out into the mortal world, they would be greeted with fear. The fear would lead to hate and then the killing would begin. It was miserably predictable. Which side would he be on?