Lucifer's Lottery - Edward Lee [37]
I’m not liking this, Krilid thought.
Was he being set up? The thought occurred to him, but any logical reason didn’t. Ezoriel is said to have never told a lie.
But bad information isn’t a lie, is it?
Perhaps Ezoriel didn’t know for sure. “Unimpeachable authority,” the Fallen Angel had said of his information source. “It cannot be doubted.”
Yeah? Krilid questioned.
Then why had he been sent on this mission totally alone, and in an expensive Nectoport? To attempt an “extraction” in what was certainly one of Hell’s most guarded secret projects?
It almost sounded to Krilid that he’d been sent on a suicide mission but no one had seen fit to tell him that.
(III)
The echoes of the deaconess’s words trailed behind her like a banner as they mounted the dark stairs. “The attic is the best place, for the power of its ambience. The cliché—do you understand? The sheer weight of the idea?”
“No, I don’t understand,” Hudson said, the whore just behind him.
“The same as the house itself, and what happened in the house. The house has become what’s known as a Bleed-Point, while certain things from the history of the house serve as functional Totems. They’re Power Relics.”
Certain things, Hudson wondered. She means the head . . . “What did you mean when you called yourself a failure but I’m a success?”
He could see the woman nod ahead of him. “You’re on one end of the Fulcrum, I’m on the other—the bad end, I’m afraid.”
“The Fulcrum, huh?” Hudson said.
“I was solicited because I was solicitable. My ebbing faith made me ripe for the Machinators. But you? You’re actually the opposite. It’s the desire of the powers I now serve that you make the choice. My rewards are minuscule compared to the rewards you will receive should you accept this incalculable prize.”
Great, Hudson thought.
The stairs raised them into a long, dusty attic. Even after dusk, it was stiflingly hot. The prostitute began lighting candles from a bag she’d carried up, and in the growing light, Hudson saw that the attic was essentially empty, save for a couple of lawn chairs and a couple of boxes. The deaconess went to the back wall, then paced off six steps toward the room’s center. There, she placed one of the chairs.
“This is where you will sit.”
From a darker corner, then, she pulled out—
Whoa! Hudson thought.
—a brand-new pickax.
“And this is how we will access the Trustee.”
“What are you talking about?” Hudson whined.
The deaconess smiled. She removed her Roman collar and started to unbutton her surplice. “Remove your clothes, dear,” she said to the prostitute. “We must show our God-given bodies unclothed, to curry favor from our lord.”
The prostitute smirked. “I want my fuckin’ money first. You said you’d give me another six hundred.”
The bills were produced like a finger-snap, and handed over.
“Curry favor from your lord?” Hudson questioned. “Somehow I don’t think you mean the Lord God.”
“Our Lord Lucifer,” the deaconess said. “Certainly, you’ve already guessed that.”
“Yeah, sure. But the thing I want to know is how did those skinny demons manage to get a hold of your Lord Lucifer’s poop to write sixes on your body?”
The deaconess popped out more buttons. “It’s a process known as Object Transposition, a very new occult science. It’s subdimensional. The Demons—and the excrement itself, by the way—were only corporeal for the duration of the rite. Six minutes. But six minutes were enough.” Then she dropped the surplice to the floor, to stand splendidly nude in the candlelight.
Hudson tried not to gawp at the robust physique. “You seem different today. Yesterday you were all fidgety.”
She went behind the prostitute to untie her faded bikini top. When the garment dropped, buoyant breasts came unloosed, with large, irregular nipples that looked like plops of chewed beef.