Prospero Regained (7 page)

“Mephisto fought Theo? Did Theo win?” Erasmus asked, surprised. “I mean Theo’s good, but…”

“I don’t know. They did not fight the duel in front of me…” I rested my nose against my folded fingers. “I’ve always assumed Theo won.”

“Just like Mephisto to win and then let Theo have his way,” chuckled Erasmus. “Or even to let Theo win, if he thought Theo really wanted it.”

“I doubt it.” Gregor’s voice grated. “Mephisto would not have trusted his sister’s safety to another unless he thought Theo could do the job. Theophrastus must have pushed himself upon this occasion and bested our elder brother.”

I tried to remember more details, but the events were lost in the mists of time. I was sure that the fight had taken place at our estates in Scotland, but during which of our stays there, I could not say. It had been centuries since I had thought of the incident. Looking back, it struck me as sweet that my brothers would go to such an effort. It made me love them both all the more.

My heart swelled until my chest felt tight. Fear for both of them seized me. Mephisto I was not as worried about; he could turn into a demon. But Theo was somewhere in Hell, alone. His face, his look of desperation as his fingers were ripped away from mine, hung before me like a specter.

“Mephistopheles fought several duels on my behalf.” Gregor put his foot up on the bench in front of him and stared ahead of us. “Once he even went to a duel looking like me, with the help of Logistilla’s
Staff of Transmogrification.
I was against this, mind you. After Logistilla turned me into the cardinal, she was never quite able to return me back the way I had been.” He pointed at his throat to indicate his voice, which had been hoarse and raspy ever since that incident. “And I worried that something similar would happen to Mephisto. But she insisted she had mastered her staff since then. So, Mephisto went ahead and let her change him.”

Erasmus leaned forward, intrigued. “What did he do, then?”

“He waited for the thugs who were trying to squeeze money out of my church and bested their leader. They thought I had done it, so they left me alone after that.” Gregor was quiet for a moment, lost in the swirling pools of distant memory. “The other times, he appeared as himself. He always won, of course.”

“Were these incidents all before your brother went bonkers?” Mab asked.

Gregor tapped the tips of his fingers together, thinking. Then he shook his head. “He has come to my defense as recently as the early nineteenth century. I had a parish in Suffolk then. Mephisto made quick work of a band of ruffians who were preying upon my parishioners. That was nearly two hundred years after his mind went.”

“Much as it pains me to say this”—Mab screwed up his face and carefully drew a single line through Mephisto’s name, where it topped the list of sibling suspects in his notebook—“I think we can rule out the Harebrain as a possible traitor. Wouldn’t make sense to keep defending you all and then stab you in the back. After all, Ma’am, if Mephisto wanted you dead, all he would have had to do was not rescue you, either in the warehouse or when we were in the plane being attacked by the dragon.”

“That’s a very good point!” I exclaimed. It had not occurred to me that I owed my life to Mephisto twice over.

“Too bad. Would have been an easy thing to blame Mephistopheles, an open-and-shut case … Alas, it’s not to be. In fact, I’m beginning to think your older brother…” Mab’s voice trailed off. He flipped to another section of his older soggy notebook and ran his finger across the page, reading what was written there and harrumphing to himself.

Gregor cleared his throat. After a lengthy pause, he spoke in a whisper even more breathy than normal. “For years, I have worried that it was having spent time as me that led to his madness, that Logistilla never turned him back correctly. The incident where he impersonated me happened not long before he lost his mind.”

“It wasn’t you.” I touched Gregor’s arm gently. “He drank from the Lethe.”

“Well, that was stupid!” Erasmus thumped his staff against the boards of the gondola. “Can it be undone?”

Mab frowned. “I don’t think that would be such a good idea, Professor Prospero. I think…” Mab paused and peered across the water at the souls of the dead on the next island. “What are they doing? Trying to marry a rock?”

Beyond the stand of trees, a large group of shades attempted to embrace a large rock. On another island, more tormented souls bowed and scraped, worshipping an enormous spiderweb inhabited by giant woman-faced spiders. Farther still, other unexceptional or repulsive objects received obeisance or undue attention from the dead.

“How peculiar,” murmured Erasmus. “I wonder what they are seeing.”

Malagigi turned to Gregor, whose turn it was to hold the star. “If you close your hand, the rest of us will be able to see what the locals see.”

Gregor grunted and closed his hand slowly, as if he did not think this was a wise course of action. As the light of the star faded, the pleasant warmth became an oppressive heat. The whine of mosquitoes filled my ears along with the ever-present moans of the dead. The humidity caused my hair to stick to my face. Even worse was the terrible stench of sewage. Together, the heat, humidity, and horrid odor made it hard to breathe.

“Oh my!” Erasmus had risen up to get a good look at the islands, his free hand pressed against his nose, plugging his nostrils. He winced at the pain.

Of course, to me, everything still looked the same.

“Please hurry!” I batted at the air around me but could not seem to shoo the mosquitoes making the irritating whine. My hand went right through them. “I can’t see what you are looking at anyway. Neither can Gregor so long as he’s holding the star.”

Erasmus sat down rapidly. “You can open your hand, Brother. I’ve seen enough.”

Mab, who had turned in his seat in order to see better, scrunched up his face. He had tilted his head one way and then the other. Finally, he shrugged. “Sorry … don’t get it.”

“What did you see?” Gregor opened his hand, bathing the gondola in silvery light. The temperature suddenly seemed more pleasant, the air more breathable, and the stench less offensive. The mosquitoes vanished.

Mab peered, frowning. “They’re all panting around a lady’s shoe and over there was some underclothes and stuff. Looked as weird with the illusion as without. Weirder, in fact.”

“Fetishists,” Erasmus said. “That rock is a high-heeled shoe, and those spiderwebs are a bra and a pair of silken undies. I won’t even describe the rest of them.”

Gregor said ponderously, “What we are seeing are the souls of those who directed their lust at a symbol instead of the real thing. Their punishment is, apparently, to be allowed to live out their empty fantasies.”

Erasmus shuddered. “Fitting, yet creepy.”

Mab stared at my brothers for a long time. He lowered the brim of his fedora and muttered, “Sorry. Still don’t get it.”

“Rejoice,” Malagigi replied. “There is much about the darker side of humanity that it would be better not to understand.”

“What about the illusions my brothers and Mab could see?” I asked. “What is their purpose?”

“To fool the lost souls,” Malagigi replied.

“Why in tarnation … and, in this case, I mean exactly that … why, here, in tarnation, would anyone bother?” Mab asked. “The souls are already damned, aren’t they?”

“Not as damned as they could be.” Malagigi’s voice was unexpectedly grave.

“What do you mean?” asked Gregor.

“This”—Malagigi spread his arms indicating the swamps—“is not the lowest level of Hell. There are lower levels. Those on Earth are told that once a man dies, his spirit dwells forever in the same place, but it is not the case in either direction. Not only can those in Hell be saved, but the fallen can fall still farther. The more they indulge and debauch themselves—the more they prey upon their fellows—the heavier their souls become. Soon, their souls grow so heavy that they are caught up by the next sweep of the Hellwinds.” Malagigi’s hands worried the golden knot of his belt.

“Ridiculous!” exclaimed Erasmus. “You’re pulling our leg, right?”

“I wish I were,
mon ami,
but it happened to me.”

We all stared at him.

“It did?” I leaned forward with great interest. Gregor’s gaze also was fixed upon the ex-sorcerer’s face.

Malagigi met Gregor’s disbelieving stare evenly before continuing. “After I died, instead of repenting—as any sensible sinner would have—I sought revenge for the destruction of my family. I called upon my friends—elemental spirits of the fire, air, and water who owed allegiance to me alone—and set them upon those who were responsible for dragging us from our home. Only … spirits are not wise. They cannot see the world clearly. Without me there to direct them…” He slapped his forehead. “
Zut alors!
Did it go awry!”

“Oh! Never turn revenge over to spirits!” Mab shook his head mournfully. “They’ll muck it up. Take it from me, I know!”

“Needing guidance, they picked a man who could vaguely hear them and influenced him to kill those who were responsible. Only they did not know who was responsible—we humans look much alike to them. Unless they have a drop of blood or a piece of hair to identify a particular soul, they have trouble telling us apart. So, they prodded this man, Maximilien his name was, to kill many people … many, many people.”

I could feel my eyes grow round with horror. “Not Maximilien Robespierre?”

“That was it.” Malagigi’s voice trembled softly.

“You mean the terrible bloodshed and violence of the reign of Robespierre was your fault?” I cried. “The glory of France was destroyed … by you?”

Malagigi’s shoulders slumped. An immaterial tear slid down his narrow cheek. “I received my revenge,
biensur
, and with it, my just deserts—incarceration in a lower circle of Hell than my initial sins had earned me.

“Only at this point,” Malagigi explained, his voice heavy with self-mocking pity, “did I begin to repent. Finally, after torments too horrible to tell, a fellow of the Brotherhood of Hope named Benedetto found me—he was rescuing others to earn off his own sins. Since then, I have devoted myself to this order and to helping others. I dwell in hopes of earning forgiveness for my transgressions. I especially try to save souls who were killed because of the urgings of my elementals.”

“So, you yourself were a damned soul who was saved!” Gregor marveled. “Then it is true!”

“Indeed.” Malagigi spread his arms. “I am living proof.” Then, he chuckled. “Or proof, at any rate. The ‘living’ part is a matter of opinion.”

Erasmus sighed wearily. “You mean we are expected to pray and to be contrite even if we find ourselves in Hell? That hardly seems fair. I thought the one virtue of Hell was that it gave rest to those who were tired of such nonsense. That there were no churchmen to prod you.”

“It depends,” Malagigi answered cheerfully, “on whether or not you wish to get out again.”

“It would be well to keep that in mind.” Gregor shot a calm but penetrating look at Erasmus, who arched a single eyebrow.

“What worries me is that a soul in Hell had the leeway to call up spirits and cast spells on the living,” Mab muttered. “Don’t seem right. This place is supposed to be the biggest, toughest slammer around—you’d think the security would be tighter.”

As we sailed the gondola, the silvery light of the tiny star shining around us, I contemplated what Malagigi had told us. On the one hand, his story seemed astonishing to me, so alien was the notion of the Brotherhood of Hope to my Protestant beliefs. On the other hand, some part of me did not find it surprising. As was recounted by Father Christmas and in the
Book of the Sibyl,
my Lady Eurynome had left High Heaven to free mankind from the Garden made by the demons. It was not so difficult to believe that others might strive to save those who still remained the playthings of those demons.

*   *   *

A FLOATING
log among the cypresses to our right lifted abruptly, revealing a row of yellow razor-sharp teeth. The teeth opened into a maw that gaped nearly as large as our gondola.

“Sea monster!” I leapt to my feet and pointed.

The monster reared out of the swamp with a loud pop. Water sluiced off its scaly back. A huge green monstrosity with wide fins to either side of its neck slashed at us with webbed fingers armed with cruel, curving claws.

In one fluid motion, Erasmus leapt to his feet and drew
Durendel.
Meanwhile, Malagigi gave his pole a violent shove, propelling us quickly backward. Erasmus would have pitched overboard into the filth, but Mab caught his green doublet and pulled. Gregor rose slowly to his feet as well.

Bracing my feet, I drew my fighting fan and then looked from it to the sea monster. True, the moon-silver slats that made up its blade had been forged by the Japanese smith god Amatsumaru, but it was still a puny weapon against so great a foe. Yet, neither of the greater weapons I was accustomed to wielding—my flute and my Lady’s aid—could help me now. Unfortunately, without my Lady to inspire my steps and my blows, I was not a particularly good fighter. I suddenly felt helpless and realized how dependent I was upon the chivalry of my brothers and Mab.

It was not a feeling I liked.

“We could use the Greatest Swordsman in Christendom about now!” Malagigi exclaimed as he poled vigorously.

The motion of the gondola caused Gregor to lose his footing and stumble backward. Arms flailing, he grabbed the high curl of the
risso
rising from the stern and steadied himself. Still clutching the stern iron, he growled, “Why are we fleeing? Did you not say that nothing could harm us unless we became angered or afeared?”

“Nothing dead,” Malagigi corrected quickly as the gondola slid rapidly backward. “This is a living monster. They wander down here by accident occasionally.”

“Monsters wander into Hell by accident?” Mab threw down his hat. “Since when?”

“Since time immemorial.”

“Can it hurt you, Malagigi?” I asked. “You are made of spirit.”

“Probably not.” Malagigi did not look entirely confident.