Chapter Sixteen
Hell House Client Brief: The bathroom door on the second floor locks from the inside. Don't fix it.
Kel dragged Shepherd into a rough, desperate hug. Then he pushed him back a step, cupped his face in both hands, and searched it intently.
“Are you OK?” he asked. It hurt to talk. His throat felt blistered, half-cooked, and he sounded like he’d somehow crammed a thirty-year, pack-a-day habit into the last twenty minutes. He could taste the remnants of the smoke in the back of his throat, like gasoline and burnt roast pork.
“I’m OK,” Shepherd said.
Kel raised his eyebrows and grazed his thumb over Shepherd’s mouth.
“I thought you said you were a good liar?”
Shepherd just snorted. He leaned into Kel, head on his shoulder and arms wrapped tight around him.
Kel let his hands slide over Shepherd’s shoulders and down the lean span of his bare back.
He tipped his head down to press a kiss against the crown of Shepherd’s head and breathed in the scent of him, still green under the burned-grease stink of Easy’s piss.
The reminder of that made Kel move his hands. He wiped them on his shirt as he stepped away from Shepherd.
“So,” he said. “Is that it? I rejected Hell. Was that enough to get me out of the deal?”
Someone laughed. It came from beneath them.
Kel and Shepherd traded looks and stepped up to the edge of the pit to look down.
The shadows had drawn back to the walls in cowed clots, clinging to the bricks and burrowed into cracks.
Kel could see nearly all the way down to where it should have stopped, only for it to plunge further down into unfathomable blackness… where something red winked up at them.
…and it was getting closer.
As Kel watched, the darkness resolved into…
technically, he supposed it was Easy. Just an Easy crowned with horns that scraped against the sides of the well as he climbed, gouging deep, raw stone channels into the brick.
Bloody stubs, raw bone and loose tendon, jutted from shoulders that rippled with unnatural muscles as Easy reached up and dug his claws into the cracks between the bricks.
The shadows scurried out of his way.
Easy grunted as he hauled himself up another foot and tipped his head back, as much as he could with his horns in the way, to look up at them. His mouth was still mangled, but when he smiled it showed fangs.
“It’s a long way down,” he said. “But I crawled out once. Did you think I couldn’t do it again?”
Below him, something rustled. It was an unassuming sound, but something about the sound of rattling stalks made Kel shudder. The chill of it ran down his back and puckered his asshole with the fear of…
Whatever made corn rustle in the dark. Apparently his nervous system didn’t need to know more than that to be terrified.
It seemed to worry Easy too, who looked down and climbed faster.
“For fuck’s sake,” Kel said. “What do we have to do to get rid of him, get my dad to turn up and ask for back child support?”
Shepherd gave an unwilling snort of laughter at that. He stepped back and looked around for his shorts.
“No,” he said. “We have to close the gate.”
He dragged the cargo shorts on. Despite everything, Kel caught himself cocking his head to the side to admire Shepherd’s ass.
Not the time, he told himself as he tried to get his brain back on track. Although, that said, if this didn’t go well—and so fucking little in his life did—at least he’d take a good memory of Shepherd’s ass to Hell with him.
“Is closing the gate an option?” he asked as he followed Shepherd around the pit. He huffed indignantly as he asked, “Why has no one done that before?”
“They did,” Shepherd said. He found Easy’s clothes neatly folded and tucked out of the way against a wall and went through them. “That’s the gig. That’s what the keeper does: opens and closes the gate. It keeps the residents in, and the drafts out.”
“So Easy is fighting for his life to be Hell’s doorman?” Kel asked, as he jerked his thumb over his shoulder.
A distant, “...at least I don’t live with my grandmother!’ echoed up spitefully from the pit.
Kel gave it the finger without looking around.
“So what now?” Kel asked. “How do we close…”
He trailed off as Shepherd, contract in hand, looked up at him and gave a rueful shrug.
Oh.
Kel took a deep breath and let it out. “You have to sacrifice me?” he said.
“Close,” Shepherd said. “But no cigar.”
He stood up and took a deep breath. The smile that twisted his mouth was strained as he reached up to touch Kel’s split lip.
“I’d have broken your heart anyhow,” he said. “At least this way I don’t have to live with that.”
He ducked under Kel’s attempt to grab him and headed toward the pit. Kel cursed and scrambled after him, grabbing his shoulder to pull him back.
“Hold on. Hang on. What the hell happened to you not being a suitable sacrifice?”
“Easy couldn’t sacrifice me,” Shepherd said. “Neither could you, but no one can stop me from sacrificing myself.”
“I can,” Kel said. “Fuck it. Let Easy crawl out. By the time he gets his fat ass up here, we could be on the road out of town.”
“Everyone will die,” Shepherd said.
“Fuck ‘em,” Kel said with a shrug. “What did they ever do for me?”
“Whatever you asked,” Shepherd reminded him. “That left a stain on their soul. Anyone you used the ‘smoke’ on, they’ll go to Hell. You really OK with that?”
Yes.
No.
Kel thought of Ruby as she choked on the compulsion Easy had put on her, of the fact that Harry hadn’t even known enough to be scared as Kel rewrote his mind. Even Warwick. Kel might not like her, but…
“I’d rather they go to Hell than you,” Kel said.
Shepherd put his hand on Kel’s chest. “I’d be going too,” he said. “Remember? I’d rather do it on my own terms.”
He walked up to the edge of the pit, bare toes curled around the carved lip, and unfolded the contract. Kel stared at the back of his neck.
It felt like his heart was breaking.
It felt like he’d never get over it.
But he would. He knew himself well enough to be sure of that. It’d hurt—maybe it would hurt forever—but he’d learn to work around it. He’d fuck other people, and now he’d even have a get-out-of-guilt-free card for when he fucked them over.
It would be OK.
Never more than that, but Kel could come to terms with settling.
“All right,” he said. “If we don’t have any other choice.”
Shepherd gave a short, quick nod of acknowledgement and tilted the contract toward the light. He jumped as Kel stepped up next to him and took one of his hands.
“What are you doing?” Shepherd asked as he tried to pull himself free.
“Going with you.”
“That’s fucking stupid.”
“Yeah,” Kel said as he squeezed Shepherd’s hand. “I know. Do it.”
Shepherd closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
Below them…a lot closer below them… Easy brayed out a wet laugh.
“What are you going to do?” he mocked. “Sound it out? It’s written in the first language of Hell and–”
He stumbled over his own split tongue as Shepherd started to read in a confident, carrying voice. The words were foul and hurt the ear, but they were clear.
“Fuck me,” Easy muttered sourly.
He started to climb faster, shedding mass the closer he came.
The horns were the first to go, shed like a deer in rut.
They clattered back down the shaft, spinning away into the dark.
The wing stubs squirmed back under his skin, his shoulder blades popping as they jammed under them, and his muscles wasted back to wiry, human fitness.
…Think this through, boy, the smoke whispered inside Kel’s head. There’s still time to pick the right side. My side. We’re blood. We’re the same.
“I know,” Kel said. “That’s why I don’t trust you.”
Easy screamed in rage and climbed faster. He hauled himself up, hand over hand, like a lizard going up a wall.
“Shepherd,” Kel said. “Read faster.”
Shepherd gave an exasperated snort, took a deep breath between one clause and the next, and did his best.
Hell is going to be hell for the two of you, Easy snarled through the smoke.
One hand reached up over the side of the pit. His talons were splintered and split from the climb, but still dug down into the brick. Tendons bulged in Easy’s forearms as he dragged himself up enough to get his other arm over.
“When I’m done with you,” Easy spat as he dragged himself up. “I’m going to tell Ruby exactly how little any of you meant to me.”
He got his knee under him and wiped his nose on the back of his hand as he started to stand up.
Kel let go of Shepherd’s hand as he stepped forward. His foot came down on something soft and dry that gave under his weight with a creaky ‘ahhh’ from a long-broken voice box. He hopped to the side in surprise as he glanced down at Shithead.
The doll stared back at him with cracked blue eyes.
Cursed, Shepherd had said, or haunted—something like that. And it hadn’t been here before. Kel was sure of that.
But why would it—
Kel supposed it didn’t matter. He stooped down, grabbed Shithead by her one china leg, and swung her like a bat.
Baseball had never been his game, but he managed well enough.
The doll smacked against Easy’s jaw hard enough to crack the porcelain face from the bottom to the top.
There was something brown and flaky under the perfect doll-face, something stitched and leathery. Kel only saw it for a second.
The impact made Easy stagger, his mangled lips bleeding again. He snatched Shithead out of Kel’s grip and held the doll up.
Shepherd faltered in his reading as he spluttered, “What are you—”
“Keep reading!” Kel told him.
He glanced from Easy to the pit, grimaced, and picked up where he’d stopped.
“Really?” Easy spat as Shepherd hurried toward the end of the page. “That’s the best you could do? I’m going to kill you here, before you can embarrass me in Hell.”
He closed his hand around Shithead’s torso as he started to rip her in half.
Honestly, Kel had always thought, cursed or not, that Shepherd was a little crazy for giving Shithead a dialogue. As he stared at the doll’s cracked, smiling face, though, he could feel its twisted satisfaction.
Dada! The voicebox croaked out. I wuv you.
Then Shithead burst into flames. Sparks and black, greasy smoke bled from her eye sockets and embers spilled out of her torn body. Her china limbs crazed and blackened from the heat and licked hungrily up Easy’s arms. His body hair singed and crisped and his flesh blistered.
“What the—” he yelped as he tried to fling the doll away from him.
Sticky, taffy strings of a dress made before anyone thought about fire-resistant material stuck to his hands. He staggered back a step as the fire licked at his face and…stepped right off the edge.
“No!” Shepherd yelled. He dropped the contract as he lunged for the pit, his hand out to grab the doll. Kel grabbed him and dragged him back. “Let me go! I have to—”
“Keep reading,” Kel told him as he shoved the contract back into Shepherd’s hands. “Shithead made her call. Respect it.”
It took a second. Shepherd finally wiped his nose on his forearm, took a ragged breath, and kept reading. As he got to the end of the page, the ink started to flake and squirm on the parchment.
The name at the bottom crawled into shape.
Ezekiel Red Laker.
“I need blood,” Shepherd said as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a knife.
The blade snapped out as he pressed the button.
He looked expectantly at Kel, who grimaced and held his hand out.
It was stupid to be squeamish at this point, but he still flinched and looked away as Shepherd carved his thumb open.
When he looked back, he could see bone and round blobs of fat spilling out of the cut.
He took a sickly breath and jammed his thumb down on the signature line.
It drank it thirstily. He could feel it suck at the edges of the wound, the ache of it working down into his knuckle and the palm of his hand. In the pit, Easy screamed with rage, and then there was a sharp, distinct sound like a lock being turned.
The screaming stopped.
The rustling faded.
The house stopped rattling.
Shepherd carefully folded the contract with shaking hands. He watched himself doing it intently and then handed the result to Kel. It felt like…paper.
“Did it work?” Kel asked.
Shepherd sat down and dangled his legs over the pit. He didn’t answer, but nothing grabbed his feet and dragged him to Hell. Answer enough, Kel supposed. He sat down next to him and stared into the darkness.
They sat in shocked, awkward silence for a while until Kel nudged his elbow into Shepherd’s ribs.
“...that’s up to me?” he said. “Seriously? I spilled my heart out and—”
Shepherd leaned against him and put his head on Kel’s shoulder. “Shut up.”
Fair enough.