All Who Wander Are Lost (An Icarus Fell Novel) (8 page)

Seeing them made me
want to throw a rock through the window.

If only they
knew what I know.

I ducked under the
police line and scurried across the lawn in a clandestine crouch to
avoid being seen by the sheep on the sidewalk. As I hurried past the
churchyard’s oak tree—also undamaged by the explosion—my
jaw unconsciously tightened. It was the spot where muggers killed me
during a spring rain storm, transforming my shitty life into a
shitty after-life.

Why couldn’t
the explosion have burnt the damn tree to the ground?

I skirted the
debris scattered across the churchyard, some cast as far as the iron
fence bounding the cemetery to the north, and averted my eyes from
the oak and its unpleasant memories as I scampered toward the
graveyard, putting the still-standing wall and its miracle window
between me and the religious lemmings. From the edge of the
rust-spotted fence, I approached the ruined church, unsure where the
woman meant for us to meet. Twilight dimmed the ruins to a
charcoal-pencil smear of tumbled walls and burned-out pews. I
squinted and picked out a much more shapely figure standing amidst
the rubble. She raised a hand, beckoning.

“
Over
here, Icarus.”

“
Ric.”
I made my way through the labyrinth of charred wood and broken rock.
“Why the Hell can’t you people call me Ric?”

She didn’t
respond—they never do. Something about angel physiology
rendered them incapable of shortening my name to something I found
bearable. My name, Icarus Fell, was a joke, a punishment.
Truthfully, I’d rather be called something classier—like
dickhead.

“
Are
you ready to go?”

I raised an
eyebrow. Was she asking if I remembered to pack my toothbrush and a
change of underwear?

“
We’re
going to Hell. Is anyone ever ready for that?”

She shrugged. “Some
more than others.”

She stepped up on a
fallen chunk of wall and I looked up into her blue eyes, luminescent
in the waning daylight—another angelism. I tore my gaze away
and surveyed the scatter of church pieces, searching for a portal to
Hell; there was no blurry spot or black hole, like in the movies, no
gap in the earth beneath which the river Styx flowed. The ruined
church organ lay by the wall, but with my lack of keyboard-playing
talent, I wouldn’t be able to play my way to Hell, though the
possibility of my off-key singing one day earning me a ticket south
certainly existed. I suppressed a shudder.

“
What
do we do now?”

She smiled, stepped
off her perch, and grabbed my hand. Her angelic energy shot up my
arm and into my chest, an electric tingle with an underlying heat
that straddled the line between painful and euphoric. Pictures of
naked flesh and exploring hands jumped into my mind; I shook my head
to dispel them and concentrate on the task at hand without success.
To regain control of my waylaid brain, I recalled Marty and Todd,
Elizabeth Elton, Tony McSweeny—all of whom currently resided
in Hell because of me—but each time I brought one of them to
mind, their faces morphed into Piper’s, dark hair cascading
down her long neck, across her smooth shoulders. I couldn’t
control my thoughts as long as her hand was on mine.

I pulled away,
hands draped strategically in front of my crotch.

“
What’s
happening?” I asked.

She halted and
faced me, an innocent smile tugging the corners of her mouth, a
knowing playfulness flickering in her eyes. I struggled against the
urge to reach out and stroke her cheek, to pull her to me, embrace
her.

“
Whatever
do you mean, Icarus?”

I opened my mouth
to explain but found I could only blush when I tried, like a
teenager too shy to ask out the most popular girl in high school.

I wonder if
Trevor is going through this?

“
How...how
will we get there?” I bumbled instead of explaining what I’d
felt for fear of... embarrassment? Rejection?

“
Just
follow me.”

She didn’t
take my hand this time and I sighed with relief. The reprieve
allowed some of the blood which had been diverted from my brain to
return. Unfortunately, the lack of her touch also allowed
realization of what we were doing to creep into me, frigid fingers
entwining with my spine and sending a shiver and goose bumps up my
neck.

We crossed the
nave, passed the unscathed altar where Father Dominic had threatened
my son’s life a month before, and stopped at the base of the
still-standing wall. I pulled up beside her and gazed at the
blackened stone. When she didn’t do anything, I touched the
stone wall, found it as solid as ever.

“
I
don’t get it.”

She didn’t
respond, surveying the wreckage around us instead. After a moment,
she strode to a charred but mostly-whole pew and picked it up like
it weighed nothing. She brought it to where I stood and propped it
against the wall beneath the stained glass Virgin Mary.

“
Ready?”

“
You
asked me that already. The answer’s still: not really.”

She shrugged,
smiled, and started climbing, using the pew as a ladder to the
window. When she reached the top, she stepped onto the window ledge
and motioned for me to follow. I breathed deep, gathering my nerves.

Do I really want
to go to Hell again?

The
answer was no, I didn’t
want
to. I had to.

I struggled my way
up the charred pew with less dexterity than Piper but made it to the
top. She offered her hand and helped me onto the ledge, a bolt of
electricity and a wayward lustful thought shooting through me. I
shook free of her touch.

We stood there a
few seconds, inches from the miracle window, and I wondered what the
people gathered on the sidewalk watching for miracles would think
when we burst through the glass. But when she took a step toward it,
the glass didn’t break. Instead, her foot passed through it as
though she stepped through one of those seventies beaded curtains.
Bit by bit, she disappeared.

I hesitated.

Piper was gone,
vanished through the window like Alice through the looking glass. I
could have turned and left; I wanted to. I looked back at the pew
leaning against the wall, at the debris-strewn church, and started
to turn, but a sound stopped me. A voice.

The voice of a
woman.

Was it one of the
miracle-seekers crying out to the Heavens? Piper prompting me to
follow? Maybe it was Beth Elton calling for help all the way from
Hell.

I drew a fortifying
breath and my foot went through the window like it didn’t
exist, then my hand, my arm, and finally my torso and head. The
chilly night disappeared, replaced by searing pain, confusion,
agony. I saw the people standing on the sidewalk for a second; the
murmur of their prayers thundered in my ears, the light of their
candles blinded me. Then they faded from view. A pressure mounted in
my head, threatening to over-inflate it to the point of bursting.

And then blackness
overcame all.

Bruce
Blake-All Who Wander Are Lost

I opened my eyes,
half-expecting everything to be ablaze. It didn’t disappoint
me to find it wasn’t the case. The gray sky looked like an
average overcast day threatening rain, though I couldn’t
discern any clouds, just gray. I breathed deep through my nose but
didn’t smell brimstone or sulfur, only the earthy smell of the
first rain after a lengthy dry spell.

“
About
time, sleeping beauty.”

My neck creaked as
I turned my head and gazed into the eerily blue eyes of Piper
kneeling beside me. She smiled.

If this is Hell,
count me in.

“
How
long?”

“
A
minute or two. Not long enough for brain damage.”

“
I’ll
have to come up with another excuse.”

She stood and
offered her hand, but I struggled to my feet on my own rather than
risk the visions her touch was sure to insert in my mind. They
weren’t unpleasant, but I’d rather have my wits about me
in Hell than walk around with an erection. As I gained my feet I
surveyed the area around us: a medium-sized stream burbled on our
left, stretching to the horizon; a forest of twisted trees clogged
our right. We stood on a swath of earth which accounted for all
else.

“
Where
are we?”

“
Hell,”
she said as casually as if she’d told me ‘the grocery
store.’

“
You
sure? Doesn’t look like Hell.”

“
You
were expecting a lake of fire, something like that?”

“
No,
actually. Last time I visited, it was a deserted apartment
building.”

She shrugged. “To
each his own.”

She looked away and
took a few paces toward the stream, leaving me to feel as though I’d
lost a friend. My eyes followed her, and when I managed to tear them
away, I noticed a small city perched on the far bank.

That wasn’t
there before.

“
Is
that where we’re going?”

“
I
think so.”

“
You
don’t know?”

She looked back
over her shoulder with an expression of mock disdain.

“
I’m
an angel, Icarus. Why should I know anything about Hell?”

“
Right.
I’m sorry. I didn’t mean--”

“
You’ve
been here more times than I have.”

That shut me up.
Still, I didn’t know anything about the place, my exposure
being limited to a fiery hallway in an abandoned apartment building
and a few rooms which didn’t look like they belonged in Hell.
Hardly detailed knowledge.

I walked toward the
edge of the stream, fully intending to step in and make my way
across. I enjoyed Piper’s company, but the sooner this
expedition got underway, the sooner we’d get the Hell out of
here, pardon the pun. My right foot was hovering over the water when
her hand on my shoulder sent a shock through my spine.