returning to Hell. For that I’m sorry. You have my best wishes, my prayers, and my full confidence that you’ll make a safe return home. I wish I could say more but time is short. By now I’m sure you know that my brother, Neshamah, is dead by Aelita’s hand. She and my other brother, Ruach, the part of us that still rules in Heaven, seem to have come to some sort of vicious understanding. Aelita means to kill the rest of us and Ruach has agreed to let her, leaving him alone to rule. I should leave Los Angeles, in fact this world, but I’ve come to love it so. For now I’ll lose myself in the tunnels where the dead once roamed under the city. I suppose it’s a pathetic fate for a deity but one I probably deserve for deserting my brothers and not doing my part to stop this madness long ago.
Take care of yourself, my boy. I’m sure we’ll meet again.
Protect the Singularity.
With warmest regards,
Muninn
I guess it’s nice that one of us thinks I’m getting out of this alive but it’s annoying how wrong Muninn is. I don’t hate him. I’m pissed. I want to strangle him, but only until he turns some funny colors. Not until he’s dead. The guy is scared to death and I understand that. Plus, he apologized, which is more than I can say for Saint James.
There’s nothing written on the second envelope. I turn it over. It’s closed with a red wax seal imprinted with twisted, angular lines like a piece of rusty bailing wire in an old barn. Samael’s sigil is as crooked as he is.
Dearest Jimmy. Or, if you prefer, your Infernal Majesty,
I bet you’ve had a few chuckles when you found out that all my plans and machinations designed to return me to Heaven returned me to one ruled by a bastard and a fool. I’ve laughed about it a few times myself, but only in private and very, very quietly.
Have assassins given you any interesting new scars? Murder is unsettling when you’re on the receiving end, isn’t it, Sandman Slim? Worst of all, it destroys your ability to trust, which is the point of this note. When you have no allies to go to for help, there’s only one logical solution. Go to your enemies. When your back is against the wall, ask yourself this question: which bastard has the most to gain by helping me?
Here’s hoping this note finds you as charming and unmurdered as ever.
Yours in Christ,
Samael
I don’t know whether to be madder at Samael or Brimborion. It would have been really nice to know that someone out there was thinking about me, even if it was the asshole that stuck me here. And it would have been really goddamn helpful a few weeks back to get strategic advice from someone who has more reasons to want me alive than dead.
Squatting in the middle of a hundred pounds of dead bugs loses its charm fast. I put the knife in my waistband, shove the letters in my pocket, and tuck the bottle under my arm. With my good hand I close the bedroom door and head down the hall. Brimborion will know where
