“How?”
“Trained attendants, Psychemancers, conjure a single human’s psyche and then guide the Sag-hrim according to Beelzebub’s plans. Each individual creature is equipped with manipulators—those long fingers that you can see— that can alter the abstract design that represents that psyche. These designs encompass an entire lifetime. Every human has one, or really two—one that is spiritual and one that is physical. Both are represented and both can be altered.
When you look closely, the spiritual design is the glowing tracery; the physical is the floating collection of boneshards. All psyches are subtly different from one another, some tougher than others. At first they may seem perfect, but there is almost always a flaw. Once found, that flaw in the design is pulled, twisted, severed, or even added to, and the Sag-hrim achieves its goal. When they have succeeded with a soul they discard the psyche’s physical shards onto the pile they sit upon. And then, eventually, that soul arrives in Hell. But remember, Eligor, the humans are not being forced; they are being tempted. That is much harder. And much more satisfying to us, for they cannot blame anyone but themselves for being here.”
Sargatanas looked out at the Plain for some moments and then slowly shook his fiery head. “One has to admit that it was brilliant to see the potential in the Sag-hrim, that it was genius to exploit them so well.”
Eligor looked at Sargatanas, surprised at the admiration in his booming voice, at the expansive credit he was giving Beelzebub. He looked back at the creatures. He had not noticed the relatively frail Psychemancers before. They seemed roughly his own height but were dwarfed by their charges. Seated, the seemingly headless Sag-hrim appeared to be nearly six times his height, covered in chitinous armor with odd organs bulging from their swaying torsos and massive multifingered arms swinging slowly as they performed their tasks. Hanging in the air before them were the glowing psyches, and Eligor watched carefully as the creatures pulled and adjusted and wove the designs with their wandlike fingers and flickering ribbons of fire. It was fascinating to watch, nearly hypnotic, and even more wondrous when Eligor thought about what they were achieving. These Sag-hrim, so distant from their human subjects, were actually coaxing them, tempting them to sin. From the smallest sins to the largest. Entire patterns of human culture were shifted, wars were begun, atrocities committed, murders, rapes—human evil in all its manifold forms— all because of the machinations of these beings. And all according to the grand strategy of Beelzebub. It was almost more than Eligor could grasp.
“It almost seems unfair. I mean, with humans as frail as they are. Who among them could withstand these?” Eligor said almost to himself.
“Not many,” Sargatanas agreed. “Not many at all.” He turned away and Eligor, gaze fixed on the Sag-hrim, only barely heard him walk off.
Eligor would study them for as long as the caravan halted; he knew it might be some time before he passed this way again. So absorbed was he, so in awe, that he was surprised to turn away eventually and see Sargatanas and Valefar deep in conversation with a winged newcomer.
Eligor approached them and recognized the messenger. He was a lesser demon of the Flying Guard named Murup-i, a good lance-wing as Eligor remembered. Murup-i knelt before his lord, undoubtedly grateful for the brief rest; his flight from Adamantinarx had to have been long and arduous.
“Eligor,” Sargatanas shouted over the cacophony of the working Sag-hrim, “your centurion here has been sent on Zoray’s urgings. It seems that, while we have been away, our old friend Astaroth has finally summoned enough courage to mobilize very nearly all of his troops and he has started to send them toward our border. Zoray says that they are establishing huge camps but not actually crossing into our wards yet. Valefar and I have agreed that we three should abandon the caravan and make all speed to Dis.”
Eligor nodded and stole a glance at the others in the party. Without the Demons Major their survival was suddenly in question, but this was his lord’s order and Eligor supposed the travelers would have to take their chances. As he watched them, they got to their feet, sensing, perhaps, that something had changed.
“It looks like the old fellow has finally run out of bricks,” said Valefar, smiling.
“And options. So now he looks to us for more. Not very grateful, is he?” said Sargatanas.
“We should never have bothered to help him,” ventured Eligor.
“We do what we are told,” said Valefar. “That is why we are heading to Dis.”
Eligor stretched his wings; they were stiff from inactivity and he flexed them to work the muscles. He slung his packs and watched as the two Demons Major, whose wings were only just beginning to appear, readied themselves, donning flight skins. Theirs was a complete transformation; unlike Eligor, they no longer possessed functional wings after the Fall and had to manufacture them from tissue and bone. It was a drastic process, and after their bodies had attenuated and flattened and enormous scarlet wings and spines had fanned out they bore little resemblance to their former selves. Only their faces, which peered out from within hoods of flesh, remained untouched.
They arose into the air in unison and Eligor watched the caravan shrink beneath him. The Guard would undoubtedly see them through to Dis; of that he was reasonably sure. As the demons gained altitude, he looked down over the Plain at the dark mosaic of the Sag-hrim, their flickering adjustments to the fate of mankind twinkling now like the stars of the Above and yet as unlike them as they could be.
Eligor looked ahead of Sargatanas and, through the ragged clouds, could just see an orange glow upon the horizon that he knew was the fires of Dis.
Chapter Eight
Adramalik watched the white figure pick its way across the Rotunda floor toward the empty throne. She was still some distance off, and, as she approached, she faded from view behind the irregular clumped piles of flesh and bones that dotted the floor. Her pure white body, undraped the way Beelzebub insisted, contrasted starkly with the deep reds of the surroundings. She stepped so lightly upon her bloodstained bird-feet that she avoided touching any of the disarticulated bones that littered the floor.
He wanted her just as did nearly all the demons of the court. As a sexual plaything, as a possession. She was, he thought, at turns beautiful and terrifying, sensuous and cold, fragile and strong, and, perhaps, because of these intimidating, unfathomable contradictions, almost irresistible. But, like all the demons, Adramalik knew what the penalty would be if Beelzebub even thought there was any competition. His paranoia was matched only by his wrath.
The buzzing started as she drew nearer.
Adramalik did not bother to look for the origin of the sound. He knew from past experience that this was futile; even if he could pierce the gloom, the sound’s pervasiveness told him that there was no single point of its origin. His master was up there, he knew. Up there amidst the densely packed hanging skins and floating chunks of meat, watching Adramalik and Lilith as she crossed the Rotunda. Navigating the moist columns and islands of rotten flesh was slow work.
The buzzing grew more intense, more localized. Now, if he concentrated, Adramalik was sure he could see movement, see them take wing, the first of the tens of thousands of flies that he knew were coming. He had long ago grown used to Beelzebub’s entrances. But in that Adramalik was somewhat unique.
Lilith was close; he could see the red sclera of her eyes, the tiny nostrils, the thick, tight curls of her snowy mane. And, brought on perhaps by the stagnant, hot air, the thin sheen of perspiration that glazed her perfectly sculpted body.
Above them a wavering dark cloud of flies was growing and coalescing, rotating like a slow tornado in the debris-laden air. The buzzing rose and fell arrhythmically, an insectile threnody that almost sounded like words. Beelzebub’s Voice never failed to bring a crooked smile to Adramalik’s hard features.
He thought of it as a miracle, a miracle that only Lucifer could explain, for solid rumor had it that it had been he who had created Beelzebub. Adramalik had heard that Lucifer, just before the War, had wanted a fearless and unquestioning lieutenant, a being so different from his angels as to answer to none but himself. Secretly, and
