Chapter 23
That was ... hmm, what is the word? Ah! Pointless. A
word that leaps effortlessly to mind whenever the queen of the
vampires expresses an opinion.”
“Well, excuse me for
having a moment of self-awareness!”
“You are excused; I
know full well how rare and wonderful such moments are for you.
Now.” The devil clapped her hands together, like a kindergarten
teacher briskly bringing the rowdy ankle-biters under her command.
“Since you have both agreed to come to my domain, there are a few
elementary rules you must—”
“No.”
The devil blinked.
“Pardon?”
“We say. Not you. Because I know something you
prob’ly wish I didn’t. You need µs.” I paused, relishing the sweet,
sweet words about to tumble from my lip-glossed mouth (Too Faced in
Drop Dead Red). “You need me.” Ha! Reap the whirlwind,
Satan!
“Yeah!” Laura echoed,
but she was a shit poker player, because the doubt? It was writ
large, as they say. “You need me. Uh. Her.”
“I smell a list of
demands,” Satan said, but to my relief, she didn’t seem annoyed, or
even put out. “Speak, 0 Vampire Queen.”
Bark, bark! “You want
Laura to see your domain, or whatever the hell you call
it.”
“Was that supposed to
be a pun?”
“Not on purpose. And
you know Laura wouldn’t come by herself. So I’m gonna get her to
the Underworld for you. In return, you’re gonna fix it so I can
read the Book of the Dead without going nuts.”
Laura made a muffled
squeaking sound, sort of a gasp crossed with a sigh. “The book!
Betsy, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“I’m sick to death of
the damn thing being in my house and always being right, while at
the same time nobody can read the stupid thing.”
“But, Betsy ... it’s
bad. You know it is. Anybody who looks at it for more than a second
and a half can feel how bad it is. How can being able to read it be
any sort of improvement? Think of what it might cost.”
“Worth it. Can you
imagine all the shit we could have avoided over the last three
years if we could read the fucking thing?
“I’m tired of
guessing and wondering. I want to know. I need to know. Your mom’s
probably the only one who can—uh.” Probably said too much.
“Anyway,” I finished with a forced cough, “that’s my price for
bringing your kid back for Old Home Week.”
“Agreed,” she said at
once. And the way Satan said it—the word out so quickly it almost
stepped on the end of my sentence—it was a tone I’d never heard
from the devil. She had the air of a person who knew she was
getting off lightly.
“But what’s in this
for you?” As if she’d tell us. But I’d at least ask. I’d at least
know, when this whole thing went screaming off the rails, that I’d
asked. That I’d tried. “What do you care if Laura ever sees hell?
Maternal obligation isn’t exactly the phrase that springs to mind
when we’re talking about you.”
“I want her to see my
home because not seeing it will eventually drive her
mad.”
There was a painful
silence as Laura and I digested this. Then I forced another cough
(which sounded more like a croak) and said, “You mean make her mad.
Really piss her off. Like how people get when they get dragged to
their high school reunion. Right? That’s what you don’t want to
risk. Right?”
“You think the dreams
are bad now? You think the pains are bad now?” Satan asked her kid.
The fallen angel looked as concerned as I’d ever seen her. The
devil was a caring mom; who knew? “You have no idea, Laura. And I
mean for things to stay just that way. I mean for you to never have
an idea. For you never to know how bad it could have gotten. I’m
not here for her. I’m not even here for me. I’m here for
you.”
“You mean ... you
didn’t do that? You didn’t make that happen to get me to
come?”
“By my father, no! I
could never hurt you—and even if I could, I would never. You coming
into harm—serious, permanent harm—how does that help
me?”
That was logical
enough to be true.
“Laura, you look
human. You sound human, you talk like a human. You smell and speak
and excrete like a human. You menstruate and—”
“TMI!”
Satan ignored me.
“But you aren’t. You’re only partly human. And all that is me,
within you, that part of you calls to my home, and will always call
to you. The part of you that isn’t human yearns toward the
dimension where my will shapes reality.”
“I don’t get it,” I
admitted.
“Laura is an Arabian
horse,” Satan explained, “who was raised on a pig farm and thinks
she’s a ping.”
“Your analogies are
hideous.” Did that make me queen of the pigs? Or just queen of the
pigs who were already dead? “Almost as hideous as—” I eyed her up
and down. “As hideous as—wait.”
“I prefer not to wait
for your tedious mental grinding to bring you up to speed. Now,
when we go to my dimension, you’ll need—”
“Wait!”
I’d been so caught up
in figuring out who was going to do what, and who was going to get
what, and who wasn’t going to go crazy, I’d barely glanced at
Satan’s ensemble. But now ...
Now, there was no
shutting it out.
“Your
feet.”
“—pay close attention
to—”
“Your.
Feet.”
“—for the sake of
your immortal—”
“Your feeeeeet!” I
shrieked, and launched myself at my sister’s evil evil evil evil
evil mother! Who was wearing a sleeveless gray and black checked
shift with a gathered waist and a round neckline, a dress subtle
and pretty and which was the perfect outfit to wear
...
... with
...
... my sacrificed
Valentino black-lace pumps!
I figure Satan wasn’t
used to bitchy vampires jumping her, because she went over as
though she were made of feathers. I even got in a right cross to
her demonic jaw before a thousand firecrackers went off behind my
eyes and the bricks above the fireplace jumped forward and slammed
me in the back.
The good news was it
didn’t hurt a bit ...