To Reign in Hell: A Novel Read Free Page A

the hard grey edifice—lonely, cold, distant, and proud. Like the Regent of the South himself, some said. But once inside, the illusion was shattered.
    The visitor, a medium-sized golden haired dog, padded through the hallway. Being a dog, and therefore colorblind, he didn’t see the cheerful blue of the walls. But he noticed the brightness of the lamps of iron and glass, one every twenty dogpaces. The oil for the lamps, pressed from local vegetation and refined in the basement of the Hold, had been scented with lilac.
    The dog continued until he came to an archway. There was a small chamber, with large green couches and overstuffed chairs. The north wall held a burgundy-colored buffet, with cups and bottles of cut glass and stoneware. The lamps were always low in this room, but the dog heard the sounds of breathing, and smelled a friend.
    He leapt onto a couch, facing this friend across a table of glass. Neither spoke; the dog moved slightly toward the Regent, who was seated with one leg on the table, his left arm across the back of the couch, his right hand loosely holding a glass into which he was staring. The dog caught a strong, sweet smell from the glass.
    “ ’Tis but cheap wine, milord,” he said.
    “It fits my mood, friend Beelzebub. I’m feeling cheap today.”
    “Hath thy mood a cause, Lord?”
    “All things have a cause, my friend.”
    “Would’st care to speak on’t?”
    His answer was silence. Beelzebub studied his friend as best he could in the dim light. The Regent was smooth shaven and somewhat dark of complexion. His hair was dark brown, almost black, perhaps a bit wavy, and curled over the ears. His brows were thick, his eyes narrow, yet wide-set, with shocking green irises and lines of humor or anger around the edges. His jaw was strong, his nose straight and pronounced; and he wore colors matching his eyes beneath a cloak that was full and gold. Brown boots covered his feet, and upon his chest was an emerald, as large as his fist, on a chain of gold.
    Beelzebub studied him for a moment longer. “Perchance ’twould do thee good to speak, Lord Satan.”
    The Regent set down his wine glass, found a small bowl, and poured into it.
    “Maybe. Drink.”
    The dog moved forward on the couch, sniffed, but kept his opinion to himself. He lapped up a bit and managed not to shudder.
    “What do you, friend Beelzebub, think of Yaweh’s plans regarding the Fourth Wave?”
    “Milord? Then it draweth nigh?”
    “Who can say? It’ll come eventually.”
    “Soon?”
    “Not that we know. But Yaweh wants to be ready this time. He wants to build a place that will be safe from the flux.”
    “Verily, have we not that now?”
    “Not permanently. What he has in mind is a place that’s complete by itself, and won’t be subject to Waves at all.”
    “Hmmm. Ambitious, nay?”
    Satan glanced at him sharply. “You sound skeptical.”
    “Thy pardon, milord—who is’t shall build this place? They must deal with the outside, so they must needs risk the ultimate end. Who is’t shall do this? Thyself and thy brethren? You are strong, but only seven. Those of us from the Second Wave? We’re less than a score of scores; the task is beyond us. Those of the Third Wave? Aye, they can do’t, milord. Will they? For they know naught of such things save the fear of them. They must needs see the danger ere they fight it, I fear.”
    “You have a way,” said Satan, “of getting right to the heart of things.”
     
     
    “It cannot last,” says the first.
    “We
will make it last,
“
says the second.
    “We
will build walls that are yet stronger, “ says the third.
    “They must be larger,” says the fourth, “for there will be more of us.”
    “That is good,” says the second.
    “Aye,” says the first. “Let us begin, then, for I see the walls crumble before me.
“
    And the evening and the morning are the Second Wave.
     
     
    “Milord?”
    “Hmmm—yes?”
    “Thou seem’d befuddled.”
    “I was