The thought of her in that horrible lake stung his heart. He wanted to ask the angel, but should he? Could he bear to hear the answer he dreaded? He closed his eyes tightly, trying to shake away the image, but he couldn’t. He had to know! He just had to!
Clearing his throat, he looked down and twisted the toe of his shoe against the platform. “I have a friend … Ashley Stalworth. She has nightmares about going to Hell, so … I was wondering …” He looked up at the angel, trying to keep his voice from squeaking. “Is she in your book anywhere?”
The angel nodded sympathetically. “You are concerned about her destiny.”
“Uh-huh. She doesn’t really have much faith, because she’s kind of … I don’t know how to say it …” He twisted his shoe even harder. “Maybe it’s like you were saying before … I guess she has a heart of pride.”
The angel reopened his book, flipped through a few pages, and ran his finger along an entry. “She has not yet made her final decision, so her destiny is yet to be determined.” He looked again at Walter. “Your prayers and the prayers of others have ascended on high, and Yeshua is calling Ashley to himself. Whether she responds to his call is ultimately up to her.”
Walter caught a glimpse of the book, but the angel didn’t seem to mind. The page was filled with beautiful but unrecognizable characters. He clenched his fist and set his hand on Yereq’s knee. “But we can help, right? We can tell her about this place and warn her!”
Yereq shook himself out of his trance and turned toward Walter and the angel. “I am ready to serve in any way I can.”
The angel stood and drew a flaming sword from his robe. Its dazzling blade dwarfed Excalibur’s both in size and in brilliance. Walter trembled, and he could feel Yereq shaking the bench.
“What emotion do you feel?” the angel asked.
“Scared.” Walter edged farther back in his seat. “So scared I’m getting sick again.”
The angel swiped the point of the blade within an inch of Walter’s nose, so close he felt the scorching heat. He lurched back, nearly losing his balance, but Yereq caught him before he could fall.
Giving Walter a stern look, the angel’s voice boomed. “Does the sight of this blade cause you to love me?”
Walter could barely breathe, but managed a weak shake of his head.
The angel’s sword continued to blaze. “Fear rarely creates a heart of devotion. It is love that begets love. Since Ashley is a skeptic and already lives in fear, telling her of this place could drive her even further from the heart of God.” He put the sword back into his robe. “If, however, the faithful show her the love of a perfected heart, her skeptic’s heart of stone will more easily be made into one of flesh.”
As if cued by the vanishing sword, Walter’s throat loosened, and his nausea eased. “How do I show her that kind of love?”
“Sacrifice. Since you are one of Yeshua’s lambs, sacrifice is the one and only word you need to know and perform. She will see his face in you.”
Walter pushed himself to a standing position, but his legs still shook badly. “So how do we”—he nodded at Yereq“—get back to the world above?”
The angel produced another sword, just as large but without flames, and gave it to Yereq. “God still has a purpose for this Naphil, but he must remain here battling the wandering devils until a later time when I will restore him to his proper place. Those devils will eventually be swept into the Lake of Fire, but for now they are well suited for preparing Yereq’s heart, mind, and body for his upcoming task.”
Feeling much stronger, Walter smiled at Yereq. “Is it all right if I tell Sapphira that he’s okay?”
“You may, if you wish, but for Ashley’s sake, I advise against it. It would be better to avoid all mention of the lake of fire if you hope to replace her fear with love and hope.”
Walter sighed. “She has a lot of fear. That’s for sure.”
The angel spread out his wings. “And that is why you were brought here.”
Walter didn’t bother to ask what he meant. He already knew. He could finally feel Ashley’s greatest terror, the darkness of the abyss, and now fear and love combined to stoke a raging fire in his soul. He had to show Ashley what love was all about—the sacrifice of a devoted heart. He had to make sure she would never have to fear this place again.
“Come,” the angel said, reaching out his hand. “I will take you back to your friends.”
Chapter 12
Twisting around on the witness bench, Walter hugged Yereq’s bicep. “Take care of yourself. I hope I’ll see you again soon.”
Yereq patted him on the back. “You are the warrior I had hoped for. It will be an honor to fight with you again someday.”
Walter stood and touched the angel’s hand. Darkness immediately surrounded him. Wind rushed through his hair and clothes. Before two seconds passed, a light appeared over his head, a bright hole in the sky. As his body rose toward it, cold drizzle fell on his hair. “That’s the pit I jumped into,” he said out loud. When he neared the surface, he slowed down, finally stopping near the top.
Two hands reached down, both slender and feminine. When he grabbed them, he surged upward and lunged into daylight, toppling over Sapphira and Karen before rolling along the wet grass. When he came to a stop, cool fingers swept across his cheek. He looked up to see Sapphira’s sparkling blue eyes.
Karen joined her, kneeling at his side. “Are you all right?”
“I am now.” He sat up and glanced around. “Still no sign of Ashley or Roxil?”
Karen shook her head. “You were gone so long, Gabriel flew down to check things out, but he hasn’t come back yet.”
“How did you fly up the hole?” Sapphira asked.
“I don’t think I’m supposed to tell. Let’s just say I got a lift from an out-of-this-world driver.” Walter climbed to his feet and helped Karen and Sapphira to theirs, but his legs still felt so wobbly he could barely stand.
“I’m not sure anyone fell in,” Sapphira said, blinking away droplets on her eyelashes. “Roxil is too big for the hole, so if she didn’t transport through the portal, maybe Ashley didn’t either. Maybe it’s because they have dragon essence.”
Walter straightened his scabbard belt and adjusted Excalibur. “Gabriel has dragon essence, and he came through. Why wouldn’t they?”
Sapphira stroked her chin. “I’ve been thinking about that, but I haven’t figured it out. Ashley and Roxil were as close to me as anyone, and I’m sure I made the fire column big enough to envelop all of us.”
Walter focused on Sapphira’s stunning blue eyes, hypnotizing and tranquil. Both of his hands trembled. Was it her enchanting beauty that made him shiver, or was his heart still stirred by the tortured faces in the Lake of Fire? He clenched his hands into fists to calm them. “We both saw a bunch of dragons enter this dimension,” he said, “so we know it’s possible.”
“Yes,” Sapphira said. “I don’t think I told you that I helped create the covenant veil so they could pass” Her face suddenly turned almost as white as her hair. She spoke slowly, in monotone. “Roxil couldn’t leave the land of the dead, because she never affirmed the covenant.”
“Affirmed the covenant?” Walter repeated. “What are you talking about?”
“Jehovah-Yasha. The Lord is my Savior. She has to believe that to pass through. Maybe we have to make another veil and get her to agree to the covenant. Maybe the threat of staying in Hades forever will convince her to try.”
Walter shook his head. “I remember that part of your story, but I don’t think trying to scare her is the right way to go about it.”
“But we have to give her a chance.” She drew close to Walter and Karen. “Will you both go with me? It will take two to make a veil.”
“I guess so.” Walter stood near the edge of the hole. “But Roxil can cool her heels for a while. I want to wait for Gabriel to come back with a report. I can’t tell you what I saw at the bottom, but I hope he doesn’t try to go all the way down.”
“I’ll watch for him.” Sapphira nodded at the trail of giant tracks leading into the woods. “I wonder what we should do about them.”
Walter scooped a beetle out of a footprint’s puddle and set it free on the grass. “If they start causing trouble, Larry will hear about it. He monitors all the media outlets.”
“But we can’t contact Larry without Ashley,” Karen said.
Walter grimaced. “Right. No communications except for … Wait!” He fished in his pocket for his cell phone and flipped it open. “It’s showing a signal, but just barely.”
Karen peeked at the display. “Give it a try.”
“I’ll call Billy. He can check with Larry for me.” Walter punched a speed dial and held the phone to his ear. “Billy! It’s Walter.”
“Talk louder,” Billy said. “It’s really fuzzy.”
“Yeah, I know. Listen. I need you to monitor Larry’s media input. Find out if there’s anything going on with the giants. They might be causing trouble.”
“The San Francisco Giants are causing trouble?”
“No, not the baseball team, or the football team, either. Real giants. Here’s what happened. We had an argument with a dragon that was born at the beginning of time, so Karen fell into a hole that went all the way to Hades, but the hole turned into a spiral staircase, so Ashley and I climbed down a zillion steps to Hades looking for her, at least that’s what the Italian words on the wall said, something from a bad comedy. When we got to the bottom, we found a bunch of giants who grew from the ground like plants and ate worms three times a day, and they were hanging inside antigravity walls for centuries, but this old-as-Methuselah teenaged girl came along and showed us this guy with dragon wings by sprouting fire from her hands, then the giants woke up, and I sliced a leg off one of them, making his boss really ticked, so they climbed out of Hades and went stalking off to make trouble somewhere. In the meantime, this Methuselah girl wrapped us all in a flaming cocoon and shot us out of the ground, but now Ashley’s missing.”
Walter paused and waited.
After a couple of seconds of silence, Billy replied. “Same old stuff, huh?”
“Yeah, pretty much, but I couldn’t call you earlier. No cell towers in Hell, you know. So, anyway, if Larry hears anything important, give me a call.”
“I’ll call Bonnie, too. We’ll keep our ears open.”
The connection died, leaving only static buzzing in Walter’s ear. He slapped the phone closed and stepped back to the edge of the hole where Sapphira and Karen stood peering in. “Any sign of Gabriel?” he asked.
Sapphira pointed into the hole. “I think I see something.” A few seconds later, Gabriel’s head appeared, then his wings, flapping hard and scraping against the sides of the pit as he rose. Walter grabbed his arm and pulled him to solid ground.
As he righted himself, Gabriel folded in his wings. “Flying straight up is for the birds!”
“Did you see Ashley?” Sapphira asked.
Gabriel shook his head. “It was too dark to see anything, but since my wings brushed against the walls all the way down, I would’ve noticed if I passed anyone. It’s just a sheer cylinder with rocky sides until you get to a dead end way down below.”
“But how is that possible?” Walter asked. “I was just down there, and there wasn’t any dead end.” He winced. Now they would drill him with questions.
Sapphira pointed at the giants’ footprints. “When the Nephilim climbed the stairs they probably made the shaft really fragile. I guess it collapsed right after you got back and blocked the passageway.”
“That might be it.” Walter finally noticed the chilly air and zipped his jacket. “I guess we’d better try to go back and see if we left Roxil and Ashley behind. We don’t have much choice.”
The cell phone chimed. Walter snatched it up. “Hello?”
“Walter. Billy here.”
“Yeah, Billy. What’s up?”
“Larry says the power grid’s failing in the West, and it’s spreading across the country. Lots of other weird stuff is happening in the big cities, strange creatures stalking the streets, and with no power, there’s panic everywhere.”
“Yikes! That’s not cool!” Walter turned toward the others. “Power grid’s failing. Everyone’s losing electricity.”
Karen stepped close and shouted into the phone. “Tell Larry to switch to emergency power immediately. The solar batteries should hold him for a while.”
Walter pulled away from Karen. “Did you get that?”
“Got it,” Billy replied, “but there’s a lot of static.”
“It’s getting worse. Cellular service might die when all the power goes out.”
“I’ll try to call you again if I find out anything new.”
“You can try, but I have to go back to Hades now. See ya.” Walter closed the phone and put it back in his pocket.
“We might not be going back to Hades,” Sapphira said. “I think you and Karen might have stayed in this dimension the entire time. Since Roxil and Gabriel were in an energy state while you were there, I think the underground realm got shifted to this dimension somehow. But now that Gabriel is solid here in the land of the living, I’m not sure what to think.”
Walter set his hands in front of her, as if bracketing his words. “Look, I don’t care if it’s Hades or Harlem. All I want to know is if you can get us back to wherever Ashley is. The giants are obviously up to no good, so the world needs Ashley and her brains more than ever.”
As Sapphira lifted a hand, a new splash of fire arose from her palm. “I’ll give it a try, but I don’t know where we’ll end up. I thought I’d be able to travel wherever I wanted to, but it feels like the dimensions are playing musical chairs.”
Hanging on to a flickering lantern with one hand, Ashley reached for the trapdoor with the other, just inches away from her fingertips. Her duffle bag dangled precariously from a strap over her shoulder. “A little higher,” she called to Roxil as she stood on tiptoes.
“I cannot stretch any farther,” Roxil said, “and your shoe is pressing against my eye.”
“Sorry.” Ashley moved her foot. “Can you jump?”
“Dragons do not jump well. I can beat my wings to give you a boost, but it will be unsteady.”
Ashley braced herself, keeping her eyes on the door above. “Go for it!”
With a sudden shake, Ashley lurched upward. She raised her free hand and pushed the trapdoor open, and her momentum threw her into the vent tunnel. After rolling and skidding, she jumped to her feet, keeping the lantern upright throughout her landing. “I made it!” she called down.
Roxil’s eyes flashed from below. “Good. I will wait here while”
Ashley leaned into the trapdoor opening, poking her head into the mobility room. “Roxil? Were you going to say something else?”
She waited for a reply, but none came. Leaning down as far as she could, she listened, but the room below was quiet, and shadows obscured the floor. “Roxil?”
Again, no reply. The glowing eyes had disappeared. Ashley sat up and fiddled with the zipper on her bag. Was Roxil okay? Why wouldn’t she answer?
Pushing her hair out of her eyes, she scanned the area. The rope was gone, and there didn’t seem to be any other way to get down. She couldn’t check on the moody dragon even if she wanted to.
She stood and set her hands on her hips. What was she worried about anyway? Roxil was a dragon. She could take care of herself. Besides, she was probably just pouting.
After tossing the bag up onto the stairs above, Ashley leaped and set the lantern on the edge of the staircase landing, then leaped again and caught the edge with both hands. The crumbling rock made it hard to get a good hold, but, inching her fingers to the side, she finally found a solid place to grab. With a swing and a lunge, she propped her elbow on the ledge, then, grabbing another handhold on the first step, she wrestled her way up, swinging a knee to the landing, then a foot. Finally, she managed to get her whole body up to the stairs and sat heavily on the third step.
Wiping sweat and grime from her forehead, she laughed to herself. That was the easy part. Now several thousand steps into the mountain overhead awaited her already weary legs. She opened her bag and felt for the contents—the gravity brick, a water bottle, her photometer, and her handheld computer—all safely swaddled in her change of clothes. They would probably feel like anchors after a while, but they were too important to leave behind.
Picking up the lantern, she stood and began a slow, methodical climb, counting each step as she went. Based on the approximate average height of the steps and Larry’s earlier elevation reports, she could guesstimate the total number, maybe fifteen thousand or so. It might take all day, but at least she would know when she was getting close to the top.
After a hundred steps, she stopped and leaned against the wall. Maybe it would be a good idea to rest after every hundred and catch her breath. No sense hurrying and getting dehydrated.
Continuing her upward march, she noticed the writing on the wall, the morbid warning about her recent descent into the dark realm. The more she climbed, the clearer the lettering became, etched deeper, each line blackened by shadows cast by the lantern’s flickering glow.
She murmured the words,
“Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate,”
then translated the phrase, speaking it into the dim, upward spiral as she trudged on. “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.” It was so quiet, even her whisper echoed, repeating the gloomy words in a phantom voice—her own voice twisted and deepened as it reverberated off the spiraling walls.
The lantern felt heavier, her legs weaker. The shoulder bag seemed to grow in weight, dragging at her like a stubborn child who refused to follow. Even after a scheduled rest, she didn’t feel any better, but she had to go on. Six hundred steps. Seven hundred.
The phrase continued to haunt her mind.
Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.
Eight hundred. Nine hundred.
Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.
One thousand.
Ashley stopped and sat on a rocky stair. A longer rest. That’s all she needed. Every thousand steps, take a longer rest and a small drink. She set the lantern down and withdrew the water bottle from her bag. After taking two sips, she returned it and rested her elbows on her knees, cradling her chin in her hands. As the tiny fire flickered, its light undulated on both walls and the ceiling, perhaps seven feet above the stairs.
She imagined the troop of giants passing through, ducking their heads as they tromped upward, their broad shoulders barely fitting through the narrow tunnel. As she rested, she listened to the sounds of silence—the thrumming of her heart, the rush of blood through her ears, the sizzle of the wick, but now, thankfully, no ghostly echoes.