Read Where All Souls Meet Online
Authors: S. E. Campbell
"You wouldn't do anything toâ"
"I don't care if you leave or stay, but if you leave, you aren't using my money to do it," Osier said. "You want to get away, fine, but use your own funds. I pay for your expensive hobbies so you'll stick around and keep Eden happy."
Rebecca gaped at the phone. "Well, I, uhâ¦"
"'Well, I, uh'," Osier mimicked cruelly. "When you get to wherever you're going, you would have to get a job anyway, wouldn't you? Your rich mommy and daddy aren't going to bail you out now."
"Osier," Rebecca gasped.
"You and I both know I'm right," Osier said. "So you want to go away and live your life? Fine. But you're going to have to grow up to do it."
Rebecca was silent as her heart pounded in her ears. Yes, maybe she could fly away to wherever she wanted to go, but it was Osier's money and she was certain he would have her credit cards cancelled by the time she landed. It was only fair, too. It was his money. How could she have forgotten this? She was so close. So close to escaping. Now there was no hope.
"I won't tell Eden about this," Osier said. "I am going to call her back in one hour. If she tells me you aren't home, then I'll assume it's time to cancel the cards and come check on her. If you are home, I won't mention your little flight plan again. But do not ever, ever let me catch you attempting to run out on her while someone isn't home to look after her again, do you understand me? If you want to leave, leave, but don't put Eden in danger in the meantime."
Then there was dial tone and silence on the other end of the phone. Rebecca stared straight ahead, sighed, and then turned back around toward home, feeling sick with anger.
Anguish filled her heart. Eden shouldn't have been in Rebecca's memory. It caused her too much pain. The way her heart ached now was powerful enough to kill her all over again. Though she tried to reason that Satan was tricking her, she was certain it was real. She knew because she herself remembered that day her mom had disappeared from her. Only later when she hid in her bedroom with her knees drawn up to her chin had she learned her mom had gone to the airport, however.
Eden could scarcely breathe, could scarcely think. She felt weak and tired.
"Good," Satan said, dropping her to the ground where she rolled and stared at the sky.
To her right, a Blood Worm moved toward her and crawled over her hand. Normally, she would have brushed the worm away, but she stared upward immersed in such misery she could have been swallowed by it. Satan grinned at her.
"I think I'll leave you alone again," Satan said. "Last time I gave you an hour. This time, maybe I'll give you two."
Then he was gone from her, but he had already done the damage. As she lay on the floor of hell, burning with fiery, unquenchable pain, she could no longer fight the misery which enveloped her. And she was alone. So, so alone.
Time moved painfully slow while Eden was tortured in the pit. She shuddered and shook her head. What kind of person was she, who had been cast aside by her own mother? As she thought of her parents, hurt, pain, and anger filled her. This ending was so different than how she had imagined it. She thought she would open the gates of heaven and everything would be okay again.
But this was not the case. Why was she here? Why, why, why?
As she lay there, growing angrier and angrier, a memory came, different than the last. It was the memory of her guardian angel, Natalia, who had come to her in a dream while she still lived.
Eden sat chained to a stone chair in hell, surrounded by demons in human form. Natalia lingered before her, a gorgeous woman in white. The world was still, as if it was a photograph.
"Where am I?" Eden asked. "What is this horrible place?"
"That does not matter," Natalia said. "The question is, do you choose this?"
Choose this? This horrible inferno?
She glanced to her right and saw the ghastly faces of the demons around her. Taunting her. Torturing her. She didn't doubt when she arrived in this place, she would be here for all eternity.
"This?" Eden asked.
"Yes, all of this," Natalia said. "The road will be a hard one. You'll have to carry a burden no person should ever be asked to carry. You will not understand the meaning behind your journey for some time, and for this, I am sorry."
"What would you need me to do?" Eden asked.
Natalia extended her hand and brushed Eden's cheek. The smell of flowers overwhelmed her. She shut her eyes and inhaled, feeling as if she was being sucked into paradise. Marvelous.
"You would need to be a light in a world of darkness," Natalia said. "Be love in a world filled with hate. The task sounds simple, but this place⦠Too long has darkness resided here."
"Wouldn't it be easier if you told me where here was?" Eden asked.
"You do not need to know where here is to give me the answer," Natalia said. "All you have to do is close your eyes and search your heart. I think a big part of you already knows where you are, whether you admit it to yourself or not."
Shutting her eyes, Eden focused on what she felt. There was pain, yes. A great deal of it, in fact. But deep down she felt something she had not in a long time. Serenity. Peace. She knew who she was. This was new, and it was worth suffering for.
"Yes, I will do it," Eden said, opening her eyes.
Eden slowly sat up and realized something. Before she had been cast into this pit of endless heat and fire, she had chosen to be here. God had given her the chance to say no, to turn him down. God had known this would happen to her, so did this mean he had not forgotten her here? Did it mean he would come for her?
She stood and stared up into darkness. The dream had ended there. Maybe, for her, this hell would end too. She was filled with different feelings than before. Hope, peace, and serenity.
I wasn't forced to endure the dream just to choose whether I would be willing to take on the task. God had made me dream of hell so I would remember it right now. Right when I was supposed to.
A chill ran down her spine; the heat no longer felt so hot and time no longer felt so slow.
And she remembered what all of her friends had done for. Adanna had followed her into Satan's claws without flinching and had protected her sister to the end. Aaron had shadowed her to Asag's prison. Yuri had taken care of his mom to the end and had more than paid for the accident with the pills. Edward had given up everything for his family once, and now, he had followed and helped her when he could have been captured by Satan and tortured. And her mom⦠After all this time, her mom had come to find her again. Maybe things would never be perfect between them, but she had to forgive her mom â and she had to forgive herself too.
The anger her mom had felt toward her was so pointless. Bitter. Eden had never felt that way toward her mom, even after all of the times she had been hurt by her. Anger like that hurt the person who felt it. Eden once again began to pity her mother. Her mom had spent so many years living with that much darkness in her heart. Eden was no stranger to the fact that sometimes your biggest enemy was yourself. And it wasn't like Rebecca hadn't loved her. There were times when she showed just how much she did. She remembered one time in particular.
Six-year-old Eden sat at a barbeque thrown by one of her mom's friends. The smell of cooking burgers and grilling hot-dogs filled the summer air. The grass was a lush green and robins twittered madly in the air. The sun was roasting hot, so most of the adults and Eden sat in the shade. Her mom sat next to her, but her dad wasn't there because he once again had to go to another business meeting. The thought of her dad missing out again made her sad.
As her mom bit into a hot-dog dripping with mustard, a woman with auburn hair glanced over at her. Eden picked at her fingernails and nervously hid behind her veil of long hair. A paper plate with a hot-dog and chips sat in front of her, untouched. The woman leaned over her.
"Hello, Rebecca," the woman said.
"Hello, Marcy." Rebecca nodded at her, wiping her hands on a napkin.
Marcy glanced at Eden, then pinched her cheek so hard it burned. She squeaked, blushed, and placed her hand over her cheek.
"How is little Eden today?" Marcy asked. "I see you haven't eaten anything. Didn't your mom ever tell you it's a sin to waste food?"
The woman looked like a witch with her long nose, beady, probing eyes, and long, jagged fingernails. Shooting a frightened glance at her mom, Eden dove beneath the table and sat in the shade. She had read books and knew all about witches. She didn't want to have anything to do with them.
Marcy clucked her tongue as Eden drew her thin legs up to her chin. "You might want to have that girl checked, if I were you, Rebecca."
"Checked?" Rebecca's voice grew a dangerous, angry edge. "Checked for what?"
"Well, you know what I meant." Marcy shuffled her feet. Eden could see her brown pointed shoes from beneath the table.
Rebecca stood up. "No, I'm afraid I don't know, Marcy. Please tell me what you're insinuating about my daughter."
"Don't take it personally, Rebecca, dear." Marcy's voice sounded pinched. "She just doesn't talk much. Strikes me as a little slow, that one."
Her mom let out a shocking growl which Eden had never heard her make before. It reminded her of the lion in one of her videos. "Slow? My daughter is bright and highly creative, I shall have you know. So what if she doesn't run her mouth. Unlike you, she has the intelligence to keep her mouth shut unless she really has a reason to talk. My daughter is worth ten of you."
Eden stuck her head out from under the table. Her eyes widened as her mom loomed over Marcy, who had her hand pressed against her quivering, ample, bosom.
"Well, I beg your pardon." Marcy gasped as if Rebecca's outburst had come from nowhere.
"No." Rebecca poked Marcy in the chest. "I beg your pardon, thank you very much."
"Well, I never." Throwing up her arms, Marcy turned and began walking away, heading toward a group of women jabbering underneath a pine tree.
Her mom sat next to her, arms crossed, as she gave a huff of annoyance. Eden sat on the bench again and stared at her.
My mom just defeated the witch. She's a hero.
"Eden, never make friends with people like that. You're worth more." Her mom patted her on the forehead and returned to eating her hot dog.
It was times like those she remembered her mom did love her. And yes, her mom did have faults and she wasn't perfect. Eden had her faults too, but she wasn't responsible for the bitterness her mom felt toward her. She had to forgive herself. Shutting her eyes, Eden threw back her head. She realized the answer to her question then â why was she chosen for this task?
Because she had to learn to love herself and be grateful for the strengths she had been given.
****
Eden knew what to expect now, which made being in hell easier. She sat with her knees to her chin enduring the terrible inferno when Satan re-appeared, glowering at her. When he gazed at her, she saw the smirk on his face melt away, replaced with fierce anger.
"How?" he said, all five heads forming a chorus of rage again. "I left you alone in your despair, and I come back with you more than healed."
Silently, she stared at him.
"Fine," Satan said. "I am not the only one who has been waiting to enjoy torturing you. You will break, and I will be there to watch."
Satan snapped his fingers. There was the sound of loud grinding and out of nowhere, a piece of the ground gave way and crumbled. Fiery orange magma bubbled in a square pool beneath the surface and a horned throne made from human bones rose up from beneath the ground. When the twenty-foot throne was all the way up and locked into place, the orange magma slithered away from the throne as if it was made from ice. Not a single part of the throne was charred. As Eden stared at the throne, she swore it had a red and unholy aura. An evil aura. She stared up from the throne and gasped, looking into Satan's many faces. Satan stood behind her, many eyes narrowed.
Satan stepped backward and then raised his hand. With a gasp, Eden turned and saw Satan build a chair suited to her frame out of the ground. The ground transformed into boiling dark ooze, which pulled together and got bigger and bigger, firmer and firmer, until a rounded stone chair remained.
"Sit," Satan said, glaring at her.
Eden defiantly shook her head.
"I said
sit
," Satan said, raising his hand again.
A force the strength of ten thousand men hit Eden straight in her stomach, forcing her to land with a
whomp
on the chair. She was immersed in extraordinary agony since the stone was so hot. The pain she felt from impact was swiftly replaced by the agonies from the heat. Satan grinned at her pain and continued to hold up his hand, binding her to the spot. She ground her teeth and wailed, but she could not move. Satan lowered his hand to his side and made a part of the ground turn into black ooze, which traveled up the side of the chair and headed toward her wrist. Eden screamed and shuddered, but she could not get off of the chair to escape the strange liquid.
The ebony gel fastened itself around her wrist, a shackle, and began to grow hard. Another tendril of black appeared and snaked up to her other wrist. She yelled at the heat of the wrist shackle, but Satan could have done whatever he wanted â she was helpless.
While Eden was fastened to her chair, Satan raised his hand. She twisted in her chair and squeezed her eyes shut. Moments passed but the pain did not come. When she opened her eyes, she saw that Satan was smirking at her. The smirk was more alarming than any blow because it hinted at what was to come.
"Come to me, my minions," Satan said, extending his hands. "Come to me from where you hide on Earth and exact your revenge on the one who chained us yet again."
Eden, panicked, shook her head and cleared the hair from her face. All around her, strange dark shapes began to appear. Some of the dark shapes appeared human, and others appeared demonic. And just like she feared, directly in front of her stood Asag in his human form with his brown hair and brown eyes. His eyes must have regenerated. At his side stood Lady Midday.
As Eden looked around, she came to recognize those who surrounded her. A groan left her throat. There was Agares and Pazuzu and another demon that held Donovan by his hair. Every one of the demons she had faced and thwarted. The ground groaned, but she was too fearful to notice it.
"Did you think you could get away?" the demon asked. "Your boyfriend won't be able to save you now."
The taunt was frightening. Was it really true nobody could save her? She swallowed but was startled by how little fear she felt. Then she realized why. She had found the answer to an unknown question, the question of why she felt so strong when she was in a world of hate.
"You and your friends can bite me," she said.
"As you wish," said Asag. "You are going to think what you saw in the other world was playtime."
His eyes glowed and he opened his mouth wide. Seconds before he sunk his teeth into her shoulder, the rumbling up above grew louder. He stopped, stepped away from her shoulder, and stared up into the sky. Asag stepped away from her shoulder and stared up into the sky. His mouth dropped open as the sound of the earth shaking continued.
"What is this?" Asag hissed.
"It's God," Eden said, a smile on her face.
The demons surrounding her cringed as if she had sworn. Growling, Satan seized the shackles which bound her to the stone throne and tore them off of her. Eden glanced at him in confusion as he seized her arm and began to pull her toward himself. She started to fight him, but Satan was so powerful she could not escape his grip.
"Let go of me!" Eden yelled. "
Let me go!
"
"No," Satan said. "This is my domain. He can't come down here. You belong to me now."
"He will always be stronger than you," Eden said. "Love always conquers hatred. It's stronger than anything in this world. He loves me, and His love is stronger than any walls you put between us."
Satan scoffed and his five heads grew uglier. All ten of his eyes went from black to a glowing carnal red. The smell of death increased tenfold and his aura went from nonexistent to an angry, pulsing crimson. He seized Eden by her arm.
"Youâ¦" Satan said. "You make me sick with your God."
A great boom rattled the air; to Eden's left, a glorious light poured in and shone on the cracked, dead land. It highlighted every last part of hell, from the deep crevices to the plains all around. Satan released her, screamed, and turned his five heads away as if the glorious, beautiful light was something to be feared.
As the light shone in, the sound of distant, inhumanly beautiful, singing reached her. Eden paused and froze, shutting her eyes just to listen. Satan screamed and hid his face from the light. When he had no hope of chasing the singing from his ears, he straightened up and let out a roar which echoed throughout hell.
"Get out," Satan said. "The lake of fire is mine. My domain.
Mine
."
From the light, more figures than Eden could count appeared. Satan turned his head away and squinted.
"Come to me, all which is mine," Satan said. "If God has come to do battle, then we shall do battle."
Eden took a step back as dark shapes appeared, too many to count. White mists covered her feet and towering ten feet tall imps appeared. Blood worms rained from the sky and fell at her feet, crawling toward her. It was like swimming in a sea of maggots. More demons came, dark and angry, causing the air to smell thick with sulfur. Eden whipped around and attempted to run, but Satan grabbed her arm and held her to him.
"No," Satan said. "You stay with me."
Eden was forced to watch the dark shadows become animal-headed demons. Satan Spawn began to appear too. Two shadows, larger than mountains, appeared on the horizon. The ground shook and split around Eden. She shrieked and almost fell, but Satan's painful grip kept her from collapsing.
The rock underfoot fell away and the demons jumped as molten magma bubbled up through the cracks in the ground. Eden and Satan stood on the only island of safety amidst the sea of lava. As Donovan was covered in magma, he let out a scream of agony. Even though he had caused her great agony, she didn't want to see anybody hurt like that. His screams pierced her ears like knives.
"He's your servant," Eden said. "
Save him.
He's in pain."
Satan said nothing and pretended he did not hear his servant screaming, "Master, help me. Master, I'm burning
.
"
Nobody came to Donovan's rescue, and as the soil shook again, Eden almost fell into the fiery orange sea around her. The ground collapsed further into itself and formed a massive, gaping hole. The hole caused such a massive drop it created a waterfall of magma. The glowing orange tide carried Donovan onwards and over a waterfall sized drop. The molten rock covered him but his wails, distant now, could still be heard. Eden realized Donovan would be trapped in the lava forever in agony because as a soul in hell he would not reincarnate, go to heaven, or even the other world. The layers of hell had swallowed him up. He had been trapped by his own choices and the belief his master would show mercy.
Eden tried hard to purge Donovan's screams from her mind. As she stole a horrified look at Satan, one of the massive, dark, shadow mountains let out an inhuman, high-pitched shriek and fully appeared for the first time. It was a seething one thousand foot creature with a legless, leech-like form and a head with uncountable circular rows of shining teeth. It had black, scaly flesh.
"Leviathan," Satan said, his five heads grinning.
Leviathan screeched again. Fire and magma poured from its mouth as if it was a fire hose for molten rock. The spout of fire would have been enough to fill a swimming pool. Leviathan dove into the lake of magma and disappeared as the ground below Eden rumbled. Moments later, Leviathan tore through the dark dirt and caused demons to leap out of the way as more of hell crumbled, fell in, and became a lake of unending fire. Once again, Eden heard Donovan's screams.
The other massive mountain growled and Eden tore her attention away from Leviathan to focus on the monster. Eden had never expected to see a dragon. A real dragon. But this dragon did not have sleek scales and beautiful wings. It was ugly, as ugly as Satan and Leviathan. The monster had seven heads so tall they had to have reached a mile in the sky, each of them decayed and ugly, like misshapen blobs with teeth the size of cars.
The dragon had three sets of massive wings. The dragon growled, which caused the ground to shake. It charged toward the heavenly white light the angels created, like Leviathan had. The light grew stronger and brighter, as the angelic figures grew closer.
Eden trembled.
Will God be able to beat these monsters?
Fear filled her. She couldn't believe He was doing this for her, for one measly soul who had gotten trapped down here. Then she shut her eyes and realized she believed she would be saved and was grateful she was saved. Donovan was trapped down below because his master would not even lift his hand to save him. God was willing to call an army of angels in order to save a single lost soul. She opened her eyes and tightened her fists, turning toward Satan, who gazed at his monsters with a grin.
"He'll beat you," Eden said. "He doesn't need monsters to do it."
The grins slid off of Satan's many faces.
The angels grew closer as Satan hit Eden across the face. She yelped, slid to the ground, and almost toppled into the sea of fire. As she lay on her side, she gazed up and saw the angels up close for the first time.
As much as Satan's army was ugly, misshapen, and smelling of death, God's army was the opposite. The smell of flowers filled the air and warm, gentle light overflowed the night. The angels sang God's song as they flew, and as Eden took in such beauty it brought tears to her eyes. God's angels were male angels and female angels with wings which spanned twenty feet long. The angels were all different races. Even their bodies were different, though they had one thing in common â they glowed with beauty. And Eden knew what the beauty was. It was love. Every bit of deceit and hatred the demons had, the angels matched it with love, loyalty, strength, and courage. Satan's monsters may have spanned the sky and breathed fire, but God's followers were powerful because of the strength of their love and hope.
Hundreds of angels came at Leviathan all at once. The monster spit fire into the air, but the angels, with such speed that Eden gasped, darted away and avoided the fiery lava spill. One of the angels flew down at Leviathan's head with a golden sword and drove it straight into its skull. The dragon let out a screech of rage as blood spilled from its scales. Leviathan screamed again, this time sending a wave of lava and fire upward. The pumice splashed on the wings of the male angel who had struck him, catching his left wing to catch on fire. He cried out and began to plummet, but two of his angel friends dove down and captured him by his arms and lifted him to safety. The rest of the angel horde rose again and drove Leviathan back with swinging swords. As each angel struck Leviathan, he continued to let out earsplitting screeches which caused Eden to cringe in pain.
Nearby, angels did battle with demons. Eden watched as a plump, female angel with short, chestnut, curly hair drove Asag into the steaming lava pit. Though the fire covered his human skin and melted it away to reveal his ugly self, he did not wail in pain. He flailed and attempted to fight the flow of the magma river, but it was too powerful for even him to escape. He reached for Agares, who ignored him and matched his strength against a pair of redheaded angel twins wielding lances of holy gold.
Asag hissed as he was pulled downward and then a moment later he leapt out of the magma pit with an angry growl. He rolled onto the ground and seized the angel by her round waist, but she used her golden sword and threw him back again.
Meanwhile, the dragon screamed in pain. Eden saw the majority of the angels were attempting to defeat the massive, seven-headed beast. The dragon's many heads attacked all at once as the angels zigzagged around him, firing golden arrows of light. The arrows plunged into the dragon's scaly hide.
The most muscular of the angels flew above the leftmost head of the dragon. The dragon spotted him and the head shot forward like a javelin. Still the angel did not cower before the dragon. Instead he drew back his hand and threw the golden sword straight into the dragon's left eye. Dark steam poured from the monster's eye and it screamed and flailed. The head plummeted downward and plunged into the magma river. The weight it hitting the sea of fire caused a tidal wave of fiery heat which headed straight toward Eden.
She yelped, turning to face Satan, but he was watching Leviathan flail.
I am going to be washed into the sea of fire. I am going to be lost in hell right before I have the chance to escape.
As the scalding tidal wave came closer and closer to her, Eden screamed and covered her head with her hands. Seconds before the deadly wave hit, Eden was wrenched upward and into the sky. In shock, she gazed up and saw someone she did not expect to see. It was Natalia. The guardian angel from her dream. But Natalia was supposed to be dead.