With a Tangled Skein (36 page)

"I-may I borrow them a moment more?"

Niobe gave her the glasses. "When you're satisfied, I would like to talk to you."

Mira hurried to another stairway. "There's one level I've never indulged myself in, but I just want to see-"

They followed her down the stairs, almost running. Niobe was surprised to learn that the woman really had not known about the deceit, but realized it made sense. Satan could accomplish much more evil, much more efficiently, if his own helpers were deluded. How many would consider an all-you-can-eat pass to be an inducement, if they knew the food was garbage?

That Satan, he's one sharp liar, Atropos agreed.

The new level appeared to be an elaborate brothel. Extraordinarily voluptuous young women in scanty clothing danced slowly on a stage at one side, their breasts and hips moving suggestively. This did not do anything special for Niobe, other than cause her a gentle wash of jealousy and regret for her own beauty lost, but she saw the effect it had on two men just emerging from the elevator. Both charged forward, their mouths literally drooling.

What pigs men are! Clotho thought. Then she reconsidered. Except for Samurai . . .

Mira was peering through the magic lenses. "No," she said unbelievingly. "They wouldn't!"

One man dashed up to the stage. "Hey, honey, you for sale?" he demanded, groping for her. The woman gazed down at him, a languorous smile crossing her bright lips. Then she jumped down to the floor, her anatomy bobbing in several places as she landed. She took the man's hand and led him to a curtained alcove. Evidently she was not for sale; she was free.

Now Niobe could hear urgent grunting from other alcoves. It seemed there were a number of clients busy.

Mira shook her head. "They are-they really are!" she exclaimed. Then she started laughing. "And to think my ex-husband, the pig, sold his soul for a permanent pass to this level!" Her laughter became so violent that Gaea had to take the lorgnette from her again.

Niobe, perplexed, took the glasses. She could understand how plain or even homely women could be recruited, just as Mira had been, to be enhanced by illusion to serve the passions of potential recruits-but what was so funny about that? It was, at best, sad.

She lifted the lorgnette. And gasped.

There were no young women dancing on the stage. It was a corral of pigs. Genuine swine, rooting about in the muck.

And Mira's ex-husband had a permanent pass.

Who says there's no justice in Hell? Atropos thought. I know some men I'd send here!

Mira sobered enough to recover her bearings. "You're no ordinary prospects!" she said accusingly. "You knew what this was like-better than I did. Who are you?"

It was time for truth. They sat down on one of the few clean places on the fence of the sty, and talked. "I am Fate," Niobe said. "I came here to talk to you, and to persuade you-"

"Fate! An Incarnation!"

"And this is Gaea, who lent me the lorgnette."

"Nature! No wonder she doesn't need glasses to see the truth!"

"We want to persuade you not to do an errand for Satan."

Mira laughed again, this time mirthlessly. "If Satan wants an errand, I'll do the errand. My soul is already lost!"

"It's not lost," Gaea said.

"Don't you understand? I became Staff because I had no soul left to give! They were going to cut me off the food-"

She put her hand to her mouth, realizing. "Oh!" Gaea gazed intently at her. "Your soul has been corrupted, Elsa Mira, but not that far; there is twenty-four percent good remaining."

"No! There is none! I used it all up, and-you don't know how addictive unmitigated pleasure is! I just couldn't stop! I-"

"I do know," Gaea said. "It is my business to know."

Mira stared at her. "Are you really Nature?"

"I really am. And my companion really is Fate. We can redirect your thread, if you will cooperate to this extent."

"I don't believe it! I kept count of every percentage point!"

Gaea frowned. "You doubt the power of Nature at your peril, woman." She made a gesture-and abruptly the room darkened. Wind swirled. Rain came down, first lightly, then in a pelting torrent. The pigs squealed, enjoying it. In a moment the three of them were soaked.

Gaea gestured again. The chamber shook. Now the pigs squealed in fright.

"An earthquake!" Mira screamed. "Let me out of here!"

Gaea held up her hand. The quaking stopped and the rain vanished. Sunlight streamed warmly down.

"But we're underground!" Mira protested. "The sun can't shine here!"

"Your fear is gone." Gaea told her. "You are happy."

Mira smiled. "I'm happy!" she agreed.

"Angry," Gaea said.

Sudden rage twisted the woman's face. "When I think what Satan told me-"

"Calm."

And the woman was calm. "I believe you now. Nature. I am amazed at your power, right here in an annex of Hell! Do I really have a quarter of my goodness left?"

"You really do. You have seen how Satan deceives both the clients and the staff members here. Why shouldn't he also deceive you about the percentage of evil charged to your soul? This is much more efficient for him; he caused you to become a creature of his directives when you did not need to be. You can still go to Heaven, Elsa Mira."

"No," the woman said sadly. "I'm still seventy-six percent evil, and I have no way to recover my goodness. I'm still addicted to foolish pleasure."

Again Gaea gestured. "Not any more."

Mira touched her stomach. "The hunger is gone! I'm not famished!"

"You will still have to earn your way by proper living and good deeds," Niobe told her. Niobe herself was impressed by the demonstration of Nature's power she had just witnessed; Gaea was indeed the strongest of the Earthly Incarnations. "But that is the only way any person gets to Heaven. God does not grant free passes. You do have time, if you start now."

"But I'm a Satanist! I signed in blood! Many times! I don't belong to any decent church."

"The contract is meaningless," Gaea said. "It is only a device to convince you that you are committed." She glanced up as another man came for another pig. The pig snorted and led him to an alcove. "It is your deeds that define you, and your thoughts, and your intentions, nothing else."

It was like dawn breaking. "You mean-?"

"Give your heart to God," Niobe said. "Your soul will follow."

"Oh, I will, I will! I don't want to go to Hell! It's much worse there than it is here! Only I never dared admit the truth-"

They got up and walked toward the stairs. "Satan will ask you to take a package to-"

"Oh, the psychic stink bomb to the United Nations," Mira agreed. "Tomorrow. I already have the bomb in my cell. I agreed to do that days ago."

"You must not do it!" Niobe said.

"Of course I won't do it, now!" Mira agreed. "I know it's an evil deed!"

They reached the stairs. "I will show you how to correct your course with minimum complication," Gaea said. "First we must establish you away from this complex-" They moved up the stairs.

Niobe lingered for a moment more. Now that the job was done, she found herself morbidly intrigued by the variety of illusion. It wasn't merely deception, it was utter degradation. Any man who later found out what he had done here would be too embarrassed to file a complaint. Thus Satan's corrupting operation continued. Truly, the ways of Evil were intricate!

She turned again to mount the stairs. Satan stood there. "So the prying Incarnation is here," he said, sneering smoke from his nostrils. "Corrupting My employees."

"You told me I had zero goodness left!" Mira cried accusingly from above.

"Don't believe everything the Father of Lies tells you, you credulous slut," Satan said.

"I resign from this institution! I'll do your bidding no more!"

"It is academic. You are fired. You never were much use anyway."

"Oh!" Mira exclaimed. She wheeled about and proceeded on up the stairs with Gaea.

Satan contemplated Niobe. His eyes were like small red fires and his horns steamed. "So now you have nullified the last of the four, you meddling frump," he said. "You think you have won."

"Evil is never truly defeated," Niobe said grimly.

"This time you haven't even started!" he said, his body smoking. Niobe raised the lorgnette, but Satan was unchanged. He was appearing in his true form. "You haven't saved your precious United Nations."

"Out with it, you old rascal," Niobe said. "You set this up."

"I set up four threads for Fate to unravel," Satan said. "Now you have used up your time on them, and cannot stop the delivery of the bomb tomorrow."

"But who's going to carry it?" Niobe asked. "I have a hundred other carriers. Did you think only four could do it?"

"But the Purgatory Computer-"

"Listed hundreds for you."

"It listed only four!"

"What you perceived was only four, old canine," Satan said. He gestured, and the image of a computer screen appeared in the air beside him. On it were the four names. "You supposed that was the real presentation."

Niobe struck her forehead with the heel of her hand. "Illusion! In Purgatory!" Of course it was in Satan's power to distort the spoken and printed material the computer worked with; an illusion was a form of lie, and the lie was his specialty.

Gaea would have known, Atropos thought. But she wasn't there.

Satan's illusions are everywhere, Clotho agreed. "The penalty of being a novice," Niobe muttered. "Had you realized how many there were," Satan said, "you would have known that individual effort would never work. You would have found a more general way, such as alerting the UN security police, who would have set up psychic sensors to prevent any such thing from getting through."

"I feel very stupid," Niobe said ruefully.

"You're not stupid, merely inexperienced," Satan said. "The stupidity was in your predecessor trio, who allowed a change of all Three Aspects in the same week. I had really expected better from them." The pig! Clotho thought vehemently. He set it up! Niobe sighed. "It's not too late. We can still alert the UN."

"Maybe," Satan said. "It's a chance. But why take it? I can offer you a better deal."

"You're not to be trusted!" Niobe said.

"Don't depend on trust," Satan said. "Depend on common sense. If I bomb the UN, there will be a very pretty tangle of Fate's threads, leading to much disruption in the world. But no one can know exactly where that disruption will lead. Sometimes what seems good turns out evil in the long run, like the Catholic Inquisition or the Nazi SS cadre. Sometimes what seems evil turns out good, like the Black Plague."

"The Black Plague!" Niobe exclaimed. "What good did that do?"

"It alleviated the European population pressure, decimated the labor force, and so paved the way for the end of the feudal system," Satan said. "You can't keep workers in peonage when there are so few that their value is great."

Niobe suspected that Gaea's predecessors had had their own reasons for spawning the Black Plague. But it was an interesting notion. "What's your point?"

"The point is that this whole UN business is a gamble," Satan said. "It might cost Me more than it is worth. Only a fool gambles when he doesn't have to."

"Many people are gambling on your gaming floor!"

"I rest My case. You do not see Me at the tables."

"What's your pitch, Satan?" she asked gruffly.

"You want to avoid a big stink. I want merely a small, harmless shift in one of Fate's threads. It seems to Me that we might reasonably deal."

"I won't deal with Evil!" Niobe cried.

"Suit yourself," Satan said. "Be sure to hold your nose as you pass the UN complex tomorrow-not that it will do much good."

He had her there. "What deal are you proffering?"

"I will cancel the stink in exchange for a simple, shift in employment in one person. No harm done to her, no evil on her soul, just an inconsequential change."

"If it's inconsequential, why do you want it?" Niobe demanded.

"Inconsequential to you; important to Me. This woman is to go into politics soon. I would prefer to have one of My own in the office she seeks. Most politicians are corrupt anyway, so it hardly matters to you. I promised this minion-well, never mind. The point is, it's something I'm willing to trade for. Are you interested?"

"I don't trust this," Niobe said.

Still, let's see how it looks, Atropos thought. We don't want to hit the UN tangle if we can avoid it. "Who is this person?"

"A young woman, hardly more than a girl, of no consequence, really."

"So you say. Name the woman."

"Oh, she's named Moon, or some such," Satan said carelessly. "It hardly matters."

"How do you expect me to adjust her thread if you don't tell me exactly who she is?" Niobe demanded, aware that she was sliding toward agreement.