John Connolly - The Infernals aka Hell's Bells

And rage: pure, channeled, governed rage.

“Did I do well, ma’am?” asked Crudford.

“You did very well,” said Mrs. Abernathy. “For this, I’ll even find you a new hat.”

Crudford’s slimy features parted in a grin. A new hat: it was more than he had dared to hope for.

THE WATCHER FOUND A quiet cave, where it mulled over what Old Ram had said. Eventually it sought out Mrs. Abernathy, but when it tried to speak with her, it found her overwhelmed by the attentions of the returning demons as they crowded around her, anxious to make recompense for their lack of faith in her. Their words were a salve to her wounded vanity, and although the Watcher might have fought its way through the mass of stinking bodies in order to reach its mistress, it had not done so. In part this was because it could see the pleasure she derived as they prostrated themselves before her, but there was also a part of the Watcher that still wondered about the boy, and the wisdom of what Mrs. Abernathy had done in dragging him to Hell.

In addition, the news that the boy might have been found had almost driven from its mind the discovery of the burned rubber on the plain; almost, but not quite, for the Watcher had spent the intervening period trying to identify the other smells it had picked up among the rocks, comparing them with the scent memory in its strange, alien brain. The Watcher was an entity apart, even among the many foul and demonic beings that inhabited the various strata of Hell. It had attached itself to what was now its mistress shortly after the formation of Hell itself, and the emergence of the oldest of the demons. No one could recall quite how the Watcher had come into being; its nature was a mystery to all. Not even Mrs. Abernathy herself truly understood it: she knew only that it obeyed her will, and when so many had turned their backs on her, only the Watcher had remained truly faithful.

But the Watcher did not obey her will alone. For as long as it had been in existence, it had reported back to the Great Malevolence himself, for the Great Malevolence trusted no one and nothing, and despite his power he was suspicious of all those around him. 29 But the Watcher had spent so long with Mrs. Abernathy that its loyalties had become confused: while it still answered to the Great Malevolence, it did not tell him everything. It could not have said why; it merely understood instinctively that not simply knowledge is power, but secret knowledge. So it was that it made its own judgments on what the Great Malevolence needed to be told, and what could safely be hidden from him. In that sense the Watcher was serving two masters, which is never a good idea.

Its situation had been complicated by the Great Malevolence’s descent into misery and madness, which meant that, even if the Watcher had wanted to report to him, it could not, for its voice could not be heard above the wailing that filled the Mountain of Despair, and the Chancellor was careful to control all access. Then again, until now there had been little to report: Mrs. Abernathy had spent most of her time moving back and forth between her lair and that of the Great Malevolence, seeking an audience that would never be granted, and then brooding over it alone in her chamber until it came time to make the pilgrimage again. When she was not walking, or brooding, she was watching Samuel Johnson in the glass, and hurling curses at him that he could not hear. It was left to the Watcher to try to track down the vehicle that had collapsed the portal, but each time it returned without news Mrs. Abernathy’s interest in the vehicle seemed to grow less and less, or so the Watcher had thought. Then, when the Watcher had at last come up with evidence of the vehicle’s presence, it had been surprised to find that Mrs. Abernathy had been plotting quietly all along to open the portal once again, if only to snatch Samuel Johnson from his world and transport him to Hell. She really was a most unusual woman, even leaving aside the fact that she was actually an ancient tentacled demon in disguise, which was one of the reasons why the Watcher’s loyalties were split between her and the Great Malevolence.

The Watcher sniffed at the air, re-creating the scents it had picked up on the plain. It had felt presences nearby, watching it, but it was not sure if they were related to the black substance on the rock. Its sunken nostrils twitched.

An old smell, almost forgotten. And another with it: sharper, more pungent. They were familiar, those smells. The Watcher rummaged through its memories, back, back, until it came at last to a pair of cowering figures, its mistress towering above them in her old, monstrous form, banishing them forever to the Wasteland.

Very little surprised the Watcher. It had seen so much that it was almost incapable of surprise. But its realization of who had been responsible for the collapse of the portal nearly caused it to topple over in shock.

Nurd.

Nurd, the Scourge of Five Deities.

Nurd, who barely justified the term demon to begin with, so inept was he at being evil.

Nurd had betrayed them all.

Meanwhile, Nurd and Wormwood were standing on a rise and watching a small van tootling merrily across the Desert of Bones while playing “(How Much Is) That Doggie in the Window?” Nurd and Wormwood knew that the piece of music was called “(How Much Is) That Doggie in the Window?” because at least four voices were singing along to it, adding “woof-woof” noises after each mention of the word window, and the words waggle-waggle to the bit about “the one with the waggly tail.”

“What’s a doggie?” asked Wormwood. “And why do they want one?”

“A doggie is a small creature that barks, like Boswell, Samuel Johnson’s dachshund,” said Nurd. “It goes ‘woof-woof.’ This one, though, also appears to have a tail that is waggly, which makes it more desirable, I suppose.”

“They do seem to want it very badly,” said Wormwood.

“It doesn’t appear like a good idea to go shouting about it, though,” said Nurd. “The kind of things with waggly tails that live around here tend to have big waggly bodies too, and waggly heads with sharp, waggly teeth.”

“If it’s from the world of men, then maybe Samuel is in there too.”

Nurd shook his head. “No, I’d sense him if he were so close.” Nurd strained to read the writing on the side of the van. “It says something about ice cream on the side. And candy.”

“Candy?” said Wormwood.

“Candy,” said Nurd.

They looked at each other. Their faces brightened, and both said, simultaneously: “Jelly beans!”

Seconds later, they were in hot pursuit of the ice-cream van.

Constable Peel very much wanted to die. More than that, he wanted to die and take four dwarfs with him, and maybe a driver of an ice-cream van for good measure. He’d been listening to “(How Much Is) That Doggie in the Window?” for a good four hours now, and was on the verge of insanity.

“Stop singing,” he said to the dwarfs.

“No,” said Angry.

“Stop singing.”

“No.”

“Stop singing.”

“Say ‘please.’”

“Please.”

“No.”

Constable Peel banged on the glass connecting the back of the van to the front compartment, in which Sergeant Rowan and Dan, Dan the Ice-Cream Man were sitting.

“For the last time,” he pleaded, “there must be some way to turn that music off.”

Dan shrugged. “I’ve told you: it comes on automatically with the engine. I haven’t been able to work out how to make it stop without messing up the wiring.”

“You’re messing up my wiring,” said Constable Peel. “Can’t I at least sit up front with you?”