James Anderson - The Altar

“Where am I?” she said. “Where have you taken me?”

The demon looked at her for a moment and almost felt sorry for her. But it had lost all emotions millennia ago when it had become so consumed by rage that it had actually become the sin of wrath, in the flesh, so to speak. It no longer knew or felt anything except the pleasure it derived from inflicting pain and suffering upon others.

The demon folded its wings onto its back and sat down next to her.

“I am afraid that you and your unborn daughter are in hell,” it said with a sneer.

The woman recoiled and moved back. “And who-or what-are you?”

The monster decided it was time to relax a bit and lose the demon persona. It pulled its wings back out and folded them around itself, covering itself completely, as if in a leathery shroud. It waited for a moment and allowed the transformation to take place. Then it unveiled itself to reveal a human form, a human male, naked and perfectly formed.

The woman was already so shocked that Wrath didn’t think anything could shock her more. She looked at it for several moments before speaking.

“You’re…human…,” she said.

“I am whatever I choose to be,” the demon corrected, now in a smooth and deep male voice. “Right now I choose to be human. At least in my form.”

The woman seemed to relax a bit. Then another contraction came and she lay back on the sand and breathed in short, powerful spurts. It watched as the shade of an old man walked completely through her solid form, calling for the shade of his dearly departed wife. The cursed soul was as unaware of the pregnant woman as she was of him, both completely oblivious to each other.

“The grave’s a fine, private place, and none I think, do there embrace,” the demon said.

The woman’s contraction ended and she looked at him for a long moment. “You quoted Andrew Marvell,” she said. “How do you know about poetry? Who are you? What are you and what do you want with me?”

She seemed more surprised by the fact that it knew this mortal poet than by the fact that she was now sitting in the middle of hell holding a conversation with a demon that was sin in the flesh.

The monster smiled. Yes, that human poet had been so close to the truth, at least for those who ended up here. His soul was down here somewhere, with the billions of others, searching for his own lost love.

“I know about a lot of things,” it said. “But mostly I know about suffering. And you and your daughter will know about suffering too before your time with me is done.”

“Well, let’s head downward,” Erik said. He had to almost shout to be heard. It was like talking into a vacuum. “There’s nowhere else to go.”

The Indian nodded.

They made their way down the rocky slope as quickly as they could. It was steep enough to be treacherous if they were not careful, but not steep enough to slow them down very much.

“This is going to be difficult when we come back up,” Erik said.

Dovecrest forced a laugh. “Somehow I doubt that we’ll be coming back this way again.”

Erik wished Pastor Mark was here right now. The preacher might be able to give him some insights into what he was seeing and experiencing. To him this was nothing but a vast wasteland, completely devoid of life, love, and hope. The pastor might understand all this better. But for now he had just one goal-to find his wife and son and get them out of this place and back home where they belonged.

The heat increased as they approached the portal. It was like the opening in the bottom of a funnel, with red, glowing embers all around it that lit up the entire world, or whatever it was, Erik thought. He wondered if they’d get burned going through the opening. It was large enough to drive a tank thorough, at least.

As they approached the opening the ground beneath them curved upward to form a tunnel, or sorts, which led through the opening.

“So these are the gates of hell,” Erik said.

“Abandon hope…,” Dovecrest said.

“If I didn’t have hope, I wouldn’t be here,” Erik replied.

Dovecrest nodded. “We must remember that whatever this place is, we are just visitors. If there is hell, there is also heaven. We are not of this place. We belong with the other. He has given us strength and power to come here and do what must be done. Then we return to our own place.”

With trepidation, they went through the opening and stepped into another vast wasteland, this one even larger than the first. An endless plain of black sand and volcanic outcroppings stretched out into the distance for as far as the eye could see. It was empty, completely empty. Erik couldn’t believe the vastness and the emptiness of this place. How would he ever find them, he thought. This went on forever. How could he even be sure they came this way, though this opening. For all he knew there could be hundreds more like it.

Dovecrest knelt down and examined the sand. Erik wondered what he was up to.

“Someone passed this way,” the Indian said. “It looks like the demon stopped here. See the marks. They’re deep into the sand. It may have landed here and then flew on.”

“Was this recent? Or is it a thousand years old?”

Dovecrest took his hand and placed it on the sand. “Feel,” he said. “It’s hot.”

“Right.”

Then he placed his hand over the mark he had indicated.

“It’s cool,” Erik said.

“That’s right. This was made very recently. And look here.”

He moved ahead a little and pointed to the ground. “This looks like the footprint of your little boy.”

Todd had scampered down the side of the giant funnel, through the opening and out onto the huge plain that spread out before him. He stopped and took a deep breath. The emptiness went on forever. But his mother was out here somewhere and he was determined to find her. He knew she was still alive. If the demon had intended to kill her, he would have done so. He would have killed them both. So it must have something in mind for her.

He had looked out ahead at the hundreds of rock outcroppings. His mother could be behind any one of them. Without thinking, he had set off across the plains in a dead run.

Now he stood up against one of the rocks and listened. He could hear a voice in the distance. It was far away and he couldn’t make out what it said. It was strong and resonant, a man’s voice, and it sounded like it was talking to someone else that he couldn’t hear. Todd had the very strong feeling-a certainty, in fact-that this voice belonged to the demon and that it was talking to his mother.

He scuttled around the boulder and crept forward. The next one was about a football field away. It sounded like the voice was on the other side of it. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do when he found his mother, but first he had to know if it were her. He caught his breath, then hurried across the open space towards the boulder.

The place felt weird, whatever it was. Todd felt alone and abandoned, yet he also felt the presence of others around him. He couldn’t actually see or hear them, but he felt like they were there, just under the surface. It was almost as if he could touch them, yet there was nothing there to touch.

He slowed down when he approached the rock and crept closer, hiding just behind it. He listened intently, but couldn’t hear anything. Then he thought he heard the sounds of rapid breathing. It was his mother.

He peaked around the rock and, sure enough, saw his mother lying in the sand with her head thrown back. She was breathing rapidly, having another one of those labor pains. In front of her, though, Todd saw a naked man. The man’s back was towards him, but he saw the man’s dark hair and very muscular body. He looked to be about his mother’s age, maybe a little younger. He knelt down in front of his mother, as if he were concerned. Todd wondered if this man was a doctor.