There’s one thing that makes me think Kelly could be for real. Mason chose him. Picking a simple back-alley cutthroat with delusions of grandeur isn’t a mistake Mason would make.
Jack is leading us down the embankment and into the thick woods that line the freeway. The trees stand at crazy, impossible angles. It’s like we’re walking through still photos of the forest in the process of falling.
“Step lightly,” whispers Jack. “And don’t touch anything. Tremors have loosed the land under the trees. They’re barely rooted. They’ll come down on us with the slightest provocation.”
Suddenly I’m sorry I’m wearing big steel-toe boots. I should be in Hello Kitty slippers.
I’ve never seen a real forest in Hell. Not one with trees and plants. I’ve seen places called “forests,” but they’re usually tightly packed mazes of saw blades and spinning pylons studded with needlelike Hydra teeth.
We walk maybe twenty yards until the forest gets tight and dark and wild. Old-growth backwoods. It’s hard not to bump into limbs and the solid trunks of the drunken trees. Each time I hit something, I feel it give, and wonder if it’s going to fall and which way to run and if running will make things better or worse by bringing down even more trees. Tree trunks crack and branches fall around us, but we make it through the forest and come out onto low sand dunes.
Jack points off into the empty distance and says, “There’s Eleusis.”
But I’m looking down. At the bottom of the dune Venice Beach stretches into the distance. Which doesn’t make sense. Venice is west of Hollywood and we’ve been going south. I don’t know what’s going crazy faster, this city or me.o;So, who are you?” I ask Kelly.
He doesn’t say anything.
“Tell him to talk to me. Tell him he doesn’t ever need your permission to talk again.”
Mammon says, “Talk to him, Mr. Kelly. Talk to him to your heart’s content. But first take this exit and merge left.”
Kelly says, “I’m Master Mammon’s servant and resident human. I do whatever he asks, from talking about my life to performing whatever tasks I’m instructed to do in a way that best exemplifies human habits and behavior.”
“I told you he was a bore,” says Mammon. “You remove creatures like this from their environment and they wither. He might still be interesting if we let him loose as a killer down here like you.”
“I wasn’t a killer until I got down here.Édown hex201D;
Mammon makes a dismissive gesture with his good hand.
“Just because a baby spider hasn’t bitten anyone yet doesn’t make it any less of a spider.”
Kelly steers us down the fire road. Mammon occasionally tells him to change lanes or follow a road that splits off from the main one. We’re driving for at least an hour but we don’t seem to be anywhere yet. If Mammon is leading us anywhere but Eleusis, I’m going to tie him to the back bumper and drag him to Mexico. If I can find it.
“What makes you so special that of all the souls down here, you rate being handed off to a general?” I ask Kelly.
“I don’t know, sir. Stark, I mean. I’m sorry. It’s a wretched habit to break.”
“Don’t sweat it.”
“There are so many people down here more accomplished than I. I’ve accomplished nothing compared to some I’ve met.”
“Don’t be so modest, Mr. Kelly. Mr. Kelly was a murderer, and after some practice he became quite adept. More than even his pursuers knew,” says Mammon. “But it was only dumb luck that kept you unincarcerated after those first few, isn’t that right?”
“Yes, Master Mammon. Just as you say, sir.”
We drive for what feels like another hour. Every now and then I see a flash behind us, like a light going out or a reflection off a mirror, but when I turn there’s nothing there.
I’ve driven the 101 south to San Diego a hundred times, but I don’t recognize this road at all. We could be driving to Oz or right into a trap.
“We’re getting off here,” says Mammon.
I look around, trying to get my bearings. All the road signs have been torn down or hacked to pieces. More of Lucifer’s paranoia or just another example of L.A.’s ever-expanding nervous breakdown?
The exit sign has been torched and lies in a little slag heap at the edge of the road. I swear I see another flash behind us, but then I’m bracing myself against the dashboard. Kelly takes the exit too fast and has to tap the brakes hard when we come to a hairpin curve. That’s when Mammon stabs me.
I should have stripped the fucker down at the palace, but the angel in my head felt sorry for all the maiming and frying I did. I went easy on him and this is what I get.
The inverted-cross medal he’s been wearing comes apart and the lower half is a razor-sharp golden blade. He was probably going for my neck, but when Kelly hit the brakes, it ruined Mammon&>