Devil Said Bang Read Online Free PDF Page B

they’re designed to punish the
paper and not just hold it together. There’s something that looks like a set of
brass teeth. The teeth chatter sometimes. Sometimes they don’t do anything for
days. There’s a gyroscope that when you spin it talks in a deep monster-movie
voice in a language I’ve never heard before. On one of the bookshelves is a gold
armillary sphere. When I touch any of the golden rings, I feel like I’ve fallen
out of myself. Like I’m nowhere and being pushed through empty space by a
freezing hurricane. There are stars far away and beyond them a mass of pale
boiling vapor streaked with lighting. I think it’s the chaos at the edge of the
universe and that this is the deep void that separates Hell and Heaven. Wherever
and whatever it is, it’s a lonely and desolate place.
    In L.A., I lived with a dead man named Kasabian who
worked for Lucifer and could see into parts of Hell. I don’t know if he can see
me here, but sometimes I scrawl notes and leave them on the desk for days. Some
are to friends. Most are to Candy. We’re a lot alike. Neither of us is quite
human. And we’re both killers. We try to forget about the first as much as
possible and try to avoid the second as much as we can, which, the way things
are, usually isn’t long.
    There’s a click behind me. I put my hand on my
knife and turn.
    Two Hellions come in through a false section of
bookcase that slides away like Japanese paper doors.
    Merihim, the priest, bows. He’s in sleeveless black
robes. Every inch of his pale face and arms is tattooed with sacred Hellion
script. Spells, prayers, and, for all I know, a recipe for chicken vindaloo.
    The guy with him, Ipos, is big and blunt. Like a
walking fire hydrant in gray rubber overalls. The heavy leather belt around his
waist holds tools that range from barbarian crushers to delicate
surgical-quality instruments. From a distance you can’t tell if he’s the
palace’s maintenance chief or head torturer. His job in the palace makes him a
useful agent. No one pays attention to the janitor.
    “Did we interrupt playtime with your toys, my
lord?” asks Merihim.
    “Go harass an altar boy, preacher. I’m
working.”
    On a table near the sofa there’s a line of peepers
projecting images from around the palace onto an old-fashioned home movie screen
I found in a storeroom. I pop out my right eye, drop it into a glass of water,
and stick a peeper in the empty socket, rolling back the images the eye picked
up like a video rewinding. Like I said, I have a few of Lucifer’s powers but
mostly Vegas magic-act stuff.
    “What are you looking for?” asks Ipos. His voice is
a low rumble, like an idling sixteen-wheeler.
    “The front of the palace where I dumped the bodies
of three bushwhacking assholes. I want to see what happened after I came
inside.”
    Merihim and Ipos are the only two Hellions who can
walk in here on their own. They were Samael’s confidants and spies and I
inherited them with the gig. I don’t think Samael would have lasted as long as
he did without them. I know I wouldn’t still be here.
    I roll back to where I came inside and let the
peeper play. The officer I talked to barks orders at the troops who are about
thirty seconds from a soccer riot trying to get a look at Ukobach and his dead
friends. The officer orders most back to their duties and others to take the
three bodies to the gibbets. A young officer comes over. They walk along the
gory trail where I dragged in the bodies. I try to read their lips but they’re
too damned far away.
    “I see by your hands you were hurt in the attack,”
says Merihim. “I’ll send for a healer from the tabernacle. I daresay they’re
more discreet than the palace medical staff.”
    “I’m fine. All the bastards did was murder my
jacket. It was a nice one too.”
    I switch my eyes back, pour myself a shot of Aqua
Regia, and hold out the bottle. Merihim shakes his head and walks away. He does
that. Prowls the room when we