Lawyers in Hell Read Online Free PDF Page B

will stay and perform whatever service is required of us.”  Then he sat down quickly, one hand on Alexander’s shoulder.
    Lysicles wished he’d never met those three.  Something here was very wrong.  This Erra was godlike; the Seven were executioners, terrifying even at rest; and the word ‘audit’ meant ‘judicial hearing’ in the most primitive meaning of the term, today.  But he had asked for this and here it was.  He squared his shoulders.  He tried to see in his mind’s eye his wife, his sons, his lovers, laughing and running through the green fields of Elysion to greet him.  All he risked was his eternal soul, he presumed to think.  Hell was forever if he did nothing to better his lot.  And he had never been a man for standing by and doing nothing.
    “Once more, Lysicles:  do you say you were rash?  Or were you just when you led your men to their death?”
    “I was just.  I believed we could win.  And we could have won – if so many citizen-soldiers had not deserted; if Philip hadn’t outsmarted us; if our allies could have held the line….”
    “Were you just?”   Erra’s booming voice boxed his ears and caromed around the room, echoing:  “Just…ust…us…s.”
    “I was just.  I, Lysicles, say it so.”  Old formula, from wars gone by, from days standing straight and tall.  Athenian generals were meant to die of old age, or at least in old age … not the way he had died.  He blinked back tears that had never overcome him in all this time:  he wished he had never brought that battle to the enemy, never gone along with Chares’ plan, never had marched his men into that valley of doom….
    Erra looked into him, past his eyes, into his heart, into his soul.  “Good,” said the god of pestilence and mayhem, now auditor of Lysicles’ fate.  “You see the truth.  You speak the truth.  And here is my judgment….”
    The Seven rose up on either side of Erra and strode down, off the dais, to form a semicircle in front of Lysicles, Hammurabi, and Draco.  Hammurabi and Draco took two steps back, away from Lysicles.
    And he was alone, facing his judgment.
    “Character witnesses, approach and do your duty,” said the molten-eyed weapon of the god, one hand upon his sword-hilt.  “Take hold of this damned soul.  Hold him tight.”
    Now the hands of Lawrence, Aristotle, and the hated Alexander were upon him.  He almost fought:  insult to injury, was Alexander’s touch.  But the irony was not lost on Lysicles, only unwelcome.  He kept his head high and his eyes on Erra’s awful visage as it changed from beautiful to horrible and back again.
    Erra said:  “Your audit is complete.  My judgment is this:  we shall cut out both your eyes, which have seen the truth; we shall cut out your tongue, which has said the truth; we shall cut out your heart, which knows the truth.  Then we shall eat them and we shall know the truth.  If the truth is as you say, you will be sent to Erebos, in the realm of Hades, and from there to Elysion, where you believe you belong.  If you are lying, then you shall go from there to Tartaros, and suffer its tortures thereafter, never to leave again.”
    Lysicles nearly staggered, but held his ground.  He said nothing.  He had a soldier’s pride.  The three souls holding him from behind tightened their grip.  Alexander, I’ll find a way to take you with me if this goes bad.   Hammurabi blustered and Draco began officiously to object.
    Then the second of the Seven fixed Lysicles with that fiery stare from an impassive face and said only, “I am very skilled at this, have no doubt.”  He drew his glittering sword.
    Lysicles reached around and grabbed Alexander in a death-grip.  Then lightning exploded in his face, in his brain, in his heart and soul, and Lysicles knew nothing more.
    *
    Erra and his Seven eat the eyes and tongue and heart of Lysicles the Athenian, and of various other defendants of the day, until the auditors can eat no