Page 143 of Katabasis
“Where is Elspeth now?” asked King Yama.
“She’s moving through the courts now, I think.” Alice cleared her throat. “That is. The proper way. With her transcript.”
“I am glad. I feared she never would.” King Yama swept his long-robed arms forth. “I’ll have that back now.”
Alice clutched it to her chest. She didn’t mean to—it was a possessive instinct—and she felt immediately she had committed some great affront. Who was she to defy the gods? But at least Lord Yama did not seem angered. He only waited from his throne, wearing that constant scowl.
“I—well, no.” She drew a shaky breath. “I was hoping we might—make a trade. I have some demands.”
He nodded, as though he had been expecting this. “What are your demands?”
“I want—” Alice halted.
She thought she knew her answer. She had been so certain, sitting on theNeurathwith the pomegranate tree beneath her legs. She had worked out the precise wording of her request; its constraints and logic. And yet here before the throne, at the end of all things, her mind went blank.
Gently King Yama asked, “What was your purpose in Hell?”
This question was easier. She answered like a child listing months of the year. “We came to find Professor Jacob Grimes.”
“Merely to find him?” King Yama raised both hands. “You need not barter for that.”
Darkness flew from his fingertips and moved in a spiral over the sand between them, swirling faster and faster until the circle took on a definite shape. It was something like a pentagram, but so much more potent. Pentagrams were meticulously crafted, written in languages known to man, while this circle was wrought of ragged symbols Alice had never seen. King Yama snapped his fingers. The ground jolted. A slumped figure appeared inside the black not-pentagram, hunched and indeterminate. The darkness stilled. The figure stood.
“There,” said King Yama. “You’ve found him.”
Professor Grimes was not one of the Shades who had put much effort into preserving their appearance. The only part of him rendered in any clear detail was his head; his hawklike features somehow emphasized, both bolder and more elegant than they’d been in life. Below the neck he was a flowing, formless darkness; the same shape of ghosts hung on Halloween.
For a moment he turned in circles, taking in all that was around him. The Shade of Professor Grimes did not walk; he drifted and swooped like a bat. He observed the wheel, the golden braid, and the throne. His head tilted all the way back as he took in King Yama’s form. He chuckled.
“So you are the architect of this realm? The mastermind of my suffering?” Professor Grimes stretched taller until he and Lord Yama were face-to-face. His feet did not touch the ground. His deathly form had no feet at all, only swirling gray. “Only a deity after all. It makes me wonder. What does it take to kill a god?”
“I warn you, Jacob Grimes.” King Yama spoke now in English. His voice never rose above its calm rumble; not a hair in his beard ruffled out of place. And yet Alice felt the warning thick in the air; a thunderstorm about to break. “You are a guest in my realm.”
“But what can youdo?” On Professor Grimes’s lips, even the vilest insults took the form of mere inquiry. “You are bound by the laws of this place, as are we all. You are a guardian, a facilitator. Nothing more.” He gestured up to the sky. “No—the real big man is up top, isn’t he? Go on, tell me you’ve never tried to piercehisrealm.” He turned to the wheel. “Fate, is that it? Suppose I choose a spoke for myself?”
“You have not passed your trials,” rumbled Lord Yama. “You have no right to pass. You are here at the mercy of the girl only, and the wish I have granted.”
“Of course.” Professor Grimes turned to Alice. His face split into a smile and, despite herself, Alice’s heart thrummed at the sight. “Dear Alice. I did wonder how long it would take you. But here you are, all in one piece—and the Dialetheia!” He reached for the little tree. Alice shrank back, but he only flew closer. There was no getting away from him. He buried his face in the petals, breathed deep, and sighed. “More glorious than I could ever have imagined.” He lifted his gaze to her eyes. “Alice Law. You brilliant thing.”
Such praise. She could never forget how good his praise felt, like the whole sun turned upon her. She was reminded again that she mattered. She was like a desperately convoluted proof running down two sides of the paper, lines dwindling to cramped scribbles on the margins until, magically, it came out valid. Her heart hammered very fast in her chest, and a hot heady wash passed through her mind before she could sort her thoughts out and speak.
“I don’t—but you—what do you mean,how long?”
“I have been watching,” said Professor Grimes. “Clever girl. Following all the bread crumbs. But who do you think left them there?”
Alice felt rather like a broken toy, capable only of repetition. “Bread crumbs?”
“There’s quite a lot you can do from the Bridge of Sighs,” said Professor Grimes. “Dreams, images, that sort of thing. I like to think I got pretty good at haunting. Tell me, did you ever dream of Ramanujan’s Summation? Of journeys into the cold, dark earth? That was me. But it takes initiative, to your credit. You put the pieces together.”
“But how—”
“I knew you’d come. You’ve too much on the line. You’ve always been so dogged about your degree. I never doubted once.”
Alice could not make sense of this. “But then—why didn’t you just wait for us?”
“Why would I do that?”
“But you could have just stayed in the fields. We would have rescued you in minutes—”
