I tilted my head to study him. “Why would you want to end it? Aren’t demons supposed to want to walk the earth and stamp humans out?”
“No, not all of us,” he replied. “We are fighting against those of us who would wish to see you all enslaved and begging for mercy. There are also creatures living in Hell that have been locked away for many millennia and should never be set free. We must make sure they stay that way. Now, River, what else can you do, besides see things?”
“Nothing,” I lied straight-faced. But then maybe it wasn’t a lie; I wasn’t sure about the curtain fire, and static electricity on someone’s fingers would be of no interest to a demon. There was also that one dream, but I was certain that had been a fluke too.
“Hmm.” His gaze raked me from head to toe and back again. “Would you tell me if there was something else you could do?”
“Will you tell me why I’m here? What is with the fliers looking for people with abilities? What exactly are you all searching for, and what will happen if this person is found, whoever it is?”
“I can’t give you those answers.”
I hadn’t expected anything different from him than I’d gotten from Mac, but frustration still caused my gut to clench. “If I am the person you’re looking for, will I still be kept in the dark?”
“No, you will be informed of what you need to know then.”
My fingers played with the edge of the goblet as I admired the rubies and tried to think of questions he might be willing to answer. I may not be able to learn everything, but I would learn as much as I could. “Is Hell as bad as we’ve been led to believe?”
“Better and worse. Depends on what you’re there for.”
I lifted my head to meet those seemingly fathomless black eyes. “Were you sent there?”
“I was born there, all demons are in one way or another.”
“Was it horrible for you?”
A small smile quirked the edge of his mouth. “What is Hell for one may not be Hell for another. It is my home; I miss it.”
“Did you, ah… did you hurt people?”
“People as you think of them are not there, their souls are. Every soul within Hell belongs there.”
“But did you hurt them?”
His fingers tapped on the table as he studied me. “They are there to be punished; therefore, they are.”
My hand wrapped around the bottom of the goblet. I took another sip of the liquid to wet my parched throat. “I’ve broken many of the commandments in my lifetime; perhaps we would have met one day anyway.”
“It’s not all about the commandments,” he replied. “The souls of the people who are sent there did far more than covet their neighbor’s goods.”
I tilted my head to the side as I pondered everything I’d learned so far today. “So there really is a Heaven and a Hell.”
“There is,” he confirmed and finished off his drink. He poured himself another glass of wine and sat back in his chair.
“Are angels going to come down and help us?” I felt as foolish asking that question as it sounded, but then I was sitting across from a demon, so why couldn’t white-winged beings swoop down to beat back the demons looking to enslave us?
“No.”
“How can you be so sure?” I demanded.
“Because your idiot human species didn’t rip a hole into Heaven. They ripped it into Hell and set almost everything inside free.”
I was going to have to start wiring my jaw shut if I kept talking to this guy.
CHAPTER 12
River
“I imagine you would all be floating around on clouds if things had gone the other way,” he said.
