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I pick it up and look inside. I’ve had the Mithras all this time, but I’ve hardly ever looked at it. It’s beautiful.
“I don’t want this sitting in the Room in case Mason manages to make a key and can get in there.”
“No. If there was anyone even more unsuitable than you to hold the Mithras, it would be him. No offense, of course. I would never have traded it to you if I thought that you were capable of using it.”
“But I am. I was. I almost pulled that plug a hundred times.”
“But you didn’t. And that’s why I let you have it.”
I push the Mithras across the table in his direction. Muninn picks it up carefully, like a preacher who just found a Gutenberg Bible at a garage sale, and puts it on a nearby shelf where he can keep an eye on it.
He says, “If you see any of my brothers when you get to Hell, please give them my regards.”
“Your brothers are in Hell?”
“One or two, I expect. I’m the only sedentary one. The others are restless sorts. They’re bound to pop up anywhere. Some of them pass through Hell on occasion and send me trinkets for my collection.”
He points to a shelf with Hellion weapons, a cup I recognize from Azazel’s palace, and a chunk of the same kind of black bone that my knife was carved from.
“How will I know if I meet one of your brothers?”
He laughs.
“You’ll know. We’re twins except that there are five of us, so I suppose we’re two and a half twins.”
“I’m going to be moving pretty fast, so hello is about all I’ll have time to say.”
“You won’t even have to say that if you’re busy. Here,” Muninn says.
He pulls a metal strongbox from under the table and takes a set of keys from his pocket. I’ve never seen so many keys in one place at one time. He flips through them, makes a face, and tosses them on the table. He gets out an identical set from his other pocket. A lot of the keys on this ring are bigger and older. He finds one that’s so thick with rust, it’s more like a twig that’s been laying in the water and is covered with barnacles. He jams the thing into the strongbox lock and turns. It scrapes, groans, and whines, but after a minute of really laying into the thing, the box pops open. He reaches inside and pulls out a twelve-sided crystal and hands it to me. I hold it up to the light and look inside. Two pinheads, one white and one black, circle around each other in the center.
“What is it?”
“A Singularity. An infinitely hot, infinitely dense dot. Well, the two halves of it. Apart they’ll circle eternally, but when they come together . . .” He raises his hands and makes the sound of an explosion with his cheeks. “In common parlance, it’s the Big Bang. You gave me the end of the universe, so I’m giving you the beginning. I spirited it away with me when I left the family.”
I heft the thing in my hand. It’s light. Maybe half a pound. It seems kind of light for a universe.
“This was your hedge, wasn’t it? In case you were wrong about me and I did set off the Mithras. If I killed off this universe, you could start it up again.”
He closes the strongbox and puts it back under the table.
“I have a great deal of faith in you, but I’ve learned that it’s always smart to have a backup plan.”
“If you set off the Singularity, would it restart this universe or start another?”
“There’s no way of telling until it happens. And in the end, does it really matter?”
“Not to me. Though I might miss cigarettes.”
He points at the crystal in my hand.
“If you run into one of my brothers down there, give it to him. Do me this favor and I’ll owe you a favor down the line.”
He gets out a bottle of wine. Muninn always likes to seal a deal with a drink. It’s one of the reasons he’s good to do business with.
“In the meantime, keep the crystal safe. There’s only one. Now, is there anything I can give you to help you on your journey?”
He pours us wine in two highball glasses with dancing girls etched into the sides. I feel like I’m in the Rat Pack.
