Part 22 (1/2)

Alicia smiled. ”Okay. Whatever. You're a grown-up, sweetie.” She bent down to kiss Dream goodnight. ”You take care of yourself, you hear?”

Dream met her friend's gaze. ”I will. Don't worry about me.”

195.

She tossed her car keys to Alicia, who caught them in midair. ”Get our bags out of the car. You can give me the keys tomorrow.”

Alicia sighed. ”Okay, Dream.”

Then she and Karen were gone, following Ms. Wickman through the archway.

Dream, at last, was able to turn the whole of her attention to King.

His smile broadened and he uncrossed his legs. ”Alone at last.”

Dream drew in a deep breath, counted slowly to ten, and expelled it with a shudder. ”Yes,” she breathed. She had to count to ten again. She swallowed hard and somehow managed to say, ”I want you.”

King nodded. ”I know, Dream.”

He stood up.

Approached her.

Extended his hand.

She stood.

Took his hand.

And followed him out of the room.

196.

h.e.l.l.

Chad wondered about that.

Am I in h.e.l.l?

Perhaps. If Satan's domain was a maze of crudely carved tunnels beneath the mountains of East Tennessee, then, yes, he was certainly in h.e.l.l. What he'd seen of Below so far was comparable in important ways to Western civilization's most common vision of h.e.l.l-an oppressively dark, hot, nasty place somewhere well south of heaven, a grim place where evil reigned supreme and soul-scorching terror was a way of life.

Okay, maybe this ”Master” person wasn't the literal Satan of the Bible, but he was clearly some variety of bad-a.s.s supernatural being. He could manipulate minds as easily as other people fold clothes, and he apparently enjoyed mucking about with the fabric of reality a bit. Not nice.

197.

Chad had never previously had occasion to give the issue much thought, but he considered it a given that anyone who went around mucking with the fabric of reality was an a.s.shole.

Which was somehow perfect.

Of course the devil was an a.s.shole-what else would he be?

So, Chad decided, let's say this guy's the devil. Master. Devil. Same difference. For hypothetical purposes, let's just go with it. This motherf.u.c.ker is Beelzebub. The horned one himself. 01' Scratch. Commander of the forces of darkness. Wielder of malevolent power beyond calculating.

Why, then, did such a being have such an inefficient infrastructure in place for his underworld kingdom?

The guards at the checkpoint, for instance.

An undisciplined joke.

These things were all symptomatic of a system ripe for exploitation. As he rode with Cindy in the transport truck, the part of his mind that made him a success in business went into overdrive, scheming, turning things over in his mind, looking for patterns, weak links, things he might be missing.

The transport truck coughed and sputtered as it rumbled over the rough tunnel terrain. Its shock absorbers were shot, and every time the vehicle b.u.mped over a rock or mound of hardpacked dirt its occupants were jostled. It was a feeling akin to being on a small s.h.i.+p during a major storm on the open sea.

Cindy, who was free of restraints, was handling it okay. She could easily grab one of the curved metal struts that 198.

supported the green canvas above them. But the slaves-and Chad was a slave-had it bad. They were tossed about like dice in a gambler's hand. Chad kept pitching to the floor and smacking his head on the bench opposite him. To get back up, he had to roll onto his side, s.h.i.+ft around until he could get his b.u.t.t under him, then propel himself backward onto the bench next to Cindy.

Cindy, of course, didn't lift a finger to help him.

She didn't even look at him.

As a slave, his safety was of only minor importance. He was her property. Extreme emphasis on the word ”property.” Dehumanization was obviously a vital component of the master-slave relations.h.i.+p. To the extent that you could even describe such an arrangement as a ”relations.h.i.+p,” that is.

He wasn't really her slave. They'd discussed it in hushed voices prior to the transport truck's arrival at the checkpoint. She had to maintain at least a facade of the typical bad att.i.tude evinced by newly emanc.i.p.ated slaves. Freed slaves had something to prove, she educated him. They had to show they could be every bit as cruel as their former masters. More so, if possible. Survival of the fittest wasn't the guiding principle down here. That was surfaceworld rhetoric. Bulls.h.i.+t spewed by clueless a.s.sholes who didn't know the true meaning of adversity.

Survival Below wasn't about corporate-style maneuvering.

Or the petty backstabbing of reality-show contestants.

Cindy made it clear she meant to put forth a convincing portrayal of the meanest b.i.t.c.h any of these a.s.sholes had ever seen. Chad, of course, knew what that meant-a.s.sthras.h.i.+ngs so severe they'd make even the jocks who'd 199.

tormented him in high school cringe. She didn't try to sugarcoat it for him. He was going to have a hard time. He was going to hate her sometimes.

But she told him to keep one thing clear in his mind at all times.

Pain aside, it wasn't real.

He wasn't her slave.

He looked at the manacles binding his wrists and thought about the leg irons immobilizing his feet, and he tried to believe that.

But it was hard.

The rumbling and tossing stopped as the truck rolled onto a stretch of tunnel floor that was significantly smoother than the rougher terrain it had just traversed. The excavation was more extensive here-the tunnel walls were farther apart, and the ceiling was higher. Chad could see this through the opening in the green canvas at the rear of the truck. The lighting was better here, too, more revealing-he could see evidence of the tunnel's long-ago construction, shovel marks in the earthen wall.

Then the walls seemed to fall away altogether, the tunnel opening up behind them like a pair of unfolding hands. Chad slid to his right, leaning into another slave as the truck went down a steep incline. Cindy held on to a strut. Chad leaned harder on the slave. The emaciated man groaned. The descent was so dramatic he could only compare it to a monster roller coaster going down a long, plummeting straightaway. His stomach roiled, and he felt a tickle of nausea in his throat.

Then the descent ended and they were on flat terrain 200.

again. Chad became aware of noise all around them. Strange sounds. Something like a carnival whistle. Angry shouts. Threats. The primal sound of conflict. Fists on flesh. A crack of a whip. Voices. A mult.i.tude of voices, like at a rock concert before the houselights go down. If he needed any further reminding that he was in a savage place, here it was, the sound of the devil's playground in full bloom.