Rituals, Regrets, and Really Dumb People

Chapter 2: The River--Eh--Not-So-Red, Part 3

"You've made a terrible mistake, mortal scum," shouted a dark, feminine voice from the blurry form in the middle of the screen. Her eyes were glowing white, piercing her shadowy face, hatred and violence spewing forth from a vile tongue. She was the Devil. "Kneel before your superior."

"She," I said in a monotone voice, "it's me."

"Oh, Sanguine," she said. There she goes, being her normal self again. This was the She I knew. "How ya doing over there? Sorry about that, you know how kids are. Call Hel, get unforetold, forbidden powers. I like to scare them straight."

She wasn't the dark, vile mother of whores and betrayers she was often portrayed to be. Leaning out from the blurry smoke and shadows was a blonde woman with her hair tied up in a knot. She was soft of skin and feature, pupils like a serpent's yet it didn't seem so horrific to me. She looked rather normal, lovely even, and despite being older than time itself, she looked in her early twenties—maybe. It may have been deception, but it was all I knew her as.

"I know. I'm alright. Did you scare any off?"

"Oh, every day, like to rile them up," she said in her rural-accented, countrified ways. "Bless their hearts, they never really understand how out of their league they are. Three million and oh. Anyways, what brings you a'calling? Did you get her?"

"You mean the Seal?"

"Yes."

"No, she got away. Did you know she was a kid?"

"Well," she said in a drawn-out expression. "Yes? But I didn't think it'd bother someone as EVAL"—she wagged her hands, exaggerating the word—"and conniving as you."

"Well, about that—"

"Oh, oh no. You were hurt?"

"Oh, no," I said and quickly shook my head. "I—uh—I don't know how to explain it."

She leaned closer to the 'screen,' hoping to hear what I had to say. When I said I didn't know how to explain it, she got frustrated. "Just wait right there." Then she snapped and disappeared.

I reached up and pushed my hands through my shaggy, dark hair. Maybe this was a mistake, contacting She. I would have had to, eventually, tell her that I failed, but She was a little different than how the books portrayed her to be. She wasn't some cold, distant demoness who partook in watching her minions fail with a mercilessness. Oh, oh no, she was much, much different than that.

"Now listen here," I heard from behind, that country accent strong to my ears. I felt a hand grab my shoulder and turn me around quickly; it was She, in the flesh. "You're going to tell me exactly what has happened to you."

"She? I didn't think you'd actually show up!"

"As long as I don't alter the world around me, I'm not breaking the Rules."

"I mean, isn't you just being here altering the world? Butterfly effect and all?"

She stood there pondering before she shook her head. "Save your geek shit for that hussy in your bedroom. Now talk to me."

I moved over to sit down and she walked around the room in curiosity. For most villains, this would be an event of grand importance, to have She actually visit you. For me, it caused dread. I watched her walk around the floor barefooted, her dainty toes digging at the obsidian-colored surface. She wore a long, sleeveless dress, something sleek and red, of a material unknown to me. She always wore her long cape, fur-lined around the mantle of the neck. She looked more like an upper-class woman or a queen than the Devil.

"Well, the priestess of He that was protecting the Seal did something to me," I told her.

"Did she now? Where's the bitch at?" She raised her hands and punched her right into the palm of her left. She was wanting to beat her up.