The Dying Squad by Adam Simcox

Author:Adam Simcox [Simcox, Adam]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781473230774
Google: APM3EAAAQBAJ
Amazon: B08GWTJTGC
Goodreads: 58606629
Publisher: Orion
Published: 2021-07-21T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Two

The Xylophone Man enjoyed the power he wielded more than he should. He was the first to admit it, and the last to feel guilty about it.

The looks he received, the cowed, furtive glances, the way the souls around him seemed to dim in his mere presence, these were signs that he was doing his job, honouring his true calling. That they brought him such pleasure was, he supposed, the reason he’d fallen in the way he had, cast out of the Next Place, never to return.

Not that returning was something he had much interest in doing. Here – unlike in that other place – he was respected. Here, he was the Infernal Serpent, the Babbling Wretch, the Culler of Men, the Xylophone Man – so many names through the ages, all carrying the same outcome for those who transgressed the rules of the unnatural order.

He watched, with neither amusement nor regret, as the shambling half-souls he walked amongst veered away from him, knowing on some animal level that he was something to be feared. The Dispossessed. Laughable creatures. Even the Almighty must have been tempted to wipe them out. He didn’t consider them clean enough for heaven, after all.

Slowly, the Xylophone Man began to ascend the hill he needed to ascend, stopping for a moment to gaze upon the scene below. Very different in appearance to his usual dwelling, but not without its poetic beauty; the blood-red sky, black and grey clouds billowing across it, appealed, as did the wall stretching as far as the eye could see.

The Pen.

A smile formed on the Xylophone Man’s face as he heard the roar of horns, then watched as a crack appeared in the sky. He had timed his ascent for this very reason, to see the dumb animals scratch and grab at their chance to escape the damnable place. Their heads snapped to attention, turning as one to the split in the sky, flocking towards it.

What kind of God allows the cruelty of hope? he wondered. At least in the Pit, the damned know their place in the scheme of things. These pitiful bastards know just enough to be damned by such knowledge. Who, really, is the evil one?

The crack closed, and as the Dispossessed laid into each other, the Xylophone Man’s attention began to wander. Really, it was poor sport, and not worthy of his time, or his talents.

But wait.

Wait.

Now, wasn’t that interesting?

A small group of Dispossessed – if you considered two hundred half-souls a small group – were ignoring the split in the sky completely, instead pressing as one against the wall of the Pen.

The Jankie girl, Hanna, was orchestrating their efforts.

If he’d been capable of it, the Xylophone Man would have smiled.

He had doubted his master’s orders when he’d received them (those doubts had, of course, been left unvoiced), but they had been brutally clear: Hanna Jankie was to be released from the Pit and shown the way to the Pen. His master hadn’t explained the reason

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