But it was only as the tram car shuddered its way into the uppermost reaches of the peak that I saw the true glory of the place, such as it was. Nestled between the peak I was ascending and the dark jut of the nearest of its neighbors was a saddle in the hills, and in it, surrounded by wiry trees and black grasses, was a lake, flat and shiny as an irregular mirror.
The tram ground to a halt in the rotting remains of the hilltop station. I got out.
“I almost didn’t believe yesterday had really happened,” she said.
Caz stood at the edge of a path between the dark trees. I hurried toward her, but although she let me take her in my arms and kiss her, after a moment she wriggled free and not too gently.
“What’s wrong?”
“Walk with me,” she said in a flat voice. I took her chilly hand as we stepped under the trees, which looked like the scorched remains of a pine forest. It was clear, however, that underneath the black char, beneath the gray soil, the trees were still quite alive.
We walked down the slope, the lake always before us, gleaming in these last hours of the second beacon like a red gem. I wondered how dark it got up here when only the afterlights burned. Caz broke our silence to point out a winged, long-beaked creature sitting on one of the black branches. “They call it a shrike here,” she said, “but it’s not really a bird. Not the kind with feathers. If you look close, you can see that it’s more like an insect.” She shook her head. “They call it ‘shrike’ because it impales its kills on tree branches, just like the bird. The difference is, the birds do that to eat, but these creatures do it to lure a mate.”
“Are you telling me that I should be building a wall of corpses if I really want to impress you?”
“Not funny, Bobby. I’m trying to make a point. Evolution works differently here.” I raised an eyebrow. She scowled. “What? Are you surprised that I know about evolution? I might have grown up in the Middle Ages, but I’ve seen a lot since then, and read a lot too. I actually met Darwin once, you know.” She let go of my hand and waved her fingers in dismissal. “No, forget it. Another time. I’m trying to make a point.”
“And what point is that?”
“We’ll never work, Bobby. We’re too different. I’m like one of those shrike-insect-things. I was only alive for a few years on Earth. This place made me what I am, Bobby. No matter what I feel about you, and no matter what you . . .” She shook her head, unable for a moment to speak, but she kept walking. “No matter what else is between us, we just don’t have a future.”
I considered this for a second or two before sharing my thoughts. “Bullshit.”
“It’s not. You can’t just make it all go away by disagreeing—”
“I didn’t say everything you said was bullshit, Caz, just your conclusion. How do you know? Look, you pointed out that this place evolves. But here’s the interesting bit—Heaven doesn’t, at least as far as I’ve been able to tell. Nothing ever changes there, and that’s the way they seem to like it. But here? Everything’s changing all the time. It’s like . . . some kind of crazy experiment or something.”
“And do you know why?” she demanded. We were nearing the edge of the trees now, the lake stretched just beyond like a mirror set down by a titan hand. Caz grabbed both my arms. I’d almost forgotten how strong she was. “Because it’s worse that way! That’s how everything works here. It’s about punishment. It’s about suffering.”
“So? I already figured that out. What does that have to do with us? It’s not like I fell for you because I thought you’d be a load of laughs.”
At another point in our relationship she might have at least looked amused, but now she was too tired, too sad. “Don’t, Bobby. Don’t make fun. What this is all about is goodbye.”
It was the one thing I hadn’t expected to hear, at least not quite so baldly, and it took me off-guard. I walked a few yards ahead, stepping out of the trees to stand on the lakeshore. Parts of the black surface steamed, while other parts were lively with the movement of slippery shapes just below the surface, rolling up into the air only long enough to make the waters splash and ripple. I had no idea what they were; something that could have happily eaten a plesiosaur, judging by what I could see, slippery bodies big around as redwood trees. I stayed several yards from the water’s edge.
“Goodbye?” I said at last. “Look, it took me a long time to get here. Do you really think I’m just going to turn around after all this and go back without you?”
“Yes.” She had stopped a little behind me. The dusty gray soil had already made a mess of her white stockings where they showed beneath the hem of her old-fashioned dress. Dinosaurs and pinafores. Hell was the craziest place. “Yes, Bobby, that’s what I think. That’s why we’re here. Love me one more time—leave me one more memory—then go away. I’ll never be happy in your world. Not in either of them.”
“Are you trying to tell me you’re happy here?”
“Of course not. I’m trying to save your soul, you fool, something you never seem to think about. So just go.”
Now I was really angry. Now I was the one grabbing her, clumsy because of my still-regenerating hand. I wasn’t planning to let go. “No, Caz! And it’s not just because I went through all this bullshit to find you. I’m not that shallow. No, we belong together, and just because you’re . . . too frightened to believe it doesn’t mean I’m going to let you talk me into giving up.”
She was crying a little, the tears becoming spots of frost almost as quickly as they leaked from her eyes. “Stop it, Bobby! Stop it! It’s . . . cruel.” She slumped so suddenly, so bonelessly, that for a moment I thought something bad had happened, but she was just overcome with exhaustion and emotion. “Don’t you understand? Don’t you know what you and your so-called love are doing to me?”
“What I’m doing to you? I’m not holding you prisoner—that’s your arch-shitheel of an ex, sweetie.”
“Do you think I care about Eligor? Do you think I even care about what he does to me? I just told you how Hell works. Why don’t you get it? I finally learned to live with the pain, or at least how to exist with it, but ever since I heard your voice at the Circus . . .” She choked a little as she fought for composure. “Since that moment, I have truly been in Hell. Because you brought it all back. Not just yourself but everything. What we had, what we pretended we had, even what we could have had if the entire universe had been different. Yes, I thought about it too. For a couple of seconds I almost let myself feel it. But it was always a lie, Bobby.”
“I’m not just Bobby,” I said quietly. “I’m an angel, Caz. I’m Doloriel, too.”
“Yes. And you always think the glass is half full. But even if that were true, the glass is half full of poison.” She extended her other pale hand toward me. It trembled. “Just love me, Bobby. One more time. Then go back to your angel games and your pretend-people friends. Let me grow some scar tissue, because that’s all I’m going to have.”
“No.” I had been waiting ever since we’d parted in the dress shop to make love with her again, but I was too angry, too hurt. “No, I’m not doing it. I’m not saying goodbye and neither are you, and I’m not having one last isn’t-this-sad pity fuck, either. I’m coming back for you tomorrow, Caz, and I’m taking you away. If you can get out on your own you can meet me in front of that old temple in Dis Pater Square where I met your soggy friend today. If not, I’m coming right into Eligor’s place to get you, and I don’t care how many of his guards I have to cut into little pieces to do it. Got it? Tomorrow, just after the last beacon goes out.” Then I turned and walked away along the edge of the lake.