The War of the Hells
Infernal


Cartwright ran, pterosaur bile still streaming down his face, their hysterical chatter close behind. His weapons were lost, the battle was lost.

The sound of wingbeats faded. A great chill spread across him. This was it. The silent attack was the worst; the pterosaurs had repositioned and could now glide in for the final blow. He prepared for the sharp stink of wing-leather and his own intestines. His only chance was the deep shell-hole ahead.

He hurled himself over the rim of the crater, tumbled down the concavity and flattened himself into the stagnant sulphurous water collecting in the bottom. Three shadows flicked low overhead, shrieking their indignation at the loss of their prey. He waited, waited until he was sure the pterosaurs had turned their dagger-beaks toward some other unfortunate. Cartwright raised himself on hands and knees. He vomited twice into the pool. When finally he lifted his head it met a wavering flintlock pistol.

The shell-hole held another soldier, lying slumped at the opposite end. This one was bloody, mud-streaked and burned, but Cartwright recognised the skunk-pelt and birch-bark uniform; an officer in his own regiment. He made a hasty salute.

The pistol fell away. “At ease,” croaked the officer. “What’s our position, Private?”

“It’s not good, sir.” Cartwright scooped a handful of water to his eyes and rubbed away the last of the bile. He crawled a little up the slope and peered over the edge. “We’re west of the slurry furnace. About a mile south of the guano ridge. Don’t see any of ours.” The plains of Hell’s eastern fringe stretched into the distance. Straggling bands of the Damned clashed feebly amidst smoke and sludge.

The officer swigged heavily from a canteen, hesitated, then took what looked like the last mouthful. He brushed dorbeetles off his shattered kneecaps and let out a rattling sigh. “What did you do, Private? Before all this?”

Cartwright slithered back down to join him. “Telemarketing, sir.”

The officer nodded, satisfied. “Regretting it?”

“Bitterly, sir. I gather that’s the general idea.”

This region of Hell was the province of the Minor Counts, quiet fiefdoms holding the Slightly Damned. No mass-murderers or idolators here, no heretics or traitors; no-one truly evil, just those who had made themselves unwelcome in any other branch of the afterlife.

Even here, a great conceptual distance from the Inner Circles, the War of the Hells had made itself felt. Cartwright’s own regiment, the Rueful Irregulars, had been raised from the Dark Province of Petty Mithering to face aggression from neighbouring Nether Ghasterton. At noon they had taken heavy fire from the Armoured Accordionists, but the line held. They had repulsed the People Who Say Nucular. The Irregulars’ fortitude had bought time for the 666th Infomercial Scriptwriters to mount their lumbering war-porcupines and enter the fray. And then came the pterosaurs.

Cartwright lay back in the shell-hole, lost in thoughts of the pre-afterlife. Through his back and shoulders he felt the throb of distant bombardment. Above him, dark clouds were gathering. He failed to notice one of them was moving into the wind. Beneath it hung a tiny speck.


*


Otto, Minor Count of Petty Mithering, peered down over the balcony of Count Glubrub’s airborne pleasure pagoda. Through an antique brass telescope he could make out knots of the Slightly Damned dragging their battered bodies across the pock-marked mudflats far below, each clutching his Bohemian earspoon or ichor-stained coal shovel. Canned laughter operators clashed with parking attendants. Fruitarians took arms against the creators of the Furby.

Otto collapsed the telescope and turned to face his host. “Fabulous contraption you’ve got here.”

Count Glubrub of Nether Ghasterton waved a claw. “What, this old thing?”

“Indeed. It’s so stable. And surprisingly quiet. Blowflies, you say?”

“About a billion, give or take. It was sourcing all the horsehair that was tricky. And the - ” He pointed upwards to the cloud of flies, then mimed tying a tiny knot. “Of course, that was before all this War nonsense. Can’t get the staff now.”

Count Otto shrugged his vestigial wings. “We’re all feeling the pinch, old man. On which note: what did Phlegmphleck and Avarizz make of your plan?”

Glubrub the Depraved rose from his chaise longue and rolled up his sleeves. On a tastefully-proportioned torture bench stood a crystal fishtank. “Fancy an octopus?”

“I’ve already eaten.”

“Me too,” said Glubrub, unbuckling his codpiece.

Count Otto swirled the wine in his goblet. “Phlegmphleck. Avarizz. Are they in or out?”

“Very much in. Same problem as our territories. With all the - hurgh - the excitement in the Inner Circles, their own Slightly Damned just don't attract the - umph - the investment. Old Avarizz had to lay off three-quarters of his tormentors last week. You can imagine how he took that. Urrgh.”

“But that’s what makes your plan such a good one. Our own little phoney war. Give the Slightly Damned the tools to torment one another for a while. And when do we expect their realms to join in?”

“Tomorrow. Daybreak. Phlegmphleck has used-car salesmen fording the Swamp of Vexation. Avarizz will send someone to outflank them, we’ll respond in kind, and the pterosaurs will ensure no one realm gains a meaningful advantage.” There was a final rubbery squelch and a soft splash. “And once it all calms down in the Inner Circles, we make the treaty public and our four realms return to their original borders.” Glubrub raised his goblet and drank deep.

Count Otto shook his head in wonder. “You’re a piece of work, Glubby.”

Glubrub grinned. “That means a lot, coming from you.” His face clouded. “Does this wine taste funny to you?”

“Not at all,” said Otto the Treacherous, pouring his own goblet discreetly into space. “Not at all.”