Barlowe, Wayne - God's Demon

Leaving Adamantinarx - (unpublished work, acrylic on Gessoboard) - Caravans of all description cross the hostile Wastes, braving Abyssals, Salamandrine Men and marauding demons from enemy realms. Unless they are escorted by significant numbers of armed demons they are frequently lost without a trace. This party is fortunate in having a few important Demons Minor amongst their number and would probably be safe enough in any short journey within their own kingdom. In the background lies Adamantinarx itself, that most un-Hellish of infernal cities.

Some paintings are about working out the details. This is one. The devil is in the details and it took quite some time to work out all of the motifs from a design standpoint. And then there was the time it took to actually render this piece - one of the longest rendering periods since the Wargate - about six months. But to be fair, I was doing film design work at the time and put this aside many times.

Chapter Six

ADAMANTINARX-UPON-THE-ACHERON

The soul who called himself Hani groaned as he tugged the sinew rope. It was tied to a giant block that scratched its way up the flagstoned dockside causeway, and Hani could see, past the dozens of souls who were, like him, straining against the rope, that it had moved only a few yards. They had been pulling for about an hour and their progress had been slower than usual.

The work-gang was shorthanded due to sudden attrition; at the last moment, as the inclined causeway was being completed, the demons had run out of bricks and had had to resort to incorporating some of the gang itself into the ramp.

Hani had knelt, eyes down, as he watched the grumbling demon Overseer's sparking feet pass him by. Fear had bubbled up into his throat as he had contemplated the awful fate of being transformed; it was every soul's worst fear. But he had been lucky; the demon moved away, selecting the soul two down from Hani instead. When there were some twenty souls assembled, the demons had taken them away, leaving Hani kneeling on the filthy flagstones, still not looking up but able to breathe again.

It was not the first time Hani had been lucky. He was tall and strong, sharp-eyed, clever, and not too ravaged by the Change. Lucky, he thought, but just how lucky could one stay in Hell?

Work resumed, but it was now staggeringly difficult. The twenty souls had made a huge difference, and Hani's agonized limbs began to tremble uncontrollably. He tried to distract himself by focusing out toward the ghostly river with its sprinkling of barges. Once, he knew, the Acheron had been choked with heavy supply barges laden with exotic materials from the far-off quarries destined for the palace-mount. But that time had passed and now the building projects were more functional and pedestrian.

His tactic did Hani little good. The pain in his arms and hands only increased with every step; the tremors became more obvious. Then, as his continuing luck would have it, a great cloud of ash descended and obscured the work site. Hani groaned with relief as he let the rope slip from his shredded hands. The gang, as well as the incensed demons, was forced to stumble to shelter, the souls with their hands upon one another's shoulders for guidance. He could just begin to feel the tattered flesh mend itself the way all small wounds did upon the souls. It might take an hour or two to completely heal if they had that much time to wait it out. The pain was enormous, but, Hani reflected as he had a million times, that was why he was here.