THE HAUNTED KINGDOM 3 by CHARLES E.J. MOULTON (ereader that reads to you .txt) 📕

he could hear the screaming damned below him. “The legend is that Lucifer himself had something to do with the tree. God did not show the angels that tree until very close to Lucifer’s eviction from Eden. But how could he have? God is omnipotent, so why would he choose to name the tree that Lucifer built hell on eventually something so complex as an abbreviation of something his first angel said. The mind boggles. Or did he know that Lucifer was going to say that and waited to reveal what it was called until after that day? Or is it a coincidence? The mind boggles.”
”But there is a good tree as well, is there not?”
”The round fruit that you may pick, yes. The flowers of Hweoihm. He who eternally over the inner heart is mighty.”
Alex smiled. “That sounds nice.”
Adnicul nodded and continued to talk about the soul.
“Anybody knows that the soul is completely yours, or Gods, forever. It cannot be devoured by anyone. So don’t believe that the soul eaters here actually eat any souls. They can’t. But it is what happens to it that makes the man suffer that gives it its name. The soul itself chooses to walk the road. He is just shown the way.” Adnicul pointed at the faces in the walls. “Those souls spend from a day to a thousand years sliding down to the next level. It depends on how good they are or how bad.”
”Being bad here is good?”
Adnicul shook his head. “What is your sense of humour, Alex? Black?”
Alex shrugged.
“No, Alex. If these souls pray to God, they might be here a couple of years and then slide down to the next level or maybe come back to earth for another try. Some of them even get back to heaven. It all depends.”
“On what?”
”On themselves. It’s like prison. Some of them get worse in prison, you know.”
Alex nodded. He paused. ”Most of them don’t?”
“What? Get back?”
Alex nodded.
Adnicul nodded in response. He pointed at the workers in the middle. They were putting left over bones into the fire. “They are only temporarily here. On a sort of purgatory.”
”How do we get to the next level now?”
”We have a long way ahead of us, my friend.” Adnicul gestured and stood up, walking crouched down a long pathway above the faces and the doorways. “When Lucifer made this cave he made it for himself as a pathway to all other worldly places. Somehow this path in a way created itself. We are visible to others here, but the souls down there are so preoccupied with their own doom that they will not notice.”
”Why are we then crouching?”
There were pillars everywhere and doorways open to the cave. Adnicul made sure he was quick enough to run past these doorways.
“You never know. The collectors are usually very keen on noticing anything different, so when they do they will try to hunt you like a dog. If that is the case we have to run fast down to the next level. This path takes us right down to the area that will take us to the cages, seven levels down.”
Alex was shocked. “Seven.”
“This is not a day on the farm, Allie. The collectors can never ever follow you to the next level. They are strictly bound to their own level. If one of us gets lost, remember to get to the next level as soon as possible. We will meet on the entrance way to that other level then after that.”
Alex hoped that he wouldn’t have to experience that then.
Just as they where about to disappear from this first level, they heard the collector of this level shout something. It sounded like “infiltrators”.
Adnicul’s eyes opened to the maximum. He looked at Alex.
“Run.”
Both of them started to run into the open. There was thirty feet to the tunnel that would get them to down to exit one. They both looked to their right and saw that the collector now was halfway across the mine. They were not even half way to the tunnel.
They ran faster and they felt a gust of wind behind them.
The collector was closer.
Alex felt his soul wanting to go back and run into the collector’s arms.
’Come and take me” he felt like saying.
He had to fight against that and it was almost painful, because he saw himself mortared into the wall.
They ran into the tunnel and it was completely dark, no blue moss here. No torches. Just pitch black darkness.
“Just run, Alexander! Trust your navigation. You won’t run into walls here.”
He felt the collector gallop behind him. He also felt the entrance now fifty feet away. He could almost feel the hand of the collector grab him, grab him, grab him.
“It is dark!”
”I know, just run, we will make it!”
Where was he, this collector? Where was he? He didn’t hear him now.
Alex was worried. Where was he?
He felt the collectors hand grabbing his shoulder, lifting him up. Then a sensation of another hand grabbing the collectors arm. There was a dead cold silence. The collector dropped him down onto the ground.
“Master Adnicul!”
”Just leave him alone, Ridur!”
The man panted a few times.
“As you wish!”
There was the sound of a horse turning.
“Hee-yah!”
The horse galloped back to where it had come from.
Alexander had hurt his knee. “I feel like a victim unable to decide my own fate.”
Adnicul patted Alex on the back. “Stand up now.” Alex did as he was told. “Let us just get past the gateway and we will be safe. He will be back.”
They both stood up and walked through what might have been the gateway, as they heard the collector return and gallop back as the went to the next level.
“How did you know that man’s name?”
”What?” There was a pause. “I took a chance. These creatures work on memories. Their minds are so fixed that it took him a long time to remember I, too, am unwanted here.” He took Alex aside and set him down on a provisoric seating space. “You all right?” Alex nodded. “Good. We are at level two now.”
”Adnicul”
Alexander paused. “You said before that I don’t have to worry about running into walls here. What --- what did you mean?”
Adnicul smiled. “Because there are no walls.”
”I felt the ground under my feet anyway. What do you mean ‘no walls’?”
”The walls and the ground are illusions. There is no ground, no wall. You just ran through open air. You create the ground because you expect it to be there, just as the souls here expect their own purgatory. That is why some get out and some don’t. It all depends if they are full of light or not. Dark souls cannot invent anything of their own. That is what they are, always will be.”
Alex looked back across his shoulder. He looked down and saw a black emptiness below him.
“Oh, Dear! What does that mean?”
”It means you see it as it is. You keep inventing your own world all the time. Come! We have a long way to go.” They started walking down the path. “You will see many strange things in the corner of your eye here, but as long as you don’t look back into the eyes that tempt you, you are safe. Remember that you are a stranger here. Even if I am a soul that has turned my back to this place, my spirit is still home-grown here, so I can speak without it being dangerous for me. Stranger souls are like fresh meat to these people and their voices are their introduction. Don’t say anything as we walk, don’t look beside you where you walk, just straight ahead. Just listen, all right? Tap me on the back if you understand what I just said.”
Alex tapped him on the back.
“Good.”
The path looked just like the one in level one. Red-brown clay all around. Seating spaces, pillars, low ceiling. He kept looking forward, but he did see more in the corner of his eye than he would’ve expected. These souls were really in torment. Obviously, everything came here, the good, the bad, the ugly, the unexpected.
“These souls are not what they really are in spirit. They know that once they have come to the second level, there is a real chance of being saved. Here the collectors are benevolent and as long as you stay friendly with them you have a chance. But the souls themselves are so desperate for attention and salvation that they will pull at you for help. You especially, not me. But don’t look into their eyes or they will pull you down with them and you will be one of them. You must think of this place as a fever dream, a restless night pacing the corridors of your home. Anything below this is hopeless, the deeper we go the more hopeless it becomes. But here there is still an honest chance of escape.”
All of a sudden, two transparant souls in white garments came flying up to Alex where he was walking.
“Don’t loose track of me now, Alex!”
Alex made sure that he stayed in touch with Adnicul in his mind and not just in body.
The souls looked briefly at Adnicul and decided him to be unimportant.
Here was a soul that could help.
The two women, for they were women, cocked their heads and whispered:
”Oh, Alex. You can help us. We are so alone.”
Two more souls came flying up. They were men. They spoke amongst themselves.
“This man can help.”
”Of course he can, he is smart.”
”I knew that he would make it this far.”
“Do you know him?”
”Of, course. He is Belinda’s father.”
”Does he know that Belinda is here?”
Alexander Winsletenna stopped. Adnicul stopped as well.
“Keep on walking, Alex. You know that she is beyond level seven. These souls are using you.”
The two male souls shook their heads. “Belinda is in twilight zone, you know that. She is not doomed. Come on and find her here.”
Adnicul spoke again.
“Your family’s captivity has nothing to do with doom, Alex. They are simply captured way below in the dungeons of hell. Only really deceased souls come here. Belinda died in the illusions.”
The two souls left, the females still about and singing little songs. “Oh, Alex, handsome soul. Tell us of the life above ground.” They giggled and spoke amongst themselves how handsome he was, how he walked and how much poignancy and personality he owned. There was a pull toward the pit. Alex saw more clear than ever now what this was. The whole level was clear, fluorescent blue. The whole place was bathing in blue colours. There seemed to be everything here, replicas of cities, spiritual lovemaking, free souls, love and life. The souls themselves were bathing together in a large sea just of spirits. They flew up and down and sideways. Now, there were about ten souls around Alex and they were all pleading for him to help them be saved.
Alex saw now that there were two gateways, one into the light, a bright gorgeous one to the right and one to the left. He would’ve want to say it was a dark pathway, but the darkness had a glow as well. It was like a party where just a few candles were lit inside blue lanterns. These dark lights devoured everything else around it.
The souls seemed to