All the Gates of Hell (7 page)

She did not, however, have to like it.

"Just keep your guard up for anything coming back that isn't me," she said, irritably.

THAT IS OUR SOLE PURPOSE. WE EXPLAINED THIS --

"Yeah, yeah. I remember."

Jin stomped off toward the doorway the guardians were flanking and pushed on the door itself as if daring the thing to get in her way. It did no such thing, but rippled like water to allow her to pass through without even bothering to open.

Jin found herself in a corridor very much like the one that led from Medias to the Gateway to All Hells itself. The same flaring torches, the same carved monsters in the stone. The same dust and debris of ages settling on the stone floor.

I don't suppose anyone ever sweeps up
.

It was a silly thought, but no more silly than a corridor with torches that apparently never burned out and never needed to be replaced. Her curiosity aroused, Jin made a conscious effort to open her Third Eye and then an immediate and panicky effort to close it again. For what seemed like one infinite moment she had stood on nothing at all over a space so vast and black that Jin knew without question it could have swallowed the universe with appetite left over. Then her Third Eye obediently closed and she was standing back on the solid stone of the passageway, squinting to see again in the weak torchlight, the dank scent of a long-closed space back in her nose. She'd never been so grateful for mold and eyestrain in her life.

It occurred to Jin that, perhaps, illusions were not always bad things. She'd suddenly become very fond of the one that made the passageways to Hell seem like simple stone corridors that allowed her to travel infinite space in the time it took to cross Pepper Street. Jin hurried down the corridor toward the far door.

Which wasn't there. Jin simply stepped through an open arch and into a cavern not unlike that containing the Doorway to All the Hells. The main differences that Jin could see at first glance was that this one seemed more elongated than round; she couldn't even see where it ended and she was fairly certain this wasn't simply because of the dim light. The other thing she noticed was that the floor of the cavern was strewn with small rocks and looked like the bed of a dried-out river.

She frowned. "This is a hell, too?"

"I suppose it depends on your definition."

Later Jin would think that, perhaps, she should be used to people just appearing and disappearing; Teacher certainly did it enough. As it was, she jumped back two feet and landed in a fighter's crouch in full demon form. A few feet away from her there stood a strange-looking little man. He carried a staff with several rings set into the top of it. He was bald, and his earlobes were elongated exactly as those on many of the Buddhist images Jin had seen in her studies. He was maybe five feet tall in his sandals, and wore the robes of a monk. He looked about as dangerous as a fireplug with the water turned off.

"Damn it all, don't
do
that!"

The little man raised his eyebrows. "Immanence, your language has certainly gotten more... colorful, since our last meeting."

Jin stood up straight and abandoned her Pulan Gong form, feeling a little foolish. She racked her brains while she waited for her heart to stop pounding. "You're... O-Jizou, yes?"

He nodded. "You remember me, after all this time. I am honored, Kannon-sama."

Something in the way he said it led Jin to think that he wasn't honored at all. In fact, if it had been anyone other than the Enlightened Being O-Jizou was supposed to be, she'd have thought he sounded downright annoyed. He was a
Bodhisattva
like herself, and had something to do with children, but that was all she could remember.

"I'm in a mortal incarnation and my memory is faulty. Have I done something to offend you?"

"The Lord of the First Hell informed me of your condition. As for offense... those in my care have suffered because of you. Suffering may be the lot of all creatures, but usually it serves a purpose, however obscure. Does what you have done serve a purpose? Emma-O believes so, but I don't know for certain and neither, apparently, do you."

Jin said nothing. There didn't seem to be anything
to
say. Then the moment passed and the little monk turned on his heel and set out at a walk so brisk that Jin had to run to catch up. "Follow me, please," he said over his shoulder.

"I'm
trying
," Jin said, amazed that the man's short legs could move so quickly.

They hadn't quite reached the riverbed when a fierce-looking old woman appeared out of nowhere, blocking their path. Her hair was white and her eyes jet black, and those eyes glittered like cold wet stones. "Give me your clothes," she said to Jin.

Jin put her hands on her hips. "Excuse me??"

"Begone, Datsueba," O-Jizou said. "Do you not recognize Kannon the Merciful?"

The hag looked at her even closer. "I know guilt when I see it. Her clothes belong to me. That is the Law."

"I don't think so," said Jin. In another moment she was in full demon form again. The hag didn't appear worried at all, or even surprised. She did look a little puzzled.

O-Jizou sighed. "Stop that," he said to Jin, as if she were a misbehaving child, then turned back to the hag. "Whatever else this woman may be, she is mortal and alive. You're wasting our time, Datsueba."

"Mortal stink," said the hag finally, and made a sniffing noise. "I should have noticed. Didn't want to touch her anyway."

In another instant the hag was gone and Jin had returned to her normal appearance. O-Jizou started walking again and Jin hurried to catch up. "What was
that
all about?"

The little monk shrugged. "After their initial judgment, the dead, guilty and guiltless alike, come to this place to cross the river to the next realm. Those judged guiltless cross on a bridge. Those who are guilty must either wade or swim the river. It is the Datsueba's task to strip the clothing from the guilty."

"Just what am I supposed to be guilty of? Are all the guilty here supposed to stay naked?!"

"As to the first, I cannot say. For the second, no, they clothe themselves again in time," he said, as if the matter was of no importance.

Jin just hurried along for a little while, so intent on keeping pace with O-Jizou that the inherent absurdity of what he had said took a little while to catch up to her. When it did, she almost stopped.

"Ummm, O-Jizou, correct me if I'm wrong, but where we're walking is dry. There's no water here."

"Not a drop," O-Jizou agreed.

"So why does anyone need to wade?"

"Because they don't understand that the water is an illusion. If they did, they wouldn't belong here." Apparently seeing that Jin was about to ask something else he went on, "Even in your mortal form you should know this. Or has your Third Eye never opened?"

"Oh, right." Jin said. She did not, however, feel an overwhelming urge to open that eye just then and verify absolute reality.

As they walked along the riverbed Jin saw something very strange. All along the bank on one side were children, piling heavy stones one on top of the other. Some of them were in fact naked. Others wore tattered clothes of an overwhelming variety: kimonos, robes, jeans, dresses, jumpers. Their ages seemed to vary from those barely able to walk to pre-adolescents. All seemed to be working at the stones. Some were piling in groups, others worked alone.

"What are they doing?"

"They're too small to wade the river, or the older ones can't swim. They're piling up the stones to try and make a footpath to the other side."

"I don't understand. What can children so young be guilty of?"

O-Jizou just shrugged again. "Ask the one who judges them."

Even as they spoke Jin saw a ragged boy turn away to pick up another heavy stone and in that moment a small demon almost identical to the one on Joyce's shoulder dashed out of nowhere and shoved the pile of stones, scattering them and reducing the pile to nothing. The demon vanished before the child could return with the stone to find all his work gone to nothing.

"The poor thing -- "

Jin had started to turn back but without even looking at her O-Jizou had reached back and taken hold of her wrist. "Neither you nor your pity can help him, Kannon. Please concentrate on those who need you."

As scoldings went this one was very gentle, but it was a scolding none the less. Jin wanted to be angry, but couldn't. "This is what you deal with all the time, isn't it?" she asked.

"Yes."

"Can...can you do anything for them?"

"When the time comes -- and not before -- I help them cross the river."

"How do you know when the time comes?"

"How do you free someone from hell?" he returned, mildly. "It is, as Emma-O has taken to saying lately, 'my job,' just as freeing the punished is yours."

"So I've been reminded. A lot," Jin said dryly.

"If it were not so, Emma-O would not be doing
his
job. Granted, he has more than enough to concern him as it is."

That sounded like a scolding too. Jin sighed. "If it turns out that this incarnation is a mere whim of mine -- and your guess on this is as good as my own -- I'll be sure to apologize for wasting everyone's time. In the meantime can we just drop the subject of my incarnation?"

He just shrugged. "Your incarnation does not matter."

"Then why do you keep bringing it up?"

Somewhat to Jin's surprise, O-Jizou actually seemed to be thinking about her question as they walked. "I don't know," he said finally. "Maybe I'm just angry."

"Human emotion is an illusion," Jin said, even though she wasn't really convinced of that herself.

"'Show me someone who's never been bewitched by a pair of beautiful eyes and I'll show you a stone buddha,'" replied O-Jizou, smiling.

"Is that a real saying, or did you just make it up?"

"Yes," he said.

O-Jizou smiled again and Jin started to wonder if she was beginning to like the guy. She really could do without the scolding, though.

Jin thought of something. "You call me 'Kannon.' That's the Japanese form of Guan Yin, yes?"

"Yes."

"Shiro called me that, too. Maybe he's Japanese."

Jin took a few moments to describe her meeting with the shadow. Jizou listened impassively. He finally shrugged.

"Over the years I've known many shadows, but none of them spoke to me."

Jin sighed. She's known asking Jizou was a long shot, but she'd hoped for better. Neither said anything for a time. Jin followed the little monk up a narrow path on the opposite side of the dry river bed from the children. The land on the other side of the river didn't look very different from the river bed itself: it was flat, stony, and dry.

"What happens when a child finally crosses the river? Or is that something I should already know?"

"Of course it is but, since you don't... Then the child goes where it's supposed to go, just like anyone else who crossed over. Or rather, the child goes where it needs to go. I can't explain it any better than that. I can, however, show you. We're approaching Mariko's -- "

He didn't even get to finish. The air in front of them shimmered like one of the doors to the hell corridors and everything changed from one step to the next. One moment they walked in a dry, desolate place and in the next they were strolling down a narrow forest path in autumn. To either side of the path were maples in the full russet display marking the end of summer. There was a cool but not unpleasant edge to the breeze that made the pines whisper and the maple leaves rustle. They came to a place where a mossy stone bridge crossed a quiet dark stream, and there they stopped.

Jin knew that the way the place looked was not real, any more than the river keeping the children from crossing into their next destination was real. And yet, like that river, the appearance of the path was important. This seemingly tranquil place looked the way it looked for a reason, and that reason belonged to neither herself nor O-Jizou who, without preamble, had just sat down cross-legged under the larger of the two maples flanking the path about fifty feet from the bridge. He placed his staff across his knees and just sat there, not looking at her. He was looking over the bridge. After a moment Jin did the same and saw the figure approaching from the opposite side.

"Mariko?" Jin asked, and he grunted assent.

She wore a kimono of pure white, and it contrasted with hair blacker even than Jin's, and far longer. It trailed in two long braids down the front of her kimono almost to her waist; the rest spread from her head to fall down around her shoulders and black almost like a cape. Her face was in shadow but, by what Jin could see, it was almost as white as the kimono. She knew that Japanese women at certain times in history had painted their faces white, so thought little of it at first.

If Mariko noticed either of them she didn't show it. She started across the bridge with the tiny, shuffling steps that a formal kimono demanded. Jin had worn one once in a school play and couldn't understand how anybody could walk more than a few steps in the silly things, but Mariko managed just fine. She stopped at the highest point of the wooden bridge and looked down, gazing at the dark water, her long, graceful fingers resting on top of the railing.

Jin had been waiting, in a sense, for the other shoe to drop, but when it did she still felt a little sick. Mariko's fingers on the railing. Fingers too long, too thin. Jin remembered what little she had seen of Mariko's face and finally put it all together.

The skeleton is wearing a kimono
. Jin almost giggled, though she didn't really think it was funny. She wasn't frightened -- she had seen far worse in her crash course in being Guan Yin
-- but the sight was at once shocking and pitiful and for several long moments Jin could do nothing at all put stare at the poor girl, who still seemed oblivious to all except the water. When she finally did look up from the stream Jin thought for a moment that she'd finally noticed them, but soon realized that Mariko was looking down the path the way they had come. Jin glanced back that way but she saw nothing and it was clear that Mariko saw the same. The poor creature's shoulders raised briefly and lowered; Jin would have sworn the girl had sighed, even though she had neither lungs nor breath to do so.