Chapter Text
He was there, and then he wasn’t. The portal opened and closed faster than Hetty could begin to blink or protest and he was gone, and for her own sanity she decided to pretend that she did not see him reach for her as he disappeared through the floor.
In a fleeting moment of anger over something trivial and objectively silly, she had managed to send Trevor to Hell.
Whether or not she had damned Elias to the great down under remained up for debate, neither proven nor disproven and likely to remain as such—at least, until now, until what she had done was discovered by the others or until she fessed up in a moment of panic, whichever came first. Was this… it? Was this her power, all along? And if so, was there a reverse setting?
“Trevor, come back,” she feebly offered to the universe, finding herself choked up as she tried to speak the words. No luck. Perhaps she needed to be more direct, just as she had been when she said The Bad Thing. She cleared her throat, lifted her chin and tried again. “I didn’t mean it!”
Still, nothing.
“Release him,” she said in her most authoritative tone.
The portal appeared and disappeared once again in barely the blink of an eye, but Hell had returned to her the wrong man.
She couldn’t help but groan at the sight of him. “Oh, God.”
Of course , she thought. Of course Hell would hear her plea and spit out her fiendish, slimy, no-good husband instead of the personified Labrador retriever she mistakenly banished. She deserved this cosmic joke, the universe’s way of saying “Ha!”
As though spending her afterlife in purgatory wasn’t payment enough for the minor crimes and transgressions committed during her mortal years; no, have this too, the fates insisted. Damn Elias for dying in that vault. Damn whatever divine intervention decided they should both become ghosts. Damn the telephone—-
—She cut that thread right there. Feel sorry for yourself later, Hetty.
Meanwhile, Elias was devilishly cocky as ever. “I believe you’re speaking to the wrong party, Henrietta,” he tutted. “Now, to what do I owe the displeasure?”
“Go away,” she hissed, physically shooing at him with her hands the same as she would shoo away a pesky fly. “Go back down, you aren’t wanted and you certainly are not welcome here.”
“You rang, my dear.”
Affronted, Hetty quickly rebuked that notion. “I did no such thing!”
“You very much did. You said, and I quote, ‘release him.’ Thus, I am released.” How smug he looked, just then. How smug he looked and how much she hated him for looking so very smug.
What a stupid, stupid, stupid power—if indeed this was her power. Asinine, foolish, unusable in any practical way and terribly dangerous in the wrong hands. The wrong hands which, evidently, belonged to her.
Flustered, she could only sputter in an attempt to explain herself. “I wasn’t—I didn’t mean—Not you !”
“Have you another husband residing down below?” Elias seemed to think he had made a very clever joke, at first.
Though she did not utter a single word in response, Hetty assumed her eyes must have given her away or else she was betrayed by the slight wobble of her chin (a wobble which she would firmly deny ever wobbling at all, thank you very much). Whatever the cause, Elias’s amusement at himself quickly turned to bewilderment directed at her.
“May I remind you that we were still wed, when I died?” he bellowed.
That unlocked something in her, flipped the sadness and shame in which she was beginning to drown into defiant anger.
“May I remind you that you were never faithful to me while we were living,” she immediately fired right back, “And therefore it is preposterous to think I should wish to remain faithful to you in death! Furthermore, you never truly cared for me, nor did I ever truly care for you. So let’s not pretend to be jealous for the sake of keeping up appearances.”
Elias seemed unfazed, observing her with narrowed eyes before he spoke again. “I must say, exposure to the modern world has done wonders to change you.”
Again, her reply came rapid-fire. “Yes, and I’m a better woman for it.”
“Debatable,” he said with a dismissive shrug, so very characteristic of the way he had always spoken to her. “Now, who exactly were you trying to send up?”
It almost surprised her that he should continue to ask. She pursed her lips, determined not to give him an inch lest he take a mile. “No one you would know.”
“Scorned lover?” he mused aloud, beginning to pace the length of the room and watching her all the while. “Though I suppose you’re rather limited in terms of eligible bachelors around here. That fellow with the arrow through his neck, perhaps?”
“Peter? No. God, no.” Hetty stood still, firmly planted in the exact spot where she stood when Trevor disappeared. The sight, brief as it was, kept replaying over and over in her mind.
“I could help you, you know, but I’ll need to find out who or what it is you’re looking for.”
“Help me how?”
Elias remained casually flippant as he explained, “I can return to Hell at my own will, and if you were to come with me, there is no reason you couldn’t bring back your… whoever.”
Hetty’s eyes narrowed with skepticism, the feeling all too familiar. To believe him or not to believe him… there was no way to be sure whether or not he was fibbing. “How do I know you aren’t bluffing in order to drag me down there for good?”
“With all due respect, Henrietta, do you think I wish to spend eternity with you?” He huffed out a harsh, cruel laugh; it was the very same one she’d heard many times during their years together. “If I did desire a life outside of the underworld, I would find a way to stay here. Hell isn’t so bad, after all this time. I’ve grown accustomed to the heat, the sulfuric smell, and the endless sounds of Chumbawumba.”
“I have no idea what that word means,” she retorted, sighing impatiently through flared nostrils.
“Chumbawumba,” repeated Elias. “It is a 1990s one-hit-wonder rock band.”
That didn’t help Hetty understand anything. “What?”
“You’ll find out.”
“Mind you, I have yet to actually agree to this proposal of yours.”
“Fine, suit yourself. But the ‘him’ you attempted to release shall stay where he is, then. I hope he likes Chumbawumba.”
A 1990s one-hit wonder rock band sounded right up Trevor’s alley, but Hetty was presently concerned with more pressing matters. It seemed that Elias was, naturally, making this entirely more complicated than necessary.
“Can you not simply go back down and send him up in your stead, if I describe him to you?” she asked. “He’s awfully, ah, easy to spot. Can’t miss him.”
“Intriguing,” Elias said with a bounce of his brows. He was quite literally twirling his mustache, looking every bit the villain. “Alas, no, it doesn't work that way downstairs. There’s going to be paperwork, regulatory nonsense and such. No simple switch-ups allowed.” He shrugged and tossed up his hands, playing up faux sympathy. “Too bad, then.”
Hetty knew she had to make a decision, and swiftly at that. Either she was going to take a chance on trusting the most distrustworthy soul she had ever known, or she would allow herself to be fully and wholly responsible for Trevor’s damnation. Imagining explaining that to the rest of the house made her chest feel constricted, as though the laces tying up her corset had been abruptly drawn taut as they would go—-and that was to say nothing of what would become of her, with such a weight on her conscience day in and day out, and of course… Well, very frankly, she would miss him. Immeasurably so, in fact. That realization only added to the tightness squeezing at her ribs.
Damn it all. This was, as Trevor himself would say, a no-brainer.
“Wait,” she called out just as Elias turned on his heel, primed and ready to descend. She stopped just short of grasping his sleeve, lest she surrender every shred of her remaining dignity.
He looked delighted, almost giddy. Giddy in an evil sort of way. “Reconsidering, are you?”
“May I bring reinforcements?” A contingency plan was beginning to take shape in her head. If she had to go down and fetch Trevor, she certainly wasn’t going to be alone with Elias for the duration.
“In what sense?”
“Give me five minutes.” Already halfway out of the room, she spun around and told him to stay put. “Don’t move! I’ll be right back. I am going with you.”
Isaac was enjoying a peaceful afternoon to himself in the sitting room, feet propped on the ottoman and a Survivor marathon on TV, when his best friend stormed in looking like a woman on a mission.
“Isaac,” Hetty dramatically announced, “Get up, and come with me. We’re going to Hell.”