“Step aside! Step aside!”
Well, nobody except Greyboar could have moved Gwendolyn aside by picking her up, and Greyboar—the last faint trace of sanity, here—was still loitering in the rear of the line with me and Hrundig.
Then my heart seized, because Jenny and Angela were pushing their way past Gwendolyn eagerly.
“Us! Us!” they cried. “Jenny and Angela! We wanna go too!”
Jack-the-fallen-angel squinted at them suspiciously. Then, slowly wrote their names into the ledger and swiveled his head to look at the line of saints. The saints, for their part, were studying Angela and Jenny intently.
My heart was frozen, I swear it was. Not beating at all. Then—
“Petition denied! Petition denied!”
I could breathe again. Whatever else happened, my girls weren’t going into that—that thing.
“Why?” demanded Jenny. “Yeah—why?” echoed Angela. In a rush, together: “We swear to mend our wicked ways, honest!”
Jack sneered. “So what? The ways aren’t wicked enough in the first place.”
“Are too!” shrieked Jenny. “We’re dykes and everything!” Angela cocked her head and gave me the eye. “Even worse than that,” she snickered. “Fallen dykes.”
Jack’s sneer never even wavered. “Big deal. You think the Lord Almighty loses sleep over stuff like that?”
Jenny and Angela’s mouths dropped. “We’ve been denounced by priests and monks, even,” whined Angela. “Lots of times,” added Jenny.
Jack rolled his eyes and cast a sour look at the saints. The saints started cackling. Weird sound, they made, as dried up and shriveled-looking as they were.
“Priests and monks,” giggled one. “Leave it to a bunch of sophomores!”
“Gotta make allowances,” wheezed the one next to him. “Bigotry 101 and Introductory Prejudice really doesn’t prepare you for postgraduate work.”
Jack looked bored. “Make an official Sorting, would you? I’d like to get to lunch before they close the cafeteria.”
“Insufficient sin! Insufficient sin!” intoned the saints. Before they’d even finished, Jack had scratched out their names. “Denied,” he droned. “Next.”
Jenny and Angela stumbled away, looking both shocked and upset. They stared at me, faces pale. I fell in love with them all over again, and knew it was forever and ever. Which, given my prospects at the moment, wasn’t too far off.
Then Greyboar nudged me and I took a breath. Then another one.
There was still a last gasp. I nudged Magrit, standing at my side. “How’s about you?”
She snorted. “Me? I ain’t getting anywhere near that thing. This is as far as I go, Ignace. That was my deal with Gwendolyn.”
“And I’m with her, runt,” hissed Wittgenstein.
I sighed and started forward. But Hrundig held me back.
“Wait, Ignace. Let me go first. I may need a bit of help here.”
I was willing enough. Hrundig stepped up to the table and gave his name. Jack scribbled it in and turned, once again, to the saints.
This time, the saints spent more than a second or two pondering the matter. A full minute, maybe. Before:
“Petition denied! Petition denied!” They didn’t wait for Hrundig to demand an explanation before giving it: “Excessive prior atonement! Preexisting condition of soul-searching and mortification!”
Hrundig must have been expecting it, though, judging by the cold little smile on his face. And I guess he must have gotten some advance coaching from Zulkeh, because he immediately demanded the right to give what he called “non-extenuating circumstances.”
Now Jack got a really sour look on his face. But apparently Hrundig was following the red tape properly, because the fallen angel removed the pen from the ledger and muttered: “Okay. Let’s hear it.”
Hrundig squared his shoulders, clasped his hands behind his back, and started bellowing:
“My name is Hrundig Fjalkerson
And I am accounted the fiercest berserk
Of my district. One day I met
Wart Giddle at the river crossing
And he refused to give me passage
So I took out my axe and killed him.
Then his brother Thord Herjolfson
Who is the son of Herjolf Kollson
Who was the brother of Hallgerd who
Was married to Hoskuld the Fat
Took umbrage. He had many thralls and
Neighbors who owned lots of pigs.”
“And horses!” I shouted. “Don’t forget the horses! And the sheep!”
“And lots of horses and sheep too.