The Known/Unknown Quantity

Chapter 181: Me, Myself, and Crowley

Chapter 181: Me, Myself, and Crowley

Aziraphale swore he hadn't unfurled his wings. All he recalled was a flurry of tree branches and leaves and brambles as he plowed onward, limbs pumping harder than they had in nearly 150 years.

The trail leading to the Fey Doorway glowed to his eyes alone, and revealed itself as thin strands of multi-colored silk, but the kinds of colors that might lie between the other colors. Off key, somehow.

He shouldn't be able to see these.

But he shouldn't be able to shift through time and space either.

And as he sprinted toward the Barrow Door, at last revealing itself in the ever-increasing crowded forest, his medallion burned on his neck, silently screaming alarm.

What rose up from the floor set Crowley's fangs on edge, grinding. It wasn't appalling. It was just, ugh, bad memories embodied in what looked like a plant growing into a woman.

"Plants shouldn't do that," he disapproved of under his breath. "They should look like plants." He was one of those people who hated carved topiaries. Plants should thrive, not....take shape...

Up from the floor grew a twiggy shoot that forked at the top. Pulling up the fabric, it filled out, skin like grey coarse bark. A third branch rose through the neck hole, and bent sharply with a snap, causing Crowley to cringe. Further and further the tree reached out, leafy fingers sliding out like long knobby spikes, and a bundle of foliage balled up in the center. Then finally a head rose up: a smooth face on the side of a giant acorn, capped with oak leaves sprouting from the top, and wet and slick, black avoid eyes without sclera opened just as a thin slice of a mouth appeared, and grinned mirthlessly at him.

He felt queasy.

Once the sound of vegetation squeaking to swell and twist into a hominid stopped, Crowley took a hard breath and exhaled. "Okay."

The creature looking back at him set her shoulders, and studied him with those terrible eyes. This was old fay fashion, the kind that existed before humans took proper control of the earth and fell to worshipping what might kill them or save them. And the antiquity of it was frightening. It was as if you were a colonist who thought the indigenous people were long gone, and then one day there's millions of them and they're on your doorstep ringing your bell because they want a WORD WITH YOU.

The demon and the queen stood seven feet apart.

Finally, he said." Um, hello."

"Greetings," she said in a deep alto, long and lyrical and appraising. FUCK. ME, Crowley thought.

"I suppose no introduction is needed then," he told her lamely. God, she looked bored and put upon, and dreadfully amused. That cynical smile opened to reveal the teeth on a Venus Fly Trap. Just another reminder of who he was dealing with.

"No introductions, no explanations," she cooed, readjusting her flaxen gown and cape. She looked at its set on her disapprovingly, and shook it until it fluttered into a robe of multiple fall leaves, and fell in angular folds around her. "Much better. My sister self tries to hard to emulate these humans. Bothersome. Now," she sighed. "To the meat of the matter."

"Wait," Crowley dared to say, holding up a hand," I need to know. Was it you that asked for payment?"

"Oh, yes."