The Devil
From Changeling Venue
Also referred to as "The Man at the Crossroads", most Lost are in relative agreement that the Devil must be one of the Gentry...because the only other alternative is too horrible to imagine. He dresses in a white linen suit and panama hat, a dapper man, our Devil, who hasn't felt the need to change his tune these many years. Few things betray his Fae nature; his eyes that burn with the fires of Hell, his ever shifting pandaemonic shadow, and the terrible smell of sulfur and brimstone that blows in the wind. But he's a game player, this Devil is, a man who'll give you a chance at fame and fortune if only you'll balance your soul on the razor's edge of luck and skill. But any man who's read his Scripture knows that there's no way to beat the Devil at his own game, and those that lose are brought back to Hell with him, to serve. Few have escaped, but late at night those that do cock their ears to a chill wind blowing from the South, and shiver at the sound of Blues guitar, and the baying of hounds.
Hell, however, isn't a realm of fire and brimstone. No sir, its a deceptively peaceful place, a land of dirt roads and fields of wheat and corn, stretching far out into the horizon under the light of a baking sun. Oh, its a hot place, hotter than a man could imagine, never able to find a lick of shade, or a drop of water. But if a man wanders through Hell long enough, wanders along the roads with no cars, the fields with no farmers, perhaps through a tiny, blasted town with no men, or beast, or food, he may eventually find himself at the steps of the Roadhouse.
The Roadhouse is a tall building, a ramshackle older farmer's home that's been taken over by the power of booze, smoke, and sin. The cars parked outside rust in the sun, but the minute foot hits step, the air becomes chill and darkness floods across the sky. Beneath the awful light of a bloated moon and a bad sign, entering the Roadhouse is the last step in walking into the Devil's reach. Its the food a man smells first, as he enters the doors and sees the Sad People, wallowing at their tables, gorging themselves on rotten food whose taste they have come to crave. A long bar offers cheap beer to drown a man's sorrow, and an type of drink ever distilled from grain. But the beer is cheap, and a body can never seem to find the coin to get the good stuff...and so he sits, and lusts, and envies. Skeletal harlots offer damp, grotesque pleasures in the rooms above, but through the walls a sinner can hear the other rooms...where men and women cavort in greater pleasure than he could ever conceive.
Presiding over this den of sin is the Devil, that old Nick Scratch whose dealing ways brought all the Sad People to ruin. He sits on stage and plays his guitar, savoring a glass of the Good Stuff to wet his lips as his voice croons out the Blues. A host of old, sad looking hound dogs lie around the stage...but those hounds slip between seen and unseen, and their bark is as likely to kill as their horrible bites. Those souls who truly cause him sorrow are liable to be dragged by the hounds into the great, brass-bound basement door, that door that burns to the touch, never to be seen again. And the Sad People had best not think of escape...the Devil likes nothing better than to sing a song of a man being chased through the wheat by a pack of hounds. On those nights, the cries chill even the weary, calcified souls of the Sad.
Yes, this is Hell. And its the Devil's own home. There ain't no swords, or great magics. Just as a Blues playing Devil in his Roadhouse, in an empty land where the American Dream has gone rotten at the core. Some Changelings say that the Devil's Hell is just the latest in a long line, that his realm wears a different face in different countries and different times. But is there one Devil, or are they Legion?
Contact: Derek Burrow
