How Can They Be Saved?

"Saved?" Blaze's voice came from the darkness as a mighty gust of wind, howling in fury. "Who says they need to be saved? Like you, they came here of their own will. Bargained with me, of their own will. Submitted themselves to me, of their own will."

Yet Lois sensed a hesitancy.

"So there is no way to break these bargains?" The reporter pushed...and the demoness' sigh was a lonesome breath of wind.

"There are exit clauses." Lois stared into the darkness, and began to perceive shapes...patches of deeper shadow, kind of depth...and things were moving there, around her. "If I am offered a greater price; if either party cannot fulfill their part; or if the Inanna descends to Kur..."

The shadows were those of women. Lost could see here and there the dark swell of hip and breast. They moved dreamlike through a black hall, supported by a forest of pillars...and Lois could not see when or where it ended, but she could hear and feel the wind the wind that whipped through that place...

"Inanna." Lois said, recalling a long-distant article she'd written on Sumerian archaeology. "The Queen of Heaven. She descended into the underworld...and returned."

"Yes," Blaze's voice whispered, high and sibilant. "A precedent was set, that still holds. Those who have the courage to descend, and face the seven trials, can recover those lost souls..." The wind whispered in Lois' ear, whipped through her clothes and hair, even to her most intimate places. "But those who dare and fail are lost forever."

Lois looked at where this last wind came from, and saw a yawning darkness. A gate into the netherworld...

"What trials are these?" Lois said, wondering how many questions she had left to ask and answer.

"Your own fears and desires. The darkness and truth within yourself that you do not face in the light of day. To conquer me, you must conquer yourself." A piece of darkness detached itself from that yawning abyss. Taller, more lithe, with jutting horns and wild hair that hung to her hips. "Now, you owe me an answer..."