Violin Lessons

Violin Lessons for the Prince of Hell

It times long past the Prince of Hell was prone to fits of gloominess. He would mope about the inner circles of Hell, paying no heed to his business or duties, and generally being what we on earth call a "wet blanket."

Then one day the Prince, in his gloominess, stepped upon a fiddle someone had left lying in the hall. When he went to pick it up it bit him, much to his surprise and consternation. And when he did find the fiddle's owner you can be sure he had some very stern things to say to her. But she only tweaked his nose and told him to stop moping so, as it did not become a prince, let alone the prince of such a notable place as Hell.

Now the Prince, whose name was Sepherus, had not had his nose tweaked him many thousands of years, and was unsure how to respond. The fiddle's owner, whose name was Grimbald, Queen of Dreams, took his silence as agreement, and offered to teach him how to play the violin. And since Grimbald did not understand the concept of "no, thank you" in those days, that is exactly what she did. By the afternoon she had Sepherus fiddling merrily, and quite out of his moping.

Next she is planning on teaching him how to dance.
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One thing I'd like to make quite clear right away is that Sepherus is the prince of a very different Hell than most Judea/Christian folks are used to. He is the overlord of Ratheal and Macheval, and a good many other people as well. And yes, Grimbald could have turned him into a fluffy, white bunny if she had wanted to.

This piece took… a long time. I had no references, which made things both easier and more difficult at the same time. I was trying for some tricky lighting, and at the same time trying to keep Grimbald sort of separate from things (Grimbald is very blue, and Hell is not a blue place at all, though it looks like she has brought a little of her own blueness along anyway).

Art and related prose © me, 2008, some rights reserved.

This picture was done with Prismacolor colored pencils on 9"x12" illustration paper, and appears on page 90 of my Black Book.
Enjoy.