Cabal

by Clive Barker

  The mob was itching for fun. Those with guns and rifles had brought them from their cars; those with the luck to have been travelling with rope in their trunks were practising knots; and those without rope or guns had picked up stones. For justification they needed to look no further than the spattered remains of Cormack’s foot, spread on the station floor. The leaders of the group – who’d established themselves immediately by natural selection (they had louder voices and more powerful weapons) – were treading this red ground when a noise from the vicinity of the cells drew their attention.

  Somebody at the back of the crowd started shouting: ‘Shoot the bastards down!’

  It was not Boone’s shadow the leaders’ target-hungry eyes first alighted upon. It was Narcisse. His ruined face brought a gasp of disgust from several of the throng, and shouts for his dispatch from many more.

  ‘Shoot the fucker!

  ‘Through the heart!’

  The leaders didn’t hesitate. Three of them fired. One of them hit the man, the bullet catching Narcisse in the shoulder and passing straight through him. There was a cheer from the mob. Encouraged by this first wounding they surged into the station in still greater numbers, those at the back eager to see the bloodletting, those at the front mostly blind to the fact that their target had not shed a single drop. He hadn’t fallen either; that they did see. And now one or two acted to put that to rights, firing a volley at Narcisse. Most of the shots went wide, but not all.

  As the third bullet struck home, however, a roar of fury shook the room, exploding the lamp on the desk and bringing dust from the ceiling.

  Hearing it one or two of those just crossing the threshold changed their minds. Suddenly careless of what their neighbours might think they began to dig their way out into the open air. It was still light on the street; there was warmth to cancel the chill of fear that ran down every human spine, hearing that cry. But for those at the head of the mob there was no retreat. The door was jammed. All they could do was stand their ground and aim their weapons, as the roarer emerged from the darkness at the back of the station.

  One of the men had been a witness at the Sweetgrass Inn that morning, and knew the man who now came into sight as the killer he’d seen arrested. Knew his name too.

  ‘That’s him!’ he started to yell. ‘That’s Boone!’

  The man who’d fired the first shot to strike Narcisse aimed his rifle.

  ‘Bring him down!’ somebody shouted.

  The man fired.

  Boone had been shot before; and shot; and shot. This little bullet, entering his chest and nicking his silent heart, was nothing. He laughed it off and kept coming, feeling the change in him as he breathed it out. His substance was fluid. It broke into droplets and became something new; part the beast he’d inherited from Peloquin, part a shade warrior, like Lylesburg; part Boone the lunatic, content with his visions at last. And oh! the pleasure of it, feeling this possibility liberated and forgiven; the pleasure of bearing down on this human herd and seeing it break before him.

  He smelt their heat, and hungered for it. He saw their terror, and took strength from it. They stole such authority for themselves, these people. Made themselves arbiters of good and bad, natural and unnatural, justifying their cruelty with spurious laws. Now they saw a simpler law at work, as their bowels remembered the oldest fear: of being prey.

  They fled before him, panic spreading throughout their unruly ranks. The rifles and the stones were forgotten in the chaos, as howls for blood became howls for escape. Trampling each other in their haste, they clawed and fought their way into the street.

  One of the riflemen stood his ground, or else was rooted to it in shock. Whichever, the weapon was dashed from his grip by Boone’s swelling hand, and the man flung himself into the throng of people to escape further confrontation.

  Daylight still ruled the street outside, and Boone was loath to step into it, but Narcisse was indifferent to such niceties. With the route cleared he made his way out into the light, weaving through the fleeing crowd unnoticed, until he reached the car.

  There was some regrouping of forces going on, Boone could see. A knot of people on the far sidewalk – comforted by the sunlight, and their distance from the beast – talking heatedly together as though they might rally. Dropped weapons were being claimed from the ground. It could only be a matter of time before the shock of Boone’s transformation died away and they renewed their assault.

  But Narcisse was swift. He was in the car and revving it by the time Lori reached the door. Boone held her back, the touch of his shadow, (which he trailed like smoke) more than enough to cancel any lingering fear she might have had of his reworked flesh. Indeed, she found herself imagining what it would be like to fuck with him in this configuration; to spread herself for the shadow and the beast at its heart.

  The car was at the door now, squealing to a halt in a cloud of its own fumes.

  ‘Go!’ Boone said, pitching her through the door, his shadow covering the sidewalk to confound the enemy’s sights. With reason. A shot blew out the back window even as she threw herself into the car; a barrage of stones followed.

  Boone was at her side already, and slamming the door.

  ‘They’re going to come after us!’ Narcisse said.

  ‘Let them,’ was Boone’s response.

  ‘To Midian?’

  ‘It’s no secret now.’

  ‘True.’

  Narcisse put his foot down, and the car was away.

  ‘We’ll lead them to Hell,’ said Boone, as a quartet of vehicles began to give chase, ‘if that’s where they want to go.’

  His voice was guttural from the throat of the creature he’d become, but the laugh that followed was Boone’s laugh, as though it had always belonged to this beast; a humour more ecstatic than his humanity had room for, that had finally found its purpose and its face.

  XXII

  Triumph of the Mask

  1

  If he never saw another day like today, Eigerman thought, he’d have little to complain to the Lord about, when he was eventually called. First the sight of Boone in chains. Then bringing the baby out to meet the cameras, knowing his face would be on the cover of every newspaper across the country tomorrow morning. And now this: the glorious sight of Midian in flames.

  It had been Pettine’s notion, and a damn good one, to pour lighted gasoline down the gullets of the tombs, to drive whatever was underground up into the light. It had worked better than either of them had anticipated. Once the smoke began to thicken and the fires to spread, the enemy had no choice but to exit their cess-pit into the open air, where God’s good sun took many of them apart at a stroke.

  Not all however. Some of them had time to prepare for their emergence, protecting themselves against the light by whatever desperate means they could. Their invention was in vain. The pyre was sealed: gates guarded, walls manned. Unable to escape skyward with wings and heads covered against the sun, they were driven back into the conflagration.

  In other circumstances Eigerman might not have allowed himself to enjoy the spectacle as openly as he did. But these creatures weren’t human – that much was apparent even from a safe distance. They were miscreated fuckheads, no two the same, and he was sure the saints themselves would have laughed to see them bested. Putting down the Devil was the Lord’s own sport.

  But it couldn’t last forever. Night would soon be falling. When it did their strongest defence against the enemy would drop out of sight, and the tide might turn. They’d have to leave the bonfire to burn overnight, and at dawn return to dig the survivors out of their niches and finish them off. With crosses and holy water securing the walls and gates there’d be little chance of any escaping before daybreak. He wasn’t sure what power was working to subdue the monsters: fire, water, daylight, faith: all, or some combination of these. It didn’t matter. All that concerned him was that he had the power to crack their heads.

  A shout from down the hill broke Eigerman’s train of t
hought.

  ‘You’ve got to stop this!’

  It was Ashbery. It looked like he’d been standing too close to the flames. His face was half-cooked, basted in sweat.

  ‘Stop what?’ Eigerman yelled back.

  ‘This massacre.’

  ‘I see no massacre.’

  Ashbery was within a couple of yards of Eigerman, but he still had to shout over the noise from below: the din of the freaks and the fires punctuated now and again by louder dins as the heat broke a slab, or brought a mausoleum down.

  ‘They don’t stand a chance!’ Ashbery hollered.

  ‘They’re not supposed to,’ Eigerman pointed out.

  ‘But you don’t know who’s down there! Eigerman! … You don’t know who you’re killing!’

  The Chief grinned.

  ‘I know damn well,’ he said, a look in his eyes that Ashbery had only ever seen in mad dogs. ‘I’m killing the dead, and how can that be wrong? Eh? Answer me, Ashbery. How can it be wrong to make the dead lie down and stay dead?’

  ‘There’s children down there, Eigerman,’ Ashbery replied, jabbing a finger in the direction of Midian.

  ‘Oh yes. With eyes like headlamps! And teeth! You seen the teeth on those fuckers? That’s the Devil’s children, Ashbery.’

  ‘You’re out of your mind.’

  ‘You haven’t got the balls to believe that, have you? You haven’t got balls at all!’

  He took a step towards the priest, and caught hold of the black cassock.

  ‘Maybe you’re more like them than us,’ he said. ‘Is that what it is, Ashbery? Feel the call of the wild, do you?’

  Ashbery wrested his robes from Eigerman’s grip. They tore.

  ‘All right …’ he said, ‘I tried reasoning with you. If you’ve got such God-fearing executioners, then maybe a man of God can stop them.’

  ‘You leave my men alone!’ Eigerman said.

  But Ashbery was already half way down the hill, his voice carried above the tumult.

  ‘Stop!’ he yelled. ‘Lay down your weapons!’

  Centre-stage in front of the main gates he was visible to a good number of Eigerman’s army, and though few, if any, had stepped into a church since their wedding or their baptism they listened now. They wanted some explanation of the sights the last hour had provided; sights they’d happily have fled from but that some urge they’d barely recognize as their own kept them at the wall, childhood prayers on their lips.

  Eigerman knew their loyalty was only his by default. They didn’t obey him because they loved the law. They obeyed because they were more afraid of retreating in front of their companions than of doing the job. They obeyed because they couldn’t defy the ant-under-the-magnifying-glass fascination of watching helpless things go bang. They obeyed because obeying was simpler than not.

  Ashbery might change their minds. He had the robes, he had the rhetoric. If he wasn’t stopped he might still spoil the day.

  Eigerman took his gun from his holster, and followed the priest down the hill. Ashbery saw him coming; saw the gun in his hand.

  He raised his voice still louder.

  ‘This isn’t what God wants!’ he yelled. ‘And it’s not what you want either. You don’t want innocent blood on your hands.’

  Priest to the bitter end, Eigerman thought, laying on the guilt.

  ‘Shut your mouth, faggot,’ he hollered.

  Ashbery had no intention of doing so; not when he had his audience in the palm of his hand.

  ‘They’re not animals in there!’ he said. ‘They’re people. And you’re killing them just because this lunatic tells you to.’

  His words carried weight, even amongst the atheists. He was voicing a doubt more than one had entertained but none had dared express. Half a dozen of the non-uniformed began to retire towards their cars, all enthusiasm for the extermination drained. One of Eigerman’s men also withdrew from his station at the gate, his slow retreat becoming a run as the chief fired a shot in his direction.

  ‘Stand your ground!’ he bellowed. But the man was away, lost in the smoke.

  Eigerman turned his fury back on Ashbery.

  ‘Got some bad news,’ he said, advancing towards the priest.

  Ashbery looked to right and left for someone willing to defend him, but nobody moved.

  ‘You going to watch him kill me?’ he appealed. ‘For God’s sake, won’t somebody help me?’

  Eigerman levelled his gun. Ashbery had no intention of attempting to outrun the bullet. He dropped to his knees.

  ‘Our Father …’ he began.

  ‘You’re on your own, cocksucker,’ Eigerman purred. ‘Nobody’s listening.’

  ‘Not true,’ somebody said.

  ‘Huh?’

  The prayer faltered.

  ‘I’m listening.’

  Eigerman turned his back on the priest. A figure loomed in the smoke ten yards from him. He pointed the gun in the newcomer’s direction.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Sun’s almost set,’ the other said.

  ‘One more step and I’ll shoot you.’

  ‘So shoot,’ said the man, and took a step towards the gun. The tatters of smoke that clung to him blew away, and the prisoner in Cell Five walked into Eigerman’s sights, his skin bright, his eyes brighter. He was stark naked. There was a bullet hole in the middle of his chest and more wounds besides, decorating his body.

  ‘Dead,’ Eigerman said.

  ‘You bet.’

  ‘Jesus Lord.’

  He backed off a step; and another.

  ‘Ten minutes maybe, before sundown,’ Boone said. ‘Then the world’s ours.’

  Eigerman shook his head.

  ‘You’re not getting me,’ he said. ‘I won’t let you get me!’

  His backward steps multiplied and suddenly he was away at speed, not looking behind him. Had he done so, he would have seen that Boone was not interested in pursuit. He was moving instead towards the besieged gates of Midian. Ashbery was still on the ground there.

  ‘Get up,’ Boone told him.

  ‘If you’re going to kill me, do it will you?’ Ashbery said. ‘Get it over with.’

  ‘Why should I kill you?’ Boone said.

  ‘I’m a priest.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘You’re a monster.’

  ‘And you’re not?’

  Ashbery looked up at Boone.

  ‘Me?’

  ‘There’s lace under the robe,’ Boone said.

  Ashbery pulled together the tear in his cassock.

  ‘Why hide it?’

  ‘Let me alone.’

  ‘Forgive yourself,’ Boone said. ‘I did.’

  He walked on past Ashbery to the gates.

  ‘Wait!’ the priest said.

  ‘I’d get going if I were you. They don’t like the robes in Midian. Bad memories.’

  ‘I want to see,’ Ashbery said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Please. Take me with you.’

  ‘It’s your risk.’

  ‘I’ll take it.’

  2

  From a distance it was hard to be sure of what was going on down at the cemetery gates, but of two facts the doctor was sure: Boone had returned, and somehow bested Eigerman. At the first sight of his arrival Decker had taken shelter in one of the police vehicles. There he sat now, briefcase in hand, trying to plot his next action.

  It was difficult, with two voices each counselling different things. His public self demanded retreat, before events became any more dangerous.

  Leave now, it said. Just drive away. Let them all die together.

  There was wisdom in this. With night almost fallen, and Boone there to rally them, Midian’s hosts might still triumph If they did, and they found Decker, his heart would be ripped from his chest.

  But there was another voice demanding his attention.

  Stay, it said.

  The voice of the Mask, rising from the case on his lap.

  You’ve denied me here once
already, it said.

  So he had, knowing when he did it there’d come a time for repaying the debt.

  ‘Not now,’ he whispered.

  Now, it said.

  He knew rational argument carried no weight against its hunger; nor did pleading.

  Use your eyes, it said. I’ve got work to do.

  What did it see that he didn’t? He stared out through the window.

  Don’t you see her?

  Now he did. In his fascination with Boone, naked at the gates, he’d missed the other newcomer to the field: Boone’s woman.

  Do you see the bitch? the Mask said.

  ‘I see her.’

  Perfect timing, eh? In this chaos who’s going to see me finish her off? Nobody. And with her gone there’ll be no-one left who knows our secret.

  ‘There’s still Boone.’

  He’ll never testify, the Mask laughed. He’s a dead man, for Christ’s sake. What’s a zombie’s word worth, tell me that?

  ‘Nothing,’ Decker said.

  Exactly. He’s no danger to us. But the woman is. Let me silence her.

  ‘Suppose you’re seen?’

  Suppose I am, the Mask said. They’ll think I was one of Midian’s clan all along.

  ‘Not you,’ Decker said.

  The thought of his precious Other being confused with the degenerates of Midian nauseated him.

  ‘You’re pure,’ he said.

  Let me prove it, the Mask coaxed.

  ‘Just the woman?’

  Just the woman. Then we’ll leave.

  He knew the advice made sense. They’d never have a better opportunity of killing the bitch.

  He started to unlock the case. Inside, the Mask grew agitated.

  Quickly or we’ll lose her.

  His fingers slid on the dial as he ran the numbers of the lock.

  Quickly, damn you.

  The final digit clicked into place. The lock sprang open.

  Ol’ Button Face was never more beautiful.

  3

  Though Boone had advised Lori to stay with Narcisse, the sight of Midian in flames was enough to draw her companion away from the safety of the hill and down towards the cemetery gates. Lori went with him a little way, but her presence seemed to intrude upon his grief, so she hung back a few paces, and in the smoke and deepening twilight was soon divided from him.