“Consider your next move very carefully,” Basil says. Cronos pulls a revolver from his belt, casually, even sloppily, and aims the barrel at Basil’s face.
“I ain’t fucking around here,” Cronos says. “Know what, big boy? You’re going to kneel. Then you’re going to unbutton my fly and take every inch I give you.”
Basil can only laugh, mostly because he knows doing so will infuriate this lesser being.
Cronos’s finger depresses the trigger, and the revolver does its job. The bullet catches Basil just above his left eyebrow, where the scalp meets one of his gnarled horns.
Basil feels a burning sensation at the base of his horn. The unfortunate smell of gun smoke reminds him of Our Fiery Home. The deafening pop, however, is the greatest wound. He holds his breath as he considers the weight of this insult. Such an act of disrespect disables Basil’s self-control. His lips curl to expose sharpened yellow canines. His body reacts before his mind has time to reconsider.
His fist caves in Cronos’s skull. The man’s neck snaps, his spinal column collapses. Cronos dies before his body hits the floor, where it settles in a crumpled heap. His toothless mouth yawns open, jaws pulverized. His right eye socket is empty, the eyeball either reduced to liquid or having detached and rolled into a dusty, darkened corner to settle among crumbs and mouse droppings. The left eyeball dangles by its optic nerve, disembodied, the glistening globe resting comfortably on its respective cheekbone.
Hunter falls out of his chair and scrambles toward the door. “Fucking Christ!” says Worm. The carnage has him in shock. Cronos’s body goes still, save the occasional nervous twitch, the final embers of life going dim.
Basil moves toward Worm, towering over his would-be opponent. He will at least give the weak little man a chance.
“Take the first shot,” he says.
Worm takes two steps backward, into the bar rail. His eyes scan the bar for a weapon, and they find it in a half-empty beer bottle. In one deft motion, he cracks the bottle against the bar and rakes the ragged edge across Basil’s exposed gut.
Basil barely feels the blow. He smiles, knowing now it is his turn. He wraps a hand around Worm’s throat and lifts the man off the ground.
“You’ve earned the misery that’s about to come,” he growls.
He stabs the talons of his free hand into Worm’s midsection, intent on tearing the man in two. Worm’s body proves extraordinarily flimsy. The head rips away from the neck, tendons snapping, leaving the headless body impaled on Basil’s left hand. Basil shakes his hand loose, sections of intestine flying, and the body lands with an awkward thump.
Basil hears the subtlest of noises behind him, like two glasses clinking together.
“You shouldn’t have done that, you know.”
It’s the bartender, calm as a clam, finishing the chore of wiping down the bar.
“Wrong,” Basil says. “They brought this upon themselves.”
“Yeah, I guess you could argue that. But try explaining that to Ronald and his merry band of Fang and Claw fuck nuggets. He’s a bad dude, sincerely. Even by your standards. A whole lot of hurt is going to come down on you now, my friend.”
“What do you mean?”
“You just erased those two pieces of shit, but you let one of them get away. With these sons of bitches, see, they’re like the fucking cops. They’re brothers, just like they told you. That means you take down one of ’em and whoever’s left is going to come back at you hard. They’ll have all eyes out for you.”
“Let them find me.”
“I get it. You’re used to making enemies. You’re going to do what you’re going to do. I mean, you’re here for a reason, right?”
“Right.” He’s beginning to forget what the reason is, if there ever was one.
“Okay, so get to it. Don’t let this kind of riffraff stand in your way. They’re a footnote.”
“Do you have a name?” Basil asks.
“Buddy,” he says. “Just Buddy.”
“Did you know these men well?”
“Sure did. They were in here just about every day of the week, by my best guess. You sure saw an end to that, didn’t you?”
“I apologize for the mess.”
“Ah, this ain’t the first time I’ve had to mop up someone else’s blood off the floor. Won’t be the last either. Unless you got bigger plans, that is. You know, The End is Nigh and all that.”
“Where do I go now?”
“Depends. What are you looking for?”
“I wish I knew.”
“Well, you’re halfway between Beak and Ellicott, and there ain’t much going on in either direction. My advice? Keep moving. Head east a few hours, you got Des Moines. Chicago’s a bit of a ways past that. Head south and there’s Kansas City. Damned good barbecue there, if that suits you.”
“Chicago,” he says, liking how the word feels on his tongue.
“How do I get there?”
“That depends. You know how to ride a motorcycle?”
Chapter 3
Fresh Tears and Brittle Bones
Basil’s hooves scrape the asphalt. He can practically feel himself getting shorter as the road grinds away at each hoof’s outermost layer of keratin. He eyes the speed gauge, sees he is moving at no more than thirty miles per hour, but even this feels too fast. The motorcycle—a Harley-Davidson 1340 Heritage Softail, nothing but muscle, black paint and chrome—wobbles to the edge of the dusty shoulder, so he steadies himself one hoof at a time.
With sufficient horror, Basil realizes Buddy’s five-minute riding lesson has not sufficed. He cranks the throttle and the bike speeds to near forty. Basil screams, thinking these will be his final moments. As his weight shifts, the bike veers off the road and plows straight into a wooden fencepost. Basil flips over the handlebars, gets entangled in the teeth of a barbed-wire fence, and crashes into a cornfield.
He settles on his back and waits for his body to inform him of any injuries, of any essential organs in need of mending. He breathes slowly, finding no pain other than the surprise of his stupidity. Involuntary laughter rumbles from within, and for a moment he wishes someone had seen the crash, merely to comment on the spectacle and laugh along with him. He considers the cast of characters.
No one would care.
Maybe Kamala, he guesses, though likely not. He cannot recall her having laughed, ever. Then again, it’s been too long since he permitted himself the thrill of laughter.
Something within him—his brain and heart working together, conspiring—conjures an image of the faceless human, a female, who has been at turns blessing and plaguing his dreams for as long as he can remember. He does not have a name for her, nor does he have any pure memories of her, only the vague feeling that she will be forever tied to him, and that he lacks some vital part because of her absence. The curse, he calls it.
He casts the feeling aside, knowing it serves no purpose other than to harass him. Splayed on the dirt, he reassesses his bones for any injuries resulting from the crash. A few bumps and bruises—the barbed wire biting into his left leg—but other than those minor complaints, he feels fine. He will survive.
Enough adventure for today, he supposes. Enough blood spilled.
He studies the dark sky as his body sinks into the pillow of soft earth and broken cornstalks. Glimmering constellations dot the heavens, the sky easing from a soft blue in the west to a deepening purple in the east. He should be happy to be here, in this place called Nebraska, but an unpleasantness stirs. Something deep and primal nags at him as he considers his few interactions with the humans. He laments the incident at the Beak Tavern. Although killing is nothing new to him, this time, after claiming the lives of two human men, he feels … different. Dirty, ashamed, sinister. He wishes the feeling away, tries his best to forget his actions, but the more he tries, the more vibrant and persistent the memory of his misconduct becomes.
To feel the weight of his wickedness—this is his punishment to suffer.
The air takes on a chill, and the cooling of his skin reminds him of his ascent out of Our Fiery Home. He wonders how Kamala is faring, so early into her appointed reign, wonders if the walls still stand. He pictures Lubos, smiling sadistically, blood leaking from his mouth, holding the sacred spear designating him ruler. Basil shakes the thought from his skull. Speculation will do him no good if this aboveground experiment is to have any chance of success.
A small brown bat does figure eights in the night sky. Basil traces the frantic yet graceful arcs as the bat tracks down the thousand insects destined to fill its wanting belly. He considers how the insects will give their lives to nourish the bat, how they would likely rather live than die, yet they have no say in the matter—how unfair the world can be to all creatures but a carefully chosen few.
His breath slows, his body sinking deeper into the shallow pocket of earth. He counts the lives he has ended, today and every day before, for no good reason—for anger, for power, for show, for nothing at all. He regrets each murder. The feeling builds within him until it spills out. Tears form at the corner of each eye. Sadness overwhelms him, and the emptiness inside begins to fill, making him cry harder.
A falling star streaks the sky. He follows its tail until it disappears, and even after he can no longer see it, he pretends he can. He imagines the star circling the planet until the end of time, or at least until it chooses to burn up and turn into clouds of stardust. He closes his eyes and expels a heavy breath, followed by another. For the moment, he is thankful that “forever” does not exist, that everything, including each day, has an expiration date.
He, too, will one day be no more.
His last thought, before his body accepts the gift of sleep, concerns the hobbled Harley at the edge of the road. Common sense tells him he should get up and move his newly acquired toy out of plain sight before another thief swoops in to claim it as his own.
* * *
A ball of wet excrement sails through the heavy air and splats against the wall of red rock. The demons cheer, knowing full well such treachery would have resulted in their deaths just a short time ago. Others follow suit, as one after another shits into the palm of his hand and smears the contents of his bowels onto the walls of Basil’s chamber, obscuring the gentle words etched into the rock by their former ruler.
A dozen young demons form a ring and link arms. They skip and hop as they sing silly songs of scorn and vilification.
“Poor old King Basil, his reign here is done. Toothless King Basil, rotting in the sun.”
Chaos possesses Our Fiery Home. Some celebrate the end of a tyrant’s reign. Others see the absence of governance as an opportunity to put to good use the cruelty they learned while living under Basil’s thumb.
Lubos slithers from his perch atop a blunted stalagmite and, like a carnival barker, beckons the others toward him. Some curious, others obedient, dozens of demons gather around. It’s time for a game, he tells them. “Hunting Basil,” he calls it. He explains how one demon will play the part of Basil, the outcast, and the others will chase him down “in good fun.” Whoever catches the pretender wins the game, he announces, though it’s unclear what the prize will be.
“Volunteers?” he asks, as he often does at the outset of his so-called games.
No one steps forward, so he points to a Nameless demon standing off to the side, designating him to play the part of Basil. The demon attempts to flee, but those who stand nearby tackle him and drag him to Lubos’s feet. Lubos directs them to smear a B onto the designee’s chest. Excrement will do just fine. This young demon has no horns, so Lubos instructs the horde to fashion a crown of root branches and wire. They have no gentility, so the demon bleeds as a result of his newly fitted prosthesis.
Once Basil’s Doppelganger is sufficiently done up, Lubos tosses the demon to the ground.
“Get him,” he says, dully.
The Doppelganger slips through a web of limbs, breaks from the crowd and snakes along the perimeter. He is surprisingly quick and, as the demons trying to tackle him discover, quite slippery. All of the pursuers laugh and smile, joyous at play, and for a time the Doppelganger laughs along with them. Then the game turns. The Doppelganger’s smile disappears. He tires, his lungs struggling to pull enough oxygen from the poisonous air, but the pack continues the pursuit.
As the Doppelganger squirms past, Lubos places a hoof in the runner’s path. The young demon stumbles, and this is enough to end the game. A potbellied demon grabs the fallen one around the waist, declaring himself the victor. Others pile on. Then someone strikes the Doppelganger with a closed fist. Then another. And another. Someone produces a rock, another a knotted club. They all move in, taking turns beating the Doppelganger’s face and back, stripping the flesh from his thighs and chest.
They hold the maimed Doppelganger aloft and carry him to the edge of the Pool of Infinite Perdition. The body lands with a splash. Then they wait. Soon enough they see movement beneath the surface. A massive tentacle reaches up to snatch the still body. They all cheer.
Lubos steps forward and places his three-fingered hand on the shoulder of the demon first to pounce on the Doppelganger.
“Well done,” he growls. “You win.”
Lubos hoists the demon over his head and hurls him into the lake of blood. The frantic demon wades toward the nearest shore. The attack comes from below, pulled under just as his outstretched hand reaches for the nearest handhold.
More cheering.
Kamala watches from a distance. She knows she must let this happen. Interfering in their revelry would suggest loyalty to an unwanted king who has abandoned his people.
“This ain’t going to end well.”
Kamala turns to see the cripple, Damir, using his stumps to drag his inert body toward her.
“Calm will return,” she tells him.
“Since when? Basil knew what he was doing when he left. I see your ambition, even if Basil couldn’t. Turning this place around is beyond even you.”
“I promised Basil I would treat you kindly, old one. Do not give me reason to change my mind.”
“You’re not going to make it.”
“Pardon?”
“They’re just playing now, but soon enough the fun and games will end. Lubos has designs on what he thinks you possess, even though you ain’t earned the gift Basil dumped in your lap.”
“I have no reason to fear Lubos.”
“Then you’re dumber than Basil’s sac of nuts. Even a numbskull like him knew better. He’s coming for you, Lubos is. You give him the chance, and he’ll undo every part of you.”
She backs away from Damir and retreats into the shadows. She knows Lubos craves her power, but she can handle him. To be safe, she will wander for a time, safely away from the fray, and return only after her fellow demons have finished spilling each other’s blood. For now she’ll let them get drunk on murder and malice. She’s smart enough to know the start of her reign will go more smoothly once the hangover has set in.
* * *
The raccoon weaves between the rows of cornstalks, seeking the source of the intoxicating stink. It hugs each stalk like a slalom skier as it zeroes in on the unmoving mound—this incredible, unnamable, hulking thing—that reeks of smoked spare ribs and decay. The raccoon darts closer, cautiously, testing boundaries.
The cologne of fresh blood hangs in the air, held aloft by the magic of humidity. The raccoon’s usual victuals—garbage and leopard frogs, maybe a few crayfish from the nearest creek—have nothing on this gift of fresh meat. It moves in and, with its almost-human paws, picks at a shallow wound, laps at the crust of dried blood. With all the care of surgery, the raccoon slips a sharpened claw into the tender flesh to restart the flow. Unsatisfied, even greedy, the critter tugs for a stringy morsel.
The reckoning is immediate.
Basil crushes the raccoon in his grip. His fist deconstructs the animal into a ball of fur, organ and broken bone, and then introduces the meal to his soft palate. Three bites
later, no evidence remains.
He lays back down, exhausted, yet thankful for a full belly that went ignored for much too long. Even in his grogginess, he notices the light changing as the hint of morning stirs in the east. The light continues its glorious shift, yet he knows he does not have it in him to endure the fireworks display in its entirety. He lingers on the edge of sleep.
The unmistakable grumbling of motorcycle engines roars in the distance. They are searching for him, he figures. The brothers of the Fang and Claw have come to avenge the two simpletons he did away with at the bar.
“They come to break you,” the voice tells him.
“Let them try,” he whispers. “Let them come,” though he does not mean a word. Not now, he knows, in such a compromised state.
He rises from the earth and stands in the cornfield, and only now does he notice the extent of his wounds. The gash on his stomach has begun to heal, and he bends to unwind the snarl of barbed wire that sank its rusty teeth into his left calf, just above the hoof. He winces as he untwines the metal, surprised at the sting as the barbs withdraw from the tender flesh. Physical pain seems new somehow. He wonders if the simple act of being here, so far from Our Fiery Home, will cause his body to deteriorate, wither and collapse into a column of dust waiting to be carried away on the wind.
He stops to study the husks at eye level, each one pregnant with an ear of corn. In the lifting darkness he sees the deep impression his heavy body has left in the soft earth. Odd that a knot of earthworms has gathered beneath him, he thinks, yet he admits he knows nothing of earthworms, only that he and they share a kinship, both borne of the soil.
Each moment above ground conjures a new surprise. Favoring his sore calf, he limps toward the road to retrieve the motorcycle, hoping the crash has not wrecked his new plaything. His bones feel brittle, muscles useless. He struggles to lift the bike onto his shoulder, but he succeeds. He then hoists it over the fence and begins to roll it up the steep incline, into the safety of the cornfield. Hidden. Safe.
Burn, Beautiful Soul Page 5
