Demon's Bride th-2

by Zoë Archer

  “Where are you going?” Zora’s mother cried.

  Zora did not stop until she slipped a bridle onto one of the horses and then swung up onto its bare back. Once mounted, she trotted forward until she stared down at the trembling men and women of her Romani band.

  “I’m doing what needs to be done,” Zora said. “I’m going to stop those lunatic men before they do something we shall all regret.”

  Despite her fear, she kicked her horse into a gallop. She had never faced anything like this in her life, and had no knowledge of what awaited her. How might she prevent the evil from being set free? All she knew was that she must.

  Atop a rounded hill, the ruin formed a dark, jagged silhouette against the night sky, like a creature rising from the earth. As the riders neared the hill, Whit felt himself drawn forward, pulled by a force outside himself. He did not know why he had to reach the ruin, only that he must, and soon. His companions must have shared the feeling, for they also urged their horses faster, their hooves pounding beneath them as thunder presaged a storm.

  At the base of the hill, all of the men fought to control their shying, rearing horses, trying to urge them up toward the ruin. None of the beasts would take the hill, though it was surely traversable by horse. The men alternately cursed and cajoled. Yet the horses refused to go farther.

  “On foot, then,” grumbled Bram.

  After dismounting, as directed by Bram, the men gathered up fallen tree branches. Bram used skills honed during his time fighting the French and their native allies in the Colonies and quickly made torches from the branches. He set them ablaze with a flint from his pocket.

  “Don’t we look a fine collection of fiends,” drawled Whit. For that is what they resembled as light from the torches bathed the men’s faces in gaudy, demonic radiance.

  At this notion, they all grinned.

  “Shall we investigate, Hellraisers?” asked Edmund.

  “Aye,” the men said in unison, and Whit felt almost certain he heard a sixth voice hiss, Yes.

  They climbed the hill, using torchlight to guide them. The shapes of toppled columns and crumbling walls emerged from the darkness, gleaming white and dull as bones. Everyone reached the top and surveyed the scene. Whatever the building had once been, its glory had long ago faded, becoming only a shade of its former self. A strange, thick miasma cloaked the ruin, its dank smell clogging Whit’s nose, and it swirled as the five men prowled through the ancient remains. Examining a partially standing wall, he touched the surface of the stone. A cold that seemed nearly alive climbed up through his hand, up his arm, and would have gone farther had he not pulled back.

  Their murmured voices were muffled by the heavy vapor, but Leo said, loud enough for all of them to hear, “What the hell is this place?”

  “Appears to have been a temple,” answered John, their resident scholar. He crouched and brushed away some dirt until he revealed what appeared to be a section of stone floor. “See here.” He pointed to the ground as everyone gathered around. Holding his torch closer to the stonework, he indicated the faded, chipped remains of mosaic lettering. “Huic sanctus locus. ‘This sacred place of worship.’”

  “Worship of what?” asked Leo.

  “Bacchus, I hope,” said Bram. He gazed critically around the ruin, the torchlight turning the sharp planes of his face even sharper, his black hair blending with the night. The light gleamed on the scar that ran along his jaw and down his neck, a souvenir from his military service. “It’s dull as church up here.”

  “What were you expecting?” said Whit. “It’s a ruin, not a bordello.” He thought of Zora, her refusal to take his money in exchange for a night in his bed, and wondered if he would ever see her again. He decided he would, and planned to return to the Gypsy encampment on the morrow, though he did not know how pleased she might be to see him.

  Bram made a noise of displeasure and paced away, kicking aside a few loose rocks in his impatience. Whit, John, Edmund, and Leo all exchanged rueful smiles. Of all of them, Bram pushed the hardest for yet greater depths of debauchery, as if continually trying to outpace something that chased him.

  The friends broke apart to drift separately through the ruin. Whit ambled toward a collection of five columns that had all toppled against each other, barely standing but for the tenuous support they gave each other. Fitting, he thought. He found himself possessed by the oddest humor, a moody melancholy that sought some means of release. Too late he realized he should have placed a wager with Leo as to what the ruin might have once been. The opportunity was gone now. Perhaps there was something else here upon which he might gamble. Leo had not gotten to a sixth cup of wine back at the Gypsy camp, so that bet could not be won or lost.

  A gleam at the base of the leaning columns caught his attention. He slowly neared and peered closer. Yes, something dully metallic appeared on the ground. As he edged closer, he saw that the metal was, in fact, a large, thick rusted ring, the size of a dinner plate. Whit thought at first the ring simply lay in the weeds. A second ring, exactly the same, lay some three feet away. Closer inspection showed the rings were attached to something in the ground. Whit crouched to get a better view.

  “Come and have a look,” he called to his friends.

  The men assembled around him, and the light from their collective torches revealed that the iron ring was affixed at one end to a large, square stone block. Whit handed his torch to Edmund and cleared away the rocks, weeds, and debris that nearly obscured the block, with Bram and Leo assisting. Soon, the block was completely uncovered. It was roughly three feet across and three feet long, with a metal ring set at each end.

  “Looks like a door,” said John.

  “If it’s a door,” Bram answered, “then we should open it.” His voice sounded slightly different from normal, a deeper, harsher rasp.

  At once it seemed to Whit to be not only the most sensible thing to do, but the most essential. A burning need to see what was behind the door seized him, as strong as any need to gamble. He gripped one iron ring, and Leo gripped the other after giving his torch to Bram.

  “On my count,” said Whit. “One, two, now!”

  Both he and Leo pulled with all their strength. Whit’s muscles strained and pulled against the fabric of his shirt and coat, against the doeskin of his breeches as he dug his heels into the ground and fought to wrench open the heavy stone door. He grunted with exertion through his gritted teeth. Pull, pull! He had to get the door open.

  Bram, Edmund, and John shouted their encouragement, their eyes aglow with the same fevered need to breach the door.

  A deep, heavy wrenching sound rumbled up from the ground, as if the very foundations of the world were being rent asunder. Whit and Leo pulled harder, encouraged by the sound. Inches of stone emerged up as the stone slab rose in clouds of dust. Suddenly, with a final growl, the stone broke free from its earthen prison.

  Whit and Leo heaved the block to one side, and it thudded on the ground, barely missing John’s toes. But John didn’t complain. He, like the other Hellraisers, was all too captivated by the sight of the opened door.

  A black square, the doorway, and through it the scent of long-buried secrets came wafting up. It wasn’t a damp smell, rather hot and dry, the scent of singed fabric and burnt paper. Whit grabbed his torch from Bram and thrust it through the doorway in the ground. The firelight illuminated precipitous stone stairs that disappeared into the gloom.

  “A hollow hill,” murmured Whit.

  “I’ve read about them.” John gazed avidly down. “From ancient legends about fairy kingdoms.”

  They paused for a moment, each taking in the wonderment of an actual hollow hill. In silent agreement, they descended the stairs. Their boots scraped over the stone, and the sound echoed as they delved farther. They found themselves in an underground chamber. Whit could not imagine what kind of ancient tools had the strength to carve a large chamber out of solid rock, yet somehow, some ancient laborer had done just that. The room itself was
almost entirely bare, just a floor and sloping walls that arched overhead. Whit was surprised at the height of the ceiling. He was a tall man, yet he did not have to stoop or bend in the chamber. Instead, he stood at his full height as he and his friends slowly turned in circles as they gazed at the incredible room hewn from a stone hill.

  Yet the chamber was not empty.

  “We have a companion, lads,” said Whit.

  At one end of the chamber, on a crude seat carved from solid rock, sat a man—or at least his skeletal remains, remarkably preserved given that they had been buried in this chamber for what had to be over a thousand years if the age of the ruins above was any indication. Whit and the others pressed closer to stare at this new discovery.

  “He’s wearing the uniform of a Roman centurion,” John whispered. “His helmet has the horsehair crest, he has medals upon his chest, and—this is astounding—his wooden Bacillum Viteum stick has not decayed.” Sure enough, a knotty stick rested in the crook of the centurion’s arm.

  “I’m more interested in that,” said Whit. He pointed to what the long-dead soldier held in his bony hands. A bronze box, the size of a writing chest, with images of twining snakes worked all over its surface. The centurion gripped the box tightly, holding it snug against his breastplate. Whatever was inside the box must have been extremely valuable, valuable enough to consign a Roman officer to death.

  Bram stared at the box, then at the faces of his friends clustered around. He grinned fiendishly as he placed his hand upon the box. “Let’s have ourselves a look.”

  Whit stared as Bram forcibly pried the box from the skeleton’s grip. The bones cracked as the box was wrenched free, yet Whit did not wince at the sound. All he wanted was the box, to learn what it contained, and he gazed avidly as Bram began to open it.

  Be careful, Zora had warned him. Yet he shoved her warning aside. The answers to everything were inside the box.

  As the lid opened, the flames from the torches were suddenly sucked inside the box. The chamber plunged into darkness.

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