by J. D. Horn
“You won’t hurt her. I won’t let—”
Babau Jean snapped into sharp focus, his razor-nailed finger darting out like a dagger and piercing the girl’s heart. He flung her aside, and she landed, dead, at Lisette’s feet, her eyes still open. In them, Lisette caught a glimpse of . . . regret.
The witch now held Joy up by her ankles. “Stop,” Lisette cried. “Anything,” she said. “Anything.” She repeated herself, sure her meaning was clear. Her life. Her soul. Whatever it took to make sure her granddaughter was unharmed.
Babau Jean pointed his bloody digit at her, touching its tip to her pulse. Lisette braced herself, expecting it to slide across her throat. Instead it fell away, as Babau Jean turned his attention to the dark fire. “Are you sure?” he said, sounding confused. “This is what you want?”
He must have heard his answer, for the eyeless white mask turned back to Lisette. “Hold out your arm,” he commanded, and Lisette reached her left arm out to him, exposing the skin that held the gad. He traced his nail across the healing slashes, just enough to scratch a red line through them into her skin. She felt a tingling in her arm as the gad shimmered, then disappeared. Babau Jean released her, then turned and began walking away. “You may go.”
“What about the baby?” Lisette said, stalking after him, afraid now she might somehow lose sight of him. “I’ve done what you’ve asked of me. I have offered myself to . . .” She cast a glance at the living fire. “. . . to that thing.” She rushed forward and caught Babau Jean by the arm. He swung back, seeming startled by her audacity.
“We promised,” the witch said, easing Joy back into a cradled position, “not to harm the child. We promised,” she said, her eyes shining with cruelty, “to deliver her safely back to her mother.” She held Joy out, then snatched her back with a laugh. “But,” she sang out the word, “we never said when.”
Lisette dug her fingers into Babau Jean.
“I will raise her as my own,” the witch said, leaning her face over Joy, cooing at her. “And I will deliver her to her mother when she’s grown, when she is so filled with hate for her, she will fall upon her mother and cut out her heart.”
A deep rumbling sounded around them, causing even Babau Jean to tremble. “Give it to her,” he said. “Give her the child.”
The witch tightened her hold on the baby. “No,” she said, her voice again the keening of the banshee. “The thing is mine.”
“It is,” Babau Jean said, the sound of cold rage building in his raspy voice, “what He commands.” Still the witch hesitated. She took a step back. “Now.”
The witch howled and flung Joy at them. Lisette’s heart stopped beating for an instant as Babau Jean reached out and caught the child, his razor-tipped fingers folding around Joy like a cage.
The creature drew near, and without a word, his fingers opened, like a deadly flower blossoming. Lisette didn’t hesitate for an instant. She snatched Joy from him and then turned and ran, moving past the line of cypresses, careening back toward the black sea, even as it parted before her.
She startled, her heart about to beat out of her chest, coming to in a recliner in the neonatal intensive care unit. She jumped up and rushed to the incubator. The baby slept peacefully inside. It was Joy, her Joy, not some enchanted doll. A small cry escaped her.
The nurse with kind black eyes appeared in the doorway. “Everything all right?”
“Will you,” Lisette said, her voice cracking, “will you come in and check on her?”
“Of course,” the nurse said, a look of confused concern giving way to her practiced, professional demeanor. She went first to the monitor, taking a quick glance at Joy’s vitals, then she came closer and leaned over the incubator.
The nurse looked up and smiled. “She’s absolutely fine. Did something frighten you?”
Lisette felt a nervous smile rise to her lips. She had been taken to that world of shadows before. She knew what she—and Joy—had experienced had been no nightmare.
“Hey,” the nurse said, drawing Lisette’s attention back to this world. “Her eyes are open. She’s looking at you.” The nurse nodded to Joy, a wide and genuine smile piercing her professional facade. “She knows you’re here.”
Lisette gazed down into those beautiful, trusting eyes.
“Go ahead,” the nurse coaxed. “Talk to her. Tell her that her grandmother is here to take care of her.”
“I am,” Lisette said, relief causing tears to brim in her eyes. “I’m here for you, sweet girl. And I would give anything to keep you safe. Anything.”
TWENTY-NINE
The end of the world will come in silence,
but not in stealth.
Astrid once again had full control over her vehicle. The servitor spirit Babau Jean had rebelled against her, tried to throw her, though she didn’t know if his revolt had been sparked by his fear of the power they both sensed coming from the Voodoo woman, or if he had planned it. He had stopped communicating with her, closing himself off after she read The Book of the Unwinding.
Perhaps the power that had come surging into this plane through Lisette Perrault, though the woman hadn’t seemed to recognize herself as its source, had provoked the Dark Man’s volte-face concerning the infant. Perhaps the woman’s presence here had never been meant as more than a ruse to test her strength, and that of the spirits who watched over her.
It was not Astrid’s place to question the Dark Man’s wisdom, though now another sacrifice would be required to prepare the way for the triumphant return of the King of Bones and Ashes to the common world.
Of course, she realized, the Longest Night.
A wild, rushing juggernaut in opulent, garish colors,
the people shall kneel before it
in the twinkle of intoxicating lights,
and each command his brother to be of good cheer.
The witches who gathered there would serve as the sacrifice. Perhaps that had always been His will.
With the words of The Book of the Unwinding burned into her, she could catch glimpses of His will, though much remained hidden. He was not of this world, but this world was of Him. He was Lord of this world, demiurge, artificer.
The beast will be welcomed first into the hearts
of those who have lusted after him,
and they shall worship his greatness.
What Astrid had once perceived as Celestin’s failure to create a perfect, immortal body for her to inhabit, one that would allow her to walk freely throughout the ages in the common world, she now recognized as part of the Dark Man’s plan. It had never been His intent for the sacrifice at Celestin’s memorial ball to bring Astrid back to the common world. She was only meant to escort the true necklace of Inanna—the necklace worn to the ball by the haughty Julia Prosper had been made of real emeralds and diamonds but was a counterfeit all the same—into the common world so the polarities of the true necklace could be reunited. At least Rose Gramont had benefited from Astrid’s disappointment; her bent old form was once again young and lithe, tender.
They shall bless the one who tears innocents
from the arms of their mothers to devour them.
And though they witness the blood on his lips,
the people shall praise his meaningless utterances.
The Dark Man drew closer as the rejuvenated crone danced through the fragile verse, oblivious to His presence, unaware of His words even though their traces clung to her youthful skin like spider-silk tattoos. Like a child placated for the loss of one toy with another, Rose had moved past the loss of her living doll by being given a jigsaw puzzle.
Rose lifted the severed head of a black Kiko goat by its impressive horns, raising it high overhead. Strange, Astrid hadn’t taken note of the butchery—she’d surfaced only in time to witness Rose picking through the parts. Now the foolish witch lifted the goat’s head high, as if it were an offering to the moon. Perhaps she believed it was; Rose was a fool. Astrid couldn’t fault the witch. She, too, had been
a fool, ignorant of the perfect, untamed darkness where nothing was, but all was possible.
He shall call out to them,
“Let the lie be the truth.”
And they shall respond unto him,
“Let the truth be the lie.”
Rose lay the goat’s head on the ground beside the dismembered remains of those first taken. The young lovers—her torso, his groin and thighs. Michael Parrish’s eyes and tongue. The black goat’s hoofed back legs. Frank Demagnan’s hands. Astrid hoped a little of the treacherous Demagnan’s spirit remained trapped in them. Not the degree of punishment Astrid would have chosen, but a small solace to her wounded pride. Not that such things truly mattered. Not now.
The old man smiled across Rose and her jigsaw project at Astrid, His grin confirming her suspicion He’d drawn the teenage paramours to the deserted lane. Astrid couldn’t help but chuckle at the memory of how the couple had reacted when Rose surprised them with her ax. Rose had so enjoyed the chase.
Astrid’s laughter caused Rose to look up from her project, her expression posing cautious inquisition. Astrid gave a slight shake of Babau Jean’s head and waved Rose back to her work with his sharp fingers. The witch fell back into the task with relish.
Rose had collected the parts she needed and tossed the rest in the direction of the solemn, red-eyed congregation lingering on the edge of the clearing. The writhing alligator-like shapes melded into an indistinguishable mass as they rushed forward in a single wave to collect the bounty, their dance set to the savage rhythm of snapping maws.
And he shall use the light of deception
to cast fearsome shadows upon them,
and the people shall cry out to him for protection.
He shall imprison them,
and the people shall praise his might.
Kneeling beside the assembled pieces, Rose threaded a curved surgical needle with a fine thread, the thread woven from strips of Eli Landry’s skin—the binding that had once held The Book of the Unwinding. She began stitching the pieces together, the sum of the Baphomet certain to be so much greater than its constituent parts.
Rose carried on, stopping only occasionally to wipe away the sweat beading on her brow, smearing her forehead with a fresh coat of crimson each time, until she’d finished assembling the form. She looked up to Astrid, an expression of excited expectation in her impassioned eyes. Astrid approached the figure and knelt beside it. She pressed the nail of Babau Jean’s finger between the breasts of the torso and pressed the razor tip in, cutting through flesh and bone. She had cleaved the sternum into perfect halves. Rose squatted across from her and scooped out the heart resting there. This she flung carelessly away, then wiped her hands on the earth. She stood and wandered off, then returned carrying a casket made of gold and encrusted with precious stones. Its lid was ornamented with what might appear to an untrained eye to be kneeling angels, their extended wings touching, but the figures weren’t angels. They were the Queen of Heaven and the King of Bones and Ashes, Inanna and the transcendent Damuzi, Artemis and Lucifer.
Rose lifted the lid and lowered the jeweled box down to her, presenting her with her own darling Luc’s heart, a relic the Dark Man Himself must have protected during her long exile. Astrid reached in, so carefully, so gently. She took it from the coffin and held it to her lips. She lowered it over the Baphomet, then laid it in the void left by the girl’s discarded heart.
Astrid rose and took a step back as Rose knelt once again by the creation’s side. She worked quickly, deftly, her nimble fingers looping the needle through both skin and bone, resealing the chest cavity with the thread spun from Eli’s skin.
As the sutures Rose had made to bind the body together dissolved into its flesh, the chimera jerked, reflexive uncoordinated movements.
The Dark Man licked His lips.
For a moment, there was stillness.
Michael’s transplanted eyes opened, the goat brain behind them firing to life one last time, a bleating scream escaping its lips. The Baphomet’s body then lurched over onto its stomach, hands pushing against earth. It forced its way up, staggering forward on hands and feet in a bastardized bear crawl—a goat’s attempt to escape.
And the people shall cry out
“Let not the sweetness touch
the lips of the wicked, for their love is impure.”
And dressed in white linens,
they shall lay with him as his whores.
The body’s memory of its human origins overtook the animal’s terror. The Baphomet rose to its feet, staggering. Rose caught hold of its hands, screaming along with the animal’s horrified bleating. The witch lifted it into the air as she leaped and skipped, swinging the chimera around in quickening, widening circles. She finally released the beast and it fell back, stumbling, finding its footing at the last moment before spilling over.
Rose bent over with laughter.
Freed from Rose’s grip, Frank’s hands went to the side of the goat’s head, digging into it. The body lurched around, spinning, falling to its knees as it struggled to separate itself from the head.
Astrid shifted her focus to the entity that had brought her to this moment. He blinked slowly like a satisfied cat, then His form fell away, shards of obsidian sloughing off and coalescing again into a cylindrical shadow, as long and black as a prize anaconda. It raised into a coil, then stretched out once more, slithering toward the beast. It wrapped around the creature’s legs, around its waist and torso, climbing, its “head” splitting open and branching. One branch oozed past the lips of its gaping mouth. Two entered its ears; two pierced its eyes. The shadow disappeared into the creature, filling it completely.
Rose didn’t at first notice, too busy making mocking bleats and pretending to charge the beast. When she finally saw the shadow invading the creature, her face twisted into a mask of confusion.
The creature uttered a sound unlike any Astrid had heard before—animal fear, a plea for mercy, a curse, a lament for every betrayal the world had ever seen, crescendoing to a cry of utter and perfect devastation. It stumbled and fell once again to its knees, but this time the topple failed to provoke a laugh from Rose, who had given the beast a wide berth. She rushed to Astrid’s side as if hoping for protection.
The creature arched its back. Its shoulders shrugged forward with an audible crack, disjointed with such force that the arms hung limply before its chest, its hands dangling, their backs turned inward and touching. The thing swung back and forth, turning at the precise moment for Astrid to witness the murdered girl’s back split open. Glutinous limbs pushed out through the wound and unfurled into enormous obsidian wings, each feather a sharpened knife.
The creature rose, teetering on its dark hooves while Astrid’s attention was fixed on other parts of the metamorphosis. The shadow that had invaded it slithered out from its gaping maw and glided to Astrid’s side even as Rose slipped behind her. The shadow piled in on itself, growing taller, first assuming the outline of the Dark Man’s shape, then coalescing into His full figure. His focus was no longer on her. The creature held His rapt attention.
The Baphomet roared and flapped its wings, the clicking of feather against feather syncopating its cry. Its eyes flashed red, as if an inferno raged within, then turned as black as its wings. In that moment the constituent parts merged into the far greater whole, losing any residual essence of the goat, any trace of Frank.
Astrid gazed at the beast in adoring wonder. Horrifying. Glorious.
She shook off Rose, who was tugging at her arm, trying to pull her away, and knelt before the Baphomet. Rose took a knee beside her, grasping her hand, oblivious to the deep cuts made by Babau Jean’s nails as Astrid drew away from her.
The Baphomet, now certain of its step, drew near them, its nostrils flaring as it sniffed their scents.
It was exquisite. He was exquisite.
And he shall lead them into a singular peace,
each following, blinded by adoration,
hand
to foot along a ladder that rises
not up to the heavens,
but downward endlessly into the abyss.
“You should run, dear,” Astrid said, deciding she owed Rose the benefit of a head start, if only for old times’ sake. Her son would be very hungry, and Rose was the only fresh meat to be had.
THIRTY
The van bounced as if it rolled over railroad tracks, four sets in quick succession, then slowed to a stop. One of her handlers—that’s the word that came to Nathalie’s mind—popped a cap off a syringe. The other grasped her arm and wrapped a tight rubber tourniquet around her bicep. As the boy held her tight, the father punched the needle into her vein and squeezed his poison into her.
Nathalie’s rational mind bobbed up and down from time to time, and in those rare moments of clarity, she realized they had been doping her. Psychedelics, for sure. God only knew what else. She breathed out the word “drug.”
“That’s right, sha. PCP. LSD. DMT. Emil, he’s done cooked you up the whole goddamned alphabet.”
A bang sounded against the side of the van. The father undid the tourniquet and nodded at his son, who hammered his fist three times on the van’s wall. Nathalie heard men’s voices, three or four of them, she guessed. The van’s rear doors opened in unison. She could still hear the voices, but no one appeared to be there. The back of the van sank down with added weight, and the hands of the men she’d heard speaking, the ones who weren’t there, grabbed hold of her and tugged her out. Nathalie landed on her feet but rocked a bit on the concrete pad. An invisible grip righted her.
The father and son climbed out of the van. The father winked at her, then placed his hand over his heart. His camouflage uniform shimmered, and he was gone, too. His son slapped his own chest and blinked out of sight.
One of the men spun Nathalie around and forced her forward—one unseen hand on her shoulder, the other bending her arm behind her back. Hot bubblegum breath feathered the nape of her neck.
