Light and dark merged as blood sprayed the walls.
Rooster backed away until he’d vanished into the safety of nearby shadows, the meager scraps of sanity he still possessed fracturing as night fell over the city of the damned.
* * * *
Lost in time, through bloodshot eyes Rooster watched the sun rise on a new day, broken dreams collected at his feet, tarnished trophies stolen rather than won. The beautiful innocence of a little boy nailed to a cross of wood in burning fields called to him across the years, tears from a forgotten and wasted life and the sins of ghosts from a past he couldn’t quite remember and perhaps never would. Perhaps he wasn’t meant to.
Repent? Save our souls? Deliver ourselves from evil?
But rather than destroy, the flames in those burning fields were what would eventually free him.
Maybe that’s what we’re doing right now.
Rooster rubbed his hands together, they’d gone so cold. He lit a Marlboro and checked the corner. The Crown Vic was gone. From behind him, he heard heels clacking pavement. Bundled in a winter coat and hat, Gaby walked across the courtyard with her typical brisk stride.
Across the street, Nauls’ car waited.
Gaby smiled, no longer wolf, but lamb.
“Where are we going?” Rooster asked.
“Away from here,” she said, offering him her hand.
“Home?” he asked.
“Home,” she said. “But get rid of the cigarette. Those things’ll kill ya.”
He slipped his hand into hers, and for the first time in a long while, felt himself smile.
Fires burned. They always would. But Rooster’s flames no longer trapped him in a Hell of his or anyone else’s creation. Instead, they destroyed those things shackling him to the Devil’s playground, and all the nightmares and lies that had tried so desperately to keep him there.
The longer you struggle against truth…
In a dark and distant field, a hideous scarecrow closed its sightless eyes.
The longer the forces of darkness will bind you…
Rooster’s soul quieted as the demons fell back into the lightless abyss from which they’d come.
Hand-in-hand with Gaby, Rooster walked to the car. Somewhere beyond the horizon, death’s other kingdom waited.
A kingdom not of shadows and darkness, but of peace.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Called “One of the best writers of his generation” by both the Roswell Literary Review and author Brian Keene, Greg F. Gifune is the author of numerous short stories, several novels and two short story collections (Heretics and Down To Sleep). His work has been published all over the world, consistently praised by readers and critics alike, received starred reviews in Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and The Midwest Book Review (among others) and has recently garnered interest from Hollywood. His novels include Children Of Chaos, Dominion, The Bleeding Season, Deep Night, Blood In Electric Blue, Saying Uncle, A View From The Lake, Night Work, Drago Descending, Catching Hell, Judas Goat, and Long After Dark. In addition to working as a full-time author, he also serves as Associate Editor at Delirium Books. Greg resides in Massachusetts with his wife Carol and a bevy of cats. Greg can be reached online at: [email protected] or through his official web site at: www.gregfgifune.com.
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