Church of Sin (The Ether Book 1)

by James Costall

  The Russian looked up suddenly and their eyes met. Never had she felt so much contempt for one man.

  The secret of bilateral travel to the Inter-World was lost centuries ago, said Azrael.

  He looked at her. His grin was incessant.

  “Ah, the Necromire cannot recall,” he realised. “So much of you was scrambled, wasn’t it demon? Or perhaps... yes... perhaps you never knew in the first place?”

  I don’t understand. Nobody knows the secret; nobody even knows whether it is real or not.

  “Perhaps I should put you out of your misery.”

  Grigori flicked open the wooden box he had put on the altar. He carefully placed his hands into the box and brought out a metal object, leaf shaped, glinting in the moonlight. About twelve inches long, much like a knife but with no handle. He took a staff from beside the altar and inserted the metal into one end to make, unmistakably, a spear.

  “The Spear of Destiny,” he announced. “The lance thrust into Christ’s side during the crucifixion by the Roman solider Longinus. Little did he know its untold power. And from his body wept blood, because he was human, and water, because he was divine. At least that’s what the Bible would have you believe. Christ was the ultimate regeneration, wasn’t he? And he did it with this spear. Not of a material that can be found on the Ether of course, but something altogether quite alien. You’ll no doubt be beginning to understand, doctor, that creatures and substances such as the Wyrm that so easily incapacitated the wretched Necromire in you from one of the other Great Worlds have seemingly magical properties if brought to the Ether. If used correctly, they can perform miracles.”

  Alix breathed slowly, every rise and fall of her chest seemed to bring her closer to black out. Her body wept with pain; it bled from every pore. She was in Hell, speaking with the Devil.

  Grigori gazed at her capitulated body; her soft, white arms, outstretched in submission. He brushed the spear across her midriff, gently lifting up her top to expose her tensed stomach. Her heart rate quickened, she knew how powerless she was. He examined her flesh where it was untouched by blood, hovered the tip of the spear just below her left breast. She looked away, disgusted.

  “You’re so beautiful,” he told her. “I thought that the first time I saw you at Innsmouth. My beautiful, dark Angel of Death. The Harbinger will be here soon to bring about an end to your suffering. To bring about an end to all suffering.”

  Then a noise from behind.

  The click of the latch.

  He removed the spear, bowed graciously and backed away until he was engulfed by the shadows.

  Chapter 82

  Harker stood with her arms folded, her hand stroking her chin, waiting for an answer. There was a musty smell in the windowless room underneath the Grand Hotel that permeated everything. It was the smell of old; unpleasant and stagnant.

  Henry and Bill, the small men who tended to the Steward, sat side by side in matching armchairs watching Harker closely, their stumpy legs not quite long enough to make solid contact with the ground. The high backs of the armchairs made them look even more disproportioned. They wore matching suits with thick pin stripes, ill-fitting waist coats and bow ties. It was impossible to tell them apart. Harker had given up trying decades ago.

  At the far end of the room the Steward sat in front of the crackling fire. To Harker, only part of his arm was visible, hung loosely over the chair, fingers tapping gently on a glass of murky, grey liquid.

  There was something about this room that made Harker feel uneasy. Something about it was unnerving. Like the walls themselves were breathing.

  “Well, Steward?”

  There was a noise from the other side of the chair, something like a sigh but deeper, as if the entire world was expressing indifference.

  “Lilith, this must be understood: the secret of how to return from the Inter-World has been hidden for centuries. Many men and Necromire have died protecting it but there are certain things that are predetermined, certain paths that cannot be altered. You know this well yourself.”

  “Bullshit. The Maker bequeathed the gift to shape this world’s future to those that inhabit it. The twenty-eighth Law of the Ether.”

  “Yes, but the Maker also provided that the Saviour would determine the fate of the Ether. For the Saviour to exercise that choice there must be a Rapture in one shape or another.”

  “Tell me the secret, Steward. You gain nothing from keeping it from me now.”

  Henry looked at Bill, or perhaps it was vice versa. They seemed to be enjoying the dialogue. With crooked fingers, the sort of fingers a puppet might have, the Steward lifted the glass of grey liquid and engulfed half of it. He replaced the glass clumsily.

  “You already know the answer, Lilith, to bilateral travel. It is depicted in the portrait that hangs in your hallway.”

  Harker pulled a face like she had eaten something disagreeable.

  “No. You surely don’t refer to the Spear?” The Steward said nothing, but continued to tap at the glass. “The Spear is lost. It’s not even on the Ether and in any event is unlikely to hold the properties that you attribute it with.”

  “Don’t be so hasty, Lilith. The power of the Spear of Destiny has long since been recognised on the Ether by those who are enlightened and those who are not. Hitler started his own world war with the sole or at least primary aim of acquiring it. And it is here. It has always been here.”

  “It is a myth that the Spear may allow return from the Inter-World.”

  “It is no such thing.”

  Harker looked distastefully at the back of the chair.

  “This was what George Bricken was protecting.”

  “Yes. Mr Bricken was the most recent guardian of the Spear and I grieve for his loss.”

  “Grieve?” Harker snorted. The midgets shuffled excitedly in their seats, they knew the heat was rising. “If the Spear does what you say it does, you entrusted it to the safekeeping of a weak old man? You are a fool, Steward. You should have given the Spear to me and it would not have fallen into enemy hands. Perhaps then, lives could have been saved.”

  “I think not, Lilith. As I have said, there are certain matters pertaining to the Ether that are already destined to play out. One of those events is the transfer of power to the Witch Hunters. More particularly, the acquisition of the Spear by the Harbinger was as inevitable as your reaction to my account of our actions.”

  Harker turned her head in dismay. She moved to find some support from a mahogany table. The item had probably once graced the home of some French aristocrat, maybe even a royal one; now it was used to prop up an old lamp in a forgotten room.

  “So let me understand this, Steward, the old man that died was a pawn in your game-plan?”

  “Lilith, it is sometimes necessary to make sacrifices for the greater good and, when making those choices, one must ensure that in so doing one bears the smallest loss to our side conceivable.”

  “A pawn, Steward.”

  “Yes,” and here, for the first time, the slightest hint of annoyance from the faceless speaker, “better to lose a pawn than a knight.”

  “I had no idea the Necromire were given to the utilitarian attitude of the feeble minded creatures native to the Ether.”

  “Their future is our future, Lilith. Ironically, the father of the concept of the greatest happiness for the greatest number, Jeremy Bentham, designed the Innsmouth institution where we now hide away our dirty secrets. The other pawns that have fallen by the wayside.”

  “Like Anwick.”

  “A good man, considering his native creed, but I understand the Necromire named Azrael survives?”

  “In the body of an ignorant woman named Franchot.”

  “Ah, yes, of course. Her father was also a Host, albeit an empty one.”

  “We never found a purpose for him and I would not have thought his daughter any more worthy. Fortuitous circumstances brought the wretch and the outcast together but which side of the line they tread is unclear
.”

  “Indeed.”

  There was silence for a moment whilst Harker chewed her tongue thoughtfully. Bill and Henry watched, eagerly awaiting the next bout.

  “So the Spear is the key to bringing the Vessel back through the Portal to unleash Sin upon the Ether,” she said. “Very well. And what of the Saviour, Steward? What else have you kept from me?”

  “There will be a time, Lilith, when the fate of the Ether shall rest exclusively with the Saviour. You know this much.”

  She took a step forward, staring dangerously at the back of the armchair, willing the Steward to turn, to see how the centuries had altered him.

  “And this Saviour: is it you, Steward?”

  The Steward said nothing. Drank the last of the murky liquid. Withdrew his hand from sight. And withered into the chair.

  “Very well,” said Harker. “The hard way it is.”

  Chapter 83

  Ash heaved open the oak door to the Church of Our Virgin Saint Mary and peered into the gloom. He let his eyes adjust for a few seconds before walking toward the font. His hand curled around the handle of an ASP spring cosh: a twenty one inch extendable baton, a favourite of CID officers and a weapon he had never actually had to use in anything other than a simulation. This was one of those times when he regretted not going to the station gym more often. He felt out of shape, confused and exhausted. The baton felt unfamiliar in his hand.

  He looked up the central aisle toward the altar, expecting to see the pyre of naked flesh and blood but there was nothing. The bodies had been removed and forensics had cleaned the church up pretty well.

  He saw behind the altar, the image of Christ on the cross, silhouetted against the moonlit window. He hadn’t recalled seeing that the last time he was here.

  She murmured his name but was too weak to project her voice enough above the rattling of the wind in the window frames.

  He walked up the central aisle apprehensively. He felt that someone was watching him from the distant corner of the room, felt something move in the shadows. His grip on the cosh tightened. He flicked the switch on the end of the handle, releasing the telescopic inner shafts to their full length.

  He stopped mid-way. Stared, his brain struggled to process what he was seeing.

  It couldn’t be. Impossible.

  Sat on chairs, looking for all the world like little manikins: the Laicey sisters. Megan and Katelyn. He tried to speak but words didn’t emerge, just a strange gargling noise. His instinct was to run to them, radio in, call an ambulance. But it wasn’t real. Couldn’t be real. Katelyn Laicey was dead.

  Must be a trick. They weren’t moving. Stock still. Their eyes just two black hollow gauges, like fish eyes.

  His name on the wind. Faint and distant.

  He faltered, dropped the baton. It hit the flagstone and rolled under one of the pews.

  Christ’s head had moved.

  It felt like something had punctured his lungs and sucked all of the air out of them, such was the intensity of the realisation. He struggled to breath, to speak. His legs felt untenable, he was supported on nothing but matchsticks bound together with brittle twine. If he moved, he felt sure his whole frame would collapse.

  “Ash,” she breathed through her pain.

  For what seemed like an age, he was paralyzed. Katelyn alive. Megan here too. Alix. Alix, nailed to the cross. Like Speck had been. But alive. At least, alive. Slowly, the colour returned to his cheeks and the adrenalin began to pump through his system. The feeling was like nothing he had experienced before. The mixture of fear, of wrath, of devastation, of need all clouded together, like a storm raging.

  And she looked into his eyes, past the tears that had accumulated at the corners and down his neck and straight into his heart and for a moment her pain seemed incidental to what passed between them. He returned her gaze, realised that the empty chasm festering at the pit of his being yearned for her, yearned to save her from this death. It felt like every mistake he had made in life was suddenly weighing down upon him; as if the floodgates that he had erected in his mind were finally breached and all of his regret – the dark, secret feelings he had incarcerated within him –inexorably spilled out through his body and, for the first time, he was truly and mercilessly awake.

  “Ash,” she wheezed, swallowing hard and bit her tongue to try and relinquish the dryness in her mouth. “It’s a trap...”

  The spell was broken as quickly as it was cast. From out of the darkness of the northern transept bolted the tall figure of a man. Ash felt something pierce his skin on the side of his right shoulder, fell back against the pews opposite and clattered to the floor. His assailant was upon him quickly and had the advantage of surprise, catching his face with a punch that split his lip open and could have broken his jaw had he not managed to deflect some of the force with his arm. For a split second, he blacked out, instinctively bringing his knees up over his stomach, trying to protect his vital areas from the assault. But the beating never came. Instead he heard the sound of metal scrape against stone.

  It gave him enough time to roll backwards and haul himself up with his back to Alix. His hand fumbled against his arm, checking the damage. It seemed only superficial but there was blood on his hand when he pulled it away. He glanced around but couldn’t see the baton.

  “Detective Fielding,” said a voice with a familiar Russian accent. Grigori, stepping forward, the Spear of Destiny lowered towards him. “It’s nice to see you again. How’s the investigation going?”

  “You?” Ash stammered, backing up the aisle and stepping into the apse. “You! I’ll kill you!”

  “You don’t have much chance of doing that, detective. Better stand aside and let the end of the world happen around us instead.”

  Grigori lunged but Ash was ready, catching the spear head as it glided past his chest and knocking it sideways sending it clattering to the floor. He thrust the back of his free elbow into Grigori’s face, felt the satisfying split of his septum, bringing a gush of blood from his nose. The Russian brought his fist hard into Ash’s kidneys. He yelled in pain and fell to one knee. Another hit to the face and he was tasting the cold flagstone again.

  “Fucking hell!”

  Alix, said the Necromire urgently. Think, hard. Focus. Focus on Ash. Focus on what may help him. You can do it.

  She tried to, looked around for something, anything. Propelled her thoughts to where he lay, clutching his side and trying to pick himself up. Grigori had already found the Spear again and was turning back to finish the job off.

  “You’ve proved to be quite a nuisance, detective. You cannot possibly comprehend the importance of this moment or the significance of the object that I am going to impale you on but needs must, I suppose.”

  Ash looked up into the mad eyes that came at him, Spear levelled, aimed at his head. He was bent over beyond the last pew, just before the apse rose by two steps toward the altar when the baton came skidding across the surface of the stone. He grabbed it, flicked it out and parried the spear, the metal sparking as it collided. Grigori found himself wrong footed, helped on his way by Ash’s foot in his ribs. He fell hard against the steps and lost the Spear.

  He turned quickly.

  Saw the baton glint in the moonlight.

  His skull shattered against the stone steps.

  Chapter 84

  What followed didn’t seem real. None of it seemed real. His sensation of it was fragmented, like trying to recall the moments of a particularly aloof dream.

  He heaved the altar across to the crucifixion, the sound of the wood scraping across the floor shattering the silence of the night. Standing on the altar, he placed his hand over her leg. He murmured words of comfort. Meaningless words of comfort.

  Heard her scream as he extracted the nail through her feet.

  Felt his body go numb, his limbs heavy and clumsy. Every inch of him wished he could swap her pain for his.

  Felt her arms wrap around him, the smell of her skin. Supported her a
s the third nail finally gave and she collapsed into him. Her dead weight threatened to topple him but he stabilized himself and eventually got her to the ground.

  They sat facing each on the floor of the apse, breathing low and heavy. Their arms were entwined round their necks and their heads lightly rested against each other.

  Minutes passed and they remained there and it seemed to them that, despite the pain, that moment was the most precious thing in the world.

  “The children,” Ash said at last, their breathing now synchronised.

  How to explain what she didn’t even understand herself?

  He began to turn his head toward them but she held it tight.

  “No,” she whispered. “No, don’t look. Please. They’re...”

  “But, Katelyn-”

  “It’s not Katelyn,” she interrupted. Then quieter: “It’s not Katelyn.”

  “Alix,” he tried to find the words but they seemed so elusive and everything seemed so complicated. “I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t understand but I’m-”

  “I know. I know that everything is wrong. But you came back for me.”

  He laughed a little, a sad, distant laugh. “Of course I came for you.”

  “Why? Why did you come back for me?”

  Time had passed so slowly between them for what seemed like an age and Ash was then reminded of the weight of his mistakes bearing down on him. He thought about the million different answers he could give and the consequences of each. The air hung heavy and stale around him. Like his whole life depended on what he said next.

  He settled for the truth.

  “Because-”

  *

  The Harbinger stopped and bent low to the ground; felt the turf beneath the ice, watched as the frozen dirt crumbled between his fingers. The drops of blood from where they had carried the body had congealed into a purple tar and partially frozen. The evidence of what had happened here was all around him.

  He looked up. The moon was a pale yellow, hanging low in the sky surrounded by pin prick stars peeking through wispy, purple clouds. At the foot of the hill, the empty village of White Helmsley spread out across an undulating landscape of snowy fields, little stone walls and illogically shaped streets and beyond that, if he listened hard enough, he could hear the low rumble of the A-road traffic.