The Truth Collector (Demon Marked Book 1)

by Corey Pemberton

  She pressed her face closer. I'm sorry, she mouthed.

  “What?” Malcolm said.

  Her lips moved again, but her words were muted on this end. Malcolm turned away from her to check his surroundings. He lay on a rocky beach with catamaran pieces all around him. Paul lay about a dozen yards away. He had his legs and arms wrapped around what was left of the ship's mast. There was no sign of the sail or any of the other ships.

  Malcolm looked back into the tunnel through which they came. He found only rocks – they looked like teeth belonging to a monster. Its mouth was open, but he couldn't see far in it because it rose at an angle and twisted. Water rushed out of it in a persistent stream, pooling next to the sandy spot where they lay.

  “You all right?” Paul said.

  Malcolm flexed his fingers and toes. “I wouldn't go that far… but I'm alive. I wonder where all the boats went.”

  “Maybe they weren't so lucky.”

  “Maybe we weren't so lucky.”

  “I think that thing – whatever it was – was like the bottom of a big drain. Maybe other boats went down different holes.”

  “Yeah,” Malcolm said. “Maybe. If that's true I just hope we went down the right hole.”

  Paul stood up, coughed up some water, and started to pick his way along the rocky beach. Walls of rock surrounded them in a horseshoe. There were walls above them too, sealing in the moisture. Malcolm's body throbbed as he watched Paul explore the underground lagoon.

  “Shit, man,” Paul said.

  “What?” Malcolm sat up to face the sound of his voice and flopped back down when the pain hit him.

  “We aren't the only ones who've been down here. Looks like a little dock or something.”

  When Malcolm propped himself up – much more carefully this time – he saw that Paul was right. Someone had arranged some driftwood into a little ramp. A log with a rope tied around it jutted out at the end. Whatever boat belonged down here was missing.

  “I'm trying to think of the girl,” said Paul, “but all I can think about is not throwing up.”

  Malcolm nodded and slowly got to his feet “My stomach's still in my throat.”

  The light from above flashed in his eyes, blinding him. When his vision cleared Malcolm looked up and found the same bedroom as before, though a new light bounced on the mirror.

  Charlotte held one of the policemen's flashlights.

  Now she aimed it at the mirror and tilted it to reflect a streak of light in the lagoon. She stuck her tongue out as she moved it back and forth, changing the angle until the light appeared at Malcolm's feet.

  When Malcolm looked down she moved the light across the beach and onto a wall.

  At least it looked like part of a wall.

  But the way the rocks were cut…

  Not by nature. But by human hands.

  They forced their broken bodies over to it as fast as they could.

  Paul got there first. Balancing on a pile of rocks, he reached for it and pushed. There was a lot of groaning and sweating, but no moving. Then Malcolm pressed against the wall too, adding his weight and desperation. He pushed until his arms gave out and collapsed against the rock slab.

  Paul kept on. He worked his fingers around the edges for some secret trigger or release point. But it was no use. Cursing, he gave up and looked out at the cove. It would have been peaceful down here if the circumstances were different. But water rushed down the tunnel beyond their vision – water that had trapped them and sealed them in.

  “Well,” Paul said. “That was a bust.”

  “Wait.” Malcolm was on his feet again, rushing down to the catamaran wreckage that had washed ashore. He rifled through lamps and jewelry and coin purses. He didn't stop until his fingers landed on a leather canteen. It was empty, but he dipped it into the water and filled it.

  When he came back to the rock he motioned for Paul to move aside.

  Then he splashed some water onto the rock face.

  Now colors appeared under the wet spots. What looked like splotches of white paint streaked across the surface. The markings were haphazard at the edges, but got more organized as they approached the center.

  There was a pattern there.

  Malcolm stared at it open-mouthed and almost dropped the canteen.

  Before them glowed a giant white spade.

  Paul stepped forward, blinking as Charlotte bounced her light up and down on it. “You've gotta be kidding me.”

  Malcolm ignored him. Before the water dried, he reached for the marking and began to trace it with his fingers.

  “H – how'd you know to do that?” said Paul.

  Malcolm kept tracing. “I don't know.” He brushed across the rock face until his finger reached the tip of the spade where he'd begun. Next he pulled his finger away and held it in midair a few inches from the rock. He held his breath too. He'd knocked on the door…

  But was anyone home? Would anyone answer?

  Then that spade brightened.

  It began to pulse like it had on Fielder's cheek when his blood and rage pumped through it. It brightened and pulsed until it swallowed up Charlotte's light and filled the lagoon with a sickly hue.

  Paul stepped back, but Malcolm didn't move.

  That thing was watching them, sizing them up like a discerning butler screening guests who dressed like they'd stumbled into the wrong neighborhood. Malcolm could hear its every pulsation. Like heartbeats. They mixed with his own, thumping in the lagoon.

  Finally the door gave way.

  It slid aside into some secret notch in the wall and welcomed them into a hallway of blinding light. Malcolm and Paul shut their eyes. It was like all the light of the underworld was stashed away down here, saved for this little corner and nowhere else. Malcolm turned his back on the light, grabbed Paul's arm, and backed him into the secret doorway.

  Then a blast of air filled their prison jumpsuits. Slam. The door closed behind them, and Malcolm heard a lock clicking somewhere deep inside the rock face. The only way to go was forward.

  Malcolm and Paul felt along a corridor as their eyes adjusted to the light. They tried to walk shoulder to shoulder, but the walls squeezed them so tightly they had to go single file. Each time Malcolm opened his eyes the pain lessened, but two red orbs still floated there like mini burning suns. He caught a few glimpses of the corridor in the corner of his vision. Instead of the rocks and water and darkness to which they'd grown accustomed, this world was just the opposite.

  This was a world of plush carpet and faux plants and crown molding. They stumbled forward, knocking pictures and paintings from the walls until Paul wandered face first into a grandfather clock and demanded they stop. Malcolm leaned against an empty spot on the wall and waited for his vision to return.

  He blinked away light spots and tears. The girl was still crying. Now she cried in sudden gasps with long spaces in between them. She cried like she was giving up.

  “Nora,” Paul said. “Are you in here?”

  More tears.

  Malcolm opened his eyes. The fuzziness had finally cleared. They were in a long, carpeted corridor that stretched past the limits of his vision. It unrolled in front of them, climbed a set of stairs, and disappeared into darkness. Mirrors and other shiny things filled the walls, casting strange reflections like a fun house they couldn't escape. Every time he turned there was a nauseating second where all the Malcolms – countless reflections of them – turned with him. Landscape paintings were mixed in with the mirrors: vast desert scenes, open ocean, tropical islands.

  The hallway lights flickered, unsure of themselves. Torches and candles and light bulbs with hanging cords that seemed to go nowhere. Malcolm and Paul pressed ahead. On the crimson carpet they left blood and tears and remnants from their treacherous trip down to the lagoon. They walked, chanting the little girl's name from time to time, until Malcolm's sanity left him altogether.

  “We aren't moving,” Paul said, reaching forward into the corridor. “I swear we
passed this stuff on the wall already.”

  Malcolm looked down at his feet. He lifted one and put it in front of the other – just like he'd been doing all these past… minutes? Hours? “Where are you, Nora?”

  Tears were her only answer.

  Then there was another sound: a peppy piano tune that drifted into the hallway. It was barely audible, but persistent. Every few measures a note jarred them, the song stopped, and then it started again from the beginning. Someone was practicing. On and on they played. They hammered keys with tired, clunky fingers until Malcolm lost all sense of time completely. He and Paul put one foot in front of the other, but they might as well have been circling.

  Caught up in an endless loop – just like that song.

  Paul stumbled forward with his fingers in his ears. “Where is she?” He screamed at his reflections, launched into a rage that ended with paintings and mirrors heaped on the floor. He joined them there, adding to the pile, the shreds of his prison jumpsuit barely covering him. “I can't do this anymore.” Nora was his chant before, but this one swooped in and replaced it.

  Malcolm opened his mouth. But he couldn't find any comforting words there. He looked down the hallway and listened to the endless music loop. It seemed louder now – almost to the point it hurt his ears.

  Wait. That was it.

  “Paul,” he said. “The song's louder now. Don't you hear it?”

  He looked up at him and shrugged. “So what? We're closer to some damn speaker? Big deal.”

  Malcolm waved him off with his hand. “Someone's playing that. Somewhere close. Now come on.”

  Paul didn't answer. He just got to his feet and started walking again. They left dirt and blood and water spots all over the hallway. And Malcolm left his last hope there too. If this was just another illusion…

  But the corridor began to slope upward. Gradually at first, then steeper. They ran up it, Malcolm first and Paul behind, until they had to cover their ears because the music was too loud. The little girl's name lived in their thoughts and on their lips.

  “Nora. Nora, Nora, Nora,” they said.

  Then they nearly flew into a wall.

  Malcolm caught himself at the last second and cried out. Their legs tangled and they flew around a corner, landing in a confused pile. When Malcolm looked back he noticed the turn in the wall. He opened his mouth to ask Paul if he was all right, but a hand smothered his lips.

  Paul lay next to him. He covered Malcolm's mouth with one hand and used the other to point across a vast expanse of empty carpet. A man sat on a piano bench. It wasn't a small bench, but his ass almost stretched all the way across it. He had his back turned to them, hunched forward like a tortoise shell. Stubby arms flew from his midsection striking piano keys. He held his face close to the keyboard and pumped his feet on the pedals as sweat dripped off of him.

  The room looked empty with the exception of the man and his instrument. He played and played, oblivious to the intruders behind him. He and the piano molded together into a single breathing, sweating unit.

  Malcolm turned to Paul but he was already gone, a swatch of white carpet where his body had been. Somehow he'd untangled his limbs and scurried away while Malcolm watched the pianist. Next he was subjected to a new kind of torture: having to watch Paul crawl across that carpet on his elbows and knees. Closer and closer to the piano he crawled, pausing sometimes to look at the man's gigantic back.

  Malcolm jerked forward, stopped. He almost called out, but he didn't dare break the pianist's concentration. So he did the only thing he could do: bit his lip and watched Paul sneak closer.

  Ten feet. Then five feet.

  Two.

  Malcolm held his breath.

  Paul was right behind him now – so close some of the man's sweat landed on his face whenever he hammered the keys in fortissimo. He crept beneath the piano bench and wrapped his hands around its legs.

  Then he pulled.

  The pianist wobbled, unable or unwilling to look back or remove his fingers from the keys. Rolls of fat shifted from side to side in his desperate scramble. He cried out – a deep, guttural scream. But Paul tugged harder and the bench flipped forward. The man's face slammed into the keyboard with a clang. His body quivered there for a moment before sliding down into the carpet.

  Paul stood above him, gasping. “He's out cold.”

  Malcolm walked over to them. “That was really stupid. What if he turned around? What kind of plan was that?”

  Paul snorted. “He didn't. And it was the best one we had. You're welcome, by the way.”

  Malcolm pressed his foot against the unconscious man's face and flipped it over. What he found there made him jerk his foot away as fast as he could.

  A familiar marking pulsed on his cheek: a spade the color of chalk dust. Watching them. Cursing them. The longer Malcolm looked at it the larger it seemed to grow, spreading across the man's face like an infection.

  “That gets me every time,” Paul said. “I don't know why. I guess I shouldn't be surprised at this point.”

  “He's another servant,” Malcolm said. “Probably good you clobbered him. We don't want whoever's in charge down here to know we're around.”

  “Yeah. If they don't already know.”

  Malcolm looked around the room. Only then did he notice it was circular. No furniture. No shit on the walls, but doors. Doors everywhere, pressed so close together their frames touched, branching off into hallways like spokes in a wheel. All of them looked identical, felt identical. The flash of intuition that drove him to splash water on the rock wall was gone.

  “What the hell?” Paul said, shifting his eyes from door to door.

  Malcolm shook his head. He went over to the piano and looked at the keys. They were slick with sweat, and so worn they blended together into one, endless key. He glanced at the man on the ground then plunked one.

  The man's eyes shot open.

  He shoved aside Paul's outstretched arm and lunged for Malcolm. His eyes were full of fear, lids pulled wide and lost somewhere in the jiggly skin. He moved faster than any man his size had the right to move. Arms out. Mouth open. Teeth bared in a snarl.

  Malcolm backed away from the piano, caught his leg on the corner, and fell to the ground. He held out his arms, stiffened his stomach before the man could crush him. Yet that weight never came. When Malcolm looked up he found the man back at his piano. He stood in front of it banging keys and pumping pedals. The fear in his face had eased, but the weariness remained.

  He had picked up the tune right where he'd left off. And he kept playing – even when sweat flew from his face and Malcolm and Paul stood over his shoulder. He paid them no regard. His eyes never wandered from the keys.

  “Hello?” Paul said. “Hello?”

  The man kept playing, hands shuffling along the keys without missing a beat.

  “Hey,” Paul said. “We're talking to you.” He tapped the pianist on the shoulder, and still the man played. Another tap. The man winced as he hit a wrong note. Paul and Malcolm started slapping his back. Now the pianist clinked out more wrong notes than right ones, but he pressed on without ever turning around…

  Until Malcolm covered his eyes.

  “No,” the man said. He took a hand away from the piano and started pulling at Malcolm's fingers. But he kept playing with the other, refusing to end the song even though it sounded like nothing more than random noises.

  Malcolm held his hand over the man's eyes while Paul reached for his playing hand. He grabbed it at the wrist. The man growled, and when the last note's echo faded he began to whimper. Every second of silence lashed him like a whip.

  “No,” he said. “Please no.” He frothed and struggled and sweat, but Malcolm and Paul kept his hands away from the keyboard.

  “Listen to us,” Malcolm said. “Listen right now.”

  “You don't understand,” the man said. “They told me to play – always play. No breaks. We might have guests.”

  Malcolm squeezed the ma
n's head. “I'm going to break this fucking piano if –”

  “No.” The man seized forward and ripped their hands away. He pressed his back against the piano with his arms outstretched. “I have to play. You have to let me play.”

  “We will,” said Malcolm. “But we need to ask you something. We're looking for a little girl.”

  “Her name's Nora,” said Paul. More of her tears rolled down his cheek.

  “Crying,” said the man. His eyes bounced back and forth between them. “They're always crying.” He hummed the tune he'd been playing, peeking around the corner that led to the corridor from which Malcolm and Paul had came. “They'll be back soon. If I'm not playing...” The spade mark pulsed on his face. He poked at it and ripped his finger away when it got too close. “They know,” he said, his voice filling the chamber. “They know I stopped.” He dove for the piano and started playing again. “I'm sorry,” he said.“I'm so sorry. Forgive me.” He spoke in a cadence that matched the tempo of the song.

  Tears streamed down the young man's face – he was more of a boy, really – and mixed with the grease and sweat.

  Paul reached for his hand again, but Malcolm shook his head.

  “Where's the little girl?” said Malcolm. “Where's Nora?”

  The pianist bit his lip and clinked a few wrong notes. The tempo of his song was faster now, reckless.

  “Where is she?” said Paul.

  Malcolm moved in front of the piano and grabbed the man's face. “I asked you a question. Where's Nora?”

  For an instant their eyes met. Something flickered – a weak link in whatever chain anchored the man to his piano. He played softer now, stopping and starting, and spoke in a little squeak. “I don't want to be a jester for eternity.” His eyes rose from the keyboard. The way he looked at him made Malcolm's blood run cold.

  “Just tell me where she is,” said Malcolm. “We'll let you be after that.”

  “Pretty pink for the pretty girls?” The man cocked his head to the side and grinned. “Yes. I distinctly remember someone telling me that once. Pretty pink for the pretty girls.” He started to sing it to the tune: “Pretty pink for the pretty girls. Pretty pretty pink...”