What Tangled Webs

by Dan Dillard

CHAPTER 9

  AGNES WAS HER name, a horrible name for a rather unpleasant woman. She was ugly to match her aura, displayed none of the sweetness or understanding found in many older women, and to complete the package, she walked with a slight limp. He wondered if he shouldn't just take her life and be done with it. Let someone deserving live on. He knew Harry wouldn't allow it.

  Perhaps, he thought, that dark shroud around her wasn't her own evil, but instead an indication that Agnes would become the victim of some horrific act. He trusted neither instinct and wanted proof. Rather than kill her outright, he decided to follow her.

  He researched Agnes for three days and learned that she worked for the rich. None of her jobs were long stints, but the wealthy liked to travel and young children were somewhat of a burden. Agnes watched their children and kept their houses for a modest fee and when he asked around, Kane found her services came with the highest recommendation from the locals. She wasn't from town, but relocated some years ago. Her past prior to that was virtually unknown and she never made small talk with anyone.

  On the fourth day, he followed her to a home where she stopped and knocked. Her limp was noticeably worse that day and she arrived at half past nine. The owner of the home met her at the door, a young man no older than Kane—at least when he had been alive. He wore a tailored suit and appeared as well-to-do as a banker or perhaps an attorney. Whatever he was, he was quite unhappy to answer the knock and find Agnes standing there.

  She attempted an obvious apology and the man of the house hurried her in the door. As Kane followed around to the side window of the home, he heard an angry discussion going on inside. Strangely, the voices were clear, not muffled by the glass. Another plus, like the night vision.

  “I will not tolerate late arrivals. We brought you in a few days early—at full salary, mind you—so that you might familiarize yourself with our home and our child. Punctuality is a must if you’d like to keep in my employ.”

  Kane heard groveling in the older woman's voice, and then, the man continued.

  “For you to show up here one hour past the agreed upon time is disrespectful and unacceptable.”

  Perhaps the woman is ill or simply misunderstood the terms. Maybe you are my target, sir.

  “I've half a mind put you back out into the street,” he continued, berating the old woman and storming around.

  “No, sir. That won't be necessary,” Agnes said, clearly thattime.

  The abusive tone continued and reminded Kane of the rage he saw when the priest brought the bottle down on the young girl’s head. He closed his eyes and shook his head to wipe the image clear. Walking to the back of the home, he noticed another door.

  Something toppled and the sound of shattering of glass alerted him. Kane assumed the man had snapped and was taking life’s frustrations out on the feeble Agnes. Preying on the elderly must've been his vice…a carnival ticket for his heart to win a ride in Satan’s satchel.

  Kane kicked in the back door and was surprised at the relative ease with which it came apart. He listened to find the scuffling continued and the noise of him bursting in the door hadn’t alerted anyone. He made his way through the kitchen into the dining room and found the two lying on the floor. The young man straddled the old bird, hands about Agnes’ neck cursing her as he choked.

  “Die you damnable…witch!” he screamed, his eyes bulging with rage.

  Kane only saw Agnes’s face as he sorted in his mind who was victim and who was villain. He kicked the young man in the back of the head with explosive force. The heel of his boot gashed the scalp wide open at the base of his skull.

  Such strength!

  Grabbing at the bloody wound, the man stood and turned to face Kane. He threw a wild punch with his other hand and Kane caught the arm in mid swing and twisted it up and under until it snapped. With the broken arm behind its owner's back, Kane slammed his face into the heavy wooden table. Bones smashed, spreading his nose and sending teeth and blood in every direction. The man’s body went limp and fell to the floor, shuddering in the final rattles of death. Blood poured from his caved-in face and the gash in the back of his head. His jaw and cheek bones were razor-sharp splinters in his brain.

  The adrenaline felt good. Kane was glad that murderer would not be adding bodies to his collection. Then he heard Agnes speak.

  “You bastard!” she screamed, breathing heavily.

  “He was mine! Not yours! I curse you to hell you vile, stupid bastard.”

  With that she slapped his face, clawing two fresh scrapes on his left cheek. The knot in his stomach was still there and it tightened. He had made a mistake. Blood drained from his head as he came to realize he’d destroyed an innocent man. Agnes's eyes were black with fury.

  He looked at the dead man on the floor and saw the bite marks on his cheek. Bite marks he hadn't seen before. She had attacked him. He watched the woman scream again pounding her fists on her upper thighs. It was a tantrum, as if Kane had taken her joy. She wailed and screeched and then she fled through the front door.

  “What have I done?” he said.

  This man was a father and a husband...and now he was dead. Kane crossed himself and then closed the young man’s lifeless eyelids. Blood pooled around the head creating a grotesque halo which Kane thought a joke for his benefit. Somewhere a young woman was shopping with her baby or visiting friends or family and would come home to find this.

  He wept openly, leaving the body as it was and exited as he had entered. Not only had he killed the wrong person, an innocent person, but now Agnes would be able to see him coming.

  ..ooOOoo..

  AS HE WALKED through door to his home, Kane felt the exact presence he hoped he would never again feel. Harry sat on Kane's dining table with his cloven hooves propped on one of the chairs and looked unhappy.

  “You don't understand my process do you?” he howled.

  The devil raised a hand, beckoning for his servant. Kane refused. Harry's flicked his claws and Kane slid across the floor and violently slammed into a chair, smashing it to pieces. He landed on his back in the leftover pile of splintered wood. Immediately the demon was in his face and Kane felt its hot breath and smelled the rot and decay that boiled up from its diseased bowels. Standing before he continued to scold his apprentice, Harry calmed.

  “We all make mistakes, I suppose. I'm actually to blame for that. Otherwise I’d be out of business. Patience, however, is not one of my inventions.”

  Kane rose up on his elbows to sit. His anger controlled, Harry pointed at the ceiling while never taking his eyes off of Kane.

  “I do not willingly send souls to Him. They suffer here first, at the hands of mortals...not at the hands of my servants. There are rules and I need you to pay better attention.”

  Harry paused, “On the other hand, the anger you displayed was quite precious and it was a nice kill…messy. Nevertheless, you missed the target. And there's that other problem. Can you guess what that is?”

  Kane looked up at him without raising his head. His muscles sore from landing on the floor.

  “She knows my face and will be looking over her shoulder,” he said.

  Harry looked more demonic than ever with his four twisted black horns and deep, dark, green skin. He batted red-rimmed black eyes.

  “Precisely. If I wanted to be obvious, I would have flown in with my own wings and eaten her soul in public. You need to work on your technique.”

  Sarcasm is the devil’s wit, Kane’s mother said to him. Apparently she was right. He didn't recall seeing wings, but little was surprising anymore.

  “Find her while she sleeps this evening, and bring her here to me.”

  “No. Not in my home,” Kane argued.

  “You have no home. There will be an investigation into the young man whose life you so rudely interrupted this morning. The good neighbors will be wary of suspicious looking characters. And, you have acquired two more scars to add to your repertoire. You look more suspici
ous than I do. Learn to pace yourself, Mr. Kane. Eternity is a long time.”

  Kane needed more information.

  “What has she done, this Agnes?”

  The demon flamed, eyes wild as it stomped its way back across the floor, bent over so as not to bump its horns on the ceiling, and leaned down into Kane’s face.

  “I don't like being questioned.”

  Kane held his hands up in protest.

  “Please, this is for my already frail sanity.”

  It was true. If he was to cull out the twisted lumber of society, it would help him cope to know they were truly guilty.

  “Your sanity is not my concern. I quite enjoy the insane. They simply see what is really there. You'd be surprised how accurate they are.”

  “This once, I will tell you. From now on, you will do as I say.”

  “Fine,” Kane replied.

  “She murders. Beautiful and calculating is her mind and very, very damaged. As a young bride, she was robbed of an unborn child by an abusive man—that's another soul I am quite proud to own. She took her revenge on that man…and eleven others since. She gains their trust and then she poisons them.”

  “It sounds like they deserved it.”

  “Her husband deserved her wrath. However, she enjoyed the taste of murder. The rest of her kills were innocent, at least to her. Today would have made lucky thirteen. I hoped you would've let her finish before killing her, but you completely fouled this up,” Harry said.

  “Were they all fathers?”

  “Yes. Men with children. Lovely, vengeful work. That's why I want her.”

  “You are sick,” Kane said.

  “She attacked with her bare hands today, and might have succeeded! You took that glory from her and still left a broken home. You also left a deviant murderer free to roam and feeling quite unfulfilled. There's no telling where she might strike. How I do love the random acts of violence.”

  Though he was grinning, Harry’s black eyes showed disapproval towards his pupil. Kane sat in disbelief of his life and asked the obvious question.

  “If you enjoy chaos so much, then why collect those who cause it? Why not leave them here for your entertainment?”

  “No point in wasting good talent is there? I like to keep it close to home. There will always be more, and besides, we wouldn’t want them forgiven now would we?” Harry said.

  “You're recruiting them?”

  “Where do you think bad ideas come from? My armies place them in the minds of humans while they sleep,” Harry said and vanished.

  It was discomforting to Kane that it could be that simple—that black and white—but there was no time. Finding Agnes was his urgent task. She could leave town or worse: she could stay, go to the police and put out Kane's description. Harry had promised he would not be jailed, but adding in the authorities, corrupt or not, only added hassle to his ongoing nightmare. His effort would need to be planned and executed quickly and quietly if he was to get her back to his home and not alert the entire town.

  Kane saw his reflection in the window and noticed the two streaks of fresh scar running down his cheek and thought he was beginning to look the part. He would have to pace himself.