by Tim Waggoner
“The earthquake….”
“Was the result of the Intercessor pulling itself out of the ground,” Goat-Eyes said.
Lori thought of the Cabal members she’d seen within the tower, hundreds of them. Had any of them managed to escape before the Intercessor had begun to wake? What of those that had been caught inside? Had they been tossed around like pieces of straw in a hurricane as their god began to move? If so, how many of them had survived? Not that she gave a damn what happened to them, considering the way they treated the people they abducted.
“Why would you let it come to this?” Lori asked. “If you just handled Imbalances yourselves instead of goading us into trying to figure everything out, something like this would never happen, and the Intercessor could go on sleeping forever.”
“We are unable to directly address an Imbalance,” Goat-Eyes said.
“Why the fuck not?” Lori demanded.
“Because we don’t know what causes them!” the Driver shouted.
Lori stared at him, shocked.
He went on, speaking normally once more, although she sensed this restraint took an effort.“The Intercessor communicates with us psychically, in jumbled images that aren’t always easy to interpret. We can usually determine who has created an Imbalance, where on Earth they live, and how to find them. But we do not know what they have done specifically to upset the Balance. We only know that they have, and that only they can repair the damage that they’ve caused.”
“It is said that long ago, the Intercessor told us everything,” Goat-Eyes said. “But by knowing too much, we risked interfering too directly, which we sometimes did, making an Imbalance worse than it was originally.”
“Sounds like a fucked-up system to me,” Lori said.
“Perhaps,” the Driver admitted. “But it has served us well enough for several thousand years.”
“Until today,” Lori said.
“Yes,” the Driver agreed. “Until today.”
“So what happens now?” she asked.
“The Intercessor will travel the Nightway until it finds an exit,” Goat-Eyes said. “It will use its power to widen the gateway until it is large enough to pass through. It will then go to your world – to Oakmont, specifically. There, it will rectify the Imbalance.”
“You said the Intercessor was awakened by Edgar’s death,” Lori said. “Why would it go to Oakmont instead of his hometown?”
“Because Edgar would not have died if you hadn’t come to the Nightway on your own,” the Driver said. “That was something we did not anticipate. Since you caused his death, however indirectly, his Imbalance has been added to yours. This now makes Oakmont the focal point of both your transgressions.”
“What will the Intercessor do?” Lori asked, but before either Goat-Eyes or the Driver could answer, she remembered the final vision Aashrita had revealed to her in the Garden of Anguish – an aerial view of Oakmont, flattened as if by a series of massive tornadoes.
“Oh god,” she whispered.
“The destruction of your town will be total,” the Driver said. “But if the Imbalance isn’t corrected, the Shadowkin will overrun your entire world, devouring everything until nothing remains. Oakmont is a small price to pay for saving your planet.”
It didn’t seem that small to Lori. Thousands of people lived in Oakmont, and if what Goat-Eyes and the Driver were telling her was true, they were all marked for death.
“There are two Imbalances in your town,” the Driver said. “And now Edgar’s can never be fixed. The Intercessor can tolerate a single Imbalance in one location. It’s like a wound that will never heal but which will not, itself, prove fatal. But the Intercessor cannot abide two Imbalances, especially when one is as serious as what you caused.”
“We know the Shadowkin are involved somehow,” Goat-Eyes said. “They’re drawn to you because you’ve become the living embodiment of Imbalance. The negative energy you emit is like food and drink to them. It’s made them grow stronger, given them the power to affect matter in your world.”
“So you know whatever I did is serious, but you don’t know what it is,” Lori said.
“Precisely,” Goat-Eyes said.
“Then what fucking use are you?” Lori sighed. “If I go back to my world and fix the Imbalance I created….”
“The Intercessor may return to its slumber,” the Driver said.
“May?”
The Driver exchanged a glance with Goat-Eyes before turning back to Lori. “It’s our best guess at this point.”
Lori was about to tell the Driver where he and Goat-Eyes could shove their best guess when a new tremor hit. This was different than the others, a single solid thoom.
The Driver and Goat-Eyes – both of whom had always seemed in total control – now looked scared shitless.
Thoom.
Lori saw a crimson glow off in the distance, and for a moment she thought the sun was rising. Except there was no sun in this place.
Thoom.
The crimson glow swayed from side to side, and Lori understood that she was seeing the tower – the Intercessor’s horn – lit up. The behemoth was using it to light its way, like a fish that lived in the darkest depths of the ocean used bioluminescence to help locate its prey.
Thoom.
Both Goat-Eyes and the Driver had been looking toward the crimson light, but now the Driver turned toward her.
“Go! We’ll do what we can to slow down the Intercessor!”
Thoom.
Lori turned toward the shimmering curtain that marked the exit and ran, pain in her knee be damned.
Chapter Thirteen
She’d forgotten it had been raining back home, but she remembered the instant she reemerged into her world and cold water pelted her naked body, the raindrops’ impact making her cuts and bruises sting. The sky was dark, but not nearly so much as on the Nightway, and she saw buildings flanking her on the right and left, saw cars moving past her, coming toward her.
The exit had let her out in the middle of a street.
Drivers honked their horns, some in warning, some in irritation, some in approval of seeing a naked woman in their midst. Lori still gripped the Gravedigger Special – which now held only five rounds – and out of reflex she pointed it at a car coming toward her. It was a black Kia Soul, just like the kind Larry drove. The vehicle stopped and the driver put on the hazard lights, while the drivers behind laid on their horns, angry at having to deal with the sudden obstacle. The driver lowered his window and stuck his head out.
“Why the hell are you naked?” Larry asked.
Grinning in relief, Lori lowered the gun and ran toward Larry’s car, bare feet slapping wet pavement. Once she was inside, Larry took off his leather jacket and handed it to her. She draped it over herself like a blanket and shivered as Larry turned on the heater and cranked it to full blast. Warm air gusted from the vents, and Lori closed her eyes and sighed. It was the first real warmth she’d felt since finding herself on the Nightway again, and it was like heaven.
Drivers continued to honk, and Larry turned off the Kia’s hazards and began moving forward again. Lori opened her eyes and looked at him.
“Thanks for picking me up,” she said. “But how the hell did you know where to find me?”
“This.”
Larry’s phone rested in the cupholder. He picked it up, swiped his thumb across the screen to unlock it, and then handed it to Lori. She took the phone and saw a text message displayed.
Lori. Franklin Street where it intersects Hawthorne. 4:37 p.m.
She saw the sender’s name: Aashrita.
“Isn’t that the name of the friend of yours who….” Larry began.
“Yes.”
Lori felt no pressure to dismiss the memory of her friend – and she felt no migraine threatening – and this was such a relief that
she almost cried. It seemed Aashrita might’ve forgiven her after all and was looking out for her from the other side. She texted back Thanks and received an immediate reply.
What are friends for?
Smiling, Lori put the phone back in the cupholder.
“So…you’re getting texts from dead people now,” Larry said.
“Guess so.”
“And you’re appearing out of thin air without any clothes on.”
“Yep.”
“Sounds like you’ve had an interesting day so far.”
“You could say that.”
“My day was eventful, too.”
“You go first,” Lori said.
She listened as Larry told her about his encounter with Goat-Eyes and almost getting run down by the Driver, how he’d slipped into unconsciousness afterward. He woke up just as the paramedics arrived. They examined his leg, pronounced it badly bruised but not broken, and suggested he see a doctor for a more thorough diagnosis. He said he would, and when the paramedics determined he was otherwise uninjured, they departed. His leg hurt, but he could get around on it okay. He’d holed up in a library after that, a place where he could be around people and feel safe, or at least safer. He figured the Cabal would leave him alone if others were close by. It was a stupid assumption, and she wanted to berate him for putting those people in danger. Better he had gone somewhere where he’d be alone, in case Goat-Eyes, the Driver, or another of the Cabal approached him again. She said nothing, though, and when he finished talking, she understood why he hadn’t appeared in the visions Aashrita had shown her. Unlike Melinda, Katie, Justin, Reeny, and Brian, he’d managed to resist the Cabal’s influence.
“So how about you?” Larry asked.
She quickly filled him in.
“So there’s some kind of Godzilla-sized monster heading for town? That’s…fucked up.”
“Sure is.”
“How long before this thing – the Intercessor – gets here?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think it moves very fast, and the Driver said once it reaches an exit, it’ll have to make it big enough for itself to go through. I have no idea how long that’ll take.”
“So we have some time, but not a lot,” Larry said.
Larry had continued driving while they spoke, not heading toward any place in particular. As they traveled, Lori saw dark shapes slinking through alleys, peering over the edges of rooftops, crouching behind parked cars.
Shadowkin. So many of them.
Some were bolder than their brethren, running down sidewalks, darting down streets. One dashed in front of Larry’s car, pausing for an instant to turn and look in their direction, featureless black face regarding them – regarding her. Goat-Eyes had said the creatures fed on the energy she emitted because she embodied the Imbalance, and it seemed like this creature recognized her. She thought it would veer toward them and attack – leap onto the hood, smash through the windshield with its clawed hands, grab her by the throat and drain the life out of her. But the Shadowkin turned away and continued across the street. It ran inside a secondhand clothing store, and Larry kept driving. She turned around in her seat as they passed the store, hoping to see what the Shadowkin was doing inside, but they were moving too fast, and she couldn’t make out any details through the store’s window. A second later, several people ran out of the building, shouting and screaming. One woman trailed behind the others, left arm streaked with blood. She only managed to make it a few steps outside before clawed hands thrust through the doorway, sank their talons into her shoulders, and yanked her back inside.
Shaken, Lori turned back to Larry.
“Jesus,” she said.
“Yeah. And it seems like their numbers keep increasing. It reminds me of that old Mickey Mouse cartoon, the one where he’s a sorcerer’s apprentice and he brings a broom to life to do his chores for him. The broom won’t quit working, so he uses an ax to chop it to pieces. But all the pieces become new brooms and they….” He broke off. “Sorry. I’m rambling, aren’t I? I’m just—”
“Terrified,” Lori said.
“Out of my fucking mind.”
Periodically, they saw police cruisers and paramedic vehicles racing through the streets, lights and sirens going. They saw a couple officers in a parking lot surrounded by Shadowkin. The officers had their guns drawn and were firing at the creatures without effect. Larry turned a corner before Lori could see how the situation played out, and she was grateful. She had a pretty good idea how that little drama was going to end.
“You all right?” Larry asked.
“Not in the slightest. If the Cabal is right, I somehow caused all this to happen.”
How many people had died at the hands of the Shadowkin since she’d been traveling the Nightway? Dozens? Hundreds?
“It’s not like you let the Shadowkin into our world on purpose. Whatever happened, it was an accident. You can’t blame yourself.”
Intellectually, she knew Larry was right. Emotionally, however, she felt totally responsible for the carnage that had come to Oakmont. She told herself that – in this case, at least – her predilection for ignoring the past could be useful. She should do her best to focus on what was ahead of her so she could do what needed to be done to fix things before the Intercessor arrived. It was like she told her clients. It doesn’t matter what caused your injury. It only matters what you do to recover from it.
She looked through the windshield at the rain hitting the glass, at the road beyond, and tried not to see the living shadows hunting prey on the streets of her town.
Oakmont was light years away from being a big city, and the people who lived there weren’t used to this level of violence. She thought of the final vision Aashrita had shown her, Oakmont lying in ruins, everyone dead. If the town’s residents thought the Shadowkin were bad, they would be in for one hell of a surprise when the Intercessor arrived – unless she could find a way to stop that from happening.
The Driver and Goat-Eyes had claimed the Cabal had no choice but to operate the way they did. Maybe that was true, but she didn’t care. Not only had they fucked with her, they’d assaulted her friends and family, transformed them in monstrous ways, all in an attempt to force her to realize what she’d done to upset the Balance and what she needed to do to fix it. Edgar had tried to help her, and he’d lost his life doing so.
She reached up to touch her head, felt the hard bump of the beetle nestled in her hair. At least something of Edgar remained, however small.
“You said you felt you’d made peace with Aashrita in the Garden,” Larry said.
“Yes. I hope so, anyway.”
“But that didn’t prevent the Intercessor from waking up and hitting the road.”
“Which is why I think reconciling with her wasn’t enough. It might’ve been an important part of the puzzle, but there’s still a piece missing. I think I need to tell her parents what I did, let them know how ashamed and guilt-ridden I was – and still am – for what I said to her that day on the porch.”
“So if you confess to them, does that count as atonement?”
“I don’t know. Maybe? I can’t think of anything else to do.”
“All right, let’s go home so you can grab some clothes and—”
“There’s no time for that. We need to see Aashrita’s parents as soon as possible.”
She didn’t know how long they had before the Intercessor managed to break through into their world, but whatever time they had, she knew they couldn’t afford to waste it.
“Okay. Tell me where to go.”
Lori did, and Larry executed a U-turn in the middle of the street – almost hitting a delivery truck – and pushed the Kia’s gas pedal to the floor, roaring back in the direction they’d come from. Lori hoped they weren’t already too late.
* * *
“You sure this is where
you want to stop?”
It was after five p.m., and Reeny had parked her Altima in the lot of a small shopping center, near an ice cream shop called Sprinkles. The wipers moved back and forth in a steady rhythm, keeping the windshield clear enough to give her a good view of the place. The lights were on inside, and three people sat at a small round table – two women, one man. Since the spots directly in front of the shop had been taken, she’d had to park a couple of rows back, and she couldn’t make out any specific details about the trio. She’d never been to Sprinkles before. Brian’s favorite ice cream place was the Cold Stone near where they lived. She hadn’t even known there was an ice cream shop here until Brian had told her to pull into the lot.
“This is the right place,” Brian said. “They’re inside. I can feel them.”
She didn’t know who they were, and she really didn’t care. She was becoming increasingly concerned for her son. His voice had a strange, flat quality to it, and his manner seemed older than his years. Quite a bit older. Then again, she supposed being resurrected was bound to mature a person.
Without saying another word, Brian unfastened his seat belt, opened the door, and got out of the car. He shut the door behind him and started walking toward Sprinkles, oblivious to the rain. Reeny had an umbrella in the car, and she wished he’d waited for her to grab it, but then again, the rain would hopefully wash away the worst of the blood from his neck wound, so that was good. She decided to forgo the umbrella as well, for the same reason. She got out, shut the door, and started running after Brian. Even if she’d carried the umbrella, she still would’ve run. She always did, and her husband Charles never failed to tease her about it.
Are you afraid you’re going to melt? You might get a little cranky sometimes, but you’re hardly the Wicked Witch of the West.
After the…incident at the mall, she and Brian had gone looking for Lori. But they hadn’t been able to find her. Reeny tried calling her, but she didn’t answer. They drove to Get Moving! and found the place swarming with police and reporters. Then they tried Lori’s apartment, but when they knocked, no one answered the door.
