by Peter Nealen
It was a sign of how abused my hearing had been all night that the boom of the big rifle sounded more like a thud. I saw the flash through my closed eyelids, and instinctively worked the lever again, even as he was blasted back from the muzzle by the impact. 300 grains of lead and silver, moving at over 2000 feet per second packs a hell of a wallop, even if you are a centuries-old husk kept alive by sorceries best forgotten.
The flies suddenly weren’t as aggressive. They didn’t go away yet, but I could open my eyes.
I wasn’t in the cave anymore. The Shadowman was standing in front of me, swaying. His shadow was gone, leaving the twisted husk of a man I’d seen in the vision fight. He was still missing one eye, so that at least had been real. He looked shocked, but decidedly not dead yet. So I shot him again. And again. And again. I hammered round after round into him until the rifle was empty, then I drew my pistol and emptied the mag into his head until he stopped moving. It took a long time for the writhing to cease, long past when any normal man should have been bug food. I slung the rifle, holstered the pistol, and drew my Bowie to hack off his shattered skull, just to be sure. Only then did I look around.
We were outside the sawmill. He must have dragged me out when everything went black. I should say, we were outside of what was left of it. It looked like the back half had been blasted away. A colossal struggle was going on back there.
I still get a headache just remembering what I saw, much less trying to describe it. It was like looking at a thunderstorm, a volcano, and a supernova all at once, only that doesn’t do that fight justice by a fair bit. Hell, you try describing a brawl between an archangel and one of the chief fallen angels. The frame of reference just isn’t there.
As much as it hurt to look at that for more than a few seconds at a time, I could tell that The Captain was getting the upper hand. Then I remembered Bob.
With every synapse screaming at me to get out of there, I charged back into the mill. “Charged” might be a little strong…my busted rib from earlier in the night was a screaming pain in my side, especially now as some of the adrenaline from fighting the Shadowman wore off. I was battered, bruised, cut up, and my throat ached abominably from the pressure of the Shadowman’s fingers. But I knew that if I didn’t do something, Bob was likely dead and, well…eight years in the Marine Corps hadn’t really conditioned me to pay much attention to pain when all hell was breaking loose.
The place was a shambles. Timbers had been smashed to matchsticks, and a lot of the siding was in pieces smaller than that. The roof was starting to sag, and if not for the cacophony of the battle going on in the middle of it, the entire building would be groaning. The rip saw and a bunch of the rest of the equipment had been smashed and flung around the floor. I saw too many structural beams damaged or out-and-out destroyed for the mill to stay standing for much longer.
Where the back wall had been, I got a sudden impression of a gigantic, molten figure, feet planted, pounding a mass of smoke, fire, and bones into the mountainside with enormous fists.
I shuffled to Bob’s cross, put my shoulder against it, and heaved. It groaned and tilted, and Bob screamed. “Sorry, buddy,” I gasped through the pain in my ribs. “But better hurt than dead.” I shoved again. This time it tilted some more, and I felt it start to get loose in its hole.
I moved around so I could pull it down and hopefully catch it before it slammed into the floor with Bob attached. That was when I found another set of hands helping out. “Sam” did most of the heavy lifting from that point, wrenching the cross out of the hole in the floor and gently lowering it to the ground. I guess The Captain had things under control.
There was so much noise from the storm and the fight going on behind us that I almost didn’t hear the bullet crack past my head. I snapped my head up to see a figure in the doorway, aiming a pistol at me. I snatched my .45 out of its holster and fired. It was more of a snap-shot than anything else, but it got him to duck out of the way.
Without seeing him clearly, I still knew, somehow, that it was Mayhew.
I wanted to stay with Bob. He was in a bad way, and needed medical attention, fast. He was also likely to die sooner rather than later if the building collapsed, which it showed definite signs of doing posthaste. But the Marine Corps drummed something else into me that I haven’t found any reason not to believe in the years since: the best medicine is lead downrange. I wouldn’t do either of us any good if Mayhew shot me while I was trying to treat Bob. I turned to “Sam.” “Can you get him to safety? At least somewhere the building won’t fall on him?” I realized it was asking a lot; he had already intervened way more than angels are generally in favor of.
But he just nodded. As if sensing my doubts, he said, “We may not step in all that often, but once we do, we step all the way in. Go. I’ll protect him.”
I nodded my thanks, holstered the pistol, and swept my Winchester back up, making sure the tube was full. I doubted I’d need nearly as many rounds as the Shadowman had taken, but it’s always a good idea to keep your weapon in the best condition possible. I didn’t know what kind of nasty surprises Mayhew might have waiting for me out there.
I went out the door at a run. The rain had intensified, and smelled funny now. I glanced down and saw that the drops hitting my hand were dark. The smell was explained. It was raining blood. Abaddon’s very presence was making nature go berserk.
There was a roar and a stab of flame out of the dark and the bloody rain, but the bullet missed, cracking behind me. I cranked off a shot at the muzzle flash, but it was fast and I knew I’d missed as soon as the trigger broke. I levered another round into the chamber and moved, dashing toward one of the piles of scrap lumber sitting out in the yard rotting. Mayhew might not be much of a gunfighter, but it’s never a good idea to stick to one place when somebody’s shooting at you.
Mayhew opened up, firing half a dozen shots at where I had been. He must not have been able to see in the dark very well. Granted, my vision was pretty limited, between the darkness and the blood rain, but I could pick up movement, at least.
He waited, then fired another shot. I stayed crouched behind the boards, watching and waiting. I had his position pretty well pinpointed by then. I just wanted to make sure he wasn’t going to move before I got my shot. I didn’t want to draw this fight out any longer than need be.
He must have thought that because I didn’t shoot back at him, I was dead. He stood up from where he’d been crouched by the corner of the building. I could just make out his silhouette against the gray, weathered siding of the mill, which was starting to shake.
“Colin Mayhew,” I murmured, as I lined up the gold bead inside the rifle’s ghost ring rear sight, and set it about midpoint on his torso, “I find you guilty of sorcery and traffic with demons. I therefore sentence you to die. May God have mercy on your soul.”
The trigger broke. The rifle bucked in my shoulder with a roar and a stab of flame. Mayhew slammed against the side of the building, then slid to the ground.
I started toward him. I had to be sure. He’d gotten deep enough that he might have been “gifted” with all sorts of abilities, including not going down from a single bullet through the vitals. The Shadowman, though vastly older than Mayhew, certainly had been an unnaturally tough customer. I’d ultimately have to cut off his head and burn the body, just in case. I had seen what had happened to some of the Shadowman’s victims.
Before I could reach him, though, the sawmill exploded.
The shockwave knocked me into the mud. Bits of wood and some leftover metal whickered through the air overhead, but, miraculously, none of it hit me.
I just lay there for a second, dazed. After a few moments, I realized that it wasn’t blood falling on my face anymore. It was just water. That was a good sign.
I heaved myself up to a sitting position, wincing as my rib decided to remind me it was there again. When I looked up, The Captain was standing over me. He held out a hand, and I took it, my own not inconsiderable paw b
eing completely engulfed in his. He pulled me to my feet.
“What about Bob?” I asked first. “Is he safe?”
The Captain nodded. “He’s at the church. None of them are quite certain how he got there, but they’ve been busy.” It seems the chief archangel has a bit of a dry wit sometimes.
“So it’s over?”
“For now.” He got grim. “It’s never really over, but this piece, at this time, is over.” Then he was gone, and I was alone in the rain.
Epilogue
I didn’t head back into town until after I’d disposed of Mayhew’s remains. It was a grisly job, and I hated doing it, but a lack of thoroughness has bitten more than one Witch Hunter before.
By the time I started down the hillside toward the few lights that were coming back on, the rain had subsided to a drizzle, and the wind had all but completely died. The unnatural storm was falling apart as its driving force was cast back into the Abyss, and quiet was descending on the brutalized town.
There were bodies in the street when I came back down, and a few people, dazed looks on their faces, were starting to come out to see what had happened. The majority of the town’s population seemed to have locked their doors and tried to just ride it out. It wouldn’t surprise me if that had backfired in a few places; evil is not always just out there.
It was a long trek back to St. Anthony’s. I was exhausted, and my whole body hurt, though my rib still managed to stand out. I still tried to get there somewhat quickly, because of Bob, but some of the urgency had gone away with The Captain’s reassurance.
The street in front was littered with bodies and a dazed, horrified mob. The front of the church was badly shot up; they’d put a lot of lead into the building, trying to kill the handful of sane people in there.
None of them dared look at me as I stalked through them and up to the church steps. They stayed out of my way, too. Whether it was my wrath or their shame that kept them from looking up or coming near, I didn’t know, nor did I particularly care.
The doors weren’t all that firmly in their frame, anymore. I kept off to one side, and knocked carefully. I didn’t want to catch a bullet from some stressed local shooting through the door because they didn’t realize that the worst of the nightmare was over.
“Who is it?” Johnny yelled. I breathed a sigh of relief. Apparently he hadn’t succumbed to possession like some of his compatriots.
“It’s Jed,” I shouted hoarsely. “You guys all right in there?”
The doors practically exploded open, one of them actually coming off as it was revealed that it was only hanging on by one hinge anymore. Eryn, disheveled but beautiful, burst out, her pistol still clenched in her hand, looking around. Her eyes lit on me, wet, muddy, and battered, and she just about flew off the steps to wrap her arms around me.
“I didn’t think I’d see you again,” she said. “When you went out into that…” she stifled a sob and held on tighter. I couldn’t contain a groan as she pressed against that busted rib. She pulled back. “What is it? Are you hurt?”
“Cracked rib,” I told her. “I’ve had worse. Just hurts to be squeezed right now.”
She slipped under my arm as the rest of the remnant came out. Bob was being carried between the two lumberjack brothers. His wrists and feet were bandaged, and he still looked like hell. Johnny was leading them toward his car. He stopped when he saw me. “Jed…I don’t have the words. I don’t know what you did out there tonight, but…”
“Get Bob to a hospital,” I told him. “We can talk about it later.” He nodded, and continued toward the car.
I looked down at Eryn. “Do you need to go with them?” I asked. To be honest, at the moment I didn’t want her to go anywhere; I liked the feel of her closeness. But she was a nurse.
She shook her head. “Both the Jarvis brothers were medics in the Army. Thad was in Special Forces. They don’t need me.”
I nodded at that. Special Forces medics are some of the best in the world. Bob was in good hands.
The entire three days suddenly seemed like it came crashing down on me. The horror, the beatings, the sheer enormity of what had almost happened…I started to sag as the weight of it hit me.
Eryn held me up. “Come on,” she said gently. “Let’s put you to bed.”
When I woke up, I didn’t know where I was. The room was dark, but there was enough light coming in around the blinds to let me know it was morning, at least. I heaved myself up to a sitting position, and groaned. I’d forgotten about that blasted rib again. Every muscle seemed to have decided to tie itself in knots while I slept, too.
Johnny was sitting in a chair at the foot of the bed. He looked haggard as hell, but a lot more chipper than he had been the last time I’d seen him. “You’re awake,” he said.
“Nope,” I told him. “I’m sleepwalking.” I took a look around the room. There was a decidedly female tone to it. “Where am I?”
Johnny ignored my sarcasm. “Eryn’s house,” he replied. “She’s still asleep on the couch out in the living room. Looks like she got you into bed then went and crashed.”
I rubbed my eyes. “I don’t remember much of anything that happened after getting back to the church,” I admitted. I realized that except for my boots, my jacket, and my weapons, I was still in my filthy clothes and had been lying on her sheets in them. I owed Eryn some laundry. Looking around, I saw my rifle, pistol, and knife, all within easy reach. “That woman is a gem,” I said.
Johnny was smirking. “That she is,” he said. “She seems to see something she likes in you, too, though I’ll be damned if I can figure out what it is.”
I ignored him. “What time is it?”
“Almost noon,” he replied. “If you’re going to get up, you might want to get cleaned up.” He stood. “I’ve still got work to do. Cleaning this incident up is going to be a bear.” He looked at me pensively. “Come by my office when you get a chance,” he said. “There’s something I think you should see.”
I nodded, and he walked out.
I found my duffel at the foot of the bed. That girl had thought of everything. I took advantage of the bathroom, had a shower, and changed into my only remaining clean clothes. I was stripping the dirty sheets off the bed when Eryn knocked on the door. “Are you decent?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I replied. She came in. She was wearing jeans and a t-shirt, her red hair a disheveled halo around her face. She was gorgeous.
“Did you sleep well?” she asked, taking a sip from the coffee mug in her hand.
I nodded. Unable to think of much else to say, I lifted the muddy sheets in my hand. “I’m sorry about this. I’ll take ‘em to the Laundromat, provided it’s still standing after last night.”
“It’s all right,” she said. “Don’t worry about it.” She set the coffee mug down on her dresser and stepped closer.
“I appreciate the place to crash,” I said. “Though you didn’t need to bring me here…”
She shrugged. “Father Pat was busy, so I didn’t want to bother him asking to use his couch. His couch isn’t all that comfortable, anyway.” She dimpled. “I’m sure he’s worried now, thinking of all the trouble we might have gotten into by ourselves.”
I think I flushed a little at that. She smiled, stepped up to me, took the sheets out of my hands, and kissed me.
It lasted quite a long time and not nearly long enough. When we came up for air, I took a deep breath. I had to tell her that this was a bad idea, that I was a drifter, that I faced horror like this all the time. I had to tell her that she’d be better off staying here, or in Tanner, or somewhere else, and looking for somebody else. All I got out was, “Eryn…”
She put a finger to my lips. “No you don’t, Jed,” she warned me. “I’ve seen more of your life in the last three days than most people ever get a chance to imagine. I know what I’m getting into.” She kissed me again.
I didn’t try to argue anymore.
When I walked into Johnny’s office, he was
sitting behind his desk, looking more tired than he had an hour before. He looked up and tossed me a set of keys.
I caught them and looked at them. “What are these?”
He finished whatever he’d been typing and turned to face me. “I impounded Mayhew’s car as evidence,” he explained. “Since Mayhew is dead, his center is burned to the ground, and nobody in their right mind would ever believe just what happened up here last night, I’m classifying it as a closed case. So, I auctioned off the car to Jerry Lebowski, who owns the local auto lot, for exactly the price of a used F250, with a canopy. That is now yours. I know it doesn’t quite replace your old truck, but at least now you have wheels.”
I was a little nonplused, but grateful. “Thanks,” I said, and meant it.
He waved my thanks away. “You saved all our skins last night, the way I see it,” he said. “It’s the least I can do.” He frowned. “It’s not all, though.” He reached into a drawer and pulled out an envelope. “I took a chance and went up to the old Booker place this morning, before I came to see you. It was a hunch.”
I frowned. “You shouldn’t have gone up there without me. That place is dangerous, even with Mayhew gone.”
He shrugged. “I did all right, so there’s no point in harassing me about it now. Anyway, I found some papers.” He tossed me the envelope. “Those are copies of the ones I thought you might find most interesting.”
I shuffled through the papers. Some of them were in obscure languages associated with the arcane. I’d probably turn those over to Thornton. Pompous ass he might be, but he knows his stuff. One in particular caught my eye, though.
It was a copy of a handwritten letter. It was dated the day before. It was addressed simply to “Master.”
We are on the verge of success. Tonight it will happen. The sgilli assures me that with what we have discovered, we will be able to summon the Destroyer himself, making it no longer necessary to find or awaken the Seven and the Ten. Our Father Below’s reign shall begin sooner than we had hoped. By the time you read this, the Destroyer will walk the land, and our time will have begun. I know you have waited and worked for an age for this. You taught me well. It will be done.
