Nightworld ac-6

by F. Paul Wilson

  After a long pause, Bill lifted his head and kissed her.

  "I love you," he said. "I puppy-loved you in high school and then buried it in an unused corner like a bone. But it never went away. I think I've always loved you."

  "And I think part of me always loved you, a little bit. But now all of me loves you—a lot."

  "Good. Does that mean we do this again? Soon?"

  "How soon?"

  "Now?"

  And then she realized that he was hard again inside her.

  "Oh my."

  3 • THE FINAL PIECE

  WNEW-FM:

  JO: It's 4:00 in the afternoon, ten minutes to sunset.

  FREDDY: Yeah. And according to the Sapir curve, this is the next to last sunset. Let's all hope he's wrong, man.

  Glaeken had settled Sylvia Nash and her son in her apartment and was on his way back to his own when Julio, the muscular little fellow who owned the bar where he and Jack had shared their first pint of Courage, ran up to him in the hall.

  "Mr. Glaeken! There's a woman downstairs looking for Jack!"

  "What does she want? You let her in, I hope." It was dark out now. The streets would be lethal.

  "Yeah, but I've got somebody staying in the lobby with her. Thing is, I can't find Jack nowhere an' she's real crazy 'bout seeing him."

  "Is it the woman he sent into hiding?"

  "Gia? No way. I know Gia. This lady's dark. Says her name's Cola-body or som' like that."

  Glaeken closed his eyes and steadied himself, making sure he'd really heard that last sentence. Could it be? Could it truly be her? Or could this be another of Rasalom's games?

  Well, he'd know soon enough, wouldn't he?

  "Bring her to the top floor. Immediately."

  A few moments later, Glaeken was waiting by the door to his apartment when Julio ushered a slim, dark, raven-haired woman from the elevator. Her clothes were torn, her hands and face smudged with grime, the dark almonds of her eyes were wide, wild, exhausted. Not at all the way Glaeken had pictured her, but he sensed the years crowded beneath the smooth youth of her skin.

  He could barely drag his eyes from the necklace encircling her throat. He had to get it from her. How he was going to do that, he did not know, but he could not allow her to leave here with that necklace.

  "Miss Bahkti?"

  She nodded. "And you're the man Jack told me about, the old one?"

  The old one. He hid his smile. Is that how they speak of me? Well, it's true, isn't it? Truer than they imagine.

  "Yes, that would be me. Call me Glaeken. Come in."

  He nodded his thanks to Julio and ushered Kolabati into his apartment. She stumbled crossing the threshold and almost fell, but Glaeken caught her under the arm.

  "Are you all right?"

  She shook her head. "No. Not in the least."

  He led her to the sofa. She all but fell into it. She rubbed a trembling hand over her eyes and sighed. She looked utterly exhausted.

  "Jack told me what was happening to the world," she said. "I thought he was lying, trying to trick me. It couldn't be as bad as he said." She paused and looked up at Glaeken with haunted eyes. "But it's worse. Much worse."

  Glaeken nodded, watching her closely. She appeared to be under extreme stress.

  "And worse is yet to come."

  She stared up at him. "Worse? Outside…one street over…something huge and black and slimy…so big it had to squeeze against the buildings on both sides to get down the street. It was covered with tentacles and it was reaching into the windows and pulling out anything it found. I heard people—children—screaming."

  "A long dark night of the soul for the survivors," Glaeken said.

  Kolabati shifted her gaze toward the fire and fingered her necklace.

  "Did Jack return with the other necklace?"

  "Yes."

  "Is it sufficient for your needs?"

  "No." Where was this leading?

  "Then you still need this one?"

  "Yes."

  "Will it make a difference?" she said.

  "It may. It may be too late now for anything to make a difference, but it is our only chance, our only hope. We must try it."

  She continued to stare at the fire. Her voice was barely audible.

  "All right then. You may have it."

  A wave of relief struck Glaeken. The impact forced him to sit down. But before he could speak, Jack burst into the room.

  "It is you!" he said, glaring at Kolabati. "Where'd you find the nerve to show up here?"

  "Jack—" Her lips curved halfway to a smile but Jack was in her face before they reached it.

  "You lied to me! You agree to come back here and talk to Glaeken, then you pull a vanishing act."

  Glaeken wanted to stop Jack before he said anything rash, but noticed that Kolabati was unfazed by the outburst. So he kept quiet.

  "That's true," she said. "And I am here. And I've been talking to Glaeken."

  Jack hovered over her, his anger visibly evaporating.

  "Oh. Yeah, but you said—"

  "I never said I'd come back with you. I said I'd come back. And I have—but on my terms, not yours. I am no one's prisoner, Jack. Ever."

  "But how'd you get back?"

  "Do you really believe you're the only one who knows a pilot willing to fly here from Maui?"

  Jack jammed his hands in his pockets. "Obviously not."

  Glaeken studied Jack and Kolabati as they faced off. He sensed more going on between these two than met the eye, but he had no time to concern himself with that. He jumped into the momentary lull.

  "Jack," he said, "Miss Bahkti has agreed to give us her necklace."

  "We already have it. You said it wasn't enough."

  "No," Glaeken said softly. "The one she is wearing."

  Jack's eyes narrowed with suspicion.

  "What's the catch?"

  "No catch, Jack," she said, her voice laden with exhaustion. "What I've seen on my journey from Maui has convinced me that you were not exaggerating. Everything is falling apart. This is not a world I wish to live in. If I keep the necklace, I'll go on living in it—indefinitely. That would be horrible beyond imagining. So I've decided to give up the necklace to someone who can make better use of it and to end my life the way I've lived it—on my own terms."

  "Charity isn't in your nature, Bati," Jack said. "What aren't you telling us?"

  "Please, Jack," Glaeken said, offended by the younger man's unyielding hostility. "She's agreed to give us the necklace, the rest is really none—"

  "I've always been up-front with Bati," Jack said, half-turning toward Glaeken. "She knows that. She knows not to expect anything less." He turned back to Kolabati. "What's the rest of it?"

  She rose and stepped to the window. She stared into the living darkness for a long moment.

  "Karma," she said. "What's happening out there threatens the turning of the Karmic Wheel."

  She turned and faced Jack. Glaeken felt as if he'd been forgotten.

  "You know the stains on my karma, Jack. Kusum shared those stains. The weight of that karmic burden drove him to the acts that led to his death at your hands. I've long feared dying because I'm terrified of the retribution my karma will earn for me in the next life. Now…now I fear living more than dying."

  She touched her necklace again. "And perhaps…if giving this up will allow the Great Wheel to keep turning…perhaps this deed will undo all the others. Perhaps this act will purify my karma of its stains."

  Jack nodded his understanding. Glaeken, too, thought he understood: Kolabati was making a deal with her gods—forgiveness of her karmic burden in return for the necklace. Glaeken wondered if truly there might be a Karmic Wheel. He doubted it. In all his many years he had seen no evidence of it. But he was not about to say anything that might dissuade Kolabati from surrendering her necklace.

  Without warning, she reached both hands behind her neck, unfastened the necklace, and handed it to Jack.

  "T
here," she said, her voice husky, her eyes glittering. "This is what you wanted."

  Then she turned and headed for the door.

  Jack stared a moment at the necklace in his hand, then started after her.

  "Bati, wait! Where're you going?"

  "Outside. It will end quickly there."

  Glaeken leapt to his feet and followed Jack. He passed him and caught up to Kolabati at the door. He grabbed her arm and stopped her.

  "No," Glaeken said. "I cannot allow you to die like that. Not out there. Not alone."

  Her eyes were frightened, terrified of what lay beyond, waiting for her.

  "Everyone dies alone," she said. "I'm used to being alone."

  "So was I. But I've learned to draw strength from companionship. Let the years take you. It will be gentle—far gentler than out there."

  "I'll stay with you, Bati," Jack said. "I'll sit with you to the…the end."

  "No!" she said, her voice rising. "I don't want you to see me—I don't want anyone to see me."

  A proud woman, Glaeken thought. And vain, too, certainly. But that was her privilege.

  He loosened his grip on her arm and clasped her hand. It was cold, moist, trembling.

  "I know a place where you can be alone and comfortable. Where no one will see you. Come."

  As he began to lead her through the door, Jack stepped forward.

  "Wait."

  For the first time since Glaeken had met him, Jack looked awkward. His cat-like grace was gone. The necklace hung in his hand like a leaden weight. He seemed at a loss for words.

  "Please, Jack," Kolabati said, turning to him, "I haven't much time."

  "I know. I know. I just wanted to tell you that I've thought some awful things about you for the past few years, but what you're doing now…it takes courage. More courage than I think I'd have if positions were reversed. I think you're the bravest woman I know." He reached for her hand and raised it to his lips. "I…we all owe you. And we won't forget you."

  Kolabati nodded slowly. "I know I don't have your love, so I guess I'll have to settle for that." She stretched up and kissed him on the cheek. "Goodbye, Jack."

  "Yeah," Jack said, his expression stricken. "Goodbye."

  Glaeken lead Kolabati down to Carol's apartment—former apartment. Carol would not re-enter it. He guided her to the bedroom but did not turn on the light.

  "It's quiet here. Safe and dark. No one will disturb you."

  He heard the springs squeak as she sat on the bed.

  "Will you stay with me?" she said in a small voice.

  "I thought—?"

  "That was Jack. I couldn't be comfortable with him here. But you're different. Your years stretch far beyond mine. I think you understand."

  Glaeken found a chair and pulled it up beside the bed.

  "I understand."

  His sentiments echoed Jack's: this was a brave woman. He took her hand again as he had upstairs.

  "Talk to me," he said. "Tell me about the India of your childhood—the temple, the rakoshi. Tell me how you spent your days before you came to wear the necklace."

  "I seems that I was never young."

  Glaeken sighed. "I know. But tell me what you can, and then I will tell you of my youth, what little I remember of it."

  And so Kolabati spoke of her girlhood, of her parents, of her fear of the flesh-eating demons who roamed the tunnels beneath the Temple-in-the-Hills. But as she talked on, her voice grew hoarse, raspy. The air in the room grew moist and sour as her tissues returned their vital fluids to the world. Her voice continued to weaken until speech seemed a terrible effort. Finally…

  "I'm so tired," she said, panting.

  "Lie down," Glaeken told her.

  He guided her to a recumbent position, gripping her shoulders and lifting her knees. Beneath her clothes her flesh felt wizened, perilously close to the bone.

  "I'm cold," she said.

  He covered her with a blanket.

  "I'm so afraid," she said. "Please don't leave me."

  He held her hand again.

  "I won't."

  "Not until it's completely over. Do you promise?"

  "I promise."

  She did not speak again. After a time her breathing became harsh and rapid, rising steadily to a ragged crescendo. Her bony fingers squeezed Glaeken's in a final spasm—

  And then relaxed.

  All was quiet.

  Kolabati was gone.

  Glaeken released her hand and stepped into the hall outside the apartment. Jack was there, sitting cross-legged on the floor next to the door. He looked up at Glaeken.

  "Is she—?"

  Glaeken nodded and Jack lowered his head.

  "Collect both necklaces and the blade fragments and be ready to leave as soon as it's light."

  Jack nodded, still looking down. "Where?"

  "I'll tell you later. I must remain with her a while longer."

  Jack looked up again. His red-rimmed eyes questioned.

  Glaeken said, "I promised I'd stay until the end."

  Back in the bedroom, the scent of rot was vague in the air. He resumed his seat and found Kolabati's hand again. The skin was cold, dry, as flaky as filo dough. He clasped it until it crumbled to dust and ran through his fingers. And when the sky began to lighten, he drew the curtains, closed the door, and locked the apartment.

  THURSDAY

  The House at the End of the Road

  MONROE, LONG ISLAND

  "You sure these are the directions he gave you?"

  Jack stopped Glaeken's old Mercedes in the middle of the road and peered about in the gloomy light. Bill Ryan sat in the passenger seat, a pair of shotguns propped between his knees. The two necklaces and the blade fragments sat between them in a carved wooden box. Bill peered at the hastily scribbled note in his hand.

  "Positive," he said.

  Jack would have preferred to have Ba along on this trek but he'd possessed neither the heart nor the nerve to ask the big guy to leave Sylvia and the boy again. But Bill seemed different today. There was a odd air of peace about him that Jack found strangely comforting.

  "You grew up in Monroe, didn't you?"

  "Yeah, but I've never been out here. I don't think I ever knew there was an out here. This is nowhere."

  Nowhere. Perfect description, Jack thought. They were in the far northeast corner of Monroe, on a dirt road leading through the heart of a vast salt marsh. To their left, under a low, leaden, overcast sky, Monroe Harbor lay smooth and flat and still and gray as slate. Somewhere dead ahead was the Long Island Sound. Nothing moved. Not an insect, not a bird, not even a breeze to stir the reeds and tall grass lining the road. Like being caught in the middle of a monochrome marshscape.

  The only break in the monotony was the file of utility poles marching along the east flank of the road and what looked like an oversized outhouse near the water at its far end.

  "That's got to be the place," Bill said.

  "Can't be."

  "You see any other place around? We're supposed to follow this road out to the house at its end. That's the place. It's got to be."

  Jack doubted it but put the Mercedes in gear again and started forward.

  "I still say we made a wrong turn somewhere."

  As they approached the shack, Jack noticed smoke rising from behind it.

  "Whoever he is, he's got a fire going."

  "I hope he builds a better fire than he builds a house," Bill said.

  "Right. He must be the original crooked man and this must be the original crooked house."

  The shack did not seem to have one true upright. The entire one-story structure was canted left, leaning against the peeling propane tank on its flank; its crumbling brick chimney was canted right; and the aerial atop that was canted left again.

  But this had to be the place: the house at the end of the road.

  An old Torino sat in front. Except for the fire in the back, the place looked deserted.

  "You know," Bill said a
s they neared it, "that's not just a plain old fire in back there. I don't know much about that sort of thing, but it looks to me like he's got some kind of forge going full blast.

  As Jack pulled into the small graveled front yard, he noticed that all the screens were ripped and tattered, all the windows smashed—like every other house they'd passed on their way out from the city.

  "This doesn't look good."

  Bill shrugged. "The fire's going, and Glaeken said…"

  "Yeah. Glaeken said."

  He parked and took the wooden box with him when he got out. Bill accompanied him to the door. To the right was what appeared to be a small vegetable garden, but nothing was growing. The front door opened before they reached the steps and a grizzled old man glared at them through the remnants of the screen in the upper half of the storm door.

  "Took your time getting here, didn't you?"

  His shock of gray hair stuck out in all directions. He needed a shave like his stained undershirt needed to be washed—or better yet, tossed out and replaced.

  "You're expecting us?" Jack said. How could that be? The phones had been out for days.

  "Yeah. You got the metal?"

  Bill glanced at the note in his hand. "First we've got to know: Are you George Haskins?"

  "'Course I am."

  "May we come in?"

  "I don't think they'd like that. You see—"

  Jack heard a garbled babble from somewhere behind the solid lower half of the storm door. Haskins looked down and spoke toward the floor.