by Edward Lee
Ginny continued to think about things as he continued. She thought about love and lust. A few days ago she thought she might be able to love Gilles, but that seemed so foolish now. Love was foolish; it was an emotional play-act where the final exit was always the same: failure. Veronica had branded Ginny’s ideologies as cynicism, but then Veronica was a head case to begin with; she wouldn’t even admit she was still hung up on Jack. Love seldom worked. Wasn’t Veronica proof? All love did in the end was tear people apart.
The notion that her ideals might be flawed never occurred to her. Ginny was at home with her ideals. Love had blown up in her face enough times. Men had used her, so now she would use them back, with her body and her looks. Seeing Gilles’ shadow make love to her, without seeing his face, heightened the philosophy.
“You are beautiful,” Gilles whispered. His hands gripped her hips. His rhythm picked up. He wasn’t making love to her as much as he was probing her. Probe me all you want, she thought, biting her lower lip. Just don’t love me. If you love me, I’ll burn you.
His rhythm slowed a moment. Ahead, his shadow seemed downcast. Was he sad? Perhaps he had a lover somewhere, and he felt guilty now. Men could be such pussies. They’d realize their falsehoods and continue to be false anyway.
Then he said: “You are beautiful and you are true.”
More passionist crap, Ginny thought. It frustrated her. The only way he could go on was to try something romantic. Did he think she was an idiot? She reached back and tickled his testicles, to goad him on. “Don’t stop!” she whispered. Why was he hesitating? His shadow stood crisp and motionless in front of her.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Sorry for what!”
He began again, thrusting much harder. That’s better she thought. Suddenly he felt snug in her, his penis like a stout plug in her sex, stretching her. He was getting her close now.
“You are very true.”
Shut up shut up! She closed her eyes, closing out his shadow, to concentrate.
“But not true enough,” he finished.
Ginny didn’t hear him, too busy summoning her orgasm. Hence, she didn’t see him either. She didn’t see his shadow and how drastically it had changed. The widened shoulders and arching back. Then a large angulated head, and the twin protuberances like horns.
* * *
When Veronica woke, the first thing she saw was the painting. Now that she’d finished, her fatigue caught up with her; she’d slept all afternoon into the night. The clock read 9:30; her window framed full dark glittered with stars. She leaned up and stared at the painting, but remembered that she’d been dreaming of Jack. The images didn’t mix. Her dream had just been pieces of them when they’d been together. She knew she should call him, at least to let him know everything was okay. But he was too reactionary, and jealous to the point of despair. Why reconnect herself to that? Stewie was another matter; he was business. She’d simply become too lost in everything — her work, her development, Khoronos — to remember to call him. He probably had all sorts of things lined up for her. Yes, she must call him, but…
Now that she thought of it, she could not remember seeing a telephone anywhere in the house.
When she’d originally called the number on her invitation, a woman transferred the call. It seemed a little funny.
A sense of emptiness followed her downstairs. Where did everyone disappear to so often? Downstairs was dark. She looked around the entire first floor but found no phone. I’ll ask tomorrow, she concluded, and went outside.
The big pool lay still in the moonlight. She noticed the gate in the back fence open and decided a walk in the woods would be relaxing. You couldn’t do this in the city; you couldn’t go for a nice, quiet walk in the woods because there was no woods. Just throngs of people, traffic jams, and smog. Since coming here, Veronica had never felt so purged of the world.
But where will I go now? She strayed along the moonlit path. Back home, to reality. How long would Khoronos want them around? The estate was just a playground. Sooner or later she’d have to get back to her profession.
What would it be like when she saw Jack again? She hoped he wasn’t moping over the end of their relationship. Ginny said that denial was actually assertion. But was it? Veronica felt convinced that getting back together with Jack would be a mistake. But—
I miss him, she realized.
The path opened into the little dell in which stood the white kiosk. She could just sit here and think, in the moonlight. She needed to think about things now that her work here was done. Yeah, just think, just think about things. She stepped into the kiosk—
— and froze.
The image seemed unreal. I’m still dreaming, she thought very slowly, and then the details of what she saw came quickly into focus. Veronica’s throat shivered shut. Her eyes darted frantically, each revelation striking them like a blow to the head.
It was a corpse that lay sprawled upon the kiosk floor: a nude woman besmirched with blood. In the moonlight, the blood looked utterly black. A tremendous stain spread from the apex of the corpse’s legs. The navel and sunken nipples looked like sockets, and the face…the face…
Veronica turned and ran.
— the face had been eaten off.
* * *
Her terror propelled her back down the path. Suddenly the woods seemed labyrinthine, insolvable. She thought in primal one-word bursts. Murder. Help. Phone. Police. She ran manic back to the house. Who was it? The corpse, bereft of a face, defied identification.
Up the wooden steps, across the deck. In the kitchen she stopped. What! What! “Somebody! Help!” she yelled, but the plea only echoed. She sprinted up the steps and burst into Amy Vandersteen’s room. The room’s tenant was not within. Veronica was about to run back out, but something locked her gaze. A lone sheaf of papers lay on Amy’s writing desk.
Amy obviously had accomplished little of her project, too distracted by drugs. The pages were an attempt at some sort of an outline, a scene from a projected screenplay.
VOICE: All the truth that you can bear…is yours.
PROTAGONIST: What truth! Tell me!
VOICE: Look into the mirror. What do you see?
[Protagonist squints.
Cut to a mirror, two o’clock angle.]
PROTAGONIST: Nothing.
VOICE: You’re not looking closely enough.
[Cut to protagonist’s face,
then back to mirror. Mirror is empty.]
VOICE: Look closely and you will see the truth. Tell me what you see.
[Close-up protagonist’s eyes. Zoom into pupils.]
PROTAGONIST: I…see…a man.
VOICE: Yes!
[Show flames in pupils.]
PROTAGONIST: I see a man made of flames.
A man made of flames? The similarity urged Veronica away from the desk. She dashed next to Ginny’s room, not surprised that Ginny wasn’t there. The manuscript, stacked neatly atop the typewriter bore the title “The Passionist.” She flipped to the last page and scanned the last paragraph of Ginny Theils’ taut, clipped prose:
…touched her, and in that touch she saw all the love in the world. Flesh made perfect, all flaws purged by the fire. “I am risen,” said the voice, but it was no human voice at all. The voice, like midnight, like truth, was incalculable. “Be risen with me.”
“But I’m not worthy!” she pleaded. “I’ve sinned.”
“And I now absolve you, with fire.”
She openly wept before the flow of love. I am risen, she thought. Trembling, she reached out. His hand closed over hers.
“Come away with me and my dream,” said the man made of flames.
Veronica’s heart wrenched in her chest. It was impossible. They’d all had the same vision in their dreams. The Fire-Lover. The man made of flames.
She was too confused to sort her thoughts. Then the words, behind her, rose in the air like a palpable shape.
“All the truth that you can bear, Veronica
, is yours.”
She shivered as she turned. Gilles blocked the doorway. “What have you people done?” were the only words she could summon.
“There’s so much that you don’t understand, but you were not made to understand. You’ll see it all, though. In time.”
“You’re murderers,” her voice whispered. She stepped back, and Gilles stepped forward. His muscles flexed beneath his tight, tanned skin as he moved.
He opened his hands. Suddenly his eyes showed only white. “I am risen,” he intoned. “Be risen with us.”
Madmen, she thought. Her instincts poured adrenaline into her heart and she rushed forward. She tried to claw at his face, but his hands snapped up her wrists. She bit into his forearm. He didn’t flinch. She bit down harder and felt her teeth grind against bone. He only winced slightly, holding her. Warm blood flowed into her mouth. Even when she bit out a collop of flesh, he barely reacted.
“Don’t hurt me,” he said. “We have a gift for you. It’s a precious gift. Your transposition will show you wonders.”
She fought against his grasp, but his forearms, firm as steel rods, didn’t budge. His grip on her wrist made her hands go numb.
“You cannot hurt me,” he said.
Veronica squealed. Her foot lashed out and caught him directly between the legs. Gilles’ hands snapped open — suddenly he was on his knees.
Veronica leapt over him, scrambled out of the room and down the stairs. Fleeing to Ginny’s car would be pointless; she didn’t have the keys and she didn’t have time to look for them. She yanked on the front door but nothing happened. The dead bolt had no knob, just a keyhole. Locked.
She sensed the shadow that appeared on the landing.
She rushed back into the kitchen. Get a knife! She heard footsteps as she hauled open drawers, spilling their contents in a clang of metal. Her fingers closed around a fileting knife, when she noticed a lower cabinet hanging open. Immediately she noticed what was inside.
A phone.
It was a portable phone. A small whip antenna stood out of its handle, and a big battery pack was screwed into its housing.
A tiny yellow light winked when she turned on the switch, and the buttons glowed. Beeps resounded as she punched in 911.
She listened, panting. Nothing happened.
“Goddamn it!” she squealed. She’d never used one of these. It wasn’t like a cell phone. She fumbled with the receiver, sensing the footfalls coming through the living room. A top button glowed SEND.
Before she could push it, she was screaming, rising, being lifted up by her hair. The heel of Gilles’ bare foot slammed down on the phone and cracked its black plastic housing.
“You don’t understand.” His accented voice was clement, soft. Her scalp barked with pain. She whipped around—
“Veronica, please—”
She brought the knife across Gilles’ face. Its blade sliced cleanly through one cheek and out the other.
He stiffened and let go. In silence he brought his hands to his pouring face and stared at her. The stare seemed to dare her. I can’t hurt you, huh? she thought. Then she lunged again—
“Please, don’t,” he pleaded.
— and planted the knife into Gilles’ left eye.
He stood shuddering. Blood flowed like a cascade down his chest, yet he didn’t fall. His right eye held wide on her while the fileting knife jutted from his left.
And then, with resolute calm, he slowly removed the blade. Clear fluid ran down his cheek. The knife clattered.
“Please, Veronica. I won’t hurt you.”
She screamed again, a high keening sound, as the hand came around and grabbed her throat. Suddenly she was kicking, held fully off her feet.
“He won’t hurt you,” Marzen said very gently. “But I will.”
The grip of the German’s big hand tightened. Veronica gagged. Aloft, she seemed to be running on air, but soon her movements began to grow feeble.
Marzen’s face looked up at her. Blank. Pitiless.
I’m dead, she managed to think.
The hand squeezed off all the blood to her brain, and down she went, into darkness.
Chapter 33
The fog of her thoughts sidetracked her all the way home. She’d read The Synod of the Aorists in its entirety, a tome as black as pitch tar. Its images seemed to peer at her like phantoms in the backseat. When she spotted the green sign, her exit—Historic District, Next Right—she nearly wept with relief.
Jack’s car was not at the house. She drove around Church Circle, trying to listen to the radio. WHFS was playing a group called Strange Boutique. “Never throw away what could be true,” the singer lamented in beautiful sadness. How much have I thrown away? Faye wondered. She did not pursue an answer.
She still felt confused about last night. Had she made Jack feel better or worse? Right now she wondered if she knew anything.
Big Brother Is Watching You, read the Orwellian sign in the bookshop window. Faye parked in the lot behind the Undercroft, unconsciously glancing about. Did she expect devils to be in wait? Black-garbed aorists bearing dolches in red hands? Baalezphon is watching you, she thought. Was there really a devil? Faye didn’t believe in devils, only the ones man made out of his own imperfections. But the aorists were as devoted to truth as the Christians, avoiding the same faith to different gods. Who could say that their acts were any worse than the Crusades butchering in the name of Jesus, the Templar Knights forcing conversion at sword point, and the mindless torture of the Holy Inquisition? Mankind pursued truth without ever really seeing it. Act for act. Evil for evil.
She scurried across the gravel lot. She needed to be around people, around life. Maybe she should get drunk and forget about everything. Relief embraced her the instant she stepped into the ’Croft. People, talk, laughter. Craig was expertly pouring four beers from four different taps at the same time. This transition, from the dark solitude of her research to this crowded reality, made her feel physically light.
“What can I do you for, Faye?” Craig inquired.
“Just water,” she said.
Barkeeps had a knack for insistency. Craig brought her a bottle of the same strong German beer she’d had last night. “I asked for water,” she complained.
“There’s water in that,” he said.
“Oh, well,” she decided. At least if she got drunk she could blame him.
“What’s wrong, Faye? You look like you’ve just seen Death.”
Not Death. Baalzephon. She ignored the comment. “Jack hasn’t been in, has he?”
“Nope, not since last night.”
Could he have used the directions he’d pilfered and gone to find Veronica?
“They’re really giving it to him in the papers,” Craig said.
“I know. It’s disgusting.”
“Why are they calling it the Triangle case?”
“Trines,” she muttered, more to her beer. “It’s a satanic emblem, a triangle with a star at each point. The killers drew them in blood at each murder scene.”
“You’d think something like that could never happen in a town like this.”
“This town is no different from any town in the world in any age,” Faye responded too quickly. “It’s got people. It’s got beliefs. It’s got good and it’s got evil, and that’s all you need.”
Craig gave her a long look. “Any leads?”
“I don’t know. I’m not even working on it anymore.”
“So what are you gonna do now?”
She’d asked herself the same question a million times already. “Go back to my regular job. Go home.”
“What about Jack?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
Craig’s barkeep vibes sensed her despondency. “Cheer up. Sometimes things work out when you least expect them to.”
“Yeah, right.”
“And here he is now,” Craig looked up and announced. “Living proof of the steelworkers’ strike.”
“Hilarious
,” Jack said, sporting three days’ growth. The door swooshed closed behind him. “I saw your car when I was passing by,” he told Faye, and took the stool next to hers.
“I—” she started to say.
Then he leaned over and quickly kissed her.
It was just a peck on the cheek, yet it nearly shocked her. Before she could even react, he was saying, “I’ve been looking all over town for Stewie. I’ve decided to give those directions to him. It’s better that way. Whatever the problem is, he’s Veronica’s manger, so he should take care of it. None of it’s any of my business, really.”
This information secretly overjoyed Faye. Did this mean he’d given up on Veronica for good? Faye doubted it, but it was a start. Circumstances often took time to come to grips with.
“But I’m still wondering about those names,” Jack commented. Craig brought him a soda water with a lime slice. “Maybe it’s just cop paranoia, but it’s almost like this rich guy is using people to cover his tracks.”
“Fraus Herren,” Faye said. “Philippe Faux. And then the business with the phones.”
“Yeah. It bothers me, that’s all.”
Faye reserved further comment. Why bring up subjects when the common denominator was Veronica? Faye felt jealous and subordinate to this woman she didn’t even know.
“How’d it go at the library? You check out that book?”
“Yeah,” she said, as the dismal images returned. “It verified the information I discovered yesterday. The aorists made random sacrifices constantly, but once a year they engaged in a special incarnation rite that specifically involved the trine—”
“The triangle.”
“Right, and what they thought of as a transpositional doorway. The first three sacrifices served as a catalyst to the ritual. One for each star. These girls were supposed to be passionate and creative, to appease Baalzephon.”
“The first victim was an art director, the second two were poets,” Jack reminded her. “And they got around.”
