“You’re no match for me, Sabnoch,” he said. “You low-tier demons are always picking fights you can’t possibly win.”
“Damn you, Ephraim. I was promised autonomy.”
“Apparently, you were misled.”
Ephraim lunged, and the beast narrowly avoided being skewered by pulling itself along the wall and swinging from one rafter to the next. The beams were too deteriorated to hold the thing, though, and one broke, sending the Traveler crashing into several rows of pews. It came to a stop a half-dozen feet away from Nico.
When the monster righted itself, Ephraim was there, waiting for it. The man rammed his blade up through the bottom of the thing and out the top. The sword flashed and lit up the room, turning night to day. A golden aura surrounded its wielder, and as the Traveler flailed its tentacles about, striking out at its attacker, the appendages bounced harmlessly against the shimmering barrier.
The church structure, however, had no such protection. The overhead beams cracked and splintered, and the whole building shifted and tilted to one side. Nico knew he had moments before the church came crashing down around him.
“Release them!” said Ephraim.
The Traveler shrieked, and its gelatinous form pulsed. A dozen or more streams of a pale smoke-like substance spewed from the creature’s maw. The misty tendrils shot up through a newly-formed hole in the ceiling and disappeared from sight.
“Now, let me go,” said the Traveler. “Give me back my host and let me be on my way.”
An octagonal disk appeared in the stranger’s hand. It seemed to be made of something like bronze and was emblazoned with a symbol Nico didn’t recognize. The glyph began to emit a blue light as Ephraim held it aloft. Where the object’s light made contact with the Traveler, the creature’s flesh—if it could even be called that—boiled and smoked.
“Sabnoch, Footman of the Twelfth Ring, for unauthorized crimes against humanity, the Archon imposes a thousand-year chastisement. Begone!”
The stranger tossed the piece of metal into the thing’s snarling mouth, and a blinding light filled it. The Traveler raged as its maw expanded until it inverted and wrapped back around itself. The creature lost all solidity and reverted into the unctuous plasm-like substance from before. The stuff slid away from the glowing blade and fell into a pool of steaming ooze on the floor.
Then the church building lost its last remaining support beam, and the entire thing came crashing down.
But before Nico could be crushed by the collapsing ceiling, the floorboards at his feet separated, and a hole opened up underneath him. He fell through the floor, into a black abyss as pieces of debris fell all around him. Pain shot up his legs as he landed on the concrete cellar floor below.
Nico fell backward and threw up his arms to keep the falling wreckage from his face. But his arms did nothing to ward away the pew that smashed into his pelvis, shattering his bones and turning his insides to jelly.
Darkness took him.
Ephraim walked up the hill to the solitary oak.
He reached up and took down the little red and gold hero and then handed it to Tobias Keene. The boy stood next to a freshly turned pile of dirt, as did the other five children, the victims of Nico Mauvais.
Ephraim smiled at them. “Did you think we’d leave you in that dark place, little ones?”
The children laughed.
Ephraim gave them back their toys and let them run and play for a little while. Erased was the pain they’d endured, and Ephraim thought it would be nice if they could just be kids again, before he took them home, before they were transformed into luminous beings possessed of the Higher Knowledge. The play of children was good. It was … pure. And it always made Ephraim and others like him feel a surpassing joy.
Finally, when the sun’s rays began to peek over the horizon, he gathered them up and led them away from that place of death. Into the light. Into the love and understanding of all things.
And none of them even heard the anguished cries of Nico Mauvais, coming from the basement of the wrecked church. And no one ever would.
Other works by S. Lee Benedict:
THE HEART THIEF
Book 1 of The Rhapp’s Barren Triptych
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Afterword
Thank you for taking the time to read this collection of short fiction. I really hope you enjoyed it and found at least one story you might consider a favorite.
Savvy readers will, no doubt, have noticed what some may consider to be “derivative” elements in these stories. I want to assure those people that this was completely on purpose and intended to be noticed. As a massive fan of genre fiction (both in literature and other media), I wanted to pepper these tales with nods to a few things that I’ve loved over the years. The Lurkers borrows heavily from H.P. Lovecraft and is, in fact, my homage to the man’s writings. Also, “Ghost in the Machine” takes a few elements from the movie, Blade Runner.
Some readers will be completely unaware of these connections, and that’s fine, too. But I hope those that did notice enjoyed the liberties I took.
It might interest some to know that “Traveler” is one of my personal favorites. Mostly because it’s something of a prequel to my full-length paranormal urban fantasy novel for young adults, The Heart Thief. If you haven’t already done so, please check it out. I think you’ll enjoy it.
—S. Lee Benedict, December 2014
About the Author
When not writing, S. Lee Benedict spends his time watching movies, reading, playing video games, and immersing himself in geek culture. He enjoys attending conventions and is relatively well-traveled. He has been to China four times.
A writer most of his life, The Heart Thief is his first foray into publishing and full-length fiction. His literary heroes include Stephen King, H.P. Lovecraft, Jim Butcher, J.R.R. Tolkien, George R.R. Martin, C.S. Lewis and China Miéville, among many, many others.
Originally a California boy, he is currently in exile somewhere in the rural south.
He has a Siamese cat named Scully.
The Lurkers & Other Strange Tales Page 15
