by Ira Robinson
"Tell me where she is or I will kill you where you stand, you bastard."
The man rolled his eyes, the brown of them flashing slightly in the glow of The Flow. Was that bravado?
He shook his head, the bangles of his earrings shifting with a soft tinkle. "No, I think not, Hallow, and we can stare at each other all night, or you listen to my commands and see your daughter soon." A red nimbus shimmered around his fingers again as he squinted. "Which shall it be?"
There was no way he could trust anything the creature had to say, but Carver motioned the sword toward himself. "What, then?"
Indris glanced between the two of them, making sure Jessup remained in place before returning his focus on Carver.
"My master has a mission for you, Hallow, and if you do it, Lisa will be returned to you."
Carver raised his brows but his lips plastered closed for the moment.
"You must kill Biel. Do this, and you will both be free."
"Wait, what?" The blade dipped, Carver's mouth widening.
Indris nodded, his grin growing. "You're good at killing spawn that doesn't belong. It should be a simple enough task for someone as potent as you." The glimmer of a laugh passed through his ivory teeth.
Confusion ran wild through Carver, shocked at the proposal.
"What do you know about Biel?" he managed to gasp out as he once more braced himself with the sword.
"More than you'll ever be aware of, Hallow."
"Why would I want to kill him? Who are you working for, Indris? Tell me!"
"That's unimportant," Indris replied, backing a step from both of them. "You want the girl, you kill Biel."
"You and your master wiped out all these people, killed my friend, and now you expect me to kill Biel?" He edged closer, sliding against the concrete softly as his knees lowered, ready to kick into motion. "You're murderous bastards. Give me my daughter, or I'll send you to the hell you've been avoiding, you piece of shit!"
A barking laugh washed over Carver as Indris sidled further away, stopping Carver's approach for a second. "Hallow, this was not my doing. Your friend, pitiful as he was, had his uses even for us. These deaths and his are not caused by the one I serve."
Carver stopped moving. He traced the lines of the tall man, the clean suit impeccable and sparkling bangles the accoutrements of avarice, unbloodied and unblemished.
"Who, then?"
His stomach dropped to the floor when Indris said, "Your master."
Chapter 23
Lisa pushed the plate of food with the tips of her toes, sliding it closer to the edge of the bars of the cell she had awakened in hours before.
She ran her hands over her arms rapidly, trying to eke out a bit of warmth to counter the chill of the surrounding air, the dampness clinging to her skin like an icy blanket. The friction helped some but sunk back in mere moments after she stopped. The nightgown she had been wearing was still on her body, torn in so many places it was useless against the cold.
Dim light came from the ceiling, a series of fluorescent lights lining the giant chamber she found herself in, when she pried her eyes open and gasped in the first conscious breath of the grimy space she could not identify the entirety of for all its size. The lights were so high and covered with some kind of filth, they did little to illuminate her surroundings, but it was enough for her to tell there was no one else around.
There were, however, muffled scampers throughout the room, the subtle clicking and scraping of something against the hard, dirt-coated flooring, metal dented and fallen long ago into disrepair. Her eyes flicked to one side and another each occasion they resonated through the air, trying to catch a glimpse of whatever was there, but only the trace of shadows, perhaps, drifting like the sounds, themselves, kept her company.
Lisa lost track of how much she had been awake, no light from any windows marking the passage of hours and no guards she could see changing shifts. Only the endless minutes with her back as far from touching the cool metal wall behind her as she could. It merely sucked the heat and gave her no hint of where she might be.
Her stomach growled constantly, telling her time wasn't somehow suspended, and her eyes crossed over the plate of food grown icy on the floor more often than she could help, but she did not want to touch it.
Her father taught her better than that. She was not awake when it was brought to her cell, she did not see the hands that carried it or made it, and the last sight she took in before she was taken captive was Indris and his demons.
That she was in their grip now was a given, but she would not do anything to help them keep her controlled, if the meal was drugged. From what her father told her, demons might use it as a way to trick her or cause her pain, just for spite and fun.
She would give them nothing, but the groaning in her belly was growing louder and longer the more time that passed, and she did not know how long she would be able to hold out.
At least she had not seen the horrible face of that tall man, and there was no sign of his demon cohorts, either. Wherever she was, there was that to be grateful for.
A creak resounded through the chamber, battering the walls back and forth and her legs twitched, kicking out unconsciously as they scrabbled from the floor, coming up to her breast. She wrapped her arms around her knees and rocked, her breath held inside as she listened.
A minute later there was nothing, no movement or other sounds to tell her what was going on, and she let her breath out, broken by the trembling of her chest.
She wiped a tear with the back of her hand and rubbed the moisture off on her dirty nightgown.
Why hadn't dad come? Where was he?
She cried for a while, the fluttering of her heart uncontrollable as the aching of her body, scrapes and cuts from the glass she was thrown through still unhealed and so sore, misery suffusing every pore of her being. She had to stop, had to get herself under control, but the pressure of so much unknown, so many things happening to her at once, was too hard.
They were probably watching her. The shadows in the wide room could be demons, themselves, for all she knew, staring at her as she wept bitter dread, each tear falling into the grime of her skin and night gown a nail of despair she could not afford to lose.
Dad, please come. Please get me out of here.
She prayed he would hear her, somehow be able to catch her words as she scattered them to the wind in her mind, the vestiges of hope decaying with each moment that moved.
When the bout of tears passed, she rested her chin on her chest, the stiffness overbearing. She caressed her neck, the long hair tumbling from her back into her lap, giving her a modicum of warmth more than she had before. Her knees rubbed the last of the dampness, but her eyes glittered as she raised her head once more and looked around.
She sniffled, the tremble now from cold more than the crying, the aching in her stomach turning to slight nausea as she kept more cries at bay.
"Dad, please come." She spoke aloud for the first time since waking, her small voice so hollow and strained in the huge chamber, the walls so distant from here no echo returned despite its emptiness.
She stood, the bare soles of her feet chilling more as they touched the metal floor, and crossed the space she was given before the bars blocked her way. Her hand gripped two of them, only a few inches apart from one another, and prodded them, but they were too solid to move. She could not even see a doorway, nothing to show how she had been placed into the room while she was knocked out.
If only she had a little of that plastic explosive dad brought home. He showed her how to set it up, and the bang would probably be able to break through the steel if she did it right. But there was nothing like that there. Nothing more than the metal floor and the dingy alloy of the bars barricading her in a place she did not recognize.
It could have been an old warehouse, or an abandoned factory of some kind. Whatever it once was, it was fallen into disuse so long there was no way to be sure.
Dust embedded everything
, so thick it turned greasy, clinging to her as she moved back to the small cot bolted down.
Lisa could not see any other cells. This one could have been built especially for her, for all she knew, but other than the disturbances on the floor from her own stepping feet, there were no other things to give her any clue there had ever been anyone else there.
The hunger was not the worst of it. The morass of grime and disgust around her she could handle, though her mind tingled with concern she would sicken from something clinging to the muck.
The trembles of fear and ache, the hard edge of the dread coursing through her with each passing second she was left there was punctuated by the realization she had to go to the bathroom, and there was not only nowhere for her to do it, the slats on the bars of her cell were wide for anybody, or thing, to see through.
She sniffed again. That, too, was probably intentional, yet another way for the demons to find glee as they watched her suffer, not just physically, but the ignoble traumas they inflicted.
She wanted to give them nothing, to be capable enough for them to bore of her and wander to their next target, their next meal of psychic debilitations on a victim not her.
She could brace herself against it and think she was that strong, but she was only one young girl and could be honest with herself to know better.
Her father had taught her better than that, too.
She tumbled back on the cot, the springs creaking, shattering the silence as she winced.
Give them nothing. Nothing. Give them nothing.
She repeated it in her mind, chanting it over and again to gain strength from it, but it faded into nothing when the loud squeak happened again.
Her eyes tore upward, a long catwalk above with a set of metal stairs twenty feet over the floor shifting slightly as a new, brighter white light than the surrounding fluorescent bulbs emitted cut through the haze of floating dust particles that began to twist. The drift of the catwalk increased as a figure strode away from the doorway that now stood open.
Black, massive as it was freed of the light above, paced along the catwalk, breathing so heavy she could hear its huffs even from this distance. Low, growling and grumbling as it took one step after another.
They stopped halfway to the stairs and leaned forward, long claws glinting in the glowing bars.
She screamed as wings, deep and harsh as night, unfurled from its back and swept the surrounding air, three times the size of the figure and reflecting the glow with thick leather.
Her hand came to her lips and she bit it, cutting off the scream as red slits appeared where their head should be, glowing a russet malevolence.
Those eyes bored into her, freezing her in place as her mind closed in terror, the warmth across her legs unnoticed as her bladder let loose and washed over the cot. Her muscles locked as the stench of her own filth mixed with that of the room.
Her body quaked as the booming laugh swept over her, deep and malicious, and continuing on as the figure turned and strode through the door, slamming it shut.
The white light cut off as she grabbed her hair with both hands, screaming over and again until her voice was gone, and kept going as a rasp.
Chapter 24
Jessup would have to deal with the smell in his own way, but Carver wrapped the old tee shirt around his head, covering his nose and face like a bandit mask.
The batch of herbs he put in with it should help.
He didn't want to be there again, the spectacle of what was left inside horrific and still untouched. No one had come for his friend, no one to investigate what befell Malachi and what was behind as evidence.
Maybe it was just how small towns were, the people keeping themselves out of the business of others so much they would let that go for weeks before coming to see what was going on. Maybe there was something more, a sense there was the stuff of nightmares held within the arms of the church, the threat their sanity would be struck away from them with an ardor inescapable.
The door was still ajar, and the insects playing havoc around the entrance alone were thick, flies and wasps making a home in the stench of decay and musk of the corpse they were no doubt feasting on. Carver had not gone in. Not yet. The thought turned his stomach so he could barely breathe.
But there was one thing he had not done while there before, and he damned himself for not taking every step he should have. Now he would have to face worse.
"Stay out here," he ordered Jessup, not caring if the dog obeyed or not.
After Indris gave him the command to kill Biel again, he disappeared, some part of his magic carrying him away without another word, leaving Carver and Jessup to the demise of Trading Circle. They, too, left the devastation behind, using the portal his friend set up for him and jumping into the truck to come back to this small space, this sanctuary-turned-horror-show.
This place that had become Malachi's coffin.
Though he came faster than he ever had before, his mind was not on the road. He barely remembered pulling onto the streets of this little crap town.
The magician-king claimed Biel was responsible for the massacre of the Trading Circle, the death of the people of the Syndicate gathered there in under a flag of peace and neutrality in the damnable war in the heavens. How was that possible?
Biel was powerful; Carver did not doubt that. He had seen for himself what the demon could do when he put his mind to things. After all, the cancer in Lisa faded within days, his addiction cleaned and the magic he exuded every time he brought destruction to the forces of darkness were fueled by him. Weren't they?
Carver kept glancing at the scar on his palm, the supple light of the sun beaming down through the windshield of his truck glistening the sweat that would not stop. He still had so many damn questions about what it even meant to be the Hallow, everything locked away from him behind walls so thick he might never discover a way through.
Most of all Lisa.
Indris had given his assurances she was safe, but could the bastard be believed? His evil was legendary, the spite in him so powerful it carried him through the ages. Would, could, someone like that be trusted?
But what choice did Carver have? The only information he had about his daughter came from shadows deep and murky. He had to find a way to cut through it.
Carver went to his truck for a moment, pulling a large tarp from the bed before coming to the door once more and stepping across the threshold into stench thick and ripe.
The shirt on his face helped some, as did the herbal mix he pocketed in it, but it was still powerful enough to cause him to retch. Jessup seemed to fare better, though his lips were pulled back away from his teeth as he breathed.
Carver brought a stick of gum out of his pocket and mouthed it, holding his breath until the pullover was in place. Mint poured across his tongue, strong enough to overwhelm his senses for a moment. The chewing continued as he walked to the front of the church and the body of his companion.
The tarp covered him, the flaps crinkling as it came to settle on top of his body. The still-open eyes were nearly white from decay, or, perhaps interactions of the flies that tried to nest within the remnants.
Those hollow eyes cut off from Carver's view, and he stepped back grateful their accusing glare could no longer focus on him.
"I'm sorry, my friend," Carver whispered. Quiet as he was, the sound disturbed the insects and other things that were returning after the interruption of the scattering of the tarp. "Sorry I couldn't help you."
He backpedaled, his leg bumping against the nearest pew. It halted him, and he turned his eyes to the shrine and the candles lined up behind it.
A massive pulpit stood sentry over the altar, raised a few feet above the rest of the room on a dais, the oak lacquered dark with age and disuse.
What was there here that kept drawing him back? Why was he here again, when he should be out looking for where Lisa was hidden away by Indris and his master?
He was missing something, he knew it, but he cou
ld not figure out what it could be. Why had Malachi been so desperate when he talked to Lisa? What had he found that was bad enough it led to his death?
Indris claimed they had nothing to do with the death of his friend, nor those in Trading Circle, yet the evil he exuded from every pore could not be denied. There was no way he could trust that creature.
And why the command to kill Biel? Was it to dis-empower him?
While Carver would, if given a choice, step away from the role thrust upon him out of desperation, he had to think about Lisa and what was best for her. If he gave it up, he was sure the tumors would come back. Biel had said as much.
