by LJ Ross
The High Priest moved towards her and his horned mask swam in front of her eyes, the lines between reality and unreality blurring so that, for a moment, man and beast merged as one.
“The seeds are working,” he said quietly and her eyes flew open again, horror mirrored clearly in them.
He noticed it and smiled. It was always sweet, that moment of recognition, the prelude to the crippling fear which would follow.
“Yes, you know me, don’t you Anna?”
She said nothing, simply stared at him, her chest heaving.
He smiled through the hole in his mask, straight white teeth stretching across an attractive face.
He straightened and turned to his followers, told himself to be patient and complete the ritual. It was necessary, he understood that now. He lifted the dagger he held in his hand and cast a circle in the air, called to the Master.
Emperor Lucifer, master of all the rebel spirits,
We beg you to favour us in the call that we make to you.
O, Count Astarot!
Be favourable to us and make it so this night you appear to us in human form.
Accord to us, by the pact that we make with you, all the riches we need.
Ave Satani!
Anna heard the words and struggled again, retching. Her arms and feet were pinned, strapped to the table with two long strands of rope which wrapped fully around and underneath the wood to cover her chest, then underneath again to cross over her legs and ankles. The rough material rubbed against the skin on her ankles and wrists hard enough to draw blood but she didn’t feel it.
Above and around her, they chanted.
Turning her head, Anna watched them with a growing sense of finality. Faces merged into nightmarish effigies of mythical creatures.
* * *
When Ryan steered the tired fishing boat into Lindisfarne’s tiny harbour, any relief he felt was outweighed by gratitude towards the coastguard who had ensured he got there in one piece.
Alex Walker ran along the slippery wooden jetty, feet skidding, to meet him off the boat. He offered a calloused hand, which Ryan took.
“What’s going on? What the hell’s going on?”
Ryan looked into the other man’s weary face and decided to trust him. Sometimes, the apple fell far, far away from the tree.
“I need to get up to the fort. I think they’ve got Anna up there.”
“They?”
“There’s a circle of people on the island, you know that.”
Alex didn’t bother to deny it.
“My father’s part of that circle and he’s a healer, Ryan. He isn’t violent, believe me.”
Ryan felt the stirrings of pity.
“I’m going up there with or without your help.”
“Have you tried calling Anna?” Alex said desperately. “She’s probably just down at the Anchor, having a drink with the others. Here, use my phone –”
“Already tried calling her. No answer. I’ve tried the pub too and Pete tells me the place is mostly cleared out and that Bill took Anna home, which is funny because there’s no answer there, either.” Ryan muscled past him to run down the jetty, out onto the road leading up to the fort.
“Any cars been past here?”
“A couple, I think, but that was probably just Mark, going up to the fort to make sure the place is locked up –”
“I need your jeep.” Ryan held out a hand for the keys, looked at Alex square in the face.
Walker closed a fist around the keys in his pocket.
“I’ll drive you, I know the road.”
* * *
Anna watched as the man threw his arms above his head, called to his Master and instructed the others to do the same. Around the room, men and women she had known since childhood watched her with vacant, drugged expressions devoid of compassion. To them, she was no longer Anna; she was their offering in exchange for riches, whatever they may be.
To the man in the centre, she was his drug, another means by which he could get a taste of the heady power which flowed from killing. His body quivered as he thought of how her blood would feel as it poured over his hands, as he imagined the taste of it on his tongue.
Satisfied that the ritual was complete, he moved back to her, his bare feet sticking slightly on the plastic-covered floor.
He realised he wanted her mind to be clear, so that she would recognise him and respect him.
“Anna,” he gave her a couple of hard slaps across the face, watched her eyes register again. He smiled.
“Doctor Walker,” she croaked.
“I am so much more than that now. You need to understand that, to understand why you’re so important, Anna. Without you, we would have nothing to offer.”
“You’ve gone mad,” she said without thinking and watched him snarl, watched his fist clench and unclench.
“Ignorant bitch,” he hissed. “Just like your mother.”
Her mother?
Anna watched him as he circled the table like a hungry lion, ready to pounce. She started to feel the clouds in her mind part and told herself to keep talking, keep him talking. He wanted to tell his story; that much was clear. He wanted to brag.
“My mother died,” she said quietly.
“Nothing so simple,” he demurred. “Your mother was my first offering.”
Anna stared at him and pain stabbed her like a knife, followed quickly by white hot anger.
“Yes,” he saw comprehension dawn. “Unfortunately, there was no time for a complete ceremony. I had to make do.”
He thought back a moment to Sara Taylor’s face as she had fallen, suspended in mid-air, her arms flailing around for anything to hold onto. He smiled in remembrance.
“A great beauty, your mother,” he said conversationally. “You have the look of her.”
“Megan. You killed Megan.”
“She was different again,” he ran a tongue over his teeth. “A delicious sin, but as with many other things we know are bad for us, the moment comes when we have to step away. She was willing. She was willing to offer herself because she understood our circle, our worship.”
“She didn’t agree to die.”
“Oh, yes she did,” he tutted and flicked a finger across her nose in an old gesture she remembered from when she had been a teenager having dinner at his home. “Megan understood that the wheels of nature keep turning, that there must be a fair exchange between us and the forces. She was part of that exchange.”
“You’re nothing but a murderer. You’ll burn in hell,” Anna snarled.
He laughed, throwing his head back so the furry pelt rolled and swept the floor dramatically.
“Do you think I am afraid of Hell? Who is it that you think we worship?” he leaned closer again in a sudden motion which caused her to take in a rasping breath, fearing what would come next.
“I am hell,” he whispered, so close now that she could feel his breath on her face. She looked at his eyes, glinting with madness behind the plastic mask and forced herself to focus, to remain conscious, and not to give in just yet.
Where was Ryan?
“You killed Rob too.”
“Talkative, all of a sudden, aren’t you?” he said with a chuckle. “Well, I suppose I can oblige you. It isn’t as if your lover will be able to save you, is it? The tides are in, Anna, and only a madman would try to cross by sea. Besides, Daniel has already agreed to pay the price society demands for our sacrifices.”
A single tear leaked from her eyes, but her mouth remained closed.
“Very well,” Walker continued, but he lifted the dagger. The blade shone silver-white in the light of the fire and Anna told herself to breathe, even when her stomach rolled and her bowels wanted to loosen. She stared up at the old ceiling, refused to look at him as he started to nick the blade over her clothes, cutting away the cloth of her top.
“Rob was weak,” Walker continued. “He didn’t appreciate the great sacrifice Daniel made for us by killing his own daughter. I love
the irony, don’t you? Very much like Abraham and Isaac, but of course our Gods are vastly different to the one they sing to every Sunday.”
Anna wondered how he could venerate a paedophile, who had subjected his own daughter to untold years of torment before eventually killing her, but focussed on questions he could answer.
“Rob wanted to go to the police?” Her breath came through her teeth as she felt him nick the last scrap of material, baring her torso.
“Indeed,” Walker growled. “But as I said, he was really very weak. Imagine, telling me that he had seen Mathieson that night. He must have known that we can risk no traitors in our circle.”
“You punished him,” Anna said.
“He needed to be made an example of,” Walker agreed. “First, for his disobedience. Second, for his lack of faith. Third, for his audacity in attempting to lead my son along an unclean path. In the end, like Megan, he came to me of his own free will.”
Conveniently, he overlooked the part where he had drugged and tied the man down before setting him alight, Anna thought.
“Alex is one of you?” She whispered the question and dreaded the answer, chose not to look around the room in case she recognised another old friend.
“When he is ready, he will be welcomed as one of us. He has been a disappointment in many ways, I’m sad to say,” Walker’s voice dipped and fell for a moment, before it rose again.
“Rob had been initiated. Did he think I didn’t know that he was sleeping with my son?” Steve was nearly shouting, his lips peeling back over his teeth.
Anna said nothing, couldn’t risk it.
“Of course, the timing was ideal. I had planned to use Jennifer Ingles,” he mused, tracing little circles over Anna’s skin, scratching here and there. “She supplies us with our life force, the means by which our followers see the true path, but she and her fool of a husband are beginning to become tiresome.”
He thought of Ingles for a moment and tapped the blade against his hand in an angry gesture. The man and his wife had run from him, but they couldn’t hide. He would find them and punish them for their betrayal. That pleasure would be for another day.
“She supplies you with drugs, you mean.”
“So prosaic, so narrow-minded,” he chided her. “Surely, now that you’ve sampled the effects yourself, you can attest to the wonderfully liberating effect they have on the human psyche.”
“The drugs help to brainwash people,” she concluded flatly. “Reducing their faculties, giving them a false sense of invincibility.”
“I never expected you to believe,” he said sadly. “But I did expect you to understand.”
“I understand completely.”
He leaned over her so that they were eye to eye.
“No, my dear, but you will.”
* * *
Phillips was an ordinary man, with ordinary tastes. Those tastes did not include donning a bullet-proof vest and flying through a storm in the middle of winter, across treacherous waters, with only a tin-pot helicopter between him and certain death.
Not that he would admit that he was afraid of heights and that he couldn’t swim; not when Denise MacKenzie sat across from him looking like a cross between G.I. Jane and Miss Ireland. Her red hair was caught up in a black helmet, tendrils escaping around her ears. She wore dark protective clothing, as he did, but where his tended to cling a bit across the stomach region, hers skimmed her body like a second skin. He told himself to keep his mind on the job.
He was their commander, after all.
“Aye, right, you all know the drill,” he shouted above the sound of the propeller, trying to ignore the roll of his stomach as the helicopter swayed sickeningly in the wind.
“We land beside the nature reserve, on the north of the island. Team A, I want you manning the exits to the fort. Team B, head to the village, crowd control. Team C, you’re with me. We’ll split up. Yates and Jennings, sweep downstairs. MacKenzie, we’ll take upstairs.”
He cleared his throat.
“Suspect is Steve Walker, aged fifty-eight. He’s the island doctor, but he’s a man we suspect of being responsible for two deaths, potential third in progress. He may have accomplices in a group of local men and women, who refer to themselves as a ‘circle’, acting under his direction. They may be armed and should be considered dangerous. DCI Ryan may be in the vicinity attempting to recover the victim, identified as Anna Taylor, sister of one of the deceased. Any questions?”
There were no questions.
The helicopter started to lurch in what Phillips considered an unnecessary nose dive towards the island and he clipped on the side of his helmet.
“Let’s go, boys and girls. One of ours is down there and he needs a helping hand.”
* * *
Anna lay naked on the wooden table, but for her underwear. She shivered, small jerks of her body as Walker circled around, peeling away her dignity piece by piece.
“Why are you doing this?” she asked the question through lips that were dry as parchment and wished desperately for a sip of water.
“I am compelled,” he answered easily. “Our Master demands it.” He remembered the circle standing around him, realised he had forgotten their existence and spoke up. “He compels all of us to make offerings and, in return, he showers us with fortune. I am the Master in human form.”
Anna laughed, she couldn’t help it. It came out long and loud, slightly hysterical, but she was past caring.
“Who do you think you’re kidding? You think that killing people makes you a god – or that it makes you invincible?” her voice was scathing. “The police will know you’ve done this, done all of this. You’re nothing but a common psychopath. They’re two-a-penny down at the max security wards in Broadmoor, I’m sure you’ll fit right in.”
He stood perfectly still, then something finally snapped. With an animal-like howl, he straddled her on the table. The action dislodged the mask and it clattered to the floor, leaving his face bared to her. Eyes feral, teeth bared, he clutched the dagger in both hands and prepared to plunge it deep into her chest.
The circle stood, watching.
Anna looked up, up at the face of a man who believed himself to be a god, who held her life in his hands. In that moment, she thought of Ryan and all they had shared so quickly. If she had known, if she had thought that there wouldn’t be any more time, she would have told him how he had enriched her life.
She would have told him that she loved him and screw the fact that it had only been a few days. She would have enjoyed watching that awkward look on his face while he fumbled to find an appropriate reply.
She smiled, thinking of it.
* * *
Alex was true to his word. The jeep made record time as it flew up the hilly road to the fort, sending small rocks and gravel flying over the cliff edge as it went. Ryan was out of the car before it came to a stop, already reaching for the clutch-piece which still lay tucked into his jeans.
“Wait! I’m coming with you,” Alex stopped to pick up a flare gun – it was the best he could do – and ran into the stone fortress after him.
It was pure instinct which led Ryan to the stairs. That feeling again, guiding him. He took the stairs, two at a time, his tread light. He moved like a shadow, blending with the darkened hallway. He heard Alex moving behind him cautiously, which was good.
“Keep behind,” he murmured, but didn’t wait for an answer. He heard the chanting, a low drone coming from the end of the corridor and followed the sound.
His heart stopped as he took in the scene. He was vaguely aware of the people swaying and mumbling in a circle around him, but his eyes flew to the centre, where Anna lay roped and bound. Above her, Walker was poised, resting on his haunches either side of her.
“Police! Lower your weapon!”
Walker looked across when he heard them in the doorway and gave Ryan and his son a wide smile. He raised his arms higher, prepared to sink the blade into Anna’s chest.
Ryan pulled the trigger and at the same time a stream of red light whistled past his ear. Walker let out a long howl before his body crumpled to the floor, writhing in agony as one bullet speared his shoulder and the hot flare grazed his right cheek.
Ryan turned to Alex, who stood just behind him with the flare gun raised and still smoking. He was breathing hard, tears glistened but they didn’t fall. Gently, Ryan pushed the gun to face the floor.
“For Rob,” Alex said in a low voice.
Ryan nodded.
“Watch the others.”
He ran to Anna, felt the tightness in his chest ease slightly when he saw her alive, breathing, looking at him.
“Get me out of here, for God’s sake,” she muttered and he sobbed out a laugh, began unravelling the heavy rope. He helped her up, wrapped his jacket around her.
They heard the sound of footsteps – one light and one distinctly heavier – just before Phillips and MacKenzie burst into the room. Ryan was amused to note that Frank had elected to swing low as Denise swung high, looking like a Northumbrian version of Starsky and Hutch.
Still, he was damn happy to see them.
“Took you long enough,” he said, then turned to the figures huddled on the floor, hands behind their heads. “Let’s shine some light on this.”
They switched the overhead lights on and systematically de-masked the circle of locals. There were fishermen that Ryan recognised, the receptionist from Walker’s surgery, but amongst them there was Alison Rigby and Bill Tilson.
“She said that my sister had stolen her husband,” Anna said dispassionately as she looked down on the woman who lay weeping on the floor.
“Whores! Every last one of you!” Alison screamed, her mascara running in black tracks down her face.
“Now, let’s not have any of that language,” Phillips said mildly, then put a heavy boot into her back as she struggled on the floor, trying to claw at him. “I suppose there’ll be no more cake for me,” he said.
“Bill.” Anna looked at him as she would a stranger. “You were like a brother to me, but you betrayed Megan and now you’re nothing. You’ve made yourself nothing.”
He held his head in his hands and wept.
