by Ted Dekker
Blood dripped into the water.
Johnis put his free hand in Silvie’s and held tight, perhaps to still the tremble in his own fingers. “He’s defiling the water with blood,” he whispered, citing the taboo they all knew. Silvie didn’t know if the rite Alucard was performing was necessary to open the gate, but she suspected it was more a matter of mood setting for the beast after two thousand years of dreaming.
He flung the knife to one side, letting it clatter off the table and fall noisily to the floor. Facing him, Darsal picked up the black book and set it on the table directly in front of him.
The beast squeezed blood from his wound onto the cover, then pulled his claw back.
Darsal set the brown book squarely on top of the bloody black book. Now there were two books, one atop the other, joined with blood.
Again, Alucard dribbled blood onto the cover.
This was the vision that they’d seen beneath the waters at the desert oasis. All seven books aligning to create a gateway.
“Darsal …” Johnis didn’t bother imploring this time. Just “Darsal,” and it was clearly for his own remorse. Darsal, Darsal, what have you done?
One by one Darsal set the books on the stack as Alucard wet their covers with his blood until there was only the second black book left to set on top.
Instead of placing the book on top, Darsal held the book out to him. “This one should be yours to place, sir.”
Alucard hesitated. Clearly this was not as rehearsed.
He took the book, uttering a soft growl. Held it over the sixth book with both hands. Lifted his head to the stone gateway before him.
He spoke in a low, crackling voice that filled the room. “By the power entrusted in me, for Teeleh, my master, and his precious blood, which gives life to all who despise Elyon and his waters, I call you forth … my bride.”
Darsal eased to one side of the table, her eyes on the books.
Alucard lowered the last black book.
A flash of light cracked above the books. Silvie threw herself as low as her chains would allow her. Above them the worms began to squeal.
“Elyon, help us,” Johnis breathed, gripping her hand even tighter.
The light slammed into the stone wall and ran a ring around the perimeters of the concentric circles. Alucard spread his wings, lifted his jaw, and roared, “My bride!”
The gate dissolved into light, humming with the power of a thousand lightning bolts. Silvie couldn’t breathe. Her heart felt as though it had been crammed into her throat.
The first streak of black that cut through the light was a Shataiki guard, the kind that had flocked above Silvie and Johnis in the Black Forest. Roughly two and half feet of shrieking muscle, with large yellow fangs.
And then they came in a dizzying rush, dozens in the space of a few seconds, flying to the ceiling, where they hooked their claws into the squealing worms and hung, glaring with red eyes.
It’s over, Silvie thought. We’ve lost.
But then everything changed.
Darsal moved. The smaller Shataiki were still flying through the breech, and Alucard was still glorying over his coming bride, and Darsal was moving like lightning.
She grabbed one of the wooden candlesticks and flung off the candles, rounding the table in long strides. The candlestick was now a long, sharpened stake.
Screaming at the top of her lungs, Darsal thrust the wooden stake under Alucard’s raised arm. Into his heart.
An earsplitting crack from the beast’s throat shook the chamber. A single, oversized Shataiki spilled out of the light and landed on the ground beyond Alucard. The female had joined her guard. And more of her guard flooded the gate.
Alucard spun about, slashing at empty air. Skin fell from his face, exposing bleached bone.
Darsal leaped over the books, snatched up the second candlestick, and descended on the still-disoriented female.
“I knew it!” Johnis cried. “I knew it!”
She sidestepped a thrust of Alucard’s claw, dove for the female, and plunged the second stake into the creature’s chest.
Silvie watched in disbelief as both Alucard and the female who would bring his offspring to life began to melt before them. Their flesh fell from their bodies like rotten flesh falling from an overripe fruit. Unable to hold their own weight, they fell to the ground, writhing.
Dying.
Darsal stood back, eyeing them. Silvie knew then that Darsal, chosen alongside Silvie and Johnis and Billos, had planned this all along.
Still the Shataiki flooded the chamber.
knew it!” Johnis said. “The key, the key, hurry!”
Darsal stared at him.
“Darsal …”
What was she doing? Shed saved them, right? Shed planned this whole thing down to the final touches: winning Alucard’s trust by giving him her book, pretending to be filled with bitterness, knowing that one day the others would come through and Alucard would have the advantage. He would beat them to the books. But she would be there to kill him, having learned precisely how to kill Shataiki in this reality.
Everything else had been lies. She’d lied to them so that Alucard wouldn’t have any reason to doubt her. And she’d turned on him only when he was at his weakest, in the moment of his own glory.
She’d done it.
Hadn’t she?
“Darsal,” Johnis breathed. “Please, no, no, no! Tell us that you’ve stayed true!”
Darsal spit on Alucard, who was now a shivering blob. She crossed to the table and stood before the seven Books of Histories.
For a moment she just stood there, her back to the others.
Stop it! Silvie thought. Break the connection. Shut the gateway!
Instead, Darsal spun around, thrust both arms into the air, and screamed at the bats still swarming into the chamber.
“It’s her!” Karas cried. “Darsal is the Dark One!”
So then not everything Darsal had said had been a lie. She’d intended on killing Alucard all along, but she was as bitter as she’d let on.
Darsal screamed at the ceiling, full throated, veins pronounced on her neck and arms. But now tears ran down her face. She took one long draw of air and screamed again, until Silvie thought she might tear her throat.
“Elyon!” Johnis wept. “Elyon compels you, Darsal. Elyon compels us all.”
“No!” Darsal whirled to Johnis. “Elyon made the Dark One, you fool! Don’t you see? I am the Dark One. The prophesy was about me! I am destined to destroy this world. I’ve turned my back on Elyon!”
She was right.
“I haven’t turned my back on Elyon.” Johnis’s eyes darted to the Shataiki filling the room. A thousand it seemed, For a moment Silvie thought she saw some white fur among them, but then it was gone.
“You may be the Dark One, but you can’t deny Elyon’s power,” Johnis said. “Or his will to take the diseased and bathe them in his water!”
Darsal was breathing hard, her eyes fiery, desperate. But she had nothing to say.
“It doesn’t matter why you did what you did any longer!” Johnis cried. “It only matters what you do right now.”
Her face wrinkled. Shataiki streamed in over her head. On the ground, Alucard and his bride convulsed, then stopped moving.
The worms stopped squealing. Except for the steady beating of wings through the gateway, the room fell silent.
The Shataiki suddenly began to fall to the floor, chunks of rotting fur raining from the ceiling by the hundreds. They thudded on the stone and immediately bowed their heads to Darsal. The ground was quickly carpeted with black bats except for a large circle around Darsal and the two dead Shataiki.
Silvie blinked. Having lost one master, they were acknowledging another: Darsal.
The Dark One.
“Is Elyon so foolish?” Johnis demanded.
Darsal was out of words. Now it was tears that came from her in streams, wetting her cheeks.
“Do you think he allowed you to be
come this so-called Dark One without knowing it would work to his advantage?”
What was he saying?
“He knew that in this moment you would do something not even you have anticipated. That was why he chose you! He knew you would stand against evil! You will undo all that Alucard has done by saving the books.”
She shook her head. “No …”
“You, this Dark One, will embrace Elyon’s love, that same love you felt for Billos, and you will destroy evil.”
“No …”
“Because you are not evil. Evil has just consumed you. But they …” Johnis pointed at the hundreds of Shataiki now on the ground, bowing to Darsal, tempting her with their service. “They are evil!”
“Nooooooo!” Darsal screamed, weeping, “Noooooo!”
“Yes!” Johnis cried. “Yes!”
Johnis began to weep. Darsal sank to her knees.
“End it, Darsal,” Johnis said. “You’ve killed Alucard. Now rid yourself of his evil.”
She let her hands go limp by her sides, sobbing, her face tilted up, eyes closed. “I’m the Dark One,” she mouthed. “I’m the Dark One.”
“Fight, Darsal! Fight for Elyon,” Then in a raw voice that made Silvie want to cry, “You are the chosen one!”
It was as if this truth had hit Johnis for the first time, Darsal might have convinced herself that she was the Dark One, but even being the Dark One, she was the chosen one.
Silvie suddenly felt the weight of the idea and began to cry with them. Because she, too, was the Dark One, wasn’t she? They all were, as much as they were all Forest Dwellers, without Elyon’s cleansing waters.
Yet they were chosen. It was up to them to follow either the one who had made them dark, or the one who had chosen each of them, Teeleh or Elyon.
“No, no, no, no, no, no …” Darsal was rocking, sobbing the words.
Shataiki continued to stream into the room.
“Please, Darsal,” Karas cried. “Please …”
Without warning, another larger Shataiki spilled through the gateway, landed next to Alucard’s dead body, and flapped to steady itself.
“Darsal!” Silvie screamed.
She jerked her head up at the warning, seeing the second female. She stood shakily, staring, gathering her wits.
And then something behind her eyes snapped into place. She rushed the dead slab of meat that used to be Alucard and jerked the stake from its heart.
Screamed, red-faced.
Rushed the second female from behind.
Slammed the stake into its back, right through the rib cage, through whatever innards filled the heartless creature, and right out its chest.
She held the stake in place, resisting the attempts of the flailing beast to break free.
“Back to hell!” Darsal thundered. Then again, in a voice that cracked with emotion, “Back to hell!”
She released the stake and staggered back, breathing hard. Her heel struck her bag, and she stopped. Still Shataiki poured in through the gateway.
“Darsal …”
It was all Johnis needed to say. Darsal’s face wrinkled with anguish for just a moment. She glanced up, saw the beasts bowing to her, and swept up her bag. Flung it sidearmed at Johnis.
“The keys!” Silvie cried. “Quick!”
Johnis frantically rummaged through the bag.
Darsal was already sprinting toward the Books of History, scattering the Shataiki gathered there. She grabbed the stack of books with both hands and tore the top three from the table with a grunt.
The light vanished immediately with a crack that echoed through the chamber. The upper halves of two Shataiki spun from the closed gateway into the room and fell to the floor, dead lumps of bleeding fur.
Darsal’s sudden change of heart wasn’t lost on the thousands of Shataiki gathered on the floor. They began to bob and shriek with open jaws, like begging chicks in a nest.
“Hurry!” Darsal grabbed the other four books and sprinted for them.
Johnis found the keys, freed Silvie, and was working on Karas.
Thoughts of servitude no longer in their minds, the Shataiki began to take flight around the room. First a dozen, then a hundred, then a thousand, shrieking and flapping in a river of black just below the worms.
Darsal kept one eye on the Shataiki and one on the bag as she withdrew first one, then two flares.
The bats gained courage and began to sweep down, snapping their jaws. Above them, the worms were screaming.
Darsal shoved a flare at Silvie. “Light it by ripping the cap off. It’s hot enough to ignite the worms’ mucus. This place will go up like a tin of gasoline. ”
Johnis had freed Karas, and now himself.
“Run!” Darsal jumped off the ledge and streaked for the shut door. Silvie followed hard after her. A bat brushed through her hair, and she cried out, swatting at her head.
“Light it!” Darsal slammed open the latch.
Silvie slid to a stop. She jerked the cap off the flare. It hissed and spouted red flame.
The Shataiki grew frantic. They flew every which way now, shrieking, crashing into the walls, clawing at the stone.
“Light it!” Darsal screamed again, throwing the door open.
Silvie thrust the flare against the worm salve on the wall. It sizzled but refused to light.
Shataiki had found the open door and flew out above Darsal’s head now, dozens, shrieking as they disappeared.
“Go, go, go!”
Karas ran out, followed by Johnis.
Darsal snatched the flare from Silvie. “Go!”
“You—”
“Go!”
She went. Through the door.
A plume of orange flame and heat mushroomed behind her, and she spun to see Darsal tearing for the door.
The flame spread along the walls like ignited oil on water. Whoosh! Silvie stood like wood, stunned by how rapidly the fire consumed the room.
Shataiki, now totally aware of their impending demise, clogged the door. Behind them a huge ball of fire fell screaming from the ceiling. A burning worm.
Go, go, go!
Darsal tugged her. Slammed the door shut. Bats thudded into the wood. Even outside, the roaring flames were deafening.
Then they were running up the passage. Silvie was the last up the stairway into Alucard’s library, where more worms crowded the ceiling. Darsal had ripped open her flare and was lighting fire to one of the wet walls behind the bookcases.
“Get out!”
No Shataiki, Silvie saw. They’d already flown out.
They waited for Darsal by the door this time, until her flame caught. The library went up like a tinderbox, chasing them out the door with hear and flames.
Darsal led them from the fortress in a full sprint. Out into the cool night air. Just in time to see a black stain winging frantically for the sky, Shataiki screeched overhead, scattering to find safety.
Silvie spun back to the castle. Light flickered from the hallway past the door. And when she stilted her breath to listen with the others, she could hear the distant cries of burning Shataiki and igniting worms.
Alucard’s lair was being consumed by hell.
ohnis, Silvie, Karas, and Darsal stood on the side of the road for a long time, watching and listening to the flames. Little was said. Much was considered.
Silvie looked up at the graying eastern sky. “Morning is coming.”
And for a while, nothing more was spoken.
“We did it.” Johnis looked at the seven Books of History that Darsal had placed on the ground. “We have finally found the seven books.”
For a few long beats they all just stared at them. Darsal’s shoulders shook with a sob. She hugged herself with one arm and lifted the other hand to cover her face.
“No, Darsal.” Silvie put her arm over the girl’s shoulder. “You can’t blame yourself.”
“I … I …”
“You are chosen,” Johnis said. “And you saved us all. That’s all
that matters now.”
It was hard to imagine what kind of suffering Darsal’s bitterness had caused her all these years. She will bear that scar, Silvie thought. But Johnis was right. They had won. They were the chosen ones, and they had recovered the seven books.
“There’s still danger. The books can still be used.” Karas picked up the black one and wiped Alucard’s blood off its cover using a tissue from her pocket. “What now?”
“Now we have to return them,” Johnis said.
A whoosh of wings disturbed the air behind Silvie, and she spun around, expecting Shataiki. But this wasn’t a wad of black muscle.
It was a ball of white fur: Roush. Michal!
And hard on Michal’s heels, Gabil landed a ways off, tumbled three full turns on the ground, and launched himself into a spindly but much improved karate kick.
“Hiyah!” he cried, and then landed on both feet where he managed to keep his balance. “What do you think? Was that better?”
Silvie now realized that the white streak she had seen among the flood of black Shataiki had been Michal and Gabil! They stood like two soldiers on the grass, green eyes glimmering, fur so white they looked like the marshmallows Karas had served them with coffee.
Karas rushed up to Gabil and dropped to one knee. “Thank Elyon!” She hugged the Roush. “How is Hunter?”
Gabil nearly toppled backward with her hug. “Easy, easy! My improved skills don’t include protection against the hug of death! Hunter who?”
“The Roush who guards Middle?”
“Oh, Hunter” Gabil said. “As full of himself as always, I’m sure.”
Johnis hurried up to Michal, dropped down to one knee, and bowed his head. “You have no idea how good it is to see you, Michal.”
A thin grin crossed the Roush’s lips. “Actually, I do.”
Then they all crowded around the two furry, white bats, peppering them with questions and offering details about their close call with Alucard. And in short order, some things were finally set straight.
Yes, both realities were linked in so many ways that not even Michal had known before. Thomas of Hunter’s dreams were indeed true, all of them, in both places. Teeleh’s attempt to destroy the world through the disease borne in Shataiki—the Horde disease—was now foiled.
