The carolers didn’t seem to notice at all. They continued to cross Merrick, walking in pairs of flawless, flowing white, each carrying a flickering lantern. Not one of them turned to look at him; instead they seemed intent on singing and following, one after another.
“Son of a bitch,” Randy said entirely to himself. His heart was thudding in his chest, triple time. His leg throbbed as horribly as ever and he watched dumbly as the carolers reached the right side of the road and prepared to continue on their way. He reached over Owen and groped blindly at the crank in the door so he could lower the window and apologize ...
… and as the window lowered, admitting a blast of frigid air, he heard them singing for the first time. It was like a choir of angels, sweet and full … performing his favorite song: Silent Night.
The lead pair of carolers turned and began making their way down the pavement. They were about to pass by the van when Owen suddenly cried out again – in pain rather than fear. The sound of it sent a new chill down Randy’s spine.
He turned in his seat to face Owen, and his heart sank. The bright red infection was even showing in his face now: trails of it were reaching up from his collar in a scarlet spider web along his neck and jaw. His eyes were flecked with red, and the sunken areas below them were a sickly blackened yellow. He was glistening and slick with fever-sweat.
Randy took a moment in the stalled van to grope in the glove compartment for a rag. Then he leaned back and mopped the shining brow of his partner. He’s really sick, he told himself. Very, very sick.
He put the rag on the seat next to him and almost against his will very carefully peeled Owen’s sticky shirt away from the wound in his side. What little hope he had faded completely. A stench like rotting meat filled the van. He had to hold his breath to keep from gagging. It was appallingly clear: the infected area had grown to at least three times its original size and it was pulsing like a living thing. The wound was a flaming red, and the heat from it radiated with such ferocity that Randy could feel it on his outstretched hand. The entire area around it was streaked with long black trails of putrefaction and flushed a sickening pallid grey. It was beginning to look like the skin on the Rotting Girl.
He’s not sick, Randy corrected himself. He’s dying. My God, he’s going to die in this fucking van.
Owen’s eyes opened a fraction. “I remember now,” he said in a ragged voice barely above a whisper. “That house. There was a family there. A boy killed his family. Remember? He heard voices. He … heard … he killed them ...”
Randy did remember. It had been a big story not so long ago. Some Italian name. A kid with no criminal record, no drug history, no nothing, got up one night and killed his parents and siblings with the family rifle. Then he waited patiently for the cops and told them voices made him do it. Voices …
Twenty-four hours ago, Randy would have joked about that. Owen would never even have brought it up. But now … now he had no doubt it was true.
Every word, he thought. That poor kid …
Owen’s eyes closed again and he slipped back into unconsciousness.
He’s never going to make it, Randy told himself, panic rising in his throat. I don’t even know where I’m going, and he’s dying here, man, he’s dying.
He turned back to face forward in the driver’s seat and pawed at the ignition key. He couldn’t just sit here on the side of the road; he had to go. But –
The cab was suddenly filled with the angelic voices of the carolers: Silent night! Holy night! Son of God love’s pure light. Radiant beams from thy holy face, with the dawn of redeeming grace ...”
Without really thinking about it Randy stopped, closed his eyes and touched the crucifix at his neck. For just a moment, he whispered a silent prayer for his friend.
At that moment, he felt the power of the artifact again, just as he had in the boat house. It crept up his fingers, into his body, and changed him yet again: comfort, warmth, power.
I wonder, he thought. I wonder …
He opened his eyes … and to his surprise, he found a nun dressed all in white, standing on the pavement, staring solemnly through the window at them both.
Randy opened his mouth to speak to her when the lantern in her hands suddenly flared brightly. She smiled and nodded to Randy, and lifted her hand to make the sign of the cross just outside the window where Owen’s head rested. Then, without a word, she walked back and again took her place at the end of the line of carolers.
Randy, stunned into silence, watched them slowly file by. For the first time he saw that they were all sisters of the same order, all dressed in blinding white robes and wimples of a design he didn’t recognize – certainly not one of the orders he saw in town, or at the local Catholic church.
But … just seeing them gave him hope, somehow. Just knowing they were there.
He didn’t take a moment to even think about it. He simply turned as he lifted the crucifix from around his neck, and reached out to place it on the exposed wound in Owen’s side.
Owen groaned. His entire body jerked violently. The instant the icon touched the wound, the infected flesh split open with a loud, sickening squelch and released an invisible cloud of foul-smelling gas. The lips of the wound actually parted and revealed an awful secret.
Randy’s eyes widened at the sight of the tip of the boathook, that shard of shining metal, still piercing Owen’s side, buried more than an inch deep.
He couldn’t stand it anymore. The blood, the gummy pus, the stink of it was more than he could bear. He pulled his hand back slowly, retreating in spite of himself, feeling as if he was somehow desecrating the crucifix with the touch of the diseased flesh ...
…but as he lifted the crucifix clear, the tiny knife-blade of metal came with it, stuck to the cross by the blood and ichor he was trying to avoid. Randy gasped at the sheer horror of it as he pulled it from his partner’s body.
At that same instant, Owen stopped groaning.
Overcome with revulsion, Randy dropped the crucifix and the piece of metal into the rag he had used to mop Randy’s brow, then wiped frantically at it. It had to be clean, he told himself. It was wrong, wrong to have it covered in this evil muck. He scrubbed the metal for at least thirty second then carefully opened the cloth. The crucifix was fine; it glittered serenely in the light of the passing lanterns, almost glowing against the grimy skin of his palm.
And the shard of metal, no larger than a fingernail, pulsed with a light of its own: a dark, evil scarlet that made Randy want to scream.
He stared down in disbelief at the small piece of metal. Could this really be the cause of what Owen’s going through? Could this be what’s killing him?
Without another thought, he picked up the rag and snapped it out the open window. The tip of the hook went flying in a short, ungraceful arc and clattered to the pavement of Merrick Road.
Randy turned away from it instantly. He concentrated on getting them back on the way. The hospital’s got to be right up here, he told himself. It’s going to be fine.
He never saw the metal tip flare momentarily, burning with its own evil light … then disappear altogether.
But just as he was about to accelerate away from the curb, Owen spoke from the passenger seat.
“Randy …”
The sound of his voice actually startled Randy. He turned to face him one last time, choking back what he really wanted to say: I thought you were dead.
He was astonished. Owen looked better. Not healed by any means, but the fingers of infection on his neck and chin had faded, and the wound looked smaller, somehow – less angry.
Owen’s eyes flickered open, and there was the light of sanity in them again. He focused on Randy for the first time since they had made it back to the van.
“Hey,” he mumbled, licking his cracked lips. “Hey, if I can …I think I’d like to go to Christmas Mass with you.”
Randy had to fight back tears. “You’ll be welcome, Owen. And don’t worry: you’ll be there.�
�
The instant before he said it, Randy didn’t believe it himself. It was just empty encouragement for a dying man. But as the words came out, he knew it was true. Owen was going to live.
The end of the line of caroling nuns now slowly made its way past the van. The last caroler, the nun who had stood by the window next to Owen, beamed at Randy with a beatific smile, and then followed her sisters off down the street, still singing. They both heard the fading strains of Randy’s favorite Christmas hymn one last time:
Silent night! Holy night. All is calm, all is bright. Round young virgin mother and child. Holy infant so tender and mild. Sleep in heavenly peace! Sleep in heavenly peace!
Randy looked over and smiled at his friend. When he looked back, there was no sign of the caroling nuns. Not on the sidewalk, not anywhere in the distance. They had disappeared, as if they had never been there, at all.
“Hang on, man,” Randy said to Owen. “We’ll be there real soon.” He eased his right foot down on the accelerator and gently eased the van away from the muddy curb and back onto the road. As they drove forward, Owen called to him again.
“Oh … Randy?”
Randy heard him, but for the next few seconds he fought to keep his concentration on the road, squinting through the pain, searching for a sign.
As he approached the next intersection, then eased to a stop, checking traffic, he saw it: a square blue road sign with a huge white “M” and an arrow pointed straight ahead. Relief flooded over him. He closed his eyes and crossed himself. He had no idea what had happened, or how, after all they’d just been through they had managed to make it here; but he felt he had to give thanks.
“Thank you, Lord,” he whispered.
And then, more loudly, he finally answered Owen: “What is it, buddy?”
Owen’s voice, stronger now with every syllable, called warmly to him: “Merry Christmas, Randy.”
Randy smiled and drove on. “Merry Christmas, Owen,” he said. “A very, Merry Christmas.”
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Wombaroo Books
The Amityville Horror: The Sequel
The story didn’t end when the Lutzes escaped Amityville with their lives. The Evil they unleashed there followed them–across the country and around the world. Now the full story of what really happened can be revealed, in the first complete and authorized sequel to The Amityville Horror.
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Amityville Horror Now: The Jones Journal
Book One of The Light Warriors Series
John G. Jones is a real-life author with books on the worldwide & New York Times best-seller-lists, an Australian writer, musician and producer who worked with the Lutz family to produce The Amityville Horror II and its sequels, telling the truth about what happened after the Lutzes left Amityville. Now he tells the rest of the story: how the Evil that was unleashed found him, how it changed his life forever. And now, for the first time, John shares the terrifying true story of his own paranormal experiences, and his work with an extraordinary group of gifted allies that fight to keep the escaped Evil from taking root in our world. The fight will never end – it can't. Because every confrontation, every supernatural experience, has taught them one terrible truth: Evil never dies...it just changes shape.
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The Supernatural
A new edition of John G. Jones’ first, transcendent novel, years out of print. Lance is a very good con man, already on the run, who finds himself chosen by a higher power to be something far greater with his life…and far more dangerous. Will he survive the transformation, or lose his humanity in the bargain?
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The Amityville Big Book of True Horror
Welcome to our world! Here are thirteen stories of real horror: the hauntings, possessions, and supernatural attacks — the true history of the shadow-world that hides within our own. A full-size coffee table book for the fundamental fright fan.
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… and get the latest news on Amityville projects and the world of horror, suspense, and the supernatural, real and imagined all at
AmityvilleNow.com
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Table of Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
Amityville Horror Christmas Page 8
