The TV set was pretty loud. And she knew that Mrs. Plack had recently been getting rather deaf. So either the woman couldn’t hear her, or was simply being stubborn.
Cassie glanced toward the hill again. The pall of smoke was spreading wider, with the orange tips of fires leaping high. And so she ran back to the truck and put an elbow through the driver’s window. Climbed inside, and pulled a mass of colored cables out from underneath the steering column and hot-wired the engine.
Just like in the old days, when she’d been the member of a gang. Cass realized she was grinning softly.
Then she gunned the engine, spun the wheel, and she was off.
“We’re sorry to ask this of you at such short notice, Dr. Purlock.”
“No, that’s fine,” the clergyman replied, trying to keep his voice calm. “It’s perfectly understood.”
There was only a small group of people in the House of the Good Word on Savory Street. A young married couple, the woman with a baby in her arms. Both sets of parents and another pair of friends. This was a modern building, built of red brick and with loads of broad plate glass. Purlock had asked for that in the original design, because he couldn’t stand dark churches. Not that the clear light of day was doing them much good right now.
The baby wailed, and Purlock tried to smile. He was a short, round man in a gray businesslike suit and gold-rimmed glasses, the lenses so thick that they magnified his eyes. He’d been the minister here for fourteen years, and had become perfectly used to this kind of occurrence.
Young Kenny here was unbaptized. And his parents, Steve and Frances, wanted that done right away. Things like this always happened when the town faced serious danger. Being made aware of your mortality – it focused people’s minds on the important stuff. Couples who’d been dating for years would come running to him, begging him to marry them. Older couples, already hitched, often asked him to renew their vows. And people like the Morriseys here wanted to make certain that their offspring were protected in the afterlife.
He could almost feel the sheer impatience seeping from their pores. Purlock had already been outside and had a good, hard look at what was going down, the fiery inferno that was descending on this town, and he couldn’t blame them. His heart was banging in his chest. But he was determined to perform his final duties with a sense of dignity and grace. So he had best get going.
“Are the godparents here?”
It was a formal question, one that he already knew the answer to. But this might be the last service he ever led, and he wanted to do it right.
“Good. Then we’ll proceed,” he nodded.
He was about to lead them to the back end of the church, when there was the roar of a truck engine, then a deafening squeal of tires from the street outside. The church’s doors burst open seconds later. And a tall woman was standing in between them, rather breathless looking.
He recognized her instantly. This was Cassandra Mallory, a good acquaintance of his friend Saul Hobart’s. Purlock had even had the unhappy duty, late last year, of arranging her boyfriend’s funeral service.
She seemed to be back nicely on her feet, though. And was with child as well, if he wasn’t mistaken.
She was also carrying several weapons. But with so much awful going on, the prudent thing was to ignore that.
The Morriseys were gawking at her, wondering why she was here. But Purlock kept his cool and moved in closer.
“Is there any way that I can help you, child?”
Cass stared around, taking in the startled little gathering, the fact they had a baby with them. She looked awkward and went rigid for a second. Then she shrugged.
“Sorry to bust in like this, folks, big important day and all. But I need to borrow the padre here. Only for a minute. Promise.”
CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE
Tavanah Kouralis had moved another distance down the hill, then stopped again. Her long, tall body was arched like a bow, and the tangled nerves in her spine quivered with dry pleasure.
By this stage, the wall of lava had reached the first row of houses in the street below. And those homes had caught light immediately, going up like tinder. Some people were struggling to fight the blaze. But the flow of molten rock kept pressing in around them, moving past the burning structures and then rumbling out across the pavement. There was nothing they could do to stop it.
Some of them had tried to build a barrier against the lava, shoveling dirt into a three-foot tall embankment, reinforcing it with anything heavy they could lay their hands on. And that might have been a good defense against a flood of water. But lava was, essentially, still rock. It had the same weight and dense, stubborn strength. And so it reached the barrier and simply pushed on through it, shoving it aside. The people who’d been working on it barely jumped out of the way in time.
It was moving at a rate of maybe twenty feet a minute, and there was more glowing redness joining it the entire time. So … the whole of this accursed town? It would probably take several days, perhaps even the best part of a week to be consumed. But devils like herself were infinitely patient. Watching this trail of destruction – it would be a delicious experience, one to savor to its fullest.
Tavanah closed her eyes, imagining how things would look come nightfall. The flames leaping, and the lava like a red illumination. Street by street and neighborhood by neighborhood, Raine’s Landing would be overwhelmed till it resembled one of the deep caverns in the place she’d come from. And a small handful of humans might still manage to survive. But they’d be the unlucky ones.
She licked her lips. And then a new sound brought her eyelids springing open. She looked over to her right, scouring the landscape with her shining purple eyes.
Some curious kind of vehicle was rumbling toward her. It looked more like a half-crushed beetle than a truck, but it was heading down a trail the molten rock had not yet touched. As she watched, a fissure opened up in front of it, the earth splitting violently. And her tongue went to her lips expectantly.
The driver was too quick, though. The truck veered away, swinging round the fissure, then continued toward her before clattering to a halt.
A woman started climbing out. She looked no larger than a thin worm to Tavanah’s eyes. She had pale skin, dark hair, and a narrow face with a square jaw. And she was more heavily armed than any other human she had encountered so far.
As if that would do her any good. But she got her bearings and then started marching over.
What was this insanity? Didn’t this girl understand who she was dealing with? But then Tavanah noticed something else. This female was with child.
And why was she behaving in this manner, if that was the case? Human women who were pregnant never put themselves at risk.
The demon reared up to her full height, spreading out her arms.
And bellowed, “I am the she-devil Tavanah Kouralis! Who dares approach me in such an impudent fashion?”
“Me!” replied a tiny voice. Tavanah had to strain to hear it.
“And who are you, precisely?”
“I’m a waitress who never made it the whole way through high school. I used to be a criminal, a member of a motorcycle gang. And these days, I’m a single mother with three kids by different fathers, and a fourth one on the way.”
She was staring up defiantly, her own eyes burning, in a different way to any demon’s.
“I’m the kind of woman politicians claim to hate and newspapers print angry editorials about. Everybody’s scared of me, in other words. So if I were you, I’d simply get out of my way and go back where you came from.”
If she’d had any eyebrows, then Tavanah’s would have sprung straight up. She’d never heard a speech of such ferocity and venom from a mere mortal before. And – when she turned it over – she almost admired that. Give this child the proper tutoring, the right amount of supernatural power, and she might make an excellent devil. But a junior one, of course.
Except that that was not to be. This was neither th
e time nor place. Tavanah’s bright lips pressed together in a wistful smile.
“Well, you certainly have spirit,” she said. “Kudos and bravo. But is that all you’re bringing to the fight?”
“I’ve got this.” The woman raised the shotgun she was holding in her pale right hand. “And these.” She tapped her fingernails against one of her side arms.
Which was when Tavanah threw her head back, laughter echoing down the hillside like a peal of thunder. It went on for quite a while, so strenuously that she was forced to wipe her eyes. But when she peered back down, the woman had moved up even closer.
“Merely bullets?” Tavanah asked, once she’d gotten her breath back. “The fools up there have already tried that. You could shoot a million of them at me, and they would count for nothing.”
The woman seemed to do a mental calculation. And Tavanah watched her curiously, wondering what was going through her mind.
“A million, huh? Nah, I don’t think I’m gonna need that many. These’ll do.”
She certainly had a confident air, for somebody who was about to die. What was she prattling on about?
But the next instant, Cassie had her Mossberg in both hands and brought it slamming up against her shoulder.
Tiny beads of moisture sprang away when she did that, flying from the muzzle and the chamber. And a human would have barely noticed them. But they were shining as they traveled through Tavanah’s field of vision.
They were glowing a pure, searing white, almost like a firework exploding. And they dazzled her. Her eyelids creased with pain.
So … Holy Water?
On the ammunition?
Tavanah Kouralis reared instinctively back.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR
Her own voice had been reduced to a distant murmur in her ears, the whole while she’d been talking. Everything seemed desperately weird, and felt like it was moving in slow motion. But that was the adrenaline in her bloodstream. Cassie knew that.
Things would start moving a whole lot quicker before very long. She knew that too, and braced herself for it. She took a deep, steadying breath, then fired her first shot.
Watched as it plowed deep into the devil’s body. And it really hurt that damned snake creature. Tavanah howled like crazy, clutching at her wound. But when she lifted her palms away, the deep hole the saboted slug had punched through was already closing over.
Well, nothing worth doing was ever easy. And so Cassie aimed the next two shots a little higher up.
The impact sent the devil reeling back. Fluid the same color as a rich port wine went pouring down its chest. It not only looked injured, but genuinely shocked, believing such a thing could not be possible.
But then it recovered and sheer anger took it over. Furious, spitting rage the like of which Cassie had seldom seen before. She’d not only harmed this thing – she had insulted it on some deep level.
Tavanah started moving in at a breathtaking rate, the lengthy muscles in her body rippling. Cassie hit her with another brace of shots. And that got more angry wails, only the devil kept on coming.
That coppery face swelled in her vision. And she couldn’t help it – she was mesmerized for a split-second. She was staring numbly at the widening jaws. And so she didn’t really notice one of the beast’s lengthy tails come sweeping in behind her.
All Cassie caught sight of was an unexpected blurring round her feet. And then her world was turning upside-down.
She hit the ground savagely, and her first thought was, “May?” She let go of the Mossberg with one hand, clutching desperately at her belly. But instincts came to her again. Her unborn child was still okay.
Other blurs were moving in around her. And at first, she thought that it was more of those damned tails. They were large enough that they could more than likely club a person to death.
But then a pair of faces lurched up in her vision – normal skin and normal eyes – and she could make out what was really happening. Ross and Lauren had come running in to help her.
Cassie didn’t even have to think about it. She let go of her shotgun, yanking both her pistols from their holsters, and tossed one apiece to her two friends.
“Use these!” she bellowed. “They’re the only things that work!”
They both looked stymied, but that didn’t matter. Cassie left them to it, rolling over, coming up on one knee. She snatched her Mossberg from the dirt and fired again.
And none too soon. Because there weren’t simply tails coming at her this time. The demon’s face was barely ten feet from her own.
Generally, I prefer a good revolver. But beggars can’t be choosers in a fix like this. And as for these weapons’ effectiveness, when nothing else was working … well, there are moments when you need to stop and figure out what’s going on, and others when it’s definitely best to leave that job till later.
I watched as another of Cassie’s saboted slugs went into the demon’s temple and left a cavity there, then added three shots of my own. Each of them made its own mark. And it wasn’t just the two of us engaged in that activity. Lauren was hopping around on the spot, firing repeatedly and letting out the kind of curses that would’ve turned a stevedore’s hair white. She was really worked up, and I could see why. She’d faced down demons in the past, but nothing of this size.
Tavanah Kouralis was screaming like a world in pain. She clutched her brow and then drew back. Every ounce of oxygen got squeezed out of my lungs when she did that. There was a steady stream of purple dripping from her chin, and her features were a ruin of their former self.
She swayed on the spot like a tree in a high wind. I really thought that we’d gotten the better of her. And I’d been in that place enough times to know that it was best to press home your advantage. So I started moving forward, letting off another shot with every step I took.
Except it turned out not to be that easy. Rarely is, when there’s the supernatural involved. The devil straightened up. It roared. Its face was healing over once again. And so we’d hurt it, but not nearly stopped it. How much was it going to take to bring this to a halt?
I jumped out of the way barely in time to avoid one of its lashing tails. Hit the ground on my side, and then rolled. But I could see Tavanah rushing past me, closing in on the two women.
Lauren bellowed more expletives and kept firing, but she was falling back. Cassie was on her feet, though, and holding her ground.
“Get out of the way!” I heard myself hiss.
But either she was frozen to the spot, or she wasn’t quite as nimble as she usually was. I watched the demon’s shadow close across her. Then one massive hand went swinging back.
It delivered Cassie an almighty slap that sent her spinning through the air. I could almost feel the impact. And …
Oh my God, but she could lose her child!
Cassie landed on a dried-out hummock, and then lay entirely still there. And she only ever does that for one reason, in a situation such as this. The blow must have knocked her out.
Blind fury swept through me. And before I even knew what I was doing, I was charging forward at full throttle, yelling crazy stuff.
Cass loads her Glocks with the extended type of clip, eighteen rounds apiece. And so I got off six more shots before the slide snapped back.
And after that, the only thing that I could do was stumble to a halt, my head clearing a little. All my magic bullets were now gone. And when I glanced across at Lauren, I could see it was the same with her. And Cassie was still lying flat out on the ground.
The devil turned to me, its gaze shimmering as it took in what had happened. And I couldn’t help but notice that its wounds were mending up again.
It steadied itself and then smiled massively. A sharp-toothed, triumphant grin.
“Reasonable try,” it said, a real gloat to its voice. “But not nearly good enough by half. And now it ends.”
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE
Everything was pain for an extended while. Everything was blurred.
Her brain and nerves and limbs had all been disconnected from each other, and she couldn’t even move.
But then Cassie managed to shift one arm and roll over a couple of inches. She pressed her palm to her belly again, touching it extremely gently.
That achieved nothing by itself. But then she got another of those strong, immediate instincts. Her daughter was still safe and well. She oughtn’t be, given the punishment her mother had just taken. But May’s powers were continuing to protect her.
“Hang in there, kid,” Cass mumbled.
Then she lifted her face about a quarter of an inch.
There were no more gunshots ringing out. Why was that – was the devil dead? Her vision was murky, but then cleared a little.
She couldn’t see Lauren anywhere, but she could make out Ross’s blurry image, and the devil’s. Ross was throwing his handgun at the snake-like creature – never a sign that things were going well – then trying to duck around it, having to leap and sidestep to avoid its swinging tails.
For her own part, Tavanah Kouralis looked like she was taking her sweet time about this, going at a casual pace. Evil beings had a tendency to do that when they thought they had the edge.
It was a rude, arrogant habit. She was playing with Ross like the proverbial cat with the proverbial mouse, cutting him off every which direction that he tried to run, hemming in his range of movement so his options kept on getting shorter.
And any time now, she would pounce. Cass felt misery flood through her when she saw that.
Why hadn’t the bullets worked? They’d fired enough of them to bring down a whole circusload of elephants. But this goddamned thing had kept on coming.
Her vision started blurring again, and real panic reared up in her. No, not now! She couldn’t afford to black out with her friend in so much danger.
But that wasn’t what was genuinely happening, and she realized that a moment later.
She was … looking at the demon in a different way. Everything around it became indistinct, like she was staring at it through a fisheye lens. And then its outer hide began to fade.
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