King of the Dead (Jeremiah Hunt Chronicle)

by Joseph Nassise

  Someone was using magick to control the Sorrows’ activities!

  36

  CLEARWATER

  Denise stared back at the others, astounded by what they’d just uncovered. Up until this point, they’d been operating on the general sense that the Sorrows were just obeying instinct; they’d evolved into predators, and predators, as a rule, fed on their prey.

  But now the game had changed.

  Someone else had been orchestrating this whole thing.

  But who? Or what?

  As she turned back to the Sorrow, an idea began to form in the back of her mind. It was a long shot, she knew, but they didn’t have much more to go on at this point and it just might work. If it did, they’d be a lot closer to putting an end to this.

  With nothing to lose, she threw it out to the others.

  “We have to let it go,” she said.

  Hunt visibly started. “Are you nuts? If we let it go, it will just end up feeding on someone else.”

  He was right: they would be taking that chance. But there were more pressing concerns right now. “And if we don’t,” she replied, “then we lose our only chance of tracking down whoever is behind all this!”

  Simon frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “The first scrying didn’t work as well as we wanted because we didn’t have a focus to tie us directly to our target,” she explained. “Now we do.”

  She knew her old coven mate was no slouch; he got it right away. “We use blood from the Sorrow as a focus and then follow it right back to its lair!”

  “And hopefully to whoever is controlling it as well.” It was that last part that was questionable. The scrying might simply show them another Sorrow nest, like those they had dealt with over the last few days, but even that would be useful as it would allow them to eliminate another of the creatures’ strongholds.

  Simon thought it over, looking for holes in her logic. “We’re going to have to work fast, though. The blood will only be good as long as it is still in its liquid state. If it dries and hardens, it will be useless to us.”

  That meant they were going to have to do the ritual from right here in the Sidhe’s enclave, rather than back at the clinic, but she could work with that. She’d have to replace her usual tools, but the Sidhe were sure to have substitutes lying around the house, given how mixed up in magick they were as a race.

  It wasn’t the sanest plan, she knew. For it to work, they had to release the Sorrow back into the city, thereby giving it the chance to take another life, maybe more. But even if there was a one in ten chance of it leading them back to the chief architect, she thought it was worth the risk.

  Unfortunately, the Sidhe didn’t think so. In fact, they almost threw her and the rest of the group out when Denise explained what they wanted to do. The only good Sorrow was a dead Sorrow, the Sidhe claimed, and they told Simon they wouldn’t even consider turning the creature over to him and his people if that was what they intended to do.

  But Simon didn’t give up. He argued with them for more than an hour, personally pledging to dispatch the Sorrow himself if the scrying didn’t work, and in the end they finally gave in, though not without some trepidation.

  Denise didn’t blame them; she was worried it wouldn’t work, too, and she was the one who came up with the idea. But even with her doubts, she still thought it was the best option.

  Extracting the blood sample turned out to be a piece of cake; a quick swipe with a knife along the creature’s exposed leg, a carefully placed bowl, and she had what she needed. She didn’t even bother bandaging the wound because she knew that the Sorrow’s accelerated healing ability would seal it up again in no time.

  Instead, they retreated to the safety of the mansion itself, leaving Dmitri and the Sidhe to deal with the difficult job of releasing the Sorrow. While they dealt with that issue, the rest of them made sure they did everything possible to allow the scrying to succeed. They were only going to have one shot at this.

  Denise sent Simon and Jeremiah into a side room to prepare the site while she and a Sidhe named Evening collected the materials she would need for the working. In the kitchen she found a wide-mouthed stone basin, which would work well as a scrying vessel, and salt, which would fill the lines of the protective circle. A wooden ladle would allow her to transfer the blood from the bowl to the basin when the time was right; a pair of candles from the mantelpiece would provide the proper environment for the entire event.

  Back in the sitting room she found that the boys had cleared away the furniture and rolled back the carpet, revealing the wooden floor beneath. Using the salt she carried, Denise sketched out a protective circle, sealing it around herself as she worked. The circle was designed to serve two distinct purposes. Since she would be vulnerable during parts of the ceremony, the circle would protect her from any outside influences. At the same time, it would serve to keep anything inside the circle from getting out.

  Just as she was finishing with the circle, Dmitri entered the room. The fact that he was there let her know that the Sorrow had been successfully released. It was time to get started.

  She began as she always did, invoking the four guardian elements, one at each of the cardinal points of the compass.

  Turning to the east, she said, “O Guardian of the East, Ancient One of the Air, I call you to attend us this night. I do summon, stir, and charge you to witness our rites and guard this Circle. Send your messenger among us, so that we might know that we have your blessing, and protect us with your holy might.”

  A light breeze stirred her hair, despite the fact that all of the room’s windows were closed.

  A quarter turn brought her to the south. “O Guardian of the South, Ancient One of the Fire, I call you to attend us this night. I do summon, stir, and charge you to witness our rites and guard this Circle. Send your messenger among us, so that we might know that we have your blessing, and protect us with your holy might.”

  She suddenly felt warm, as if she’d caught a fever. It only lasted a moment, just enough to let her know that the spirit had heard her. Sweat dripped down her neck as the feeling passed.

  The west was the home of the element of water, while the north belonged to earth. She moved through them both, until she stood facing east once more. The air around her now felt charged with energy, and she knew that the protective circle was active.

  Picking up the ladle, she dipped it into the bowl of the Sorrow’s blood and then poured what she’d collected into the stone basin. Rather than sinking into the water as it normally would have done, the blood spread across the surface instead, creating a crimson slick that filled the bowl from edge to edge. She gave it a moment to settle and then moved to the next part of the scrying.

  She took a deep breath, pulling power out of the air around her as she did so, and then blew it back out across the surface of the bloody slick, charging it with energy and activating the scrying.

  Within seconds an image formed inside the basin, an image that corresponded exactly with what the Sorrow was seeing as it made its way through the dark city streets. For all practical purposes, Denise was looking out at the world through the Sorrow’s eyes: what it saw, she saw. She hoped that she’d be able to recognize enough landmarks to retrace the creature’s route.

  But it only took a few moments for her to realize that her intentions were too ambitious. The creature stayed in the shadows and kept its head down for the most part, so there was little for her to see but the street passing beneath her feet. The Sorrow only glanced up occasionally, and even then there was little to see. The Sorrow seemed to be responding to some inner guidance system rather than using external landmarks to gauge its position, and Denise knew that she would not be able to make heads or tails of where it was going.

  Something more drastic was needed.

  She was in the midst of trying to figure out just what to do when something large loomed out of the darkness.

  As the Sorrow drew closer to the object, Denise recognized w
hat she was looking at, though she never would have expected to find one here, in the midst of dry land.

  It was a Mississippi riverboat, tossed up on its side in the middle of the empty street. Dried river mud still clung to its sides, but the weeds that grew around it said that it had been here for months, maybe even years, and the gaping holes in its hull made it clear that it would never float again.

  Denise expected the Sorrow to go around the boat, so she was surprised when it headed right for it. As the Sorrow closed in on the boat, something began interfering with her spell. She could feel the link between her and the Sorrow starting to fade and something told her that she had to act fast if she wanted to continue tracking the creature.

  Whatever it was that was interfering with her link was too strong for her to overcome; another few seconds and her scrying spell would dissipate altogether.

  Without any real options, she did the one thing she could think of.

  She plunged her hand into the middle of the stone basin, sending a pulse of power flooding down her arm at the same time. When that energy met the blood and water in which her hand rested, there was a resounding crack of power that hammered the air inside her protective circle, nearly knocking her over. She held her ground through sheer force of will and was relieved to feel the corresponding surge flow back out of the bowl and up her arm just before the link between her and the Sorrow faded.

  Her last effort was not in vain; the visual link was transformed into a physical one. For a short time she would be able to sense the Sorrow’s location like a presence in the back of her mind and would be able to make her way toward it just as if she were following a set of directions simply by gauging how each direction “felt” to her.

  A wave of dizziness washed over her, the backlash from using so much power in so short a time, but she knew the effort was worth it. She shook her head to clear it and then reached out with one hand to break the circle of salt that surrounded her.

  Simon and Jeremiah were at her side the moment the barrier faded.

  “I know where it is,” she told them. “But we’ll have to hurry.”

  37

  HUNT

  Denise was worn out from the ritual she’d performed, but as she explained, we didn’t have time to waste. The link she created between herself and the Sorrow had a limited life span, so we got out of there as quickly as we could. Leaving Dmitri behind to deal with the Sidhe’s apprehension over letting the Sorrow loose, Gallagher, Denise, and I piled into the Charger and took off into the night.

  Gallagher drove, allowing Denise to concentrate on following the link she’d created. Unfortunately, we soon found out her directions were a bit problematic: she was connected to the Sorrow as the crow flies, while we were forced to deal with one-way streets and multiple turns to keep us headed in the right direction. Conversation in the car was kept to a minimum; neither Gallagher nor I wanted to disturb her concentration.

  We left the Garden District behind and headed toward the river, passing through several less-than-desirable neighborhoods that had been left to crumble and decay in the wake of the government’s foot-dragging after Katrina. Eventually we found ourselves in an abandoned industrial park along the bank of the Mississippi.

  Denise slowed the car to a crawl and cautiously made her way through the empty streets, carefully noting each building we passed as if looking for a particular one. Apparently she found it, too, for it wasn’t long after that she pulled the car to the curb and turned off the engine.

  I glanced around.

  No riverboat in sight.

  Anticipating my question, Denise said, “The boat’s half a block down, just beyond the last building in this row. I don’t know how good a Sorrow’s hearing is, so I didn’t want to take any chances.”

  Getting out of the car, we followed her down the street and around the side of the last building in the row. Peeking around the corner, we saw our destination.

  The boat had been washed up out of the river, probably during the floods that accompanied Hurricane Katrina, and had come to rest in the middle of the street that led down to the loading docks a few hundred yards away. It had fetched up against a huge pile of debris—dirt and trees and other assorted detritus—so that its decks were canted at a slight angle.

  Moving around inside was therefore going to be difficult.

  We stood there and watched for several long minutes, but nothing moved.

  “What do you think?” Denise asked.

  “I think it’s time we take a look,” Gallagher replied and moved to head in that direction, but I reached out and grabbed his arm.

  “Wait a minute! We shouldn’t go in there alone. What if something goes wrong? We should call in the others for backup.”

  Gallagher scoffed. “We don’t have time to wait for the others, Hunt. We need to see what’s in there now; we can’t afford to miss this opportunity.”

  Denise didn’t say anything, so I took that as tacit agreement with his stance.

  “We should at least have some weapons with us,” I insisted.

  Gallagher grinned. “You forget, Hunt, we,” indicating himself and Denise, “are weapons.” He shook himself free and moved off.

  I reluctantly followed.

  We didn’t want to enter the derelict through the same route the Sorrow had taken, for stumbling on a nest of those things in the dark was not anyone’s idea of fun, so instead we pulled ourselves up onto a nearby pile of debris and slipped in through a hole on the deck above.

  It was dark inside, dark and hot, and it felt like we were crawling into the gullet of some massive beast ready to devour us at the slightest misstep. I didn’t have any trouble seeing, given my unique means of sight, but I knew the others were going to need some kind of light if they were going to keep up with me. As a result, we decided I would scout out ahead while they followed behind. That would keep them from ruining my sight while at the same time giving them ample warning if they needed to douse the light quickly.

  “You’re sure it’s still here?” Gallagher asked and Denise nodded.

  “Can’t you feel it?”

  Now that she’d mentioned it, I realized that I could too. There was the same electric tension in the air that we’d felt at the sites of the other Sorrow nests. One thing was certain: there were Sorrows somewhere inside the hulk of this old boat.

  As Denise conjured up a small ball of light to hold in her hand and light their way, I set out toward the bow of the ship. My plan was simply to make my way forward and hope I found what I was looking for.

  Since I didn’t really know what that was, I wasn’t all that confident in my eventual success, however.

  It didn’t take long to realize that the old riverboat had been converted into a floating casino. Signs throughout the deck halls pointed the way toward the casino floor, and I steered our group in that direction, figuring that would probably be the biggest area within the ship itself and the obvious place to find the nest.

  With the signs to lead me, it didn’t take me long to reach the midpoint of the vessel. The hallway we were following suddenly opened up, splitting in two and continuing around either side of the vessel, while directly in front of us you could look over the railing and see down into the center of the vessel, which, I assumed, held the casino floor.

  I could hear a rustling sound, as well as smell a familiar odor, coming from the deck below us. I settled into a crouch and waited until the others had drawn close enough to see my signal to wait.

  Denise doused the light as planned, and I gave my eyes a moment to readjust before I crab-walked the rest of the way forward until I was directly behind the railing that guarded the rather steep drop on the other side.

  Cautiously, I raised my head until I could see over the railing and down to the casino floor on the deck below.

  I immediately wished I hadn’t.

  Like the pool back at the high school, the floor beneath us was a writhing mass of Sorrows. There had to be fifty, maybe more, of t
he creatures, all intertwined amidst the ruins of craps tables and slot machines.

  Standing in the Sorrows’ midst was a tall figure dressed in a sweeping cloak of a dark, shimmering material and tall leather boots. Its back was to us, so I couldn’t tell if it was male or female, and the few wisps of long white hair that I could see falling beneath the wide-brimmed hat it wore didn’t help me decide one way or the other.

  The figure was chanting something in a language I didn’t understand while drawing strange symbols in the air with its left hand. In its right, it held a long-handled sickle, the edge of the blade gleaming with a pale blue light that seemed to emanate from deep within the metal from which it was formed. The figure’s hands themselves, at least what I could see of them, looked skeletal, with the yellow tint of ancient bone visible even from that distance.

  As the figure’s left hand flexed and moved, the churning pit of Sorrows at its feet responded in kind.

  It was creepy as hell, and I knew I’d be seeing the scene in my mind’s eye for a long time to come.

  Apparently I wasn’t the only one who thought so. As Denise reached my side and took a look for herself, I felt a shudder run through her frame.

  “What is that?” her look said when she turned to face me, but I didn’t know and could only shrug my shoulders in reply.

  I waved my hand into the darkness behind us, the signal for Gallagher to move up, and a few seconds later he emerged from the shadows to crouch at my other side.

  I cocked my head in the direction of the railing and he slowly drew himself up a few inches to peer over it as we had done.

  “Go mbeire an diabhal leis thú!” he swore and quickly dropped back down behind the edge of the railing.

  I stared at him in shock.

  The language he’d just spoken in was damned similar to the one used by that thing below us!

  He pulled me and Denise close and said, in English this time, “We need to get out of here. Right now!”

  The look on his face said it all. He was absolutely terrified!