The Jo Fletcher Books Anthology

by Frank P. Ryan

  Elaine caught it deftly, her dressing gown slipping down one shoulder and allowing him a full view of her right breast. Her flesh was perfect, her whole body flawless, just like his – attractive and oozing sex. When they went out together people of both sexes stopped and stared: Succubus and Incubus.

  But they knew each other too well to get distracted. Ignoring her nakedness, she flicked through the magazine Unworld with her slim fingers, until she found the fluorescent yellow marks.

  ‘A website?’ she asked him, tossing a long strand of black hair over one shoulder.

  ‘It could be them. The kids’ dad mentioned a similar name.’

  Her pale grey eyes skimmed the few lines. ‘Have you checked it out?’

  ‘You’re our technological expert.’

  Elaine took a final bite of her bread roll, picked up her cup and disappeared into the study with the magazine. A series of beeps soon told him she had switched on the computer.

  Computers were Elaine’s area. He preferred old-fashioned methods for finding information. Bars, backyards, youth clubs, nightclubs, homeless shelters, neighbours – those were his sources, not the anonymity of an abstract, virtual, parallel world. He found the very idea incomprehensible. Elaine, on the other hand, clicked and hacked. Her online alias was ‘DataDevil’.

  Right now, they were looking for a seventeen-year-old girl called Magdalena. Despite, or perhaps because of, her name, she had been taken in by a satanic cult. When her father had found out he wouldn’t stand for it, so she ran away. He was upset and wanted her back. That would set him back €20,000.

  He poured himself more coffee and stirred in four spoonfuls of sugar, then dipped a croissant into the dark liquid. The stainless steel coffee pot reflected his handsome features, his dark blue eyes unfathomable and mysterious. Women lost themselves in those eyes, forgot all their inhibitions. He looked marvellous as always.

  The bedroom door opened and a sleepy brunette emerged, her clothes a mess. The nocturnal scent of perfume, sweat and fresh sheets wafted out of the room to the breakfast table. She went past him into the toilet and he listened as her urine splashed into the bowl. The flush went and she reappeared in the kitchen.

  ‘Morning,’ she greeted him. ‘Do you mind?’ She pointed to the coffee.

  ‘Sure,’ he agreed. ‘Help yourself. How was last night with us, Myriam?’

  ‘Marianne,’ the brunette corrected him sleepily, rubbing her face with her hand. ‘It was exhausting, but cool. Very cool.’

  ‘It took two years of your life, Marianne,’ he said, smiling at her with his perfect teeth, ‘so we had to make it worth your while. You gave us new life.’

  ‘Right,’ she smiled weakly, not believing a word he said.

  He stood up, wearing nothing but a towel around his waist, and pushed her head back to kiss her passionately.

  She returned his affections, already groaning unintentionally. She was turned on – her lips parting hungrily.

  ‘Please leave once you’ve had breakfast. Elaine and I have work to do.’

  The brunette looked disappointed but nodded. ‘Sure.’

  He left her in the kitchen and – running a hand through his short, dark hair and slurping his coffee – went into the study to find Elaine sitting in front of the three big TFT screens with nine browser windows open at once. The sight always reminded him of a shrine, the modern equivalent of the triptychs that people used to kneel in front of and pray. Only the rituals and saints had changed. Her cursor flitted back and forth, rummaging around in cyberspace and panning for valuable information.

  ‘There seems to be several of them,’ she murmured absently, her eyes fixed on the monitors. ‘I’ve hacked into their server. The rendezvous is tonight, at 11pm, in the old convent ruins in Wörchweiler.’

  ‘Oh, please. Deconsecrated holy ground?’ he laughed. ‘I wonder if they think it works better that way?’ He touched her pale shoulder gently, leaning forwards and pulling the dressing gown to one side to nuzzle her flawless neck. ‘We’ll be there in any case.’

  ‘Not now, Gedeon.’ She said, pushing him away. ‘Do you have everything you need?’

  ‘No. I still need to get a Molotov cocktail ready.’ He straightened up, grinning. ‘See if you can find out anything more about them while I get the materials. Send them our email.’

  In the bedroom, he put on his work clothes: simple black leather trousers, a white latex t-shirt and a shoulder holster for his sawn-off shot gun underneath a mid-length, wide frock coat made from dark synthetic nappa. His special sheath, containing a dagger with an engraved blade the length of a forearm went underneath his left armpit.

  He took out the blade and examined it in the morning light that shimmered through the cracks in the shutters. It was a special weapon; both holy and unholy at the same time. It contained opposing forces, burning with guilt but also imbued with the purest power imaginable. He’d killed everything with it, good, evil and everything in between. Nothing could withstand it.

  The brunette had disappeared, taking the memory of her name with her. He didn’t care what they were called. No matter how beautiful they were, they remained interchangeable, random. Disposable. But Elaine wanted them.

  He left the apartment they had been living in for the last three weeks, picking up a plastic five-litre canister from the hall as he passed by and walking down ten flights of stairs.. The apartment was near the university clinic, cheap and anonymous. He had made sure of that.

  *

  He drove to St. Michael’s Church in their dark green 4x4. The main entrance was locked, so he found a side door and forced it open. He didn’t have time to wait for a priest to haul himself out and open up for him.

  Inside, it was cool and dry, redolent with incense. Summer never penetrated these thick sandstone walls.

  He began his hunt for ingredients. He found a container in the sacristy that someone had written ‘baptismal water’ on with a marker and poured it into his canister. He added the hosts and transubstantiated wine and shook the container, mixing the contents into a pale pink, sacred liquid with soggy nuggets in it. The Molotov cocktail was ready.

  Satisfied, he took a seat in the front pew. His dark blue eyes contemplated the bright portraits of saints in the stained glass windows, the sun making their colours vibrant and bringing them to life. They looked benevolently down at him, blessing him with their glass fingers and unknowingly justifying what he was doing. He enjoyed the sight of them.

  ‘You have been stealing,’ came a voice from behind him, the sound echoing in the high-ceilinged space.

  Gedeon didn’t flinch. ‘It’s for a good cause.’

  ‘No, it’s not good. It’s making it worse.’

  He finally tore himself away from Paul, Peter and Hieronymus, turning to look at the priest standing behind him in the aisle. ‘If it worked, I would tell you to go to hell.’

  The man in the black soutane smiled. ‘No, it doesn’t work. You know I was sent by a someone else.’

  ‘It’s nothing to do with him.’

  ‘It does concern him. I’m meant to talk to you.’

  ‘It’s pointless. Tell him I’m saving a girl’s life. An innocent soul will be kept from damnation and her father is paying me €20,000. I’m freeing her from the clutches of evil people,’ he laughed wickedly. ‘The one who sent you ought to be happy.’

  ‘He would definitely think that is good. But your general behaviour is making him . . . uneasy. You are upsetting the balance and destroying order.’

  ‘Uneasy?’ He was silent and as he stared at Hieronymus, he seemed to wink at him. The saint was on his side. ‘I doubt it. He has no reason to feel uneasy. He’s safe from us.’ Gideon smiled at the priest. ‘Anyway.’ He stood up and stepped onto the polished marble slabs of the central aisle.

  The clergyman blocked his path. ‘Think of the consequences!�
�

  ‘I couldn’t care less.’

  ‘Then I can’t let you leave.’

  ‘Try it, priest. You wouldn’t be the first I’ve had to kill.’

  They stood facing each other, neither of them moving. Peter, Paul and Hieronymus held their breaths; their enamel faces looking scared and threatening to jump.

  Suddenly the clergyman began to glow, giving off beams of his immeasurable love and getting brighter and brighter, hurting Gedeon terribly.

  Half blind, he tore his dagger from its sheath and thrust it through the priest’s robes, slicing the man open from navel to gullet.

  The blade did its job. The blinding light abruptly went out, the priest’s innards plummeting to the floor in a surge of blood. The priest fell to his knees and landed face-first in his own entrails.

  Gedeon walked back into the sacristy to wipe himself clean – one of the benefits of Latex clothing. Then he left the church.

  *

  ‘All ok?’

  Elaine nodded, holding a hand to the wound in her stomach.

  Gedeon had found her sitting on the floor of their living room, surrounded by four dead bodies. Beneath the torn sleeve of one of the corpses, was a symbol, inexpertly tattooed onto once tanned skin. The seal of their enemy.

  Two of the attackers had been armed with pistols, the others had automatic rifles; all fitted with silencers. This was an execution squad, trained to act discreetly. Creating a sensation helped nobody.

  The assailants had underestimated her, like so many others before. A single bullet casing lay on the carpet. That was the only shot they’d had time to fire before she’d torn their throats to shreds with her fingernails and teeth.

  ‘He sent them,’ she said and coughed up blood. He couldn’t tell if it was hers or her attackers’ – she sometimes got carried away and drank too much. ‘And shit, they’re getting better – they’ve never managed to get a shot off before. Shit.’

  Gedeon knelt down in front of her, pulled open the blood-soaked dressing gown and examined the wound. ‘Brace yourself,’ he implored her, his hand gliding over the inner side of her right thigh and creeping promisingly close. ‘I’ll bring you the prettiest woman in town this evening,’ he promised in a whisper.

  It worked. The finger-wide hole next to her navel began to close – slowly but surely. He kissed her as a reward and jumped up. ‘I’m going on the hunt.’ Gideon checked his watch. ‘I’ll be back in three hours, you have until then to clean up.’

  Elaine smiled weakly and waved him away as she hauled herself up and staggered into the bathroom to pour acid into the bathtub. They always had acid on hand. There would be nothing left of the attackers when he returned.

  *

  The girl he found her was called Sabrina. She was sweet, eighteen years old and pretty as a picture. She had so much fun they were afraid her screams would frighten the neighbours. Elaine couldn’t get enough of her – Gedeon barely had to do anything.

  When the brunette fell asleep three hours later, exhausted after giving six years of her life to them, they packed their suitcases, loaded the 4x4 and set off.

  They drove away from Homburg, heading towards Wörschweiler. When they reached the car park in front of the old schoolhouse, they pulled in and waited.

  ‘By the way, he sent another one.’

  ‘Again?’ She was silent as she fished a cigarette out of the half-empty packet. ‘Where?’

  ‘In the church today. Where I made the Molotov cocktail.’ He took his dagger, pierced the plastic casing of the canister and taped up the holes with dark brown duct tape without losing a drop, just as he always did.

  ‘And?’

  He shrugged. ‘Nothing special. But still . . .’ He grinned. ‘He must be worried.’

  Elaine lit the cigarette and put on her sunglasses. ‘A good sign. We’re making progress.’ She puffed the smoke towards the roof of the car. ‘I sent them an email and got them worked up in an online chat,’ she said after a long pause.

  ‘So they’ll try it out?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Yes.’ She watched a pedestrian walk along the pavement with his dog and glare at the 4x4 in annoyance. In a small village like this, unfamiliar vehicles stood out immediately. Elaine ginned wickedly at him and lifted her t-shirt up over her breasts, exposing her black underwear and a lot of flesh. The man shook his head and hurried away, dragging the panting, choking dog behind him.

  ‘Stop it!’ Gedeon ordered her. ‘No unnecessary attention.’

  They fell silent.

  ‘What if it doesn’t work again?’

  ‘We’ll try another time. It’s obvious they don’t want to stop their incantations. Works for us, right?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she murmured unconvincingly, taking a drag on the filter of her smouldering cigarette

  ‘But it’s taking such a long time, Gedeon, and he’s escaped before.’

  He ran a hand over her long black hair. ‘I know,’ he whispered, ‘I know, my dark angel. But I know we’ll get him this time. I can feel it.’

  They lasted until 10pm, but then Elaine couldn’t sit still any longer. They grabbed the sports bag and the canister and left the car, walking up the rest of the hill on foot.

  As soon as they were out of view of the houses, she opened the bag, handed Gedeon an automatic rifle taken from her assailants, grabbed a second one for herself and divided up the magazines. They left the bag behind a bush.

  The convent ruins were perfectly located. It was deserted. They scouted the area, taking their time to get to know the lay of the land and finding a secure hiding-place with a good view of everything that would happen within the collapsed walls on this summer’s evening.

  It smelt of wood, moss and old stones. Midges whirred through the warm air, looking for victims to slake their thirst. They approached the pair before suddenly flying away – some primal instinct telling them didn’t want to pierce that alabaster skin.

  Around 11pm, a young man in black clothes appeared. He was sweating and carrying a heavy duffel bag. The insects swarmed around him, pouncing happily. Four more people arrived over the next ten minutes, two men and two women. Three of them began to set out red cemetery candles in the shape of a pentagram, whilst the other began to chalk cabalistic symbols on the monks’ medieval grave slabs. A dark blonde woman looked up from setting out the candles and argued with the drawer briefly about the pattern, but the young man – who the others called ‘high priest’ – quickly broke it up by asserting his authority and making the man with the chalk sketch the woman’s symbols.

  ‘They believed your email,’ he whispered in Elaine’s ear, kissing her on the cheek. ‘You’re good.’

  ‘I know,’ she replied and checked the positioning of her rifle. ‘Be quiet or they’ll hear us and get suspicious. I’m not waiting any longer than necessary.’

  More people in black began to arrive at the hillside convent. Two brought a girl with them – clearly their prisoner – who was tied up and had a sack over her head.

  ‘That’s got to be her,’ he murmured.

  ‘She has a bag over her head. How can you tell?’

  ‘Just wait.’

  The assembled men and women, none of whom were older than twenty-five, began to strip, also undressing their prisoner, but leaving the bag on her head.

  Gedeon was the first to spot the tattoo on her back: a dark blue butterfly with a black skull on the wings.

  ‘It is her. Her dad told us about that tattoo.’

  The high priest of the ‘Unholy Order of Satan’ – when she heard that, Elaine struggled not to laugh out loud – began his incantations, while his assistants laid the bound woman on a grave slab and forced her legs apart.

  But the high priest did not stick to the directions.

  Instead of taking h
er in the name of the prince of hell, as the gathered men and women expected, he took a step towards his assistants. The dagger flashed gold in the light of the candles and he sliced the carotid artery of a surprised man.

  Gedeon smiled. Everything was going exactly as planned

  Two other men leapt forwards and grabbed hold of the dying man. They dumped him next to the tied up girl, shoved her carelessly to one side and pushed him onto the stone, muffling his screams with a gag.

  The sweet scent of fresh arterial blood reached Gedeon as it pumped from the wound and soaked the grave and the symbols. The high priest began the invocation.

  Elaine clicked her tongue in satisfaction.

  The chalked symbols darkened, a soft tremor ran through the hillside convent, shaking the old ruins. Walls swayed, rocks plummeted to the ground.

  The high priest faltered. He apparently hadn’t counted on his ritual actually succeeding. That was the perennial problem with hobby and dilettante Satanists.

  ‘Damn it! Don’t stop now!’ snarled Gedeon impatiently. Elaine was fidgeting next to him, ready to leap into action.

  The priest uttered the final words of the ritual, and then it happened. A red-tinged arch of darkness appeared in a flash and stretched towards the sky. It materialised like a black spot on reality, an opening to the end of the world. The edges were moving, undulating, and heat poured out of the void.

  The high priest shrank back, but he couldn’t escape the greedy tentacles that sprang from the opening and seized him. Screaming, he was pulled into the blackness. There was no gratitude waiting for him on the other side. Elaine and Gedeon knew that all too well.

  ‘Go!’ Elaine commanded, startled as a helicopter suddenly flew overhead and hovered above them. Neither of them had heard it coming.

  The wind from the helicopters rotor blades tore at their hair and clothes and knocked the candles over, spilling liquid wax over the stones and on the ground. A searchlight cut through the half-light on the hill with a penetrating, almost blue beam and bathed the members of the sect in luminescence. Putting their hands over their faces to shield themselves from the wind and the searchlight, their naked bodies looked deathly pale and vulnerable.