A Soul To Steal (The Sanheim Chronicles, Book One) (38 page)

Please think I’m dead, Janus thought. He hung there attempting to look lifeless, wondering if soon it would not be an act.

He heard footsteps approaching the car, heard the car creak as someone climbed up on it and opened the door.

“You almost made it, Janus,” the voice said.

Janus felt a hand reach across him and undo his seatbelt.

He was insanely tempted to look at the man, but he didn’t. He had to appear to be dead. It was the only thing that could save him.

“But close doesn’t quite count, does it?” he said.

Please think I’m dead, Janus thought again.

He could almost sense the man looking at him.

“Hmmm, maybe it got you worse than I thought,” the voice said. “Or maybe you’re just faking. Like you faked all those photos.”

Janus felt a sharp pain in his leg as the man dug in a knife.

He didn’t think quickly enough to stop himself from crying out.

“There, I thought so,” the man said, and the knife cut deeper.

The pain was excruciating. Janus’ eyes flew open and he looked at the man already pulling him out.

Janus did not believe his eyes.

“No,” he said, but it came out as a whisper.

Janus felt in no condition to resist. He tried to move, but every limb seemed to be in shock.

The man hefted Janus up and then lowered his body down to the ground away from the Jeep. The pain was unbelievable.

“You can blame this one on your friends,” the man said. “You weren’t on my list until they started avoiding me. It hurt my feelings, Janus. And I think you are the right way to send a message about this.”

Janus wanted to sit up, but the man began dragging Janus across the ditch.

Janus felt himself slipping into unconsciousness. He must have been hurt worse than he thought. A car, Janus thought. He would need a car now. Maybe someone would come by.

But there was nothing.

I’m going to die in broad daylight, Janus thought.

But the man was still talking.

“All those photos,” he said. “I know you faked them. I know because nobody is that good. It’s ridiculous, of course.”

Janus didn’t even process what he was talking about. He recognized his assailant, of course, but everything seemed different than the man he had known before. It was as if the man before and this one was not the same person. They only looked the same.  

The man dragged Janus to the BMW.

“I bet you’ve been wishing for a car. I wouldn’t. Unless it was an army, I would just kill them too, you know. Say I found you after the accident, stab them in the back as they looked at you. Easy, you know. People just naturally trust me, always have.”

Janus decided then to give it all he had, before he was in that car and would never be heard from again. He lifted his head up and shouted as loud as he could, a cry into the wilderness he prayed someone would hear.

“PLEASE SOMEONE HELP ME,” he yelled.

*****

“Can you see anything else?” Quinn asked her. He could see her vision in his mind. When he tried to call something up, he got nothing.

“Someone was putting him into a car, Quinn, but I couldn’t see who. He looked bad. There is blood on his face.”

She picked up the cell phone.

“911,” a voice answered. “What is the emergency?”

“A friend of mine called,” she said. “He said someone was following him, trying to run him off the road. I lost contact with him. I think he could have been kidnapped.”

“Did he give you his location?”

Kate tried to think. In her mind, she could see a curve in a road. But she didn’t know the county that well. She tried to show the mental picture to Quinn.

“Tell them it’s off Reservoir Road,” he said. “Tell them that curve where a lot of accidents happen.”

Kate relayed the directions.

“What time did he call?” the 911 operator asked.

“A few moments ago,” Kate said, her voice completely calm. She knew how to impart information even while panicking on the inside.

“Did he see who his attacker was?”

Kate didn’t even look at Quinn. They knew nothing about the kidnapper, that was the worst part. She had a vague idea from the image of Janus that he had known who it was, but it was blurry.

“He didn’t know,” Kate said. “He only called quickly.”

“Was he armed?” she asked.

“I have no idea,” Kate said.

But the attacker would have been armed, of course. He would have had a knife.

“Okay,” the operator replied. “A unit is on its way. It should be there shortly. I need to get your name…”

Kate hung up. They could trace the cell phone, but it didn’t matter. She didn’t want to be on the phone. Instead, she looked at Quinn.

“Get out my gun,” she said.

He nodded and grabbed her purse and started looking through it. He pulled out the gun and looked at it as if it were an alien thing. In her mind, Kate showed him how to load it, which Quinn did even as they continued to tear through town.

They ran three red lights before she turned onto Reservoir Road. That distinctive curve was miles away—an eternity, he thought.

As she continued driving, she glanced in the rearview mirror.

“Fuck,” she said, and put her hand on Quinn’s thigh.

Quinn didn’t need to look behind him. He already saw it clearly in his mind.

They were no longer the only thing on the road. Behind them, the figure of the Headless Horseman had appeared. And he was gaining on them.

*****

“Now, Janus,” the man said, and kicked Janus squarely in the stomach. “We don’t like it when people talk too loudly at the table.”

The man kicked him again.

“Goddamned boy,” the man said again. “I’m disappointed. I thought you would put up more of a fight. The last one, well, he was too easy. And you were too. Young kids. You guys these days are so soft.”

Janus said nothing. He thought his right leg was broken, it hurt so much.

And he had a feeling of time loss, so much so he wondered if there was internal bleeding. He felt himself slipping, like he might go unconscious at any moment.

Maybe that was a blessing.

“And shouting like that,” the man said, “Who did you think was going to hear you?”

The man picked Janus up and threw him into the back seat of the car.

He opened the front door, took another look around to see if anyone was watching and then got in the car. It was a clean operation, the man thought. He started the car and began to drive off.

*****

“What do we do?” Kate asked.

“We ignore it and hope he goes away,” Quinn replied.

Kate looked in the rearview mirror and simultaneously sped up. How the hell the Horseman could be gaining on them in a car was insane. Didn’t this thing have to play by the rules? It was a horse after all. Horses cannot outrun cars.

“I don’t think that is a very good plan,” Kate said.

“Got a better one?” Quinn asked.

Kate nodded toward the gun on Quinn’s lap.

“Maybe,” she said.

“You are planning to shoot a headless phantom?” Quinn asked.

“We have to at least try, right?” she asked.

“But we will need that ammo if we catch up to Janus,” Quinn said. “We need something to fight off his attacker with.”

“I know, I know,” Kate said. “But we are going to have two problems at that point instead of one.”

Quinn looked at the speedometer. The car was at 75 miles an hour now. They would be at the curve in two or three more minutes.

“We have to do something,” Kate said. “He’s gaining on us.”

Quinn turned around in the seat and looked behind them. Even in broad daylight, the Horseman was a terrible apparition. If anything, he looked worse. You could see the decay on his cloak and the horse looked as if it was being tortured in an effort to make it move faster. The only difference from the last time Quinn had seen him was what was in his hand. It wasn’t a sword.

 “He has a pumpkin,” Quinn said.

“Well, that’s better than a sword,” Kate shot back.

But this was not just a lump of orange vegetable. Instead the thing had a hideous grin carved on it—a demonic face—and it was on fire.

“It’s on fire,” Quinn said. “The pumpkin is on fire. I think he is trying to catch the car on fire.”

How the hell could the Headless Horseman know about flammable gasoline? It was absurd.

(
He’s us, remember. He has our knowledge.
) Kate thought.

Quinn looked in front of him. Just another minute or two down the road. But Quinn could see they were not going to make it. The Horseman appeared ready to throw and he was in good distance to do it.

(
Take the wheel
) Kate thought.

(
Are you insane?
) Quinn asked.

(
Do it now, Quinn.)

Quinn grabbed the wheel and tried to keep the car steady. Kate rolled down the window and grabbed the gun from Quinn’s lap. He saw she must have put the car on cruise control to keep it going at a steady pace. That would have to change before they hit that curve or there wouldn’t be much left of their car.  

(
You ever done this before?
) he asked.

(
No, but I saw it in one of the Terminator movies.
) she replied.

(
How reassuring.
)

Kate aimed the gun carefully, trying to balance it even while the wind ripped around her and threatened to yank the gun out of her hand.

She decided to aim for the horse, by far the bigger target. She fired off the first shot with her pistol, but the shot went wide.

Quinn tried to keep the car steady.

Kate waited and watched. She had to block out everything. She could see the flaming pumpkin in the Horseman’s hand, a ball of fire that would be unleashed at any moment. She had to stop it. She concentrated on nothing but the horse. She blocked out the Horseman and his echoing laughter that seemed to be in her head more than anywhere else. Only the horse. Please let this shot count.

She fired again and the horse or its rider seemed to know it was coming because it leapt into the air.

But the horse was not quite fast enough. Instead of being hit in the chest, the horse was hit in the leg.

The Horseman appeared about to throw his pumpkin, but then suddenly he was gone. The horse and its rider vanished.

Kate shouted out in triumph, before feeling the car swerve beneath her.

She nearly fell out of the car, but grabbed on to the hood and brought herself back in.

“Quinn?” she asked and looked at him.

Kate had to grab the wheel and quickly slid back into the driver’s seat as she looked at Quinn. He was looking at her in shock. His left thigh was covered in blood.

“Your shot…. Your bullet… It hit me,” he said.

*****

Janus didn’t know where the car was headed and he felt like he was coming in and out of consciousness.

“I’m going to enjoy this,” the man said. “You know that right? It’s good when people are strangers, but friends, true friends, are so much more satisfying.”

 Janus opened his eyes. He was in the back seat of the car. There was blood on the seat—his, he thought.

But on the floor there looked like more dried blood—and it definitely was not his.

The man didn’t seem to regard Janus as much of a threat and he could see why. His leg was certainly broken—he felt only pain there and blood seemed to be coming from his forehead. He felt dizzy and confused.

I’m going to die here, Janus thought and grimaced. Die like a fucking ponce begging for his life.

The man kept talking.

“You know I had to wait 12 long years to do this. Do you know how hard that is? To see the vermin all around you, every day. To talk to them, smile at them, act like you are one of them. But I’m not one of them, Janus. No, no, I think I’ve proved that. I’m invincible. I’m unstoppable. I am a force of goddamned pure fury bent on hell and fire.”

I wish you would fucking shut up, Janus thought. Dying would be preferable. He moved on his side slightly and felt on the bottom of the seat.

Nothing. Fuck, he thought. I will not die like this. I will not die afraid and in pain.  He would finish this his own way, not on this asshole’s timetable.

His hands continued to search the seat.

Nothing. Janus wanted to cry in despair.

Concentrating, he felt his own pockets, hoping desperately for something he could use. But there was nothing but a couple of crushed cigarettes and his silver lighter.

Maybe I could have a smoke before I die, he thought. Or maybe…