Nightworld (Adversary Cycle/Repairman Jack) (56 page)

As it walks, it tests its voice.

“Mother.”

Queens, New York

Ba should be driving, Bill thought as he raced along the deserted LIE, aiming the big Crown Vic for the Queens-Midtown Tunnel like a bullet from a gun. He glanced at his watch: 3:32. Less than forty minutes of light. He would have preferred the Queensboro Bridge but remembered that was impassable due to a gravity hole.

Jack rode shotgun—literally. He sat high in the passenger seat with this huge short-barreled thing—he’d called it a “Spas”—held up in plain sight. An exotic Indian woman was squeezed between them. Ba sat behind Bill with a similar shotgun in plain view. The two warriors were sending a message: Don’t mess with this car. Nick sat behind Jack, Sylvia and the boy were squeezed in the middle, their cat on the boy’s lap, their one-eyed dog panting on the floor.

That left the driving chore to Bill. He knew he wasn’t the greatest driver, but if they ran into one of the roving gangs that had taken over the city during the day he figured he’d do better with a steering wheel than with a shotgun.

He glanced at Jack, who’d been withdrawn since their reunion at the airport. He was definitely on edge. Something eating at him, something he wasn’t talking about.

Bill guessed if it concerned them, they’d find out soon enough.

The farther he drove into Queens, the more obstacles on the expressway; he wove as quickly as he dared around and through the litter of wrecked or abandoned cars. They slowed him and he wanted to fly.

Carol … he hungered for the sight of her, for the sound of her voice, the touch of her hand. She consumed his thoughts, his feelings. He wished he could have got a call through to her from the airport, just to let her know he’d made it back and was coming home.

“Better hurry,” Nick said from the back.

“Going as fast as I can, Nick.”

“Better go faster.” His tone was as flat as when he’d told Ba he had no need to hurry. They’d learned what that had meant. What did this…?

“Faster why?”

“It’s Carol.”

The car swerved slightly as Bill’s fingers tightened on the wheel.

“What about Carol?”

“She’s in trouble.”

WNYW-TV

Manhattan

Carol found the head waiting in the kitchen.

She was on her way back from Magda’s room, carrying her lunch tray, worrying about Bill and why she hadn’t heard from him yet. She screamed and dropped the tray as she rounded the corner and saw it floating in the air. She recognized the face.

“Jimmy!” she cried, then got control of herself.

Not a head, just a face. And not Jimmy. Not her son. She’d almost stopped thinking of him as her son.

Rasalom. This was Rasalom.

The face smiled—an Arctic gale registered greater warmth. Then its lips moved, forming words, but the voice seemed to come from everywhere. Or was it inside her head?

“Hello, Mother.”

Carol backed out of the kitchen. The face followed.

The tone turned mocking.
“Mommy, don’t leave me!”

Carol stopped retreating when her back came up against the dining room table. She looked around for Glaeken but knew he wouldn’t be there. He’d gone out hours ago while she’d stayed to watch over Magda.

Carol swallowed and found her voice. “Don’t call me that!”

“Why not? That’s what you are.”

She shook her head. “No. You grew inside me for nine months, but you were never my child. And I was never your mother.”

Another smile, as cold as the first.
“I sympathize with your efforts to dissociate yourself from me. I understand them because I’ve tried to do the same in regard to you. Perhaps you’ve had more success than I.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The bond of flesh. Since the day I was conceived within you, I’ve worn the flesh you gave me. It links us. I don’t like it any more than you do, but it is a fact, one that won’t go away. One we both have to deal with.”

“I’ve learned to deal with it—by not thinking about it.”

“But that doesn’t cancel it. I’ve given this a lot of thought and there’s a better way to deal with it, a way that allows me to come to terms with my fleshy link to you. A way that can benefit you as well.”

The voice in her head was so calm, so soothing. Almost mesmerizing. Carol shook herself.

“I—I don’t want anything from you.”

“Don’t think just of yourself. Think of your friends. I’m offering you and some of them a safe harbor, a haven, a chance to survive the endless night.”

“I don’t trust you.”

The smile again, rueful this time.
“I wouldn’t trust me either. But hear me out. You have nothing to lose by listening to my proposal.”

Carol remembered what Bill had told her about a woman named Lisl who’d lost her soul and her life by listening to Rasalom. But what, besides sanity and dignity, did Carol have left to lose? Unless a miracle occurred, tomorrow would hold the world’s last daylight. After Thursday’s sundown she’d be in the same leaky life raft as the rest of the world.

“What do you mean by ‘a haven’? And how many of my ‘friends’ can I take there?”

“A reasonable number.”

“Glaeken among them?”

The face rotated back and forth, the equivalent of a headshake.

“No. Not Glaeken. Anyone else, but not Glaeken. I’ve waited too long to even my scores with him.”

Carol didn’t know what to think, what to do. If Rasalom had agreed to allow Glaeken safe harbor, she’d have known he was lying. No rivalry, no enmity in human history was as long and as bitter and as deeply ingrained as theirs. But he had excluded Glaeken. What did that mean? Could his offer be genuine? If she could save Bill and a few of the others …

“Come downstairs and we’ll discuss it.”

“Downstairs? Oh, no. I’m not leaving this building.”

“I’m not asking you to. I’m one floor down. In your apartment.”

“How—how did you get in?”

“Come now, Mother dear. I can do anything I wish. Anything. Come visit. We’ll talk. I’ll be there until darkness falls. After that I’ll have other matters to attend to.”

The face grew dim, became translucent, then disappeared. Gone as if it had never been.

Carol sagged back against the table. Expect the unexpected. Wasn’t that what Glaeken had told her? Easy enough to say, but Rasalom’s face—floating in the air, talking to her as casually as if they’d bumped into each other in an aisle at the A&P.

The ease with which he seemed to have entered the building was bad enough, but knowing he was waiting down in her apartment tied her in knots.

Should she go? That was the question. And what was this all about? Was she supposed to haggle with him? Barter for lives? The responsibility was numbing.

She had to risk it. If she could save even a few people …

But she didn’t want to go alone. She knew she had to, but she didn’t like it. She didn’t have much time, either. If only she had a weapon of some sort. But what could she use against someone who could change the course of the sun and anything else he pleased?

As Carol picked up the broken dishes from the kitchen floor and threw them away, she spotted the knife rack over the sink. She pulled out the wide-bladed carving knife and tucked it into the folds of the old cardigan she’d borrowed from Glaeken. A laughable weapon, considering who she’d be facing. But the weight of the blade in her hand offered some tiny comfort.

She peeked in on Magda and found her sleeping soundly. Carol guessed it would be all right to leave her for a few minutes. Glaeken would be back soon, and Rasalom had said he’d wait only until dark.

She hurried downstairs.

Her apartment had an empty feel. The drapes stood open but because the windows faced north, the light was dusky.

Was he here? What was she supposed to call out? Jimmy? Rasalom? Certainly not
son.

“Hello?” she said, settling on that. “Are you here?”

She walked through the living room and down the hall. Why didn’t he answer? Was this some sort of a joke?

Suddenly he stepped out of the bedroom not three feet in front of her. In the flesh.

Naked flesh.

Carol cried out in shock and jumped back.

“Hello,
Mother.
” His voice was coarse, raspy, more dead than alive.

He stepped toward her as she backed away. His left hand was missing. His slim body seemed faintly luminescent, and his genitals … he was hugely erect, pointing directly at her face. Suddenly he darted by her and positioned himself between her and the door.

She turned and faced him, her heart thudding, her palm slick on the handle of the knife in her sweater.

“Wh-what’s this all about? I thought you wanted to talk.”

He smiled. “Isn’t it wonderful what desperation does to people? It paralyzes some, makes others brutish, and makes others
stupid.
You fall into that final category,
Mother.
” He spat the last word. “What’s this about? It’s about a love note to Glaeken and the rest. It’s about defilement and slow, painful death, Mother. Incestuous rape and matricide. In other words, you and me.”

He leapt at her. Reflexively Carol pulled out the knife and held it before her with both hands. She felt the impact as Rasalom’s body struck it, felt the skin part before the point, felt the blade sink deep into his flesh. He grunted and stepped back. He looked down in wonder at the knife handle protruding from his upper abdomen, just below the breastbone. He touched the handle with a finger, then looked up at her.

“Mother … you shock me. I guess there are still a few surprises left in this world.”

“Oh, God!”

“He won’t help you. He was never there. But I am here now. And I am your God. Think of it, Mother. You are about to be raped by God. And afterward…” He caressed the handle like a priapic tool … “I shall use this to skin you alive. Won’t that be a nice gift to hang in Glaeken’s closet? Your skin.”

Carol screamed and tried to dash past him but he caught her with his only hand and slammed her back against the wall. The breath whooshed out of her with the impact. As she tried to regain it, the door burst open.

“Carol!”

A group of men—some of them armed—burst in, with Bill in the lead. He leapt to her side and Carol clung to him, sobbing.

“Oh, Bill, oh, Bill, thank God you’re here!”

“You!” Bill glared at Rasalom, who had stepped back and appeared to be surveying the scene with amusement.

Jack stepped forward and faced Rasalom, a shotgun of some sort cradled in his arms. Ba stood by the door, similarly armed, while Nick stood behind him in the hall.

“Who the hell are you?” Jack said.

“I once knew him as Rafe Losmara,” Bill said. “But his real name is Rasalom.”

Rasalom bowed, unfazed by the intruders. “At your service.”

Jack’s expression was skeptical as he glanced at Bill, then back to Rasalom’s slim, naked figure.