The Darkening Dream (47 page)

The surface of the earth cracked and breached. No breath carried his tumbling screams.

Down to
Jahannam.
The inferno.

Fifty-Nine:

Climbing into the Light

Temple of Solomon, Thursday, November 20, 1913

A
STORM OF BRITTLE OBJECTS
pelted Alex about the head and shoulders. Silently, the inner doors to the Holy of Holies closed, snuffing out the glow. Sensation faded back into the world.

Minutes before, the sanctuary had been in disarray, but now it was meticulously arranged. He glanced down to discover what had struck him and found the area littered with bleached bones. A femur here, ribs there, even a misshapen skull studded with razor-long teeth. Not a single shard remained on the inner side of the threshold.

God, it seemed, had settled accounts with Ali ibn Hammud al-Nasir.

But Sarah?

Alex ran down the stairs to find Anne crouched over her crumpled form. The swirling clouds had turned dark and ominous. From the courtyard, priests streamed toward them.

“She’s not breathing!” Sam squatted beside Anne, his face as white as the vampire’s bones.

Alex knelt. Something was wrong with the angle of her back, and one of her wings lay smashed beneath her. Brittle bones jutted from the feathery mass. Dark red drooled from her lips. He felt nothing but desolation.

Anne held one of Sarah’s hands as she rocked back and forth. Then a beatific expression lit her face, and her body began to emit a soft white light. A nimbus spread from her hands to Sarah’s body.

Sarah shifted, and her mangled wing twitched and straightened. Her eyes shot open. She coughed and sprayed her friends with bloody spittle.

Alex didn’t care.

The wounds on her stomach healed and faded in front of their eyes, leaving only dried blood on clean white flesh. She released Anne’s hand and tried to pull down the tunic to cover her legs. The glow around both girls faded.

“Remind me never to get mauled to death by a vampire again.”

Alex watched Sarah’s wings waving behind her as she talked with the High Priest. In the background, the giant tank of water still burned with white flames. Dried blood still edged Sarah’s lips, but she seemed in great spirits, full of energy even. She put a hand to her mouth.

The gesture was so unconsciously cute that Alex spun her around and kissed her full on the lips before he’d quite decided to do it. Her eyes went wide, just inches from his, but she was kissing him back when they heard the High Priest.

“Please remember we stand on God’s holy ground.”

Sarah pulled away. “Emily’s doll! Where is it? I had it when the vampire attacked me.”

She blew him a kiss, then raced up the stairs, stopped midway, flapped her wings and more or less flew to the top. She paced the portico, searching the ground.

“Disgusting!” she yelled down. “I’m getting vampire bones stuck between my toes.”

Alex joined her. He found the doll perched on the base of a pillar.

“Its name is
Boaz
,” Sarah said.

“The doll?” Alex said.

“No, ninny, the pillar.” Somehow, he even enjoyed her little insults.

“The pillar has a name?”

She nodded. “The other one is
Jachin
.”

Alex supposed God could name His pillars if He was so inclined. Sarah and Alex walked down the stairs together. He took her hand. If the cat was out of the bag, he might as well enjoy the advantages.

Sarah showed the doll to the High Priest.

“This evil thing was constructed to steal the life from their little sister.” She indicated the twins.

The High Priest held out his hand toward the little bundle of rags, hair, and wax.

“May I?” He brought the doll close to his face. “Although expertly built, it’s a straightforward sympathetic binding. The form analogizes the nature…”

Alex watched Sarah while the man blathered on about how to unravel the warlock’s curse.

“I’m going to do it here,” she said when he was finished. “Magic works better in this place, I don’t think I’ll even need any paraphernalia.”

“Is it safe?” Anne said.

Sarah sat cross-legged on the stone, clutched the little doll in her lap, and chanted some prayer or another.

There was a brief white flash, and the doll unraveled into a handful of rags and hair. She let the pieces drift from her hands to the pavement.

“Is that it?” Sarah asked the priest.

“Your sister should be free.”

Anne rushed in and hugged Sarah, then the man — who turned bright red and tried to back away.

“No, no, my oaths!”

“What’s the matter?” Anne released him.

“The priests took oaths not to touch women,” Sarah said. “Speaking of touching…” She jabbed a finger at each of the twins. “Not a word about me and Alex to my father.”

Sam slapped Alex on the back. It wasn’t the most gentle of taps.

“We’d best look to finding our way home,” Alex said. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to dawdle here.”

“What about the warlock?” Anne said. “He just disappeared—”

“As far as I’m concerned, he can go to hell,” Sam said.

“That’s a certainty,” Alex said, “but hopefully sooner rather than later.”

Sarah fished her little silver necklace out from under her tunic and showed it to the priest.

“My father used this
mezuzah
to build a magical bridge to this place. Would you know how to get us back?”

The High Priest squinted at the tiny amulet. He touched it with the tip of his staff and both emitted the same soft white light.

“An elegant construction. I think he left the door cracked for you. That must be exhausting.”

The priest started chanting.

The white glow from the amulet and staff intensified.

The world began to white out—

Alex tumbled onto the dirt floor of the cellar. His friends, dressed now in their normal winter clothes, were sprawled nearby. Mr. Engelmann sat on the ground cross-legged. He looked old and tired.

Sixty:

Awakenings

Salem, Massachusetts, Thursday night, November 20, 1913

E
MILY WOKE EXHAUSTED.
Her room smelled stuffy and the curtains were drawn — odd, since she liked sunrise to wake her. She felt feverish and dizzy. How had she gotten into bed, anyway? The last thing she remembered was Sunday services at church.

She threw back the covers, intending to turn on a light. Hopefully Anne wouldn’t wake. When she tried to stand, her legs gave way and she toppled to the floor. She bit her tongue and pulled herself up to the nightstand for a candle.

She fumbled with the matches, gripped the table for support, fumbled with the matches again. Finally she got one lit.

Where’d Anne gone in the middle of the night? Her bed was empty and made. The room was completely rearranged. The dresser was covered in folded piles of nightgowns and towels.

She was wearing a nightgown her mother must have picked — pink with lacy white trim. Her arms and legs looked thin.

Images jumped into her head: a hideous purple-faced woman touched her in ways both soft and painful, and a dusty skeleton lay on a table. She shuddered. Too tired to stay upright any longer, she slid to the floor with her back against the wall.

A funny bit of something was around her ankle. She tugged and snapped it free, tossed it aside into the darkness. She had no energy to move, so she sat, spreading her toes and relaxing them, trying to bring feeling back to her stiff muscles.

The clock in the hall chimed twice — hours till dawn. She felt too tired to even try to stand.

“Mommy!” Her voice sounded hoarse, her throat dry.

In seconds she heard footsteps hurrying down the hall. Hopefully they wouldn’t mind being woken. The door to her room opened. The light came on, and instead of being upset, Mommy hugged and hugged her, Daddy hovering behind in his checked flannel robe.

“Emily! You’re up, darling! Has the fever broken? Let’s get you back to bed.”

Emily’s half-closed eyes turned the twinkling flame of the candle into little stars. She looked up through it at her parents. Mommy’s round face showed only relief, but the flickering light made Daddy’s skin look like a bowl of clam chowder filled with squirming black crawfish.

“I’m fine, Mommy, just tired and a little dizzy. Have I been sick?”

Sixty-One:

Retreat into Fire

Temple of Solomon and Unknown Locale, Thursday, November 20, 1913

W
ATER, PARTICULARLY HOLY WATER,
was an effective magical shield, and Parris had wrapped it around himself, becoming practically invisible. Back in the material plane, the spell would have taken time and reagents, like the bay leaves and opal. Here he only needed the water itself and a simple incantation. Small blessings.

He tasted blood and pus, his burned face and arm throbbed, and he couldn’t see out of the eye the Williams girl had poked. Wading in the center of the tank didn’t give him a great vantage point, but as the children and the priests gathered below, he knew the outcome couldn’t be good. No sign of the vampire. Soon enough, the priest raised his staff and the meddling teens vanished.