The Messenger (2011 reformat) (16 page)

He smiled and
closed the blinds.

He didn't want
to put on the television again-it would just be more of the same-but he
switched it on regardless. He'd learned long ago, when he'd first started,
never to be alarmed, or shocked. There was no point.

It comes with
the turf, he thought.

Besides, he'd
seen far, far worse.

The bed
creaked when he sat on it. The television screen came alive.

The Channel 9
newswoman stood in front of the school, hairspray stiff blond hair wilting in
the humidity. She was clearly on edge as she recited the events.

"... the
second inexplicable tragedy to strike the quiet town of Danelleton in just
three days, both involving postal employees..."

The screen
snapped to a employee-file photograph of...

"...Longtime
postal supervisor Carlton Spence allegedly went on a rampage today at the
Seaton School for Christian Girls, murdering a nun, a dorm assistant, and six
students before taking his own life when local police arrived at the school's dormitory
building..."

The shot cut
back to the disheartened newswoman, her voice droning. In the background,
police and paramedics rushed in and out of the dormitory's pillared
entranceway.

This shocking
second mass murder of the week brings Danelleton's death toll to
thirty-eight."

The words
faded out in Dhevic's head. He'd seen it before-and wasn't surprised. He knew
full well that it was happening again.

He nodded off
on the bed, still fully clothed. His dreams were awful, they often were,
because they typically replayed what he'd witnessed in his visions. Horrors
stacked upon horrors stacked upon horrors in a place where time did not really
exist. Seconds ticked by in twinges of agony, minutes ticked by in screams.
Hours ticked by in atrocities designed to exist without purpose, for their own
sake. It was not understandable. Not by humans.

The human mind
could not reckon, it could not grasp this timeless war. We're just too stupid,
too simple and unsophisticated, he thought.

Some things
aren't meant to be known.

That would
have to suffice.

He sat up on
the bed, rubbed his eyes. Then he got up, stepping over a cockroach, and went
to the bathroom. He washed his face in the stained sink, as if that might wash
away the atrocities of his dreams and visions. He felt tainted, contaminated by
these truths revealed to so few.

But he never
lost his faith.

A click in his
head; he glanced up quickly, spied his face in the mirror and saw water
dripping off his beard. He looked like Rasputin, sopping wet as when his body
was pulled from the West Dniva River. The familiar yet always strange noise
creaked in his head, like a bad hinge, then a quiet bonelike snap!

He could see
them out there.

Dhevic sighed.
He was a tall man but not physically strong. He had no weapons. But he needed
the vehicle that his benefactors provided. I'll call the police, the truck will
be gone or stripped by the time they get here.

And it's a
damn nice truck!

He had but one
recourse. Confront them.

I'm a
recipient augur, not a tough guy. He toweled off his face, put on his black
jacket, and opened the motel room door.

Punks was the
only word to describe them. Dhevic knew their plight: abused, terrifying
domestic environments as infants and children, poverty, and just plain evil
influence. But they were still punks. They were intently clothes-hangering
Dhevic's brand-new silver Ford Explorer.

Late teens,
Dhevic could see. One black, one white. Buzz cuts and lip rings. Baggy long
pants, waistbands of their briefs showing, sneakers untied. Dhevic didn't get
the style. Neither wore shirts, and both had an array of tattoos.

"Please.
Stop that. Go away. I need that vehicle more than you can know."

Both kids
glared up, not even momentarily taken aback by Dhevic's height.

"Fuck
off, man. We'll kill ya," the black one said.

The white one
pulled a small pistol.

"Let's
kill the fucker anyway..."

They laughed,
White Kid keeping the gun on Dhevic, Black Kid clothes-hangering the Explorer's
door. "Fuck this shit, man," the black said, arrogantly eyeing
Dhevic. "Gimme the keys."

Dhevic could
smell what they were both thinking: Now that he'd seen them, they'd have to
kill him, to prevent their description from being given to the police. They'll
put me in the truck at gunpoint, make me drive, then kill me on some back road.

"Keys,
man," White Kid insisted. "Now."

"No,"
Dhevic said. "Just go away."

The punks
exchanged incredulous glances. "Man, what is wrong with people? Can you
believe it?"

"Fuckin'
Acan't."

"Hey,
buddy? Hey, beard?" White Punk aimed the pistol straight at Dhevic's face.
"You listenin' to me, mother fucker? You gimme those keys right now or I
cap your ass."

Dhevic stood
there perfectly still, eyes wide. "Look," was all he said.

White Kid was
staring back now, right into Dhevic's eyes.

"Do you
see?" Dhevic asked him quietly. "Look closely."

The kid's
expression collapsed. The gun lowered and he fell to his knees. But he could
not take his gaze off Dhevic's eyes.

"Do you
see her?" Dhevic asked. He stepped closer, wielding his stare like a
weapon itself. "I can. She's waving to you, isn't she? Here, I'll show you
more."

"No!"
the kid shouted. Tears poured down his face. "Don't make me see any
more!" He slid the pistol to Dhevic's feet. A trembling hand reached into
his pocket and threw Dhevic a wad of cash. Then he brought his face to his
hands and cried outright.

"The heck
you doin'?" Black Kid yelled.

"I-I-I
just saw my mother."

"The fuck
you just say?"

"He made
me see my mother!" White Kid wept.

"What the
shit you talkin' about, man? Your mother's dead."

"No,"
Dhevic corrected. "She's very much alive. Someplace else. Forever."

Hitching sobs
and gagging, the white kid literally crawled away on his hands and knees.

Black Kid's
gaze whipped back and forth, between Dhevic and his comrade. His expression kept
forming and re-forming, the best he could do to mask his fear and confusion. He
looked back at Dhevic, who seemed much more formidable now, and his hands
patted his pockets in frustration.

"No
weapons now?" Dhevic's voice grated. At his feet lay the pistol; he kicked
it over to the black kid. "Before you pick it up, though ... look."

The kid's
defiant stare began to tremble. Dhevic stepped forward once, twice, baring his
gaze down into his opponent's face. "And what of you? Would you like to
see your sister?"

Their stares
locked.

"Her name
is-what? Jerrica? Erika? Something like that? Look. In my eyes. Look and you'll
see her." His voice ground down like gravel rubbing. "Look and see
what they're doing to her."

The kid's
mouth fell open, lips quivering. It appeared that what he saw was making his
eyes quiver, too. "No more, no more," he murmured.

"It was
you who hooked Erika up with the stoners" Dhevic said. He said it because
he knew it. He knew nothing but everything. "It was part of some deal,
wasn't it? Some kind of gang initiation. Well, that's what she's doing now.
She'll die soon, too, and be in the same place as your friend's mother-but that
doesn't matter. Look. Look."

"No. God.
Please."

"And now
Twanna," Dhevic said. "Your first girlfriend, right? Right now, she
is in the same place as your friend's mother. You indoctrinated her...very
effectively. Look. Look at her now."

The kid fell
to his knees and vomited. Like the other kid, he began to sob from the impact of
the catastrophic vision.

"Those
things eating her are called dentatapeds, a species of cacodemon from the Lower
Orders. They eat her alive and regurgitate her every night, and then start
again the next night. It's part of the entertainment for the Court of Grand
Duke de Rais. The entire court rapes her first, of course. Twanna is immortal
now. This is how she will spend eternity. Here, let me show you your brother."

"NO!"
The kid teetered on his knees like a svelte tree in high wind. Eyes bugging, he
snatched the gun up from the pavement and put it to his head.

"Don't do
that," Dhevic said very calmly. "What you have to understand is that
you still have a chance, and so does your friend. Keep it all in mind, along
with everything you've seen tonight." Then Dhevic gave the kid a selfless
smile. "Who knows what the future holds?"

The kid
dropped the gun, stood up in his shock. Like the other one, he fumbled in his
pocket and threw some cash toward Dhevic. "Please. No more."

"Go. Go
find your friend and tell him this: 'O send out your light and your truth. Let
them lead me.'"

The kid sobbed
as he staggered away.

Dhevic sighed
in relief. This is wearing me out, he thought with a laugh. He looked up and
down the motel front; no one had seen the bizarre confrontation. He quickly
pocketed the pistol, then scooped the cash off the ground.

This is a
fair shake of cash!
,
he thought.

Then he
thought: Yep. God works in mysterious ways.

He stuffed the
money in his jacket pocket and walked across the main drag, to treat himself to
an omelet at Denny's.

I

The night
turned sedate, the moon hanging large and low. A comfortable breeze flowed off
the bay to knock down some of the mugginess. Crickets could be heard, their
chorus making the evening seem to throb. Jane felt tranquilized.

But still at
odds with so many things, so much she didn't understand.

She sat out on
the back porch, protected from mosquitoes. She let herself be lost in her
thoughts, however confusing they may have been. The night breeze sifted through
the screens, lifted her hair. She was trying to feel as good as she could under
the circumstances.

She'd already
checked on the kids; both Kevin and Jennifer were sound asleep, relieved that her
fainting spell hadn't been serious. She'd checked all the outside doors, made
sure they were locked. When her thoughts turned to the calamities of the past
few days, she blocked them out.

All but one.
What Steve had been saying earlier, just before he'd left. Who else out there
is in the cult too?

Could it
really be a cult? It made too much sense when Steve had been discussing it, but
now? The day done, the kids asleep, the doors locked? I just don't think I can
believe it, she thought. Not in an area like this. Not in Danelleton. There
were no satanic cults, no ritual murderers in league with one another, like
some integrated but very discreet cell of terrorists.

I should just
go to bed, she told herself, but when she began to do that, a laziness kept her
in the porch chair. It was too tranquil right now, too peaceful and serene. She
loved the night breeze against her face, and the feel of the weatherproof
carpet against her toes. I could just fall asleep right out here, she realized,
and then a stiffer breeze

blew in,
rustling the backyard trees. It billowed her nightgown, slipped coolly down her
warm skin. It felt-again-serene. It made her feel like the night.

What she
didn't know was that the night was coming for her.

II

The night was
his blood. He took it and lived on it. Technically, this would be called simple
sub-corporeal channeling. Not so technically: walking-around time for a
disembodied spirit. The Messenger liked to slip about at night. He liked to see
people, to see what they were doing. He liked, too, to get right behind them
and puppet them, ooze into their minds until they were essentially one.

He glided on
shadows. He stomped through brushes and brambles but made no sound. Now he was
moving around the house, like a shadow himself, like a shadow moving in car
lights.

What is in
here? he wondered.

He stopped and
looked into a window, saw a sleeping child, a young boy. The Messenger wanted
to slip into the boy's head and spoil his dreams, make him wake screaming.

But not
tonight.

I must control
myself.

In the next
window, a girl lay asleep, older than the boy. This roused the Messenger. She
would be sweet to terrify, to corrupt, to destroy. Innocence was the problem,
though, one of the Messenger's few barriers. He could not machinate her. He
knew that if he genuinely exerted himself, he could send her dreaming visions
into a tumult, he could drop them right off the precipice into the most foul
canyon of the netherworld. He could pollute her dreams to the extent that she
would never forget them, never recover. She'd be tainted for life.