The Remnant (22 page)

"No fucking way," he muttered, raising the
knife and stumbling through the furry, eeping mass toward the
King.

The rats erupted.

The King Rat leaped away to disappear within
the undulating, furry current of the colony, but the throng itself
struck like a wave. The rodents nearest Trace leapt onto his pants
and clawed their way upward, biting and scratching through his
jeans. Other rats scrabbled up the table legs to splash onto his
shirt like deadly spray. He kicked and slashed and clawed, jerking
the scabby creatures away, snapping their thin necks in his gloved
fist, stabbing down across his shirt and pants, feeling the knife
biting fur and flesh, the eeping and shrieking rising into an
overwhelming cacophony that drove him backward until he stumbled,
teetered on the top step, felt himself falling...

He crashed headfirst into the stairwell,
landing on a thick carpet of vermin, cascading down atop the
roiling mass. He crunched against the door, watching helplessly as
a flood of crimson eyes poured from the landing and down over him.
Teeth and claws scratched and bit everywhere, but when rats landed
on his face he jerked his hands away from his belly and groin to
protect his eyes. More rodents continued to smother him like a
slowly-filling grave, the teeth and claws of the beasts still
scrabbling for his stinging flesh.

As though his lungs had taken that long to
fill he finally gave himself up to terror and began to scream. The
sound started at the soles of his feet and wrenched its way through
his tortured torso, ripping past his lungs and throat in a wail of
panic and pain. He shrieked over and over, the sound miraculously
cleaving his attention from the rats, from the agony and disgust of
their million gnawing, gnashing teeth, until he felt as though he
had no body any longer, as though he were nothing more than
screams.

Something moved sinuously across his belly,
and he tensed, his eyes jerking open.

Ashley’s face was clenched in shock at his
sudden spasm, and he glanced at her hand, resting atop his stomach,
the buttons of his shirt undone. In the lamplight the mass of tiny
half circles on his skin looked as though he had been branded by
hot chain mail, and he forced his eyes away to stare at the outline
of her body through her gauzy nightgown.

He pulled her into his arms, noticing the
tears welling in her eyes again. He kissed one away before it could
fall, and she rested her head against his chest.

"Do the scars hurt?" she asked.

"Not anymore," he whispered into her ear.

"It must have been so terrifying for
you."

He sighed. "I seem to have an affinity for
rats, or they have an affinity for me. I’m not sure exactly what
that means. Maybe Marie could tell me."

"Maybe she could," she whispered, moving
against him naturally, without hesitation.

His hand cupped her breast, and she gasped,
burying her face in his throat. She pressed him down on the sofa,
sliding atop him. His hands slid to her buttocks, and when she
began to gyrate against him he groaned.

"What
about
Marie?" he croaked.

"She’s already sound asleep," whispered
Ashley.

Her hand slid between them, finding him and
squeezing, and then they were both clawing at his clothing.

Marie stood in front of her window in the
dark bedroom, listening to the murmuring sounds of lovemaking down
the hall. She couldn’t always make out the words, but she knew what
was going on, and she was glad for Ashley. She also realized that
part of the reason she was glad was that with Trace in the picture
Cole would have to accept that Ashley could not be his, and in the
future he would most certainly come to see
her
as a
woman.

If any of the people in the valley lived long
enough to have a future.

She glanced at her revolver on the bedside
table. Because Ashley had forced her to learn she was proficient
with the gun, but she wasn’t certain she’d be able to use it
against a person if she needed to. Ashley had told her over and
over that the Angels weren’t
people
, they were devils, and
there was no crime in defending yourself against them. Still,
picturing a person dying by her own hand, even an Angel, took
Marie’s breath away. The problem was that she knew a lot of people
were going to die soon if her visions were true, and she believed
with all her heart that they were.

Without thinking she dropped onto her knees
beside the bed, resting her elbows on the mattress and placing her
nose against her steepled fingers. She closed her eyes.

Dear Lord, please protect us because I don’t
think I can kill anyone, and I’m really afraid of getting killed,
myself. So, if it’s not too much to ask, could you please listen to
me the way you used to listen to all of us, and take care of
us?

Amen.

She felt better. Not safe exactly. Just
better. At least it was all off her chest. But she knew that God
didn’t always answer prayers, and when they were answered sometimes
it wasn’t the answer you were looking for. God’s ways were not
man’s ways, and it was impossible to understand what the plan was
all the time. You just had to accept that there was a plan and go
with it. She knew Ashley and the others didn’t believe the way she
did, anymore, and that was sad. But they didn’t know what Marie
knew, and she could not explain it to them because they would not
believe.

Suddenly a light outside the window caught
her eye. It was in the same location she’d thought she’d seen a
flashlight before, but now it didn’t look like a flashlight at all.
As she watched the radiance increased until it seemed to blast out
of the trees, as though someone had opened a door into a brightly
lit cave, and now the light was escaping into the forest. She
blinked, and it brightened even more, but still it was a soft
light. She could stare directly at it.

It dawned on her then that perhaps the light
was not a good thing. If Angels were coming into the valley they
might well come at night as they had before. Without thinking she
hurried down the hall, surprising and embarrassing Ashley and
Trace. Ashley quickly covered her nakedness, and Marie felt
embarrassed herself at her sudden intrusion and by Ashley’s
blushing red cheeks.

"There’s a light," Marie whispered.

"Where?" asked Trace, and Marie told him.

Trace wrapped himself in the sheet as Ashley
did the same with the light blanket. They followed her to the back
door, and Trace opened it a crack and peered out into the
night.

"I don’t see it," he said.

Marie glanced past him, frowning. The light
was bright as ever.

"It’s right there," she insisted,
pointing.

"I don’t see it, sweetheart," he said.

Ashley leaned to peer past him, but shook her
head as well.

"It’s right there!" Marie insisted, pointing
through the open door.

She could tell by Trace’s frown and the look
of concern in Ashley’s eyes that she’d made a mistake. The light
was not there at all, at least not for others to see. It was simply
another of her visions. Now they would assumed that she was either
ill or crazy or both. To prove the point Ashley rested the back of
her hand against Marie’s forehead. Marie shook it off.

"I’m not sick," she said, disgustedly.

They followed her back to her room, and both
stood beside her as she climbed back into bed. Ashley leaned to
kiss her lightly on the forehead.

"Sometimes we see what we want to see,
Querida," she said.

She frowned up at Ashley.

"What do
you
want to see?" she asked
petulantly. "You don’t believe in God, anymore, just because
of that old casket."

Ashley sighed. "It is true. I lost my faith,
and that is a sad thing, but I’ve come to believe in
something.
I’m just sure what that something is."

"But God’s still out there," insisted
Marie.

Ashley shook his head. "I hope you’re
right."

"God loves you. You just don’t love God. I
love God more than I love you."

Ashley sighed. "You don’t mean that."

Marie had spoken without thinking,
distracted, frustrated. Ashley was such an easy target that she
felt terrible.

"I’m sorry," she said, softly, meaning it. "I
don’t love God more than you. But I still love God."

Finally Ashley leaned to kiss her, again, and
she whispered in Marie’s ear. "I love you, too. Never forget
that."

Marie nodded, but she held her tongue, afraid
that what might come out would still be acidic.

Trace wandered away, but Ashley remained,
watching him go. When she turned back to Marie she was still
blushing a little.

"Trace and I-"

"I understand," said Marie.

"Nothing has changed between you and me,"
said Ashley, stroking Marie’s cheek with her fingertips. "Nothing
ever will. I promise."

"I know," said Marie. "I’m not a little
kid."

Ashley smiled. "I know you’re not. Sometimes
I just want you to stay one, but circumstances haven’t allowed you
to be one for a long time."

"It’s real," Marie insisted. "I see things. I
know things."

Ashley nodded. "But what is it that’s real?
Paulie once told me that your grandmother was a brujo, a witch. She
could tell fortunes, and she promised to pass the gift on to you.
Even though the Veras joined the Brethren in Mexico your family
came from a long line of believers in the old ways, the old gods,
the way of the Mother spirit."

Marie frowned. "You never told me that
before."

Ashley stroked her cheek again lightly.
"Because I thought they were superstitious beliefs. I thought your
ancestors were pagans, silly and ignorant barbarians, but I suppose
they weren’t any sillier than me. What I’m trying to say is that no
one knows what to believe or not believe anymore, sweetheart. You
believe what you will."

"It’s real... what I see. What I know,"
insisted Marie.

Ashley smiled at her.

"Then for you it is real," she said, gently.
"You just have to make that enough. Then it won’t be a
problem."

When her shadow had disappeared down the hall
Marie stared out the window again at the strange and beautiful
light that neither Ashley or Trace could see. Maxie came in to lie
beside her bed, and she knew that if the light was still there
after Trace and Ashley were asleep she would have to go and find
out what it was.

I can see. That’s the problem.

Trace was one of those people who always
knew
when he was dreaming, and most of his dreams were
nightmares. So, as he drifted slowly into that ethereal-but
sometimes far-too-real world of myth and madness and mayhem-he was
not so much terrified as distressed and apprehensive. But at least
for once the dream wasn’t about the attic and the rats. Instead he
found himself in the woods again. Still, for Trace that alien
environment-as much as any notion of impending doom-almost assured
that whatever was coming next wasn’t good.

It was dark, but there was the same twinkling
of starlight that had lit their way during his and Ashley’s trek,
and the surrounding shadows had that same sense of waiting. But in
the dream he was alone, and he was lost. There was no clearing with
a cozy little cottage to return to, no slope to the forest floor to
give him any sense of any bearings at all. He had the eeriest
feeling that something was behind him, stalking him through the
night, but as he crept warily ahead, parting the bracken with both
hands, he became more and more certain that there was something
equally terrifying just ahead. He was caught between the unnamed
and the nameless, and he feared both.

He began to notice eyes in the darkness all
around. Low to the ground, like raccoons or maybe skunks, but some
were taller and wider spaced. Coyotes maybe? When he heard a
frightening moaning sound overhead he realized there were owls as
well. The entire forest took note of his passage. Not an animal
shied away. They were all as stuck in his dream as he was, and he
sensed his own anxiety mirrored in the reflected glow of their
eyes. The feeling of doom spiraled higher with each footfall, the
presence behind in the darkness drawing closer, the sense of
something waiting just ahead becoming more and more real. There was
an ominous inevitability about the whole thing, as though the dream
was not just a function of his subconscious but a message from some
outside source.

Curiously, just when he was certain that some
dark beast was about to leap out at him, the night began to grow
lighter. But it wasn’t the rising of the sun or moon, or even the
brushing aside of clouds from the slim light eking down from the
stars. Some otherworldly glow lit the forest all around, and Trace
searched for the focal point from which it arose.

It was more than just light. There was a feel
to it, a strange a sort of welcoming sense, an assurance that
anyone, any creature within the spread of illumination would not
suffer transgression this night, that the dull aching presence
behind him would not invade its soft glow, and yet Trace hesitated
to trust his feelings. Still he stumbled along until he was almost
to the very center of the strange golden gleam.

Brushing aside a twisted mass of alder
branches he stepped into a small clearing in the woods, and
suddenly the glow was so bright that he blinked and shielded his
eyes. Then, as he lowered his hand he could see a small figure,
wearing what looked like a monk’s heavy woolen garment with the
cowl pulled up over his head. The man lifted the hood, and Trace
recognized him instantly as the little man from New York, the one
who had handed him the card.

"You," said Trace.

He started across the clearing toward the
man, but when he was almost upon him his feet simply quit moving.
At that moment the figure spoke in that peculiar, tranquil
voice.