Welsh Road (The Depravity Chronicles) (7 page)

“Trevor, what
are you doing?” Anish asked. Neither of them had noticed Trevor being quiet.

“This thing is
awesome,” Trevor exclaimed as he scrutinized the device in his hand. It was
black and in the shape of a sphere, about the size of a baseball.

“Trevor!” Anish
said, his voice slightly raised.

“What?” Trevor
asked, startled. He dropped the sphere onto the floor.

“Take cover!”
Anish yelled, sliding from his chair and crawling under the desk. Trevor and
Simon quickly joined him.

Just then,
someone knocked on the office door.

“What was that
thing?” Trevor asked loudly, though his face only inches from Anish’s ear.

“It is a weapon
against certain creatures of the night,” Anish said, sounding irritated.

“What kind of
creatures?” Trevor asked, trying to extend his cramped legs. “God, it’s tight
under here.”

“Well this is
the safest place,” Anish answered.

“Are we hiding
from whoever’s at the door, or are we hiding from some explosion? Wouldn’t we
have had time to get out…” Simon started, but the consequences of dropping the
sphere grabbed his undivided attention.

WHISH!

The white light
that was produced from the sphere lit up the office for three seconds. It was
blinding and forced Trevor and Simon to cover their eyes.

BOOM!

That was the
part they had all been expecting. The desk was forced back a few inches,
alarming the teenagers. Books landed on Anish’s desk chair.

“Thank God,”
Anish said as he used the chair to help him stand.

“Whoa,” Simon
said as he joined him. There were papers still drifting through the office,
waving back and forth like falling feathers.

“Uh, that was
dramatic,” Trevor said, his shoulders slumped and his voice soft. “I’m guessing
that the light is to confuse werewolves. Or maybe ultraviolet light to kill
vampires. But why the explosion?”

“There are times
when you are beyond your age in wisdom,” Anish said. “And then there are times
when you are a child.”

“So is that a no
to both werewolves and vampires?” Trevor pushed.

Anish just shook
his head.

“Should we
answer the door?” Simon asked, diverting attention from Trevor’s latest feat of
destruction.

“The door is
open!” Anish called.

The door opened
and a strikingly beautiful girl stood on the other side of it. Her dark hair
was clumsily tied up behind her head, which helped to emphasize her high cheek
bones and round face.

“Ah, Jena,”
Anish said as he walked toward her.

“So this is
Jena,” Trevor whispered to Simon as they watched Anish greet her. They stayed
behind the desk.

“Jena,” Simon
repeated.

“Hello?” Trevor
asked, knocking on Simon’s head. “Anyone home?”

“Jena,” Simon
said again.

“Oh, Jesus,”
Trevor moaned. “Okay, Romeo. How about we meet this girl?”

“Jena,” Simon
whispered.

* * * * * *

3

Anna and Sam
spent their afternoon studying the immediate area surrounding the crime scene.

“It feels good,”
Anna said.

“What feels
good?” Sam asked, curious as to how Anna could feel good in their current
environment.

“Not having to
worry about being in charge,” Anna said.

“I hear you,”
Sam laughed. “I wonder how involved we’re going to be in this case.”

Anna sighed.
“Probably more than we want to be.”

“I’m going to
take some of our own photos,” Sam said, pulling a pen from his pocket.

“Is that a
camera pen?” Anna asked, grinning.

“Why, Sheriff, I
haven’t the slightest idea what you mean.”

They circled the
large tree several more times. Sam grunted, clearly irritated about something.

“Why do you keep
looking up?” Anna asked after seeing Sam gazing toward the branches.

“Look,” Sam
said, trying to move Anna into his sightline.

Anna spotted
more rocks, plus something that appeared to be a piece of paper.

“Commissioner!”
Sam called.

“What can I do
for ya?” Jackson asked. Sam pointed to the third collection of rocks.
“Walters!” Jackson hollered. Within ten seconds, a lanky redhead was standing
before them.

“Yes, sir?”

“We need to get
up this tree,” Jackson said. “Make it happen.”

“Right away,
sir,” Walters responded.

“Does anyone
ever question you?” Anna asked Jackson, grinning.

“Not usually,”
he said, returning her grin. “But that’s what you’re here for. I need you to be
my right hand, so that means telling me what you think, even if I won’t like
it.”

“Count on it,”
Anna said.

Commissioner
Jackson’s phone began ringing, an obnoxious clanging noise that didn’t sound
like any notification she’d ever heard.

“I hate it,
too,” Jackson said, noticing Anna’s scowl. “It’s
my
boss, the mayor. I
use this ringtone to know I can’t let it ring more than three times.”

“That’s a bit
over the top,” Sam added. “What happens if it rings four times?”

“I’ll let you
know when that happens,” Jackson said with a wink. “Hello, Mr. Mayor, what can
I do for you?”

After about
thirty seconds of the mayor talking, and seeing the expressions on Jackson’s
face, Anna and Sam were getting nervous.

“Where?” Jackson
said. “How many? Similar scene?”

“Shit,” Anna
mumbled.

“I’ll be right
over,” Jackson said flipping his phone shut.

At first he
didn’t say anything. Jackson just glanced at different components of the crime
scene.

“Well?” Sam asked,
hoping that he, too, could say anything to the commissioner.

“Two more
victims,” Jackson said sadly, shaking his head. “They’re going to bring the FBI
in for sure.”

“Can we come
along?” Anna asked. “Bubba was our ride, and, quite frankly, if you want us to
be of any help then we need to go with you.”

“Let’s go.”

The three
officers got into Jackson’s luxurious and rather large Dodge Charger.

“Where are we
headed?” Sam asked.

“A few miles up
the road,” Jackson responded. “Then about a mile walk into the woods.”

Anna was glad
she was wearing sunglasses. That way neither Jackson nor Sam would see the
worry and fear in her eyes.

Within a half
hour the group arrived on foot at the base of another massive tree. And, like
the previous tree, two bodies were hanging upside down, arms and hands extended
in a position of prayer.

“Damn,” Jackson
cursed. He looked to the left of the tree and noticed what Anna and Sam were
already walking toward.

“Same set up,”
Anna said as she studied the victims’ identification information.

“The main
difference is the ages,” Sam added. “Our first two victims were seventeen.”

“And these two
are thirty-four,” Anna finished. “Twice their age.”

“And check this
out,” Sam said, leaning in to get a better look at the licenses. “Same birthday,
too. October 31
^st
.”

“Are you
shitting me?” Anna asked abruptly.

“Nope, no shit,”
Sam joked. No one laughed.

Everything about
the immediate environment was exactly the same as the first crime scene. The
rocks, the ritual tools. The only other possible significant difference was
that they were further from the road.
Welsh
Road.

“Commissioner,
you’ll want to hear this,” a woman said, most likely a detective since she was
in civilian clothes. Or maybe, Anna thought, she was called in at the last
minute as well.

Jackson took the
phone and put it on speaker. “I’m listening,” he said. “What do you know?”

“We got the
evidence from the tree branch,” Walters, the lanky redhead said.

“Well, don’t
keep me in suspense,” Jackson said. “I’m aging here, Walters.”

“Well, there was
a small group of rocks, similar to the ones on the ground,” he said.

“What else?” Sam
asked, causing Jackson to give him a look.

“What
else
?”
Jackson repeated.

“A piece of
paper,” Walters reported. “Well, not really paper, like, you know, the paper we
use today.”

“No, I don’t
know,” Jackson said. “That makes no sense. It’s paper, but not paper. Which is
it, Walters?”

“I would wager a
guess and say it’s papyrus, you know, like ancient paper.”

Jackson rolled
his eyes. Anna wondered if anyone ever came to like the commissioner as a boss.
Hell, even as a person. He certainly knew he was in charge, and he liked it
that way.

“And what does
this ancient piece of paper say, Walters?”

“We don’t know.”

“Meaning what?
That you can’t fucking read?” Jackson sneered.

“It’s in an
ancient language, sir,” Walters said. “Hebrew, most likely. We’re going to have
someone look at it.”

“Good idea,”
Jackson said. “Make sure you find someone who can read.” He hung up the phone.

“Looks like we
have another papyrus,” Anna commented as she looked up to the branch that held
the hanging rope.

 “Get somebody
up there,” Jackson ordered.

As they waited,
Anna took out her phone and texted Trevor.

Remember the
rule, Trevor. Do
NOT
leave campus.

It didn’t take
long for him to respond.

Relax, Mom. It’s
all good.

Anna sighed as
another lanky man climbed down from the tree, paper in hand. She looked at the
writing along with Sam and Jackson.

“Anyone around
here Jewish?” Jackson asked. Before waiting for a response he answered his own
question. “Yeah, me neither.”

Anna and Sam
exchanged glances. They were both thinking the same thing: please let this not
be another summoning spell.

What they
couldn’t have known was that the writing on those pages was dramatically
different than a summoning spell. It was much, much worse.

Suddenly, leaves
began falling from a group of trees about thirty yards ahead of them.

“What the hell?”
Sam cursed.

“Oh, Christ!”
Anna cried, immediately regretting it.

“What? What did
you see?” Jackson asked.

“Nothing,” Anna
responded. “I thought I saw something.” Anna
had
seen something. It was
only a shadow high in the trees, but she distinctly saw a large figure jumping
from branch to branch.

“Let’s check it
out,” Jackson said.

“You go ahead,”
Anna said to Jackson and Sam. “I need to make a few phone calls.”

“We won’t be
long,” Jackson said as he, Sam, and a handful of other officers jogged toward
the falling leaves.

Here we go again
, Anna thought
for the second time that morning. She pulled out her phone and dialed.

* * * * * *

4

Jena recognized
by her surroundings that she was at a school. She also remembered that Anish’s
office was Room 334. But when she heard the explosion and several male voices,
she started to reconsider his invitation. Just as she turned to leave, she
heard Anish say that the door was open. She took a deep breath and plunged into
what she knew would be a dangerous venture.

“Ah, Jena,”
Anish said from behind his desk. There were two other men there, but they
seemed somewhat young to be college students. One boy had jet black, spiked
hair and the other boy was simply adorable.

“Hi,” Jena said
to Anish.

“What’s wrong,
my dear?” Anish asked, reading the weariness on Jena’s face.

“I’m not sure,”
Jena answered. “I had another blackout.”

“When?”

“Well, I just
came out of one before I knocked on your door. And one on the way home from the
hospital.”

“Okay, we will
discuss this. First, I would like you to meet two very good friends. Jena, this
is Trevor,” Anish said as the spiked hair boy greeted her.

“And this is…”
Anish began, but was cut off by Jena.

“Simon,” she
said.

“What?” Simon
asked.

Jena’s face
became red. “Oh, shit. Or, shoot. That’s not your name, is it?” She felt like
an idiot.

“Actually, that
is my name,” Simon answered.