B006P1R39O EBOK (25 page)

“Well, what did she say?” Nicole asked.

“Go with St. Michael. That’s what she said.”

“The sword!” Father Rovati spoke up. “She is talking about the Archangel’s sword.”

“My mother! It has to be.” Kathrina wrinkled her forehead.

“Do you think she is talking about the sword that Chad brought that night?” Nicole directed her question to Kathrina.

Kathrina nodded, and then proceeded to tell them what happened at the airport while she was waiting for Father Rovati.

“Well let’s get going with it,” Sarah told them. “I want to get back to
Outerlands
before Darrien thinks I’ve deserted him.”

“Where should we do it?” Nicole asked.

“Why not right here?” Kathrina suggested. “If I’m right about this … it won’t really matter where we do it.”

Fortunately her father was gone, though she wasn’t sure if that made her feel better or not. There was a certain comfort that she got from having Donavan close by, though she didn’t really know how much he would have been able to help in this situation. At least he would have given her a sense of security.

Feeling that the danger was over Donavan had taken Vicky to New York City, leaving Kathrina the house for as long as she needed it. He hadn’t said how long he’d be gone, but she’d gotten the impression that it would be an extended trip.

“We have the house to ourselves.” She reminded them.

Sarah placed her suitcase on the sofa and unzipped it. She then pulled out a green velvet bag. Kathrina knew that her sister kept all of her tools inside the bag.

“I’m going to use the front door as the portal. All of you face the door and concentrate,” Sarah instructed.

“Wait!” Kathrina started for the stairs. “We need the sword.”

A moment later she returned with the golden sword.

Holding the sword in one hand, Kathrina closed her eyes, forcing herself to focus on that elusive - shadowy world that she remembered. Even while she tried to concentrate, Kathrina couldn’t stop the fear that was knotting at her stomach.

She could hear Father Rovati reciting a prayer - his words surreal and faint.

“In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”

With only the slightest pause, Father Rovati moved on to another prayer. “
             
Most glorious Prince of the Heavenly Armies, Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in "our battle against principalities and powers, against the rulers of this world of darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places"

Over the priest’s voice she heard another voice. It was a woman. “You won’t be alone this time.”

The words came into her head, but they were not her own thoughts. She heard the woman’s voice as clearly as if she had whispered in her ear.

There was little time to absorb what she’d heard before Sarah began speaking. She could hear Sarah’s words - they sounded almost poetic. Soon her sister’s voice grew distant, like she was hearing her from far away. When Kathrina opened her eyes, she was alone in the parlor.

Not again!

How had she managed to get through, but not the others?

Through her terror, she remembered to look down to see if she still had the sword. She did.

Should she wait to see if the others came through?

She was just about to go out the front door when she heard her sisters behind her. Kathrina had never felt so relieved in her life.

“What happened?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Sarah shrugged. “One minute you were there and then you were gone.”

“How did you get over here?” Kathrina asked.

Nicole looked confused. “We didn’t, you just came back.”

Kathrina shook her head. “We are in a different dimension. This is exactly what it was like before … deserted. Look,” she said pointing to the lamp. “The light is on, but somehow it seems smothered by the darkness. Like it can’t break through.”

It was true. The darkness appeared to overpower the light.

“Can’t you feel it … there’s a different atmosphere,” Kathrina said. “And Father Rovati is not here.”

Nicole was looking around the room. “I guess that makes sense. He is a priest and probably wouldn’t have been able to come through.”

“I thought the door was supposed to be the portal,’ Kathrina was confused. It happened almost exactly the way it did before. She couldn’t even tell she’d crossed.

“Well it doesn’t really work like that,” Sarah told them. “Sometimes you have to cross through the portal, other times it will suck up the space that you are in.”

“So what now?” Nicole asked. “Obviously there’s nothing here.”

“Let’s go look around,” Sarah urged. “Maybe we’ll find something.”

The three of them stepped out the door and onto the front porch. That’s when Kathrina saw her. The nun was standing on the sidewalk in front of the house, or at least the illusion that passed for the house.

“There she is,” she cried. “That’s the same nun I saw in the church.”

The nun stood there looking at them, as if waiting for something. “Go talk to her,” Sarah told Kathrina.

As soon as she descended the stairs, the nun started walking, and Kathrina followed her, motioning for her sisters to come with her. Walking fast, she tried catching up, but no matter how fast she walked, the nun seemed to stay ahead of her.

“Has it occurred to you that this demon might have your mother’s soul too?” Sarah put voice to Kathrina’s fears.

Someone had killed her mother, and if it were one of hell’s minions, then her mother’s soul could have been trapped in this dimension since her death. The thought made Kathrina feel sick to her stomach.

Dash suspected Ray of killing her mother. He also thought the vampire was influenced by the demon.

They followed the nun for what seemed like miles. Everything was as empty and lifeless as Kathrina remembered. They were in New Orleans, but they weren’t. It was a double of the city, but it lacked the vibrancy of life and light.

Suddenly the nun stopped. She stood on the curb and stared blankly into the street.

“What is she doing?” Nicole asked in a low voice.

There was something about the stillness of the night that made Kathrina think of death. There was a strange absence of sound and movement. The usual symphony of night creatures was absent, and there was not even a hint of a breeze.

It was this lifelessness that made the sound of the bus even more startling. The three sisters looked behind them to see a black bus making its way toward them. As it passed, Kathrina saw that it was completely black, even the windows were blacked out.

The bus pulled to the curb and stopped near the nun. She looked over her shoulder at them one last time, and then boarded the bus.

“No wait!” Kathrina called out to her, but the doors to the bus had already closed.

“Now what?” Sarah asked.

“I don’t know,” Kathrina told her. She was feeling discouraged. When following the nun, she had been sure it was her mother and that she was trying to take them somewhere.

“Why don’t we just do exactly what the nun did,” Nicole suggested. “Maybe that’s what we are supposed to do.”

Sarah shook her head. “I don’t know. That bus was spooky.”

Kathrina and Nicole were already standing on the curb exactly where the nun had been standing.

“Well … let’s not listen to my input,” Sarah grumbled, though she followed her sisters.

They waited only a few minutes before they heard the sound of the bus coming down the street. It came to a stop in front of them and the door swung open. Kathrina tried to see what was in the bus, but it was too dark.

“I still don’t think this is a good idea,” Sarah told them.

“Let me go first … just incase.” Nicole stepped in front of them.

Nicole boarded the bus and immediately seemed to be swallowed up by the darkness. Kathrina put her foot on the first step, but Sarah’s hand on her arm stopped her.

“Wait.”

“Nicole … are you okay?” Kathrina called out.

She was answered by silence.

Sarah stuck her head in the bus. “Nicole!”

Again there was no answer.

“What’s in there?” Kathrina asked.

Sarah shook her head. “I don’t know. When I put my head inside there’s just nothing.

Kathrina looked down at the golden sword that she still held in her hand. It brought her a small measure of comfort. Taking a deep breath, she put her foot on the first step and boarded the bus. For a second or two she could hear and feel Sarah behind her, but then she was alone in a void of absolute black.

“Sarah!” she yelled.

It was like her voice hit a barrier. There was just nothing beyond the darkness.

They had been sucked into some black hole and would now disappear into complete oblivion. At least that is what Kathrina was thinking when she finally saw a sliver of light somewhere ahead of her.

She started walking to that little pinpoint of light. It seemed that she took many more steps than what there should have been, even if she were walking through an entire fleet of buses. The more steps she took, the closer the light got. Finally she was able to make out the door of the bus, and the outside streetlights.

Moving faster, she scrambled off the bus, not daring to breathe until she felt the ground beneath her feet. Nicole and Sarah were already standing on the sidewalk, a look of shocked disbelief on their faces.

“What was that?” Sarah asked.

“I don’t know but I’m glad it’s over,” Kathrina told them as she was looking down to make sure that she still had the sword.

When she looked back up, she suddenly realized where they were. “Look!” Kathrina pointed to the house directly in front of her.

It was the same house where they had met Jordan that day. The windows were dark and there was no sign of life at all. Kathrina had that same sick feeling that she’d had the first time she’d seen the house, only now it was worse.

“I knew it,” she whispered.

“What?” Nicole was confused.

“That Jordan has something to do with all of this,” she told them as she started up the little sidewalk to the front door. Kathrina was done with the games. She was certain that whatever had been playing with her was beyond that door.

Without knocking, she turned the knob and threw the door open. “Jordan!” Kathrina called out to the slayer, though she knew now that’s not what he was at all. Maybe Jordan had been a slayer at one time, but now he was infested with the demon.

The interior of the house was just as she remembered it, except for being a little dirtier, and feeling a lot more sinister. Kathrina stepped into the living room with her sisters close behind her.

She was surprised to see the room filled with people. There were people standing against the wall, sitting on chairs, on the floor. The room was crowded with people. The one thing that all of the people had in common was that they all had blank looks on their faces. Their eyes were open, staring straight ahead, but obviously seeing nothing.

She remembered hearing from Grandpa Lex that the eyes were windows to the soul, but if that were true, these people had no souls.

Kathrina recognized some of the faces. The nun was there, and so was the vampire Ray, but unlike the others, there was some kind of black webbing over him that prevented him from moving. Only a part of his soul was in this netherworld, but if he should ever die, he would be just like the others. She was sure that if she searched long enough, she would find a part of Luciano’s soul in this world too.

Her eyes jumped to a dark corner of the room where she’d heard movement. Jordan stepped forward, his lips spread in an amused smile.

“How sweet of you Kathrina. You’ve come to save your lover.” Though it was Jordan’s voice, the guttural sound that radiated from his throat made it almost unrecognizable. There was no doubt in her mind that Jordan and the jester were one in the same.

Kathrina gave him a cold smile. “No, I have come to kill you.”

The demon’s fetid laughter vibrated through the room. “You are quite an ambitious little girl.”

“Where’s Luciano?” Kathrina asked, refusing to let him bait her.

Without answering, he pointed toward the nun. Just like the jester, Jordan’s fingers were deformed with long, grotesque claws. “Don’t you care about your mother?” he asked.

He was using her mother as a distraction, but she wasn’t going to play along. Kathrina raised the sword, ready to swing at the demon when black smoke began to seep up from the floor. The columns of swirling smoke began to take the shape of monstrous creatures that resembled rats with decaying bodies.

From behind, she could hear Sarah chanting the words to a banishing spell. A streak of electricity left her mouth and bounced around the room, hitting each of the creatures. The rat monsters dissipated into nothing but dust.