Desolation (33 page)

“I assure you, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You’re a child-killer,” said Virgil.

Moreno’s smile dropped a little. “I would ask you to lower your voice, Mr Abernathy. I wouldn’t go to your house and start flinging insults around, willy-nilly. Yes, I’ve killed children. But not exclusively. I’ve killed all sorts of people over the years.”

“Why me?” Javier asked. “Why’d you take my face?”

Moreno smiled again. “I’ve always loved television. TV trained me, in a way. It showed me how to interact with people, how to form relationships … I studied it. My kind, we’re not a social species, but there was always a part of me that wanted … a connection, I suppose. And now I have it. I have a family, because of you and your wonderful show and all the wonderful shows like it.”

“But why me?”

“I came to Desolation Hill a long time ago,” said Moreno. “I was nobody. I was this thing they called the Narrow Man. I had a simple purpose that I fulfilled. And I fulfilled it for many years. But I was missing something. I was missing an identity.

“Then you moved in, Mr Abernathy. I recognised you immediately, even if others did not. We’ve spoken, actually. Twice. I wore different faces each time, so you probably don’t remember me.”

“I meet a lot of people,” Virgil said carefully.

“Of course,” said Moreno, “of course you do. I knew you wouldn’t remember me. I didn’t have a personality back then. I do now. I realised I needed a face to build it around, a face to keep, as my own. Desolation Hill already had its Shroud – so now it needed Ernesto Insidio. It was with this face that I married, that I bought the hardware store, that I assimilated into this town. Mayor Jesper helped, of course, but it was this face that made it all possible.”

“That’s it?” Javier said, frowning. “That’s all?”

Moreno looked concerned. “You were hoping for something else, weren’t you? Something … more meaningful. Oh, I’m sorry. Now I feel bad.”

“That’s okay,” said Virgil. “We got what we came for. Now we know. We better get back.”

Moreno stepped into their path, wearing a look of deep, deep regret. “I can’t allow you to do that, I’m afraid.”

Virgil’s knees began to actually tremble. “So what are you going to do? Kill us? Kill the Shroud and Insidio? Do you really want to do that? Could you live with yourself?”

“You flatter me,” said Moreno.

“I’m sorry?”

“My performance must really be convincing if you believe I am capable of either remorse or empathy.”

Virgil swallowed. “Then … then take us instead.”

“I’m sorry?”

“They took Austin from you. Do you have another kid? If you do, for God’s sake, release him. Let him live. We’re old. If you’re going to kill us, please, give our deaths meaning. Let the kid go.”

“You would do that?” Moreno asked. “You, too, Mr Santorum? You would replace the child as a sacrifice?”

“Well, I … If you only need one of us, I suggest taking him. But if you need both … yeah, I guess.”

Moreno made a surprised sound, deep in his throat. “Very well. And maybe the fact that there are two of you will make up for your advanced age. Quantity over quality, as it were. I accept your proposal. Mr Abernathy, the cellar door is unlocked.”

“Here?” said Virgil. “This cellar?”

“I always move the sacrifice into my own house a few hours before they’re due to die, just in case anything goes wrong. They can scream all they want – no one will hear. If you please …”

Virgil hesitated, but he could see no alternative than to just do what he was told. He gripped both handles and pulled, revealing the steps leading down. He went first and Javier followed, and lights flickered on. Moreno came last, closing the doors behind him.

The cellar was large and wide and clean. Also soundproofed. To their left, there was another set of stairs leading up to a door, presumably to the house itself. On the wall to their right, an array of shackles hung. There was no child down here.

Virgil gritted his teeth. “You don’t have another kid, do you?”

“I have misled you,” Moreno admitted. “I have my rules, you see. It is the town that decides which child shall be sacrificed. If I were to arbitrarily choose another, why would they bother to vote in the future? The process is important to them. The process is everything.”

Virgil and Javier stood shoulder to shoulder. Javier made a whimpering noise, but stayed standing. His right leg was shaking so badly that Virgil worried it might pop off his hip – a not unlikely scenario, it had to be said.

“So now you’re … you’re just going to kill us?” Virgil asked.

“Now I’m going to chain you up,” said Moreno. “And at precisely eleven twenty-four I will come back down and take you to Naberius.”

“Okay …”

“And then
he
will kill you.”

B
ENEATH A BLOOD-RED SKY
, Amber stepped from the trees into a clearing, the golden leaves crackling under her feet. Balthazar turned to her, his shock of black hair falling over his ice-blue eyes, the sun catching his cheekbones, sharp as blades. Tempest, the woman beside him, was pale, her bronze hair long and tousled, her lips full and her green eyes wide. They clung to each other like the lovers they were, their features perfect, their passion barely contained, and they stood there while the trees stopped swaying and it all went quiet and Amber blinked, saw that she was not in a forest in Montana at all, but merely looking at one, and she stepped back, a peculiar kind of fuzziness working its way between her thoughts. It was a picture – no, a poster, an
In The Dark Places
poster – on a wall. On her wall, in her parents’ house in Florida.

Amber looked round. Wesley Sterling, the Nightmare Man, stood by her old bed, holding a speargun. It was hot. Bright outside. She was already sweating. That was odd. She looked at her hand, at her small pale hand. Ah, that explained it. No longer a demon. She smelled something cooking. Did she smell it, though, or did she just think she smelled it? Did it matter? Not really. She left her bedroom and walked down the long, long corridor to the kitchen. Much longer than she remembered. Her parents were here, in the kitchen, as was her demon-self. They parted and she walked between them, climbed on to the table and lay with her head beside the salad bowl, waiting to be eaten.

Her dad put his arm round her demon-self. “I much prefer you when you’re like this,” he said. “You’re the daughter we always wanted.”

“Oh, Dad,” her demon-self giggled, and rolled her eyes.

Amber’s mother stepped up, carving knife in hand. “Leg or breast?” she asked.

“Leg,” said her dad, and her demon-self said, “She doesn’t have much of the other.” They laughed the way a family was supposed to laugh, with good humour and warmth. Behind them, Wesley Sterling loaded a spear into the speargun, which was roughly the length of Amber’s forearm.

“This was my father’s,” Sterling said. “Only good thing he ever did, teaching me to use it.”

Nobody else heard him, and Amber ignored him. Her mother carved a slice off Amber’s leg and laid it on a plate. It was white meat, and steam rose off it.

“I don’t want to be eaten,” said Amber.

Her parents turned into demons.

“So?” said her demon dad.

“We don’t care,” said her demon mom.

“We’re going to eat you, anyway,” said her demon-self.

Amber shook her head, started to get up, but a dozen corpse hands emerged from the table and grabbed her, pulled her back down. She kicked and struggled and her mom carved off another slice. The kitchen was gone. They were in the Firebird Diner now.

“Please don’t eat me,” Amber sobbed. “I don’t want you to eat me.”

Her parents had full plates, and they ate with their fingers. When their fangs pierced the white meat, blood ran down their chins, dripped on to their clothes. So overwhelmed were they by the taste of Amber’s flesh that they didn’t hear her sobbing.

Her demon-self leaned over. “I hate you,” she said.

“Please let me go.”

“You’re weak,” said her demon-self. She was wearing Amber’s Firebird uniform. It looked so much better on her. “You’re ugly. You’re pathetic. I hate you so much.”

“I don’t want to die.”

“You deserve it, though. For all your stupidity. Think of the life I could have had if you’d been better. You think
I’d
have let them fool me? You think
I’d
have had to run?”

“Help me.”

“Why couldn’t you have been stronger? Why couldn’t you have been better?”

Amber’s demon-self picked up a plate of Amber’s flesh and Wesley Sterling moved aside, allowing her to take it to the booth opposite. Two boys sat waiting. Amber knew them. She knew their names. Brandon. Brandon and Dan.

Her demon-self dropped the plate on the floor.

“You stupid fat pig,” said Brandon.

Dan howled with laughter.

“You clumsy, ugly little troll,” Brandon continued. “You did that on purpose.”

Amber’s demon-self looked back at her, and smiled.

“
Oink
,
oink
, little piggy,” said Brandon.

Amber’s demon-self took Brandon’s head off with one swipe of her claws. Dan kept laughing until she pulled his throat out. Blood gushed like a fountain and Amber turned her head away so suddenly that she tore free of the hands holding her. She tumbled from the table, landed on a sidewalk, and it was dark, it was night, and she was alone apart from Wesley Sterling, standing over there with his speargun.

She heard a voice – Kelly’s voice – raised in alarm. Amber got up. She didn’t know this street. Didn’t know the buildings. Didn’t know this alley she was now running into, tripping on unseen things in the shadows. Kelly was ahead of her, but blocking her way out was Amber’s demon-self.

“There’s a toll to get by,” said her demon-self. “One kiss. Just one little kiss.”

Kelly shook her head. “Let me go.”

“I’m paying you a compliment!” Amber’s demon-self roared. “Can’t you take a compliment? Stop playing the victim!”

She slammed Kelly against the wall and pinned her there. “I know you want me,” she whispered. “Not
her
. Never
her
.” The whisper was loud in Amber’s ears, as Wesley Sterling walked up behind her. “I can see it on your face.” Amber’s demon-self glanced towards Amber. “Look at her. She’s nothing. You want
me
. You’ve always wanted me. She’s weak and pathetic and fat and ugly. Admit it. Admit it. You want me.”

“I want you,” Kelly said softly.

They kissed, and Amber’s demon-self plunged her hand into Kelly’s chest and pulled out her heart and Kelly kept kissing her. “You can have this,” Amber’s demon-self said, tossing the heart to Amber. “I’ll have the rest.”

Tears came to Amber’s eyes, but thankfully Wesley Sterling stepped into her line of vision and blocked out the kiss.

“I like your dreams,” he said.

The tears were turning the world into a blurry mix of light and dark.

“Most people have surprisingly dull dreams,” said Sterling. “I like yours. I’d have liked to play in them, if only we had more time.”

“Wake up!” Kelly shouted from somewhere behind him.

“But as good as they are,” Sterling continued, “they’re just the appetiser. The Ghost of the Highway … now he has some nightmares worth devouring.” Sterling’s blurred outline moved a little as he pointed the speargun into her face.

Amber’s demon-self walked up beside them, in shocking clarity amid all the blurred details of the alley. “A speargun is a shit weapon,” she said, and stepped into Amber and Amber gasped, like she was reabsorbing every violent thought she’d ever had, and the fuzziness vanished and she blinked. She wasn’t in the alley anymore. She was in Jesper’s office, with the floor-to-ceiling bookcases and the big windows and the desk that was probably once owned by a president. She was still in demon form, and Jesper was there, and Milo stood beside her with his head down and his eyes closed, and right in front of her with his finger tightening on the trigger of his speargun was the Nightmare Man.

Amber jerked her head to the side as she batted the speargun away. The gun hissed with compressed gas and the spear shot past her ear and thudded into the bookshelf behind. Beneath his plastic mask, Sterling looked surprised, and angry, but before he had a chance to recast whatever spell he’d put on her, she shoved him. He lost the speargun when he hit the ground and went sprawling. Jesper staggered back against his desk, actual fear on his face now, but Amber ignored him as Sterling scrambled to his feet. His features contorting with hatred, he slid a spear from his jacket, then dived for his fallen weapon. When he was in mid-air, Milo drew his gun and fired three times.

Sterling collapsed mere inches away from his weapon. Blood leaked from the bullet holes in his chest.

Amber raised her eyes to Jesper. He wasn’t looking so confident now.

“We don’t have to be enemies,” the old man said.

Milo grunted, grabbed Jesper’s arm, and dragged him after Amber as she headed for the door they’d come through. She shook away the last remnants of the dream and took the brass key from her pocket. Ignoring Jesper’s attempts at bargaining, she did her best to visualise the mirrored door back at the carnival, but images of her parents eating her flesh kept sneaking back into her thoughts.