The Dark Ones (30 page)

Jared looked pale. “So we have to get rid of two demons? Shit.”

Mark groaned. “We are so fucked.”

Clayton dug into a hip pocket and pulled out a small key. “Maybe. Maybe not.”

He unlocked the box and flipped the lid open. Mark and Jared leaned over the table for a closer look. Inside was a stack of crumpled sheets of old notebook paper. Neat handwriting in slightly faded ink filled the pages from margin to margin. Clayton pulled the papers out. Beneath them was a handgun and several loose bullets, the source of the rattling noise.

Clayton passed the papers to Mark. “It’s all in there. Everything I told you and more, including instructions for binding demons.” He pulled one of the bullets out and showed it to them, holding it between thumb and forefinger. The cartridge was shiny and silver. “This is one way. Actual silver bullets, made special for my father by a local gunsmith.”

Mark shuffled through the papers and frowned. “You can kill a demon just by shooting it?”

Clayton shook his head. “No. You can’t kill a demon at all, at least not by any means my father ever found. But a silver bullet can expel the demon from a human host and banish it back to hell, where it will stay until summoned again. Very effective, but the downside is it has to be a kill shot. The human host has to die.”

Mark’s hands clenched around the papers. “My dad . . .”

Clayton dropped the bullet back in the box. It made a soft metallic clank. “Right, and that’s why it should be our last resort.” He nodded at the papers. “If you read through to the end of that, you’ll see the other way to get the job done.”

Mark’s brow furrowed as he flipped to the last pages and read. “What is this? Some kind of spell?”

Clayton nodded. “A summoning spell. We use it to call Andras, just like those other assholes did. And where Andras goes, Flauros will hopefully follow.”

Mark set the pages on the table and leaned over them. “This talks about ways of increasing the likelihood of success when performing a binding spell. ‘If possible, the binding should be performed on hallowed ground, or in a place of deep magical significance.’ Hallowed ground would be a cemetery, I guess, or a church, but . . .”

He trailed off.

They were all thinking the same thing. It was obvious in the haunted looks they exchanged. Fiona picked up on it and became vocal again, shrieking muffled curses around the gag in her mouth.

Jared slapped a palm against the tabletop, making the empties rattle. “Shit. The basement.”

Mark swallowed hard. “Fuck.”

Clayton sipped beer. “It’s the logical place to do it. Andras was imprisoned there a long time. He’ll be frightened to find himself drawn there again. He’ll be off balance. Confused. It still won’t be easy. Hell, it’ll probably still be almost impossible. But I like our odds better this way than just walking up to him and pointing a gun in his face.”

Jared slapped the table again. “Shit.”

Mark sighed. “We’d never get close enough for that to work anyway.”

Clayton had another sip of beer. “What I was thinking, too. And, from what I understand, all the wards and seals in the basement are still in place. We just have to reactivate them, basically. Like flipping a switch. And I’m sorry, Fiona, but you’ll need to be with us. You probably already guessed that. The more of you who were there the night Andras got out, the better.”

“Why?”

“Well . . . I’m getting into hunch territory here. This isn’t in my father’s papers.”

“Spill it.”

“You all endured a traumatic event there. I think the binding magic will be more powerful the more of you we have working on it. Again, just a hunch, but it feels right.”

The boys didn’t say anything to this at first. But it felt right to them, too. Clayton saw it in the grim set of their features.

Mark coughed. “So . . . when do we do this?”

“I don’t think we can afford to wait much longer. It has to be tonight.”

The looks on the boys’ faces made it clear they weren’t happy about it. But, beyond the troubled expressions, there was a clear sense of acceptance and determination.

They were going to do this crazy thing.

Summon and, hopefully, bind a demon.

Clayton drank more beer.

God help us
.

F
ORTY

The ongoing dark revelry at the former McGregor residence did not abate as the evening lengthened. Scenes of unhinged debauchery and depravity continued to play out in every room. The madness was nearing a point of uncontrollable frenzy, tilting toward an explosion of violence and violation the house was not nearly big enough to contain. And that, of course, was the point. Andras wanted the members of his congregation on the edge of hysteria. He wanted them burning with the need to inflict pain and spread misery. They were close. Natasha could feel it even in here, behind the closed door to Andras’s private room. It made her ache. She wanted desperately to be a part of the revelry. She was so bored in here by herself. On occasion Andras would return to check on her, but each time he denied her pleas to enter the fray.

She got up again and peered through the bedroom window at the backyard. Much of the decadent cavorting had spilled over into the backyard, which was surrounded by a high wooden fence that effectively blocked the sinful activity from the view of anyone who might happen to wander by in the street. Natasha smiled at that, knowing the need to hide what was happening here was nearly at an end. The house and backyard was packed with people. Many of them were from the neighborhood, but numerous others had been drawn in from other parts of Ransom by calls from relatives or friends. A few people in this category harbored some suspicion at being invited to a party in posh Wheaton Hills, but most came anyway, overwhelmed by curiosity. The neighborhood was well known as the place where the rich new people lived. Who wouldn’t want to check it out? They would show up and see the cars lined up on the sides of the street, hear the wild noises coming from the house, and stroll right up to the door without a second thought, never suspecting that in a few moments life as they had known it would be over.

A bonfire was blazing in the center of the yard. Andras had put some of the men to work earlier in the day. The men dug a pit and demolished nearly every piece of furniture from the house to feed the fire. The towering flames cast a flickering yellow-orange illumination over the mostly nude bodies of the frolicking revelers. A plump woman with very large breasts was on all fours almost directly beneath the window. Natasha placed her forehead against the window and slid a hand between her legs as she watched a tall black man ram in and out of the big woman from behind, making those huge, pendulous breasts sway wildly with each thrust. Natasha’s attention was diverted as some more people emerged from the house, two men dragging a screaming woman toward the bonfire. One of the men had an ax. The woman bounced up right away when they threw her to the ground, but the man with the ax swung it in a vicious arc, severing her right arm just above the elbow. She screamed and spun about in a staggering circle as blood sprayed. The men laughed. Then they grabbed her and tossed her onto the fire. She was still alive as the flames began to consume her, thrashing and screaming as she slid off the pile of burning wood and tried to crawl to the edge of the pit. The man with the ax aimed his cock at her and began to piss on her, causing the other man to laugh maniacally. Natasha gasped and bit down on her lip, shuddering as she neared orgasm.

She banged her forehead on the glass in frustration.

She hated being stuck up here, even though it was what Andras wanted. She was his bride and needed to be protected from what was happening in the rest of the house. It was possible she might be hurt by accident should she join in the festivities, but it was a risk she’d like to take. Unfortunately, it wasn’t her call.

The door opened behind her and she turned away from the window.

Andras came into the room and shut the door. “Enjoying the spectacle?”

She pouted. “I want to play, too.”

He came over to her and cupped her face in his hands. “You’ll have what you want very soon. In a short while, I will send the members of my congregation out into the world to do the work of the devil. We will join them.”

“And what sort of work will that be?”

He kissed her lightly on the mouth, making her shiver with delight. “Murder. Violence. Destruction. Death and more death. We will be hell’s storm troopers, slaughtering everything in our path, with no thought of mercy for the weak and the innocent. Indeed, we will relish their screams the most. And you’ll be right there next to me, killing in the name of Satan.” He kissed her again. “What do you think of that, darling? Will it be worth the time you spent locked away in here?”

She curled a leg around him and pressed close. “It sounds wonderful.”

He smiled. “Good. The time is almost at hand. My only regret is that my other bride will not be with me.”

Natasha tried not to smile. “Oh?”

Andras’s tone turned cold. “Yes. She was not at her house. I’m afraid something may have happened to her.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I found bodies. Members of her family. They had been shot. The mother and a sister. I know this because I waited there for a time, until the father arrived home from work. The man was hysterical, but I managed to conduct an interview of some substance before I killed him. He maintained he did not know what had happened and had no idea where Fiona might have gone. I believe he was telling the truth. Humans tend not to lie when they are having the flesh peeled from their bodies.”

Natasha grunted. “Yeah. Uh . . . you’re probably right about that. But . . .”

He put a hand to one of her cheeks. “Yes?”

Natasha didn’t want to say anything further, because she didn’t want to share Andras with Fiona, but her wishes were not what mattered here. Only Andras mattered. She sighed. “She might have gone to Clayton’s house.”

Andras frowned. “Clayton is your older friend?”

“Yeah. Fiona had this weird thing about him. Sort of a crush. She wouldn’t admit to it, but I could tell. It’s why she gave him shit all the time. If she was in trouble, she might go to him.”

He smiled. “Thank you.”

“You’re going there now?”

He shook his head. “The time has come to send out my warriors. I’ve been waiting for just the right moment and it has arrived. I feel it. I must rally the troops. I’ll send someone else to fetch her.”

“I’ll go. Clayton won’t be suspicious of me. It’ll be perfect.”

Andras shook his head again. “No. I want you by my side in my moment of glory. Someone else will go. Get dressed and join me out back.”

He left her then, departing quickly without another word. Natasha gathered her clothes from where she’d left them in a pile on the floor. She left the room as soon as she was dressed. She thought Andras was making a mistake by sending someone other than her out to Clayton’s place, but this concern was obliterated by her relief at being out of the room. She threaded her way through the naked bodies crowding the hallway and the staircase, trailing her hands over the bare flesh as she moved. Suzie McGregor grabbed her when she reached the bottom of the staircase and slid her tongue into her mouth. Natasha let the woman kiss her for a few moments, then shoved her away and continued on into the kitchen, where the floor was awash in blood. There were dead bodies and pieces of bodies everywhere, limbs and torsos stacked in the corners to make room for more. An attractive and slender young woman was presiding over the kitchen slaughter. She directed some men who dragged another man into the kitchen and held him down on the floor. The woman then proceeded to stomp on the prone man’s face with the heel of her boot. The man screamed and thrashed, but the other men held him down as she continued to stomp. A crowd of onlookers ringed the periphery of the kitchen. A woman nudged Natasha and smiled. “Isn’t Carrie awesome?”

Natasha smiled. “She’s hot.”

It was the truth. The woman had her own little entourage and circle of admirers. It was tempting to stay and watch Carrie do her thing, but Andras was waiting for her outside. She made her way through the kitchen and exited the house through a door that opened onto a small deck. On the deck was a grill and a small table. Someone had fired up the grill. Natasha saw glowing coals and pieces of cooking bodies—a breast, a head, a cock, and various internal organs. The smell made her mouth water. A middle-aged man wearing an apron and a backward baseball cap was tending the grill, poking at the people pieces with a long, three-pronged fork. He saw Natasha watching and gave her a wink. “These are coming along nicely. Want a taste?”

“Sure.”

She tried a bite of the grilled cock. It was bliss. Then she stepped off the deck and into the yard, barely noticing that the rest of the congregation had begun to stream out of the house behind her. The view from the bedroom window had not prepared her for the sheer sensory overload of actually being down here in the midst of the revelry. The night was alive with the sounds of ecstasy and agony. Screams and moans. The crackling of the fire as burning pieces of furniture shifted and settled. Frequent bursts of demented laughter. All around her a sea of naked, copulating bodies covered the ground. More naked people danced and frolicked around the fire. Natasha marveled at how many of them there were now. It was amazing that Andras had been able to grow his congregation to this level in so short a time. There had to be more than a hundred people in the house and out here in the backyard. Maybe more. The place was approaching maximum capacity, if it wasn’t there already. She was aware of the earlier attempted intervention by members of the police, but that had been a while ago, before things had really started to ramp up. It was late in the evening now, approaching midnight. To her knowledge there had been no more such incidents, which was surprising. There had to be some neighbors left who had not yet been drawn into the congregation. Surely they had phoned in more complaints. If so, though, the police didn’t seem to be acting on them. Perhaps Andras had come up with some clever way of deflecting them.