Voices (Whisper Trilogy Book 3) (31 page)

He reached Henry, standing in front of him, a bloody, filthy, living nightmare that towered over his slight frame. Henry grinned, and with the moon at his back, Isaac finally felt absolute deep-seated fear. His stomach rolled violently, and he turned to run, snapping out of whatever spell had entranced him, but it was too late. Henry clamped a hand on his shoulder, pulling him close.

The clearing exploded in noise.

The sounds, which to him had been muted, thundered back: The screams of Emma and the others pleading with him not to go, the incessant howl of the wind as it shook the trees with a violence that was terrifying in its own right, and finally, Henry. Henry laughing.

On the edge of the clearing, the same spell that bound Melody was also broken. She collapsed in front of Emma, letting out a scream of her own, trying to scramble back to Isaac. Truman and Dane held her back, letting her grieve, letting her screams feed the things in the trees, which increased their activity, sending a rain of leaves into the clearing.

“What do we do now?” Emma shouted to Mrs. Alma, who, of them all, seemed the calmest.

“Nothing,” the old woman said.

“What do you mean? What about the reason we came? What we talked about?”

Mrs. Alma turned to Emma, the defeat in her face clear. “Without the boy, we can’t cleanse this place.”

“Then we have to get him back,” Emma screamed. “We have to.”

“No,” Mrs. Alma said, shaking her head. “His fate is decided. Death is coming to him. And coming to him soon.”

“I can’t accept that. I won’t accept it!” Emma screamed, now struggling to be heard above the bluster.

“You have to,” Mrs. Alma replied coldly. “It’s over. They’ve won.”

CHAPTER 40

Kimmel moved down the tunnel in the pitch dark, the bullet wound in his shoulder burning with a fiery intensity. He stumbled and almost fell, pausing to listen. He could hear Petrov following him some distance behind, still talking, still rambling. Kimmel pushed on, unsure where he was going. Unlike before, there was no light to guide him, his torch left behind in the painting room when he’d run from Petrov. Instead, he had been forced to inch through a thick sea of claustrophobic black. Even those terrible voices that had plagued them since they’d arrived grew silent. Feeling his way across the wall, he was aware of the ground dropping away, taking him deeper underground. Time seemed to stop entirely. There was no sense of direction, no sense that he existed in the world as he knew it. The opacity of his surroundings made it easier to see those faceless entities as they flashed in and out of the ether. Mouthless elongated things with sunken holes for eyes. The torture went on, but still he went deeper, Petrov’s taunting forcing him to go where his instinct screamed at him not to.

The tunnel began to grow lighter, a soft glow ahead giving definition to the walls and enabling him to at least see where he was going. With sight came other senses. A stench beyond description, a putrid, rotten ammonia-like smell that burned his nostrils. The tunnel opened into a wider room, another chamber supported by ancient wooden beams. Kimmel could finally see the deep red staining on the arm of his jacket. Lights were placed intermittently down the length of the chamber, flickering and spluttering. Kimmel saw a wooden torch discarded in the middle of the room, its end black from recent use. He suspected Marshall had done this, showing them where he was. Kimmel was painfully aware that he was running away from one threat and straight into another. Something caught his eye, a flash of metal from down the hall.

“Goddamn,” he muttered, heading toward it.

The GT16 lay on its side where it had been left, devoid of power, a relic destined to remain there forever. Kimmel paused, not recognizing the particular model but knowing it was military hardware. No doubt some fancy new prototype brought in by Fisher to remotely explore the tunnels.

Petrov’s voice came to him, uncomfortably close, pushing him to move on. He hurried past the abandoned unit, hoping to put some distance between himself and the detective, then paused, staring at the floor. Bones littered the ground: skulls and ribcages, arms and legs. All broken and discarded. He tried to mentally guess how many there were, but the more he looked, the more he could see. As he gazed at them, the voices returned. They caught him unawares, assaulting his senses, clambering into his brain and filling it with vile imagery. Kimmel fought back, pushing them out and gritting his teeth as he pressed on, wading through the human boneyard, trying not to think about what he was stepping on or how strong the stench was. He hesitated; the torches ahead were unlit, the tunnel beyond opaque and oppressive. It was the fear of Petrov catching up to him that forced him on into the darkness. He stumbled on, bones displaced under his feet, hissing, chattering voices in his ears, unseen hands clawing at his clothes. All of it horrifying enough, but not as much as the thoughts being placed into his mind; ideas and images he was no longer able to fight. Not here, not so close to the source. Familiar voices spoke to him like they always used to. The voices of the dead.

His sister – killed in a car crash back in the summer of eighty-six.

His mother – in her grave for almost twenty years.

His best friend, Joe Davies – killed by an IED in Baghdad years earlier.

All of them vying to advise him, their poisonous words clinging to his mind like intertwined, overgrown thorns. They alternated between soothing, friendly tones and sneering, barked commands and insults. Worse still were the images, fragmented pictures placed in his head by his tormentors.

Plunging his wife’s head into the flames of a roaring fire, holding her there as she kicked, thrashed and tried to scream through melting lips.

Dismembering his daughter. Hacking her body into a pulpy mess. Eating her flesh. The chew of sinew. The copper taste of blood.

Tearing his son’s stomach open, guts steaming in the cold night air.

Next he recalled the names of the men he’d lost under his command. Men with wives, girlfriends and families, who’d survived some of the most brutal and violent warzones on the planet only to lose their lives in the shithole of a town above his head. He recited their names in his mind as he continued to wrestle against those mental demons and stumble further toward whatever awaited him.

Reynolds.

Layfield.

Shaw.

Landro.

Levas.

Blanchard.

Drench.

Cook.

Williams.

Brook.

Frederick.

With each name, the black things in his brain showed him how each had died. How each had been tortured, and how, in the end, each had begged for death. Kimmel let out a low groan, one which seemed to delight the things in the dark.

Reynolds.
Skewered on a spike he’d carved from a branch in the night.

Layfield
. In his body bag and then gone. Gone, gone, gone.

Shaw.
Hanging from a tree, face bloated and covered with flies.

Landro.
In the clearing. Disemboweled, entrails between his teeth.

Levas.
Floating in the river. Fish feasting on his bulging eyes.

Blanchard.
Bullet hole in his head, brains splashed all over the forest.

Drench.
Disappeared without a trace. Sounds of screaming, screaming, screaming.

Cook.
Throat slit with hunting knife, gargled bloody laughter.

Williams.
Slit wrists and rock in hand, standing over Brook’s body.

Brook.
Head a pulpy mess without shape.

Frederick.
Gone like Drench. Into the woods never to return.

He was sure he was about to break. It was inevitable. He wondered if, years from now, they would find him, just another skeleton on the floor with the rest. A forgotten, nameless victim of a horror unlike anything ever seen before. He looked at his hands trembling in the gloom and realized he shouldn’t be able to see them at all. He looked around him, surprised to find he could see the walls, bathed in a soft red hue. The tunnel curved away to the right, the light source coming from whatever lay beyond it. Petrov whistled behind him, and Kimmel had no choice but to exit the tunnel and into the room, somehow managing to stifle a scream as he saw what lay beyond.

CHAPTER 41

They came through the trees; wispy forms melting through the branches, white mist forming into human shapes. Men, women, children. All who had lost their lives on the land over the centuries. They lined the edge of the clearing, bodies materializing and dematerializing, weaving between semi-transparent and solid. Their arrival brought with it silence. Emma and the others edged away from them, moving further into the clearing. The ghosts watched; black voids where their eyes should be. Silent. Waiting. Two of them came forward, appearing like some cheap magician’s illusion at either side of Henry. Melody whined, grabbing Emma’s hand and squeezing it, feeling a fear she had almost learned to forget.

The pale form of Donovan stared at her, hungry lust on his face. Beside him was Eto, clad in full tribute paint, white skull daubed on his face, pointed teeth exposed, symbols on his body in honor of those he worshiped.

The group stared, unable to comprehend. The atmosphere was so heavy, so charged, it was hard to breathe. They had transcended reality to a place beyond fear, beyond any known capacity to deal with what was happening to them. They knew they were a part of whatever was about to happen, and were completely powerless to stop it.

Henry spoke, Eto and Donovan’s mouths mirroring his as he addressed those who had come to witness the death of the boy.

“They want you all to witness the end. To witness their eternal existence.”

“You can’t get out of this, Henry,” Dane said, thinking about the gun and if he would be able to use it if he had to. “They’ll shoot you where you stand, you have to know that. You don’t have any chances left. You can’t talk your way out of this like you used to.”

“They won’t be here in time. Not now.”

Dane pulled the gun from his jeans, hands shaking as he aimed it at his brother. “I’ll do it myself if I have to.”

Henry smiled; an expression more of pity than amusement. Dane faltered, realizing he had made a mistake.

“No, you won’t,” Henry said.

It was then they came, those on the edge of the circle. They rushed the group, exploding from their positions; a swirling, screaming mass of formless things.

“It’s time,” Mrs. Alma said. “Form a circle, just like we practiced.”

Truman, Emma, and Mrs. Alma linked hands as Dane stared open mouthed at the rushing, ducking, diving spirits.

“You too,” Mrs. Alma said to Melody, holding a hand out toward her.

“Me? I don’t understand…”

“You’re part of this too. Join us.”

“My son…” was all she could manage as she watched Henry and Isaac.

“Quickly!” Mrs. Alma snapped.

Melody grasped Truman’s hand and pulled herself up.

Gunshots echoed around the clearing as Dane fired at the translucent forms of the dead, his bullets passing through them and into the forest.

Mrs. Alma blocked everything out. She closed her eyes and began to chant, mouthing secret words in a language long forgotten. “Close the circle,” she said, finally opening her eyes.

“What about Isaac?” Emma screamed above the noise.

“You know his fate. We can’t stop it now but we might be able to save ourselves.”

“There must be something we can do.”

Mrs. Alma looked at Emma, the answer evident in her eyes.

“Please, close the circle,” the older woman said.

Sobbing and trembling, the group joined hands. As their link was made, the ground began to rumble and the trees swaying furiously, shedding branches as they were violently pushed by the spirits of the dead.

In the middle of the clearing, Henry leaned close to Isaac, whispering in his ear. “Every night in my cell I dreamt about this moment. Now, it’s finally a reality.”

Isaac was about to ask what he meant, but Henry’s hands were already on his throat, squeezing, blocking his airway. Isaac kicked and choked, clawing desperately at Henry’s hands as the life was squeezed out of him. Henry roared in ecstasy, and the trees roared back.