The Gathering Dark Part 11

For Mont de Moreau, and the people aboard that train, it was already too late.

In the tomblike silence of his bas.e.m.e.nt office, Father Jack Devlin poured two fingers of Crown Royal into a tumbler and tossed it back before he had even set the bottle back down upon his desk. The whiskey burned its way down his throat, a little nugget of warmth that slid down inside him. He cupped his hand around the tumbler and let his gaze drift, seeing nothing. A niggling feeling at the back of his neck made him look up. He snapped his gaze over to the big mason jar on the shelf above the desk, where the hideous little Cythraul demon stared back at him. Its mouth was drawn taut in an obscene grin.

"f.u.c.k you!" he screamed.

With a snarl, his chest rising and falling in heaves, Father Jack stood and s.n.a.t.c.hed the Cythraul off the shelf, opened the bottom drawer of a filing cabinet, and set the jar inside.

"Little s.h.i.t. See how you like it in there."

A tiny sound came from the jar, and Father Jack thought the Cythraul was laughing at him. He slammed the drawer of the filing cabinet and slumped once more behind his desk. With a pained sigh he leaned far back in his chair and slipped his gla.s.ses off. He set them on the desk and ran both hands across his face, through his red hair. For a long moment he held himself there, trying to make sense of what had come to pa.s.s in the previous twenty-four hours.

But he could not. Could not make sense of it. Could barely comprehend it. The implications were so vast that each time he turned his mind to it, the priest felt a flutter in his heart that he had never felt before. It was fear. He knew that. For it was accompanied by a chill deep inside him, a cold dread that the whiskey could never warm.

Which did not stop him from trying.

Jack Devlin had never been much of a drinker, but now he poured himself another generous shot of Crown Royal-the fifth or six-and downed it quickly, drawing the back of his hand across his lips. Why the h.e.l.l are you even using the gla.s.s, Jack? Why the h.e.l.l are you even using the gla.s.s, Jack? he thought bitterly. he thought bitterly.

But he knew the answer. The whiskey was bad enough on its own. Drinking it straight from the bottle would seem far too much like giving up.

"f.u.c.k!" he screamed, and he threw the whiskey gla.s.s across the office. It struck the filing cabinet where he had stashed the Cythraul, and shattered there, shards falling upon the carpet.

Father Jack started to laugh, shaking his head. He felt like an idiot. Throwing the gla.s.s was a bit of melodrama he had seen in too many movies, and now here he was copping from some film or another because he couldn't find a way to get a handle on his own emotions.

"Idiot," he whispered to himself.

He laughed again, shaking his head, and then fell silent. There was a sheaf of paper on top of his desk, along with his computer, but he had no interest in looking at the reports from Hidalgo again. He knew what they said. His face crumpled and his eyes grew moist.

"Oh, dear Lord," he whispered to himself, not kneeling or clasping his hands, but penitent and reverent just the same. "Where do we go from here?"

The silence in the office deepened. After a moment Father Jack closed his eyes and sighed. Then he rose and crossed the office, grabbing his trash can so that he could begin picking up shards of the broken gla.s.s.

When he was on his knees on the carpet, a knock came at the door. Whoever it was did not wait to be invited, and the door swung open before Father Jack could even begin to stand.

The priest stared in amazement.

Peter Octavian stood in the doorway. Behind him were two women Father Jack had never seen before. The mage raised an eyebrow and leaned casually against the door frame.

"I'm sorry, Father. If we're interrupting prayer time, we can come back later."

For a moment Father Jack only stared at him. Octavian was an enigma, one moment an amiable man, a regular guy, and the next waxing nostalgic about ancient battles and fallen cities any historian would kill to have seen with his own eyes. As he leaned there, Octavian's eyes sparkled with humor and benevolence. The priest felt himself a good judge of character, and he liked Octavian, despite the sorcerer's history and the fact that the man made him nervous. Now, though, Octavian must have seen something in his face, for he stood up straighter and frowned as he studied Father Jack.

"What's wrong?" he demanded. "What happened?"

Careful not to set his hands in any broken gla.s.s, Father Jack gave up his task and rose. "Come in, please," he said, gesturing to Octavian and his companions, an earthy blonde who looked somehow familiar and a pet.i.te Asian woman with long, silken hair.

"What brings you you here?" the priest asked. here?" the priest asked.

Octavian looked thoughtful. Then he stepped aside to let his companions enter the room. "Father Jack Devlin, meet Keomany Shaw and Nikki Wydra. Nikki, Keomany . . . Father Jack."

The priest's hands fluttered in the air as he waved them toward his desk. "I just broke a gla.s.s. There's nowhere to sit. A dungeon down here, actually. So watch your step, but come in."

He turned abruptly to look at Octavian face to face. "I was just getting ready to call you."

Octavian nodded slowly, as if the news did not surprise him. "I don't suppose Bishop Gagnon wanted to invite me for dinner."

Father Jack could not muster a smile. "No. I'm afraid not."

The two men stared at one another for several seconds. It was Nikki who broke the silence.

"Father Devlin-"

"Please," he said reflexively. "Call me Jack. Or Father Jack. My father was Father Devlin."

Nikki blinked and glanced at Keomany before looking back at him.

"Sorry," Father Jack said, chagrined. "Very off-color humor. Sort of ingrained in me. But please do call me Jack."

Nikki smiled and the priest felt warmed by it in a way the whiskey had been unable to accomplish. He realized then where he knew the name from. She had been involved with Octavian during the New Orleans business, some kind of performer now, he thought.

"Jack," Nikki said, "Peter tells me you're an expert on the crazy stuff. Something terrible's happened in a town called Wickham, in Vermont. Keomany's hometown, actually. We could use your input."

Father Jack listened, his gaze ticking toward the anxious-looking Asian woman and then back to Nikki. But Octavian seemed to haunt the office, drifting around, studying the books and the paintings and the plants in a way that unmistakably marked him. He had been a detective once. For years. Father Jack saw now that he still had that eye.

"I'd be happy to help in any-"

Octavian stopped at the filing cabinet. Father Jack stopped speaking, surprised to see the mage bend and open the bottom drawer, removing the jar and holding it up so the light pa.s.sed through, illuminating the Cythraul. The sorcerer gave the priest a look that Father Jack could not read.

"What was this filed under?" Octavian asked.

"P," Father Jack answered instantly. "For pain in my a.s.s."

The mage smiled. "We'll get to Keomany's story in a moment, Jack. Meanwhile, why don't you tell us what's got you so skittish."

Octavian glanced at the broken gla.s.s on the floor, then at the bottle of Crown Royal on the desk, and Father Jack nodded. This was what he had been about to call Octavian about anyway. Bishop Gagnon would not approve, but he was past the point of caring. With a heavy sigh, Father Jack moved to the desk and leaned on it. He had no chairs for his guests and so would not take the single seat in the office.

"Hidalgo," he said.

The mage frowned. "I restored that ma.n.u.script for you. The Okulam should have been no problem at all."

"They weren't," Father Jack replied. "I translated the last of that and phoned it in. Our people in Texas scoured the town of Okulam in just under two hours."

Nikki Wydra shook her head as though his words weighed heavily upon her. "Why do I hear a 'but' coming?"

The priest nodded. "But. As of yesterday morning, Hidalgo was gone."

The other woman, Keomany, uttered a tiny gasp and looked stricken by his words. Her elegant features went slack.

"What do you mean gone?" she asked, the first time she had spoken since her arrival.

"Gone," Father Jack replied. "Or possibly not. Something is still there, that much is certain. Father Tratov reported that witnesses claimed the sky changed color, that it went dark, turned-"

"Orange," Keomany whispered. "Orange like rotten pumpkins."

The priest stared at her, his mind racing as he realized the connection between this woman and Hidalgo. Slowly he nodded. "Orange. That's right. But then the sky was blue again and the town seemed to have disappeared. Only at the edge of Hidalgo, there's some kind of . . . membrane. It's invisible, but it can be pierced. Father Tratov sent two of his deacons through it. He reported the orange light seeping out when the membrane was torn."

"And they never came out," Octavian said.

Father Jack looked at him gravely. "Not yet. And then after they'd gone through, it hardened. Maybe it takes a while. Whatever the process, it's impenetrable now."

The mage gazed at him. "And you think the town is still there, on the other side of that membrane?"

"Don't you?" Father Jack asked.

He saw the way Octavian's eyes ticked toward Keomany, as if measuring his response against her needs. At length, the mage nodded slowly.

"Let's hope so."

"It was the same in Wickham," Keomany said.

Father Jack listened as she told her story. It echoed what had happened in Hidalgo, and the dread in him began to grow even larger. This was no longer an isolated incident. It was no longer just a tiny village on the Tex-Mex border. It was a town in Vermont. And who knew how many others.

"What's going on?" Nikki asked aloud, though Father Jack doubted her question was meant for any of them.

Octavian had begun to pace. Father Jack watched him, his own mind working on the problem, trying to find some reason behind it. He and the mage had spoken at their first meeting about the growth in the number of events in which demons had appeared upon the earth plane. The frequency had been increasing radically, particularly in the last year.

Mulling it over, he looked at Keomany, who was watching Octavian even as Nikki laid a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"You didn't say how you escaped," the priest said.

The woman glanced at the ground. "I . . . just lucky, I guess. Timing. I got out right before it was all closed off. I . . ."

And she said no more. Father Jack sensed there was a part of the story Keomany Shaw had not shared with them, but he chose not to push her on it. Not yet. If, at some point, it seemed some missing facet might be the key to what was happening, he would insist. For now, he let it lie.

"Peter? Any thoughts?"

Octavian looked at him. "You've considered that the Okulam had to have slipped onto this plane somehow? That there had to be a crack?"

"A breach, yes, it's only logical," Father Jack agreed. "My guess would be that whatever's happening in Hidalgo came through the same breach, that it leaked somehow."

"But that would mean there had to be some kind of breach like that in Wickham, too," Keomany said, shaking her head. "My family's lived there for decades. I grew up there. I lived away for a few years, but I've been back awhile now. I don't remember anything freakish. No demons."

Silence descended upon the office for a moment as they all glanced at each other. One by one, each of them focused on Keomany. Father Jack gazed at her with deep sympathy. But there was really only one way to know.

"Oh, s.h.i.t," Keomany said, as her eyes lit up with understanding. "We have to go back, don't we?"

Octavian set the Cythraul jar down on top of the filing cabinet. The thing leered disgustingly at him but the mage ignored it. He walked to Father Jack and held out his hand. The priest did not hesitate. Nothing in his life, nothing in his research, had prepared him for this. With his resources and Octavian's memories and magick, an alliance was the only reasonable course of action.

After they had shaken hands, the mage turned to the two women. He reached out to gently touch Nikki's shoulder, but his gaze was on Keomany. To her credit, she did not look away.

"Not just back," Octavian said firmly, face to face with Keomany. "Back isn't enough. We have to go in in."

8.

At dusk in Venice the setting sun cast a reddish-golden hue across the domes and spires and arches of the city and onto the cobblestones of the broad piazzas. Despite the filth of the ca.n.a.l waters and the grime in its back alleys, for those few precious moments each day Venice became a fairy tale kingdom, a wondrous place where anything was possible, if just for a moment. In its narrow alleys, which had long since been cast into darkness by the angle of the sun as it slid west, the shadows only deepened and those things that now seemed possible were far more sinister.

Allison Vigeant feared nothing from those shadows, those darkly ominous alleyways, and yet this night-her first visit to Venice since the Jihad-she remained in the Piazza San Marco, where the laughter of tourists created a kind of veil that separated her from the rest of the city. The Basilica di San Marco stood glorious guard over the piazza at one end, four golden lions crouched like sentinels upon its roof, the last rays of the sun glinting from the ferocious statues.

It was possible a day might come when she would feel comfortable here, in this city once known for its serenity. But Allison could not imagine it. She sat on the patio of a pleasant trattoria that catered to the tourists and served gelato out a window so that people might eat it while wandering the cobblestones. A five-piece band played Italian music and American standards at the edge of the roped-in patio, and people stopped to listen briefly before wandering on.

Allison sat on the uncomfortable metal patio chair and sipped a perfect bianco. Out in the piazza the golden light continued to bleed from the air and a deep blue replaced it, all of these extraordinary colors that slipped by each day almost unnoticed. The pigeons that swarmed the piazza in search of sympathetic humans to feed them- and often perched atop the heads and arms and shoulders of such people-fluttered in formation up from the cobblestones to the eaves and ledges where they had made their nests. There had been children in the piazza with their parents, families, and older couples. Yet now, as nightfall came on, there seemed only young lovers and small troops of traveling students.

Venice changed with the onset of night.

The music from the band seemed to increase in volume, as did the laughter from the patio and the clinking of winegla.s.ses within the restaurant. Across the piazza, even the lapping of waves that spilled onto the cobblestones from the Grand Ca.n.a.l seemed louder as well. And yet everything else grew silent.

Allison shivered and tipped her winegla.s.s to her lips once more. The wine was so dry it left her even more parched than she had been, and she realized she ought to have ordered something else. Her gaze rested upon a gondola all the way on the other side of the piazza. A pair of dark-haired women were holding hands and speaking with one of the gondoliers, perhaps haggling over a price for his services. Seeing the women together made her think of old friends she had lost, and a kind of melancholy swept through her. Still, it was a welcome relief from the anxiety she had been feeling . . . about Venice, about everything.

"You look troubled, babe. I hate to see lines on that pretty face."

The voice seemed to drift to her out of the gathering dark, and yet out of her past as well. A smile spread across Allison's face as she turned and looked up at Carl Melnick. It had been a decade since she had seen the man, and though the years showed on him, Allison thought they had improved his appearance. Carl had always had a rather ordinary face, but now there was a thickness to it, and contemplative lines around his blue eyes, and his hair had gone a salt-and-pepper gray that lent him a certain dignity.

"Hey," she said, voice barely a whisper as she stood to embrace him. Carl had been a news producer for CNN during the time Allison had been a reporter there, and they had been quite friendly as a.s.sociates, but not really outside the office. Allison was surprised at the intensity of the pleasure she felt at seeing him.

"Allie-cat," Carl said, holding her close. "It's really wonderful to see you. I'm so glad you called me."

The embrace grew suddenly awkward and Allison took a step back from him. For a moment they just looked at each other and then she laughed brightly and motioned for him to have a seat, then slid back into her chair.

"You look great, Carl," she told him.

"Flatterer," he replied. "One of us is getting old, and it isn't you."

Allison winced and looked away from him.

"Sorry," Carl said quickly. "I wasn't . . . I mean, I guess I didn't think that would be a sore point for you."

"I didn't choose to be what I am, Carl. Somebody took that decision away from me. There are benefits, I'm not going to lie. But for the most part, it's a terrible existence. f.u.c.king miserable, if you want the truth."

The news producer laughed, eyes sparkling, and waved the waiter over. "Who says I want the truth?" He ordered a beer and then turned his attention back to Allison, but now all the humor was gone from his face.

"We all thought you were dead, Allie. After New Orleans, that's what the news said. I found out a little over a year ago that you were still alive, but I kept it to myself because, well, it's a secret, isn't it?"

Carl reached across the table and laid his hand over hers. Allison had to force herself not to flinch, not because she wanted to pull away from the warmth and comfort the man was offering her, but because no one had bothered to do such a thing for a very long time. The intimacy of that touch, there on the patio of that trattoria in Piazza San Marco, was almost too much for her.