Soul Taker

by William Massa

“That isn’t true, Simon, and you know it. True devotion requires a leap of faith.”

  “No, don’t you dare…”

  “True devotion takes sacrifice.”

  The woman took one more step, inching toward certain death.

  “Don’t do it, Mary!”

  “The streets must run red with my blood. Goodbye, master.”

  And with these words, Mary Kinsey—or perhaps her lookalike—stepped off the ledge.

  “NO!”

  I reached out for her, but my fingers grasped only thin air.

  My shout was swept away by the wind, replaced by an eerie silence. The female officer to my right let out a shocked gasp, and Detective Sanchez coughed up a string of expletives.

  More sounds drifted from below as the crowd reacted to the suicide.

  I crept toward the edge of the roof, my feet heavy as lead, and peered over the ledge.

  Down below, the onlookers had backed away from the broken, vaguely human form splayed across the sidewalk.

  I had tried to save her life. And failed.

  But no, that wasn’t the whole story. Her request for my presence hadn’t been a cry for help. She’d been looking for an audience.

  She’d wanted the son of Mason Kane to be here as she completed the task my father had failed to all those years earlier. I was never meant to talk her off that ledge.

  I had to come to terms with the reality of the situation. The Children of the Void had returned.

  My old nightmare was about to start all over again.

  Chapter Six

  Over the years, I’ve spent way too much time in morgues. No matter how many horrors I face, I’m still affected when a coroner pulls back a sheet. Staring down at a corpse is like holding a mirror up at one’s own mortality. I know all too well that there is existence after death (hey, I’ve battled my fair share of ghosts), but I also understand that for some of us, the real nightmare begins once we shuffle off our mortal coil.

  Why was I doing this to myself, you ask? What could I possibly learn from looking at Mary Kinsey’s shattered body? It wasn’t like her cause of death was some mystery to me. A fanatic had taken her own life, end of story.

  Unfortunately, things aren’t that simple in my world.

  From my perspective Mary Kinsey, her beauty untouched by the passage of time, had been waiting for me on that ledge. Fifteen years after barely escaping my father’s sacrificial blade, she’d voluntarily given herself to the darkness.

  There was one little problem. Detective Sanchez didn’t share my perception of the events that had played out on the hotel roof. According to the detective and everyone else on that rooftop, the jumper wasn’t Mary Kinsey but a completely different woman.

  A woman I knew.

  Sanchez claimed the shattered form now hidden under a sheet on the autopsy table belonged to Ashley Jones, host of the popular paranormal podcast “Mysteries from the Beyond.” The alluring Ms. Jones had interviewed me on her show only days earlier, and we’d spent the night together.

  She couldn’t be dead, couldn’t be the same woman who jumped off the roof right in front of me. I knew what I saw up there. I would prove it to him.

  My stomach churned as Sanchez nodded at the coroner. The tall, gaunt man with the thick glasses pulled the sheet back, revealing the nude corpse of a female in her twenties.

  Even though half of her face had been pulverized by the impact, I now saw the same thing Sanchez and the other cops had seen earlier.

  Ashley Jones’ lifeless eyes bored into me. Bile crept up my throat, and I clenched my jaw, struggling to maintain my equilibrium.

  I shifted my attention from the disfigured features and focused on her shoulder. A tattoo of a red rose covered the skin, miraculously untouched by any traumatic injuries—or snake tattoos.

  Had the Ouroboros been another trick of my imagination?

  In my line of work, there’s usually only a single explanation for these kinds of differences in perception. Dark magic had twisted and altered my senses back on the hotel roof.

  An invisible puppeteer had been pulling my strings, and I didn’t like it one bit.

  Sanchez gave the coroner another nod, and the dead woman’s face vanished under the white sheet again. A small mercy that did not calm my buzzing nerves.

  Your enemies are drawing closer, a thin voice whispered deep inside me. First they came after your father’s grave. Now they’re targeting the people you know. Acquaintances, friends, and finally it will be your turn…

  Shut UP! I thought and silenced the haunting voice echoing through my mind.

  I couldn’t lose it. Now more than ever, I had to keep my wits about me.

  These crimes served a distinct purpose. They were designed to weaken my emotional equilibrium. To throw me off balance. I couldn’t allow that to happen; I refused to let my enemies defeat me before the real battle had even begun.

  I pivoted on my heel and strode out of the autopsy room. I’d seen enough for one day.

  Footsteps rang out behind me. Sanchez would not let me storm off without answering a few questions first. He caught up with me outside the morgue. I felt his hand on my shoulder, and I spun around. Our eyes locked. I wanted to bark at him, tell him to get his hands off me, but I held my tongue. I reminded myself that the detective was only doing his job.

  Nothing would be gained if I unloaded on the wrong person.

  Detective Sanchez was simply trying to understand what was happening here. I wish I could help him out, but my confusion mirrored his own. All I knew was that dark forces were gathering around me, and the real shitstorm hadn’t even started yet.

  “What the hell’s going on here, Kane?”

  “I have no idea. But I will find out.”

  The mixture of anger and determination in my voice gave the detective pause, and he relinquished his grip on my shoulder.

  “I’ll be in touch as soon as I know more.”

  And with these words, I stalked out of the precinct.

  Chapter Seven

  Vesper was waiting for me at the door when I arrived. The story of Ashley Jones’ suicide was all over the news. I quickly brought her up to speed on my version of events. Once done, she regarded me pensively. Her sharp mind was clearly working overtime, trying to make sense of my experience on the roof.

  That made two of us.

  “What are we up against here? Why are they playing these games?” she asked.

  “It’s psychological warfare, black magic style. Defeat the will of your enemy, mentally throw him off balance, before you launch your real attack.”

  I walked up to the bar area next to the living room and poured myself a tumbler of whiskey. The alcohol burned down my throat and I shivered with delight. I would have to be careful. One drink might momentarily take the edge off and calm my nerves, but more than that would make me careless.

  I finished the drink in two gulps. My skin tingled as the heat spread into my chest and stomach.

  With a longing glance at the bottle, I set down my glass and decided to hit the pool for a few laps instead. I sometimes did my best thinking while in the water. There was something about the monotony of doing one lap after another that allowed me to cut through all the random chatter in my mind.

  “What’s our move, boss?” Vesper asked as I turned to leave.

  “I don’t know. I need to clear my head.”

  “Sounds like someone is hitting the pool. Just use sunblock this time.”

  “Thanks for the reminder, Mom.”

  I grinned as Vesper shot me a mock admonishing look. Getting skin cancer was last on my list of things to worry about.

  I took a quick shower, slipped into my swimming trunks and made my way to the pool. It was a balmy eighty degrees and the water felt refreshing. For a moment I allowed myself to drift, my eyes open as my body floated in the cool water. I tried not to think of the night I’d spent with Ashley Jones, did my best to block out the smell of her hair, the soft feel of her skin press
ed against mine.

  I cursed myself for having agreed to an interview on her show. Might as well have sent up a flare telling the bad guys to target her. Ashley’s death served as a sharp reminder that I couldn’t let people get too close to me. Knowing Simon Kane could be hazardous to your health.

  I thought of Vesper, who was already so fragile. Would my new enemies come after her next?

  I tried to shake off these morbid thoughts, but guilt consumed me.

  Bottom line, Ashley Jones would still be alive if it weren’t for me.

  The passionate, energetic woman I’d spent the night with a few days earlier didn’t have a suicidal bone in her body. Black magic had clouded her thinking and pushed her to take that fatal leap, in the same way it made me see Mary Kinsey on the roof. My new enemy was well versed in the dark arts.

  Ashley’s death also crushed any hope in my mind that some misguided fanatic might have dug up my father’s remains. This enemy knew precisely what they were doing. And like my father, they had no qualms about resorting to magic to achieve their twisted objectives.

  My father’s cult was making a fierce comeback.

  “The age of reckoning draws near. The time has come for you to embrace your legacy and continue your father’s work. The Children of the Void have returned. We await your command.”

  My brain kept turning back to these words.

  Why would this copycat cult want me to get involved? Did they honestly think I would ever follow in my dad’s footsteps? Or did they hope to sacrifice me in some ritual to appease their unholy masters for Mason Kane’s failure? My ex had already tried that, and it hadn’t worked out so well for her.

  My head hurt as I ran through all the possibilities. I needed more information about my new enemy before I could draw any logical conclusions. Everything else was mere conjecture at this point.

  My movements in the pool grew more aggressive, fueled by my growing frustration.

  I gave myself an internal push, blocked out the negative thoughts, and cleared my mind. I focused on the sensation of the water against my body, the pleasant pain of exertion tickling my muscles.

  I lost track of how many times I swam back and forth. My head dipped in and out of the water with pneumatic precision, the sameness of the exercise almost hypnotic. I turned my face up and took a deep gulp of air, then dipped back underwater and… froze.

  A grotesque figure was peering hungrily up at me from the bottom of the pool. A twisted body, one side of the face caked with gore, the mouth frozen in a rictus of a grin.

  It was Ashley Jones as she had looked in the morgue.

  I jerked my head out of the water, only to find the large pool surrounded by a circle of robed cultists. The monk-like hoods shadowed their features, transforming the figures into red-garbed, faceless wraiths.

  Terror flooded my chest, and that’s when something cold and slimy closed around the ankle of my right foot and yanked me underwater with brutal force.

  My world dissolved in an explosion of bubbles and flailing limbs as the phantom dragged me to the bottom of the pool. The water temperature had dropped dramatically, and every nerve in my body was screaming in agony. It felt like someone had dropped a ton of ice into the pool. Faded, distorted robed figures looked down on me as the decaying corpse of Ashley Jones pulled me into a revolting embrace.

  This can’t be real.

  This is only happening in your mind.

  The water’s surface rippled and distorted, and a second figure burst into the water. The new arrival shot toward me, and I felt warm hands reaching out to grab me. A second later, I was dragged to the surface, gasping and coughing.

  I inhaled deeply and spat out water as my rescuer pulled me toward the edge of the pool. As my vision cleared and my breathing first steadied, then normalized, my gaze turned to her. Vesper, her hair pasted to her head, black mascara running down her face, stared back at me with big eyes.

  “Are you all right? Simon, talk to me.”

  I considered the question.

  Was I okay?

  I took in my surroundings. There were no cultists, phantom or otherwise. A glance toward the bottom of the pool told me there was no evidence of Ashley’s dead body, either.

  Was I losing my mind?

  No, someone was magically hacking my thoughts, determined to manipulate my thinking, to push me over the edge.

  I wondered how they had breached the wards.

  What sort of magic was I up against here? Who the hell was this enemy?

  “The Children of the Void have returned.”

  In short, a new big bad had entered my life, their true identity hidden just like the features of those spooky monks had been in my most recent vision.

  “Simon, talk to me.”

  “I’m okay,” I said weakly, suddenly all too aware of how Vesper’s body was pressing against my own. I felt her curves under her wet T-shirt and jeans. My assistant must have heard me screaming and jumped in the pool with her clothes still on.

  “Thank you,” I said as I pulled away from her and climbed out of the pool, water streaming down my back. The sun was a red streak against the ocean in the distance and painted Vesper’s features in a scarlet glow.

  I offered my assistant a hand and pulled her out of the water. Her wet punk-rock attire clung to her shapely form. For a moment we looked at each other, adrenaline surging in my veins. I had the mad, momentary impulse to pull her into my arms, to prove to myself that I was still alive, but it passed.

  “What happened, damn it?”

  Her question awaited an answer.

  I wanted to tell her the truth, to tell her how Ashley’s icy fingers had closed around my ankle with steely force while the ghosts of my past watched in silence.

  But if I shared this information with Vesper, I would have to admit that my new enemy had successfully breached my magical defenses. Vesper felt safe within the mansion, probably the only place left on Earth where she could feel secure enough to let her guard down. I didn’t want to take that away from her.

  Everyone deserves a haven.

  So I lied.

  “I don’t know. I must’ve passed out. Probably dehydration from all the physical exertion and alcohol.”

  Vesper shot me a long, disbelieving look. She wasn’t buying my story.

  I didn’t enjoy deceiving her, but having her worry unnecessarily about what might happen in this house bothered me even more.

  I scooped up a towel from a nearby pool chair and handed it to her. She accepted it and started drying her face.

  “There’s something you’re not telling me, Simon.”

  I flashed her my most winning, boyish grin, and that seemed to bring a hint of a smile to her features.

  “The minute I know something for sure, you’ll be the first person to know.”

  Vesper studied me for a beat and then nodded as if she’d made a decision. “Okay. You know where to find me.”

  We both returned to the house and I headed upstairs. I showered, got dressed and headed to the occult library. Surrounded by my stacks of esoteric tomes, many of which predated Christianity, I found a certain peace. Perhaps in another life I’d been a scholar or a monk. Reading relaxed me, even if the subject was grim. There was just something about the weight of a book in my hands, the smell of ancient paper filling my nostrils, that allowed me to shut out the darkness of the world.

  Within these walls the nightmares still existed, but I could manage them. Surrounded by wisdom of the ages and the mysteries of the centuries, I felt in control.

  We all need our illusions, right?

  Nevertheless, I never forgot that the entrance to the dark temple waited only a few feet away. Sometimes I almost expected the bookshelf to swing open and release the horrors of my youth.

  Over the next few hours, I tried to occupy myself with research. I read any article I could find that talked about my father’s cult and scoured my resources for any mention of the Children of the Void. I learned nothing new
. In my quest to gain a better understanding of my dad over the years, I’d done many a deep dive on the subject.

  The gist of it was this: My father had believed the dark deeds of his cult would pave the way for a new world order. A hellish world where he would be in charge.

  Despite his grandstanding, the man I’d idolized as a foolish kid was nothing more than another power-hungry monster with twisted delusions of grandeur. By ushering in his version of Hell on Earth, Mason Kane believed that he would secure his rightful place in the new order. We all knew how that had worked out.

  Not that his failure was stopping this copycat cult.

  I guess a fool is born every minute. Here was another mortal idiot who thought he could rule among gods and monsters.

  It must’ve been past midnight when I closed the pages on the tome I was riffling through and called it a day.

  I left the library and was surprised not to find Vesper behind her terminal. She loved to maintain a night-owl schedule but had clocked out early today. Good for her.

  Inspired by her example, I hit the sack a few minutes later. Despite my exhaustion, sleep escaped me.

  My body was tired but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t silence my whirling thoughts. After another hour of racking my brain, I gave up on sleep. Instead, I slipped into one of my sleek suits and took the BMW for a late-night spin.

  Los Angeles is known for being sprawling and spacious—and riddled with traffic. But late at night the traffic eases and you can zip down streets that move at a snail’s pace during the daytime hours. A 90-minute daytime slog becomes a twenty-minute breeze. Similar to swimming and hiking, nighttime drives were calming to me. I liked it when the streets were empty and quiet.

  I passed a popular taco truck that had drawn a nice-sized crowd of late-night revelers eager for their fix of grease and spice. Then I navigated into Hollywood, shot down Sunset for a bit and zoomed down La Cienega, where the lights of tall luxury apartment buildings winked at me. A few minutes later, I found myself on Venice Boulevard, where stray bands of homeless people roamed the otherwise-abandoned sidewalks.