by Lucian Bane
Solomon finally nudged when she took too long, “Because what?”
“Master said… he only said it because he didn’t know. Said he was a heathen and I shouldn’t talk to him.”
“What kind of things did he ask you?” Solomon pulled her close so she knew she was safe to talk.
“He asked a lot about the asylum. I didn’t know the smart answers, but I gave him the ones I knew. I didn’t feel like he was a bad person. And he was always very nice to me, he made me feel…”
Solomon held his breath, not sure if he wanted to hear.
“Safe,” she finally said, like she was trying to find the exact term.
He let out a quiet sigh as the idea sank in. His dad made her feel safe. For the first time in many years, Solomon felt something besides bitterness and resentment for the man. Making Chaos feel safe in his mind, counted for a lot. Not to mention she’d just cleared his name of being connected to Master.
“You realize what this means?” his uncle said.
Solomon wasn’t sure what he meant. “That they actually may have killed my mom?” was the first thing that came to his mind.
“And he probably knows something. And if it was too much… ”
“But… Mr. Kratch never came back since,” Chaos said, sounding like she wanted to assure him. Only, Solomon and his uncle knew there was no assurance when it came to being safe in that town.
“When did you talk to him last?” his uncle asked.
She thought a moment. “Last I saw him was… in June I think. Because it was really hot that day and I remember him saying ’You better find a tree to get under… before you melt away.’ He talked funny like that,” she said, after imitating a southern accent. “I got scared because he sounded serious. And he must’ve known it because he laughed.” Chaos gave a booming laugh imitating him, making Solomon chuckle.
“How’d he laugh?” he prompted, wanting to hear her do it again.
She did and Solomon busted out in snickers, pulling her to him for kisses while his uncle shhhh’d them harshly.
“If your father hasn’t already gotten into any trouble, maybe he’ll get my message and come. He’d know to be careful.”
“I told him to be careful,” Chaos said.
“You did?” Solomon asked. “Why?”
“Last time I saw him, I told him I couldn’t visit any more. I remembered how he looked into my eyes that day. Like… he was reading my mind. I was saying…. Don’t ask any questions Mr. Kratch. I can’t tell. And he didn’t. He just nodded and that was it. I never saw him again.”
The sadness in her voice made Solomon hope she got to see Mr. Kratch again. And for the first time in longer than he could remember, he may have wanted to see him again, too.
Solomon wondered if his dad had been captured by those animals. Then he thought about his mom. Why would they murder her?
Solomon sat forward, dread slamming him.
“What’s wrong?” Chaos got on her knees, staring at him.
Chantilly.
“Nothing,” he gasped, pulling her back in his arms while an awful dread continued to fill him, making his thoughts race. Raced back to all the details surrounding his fiancée’s disappearance. Then they called him here. It was all planned. Had his wife known something? Had they done something to her? If his dad was right about his mom and they’d planned him coming all this time, then… oh fuck, they would have needed his fiancée out of the way.
“What’s wrong?” Chaos asked again.
Solomon realized he was gripping her tight and let her go a little. “Nothing, Beautiful. I’m okay.” Solomon’s mind continued to race with connecting dots. What they were doing around the time of her disappearance, what they were planning. They were going to get married in months. If he was supposed to be the sacrifice…
“Chaos,” Solomon decided to take a chance. “Did Master ever talk about… my fiancée?”
She didn’t answer right away and Solomon worried she would be threatened with the question. “No,” she answered.
Solomon thought he heard something odd in her tone and his mind began racing again. He suddenly wanted to talk to Uncle Joe, alone. He didn’t want Chaos to hear him asking about Chantilly in case it made her feel bad or jealous.
But he needed to see if he was right in his deductions that these monsters might have had something to do with her disappearance. And if so… where was she now?
More panic slammed him at imagining her being dragged under that asylum to be tortured and killed.
Or kept alive.
To be used and raped like they did Chaos.
Solomon couldn’t stop from asking another question, “Did Master… kidnap people, Chaos?”
“Kidnap?”
Solomon realized by her tone that he’d never call it that if he did. He thought of a better term. “Brought people into the church? From the outside?”
“Yes,” she said, easily. “All the time. To build the family.”
Sickness tightened his gut. “Did he bring… just men?”
“No, women too. Mostly. We have men that are just for helping women have children.”
“Help?” His gut burned, as he waited to hear what that meant.
“They impregnate them.”
“Oh shit,” Uncle Joe muttered. “That’s sick, that is fucking sick right there.”
“It was to… build the family.” Chaos’s tone dropped to guilty and ashamed as though she remembered that was probably wrong too.
“She didn’t know,” Solomon said.
“I don’t mean her.”
“I knew,” Chaos said quietly. “I just… learned how to not speak. And do what I was told.”
“Sweetheart,” uncle Joe said softly. “You were taught that wrong was right and right was wrong.”
“Nooo, I knew better, I did. I learned to be quiet.”
Solomon wrapped her in his arms tighter and put his face against hers. “Shhhhh,” he said, turning his mouth to her ear. “You’re okay, I’m right here. We’ll make it right, okay?” God she was on the verge of a breakdown.
“I learned to be quiet.”
“Let’s get some rest,” Solomon said to her. Geeze, nothing but the hard ground. He undid the straps on the overalls and removed his shirt. Balling it up, he put it on the ground. “Here, lay on that.” He laid next to her, wrapped his arm around her. She held his wrist with both hands, and put her mouth on it. He laid with her that way, hoping she fell asleep. He really needed to talk to Uncle Joe.
Chapter Thirteen
Chaos wished she couldn’t hear, but no matter how hard she tried, she did. She felt like she was on an operating table having her heart cut out. She was scared and couldn’t move. Every word he spoke sliced more and more until her entire chest burned and throbbed from the mutilation. And then he said it. He ended her life right there on the ground. “What if Chantilly is still alive?”
That hour glass attached to her life was suddenly flipped. It was just a matter of time now. She would be done. Expired. But there was no fear or regret, her body and mind new this. Had always known it. The pain suffocated her and that was okay because she knew pain. She knew agony and torment. Need. They had become familiar comforts for her.
“I’ve got to find out, Uncle Joe, I’ve got to know the truth. What if she’s alive?”
His desperation for her to be alive was like a boulder slowly rolling over her body, forcing all her blood to drain out. He loved her so much. Of course he did. As much as she loved him. She loved him that much and she’d give anything for him. Even if it meant dying, yes, she would help him be happy. And even if she didn’t actually die but just stopped existing. It wasn’t a bad place to be, that safe place where nobody could reach her.
She’d help him find his beautiful Chantilly… so he could be happy. If Master had taken her, she’d be one of the new ones.
“We need to get out of this state, son before you’re recaptured or all of us are.”
“I can’t leave.”<
br />
“We can come back!” his uncle hissed.
“She can’t know about this.”
“Who?”
“Chaos, this would upset her. I don’t want her upset.”
Tears poured out of Chaos’s eyes as she smiled from the caring words. Even though he probably worried about her doing something to make it harder to find his Chantilly. But she would never do that. She would work so hard to help him find his love. He deserved that more than anything. Her angel, that’s what he was. If she lived three million lives, she’d never be able to love him enough, the way he deserved. He was so good, so very good. And she was happy to be a part of that goodness even for a little while. What a great gift it was. That’s what she’d focus on. That she’d gotten to taste heaven when she was, and always had been, a pawn for hell.
“We leave the state and we come back.”
“Fine. I have to find a place for Chaos, I can’t have her go back there. No matter what happens with me, she needs to never go back there.”
“Agreed.”
****
Solomon couldn’t sleep. He lay there with his eyes wide open, ears on high alert, body gripped in fight or flight readiness, while a million thoughts raced in his head. The fear of being found, thoughts of Chantilly, Chaos, his mom, his dad. All of it wrecked together in his mind and made a mess of his heart. And God, he’d never faced the thought head on but knew he needed to. What if Chantilly was alive? What if he found her? What about Chaos? What was he supposed to do? What was right?
The answer to that terrified him. What if what he wanted was morally wrong? And what was morally right in this? He’d married Chaos. But Chantilly was his wife first, even if the marriage never happened. And yet it all seemed useless in the same breath when the odds of her being alive were so little. But he had to consider it no matter how little the odds. He had to know, decide now. It made him sick to have to ask that question—who he wanted more. Chaos or Chantilly. But the choice had to be made, and he could tell it needed to be made now, before he went any further with Chaos. But how was it right to stop? It would kill her.
This situation was so fucked up. But after thinking all night on it, while laying with Chaos who clung to him so tightly, it seemed right to continue as he was. At least, until he had more evidence that she might possibly still be alive.
Solomon pulled Chaos closer to him at reaching that decision and she gasped in such a way that he realized she was crying. He tilted her face up and kissed her lips. “What’s wrong, Beautiful?”
It hit him then that she might have concluded what he had about Chantilly. Fuck. His line of questions definitely could have given her enough to think it.
“Just scared,” she whispered.
“Of what?” He stroked her cheek with the backs of his fingers, his heart shattering at her words.
“Just… I don’t want you hurt anymore, that’s all.”
He let out a silent breath, closing his eyes. “I know, Beautiful. I’m scared too. We’ll be very careful.”
She nodded against his chest and for the final thirty minutes before dawn, Solomon slept.
****
They walked the forest in silence for most of the day, stopping only to eat whatever his uncle presented to them as they went along. Solomon was starving and never questioned any of it, grateful for the energy it seemed to provide at least. God, he was thirsty though. And walking along the road meant no water.
Then there was the issue of hiding the neon sign that was Chaos. So his uncle had the idea to smear mud on her dress. And holy God, Solomon’s heart shattered at seeing the look on her face as he did. Like her fairytale dreams were being dragged through the mud. When he saw the tears in her eyes and the way she fought them back, he flew to her side and held her face, kissing her and promising her many more, while his oblivious uncle finished his camouflaged artwork.
Uncle Joe gave Solomon a gun, and he carried it in the back pocket of the giant overalls. His uncle was a genius in Solomon’s eyes though, and damn was he grateful he was there.
The other reason they travelled along the road was in case, by some miracle, his dad would come to town that way. It was one of those crazy odds, but that chance, no matter how slim, they sure as hell weren’t squandering.
Solomon eyed Chaos before him, stumbling along. She was acting odd. Closed off and very quiet. He kept telling himself it wasn’t exactly a chatty event and that it had nothing to do with his internal struggle with Chantilly and her.
He was guilty, yes, but it wasn’t over his feelings for Chaos, it was for Chantilly. After searching his heart carefully, as much as he loved Chantilly, Chaos was part of his soul. And he could never undo it and the thought of maybe having to, promised a devastation that was unthinkable. Chaos belonged with him and he belonged with her. When that glorious revelation had hit him, he knew it was solid, irrevocable, divine truth. And it had given him so much relief to know that what he wanted was in line with what was right.
His regret and remorse were for Chantilly, who might, by some miracle, still be alive. He was pretty sure the guilt of that was what had his body locked up, like it needed more convincing. He needed to connect with Chaos again, that would solve that. It’d also put to rest any doubts she might be having. If she had drawn those conclusions about his idea of Chantilly being alive, she might be thinking he’d leave her. The idea of her hurting over that made him want to stop right where he was and vomit.
“Stop!” his uncle suddenly hissed, crouching to the ground and waving them to do the same.
Solomon hurried to Chaos and wrapped his arms around her, pressing his face to hers. She gave a violent gasp, telling him he was right about her doubting his feelings. He placed a hand on the other side of her face and pressed her tight to him. “Shhh,” he barely whispered, his heart hammering at the sound of a vehicle. Whoever was coming was driving awfully slow. An old pick-up crept into view.
“Anybody we know?” his uncle whispered.
Solomon shook his head. “Not me. You recognize that vehicle, Beautiful?”
“N-no,” she whispered.
It passed by and they resumed walking.
Solomon’s heart grew heavier as he realized he’d likely hurt Chaos with his questions about Chantilly. He suddenly needed so badly to stop and make her know how he felt. He closed the gap between them and grabbed her arm. She turned and looked up at him. Oh fuck. The pain in her eyes stole his breath.
He pulled her to him and a loud boom hit the air. They all ducked low to the ground, looking around.
“What was that?” Solomon gasped.
“Sounded like a blow out.”
As if they both realized in the same second what a disabled ride might mean for them, they both shot toward the source, Solomon dragging Chaos behind him.
They heard the man before they ever saw him. “Goddamn sonofabitch! I’m gonna blow a goddamn holt in his doggone ass when I get back, look at that! Hole the size of a gorilla’s ass! That lying thieving SOB. I’ll have his ass removed from town after this!”
They crouched only ten feet behind the old pick-up, watching, listening as he mumbled on and on now, continuing the conversation to himself. “Gonna have to walk,” he said. Then there was more mumbling, followed with, “clear cross the goddamn equators.”
They shot a look at each other. He had no spare? Damn!
“What should we do?” Solomon asked.
“We could wait for him to get back and take his truck,” his uncle suggested. “Or when he leaves, hot wire it and drive it on the rim. But it might mean getting stopped by somebody we wouldn’t like.”
“Mr. Mansard lives on this road,” Chaos said, sounding worried.
They both looked at her. Why hadn’t Solomon asked her if she knew where she was? Because he assumed she didn’t know much outside of the evil monastery she’d been raised in.
“How far is it?”
She peered through the trees on the left and right. “I don’t recognize
anything to be able to tell, but I just know he lives on Meathouse Rd. It has that tree that was struck by lightning, and a farm with a two-headed cow.”
“Who is this man? Is he a good man, is it safe for us?”
She shook her head no, and despair hit.
“Do they have a phone?” his uncle asked.
Solomon looked at him. “What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking I can try to call my brother again? I don’t know. Maybe they have a car there we can borrow?” His uncle raised his brows and glared at him, pressing his double meaning.
“Yeah. We could wait to go when it’s late.” He looked at Chaos who appeared terrified now. “They have animals there?”
“I… yes, a big orange cat. And two dogs, but one’s missing a leg. The other one is very mean, but he’s always tied up.”
“Who is Mr. Menard to you?”
“He’s the Order’s Doctor and Scientist. But he’s very bad at it, I think.”
“Why?” Solomon asked even though he was sure he didn’t want to know.
“All the doctor things he does kills or just hurts them. And he’s also the one who does the sewing.”
“What… sewing?” his uncle asked, sounding disgusted.
“For the ladies? The ones that have to be sealed down there.” She cast a glance at Uncle Joe seeming embarrassed.
“Oh, fuck no,” Solomon hissed. “Fuck no, we’re not going there!”
His uncle sighed and scrubbed his face. “We could just go to borrow the car. I don’t need to ask, if you know what I mean.”
Jesus. What were the odds? That the head psycho’s doctor lived on the road they were on? It was like they were fated to end up in the devil’s den, one way or another.
“How about,” his uncle said. “We just go to scope the place. Maybe he’s not there and we can get in and use the phone? Tell my brother where we are and go find a place to hide and wait. Or maybe he leaves the keys in the car and we can wait till late at night and take it. Don’t forget we have weapons.”
Ah yes, the final option if those first things somehow went wrong. Which Solomon was pretty confident they would.
Then there was that other thing. Being within walking distance of the sick fucker who had probably hurt Chaos and countless others. With the element of surprise and ammo on their side, Solomon felt like maybe it was worth at least scoping.