Aimee began to cry. Brandy took her in her arms.
The blazing chapel, the hustling firefighters faded from Fournier's reality as he stared at Felix's body in the courtyard.
The fire chief (magistrate?) saw him in his fire scene and, stroking his mustache, strode over to move him out. As he drew near, Dupont recognized Fournier as the driver of the car that had overtaken his engine on the mountain. He cleared his throat and demanded to know why he'd cut them off. Didn't he know the law? Didn't he know who he (Dupont) was? Didn't he hear him talking?
Fournier laid his jacket over the corpse and, when his trembling knees failed him, sat down on the cobblestones beside. The chief barked again. Fournier, tears streaming, stared at the pompous ass from his place on the ground but made no response.
Neither did he respond when Father Trevelyan sat down beside him and began to pray over Felix.
Neither did he respond when Aimee shrieked…
Twenty Eight
Father Trevelyan finished his prayer then sat, exhausted, between Felix's body and the fire engine. Fournier was still there, still crying and, it seemed, not happy with the priest's presence. He said something, said it again with a forceful gesticulation, then shouted over the din. Trevelyan wasn't getting the message. The priest just sat giving Fournier his full attention but no satisfaction.
On the other side of the engine, Luis stepped, blinking, through the front arch of the castle. He wore tennis shoes and Ray's baggy, scorched pants but was naked from the waist up and badly burned. He sat on the steps as if waiting for a taxi.
Aimee saw him and thought her eyes were playing tricks. She pulled away from Brandy and shrieked in delight. Then, shrieking again, ran to Luis, fell on him and kissed him desperately giving in to feelings she had steadfastly denied.
“I thought you were…” Tears ran down her cheeks. “Where have you been?”
“I told you,” he said through gritted teeth. “I know this place.”
“You tried to save us?”
Luis waved it away. “Just wanted to get you a story.”
She hugged and kissed him until Luis, his eyes wet with pain, begged for air.
Brandy watched their reunion, sharing their happiness without jealousy. She looked at Ray as the medics worked and realized that, though she was frightened, for the first time in a long time she was happy too.
Only after Aimee let go, and let Luis breathe, did she see how badly he was burned. His hands were blistered. His stomach, chest and face, beneath the smudges of ash, were splotched in brilliant patches of red. His black hair was singed a dull brown and wound in brittle curls. She helped him up and toward the ambulance.
Soliveres had Ray almost ready for transport, Aldric was seeing to Trevelyan's arm and - thankfully superficial – burns, when Aimee walked up with Luis. The young medic took one look and blurted something to his partner in the back of the ambulance. Soliveres yelled back in exasperation.
“What's he shouting about?” Brandy asked.
The priest joined the conversation and, when an agreement was reached, translated. “With Ray, they have room enough for only one more. We agreed it should be Luis. I assured them we'll make our own way to the clinic.”
“How?”
“Marcel… M. Fournier has offered to take us.”
“I'm not leaving Ray. And I'm not going with a drug dealer.”
“I'm delighted to see the old Brandy,” the priest said, then added, “but you have no choice regarding Ray.”
With a boost from Aimee and Aldric, Luis was assisted up and onto the bench beside Ray's cot. Aldric followed him in and began pouring sterile water on his burns.
“As for, eh, Fournier's… eh, drugs… he's leaving that business.”
“He's giving up dealing…”
Trevelyan shushed her and led Brandy from the ambulance. “Yesterday was emotional for Fournier as well. Felix's leaving injured him more than any of us would have guessed. It was, he said, like losing a son. Then last night he was stupidly caught, how would Ray say it, with his trousers down? He thought the Gendarmerie were coming for him. When they passed by he had an epiphany of sorts. He paid his men off and, he claims, spent the night dumping his, eh, product into the canal. He described it as pathetic; a scene from a bad opera.”
“Last night,” Brandy said. “I thought I'd seen everything. Now I've heard it.”
“Oh, it's stranger still. Fournier has always made it plain I was his enemy. And, for years, I wondered why he hated me so. His mother, it seems, wanted him to be a priest – and he took that out on me. Now he thinks he's been called.”
Brandy gawked across the courtyard at Fournier, still at Felix's side. “He's giving up dealing to be a priest?”
“He's given up drugs,” Trevelyan said. “The priesthood, eh, is a matter between Fournier and the Lord. But, ah, he has offered a ride. Shall I tell him we're ready?”
For the first time Brandy noticed the object in her hand, Luis' little worn book. When Aimee spotted him and ran, Brandy somehow wound up with it. Only now did she flip through the book's pages. A quizzical expression crossed her face.
“Brandy,” the priest asked again, “shall I tell Fournier we're ready?”
“Not yet.” She joined Aimee at the ambulance and held up the book. Luis saw it and beamed. But, when he reached for it, she pulled it back. “It's in English,” she told him flatly.
“Quel?”
Brandy shook her head. “Oh, no.”
Ray peeked over his oxygen mask, saw Brandy's face, and laid back down. He knew the look. Thank God it was aimed at someone else.
“You can read English,” Brandy told Luis. “You've been reading English long enough to wear it out.” She wagged his Shakespeare at him. “That means… you speak English.”
He looked innocently from Brandy to Aimee, and back, then smiled. “Yes,” Luis said with perfect clarity. “Of course.”
Aimee's mouth fell open. “Vous… parlez anglais?” She swore; and repeated it in English.
“I never said I didn't.” He pointed at her. “You said I didn't speak English.”
“I did not think you could. You left me translating for you all night.”
“I didn't ask it of you.”
“You didn't trust us?” Brandy asked.
Luis' smile faded. “After five years in prison, you too would be slow to trust. Besides,” he added, nodding at the cot, “Ray was not friendly when we met last night.”
Ray groaned at something Soliveres did then peeled back his mask. “I'm sorry,” he told Luis. Both managed weak, pained smiles as the medics continued to paw at them.
“Well, you're not in prison anymore,” Aimee told Luis.
Aldric said the ambulance could wait no longer. He offered the women a chance to kiss their men au revoir and they wasted no time in doing so.
“Behave yourself,” Aimee told Luis.
“Where is the story in that?”
Brandy kissed her fiancé's forehead and whispered, “I do love you, Ray.”
“Should we get married, after all?”
“Yes. Yes! But you need to hold on.”
“No worries. After last night, I want no part of being dead.”
Brandy nodded her understanding, then confided in him, “I used to feel too much. Now, I just feel so much!”
They climbed from the van, assisted by Trevelyan and, of all people, Fournier. The ex-drug dealer, less foreboding with eyes swollen from crying, escorted the women and the injured priest to his car.
On-lookers, from the village, neighboring farms, passing motorists, had gathered. They'd filtered in behind the emergency vehicles and were blocking the egress. Realizing no gendarmes remained to remove them, Aldric implored the chief for help. Dupont, tugging his mustache, chased them back.
Aimee and Brandy, in Fournier's car, watched the ambulance enter the throng. “C'est fini?” Aimee asked. Brandy mulled the question, one she actually understood and, despite her tears, smil
ed. “The night is over, Aimee. The horrible night is over. But no, thank God, it's not the end. Life is just beginning.” Fournier's BMW followed the van over the drawbridge and away.
The crowd turned back to the burning ruins; chattering, laughing, crying. Some stared in wonder. Some shook their heads at the tragedy. A handful secretly wished they'd witnessed the events first-hand. But dotted throughout the crowd were those few who, though they neither knew nor cared to know the details, were certain of the inspiration for the chaos. They crossed themselves, kissed their rosaries, quietly prayed, and could be heard to whisper, “La vengeance des templiers, les chevaliers de l'ombre.”
They were witnesses, they knew, to the vengeance of the accursed Templars; the knights of darkness.
About the Author
Doug Lamoreux is a father of three, a grandfather, a writer, and actor. A former professional fire fighter, he is the author of four novels and a contributor to anthologies and non-fiction works including the Rondo Award nominated Horror 101, and its companion, Hidden Horror. He has been nominated for a Rondo, a Lord Ruthven Award, and is the first-ever recipient of The Horror Society's Igor Award for fiction. Lamoreux starred in the 2006 Peter O'Keefe film, Infidel, and appeared in the Mark Anthony Vadik horror films The Thirsting (aka Lilith) and Hag.
Other Books by Doug Lamoreux:
Corpses Say the Darndest Things: A Nod Blake Mystery
The Melting Dead
Dracula's Demeter
Apparition Lake (with Daniel D. Lamoreux)
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