Where Angels Fear to Tread

by Thomas E. Sniegoski

The child had slipped from her fuguelike state again, and he could feel her fear-filled eyes upon him.

  “Do not fear me, little one,” Dagon proclaimed, spreading his arms to show her the beauty of his naked form. “I have come to make this world a better place.”

  The little girl gasped, crawling to cower against the prone form of her parent as Dagon’s horns began to grow; curling long and beautiful from his bony forehead, a crown to his glory.

  The glory that he was now becoming.

  They would be coming for the power soon; Dagon had no idea who they were, but he understood why they would come.

  “So be it,” he growled, flexing the muscles of his powerful new form.

  He had shown them an example of his might, reaching down through the child conduit, to the observer who attempted to spy upon him.

  Dagon had horribly slain that one, but doubted it would do much to deter them. The power of creation was something to fight for.

  And he was perfectly willing to let them.

  Before slaying them all for such an affront to his godliness.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Remy watched as two of Delilah’s followers disembarked the plane, each holding the end of a blanket that contained the bloodied remains of Clifton Poole.

  “That’s it,” Delilah said, watching from the tarmac of a little-used runway at the small West Virginia airfield. “Carefully, now.”

  And just as she spoke, one of the men lost his footing, stumbling and dropping his end of the blanket.

  Clifton Poole’s body tumbled from its wrapping, landing at the bottom of the stairs in a broken pile.

  Delilah rolled her eyes and sighed with exasperation. “Please pick that up,” she said, pointing to the body. “We don’t need to draw any further attention to ourselves.”

  The two who had been carrying Poole’s corpse hustled to stuff it back inside the blanket and carry it to a waiting van.

  The side of the van said it was from a flooring company, and Remy noticed the two drivers staring at Delilah, mesmerized. She approached the driver’s side window of the van.

  “Be a pair of dears and dispose of that for me, would you?” she asked, blowing them kisses as, with a screech of tires, they drove away.

  Anything for their mistress, Remy thought with a scowl, especially if she has a piece of their souls.

  Remy stood off by himself, noticing that Samson and his family were standing on one side of the tarmac, while Delilah’s followers stood on the other. Remy wondered how this would work; if they were going to be fighting together, could one side actually depend upon the other?

  He caught the approach of Deryn out of the corner of his eye and turned toward her. She was pale and sickly looking, and she was still wrapped in her own blanket from the flight, even though the air was quite humid.

  “You okay?” he asked her.

  She smiled as she nodded. “I keep seeing him all torn up like that,” she said, and brought a hand to her mouth to stifle the tears. “And then I start to wonder how something like that is possible, and then . . . and then I realize that you’re . . . that all of you aren’t what you appear to be and . . .”

  The woman was on the verge of complete shock, the glimpse of a strange and brutal world being more than her human mind could comprehend.

  Remy stepped closer, using the voice of the Seraphim to calm her.

  “Now, let’s hold it together,” he said to her.

  She looked up into his eyes, and he willed her to calm down with his gaze.

  “Remember that Zoe needs you. She’s waiting for you, and you won’t do her, or anybody else, any good if you come apart at the seams.”

  He could feel her begin to relax, the nervous energy that her body was emitting dwindling down to the faintest of crackles.

  “This will all be over soon,” Remy said, and he pulled her close for a hug. “Just a little more craziness and it’ll all be done.”

  “A little more craziness?” she asked, and he felt a tremble go through her body as he held her.

  “I’m not sure how much more I can take,” Deryn said, letting herself be held by the private eye.

  She didn’t know what it was, but there was something about him; the way she felt whenever he was even close by. Remy Chandler made her feel safe, and she totally believed him that things were going to work out.

  Deryn had been on the verge of panic since her daughter’s disappearance, but after having met the man in Zoe’s drawings, and having spoken to him about finding her daughter, she had believed then that things were going to be okay.

  But that was all before she was taken from the motel.

  Her panic threatened to rise again, but the closeness to Remy Chandler helped her to keep it all under control.

  She knew things were not normal with the woman called Delilah, and with the people who seemed to worship her every word. To look at her, one saw a beautiful woman in her early thirties, apparently wealthy and very much used to getting what she wanted.

  But there was something else, something occasionally caught from the corner of the eye, something that hinted to Deryn that this woman was not what she appeared to be.

  That they all: Delilah, her servants, the blind man—Samson—and his children, and even Remy Chandler . . .

  They were all not what they appeared to be.

  But being held by the private investigator seemed to make everything all right.

  Deryn always suspected that her daughter’s odd talents, the ability to predict the future through her drawings, would take her to some interesting places; that the door to another world could possibly be opened to her.

  But she never imagined the door opening so wide.

  “How sweet,” a woman’s voice commented, and Deryn found herself stepping back from Chandler’s arms.

  And she immediately felt the effects of a world, far stranger than she ever imagined, begin to exert its influence upon her.

  “The cars are here and we’re ready to go,” Delilah informed them.

  Six black SUVs had silently appeared upon the runway, waiting for them.

  “All right,” Deryn said, starting toward where the trucks were parked.

  Delilah’s hand shot out as she passed, gripping her elbow in a hold so powerful that it made her wince.

  Remy had started toward them at seeing this, when Delilah specifically addressed Deryn.

  “We’re ready to go,” Delilah said again.

  Deryn didn’t understand.

  “Where are we going, dear?” the woman, who maybe wasn’t a woman at all, asked her.

  “I’m not sure I . . .”

  “Poole is dead, so we no longer have our Hound,” Delilah informed her. “But I believe your connection to him was likely enough to have left some kind of residual impression to where we should be going next.”

  Deryn looked at Remy, her anxiety starting to escalate. She wanted to be in his arms again, to feel as though everything was safe.

  “Think of your daughter,” Delilah commanded. “Think about how badly you want to hold her again.”

  She found herself doing exactly as the odd woman commanded, and found her head filled with the staccato images of a place she had never been, but where she somehow knew her daughter to be.

  When she opened her eyes, Remy was standing beside her, a look of concern on his face.

  But she was fine; she knew where her daughter was.

  “We need to go that way,” Deryn said, pointing toward an open gate far in the distance.

  The alarm wailed in the night, calling forth his followers from the safety of their beds.

  Dagon stood before the dwelling of Pastor Zachariah, as the sirens howled, and waited for the faithful.

  He held the child’s tiny hand firmly in his own, feeling the continued presence of a power that could very well reshape the world, pulsing within her fragile, human form.

  Dagon glanced down at her, sensing that it was no longer the child who controlled the little girl’s body, but the power of creation that had emerged, peeking out through th
e child’s eyes.

  This power, now coursing through his own form as well, had lain becalmed for countless millennia, watched over by holy men, protected, until the woman—the soul eater—had begun her search, and it had found refuge in a child’s body.

  Dagon saw the woman inside his mind, the one who was going to try to take his prize from him.

  She would fail.

  With new eyes that could see in darkness as clear as day, Dagon watched his followers come to him. The expressions on their faces were humorous to behold. They had no idea what they were looking at . . . what they were in the presence of.

  He raised his perfectly muscled arm and waved them closer.

  “Come to me, my faithful,” he said, his voice booming in the night like Gabriel’s trumpet. “Come, and stand before your god.”

  They moved closer, but not too close. They were afraid, and he could understand their fear.

  For he doubted that these mortals had ever stood before something so wonderful.

  Their frightened murmurings filled the air like insect song as he began to address his acolytes.

  “Be not afraid,” he told them, “for I mean you no harm.”

  Their chatter grew more intense, and then an older woman in a flowered nightgown stepped from the crowd.

  “What are you?” she asked, her voice raised in fear. “Where . . . where is Elijah? . . . Where is Pastor Zachariah?”

  The crowd murmured, not yet convinced that they were in the proximity of greatness.

  “I am your lord and god,” he told them. “The one you have prayed to for so many years.” He paused for a moment, smiling as he raised a perfect hand to the sky.

  “I am Dagon.”

  The crowd buzzed, and he basked in their fear, surprise, and adulation.

  “Where is the pastor?” the woman asked again.

  “He no longer exists,” Dagon explained. “He and I were one, but now only I am here.”

  The woman stepped back into the protection of the crowd.

  “You look like the Devil,” she said, and the gathering agreed.

  Dagon laughed at the superstitious lot, his laugh a booming sound that cleaved the silent night like a thunderclap.

  “Certainly you can’t be serious,” he said, his patience waning. “I have come for you—I have come to save you all.”

  “Everything I’d expect a devil to say,” the woman cried.

  Dagon was tempted to silence her, but knew that any act directed toward her would be seen as proof of her accusation.

  No, he had to show them the truth.

  He closed his eyes, feeling the power that coursed through his every muscle burn like the sun. They had to be shown the glory of what stood before them; the glory of what he was.

  A messenger was needed to proclaim his coming.

  The god growled as he reached out with his mind, taking hold of the one who would best serve his purpose, and calling him forth.

  The little girl gasped, her own eyes closing as he exerted his strength. The power within her crackled about her head, joining with his own.

  She looked up at him with large, vague eyes.

  “I will show them,” he told her.

  The crowd was growing anxious, and he could sense their fear and confusion increasing. He hoped what he had to show them would belay their concerns.

  The sound of a door opening behind him made Dagon smile.

  He listened to the creak of the porch beneath the weight of a footfall as a figure emerged from the house.

  Dagon stepped to the side, pulling the child along, and they both watched the figure sway on the top of the porch, preparing to descend.

  “It’s Elijah,” the woman proclaimed, and the crowd murmured enthusiastically.

  The young man looked out over the gathering. His clothing was stained nearly black with blood, but the crowd seemed not to notice. Nor did they see the jagged hole in his throat—until he began to awkwardly descend the porch steps.

  “Look at him!” somebody yelled.

  “Is that blood?” cried another.

  The crowd began to back away, but Elijah continued to stand before them, watching, his head tilted loosely to one side.

  It was suddenly eerily quiet in the compound.

  Dagon closed his eyes, reaching out to his puppet, manipulating brain functions and vocal cords for this, his most special moment.

  “I . . . ,” Elijah began, his voice horribly rough and gravelly. “I was . . . I was dead.” The young man raised his bloody hands for all to see, and then showed them the mortal wound torn in his neck.

  Dagon could feel the fear slowly turning to awe, and he knew he had them.

  He had them all.

  “But now . . . ,” Elijah croaked, “now I am alive.” He spread his arms. “Praise him. . . . Praise Dagon.”

  Dagon smiled.

  “Praise him!” somebody screamed.

  “Praise Dagon!” bellowed another.

  And soon they were all singing his praises, and he allowed his influence to slowly creep within each of them.

  They were his, body, mind, and soul.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Remy sat in the back of the black SUV as it sped down the dark West Virginia road.

  “We’re close,” Deryn said from the front seat, between Mathias, who was driving, and Delilah. “We’re really, really close.”

  Delilah placed a comforting arm around the mother, pulling her close. “And soon you’ll be holding your little girl in your arms again,” she said, leaning her head against Deryn’s. “And I will be holding mine.”

  Remy’s ears perked up, and he was about to ask what she had meant by that, when the first of the attackers spilled from the woods down onto the road. They came from both sides, many of them wearing dark clothing, their screaming faces seeming to float in the stygian darkness as they jumped into the path of the speeding vehicle.

  Mathias barely slowed as he plowed into the first of the fleshy obstacles.

  Tires screeched, and the windshield turned to a frosted red, ice tinged with crimson, before the air bag erupted from the steering column. The sound of impact was horrible; the screams of those hit even worse.

  Deryn was screaming too as the car spun and came to a neck-snapping stop.

  “Deal with this,” Delilah ordered her driver, before turning in her seat to look at Remy and at those beside him.

  Without question, they all left the car.

  Remy was torn as he heard the sounds of fighting from outside.

  “Go, angel,” she told him, her arms still around his crying client. “They need you out there. She’ll be perfectly safe with me.”

  Remy hesitated until the first blast of gunfire.

  “Go,” Delilah hissed, her eyes glistening in the darkness of the car.

  He pushed open the car door. It was chaos outside, Samson’s children and Delilah’s soulless warriors fighting together against a common foe.

  A woman wearing a hooded sweatshirt and torn sweatpants came at him with a kitchen knife. She screamed something unintelligible, thrusting the blade toward him. Remy moved aside, grabbing hold of her arm and twisting it enough so that she dropped the blade.

  “Fucking bastard!” she got out between screams of pain.

  But that didn’t stop her; she continued to fight, clawing at his face in her frenzy.

  He hated to do it, but he punched her, and blood sprayed from her nose as she at last dropped to her knees and fell sideways to the ground.

  “Nice one,” he heard a voice say, and he glanced over to see Marko grinning, just before Remy delivered a roundhouse kick to an attacker wielding a baseball bat. “Did you imagine maybe it was your wife or girlfriend when you did that?”

  The man’s words were meant as a joke, but they, like the current situation, just pissed him off.

  The Seraphim was eager to be free, as it always seemed to be these days, and Remy cut it some slack, letting it emerge enough to fill him with a warrior’s fury.

  And the hunger for battle.

  The ground was lit
tered with bodies; he did not take the time to identify each and every one, but he knew that some of Samson’s children, as well as Delilah’s minions, had fallen.

  But so had their enemy.

  He snatched up the baseball bat dropped by Marko’s fallen enemy, hefting it in his hand, and waded into combat.

  As he swung, blocked, and struck out with the weapon, his mind flashed back to an earlier time—a time when he fought on the side of the Almighty against those who had attempted to usurp His holy rule. Remy remembered the anger, and disgust, he’d felt for his enemy—those who had once been his brothers—and immersed himself in battle.

  The Seraphim was elated, attempting more and more to exert its influence, trying with all its might to persuade Remy to let it be completely free.

  It whined pathetically in Remy’s ear, telling him that the battle in which he now fought would be over in a matter of seconds if only he would let go.

  The temptation was great, as it always was, but Remy remained in control, letting his fragile human nature hold sway over the power of Heaven.

  The Seraphim was not in the least bit happy with this as it moved about the road, smiting its enemies with savage precision, but it knew that it must take what it was offered. Always holding out hope that someday it would be free, and that not a trace of the false humanity that held back its full essence would exist to suppress its holy might.

  It could dream, Remy thought as he smashed a man with his handgun across the face in a shower of teeth and blood.

  At least he could give it that.

  As the newest to face his angelic wrath dropped to the road in a twitching pile, Remy saw that others were running, abandoning the fight.

  Still at the ready, he stopped, examining the situation.

  Samson was in the process of picking up a squirming man and smashing him down onto the ground. Samson’s spawn and Delilah’s faithful watched as their enemies suddenly stopped their fighting, turning tail to disappear into the shadows of the woods around them.

  “Looks like they had enough,” one of Samson’s daughters, a young lady in her mid-twenties with a lime green Mohawk, proclaimed as she pumped her fist in the air victoriously.