Torn Realities

by Post Mortem Press

  And he recalled another fire, the memory of which his mind tried to dodge and duck, but he couldn't avoid thinking about it: the humiliation of that night would be with him forever. They'd picked their season so carefully: high summer, and no rain in two months. The undergrowth of the Wild Woods was tinder dry, even the living tree caught the flame easily. He had been flushed out of his fortress with streaming eyes, confused and fearful, to be met with spikes and nets on every side, and that . . . thing they had, that sight that could subdue him.

  Of course they weren't courageous enough to kill him; they were too superstitious for that. Besides, didn't they recognise his authority, even as they wounded him, their terror a homage to it? So they buried him alive: and that was worse than death. Wasn't that the very worst? Because he could live an age, ages, and never die, not even locked in the earth. Just left to wait a hundred years, and suffer, and another hundred and another, while the generations walked the ground above his head and lived and died and forgot him. Perhaps the women didn't forget him: he could smell them even through the earth, when they came close to his grave, and though they might not have known it they felt anxious, they persuaded their men to abandon the place altogether, so he was left absolutely alone, with not even a gleaner for company. Loneliness was their revenge on him, he thought, for the times he and his brothers had taken women into the woods, spread them out, spiked and loosed them again, bleeding but fertile. They would die having the children of those rapes; no woman's anatomy could survive the thrashing of a hybrid, its teeth, its anguish. That was the only revenge he and his brothers ever had on the big-bellied sex.

  Rawhead stroked himself and looked up at the gilded reproduction of The Light of the World that hung above Coot's mantelpiece. The image woke no tremors of fear or remorse in him: it was a picture of a sexless martyr, doe-eyed and woebegone. No challenge there. The true power, the only power that could defeat him, was apparently gone: lost beyond recall, its place usurped by a virgin shepherd. He ejaculated, silently, his thin semen hissing on the hearth. The world was his to rule unchallenged. He would have warmth, and food in abundance. Babies even. Yes, baby-meat, that was the best. Just dropped mites, still blind from the womb.

  He stretched, sighing in anticipation of that delicacy, his brain awash with atrocities.

  *****

  From his refuge in the crypt Coot heard the police cars squealing to a halt outside the Vestry, then the sound of feet on the gravel path. He judged there to be at least half a dozen. It would be enough, surely.

  Cautiously he moved through the darkness towards the stairs.

  Something touched him: he almost yelled, biting his tongue a moment before the cry escaped.

  "Don't go now," a voice said from behind him. It was Declan, and he was speaking altogether too loudly for comfort. The thing was above them, somewhere, it would hear them if he wasn't careful. Oh God, it mustn't hear.

  "It's up above us," said Coot in a whisper.

  "I know."

  The voice seemed to come from his bowels not from his throat; it was bubbled through filth.

  "Let's have him come down here shall we? He wants you, you know. He wants me to--"

  "What's happened to you?"

  Declan's face was just visible in the dark. It grinned; lunatic.

  "I think he might want to baptise you too. How'd you like that? Like that would you? He pissed on me: you see him? And that wasn't all. Oh no, he wants more than that. He wants everything. Hear me? Everything."

  Declan grabbed hold of Coot, a bear-hug that stank of the creature's urine.

  "Come with me," he leered in Coot's face.

  "I put my trust in God."

  Declan laughed. Not a hollow laugh; there was genuine compassion in it for this lost soul.

  "He is God," he said. "He was here before this fucking shit-house was built, you know that."

  "So were dogs."

  "Uh?"

  "Doesn't mean I'd let them cock their legs on me."

  "Clever old fucker aren't you?" said Declan, the smile inverted. "He'll show you. You'll change."

  "No, Declan. Let go of me--" The embrace was too strong.

  "Come on up the stairs, fuck-face. Mustn't keep God waiting." He pulled Coot up the stairs, arms still locked round him. Words, all logical argument, eluded Coot: was there nothing he could say to make the man see his degradation? They made an ungainly entrance into the Church, and Coot automatically looked towards the altar, hoping for some reassurance, but he got none. The altar had been desecrated. The cloths had been torn and smeared with excrement, the cross and candlesticks were in the middle of a fire of prayer-books that burned healthily on the altar steps. Smuts floated around the Church; the air was grimy with smoke. "You did this?"

  Declan grunted. "He wants me to destroy it all. Take it apart stone by stone if I have to."

  "He wouldn't dare."

  "Oh he'd dare. He's not scared of Jesus, he's not scared of..." The certainty lapsed for a telling instant, and Coot leapt on the hesitation.

  "There's something here he is scared of, though, isn't there, or he'd have come in here himself, done it all himself..." Declan wasn't looking at Coot. His eyes had glazed. "What is it, Declan? What is it he doesn't like? You can tell me--"

  Declan spat in Coot's face, a wad of thick phlegm that hung on his cheek like a slug.

  "None of your business."

  "In the name of Christ, Declan, look at what he's done to you."

  "I know my master when I see him--" Declan was shaking. "--and so will you."

  He turned Coot round to face the south door. It was open, and the creature was there on the threshold, stooping gracefully to duck under the porch. For the first time Coot saw Rawhead in a good light, and the terrors began in earnest. He had avoided thinking too much of its size, its stare, its origins. Now, as it came towards him with slow, even stately steps, his heart conceded its mastery. It was no mere beast, despite its mane, and its awesome array of teeth; its eyes lanced him through and through, gleaming with a depth of contempt no animal could ever muster. Its mouth opened wider and wider, the teeth gliding from the gums, two, three inches long, and still the mouth was gaping wider. When there was nowhere to run, Declan let Coot go. Not that Coot could have moved anyway: the stare was too insistent. Rawhead reached out and picked Coot up. The world turned on its head--

  *****

  There were seven officers, not six as Coot had guessed. Three of them were armed, their weapons brought down from London on the order of Detective Sergeant Gissing. The late, soon to be decorated posthumously, Detective Sergeant Gissing. They were led, these seven good men and true, by Sergeant Ivanhoe Baker. Ivanhoe was not a heroic man, either by inclination or education. His voice, which he had prayed would give the appropriate orders when the time came without betraying him, came out as a strangled yelp as Rawhead appeared from the interior of the Church.

  "I can see it!" he said. Everybody could: it was nine feet tall, covered in blood, and it looked like Hell on legs. Nobody needed it pointed out. The guns were raised without Ivanhoe's instruction: and the unarmed men, suddenly feeling naked, kissed their truncheons and prayed. One of them ran.

  "Hold your ground!" Ivanhoe shrieked; if those sons of bitches turned tail he'd be left on his own. They hadn't issued him with a gun, just authority, and that was not much comfort.

  Rawhead was still holding Coot up, at arm's length, by the neck. The Reverend's legs dangled a foot above the ground, his head lolled back, his eyes were closed. The monster displayed the body for his enemies, proof of power.

  "Shall we...please...can we...shoot the bastard?" One of the gunmen inquired.

  Ivanhoe swallowed before answering. "We'll hit the vicar."

  "He's dead already." said the gunman.

  "We don't know that."

  "He must be dead. Look at him--"

  Rawhead was shaking Coot like an eiderdown, and his stuffing was falling out, much to Ivanhoe's intense disgust. Then, almo
st lazily, Rawhead flung Coot at the police. The body hit the gravel a little way from the gate and lay still. Ivanhoe found his voice--"Shoot!"

  The gunmen needed no encouragement; their fingers were depressing the triggers before the syllable was out of his mouth. Rawhead was hit by three, four, five bullets in quick succession, most of them in the chest. They stung him and he put up an arm to protect his face, covering his balls with the other hand. This was a pain he hadn't anticipated. The wound he'd received from Nicholson's rifle had been forgotten in the bliss of the blood-letting that came soon after, but these barbs hurt him, and they kept coming. He felt a twinge of fear. His instinct was to fly in the face of these popping, flashing rods, but the pain was too much. Instead, he turned and made his retreat, leaping over the tombs as he fled towards the safety of the hills. There were copses he knew, burrows and caves, where he could hide and find time to think this new problem through. But first he had to elude them.

  They were after him quickly, flushed with the ease of their victory, leaving Ivanhoe to find a vase on one of the graves, empty it of chrysanthemums, and be sick.

  Out of the dip there were no lights along the road, and Rawhead began to feel safer. He could melt into the darkness, into the earth: he'd done it a thousand times. He cut across a field. The barley was still unharvested, and heavy with its grain. He trampled it as he ran, grinding seed and stalk. At his back his pursuers were already losing the chase. The car they'd piled into had stopped in the road, he could see its lights, one blue, two white, way behind him. The enemy was shouting a confusion of orders, words Rawhead didn't understand. No matter; he knew men. They were easily frightened. They would not look far for him tonight; they'd use the dark as an excuse to call off the search, telling themselves that his wounds were probably fatal anyhow. Trusting children that they were. He climbed to the top of the hill and looked down into the valley. Below the snake of the road, its eyes the headlights of the enemy's car, the village was a wheel of warm light, with flashing blues and reds at its hub. Beyond, in every direction, the impenetrable black of the hills, over which the stars hung in loops and clusters. By day this would seem a counterpane valley, toy town small. By night it was fathomless, more his than theirs.

  His enemies were already returning to their hovels, as he'd known they would. The chase was over for the night.

  He lay down on the earth and watched a meteor burn up as it fell to the south-west. It was a brief, bright streak, which edge-lit a cloud, then went out. Morning was many long, healing hours in the future. He would soon be strong again: and then, then--he'd burn them all away.

  *****

  Coot was not dead: but so close to death it scarcely made any difference. Eighty per cent of the bones in his body were fractured or broken: his face and neck were a maze of lacerations: one of his hands was crushed almost beyond recognition. He would certainly die. It was purely a matter of time and inclination.

  *****

  In the village those who had glimpsed so much as a fragment of the events in the dip were already elaborating on their stories: and the evidence of the naked eye lent credence to the most fantastic inventions. The chaos in the churchyard, the smashed door of the Vestry: the cordoned-off car on the north road, Whatever had happened that Saturday night it was going to take a long time to forget.

  There was no harvest festival service, which came as no surprise to anyone.

  Maggie was insistent: "I want us all to go back to London."

  "A day ago you wanted us to stay here. Got to be part of the community."

  "That was on Friday, before all this...this...There's a maniac loose, Ron."

  "If we go now, we won't come back."

  "What are you talking about; of course we'll come back."

  "If we leave once the place is threatened, we give up on it altogether."

  "That's ridiculous."

  "You were the one who was so keen on us being visible, being seen to join in village life. Well, we'll have to join in the deaths, too. And I'm going to stay--see it through. You can go back to London. Take the kids."

  "No."

  He sighed, heavily.

  "I want to see him caught: whoever he is. I want to know it's all been cleared up, see it with my own eyes. That's the only way we'll ever feel safe here."

  Reluctantly, she nodded. "At least let's get out of the hotel for a while. Mrs Blatter's going loopy. Can't we go for a drive? Get some air-"

  "Yes, why not?"

  It was a balmy September day: the countryside, always willing to spring a surprise, was gleaming with life. Late flowers shone in the roadside hedges, birds dipped over the road as they drove. The sky was azure, the clouds a fantasia in cream. A few miles outside the village all the horrors of the previous night began to evaporate and the sheer exuberance of the day began to raise the family's spirits. With every mile they drove out of Zeal Ron's fears diminished. Soon, he was singing.

  On the back seat Debbie was being difficult. One moment "I'm hot, Daddy", the next: "I want an orange juice, Daddy"; the next: "I have to pee".

  Ron stopped the car on an empty stretch of road, and played the indulgent father. The kids had been through a lot; today they could be spoiled.

  "All right, darling, you can have a pee here, then we'll go and find an ice-cream for you."

  "Where's the la-la?" she said. Damn stupid phrase; mother-in-law's euphemism.

  Maggie chipped in. She was better with Debbie in these moods than Ron. "You can go behind the hedge," she said. Debbie looked horrified. Ron exchanged a half-smile with Ian. The boy had a put-upon look on his face. Grimacing, he went back to his dog-eared comic.

  "Hurry up, can't you?" he muttered. "Then we can go somewhere proper."

  Somewhere proper, thought Ron. He means a town. He's a city kid: its going to take a while to convince him that a hill with a view is somewhere proper. Debbie was still being difficult.

  "I can't go here Mummy--"

  "Why not?"

  "Somebody might see me."

  "Nobody's going to see you darling," Ron reassured her. "Now do as your Mummy says." He turned to Maggie, "Go with her, love."

  Maggie wasn't budging. "She's OK."

  "She can't climb over the gate on her own."

  "Well you go, then."

  Ron was determined not to argue; he forced a smile. "Come on," he said.

  Debbie got out of the car and Ron helped her over the iron gate into the field beyond. It was already harvested. It smelt...earthy. "Don't look," she admonished him, wide-eyed, "you mustn't look."

  She was already a manipulator, at the ripe old age of nine. She could play him better than the piano she was taking lessons on. He knew it, and so did she. He smiled at her and closed his eyes. "All right. See? I've got my eyes closed. Now hurry up, Debbie. Please."

  "Promise you won't peek."

  "I won't peek." My God, he thought, she's certainly making a production number out of this. "Hurry up."

  He glanced back towards the car. Ian was sitting in the back, still reading, engrossed in some cheap heroics, his face set as he stared into the adventure. The boy was so serious: the occasional half-smile was all Ron could ever win from him. It wasn't a put-on, it wasn't a fake air of mystery. He seemed content to leave all the performing to his sister.

  Behind the hedge Debbie pulled down her Sunday knickers and squatted, but after all the fuss her pee wouldn't come. She concentrated but that just made it worse.

  Ron looked up the field towards the horizon. There were gulls up there, squabbling over a tit-bit. He watched them awhile, impatience growing.

  "Come on love," he said.

  He looked back at the car, and Ian was watching him now, his face slack with boredom; or something like it. Was there something else there: a deep resignation? Ron thought. The boy looked back to his comic book Utopia without acknowledging his father's gaze.

  Then Debbie screamed: an ear-piercing shriek.

  "Christ!" Ron was clambering over the gate in
an instant, and Maggie wasn't far behind him.

  "Debbie!"

  Ron found her standing against the hedge, staring at the ground, blubbering, face red. "What's wrong, for God's sake?"

  She was yabbering incoherently. Ron followed her eye.

  "What's happened?" Maggie was having difficulty getting over the gate.

  "It's all right...it's all right."

  There was a dead mole almost buried in the tangle at the edge of the field, its eyes pecked out, its rotting hide crawling with flies.

  "Oh God, Ron." Maggie looked at him accusingly, as though he'd put the damn thing there with malice aforethought.

  "It's all right, sweetheart," she said, elbowing past her husband and wrapping Debbie up in her arms.

  Her sobs quieted a bit. City kids, thought Ron. They're going to have to get used to that sort of thing if they're going to live in the country. No road-sweepers here to brush up the run-over cats every morning. Maggie was rocking her, and the worst of the tears were apparently over.

  "She'll be all right," Ron said.

  "Of course she will, won't you, darling?" Maggie helped her pull up her knickers. She was still sniveling, her need for privacy forgotten in her unhappiness.

  In the back of the car Ian listened to his sister's caterwauling and tried to concentrate on his comic. Anything for attention, he thought. Well, she's welcome.

  Suddenly, it went dark.

  He looked up from the page, his heart loud. At his shoulder, six inches away from him, something stooped to peer into the car, its face like Hell. He couldn't scream, his tongue refused to move. All he could do was flood the seat and kick uselessly as the long, scarred arms reached through the window towards him. The nails of the beast gouged his ankles, tore his sock. One of his new shoes fell off in the struggle. Now it had his foot and he was being dragged across the wet seat towards the window. He found his voice. Not quite to voice, it was a pathetic, a silly-sounding voice, not the equal of the mortal terror he felt. And all too late anyway; it was dragging his legs through the window, and his bottom was almost through now. He looked through the back window as it hauled his torso into the open air and in a dream he saw Daddy at the gate, his face looking so, so ridiculous. He was climbing the gate, coming to help, coming to save him but he was far too slow. Ian knew he was beyond salvation from the beginning, because he'd died this way in his sleep on a hundred occasions and Daddy never got there in time. The mouth was wider even than he'd dreamed it, a hole which he was being delivered into, head first. It smelt like the dustbins at the back of the school canteen, times a million. He was sick down its throat, as it bit the top of his head off.