by Harvey Click
“He’s a Longevital,” Azura said.
“What does that mean?”
“It means he gave himself a treatment he found in one of his old alchemy books. He’s almost immortal, almost but not quite. If you shot him with bullets they wouldn’t kill him, not unless they were made of Hermesium.”
“What’s Hermesium?” Joe asked.
“It’s some weird alloy ancient alchemists invented. If you don’t have Hermesium you’d have to cut off his head or burn him up or something like that. A Longevital can live just about forever if they renew their treatments every hundred years or so. Daddy claims he was born in 1760 and took his first treatment in 1820, but I can’t say for sure.”
“He needs to go to a hospital,” Shane said. “He’s just barely breathing.”
“They wouldn’t know what to do for him,” Azura said. “I know what to do, and I know it’s not safe to move him. The rest of you can leave if you want, but I’m going to stay here and nurse him till he’s better.”
“How long will that take?” Joe asked.
“I don’t know. A couple days at least.”
“Shit,” Nyx said. “Those demons aren’t going to give us a couple days.”
“Yes they will,” Azura said. “Come out to the barn with me and I’ll show you.”
She got her slender blue wand from her bedroom, and they followed her partway to the barn but stopped about thirty feet away, afraid to go any closer. The sliding door was wide open, and they saw demons standing in there or sitting on the floor, staring out malevolently at them.
Azura stood just a few feet outside the doorway and pointed her wand at a listener. “You there, come out here and kneel at my feet,” she said.
Slowly and reluctantly, the listener waddled out into the yard and knelt at her feet. Azura reached out and patted the top of its slimy bald head. “You’re a pretty one, aren’t you?” she said. “Would you like to be my favorite?”
Nyx touched the hilt of her sword and said, “This is gonna get ugly real fast.”
“Now you,” Azura said, pointing her wand at a grimsnuffer.
It snorted like an angry horse and stood there staring at her without moving.
“You heard me,” she said. She gave the tip of her wand a quick shake, and the grimsnuffer fell to the barn floor with a sharp shriek. “Now come out here crawling on your hands and knees before I turn you inside-out.”
The grimsnuffer crawled out on its hands and knees and lay prostrate on the ground by her feet.
It took about half an hour, but eventually all the demons were out in the yard kneeling or lying on the ground in a circle around her.
“Now take a close look at my friends,” Azura said. “Their names are Joe, Nyx, Lucky, Shane, and Amy. I’m your queen, and you’re my subjects, and these people are my very best friends. You shall respect them and protect them, and you shall never ever harm them. Tell them now that you’ll never harm them.”
The demons let out a variety of squeaks and moans, and the babbleboons chattered some incoherent gibberish.
“Good,” Azura said. “A good queen loves her subjects, and I love all of you. I’ll show you my love now by giving you permission to go to the bunkhouse and eat whatever’s left in there. Don’t let a scrap go to waste, and when you’re done eating go back in the barn and behave yourselves.”
She turned her back on them and walked toward the house without even glancing back to see if they were obeying her command. But they were. They thronged their way into the bunkhouse, and soon there was the sound of flesh ripping and teeth chewing.
***
“What are we going to do with these goddamn bodies all over the house?” Nyx asked.
“Drag them into an empty room,” Azura said. “Tomorrow I’ll hack a couple of them into pieces so I can feed my demons.”
The men dragged the Nephilim into one of the empty bedrooms. “In this heat they’ll be stinking like hell tomorrow,” Joe said.
“They already stink,” Lucky said.
Nyx and Amy scrubbed blood and gore off the walls while Azura nursed her father. The men repaired the doors and then screwed brackets into the walls so they could lay bars across them later.
“We better clean up those bones in the backyard before somebody drives by and sees them,” Joe said.
Lucky got the tractor out of a shed, and they threw bones in the wagon. There were plenty more of them in the bunkhouse, and gathering them wasn’t pleasant because of the flies and stink. They hauled them a quarter mile back into the desert and dug a big hole to bury them in.
They returned to the bunkhouse and collected the swords and other weapons. There were fourteen swords plus two more in the house that had belonged to the broad-shouldered woman and the other mercenary who had been killed during the demon attack. Bill’s other two ops, the ones who’d supposedly been watching the church last night, were missing in action along with their swords.
The weapons were splattered with gore and some of the scabbard belts had been damaged by the demons, so they sat on the back porch for a couple hours cleaning weapons and repairing scabbards. Pretty soon Amy and Nyx came out and helped.
“These swords aren’t worth a whole lot if there’s no one around to use them,” Lucky said.
Joe frowned and said nothing.
“What I’m getting at is, we can’t pull this off without more people,” Lucky said. “What’s our next step, just hang out here until we all get killed?”
“The rest of you can find a motel if you want to,” Joe said, “but I’m not going to leave that girl alone with her father tonight. If there’s an attack she’ll probably get killed before she can get her demon friends out of the barn. I’m hoping Bill’s recovered enough tomorrow so we can move him, and if he’s not then she’ll have to fend for herself.”
“He belongs in a hospital anyway,” Nyx said.
“You plan on calling an ambulance?” Lucky asked.
“Maybe Godson won’t send us any more Nephilim tonight,” Joe said. “We killed twenty-five of them already, maybe he doesn’t want the rest to get killed.”
“We killed more than twenty-five,” Nyx said. “I know damn well I killed at least ten up there on the roof.”
“I was counting them,” Joe said. “I spent two hours picking up their bones, so I guess I know how many there were.”
“You’re probably right he won’t send any more,” Lucky said. “Tonight it will probably be humans.”
“That’ll be a nice change,” Nyx said. “My social life has been pretty limited lately. I’m gonna go have a nap.”
“We should all take naps this afternoon,” Joe said. “We probably won’t be getting much sleep tonight.”
When they were done they carried the weapons up to the room where the ammo and spare rifles were stored. Shane wanted to have a shower and wash his dirty clothes, but his other clothes as well as Amy’s were still out in the shed where he’d dropped them behind the Jeep. He went out to get the bags, and when he was returning to the house he saw the sheriff’s car pull into the driveway.
Shane set down his bags and stood there. The sheriff and a female deputy got out of the car and slowly approached him. They both had their hands close to their side arms but didn’t draw them, even though Shane had a sword hanging from his right side and a pistol from his left.
When they got close enough to talk the sheriff said, “Good afternoon, Mr. Malone.”
Shane didn’t say anything. The sheriff was older than he expected, maybe seventy, but he looked trim and healthy and his gray eyes were bright and alert. The deputy looked quite a bit younger and was rather pretty in a sort of elfin cat-like way. She didn’t have the cold, hard look of a law enforcement officer; she looked a little nervous but her expression was pleasant, as if she was pleased to see him and not too worried about the weapons hanging from his belt.
“I’m Jack Roamer,” the sheriff said, “and this is Deputy Murdock. Is your wife well?”
&nb
sp; Shane nodded.
“I’m very pleased to hear that,” Roamer said. “What about your daughter?”
“I don’t know,” Shane said. “She’s at a place called the Church of Love and Serenity. Somebody named Godson kidnapped her, and I can only hope she’s well.”
Roamer nodded. By now Joe, Lucky and Nyx had come out and were standing behind him, and he turned and looked at them.
“All those guns and swords you’re wearin’ are makin’ us a little nervous,” he said. “Maybe if you’d stand in front of us so we can see you better we’d all feel more comfortable.”
Joe and the others came forward to stand with Shane, but they didn’t remove their weapons.
“How’d you find me?” Shane asked.
“Plain old-fashioned police work,” Roamer said. “And if an elderly small-town sheriff can find you, it’s a pretty good guess the FBI can too. If I was you I’d pack up and get out of here before they do that.”
“Are you working with them?” Shane asked.
“Nope. They seem to be workin’ for the other side. They’ve concocted some yarn about your wife killin’ her brother and kidnappin’ her own baby, so if they find her you can be sure they’ll arrest her.”
“And what do you think happened?” Shane asked.
“I think the people at that cult kidnapped your baby and have her out there. Why they did it I don’t know.”
“What do you plan to do about it?”
“I got some ideas but I’d rather keep ‘em to myself.”
“Are you planning to go in there with a warrant?”
“I do have a warrant, but the people livin’ out there have already demonstrated they’re not likely to be served a warrant in a peaceable manner.”
“Then I guess you plan to bring your Irregulars with you,” Shane said.
“I expect you’ve been talkin’ with Jim Blaine,” Roamer said.
“Well, I’ve got some bad news for you, sheriff. You and your Irregulars are probably going to get killed.”
“We’re expectin’ some shooting.”
“There will probably be plenty of that, but guns aren’t what I’m talking about. They’ve got demons out there. Some of them can fly through the air, and you can’t kill them with bullets. One single demon bite will kill you.”
“I’ve heard gossip about these things, but I believe it’s just old wives’ tales,” Roamer said. “I know they have some deformed-looking people out there because I’ve met some of ‘em. But they’re just people, they’re not demons.”
Azura and Amy were standing on the back porch listening, and Shane motioned for them to come out. Sheriff Roamer touched the brim of his cowboy hat when they approached, and Deputy Murdock gave them a pleasant smile that looked nothing like a law-enforcement smile.
“Azura, would you mind showing these people your pets?” Shane asked.
She looked confused. She grabbed Shane’s shirtsleeve, led him some distance away, and whispered in his ear. “Do you want me to have the demons kill them?” she asked.
“No. I want you to tell them that these are friends.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Roamer and Murdock followed the others to the yard in front of the barn, and Shane told them they’d better stand back a little ways. He slid open the door and looked inside. It was dark in there, but he could dimly see them. Most of them weren’t in their stalls; they were sitting or standing on the floor staring out.
“What’s that you got in there?” Roamer asked. “Is that some kind of livestock?”
Azura smiled proudly and switched on the lights.
Chapter 20
Joe knew the others were waiting for him to make a decision. He had spent much of his life working outside the law and generally wanted nothing to do with it. But some lawmen were good people, and he thought maybe Roamer was one of them. He could tell a lot by looking at a man’s eyes, and the sheriff’s gray eyes looked steady and honest.
“You’ve got your plans and we’ve got ours,” Joe said. “I guess it makes sense to put them on the table to see if they can fit together.”
“Agreed,” Roamer said.
“But first we gotta get one thing straight,” Joe said. “When this is over, if we’re still alive we’re going to get on the road and leave, and we don’t want anybody coming after us or looking into our business. No matter what happens, you’ve got to promise you won’t report us to the FBI or anybody else. It’s got to be like we were never there. Either you promise that or it’s no go.”
“We promise,” Roamer said. “When this is over I’ll have enough explaining to do without trying to justify why I was working with the Malones or the rest of you.”
Joe could see by the sheriff’s eyes that he wasn’t lying. “Okay, then we better go inside and talk this out,” he said.
They sat at the dining room table, and Azura went to the kitchen to make coffee. Joe talked first, but he didn’t want to discuss their plan until he heard the sheriff’s plan, so instead he talked about the demon attack and last night’s Nephilim attack.
“So we’re pretty damn wore out,” he said. “And tonight we need to keep our eyes open for another attack.”
“Maybe tonight’s the last night you’ll have to worry about that sort of thing,” Roamer said. “I’m makin’ my move tomorrow at 2:00 p.m. Saturday’s a good day because nobody’s workin’, and 2:00 p.m. gives my Irregulars time to eat their lunch and think about whether they want to back out.”
“I was thinking tomorrow was Friday,” Lucky said. “I’ve lost track of time out here.”
“You oughta trade in that stupid pocket watch for something that tells the date,” Nyx said.
“How many of these Irregulars are coming with you?” Joe asked.
“I’ve got twenty-five who say they will, but after they’ve had some time to think about it I’m expectin’ maybe about fifteen or twenty. Whatever your plan is, I want it to wait until I’ve initiated my own. I’m going to drive out there at two o’clock with the Irregulars driving behind me. They’ll park on the road outside the compound and wait while I drive up to the door. I’ll knock and if they don’t let me in I’ll speak to ‘em through a bullhorn and tell ‘em I have a search warrant.”
“They’ll kill you,” Joe said.
“Maybe so. If they do, then my Irregulars will come in shootin’. But not before. I was a lawman for thirty-five years before I retired, and I never took a bribe or shot a man unless he pulled a gun on me first. I maybe broke a few rules here and there, but I didn’t break any that mattered. And I don’t intend to start doin’ that now.”
Joe felt admiration for Roamer. The sheriff knew he was probably going to die tomorrow, but his eyes were calm and resolute. They were the eyes of a warrior.
“You won’t change his mind,” Murdock said. “Believe me, I’ve tried.”
“If your men try to drive in there with their cars they’ll all get shot,” Joe said. “If you get killed I want them to stay where they are and call us immediately. We got a big armored bus with a battering ram on front to knock down the door, so we’re hoping we can get inside the citadel and do most of our work in there. There’s a stand of piñon about a mile east of the church. We’ll be hiding there with our demons ready, and if we get the call we’ll send them in and a few minutes later we’ll follow them. If your Irregulars want to go in there with us, they better get on our bus.”
Roamer nodded and finished his coffee. “Well then, we best be getting’ back to town,” he said.
Joe, Shane, and Lucky brought down the sixteen swords with their scabbards and put them in the trunk of Roamer’s car. Joe shook Roamer’s hand and said, “Good luck.”
“Good luck to you folks too,” Roamer said. “Mañana.”
He smiled at Amy and Azura, touched the brim of his hat, then got in his car and drove away.
***
Jack Roamer drove without saying anything. He was thinking about the
Native American named Joe and wondering why he trusted him. It was something about the eyes. Most people could lie easily with their mouths, but not many could with their eyes.
“You’re going to get killed, Jack,” Doris said. “I’m asking you one last time to change your mind, and this time I’m saying please.”
“Nope. I intend to get her baby back and end the blight on this town, but I’m not going to go in there shootin’ till I give ‘em a chance to settle this in a peaceful manner.”
“They’re not peaceful.”
“I know that.”
“I’m not much for crying,” Doris said, “but I sure feel like doing some of it right now.”
“I don’t intend to get myself shot tomorrow, but if it happens I don’t want to spend my last night listenin’ to somebody cry.”
“How would you like to spend it?”
He glanced over at her and was glad to see she wasn’t crying. In fact she seemed to be trying to smile.
“Well, a good night’s sleep wouldn’t hurt, but I don’t sleep worth a damn these days,” he said. “Mostly I sit up and play solitaire.”
“If you’re not expecting to sleep, maybe you wouldn’t mind too much if I spent the night with you,” she said.
He looked at her and smiled. “There’s nothin’ in this whole world that would make me happier,” he said.
***
They ate dinner early but didn’t have much appetite.
“Tonight we keep three people up on the roof watching while the other three sleep,” Joe said. “Me and Nyx and Lucky can do first watch or second, it don’t matter.”
Shane was dead tired and he knew Amy was too, so he said they’d prefer second watch. They’d already had their showers, so they headed up to their room, but before they got there Azura motioned them into Bill’s room.
The transformation was hard to believe. The swelling was gone, his skin had returned to its usual sickly white color, and his breathing sounded regular.
“His wounds are almost healed,” Azura said. “There’s new pink flesh with the skin already growing over it. I think he’ll come out of his coma tomorrow, maybe even tonight.”