by Ian Dyer
Their silence was good enough for the Sheriff.
10
The sheriff moved slowly to the door, his huge weight and the stuffy heat dragging him down. Once he was out in the main hallway that had doors running along both sides, he adjusted his shirt and flicked back his straggly locks of grey hair. He wanted to look his beast for the sweet but yet vulnerable Mrs Depor.
Jameson opened the door and greeted the middle-aged woman that stood before him. Her face was long and smooth. Eyes full of wisdom and love and a mouth that demanded attention. In a crowd she could blend in easily but on her own she had a beauty that the sheriff could not pinpoint. Once the pleasantries were over he ushered the child minder into the station and with a nod and a semi caring smile lead the children in after.
He had no words of strength for the kids. He neither had them nor did he care for them. The children had to learn what had happened. They had to learn what men can do. Even men that you loved.
The office now fell silent, quieter than the deepest darkest cave. The atmosphere was harsh, full of knives and unsaid words of love and of hate. The children were ushered in, all five of them staring at the floor. The girls stood behind the boys and each one of them had their hands crossed in front of their stomachs. Their red eyes, glazed and soar told the tale of many a shredded tear. Their father, sat in the cell directly in front of them, began to shed his own.
With an audible click in his throat as he swallowed he spoke to his now lost family.
‘You all must hate me?’ He whispered but their eyes remained upon the floor.
Mrs Depor coughed behind her raised hand and her eyes scanned the kids and with a burning look that the Devil himself would have been proud of, she stared hard at both their father and his murderous lover.
For a while the three of them looked blankly at each other; not knowing what to say or how to say it. Guilt was a strange mistress and John was in her bed now. He wanted to tell them how sorry he was but didn’t have the guts to do it. They didn’t want his pity nor his apology. Al his children wanted, his dear sweet kids who hadn’t done anything to deserve what he had done, was their mommy back. But that aint gonna happen and John placed his dirty shaking hands on the cold iron bars of his cell. He pleaded for them to look at him, sent out messages with his mind but to no avail. He heard the woman in the cell next to his, a woman he had plotted with and fucked utter some caring ‘it will be okay’ nonsense but he didn’t hear it. John was too far away, lost in his own madness, seeing flashes of memories in his mind of all the good times. For there were good times. Seeing his wife pregnant, knowing that he would be a dad not just once but five blessed times. The day of their marriage, their first kiss and the first time they made love beneath the half-moon outside in the fields. Maybe this was punishment enough for John. Maybe not.
Looking over the scene that he had set in motion, the sheriff stood in the doorway, his huge frame leaning against the door frame. He was neither saddened nor pleased at what he was seeing. He knew what must be going through Johns mind, could see it in his eyes. But the children were harder to read. Their eyes had remained locked onto the floor. He took in a deep breath.
‘Have you children nothing to say to your father? He aint long for us now.’
Both Mrs Depor and Cathy looked harshly at the Sheriff. He had spoken out of turn but the fat old lawman cared little.
‘Do you not have an apology for your children, John? Do you not care a jot for them?’
John sobbed openly and like his kids locked his eyes upon the cold, concrete floor.
‘I have no words of comfort for them Jameson.’ John paused seeing images of the boys hurt in scraps or his girls petrified of a dangling spider, ‘I never have.’
Mrs Depor leant over to the five children, her brow beginning to shine as the sweat built up. She whispered something to them and almost in unison they looked up from their dead gaze and looked at their father.
John opened his mouth to utter some heartfelt apology but the words couldn’t come out. He stood there like a fish; mouth open, bobbing for air. He tried a second time and a third but the blank stares from his children stopped them in their tracks.
The Sheriff pushed himself free of the door frame and as he went to enter his own office a knock at the door made him jump.
11
Ten minutes is a long time. It doesn’t feel like it, but it is. A life time of misery can be caused in just that short time. Lives can be taken and, on the other hand, lives can be made. For a Watchman days of planning can all be for a brief ten minutes of gun fire and blood. Stephen had seen this many times. Had dished out ten minutes of pain and torment many a time and as he kneeled upon the floor weeping into his blood drenched hands he wandered how many more he would have to go through before his time was up on this earth.
Jonah, the gun that had been with Stephen since he turned from a young boy into a man, was slung to the side of him. Discarded almost. It’s dark, cold metal frame was wet with the blood of its latest victims and its barrels, the guts of the weapon, emanated a deep green glow. Jonah had eaten well today. Jonah, as Patience had warned, had gotten the better of Stephen and the bodies that surround the Watchman were a testament to that.
He remembered knocking the door. Waiting outside in the blinding heat for the door to open and for him to take the lives of Cathy and John. Their souls were needed for better things and Stephen needed to act fast. But there had been a voice in the back of his mind. A small voice but a vibrant, forceful one. He had tried to ignore it but that hadn’t worked and the voice grew stronger. It reminded the Watchman of his tutor, how he had sounded, all throat and spit. You either listened to what he said or you faced the lash. The voice in Stephens mind threatened the same. It uttered sentences that he couldn’t make out at first and even though he stood at the doorway for no more than thirty seconds the voice in his mind made the time feel a lot slower than it had been. Thirty seconds dragged out to feel more like thirty minutes as Stephen tried to shake the voice from his head. When the door finally opened and the Sheriff stood before him the voice became more than just an annoyance, it became whole. It just simply became, like water becomes ice. Stone becomes sand.
Kill him! Kill the fucker!
Jameson had smiled and went to greet him; outstretching his arm and handing the hero traveller his hand
Don’t take it. Don’t take the hand of the man you hate. Enemy!
Before Stephen could think otherwise he had drawn Jonah, the gun with a soul, the gun that had become whole, aimed and fired. Stephen remembered seeing a small red flower open up in the sheriff’s forehead, the grin still on his face and moments later
Ha! Ha fucker!
the back of the sheriff’s head exploding all over the door and the side walls of the court house. Jameson fell from the doorway his face landing hard upon the wooden surround. Dark red blood, almost black, ran from the open wound in the back of the Sheriffs head. In his hands Jonah began to throb, pulse with life. The whole was becoming more than whole now.
Move in Stephen. Take them all. I wants them all. Do it before its gone.
The voice was Stephen and Stephen was the voice. Jonah had done what the witch had warned. He should have listened to the old girl in the rickety hut. But Jonah had been too quick.
You aint seen nothing yet
Slowly, like a man in control, Stephen moved in. Like a ghost floating through a haunted church Stephen moved into the office. He hadn’t heard the screams coming from all parties nor did he care for them. He couldn’t remember what Mrs Depor had been doing, nor the kids for that matter - all he cared for was seeing to John and Cathy.
They deserve it Stephen. Use me. Use all of me
It was Jonah. Jonah had taken over. He controlled the Watchman now and his blood lust, his need for harvesting souls was insatiable. He gave up trying to control it, his minds calming words fell on deaf ears.
He moved through the office ignoring the five children and their mind
er and focused his attention on the two criminals locked in the cells. As he spoke to them, Stephen remembered his voice being quiet, without humour or concern. His mind was far off from what he was doing and what he was saying but somehow he had control over it; somehow he could utter the words he wanted as well as those of Jonah.
‘Your lives are coming to an end.’
Cathy screamed, her mouth almost swallowing the cell she was in, her eyes squinting shut with the effort, ‘You are no better, you delusional fuck. I know what you are! I have seen your kind before!’
Stephen shook his head letting the words go in one ear and straight out the other.
John had spoken next but Stephen couldn’t remember what he had said. It was lost in the red mist that Jonah had brought with him.
‘You two are filthy murderers who do not deserve to walk on the green lands or the yellow wastes of this world. Your souls shall join those of many others and be used as food for the Bitch herself.’
Cathy could only watch as the gun was raised and then aimed at her head. Behind him, Stephen could feel the fear that was rising in the children and there was something else. A yearning for more. More blood. More souls for the bastard Jonah. All around them the air grew hot, stale, the scent of death and cordite filling their nostrils.
‘If you are looking for tears Stephen, if you are looking for fear, then you are looking at the wrong woman. I care little for those kids, I cared little for Ellen. All I care for is my John and you can go fuck yourself for all-.’
But her words had been cut short. The blast from Jonah echoed around the small office and the bullet it released tore through her face, shredding skin and tearing out teeth as it went. She fell to the floor hard, blood pissing from her skull. It sounded to John as she tried to say something but it was lost in the blood gurgling from her destroyed mouth and throat. The children as well as Mrs Depor screamed in terror but they did no try to escape. They were scared stiff stuck to the spot, their legs turned to jelly, and their guts twisting in fear.
The Watchman remembered back, remembered pointing his gun at John, seeing his tears, seeing his fear, seeing his soul. The gun in his hand pulsed as the soul from Cathy rushed into its barrels. But its appetite was insatiable.
‘I am sorry for what I have done, Stephen. I cannot begin to tell you how bad I feel.’ John sucked in a huge deep breath and turned his attention to the crying children huddled in the corner. ‘I hope one day you can think better of me my children. I hope one day you will think back to your dad and say only good things about me.’
The ex-deputy looked back to Stephen and gazed into his deep dark eyes and in that moment he knew that Cathy had been right.
‘You are what they say you are, aren’t ya? I can see it in yer eyes. Should have seen it before. A killer knows a killer. Fuck it, fuck you and the whore bitch that…’ But again Jonah’s single barrelled bark brought silence to another and John’s headless body slumped forward like an old sack of potatoes and leant against the iron bars.
And then the world went completely red and he knelt now, in the blood and gore of those he had slain and Stephen reached over and grabbed hold of a small teddy bear that one of the children had been concealing under her dress. It was tatty and covered in blood. Their father had died quickly. How he would have enjoyed killing him slowly, giving him the same treatment as the Quint brothers had given his poor wife. Scanning the room he threw the bear back into the lifeless hand of the child it had come from. The souls of Cathy, John and the Sheriff had filled Jonah and Stephen could feel it pulsing with a deathly beat. He had assumed Jonah was well fed and would leave well alone, but Stephen had been wrong. The voices, the controlling voices started to take over again, powerful, stronger than last time. They cried out for more. More souls for Jonah, more treats for Petra!
And he was unable to control the guns strong will. He had turned quickly and in one fluid, deathly, evil motion, destroyed the lives of six other harmless souls. He was killing without a care. The children tried to hide between the legs of the corpse of the woman that had taken care of them over the last couple of days but she could protect them no longer. Stephen out of pure instinct halted his deathly tirade when he went to reload Jonah. He looked at the weapon and smiled at it. Stephen remembered that. How easy death would come to the ones that he hunted. As if he had never stopped to reload, the Watchman carried on with his deadly tirade and now, kneeling in the blood of six children, their minder, two criminals and the Sheriff he could feel the power coursing through his veins.
12
He stood up from the gore covered floor. Jonah was holstered; his appetite had been sated. Stephen walked across the slippery wooden floor his boots leaving bloody trails like footprints in the deep snow, the footfalls on the bare floor boards echoed loudly in the quiet office. He marvelled at the lifeless fat legs of the Sheriff hanging over the threshold as he left the Court House. Not being careful and using his own feet he pushed and kicked the body of Jameson well beyond the line of sight of anyone passing and closed the door. Stephen wasn’t surprised to see the road out front empty.
His tally was building up and so too was his awareness that sooner or later the good people of Rockfall would cotton onto his ways and set a mob upon him. Hopefully he would be long gone by then. Exiting the shade of the Court House he winced at the harsh sunlight pouring into his eyes, they began to water almost instantly. He was reminded suddenly of his training, of the words that were beaten into him on a daily basis – Don’t trust in hope, trust in the now – Don’t trust in hope, trust in the now – on and on he would have to say it until his throat was dry and his tongue swollen. He would have to write it down, not on paper, but in the dirt and mud of the training yard under the watchful eye of his master, Yarik. But Yarik was dead now, heeding not the words he trained.
Stephen wiped the tears from his eyes with a dusty, blood stained sleeve and walked over to the water well. He was thirsty but the thought of using that old contraption didn’t sit well with him so he decided just to lean against the cool rock, his head flopped forward and his arms crossed about his chest; waiting for his next order. The dust whipped around his feet and the wind whistled through the gaps of the buildings. Last night those same buildings looked like rotten teeth, but now, in the light of day they looked pathetic; ready to fall with but the slightest of strong winds.
And then he knew what would happen to this town – it would be lost to the desert. Beaten to death by the sand and its end was coming. Coming fast. Stephen was but a minor illness compared to the fatal disease that approached.
He caught some voices carrying on the wind so he moved away from the well back toward the Travellers. But as he walked, he lowered to save his eyes being torn out by the sand, he got the feeling that something wasn’t right, something was in fact trying to undo everything he had done here. He looked about, expecting to see – Black Sorcerer – something, anything; but he was alone except for the wind and the rocks and the road.
We have a problem, Stephen.
‘What is it?’
The witch! She is up to something but I don’t know what.
‘So?’
The wind howled some more and the old rickety signs above the stores creaked and groaned like laughing hyenas. The crows had fallen silent but their cries had been replaced by the nervous screams of the animals.
She has fooled us both, Stephen! She means to have it! She means to have it all and by doing so will bring about the end of me, the end of you and the end of your dreams. Run! Run as if old Lud was at yer heels!
Stephen didn’t know who Lud was, but it didn’t matter. With the wind at his back he headed back out into the fringes of the desert and back to the wretched hovel of Patience.
Mashed Up Blackberries
1
He ran until his legs burnt and his chest heaved. But he didn’t stop. His shirt was drenched with sweat, his body hotter than a bread oven. But he didn’t stop. His leapt over rocks, slid down into sh
allow valleys and kicked through razor bush. He was on the same path that Susie had been on earlier and he skated down the steep side of the shallow valley where the lavender crew. His feet were more stable and his fast motions made it easier to run down the valley wall that Susie’s had been.
Reaching the bottom he stopped – small drops of blood were surrounded by uneven boot prints. Two sets, excluding whoever’s blood that was soaking into the dry rocks. The boots headed right, towards the old hut.
Jonah was drawn and Stephen stood in silence for a few moments, gathering his breath, composing his thoughts. The wind wasn’t as strong out here, the valley walls were a protection for the time being, but soon the storm would turn this valley into a wind tunnel. The clouds above raced by, the usual bleached white sky was a now a deep blue – like an ocean floating above the land. Stephen followed the two sets of boot prints.
Reaching the broken gate he hunkered down; scanning the front of the hut for any signs of movement. There were none. It was as he had seen it the day before but this time there was a stench hanging. It was familiar to Stephen – it was the stink of death.
He walked around the gate and into the front garden of the witch. The long grass brushed past him and his foot falls crunched on the hardpan. His heart was pounding, the hut seemed larger, a black mountain against a blue sky; he swallowed hard his throat a chasm of nails.
‘Whats you doing here, Cowboy?’
Stephen twisted to his left and raised his gun.
Tommy stumbled back his arms flaying like a chick trying to fly for the first time. His right foot hit a jutting rock – he teetered – was about to fall, but managed to right himself raising his arms high.
‘Don’t shoot me, don’t shoot me, don’t shoot me.’
‘Who is in there?’ Stephen demanded.
‘Susie. Just Susie. Well Susie and the wit… I mean Patience. She’s gonna be my girlfriend in a bit. Please, mister, don’t shoot me.’
Stephen lowered his gun and moved slowly and quietly toward Tommy. He gestured for the boy to lower his arms. ‘Don’t worry, Tommy, I aint gonna shoot you.’