Vic Lords had been right. I was dealing with something else here. Something legendary.
The Hooded Man’s bone feet clacked on the marble as he strolled towards me. ‘I've been known by many names over the centuries,’ he told me. ‘The Reaper, Death, Charon, The Boatman, The Rider of the Pale Horse. Believe it or not, I used to be feared once. Admired. Valued. Of course, that was before the Man Upstairs phased me out and turned me into a… a bloody halloween costume!’ He swung his scythe and lopped the top off a four-feet tall candlestick. ‘When I think of all that I did for Him… swinging my sickle, reaping great clusters from the vine. And the work I did here in London during the Black Plague…?’ He kissed the tips of his bony fingers with his lipless mouth.
As he continued to advance on me I did what I could to placate him, hoping to buy myself enough time to come up with a plan. ‘I hear you, pal,’ I said, ‘the bloke’s got no class.’
‘You’ve got that right!’ agreed the Hooded Man. ‘And it used to be so classy! Picture yourself sat upon a hand-carved wooden barge as I stand before you, punting your soul across the River Styx, transporting you to your final judgment.’
‘Sounds great,’ I replied. ‘You know what I got? The old golden elevator.’
‘Christ, I hate that thing!’ he spat. ‘Golden lifts, golden staircases, golden bloody chariots! What’s next, golden jet planes? Golden rocket ships? What is it with Him and gold? Ever since He modernised He’s become bling obsessed!’
‘Progress, eh?’ I said, offering him a conciliatory shrug as he continued to back me into a corner.
‘I tried to keep up, I really did,’ he went on. ‘Tried to move with the times. I even offered to trade the scythe in for a chainsaw, but He was having none of it.’
It’s a terrible day when even Death's depressed. This Millennium, man.
‘I get that you’re upset,’ I told him, ‘but why are you making people kill? I thought your job was to collect souls, not claim them.’
‘That was the old way,’ he replied. ‘When death was comfy and quaint. I decided I needed to try something different. Something more fitting for these times. So, I take the initiative now. I don't wait for things to happen anymore, I grab the bull by the horns!’
He sounded like a madman; worse, like a contestant auditioning for The Apprentice. ‘Can’t you just let things be?’ I asked. ‘Why get involved at all? Why not just move on with your life? Hit the links. Go on a cruise. Do a Sudoku.’
‘No!’ he roared. ‘I’m going to get His attention. I’m going to make Him see I’ve still got it. I’m going to get my job back!’
I cast a quick glance to Stronge, who stood rooted to the spot still, like a pawn awaiting a game of chess.
‘You used a dead kid to murder a man,’ I told the Hooded Man. ‘What do you think God's going to make of that?’
‘Don’t be so squeamish, the boy was already dead. Besides, I needed to make a grand gesture. God doesn’t notice the details, there are too many souls on this Earth for Him to be a micromanager. He only cares about the big picture now, and that’s what I’m giving Him – something worthy of His attention. Something biblical!’
This was beginning to turn into a real Ted Talk. ‘You’ve lost it,’ I told him. ‘You really have.’
‘I just wanted to get in His good graces,’ the Hooded Man pleaded. ‘Surely you of all people should understand that?’
He had a point there. We were both chasing the same goal to some degree, the only difference was that he was off his rocker. Being stuck in limbo had really done a number on this feller. Was that going to be me one day I wondered? Gone loopy from being trapped in a dimension I didn’t belong?
‘We’re nothing like each other,’ I told him, as much for my sake as his. ‘I help people. You only help yourself.’
His skull seemed to smile, though I’m not sure how. ‘I can see the contents of a man's soul, Mister Fletcher, and yours… yours is not so pure.’
‘It’s clean enough,’ I replied. ‘Now are you going to put my friend back to normal or are you and me going to have a falling out?’
It was all bluster, really. I’d rather have been anywhere but in that church giving the large to the Grim Reaper himself, but I had to stand tall. Stronge stood there, pale and lifeless, her very existence on the line. I’d led her into this mess and I was damned if I wasn’t going to lead her out of it. I’d made up my mind; tonight I was the ferryman, and I was boating the other way.
The Hooded Man rapped the wooden part of his scythe on the floor as if to say, “That settles that then,” then he raised the large, curved blade and presented it like a giant metal frown. ‘Take one last look at your surroundings, Mister Fletcher, because this is as near to heaven as you’re ever going to get.’
He brought down the scythe and I dodged it with a hair to spare. He swept it in a horizontal arc next, and I only managed to pull clear of that one by sucking in my gut. We went on like that for a little while, me bobbing and weaving while he carved up the place. Pews were scarred, a donations box obliterated, a bowl overturned, spilling communion wafers everywhere (or “Jesus crackers” as I like to call them). Each time he missed me I lunged at him for a jab, but no amount of welterweight boxing was going to upset the personification of death itself.
Soon enough my luck ran out and my futile struggle came to an end. The Hooded Man surprised me by using the wooden part of the scythe (the “snath,” Google tells me) to hook my legs out from under me and deliver me to the ground.
Wallop.
I landed hard on my tailbone, but before I could voice my displeasure, I saw the Hooded Man’s fatal farm tool come driving down on my neck. Somehow I found the wherewithal to defend myself, reaching for the back of a pew and grabbing the first thing that came to hand: a holy bible.
The Reaper’s scythe bit into the book and made it about as far as Second Corinthians. Because of the angle, he was only able to employ the back part of the blade (the “rib” – thanks again, Google), so thankfully he didn’t slice right through.
‘Help me!’ I shouted, as the Hooded Man pushed down on the blade some more and cleared his way to Ephesians.
‘Who are you calling?’ he asked. ‘Her?’ His hollow eye sockets flicked to Stronge, who stood there statue-still, jaw slack.
‘You're just going to let this happen?’ I screamed. ‘You're going to let this fruitcake do me in, is that it?’
The Hooded Man put his full weight on the scythe, pushing the blade all the way through to Hebrews. ‘Or is it the other one you’re calling? Your Uncanny friend, the witch’s familiar?’
The blade split open the book of John. The only thing standing between me and my maker now were John’s Epistles, a flimsy bit of correspondence stuffed into the back of the bible to bump up the page count. ‘Come on!’ I yelled. ‘What are you waiting for?’
‘No one's coming to help you, ghost.’
It was certainly starting to look that way. I had one last chance to get myself out of this before I wound up deader than Sean Bean. ‘My life for hers!’ I croaked, my eyes shooting to Stronge.
The rib of the scythe punched through the last book of the bible and into my throat, pressing down on my windpipe hard. I got one hand under it, but that would only buy me a few extra seconds. I swatted at the Hooded Man’s leg with my other hand, but the best I could manage was to ruffle his robes.
‘What are you doing?’ he mocked, as I clawed desperately at the hem of his raiment. ‘Do you really think you can kill death?’
‘No,’ I squeaked. ‘But he can…’
The Hooded Man turned to see a celestial glow shooting out from the church’s confession booth, and then its curtain open in one swift swipe.
I'd chosen this arena for a reason.
21
Adonael the angel stood there in his bleach white suit, shoulders thrown back, looking genuinely fierce. By his side he held a sword, polished to a mirror finish. It was the seraphim sword, the one I�
�d apparently allowed to be burned up by witchfire during my tangle with the soul feaster. The same one he was holding over my head like the, well... sword of Damocles, adding its “destruction” to my already lengthy list of sins.
‘You little shit,’ I cried, seeing the sword intact, and in mint condition no less.
‘Next time don’t play with things that don’t belong to you,’ he replied.
The Hooded Man watched Adonael as he ascended the altar steps and approached Stronge, who stood there zombified still, eyes dead as a halibut’s.
Adonael turned to me. ‘I can return her from the brink, Mister Fletcher, but know this: my intervention here—an intervention that you have called upon—breaks the conditions of our bargain. Once this is done, I am taking you Upstairs. Do we understand one another?’
‘It’s a fair cop,’ I said.
It was worth it. I’d had my life and then some. My raggedy soul for Stronge’s was about an equitable deal as I could imagine.
With an agreement settled, Adonael placed a hand on Stronge’s shoulder and immediately her face flushed pink. She gasped and sucked down about five minutes of unbreathed air, then collapsed to the floor like a puppet cut from her strings. She coughed, spluttered, and fouled the air with some choice profanities.
‘Kat, are you okay? Speak to me!’
‘I can’t believe you smashed the antidote, you prick,’ she wheezed.
I smiled. She was back.
During all of this, the Hooded Man simply stood by and watched, his expressionless, skull face making it impossible to tell what he made of Adonael’s intrusion. Was he angry? Scared? Gently amused?
Adonael looked to the Hooded Man, then to me. ‘I’m going to dispatch this wretch now,’ he said.
And with that, the angel pounced at the Reaper, his sword singing a high, swift tune as it cleaved the air. The Hooded Man stalled Adonael’s attack with his scythe and the curved blade shivered and rang like a tolled bell. The two of them fought, sword to sickle, metal clashing, sparks flying.
It was a hell of a sight to see.
The Reaper and the angel, black against white, yin and yang, circling each other like a swirl of squid ink in a butter churn.
The two of them continued to lock horns, raining down on one another with their blades, each of them giving as good as they got.
‘I’m going to clip your wings, angel!’ hollered the Hooded Man, swinging his scythe and drawing a swatch of white cloth from the angel’s suit jacket.
‘I don’t have any wings, you freak!’ Adonael replied, cracking the Hooded Man in the skull with the pommel of his sword and sending him reeling.
It turned out the angel was a bit tasty after all. This was no traffic warden. This was no parole officer. This was a gladiator.
The pair of them continued to give each other a proper drubbing. Standing there, watching them go at it, I started to feel like a bit of a third wheel. I considered grabbing Stronge and doing a runner, but I knew that would only end up compounding my problems. I couldn’t keep running forever. Soon enough I was going to run out of road.
Adonael dealt the Hooded Man a crushing blow that sent him staggering into the baptismal. The Reaper looked down at the ragged cleft in his robes and arranged his skull into a grimace. He was hurting. The angel took a step forward to deliver the death blow, but didn’t reckon on the Grim Reaper being a bit of a wrong ‘un.
‘Watch out for that—’ I shouted, but I was too late.
The Hooded Man reached into a pocket of his robe, scooped out a handful of grave dust and blew it into the angel’s eyes.
It was a move straight out of the Big Book of Dirty Tricks, but Adonael, being an apple-polishing boy scout, didn’t see it coming. Instead, he coughed and clawed at his eyes as though he’d been pepper sprayed, his sword ringing from the marble altar as it slipped from his hands. While he was busy with that, the Hooded Man swept his legs from under him, dropped to one knee, and hooked the blade of his scythe under the angel’s chin, drawing a bead of blood.
The Reaper let out a slithery laugh. ‘If this doesn’t get His attention I don’t know what will…’
He went to yank back the blade and crop off Adonael’s head, but just as his arm tensed a shot rang out, quickly followed by five more.
Stronge.
She stood beside me, smoking gun in her grip, hands steady as a rock.
Not that her efforts amounted to anything. The bullets rattled around the Hooded Man’s ribs and shot out of the other side, leaving him completely unharmed. He was as indestructible as Tom Cruise's confidence. All Stronge managed to succeed at was lightly aerating the dread spectre of death.
Wait a minute...
Spectre.
A spectre is a ghost.
And I know how to hurt ghosts.
The Hooded Man shook off Stronge's distraction and returned to the matter at hand, raising his blade to lop off Adonael’s big, dumb head.
I had one more roll of the dice. One more chance to make this right. Moving quickly, I yanked the baptismal font off its pedestal, heaved it over my head and dumped it onto the Reaper like an ice bucket challenge.
He screamed. Screamed like a Munch painting. Screamed like a hog being tied for market.
Ghosts hate holy water, or at least the ones with faith do. It has no effect on me because I’m not devout, but the Reaper… he was right out of Revelations.
The water dissolved the Hooded Man’s skull like an Alka-Seltzer dropped into a glass of drink. I saw right through the top of his cranium to a pulsing black brain, which fizzed and popped as the holy water continued its acid burn through the remains of his head.
He wasn’t done yet though.
With a final gasp, the Hooded Man thrust out a hand and slipped it, phantom-like, through my chest. Now it was my turn to gasp as his bony fingers closed around my heart.
‘Die,’ wheezed the Hooded Man, as the holy water burned through to the hinge of his jaw and left it swinging like a pendulum.
The old hand around the heart trick was one I’d played on countless bastards. It didn’t feel good to wear the shoe on the other foot though. It didn’t feel good at all.
I felt my knees buckle and the world begin to turn to black soup.
I looked to Adonael, but he lay there clutching his neck and coughing.
I looked for Stronge but my eyelids were too heavy to find her.
Sleep fell on me like a guillotine.
Then, CRASH.
The giant, free-standing crucifix came toppling down, striking the Hooded Man and pinning him beneath its weight. I was delighted to feel his hand withdraw from my chest, and even more delighted to see it lay flat on the altar, fingers splayed and still at last.
I looked up to see the cross-toppler looming over me. ‘The power of Christ compels thee,’ said DCI Stronge.
22
The way Adonael saw it, it was unclear whether it was really the Grim Reaper we’d banished. Was the Hooded Man who he said he was, or was he just some demonic entity with a screw loose and a penchant for waxing poetic? Me, I’m going with the former. Looks better on my CV.
Either way, the job was done and I was riding high. There was one thing bugging me though...
‘I can’t believe you lied to me about the sword,’ I said.
Adonael made slits of his eyes. We were sat on the front steps of the church, invisible to the world, watching an ambulance drive away with Stronge in the back. She’d wanted to walk home if you can believe that, but I insisted she get herself properly checked out. It’s not every day you die and come back to life. I’ve been around the block a few times, and even I’ve only had it happen the once.
I looked back to the sword on Adonael’s hip. ‘I’m just saying it’s not very godly is all.’
‘What would you know about godly?’ he grunted.
‘Well, let me see,’ I said, stroking my chin. ‘I saved the souls of the Hooded Man’s victims… oh, and I saved your life too.’
&
nbsp; Rescuing an angel from the jaws of death. That had to be worth a few Brownie points.
‘The way I see it,’ he replied, ‘it was your detective friend that saved my life when she toppled that cross. And the only reason that happened was because I loosened it from its moorings the first time we came here.’
‘—And the only reason that happened was because I shackled you to the cross in the first place.’
His nostrils flared at the memory. I had him over a barrel, we both knew it. After all, if he was really going to cart me off to the afterlife, we’d already be well on our way by this point.
‘In any case,’ he grumbled, ‘you still have a lot of work to do before your account is anywhere near the black. A lot of work.’
I grinned. ‘Who's keeping track of my finances anyway? The Big Man?’
‘I keep the tally, Mister Fletcher. The Lord Almighty barely knows you exist. You really think He has time to keep track of the likes of you? You're my job, and one of these days I’m going to close the books on you. Rest assured, this is merely a stay of execution.’
‘What good’s an execution when I'm already dead?’
‘A reprieve then. But if you put one foot wrong…’
‘Yeah yeah, helter skelter to Hades, I get it.’ I stood up. ‘Oh, one last thing before you go, just a quick one... what does God look like?
‘That is not for you to know,’ he replied.
I chuckled. ‘You’ve never even met him, have you?’
‘Of course I have!’ he barked.
‘You’re lying, Adonael. A lying angel. No wonder you got the shitty stick and wound up with me on your books.’
I visited DCI Stronge first thing next morning. It was the second time I’d seen her laid up in a hospital bed, and I very much hoped the last.
A doctor had diagnosed her symptoms and checked her in with that most perennial of Hollywood afflictions; exhaustion. Little did she know her patient had been pumped full of magical poison and brought back from the brink of death by an avenging angel. To be fair though, even House M.D. wouldn’t have figured that one out.
Something Rotten: An Uncanny Kingdom Urban Fantasy (The Ghosted Series Book 2) Page 13