The Devil's Heart

by William W. Johnstone

  "I can pick up on your thoughts, now," she said, smiling. "And yes, Sam, I am wearing panties."

  And she deliberately chose not to wear a bra. The thought popped into Sam's mind.

  "You see?" she said. "It's not exactly reading a mind as much as just guessing accurately what the other has done or is about to do."

  She wants me to kiss her. Sam sensed that mental push very strongly.

  "So do it, Sam. Before I change my mind."

  He stepped off the short distance between them with as much mixed emotion as when he first hurled himself out the open door of a plane, back in jump school. The one main difference being, he recalled, he did not have a hard-on back then.

  "How crude," Nydia whispered. She was slightly tense as his hands cupped her face.

  "We're going to have to do something about this new power of ours."

  "First things first," she said, her lips trembling as her hands found his lean waist and pulled him to her.

  Sam kissed her mouth, her throat, her neck, as their hips met in a frontal assault, as frenzied an attack as storming a beachhead.

  And then, as they both would later recall, events began happening as if they were really above it all, watching two distinctly different beings in the room.

  Her gown dropped to the carpet in a silken rustle of fabric, and his eyes became as greedy as his searching mouth. She pulled the waistcord to his robe and it parted. One touch from her hand and a shrug of his shoulders and robe made contact with gown on the floor.

  Her pantie was no more than a thin strip of almost diaphanous silk, the lushness of womanhood vividly outlined, a perfumed jungle resting at the completion of gently curving belly.

  "I am not perfection," she told him, thoughts mingling and meeting invisibly.

  "You are to me," he replied.

  She wore nothing except the gold cross, nestling between her breasts.

  His shorts joined her panties on the floor and they were content to stand naked in the center of the room, their lips touching gently, minds speaking volumes of silent words.

  "I can't believe it's wrong," she said.

  "Nor I."

  She ran her hand down his flat, ridged belly to grasp his maleness, fingers encircling the thickness. "Will it hurt me?" she asked, her voice throaty with passion and trembly from anticipation.

  And he knew she was telling him she was a virgin. "I … don't know."

  The bed seemed the most logical place to answer any number of questions, and they were soon there, without either of them realizing they had traversed the short distance.

  His lips found the hardness of nipple and his tongue brought them to jutting nubs of excitement, while his hand traveled over the silkiness of belly to touch the edge of pubic hair and beyond: touching, lingering, fondling the wet lips and extended clitoris, finally moving to caress and part the folds of her, entering the soul of womanhood while she breathed words into his mouth as they clung to each other, joined at the lips.

  She found his maleness, hard and eager, and with a knowledge that is inbred, began stroking him, finding to her astonishment and delight, the muscle of love thickening and hardening even more under her soft hand.

  She clutched almost frantically at him, whispering, "Now, Sam! Now!"

  He shifted on the bed and was between her legs, positioning himself. He gently placed the source of his manhood against the outer fold of woman and gently pushed, penetrating only a bit. She sighed under him, arching her hips upward, willingly asking for and receiving more of what she had desired since the moment of introduction only a few hours before.

  Sam slowly and with a tiny bit of pain pushed the length of him into the hot wetness of woman, then slowly withdrew. And from that moment on, it was a battle with no losers; a war of silk and fire and passion; an ageless confrontation between man and woman … but it was more than that. It was a time of pain and pleasure for the both of them as they dueled on the bed, turning the sheets into a satiny battleground, a mixture of scents, a tangle of flesh. It seemed to them to stop time, to halt the forward movement of that which is unstoppable except for that brief time between the cessation of the heart and the soul exiting the cooling flesh.

  Nydia began low whimpering sounds, shedding a few hot tears, not from pain or guilt, although one of those would come later, but from the knowledge, the signals her body was sending to her brain, that this deliciousness, this first time that would never again be the same, was about to end. Several small orgasms had shaken her, wavering almost sinfully through her, but as that one huge climax began its grip on her, she fought to hold on. But it was not to be. She grabbed almost too tightly at Sam's shoulders, pulling his mouth to hers as a feeling unlike anything she had ever before experienced ripped through her like the bow of an ice cutter charging through thick ice.

  Sam exploded within her, his juices mingling with hers, a volcanic eruption of fluid that spread its warmth around the silken walls of the ultimate entrapment of male and female.

  Nydia wrapped her legs around his and pulled him to her until it seemed there was only one person on the bed: a huge double-headed, many limbed creature. She shivered slightly as he softened within her, and she sighed as he withdrew from this battle. Not retreating, merely recouping resources. She kissed him, and he returned the touching of lips with a gentleness that was almost sad.

  And they slept. Together. And the two were not alone.

  Sam awakened once at the sound of a gentle knocking on the door. He fumbled for his clothes and padded barefoot to the door. The hall was empty, but two trays of food were beside the door. He took the trays in and placed them on the dresser. He wasn't hungry, and Nydia was deep in sleep. He crawled back into bed, and she nestled her warmth against him.

  The food was forgotten.

  "I have been blocked," Falcon said to Roma. "I cannot tell what is happening with Balon's son and Nydia. Is He interfering?"

  "Indirectly, I believe. Through Balon, I am sure. My daughter and Sam now have powers even they do not realize they possess. And I do not understand that. I have attempted to speak with the Master, but I have been unable to do so. That distresses me."

  "Roma?" Falcon lingered over the word, drawing it out as his mind raced. "Perhaps … yes! I sense the battleground has been marked; the Master of Light and the Prince of Darkness have finally agreed on something."

  "They haven't agreed on anything for thousands of years. Except Their mutual dislike of each other." She was silent as the implication of his words struck home. "You mean … you believe we are alone in this? That neither Master will interfere any further?"

  "For now, yes, I do. For how long … ?" He shrugged eloquently, then put a finger to Roma's lips, a gesture of caution. "But I believe this, darling: should we fail here, we are through on earth."

  She thought about that for a moment, her beauty marred by the ugliness of her deliberations. She laughed nastily. "Things seem to be repeating themselves. I'm beginning to believe our Master's sense of humor is equalled only by his lack of trustworthiness and loyalty."

  "I hope you know what you are saying, for I surely don't."

  "My sins—I hate that word!—have come home to roost." She smiled. "Isn't that a quaint expression? A colloquialism, really. I picked it up in Alabama, right after the American Civil War. Excuse me, the War Between the States. I plotted against Black Wilder more than twenty years ago. Someone in this house is plotting against me."

  "Not I!" Falcon drew himself to his full height, indignant that she would even think him guilty of such treason.

  She laughed darkly. "No," she said patting his arm, "not you, Falcon. Even for a warlock you have an inordinate sense of honor and loyalty. And we have known and liked each other for too many centuries."

  "Then … that leaves only …" He refused to speak the name.

  But Roma had no such reluctance. "Yes. My son. Black. He is … strange, even for us. And he is also young, ambitious, and, I have to admit it: he possesses my genes
and none of his father's."

  "But surely the young man realizes his power is not yet equal to yours; will not be until he leaves this life and assumes his true role in the ways of the arts." Falcon shook his head. "But … you are right. Black is … odd, even for us."

  Her gaze silenced him. "I don't wish to discuss my son's pederastic tendencies. It is not forbidden by our Master." She sighed and waved her hand. "But you are correct, of course. He does go too far at times. But I have had many offspring—some good, some bad." A thought sprang into her mind; a thought she did not share with Falcon.

  "If we are alone here," Falcon mused. "I wonder if the same applies in Whitfield?"

  "Probably. I feel Balon is there, looking after his precious Jane Ann. I never could understand what he saw in her. No tits."

  SIX

  "Explain a golem to me, Sam," Jane Ann said.

  They were in her home, after having spent hours with Miles and Doris, Wade and Anita. Tony and some of his friends from the Coven had been to the house, and had, in the vernacular of the young, trashed it, writing filthy sentences on the walls, stating plainly what they were going to do with Jane Ann.

  But Balon's Bible had not been touched. It sat on the small table like a sentry on duty.

  Jane Ann had cleaned up the house and painted over the nasty words and obscene drawings.

  "There is no such thing as a golem," Balon thrust his reply.

  "But that … creature standing in the corner in Miles's living room!"

  "Yes."

  "Then it is real?"

  "All things are real. Mythology is real. Dreams are real. Evil is real."

  "Sam … you're being vague."

  "In a sense. But really, I am telling you all that I can."

  "All right," she said after a time. "I think I see. If we believe in it, it is real. But if someone does not, it doesn't exist." She waved her hand toward the outside.

  "But … will they believe in it?"

  "Oh, yes. Be assured of that."

  "God must have a sense of humor."

  "He created humans, didn't He?"

  And the clock in the hall chimed its message: it was Friday. The horror was about to begin.

  Sam awakened with his arms full of soft, warm nakedness and his heart pounding. But he did not awaken with a start. He wondered why his heart was hammering so violently in his chest? He opened his eyes, looking around the dimly lit room. He saw the trays of food on the dresser and remembered bringing them in. Nothing else was disturbed. He listened but could hear nothing. He glanced at his watch on the nightstand and knew then what had awakened him. It was just past midnight. Friday. But what was so special about that? Friday? The day Satan is worshiped, of course.

  He gently brought Nydia out of sleep.

  "I love you," she whispered. "And I don't think it is wrong." She smiled. "And I must look awful."

  "No, you're beautiful." He picked up his watch. "Look at the time."

  "Oh, God! No wonder no one checked on us."

  "What do you mean?"

  "It's Friday. They would all probably be at the circle of stones, behind the house. I used to ask them what they did out there, but I would get such silly answers I finally quit asking. Something about star-gazing was what they finally settled on. I never did believe it."

  "Nydia? You're holding something back from me."

  "Yes."

  "Tell me?"

  "It … isn't time, Sam. I will. I promise."

  He thought of her statement in the four-wheel about knowing a lot about him. He shrugged it off. "You mentioned something about that circle of stones this afternoon while we were eating at the park. It triggered something in me then; the same thing happened now. There is something about a circle that is whispered about back in Whitfield—used to be, anyway." He paused. "Sure. Now I remember. Kids used to say that was where the Devil lived. That must be where Dad met the Devil. Oh, damn, Nydia! How much of this is real and how much is not? What in God's name are we supposed to believe and do? I don't know. I do know this: I want to see this circle of stones. We'll go out there tomorrow."

  "Are you out of your mind?"

  He ignored that, for he believed he just might be … for a number of reasons. "Can we see it from the house?"

  "Faintly. From that window." She pointed. "But you can't see it at night."

  He slipped from her warmth and blew out the small lamp, plunging the room into darkness. He opened the drapes. "Nydia," he called. "We can see it."

  "What do you mean?" She crawled from the big bed and came to his side, pressing against him. She gasped at the sight in the small clearing behind the mansion.

  It was torch-lit.

  "I've never seen that before," she said.

  "It's begun," Sam said flatly, without fear. And Nydia picked up on the firmness in his voice. "The nine days have begun."

  "Sam, what are you talking about? What nine days?"

  He looked at her in the darkness of the room. "Nine days, honey. We have … they have, nine days. Don't ask me how I know. I just know. And I'll tell you something else: my knowing scares the shit out of me!"

  In Whitfield, around the circle of stones, as behind Falcon House, the pledge was being chanted: "I renounce God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost."

  And in both places, the Beasts growled their approval.

  "I renounce and deny my Creator, the Holy Virgin, the Saints, Baptism, Father, Mother, Relations, Heaven, Earth, and all this world contains that is good, pure, and sacred."

  They lifted their arms straight out in front of them and screamed: "Praise the power of the Prince of Darkness. For only he is the true Master.

  "I give my body and mind to Satan. Praise be his name. My Master. None other than him. This I swear by all that is unholy."

  And the Beasts of Satan howled their agreement, their eyes wild, jaws leaking drool. The Beasts began dancing: an obscene hunching and howling, dancing to the beat of music they alone could hear.

  "Is there a gun room in this house?" Sam asked as they dressed. The drapes were closed, the room lighted. Somehow they both felt much more comfortable with the lights on.

  "Yes. Falcon enjoys shooting." She grimaced a sudden distaste.

  "What's wrong?"

  "He likes to see animals suffer. He's an expert shot, but I've overheard servants talking—down through the years—that he'll deliberately shoot an animal where it will take it the longest to die. He likes to listen to a wounded animal scream."

  "Nice fellow," Sam muttered. "The servants?"

  "You mean can we trust them? No, I don't think so. They have all been with Roma for as long as I can remember. Especially Jimmy Perkins. He's a sneak. That's not the right word. He's a zombie."

  "You may be more right than you think about that," Sam told her. "Come on—let's see this gun room. I want to see what Falcon has in stock."

  They walked down the dimly lit hall, walking quietly but not stealthily, in case they met someone unexpectedly and aroused suspicion. Nydia stopped him at a doorway.

  "The first of the guest rooms in this wing," she whispered. "This would be Adam's room. All the boys' rooms are on the left, girls' rooms on the right."

  Sam cautiously opened the door and looked in. The room was deserted. "You take the girls' rooms," he told Nydia.

  Only Mac and Howard were in their beds. When Sam tried to wake them, he could not. They were sleeping as if drugged. Which, he concluded, they probably were. Across the hall, four young women were in their beds: Judy, Lana, Linda, and Susan. Sleeping soundly. Too soundly. Sam shook Lana gently, then roughly. She could not be roused. He did the same with each of them; they could not be awakened. He noticed the heavy gold medallion on a chain around Susan's neck.

  "They're all drugged," he told Nydia. "I guess. From now on we'd better be careful what we eat and drink. I'll bet you those trays of food I found outside the door to our rooms were drugged; that's why no one checked on us.

  "Mother
always uses the buffet line when we have this many guests. At least that's been her routine in the past."

  "Routine can be dangerous," Sam said, remembering his training. "Lulls one into a false sense of security."

  Nydia smiled. "Yes, Sergeant."

  Sam slipped his arm around her waist and let his hand slip down to the curve of her buttocks. He gently caressed her.

  "Don't start something you can't finish," she said. "And here in the hall would be a perfectly dreadful place to be caught making love."

  Sam removed his hand.

  She stopped them before they entered the foyer they had to cross to get to the gun room on the second floor. "I just remembered something: Falcon has a reject room in the basement. He spends hundreds of dollars—maybe thousands—on guns every year. If there is the slightest flaw: a scratch on the stock, a tiny bit of bluing that's wrong, anything … he won't have it. Just throws it in the reject room and forgets it."

  "He doesn't return them?"

  "No, never."

  "That's the place for us, then. Take one of his favorite guns and he'd probably miss it. Where are the servants' quarters?"

  "That way," she said, pointing. "First floor, in the back."

  "Come on. 1 want to check there, too."

  The servants' quarters were all empty.

  "That answers another question," Sam said. "Come on, we'd better hurry." He wondered how long the ceremony at the circle of stones would last.

  "It breaks up just before dawn," she said, reading his thoughts.

  "Pretty good gimmick we have going," Sam said with a grin. "It may really come in handy before all this is over. I wonder how far we can project and read each other's thoughts?"

  "We'll try tomorrow." She tugged at his arm. "Today, I mean. Come on, let's get to the reject room."

  Sam selected a good shotgun and a high-powered rifle, then picked a pistol for Nydia. The weapons were all in good condition, except for needing cleaning and oiling. They were fine weapons, from old and skilled manufacturers. He stuffed his pockets with cartridges and had Nydia do the same. She was nervous, wanting to leave, but Sam wanted to prowl. He found a tarp-covered cache of camping equipment, loading them both down with shelter halves and blankets, rope and tent pegs. They filled two packs, then filled two smaller knapsacks. Finally Sam picked up two pairs of binoculars and steered Nydia toward the door.