Give the Devil His Due

by Blackwell, Rob

  “Would you stop hitting on her?” Quinn said. “She tried to kill me, you know.”

  “Oh, I’m not hitting on her,” Janus responded dismissively. “I’m out of the dating game. But sexy is sexy, and stabbing a zombie scarecrow clown through the brain is surprisingly hot.”

  “You’re a sick man, Janus.”

  His friend opened his mouth for a retort when the two doors in front of them opened. Two more zombie clowns stepped out, each one carrying the same kind of knife.

  “Oh, shit,” Janus said.

  Without missing a beat, Elyssa reached back and yanked the knife out of the dead clown's skull, putting her foot on his body so she could pull it free.

  “Get behind me,” she called, and both Janus and Quinn rushed to obey.

  For once, she didn’t appear focused on what Quinn might do to her. Instead, she held the knife in front of her like the expert she was.

  “Come and get it, boys,” she said and a smile crept onto her face. Quinn thought she looked like someone who had been sleeping for days and was only just starting to wake up.

  As she advanced on them, the doors behind them opened. Two more undead clowns stepped through.

  "You have the ones in front?" Quinn asked Elyssa.

  She nodded. The four clowns started giggling, an effect that was undeniably creepy.

  “At least it’s just four-to-three,” Janus said.

  At that moment, the two doors directly next to Janus and Quinn opened and two more clowns charged through.

  “You had to say something, didn’t you?” Quinn asked.

  All hell broke loose. Rather than waiting to be attacked, Elyssa sprinted to the two clowns directly in front of her. Quinn ducked the clown coming in from his side and rushed the two behind him. Meanwhile, Janus tried to dodge and weave away from the knives of the two clowns on either side of him.

  The two clowns near Elyssa both started laughing again and swung their large knives in her direction in unison, trying to slice her across the chest. She jumped back, avoiding their attack, and then brought her knife down on one of the clown’s hands, cutting it clean off. The wounded clown screamed and giggled at the same time — it was difficult to tell exactly which — and stared at his stump, which was now a mixture of blood and straw.

  His companion tried to slice at Elyssa again, aiming for her face. But she crouched down as she saw the blow coming, then sprang forward with her knife aimed directly at the clown’s chest. There was a satisfying ripping sound as she punched the knife directly into his stomach. The clown looked down and giggled.

  “You think that’s funny?” Elyssa said. “How about this?”

  She dragged her knife up the clown’s belly, making a loud tearing sound as she went. She saw bits of straw peeking out and the remnants of a faded flannel shirt underneath the clown suit. The clown kept laughing until it sagged against her knife, dead.

  Meanwhile, Quinn was circling the two clowns in the back, who were taking turns jabbing at their prey. Without a knife, Quinn was forced to wait for an opening. But he was patient. He wasn’t able to turn into the Headless Horseman anymore, but the former cavalry officer’s knowledge was still firmly implanted in his head. When outmanned and outgunned, the best strategy was to wait for an opponent to mess up.

  One finally did. The clown to the left, clearly tired of the parry-and-dodge game they were playing, charged Quinn, laughing as he came. It was exactly what Quinn had been waiting for. The clown effectively blocked his partner from attacking, leaving just one opponent for Quinn to fight. The maneuver was also relatively crude, a head-on assault with his knife held in front of him.

  Quinn easily dodged to the side and drove his body into the clown, slamming the attacking arm into the wall. The clown dropped his knife.

  The second clown tried to come forward while Quinn was occupied, but Quinn delivered a roundhouse kick to the first clown, knocking him back into the path of the second. Quinn felt exhilarated. He hadn’t changed form, but a part of him still clearly remembered how to fight like the Horseman. He picked up the knife on the ground.

  The two clowns started giggling as he moved toward them, but Quinn now felt like he had the upper hand, even if he was still outnumbered. The unarmed clown tried to punch Quinn, but he ducked and sliced his attacker’s arm as it went by. His opponent screamed and giggled, clutching his arm. The second clown tried to close in, but Quinn had decided his attackers were amateurs. He, on the other hand, was not.

  As the second clown came closer, Quinn held back the knife and flung it at the clown’s head. Like the stone throw that had saved Elyssa, his aim was perfect. The knife sailed through the air, hitting the clown right between the eyes. A giggle died in his throat.

  Not missing a beat, Quinn pushed the first clown out of his way and grabbed his knife from the second clown’s skull even as it started to fall backward toward the floor. Quinn turned to find the first clown closing in to deliver another blow, aiming for the back of Quinn’s head. But Quinn blocked the attack and jabbed his knife directly into the first clown’s throat. The move pinned the clown to the wall behind him. It didn’t even have time to give off a demented giggle.

  “Quinn, help!”

  Quinn turned to see two clowns circling Janus, his arms covered in blood. While Elyssa and Quinn had been dispatching their opponents, Janus had fended for himself. The former photographer was good at many things, but fighting wasn’t one of them. Fortunately for Janus, his attackers seemed keener on playing with him than trying to kill him. His wounds appeared mostly superficial.

  Quinn sprinted toward Janus and caught one of the clowns by surprise. Facing Janus, the clown clearly never heard Quinn coming, and looked down to see a knife point protruding from his chest.

  Just like me, Quinn thought, remembering his own death. He withdrew the knife and the clown slumped to the floor.

  While Janus watched one of his opponents die, the second took advantage of his momentary distraction. It circled behind him and grabbed him by the throat, hauling him backwards. The clown held his knife to Janus’ neck and started giggling madly. Quinn stepped toward the clown.

  “Please don’t let me be killed by a fucking clown,” Janus said.

  Quinn just smiled.

  “Hey genius,” he said. “Why don’t you look behind you?”

  The demented clown jerked his head backwards just in time to see Elyssa ram her knife into one of his eyes. It thrashed out wildly, releasing Janus and falling to the ground.

  Elyssa was staring at the thing in triumph when she noticed Quinn coming toward her. He held his knife out and appeared to be aiming right at her. He shouted something, but she didn’t understand him.

  Just as he seemed about to stab her, he pushed her out of the way. She fell against the wall and watched as Quinn plunged a knife into a clown who had been sneaking up behind her. It was the clown she had first attacked, the one whose hand she had cut off. When he had fallen down earlier, she had forgotten he wasn’t dead in the confusion that followed. She looked at Quinn, who had now saved her life twice.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  He looked back and held her gaze.

  “You thought I was attacking you,” he said. “I saw it in your eyes.”

  “Can you blame me?” she asked.

  He thought about it for a moment.

  “No,” he said finally.

  Quinn stared in shock at the mass of bodies around them. Seven clown corpses lay strewn along the hallway.

  “And that's why I fucking hate clowns,” Janus said.

  The three of them were startled by a sudden noise. The doors along the side walls all slammed shut, but the black one at the end slowly opened on its own. The creak of the door was ominous and echoed through the now-silent house. On the other side, Quinn could only see pitch darkness.

  “Gee,” Janus said. “Who wants to go through first?”

  Chapter 10

  Tim stared at Kieran and Kate as if they had
gone crazy.

  “What you’re proposing doesn’t even make sense,” he said. “You can’t break into hell.”

  “It’s not really hell,” Kieran replied.

  “Whatever it is,” Tim said. “The Land of the Dead. It’s not an exit ramp off a highway. You can’t just drive over there, ghost army or not.”

  Kieran let out a hollow laugh.

  “That’s where you’re wrong,” he said triumphantly. “Think about the legend of Sanheim. Did Kate and Quinn tell you any of it last year?”

  “Most of it,” Tim said.

  If he was being honest, Tim didn’t believe all of it. He had done some research after Quinn’s death in an effort to find something that might help Kate, but everything he found seemed like more mumbo jumbo than anything actionable.

  “The entire celebration of Sanheim — or Samhain as it is popularly but incorrectly spelled — is about crossing over from the Land of the Dead,” Kieran said. “It’s a celebration of the idea that ghosts, spirits and all sorts of dark and terrible things can come through into our world.”

  Tim shook his head.

  “But even if that’s true, it’s a one-way street,” he insisted. “They come here, we don’t go there.”

  Kate, who had that far-away look in her eyes, which Tim thought meant she was arguing with herself, suddenly became alert again.

  “No,” she said. “Other Princes of Sanheim tried to cross over. First the Spider, then others, and then Robert Crowley.”

  “Exactly,” Kieran said. “Crowley was the last to try, and though he didn’t defeat Sanheim, he was successful in opening a doorway. Remember the rhyme? ‘Fifty men went up a hill, none of them came down. Fifty men went to him, none of them were found.’ On Halloween night in 1873, Crowley used his followers’ psychic energy to open a doorway to the Land of the Dead. They all went through it, leaving just one behind.”

  “Camden,” Kate said.

  “The same guy who wrote the prophecies book?” Tim asked.

  “Yes,” Kieran replied.

  Tim stood up and walked into the kitchen to fix himself a drink. He wasn’t really thirsty, he just needed time to think.

  “Crowley failed though, didn’t he?” he asked through the open doorway. “You just said so yourself.”

  Kieran stopped pacing and stared across the room at Tim. His eyes danced excitedly.

  “Sure,” he said. “From Lilith’s account, they marched into a waiting trap. Sanheim was there and wiped them all out.”

  “And that’s not going to happen again because…?”

  “Well, for one, it’s possible we’ll have the element of surprise,” Kieran said. “He was ready for Crowley and Lilith. But Kate has lost her partner. The legends are quite clear that only two living Princes of Sanheim can seize Sanheim’s mantle. So to him, Kate’s already out of the game.”

  “If he’s as crafty as you say, he won’t rely on that,” Tim said. “Especially if he knows much about this ‘last’ business. You said he wanted you to kill Kate, not Quinn. If he saw her as a threat last year, he probably still sees her that way. Enough to keep an eye on her, at any rate.”

  Tim came back into the living room with a whiskey in his hand. It burned down his throat as he downed it in one gulp. He had never been much for drinking, but then again he had never been much for ghost stories, either.

  He noticed that Kieran’s excitement didn’t elicit any response from Kate. She at least seemed to be paying attention, but her face was impassive.

  “I hate to admit it, but you’re probably right,” Kieran said. “Especially once we get going, he’s likely to figure out what we’re up to. He may even try to stop us, though there are rules that bar him from interfering too much.”

  “Rules?” Tim asked.

  “I don’t pretend to understand it,” Kieran said. “When he spoke to me last year, he was very careful to say what he could and couldn’t do. For example, he gave me the shield that Kate and Quinn used to stop Aillen last year.”

  “He gave that to you?” Kate asked.

  “Yes,” Kieran replied. “He wanted you to beat Sawyer and Elyssa. The shield was key to that. But my point is that he didn’t just walk up and hand it to me. He told me to go to a warehouse near Dulles Airport where I had to pick it up. From what I gathered, he convinced others to bring it there. He probably killed whoever did it, too. When I asked him why he used others to do his dirty work, he mentioned something about rules. He said he couldn’t interfere too much.”

  “What happens if he does? Who enforces the rules?” Tim asked.

  “I don’t know. When I asked, he just said the cost of violating the rules is ‘severe,’” Kieran said.

  Tim could see Kate looking at Kieran intently, studying him.

  “What about the knife?” she asked.

  “What knife?” Kieran responded.

  Kate didn’t respond, but merely stared at him. The impassive expression on her face turned to one of hate.

  “You know what knife,” she said. “The one that killed Quinn.”

  “I…” Kieran started. He looked momentarily flustered. “I’d forgotten about that. Yes, you’re right, he gave me that knife.”

  “It wasn’t just any knife, was it?” Tim asked. “The police said it was made of a material they’d never seen before.”

  “It was… special,” Kieran said. “I don’t know where it came from.”

  “A normal knife wouldn’t have killed the Headless Horseman,” Kate said. “I doubt it would have even injured him. He gave you something powerful.”

  “Yes,” Kieran said. “I don’t know why he could give that to me directly, but not the shield. I didn’t think of it at the time.”

  “Maybe he wasn’t supposed to,” Tim said. “Maybe he broke his own rules.”

  Kieran shrugged and looked anxious to move off the subject. He appeared uncomfortable talking about Quinn’s death.

  “I don’t know that it matters. The point is, once he gets wind of what Kate and I are up to, he’ll throw something at us. How much and how serious it is, I just don’t know.”

  “Which still leaves us at square one,” Tim said. “Even if you break into hell, he’ll be there waiting for you.”

  Kieran cast him a dirty look.

  “I really wish you’d stop calling it hell,” Kieran said.

  “Does it matter?” Tim asked.

  “It does to me,” Kieran said. “In Biblical terms, hell is a place of punishment for those who have sinned against God and their fellow man. The person who controls hell is a powerful demon called the devil.”

  “We’re arguing over semantics,” Tim replied. “Sanheim seems like the devil to me.”

  Kieran grunted in disgust.

  “That’s exactly what he wants you to think,” he replied. “That’s why he dresses up in those fancy suits and talks about ‘deals’ and ‘darkness.’ ‘The devil went down to Georgia and he was looking for a soul to steal.’ Is that the riff he played for you, Kate?”

  “He told me the truth,” she said. “You are what you hate. I’ve become the very thing I tried to destroy. He knew what I would become.”

  Kieran cast a worried look at Tim.

  “He lied, Kate,” Kieran said. “And Sanheim isn’t the devil.”

  “Why does it matter what we call him anyway?” Tim asked.

  “It matters because words have power, and names have more than most,” Kieran replied. “It influences what we believe and that definitely matters. If we say the Land of the Dead is hell, and Sanheim is the devil, then we’ve already lost. How can we free a soul from a land where only the most evil and corrupted go in the first place? How can we defeat a monster that is evil incarnate? This is why Sanheim acts the way he does, why he no doubt tries to make the Land of the Dead seem like our conception of hell. Because it teaches people to accept their fate. They believe they are there because they deserve to be, and the creature that rules them is nothing less than an evil god.”
>
  “But Sanheim is a god. A Celtic one, at least,” Tim said.

  “Who knows what he really was, once upon a time?” Kieran said. “The more I think about my interactions with Sanheim, the less like a god he seems. Why would a god be threatened by Sawyer or Kate? If he really ‘rules forever,’ as Lilith said, why would he worry about anything at all? There’s more to him than I can explain. But one thing I’m sure of — he is not the devil and he’s not unbeatable.”

  Tim looked at Kate while Kieran spoke, hopeful that she would absorb what he said. He wasn’t sure he believed it all himself, but if she didn’t fight back against the idea that she was some kind of monster, he knew they were doomed. But Kate was staring vacantly into space again, trapped in whatever mental prison she had built for herself.

  “Okay,” Tim said, trying to move forward. “But you still haven’t said how we can beat him, especially if he knows we’re coming. Or how we can succeed with only half a Prince of Sanheim.”

  Kieran nodded at him, excited again.

  “Because we’re going to take things to a whole other level,” Kieran said. “Crowley had a measly fifty moidin when he attacked. He clearly thought that was a lot. But Kate proved last year that she’s unique among the Princes. Her powers don’t rely on mortal followers. She can call the dead to fight for her. Of course, in the Land of the Dead, they’ll just be people, not ghosts, but it doesn’t matter at that stage. Before she crosses over, she can raise one helluva army.”

  “Can she raise that many?”

  Both Kieran and Tim looked at Kate, waiting for her to respond. Though she was sitting in a chair without moving, her mind seemed far away.

  “I don’t know,” Kieran said, turning his attention solely to Tim. “But I believe she can. Last year she needed to give the spirits at Ball’s Bluff a reason to fight. The soldiers came to her because she was defending Leesburg, defending their sense of home. I felt the tug when she called them and it was incredibly powerful.”

  “What are they going to fight for this time? Surely not to save Quinn.”