by David Clark
It reached his knees without him having to move an inch. Overhead, the skies clouded up as if a storm front was approaching, but instead of just turning dark, the sky had a red haze to it. “Red sky at night, sailor’s delight, but red sky at morn, sailor’s be warned,” was a saying he remembered his uncle saying. The problem was, he didn’t know whether this was morning or night. He didn’t have time to worry about that now. The water reached his waist, and the temperature had become uncomfortable, sending his upper body into a flop sweat. Right before his eyes, the lilies that bordered the brook turned to dried stems and wilting petals. As he looked around at the changing scene around him, he realized Ainslee was gone. The last time he saw her was before the water had started to rise. Afraid she had disappeared below the water, he tried to turn and search for her, but his feet were locked in place in the creek bed.
The water bubbled around his body, and his skin sizzled as the water surrounded his chest. Breathing became labored and painful. His skin was scalded, and yellow pus-filled blisters covered every inch of its surface. The urge to scream was primal, instinctual, but he couldn’t. Water surrounded William’s throat, and the steam that rose from its surface robbed him of the necessary oxygen. All around him the sky began to bleed, from just above the horizon, down to the ground. First slight drips, and then gushing flows. When it reached the ground, it continued and raced toward him like a great tsunami of red. A ring of fire exploded in the sky over his head. Waves of fire rolled across the sky toward the blood running down the horizon. Where they met, the flame congealed into a red fluid and joined the flood of red blood rushing across the landscape. The top of his head baked, and his body boiled. Pain soared through his being, forcing his eyes closed.
When William next opened them, he was back in his residence, lying in their bed, but all was not well. The full-on body sweat might have hinted at a terrifying nightmare, but that didn’t explain the river of flame that surged across the ceiling, the fingers of which turned into blood when it hit the wall. Red liquid flowed down the surface of every wall, into a foot or more of the substance already pooled on the floor. Beside him, his wife laid silently, but her body cooked from the outside in. Her flesh grew taut and cracked, like the skin of a large sow on a flame pit. Singe marks covered her face. She did not scream. She did not move.
William tried to jump up and carry her to safety, but the bed linens trapped him where he was. Another pull, and he was jerked back the few inches they gave. An attempt to scream was met with nothing but silence escaping his open mouth, as a great force pulled him down deeper into the bed.
“Now, now, William. There is no reason to scream. You knew this was coming.” The voice echoed from everywhere, and nowhere, all at once. It rattled the room and sent ripples running up the waterfall of blood flowing down the walls. Above him, the color of the flames changed from orange to yellow, and then the edges of a spot of white flame came into his view. It was a small circular spot, but grew by the moment. At the center sat a dark dot that grew in size within the circle of white flames. The dot took on a shape, an oval. No that wasn’t it. It was a head, and not just any head. A head with a face, with horns sticking out from each side.
The head descended to just above William, along with its upper body, which hung out of the circle of white flames. “Hi, William,” said the face.
William knew this head, this face, and the voice that echoed. This would now be its third visit.
“Leave her alone,” William croaked. He intended to yell that demand, but the great force pressing him into the bed restricted his lungs’ ability to take the gulp of air he needed.
“I gave you a choice. You should have taken it. It was a real peachy life.”
It leaned over the top of Ainslee and grinned an evil grin. William tried again to break free, but the force pressed him back into the impression his body had made in the mattress. He struggled as a long and jagged claw descended past his head. A muscular arm of molten material connected it to the creature’s right shoulder socket. The creature turned to look at William, with the same evil grin, as the claw drew a line down Ainslee. A white haze shined up from the line as her skin peeled back to either side. It turned its attentions back to her as it started to dissect her inch by inch.
William jerked his body wildly to either side, in a move that resembled a turtle having a convulsion while it tried to flip itself back over on its feet. His arms flung wildly at first, gaining just inches, but worked their way free, while the creature’s attentions were on his wife. Faced with the choice of reaching over and trying to stop whatever was happening to her, if he even knew how, and going for help, in a sheer moment of panic he chose the latter. He was sure either Cristobal or the cardinal would know what to do. With his arms free, he pried himself off the bed and fell to the floor. The sound of his body slamming on the solid floor got both his and the creature’s attention. A question rushed into William’s head. ”How do you slam in several feet of pooled blood?”
A wiggle of his toes confirmed the answer. There was no blood. None of this was real. He hoped what was happening to Ainslee wasn’t either. There was only one way to find out, he had to stop and dismiss this creature, who Cristobal had told him was one of Morax’s agents. William stood up, confident and strong. His body screamed in defiance and his eyes searched for the table. The creature was alarmed by these events, and thrust its hand into what was left of Ainslee’s body. It cackled a thunderous laugh that pushed William back to the ground but, once again, he didn’t splash down, he crashed on the floor. Even falling backward to the floor, his eyes stayed fixed on the table.
The creature spun around and followed William’s focus to the table. It hovered above the bed, frozen in place. From his vantage point, William thought he could detect a slight wrinkle of its brow, and downturn of its lips. It was fear, and he had every intention of using it.
William leapt to his feet and ran to the table. The creature was transfixed by the objects laying on the table, and never saw him approach. It never saw his hand reach into its view and grab the cross. It never saw him thrust the cross up into it. His heart was full of the belief that the object, and his faith, would send that creature back where it belonged.
In that instant, the sea of blood on the floor disappeared, and the fire above his head receded back into the circle of white flame. The creature pulled back up into the circle and, in a flash, both were gone, leaving the room bathed in the darkness of night. The only sounds were the crickets outside the open window, and the deep and restful breathing of his asleep in bed.
He watched her laying there, peaceful, as his mind tried to remove the images it had been presented just moments ago. The thought that what he had seen could have happened, shook him to his core. His thoughts went back to Cristobal’s story about his own wife. Over and over, William wondered if that could happen to Ainslee. His decision to do this was putting her in harm’s way, and he felt both guilty and responsible for that. She would be safe, back at home in St. Margaret’s Hope, if he hadn’t brought her here with him, and exposed her to these dangers. The truth was, he wasn’t aware of these dangers then, but that counterargument did little to quell the fear he felt, or the gnawing feeling in his gut that he needed to send her home.
A scream, followed by a second, and more harrowing one, interrupted the internal debate waging inside William. There was no question whether this scream was real or not. The second scream woke Ainslee up with a startle. “What was…” Her question was cut off by a third scream, and the sound of other voices yelling. Neither of them could understand what was being said, but the tone contained fear and violence. Before the fourth scream had completed its course down the hall, William had raced out the door, cross in hand, his footfalls echoing in the cavernous hallway along with the others that also raced toward the scream.
28
Another scream ravaged the darkness of the hallway. This scream was different than the others. It was most definitely not human. The sound
was full of pain, sorrow, remorse, and hatred: pure unrestrained hatred. Following that were the exclamations of several men, in Italian, but there was one word William could recognize as clear as anything, “No!”
Behind William, other footsteps raced down the hall. He didn’t know who it was, nor was he interested in turning around to find out. The source of the screams were his focus. If others were on their way to help, all the better, but not his concern. The darkness in the hallway cast a layer of confusion on where the screams were coming from. All William could do was follow his ears, but the cavernous size of the hallway masked the source, in the endless echoes of screams and cries.
A cloud of uncertainty overcame William at an intersection of corridors. Standing in the middle, the echoes seemed to emerge out of the darkness of each. The footsteps that had trailed him down the hallway caught up as he danced between the decision of continuing straight, or taking either the hallway to the right or the one to the left.
“Which way?” asked Cristobal, who had joined William in the center, just as confused as to where the source of the screams was coming from.
“I don’t know.”
Both men took steps down each hallway, listening, but the echoes continued to play tricks with them. As the seconds ticked by, William felt the muscles in his body tense up. He stretched his fingers and then clenched them in a fist, before stretching them again. His weight bounced back and forth on his legs as he moved to check each of the hallways for the source of the sound. Behind him, Cristobal was checking the opposite side for the source, and let out a guttural groan of frustration. Then it hit William.
He took one step further down the hall, and on the back of his neck there was a single cold prick of a pin. Another step, and several more prickles were followed by an outbreak of gooseflesh across his neck and down his back. With one more step, he knew for sure, especially when the familiar suffocating weight settled upon his shoulders.
“This way,” he said, adding to the echo, and then sprinted down the hallway. Another set of footsteps followed close behind him. They were both still searching in the darkness for a destination they did not know, nor did they know what they would find once they’d reached the source of the screams. The weight pressing down on William, and the cold he felt in his core, told him they were getting close, but he neither needed nor wanted those signs. The bloodcurdling screams and cries were getting louder, and they were also getting clearer. He and Cristobal could now hear two distinct voices behind the screams. One was not human, something they already knew. The other was a voice they both recognized, Cardinal Depeche.
Cristobal sprinted past William, taking the lead down the hall and around the corner. Not knowing where the cardinal’s room was, William was content with following. When he rounded the corner, there was no question of which door it was. Both men stumbled to a stop in front of the third door down on the right. An eerie red hue glowed through the gaps along all four sides of the door, and a scorching heat radiated outward.
“Fire!” screamed Cristobal, as he reached for the door.
Before his hand touched the handle, William grabbed his wrist and yanked it back. Cristobal responded with a look of shock, but William maintained his grip on his wrist and shook his head. The screams continued behind the door. The red glow intensified along with the inhuman scream full of hatred. Cristobal’s head turned slowly from William’s face toward the door. His eyes opened wide as the realization of what was behind the door hit him. William had known for several moments now.
Cristobal backed away from the door. His body trembled in fear. He was not alone. William felt it, too, along with all the other sensations that used to drive great fear in him, now he was used to them. The fear was palpable, and every scream allowed more of it to ooze out the door and attach itself to them, like a great parasite that fed on them and grew deep inside, until it was able to control them. Unless they took control of it first. That is what William did. He stepped forward and, with the crucifix clearly in his left hand, he reached with his right and opened the door.
A flash of flame threw both men against the opposite wall. The impact took William’s breath away for a second. He rolled back over and looked toward the doorway. The large wooden door was now lying on the floor, several feet from William and Cristobal. Through the doorway, he could see the room engulfed in flames. They roiled up each wall, and across the ceiling. The screams continued, and sent ripples across the sea of fire.
William pushed himself back to his feet and walked through the doorway with his left hand out in front of him, to ensure the crucifix entered the room first. The heat was overwhelming, but he still felt the cold pinpricks from the back of his neck to the bottom of his spine. He looked around and saw no sign of the cardinal, but his scream continued, as did the other scream, the non-human scream.
The floor was clear of any fire, which allowed William to move inward freely. His eyes traced the fire from the bottom of the wall, up to the ceiling, and across. When he reached the image, he knelt down. Cardinal Depeche’s body was suspended from the ceiling. Circulating bindings of flame were wrapped around both his arms and legs, as well as his neck. His screams were cut short by fingers of flame that reached over and shoved themselves through his open mouth, stifling the sound. When the fingers retreated from his mouth, his scream started again, and was allowed to persist for only a few moments. The fingers of flame cut them off again.
Movement to the right caught William’s eye. He turned and saw one of the two monks, restrained by similar bindings of flame. His skin smoldered where it contacted the bindings, and produced billows of dark grey smoke. A quick search around the room found the second monk, restrained like the others, but the heat of his bindings had already reduced his body to a smoking skeleton.
Neither of the images frightened William as much as the deep snort that rumbled above his head. Full body trembles shook his vision as he looked up. A large hump circled the cardinal in the flames, as the whole mass pulsated up and down like a heartbeat. Large puffs of smoke bubbled from the hump with each snort.
He looked back. Cristobal stood in the open doorway, and crossed himself. Sheer terror dripped from his body. His body fell rigidly to his knees, like a plank of wood falling on one end. With his hands clasped in front of him, he started a prayer, but did not bow his head. With his eyes bulged out of their sockets, and his mouth gasping for air, he kept his head up, eyes fixated on the scene from the bowels of hell itself that was before him. His lips moved, but no sound escaped. The bulge slowed its rotation around the cardinal, but the snorts continued, more frequent than before, and more visceral.
It stopped, and the puffs of smoke spiraled toward the kneeling Cristobal. The fingers of flame flooded into the cardinal and silenced the start of another scream, sending the room into an eerie silence. Only snorts, and the low rumble of raspy breaths, interrupted the silence.
In and out.
In and out.
The breathing continued, slow and hollow, like wind flowing in and out of a large empty cave. William noticed with each breath in, the flames pulsated up, and then down with the exhale. William wondered if they were inside the beast, itself.
He wasn’t given a lot of time to consider that, before horns broke through the bulge and the head of a bull charged at Cristobal. His friend was frozen in place, either by fear or by the power this demon had over him. William leapt in between the kneeling scholar and the head of the bull, a head he had seen before. With his left hand, he thrust the crucifix forward. The movements were strong and firm. As was his voice as he proclaimed, “Morax, you will stop.”
The demon recoiled backward, and snorted a fire and smoke-filled breath that tousled William’s hair, but he didn’t move. Instead, he took a step forward and closed the gap. Morax roared with the voices of a thousand dead souls, but William didn’t retreat, he took another step forward. Each step filled his heart with more belief, and a glow of white light began to radiate out along the floor.
Morax dipped his head to look at the light and shook his head back and forth with an uncontrolled shudder. From inside the fire, ran the demon that had visited William three times over the past few weeks. It was smaller than he remembered as it ran along the neck of the great beast, but grew with each step. It leapt from its head through the air, toward William, but his resolve was solid, like a brick foundation a great house was built on. Cristobal and Cardinal Depeche had laid that foundation, and then given him the training, and the tools, to build upon it. This was a great test, like the arrival of the first hard storm a building will face. If built with the right tools and materials, he, like the building, would not crumble under the attack.
William held his position at first, and then stepped to the side and slashed at the demon with the cross. He commanded in a voice as strong as his body, “In the name of God, I condemn you.” The force of the impact was not great, but the demon was sent across the room with a thud. Its body flailed on the floor, as it whined in a high pitched hum that pierced William’s hearing. Its great claws dug at the floor to try to drag itself away from the fire. A hint of blue smoke rose above it. At first it was a light haze of blue, but grew denser, into a dark grey-blue. The piercing hum ceased and the flames that danced along its body dissipated, leaving a black form on the floor that collapsed into a pile of dust.
The fire that rolled up the walls receded up to the ceiling. On one side of the room, the scorched body of one of the monks collapsed to the floor. The skeletal remains of his counterpart crashed down on the other. William stepped forward again toward Morax, the light now covered the floor. The pulsating mass of fire above him skipped a beat. Its head jerked up and the flames that dripped from its horns lost their intensity.