“When I first confronted it, I brought the small army it… had chosen. What did I bring? I brought abuse, I brought hate and I brought fear. I stood immersed in the sin of pride. I was proud of my knowledge of God, though I know now he held no pride for me. It broke me; it tried to break us all. There is no weapon patented to defeat this thing. A broken cross, one driven by my own hand, it was not enough to remove this evil from the world.
“My folly is that we sought to defeat what cannot be defeated, hold in bonds that which cannot be bound. I am also guilty of not confessing my pride, of not standing before this entity and my God and begging for forgiveness. I gave it strength… just as Lonnie gave it flesh.
“I could not convince myself that I had been called by this… dark soul… and not by my God. Do you understand… how I celebrated the fact of being chosen… being called to glory by my creator? I saw myself worthy and one thing is certain… as we stand here today… we are not worthy of any honor from our God.”
“Abner,” Stephanie called from across the room, “It waits for us.”
Chapter 14
“James… wait,” Keri pulled on the back of his arm. He was driven to face the demon. The others were with Stephanie, in the hotel lobby. They watched the world outside where darkness battled a thick fog off the Atlantic Ocean. The weather forecasters would develop some explanation for the abrupt change in condition, but these six individuals knew the actual cause.
Keri’s blue eyes couldn’t mask her fear. “Maybe we shouldn’t do this,” she said as James turn toward her. “I want to go back to last night. I have never felt so much security… and now I’m frightened. Why can’t we just leave, not face this thing… start a life…”
The last phrase slipped across her lips without completion. His hand reached up and stroked her cheek with the same gentleness she felt in his embrace last night.
“Start a life… together?” He finished her statement as a question, giving her the opportunity to agree to future terms.
She nodded and whispered, “Yes.”
“How could we build a relationship, knowing we were brought together by something evil, knowing the evil strives because we turned away? Keri… last night,” she heard the words and felt the pause, she prepared herself for a some form of sentimental rejection, “I want last night… to be a part of our lives… present, future… and not simply one night buried in the past, but I cannot be tormented by these dreams while living in passion with you. If we are to be, we will stand together after this thing is defeated… I promise.”
‘I love you,’ the words were inside her heart, but she didn’t speak them. She had uttered their sound last night, in answer to him, when they were together, naked, one body swimming in ecstasy. In reality he might have taken her proclamation of love as an expression of sheer lust. He probably gave little credence to her uttered emotion, three words, spoken to a lover by her lips at the peak of mutual orgasm, three words she wanted her heart to speak with clarity.
A whisper slipped over her lips, tiny and unheard as Abner burst out of the room into the hallway. In his fist he held a broken crucifix; his aged grip squeezed the cross at the intersection of the two beams. “I almost forgot… a weapon,” he announced.
***
The Jeep pulled beside an abandoned warehouse along the docks, a home for rodents, dust and the forgotten freight of some long bankrupt company. Stephanie’s white Firebird stopped alongside the vehicle once belonging to Zachary Wells.
“Well I guess we’re not taking the scenic route,” Candice offered her opinion of their surroundings from the Jeep’s back seat.
Noah, riding shotgun, turned to face the actress and the sullen young blond. “I think its kinda fitting after all… don’t you… James?” The driver didn’t respond. “The impending storm, the thick fog moving in across the water… if we’ve come here to be slaughtered I can’t think of a better setting.”
“Stop that,” Keri said, breaking her self imposed silence.
“Darlin’ we’re here,” Noah commented, turning back around in his seat, “and I don’t think there is anything we could’ve done t’ change it.”
James opened his door and got out. Keri sat in the seat behind him and he held her door open as she stepped out into the thickening fog.
“You okay?” He asked quietly.
“Ask me again tomorrow morning,” she answered, forcing a small smile to spread across her lips.
Both doors of the Firebird closed. Stephanie walked around to the passenger’s side as Abner willed his muscles to stretch back into recognizable form. Given the choice a Pontiac Firebird would not be his intended mode of transportation, but his discomfort mattered little given the circumstances. He needed a last moment alone with Stephanie to ensure her understanding of the situation they faced. She would be the crux on which possible success balanced.
“Are we ready?” Abner asked the other five.
“Question,” Keri stated, “why is it so… impossible for us to just turn away?”
“Cause you know,” Abner answered, “the evil has touched you… touched your depths. You can never escape the vile essence of it as long as it lives. Each time it seeks strength and steals life from an unfortunate soul… you will taste it. We are all sinners, but death… murder is not something our own hands are capable of. That’s why you’re called by… it. You do not have the capacity to murder… not as individuals, but as a group… you must pray for that strength.”
***
Stephanie felt the caress of cold fingers against her flesh. She shivered and attempted to hide her discomfort from the others. The sensation spread over her body, lingering within her private areas, arousing her despite the cold.
Dozens of windows along the face of the warehouse were shattered. Shards of glass grabbed onto what little light the night offered through the fog. Stephanie noticed one broken window in particular, vapor danced at the open wound, the evil essence waited for them.
She heard Abner speaking to the group about sin and prayer. She murmured an ‘Our Father’ to herself, but didn’t feel the words with any depth.
‘I have you,’ she felt the words tingling through her head, ‘and he does not.’
“Stephanie,” Abner’s voice broke her trance, “are you alright?”
The one she knew to be a minister supported the old man’s weight against him as they moved toward the building. Stephanie realized she had lagged behind.
“You okay?” One of the women asked.
“It’s here… waiting for us.” The words slipped from her mouth reluctantly.
“Come,” Abner stepped away from Noah’s support, finding strength on his own, “none of the lambs will die tonight.”
A strange statement, from a man she’d know all her life. No lambs would die tonight, but did the shepherd plan to sacrifice his ancient existence in their place?
‘Why would I want an old man?’ The thing in her head whispered, ‘I can have so much more.’
***
A heavy steel door opened with more ease than expected. James found his way into the dusty dark chamber before the others. Keri pulled at the back of his shirt again, enticing him to slow his pace.
Long shadows stole substance from the darkness. The fog off the Atlantic coast transgressed through the shattered windows, entering the belly of the beast with caution. The group gathered inside the opened door, pawns in a game they didn’t control.
A jolt from behind startled James, Stephanie walked past, her form barely visible among the darkness in the short black dress she wore. James noticed the vapor before her, a beckoning vine of indulgence, calling them to be one with its master, to seek pleasure in the bosom of sin. She followed, and without hesitation James pursued her. The others took stride behind him, Keri close, as if in the umbrella of his protection, Noah, Candice and Abner a few feet back.
Ahead, another door, another room, this guardian of some inner cavity yawned as they neared. Stephanie hadn’t touched t
he cold steel; the hinges were independent of any action on her part. James felt Keri behind him; she gripped his arm, just above the elbow, in a firm vice of frightened fingers.
“It’s here,” she whispered beside him, “isn’t it?”
“It will show itself when it’s ready,” Stephanie said, turning back to those who followed. “Your fear is an appetizer.”
James knew the voice flowing from Stephanie’s lips did not belong to the young woman. The demon staked out its warning. The thing that had brought them here filled Stephanie’s mouth with its venom.
“I know who you are,” Abner spoke from behind James and Keri. “Leave the girl and be bold enough to show yourself.”
“Old friend, when I bid you the honor, you will wish to have remained innocent of all your curious endeavors.”
Abruptly, shadows sucking the final embers of light from the room. James lost sight. Keri fell against him with a startled cry.
“I come to form in absolute darkness,” the voice, which had spoken through Stephanie, said. James knew the words no longer flowed from the girl. “For I am the darkness.” It bellowed.
A scream, Keri’s screech of horror came from beside him. James reached for the girl, whose life he had saved, in his blindness. He felt her trembling hand against him at the moment her scream formed solid words. “It’s touching me… don’t let it touch me.”
Chapter 15
Abner’s heart skipped a few required beats. The pain escalading through his chest intensified. He slumped against the cold concrete wall. Around him the others had either lost consciousness or were being held in check by some unseen force of darkness.
“This place,” the voice of Lonnie Wilkerson said to the old man, “has been a place of worship. Those who idolize darkness gathered here in secret. They drank the blood of animals… did you know that Abner? They would have been tormented by the likes of you… by your holy sickness, if they gathered in public… if they were to share their sacred drink before the open eye. Satan called them in his weakness. He needs constant worship… I only need to take your flesh and its sinfulness. Still my ego will be well satisfied by the adoration of these in the moments before I quench my hunger.”
Abner tried to move, but as he shifted his weight the pain in his chest dug deeper. Death was coming. He wanted a few more minutes. He became aware of light beginning to sift through the darkness again. The adversary wished to be seen.
Stephanie stirred, slowly beginning to come back into the present world. The one named James sat up against the wall to his right. The younger man had regained consciousness, but at the moment his concern was with Keri’s well-being, rather than the evil entity before them. Abner wondered about their attachment.
“I offer… myself,” Abner said between short breaths, “release these… for the sake of God… let these… go.”
“And you will thus be able to recite to God, ‘I have not lost any of your sheep.’ These are mine. I am the closest thing they will ever know to god. You will return to your maker as a failure.”
To Abner’s left, the minister named Noah moved for the first time since being knocked unconscious by a force unseen. Abner felt for the broken piece of crucifix in his pocket. His heart raced, the hammer pounding in his chest reminded him that death neared with vengeance. He did not want to fail in his last hour.
“You are old. You are the remains of flesh having no purpose. What good would your puny carcass be to me, Abner? You have not tainted your soul with sin in years. What a boring web you weaved.”
“Do not…” A coughing seizure raged through Abner’s body. He spit phlegm on the floor and noticed traces of blood in the substance.
“Death will not be easy on you Abner. It will most definitely not come with any haste. You will witness these give their lives for my purpose, then I will allow you to go to your maker, on his terms, not mine.”
Stephanie began to slowly crawl toward a dark void in the room’s center. Her short black dress clung to her thighs with electricity.
“Stef…” Abner called with what little voice remained, “get back… do not… go near him… the thing. It will make you…” Abner grabbed at his chest in a futile effort to squeeze another beat from the ancient pump beneath his rib cage. He laid his head against the floor, watching, as the girl entrusted to his care slowly positioned herself to pay homage before pure evil.
***
Stephanie knelt in submission. The evil force in Lonnie Wilkerson’s dead body absorbed the shadows unto itself and allowed the time worn flesh of its host to become visible. The stench of decay filled the room. Then, as if the dark soul controlled even smell, the perverse odor of death flowed back into his shape. He moved toward Stephanie, to touch her, to defile her with probing fingers of dead sin.
“What is it that you want of me?” It asked in a voice once belonging to her father’s friend.
“To be like the other,” Stephanie answered in a trance.
“The other?”
“The prostitute.”
“You seek the vile ways of another,” the stolen voice of Lonnie Wilkerson deepened, “but your sins are not based in reality. They are nothing more than simplistic fantasies; thoughts filling your mind while your fingers probe your moist vagina. I need sin, which has already manifested itself in this world. The prostitute has such sin.”
Stephanie began to sob without control. “Don’t do… this… to me,” she pleaded.
Evil raised a right hand laced with torn flesh to Stephanie’s face. She stood, enraptured by a trance of sinful desire, beckoned by a force from within. “Tell them who you are… demon.” Stephanie’s fingers unfastened the top two buttons at the front of the dress. “Demon I command you to give voice to your identity.”
“I am she,” Stephanie said with a voice that wasn’t her own, “I am the prostitute… the whore.”
“Are you not also Pride… Greed and Apathy?”
“Yes,” the demon called forth through Stephanie spoke, “but I yearn for the carnal desires of the one who has given her flesh for a price.”
Stephanie’s fingers complete the task of unbuttoning the front of her dress. The garment fell to the floor, leaving her white bra and panties exposed to those who wished to gaze into the young woman’s fantasy.
Lonnie Wilkerson’s eyes turned from the underwear clad brunette to the others in the room. “I do not desire the sin of a whore. I seek more, pride… greed and apathy, then I will absorb the sexual pleasure of one who has prostituted herself.”
Stephanie began weeping again.
“There is one sin of the many that I have permitted this one to feel. She longs to immerse herself in that sinfulness, to be baptized with the seed of a lover who has purchased her flesh.”
***
The decaying flesh covering a dead hand reached out for Stephanie’s throat. She stood frozen in the breathless grip, unable to yield to the choking grasp around her neck.
James tried to stand, but the muscles in his body offered no stability. He watched the withering hand lift Stephanie off the ground by her neck. One shoe fell from her foot as she struggled to gain a breath.
“Let her go,” James Lansing found a semblance of his voice.
“Apathy speaks.” Lonnie’s form turned quickly, keeping a firm grip on Stephanie’s throat. “I so long to hear from the others.”
James tried to rise again and this time his legs supported him. He braced himself against the wall. Candice and Keri were helping each other to their feet.
A flesh-decaying arm tossed the limp body of its victim onto the floor as if the girl were weightless. Stephanie coughed, announcing to the world that she was still among the living.
“I did not wish to kill her. If I had I would own her flesh now. I have not based this on your desire to speak up for her, Apathy. Everything I do is ordained… by me.”
Abner wasn’t moving. James, choosing to ignore the boasting essence of evil, looked toward Noah Cote who sat beside the old
man. “Is he?” The schoolteacher asked the minister.
“Still breathing… barely,” came a worn and exhausted response from the reverend.
“Even the old man lives because I wish it so.”
Stephanie pushed back against the nearest wall, attempting to cover herself with her arms. James met her gaze and knew she had been freed from the mental and physical grip of evil.
“Speak to me… Greed, I the darkest of all souls demand that you speak.” Lonnie’s body twirled toward Noah, seeming to forget James for the moment. A long finger pointed condemnation. “Minister of the Christ, tell me your greatest sin. Keep it from me and I will pry it from your soul.”
“This is nothing but a game to you,” James shouted. His arms held onto Keri, who moved close, seeking protection where there was none.
“Isn’t that sweet, such displays of affection, first for fellow man and then for your cherished.” It turned back to Noah, rage shifting across its facial features. “Now tell me about your greatest sin, enlighten the one who commands you.”
***
Tears streaked down Noah’s face. Abner shifted beside him, moving an arm free, offering comfort to the trembling hand of the minister.
“She is dead because of me,” Noah said between sobs.
“Murdered… because of your actions,” Lonnie’s voice persisted.
“I had no way of knowing…”
“You condemned her because of her sin. You judged her. What right do you have to pass judgment?”
“None.”
“Then seek forgiveness of the Christ you preach.”
Dark Places of the Soul: Dark Soul Trilogy - Book 1 Page 9