New Title 1

by Dru Pagliassotti

  “So?”

  “So, there aren’t a bunch of fat snakes sitting around digesting, and a lot of people are missing, so maybe they’re, uh, storing the bodies like, y’know, Aliens or something.” She shuddered. If she saw a facehugger, she was going to freak.

  “You’ve got a scary imagination,” Jarret said, looking askance at her.

  “Yeah, but she’s smart,” Peter said. “She makes dean’s list every semester.”

  “Really?” Jarret seemed surprised, and Ally gave him a dirty look. He held up his hands. “Hey, I didn’t know. You’re all quiet in Religion.”

  “I am not!”

  “Hey, Ally, so what’s the plan? You’re not saying we should look for the snakes’ hideout, are you?” Peter interrupted.

  “We could look around a little....”

  “What do we do if we find it? We can’t fight those things.”

  She bit her lip.

  “There’s got to be weapons somewhere.”

  “At USC, maybe, but not California Hills.”

  “Would Campus Security have any?”

  “Yeah, right. We’d be lucky to find a can of pepper spray there.”

  She took a deep breath, then smiled.

  “Gas,” she said, looking up and meeting Peter’s eyes. “We can siphon it out of the cars, and when we find a snake, we set it on fire. Monsters hate fire.”

  “No way.” Peter gave her a dismayed look. “Do you know how dangerous that is?”

  “Not as dangerous as sitting around waiting to get eaten.”

  XXIV

  Jack swore as his fingers pushed through the devil’s dry, brittle skin. He couldn’t get a grip on the thing—it just crumbled beneath his touch, although every time he pulled away his soot-covered hands, the devil’s crisped flesh seemed as intact as ever. Its mirroreyes rolled and stared at him as it hunkered over Todd’s body, drinking the man’s blood, and Jack could see the holes in his own reflected image, the gaping absences where he’d fallen short of both grace and damnation.

  Andy was kneeling next to Todd’s head. He’d been trying to pull the devil’s flesh out of Todd’s mouth and he had pulled his fingers away just before the professor had started chewing. Now Todd was shuddering, his dark eyes fixed on a point in space a few feet above him, sweat shining on his ebony skin. Andy grimaced and started plucking sharp iron nails out of the man’s flesh.

  Frustrated, Jack stepped back, wiping his face with the sleeve of his leather jacket.

  “All right, Amon, you’re gonna make me do it the hard way.” He dug his boot heels into the dirt, took a moment to steady himself, and made the sign of the cross. “I beseech thee, O Lord Jesus Christ, that Thou lend me Thy virtue and power over all Thine angels which were thrown down from heaven to deceive mankind, to draw them to me, to tie and bind them, and also to loose them, to command them to do all they can, and that they not contemn my voice or the words of my mouth.”

  Amon’s blackened body shuddered, and it rolled its silver eyes toward him again. Its segmented beak curled over Todd’s wrist to reveal bloodstained teeth. Jack licked his lips, seeing his reflection solidifying in the devil’s eyes as his prayer temporarily strengthened his role as the creature’s adversary.

  “But that they obey me and my sayings, and fear me, I beseech Thee by Thy humanity, mercy, and grace, and I beg Thee, Adonai,” he crossed himself and saw Amon flinch, “by all Thy holy names, and by all Thine holy saints, and by all Thine angels and archangels, powers, dominations, and virtues, and by that name that Solomon did use to bind the devils, and shut them up, that Thou enable me to congregate all Thy spirits thrown down from Heaven, that they may give me a true answer of all my demands, and that they satisfy all my requests, without the hurt of my body or soul, or any thing that is mortal, through Our Lord Jesus Christ,” he crossed himself again, “who lives and reigns in unity of God and the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end, amen.” He crossed himself one last time.

  Amon quaked and whimpered on Todd’s chest. Jack pointed to the ground before him.

  “Amon! Release him and stand here!” he demanded, his voice hard and ruthless.

  The devil’s whine rose to an ear-splitting pitch, but then it unfastened its jaws and slunk forward, regarding Jack with pure hatred. Jack glared back, feeling his protective wards shrilling of danger.

  Andy grabbed Todd’s wrist and pressed his fingers down over the bite marks to try to staunch the flow of blood.

  “In the name of God, stay there motionless until I release thee,” Jack snapped. Amon hissed, its bloody teeth bared. Jack crouched and scratched a cross in the dirt in front of it, on its left, on its right, and then behind it. The devil shrank in on itself, clawing at its shoulders and tearing away chunks of its body.

  “How is he?” Jack asked, kneeling next to Todd’s body and checking his pulse. It was fast but strong.

  “Already healing.” Andy turned Todd’s wrist over, fingers still clamped over the wounds. Jack saw the flow of blood slowing. “I’m not sure who he is, but he’s definitely not human.”

  “Then I don’t know if it’s safe to use a charm on him,” Jack replied. He knew several spells to stop bleeding, but they all invoked God, explicitly or implicitly. He wasn’t sure how the Lord’s name would affect someone like Todd.

  “I don’t think he’ll need one.” Andy met his eyes. “You’re going to confess that later, right?”

  “Yeah, of course.” Jack didn’t think that coercing a devil to release a man counted as black magick, but he was wary enough of his own moral shortcomings to take his friend’s advice. Andy had always seen things more clearly than he had, discerning black and white where Jack saw only shades of gray. “So, what do you think about our friend here? I still can’t detect any magick on him.”

  “Could his abilities be channeled through his familiar?”

  Jack turned.

  “Amon!”

  The devil looked over its bony shoulder, its beak snapping with hatred.

  “Does this man, who calls himself Edward Todd, get his power to walk through hell from thee or from any other member of the mal'akhim?”

  “No,” Amon hissed, glaring at him.

  “What kind of magick does he use, then?”

  “Physics,” the devil snapped, then turned back and began to tear at its chest with its beak.

  Jack looked at Andy, puzzled.

  “Technically,” Andy sighed, “all forms of magick are physics. It’s all about converting energy of one kind into another. Physics is a very broad term.”

  “Well, if he’s working for Satan, hell’s learned a few new tricks.” Jack shook his ponytail over his shoulder. “All I know is, he sure can’t be working for God.”

  “It’s impossible to walk a middle path.” Andy’s agreement sounded uncertain.

  The earth shuddered beneath them. Jack checked on Amon, but the devil was whimpering again, turning in a tight circle, its neck stretched as it stared into the starry sky.

  “What be thou looking for?” he asked, as coldly as he could. Two-thirds of spellcasting was sheer force of will. Devils would attack at any sign of weakness.

  “The others,” Amon said, unwillingly, its mirroreyes still focused upward. Neither the stars nor the moon were reflected in them. Since planets and suns were morally neutral, they were invisible to the mal'akhim.

  “What others?”

  “I don’t know.” The devil squirmed in place, talons digging into the dirt as it stared upward. “They touched me, but I don’t know.”

  Todd gasped, his back arching. Jack grabbed his shoulders and Andy checked his pulse.

  The theologian shuddered and Jack threw all his weight into holding the huge man down.

  “Ecstatic convulsion,” Andy diagnosed, grabbing Todd’s arms as the man reached for his own face.

  Jack nodded. Behind him, Amon whined, its beak snapping and clattering like dried branches.

  After another few seconds, Todd collapsed, his
mouth opening to draw in a sucking gasp of air. He blinked, looking rational again.

  “Are you all right, Edward?” Andy slid an arm under the big man’s back and helped him sit up. Todd nodded, wiping his forehead.

  “Where’s Amon?” His expression darkened as he saw Amon sitting, quivering, to one side. “Release it.”

  “You want to get bitten again?” Jack asked.

  “It wasn’t biting me.” Todd hesitated, looking at his healed wrist, then jerked his cuff forward as if he could cover the drying blood. “It was reviving itself. There are creatures in the passages, and they nearly killed it.”

  Jack stood, feeling a twinge in his knees, and ran the toe of his boot over one of the crosses in the dirt.

  “Thou be free to move,” he said, gazing distrustfully at the devil. Amon snapped at his boot as it scuttled past, but its teeth closed harmlessly on air. It was still constrained by his will, and it would be until he released it or his strength faltered.

  The devil pressed its bony, lumpy skull against Todd’s side.

  “Tell them what you discovered for me, beloved,” Todd said, looking down at it. Jack was troubled by the neutral, almost gentle, tone of the theologian’s voice.

  It wasn’t will that bound the devil to Todd, he suspected.

  “The Gudruns’ souls are lost to the mal'akhim,” Amon said, nuzzling its head against Todd’s snagged and torn sweater. “They were devoured by the others, the ones between, and the legions of hell curse their loss.”

  Jack yanked his leather jacket closer around him. “What are the ‘ones between’? Some kind of pagan spirits?”

  “Pagan? What is pagan?” Amon seemed distressed, two pairs of legs raking nervously at each other. “They aren’t from here. They don’t belong here. They are old, older than the satan, older than the mal'akhim. I can’t see them, only feel them. Oh, beloved, they will do terrible things to us all.”

  “Amon.” Todd laid a hand on the devil’s sharp, jutting spine. “Have you seen the snakes?”

  “No. I cannot see the things you call snakes. But I know they exist by their works.”

  “What did you see?” Andy asked, still kneeling in the dirt next to Todd. “You ate the devil’s flesh. What did it show you?”

  “Strange things.” Todd frowned, his fingers curling around the devil’s back. “They caught Amon, but it couldn’t tell what they were. It just sensed them, like sensing a hole in space.” He drew in a breath and slowly released it. “The same thing Amon senses when it looks at me.”

  “You got family out there?” Jack asked.

  “As far as I know, I’m the only mortal who has learned to open gateways through the dimensions.”

  “So we’re back to aliens,” Jack muttered.

  “Whatever they are, they’re certainly alien. And if they followed Amon back, we’re all in danger.”

  Jack instinctively looked up, the way Amon had, then scowled and dragged his gaze back to Todd.

  “Does Amon know how they’re linked to the snakes?”

  Todd didn’t bother asking the quaking devil at his side. “No.”

  “I think our next step is to find Penemue,” Andy declared, gazing around the empty, torn-up field. “If he’s a Watcher, he’ll have some answers.”

  “Yes.” Todd stood. His fine wool sweater hung in ravels and rags, and the shirt beneath it was ripped in several places. Despite that, he didn’t seem to notice the December cold. “The most likely place for Penemue to be is....” He reached out, then dropped his hand as Amon hissed. Jack saw an uncharacteristic uncertainty on the big man’s face. “It may be safer to walk.”

  “Where?”

  “To the chapel.” Todd looked at them, his face impassive. “The most likely place for Penemue to be is in the chapel. And I think there may be lives involved.”

  “Aw, shit,” Jack said, reaching out a hand and hauling Andy to his feet. “Let’s go.”

  XXV

  “We’ve been trying to call the hospital, but all we get is a recording that all ambulances have been sent out,” the administrator said, one hand resting on his coat sleeve.

  Gregory Penemue nodded absently, studying the students lying on the floor of the chapel foyer. More were huddled in the chapel proper, praying or hugging each other.

  “Everyone here was in the library?” he asked, cutting through the briefing. The administrator shook her head.

  “No—no, most have come in from other parts of campus. They saw the headlights we shined on the rubble, so we’ve pulled up a few more cars and turned on the lights to make the beacon clearer. I think it’s a good idea to get as many students in one spot as possible.”

  “Yes.” The students around him were so pale, so colorless, against the rich tapestry of divinity that formed the unseen backdrop to their lives. Penemue grieved for them. If only they’d open their eyes and see what they were missing, all the brilliant colors: the purifying whites and seductive blacks, the passionate reds and spiritual blues, the celestial golds and fiery coppers. But so very few ever paused in their pursuit of social acceptance and material success to appreciate the greater things in life.

  It was a waste. A true waste.

  However, it would be an even greater waste to lose their souls to the eternal void.

  Penemue had hoped that stilling Duncan Graeme and removing the old records of the Gudrun scandal would keep history’s secrets safe. He’d hoped that, despite the bones’ appearance, the goetic seals would hold fast and the skeletons would be written off as a historical mystery. But the seals had been broken by the forensics team, and the dragons of the abyss had awakened, and now he would have to take more drastic measures to close the breach and save these souls from the emptiness.

  That was his job. To watch and defend.

  “Your name is Sarah Cristol, isn’t it?” he asked suddenly, turning. The woman nodded, brightening. Her look of gratitude at his remembering her name was yet another note in the perpetual grief Penemue felt for the human race. Didn’t they realize that each of their names were engraved on the hands and heart of God?

  “Come here, Sarah.” He held out a hand. She took it, looking trustfully at him. “Don’t be afraid.”

  He leaned forward and kissed her, drawing out her breath. She collapsed. He caught her with his free hand and lowered her to the ground, then tilted his head back and breathed out, a long, slow exhalation that sent her soul to the security of its final judgment.

  “What—what happened?” a student asked, staring. “Did she faint?”

  “She was working really hard,” another volunteered, as if to defend the fallen woman. “It’s not her fault.”

  “There’s nothing to fear,” Penemue said, his voice calm. “We’ll let her rest. I’m going to preach a sermon. Will you help me bring everybody into the chapel?”

  “Well, I’m not really Lutheran, you know,” the second student said, balking. “I’m kind of an atheist.”

  Penemue sighed. So sad.

  “Your support would still be reassuring to your peers in this troubling time.”

  “Well...I guess.” Embarrassed, the student stood. “I mean, I can help move people, as long as you don’t expect me to, like, pray or anything.”

  “Thank you.” Penemue looked around the room, battered by a sense of loss.

  The curse of the Watchers was that they saw too much. The Celestial War would be much easier to wage if its collateral damage were as invisible to him as it was to the nephilim and b'nei elohim.

  XXVI

  Getting the gasoline out of the tanks was harder in real life than it looked in the movies. They ended up siphoning it through a hose Peter chopped up with a pair of gardening shears, and instead of proper gasoline containers, they filled a bunch of empty water bottles dug out of the recycling bins scattered around campus. The only advantage, as Jarret pointed out, was that a lot of the bottles had squirt nozzles.

  “It’ll be easier to hit the snakes with these,” he said, wiping
another bottle clean and dropping it into a backpack.

  “We’re going to kill ourselves,” Peter grumbled.

  “Well, if you have any better ideas, I’m waiting,” Ally snapped. She was getting annoyed that nothing was working out the way it was supposed to. The earthquakes hadn’t stopped—they still felt them intermittently, and sometimes they heard crashing, like another building collapsing. About ten minutes earlier the earth had really rocked, right after a bunch of engines had started up all at once. Ally knew it had been the distraction for the runners, and she hoped they’d gotten through the perimeter all right. But after that, everything had fallen silent, and she was terrified that the snakes had killed more people.

  “That’s it,” Jarret said, pulling the hose out of a Honda’s gas tank. “We’ve got three backpacks’ full now. How much do we need?”

  “That’s all we can carry,” Ally said. She rubbed her feet and gathered her thoughts. “Um, so now we have to find out where they’re hiding?”

  “Jeez.” Peter leaned his head back against the Honda’s side panel. “You know, it’s fine for you. You’re a girl, and girls always live in the horror movies. It’s the guys that get slaughtered.”

  “Girls don’t always live.”

  “Name one horror movie where the girls die and the guys live.”

  “Uh,” she hesitated. “Zombie movies. Everybody dies in zombie movies. And bad girls die all the time.”

  “You’re not bad.”

  “Thanks.” She gave him a quick smile. “Look, we’ll be okay. We’re smarter than any of those people in the movies.”

  “And we have faith,” Jarret added, arranging the bottles in his backpack. He looked up. “I like the idea of taking the fight to the monsters. We’ve been called to be warriors in Christ. We have to face the Devil to defeat it.”

  “Oh, Lord, now it’s a holy war.”

  “You shouldn’t take the Lord’s name in vain,” Jarret pointed out. “It’s a sin.”

  “Ally—”

  “I think he’s right.” She remembered her first conviction that the snakes were a sign of the end times. “It can’t hurt to be safe, can it?”