Deceived

by Lynda O'Rourke

  Reaching the end coffin, and knowing this rotten corpse belonged to Trabek, I turned to Raven. “Stab the knife through this body. Do it, now!” I held the crucifix high. Etta continued to chant.

  Unsure, Raven hesitated, knife poised above her head. “Are you sure? Are you sure this one doesn’t belong to Eras or Quint?”

  Shaking my head, I whispered, “No. This isn’t Mathew or Adam.”

  “Huh?” said Raven, a look of confusion across her face.

  “Do it! Or I’ll do it myself!” I shouted, aware that behind us, a fight between demons had broken out. I could hear Quint and Eras, their voices boomed out and echoed through the chamber. Glancing over my shoulder, I watched, eyes wide as Trabek seemed to be gaining the upper hand. He held both Eras and Quint by their hair. His figure had stretched in size and his body swarmed with angry shadows that seemed to have many hands.

  Turning back to Raven, who still stood, knife above the corpse, hesitating, I latched onto the grip, my hands wrapped around Raven’s. Thrusting my arms down, together we stabbed the knife through the corpse of Trabek. I didn’t need to turn around to see if we had done right. I heard Trabek wail out like a dying creature.

  “Again!” I shouted, pulling out the knife and thrusting it down into the skull. It splintered and cracked, and the bone began to turn into tiny pieces of dust. “Again, Raven!” I screamed, grabbing a quick look over my shoulder.

  Trabek had fallen to his knees. The hands that came from his shadows grasped and clutched at the air. His servants swarmed about him, and for the first time, I could hear the Cleaners cry out.

  Looking back at Raven, and remembering what Etta had told me to do, I said, “Don’t stop… keep stabbing him. I’m gonna go and get the torch.” I looked up at the burning flame that flickered warm shadows against the rocky wall. I raced toward it, my heart thumping in my chest. Snatching it from its holder, I turned back. Raven, hair stuck across her face, looked like a crazed loon as she frantically thrust the knife up and down. I glanced up at the ceiling. Doshia was in here somewhere. It wouldn’t be long before he decided to show himself again in some form or another.

  “Do it, Kassidy!” shouted Quint. “Do it for Eras and me—for Mathew and Adam. Finish this bastard!” He glared down at Trabek.

  “Step away!” I shouted at Raven, holding the flames above the corpse. I moved back as the fire caught hold of Trabek’s body. It went up in a seething ball of flames. Through the smoke and the fog, I could see Trabek, arms outstretched as he peered up at Quint and Eras, a look of shock across his face. And through all the noise that echoed about the chamber, I heard Eras cry out, only his voice sounded different, younger. “You gave us eternity… we give you your end!” And with that, I watched Quint and Eras lash out with their feet. Trabek screamed as the impact and the seething flames eating his corpse turned him to nothing more than dust.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  Kassidy

  I stood in front of the next coffin, unsure as to who it belonged to. I was aware that the Cleaners were beginning to mass closer together. Their creaking had become louder and I knew Eras and Quint wouldn’t be able to hold them back for much longer. Trabek’s death had done nothing to deter them, and I wondered now whether they would be guided by Doshia.

  “Hold your hand above the skull,” said Etta, reminding me of what to do.

  “Well?” pushed Raven, eyes wild. “Do we stab this one?” She held up the knife above the corpse.

  “Wait!” I said, my hand hovering over the skull. I waited for Etta to respond. I peered over my shoulder again at the Cleaners. Eras and Quint had disappeared amongst the fog. “Come on, Etta!” I pleaded, scared we would run out of time—frightened that at any moment, Doshia would come back.

  This is Adam’s body. Move to the next one, said Etta, her voice calm and whispery inside my head.

  “Not this one,” I said, pushing Raven onto the next coffin. I held my hand above the skull.

  Move on, Kassidy, said Etta. This is my body.

  I glanced down at Etta’s corpse. Her skull had strands of long, blonde hair and her blue eyes were still intact. They peered up at me with an emptiness, and her fingers, still fleshy, were missing the nails.

  Raven stood, knife above the corpse. Strands of fog had begun to linger around her, and as I held up the torch, my heart raced faster. The fog was twisting itself around my ankles.

  “Leave this coffin, Raven. It belongs to Etta,” I whispered, feeling afraid now that the fog had reached us. Where were Quint and Eras? Were they still in there lost in the fog?

  “The Cleaners are near,” said Raven, as the fog floated past her face. She reached out and tried to wave it away. But the fog just became thicker. “We’re gonna die, aren’t we?”

  I held the torch higher, but Raven became more obscured. I reached out and grabbed hold of her hand. “We keep going, Raven. We don’t stop until it’s all over. Come on, next coffin.” I tried to sound brave—to sound sure. But it wasn’t just for Raven’s purpose. It was for me, too. My voice gave me comfort even though deep inside, I wondered if we were too late.

  “Hurry,” ordered Etta.

  I jumped at the sudden outburst and shoved Raven on. The torch did nothing to help me see. It just illuminated the fog with an eerie orange glow.

  “I can’t find it!” called Raven, still holding my hand. “It’s not here!”

  “Of course it is!” I said. “You just can’t see it in the fog.” I let go of her hand and held out my arm as a guide. My fingers snatched at nothing more than the air. “It should be here…” I whispered, now doubting myself.

  “Well… it’s not,” hissed Raven sounding impatient. She grabbed for my hand and pulled me nearer. “Look… hold up the torch. See… that’s Etta’s coffin. You can just make it out in the fog. But here it’s just a stone plinth with nothing on it.”

  I frowned as the flames lit up the plinth. Raven was right. It had gone. “Shit. What do we do, Etta?” I asked, scared that Doshia had somehow taken his corpse away so it couldn’t be destroyed.

  Just go to the next one, said Etta. We have to keep moving.

  Taking the lead, I pulled Raven along behind me. I stumbled forward as my feet hit the next stone plinth. I held my hand over the skull and waited for Etta’s direction. A warm feeling filled the inside of my body, and an image of Etta with Quint together played in my head. Then it changed to two boys laughing together.

  This is Mathew’s body. I heard Etta say inside my head.

  I peered through the fog at Raven. She stood poised, knife ready for the next onslaught. “Well?” she asked.

  “No, this coffin belongs to Mathew,” I replied. “The next one will either belong to Doshia or Vectis. “Come on,” I urged, feeling a shiver come over me as I looked about and could now see nothing of the chamber, just fog.

  But Raven wouldn’t move. She snapped her head to the right and stared at me. “Did you say, Mathew’s?”

  “Yes,” I snapped, feeling annoyed that she was holding us up. “What are you doing… why the wait? We need to go to the next coffin!”

  The fog appeared to clear a little and as Raven’s face became more visible, I narrowed my eyes and shook my head. Was I seeing things in the fog? Was Raven smiling as she stood towering over the corpse of Mathew, knife still held high?

  “Raven?”

  “The light that comes from you, Etta, is about to get very dim!”

  “What?” I said, taken aback as Raven began to laugh.

  “Goodbye, Mathew. Sleep well, Quint!” hissed Raven, teeth clenched. She stretched up high and thrust her hands down. The knife went right through the corpse of Mathew and hit the bottom of the coffin.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  Kassidy

  Somewhere in the fog and in this cold, damp chamber, I heard a cry. My heart felt as though it had come to a stop. My head filled with the sound of Etta weeping. I stood, shocked, mouth open and gawped at Raven.

  Another
cry cut through the fog and smoke. It was Eras. But his voice became watered down—drowned out by the eerie laughter coming from Raven. At first, I couldn’t move. It was like time had stood still and I was lost in this moment—frozen in its disconcerting chill. I could feel myself blink over and over as if trying to shift what had just happened in front of me—like flicking through snapshot images and getting to the one you wanted and discarding the pictures you didn’t like. But it didn’t matter how many times I blinked. The same image was still there—right in front of me.

  I glanced to my right at the coffin of Mathew. Etta’s knife had sliced right through the bones. Not wanting to believe what I had just seen, I shook my head and whispered, “No. No… this is wrong. That didn’t happen. No!” My voice became raised. A wave of realisation washed over me and I covered my heart with my hand. It was broken. There was no mending it. No turning the clock back. No stopping the death of Ben.

  I staggered forward, overcome with a pain too torturous to bear. The sting in my heart became an ache and the ache became agony. My face was wet with tears.

  Springing up onto Mathew’s coffin and squatting over the corpse, Raven continued to laugh. Her greasy hair hung over her face and black drool dribbled from the corner of her mouth. She hissed and rocked back and forth. With the knife still in her hand, she slashed it about, slicing at her own flesh. Lines of blood began to appear across her arm and face. Raven peered at me. As if suddenly realising what she had done, the smile dropped from her face and she stared wide-eyed at the knife.

  “No…no…I didn’t want to do that!” Shaking her head she continued, “I swear…that wasn’t me. Please believe me, Kassidy. I couldn’t stop him. I couldn’t stop Doshia. He just came out of nowhere and…and…” She broke off and then tugging at her hair she began to howl and wail. And then her voice changed back to Doshia. “Do it! Finish him!” Raven raised the knife above her head and laughed. She looked down at Mathew’s coffin with a look of confusion across her face as she appeared to struggle with herself and the demon controlling her. Then, pointing the tip of the knife toward the other coffins, she said with a male’s voice, “Or maybe I’d like to play a bit longer. Which one next? Shall I do Adam’s… or do you want to go before him, Etta?”

  The callousness of Doshia was cold and brutal. There was no feeling. Just direct to the point, and a lust for death and pain. I stood silent, unable to say anything. Instead, I spoke inside my head to Etta. We were too late. Etta… I’m not sure if I can go on. What’s the point? We’re not going to survive this… are we? And even if we do… I stopped talking. Etta cried. Both our hearts had been shredded in a matter of moments right in front of our very eyes.

  “Give up… give up!” Raven hissed at me, her voice deep and rasping. “I’ve broken you both. You will never mend. I just wish I’d had more time to make Quint suffer… to give back what he’d done to me.”

  I curled my toes in anger and gritted my teeth. My grief was still there and would be forever, yet, as I faced Raven, the black eyes that looked back at me weren’t hers. The words that came from her mouth came from Doshia, and those evil, twisted insults began to eat away at my sorrow and turn it into hate. I will kill you. I will. I won’t back down. Not now. I will kill you for what you’ve done. I will destroy you for all the lives that you have taken.

  Tears of anger filled my eyes as I thought of my best friend, Hannah, of Max and his brother, of Sylvia Green, and all the other volunteers who had had the misfortune of stepping inside Cruor Pharma. My parents and… I swallowed back the large lump in my throat as I thought of Ben. How he had tried to help me and knowing that all he ever wanted was to be free.

  My hatred intensified as these thoughts filled my mind. I threw myself at Doshia, the burning torch still gripped in my hand. I stabbed it hard into Raven’s face and watched as her skin began to melt. But she didn’t scream. She continued to laugh and jeer at me. I clambered up onto the coffin and charged into her body, dropping the torch to the floor. Etta’s knife fell into the coffin, and as I went to snatch it up, cold hands fell upon my shoulders and I was dragged out. As I turned my head and peered at the hands which held me, I saw the leather gloves and heard the creaking. A cold, sharp pain filled me from inside out. It was the torture and agony of the Cleaners’ victims I could feel. Their screams echoed through the fog as they kept their distance from the Cleaners. I could feel myself dropping—falling to the ground. The Cleaners pushed their evil upon me, crowded over my body so all I could see was their masks and aprons and the eyes which played a constant image of death and murder. And just as I began to believe that this was it, that I would become nothing but a shell for one of these abysmal creatures, their painful hold on me fell away and they scampered back into the fog.

  Holding out his hand, Eras pulled me to my feet. Behind his dark demon eyes, there was a sadness. I knew why. It was for Ben, for Adam, and for Quint. He remained silent and turned back to face Doshia. The flames had gone out and half of Raven’s face looked like the skin had dried trails of wax down it. Eras stretched high and wide. His shadows slashed about like angry snakes and they reached out and sent some kind of a shockwave into Raven. She flew back, disappeared into the fog, but I heard the smack of her body as it hit the chamber wall. Holding out his hand in the direction of Mathew’s coffin, Etta’s knife floated up, and in a blink of an eye, it fell into Eras’s hand.

  Turning to look at me, he said, “Do it! Kill that fucking demon once and for all. Kill it for us! Kill it for Quint, for Jude, and for my brother, Mathew. I promised you I would fight for you… that I would protect you… now promise me that you won’t fail. I can’t kill Doshia… but you and Etta can!”

  Eras grabbed my hand and shoved the knife into it. With both hands, he took mine and wrapped my fingers tightly around the grip. “Do it, Kassidy… finish this hell now!”

  He let go of my hands, turned his back on me, and called out, “Bring it, Doshia, you evil, fucking bastard!”

  Doshia came like a flash out of the fog—like an animal wanting to feed. He struck Eras so hard that he disappeared back into the fog.

  Not wanting to waste another moment, I rushed forward, arms out front and felt for the coffin. But what if this coffin wasn’t Doshia’s? One was missing after all.

  “Just do it, Kassidy,” came Etta’s voice, her determination to end this evil back again. “We have to hope.”

  I nodded my head and as my hands found the coffin shrouded in fog. I gripped the rim and pulled myself up. Placing my feet on either side of the corpse, I rose my arms as high as I could.

  With tears falling from my eyes, my arms plummeted down. The knife hit the bone and the force shattered it. Falling to my knees and astride the corpse, I raised my arms and stabbed again at the body. Over and over again. A scream cried out from somewhere in the chamber. The body began to crack and crumble into dust. I breathed heavily, sweat pouring down my face and neck. I raised my arms again.

  “Enough, Kassidy. Step back. I will finish the rest,” spoke Etta.

  With my limbs sore and weak, I clambered out of the coffin.

  Etta came forward, and using my hands and voice, she made fists. “Burn, demon. I send you back to where there is no return.”

  The flames shot up and I stepped back from the heat. The body hissed and fizzed and its arms rose up. I watched, horrified, as the skull turned and appeared to look at me with its one eye. What sounded like several voices screamed and cried from its mouth. The corpse of Doshia became nothing more than a seething ball of flames. Somewhere from within the chamber, a garbled scream filled the room.

  “Is it done? Have we finally killed Doshia… please let it be so!” I fell to my knees, distraught.

  “It is done,” whispered Etta. “That corpse was Doshia’s.”

  The chamber echoed with the cries and screams of the Cleaners. I peered over my shoulder. Eras walked from out of the fog, the Cleaners following close behind.

  “They won’t go. Not whil
e I’m still here,” said Eras. “They will follow me, waiting for their chance to take a body—hoping that I will take up the lead of Trabek and Doshia.”

  “Then we must change that,” spoke Etta.

  Eras nodded his head and stepped aside. The Cleaners held out their hands like hungry children waiting to be fed. They crowded around Eras.

  “Your darkness fails you, servants. The light of good and pure prevails. I cast you back to the depths of Hell. You will never come back again!” Etta said.

  I watched as the Cleaners screamed, their gloved hands snatching at the air as a wind so forceful rushed through the chamber and blew them away into nothing. They disintegrated and the fog vanished.

  The chamber remained cold and I looked about dismayed at the bodies that lay on the floor. There was Robert, Max, Raven, and Ben. They lay perfectly still, like in a deep sleep.

  The two burning coffins filled the chamber with smoke, and as I stood up, I waved my hands in front of my face to clear my view.

  A low moaning came from where Raven lay. I looked at Eras, my eyes wide. “Is she still Doshia?” My heart began to race again.

  Eras shook his head. “No, Raven is still alive, although one side of her face is burnt. But she lives. Doshia didn’t have enough time to take her down with him. He left her body the moment you stabbed his corpse.”

  I wasn’t sure how I felt about this. Although Raven had been the one to stab Mathew’s corpse, and a part of me resented her for it, I had to understand that it hadn’t really been her doing. And of course, it had been me who had killed Robert, but under the power of Doshia. I glanced over at Ben. Slowly walking over to him, I knelt down beside his body. His eyes were open, yet empty.