Sepulchre

by James Herbert

  "Please go, Liam," she said, her voice brittle.

  "Oh no, not yet. Not yet, Cora."

  That faint Irishness to his voice again. How strange that it should make him sound so dangerous.

  "I want you to leave."

  Instead he took the glass from her hand.

  "I don't know what game it is you all think you're playing," he said quietly, "and honestly, I don't much care. But at least there's something more to you, Cora, something that megalomaniac hasn't touched yet. I don't know how he's managed to bring you to this point, but I do know you've kept a part of yourself away from him. You were different the first time I saw you, and I think it was because I was seeing you the way you used to be, the way you can still be."

  "There's nothing left for—"

  He touched his fingers to her lips. "You're wrong." His own lips replaced his hand and she tried to turn away. He held her firm and kissed her, hurting her.

  Cora sank into the sofa and pushed at his chest. She didn't want this. He wasn't the man to take her from Felix. They were alike, Felix and Liam. Cruel men. Vicious men. That was why Felix was fascinated by him. They were akin.

  He was hurting her, and there was pleasure in that. But she mustn't let him, she couldn't let him . . .

  Halloran grabbed her wrist and pulled it aside. She was lying on the sofa now, the robe open beneath the belt, exposing her thighs. He continued to kiss her, his mouth hard against hers, and when she finally wrenched her head away, his lips sank to her neck and he bit, but used no strength. Cora moaned, partly out of self-pity and partly out of self-disgust, for feelings were being aroused in her.

  "Please don't," she tried to say, but Halloran had pulled the robe away from her breasts. He lowered his head to them. "I don't want this!" she hissed, but his hand was on her thigh, pressing firmly, then gliding down to her knee, reaching behind, touching delicate nerve-points. His weight was on her, pinning her, and he used his body to part her legs. Still she protested, squirming against him, her fingers clenched on his shoulders. She could have clawed him, or pulled his hair, or bit him. But she didn't.

  He sank to the floor, kneeling before her, keeping his body between her legs. Her robe had fallen open completely, the belt loose around her waist, and Halloran deftly undid his own clothing. He entered her, the movement hard and quick, causing her to cry out even though she was moist, ready for him despite her resistance. His lips found hers once more and this time she did not refuse him; the force of her kiss matched his.

  Her arms reached around him, drawing him tight, and now Halloran groaned, a soft murmur that excited her. Cora's legs were rigid against his hips and she thrust herself forward, letting him fill her, wanting more, crying for more, her breathing tight and her arms trembling. Cora's cries turned into gasps, and Halloran's hands went under and around her shoulders so that he could pull her down onto him, his own thrusts controlled and rhythmic. But that restraint was soon overwhelmed and he twisted his face into Cora's wet hair and she arched her neck, pushing her head back into the cushions, her hips almost rising off the sofa, clutching at him as their juices surged to mix inside her body. Her cry was sharp, trailing to a whimper, their bodies shuddering together, slowly calming to a trembling, eventually relaxing to a stillness. They lay there, neither one willing to separate.

  Halloran felt the wetness on his cheek and lifted his head to look at Cora. She was weeping, and when he tried to speak she pulled him down against her. His arm slid beneath her neck and he held her tightly.

  They stayed that way until her weeping stopped, neither one saying anything, feeling no need to, content to rest with each other. Cora loved the feel of him inside her, even though he was soft now, and she ran her fingers beneath his shirt, caressing his spine. Halloran raised himself without withdrawing and lifted her legs onto the sofa. He lay on top, brushing his mouth across her face, kissing her eyes, her temples, her cheeks, passion subdued, replaced by tenderness.

  "You don't know what he's done to me," she said.

  "None of that matters," he soothed.

  She sighed, a sweet sound, when she felt him becoming hard again. They made love slowly this time, their movement sensuous, almost languid, sensing each other in a different, more perfect way. Their passion grew but was unleashed easily, a flowing, then gently ebbing release.

  As before, they remained locked together for some time and, when at last Halloran withdrew, it was with reluctance. He adjusted his clothing, then sat on the floor, an elbow resting on the sofa where Cora was still stretched. He leaned forward to kiss her lips, his hand smoothing away the damp hair from her face.

  "Liam . . ." she began to say, but he shook his head and smiled.

  "No need, Cora. We'll talk tomorrow. Tonight just think about what's happened between us." He stroked her body, fingertips tracing a line over her breasts down to her stomach, running into the cleft between her thighs.

  Her arms went around his shoulders and she studied his eyes, her expression grave. "I need to know more about you, can't you see that?"

  "In time," he said.

  "Is it possible for me to trust you? There's something"— she frowned, struggling to find the word—"dark about you, Liam, and I can't understand what it is. There's a remoteness in you that's frightening. I felt it the first time we met."

  He began to rise, but Cora held on to him.

  "I told you yesterday," he said. "I'm what you see, no more than that."

  "It's what I feel in you that scares me."

  "I often deal with violent people, Cora. It can't help but have an effect on me."

  "You've become the same as them? Is that what you're saying?"

  He shook his head. "It isn't that simple."

  "Then try to explain." There was exasperation in her demand.

  He began to rise again, and this time her arms dropped away. "In my trade violence usually has to be met with violence," he said, looking down at her. "It's sometimes the only way."

  "Doesn't that corrupt you? Doesn't that make you the same as them?"

  "Maybe," he replied.

  She pulled at her robe, covering her nakedness.

  Halloran walked to the door and paused there. "It's when you start to enjoy the corruption that you know you're in trouble." He went out, quietly closing the door after him.

  Leaving Cora to weep alone.

  Halloran washed himself in a bathroom along the hall before returning to his room. Once there, he hung his jacket over a bedpost and took the gun from its holster, placing it on the bedside cabinet. He removed his shoes this time, set the small alarm clock, and lay on the bed. The curtains were apart, but moonlight was feeble again that night and barely lit the room. Despite the fact that there was an extra bodyguard on duty inside the house, Halloran would only allow himself four hours' rest, intending to check on Monk and Palusinski during their individual watches, scouting Neath and the immediate outside area in between. Cora had taken up nearly an hour of his rest period. And a lot of energy.

  He shut his eyes and remembered the hurt on her face as he'd left the room.

  A brightness flashed beyond his eyelids.

  Halloran opened his eyes again. The room was in darkness. Had he imagined the sudden flare?

  It came once more, filling the room like a lightning flash. Yet no rumble of thunder followed.

  He quickly moved from the bed, going to the window. He peered out into the night. A muted white glow marked the moon's presence behind a bank of clouds, the ragged-edged, mountainous shapes barely moving, the landscape below blurred and ill-defined. The lake was a huge flat grayness that appeared solid, as if its depths were concrete.

  Halloran blinked as the light flared again. The source was the lake itself, an emanation from its surface. And in that brief light he had seen forms on the water, black silhouettes that were human. Or so he assumed.

  He rolled back over the bed, pulled on his shoes, and grabbed his gun. Halloran headed for the stairs.

  25
r />   LAKE LIGHT

  Monk should have been on guard duty. But the main hall was empty.

  Halloran wasted no time searching for him; he switched off the hall lights, then opened one side of the front doors just enough to slip through. He was disturbed that the door had been left unlocked. His steps were barely audible as he hurried through the stone-floored porch, and he stopped only briefly once out in the open.

  The lake was nothing more than a broad expanse, slightly lighter than the area surrounding it.

  Halloran holstered the Browning and moved off, quickly edging along the frontage of the house, using it as a dark backdrop against which it would be difficult to be seen, his intention being to approach the lake from an angle rather than in a direct line from the main door. Once at the corner he made a crouching dash toward the lawn. Instinctively he dropped to the ground when light flared from the lake again. He blinked his eyes rapidly, feeling conspicuous and vulnerable lying there on the damp grass. But imprinted on his mind was the image the sudden brightness had exposed.

  There was a boat out there, three or four figures huddled together in its confined space. They were watching something that was outside the boat, on the lake itself. Something that was not in the water but on the surface.

  The vision dissolved as his eyes adjusted to the darkness once more. He stiffened when a howling came from the shoreline to his right, an eerie, desolate cry in the night. It was followed by a collective ululation, the baying of wolves—or jackals—a fearful sound wending across the water. He narrowed his eyes, hoping to see them among the indistinct shapes of trees and shrubbery that edged the side of the lake.

  He thought he could make out the jackals, although it might only have been a clump of low foliage, for there was no movement. Halloran rose to one knee.

  And again was temporarily blinded by a fulguration from the lake.

  It had come from below the water, a silvery white luminance swiftly expanding across the flat surface, its extremities shading to indigo and the deepest mauve. The illumination lasted only a second or so but there was time for Halloran to observe the jackals gathered there at the edge of the water. The glare had frozen them. Their heads, with long pointed muzzles and erect ears, stood high from their shoulders, cocked in alertness and perhaps puzzlement. At least a dozen pairs of glowing orbs, set in irregular pattern, reflected the light.

  Darkness, total after the glare. But again an impression lingering. Halloran had seen someone standing among the beasts. A bent figure, a cowl concealing its features. Whoever it was had been watching the lake.

  Halloran heard a voice—no, laughter—and his attention was diverted to the boat. He had recognized the dry cackle of Felix Kline, the sound amplified across the water. Halloran rose to his feet and moved forward at speed, keeping low, taking the gun from its holster as he went.

  He could make out the landing jetty ahead and noted that the boat he and Kline had used that morning was no longer moored there. Did Kline enjoy a nighttime boat ride as well as an early-morning one? Or had he been forced into a trip not of his choosing, the lake making an obvious route to avoid the guard dogs? But he had heard Kline laughing, hardly the attitude of someone being kidnapped. Nevertheless, Halloran did not relax. If they moved any farther away he would get to a car and be ready to meet them on the opposite bank at the border of the estate. He would also have a chance to call in backup on the journey.

  There was no cover this close to the shoreline, so Halloran moved back a ways, then spread-eagled himself on the ground, his gun pointing toward the dull shape on the lake. He waited and yet again was dazzled by another vast spasm of light. The intervals between had not been regular in length, so there was no way of preparing himself for each surge. The light vanished instantly, neither fading nor receding, snuffed like a candle flame. He rubbed at his eyelids, disbelieving what he had seen, telling himself there had to be a simple explanation, that he hadn't been able to take in everything during that short burst of light. Reason reassured him, but the afterimage refused to compromise.

  Halloran had seen four men in the boat—Palusinski, Monk, and the two Jordanians. Kline had not been with them.

  He was several yards away. He had been standing on the calm surface of the water.

  Halloran shook his head, resisting the urge to laugh at the absurdity. There had to be something else out there just below the water level, a sandbank, a submerged platform, perhaps even a large rock. There was a logical explanation. Had to be. It was in Kline's nature to play such childish games. But surely they would have come across such an obstruction when he himself had rowed out there that very morning?

  In the distance the jackals howled, the sound farther away this time, as though they were leaving the shoreline to slink back into the wooded slopes. He heard oars swishing on water. Voices. Drawing close to the jetty. He waited for them all to disembark before getting to his feet and going toward them.

  Moonlight squeezed through the merest rent in the clouds, and the group came to a halt when they caught sight of Halloran.

  "No need for weapons," Kline said, humor in his voice. "No enemies among us tonight, Halloran."

  "What the hell were you doing out there?" The question was quietly put, Halloran's anger suppressed.

  "I'm not a prisoner in my own home," Kline replied jovially. "I do as I please."

  "Not if you expect me to protect you."

  "There's no danger tonight."

  Moonlight broke through with greater force, and he saw that Kline was grinning at him.

  "The light from the water . . . ?"

  Khayed and Daoud, dressed in the robes of their country, grinned as broadly as their master, while Palusinski glanced anxiously at Kline. Monk remained expressionless.

  Kline's eyebrows arched uncomprehendingly. Then: "Ah, the lightning flashes. Yes, there seems to be quite an electrical storm raging above us tonight. With thunder soon to follow, no doubt. And then, of course, a deluge. Best not to linger out here, don't you agree?"

  Once again his manner had changed. Kline's disposition had become that of an older, more reasoning man, the insidious mocking still in his voice, but his tone softer, less strident. His persona was vibrant, as if brimming with energy, though not of the nervous and neurotic kind that Halloran had become used to.

  "You weren't in the boat," Halloran said almost cautiously.

  There was elation in Kline's laughter. "I'm not one for moonlight dips, I can assure you."

  Palusinski snickered.

  "I saw you . . . on the water."

  "On the water?" Kline asked incredulously, continuing to smile. "You mean walking on the water? Like Jesus Christ?"

  Halloran did not reply.

  "I see you've been hallucinating again, Halloran. Something in this lake obviously doesn't agree with your mental processes."

  The Arabs chuckled behind their hands.

  "I really think you should be resting," Kline went on in mock sympathy. "The strain of the last couple of days is apparently affecting your judgment. Or should I say your perception? I can't say I'm not surprised, Halloran. After all, you did come highly recommended as a bodyguard. I wonder if your employers realize that stress is getting the better of you."

  At last even Monk smiled.

  The clouds resumed their dominance and the landscape darkened once more.

  "I think we should talk," Halloran said evenly, ignoring the stifled sounds of mirth coming from Kline's followers. For that was what they were, he had decided, not just employees, but in some way disciples of this strange man.

  "But you should be sleeping. Isn't this your off-duty period? That's why we chose not to disturb you—we are perfectly aware that someone under your kind of pressure needs his rest."

  "Monk and Palusinski had instructions to alert me to any activity, no matter what time it was."

  "A late-night excursion on the lake was hardly worth rousing you for."

  "I gave them orders."

  "And I co
untermanded those orders."

  "My company can't function under those conditions. Tomorrow I'll recommend the contract is canceled, or at least that I'm taken off the assignment. There's too much going on here that I don't like."

  "No." At least the mood had been broken; Kline's tone was sharp, urgent. "You mustn't do that. I need you with me."

  "You might need Shield, but you don't need me. There are other operatives equally as good." He tucked the automatic back into its holster and turned to walk away.

  "Wait." Kline had taken a step after him, and Halloran paused. "I suppose I'm being a little unfair," the smaller man said, and immediately something of his "other" self was in evidence, almost as though it were another guise. "You're right, we should have let you know we were coming out here, should've brought you along for safety. But it was a spur-of-the-moment thing, y'know, something I felt like doing. I didn't see any need to worry you."

  "That doesn't explain why you went on the lake. Nor does it explain the light. Or what I saw."

  "Look at those clouds. Just study them for a while."

  "That isn't nec—" A flash of light stopped him. He gazed skyward. Another, fainter discharge of energy, but enough to throw the tumbled cloud into relief. "That isn't what happened before. The light came from the lake."

  "Reflections, that's all. It bounced off the water's surface. The lake's calm tonight, just like a big mirror."