Part 14 (2/2)
She didn't know why she did, but when he turned, walking toward the stones in the underbrush, she followed.
They reached what she had drought to have been a marble angel. Seeing it up close, even in its state of aged decay, she saw that it was no angel. It was a demon. Horned, tailed, with a lean jutting jaw that gave it a terrible impression of pure carnal amus.e.m.e.nt and... evil.
”Andy, this thing is awful!”
”And too true,” Andy said softly. He scratched the day's growth of stubble on his chin, looking at Megan, then added flatly, ”He's trying to come back.”
Chills snaked through her, but she said firmly, ” I'm sorry, but marble creatures are the artistry of men.”
”Aye, girl, and you need men, the living, to bring about the return of the dead.”
”Andy, you're creeping me out here,” she said honestly.
”You've got to understand. I have to make you understand.”
She inhaled on a deep breath. ”Andy, I'm trying to understand. You think that a man is trying to bring a demon to life. A demon-a broken-down old statue-back to life.”
”He came before,” Andy said, and his words were barely a breath.
The wind s.h.i.+fted. A cold breeze rippled past her face, lifted her hair, and seemed to caress her throat.
”Andy, I understand that this is a graveyard. For people who might have been bad news. But surely, if there were such a thing as a demon, he wouldn't allow himself to be buried among humble men.”
”You don't understand. He came before.”
”Before what?” She was getting frightened, and therefore, impatient. She didn't believe any demon was coming after her, but she was beginning to fear the old man out in the middle of nowhere with only skeletal trees, the caw of crows, and a chill in the air as company for them.
”After the witch trials. During a phase you won't hear about in any old history books. People were ashamed. Very ashamed of all the innocents who suffered. Oh, not just those who died. Those who were incarcerated for years. Who died in prison because they couldn't pay the debts for the cold hovels and chains that held them. No one wanted anything to do with such persecutions. So the time was ripe, just right, for those who were truly evil. Not Wiccans. True Satanists. Devil wors.h.i.+pers. Demon wors.h.i.+pers. There was one such man. Convinced he was the chosen one to bring back to a human incarnation an ancient demon, Bac-Dal, first seen in Persia, eons before the time of Christ. That man came here. Right at the time when both men and women were deeply sorry for all the death and destruction that the hysteria had caused. When they were least likely to watch what their neighbors were doing.
When they were quick to turn blind eyes to whispers of sorcery. His name was Cabal Thorne. He wreaked havoc among men and women, created a life of true debauchery, and committed many murders for his blood l.u.s.t.”
”Andy, surely if there were any truth behind such a story, the history books or legends would have some hint of what had occurred.”
”The Elders allowed no word of it, once they believed. Men came here from elsewhere, and were closeted with some of the most learned men of the area. There could be no arrest for Cabal Thorne. No trial. No record of him, or what was to happen to him.
And no one knows exactly what did happen. They grouped together one night, and what they did remains secret to this day, what power they used, no one knows. But Thorne was killed. And brought here.”
”Surely, an anthropologist would have dug him up by now!” she said, trying once again to speak lightly.
”At the turn of the century, unbeknownst to history, someone did try to dig him up. A man known as Aleister Crowley. Ever heard of him?”
Megan gritted her teeth. ”A very famous necromancer, Satanist, into the occult, a debaucher, all that, yes, I've heard of him.”
”He tried to dig up the remains. It was claimed that he found nothing.”
”There was probably nothing to find. Look, Crowley was known to be one of the most hedonistic-if not evil-men of the past two centuries. If he didn't stay-”
”The history books won't even say that he was here.”
”Andy, did it ever occur to you that all this might be... tall tales?”
He c.o.c.ked his head strangely. ”I'm an old, old man. I've seen a great deal. Aye-uh, girl. It's men create evil most often. But there are forces in the world. And I've lived so long that I know when those forces are at work. Look at the things done! In the name of G.o.d? Don't you think that sometimes, something not so G.o.dly slips in? Haven't you felt it when there's a touch of evil, just a touch, at the base of your spine, creeping along, setting ice at your neck? There's evil out there. And some men who can manipulate it better than others.”
The trees rustled in a chill breeze. Somewhere, there was suns.h.i.+ne. It didn't enter through the canopy here. G.o.d, yes, she felt a chill!
”All right, Andy. Say a really evil man lived in the very early 1700s. And he thought he could become one with this demon, Bac- Dal, or whatever. He was hunted down and killed. Probably for murder and rape and other crimes-far too well known to normal men. What can that really have to do with now?”
There was a sudden sizzle in the sky, a flash of light, and then, a crack of thunder that caused Megan to jump.Andy was staring at her sagely.
”Weather!” she sniffed, though those icy fingers he was talking about had a really heavy grip around her neck by now. ”Rain, thunder, lightning. Natural phenomena!” she said.
He nodded. ”Aye-uh, girl. Natural phenomena. Don't you see? The time is right. The full moon is coming for All Hallow's Eve. And even that goes back... so far back. The night of the dead. When the souls of the departed are allowed to converse with the living.
Don't you sense it? This is a playground for those who would twist what is good... and turn it to evil. The time is right for Bac-Dal.”
”Andy, I have to go. Finn will be up by now.”
”You haven't understood me.”
”What is there to understand?”
”That there are forces in the world. Forces of good and evil.”
”Andy,” she said very gently, ”think about it, please. People cause the evil in the world.”
He shook his head stubbornly and stared at her. That stare that could make her so uneasy. So aware that there was no one else near them.
She very well might be alone in the secluded woods with a man who had truly gone a little bit mad.
”The time is coming,” he said stubbornly. ”And you must be aware.” He gripped her wrists suddenly, a grip that was as tight as any vise she had ever known before.
”Andy, you're hurting me.”
He released her instantly. But even so, she was aware of the leaves, rustling, as if they watched the two of them, creating shadow, chattering softly, whispering.
”What time is coming? Halloween? Andy, it's a holiday, it comes every year.”
”All Hallow's Eve. When spirits and demons can walk the earth.”
”Andy-”
”Bac-Dal is coming. And I'm afraid.”
”Afraid of what?”
”You must be afraid, too.”
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