Hell Fire (37 page)

That cold wind rolled over us again, carrying with it an actual physical darkness. The small clearing grew smoky, a tiny pocket hell, where I’d led twelve souls to be tormented. A man burst past us, screaming with raw horror. Before I could move or speak, he too plummeted over the edge, crashing down the slope to find his eternal rest just a few feet from Agnes Pettigrew.

“We shouldn’t stay here,” Chance said then. “You don’t really want to see . . . ?”

No, I didn’t. Nausea and horror warred within me. I’d wanted justice, but I’d never foreseen the horror-laced madness that led them along the same path like lemmings. Demon darkness and the wailing of the wretched dead drove them along, scared almost to death even before they fell.

With some effort, I asked, “You have your little tablet?” In answer, Chance pulled it from his jacket pocket. “Yeah. Shannon’s sharp as a tack, isn’t she?”

“You feel like testing her invention?”

He arched a brow. “What’d you have in mind?”

“I thought maybe we could really find some lost souls.”

Maybe if we did some good out here, it would outweigh the rest. I didn’t put too much faith in that, of course, but I wanted to feel like more than an agent for destruction. In this way, I could give comfort and closure.

Thanks to his luck, we found two bodies in the first hour. They both lay in varying positions along the bottom of that gully. They’d run from the demon, fleeing it in terror, and plunged to their deaths.

I tried to ignore the screaming as others broke down, forgetting everything but the need to flee that devouring darkness, further agitated by angry spirits whipping through the trees. It couldn’t be easy, knowing they were the reason such evil surrounded the town. But they hadn’t realized when they set out to hunt me here that the demon wanted their deaths more than anything else. I hadn’t been sure of that, but I did know monsters didn’t like being bound, cheated, and forgotten. And I’d been willing to bet it wouldn’t hurt me.

I knelt to mark the second corpse, which had rolled beneath a scrubby little bush, and said, “I think this is Glen Farley.”

Chance didn’t answer. I stilled, scenting danger like a living thing all around us. Scarcely moving a muscle, I glanced up to find Sandra Cheney, filthy and bloody faced on the rise above. The wind whipped at her clothing and lifted her platinum hair in a way that made her look utterly mad—and terrifying. She held no weapon, but she didn’t look as though she had mind enough left to remember why she’d come out here in the first place.

Her hands curled into claws as she screamed for her daughter. “Shannon! Shannon!” She threw back her head, wailing in wordless grief.

I heard the crunch of approaching footsteps, and then I saw Jesse and Shannon approaching from the southwest. Sandra hadn’t noticed them yet, keening like a bereaved woman from ancient times. The gale amplified her pain, and all around her, the shadows gathered. From my angle, they looked hungry, swollen with sharp anticipation.

I didn’t know if the deaths of those responsible would be enough to give the phantoms rest or if they’d passed beyond the human afterlife—and were now feeding on pain, terror, and grief. They had been paler wisps, facsimiles of those they’d known in life, but we’d turned them into something else, and I didn’t know what exactly they could do.

Shannon had called them. Perhaps she could send them away too.

“I’m here, Mother.” The girl stepped forward, but not close enough for Sandra to sweep her over the edge, and Jesse stood within a safe distance.

“I did it for you,” Sandra moaned above the rising wind. “I didn’t want them to know you were Gifted. If only you’d listened to me—”

“So this is
my
fault? You could have warned me. Instead, you plotted and schemed, fucked that filthy old freak, and made Dad miserable. He loves you, though God only knows why.”

“It was for you,” Sandra said again. But she didn’t sound as sure as she had. “I didn’t want to let them take you.”

Shannon snapped. “Right. And when exactly were you going to get me out of here, Mommie Dearest? When did you plan to save me, if you couldn’t convince England with your bodily charms?”

“So you will not forgive me?” It was such a melancholy question, but I knew the answer before Shannon spoke.

“Never.” The girl’s tone echoed with ice.

To my absolute horror, Sandra did a swan dive then, landing in a broken heap near where we stood. I shuddered . . . because I was pretty sure she’d died in midair. That image would haunt me—the shadows closing in on her, swallowing her as her flesh fell and then passed into an inert state, before she touched the ground.

“Are you guys okay?” I managed to call out.

“A little beat-up from playing
Survivor
,” Jesse answered, “but nothing serious.”

“There’re only two left,” Shannon said.

Harlan Cooper and Augustus England.

“Should we go hunting?” Chance asked as he helped me climb out of the gully. I think he knew I’d go nuts if we stayed down here a minute longer.

Jesse nodded, offering me a hand to tug me the last few feet. “It’s about time.”

As much as I wanted to run, I couldn’t bring myself to leave the job unfinished, not after all we’d been through. If I didn’t put an end to things, once and for all, I’d likely never forgive myself. Especially not when we were so close.

I raised a brow. “Any idea where we should start?”

Shannon raised her antique radio, looking cool and remote. “They’ll find the last two for me, if you want me to ask.”

Something about her expression made me shiver a little. I glanced at the guys to get an idea what they thought. Chance was nodding; Jesse looked unsure. Would it warp her gift, asking spirits to do her bidding instead of merely communicating with them and offering information? She’d asked Rob Walker to find his own body, but that had the whisper of altruism attached. This, most assuredly, didn’t.

Since the alternative was knocking around the woods all night—and it was already starting to get dark—I gave a curt nod. “Let’s finish this.”

The girl powered the radio on and fiddled with the dial until the hissing static coalesced into a comprehensible, inhuman whisper. “Thank you,” it said. “Thank you, Shannon. They’re almost all gone. We made them pay. And . . . I’m not so cold anymore.” It gave an awful little giggle.

Shit.
That couldn’t be good.

“Tell me where England’s hiding,” she bade it.

The rest of us stood stock-still, distrusting the give-and-take between Shannon and the thing on the radio. I was afraid to move. I sensed the shadows pooling all around us, drawn to her like a lodestone. She almost seemed to glow with a dark, unholy light, feeding them even as she conversed.

I exchanged a look with Jesse. We really had to get a handle on her gift before something terrible happened. Shit, it might have already.

The whisper lapsed into a soft sibilance that the rest of us couldn’t understand, but Shannon nodded and responded as if the thing made perfect sense. It was eerie as she led us along the gully to the south, skirting the slippery edge. A soft rain began to fall, making progress more difficult.

We came upon England from behind. He was crouched in a blind, trying to be patient, but I could sense his fear like a living thing. He just had more control than the rest of his people. And he held a hunting rifle with the surety of someone who knew what to do with it. If he hadn’t been so distracted by the swooping shadows and the icy wind, he would have heard us approach.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
I was supposed to end this. If I were really the instrument of vengeance I’d tried to become, I wouldn’t hesitate to end him. In the distance, thunder rumbled, but no lightning accompanied it.

How fitting
, I thought, disgusted with myself.
All sound and fury.

Chance broke the stillness, going after England with such speed I could have blinked and missed it. My heart clenched until I remembered he had his luck back. He wrapped an arm around his neck and knocked the rifle out of England’s hands. To his credit, England didn’t even struggle.

He stilled, eyeing me with pure hatred. “Shoot me,” he spat. “You’ve won—and destroyed Kilmer in the process. Now it will fill up with franchise stores, fast food, Internet cafés, and pornographic bookshops.”

I’d tucked Ms. Pettigrew’s pistol into my bag, and now I drew it out slowly, as if it were a snake about to bite me. Could I really do this? Execute a man in cold blood? I knew he was responsible for my mother’s death, but I’d never felt any closer to her here, never felt she was watching with approval. Now he was beaten, broken at my feet, and I cringed to think of putting a bullet in him.

Darkness flooded the woods, carrying that particular scent of dying vegetation. The wind kicked up, full of echoing whispers of murdered souls. Though I knew I had nothing to fear from either the cold or the dark, I couldn’t help but shudder. The demon had come to witness this moment.

England set his jaw, straining against Chance’s hold. “We should’ve killed you when you were a kid,” he told me. “I wish to hell we had. But mark me, only one of us will walk out of here, Corine Solomon. I don’t make the same mistakes twice.” He slammed his head into Chance’s chin, loosening his hold, and then kicked backward.

Chance went sprawling, and his luck tablet bounced out of his pocket when he hit the ground. It tumbled into the underbrush, shrouded in darkness. We couldn’t take our eyes off England long enough to go searching for it, and I couldn’t live with myself if anything happened to Chance.

“Stay back,” I begged him.

For an old man, England had some vicious moves, but he was unarmed and I had a gun. I knew how to shoot, if not well, and at this distance, even
I
couldn’t miss. My blood cooled as I leveled my weapon on him.

“Get out of here,” I told the others. “This is between him and me.” When they hesitated, I added, “You’ll just distract me and give him an opening. Let me end this.”

I must have sounded cold—and sure—because I heard them moving off. England’s pale eyes held a mad, fervid light, as if he debated coming at me with his bare hands. “You murdered my mother,” I said quietly.

He didn’t deny it. “She didn’t belong. Neither do you. I’ve dedicated my life to keeping Kilmer a quiet, clean, peaceful place where people can be proud of living. I’ve kept the filth of the modern world at bay, just like my father before me. And now”—he dove for his boot—“it’s time for you to go.”

When I saw him come up with a holdout pistol, I fired. The pistol report rang like an explosion in my ears, and the kickback hurt more than I’d expected. He got a shot off as he fell, but it went wide, up in the air as he toppled back. I’d hit him in the gut, maybe not a fatal shot if he got medical attention right away. He wouldn’t.

The rain beat down in a savage fury. Then the lightning came, flashing above the trees as if in fierce celebration. Blood spread across his abdomen, trickling down his sides and into the damp forest floor. The earth itself rumbled as if with pleasure. I should’ve walked away, not watched whatever would happen next.

But England raised a hand, as if beckoning me closer. I knew he didn’t want forgiveness. He’d probably try to stab me if I crept up to him, and I didn’t think I had the strength to shoot him again. I backed away, knowing I had to find the others.

The ground shuddered again, like the earthquake Miss Minnie had predicted. As I scrambled backward, the forest floor gave way, and England went sliding down in a mad muddy rush. I tried not to imagine him suffocating as he bled out, buried with those he’d led to their deaths.

A landslide like that would hide a lot of bodies.

I lost my breath, running blind. I didn’t care where I was going, as long as it was away. The rain lashed at my face, stinging along with wild branches. Darkness writhed all around me with tormenting shapes. I tore my hands when I fell.

Someone jerked me to my feet.
Chance.

His hands framed my face, his gaze anxious as he searched my face. “Did you really think I’d leave you? You did good, Corine. It’s almost over.”

I tried to wipe the mud and water out of my eyes, but only succeeded in smearing it further. “We have to find Cooper,” I agreed. “Where are the others?”

“Right here,” Jesse said.

Shannon smiled at me; at least I thought she did. Between the wild wind, the driving rain, and the swirl of shadows, I couldn’t be sure.

 

 

 

 

The radio stopped working.

Shannon fiddled with it, but try as she might, she couldn’t get a response. Finally, she glanced at me, brow furrowed. “I don’t know what’s wrong.”

I shrugged. “It could be that killing England gave the spirits closure and now they’re gone. But we still have Cooper to deal with.”

“And that’s not going to be easy,” Saldana predicted.

Chance stared beyond us into the dark tangle of trees. The wind wailed through their skeletal limbs, giving no hint of human movement. “What do you know about him?”

“He’s a hunter,” Shannon answered.

That meant he wouldn’t have panicked, wouldn’t have broken beneath the mental strain. He’d probably hunkered down somewhere until the smoke settled. Now he’d be clearheaded and rested, ready to stalk his prey. A shiver ran through me.

My voice sounded thin. “So what do we do?”

“Get off the path,” Saldana said at once.

Chance led the way into the undergrowth. I couldn’t help the prickling sensation that we were being watched, but that might be the demon, though I couldn’t smell the dank, decaying vegetation that marked his presence. Shannon stuck close to my side, and I ached for her. Though she might seem cool, soon it would hit her that her mom was dead—and how Sandra died couldn’t help but scar her. I could still see the shadows swarming as she fell, as if feeding on her despair.