MudMan (The Golem Chronicles Book 1) (36 page)

Tears began to leak down Ryder’s face, running over her cheeks and staining the gray stone black. “But we’re family, Jamie. I know we’ve never seen eye to eye on a lot, but how could you do this to me?”

“I’m not doing it
to
you, I’m doing it
for
you. You deserve justice, just as much as Mom or Dad or Jackson. None of us walked away that day. That day broke you—it broke us both. The drugs and alcohol, the boys. It all started after that,” she said. “He broke
us
. You always tried to hide it, but I know how much you resent me. You resent me because of what you had to do, what you had to give up to protect me and cope with what you saw.

“He spared your body, but he murdered your future, Sally. Mine, too. I’ve got a degree, a house, a good job. But I’ve never had a boyfriend. The thought of starting a family or bringing a child into a world like this, a world where criminal tyrants massacre families and walk away, is unthinkable. It makes me sick.” She balled her hand into a tight fist. “He killed everything that day. No survivors. And if we can pay the price so no other family has to live through that? It’ll be worth it.”

Ryder didn’t say anything, couldn’t say anything. She sobbed silently onto the stone. Jamie had always been a bitch, but she was still family. The only family Ryder had. The only real, lasting relationship she’d managed to keep
ever
.

Jamie cleared her throat and backed up a step, running hands over her scrubs, smoothing away nonexistent wrinkles. “I’m sorry it had to be like this. But I promise, it’ll be over soon.” She turned to go, then faltered and glanced over one shoulder, refusing to meet Ryder’s eyes. “I’ll be back with the doctor in a bit,” she said. “Don’t struggle, that’ll only make things worse and nobody wants that—”

Jamie fell silent as her cell phone
buzzed
, flickers of light showing through the thick fabric of her pocket. She pulled the phone out and glanced down at the caller ID; the color drained from her face, her complexion suddenly ghost white. And then she was gone, rushing back toward wherever she’d come from, phone held out as though it were a deadly rattler just waiting to bite.

“It’s going to be alright,” a man said as Jamie darted away, Kobock guards trailing behind her. She rotated her head again, locking eyes on the beaten man chained to the wall. “We’ll find a way out.” His voice was wheezy, tired. “Either that or your golem friend will come for us,” he said, the words a whisper.

She wanted to wipe the tears away from her cheeks, but couldn’t, not with her hands tied down. She hated letting people see her cry, so she turned away, staring blankly at the ceiling overhead. “You don’t really believe that do you? We’re boned beyond belief. Even if Levi comes for us, he’s not gonna be able to save us. No one can save us.”

“Hope and despair are both choices, young lady,” he said softly. “I suppose I would rather die hopeful.”

“I call that being delusional,” she said. They were both quiet for a time, listening to the muted shuffle of feet, which drifted down from above. Sounded like someone was pacing. “Who are you anyway?” she finally asked. “I feel like maybe I should know you, but don’t. My mind’s still foggy from whatever shit they gave me.”

“Owen Wilkie,” he said, “professor of cultural anthropology, comparative theology, and linguistics.”

“You’re that wizard or whatever.” Things were starting to click into place again. “The one we were looking for.”

“Mage, not wizard, and yes to your question,” he replied, then fell silent as though every word took a tremendous effort of will.

She shifted her head, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye. “What’s really gonna happen to us? To me?”

He sighed, then broke into a fit of raspy coughing. “The truth is often ugly, dear,” he said once the hacking had finally subsided. “Perhaps it’s best not to know.”

“I’ll take an ugly truth over a pretty lie any day of the week.” She paused, letting the words hang between them for a beat. “Tell me. I wanna know what’s gonna happen one way or another. Better to know what to expect.”

She heard the rattle of chains and the rustle of fabric as the man adjusted his body. “You would think, being a scholar, I would agree. After two hundred years, though, I often find that the lies are more comforting, and comfort isn’t a thing to be so readily dismissed.” More rustling and rattling, then another round of hacking. “Ahh,” he said eventually, “but who am I to deny you, if you want to know. Here is the truth. In a few hours, your sister is going to gut you like a fish. She’s going to slice your belly open and the thing growing inside you will rip its way free.

“Then, as you lay dying, your sister is going to do the same thing to herself. She’s going to shove a ceremonial knife into her own intestines and essentially disembowel herself, in order to tear open a rift between the worlds, allowing the essence of a murder godling to break into our plane of existence. The spirit of that creature will inhabit the homunculus and will slowly feed off your life force—you and your sister both—sucking you dry like a juice box. You will die, he will be free, and he will be unstoppable.”

Ryder was quiet, more tears forming a rebellion and breaking free against her will. “Shit. I wanted the truth, not a fucking kick in the teeth. Way to crush my spirits completely.”

“You asked for the truth.”

She looked back toward the professor. He was leaning against the wall, head back, swollen eyes closed. “There’s the truth, and the
truth
. Maybe you could’ve skipped some of the details.”

“I’ll remember to work on my bedside manner for the next time I find myself in a situation like this,” he said, then chuckled, which turned into another round of dry hacking.

“You think Levi has any chance in hell of saving us?” she asked.

He shrugged, then winced. “If your friend can stop the ritual before it commences, maybe. Once that thing is free, though, I’m not sure any force on Earth will be capable of stopping him from doing whatever he wants. There is, perhaps, a very narrow window when the homunculus will be vulnerable. While he is bound to you and your sister, feeding off your essences. In that twilight moment between life and death, you or your sister could, theoretically, kill it.

“Well, no, that’s not quite right. No one can
kill
Cain—he’s spirit cursed with immortality by God. But Cain’s mythos is intrinsic and central to the ritual: blood must kill blood. Since you will be temporarily bound to the homunculus by blood and spirit, you will have a certain power over him. At least until you bleed out and die, which will probably take less than ten minutes. Hypothetically, though, you
could
exercise that power and interrupt the ritual before it can come to completion. Sever his link to the world—destroy the body you created—and he might be pulled back into his hell.”

“So if I’m following,” she said, “what you’re saying is we’re screwed beyond all possible hope if Levi doesn’t show up before my little sister kick-starts this fucked up ritual.”

“You got it in one, dear. Shall we return to our delusions now?”

“Sign me up,” she replied morosely. “In fact, let’s just pretend you didn’t say any of that bullshit and you can go back to telling me how everything’s gonna turn out all right. ’Cause. Holy. Shit. Better yet—where the hell is my bat-shit crazy sister? I could use some
good
drugs right about now. If I’m gonna be gutted like a fish, I’d like to have enough morphine pumping through my body to kill a fucking whale.”

TWENTY-SEVEN:

Counsel

Levi puttered along in his minivan, heading for the Hub entrance behind the old theater on Colfax. Time was short and the plan was simple: hit the Hub, take one of the numerous Vegas exit portals, then catch a cab and head over to Hogg’s warehouse, where he’d meet Chuck and company. The “company” being whatever reinforcements Chuck could conjure from the shady ranks of the Hub’s denizens. Not a great plan, but it was the best the Mudman could do on such short notice. He thumbed the radio’s power button, flooding the cab with contemporary worship music—the current song had a country flair, complete with the twang of a banjo.

The music soothed his fraying nerves.
Nice and easy
.
No point in getting worked up. Gam zu l'tova
—
this too is for the good
—he reminded himself.

He crept to a halt at a four-way intersection, mind drifting as he subconsciously tapped out the bass rhythm on the steering wheel with a thumb. Once the traffic broke, he hooked left, eased his foot onto the pedal, and navigated across three lanes of asphalt, making sure to keep the van under the speed limit. He was going to do battle with a nigh-immortal murder god, true, but that didn’t give him an excuse to violate the posted traffic signs.

Traffic laws saved lives.

He’d been cruising for a few minutes, kicking around thoughts of death and genocide, when he saw the church off on the right. His church, New Eden. At this hour the building should’ve been dark, empty, and locked up nice and tight against the night. It wasn’t. A lone Ford F150—big wheels, red paint, and long bed—sat in the parking lot. Pastor Steve’s truck. And the corner office was lit with the warm yellow glow of an office lamp, which seemed to invite Levi, to beckon him to come in out of the dark.

He glanced at the dashboard clock. 10:50. Not much time now, not considering how far he had to travel and how much remained undone.

He hesitated only an eyeblink before flipping on his turn singal, pumping the brakes, and swinging into the parking lot. Tonight Levi was war bound; only death and uncertainty waited for him in Nevada. If tonight was the night he was to meet his Maker—well, figuratively, since his
actual
maker was a monstrous, millennia-old psychopath he was hoping to kill—he wanted … well, he didn’t quite know. Guidance? Reassurance? Conviction he was doing the right thing? Conviction that his very existence wasn’t somehow a crime against God?

He was empty, broken. He needed
something
. A balm for his troubled soul.

He didn’t exactly know what he needed or wanted, but he believed Pastor Steve might have some insight. The pastor should’ve been home long ago with his family, so perhaps his presence here was a sign from God above. Maybe the Almighty wasn’t so indifferent to the affairs and heartbreaks of man as Levi had once thought. Maybe He’d looked down from His throne, seen Levi’s desperation, and shown clemency. Mercy. An extended olive branch of peace or, perhaps, the correcting crook of a shepard ready to guide a wandering sheep back into the fold.

The Mudman pulled into the nearest spot, killed the engine, and headed over to the church’s front door. He faltered at the entrance, his hand extended, ready to grasp the brass handle, but lingering just out of reach. Maybe this was a mistake. Maybe he was a monster
and
the fool Hogg had named him. Time was short, after all—he couldn’t afford to be here, wasting precious minutes. Besides, what would he even say? It wasn’t like he could be honest with the pastor. Better for him to go—

Steve’s office door, visible through the glass-fronted entryway, swung open, spilling a pool of amber light into the gloomy main corridor. Steve’s smiling face popped out a heartbeat later. “Come on in, Levi, no point in standin’ around out there in the dark. I’ve got some water on for tea.”

Guess that solved that.

With a nod, Levi pushed his way in, going over to the pastor and giving his hand a shake before heading into the office proper. A nice room, Steve’s office: white walls, accented in beige; several towering bookcases filled with bibles, history books, and theology texts. A simple work desk with a computer—next week’s sermon pulled up on screen. A deep-cushioned couch and a rough circle of chairs surrounding a squat, glass-topped coffee table.

Steve used the space for the men’s Bible study.

He ushered Levi in, then beelined for a small table at the back of a room, its surface littered with mugs, tea packets, instant coffee, and an electric kettle.

“Water’s still hot,” he said with a grin. “I’m burning the midnight oil, as they say, so I just made a cup of rocket fuel. Please”—he waved to the couch—“take a seat while I get you something. What’ll you have?”

“One of those instant coffees will do fine,” Levi replied, impatiently running hands over his pants.

“Cream or sugar?” Steve asked, grabbing a mug that read “I Look 30, act 20, feel 60—I must be 40” and pouring a splash of steaming water from the kettle.

“No, no. Black is fine.”

Steve ripped open a pack of coarse coffee—looked like granular dirt—added it to the mug with a grimace of distaste, gave the water a stir with a spoon, then padded over and set the piping cup on the table. “I really need to get something better,” he said, gesturing toward the coffee. “The instant stuff is convenient and
technically
qualifies as coffee, but only in the most liberal sense of the word.”

He pulled over a chair, positioned it across from Levi, and sat. “You may not know this about me, Levi, but I grew up in Palermo—Italy, that is. My parents were missionaries there for eleven years. And believe me when I say, no Italian would
ever
tolerate instant coffee. In the morning I still make my coffee at home using this bulky antique teapot, it’s called a
caffettiera
, which my grandpa passed on to me.” He sighed, then smiled. “Anyway, enough of that.” He folded his hands. “What brings you here? Pretty late. You burning the midnight oil too?”

Levi dithered, not sure what to say or how to start. “Something like that, I suppose. I … well, I saw your car in the parking lot and I thought I’d stop in and say hello.”

“Levi,” Steve replied, leaning back in his chair. “I haven’t been at this pastoring thing for all that long, but I’ve been at it
long enough
to know when someone’s got something heavy on their mind. Now, I’m sure you wanted to say hello, but I think you also have something else you’d like to air out.”