Right Hand of Evil (24 page)

And the music was louder now, and coming from somewhere below!

Downstairs. That must be where Scout had gone. Kim hurried to the top of the stairs and started down, quickly coming to the landing where they curved downward in the broad flight that would take her into the entry hall. She started down once again, but the stairs seemed to go on forever, stretching away from her in endless repetition. She hurried her pace, racing down the stairs, and finally came to the bottom.

The music was thundering in her ears now. It still seemed to be coming from everywhere and nowhere; it drew her forward until she stood at the top of the stairs leading to the basement.

She stared down into the dark abyss, seeing nothing but blackness.

Blackness, and a single pool of light that seemed to fade away into the distance even as she gazed down at it.

But that was where Jared had gone.

She knew it. She could feel it.

And if she wanted to find him, she had to go there, too.

Steeling herself, Kim started down into the darkness.

The music grew louder with each step, until it was throbbing painfully inside her head. But she kept going, for she was beginning to feel something else, too.

Jared.

He was here, close by.

She kept going, deeper into the blackness. With each step, the pool of light seemed to recede. Yet at the same time, it pulled her toward it like a moth. "Jared," she whispered, her voice lost in the throbbing of the music. "Jared, where are you?"

At last she came to a door. A closed door. She paused, part of her wanting to go through the door, while another part of her wanted to turn away, to flee back up the stairs through the darkness, even disappear back into the gray miasma in which she'd first found herself. But she reached out and took the knob.

And pushed the door open.

The music swelled, her head feeling as if it would burst, and the brilliant light that broke from beyond the door blinded her for a moment. But then her vision cleared, and she gazed into the space that opened before her.

The ceiling, which soared to a height that made her dizzy, was supported by huge black columns so large their mass threatened to overwhelm her. Indeed, the entire chamber seemed to be bearing down on her, and despite the vastness of the space, the walls felt as if they were closing in on her. Everywhere, strangely etched panels hung, and Kim's eyes, blinking in the brilliant glare, moved rapidly from one hanging to another, gazing at the figures depicted in them. There was something familiar about them, a flickering of recognition at the edges of her consciousness, but each time she focused on one of the great gleaming panels, the feeling of recognition retreated. Only when she saw what lay at the far end of the vast chamber did she realize what it was: some kind of cathedral. But a cathedral unlike any church she had ever entered, for instead of offering her peace and comfort, this vast emptiness was filled with a terrible despair that seemed to worm its way into the core of her being.

Then, at the far end of the cathedral, above an enormous altar, she saw the cross.

It hung upside down, and where the figure of Jesus should have been, Kim saw the form of a woman, hanging head downward, her face a visage of agony.

On the altar itself, another figure lay, stretched prone on its back, gazing up toward the vaulted ceiling. And in front of the altar, a third figure stood. A tall figure, its arms raised, and spread wide in a gesture of supplication.

Or of blessing.

Even though the figure's back was to her, Kim recognized it at once.

Jared!

She took a step toward him, calling out his name.

He turned.

His eyes met hers, and Kim realized it wasn't Jared at all.

The face was Jared's.

The hair.

The eyes.

The smile.

But it wasn't Jared, for from the familiar form of her twin brother radiated an aura of something so strong it was almost a physical force.

It was Evil.

An Evil so pure and unadulterated that for a moment Kim could do nothing more than stand paralyzed in the face of it. Suddenly she understood that it was the source of everything she'd seen and felt and heard.

The suffocating gray mist.

The force that guided her down the stairs and led her into the cathedral.

The throbbing music.

All of it was Evil, pure and simple.

And at the center of it was Jared.

Now it reached out to her. She could feel it creeping closer, stretching tentacles toward her. Tentacles that-if she allowed them to touch her at all-would never release her from their grip.

She heard her name whispered in the shimmering light: "Kiiim…"

Part of her wanted to answer the siren call, wanted to reach out to the blinding light, be absorbed into it.

"Kiiimmmm…"

The whisper came again. The Evil drew closer.

And before her eyes, everything began to change. The light turned gray and cold, and now she could see that the great pillars soaring to the ceiling were made of bones. The images in the shimmering windows were visages of death. A terrible, paralyzing cold gripped Kim. Then, as if of its own volition, her right hand came up to close on the tiny golden cross, her aunt's deathbed gift. In an instant, the cold released her and she turned, fleeing from the temple of death, plunging back into the darkness, stumbling up the stairs.

Her heart pounding, her breath coming in labored gasps, Kim raced through the house and started up the great staircase in the entry hall. The gray fog closed around her again, wrapping her once more in its asphyxiating bonds, and then she could neither see nor hear.

As the breath went out of her, and the gray faded to black, she uttered a single, silent scream. Then she gave herself up to the mists and the darkness.

She deserves it.

She really deserves it.

Luke Roberts repeated the phrase over and over as he watched the face of the woman suspended head down on the inverted cross that floated above the shimmering altar.

His mother's face.

He'd watched in fascination as the spinning cross slowed to a stop, but even when he finally got a clear look at the face of the woman, he hadn't recognized it right away. All he'd seen was the pain in it-the agony. The mouth was open but no scream emerged; the eyes were stretched into horrified orbs, but no tears ran from beneath the lids. Everything about the face was distorted, but slowly-so slowly Luke was barely aware of it-he began to recognize his mother.

As her features came into focus, so also did all the angry memories-memories that, until this moment, he hadn't even known existed.

Her fault!

Everything was her fault!

Her fault that they never had any money.

Her fault that no matter what he did, Father MacNeill always found out about it.

It was probably even her fault that his father was dead!

But now she was finally getting what she deserved.

His eyes met hers then, and he felt her silent accusation:

Why are you doing this to me?

All the fury he'd felt that evening when he got home from cleaning the church came flooding back to him. What was she doing, getting all over his back? He hadn't done anything! So he'd been a couple of minutes late getting back from lunch. Big fuckin' deal! Who cared, except her and all those priests? As his anger grew, he watched his mother writhe on the inverted cross, watched blood begin to ooze from the pores of her face.

Don't you like it?
he silently taunted.
Well, now you know how I feel when you're always picking at me!

His rage-a rage far stronger than he'd ever felt before-continued to grow, until he was on his feet, moving toward the altar. Drawing closer to the cross, his arm outstretched, he pointed directly at his mother's pain-ridden face with a quivering finger.

"Die!" he hissed. Then his voice rose. "Die," he shouted. "God damn you! Just die!" His voice cracked, and he dropped to his knees. "Die!" he breathed once more. His rage spent, his head dropped forward onto his chest and his eyes closed.

Luke's whole body trembled, then stilled, and finally, depleted, he opened his eyes again.

The candles Jared had arranged on the workbench were guttering-one of them had already gone out.

The visions he'd seen-the hallucinations of the glorious cathedral-had vanished, leaving only the black-painted reality of the basement room. Luke's heart was hammering, his whole body was covered with a sticky sheen of sweat, and his breath came in panting gasps. His legs feeling as if they'd barely support him, he moved back to the mattress, letting himself sink into its softness, lying back against the wall as his respiration and his pulse slowly returned to normal.

He felt both exhausted and exhilarated, and as the minutes crept by, he listened to the discordant sounds of the music that still blared from Jared's boom box. As the last chords faded away, he finally spoke. "Jeez," he whispered, turning to gaze at Jared in the flickering light of the few candles that were still burning. "Where'd all that come from?"

"Where'd what come from?" Jared asked.

Luke frowned uncertainly. "D-Didn't you see it?" he stammered. "It was like-like some kind of huge church or something. And there was a cross." Haltingly, he tried to describe what he'd seen, what he'd felt, but even as he spoke, the details began to fade from his consciousness, until all that remained was the memory of his exhilaration.

And the anger.

Then he looked at his watch.

One o'clock.

It wasn't possible! He'd only gotten here a little while ago-it couldn't have been more than an hour.

Could it?

He looked again-the numbers on the face of his watch hadn't changed. And he felt exhausted. His muscles all hurt-even his bones seemed to be aching.

The church! That must be it-he must finally be feeling the effects of the hours he and Jared had spent cleaning the church that afternoon. "I-I better get outta here," he mumbled, scrambling to his feet. "My mom's gonna kill-" The words died on his lips as a flicker of a memory rose in his mind, then vanished so quickly he wasn't even certain what it was he'd remembered.

Something about his mom, and-

– and what?

Nothing. Whatever it was, it was gone. "Better get goin'," he muttered.

Jared waited until Luke was gone, then relit the candles on the workbench. Every detail of what Luke had seen was still etched sharply in his mind, as was every word Luke had uttered as he'd stood pointing an accusing finger at his mother's image.

Luke himself might not remember what he'd said, but Jared did.

"Die, God damn you! Just die!"

Then he heard another voice-a voice so faint he could barely make out the words at all.

"No," Kim's voice whispered. "No, Jared, don't…"

Jared hesitated, the match in his hand flickering above the only unlit candle on the workbench.

"Don't," Kim's voice whispered once more, but so faintly now that her words were easy to ignore. "Don't do it, Jared. Please don't do it…"

Jared lowered the match to the wick.

The flame shrank, nearly dying away.

But then the wick glowed red, caught fire, and flared up.

The memory of Kim's softly whispered words was lost as the blinding light expanded once more to fill the room.

"No, Jared! No!"

Kim's own shriek jerked her awake, and she sat bolt upright. A flash of terror came over her-a terror such as she'd never felt before. Then, just as quickly, it was gone.

A dream! It had been nothing but a dream!

The mists she'd been lost in, the darkness she descended into, the vast cathedral she'd seen-all of it had been a dream!

And the figure she'd seen, the evil figure she'd recognized as Jared-nothing but a nightmare.

She sat in the darkness. Though the night was warm and unseasonably humid and her face was sticky with sweat, she felt chilled as well, almost feverish. She got out of bed, pulled on her robe, and went into the bathroom. She flicked on the light, turned on the tap, then washed her face with cool water, rinsing the salty perspiration away from her skin. Finally she looked at herself in the mirror.

She looked exhausted, as if she hadn't slept at all. But the clock on her nightstand said it was after one, so she must have been asleep. Her complexion looked pasty and her hair hung in lank strings around her face. As she reached up to comb it back with her fingers, the mirror reflected a flicker of movement from behind her, and she whirled around, scanning the room.

Nothing!

It must have been her imagin-

And then she saw it.

A rat-the biggest rat she'd ever seen-was climbing out of the toilet, its wet fur matted down. As Kim screamed, the rat bared its teeth, hissing at her. Then another rat climbed out of the bowl, and another.

As Kim screamed in horror she jerked the bathroom door. The latch stuck.

Trapped!

More and more rats erupted from the toilet as Kim's heart raced. They were coming toward her, skittering across the floor toward her bare feet-

"NOOOO!" As the terrified shriek rose from her throat, Kim yanked at the door one last time and it flew open. Sobbing, she stumbled out into the hall just as her parents came through the doorway to their own room at the far end of the mezzanine.

"Kim?" her mother called. "Kim, honey, what is it?"

She hurled herself into her mother's arms, shaking, unable to speak. She pointed toward the bathroom door, which she'd jerked closed behind her.

Her father started toward the closed door, but she reached out, clutching at him. "No," she croaked. "D-Don't. Don't go in there."

Ted looked at her. "Don't go in? Why?"

Kim struggled to speak. She could still see the rats boiling up out of the toilet, their teeth-hundreds of needle-sharp fangs-bared, hissing furiously as they swarmed toward her. "R-Rats," she finally stammered, her voice quavering, her body still trembling at the memory. She began sobbing again. "They were coming out of the toilet, Daddy."