A Latent Dark (5 page)

After they spoke the boy left with a bag and the man in white stood for a long time, smoking a cigarette. Then he too disappeared into the black abyss that was once her room.

A few moments later, Skyla wept silently as black smoke billowed from the house. It was hard for her to tell if it was the smoke she was seeing or the shadow of the man in white. As the flames roared, Orrin fluttered to her shoulder and croaked into her ear:
“
Pree-cher
.”

Chapter 3

While Charlie rushed off to tell his cousin Sarah about the job opportunity, Lyle Summers returned to his hotel room, storming past the smiling receptionist as if she were invisible. He felt it before he even arrived at the witch’s house, his opportunity slipping away. It was amazing the girl was even there at all.

Too slow. Too slow and Charlie let her escape,
he fumed.

He felt the disappointment as a physical thing—a pressure from within. The sin collected on his cheeks and arms, crawling through his clothing, digging into his flesh. A million ticks, finding purchase with every action. The simple act of moving filled Lyle with disgust.

Perspiration pasted white linen clothes to his skin in damp patches as he rushed gasping into the suite, slamming the door. The tie around his neck felt like a noose. He loosened it, rolling his eyes with relief. Trembling hands tore at the suit jacket, flaying it open, flinging it onto the floor in a pile. The gloves were the last to go, slick with sweat as he removed them like a second skin.

He thought back to the witness, how she was so trusting at first, those large eyes looking up at him, so cooperative. He promised her it would be over—he hadn’t lied about that at least. After she told them what they needed to know, he had said his prayer, dashing baptismal water on her forehead as the blade made its final pass, sending her to heaven.

That was our window, our one chance to find the girl. To find the mother.

She served her purpose, the witness, now off to receive her great reward.  Oh, she screamed and cried at first. They all did once they understood the gravity of their situation, once they saw the tools. But now she was with Jesus.

A slaughtered lamb, dead and for what?
He ended the thought by hitting his fist against the wall.
It’s all a waste. All of it for nothing!

Standing there, naked and scarred, he felt reborn, renewed like a babe. But still his skin crawled with disease. Tiny fingers skittered through the fine hairs on his arms leaving behind slimy trails of black ink. He slapped at them with open palms, leaving welts, but they only burrowed deeper. He slapped his chest as they tunneled into his heart. He clawed at them and the relief was… promising.

The witness had been consecrated. They all had to be. There was no other way to satisfy the demons, satisfy the voices. It was through their purity of heart that they should suffer the way Christ suffered. The knowledge that it was for a greater good, to save the world, was what made the suffering divine, transcendent.

And so she had satisfied the beast within him, inviting Lyle to see the witches’ home, her screams a harmony to his jubilation.

Fingernails gouged at his flesh. So too would he suffer, now that he had failed. Now the punishment would begin.

“Be gone
,” he prayed in his mind as nails sanctified and tore. Deep gouges leaked dancing red lines of blood down his chest and into the carpet, pooling around his bare knees—the wounds burned as he rocked. He ripped again and again, the pain in his flesh subjugating the pain in his fevered mind.

“
I’ll not feed you again.”

Fine threads of curled skin tumbled to the carpet like dead maggots, to join the congealing fluid at his knees. He looked up at the paintings before him, rebuking the sin, purging it—such truth and beauty in those paintings of oil and canvas. Mother Mary looked down upon him with her eyes of mercy. Sweat from the heat of the lamps stung at his self-flagellation, the pain sweet and freeing.

He felt himself back on the stage, under the lights, back where he had been whole. He felt his healing hands on the congregation, his palms on their foreheads as he had yelled,
“Be gone. Be gone! Here is your meat. Take my flesh. Take my blood! Be gone! I have given you your lamb!”

And was that a knock at his door? How long had they been there?

He stared at nothing with red-rimmed eyes. Memories slid back into his mind at a crawl. He looked down at his stained hands, scarlet paws, his chest screaming red, burning pain. It was better now, quieter now. Lyle breathed deeply, eyes closed for a moment.

The blood washes away all sin
.

Another knock at the door shocked him into reality. A muted, wavering voice came from the hallway.

“Reverend?”

He cleared his throat. His throat was so dry. Had he been screaming again?

“Reverend, your luggage has arrived. You… um… is everything alright?”

“Yes,” he said, struggling with the words. “Yes, everything is just fine.”

His gaze fell on the pile of white clothes, so foreign now.

“One of the guests said they heard screaming. I-I wanted to make sure you were alright. I’ve brought your things from the station… are you sure you’re okay?”

Lyle blinked again. Sweat was beginning to work its way into the trenches on his bare chest. He welcomed the burning, closing his eyes and taking another long, ragged breath. A stream of saliva connected the corner of his lip to the white bloodstained hairs on his bosom. He wiped it away, surprised.

“I’m sorry about that,” he said to the closed door.

He pulled open the closet and grabbed a gray bathrobe, shuddering as he put it on.

“I was rehearsing a sermon,” he said through the door. “It’s important that you rehearse how you perform, I always say.”

He opened the door, smiling to see a nervous looking bellhop in a red and black uniform with a matching pillbox hat. There was a trickle of sweat on the bellhop’s brow.

Lyle watched the bead as it crawled down the boy’s forehead and fought back the urge to strike him. A wardrobe chest, as tall as The Reverend, stood behind the young man.

“Bring it inside.” He opened the door wider, his voice pleasant. “Please give my apologies to the other guests. I sometimes get a little passionate when I rehearse. I guess I must have overdone things a tad.”

The bellhop rolled the trunk into the room, taking special notice of the paintings, the lanterns illuminating every corner… the red stains.

“Is that—”

“Red wine. I apologize for my clumsy hands.”

“I can have that cleaned—”

“No need.”

Lyle stood patiently, hands in his robe pockets while the bellhop continued to roll the chest through the suite. He stopped at the pile of clothing on the floor.

“Would you like me to take these?” he asked.

“That would be splendid.”
Now get the hell out
.

“I can have them dry cleaned for you overnight—”

“No,” shouted Lyle. The boy winced as if struck.
Idiot.

Lyle paused for an awkward moment before continuing. “Go ahead and take them but I don’t need them back.”

The boy gathered the pile of clothing as Lyle winced.

“What should I do with them?” said the bellhop, clutching the mass of clothing like some beggar; Lyle felt bile rise in his throat.

“I would appreciate it if you could burn those, son.”

“B-burn—”

Lyle’s eyes ground the boy into fine powder. He spoke in succinct, buzzing syllables. “I said, I would appreciate it, if you... Would. Burn. Them. Do I have to say it twice?”

“Yes sir… I mean… no sir... I’ll burn them,” said the bellhop. He found himself staring at a dark stain forming on the center of the bathrobe. “Sir, are you—”

“I’m fine,” snapped Lyle. “Now if you will please leave me. I have a very long day tomorrow.”

The bellhop left the room, eyes tracing the floor and walls as he went. Lyle fought back the urge to send him out with a kick, instead slamming the door behind the boy.
Nosy little prick
.

He turned and faced his empty room again, embracing the solitude. The wardrobe trunk stood staring at him like an old friend. He threw off the robe—
let them burn that too
—and stepped up to the trunk. He unlatched it and swung the lid open sideways. The inside was thick with tightly packed white clothing.

“Cleaned, pressed and blessed,” he said with a chuckle.

He walked around the chest to the work desk and sat, feeling the cool wood against his buttocks. He began to type:

[I will need some documentation]

The reply:

[What do you need?]

[Forms mostly, and photos] [I’ll send a courier with a detailed list]

[Anything else?]

[I believe I will be needing those bank notes now] [Also a map]

[You lost the girl]

No, you did with your incompetent military. [Yes] [An unfortunate detail that will be rectified]

The pause was longer his time.

[You’ll have your map by morning]

[And schedule a meeting with the city constable’s office if you could] [I’ll send an assistant by to arrange the details] [I will require full access to their records]

[That would require security measures]

[Then promote me]

[You are forgetting who gives the orders, Reverend]

[Am I?]

The pause stretched on for a full minute while Lyle rummaged through his desk for a cigarette.

[Congratulations, Reverend Inspector] [You should be receiving your paperwork by morning]

Lyle leaned back in the chair and smiled, the cigarette pinched between his fingers.

Chapter 4

Skyla hadn’t given herself time to mourn all night. There would be time for that later. She tried to keep to the shadows, ducking into alleyways and behind piles of trash. Above her was Orrin, always following from a distance, soaring from streetlamp to rooftop, as large as a hawk, always watching for danger. A pair of dim amber lights appeared in the distance, accompanied by a rhythmic sputtering and hissing. He cawed a deep throaty warning and Skyla ducked behind a planter—trying to get out of sight as the headlamps of a steam-buggy approached.

Not him,
she thought.
Not the man in white.

The car passed. She waited for the all-clear from Orrin and then left the protection of the planter, continuing down the empty street. She was hungry, but then there wasn’t time for that either. She passed the closed shops, staring longingly into the gas-lit windows, her stomach growling at the pastries and sweet meats hanging from hooks. She wiped dirt and tears from her face in the reflection.