Darkest Heart (26 page)

The seraph squats as immobile as a cypress knee before its tiny campfire, dressed in a greasy canvas coat and soiled pants held in place by a length of twine. Its hair is wild and matted as a bison pelt, filled with twigs, scraps of old food and other detritus, and it smells of urine and body odor. The only hint that the creature hunkered before me isn't exactly what it appears to be is its skin, which shines like rotten wood in the dim light.

I move forward cautiously. This is not a seraph I am familiar with, and I am uncertain of my reception. I have to fight more than my own unease. The Other doesn't like being near seraphim, no matter how wretched they may seem. This particular specimen agitates the Other as much as Lady Madonna's freakish little vampire-baby, but it seems more interested in flight than fight this time. It's all I can do to keep from turning on my heel and fleeing back into the darkness. I pause to take a deep breath and steady myself as best I can. I refuse to allow the Other to ruin this, as it has ruined so many things before.

As I draw closer, the campfire's flame rises like a cobra poised to strike. Although my approach has been as silent as a shadow, and the seraph's back had been towards me, it stands up and turns to look right at me, its eyes glowing like bronze mirrors. Outlined by the flickering light, it appears twisted yet awesome, like a once-mighty tree withered by blight.

"I mean you no harm," I say, holding my hands up, palms turned outward. There is no sign of fear in its posture. After all, how could I pose a threat to one such as it?

"I have come to ask a favor..."

The golden glow in the back of the derelict's eyes flickers then goes out. It has lost interest in me.

Seraphim are notoriously hard to engage in one-on-one encounters. Their agenda is unknowable, even to those such as myself, who have been permitted brief glimpses into their mysteries.

"I need your help..."

The seraph returns its gaze to the fire, turning its back to me. Panic rises like blood in my throat. If I can't get this seraph to pay attention to me, then I'm screwed, Estes' screwed, Judd's screwed - in short, we're all screwed.

I move closer to the seraph, but it doesn't turn to look at me or show any other sign of acknowledging my presence. It merely sits before its trash-fed fire, eyes turned inward, as silent as a dead man's heart.

Create PDF
files without this message by purchasing novaPDF printer (
http://www.novapdf.com
) Talking to it is about as much use as cutting water with a sword.

I place my hand on the seraph's shoulder. Heat jumps up my fingers and through my arm, as if an invisible flame is raging under its skin. Although it feels like I'm pressing my palm against a hot stove, I don't loosen my grip. I pull on the seraph's shoulder, turning it back around to face me. My arm feels like I've plunged it into a vat of boiling water up to the shoulder. The seraph stays mute as a turtle, staring off into space with unfocused eyes.

"Look at me, damn you!" I grit between clenched teeth. I give the seraph a shake, hoping to elicit some kind of response, but it remains as impassive as a glass of milk.

The heat radiating from the creature is so intense I feel like a piece of candy melting on a summer sidewalk. My pain is quickly giving way to anger. I can feel rage bubbling in my head, like crude oil working its way to the surface.

A demon-born fury spreads through me like a virus, bringing with it a wrath as naked as bone. I feel as if I'm standing on a crumbling ledge, suspended high above a windswept precipice. Any second now I'll lose control, and the Other will emerge. But I know that, once in command, the Other will flee as fast and as far away from here as it can go, like a monkey desperate to escape the coils of a python.

I'm playing with dynamite, but I need the temporary insanity born of intense, dark passion to do what comes next, because I would never dare it in my right mind. I shove the seraph backward, sending it into the campfire. Sparks fly up from like a cloud of burning bees. The seraph's hair and coat catch fire with a dry, puffing cough, but still it doesn't open its mouth or cry out. It slowly regains its footing as its skin burns and blisters, chunks of melting flesh dripping from its body like tallow from a candle. As it turns to face me, its head splits open like a cicada's husk, unleashing a brilliant, cold light that burns like a fire in a blizzard. Something tells me I've gotten its attention.

The seraph stands revealed, its pretense of humanity destroyed. Although I am so frightened my stomach is full of static electricity, I can't keep from staring. It's slightly taller than a man and humanoid in appearance, but with transparent skin, like that of a medical teaching model. But instead of bones, blood and other viscera on display, there are arteries of lights, veins of brilliance, and organs that glow like radiant jewels.

It hurts to look upon its fearsome beauty, even with my shades on. Tears of blood well at the corners of my eyes, but I can't turn my gaze away, despite the Other's screams of horror. The desire to flee from the thing standing before me is no simple fear, but some deep, primordial instinct, the kind hardwired into all animals, whether natural or unnatural. Although it has not lifted a hand against me, a part of me recognizes the seraph as being as dangerous to my wellbeing as a cougar is to an antelope's. Mercifully, the seraph reforms its mortal guise, dousing the agony of its beauty as easily as pulling a window shade against the glare of the sun. It looks at me through its outward countenance of an unkempt street person, its eyes shining like opals held before a fire.

"Will you help me?" I whisper, my voice dry as a paper flower.

As if in response, the seraph looks up at underbelly of the bridge works hanging over our heads. I follow its gaze and feel my breath freeze within my chest.

Above us are dozens of seraphim squatting along the I-beams and concrete supports of the twin bridges like so many shabby gargoyles, their lambent eyes glowing in the darkness.

I should have known better. Where there's one, there are often others nearby. Or did they simply pop into existence upon receiving a summons from their fellow seraph that he was under attack? To tell the truth, I don't know if they are actually capable of individual existence. Maybe they're like bees and wasps, and share some sort of hive consciousness. I clear my throat and open wide my arms, to show I harbor no weapons. The seraphim peer down at me with unblinking eyes, like a parliament of owls come to judge a bam mouse.

"I stand before you unarmed. I have come to ask a favor of you, not to do harm. I only ask that you hear me out."

The seraphim grouped overhead wink out, only to reappear before me, gathered in a rough semicircle, with me at its center. It's almost enough to make me turn tail and run for all I'm worth, save that I now recognize one of their number. It is Fido. Or what I have come to know as Fido. The seraph tilts its head and touches a filthy finger to its mouth, then points at me.

I frown and shake my head. "I will speak to you with words, not my mind, for I fear to let you in my head, old friend. I do not pretend to understand what you have become, but I do know that you were once like

Create PDF
files without this message by purchasing novaPDF printer (
http://www.novapdf.com
) myself - perhaps even worse. At one time you were all murderers, killers, monsters... enkidu. You fed on the blood of innocents and feasted on the darkness at the heart of humankind. I don't know why you are here on earth, or what plans you have for mankind. But I do know you can drive forth demons, because the one inside me is terrified of being in your very presence. This is why I have sought you out. There is a man named Jack Estes... he was killed by a vampire, and within a few hours he'll be resurrected as one of the undead. I promised I would never let that happen to him."

I receive a mental impression, brief but vivid, of an axe cutting through Estes' neck, sending his head flying. I close my eyes and grimace, trying to rid myself of the sight.

"No! I don't want to damage his body! I have a means of returning him to life - but I have to first rid the body of the vampire's seed."

Another image flickers through my mind, this one of Estes squatting naked and empty-eyed, his body smeared with feces and blood, chewing hungrily on a severed arm. The vision is so sharp and detailed, I smell the reek of human waste mixed with spilled viscera. It is as if I am looking directly into the future, instead of being shown something that might occur. The ghoulish apparition shakes me, but I do not allow it to shift my resolve.

"I know what reanimating a human corpse can lead to. But that is not what I propose to do. I have a soul waiting to enter the body. You yourself know which one I'm speaking of. You helped me harvest it."

The assembled seraphim turn their heads as one towards Fido, who nods slowly, and then they all return their unblinking gaze to me. They simply stare at me, as impassive as stones. Their expressionless faces trigger my frustration.

"You think you're so high and mighty? So much more evolved beyond me? You're no different now than when you were enkidu!" I snarl, spitting on the ground in frustration. As if in answer to my plea, the assembled seraphim waver like images on a dying television set and wink out, one by one, returning to wherever it is they go.

Defeat, as bitter as bile and thick as blood, crowds the back of my throat.

"Damn it - you fuckers owe me!" I shriek, snatching up chunks of broken concrete scattered at my feet and hurling them at the disappearing seraphim. "That's right! Run away! That's all you sons of bitches are good for anyway, being enigmatic and disappearing when you're really needed!"

A fist-sized chunk of pavement passes through Fido's chest and lands with a splash in the river. This is what I get for depending on others to do the right thing. You would think I would know better than to rely on anyone beside myself by now. Whenever I've counted on someone to help out whenever I've really needed it, I always ended up disappointed. Monster or human, it's always the same - you can't trust others worth shit.

I snatch up a chuck of breakwater the size of an engine block and lift it over my head, only to find myself alone under the bridge, with nothing but the Father of All Waters for company. With a cry born of grief as much as rage, I shotput my final missile into the river, sending up a spout as large as the spume from a whale.

I stagger drunkenly and slide to my knees on the filthy river's edge. I can't bring myself to look heavenward, but instead stare at the reflection of the moon floating on the surface of the dark water of the Mississippi, as blind and cold as the eye of a drowned sailor.

VéVé looked up from the pot of gumbo simmering on the kitchen stove as the headlights cut across the kitchen window. Sighing, she turned off the gas ring and dried her hands on the apron cinched about her waist. She could tell by the slam of the car door that whatever happened in New Orleans had not been good.

"They would not help," VéVé said simply, as Sonja entered the room. Sonja nodded sharply but said nothing. VéVé moved forward and took her friend's hands in her own. "Honey, you got to recognize that there are times when things are beyond your ability to set right. This is one of 'em. You have to let go, otherwise you're just tormenting yourself for no earthly use."

Sonja took a deep breath, steadying herself as best she could, then blew it back out. "You're right. I can't put it off any more. Where is he?"

Create PDF
files without this message by purchasing novaPDF printer (
http://www.novapdf.com
)

"Still in the basement. I got Levon keepin' flies off him."

"Let's get it over with, then."

As VéVé opened the cellar door, a damp, earthy smell, like that of a cave, rose to greet them. She turned an old-fashioned twist-switch just inside the door and a solitary light bulb flared into life at the foot of the stairs, illuminating the dirt floor and brick walls pock-marked by lichen and mold.

"Hope you don't mind me turnin' on the light," VéVé said as they descended the steep wooden stairs. "I realize you can see perfectly well in the dark, and Levon...well, it's been a long time since day or night mattered to him at all. But I'm afraid my eyesight's nowhere near as sharp."

Estes' body, still wrapped in the velvet stage curtain from the strip club, lay atop an old picnic table in the coolest part of the cellar. Levon stood over the corpse like a bizarre scarecrow, staring into nowhere, a flyswatter clutched in one hand.

"That's enough for now, Levon," VéVé said, waving the zombie aside. The flyswatter dropped from Levon's dead fingers as he stepped back to await his next command.

Sonja gazed down at Estes' face for a long moment before peeling back the makeshift shroud. Once the body was completely exposed, she glanced at VéVé and nodded. The voodoo priestess took a white kerchief from her apron pocket and tied it about her head, chanting a prayer for the dead under her breath.

Sonja reached inside her jacket and withdrew Estes' silver Bowie knife. Normally it would take a hacksaw to sever a human head, but given her preternatural strength and the sharpness of the blade, it would only take two, maybe three cuts to do the job.

Jack Estes was gone. All he was and ever could be fled with his final breath. The thing stretched out on the table before her was a husk; nothing more than dead, senseless meat defiled by the taint of the enkidu.

By destroying this corrupted vessel, she would prevent yet another member of the undead from walking the earth and save the lives of countless others. So why were her hands trembling? Why did her heart ache as if it was being squeezed in a tourniquet? She closed her eyes and bit her lower lip until something like blood came to her mouth.

She placed the Bowie knife against Estes' exposed throat. She had performed this act a thousand times before, without hesitation. Estes would feel nothing; indeed, he was already far removed from any pain and sorrow. She leaned forward and pressed her lips against Estes' pallid brow in a final kiss farewell. His flesh was as cold as something dredged from a pond.