Piercing the Darkness (92 page)

“My Lord has defeated you!”

Destroyer stumbled to his feet, holding his sword limply, his eyes losing their fire.

“Get out of my life, Jonas! Forever! Do you hear?”

THUD!
Tal came in with a blow that sent Destroyer spinning. The black demon righted himself and held his sword ready. Guilo came in from the side and assailed him again with a clash of blades and bursts of light.

“The woman belongs to
me
!” Destroyer roared.

“She is
ours
!” said Tal.

Sally’s desperate, screaming voice came across the distance: “I belong to Jesus! Jonas, I
renounce
you! You have no claim to me! Get out of my life!”

The words hit Destroyer like poisonous darts. Then a revelation hit like a salvo, and Destroyer stood still, facing his archrival, the Captain of the Host.

“You
knew
, Captain of the Host! You knew she would do this to me, to
us
!”

Tal held his sword ready, but answered, “I knew what you would do to
her
—that you were commissioned to destroy her.”

Destroyer’s mouth spread open, and the fangs went dry. “
You
placed her there, in Bacon’s Corner!”

“And you tried to kill her, as always!”

Destroyer began to wilt. “She . . . was
mine
, from her youth!”

“Ours—our Lord’s,” said Tal, “from her mother’s womb.”

“Get out of my life, Jonas!” Sally cried. “Jesus has conquered you—so get out!”

The sword quivered in Destroyer’s hand. “She has taken away my name!”

With an agonized roar and a final burst of fury, the weakened demon dove at Tal, bringing his blade down in a fiery arc. Tal parried, jabbed, let him keep coming. The red sword swung from the side, came back again, cut through the air. Tal sidestepped it, struck it aside with enough force to throw the demon off-balance. He delivered a stunning kick to the demon’s flank, jolting him, toppling him. The demon twisted about, swung at him; Tal met that clumsy attack easily, then brought his own blade down in a shining arc.

The air filled with red smoke. Destroyer wailed like an eerie siren, clutching his opened side, floating, withering, fading. He pushed himself backward with one foot, hovering on erratic wings. Tal hauled back for one more blow, but it wouldn’t be necessary. As the demon’s eyes remained fixed on him, ruby-red, bulging in hate, the wings fell silent.

With the dying, groping lips forming a silent curse, the thing pitched forward, sighing out sulfur, and slipped into oblivion.

The forest was suddenly quiet. Now Tal could hear the muffled weeping of Sally Roe. He sheathed his sword.

SHE LAY NEARBY,
facedown in the dirt, weeping, physically exhausted and emotionally spent. Guilo sat beside her, his wings spread over her, stroking her head and speaking soothing words to her soul. Tal approached quietly, knelt beside them, and spread his wings high and wide, joining Guilo’s wings to form a canopy to keep out the world for a while.

“One more season of restraint,” he said. “She has gained it for all of us.” He touched her head, now scratched and dirty, and said softly,
It’s over, Sally. You’ve won.

In the valley below, the sounds of battle continued—rumblings, shrieks, clashings, flashes of light like distant lightning. But it would settle eventually. The outcome was certain and only a matter of time. For now, they remained with her.

CHAPTER 45

IN WESTHAVEN, IN
the quiet, dull courtroom, Wayne Corrigan was just finishing his rebuttal to Gordon Jefferson’s arguments.

“And so, we hope that the court will be careful to protect Mr. Harris’s constitutional right to due process and his right to confront his accuser. We confirm once again that we have no intention of harming Amber Brandon or causing any further trauma. We only desire to get to the truth, and that, we believe, is the least our judicial system must allow any defendant. Thank you.”

He took his place next to Tom Harris. Tom had been watching the clock. It was just about 4 in the afternoon.

The three judges had been watching the clock as well. The one in the middle, the older man, shuffled his papers together.

“Thank you, Mr. Corrigan, and thank you, Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Ames. Arguments were thorough and well-presented. Court will recess for the day. We’ll have a ruling for you by Thursday, the day after tomorrow.”

WHAM!
The bailiff rapped the gavel and ordered, “All rise!” and they all rose, and the judges went out.

Ames and Jefferson seemed just a little somber, even angry, as they rose, gave Corrigan and Tom a carefully sculpted dirty look, and left the courtroom.

“Hm,” said Corrigan. “I didn’t think I did that well.”

“I thought you did great,” said Tom.

Corrigan shrugged. “Well . . . we’ve been praying. It’s in the Lord’s hands.” He gave a weak smile, looked at the floor, and admitted, “But I don’t know, Tom. Sometimes I wonder if I’m just a rotten lawyer or if God chooses to stay out of courtrooms. I haven’t had much to feel good about lately.”

Tom’s smile came from deep inside. “Oh, whatever happens, God isn’t mocked. He’s Lord, Wayne. However He wants this to turn out, I’ll accept it.” He slapped Corrigan on the back. “Let’s get some dinner.”

Corrigan fumbled a bit. “I hope you have some money on you.”

“Uh . . . I have three dollars, I think.”

“Okay. I think I can match that.”

“We’ll make it McDonald’s!”

THE LAKE WAS
calm, like a mirror, reflecting the trees on the shoreline with clear, unbroken lines and deep spring colors while just above the water’s surface myriads of bugs danced in the sun like tiny golden sparklers. The lone fisherman sat in his aluminum boat, glad for the quiet, glad to be alone. He was somewhere in his fifties, with salt-and-pepper hair and a youthful face, dressed in jeans, flannel shirt, and a drooping fishing hat that had to have been his favorite for years. The fish weren’t biting much, but he was getting the peace he’d come for, and he was satisfied. For now, he reclined lazily against a boat cushion, just floating, relaxing, and not thinking much.

Somewhere in the middle of the day, he heard the rumble and gentle splashing of boat oars, and looked out from under his hat brim. Yes, someone was coming toward him in a small wooden dinghy.

When the visitor drew nearer, the fisherman sat up. He knew that slightly rotund, bespectacled man in the straw hat. They weren’t exactly friends, but they’d bumped shoulders on many occasions. What was he doing here? This was supposed to be the fisherman’s hideaway.

The visitor looked over his shoulder, smiled, and kept rowing closer, not saying a word.

The fisherman had an eerie feeling about this encounter. If the visitor wasn’t going to speak, then
he
would. “Jim?”

Jim looked over his shoulder. “Hey, Owen.” With a few last oar
strokes, he brought the little dinghy alongside. Owen used a short piece of tether to join the two boats together. “Ah, thank you much.”

“To what do I owe this visit?” asked Owen Bennett. “I hope it isn’t business. I’m out of the office right now.”

“Oh, I figured this would be a great place to have a chat, just you and me.” Jim looked back toward the resort. Some families were picnicking near the lakeshore. “But I’d talk quietly, Owen. The sound is really carrying today.”

Owen lowered his voice and asked, “So state your business. I’m very busy doing nothing today and I’d like to get back to it.”

Jim heaved a deep sigh, rested his forearms on his knees, and just looked at Owen for a moment. “I’ll come right to it, but even that’ll take a while. I suppose you’ve been keeping up on that case out of Bacon’s Corner?”

Owen stared at him blankly, then shook his head.

“Never heard of the place?”

“No, afraid not.”

“Well . . . I never heard of it either. Never cared to, except that the ACFA started a lawsuit there, and I know they were coming your way with it. They were going after a Christian school again, and thought they had all their ducks in a row, including you.”

“Well, if it’s a pending case, obviously I can’t discuss it . . .”

Jim held up his hand. “Oh no, no . . . don’t worry about that. We don’t need to discuss the case, no sir. We can talk about other things.”

“All right.”

Jim looked across the lake, gathering his thoughts. “We can talk about a few personal items, I suppose . . . like a particular secret society, the Royal and Sacred Order of the Nation?”

Owen smiled. “Well now, if I talked about that, it wouldn’t stay a secret, would it?”

Jim nodded. “So I’ve gathered. You know, I’m amazed at how many supposed friends of mine know everything else but what I want to find out about that bunch.”

“It’s just a lodge, Jim. It’s nothing to worry about.”

Jim wasn’t that willing to brush the matter off. “Ehhhh . . . you have to understand, a man in my position gets a little spooked when men in your position start protecting each other and keeping little secrets
among yourselves. Well, I said
little
secrets, but I don’t know
what
size they are, do I?”

Owen remained tight-lipped. This was Jim’s meeting; let him carry the conversation.

Jim did. “I hear that Carl Santinelli’s a member, and
that
would concern me, as much as his name gets around Washington. To think the two of you are bosom buddies in the same secret society curls my hair just a little.”

Owen got a little tense, and his voice had an edge. “That raises an obvious question for me, though I doubt I’ll get an answer: How did you find out?”

“I’ve been reading some mail, Owen. A lot of mail.” Jim looked directly at him. “Letters written by Sally Beth Roe.”

Paydirt. Jim could see a definite reaction all over Owen’s face. Owen lowered his head and muttered, “Oh, boy.”

“Aw, we’ve all got a few skeletons in the closet, Owen. You know that about me, and I know that about you.”

Owen couldn’t contain his curiosity. “What . . . Did she write to
you
?”

“Oh, no. She wrote to the headmaster of that Christian school—I guess to give him some inside information and help him out.”

“Well . . . I hope you can recognize truth from vindictive lies.”

“Mmmm . . . one of the first things she wrote was that she wasn’t dead, and I was impressed by her truthfulness.”

“Jim, I think you’re talking in riddles!”

“Well, okay, stop me if you’ve heard this one: Sally Roe wrote a whole stack of letters to the headmaster of that school, I guess to help him out. The only problem was, he never got the letters because somebody tampered with United States mail and snatched them all. Turned out it was the local postmaster, also the plaintiff in the suit, but she agreed to cooperate and told us where she sent them all. You’ll never guess where: the Summit Institute! Some FBI agents went there and found every one of them in the possession of—are you ready for this?—Carl Santinelli, Mr. ACFA himself. He’s in real hot water right now.”

“That has nothing to do with me.”

Jim was a little shocked. “What happened to the old team spirit,
Owen? I thought you guys were lodge brothers.”

“That means nothing.”

“All right, all right, we’ll try not to place guilt by association.”

“I would greatly appreciate that.”

“But just for my own information, don’t all you Nation guys have some kind of membership ring, some funny gold ring with an ugly face on it, and your secret code name on the inside?”

“I don’t have any such ring.”

“Well, I know you don’t have yours. Sally Roe has it. Well, she
did
have it. Now we have it.”