The Forsaken (20 page)

“Da pain is a warning. We warn you. You no understand.”

A sudden, thunderous echo disturbed all three of them. “Leave him alone!” The beaten detective looked up. It was the old beggar he’d given money to only minutes earlier.

The men stood rigidly over Jude’s body.

“Did you hear me?” The old man raised his cane, unflinching. His stature commanded obeisance. They issued it with their eyes, recoiling at the beggar’s shrill, angry voice.

The barbaric men shoved Jude’s body aside and fled. No beggar back home had ever commanded such persuasion. At length, Jude stood, and his savior approached.

“They were right. Guy like you must be blind if he can’t see that this isn’t a place that often welcomes strange flesh.”

“Strange flesh?” Jude asked.

“Someone who’s not from these parts.”

Jude’s eye bubbled red. His shirt was torn, his body clearly displaying the colors of each wound. “Thank you for helping me.”

The old man tilted his hat. “Walk with me. I will give you a place to stay. It is not very safe for you out here, alone. Not very safe at all.”

“All right.” Jude grabbed his bag, found his gun, and followed the old man deeper into the village. “Your English is better than the others.”

“Very observant,” the man said. “I guess you could say I’m a fast learner. This way, stranger. We are close.”

27

WHATEVER THE TRANSPARENT LIQUID
seeping into his cuts was, it stung. Jude clenched his teeth as the old man’s medicine was absorbed.

“What is it?” he asked, his mouth tired from biting to mitigate the pain.

“It will help you heal.” The man coated Jude’s bruises with a new layer of cream then crushed what looked like rocks into powder and mixed it with water. “Sip this,” he said, handing Jude a wooden cup.

“Is this supposed to finish the job?”

The old man coughed, wiped some of the blood, and applied bandages.

Jude breathed over his wounds. “I’m not sure if I should thank you or slug you.”

“Perhaps I should have left you back in the alley, then.”

“No, it was, it was a joke. I don’t know what happened to me back there. Those men came outta nowhere and jumped me before I had a chance to defend myself. Being taken off guard…That’s not like me.”

Cleaning up the remainder of the mess, the old man said, “It is when we least expect it that danger comes for us. You should know that better than anyone, Detective.”

“How did you know I was a cop?”

“I saw your badge when you entered my village, remember?”

“Right.”

“You need rest.”

“Yeah. Thanks. By the way, my name is Jude Foster.”

Shaking Jude’s hand, the man replied, “It is a pleasure to have you as my guest, Detective Foster.”

“What is your name?”

“I have been called many things.” The old man hunched over mechanically, placing the majority of his weight against the rough wood of his short cane. White hair brushed against his scrawny shoulders, and as he took off his hat, he revealed a pair of eyes, one real and the other a marble of black glass. “Perhaps for now, you should just call me your host and friend.”

“Why did you help me?”

“The reason is not important. For every weary traveler, there must be a kind Samaritan, no? It is not so unusual to help a wounded man.”

The man was possibly a witch doctor or at least one who practiced dark magic. Jude made the assessment based on the ritualistic items dangling from nearly every window and doorframe. Unnamed liquids in odd containers were scattered across countertops and shelf space. And a silver medallion dripped from his wrinkling neck.

“One eye still works, you know. If you are going to stare, you must not be so obvious and rude about it.”

“Sorry,” Jude said.

“You want to know how it happened, I suspect. I was out there, in the fields.” A stiff index finger pointed out the window of the stone home and into the sunset. “I was getting a drink of water. As I journeyed up that path, into the hills, I lost my step and fell. At the bottom lay a blunt tree stump. Upon my descent, it took my eye from me.” The witch doctor leaned against the wall, his cane tucked into his armpit. The story seemed far removed from him, like he’d told it more than a dozen times and by this time, the effect was gone. “As the stars would have it, there was a man—my Samaritan—who came to help me. He was much younger than I.”

“Who was it?”

“His name escapes me now.” The witch doctor stirred a pot of tea. “I am better with faces than names, I suppose.” There was a sudden subject change. “There is a universal truth that exists all around us. Do you know what it is?”

Jude shook his head.

“You must lose something in order to gain something else. Losing part of my sight has been a true challenge, but it allowed me to see things from a different point of view. I do not know why it did not heal, but such is my fate.”

“What do you mean?” Jude asked. “When you say
healed
. What do you mean?”

“Did I say that? Just gibberish. My old mind is slipping, I’m afraid.”

“Maybe I misheard.”

“Maybe.”

Jude knew he couldn’t waste any more time. It was time he start digging for his answers. “When I arrived,” he began, “I saw a signpost at the entrance. Village of the Dead. Why do they call it that?”

“Everything has a name.” The witch doctor scanned the lonely hill outside, far off. “I think I will show you. Then it will be more clear.”

Jude winced. “But it’s dark. Shouldn’t we stay here?” He couldn’t believe he was actually buying into this place’s superstition, but the words flooded out before he could stop them.

“You will be safe with me. Follow my footsteps.”

***

Jude counted the steps up the hill and every so often looked back at the village in the distance. How far would they go? Where was this odd witch doctor taking him?

The dirt road snaked upward and became even more twisted the higher they climbed. The apex was in sight but still required a considerable hike, which, in his condition, Jude wasn’t thrilled about. His host, however, made the climb with little effort.

Jude searched the grounds, looking for eyes, faces. But they were alone now, in the quiet. His suspicions were growing when, all of a sudden, the witch doctor stopped. Jude hadn’t noticed they’d reached the highest point of the hill already. Had the time really passed that quickly? The sharp path had cut new holes into his shoes, and he was already experiencing a swelling in both heels.

From where he stood, near the edge of a great cliff, he watched a chaotic sea roll in and out against the rocks. The sea moved in the east, but behind them was a cemetery. His host directed his attention to it.

“It’s a graveyard,” Jude eventually spoke.

“Yes, it is a great home for the dead. They come here to sleep until the end of the world.”

“What happens then?”

“I do not know for certain. The end of the world is not here yet.” His host’s mouth slid into a grin. “Most times, men forget. But this place does not forget those who lived and died. It is the dead that govern the world. Their spirits wander through this village.”

“Their spirits wander?” Jude said, puzzled.

“I have seen them. There are other…levels on this earth, some that not all men can see. Things not all men can see. I have felt and tasted these wandering beings. But I do not expect you to understand fully of what I speak. In your country, most do not believe in such
silly
things.”

Jude froze for a moment. The wind pushed shivers down his forearm. “We have cemeteries back home.”

“But none like this. Our village was built after it. They are part of each other, you see? The aged name you encountered at the entrance derives from this part of the mountain. Things are different here. Justice is not for the dead but for the living. Do you give the living justice in your city?”

A slow but unsure nod. Jude stood rigidly. He followed the path that led toward the stone faces. Gray rock that crept out crookedly from the earth, as if holding on to a piece of the life their bodies had lost in death. The sky draped over the scene, black and starless. His eyes drank in what seemed like an unending field of graves.

There was movement in the trees just then, and Jude swore he heard a whisper. The voice was impossible to identify, but he knew he had heard something. His host knew it too. “Perhaps it is time to return. But I hope that now you understand what gives us purpose. It is the dead that allow the living to exist.”

“If you believe this place helps them, why are the people here so afraid?”

“All of creation fears death.”

Jude’s eyes glazed over as he looked once more at the endless gravestones.

28

IT WAS THREE IN
the morning. Insects swam in the humid air, their wings humming all around him. A true nightmare had startled Jude awake. He couldn’t shake it. Every time he shut his eyes, Morgan Cross was there ridiculing him, stabbing him, soaking his knuckles in blood.

The mattress Jude slept on lay stiffly beneath his back. His heart drummed. He stared aimlessly at the sharp rock ceiling, and as he did, horrible reflections crawled there. He turned, but the faces found new homes. They seemed to come alive out of the stone and the carvings too. He watched the painted symbols inked into the cheap wall surfaces shift and appear as if they were about to evaporate. Skulking pagan idols melted into claws that began taking steps toward him. Jude jerked to his right. An open, orange bottle was knocked over. No pills remained.

He tasted grime, more than just typical sleep swelling inside his cheeks. The haunting and patterned grimaces reached toward him even more now, and they came with threats. How similar to the accusations that found him within the church back home.

“Shut up!” he said with a curse. “No more. I just want a night of sleep.”

Turning over on his side, his ears captured a distinct sound. Almost muffled at first listen, but the more he let it in, the clearer it became. Strange sounds were born and then echoed from across the hall. He waited, assuring himself that it wasn’t his imagination anymore, not this time. Couldn’t be, could it?

How many pills were there? How many did I take?

He didn’t remember taking any, not tonight. But why? Maybe this was no more than the similar kinds of side effects his body had presented before. He’d taken pills in the past often, and little greens and whites never made him feel like this. He couldn’t shake it off. The noise was getting thicker. More sinister.

Climbing off the bed and onto the concrete ground, he sucked a breath of humid air into his lungs. He stepped softly out of the room and into the hall, his spine nudged against a wall. The noise was relentless.

Jude’s curses hid behind gritted teeth. Dark whispers lurked toward him from the room at the end of the narrow way. He squinted, hoping to form a clearer picture, though his vision blurred, and his eyes blinked with fervor.

There was a candle, its flame shrinking and uncertain. The brightness started to dim, and a chill entered the house.

Crouching down, Jude peeked through the open door, undetected. The scene unfolded as his chest bled with sweat. The witch doctor hunched over weak and stuttering knees. A black smoke spread over him as he danced and began to utter a language Jude didn’t recognize. Was it even a real language?

Jude’s growing apprehension was a drop of rust in his blood. Unfiltered woe blending into his veins. His host’s brittle hair hung across thinly carved shoulders. There were new scars scratched into both cheeks, and those eyes, once welcoming, seemed to hold the darkest mysteries of the world. Screaming, trapped faces caught inside every blink, fresh blood stained beneath the eyelids. The dance continued with brutal grunts and a slithering, corrupted tongue. Reptilian movements almost impossible to be shaped by human footsteps followed by stomping, a drumming without origin or reason. A calculated puppeteer using no strings.

Jude controlled his breathing, wishing the drugs would flush through him already. Leave his mind in peace. It was a mistake bringing the medication with him at all. His intent had always been to quit using months ago. In fact, he’d sworn to himself he wasn’t even addicted.

But he was. He needed them. To fix him.

But they couldn’t fix this.

He wasn’t sure when his mind would make it to the surface, when he’d finally swim out of this foggy sea. His body was frozen still. Too terrified to move. Too entrenched in the sadistic event unfolding. Whom was this lunatic speaking to? What was that cloud hovering over him, passing through him?

Jude’s fingernails sank into the clay door. The tension was a horror all its own. He caught a clearer picture of the second shadow hovering above the man. This phantom echoed what sounded like a thousand screams through smoke. The dance then became something hypnotic.

He had to get back to his room. If he had made eye contact with the old man, Jude knew there wasn’t enough strength in his body to survive a fight. Heat climbed his shaking bones, consuming.