The Soul Consortium (7 page)

Under such circumstances it seemed my calling was irrevocable. I would never be caught. But that all changed the following year, seven days after my forty-sixth birthday, the day Keitus Vieta chose to take something of mine.

A
ddiction is ugly. When one is deprived of their vice, the heart swells like a ravenous sponge. It becomes a fallen tyrant, screaming its demands and sobbing its grief in a volume that drowns out any words of quiet reason the mind might impart.

Five months passed without a victim. I had gone longer than this before but not without consequences. I walked the streets in a daze, knowing only that my desires were unquenched. I scoured the papers, studied the local news, hovered around hospitals, but I had not found one person anywhere who had cheated Fate. Perhaps the true link to all the murders had been discovered, and the media had been silenced to flush me out. Perhaps Fate had abandoned me. Perhaps it was another test. But I know now that the answer is more subtle, more fitting than any of those.

On my final day amongst the masses I walked the cliffs of Cornwall to clear my mind, following the coastal path to Tintagel—a place that breathes history through every ancient blade of grass and every moss-covered rock. I fished through my pockets to find my shades in the hope that I could dwell on the view for a time without squinting, but they had gone. When the seaside sun burns in the heights of a cloudless sky and the smell of ocean water fills every pore, one would have to be born without a soul not to smile. I watched anyway without my sunglasses.

For a time I found my contentment, but the serenity was soon broken. Shouting is not something one expects on a pleasant Sunday morning walking the cliffs, but nevertheless, a short way ahead of me two men bellowed above the barking of a large dog. Other walkers gave the two men a wide berth but not me; I thrive on conflict.

The argument had escalated into finger-stabbing posturing, and as I drew closer, I noticed that the man standing with his back to the cliff edge had lines of blood tracked across the back of his hand. The dog, still barking but restrained with no small effort by the other man, had blood on its teeth.

“Of course he’s going to bloody bite. He thought you were threatening me.”

“Threatening? I was running past.”

“You knocked my arm. What the fuck did you
think
was going to happen? Fuckin’ arsehole.”

“What?”

“You heard.”

The man with his back to the cliff, a good two inches taller than the other, moved his face within head-butting distance.

The other stood his ground, faltering slightly as he held the Alsatian back from a second attack.

Time for me to jump into the fray. I closed in. “I take it from your tones that neither of you gentlemen is from this area?”

They observed me for no more than five seconds as one might examine a piece of excrement that had suddenly acquired the ability to speak, then turned back to each other.

“I’ll be making sure that fucking mutt gets put down, pal.”

“Not if he puts you down first, you piece of shit.” Another finger stabbed into the man’s chest.

My organs leapt when the man’s heel shuffled ever closer to the cliff edge. Had my five months of fasting finally come to an end? I salivated as he pushed forward again. The man closest to the edge flinched, and he grabbed the dog man’s coat collar, more to hold himself steady than anything else. I stepped closer.

Neither of them seemed interested in my approach. They held each other’s clothes, eyes wide with horror, tottering like skittles, but at the same moment they both understood the danger and stepped away from the edge.

Unchecked by its distracted owner and alarmed by my approach, the dog yanked itself free and hurtled toward me like a frothing demon.

“Chip! No!”

I sidestepped but the dog had already charged into me, and then it was my feet that scuffled on the crumbling precipice. The hungry waves a hundred feet below beckoned as my right foot found nothing beneath it. My arms wheeled like rotor blades. My insides exploded with adrenaline, and time stretched as my mind rebelled. A solid jolt of knuckles bruised my collarbone as a fist grasped my shirt, and I hung for a moment, one foot dangling, the other sliding against chalk, before I was pulled onto the grass.

At least the dog had stopped barking.

“Jesus! That was really close. You all right, mate?” The man was half laughing.

I stared at the ground, panting on hands and knees. Two sets of boots stood in peripheral vision, the dog sitting beside one of them, sated with a chew stick provided by the owner. I looked up at the man who had saved my life but lingered there less than a moment; someone else caught my eye on the brow of the hill, perhaps two miles away.

It was him.

Specific detail was impossible to make out at that distance, but I could still discern the same hunchbacked posture, the hat and black clothing, and perhaps a flicker of indigo from the jewel in his cane. Keitus Vieta turned, as if he had been waiting for me to notice him, then disappeared over the hill.

I stood up, faced the man who had stopped my fall. “You saved my life, Mr.—?”

“Booth … Andy Booth. You all right?”

“A little shaken but, yes, I believe so.”

The other man squatted down to ruffle his dog. “Bet you saw your life flash before your eyes then, eh? Lucky he caught you.”

I smiled. “Fate has uncanny taste, doesn’t she?”

“The council ought to put some bloody fences here. I reckon loads of people must end up splattered on them rocks. Anyways, looks like it was your lucky day. Take it easy, mate.” He looked at the dog and its owner, and I saw the debate in his eyes about whether he should continue the argument or leave it alone. A glance at the sea changed his mind, and he turned to leave.

With an equally cautious glance, the other man left too.

Somebody should have died today on that cliff.

I fished around my pockets, looking for my sunglasses a second time. Still missing. Or taken. I faced the empty hill and nodded. I knew what had to be done.

T
oday.
Such a casual word for most people. One hundred and fifty thousand people die every day, and for some, today will be their last. I wonder how many of them know that. I suspect the number is relatively small.

“This gonna take long, chief?”

I stare at my target, study every part of him. Silence, when combined with scrutiny, is a powerful thing.

He shifts from foot to foot, one grubby toe poking through a tear in his trainer.

There’s a moment of regret at selecting this man. Not because I think he is incapable of the task, but because I would prefer not to be locked away in a room that has boarded-up windows and virtually no ventilation in the presence of a man who has not discovered the benefits of soap.

He draws his canvas coat tighter against his body as if the action might shield him from my gaze, and a urine breeze finds my nose.

“I’m paying you, aren’t I?” I pinch my nostrils with my left hand and pull a packet out of my pocket with my right. “Cigarette?”

“Cheers.” The vagrant shuffles forward, snatches nervously at the white stick with oily fingers, and plants it between his lips. “Nice place.”

If that’s his attempt at sarcasm, I’ll forgive it. In the next few minutes this grimy-walled room with its festering floorboards and roach problem will be a place more than fit for such an observation. I pull a lighter from my pocket, light his cigarette, then one for myself.

“Take a seat.” I inhale a lug from my smoke and gesture to a wooden chair in the middle of the room. Facing it is another chair, and focused on both of them from the side is a video camera on a tripod.

“So what sort of documentary is this anyway? Another one of those
why the homeless can’t get a home
jokes?” He pulls hard on his cigarette, slumps into the seat with a leering grin, and blows smoke at me.

“No … Nothing like that.”

“A talent show for the great unwashed, then?”

I allow a slow smile to creep over my face.

“Well?” He flicks a palm up. “You gonna give me a hint? Do I have to act or something?”

I push the red button on the camera, take my coat off, and hang it on the back of the chair opposite him. “All you need to do is keep your eyes on mine.”

“You a queer?”

As I lower myself onto the chair I pull a syringe from one of my coat pockets and hold it up to the light, checking for any bubbles in the liquid. It’s fine.

“Hey! What’s in the tube? You a druggy? Just ‘cause I live on the streets that don’t make me a spliff head.” He makes to get up.

I grab his sleeve. “Sit. Down.”

He pauses and we lock eyes. He sits again, still looking at me as he draws on his cigarette almost down to the filter. Mine is only halfway through.

“That’s better. Just keep your eyes on mine. It’s really not that much to ask, is it?”

“I ain’t taking any drugs.”

“I’m not asking you to.”

“Then what—?” He balks as I slam the needle into my arm. “What’s in the tube?”

“Drugs.” I smile, suppressing the pain as the cold liquid works its way up my vein. “But not the kind you think. Keep looking at me, right at me.” I toss the empty syringe aside, its contents now wending their way toward my nervous system. And after crushing my cigarette under my heel, I grab the vagrant’s face and pull it to mine.

“What the—?” He grips my arms but holds still. His nails bite through my shirt into my biceps, and the tang of nervous sweat stings the back of my throat. With each faltering breath we stare deeper into each other.

“Don’t move … This won’t take long now.”

“What the fuck is this? What are you doing?”

“I’m giving you the second half of your payment. A gift.”

He’s probably too frightened to ask what I mean, but it doesn’t matter. He’ll soon understand. When the baton is passed he’ll run with it just as I did when the killer of my parents, Zachary Cox, handed it to me. I only wish I could still be around to witness my legacy, but I’ll not mourn in my last few minutes while the camera catches these precious moments of shared revelation. He’ll think this moment is unique, a special bond between the two of us, and it is, but such wonder can be found in the heart of any man, woman, or child; one has only to look into their eyes to see it. No, not look—one must wallow, breathe, drink,
gorge
on the moments given.

I look deeper into the vagrant’s eyes and see beyond. As dark as apocalypse night, as deep as death’s abyss, I drift down and allow my will to follow. There is nothing darker, nothing more consuming than the soul, and as if the goddess desired to make this plain to all who chose to see, that circle of black is ringed by a myriad of colored fibers, a million spokes pointing to the deep. A marvel like no other is the eye.

His muscles are stiff like stone under my grip, the body odor intensifying, and though I sense the connection, there is no epiphany for him yet. But I will not lose heart. I have not failed any of Fate’s tests so far, and this one will be no exception. She has been a faithful goddess—always rewarding my desire with new souls to un-wrap—and we will be face-to-face soon. There I will gaze into her eyes and know sweet satisfaction forever. She has teased me too long. Like a drop of wine touched to the end of my tongue, I have tasted this bliss many times but never long enough to savor completely. Taste is not enough. To drink is not enough. I want to swim in it,
drown
in it.

A low moan escapes my subject’s lips. Still he does not feel it, even as I feel the cold poison in my veins. Wet slivers tremble on the rims of his lower lids as his eyes say stop. But I can’t and I won’t. The taste is too close now to break away, the perfect circle that shields the human soul holds me—the hollow with its hunger never satisfied, eating my mind, howling for more. Or is that the whoosh of my heart thudding through my ears like a boat master driving his slaves?

Through my delirium I hear the creak of the door, catch the flap of a black coat in my peripheral vision, feel the cold breeze of a body passing by our side, and my successor is ripped from me as he looks to my right, his eyes widening with an even greater terror than I could instill. And now the smell! Formaldehyde overwhelming the stench of sweat. I should have known Keitus Vieta would come here at the end. But no matter. My only regret is that I learned nothing more about him, but that doesn’t matter, either. Fate is whom I serve. She comes now with her reward—the circle of black is exchanged for its white negative, and I drop forward, hardly noticing the floorboards as they slap my cheek. A tunnel of godly light engulfs me.

Come, Fate. I am ready for your embrace.

C
ome! Rescue me, my goddess. I am stripped naked of my soul, soaring through the white void waiting for my reward—in death I am yours. If I still had a beating heart I would tear it from my chest to place it on your altar. Where are you?

“Did you find what you were looking for?”

That voice—so familiar. “Goddess?”

Cold steel tightens against my skin as something restrains my wrists and ankles. Or is it just the return of sensation? Hair-thin wires retracting from my skull. The light of oblivion fades, and shadowy orbs bloom before me as my surroundings take shape. The entrance to the WOOM opens before me like a bloodless wound stretching its lips to welcome the real world, and beyond, a plethora of tiny slits covering the curved wall, each sheltering a single soul. All is washed in sweeping emerald luminescence.

“Goddess?” the voice echoes in mild amusement. “You missed me, Salem. I’m touched.”

“No! No! I’m Orson … Roth.” I clench my fists, pull at the restraints. I am violated, deceived. Fate has been cheated too. This is not the afterlife I expected. Instead of the goddess there is … Qod.