Desolation

  “I’m so cold …”

  “Of course you’re cold,” Hillock said. “It’s Alaska. Stop exaggerating.”

  “I really am dying, though.”

  “Then die! Jesus, Marco, just die already and get it over with!”

  Mabb’s demonic face told Austin all he needed to know – that Hillock’s indifference to his fate hurt him more than any bullet ever could.

  “You dick,” said Mabb, and reared up, grabbing Hillock and slugging him right across the jaw. Hillock wobbled but didn’t fall, and slammed his fist into Mabb’s wound. Mabb screamed and stumbled and fell to his knees, and Hillock’s shadow danced as red headlights lit him up.

  Milo’s black car hit Jamie Hillock so fast he was thrown ten feet into the air. He landed as a jumble of broken bones wrapped in demon skin, howling in pain.

  The car swerved round and came rolling to a stop beside Austin.

  “Climb in,” Milo said. “Let’s get you to something approaching safety.”

  Marco Mabb looked up. “Excuse me, sir,” he said. “Could you take us to a hospital? I’ve been shot. And you ran into my friend.”

  Milo ignored him, so Austin did, too. He got in the car.

  THE TOWN WAS TWISTED.

  It was a nightmare version of its daytime self, the streets narrowed and crooked and the buildings long and bent. Nothing fit. To Amber, it was as if each selfish piece of Desolation Hill had shouldered the others out of its way. The Municipal Building hunched jealously over the square, the stores on Main Street jabbed and strangled their neighbours, and the church reared away from it all, tall and spiked and vicious.

  But, if the town was twisted, its inhabitants were merely showing their true selves.

  She drove by demons carousing on the streets. They fought and screwed and danced and destroyed. They were bloodthirsty and insatiable and quick to anger. Three demons having sex in a store window suddenly started arguing, and the window smashed as they fell through, tearing at each other’s throats. Other demons laughed at them as they passed.

  They were giddy, Amber saw. Giddy with malevolent delight, and high on the rush of adrenaline and endorphins that came with giving themselves over to their baser instincts. Not one of them was trying to fight it. And why would they? They’d been looking forward to this night for the last year. Twelve months’ worth of lust had built up. Twelve months’ worth of grievances could now explode into full-blown fury. Old debts were looking to be settled. No slight would go unanswered.

  Amber thought for a moment of all those kids and all those teenagers down in their soundproofed panic rooms, their parents unable to get at them, unable to tear them apart or feast on their flesh. She imagined games being played or movies being watched. She imagined them sleeping, safe and warm in their peaceful, pleasant soundproofed cocoons, while outside hell had come, raging and vengeful, to stalk the jangled streets of their town.

  Two demons were up ahead, beating the crap out of each other in the snow. She recognised the smaller one as the old man from Fast Danny’s, the fisherman who had the crusts cut off his sandwiches. He had horns now, and fangs, but he went down and the bigger one laughed, started kicking him. He lost his balance and stumbled out on to the street, and Amber clipped him as she passed. In the side mirror, she watched him twirl and fall, and then the demon fisherman got up and started kicking him, howling with laughter the whole time.

  She left them in the distance and returned her attention to the road, and braked.

  A Hound sat astride his bike in the middle of the junction ahead. Waiting for her.

  Amber sat very still, feeling the pickup tremble beneath her, barely aware of the smile creeping across her face.

  She threw the pickup into gear and slammed her foot on the gas. The pickup lurched, gained speed quickly, hurtled straight for the biker. The Hound rode to meet her, a bullet fired from a gun. But Amber’s pickup was a tank shell, and tank shells beat bullets.

  Usually.

  The pickup hit the bike and the hood crumpled and Amber was lifted from her seat and crashed through the windshield and flew, but flew badly, and landed worse, the road scraping at her chest and face and knees and belly.

  She lay in the middle of the street, making little sounds, but not moving.

  The Hound got off his bike. She heard this, didn’t see it. All she could see was the road and the sidewalk and the bus stop with its bench and a poster for a movie that had already left theatres by the time she’d fled Orlando. She listened to the Hound walk up. He stood over her. She wanted to turn her head, look at him, but her body was slow to obey. She wriggled her fingers and toes. They were still working. That was good. She wasn’t paralysed. Her horns had saved her, maybe. Or her scales. Or her strength. Or the power she’d absorbed when she’d eaten Benjamin – maybe that had done the trick.

  She couldn’t feel it anymore. The buzz. That electricity. It was gone. She’d used up most of it healing from the gunshot wounds, and now the rest of it was gone. Stupid. Why hadn’t she worn her goddamn seat belt? Stupid.

  She managed to turn her head in time to see the Hound draw back his foot and kick.

  The boot connected with her side and lifted her off the ground like she was a football. She smashed through the bus stop in a storm of glass beads and torn movie poster. She landed and rolled, hit the wall on her hands and knees and stayed there, wheezing. Boots crunched on glass behind her and then he was pulling her off the ground by her horns. She went to slash at his throat, but couldn’t raise her arm high enough, and felt her ribs slide against each other when she tried.

  He hit her, his fist slamming into her belly. Fresh pain sliced through her. She dropped to one knee and the Hound brought his own knee in. It struck her in the side of the head and the world rocked. She felt his hands on her horns again, felt the sidewalk moving beneath her. He was dragging her backwards after him as he walked to his bike. Amber’s struggles were feeble. Pathetic. She would have been ashamed if she’d had the luxury.

  He dumped her beside the bike, then searched through his saddlebags. She heard the rattle of a chain and tried to crawl away, but he stomped on her ankle. She turned over, clutching her ribs and moaning. The Hound was looking down at her, a heavy chain in his hands, but Amber’s gaze flickered over his shoulder, to where the demons perched on the wreckage of the pickup.

  Seven of them. Maybe eight. Different colours, different types. Some slim, some bulky. Some with horns, some without. One with wings. One with sharp, bony protrusions at every major joint. They perched there like gargoyles, silent. The Hound sensed them, and turned slowly. They observed him through narrowed eyes.

  One of the demons, the smallest of them, screeched, and they descended on the Hound. He grabbed the nearest, his hand lighting up and the demon howled in pain, but another one hit him and he stumbled. There were too many, and they were drawing blood now.

  The Hound bled, just like anyone. Just like Amber.

  She got up, holding her ribs, trying not to cry out. Not that she could distract the demons from the fight even if she’d wanted to. They shrieked with unbridled joy, a stark contrast to the Hound’s grim silence.

  She hurried away before any of them remembered she was there.

  She turned the first corner she came to, started down it. Two demons slammed against a parked car on the other side of the road. At first, Amber thought they were having sex, but then she changed her mind, decided they were trying to kill each other.

  She carried on, emerging on to Main Street. Back to Virgil’s. All plans were now scrapped. It was too dangerous out here. She had to reach Virgil’s place, hide with the others. If there were any others. If they weren’t all dead by now. If Milo wasn’t dead by now.

  Or Kelly.

  A naked demon stepped out through a broken window on to the sidewalk. It took a few moments for Amber to recognise her as Brenda, the waitress from Fast Danny’s.

  “And who might you be, beautiful?” Brenda said, walking closer. “Don??
?t think I recognise the face.”

  “I’m just passing through,” said Amber.

  “Ohhh,” said Brenda. She jabbed at the air with her finger. “You’re the tubby girl, aren’t you? Heard you were more trouble than you were worth. Certainly got prettier, though.”

  Amber held up a hand. “You’re going to want to back off there, Brenda.”

  “Are you the reason for the delay?” Brenda asked as she neared. “Usually, Hell Night starts just as the sun goes down. I was standing in my backyard, waiting for the change … When it got dark and nothing happened, I started to cry, I’m not gonna lie to you. I’ve been waiting for this. Hell Night is the reason I never take a vacation. I never have to.”

  “If you take one more step, I’m going to kill you, Brenda.”

  Brenda stopped walking, but kept smiling. “We can’t let you leave. See, we’re all nuts when we’re like this, yeah, but we’re not too nuts. We’ve got our rules. We try our very best not to kill each other or set fire to anything. Those are tricky ones. No one blames you too much if you break those. One of the more concrete rules is not to go after the kids. That’s an important one. Of course, every so often, someone will crack. Last year it was Joy Sinclair, the grade-school teacher. She went after one of the little shits who’d been making her life a misery. We all understood, of course, but rules are rules. She’s spending tonight in one of Chief Novak’s cells, as punishment. We need our rules or else we won’t have a town to wake up to.

  “One of those concrete rules, steadfast, we call it, has to do with visitors. Anyone who isn’t from here must leave before the festival begins. And anyone who’s caught here once the festival has begun? They don’t get to leave. Ever.”

  “You don’t want to do this, Brenda.”

  “Yeah, I do,” said Brenda. “Yeah, we all do. You’re a visitor and you have to die. It’s how we’ve kept Hell Night a secret for all these generations.” Her smile widened. “Death to outsiders.”

  Brenda came at her and Amber raked at her with her claws. She expected Brenda’s protective scales to form, but none did, and Brenda shrieked and staggered, holding her injured arm, blood running through her fingers.

  A sudden wave of anger hit Amber, and she stomped on Brenda’s knee, snapping it sideways. This ridiculous woman who thought she could be a threat. To her? To Amber? After everything she’d been through? She hit her then, a backhanded blow, and Brenda twisted and crumpled and rolled over and started screaming for real now, like she’d finally realised just who she had gone up against.

  “You’re not like me,” Amber snarled. “This happens to you once a year. But I can do it anytime I want.”

  Brenda was in no condition to reply. She just kept screaming – wailing, really, a high-pitched wail of pain and self-pity that hurt Amber’s ears and stoked the anger already burning inside.

  Amber batted Brenda’s hands away and crouched over her, started hitting. “Stop it,” she ordered. “Stop. Stop making that noise.” Brenda’s blood smeared against the scales that had formed around Amber’s knuckles. The wail stopped after ten seconds or so, but Amber kept punching, just to make sure she had shut up.

  When she was done, Amber stood, ignoring the pain from her broken ribs and curling her lip in disgust at the pathetic mess that lay silent and still at her feet.

  “Look at our little pride and joy,” said her father from behind her. “Did we or did we not raise her right, wife-of-mine?”

  Amber turned without haste, glaring at her parents as they came over.

  “We certainly did, husband,” said Betty, smiling. “I like to think this suddenly merciless behaviour comes from my side of the family.”

  “Nonsense,” said Bill. “That look in her eyes is all me.”

  BUNCH OF GODDAMN SERIAL KILLERS.

  Not even undead serial killers, either. They’d made no deals, they’d been given no powers … they were ordinary, garden-variety psychos, and yet they’d managed to capture Kelly’s whole entire goddamn gang.

  It was embarrassing is what it was.

  “Isn’t this great?” said the one called Sam, looking out of the window of the Chronicle office, across the snow-covered streets of Desolation Hill. “Isn’t it just awesome?”

  The cords were digging into Kelly’s wrists and her jaw was hurting from where Sam had hit her, so she wasn’t sharing his enthusiasm. Sam’s fellow serial killers were there to pick up the slack, though.

  “Look at them out there,” said Goulder. “See their teeth? Their claws? Demons, man. That’s gonna be us. As soon as this night is over, that’s gonna be us.”

  Sure, they had guns, and sure, Kelly and the others had each stumbled across them purely by chance instead of being lured into some kind of ingenious trap … but that was hardly the point. The point was Kelly’s arms were decorated with enemies endowed with supernatural talents, and now it looked like she was going to be killed by four complete amateurs.

  “I cannot wait,” said Demer. At least Kelly thought his name was Demer. He was the tallest of the men, and the skinniest. Sam had the worst haircut and Goulder was the heaviest. “I’m so frickin’ pumped for this. Am I ready? I was born ready!”

  He laughed – a strange, high-pitched giggle that appeared genuine yet sounded false.

  Beside her, Linda had her eyes closed and her breathing was slow and steady. Having her hands bound kicked up her claustrophobia, but she was dealing with it. So far.

  “Y’all are celebrating before the job is done,” said Bowsher, scowling. Bowsher was the oldest, and the most serious, and definitely the one with the ugliest scowl.

  “But now we have demon-girl’s friends!” said Sam. “The Shining Demon will bestow upon us everything we’ve ever wanted! We’ve got this, man!”

  “We ain’t got spit,” said Bowsher. “Before you start making plans for what happens after, how about we figure out if she’d even be willing to exchange herself for the well-being of these good folk? What does everyone think of that little plan?”

  The others glanced at each other, chastised.

  “I guess that’d be okay,” said Demer.

  “You guess?” Bowsher said, marching up to him. “Is that what you said, you little pissant? You guess?”

  Demer wilted. “I mean, you know, it’s, it’s a … It’s what …”

  Bowsher cupped his hand to his ear. “What’s what? What’s that? Speak up, asshole!”

  “It’s a good plan,” Demer said quietly. “It’s what we should do.”

  “You’re damn right,” Bowsher said abruptly, and turned to Kelly and the others. “I’m assuming one of you has her phone number?”

  Kelly didn’t say anything. Her friends remained quiet.

  Bowsher sighed. “We’re gonna start killing you. If you don’t cooperate, we’re gonna start killing you. We’ll start easy, though. We’ll kill the dog first.”

  Two, tied up next to Warrick, growled.

  “You stay the hell away from him,” Warrick said.

  “And then we’ll kill you,” said Bowsher. “Then it’ll be the chick with the boobs. Then Handsome here. Red, you’re the last one we grabbed, so you’re the last one to go. Let’s see if you can hold out that long.”

  “We don’t have her number,” Ronnie said. “We barely know her.”

  “You’re lying,” said Sam. “What, you think we stumbled across you by accident? Ronnie? I been watching you. You’re tight with the demon girl.” His eyes flicked to Kelly. “This one, especially.”

  Bowsher nodded. “I heard about that, yes, indeed I did. Sam here is something of a Peeping Tom, see, and he reported back to us some hot and steamy lesbian action as seen through a window, oh hell, yeah. I am all for that, by the way. Live and let die, that’s my motto. Sam, you okay with gay people?”

  “Course,” said Sam. “I’m from New York.”

  “I have no idea what that’s got to do with anything, but fair enough. What about you, Demer? Demer? Oh, for Christ’s sake, stop
sulking and answer the goddamn question. Do you have a problem with the homosexual person?”

  “No,” Demer mumbled.

  “Well, thanks for sharing. See that, Red? We are three progressive individuals. Goulder, however, is not nearly so culturally advanced as the rest of us. Goulder, what is your stance on homosexuality?”

  “It’s disgusting,” said Goulder. “But lesbians aren’t so bad.”

  “Hear that?” Bowsher said. “Even Goulder, who was raised by the most evil of Bible-bashing preachers in this great nation of ours, is onboard as far as lesbians are concerned. Y’all have his blessing, I daresay. But you gotta ask yourself a question here, Red. How do your dirty little fantasies stack up against the lives of you and your friends? Is she worth dying over? Is she worth watching your friends, and your dog, die painful deaths?”

  “She doesn’t have a phone,” said Kelly.

  “Bullshit.”

  “She doesn’t. Phones are too easy to track.”

  “Every teenage girl in this goddamn country has a goddamn phone. From this point on, every lie you tell will be a bullet.”

  He nodded to Sam, who aimed his gun at Two.

  “Do not harm my dog!” Warrick shouted.

  Sam switched his aim, pressing the gun against Warrick’s head. “You wanna go first? Fine with me.”

  “Warrick,” said Ronnie.

  “Do not threaten my dog,” Warrick said through gritted teeth.

  Bowsher waited a few seconds. Then, when nobody was shot, he nodded. “Well, okay then, back to what I was saying. The truth from this moment on, you get me?”

  Kelly glared at him.

  “Does demon girl have a phone?” Bowsher asked.

  “Yes,” said Kelly.

  “And do you know her phone number?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good,” Bowsher said, smiling.

  Demer walked up at that moment and put his gun to Bowsher’s head and pulled the trigger, and Bowsher’s head came apart in all sorts of stomach-churning ways.

  “Holy crap!” Sam yelled.