The Fall: The Rift Book I

  At that moment he saw it. An aura cascaded around the boy, something old, something he had known since the beginning of time.

  It was familiar because it was his own.

  The aura undulated through the air like invisible flames. In spite of the pain spiking in his head, Sam smiled. I found you, he cried.

  His excitement faded when the anguish in his skull spiked. A soft and sweet voice echoed beneath his thoughts. Thank you, I love you, I forgive you, it said. Sam gulped and retreated as quickly as he could, pushing his way back through the tangled mental web.

  Even the netherworld, as surreal as it was, had laws. He knew that if he were to be trapped in the girl’s mind when all went black, he would be stuck there forever, in nothingness, just like her.

  * * *

  Sam opened his eyes, and the haze of his world beneath the world dissolved. It took a moment for him to regain his physical balance after the sudden shift into a different state of being. He breathed in through his nose even though he didn’t have to, for he could survive without any earthly requirements save the need to nourish his body, but he found an odd sort of comfort in the mundane act of inhaling and exhaling. It was a comfort he hoped he would soon have no desire to experience again.

  He glanced at the mangled corpse spread before his crossed legs. Blood formed rivers of red that ran across the hardwood floor and emptied outside the front door. He nodded. Everything came back to him.

  I’m in Virginia, on a farm. This old woman’s name was Olga. She tasted sour.

  He looked at his hands. They appeared somewhat normal now that they were covered with unscarred flesh. Even his fingernails, always the last to heal, had reacquired a smooth texture. It felt good to be almost whole again, even if he couldn’t remember the last time he had been so.

  Sam dropped the half-devoured heart he’d been holding and stood up. He walked to the doorway and stepped through, admiring the beasts that were gathered outside, his children, the rising moon reflecting in their eyes. They stared at him, and a thousand individual faces blended into one. They were good soldiers, each one of them. They would fight his enemy until they could fight no more. They would help him regain the world, help him shape it in the way he desired. All he needed to do was find the boy. Then all this madness could stop, and he would be at peace.

  He wasn’t worried that he didn’t know where to look. He knew he would find him.

  In time.

  CHAPTER 18

  SOLACE

  HIS BLEARY THOUGHTS were still influenced by the trappings of sleep when Josh woke up. He rubbed his eyes; felt thankful that the nightmare had finally ended. It didn’t matter that his hips were numb—the inevitable result of sleeping on a cold, hard floor. He’d been granted the time to doze, to cleanse his mind and body, and that was all that mattered.

  He yawned, stretched his arms above his head, and listened for the snap of sore joints that usually followed. When none came, he shrugged and rolled onto his back. He cursed his lack of foresight, allowing sleep to take him while watching television in the living room yet again. Now his morning classes would be difficult. Advanced biology was tough enough without a sore spine and stinging, dry eyes. He wondered why his mother hadn’t woken him up. She almost always did when he passed out like this. Perhaps she was sick. If that were the case, there would be no one to get his sister up and dressed.

  Sophia, he thought. I should get up and check on her.

  A bright yellow light blinded him. He squinted against the harsh glare and waited for his eyes to adjust. When they did, his face scrunched in bewilderment. Before him was a sink, beside which stood a cabinet filled with long green robes. On his left was a tall, slender box that looked like a safe. To his right, sitting on a shelf, was a statue of the Virgin Mary.

  Everything came back to him. This wasn’t his parents’ house, he wasn’t fifteen years old, and Sophia wasn’t upstairs in bed, waiting to be sent off to nursery school. They were all dead now. Much to his surprise, this realization didn’t cripple him. His agony remained subdued, for in that moment the memories were cold, hard facts and nothing more.

  He looked around. This was the Stone Church; of that much he was certain. The walls were creased with familiar watermarks and decayed mortar. He never remembered it looking like this, however. Where he found himself now was still a genuine place of worship.

  “Oh come, all ye faithful,” a woman’s voice sang.

  Josh stood up. The singing called him from a point beyond his sight, reaching out and massaging him with delicate, vibrating fingers. He fixed his mind on it and let the song guide him. The yellow light, which seemed to radiate from nothing and everything at the same time, led him through the door and into the cathedral.

  “Joyful and triumphant.”

  A spectacular vision greeted him there. The stained-glass windows shimmered with iridescent light and the solemn faces of the saints gazed down on him in reverence. Positioned in two symmetrical rows in front of the altar, the pews were lined with purple trim. The marble chair where the priest would sit looked forlorn beneath a giant crucifix, a throne awaiting the mislaid prophet who’d been lost in a wilderness of disregarded faith.

  “Oh come ye, oh come ye.”

  Josh meandered down the center aisle, running his hand along the edges of the polished wooden benches. They were smooth and spongy to the touch, as if they’d been molded from cured leather. He breathed in deep and smelled burning sulfur and wax. The smell reminded him of Christmas mass. It made him smile. He let the song guide him toward the entrance to the choir loft.

  “To Bethlehem.”

  The door closed behind him and he started up the stairs. The singing melted away and was replaced by a more abstract tone. These were the sounds of woodwinds blowing gentle notes while trumpets cried out with joy and violins wailed in wrenching sorrow. Tears streamed down his cheeks.

  He entered the loft, where a thousand candles greeted him, lining the banister, propped up on shelves surrounding a painting of the Savior. Some dripped steaming wax onto the pipe organ’s leather bench. The organ itself boasted monstrous dimensions. Massive copper cylinders rose from the rear of its body of stained oak. They reached for the heavens with giant bronze fingers as if in homage to the Tower of Babel’s folly.

  Drawn to the instrument, he pressed down a key. The ivory felt cold and no sound escaped those giant cylinders. Instead, the odd music intensified.

  Look over here.

  On the side of the organ appeared a bed. It was the largest one he’d ever seen, at least twice the size of a king. Candles had been placed around the bed, the white satin sheets atop the mattress glimmering in their luminescence. His eyes were drawn to the center.

  Sprawled there, naked as the day she was born, was Kyra.

  She stared at him, her expression imparting the same mixture of awe and trancelike diffidence that he felt. The sheets sculpted to the curvature of her body, wrapping her in a cocoon of satin. He suddenly felt very warm.

  “What’s happening?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” replied Kyra.

  “This wasn’t here before, was it?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Go to her.

  Josh looked around for the originator of the voice. It seemed to come from everywhere.

  “Who is that woman?” Kyra asked.

  “You heard her?”

  “Yeah. She’s been in my head since—” she swept her arm in a grand gesture that exposed her spry little breasts and caused Josh’s heart to skip a beat, “—all this happened.”

  She’s waiting.

  Josh lifted his gaze. Behind the bed, in a deep black chasm that shouldn’t have been there, stood the lady of shadows. Her hair still danced, just as it had when he followed her down the beach in his dream, just as it had before she made him kill his sister. A hint of resentment caused the bile in his stomach to churn. He wanted to hold on to that anger, but couldn’t.

  Kyra had turned
her head, as well. “Do you see her?” asked Josh, and Kyra nodded. He aimed his next question at the phantom.

  “What do you want from me?”

  In time.

  “Am I dreaming?”

  No.

  “Then what is this?”

  The lady replied in words he couldn’t quite hear, and then her image liquefied and the wall reappeared. He faced Kyra and they stared at each other. Despite the heat that rapidly filled up the space, a tingling sensation crept downward into his gut, making him shiver.

  “So…” said Josh. He felt inebriated and unsure of his next step.

  Kyra swung her legs around, spread them wide, and sat up on the bed, exposing the whole of her vulnerability. She appeared younger than he remembered—younger than himself, even. Not a streak of gray tainted her red hair. Her flesh was smooth and without a crease. Those electric green eyes of hers were alive with excitement, rather than somber from the weight of many lost years. He glanced down at his own body and frowned. His slightly bloated gut was disgusting by contrast.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  Kyra tilted her head and ran her fingers down her neck, then traced a line around her left breast. Her nipple stood at attention. “There’s nothing to be sorry for,” she said in a demure tone. “Come here.”

  He shuffled over and sat down on the edge of the bed. It seemed to take forever for his rear end to land, as if someone had forgotten to wind Father Time’s watch. He stared straight ahead, his body feeling like one huge goose bump.

  Kyra slunk behind him. He raised his arms above his head and allowed her to lift off his parka. In his jacket pocket, a million miles away, two useless bottles of medicine swished. He shrugged off the sound, somehow willing to accept that they were useless to him now.

  She tossed his coat on the floor and kissed his neck, wrapping her legs around his torso. He let his hand wander to her thigh. Her skin burned to the touch. Any doubt and embarrassment he might have felt drifted away. All he could think of was her.

  He kissed her lips, soft and wet, then pulled back slightly when it seemed as if his racing heart would explode and looked at her. Her cheeks were ruddy and she panted like a marathon runner, just like him.

  “What—” he began.

  She put her finger to his lips. Bracing her arms around his neck, she used his body as a pole, swung into his lap with the grace of a gymnast, and pressed her bare buttocks into his lap. She wiggled back and forth and his passion rose. He thought he might lose it right there.

  She stopped and removed his sweater and his t-shirt. Then she gently pushed him flat on his back, unbuttoned his jeans, and slid them off his legs. She lowered herself upon him, and allowed him inside.

  The room dissolved and they made love in a vacuum. They floated through space, cognizant of nothing beyond the primordial zeal of their intertwined bodies. Planets formed inside the dust of eternity and stars breathed their final, destructive breaths, which gave birth to new galaxies and new horizons, all while they moved in tune with each other. Glowing spirals of debris, illuminated by the light that pulsed from a great star on the black horizon, brought forth pinwheels of fire. These events grew, expanded, and twisted about them like a mobile with invisible strings, creating a nursery out of the emptiness of space.

  Josh felt a tightening as energy built up in the pit of his stomach. He stared at Kyra, her head thrown back, her eyes closed. Her gleaming skin reflected the molten flares licking off the nearby sun, representing all the purity of creation. This image was the final straw. Josh tossed his own chin at the stars and moaned. Kyra, writhing on top of him, moaned as well. The sun became a red giant then burst into a supernova, and she willingly accepted all he had to offer.

  When it was done, Kyra collapsed, panting. He felt the slickness of her perspiration and rubbed his torso against hers. He loved the way her breasts shifted with the contour of his movements. She slid off of him and rested by his side. He lifted himself up on his elbow and gazed down at her. Her eyes, wide open and staring at him with a mystical calm, had never looked so contented. Sophia and his parents entered his thoughts. The wave of despair he expected never came. All he felt was joy.

  “What’s going on here?” a stunned female voice asked.

  The veneer fell. Josh pulled the sheets (cotton now, there was no satin to be seen) over their bare bodies and looked around. The huge bed had disappeared. They were still in the loft, only now they were atop a spread sleeping bag. Diffused early-morning sunlight drifted through chinks in the blacked-out windows, creating a dimness that replaced the brilliant glare of the supernova. Josh glanced at Kyra, who appeared as baffled as he did. The woman’s voice spoke again. It sounded mortified.

  “Oh, God! I’m sorry!”

  Mary Kincaid, a woman in her late thirties with wide hips and short, peppered hair stood in the doorway. Her hand was over her mouth and her eyes bulged out of her head. “I’m so sorry,” she repeated, turning her back to them. “I heard someone scream and got worried. I didn’t know you two were…um…doing things.”

  “It’s okay, Mary,” said Kyra, her tone confident. “I’m flattered you cared, actually.”

  “Uh, sure. I guess…well…I think I’ll go downstairs now.”

  Kyra glimpsed at Josh and winked. Her expression was mischievous.

  “You do that,” she said.

  Mary left the loft, hurrying down the stairs as if she couldn’t get away fast enough. Josh let out a long sigh, reclining on the warm sleeping bag and tapping his fingers on Kyra’s naked back. She faced him. The creases around her eyes and the slight gray of her hair had returned. He didn’t care. She was still beautiful.

  “Do you think they’ll be talking about us?” he asked.

  “Who?”

  He pointed at the floor and shrugged.

  “Oh, them. Of course. The old wives’ club always does.”

  “Them’s the breaks, I guess, huh?”

  “Exactly.”

  He couldn’t stop thinking of the exquisite other world from which they’d just returned. It was still fresh in his memory, despite Mary’s interruption. He hoped Kyra had experienced it, as well.

  “What just happened?” he asked.

  She smiled. “I don’t know. But it was wonderful.”

  “It was like we were dreaming.”

  “Sure did seem that way. I don’t think I’ve ever been so…turned on.”

  “You’re telling me. But are you embarrassed at all?”

  She dropped her head into the crook of his arm and played with the kinky hairs on his belly. “Absolutely not,” she said. “Why should I be? There’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

  “I’ll give you that.”

  She seemed to pause for a moment. When she lifted her head and looked him in the eye her face was stern. “Josh, I need to ask you something. I don’t want you to be mad.”

  “Okay.”

  “What happened earlier? With your folks?”

  Josh swallowed hard. With the fantasy over, he couldn’t shield his consciousness from the emotions any longer. They threatened to arrest his forward momentum, to tie him down with grief if he spoke about it.

  “I…can’t,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  Kyra nestled her head back in. “That’s okay. Take your time. I don’t want to upset you again.”

  The memory of their harsh earlier encounter came back to him and he grimaced. “Oh, shit, I’m sorry, Kye. I didn’t mean to take it out on you. It wasn’t fair. You were just…there. You know what I mean?”

  “I get it, Josh. I really do.”

  They lay together in silence after that. Everything seemed so strange. Just like earlier, it seemed almost creepy that he should feel so close to this woman he hardly knew, that he would be able to shrug aside the filth surrounding him and the horror going on outside the walls and just indulge in sex. His confusion and guilt threatened to overtake him, so instead he listened to the rustle of the leaves drifting through the stone
walls, pretending it sounded peaceful. The image of Kyra’s naked body as they made love came to mind once more, the way she twisted, the way she slid against him, the moans that escaped her lips, the smells she emitted. He realized how, in his desperate descent into misery, he’d needed every inch of her. And she gave it to him. Willingly. When he thought of it that way, their actions didn’t seem so strange any longer.

  “I know,” she said. “I needed it, too.”

  “What, do you read minds?”

  She laughed. “No, silly. You moaned and started twiddling my pubes.”

  He was about to reply with a cackle when he thought of the shadow lady again. He kissed Kyra on the neck and then asked, “Do you remember the woman?”

  “Of course.”

  “She said something before she disappeared. I couldn’t quite make it out. It sounded like she said…I don’t know, like ‘seek providence’ or something.”

  Kyra giggled. “That’s not what she said at all.”

  “Then what was it?”

  “This is solace. And she was right.”

  CHAPTER 19

  BERWICK

  “ALL HOLD!” ORDERED GENERAL STACK, and the convoy came to a halt. He took the map from his rucksack and examined it while the rising sun, just visible on the horizon, framed him in a menacing light. James Conroy, who watched from his place in the topless Hummer behind the lead vehicle, couldn’t help but recall the long days and nights he had spent in Vietnam. He remembered how every second seemed to take forever and how uncertain his commanding officers seemed when they issued orders. In this instance the first trait was the same, but the second, not so much. Stack, unlike his superiors of long ago, exuded confidence. He acted as if he were untouchable. With that arrogance unfolding before him, James began to doubt his decision.