"And not just for you. Your love will share your fate." Julie convulsed as her unconscious mind was exposed to the horror. "Make your choice. Free her, or condemn her."
I held Julie and cried. I could not fight Koriniha. She could kill me with her thoughts. There were two paths before me. If I refused her, then Julie and I would be banished to an eternity of pain. If I did as she said, if I made the selfish choice, then everything I had ever wanted would be given to me. No more pain. No more suffering. The incredible feeling that I had possessed moments before would be mine forever.
I could see myself doing it, Julie by my side. The Old Ones coming seemed inevitable anyway. Why not? Julie's life was draining out while I hesitated. I would be king, and she would be my queen.
I would be king.
Of a dead world.
"I've made my choice."
Koriniha sighed, slowly shaking her head. "You fool, human. I can see it in your eyes. Five hundred more years on this stinking rock, having peasants sacrifice chickens to little statues of me. Damn you. Your punishment will be the stuff of legends." She focused in on Julie and me, drawing together the energy to cast us both into the black sphere. "Insolent little air breather."
I had to try something. I could not just let her condemn us without a fight. If only I could access the power just enough to fight her and save Julie. I had controlled time once before. Maybe I was strong enough to hold back the Old Ones.
"Yes. You are the strongest one yet . . . you can control it," Koriniha whispered. "I feel your mighty will. Surely you can do it."
Maybe I could . . . Maybe I had a third option . . . I had defeated every other monster that this world had thrown at me. I could defeat these as well. Koriniha licked her oily lips in anticipation. The sphere above her roared, huge now, a world of its own, blotting out the storm-drenched Alabama sky. We stood at the intersection point between two spheres. When they connected, a new world would be born.
I stopped, realizing what I was about to do. The Old Man had warned me about this, only I had been too ignorant to understand. Good, but sometimes stupid. Brave, but proud. Too proud for own good. If not more careful, pride will kill you and blow up world. Think you can solve problems, but no patience to learn. Want to rush. Do things now.
That was what she wanted. She wanted me to fight. The Old Ones would eat my soul for breakfast. She waited for my move, so intent on subverting my will and destroying me the instant that I unlocked the gate that she did not see the tentacle slither past her feet and slowly wrap around the battle-ax and drag it away.
"I can beat you," I lied.
"We shall see."
BETRAYER.
The ax blade exploded from out of Koriniha's chest. She shrieked in rage. The broken Lord Machado rose behind her, encircling his tentacles around her form, lifting her upward, and tearing the blade free. He slammed it into her again.
I lifted Julie in my arms and carried her away as they battled. Lord Machado hoisted Koriniha over his shattered skull, the black tissues of both creatures separating and tearing up into the sphere, drawn irresistibly home. The energy pulsed and surged. Growing larger by the second, the wall approached us, shapes twisting and clawing at the other side.
My boots slipped in the puddle of blood from Thrall. We landed next to him. He was still and his lidless orbs stared into the distance. I began to lift Julie. We were too close to the whipping tentacles, and without the power of the Old Ones upon me, one furious strike would be certain death. I heaved her up into my arms.
Suddenly a red hand grasped my wrist.
"Wait—" Thrall croaked through his lipless mouth. I struggled to hear him over the storm. "—was wrong. Thou truly art a warrior without guile." His grasp was still amazingly powerful and he pulled me closer. "So much death . . . I give thee back one life . . ." He held up his other fist. Squirming between the muscle of his clenched fingers was a tiny bit of black energy, the last vestige of his unnatural immortality. It struggled to escape. He opened his hand and pushed it against Julie's neck. She gasped, her eyes suddenly flared open, then she passed back out. The ancient captain uttered one last thing, "Until Ragnarok . . . my friend."
The hand fell limply away. The last bit of power flew home like a bolt. I turned Julie's head. It was a blood-soaked mess, but I could no longer see the entrance wound. Thrall's lungs rattled as he gave up the ghost.
"See you in Valhalla," I whispered.
The sphere was only a few feet over the pyramid now. It blotted out the sky in its terrible majesty. Lord Machado and Koriniha still battled, more and more of their ichor being stripped away by the second, leaving only filthy bones and angry souls.
"Machado! I curse you!" Koriniha's skull screamed as her face was torn off. "Curse you!" She struggled in his tentacles as he forced her toward the sphere.
TOO LATE FOR CURSES . . . MY LOVE.
He thrust her body upwards. She broke the surface of the rift. The last bits of alien tissue were stripped away. Her skeleton quivered, and then exploded, the winds whipping bones about like missiles, snapping out into the forest and embedding into the trees. A jagged femur pierced the ivory next to my head.
Lord Machado's voice screamed inside my brain. His limbs were extended into the rift. It was a fatal connection. His flesh was stripped, withering, disappearing into the maelstrom. I covered my eyes as the black light began to sear my retinas.
There was a roar, followed by a wet explosion, a concussion of sound and fury. Bits of the Cursed One splattered across the pyramid, showering us in gore, and then all was quiet.
I opened my eyes. The sphere was gone. The night sky was bright and clear, and I was lying on a pyramid, in the middle of a little forest valley, which appeared to be floating unsupported several hundred feet above rural Alabama.
Julie was breathing, though it was shallow and her pulse was weak. Her wound was closed, sealed by Thrall in a final act of mercy. I stood up. Amazingly enough, I felt fine, no broken bones, no blindness, no shattered eardrum. The breeze was natural and clean. The moon was descending over millions of stars. It was beautiful.
Something moved from where the Cursed One had last stood.
"Oh, give me a break," I muttered. I looked around for weapons. I found both of my pistols, put the thumb safeties on, and shoved them in my waistband. Abomination was still where Thrall had dropped it. Empty, but it still had a good bayonet. I walked toward the shape that was moaning in the pile of burnt garbage that had been my enemy.
I held the shotgun like a spear, silver blade extended. Kicking aside the charred mess, I searched for the movement. The remainder of Lord Machado's body had turned to ash, and was slowly blowing away in the wind. I saw small glints of the armored breastplate sticking out from under the cinders. It rocked slightly. I readied myself.
Slowly, shakily, a person emerged from the remains. He was a short man, and his features were hard to distinguish beneath the soot. He was naked except for the remaining armor, and a few tatters of the once opulent robe. He struggled weakly to his hands and knees, a tiny creature amongst the ruins of his former body.
I waited.
He spoke slowly, not used to forming words. The medieval Portuguese was still very familiar in my mind.
"The curse is lifted. I am a man again. Human at last."
"Yup."
He looked at his hands in wonder, and brushed the ash away from his skin. He began to cry, tears rolling down the soot. "Five hundred years of torment. I am free. You have freed me from my curse . . . Somehow it is broken."
I tied Abomination's tattered strap over one shoulder and drew the full-size .45 from my waistband. The click of the safety was eerily loud. I carefully put the front sight in place and placed my finger on the face of the trigger. He looked up at me warily. "But . . . but I have been redeemed."
"I'm not in the redemption business."
BOOM.
A hole appeared in his forehead. The silver bullet mushroomed perfectly through his brain
tissue and ruptured out the back of his skull in a spray of red and white. The single brass case bounced on the ground. A thin line of blood fell from the entrance wound. Lord Machado's eyes rolled slowly back into his head and he flopped into the ash.
I kept the gun on him. His leg kicked spasmodically a few times. There was no magic. He was not coming back.
Lord Machado was dead.
I slowly lowered the gun to my side. It was over.
The pyramid shook violently. I stumbled, but somehow managed to stay upright. In the distance the edges of the little valley began to disintegrate, collapsing as the unnatural force that sustained the pocket dimension began to dissipate. Trees dropped through the ground, disappearing in showers of dirt and snow. Gravity was a jealous bitch.
I sprinted for Julie. I lifted her into my arms and looked around. The spot where we had entered the little world was gone. The portal was no longer there. The rocks that had supported it were now plummeting hundreds of feet to the earth below. It was shrinking fast, and the ground was falling away, forming a boundary that was heading quickly for the ivory pyramid.
If only I had a parachute.
Hell, I didn't even have a shirt. I might as well have wished for a rocket pack. I wasn't exactly James Bond here.
We were going to die. The artificial ground was gone now. Only the ruins remained. My footing slipped as the pyramid began to shift wildly, the last vestiges of ancient magic fleeing. The structure dropped for what seemed an eternity, only to slam to a halt, shiver and quake, and then drop again. This halt was especially violent, and I knew that it was our last.
Blocks of ivory broke away, cracking and slipping into the darkness. We only had seconds left before this whole thing fell apart and we were dumped into the air.
Something clanged against the ivory, bounced a few times, and then stopped. The artifact! The pyramid jolted again and it slid toward the edge.
I started after it. If I could reach it, I could use it to get us out of here. I surged forward, one hand holding Julie's limp form tight, the other grasping for the little stone box.
My fingers stopped an inch from the artifact. I froze. "Nice try, you evil bitch."
Koriniha's voice echoed through the night air. "Pity. Now I have to put up with five more centuries on this shitty planet." Her spirit drifted away on the winds and was gone.
With a groan the pyramid began its final disintegration. A seam split open between my feet. The artifact slid over the edge and disappeared. The corpses fell away. The last blocks began to plummet, hurtling toward the ground. The top tier was all that remained, and we began to fall. It was a sickening feeling. Air rushed past my ears, deafening me. This was it.
Blinding light. What the hell? The spotlight veered away, and something metallic clanged against the ivory. In the split second before the block beneath my feet dropped, I realized it was a chain ladder. I extended one hand and grabbed it. My foothold was gone. I held onto the rung with all of my strength. Julie and I fell. My arm wrenched painfully in its socket. My fingers popped. I cried out in pain as I struggled to hold on. I kicked my legs wildly, panicking, trying to get one foot on the rung. The Hind jerked wildly above as Skippy tried to get us safely to the ground.
It had been an amazing feat of piloting. The clumsy Russian chopper was not known for its precise handling, yet he had managed to match speed with the dropping pyramid long enough to snag us.
I clamped Julie's unconscious body tight against my chest. She threatened to slip away. I could feel the rung trying to pull out of my hand. Instinct told me to drop her and use my other hand to hold on. Screw instinct. My hand was on fire, but I held on. We were losing altitude quickly. I tried to get a foot through another rung, but the ladder was whipping wildly in the wind. Finally, by some miracle, I was able to get the toes of my boot through the chain to brace myself. I held on for dear life.
Ground. Blessed ground. It came up frighteningly fast. Skippy flared the chopper upward, slowing us at the last possible instant. Almost gently he lowered us until the ladder was dragging in the grass. I hopped off, covering my eyes as the blades tore up a mighty cloud of debris. Hunters moved quickly from the woods, swarming toward us. I waved happily. I had no idea what was going on down here, but the Cursed One was dead. The Old Ones' plan had been foiled. No matter what, we had won. I was briefly illuminated in the spotlight of the Hind as it quickly banked up and away. I grinned like an idiot and gave everybody a thumbs-up.
The final rung of the ladder struck me violently in the back of the head. The last thing I remembered was a bunch of flashlights shining in my eyes and somebody hollering for a medic.
Chapter 28
I had to be dreaming. Either that or I was dead.
The field stretched as far as the eye could see. It was the same unnaturally beautiful place where I had first met the Old Man. Only now, the sky was clear. The storm had passed. The crops that had resisted the winds had survived. Their roots had been anchored deep. Now watered and tested, they would be much stronger than before. I felt the moisture under my bare feet. It was a peaceful place.
"Hello, Boy!"
I turned around. The accent was familiar, but the voice was wrong. It was far too young and happy. "Mordechai?"
"You look surprised to be seeing me, you do." He grinned. I suppose I couldn't call him the Old Man anymore. I still recognized him, but instead of being arthritic and frail, he was in the prime of his life. Young, handsome, and strong. Probably what he looked like when he had first started Hunting. He was not even wearing glasses.
"You're alive?"
"No. Am still dead of course. But no longer stuck. You killed the Cursed One. Prison was opened. Now free I am to go."
"Go where?"
"I not know. Have not been to next place before. Have been stuck for long time."
"What do you know about it?" It could not hurt to ask.
"My friend. You find out that for your own self some day." He held out his hand to shake. I pushed his hand aside and engulfed him in a bear hug. I easily picked him up and squeezed. "Ugh . . . Easy, Boy. Respect your elders!"
I put him down. "Thanks for everything," I said. "Sorry about your cane."
"I not need it any more now." He quickly stomped his feet to demonstrate. "Is better used up killing Nazi bastard son of bitch. No, I thank you. Free because you did good, though for second, I thought we were, how you say . . . screwed. But heart was good, and made right choice. I thank you. In fact, many others want also to thank."
"What do you mean?"
He nodded his head off to the side. There was a crowd of people assembled who had not been there before. Men and women, all of them young and fit and strong, much like Mordechai. They were all of different races, and were dressed in many styles of clothing. Robes, furs, silks, even mail armor. A tall man with a curled Babylonian beard saluted me with his bow. The others followed suit, one by one, raising their spears, swords, axes, a musket. I recognized one of the men. He had been the Brazilian Hunter sacrificed by Lord Machado in the memory. He raised his obsidian-tipped club overhead and gave me a nod of approval. There have always been monsters. And as long as there are monsters, there will be some who dare to hunt them. These were my people. I bowed to the ancient Hunters.
One by one they began to walk away. Slowly they became transparent, and began to fade. Within a moment they were all gone. The sacrifices were free.
"Prison is broken, so now they go. Only one of us could break away to contact the one from prophecy. I got to be one to teach you, because mine was the best English speaker." He sighed contentedly. "Sorry I could just not tell who you were, but it was not allowed. Only some things I could see, others I could say. Rules were different. But it is all good now. For me, work is done." Mordechai patted me tenderly on the shoulder. "You probably should be waking up now." He turned and began to walk quickly through the crop, running his hands through the rain droplets clinging to the leaves.
"Wait. What do I do now? Is
it over?"
He paused, and looked up as if he was enjoying the sun. "My friend, you still have much work to do. You still have calling. Short straw you have drawn, and you not done until you end up like us. What to do now? Hunt monsters of course. For you, is never over."
I raised my hand and waved. "Thanks, Mordechai. Without you we would have lost. The whole world would have lost. Thanks."
"Silly Boy. Wake up now. Pretty girl is waiting for you. Be nice to her. Is brave and shoots very good." He winked. "Not find girl like that very often. Good-bye, friend."
He walked away with a spring in his step, ready to embark on his final adventure. Mordechai Byreika had been one of the greatest Hunters of his day. He had risked all to stop the storm. He had been my mentor and my friend. He turned one final time to grin at me, eyes twinkling, excited to continue on. He faded from sight and disappeared.
"Hey, guys, Z's awake," said a voice. "Dude, you've got to be the clumsiest, most accident-prone oaf I've ever known. I'm amazed you've lived this long."
"Trip?" I asked, trying to rise up so I could look around. My head ached, and I did not need to touch the back of my skull to know that there was a huge lump. "You're alive?"
"Can't kill a brother that easy." He laughed, and began to cough. His armor had been cut away and bandages encircled his chest and most of his head. One leg was propped up and had been tied to a splint. We were lying on blankets, set under the shade of a tree. The morning sun was rising in the distance. Several other wounded Hunters were also resting here. "No thanks to Holly," he joked.
"Shut up, dick," Holly said from the other side. "It was a good idea at the time." She was kneeling next to an unconscious Hunter that I did not know and applying a clean bandage to his arm. She appeared to be fine. "Besides, one little hit on the head and you sleep through the whole battle, while me, Sam and Milo get to kill like half a million wights."