Church of Sin (The Ether Book 1) (44 page)

“She paints such a negative picture, doesn’t she?” Baron was smiling, leaning up against the altar, arms f
olded and legs crossed looking like he was a man without a care in the world waiting for a bus to take him to work. “But that’s what her kind do, Alix. They control with fear. Isn’t that what they’ve been doing all along? You don’t see me getting all hot under the collar and shouting do you? And I won’t. I’m not interested. But there’s more. There’s another fundamental difference between me and the demon over there, Alix. Do you know what that is?” he paused for effect. “Well, I’m the only one who hasn’t purposefully tried to kill you this week.”

Alix watched Baron’s mouth form the words but they didn’t sink in straight away. Like seeing the lightning and having to wait a few moments for the thunder to rumble.

What did he say?
Said Azrael.
What about the motorway?

“You tried to kill me on my way to see Harker,” said Alix confused. He was lying. He must be lying. But then there was the look on Harker
’s face. The expressionless mask had fallen away and there was something indeterminable beneath it now staring at her.

“Then who?”

She looked at Harker. The fire in her eyes was gone. Nothing but two black cavities.

“You!”

“You stupid child!” screamed Harker. “Why don’t you still get it? The prevention of Sin’s inception into the Ether takes precedence over the worthless lives of you and your Necromire.”

You tried to kill us, Lilith?

“You back stabbing bitch!” cried Alix. She felt her arms and fists tense as she thought about the devastation Harker had caused, the lives she had destroyed just to get at her. “Why?”

“I just told you why and I’m fed up with playing games. Give me the damn box and lets all walk out of here.”

What happened next was hazy. It happened so quickly and so slowly at the same time that everything became confused in a riot of colour and force. Who struck first wasn’t clear but at that moment the rage that had been building up in Alix, the anger and fear and resentment she had bottled up inside her since the day she had been burnt alive in Anwick’s cell, that raw wrath, unfastened itself and coiled its way around through her stomach building in momentum until it was spilling out onto the church floor and she was spinning around and around taking the stones that surrounded her with her so that they cracked and broke away from the walls of the church and soon what was Alix and what was building fused into one indistinguishable mass of flesh and brick. In the distance, she could hear shouts of anger and confusion, the blurred whirl of shapes moving in front of her, moving around her as she sent shocks of energy in every direction not caring where they landed or against whom they were aimed just as long as both Baron and Harker were sent sprawling into oblivion.

But the conflict, if that is what it was, was short lived. For all her anger, A
lix was no match for the strength of the bond between Baron and Belial, Harker and Lilith and it was only a matter of seconds before she found herself collapsed in a heap on the floor, the wind having been forcefully extracted from her lungs.

“Shit,” she gasped for breath.

“That’s not very wise, doctor,” mocked Harker. “You could hardly take us both on although we have different reasons perhaps for wanting to detain you here. And besides, this church has stood unhindered for eight hundred years. I’ll not see it damaged because of a child’s temper tantrum.”

Harker waved her arm. The stones and bricks that were scattered around Alix scraped across the floor, circling and gathering in momentum and finally lifting to return to their
original places, fusing together instantly as if the walls had never been touched. In seconds, everything was reinstated.

“What do I d
o, Azrael?” she whispered. The demon thought about it before she responded.

You have to make a choice. That’s the only way out of here.

“But
what
? What do I do?”

You kill him, or you kill everyone.

“Perhaps,” said Harker, “you ought to consider a further point, doctor. The Hollow One requires a human Host to exist in the Ether. A Host can only be, like us, a descendent of the Ancient Travellers. What makes you think that if you open that box Sin won’t choose you to be that Host?”

“What makes you think he won’t choose
you
?” she retorted but Harker just smiled.

“Perhaps he will. Perhaps it will be Baron. That is the point. Again, why take the risk, doctor. You may save
the man, but if you do you’ll watch each other perish as the World is destroyed or you’ll watch him burn at your hands as the evil possesses you. And don’t think for one moment that Azrael can help you.”

She might be right,
said Azrael.
We should put the box down.

“No,” said Alix to herself. “No. We wait and we think.”

“And what about you, Belial?” Harker turned to Baron. “Are you prepared to give up your Host for the Cause?”

Baron smiled pleasantly and waved her away dismissively. “I’ll take my chances.”

What’s it going to be then, Alix?

Without
realising it, Alix had sat down, the exhaustion of it all suddenly overcoming her. There seemed no way out. It wasn’t a choice between Harker and Baron. She realised that of course. They were both her enemy, as far as she was concerned. But it should be simple, shouldn’t it? She hadn’t murdered Ash. Baron had. Bringing him back at the expense of releasing a very pissed of God-like creature who purportedly wanted the world for himself seemed reckless to say the least. Assuming of course that that part of the story was true and having been asked to accept so much impossibility over such a short space of time had left Alix in disarray. She felt sure that there was only so much anomalous information her mind could take before it snapped so by now she didn’t know what to believe.

But how could
she live with herself if she chose to keep Ash’s soul locked away? He would remain dead because of her. And there was another point: she wouldn’t see him again. She wouldn’t see his smile or hear his laugh or sit down over a coffee and talk about a case again. But even if she did save him, were those things possible anymore? How could she try and live a normal life after today, after seeing what she had seen, after seeing so much death. After knowing the truth about the world. Everything had changed, irredeemably so. There was no fantasy anymore. No more thoughts of beach holidays, kids laughing in the pool, strolls across the city, nights out, nights in. That was out of reach. Those thoughts, those idealisms, those aspirations, belonged to someone else. Not her.

“What would I be bringing you back to?” she asked the box.

“Alix,” said Baron warningly, “don’t do something you’ll regret forever.”

There was a siren blaring in Alix’s head. A throbbing pain that had wrapped itself around her brain and was crushing her. Darkness was seeping inwards round the edge of her eyes, blurring her vision. With trembling hands she picked up the box and examined it once more. Examined
it for the last time, she told herself. Beyond the ragged wood, Harker’s out-of-focus shape stepped forward again. Her hand outstretched. She said something but the words were meaninglessly entangled with each other, like brambles, each vine indeterminable from the others.

For some time, she didn’t breath.

Chapter 90

In a sleepy suburb, Charlie stirred. Something was making a loud noise. Distant voices. Harry was crying. He slipped out of bed and tiptoed across the room. It was dark outside. Night time. He shouldn’t be up. But then again neither should Harry.

The moon was big. Like a big golf ball in the sky. Charlie thought about the flying lady although mummy had told him not to speak about her because she wasn’t real.

Other people had their lights on too and there were some people in the streets, pointing to the sky. That was wrong because you weren’t allowed out after
it got dark, Charlie thought. In case the Bagman came and got you. Charlie felt scared but a bit excited too, like the feeling you get when you go on one of the big rides at Alton Towers; you know something scary but fun is going to happen.

There was a funny smell too. It smelt like Granny’s kitchen when cooking goes bad and Granny shouts at
Granddad for cooking things too long. Burney. That was it. Burney. Charlie climbed onto the top of the chest of drawers where socks live to get a better look out of the window. He could see the mean old man from next door looking out of his window too like he sometimes did but never at night. The nasty old man had shouted at Charlie once for making too much noise but he had never told Mummy, only Daddy and Daddy said he shouldn’t upset the old man because he was poorly.

But there was something going on behind the nasty old man’s house. Somebody had a big orange light they were shining and there was smoke from a big chimney maybe and blue flashing lights. Charlie pointed at the lights but then Mummy came in.

“Charlie! Get down from there.” Mummy took Charlie round the tummy and put him on the bed, which had gone cold.

“Mummy, what’s happening?”

“I don’t know Charlie, but I want you to get dressed.”

They were going on holiday. You only got dressed at night when you went on holiday because planes don’t fly in the day. Charlie felt happy.

Outside, more lights were coming on.

Chapter 91

In the Church of Our Virgin Saint Mary, nobody moved.

At Alix’s feet, a wooden box lay open and from it a thick, black smoke spilled out over the edges like a waterfall, cascading down the sides and collecting on the Church floor where it curled around her feet, licking up her ankles,
and then meandered across the flagstone to the altar where it collected together, a bulging mass of swirling gas growing and swelling in size.

“What have you done?”

Alix couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t remember opening the box. Things were happening in front of her that she couldn’t assimilate. Had
she
done this? She looked on in horror as the gas began to take more shape, until it rose high above the altar and its form was more like a man, taller than Baron who had also backed away against the far wall. Harker hadn’t moved. Outside, a giant thudding noise, something banging against wood getting progressively louder with each strike. Alix didn’t discount the possibility that it was her own heart beating.

“
One of us will be chosen,” murmured Baron. “One of us will become a living God.”

It occurred to Alix that if she had been the one to bring this Devil here, did that make her a more likely Host? She wanted Azrael to say something. Anything. But there was no comforting voice in her head now. Was she angry with her? Had she just condemned them all?
The feelings of terror and guilt fused together until they were no longer distinguishable and she was paralysed by the sensation.

Jesus Christ. W
hat had she done?

The thudding against the wood was deafening now. Alix looked at the Church door. Was something trying to get in?
Even Harker looked uncertain.

“
Whoever the Hollow One takes for its Host, you have damned us all!” she seethed at Alix. “Foolish child. And for what? So you could bring back one man? For ten thousand we have kept this World safe from the Beast and you have taken our efforts and shattered them in seconds.”

“I didn’t...”

Didn’t what? What on earth was the point in protesting?

“Lord!” Baron had found his tongue and had stepped forward toward the cyclone of energy which was now lurching violently from side to side. It was as if the gas was nothing more than a shell cocooning a wild animal which raged and tore at its prison feverishly trying to escape. “Lord, I am your servant, Belial. I have brought you a Host so that you may take this World for your own and walk amongst
us as our master.”

Alix stumbled backwards over the front row of pews as Baron was gesturing towards her.
The bastard was trying to save his own neck! She felt a sudden breeze whip around her head as the church doors blew open with a hideous crash of wood on stone but it was too late as to her horror the smoke began to change again and the gas began to concentrate at a point half way up the central aisle, circling faster and faster until a tube was created which protruded a little way ahead of the rest of the body rather like a knoll on a tree. From this a dark opening emerged, a hole into which Alix stared. She couldn’t move. Her body was transfixed with ice cold fear as the knoll extended further and narrowed until finally lurching forward taking more of the gas around it. As it did so, the body was suddenly drawn into the extension as if the whole thing was being sucked into an invisible vortex. Then, snake-like and lightning fast, the tube swept across the Church floor towards her like a bungee cord contracting and she realised that it was going to smash into her. Instinctively she jumped up onto the pew only to watch the snake pass underneath her and hurtle down toward the bottom end of the church where it began collecting again around the feet of... Was that? Alix rubbed her eyes disbelievingly as the snake wrapped itself up again and ascended higher and higher, encasing the figure Alix recognised in its fetid embrace until finally wrapping itself around the figure’s neck, lifting his head back and feeding itself into his mouth. From the bottom, the smoke began to disappear, unravelling around the figure as the top end poured down his throat. His feet quickly became visible again, followed by his knees and waist and in a matter of seconds he had swallowed the whole thing.

More minutes of silence passed as Alix, Harker and Baron stood motionless waiting for the figure to speak. At last, Baron broke the silence.

“Lord, this Host is-”

But he never finished. Baron felt his ribs crack at the suddenness of his propulsion as he was sent sprawling backwards across the church until he struck the northern wall with such force that the stone gave way and for a moment Alix thought the wall might collapse around him. He lay slumped up against the broken stone, a trickle of blood running down his forehead.

Ernst Stranger turned to Harker. Alix had recognised him immediately: the small features scrunched together to reveal too much excess greased skin around his forehead and cheeks, the rat-like quality to everything was unmistakable. Except that his eyes no longer darted around the room like a caged animal. Rather, he had no eyes at all. Just two black holes that lacked every trace of humanity. From his tiny mouth a noise emitted, the most dreadful sound that Alix had ever heard. There are certain sounds that repulse us. They make the hairs on the back of our necks rise and our hearts reel and swell in our chests. They can bring us from a state of sleep to a state of absolute unadulterated alertness in seconds. The sounds of our fellow human beings in distress. The sound of the dying, of the suffering, of the sick. The sounds of war and rage, bitterness and misery. The sounds of fire spreading out across a city, of walls crumbling and the ground shaking. The sounds of panic and terror. The sound a mother makes when her child is lost.

Alix heard all of these sounds – this unholy chorus – emerge in a
heartbeat from Ernst Stranger’s mouth. It was a sound that drove utter horror into her.

Harker fell to the floor. She did not collapse. She fell, like a statute. Stiff and inanimate. Like she had just turned to stone.

Devil’s Tongue
, whispered a small voice in Alix’s head.
The language of the Ancient Ones.

Ernst watched her fall and then turned his head slowly to look – if looking was something he was actually capable of doing – at Alix. She felt the blood drain from her head and for a moment she thought
she might have succumbed to the same magic that had so easily taken Harker. She thought about running, skipping over the pew to the right where she might find some cover behind the pillars. Or to the left where a wooden door led to the belfry. But then what? How could she escape a monster with so much power? Her arms dropped by her sides as she realised the hopelessness of the situation. And this was her, wasn’t it? She had done this. She had released this evil. And now it would destroy her.

The pain was the most excruciating pain she had ever felt. It was
as if something had buried itself under her skin, all over her body and up her arms, something sharp and with jagged edges like glass and when she was flung from one side of the church to the other the glass shattered inside her, cutting deep into her muscle and tendons, ripping arteries from their channels and electrifying every nerve in her body. She was thrown around like a child might treat a disliked toy until finally she was thrust back against the altar where she lay winded and broken. She could taste blood in her mouth, she had lost feeling in her legs and her shoulder wouldn’t respond, the arm having come loose from its socket.

She opened her eyes. Ernst, or what was left of him, was standing over her. His arms drooped by his sides, he looked utterly indifferent about the suffering he had caused. He looked
at her strangely, like one might regard a particularly tricky crossword puzzle, like she was of vague interest to him but no more. Then he put out his hand and she felt a new a sensation. It was similar to the feeling of fainting, the last few seconds of consciousness when that icy cold nausea washes through your brain and you lose control; except it didn’t stop. She didn’t slip into unconsciousness. She felt her head tip back and her eyes glaze over and then something jolted in her stomach and she had the sensation that something was being dragged up through her wind pipe. Was he pulling her stomach out through her throat? Then it was in her head and her face was burning hot as he drew the demon from her. There was a horrible screaming in her ears. She tried to resist but it was useless. In her mind, they passed each other. Alix and Azrael. At least, that is what she thought until she looked again and she realised that she recognised the face of the voice in her head. She called her name in the dark – Zara! – but no sound came. Just a breeze. And the crack of thunder.

She felt something warm on her face. Warm and sticky. The feeling of separation was gone. The screaming stopped.

Her eyesight returned, the church came into focus. Ernst Stranger was looking at her but his expression was different. He looked annoyed about something.

She saw the hole in his head before he fell.

Behind him, Ash stood with the Glock extended to where Ernst’s head had been, his chest heaving. Their eyes met. She had absolutely no idea what to say.