The Brotherhood of the Wheel (53 page)

“Tell George we're back to him in three seconds,” Gage shouted into his mike. The control room erupted into chaos as techs and staff hustled to adapt and manage the sudden crisis. “Tell him the Feds shut us down and we're going to commercial in ten.”

Norse suddenly appeared on the monitors. He looked a little surprised, but only a little. “Ladies and gentlemen, agents of the federal government just shut us down from showing you the truth of this astonishing video. What is the government hiding from you, and why?”

“Oh, he's good,” Dann said to Gage as he holstered his gun. Gage smiled and nodded, pushing buttons and preparing for the commercial break.

“Yeah,” Gage said. “The best. You might have just pushed up our ratings for the whole season.”

On the monitors, Norse went on, “We'll discuss why our government is hiding the occult connection to the Pagan murders with our panel of experts when
Paranormal America Live
continues—unless they shut us down, too! Stay with us.”

The audience erupted in thunderous applause, and Norse, seeing that the camera's red light was out, gave a big grin and a thumbs-up to the monitors.

Dann shook his head. “Sorry about the gun,” he said to Gage.

“Meh,” the director said with a shrug. “You work in network TV long enough, some meshuggener's gonna point a gun at you.”

Across America, the knocking stopped. Doors were opened or peeked through, and, where only a moment ago there had been small hooded figures, waiting, now there was only the night.

*   *   *

The Master of the Hunt's knife descended toward Lexi's chest just as there was a roll of thunder across the black velvet sky and a third beam of white light rose out of and above Four Houses. Chasseur stopped in mid-strike.

“No,” he growled. “No! The door is closing! Those bitches have ruined everything I've worked for, for centuries!” He noticed a bouncing, fluttering ball of yellow-and-orange fire moving quickly through the field on the other side of the dense curtain of forest. He couldn't make out what it was. A huge explosion tore through the forest. A massive plume of fire soared into the air, and Chasseur knew … he felt it: the house of the Horned Man was burning.

“No!” he screamed. He jumped off the rock and sprinted toward the fire and the massive cloud of black smoke rising above the tree line. “I'll flay them all!” The Master of the Hunt sprinted into the night and was gone, leaving his two sacrifices on the cold rocks.

Lexi rolled over and pulled at Cole. The drugs were making everything fuzzy and hard to hang on to, but the explosion had helped. “Cole, Cole, we have got to get up!” she said. The boy clutched her hand, refusing to let go, and together they climbed to their feet. They stood naked on the stones and watched as the huge fireball burned and continued to send jets of fire and debris skyward.

Chasseur cleared the tree line and saw the house of the Horned Man engulfed in flames. He ran closer, his face swollen and twisted in rage, ruddy in the light from the inferno.

Heck coughed a few times and opened his eyes. He was alive, barely. Apparently, he was good with fire, but explosive concussion, being thrown through the air, and debris raining down on him all still hurt like a son of a bitch. Between this and getting shot by Scode earlier, he was in pretty bad shape. His clothes had been on fire, but the concussive force of the blast and rolling to a stop in the field had put them out. He was covered in soot, ash, and badly burned and tattered clothing. He groaned as he struggled to his feet. When he saw Chasseur's house burning, he laughed and whooped, letting out a rebel yell.

“Fuck, yeah!” Heck shouted. Then he saw Chasseur walking across the field, a silhouette against the fire. “Hey! Sorry about the truck, asshole. You insured?”

“I tried to tell you what you were,” the Master of the Hunt said, his voice cold slate above the roar of the fire. “You have no idea what you've just done, how much you and your foolish friends have undone.” Chasseur raised the knife.

“Not a clue,” Heck said. “I find mindless violence loses its charm when I actually know what's going on.” He slid his knife free of his belt sheath. The sheath fell apart and dropped to the ground, but the blade was in good shape.

“I'm going to skin you,” Chasseur said, spinning and tossing his own knife between his hands. Only twenty feet separated the two men now. “I'm going to put your head up on the sacrificial rocks and let the birds pick it clean.”

“I'm just going to fucking kill you,” Heck said. Ten feet now between them, and they were circling each other. Behind them, the house burned. “Nothing special, nothing fancy—just like you. You got jerked around by some big cosmic hoo-ha and you think that makes you important? Any asshole can kill people. Here, let me show you.”

Heck launched himself at Chasseur, tackling the Master of the Hunt. The two men rolled around in the high grass, grappling.

“Why don't you sic your shadow puppies on me?” Heck said, driving his fist into Chasseur's face. The killer rolled with the punch and disengaged from Heck, coming up in a crouch, slashing out with his knife. The blade cut across Heck's stomach, leaving a trail of dark blood, but it didn't cut deep. Heck punched Chasseur in the face again and connected solidly. The Master of the Hunt stumbled backward, almost falling. “Oh yeah, I guess it's not as easy to call them up now, is it?” Heck said, pressing his advantage. The two men's blades flashed and sparked as they lunged and swung, blocked and parried. “Same with those things you made from innocent kids, huh? All those little tricks aren't working right now, are they?”

Chasseur's knife darted out toward Heck's chest. Heck tried to move, but he was too hurt, too slow, and the blade sank deep into his stomach; he gasped at the sharp, bright pain in his guts. He grabbed Chasseur's hair and swept his own blade across the serial killer's throat. A spray of blood covered Heck's face. They staggered away from each other, both bleeding out.

“You bleed easier now, too,” Heck said, and coughed up some blood. Chasseur held his throat as blood gushed from his neck. “Just regular folks, right?”

“I'll live along enough to kill you,” Chasseur gurgled. He charged Heck, swinging the knife wildly. Heck parried as best he could and tried to move out of the way, but he suffered another cut, this one deep to his biceps; part of his arm burned and another part went numb. He countered with a shallow cut to Chasseur's shoulder and another punch, this time to his cut throat. Heck roared and hit the killer again, and again, driving him back.

Heck briefly blacked out from the pain, the lost blood. He swam back to awareness and found him and Chasseur staggering in a clinch. He could feel the heat from the blaze clawing at his face, the acrid smoke burning his lungs. Heck didn't know where his knife was, and he was gripping Chasseur's wrist, keeping the bone-handled blade from slipping into his gut again. He head-butted Chasseur. They both stumbled back to the very edge of the fire. Heck thought he heard voices shouting, calling to him, but his awareness was locked onto the killer's bloody face.

“What you are … will devour you,” Chasseur spat through a throat full of blood. “Just … remember that. I wish I could watch it happen, watch you fall, watch you destroy everything and everyone you love, and laugh as you do it.”

“Bullshit,” Heck muttered. “I'll never be like you, you mass-murdering psychopath.” Heck struck him again, slapped the blade from his hand and sent it flying. The universe was only Chasseur, only hurting him, making him shut up, forever. Heck heard a hissing, felt heat, but no pain from it.

“You'll … be … worse,” Chasseur croaked. “Tell me, noble hero, how did you find me? Find the children? You got my loyal hound, Walden, to … tell you. He … would never betray me, his master, never betray … the Horned Man … he worshipped.” Blood was pouring from Chasseur's mouth as well as from his throat now. His eyes, usually dead and dark, were bulging as he fought for the air for every word. “So … tell me, tell the evil psychopath, what noble means did you use … to find me?”

Heck remembered the blowtorch in his hand, the cool indifference, almost a controlled anger, with which he had used it on Wald until the old bastard gave him what he wanted. But he hadn't stopped there; he had kept going, enjoying the pain and degradation he was inflicting. The cold rage roaring in his mind, at the center of him. Wald died begging, unable to cry because his tear ducts had been seared. He kept torturing the body even after Wald's diseased soul had been pulled down into Hell.

There was hot ash blowing around them as Heck grabbed Chasseur by the shoulder and drove a combination of punches into the killer. Chasseur tried to block them as best he could, but the fury of the punches drove both men back farther and farther. There was a rumbling, like a furnace. Heck was locked into looking at the killer's eyes. Off at a great distance, somewhere away from the furnace, voices shouted his name, pleading. But now there was only the man in front of him that he was going to kill and the fury of the flames.

The Master of the Hunt tried to smile as best he could with the muscles in his throat severed. “I … see,” he rasped as he struck at Heck again with a feeble combination of blows. “You do recall it … good. You always will.”

“Fuck you!” Heck screamed. He mustered the last shreds of his strength to strike Chasseur again and again, punch after punch. His awareness winked out and then back again, in a jerky, non-linear continuity. His knuckles were raw; his wrists ached as he drove punch after punch into that evil, broken, smiling face. All around them were glowing cinders floating in the smoke-smeared air like fireflies that stung his lungs and skin but left no mark, no harm. They were deep into the fire now—it was all around them. The heart of the blaze, the roaring skeleton of the house, was close. Each punch, each stumbling clinch, brought it closer. Heck felt the flames, but his eyes were only for Chasseur.

“You think … killing me is the end?” The Master of the Hunt said as the maelstrom of Hell fell down upon them. They were both on fire, and the whole world around them was crackling flame and the snap and groan of the house of the Horned Man dying. There was no clear sky, only smoke; no cool grass, only hot ash. “You … are the greatest of predators, my brother,” Chasseur said, his voice dry gravel. “I was initiated … into this life, but you … you have it … in your very blood and bones.”

“Shut up!” Heck screamed. They fell among the ashes. Heck straddled Chasseur, punching him again and again and again as they burned, as the house burned, as the world burned. The thudding in his ears returned, like great leathery wings flapping in time to each punch, each broken bone in his hands, as he struck the Master of the Hunt again and again. Chasseur no longer moved; his skull was on fire, but Heck continued to strike him, hearing his very blood hiss, devoured by the fire. Some distant corner of his mind thought this was not the sacrifice of blood and fire that Chasseur had planned on tonight. Heck laughed at this. He couldn't stop laughing as he beat the serial killer called the Pagan to death with his bare hands in the collapsing frame of the Horned Man's home. Heck's tears evaporated from the fire that covered him. He
was
the burning, laughing thing in the desert now. That thought made him laugh and weep uncontrollably. It was his last thought before he slid off Chasseur's blackening body and fell into blissful, cool darkness.

Jimmie stood as close to the burning house as he could. Max, Lovina, and the others from the town, from Buddy's, were shouting, trying to figure out how to get into the blaze to go after Heck.

“I can't believe that crazy SOB just fought his way into that!” Lovina shouted over the blaze. “He's dead!”

“No!” Jimmie shouted. He grabbed a couple of plastic jugs of water that he and Max had fetched from the semi, which was idling in the field, near the access road. Jimmie poured them over an insulated fire blanket. He wrapped the blanket over himself as best he could.

“You're not seriously going to try to go in there, are you?” Max asked as Jimmie adjusted the blanket.

“He's my squire, my best friend's son. He's saved my life,” Jimmie said to the professor. “He's my friend, and I don't leave friends behind.” Jimmie sprinted to the edge of the fire; building speed, he closed his eyes and dived past the threshold of fire, vanishing from view in the smoke and flame.

“What do we do?” Max asked Lovina, who sighed and shook her head. A minute passed, then two. Lovina was pacing, looking for anything she could use to make a run into the flames. She was considering driving Jimmie's rig in when a smoldering, stumbling figure appeared at the edge of the fire, carrying a still, smoking form. Jimmie staggered out, flames licking at the blanket covering him. He dropped Heck's limp, blackened body as gently as he could in the grass, staggered a few more feet, and then fell, coughing and rolling, to extinguish the flames.

Jimmie heard shouting across the field and knew help was coming. The night air was cool, the stars were beautiful, and he was struck by how breathtaking this world truly was. He looked over to Heck, covered head to toe in black smudge and, he assumed, burns. His body was so still and had felt strangely cool to the touch when Jimmie found him beside Chasseur's flaming corpse. Heck suddenly convulsed and coughed, and Jimmie smiled. Jimmie struggled to sit up. His hands were hot and hurt and were kind of numb. He recalled shock from his time in the Gulf, and knew that his hands had some burns and his arms and shins, too, but the fact that he could feel it made him think they weren't too bad.

Sitting in the field, he looked across it to the dark woods. Then he saw it. It was close to the edge of the woods, vaguely visible in the jumping, frenetic light of the house fire. A dark man wrapped in shadows, with massive antlers, like the branches in the trees, spreading from his head, stared at Jimmie, at the cool, beautiful world, with burning, hungry eyes—predator's eyes. The shadowy pack of hounds around him—eyes like moonlight, stared, too, silent and ready to heed their master's command.