When the flames died down, the Peregrine saw that Doctor Satan was marching towards them, a raging inferno beginning to form behind him.
“Ascott Keane,” the master criminal said with a sneer. “Why am I not surprised?”
Keane held his ground, even as the heat from the fire began to pierce his protective shield. The Peregrine rose to his feet at his side, pistols still in hand. “We’re not here to fight you, Doctor. If you’ll hear us out, you might find our information worthwhile.”
Doctor Satan halted some feet away from them. Beneath his hood, dark eyes blazed. “You came here for a bit of banter? How unlike you, Keane.”
The Peregrine could contain himself no further. “You killed my friend, you sadistic bastard! I swear that you’re going to pay!”
Satan threw back his head and laughed mockingly. It was then that Max noticed that the flames had paused as well. They continued to burn where they were but they no longer advanced. How could any mortal man contain such powers? Max wondered. The obvious answer was that Satan was not a mortal man at all…
“Leopold Grace died screaming like a woman,” Satan taunted, enjoying the pain that flickered across the Peregrine’s face. “A fitting punishment for one who befriends a thief like yourself!”
Keane held up a hand to cut off the Peregrine’s reply. “If you please,” he whispered, locking eyes with the vigilante. When the Peregrine nodded and backed away, Keane turned back to Satan. “The Knives of Elohim were not stolen by the Peregrine. Two criminals named Marlon Woodson and Arias set you and the Peregrine against each other to distract the two of you. I believe that Arias means to open a portal to The Bleeding Hells.”
Satan scoffed at the notion. “Those are mere rumors. There are no such things.”
“I believe you’re wrong. And more importantly, Arias believes you are wrong. When the portal opens, the first of the demons will come through and more will follow in short order. We must find Arias and Woodson. If you aid us, I can guarantee you free passage from the scene.”
“You’re suggesting that we… work together?” Satan stared at Keane in disbelief. “You’ve gone insane.”
“It’s an alliance of necessity,” Keane responded. “I wouldn’t be making this offer unless I was convinced that separately, none of us stand a chance of stopping Arias and the Bleeding Hells.”
“So it would be the three of us?” Satan asked, studying the Peregrine.
“Along with the Black Bat and the Peregrine’s female companion,” Keane said.
“Hmm.” Satan turned with a dramatic swirl of his cloak. He moved a few steps away, waving his hands to dispel the flames that had continued burning. “I want more than a mere promise of freedom when the task is completed.”
“I’m not going to agree to leave you alone in the future,” Keane warned.
“I wouldn’t think of it,” Satan laughed. “But I want my knives returned to me.”
“No,” the Peregrine said. “They’ll be put someplace safe, so that no one can try and open the Bleeding Hells again.”
Satan looked over his shoulder, a sneer on his lips. “Then I won’t help you.”
Keane sighed and whispered to his companion. “It’s a fair enough deal, I think. Everyone gets back what they had to begin with.”
“But now he knows that the Bleeding Hells exist,” Max countered. “He’ll want to bring them all together again so
he
can make a play for power, just like Arias is doing!”
“Then you’d best keep your own blade someplace well protected. Without all four, he can do nothing.”
The Peregrine sighed, knowing that Keane was right. He noticed that the force field surrounding himself and the criminologist was down, however, and elected to do something that would make his true feelings known.
The Peregrine jumped for Satan, who was shocked by the sudden turn of events. The vigilante drove a hard kick into the villain’s midsection, following it up with a powerful lefthanded blow to the man’s chin. Blood sprayed from Satan’s mouth as he staggered back.
“We’ll play it your way,” the Peregrine said, pointing a finger at Satan’s chest. “But if you try anything out of line, I’ll kill you where you stand. And someday, down the line, you’re going to get a visit from me. And we’re going to talk about what you did with my friend’s life.”
Doctor Satan wiped his wounded lip with the back of a crimson glove. His tongue then darted out to taste the still seeping fluids. “I can’t wait, Mr. Peregrine. I suspect you and I will have a lot to talk about…”
CHAPTER IX
The Jewel of the Seraphim
Jacob Duval pulled the shutters tight on the windows and tried to ignore the howling of the wind. A storm of some kind had moved in and brought with it a terrible chill that froze the blood in Jacob’s veins and made the whole house quake as powerful gales blew past.
Jacob was a young man in his early twenties with curly brown hair and a classically Jewish appearance. His beard was full but not overgrown and he was attractively thin. There was an earnestness to him that appealed to young ladies, many of whom sought to win his eye. But Jacob was a studious man and he ignored the fairer sex for now, seeking instead to become a lawyer.
He shivered, picking up a throw blanket that he wrapped about his shoulders. He wore only pajamas and socks, which did little against the sudden harshness of the cold. He began to prepare the fireplace for use when an odd sound caught his attention: it sounded like the wailing of a tiny voice, one whose gender could not immediately be determined.
Living in New York City meant that strange sounds were often heard in the dead of night… but the oddity of this one was that it sounded like it came from inside Jacob’s apartment. In fact, it seemed to be emanating from within the locked drawers of his work desk.
Jacob slowly approached his study, where the noise appeared to grow ever louder. He retrieved his keys from a nail on the wall and sat down in front of the desk, turning his head to the side. The little wail sounded frantic, reaching down deep inside Jacob’s head and stirring his soul. This was the call of something from Beyond, something that would not be ignored.
As a child, Jacob had been fascinated and repulsed by his father’s collection of occult oddities. They definitely caught hold of the young boy’s imagination but there was something unsettling about many of them: a crystal skull that was rumored to be cursed; an ancient Viking weapon known as the “Sword of Hel,” and a book bound in human flesh. When Jacob’s father had passed away, he had not wept upon hearing that his father wanted the collection sold and the proceeds to go to his son. Jacob wanted no part of the accursed things.
But his father had made one exception: a stunning blue-white gem set on a leather cord. The Jewel of the Seraphim, he had called it. Jacob had thrown in his desk drawer upon returning from his father’s funeral and not given it one more thought since.
But as Jacob unlocked the drawer and opened it to reveal the Jewel, Jacob wondered what strange story lay behind the piece of jewelry.
When the Jewel was revealed, Jacob stood up so quickly that his chair flipped over and slammed against the floor. Within the gem, Jacob could see what looked like a tiny winged figure. It was beautiful with smooth features and a soft glow that surrounded its body.
The wail now formed into words that shot forth into Jacob’s brain:
Turn around now! The shadows come!
Jacob looked over his shoulder and felt a scream bubble up from within. It exploded out as he saw wisps of darkness slipping under his door and down through the chimney. These forms coalesced into solid shapes, looking cloaked figures with drawn hoods. They reached for Jacob, speaking in unison:
Give us the Jewel of the Seraphim. Give it to us and your life will be spared!
Jacob acted without thinking, snatching up the Jewel and dropping the leather strap about his neck. He then bolted for his bedroom, slamming the door in the faces of the shadow wraiths.
And then came sounds of gunfire and shouting. Jacob swallowed hard, wondering if this was all a dream somehow. But then a bullet tore through the door and embedded itself in the wall above his head, confirming the reality of the situation.
A woman’s voice came through loud and clear, saying “They seem to be hurt by the light! Let’s keep that on them!”
Jacob saw the flickering shadows beneath his door and realized that someone had started up the fire place. He smelled burning wood and heard the screeching of the inhuman shadow things.
Those are friends,
the thing in the Jewel whispered, its words once again entering straight into Jacob’s mind.
“Who…? The people with the guns? And what the heck are you?”
My name cannot be pronounced by your mortal tongue, but I am bound to this gem. I have but one purpose and that is to close the gate to the realm of the cutters and the slicers. The ones with the guns are seeking to use me for that purpose. We must work with them.
“But… I don’t understand.”
Give me to them, Jacob. This is your purpose. To watch over me until I am needed. You have done well, even though you knew it not—just as your father did before you.
The sudden silence outside his bedroom door made Jacob pause in his internal conversation. The door suddenly flew open as a man dressed in black kicked it in. The only parts of the man’s face that were visible were his mouth and a pair of incredibly penetrating eyes. A long cloak, cut to resemble bat wings, fluttered after him and finned gloves adorned his hands.
Behind him was a trim woman of pleasant shape. Her auburn hair was tied back to avoid being distracting in battle, her eyes partially hidden by a domino style mask. She wore slacks and a button-up shirt, a long coat over both.
“Jacob?” the man in black asked. “I am the Black Bat. This is…” the man paused, glancing at his companion.
“Call me a friend,” she said with a smile.
“I’ve heard of the Black Bat,” Jacob admitted, thinking of the lurid newspaper headlines that alternately hailed the Bat as a hero and other times as a hardened killer.
“Then you know that I fight against criminals. I’m working on a case now that might put everyone in the city at risk. We need you to give us the necklace.”
Jacob stared past his rescuers, noting that his apartment was a wreck… but there were signs of the shadows any longer. “It says I should do it.”
Evelyn blinked in confusion. “Who says…?”
“The Jewel.” Jacob reached up and removed it, holding it out with trembling fingers to the Black Bat. “It told me that I should give it to you. It mentioned a ‘realm of cutters and slicers’—what does that mean?”
The Black Bat stared at the gem. “It’s an awful place: a sort of hell where these demons live, who exist only to cause pain. They think that hurting others is some form of high art.” Quinn blinked in surprise as the tiny angelic form within the gem suddenly fluttered about, a smile on its features.
“It’s beautiful,” Evelyn whispered from Quinn’s side. The light from the gem glittered in Evelyn’s eyes.
“Who sent those… monsters after me?” Jacob asked.
“Some very bad men,” Evelyn offered. She smiled again at him and Jacob felt his knees go weak. Even with the mask, she looked familiar somehow. He had seen her somewhere before? She looked a little like the girl from
Amazonian Princesses from Mars
, that cheesy B-movie he’d seen at the local theatre a few weeks back… but what in the world would an actress be doing running around with a man dressed as a bat?
“Is there something I can do to help?” Jacob said, surprising even himself.
The Black Bat regarded him for a moment before finally speaking. “I would prefer that you stay here, where you’re safe. I think it’s very brave of you to offer your assistance… especially after seeing some of these creatures face-to-face… but this is simply too dangerous to let you get involved in any further.”
Jacob ran a hand through his dark hair and nodded. “When it’s all done, can I… can I have that… back?” he wondered, gesturing towards the Jewel.
From within its surface came a warm burst of laughter, followed by the words
If I survive, I will come back, Jacob. Perhaps our story is not finished, after all.
CHAPTER X
The Gates of Hell!
Arias reached back and pulled the small band from his hair. His reddish curls fell about his shoulders, giving him a somewhat feminine appearance. His full cupid-bow lips and soft skin accentuated the fact that he was not the most masculine of men. But Arias’ beauty was marred by the horrible scar he bore, a jagged line that had cost him much in the way of pain.
Arias sat nude on the floor of his lair, directly in the center of a meticulously drawn pentagram. His associate, Marlon stood nearby, just outside the occult symbol, smoking his third cigarette in the past fifteen minutes. Marlon smoked and drank heavily when he was nervous and he was most assuredly nervous now. He’d come to respect the abilities that Arias possessed but they still freaked him out.
Marlon was not a religious man but he believed with all his heart that there were things in life that no scientist could explain. The existence of the Bleeding Hells was something that he had doubted at first but as they had moved down the path towards this point, he’d come to believe in it. He
wanted
it.
Marlon had been with every kind of woman imaginable. He’d even dabbled with men. He’d tried it rough, soft and everything in between. Mixed in with all the sex had been drugs—mounds and mounds of them. But there was always a piece of Marlon that had wanted more, always wanted the next big high. If even half of what Arias said was true, then the Bleeding Hells would be the ultimate high. There would be pain, yes… but eventually the pain would become pleasure: a pleasure that, according to legend, would last for eternity.
And so he sold his soul in exchange for pleasures of the flesh.
Marlon stared at the four Knives of the Elohim, laid out before Arias. Their natural glows were much more intense now, as their proximity to each other seemed to increase the glare exponentially. “What now?” Marlon asked, blowing out smoke with each word. He took another drag on the cigarette and then tossed it to the floor, stamping it out with a foot.