Where Angels Fear to Tread

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Remy watched as two of Delilah’s followers disembarked the plane, each holding the end of a blanket that contained the bloodied remains of Clifton Poole.

“That’s it,” Delilah said, watching from the tarmac of a little-used runway at the small West Virginia airfield. “Carefully, now.”

And just as she spoke, one of the men lost his footing, stumbling and dropping his end of the blanket.

Clifton Poole’s body tumbled from its wrapping, landing at the bottom of the stairs in a broken pile.

Delilah rolled her eyes and sighed with exasperation. “Please pick that up,” she said, pointing to the body. “We don’t need to draw any further attention to ourselves.”

The two who had been carrying Poole’s corpse hustled to stuff it back inside the blanket and carry it to a waiting van.

The side of the van said it was from a flooring company, and Remy noticed the two drivers staring at Delilah, mesmerized. She approached the driver’s side window of the van.

“Be a pair of dears and dispose of that for me, would you?” she asked, blowing them kisses as, with a screech of tires, they drove away.

Anything for their mistress, Remy thought with a scowl, especially if she has a piece of their souls.

Remy stood off by himself, noticing that Samson and his family were standing on one side of the tarmac, while Delilah’s followers stood on the other. Remy wondered how this would work; if they were going to be fighting together, could one side actually depend upon the other?

He caught the approach of Deryn out of the corner of his eye and turned toward her. She was pale and sickly looking, and she was still wrapped in her own blanket from the flight, even though the air was quite humid.

“You okay?” he asked her.

She smiled as she nodded. “I keep seeing him all torn up like that,” she said, and brought a hand to her mouth to stifle the tears. “And then I start to wonder how something like that is possible, and then . . . and then I realize that you’re . . . that all of you aren’t what you appear to be and . . .”

The woman was on the verge of complete shock, the glimpse of a strange and brutal world being more than her human mind could comprehend.

Remy stepped closer, using the voice of the Seraphim to calm her.

“Now, let’s hold it together,” he said to her.

She looked up into his eyes, and he willed her to calm down with his gaze.

“Remember that Zoe needs you. She’s waiting for you, and you won’t do her, or anybody else, any good if you come apart at the seams.”

He could feel her begin to relax, the nervous energy that her body was emitting dwindling down to the faintest of crackles.

“This will all be over soon,” Remy said, and he pulled her close for a hug. “Just a little more craziness and it’ll all be done.”

“A little more craziness?” she asked, and he felt a tremble go through her body as he held her.

“I’m not sure how much more I can take,” Deryn said, letting herself be held by the private eye.

She didn’t know what it was, but there was something about him; the way she felt whenever he was even close by. Remy Chandler made her feel safe, and she totally believed him that things were going to work out.

Deryn had been on the verge of panic since her daughter’s disappearance, but after having met the man in Zoe’s drawings, and having spoken to him about finding her daughter, she had believed then that things were going to be okay.

But that was all before she was taken from the motel.

Her panic threatened to rise again, but the closeness to Remy Chandler helped her to keep it all under control.

She knew things were not normal with the woman called Delilah, and with the people who seemed to worship her every word. To look at her, one saw a beautiful woman in her early thirties, apparently wealthy and very much used to getting what she wanted.

But there was something else, something occasionally caught from the corner of the eye, something that hinted to Deryn that this woman was not what she appeared to be.

That they all: Delilah, her servants, the blind man—Samson—and his children, and even Remy Chandler . . .

They were all not what they appeared to be.

But being held by the private investigator seemed to make everything all right.

Deryn always suspected that her daughter’s odd talents, the ability to predict the future through her drawings, would take her to some interesting places; that the door to another world could possibly be opened to her.

But she never imagined the door opening so wide.

“How sweet,” a woman’s voice commented, and Deryn found herself stepping back from Chandler’s arms.

And she immediately felt the effects of a world, far stranger than she ever imagined, begin to exert its influence upon her.

“The cars are here and we’re ready to go,” Delilah informed them.

Six black SUVs had silently appeared upon the runway, waiting for them.

“All right,” Deryn said, starting toward where the trucks were parked.

Delilah’s hand shot out as she passed, gripping her elbow in a hold so powerful that it made her wince.

Remy had started toward them at seeing this, when Delilah specifically addressed Deryn.

“We’re ready to go,” Delilah said again.

Deryn didn’t understand.

“Where are we going, dear?” the woman, who maybe wasn’t a woman at all, asked her.

“I’m not sure I . . .”

“Poole is dead, so we no longer have our Hound,” Delilah informed her. “But I believe your connection to him was likely enough to have left some kind of residual impression to where we should be going next.”

Deryn looked at Remy, her anxiety starting to escalate. She wanted to be in his arms again, to feel as though everything was safe.

“Think of your daughter,” Delilah commanded. “Think about how badly you want to hold her again.”

She found herself doing exactly as the odd woman commanded, and found her head filled with the staccato images of a place she had never been, but where she somehow knew her daughter to be.

When she opened her eyes, Remy was standing beside her, a look of concern on his face.

But she was fine; she knew where her daughter was.

“We need to go that way,” Deryn said, pointing toward an open gate far in the distance.

The alarm wailed in the night, calling forth his followers from the safety of their beds.

Dagon stood before the dwelling of Pastor Zachariah, as the sirens howled, and waited for the faithful.

He held the child’s tiny hand firmly in his own, feeling the continued presence of a power that could very well reshape the world, pulsing within her fragile, human form.

Dagon glanced down at her, sensing that it was no longer the child who controlled the little girl’s body, but the power of creation that had emerged, peeking out through the child’s eyes.

This power, now coursing through his own form as well, had lain becalmed for countless millennia, watched over by holy men, protected, until the woman—the soul eater—had begun her search, and it had found refuge in a child’s body.

Dagon saw the woman inside his mind, the one who was going to try to take his prize from him.

She would fail.

With new eyes that could see in darkness as clear as day, Dagon watched his followers come to him. The expressions on their faces were humorous to behold. They had no idea what they were looking at . . . what they were in the presence of.

He raised his perfectly muscled arm and waved them closer.

“Come to me, my faithful,” he said, his voice booming in the night like Gabriel’s trumpet. “Come, and stand before your god.”

They moved closer, but not too close. They were afraid, and he could understand their fear.

For he doubted that these mortals had ever stood before something so wonderful.

Their frightened murmurings filled the air like insect song as he began to address his acolytes.

“Be not afraid,” he told them, “for I mean you no harm.”

Their chatter grew more intense, and then an older woman in a flowered nightgown stepped from the crowd.

“What are you?” she asked, her voice raised in fear. “Where . . . where is Elijah? . . . Where is Pastor Zachariah?”

The crowd murmured, not yet convinced that they were in the proximity of greatness.

“I am your lord and god,” he told them. “The one you have prayed to for so many years.” He paused for a moment, smiling as he raised a perfect hand to the sky.

“I am Dagon.”

The crowd buzzed, and he basked in their fear, surprise, and adulation.

“Where is the pastor?” the woman asked again.

“He no longer exists,” Dagon explained. “He and I were one, but now only I am here.”

The woman stepped back into the protection of the crowd.

“You look like the Devil,” she said, and the gathering agreed.

Dagon laughed at the superstitious lot, his laugh a booming sound that cleaved the silent night like a thunderclap.

“Certainly you can’t be serious,” he said, his patience waning. “I have come for you—I have come to save you all.”

“Everything I’d expect a devil to say,” the woman cried.

Dagon was tempted to silence her, but knew that any act directed toward her would be seen as proof of her accusation.

No, he had to show them the truth.

He closed his eyes, feeling the power that coursed through his every muscle burn like the sun. They had to be shown the glory of what stood before them; the glory of what he was.

A messenger was needed to proclaim his coming.

The god growled as he reached out with his mind, taking hold of the one who would best serve his purpose, and calling him forth.

The little girl gasped, her own eyes closing as he exerted his strength. The power within her crackled about her head, joining with his own.

She looked up at him with large, vague eyes.

“I will show them,” he told her.

The crowd was growing anxious, and he could sense their fear and confusion increasing. He hoped what he had to show them would belay their concerns.

The sound of a door opening behind him made Dagon smile.

He listened to the creak of the porch beneath the weight of a footfall as a figure emerged from the house.

Dagon stepped to the side, pulling the child along, and they both watched the figure sway on the top of the porch, preparing to descend.

“It’s Elijah,” the woman proclaimed, and the crowd murmured enthusiastically.

The young man looked out over the gathering. His clothing was stained nearly black with blood, but the crowd seemed not to notice. Nor did they see the jagged hole in his throat—until he began to awkwardly descend the porch steps.

“Look at him!” somebody yelled.

“Is that blood?” cried another.

The crowd began to back away, but Elijah continued to stand before them, watching, his head tilted loosely to one side.

It was suddenly eerily quiet in the compound.

Dagon closed his eyes, reaching out to his puppet, manipulating brain functions and vocal cords for this, his most special moment.

“I . . . ,” Elijah began, his voice horribly rough and gravelly. “I was . . . I was dead.” The young man raised his bloody hands for all to see, and then showed them the mortal wound torn in his neck.

Dagon could feel the fear slowly turning to awe, and he knew he had them.

He had them all.

“But now . . . ,” Elijah croaked, “now I am alive.” He spread his arms. “Praise him. . . . Praise Dagon.”

Dagon smiled.

“Praise him!” somebody screamed.

“Praise Dagon!” bellowed another.

And soon they were all singing his praises, and he allowed his influence to slowly creep within each of them.

They were his, body, mind, and soul.