The Demon Signet Page 21

  And then it was gone, flew through a cloud and disappeared, its pointed tail swallowed last by white, shapeless mountains.

  She tried to turn, to talk, to warn them of the danger coming, but she couldn’t do a damn thing. Her consciousness was prisoner to impotence, the link between spirit and brain, will and computer, severed. All she could do was feel, feel the indescribable torment of being abused, not by the piece of garbage that had stolen from her before, but by Satan himself…and that forever.

  The flashing lights of the police car were just about to disappear beyond the horizon when, all of a sudden, they came to an abrupt stop, smoke spilling into the air behind them. It was turning around. It was coming back.

  Without realizing she was doing it, Ashley’s right arm began nudging Heather.

  “What?” Heather noticed the far-away look in Ashley’s eyes, the pale fear twisting her face. Turning to see what had her sister’s expression paused like a piece of morbid art, she saw the police car screaming down the highway toward them, speeding south on the northbound side of the icy median. “Marcus,” she whispered.

  Marcus looked up into the rearview mirror, saw both girls staring out the back, and let his gaze drift down to the side-view mirror. “Uh oh.”

  Ian swore when he saw it, too. “Get off at the next exit.”

  Marcus nodded.

  Ashley heard what was being spoken even though she couldn’t react to it. Her gaze remained locked on the police cruiser. Perhaps the angels weren’t helping them after all. Perhaps it was something else that was working in mysterious ways.

  The cruiser, in an insane maneuver at top speed, attempted to cross the median. But when it hit the ice, the driver, a man that had seemed warm, friendly, and relatively rational just minutes ago, lost control of the vehicle. Striking a large rock of ice, the cruiser went spinning in circles across the southbound lanes, going straight off the shoulder and crashing nose-first into the steep slope of rocky earth that stood embracing that portion of the highway. Like a missile, the officer went through the windshield and into the granite.

  Heather swore and turned away from the sight while Marcus fought the urge to go back for the officer. But the way the cruiser had been operated, the insane way it had come back after them, told him all he needed to know about what had sent the car into the rock wall, no doubt killing the officer instantly. It was not his God that had done that, but something from the other side. And why the Darkness would want them to remain free was a mystery that sat terribly uncomfortable in the pit of his stomach.

  Ashley’s paralysis snapped, and she crumpled to the seat in tears, trying to catch her breath, to rid herself of that feeling…

  Marcus took the exit.

  It was Christmas Eve indeed, and as Marcus turned the Saab into a gas station just off the exit ramp, they all couldn’t help but wonder if their last Christmas might have already come and gone three hundred and sixty-four days before. The babe in the manger, the angels pronouncing His birth, the prophecies that promised joy to the world… It seemed like a bad joke in a world that was clearly controlled by Darkness. Peace on earth and goodwill toward men? Maybe someday. But certainly not now.

  As they all sat motionless, each of them trying to grapple the impossible in some wrestling ring positioned within the privacy of their own fractured minds, John Lennon sang about war and Christmas, hoping they would have fun.

  Twenty-seven

  Refueled, the Saab rolled down Route 11 through Binghamton. The city was lit for Christmas, but all the festive dressings proved unable to fully distract from the ominous sky that was almost now upon them. Reindeer would be pulling the fat man through a blizzard tonight.

  Ian poked at the GPS on the center console. “It wants us to get back on 81. We can either take it all the way, or in fifty miles we can hop on 476 and take it to 95.”

  “You don’t think we should hole up somewhere for the night?” Marcus asked.

  Ian shook his head. “If this blizzard is anything like they’re saying it’s gonna be, we’ll be snowed in for a week.” He glanced back at Heather. “I’d like to be home a lot sooner than that.”

  Marcus didn’t want to spend another second away from the normal parameters of what he knew to be his life, and when he looked into the back seat, both girls nodded their approval, too.

  So they were either going to outrun the storm or be swallowed up trying.

  Marcus could see the strain pulling awkwardly at Ashley’s face, the far-away look in her eyes. She needed to get away from all this as soon as possible, before she retreated to a place from which there would be no coming back. He didn’t know if she’d seen something back there on 81, right before the cop turned after them, or if that’s just when all of it finally hit her, but that’s when she’d gone internal. Her psyche was fracturing, and in order to preserve it, her mind had slipped away into a hidden sanctuary—one Marcus hoped wasn’t buried too deep.

  Once more, snow began fluttering to the earth as the day gave way to night. The Saab’s headlights switched on while Marcus followed signs back to 81. They would be in Pennsylvania in half an hour.

  Thoughts of the people slain began to fizz in Marcus’ brain, and he couldn’t help wonder about the cop’s family—if they were going to be spending tomorrow in mourning, the presents from Dad left unwrapped. Or maybe his wife would try to get Christmas in first, saving the life-altering news for the next day, once the kids had their new toys to distract them from the full sting of the truth. The truck drivers, the person behind the wheel of the SUV, Joyce and George… He wanted to stop thinking about it. It was too much to bear. But he couldn’t, and soon he found himself wondering if it might be inevitable that they’d need to add Ashley’s parents to the list. He closed his eyes as if the thought was something visible and able to be ignored simply by looking away. Maybe the ring had prevented their calls, texts, and emails from going through, but the ring was gone now and they still couldn’t be reached. He prayed that there was some other explanation, that Ashley and Heather’s parents were only sick with worry and not a pair of corpses dangling like some grotesque mobile from a ceiling fan in their house.

  The snow fell harder.

  ****

  The clock on the console glowed 6:47 p.m. As they had gotten further south, the snow gave way to rain, and by the time they crossed into Pennsylvania, the night’s dropping temperatures were converting most wet surfaces to ice. They were moving along a two-lane section of 81 at five miles an hour, trapped in rows of dense traffic. The next exit was still miles ahead.

  Ian leaned over and turned the radio up when a local news report put a sudden stop to Madonna’s “Santa Baby.”

  “…Just as was feared, the storm is beginning to follow the pattern of the February 2007 North America Winter Storm, otherwise called, ‘The Valentine’s Day Blizzard.’”

  Ian didn’t care about the pressures and fronts and all the meteorological rhetoric. It didn’t mean anything to him. He wanted to know feet and inches, timeframes, and traffic delays. The smell in the car seemed to be growing worse, and the thought of being stuck in it overnight was enough to send one walking, blizzard or not. The aroma wafted from a mixed drink of sour milk, pickles, and cat piss topped with some whipped poop.

  “…The 2007 blizzard that claimed thirty-seven lives and inflicted fifty million dollars in damages across thirteen US states as well as New Brunswick, Ontario, and Quebec, saw heavy snowfall across the Midwest, parts of the Northeast and into Canada. And now we’re beginning to see the same thing taking shape again. The areas that saw warmer temperatures this afternoon, from northern Pennsylvania all the way to Maryland, are facing a major problem with all that rain and sleet now freezing in the plunging temperatures. Remember Winter Storm Nemo? If that was Nemo, think of this one as Jaws…”

  “Great,” Marcus mumbled from the driver’s seat. He had one hand on the wheel, the other holding up his head. A new voice came over the radio, this one seemingly giddy with the d
etails of the 2007 blizzard. A great many motorists, however, were not so excited by the history lesson.

  “…even as severe thunderstorms and tornadoes ravaged the southern end of the storm. The storm, which began on February twelfth, prompted the governor of Maine to declare a state of emergency, the governor of New York to call in the National Guard, and the mayor of Covington, Kentucky, to postpone Valentine’s Day…”

  Ian closed his eyes and knew that what he was hearing was nothing short of a prophetic description detailing their next twenty-four hours. Not just an inclination or a feeling, he knew this as a matter of the strictest fact. How he knew it was another matter. He seemed to know a lot of things lately. Like the fact that Heather was carrying his daughter in her womb and that she was struggling with whether or not to keep her. He also knew that she wouldn’t go through with it, that Ashley wouldn’t let her.

  Ashley… Just like that, the knowledge of Ashley’s miscarriage came to him, uploaded from a tethered connection to some alien source. What source? But the feeling that came with knowing seemed so natural that it failed to terrify him. Information just slipped into his mind with such effortlessness that—

  “…I-78, between Lebanon County and Allentown, was shut down because of a fifty-mile backup caused by accidents and ice, stranding over a hundred trucks alone and leaving people without food, water, and heat—once their vehicles ran out of gas—for twenty-four hours. The National Guard was called in to help the stranded motorists. Other stretches of I-80 and 81 were shut down, as well as the PA turnpike the following day… Snowdrifts in the Poconos were covering roads faster than crews could clear them, and more roads were closed… The Adirondacks saw forty-two inches of snow, while the hills and valleys south of Syracuse accumulated twenty-four to forty-five inches of snow… Lackawanna County and Luzerne County in northern PA had so much snowfall that every highway had to be closed…”

  Ian massaged his arm. It hurt like hell, and the bleeding hadn’t stopped yet. Ashley had taken a good chunk of flesh, like some rabid dog or crazed zombie. He wanted to beat her with a baseball bat until her brains began oozing from her nose…even while thankful she’d stopped him from killing Heather. There was no doubt in his mind, as much as he despised the thought, that he would have surely crushed her spine.

  He shook his head and tried to will this new disease out of his body. It seemed to be turning itself off and on at its own leisure, leaving him struggling for dominion over his thoughts one second and feeling perfectly normal the next. He didn’t know if there was a triggering mechanism or what it could be if there was one, but the feeling that some other entity had the capability, at will, to slip its fingers into his mind and then vanish as if it had never been there was more than unnerving. He only hoped that the uninvited thoughts would refrain from pushing him to violence again.

  He closed his eyes and concentrated, willing the wave of psychosis from his body. Finally, it left him, taking with it all the insane feelings toward the people around him—people he loved. He was himself again, but he knew that he was still sick, and that he had no power in and of himself to conjure up a cure. Without help, he could be lost forever, slave to its intrusive possessing. He needed help, and his spirit wanted to cry out for it, for the God he’d rejected so long ago. But Jimmy’s broken body, lying there in that casket… No. He refused to go to the God who had let that happen. Free will, sovereignty, theologies that argued the whys and hows of evil… He didn’t give a damn. His brother wasn’t here, would never be here again, and that was an infected wound that was never going to heal.

  Marcus braked when the taillights of an old station wagon glowed a brighter red in front of them. The Saab slid on the ice a little, and Marcus struggled to bring the car to a stop before kissing the bumper of the wagon. Thankfully, the vehicle behind them was also able to stop in time.

  “I don’t like this,” Heather whispered. They were in bumper-to-bumper traffic, restricted to movement in small, incremental spurts, and her claustrophobia was gearing up for an invasion.

  Ashley didn’t respond to her this time, her own eyes focused on some faraway place.

  The voice on the radio wished everyone a safe time out on the roads tonight before issuing yet another warning for certain parts of northern Pennsylvania. The blizzard was moving in and was going to dump feet of snow on top of the ice. The voice faded to more music, “Carol of the Bells.”

  Five minutes later and they still hadn’t moved an inch. Car horns sporadically honked around them, and people were beginning to yell out their windows. What they were yelling about was anyone’s guess. Whatever the cause of the backup, it rested miles down the road and well out of earshot. Ian looked behind. The caravan of lights was now stretched all the way to the horizon, and the line of cars and trucks behind them would soon be even greater. They were trapped until whatever caused the delay was removed. A multi-car pileup might take hours, but feet of snow? If authorities weren’t able to get to the scene, they were looking at a long night. Perhaps it would even take days to dig the miles and miles of cars from the coming snow, soldiers’ hands pulling stranded occupants from wheeled tombs.

  “Try another station,” Marcus said. “See if we can get a traffic report.”

  Ian leaned forward and, with his good arm, went to work scanning the airwaves. After going from one end of the dial to the other and back again twice, he gave up. “I’ll try again in a few minutes.”

  “Maybe someone else knows something,” Heather said. Before anyone could stop her, she opened her door and stepped out into the freezing cold, almost slipping on the ice in the process.

  Ian watched as she knocked on the window of the car beside them and spent a few moments talking to the passengers inside. The wind was whipping her golden hair around with such force that Ian feared it might pull her away, drag her kicking and screaming down the highway. The mental image of that actually happening was so strong that it sent chills through his body, and he knew that it was more than his imagination producing the scene. It was a premonition. Only, in reality, it wouldn’t be the wind dragging her by the hair.

  She turned away from the Saturn beside them and returned to the backseat, shivering next to Ashley as she tried spreading the car’s heat back into her limbs with her hands. “It’s freezing out there,” she stammered.

  Ian recognized that sound, the chattering teeth, the slurred speech. He had no desire to revisit that feeling. “What did they say?” he asked.

  “A pile-up, five miles ahead.”

  “How do they know that?” Marcus wanted to know.

  “They’re talking to someone on the phone.”

  Ian turned his eyes to their surroundings once more. Lights as far as he could see—white behind, red in front—and across the white earth that separated the north and south lanes, another parade of lights was lining up.

  It’s coming.

  He could feel the fact of it writhing with life inside him, birthed by wearing the ring. The driver of the Camaro was coming for the ring…for the end of the world.

  “Here it comes,” Marcus muttered, peering up into the sky.

  Ian turned and followed Marcus’ gaze to the dark heavens, to the golf ball-sized snowflakes sweeping down at them. A fierce gust of wind rocked the Saab and whipped the snow into a dizzying dance that blotted out the night.

  Marcus began whispering, “‘Hast thou entered into the treasures of the snow? Or hast thou seen the treasures of the hail, which I have reserved against the time of trouble, against the day of battle and war?’”

  “What the hell is that?” Ian demanded. “More preacher talk?”

  “The Book of Job.”

  “Ah.”

  “This is bad,” Heather commented as she watched the large flakes land on the ground. They failed to dissolve upon impact, and in less than a minute, the road’s shiny black surface was painted white.

  Ashley just kept staring ahead, unblinking, unmoving, barely breathing.

  “Look!�
�� Heather leaned forward and pointed up through the snow.

  Ian squinted, trying to see something beyond the storm. Then he saw the searchlight. “Helicopters,” he said. There were two of them, coming from the north, spotlights reaching down like UFOs looking for subjects to beam aboard. They flew overhead, passing with a whoosh, their lights passing over the car ahead of them and next to them, but missing Joyce’s Saab.

  “Police.” Heather was following them out the back window.

  “We should go,” Ian said.

  Marcus looked at him. “Go?”

  “They could be looking for us, for the Saab.”

  “In the middle of this?”

  Ian stared intensely at his friend. “He’s coming.”

  “Who?”

  “The Crest of Dragons.”

  “What?”

  But there was no time to explain what he knew or how he knew it. “We need to go.”

  “Go where, Ian? It’s freezing out there. We’re not dressed—”

  “We’re going to be stranded here for days unless the police get us or he kills us. Either way, staying here is not an option. Better to move now before the snow is too deep.”

  Marcus stared at him, eyes full of horrible understanding. Then he looked back at Ashley. She didn’t seem capable of traveling even five feet through the turbulence that was picking up outside.

  “We need to,” Ian stated. There was no flexibility in his voice, and his eyes conveyed the assurance of his words.

  The helicopters flew overhead again, their lights continuing to search.

  Though Heather wasn’t looking forward to braving the elements again, she didn’t want to be entombed in the car either. She leaned over and grabbed Ashley’s shoulder. “Ash, we’re going. Come on, snap out of it. Please. We need you to walk.”