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On the other side of the black door was an ordinary square room with ornate antique couches along the walls, two large red doors opposite the dark entrance we’d just come through, and some old paintings depicting scenes from what appeared to be eighteenth and nineteenth century Europe. One especially large artwork caught my eye, centered on the right wall as it was. A macabre scene of winged devils skewering many naked and pale people upon spears and tridents—men, women, even children—kicking them to the ground, strangling them, and otherwise murdering, in a wide variety of creative ways. I turned my sight back to the twin doors, doing my best to not let my uncovered mouth twist into a scowl.
I was committed. Deep in it. Yet, despite it all, I wasn’t frightened. Because I wasn’t thinking about myself. I wanted to learn more, and this kept me hyper-focused if anything. I needed to know what the fuck was going on and find Vicki as fast as possible.
The nausea from earlier didn’t return, but growing spiritual revulsion and disgust took its place. I’d get Vicki and pound an exit with my head on brick if I had to, to get away from Serenity Mere.
I gritted my teeth and walked forward into a new line that had formed to the left.
The costumed masses politely and patiently filed through the two doors ahead of me into an oddly angular room with a cathedral ceiling. In the low light of dozens of candles and candelabras around the tiled floor and ensconced in the walls, I could barely discern the height of it. Easily a good thirty feet up or more.
Along the north wall was a huge archway. A baseball team could have walked out side-by-side from behind the wine-colored curtains that covered it. It reminded me of a warehouse entrance on the backside of a concert hall, meant for the movement of large gear and equipment by forklifts.
All of this was the ordinary part of the huge, scary room.
Along the walls were unmistakable buffet tables, long, white, rectangular, and waist high. I’d seen plenty in my music career. My starving musician career. Weddings, bar mitzvahs, Austin city council gatherings, you name it. I’d eaten free food off more than my share.
If only these tables were catered like those events.
Instead, there were humanoid shapes on some of them. I couldn’t tell if they were actual bodies, living, breathing, dead, or mannequins, but they made my stomach twist into a fresh knot.
Notably, many of the tables remained nearly empty.
Each body on display was naked, but covered in various foodstuffs and ornamental decorations. Plant life, dark roses, pineapple rings, and more.
I couldn’t make out more from that close to the center of the...
A spotlight snapped on, aimed at the far northwest corner of the room, and a small cheer broke out from the crowd. There, cross-legged, fat-bellied and grotesque, sat a massive statue, some twenty-feet high, of a creature with the chimeric features of man, goat, bird, and reptile. The eyes had slit pupils, the chin, a goatee below a round owl-like visage. The ears and legs were of a satyr, and there were countless scales along the edges of its protruding, human stomach.
In front of the statue, now illuminated by lighting from above and from ambient light shed by the statue’s spot, there was an immense Jacuzzi. No, actually, it looked more like an adult-sized kiddie pool that you’d find at a high-end hotel. Immaculate white ceramic formed the edges of the empty pool, but its bottom was out of sight from where I stood.
It was only after the initial shock of the spectacle had worn off that I heard the music now softly filling the large room. Some kind of Gothic-industrial hybrid meant for ambiance.
The effect on me was clear. I breathed heavier.
This wasn’t a simple banquet room or giant hall.
It was a temple.
The gong rumbled one more time, only once, and upon hearing it, the majority of the crowd turned to face the curtained archway.
The curtains split in the middle and rolled back, foot by foot. The rumbling of rollers reminded me of my high school days, sitting in the pit orchestra for the latest school musical. If only this would have been just another performance of Damn Yankees, my heart would not have beaten so heavily in my chest, pulsing blood so fast through my arteries that my neck quivered.
A single Devil did not appear from behind those curtains. Instead, there were five. Five people, dressed in fine clothing adorned with dark cloaks, some black, some crimson. Four men and one woman. They wore masks of a kind I hadn’t seen all night. Human masks. White, expressionless, but sculpted uniquely and adorned with varying degrees of filigree, lace, and more sparkling things. Light from behind the figures, where they’d been convening, spilled into the temple hall where I stood. It forced me to turn away as my eyes adjusted.
The medium-height man in the center bore a nondescript, black staff as tall as he was. Ceremonial robes surrounded his own tuxedo, opened in the front to reveal the black-tie, layered in shimmering dark green and crimson. Silk would be my guess. His cape was midnight black. His fingers bore several rings, but I was too far away to make out the designs.
Behind these menacing ringmasters, through the archway, a helicopter parked on a wide metal floor. Like the sort that the President of the United States is shuttled around in. There was no Presidential Seal evident on the dark blue machine, though, at least not from where I was. The copter was angled with its gray nose pointed straight at the arch.
I resisted the urge to walk around to try to get a view of the helicopter’s tail.
It didn’t matter anyway. The curtains closed on the hangar, and in short order, the temple hall was wreathed in low light again.
Then the staff-bearer spoke.
“Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. It is an honor once again to be surrounded by such esteemed houses and representatives.” He raised his arms into the air, spread them wide then angled his staff down before him in the crowd's direction. “The blood moon approaches above, as you are all well aware. What transpires here tonight under this boon shall empower all of us with the vitality to carry forward. Thus, our table is once again united.” He smiled. “And as you can see, our tables are set.” The staff-bearer gestured around the room toward the banquets.
There was laughter from the crowd on all sides of me. A confused part of my brain wanted to laugh along with them because the creep with the staff had a British accent. The aristocratic kind. The same kind as Chiang’s demon.
Staff-bearer continued. “Most of you have partaken of the Blooding before. However, a few of you are new. So again, welcome.” He dropped his arms, and his staff banged against a tile. “The clarity you shall attain after the feast will hold the answers to everything you are undoubtedly wondering right now. Throw care away then. There is no room for guilt in this space.” The Ringmaster surveyed the temple, his white mask a muddle of shadows and light. “We are on the brink of ultimate victory, after so many centuries of planning and preparation. Mastery over this world and the ushering in of the Messiah and his heralds. It is the grandest of times to be alive, my friends!”
Cheers, shouts, and clapping erupted throughout the temple.
The only woman amongst the five ringmasters caught my eye as she demurely shifted her stance with the staff-bearer’s last sentence, her mouth opened softly into a half-smile, just enough to show a few of her perfect teeth. She was adorned in a form-fitting, silver and white gossamer gown. A spectacular form if I’m being honest. Slender yet curvy. Her hair was loose and long, platinum and glistening. Her very pale skin flushed pink at the nape of her long neck, and she wore no obvious jewelry, except for a silver and diamonds necklace.
If I’d run into her at a cosplay convention, I would have assumed her for a vampiress. A convincing look, whether she was going for it or not.
Silana’s sister.
Despite her almost perfect presentation, I was instantly repulsed. I shouldn’t have been. Meeting her on the streets of Austin days before that madness, I would’ve struck up a conversation, and invited her to the next gig. But a taint was on her. Not a rotting smell, but it might as well have been.
I risked muttering to myself and to my crew listening in. “The Lady...”
Silana spoke up immediately in my earpiece. “She’ll appear fair. Lithe but strong.”
I didn’t respond.
The Ringmaster continued his welcome speech. “Overhead, the Moon. Not yet the perfect time for our sacrifice, but as it is now past midnight, we’re prepared to offer all of you an appetizer—”
A cruel murmur of approval rose from the surrounding crowd. I couldn’t help but shift my eyes every which way behind my mask to scan the mass of costumed people on both sides of me and in front. My jaw tightened, and I shifted my weight back and forth on my feet, like a great, trapped animal.
The Ringmaster lifted his head and peered past the crowd before him. He rapped his staff two times on the tiled floor. “For your approval...”
The creak and clacking of a metal door sounded from the rear of the temple, then some extra light swept across the huge room in a single strobe. Everyone in the place turned to see.
Two large men in suits and human masks exited the opened door, pushing a petite form before them.
As she came out of shadow and into the temple candlelight, I recognized Victoria by her walk first, then her face. Her red hair was shorter than I remembered, but the freckles across the bridge of her nose were unmistakable.
Vicki wore little more than a white shift. Her face was blanched, her steps short and stuttered, but she walked straight enough and kept her head high and defiant.
When she came another ten feet closer, I could see her eyes clearly. Agonized, confused. Her neck remained stiff, but her haunted expression assessed the temple chamber in sweeps up, down then side to side.
At one point, she even made eye contact with me for a second, and it felt like my heart would explode.
The ringmaster’s booming voice interrupted. “I present to you our guest of honor. I trust she meets with your satisfaction.”
The crowd responded with a round of clapping and thirsty affirmations.
Vicki stumbled briefly and her mouth dropped open, but she didn’t utter a word. One man behind prodded her roughly forward with his hand. She recovered and moved past the empty pool in the temple's center, then was ultimately pulled to a halt not too far from the four men and the Lady. Another of her handlers turned her to face the audience.
“She’s exquisite,” the Lady said in a velvety soprano. “Where’s my pet? Where’s Aaron? He should indulge himself with this one.”
“We’ll all taste of her before the sun rises, Katrina. She’s quite special. Quite special, yes.” The Ringmaster with his staff rapped it once more upon the floor for emphasis. “She’s of my own seed.”
The audience went into a fluster of gasps, laughs, shouts, and applause. Victoria’s head turned and locked in horror upon the Ringmaster. She opened her mouth again, as if to speak this time, but after a few seconds, evidently thought better of it and remained mute.
The Ringmaster noticed. “I can see that comes as quite a shock to our guest. I assure you it’s true, Victoria, though your mother has no recollection of me, I’m also sure. A long story, I’m afraid. One too long for tonight, but I felt you deserved some explanation of ‘Why you.’ You are my daughter after all. And so, there it is.”
I wasn’t breathing and gasped to compensate for the lapse caused by the Ringmaster’s revelation. Silana and Conrad had told me my mother and Victoria’s were raped around the same time, in the same facility. So, I wondered if this monster was my mother’s attacker. And my father.
My upper lip curled reflexively into a snarl beneath my wolf mask.
I evaluated the mad situation I found myself in, surrounded by a cult of psychopaths—criminals, murderers, and rapists. It was a bad spot. As sure of myself as I am, I’m not crazy. I recognized that this was an encounter I wasn’t likely to escape.
But it wasn’t time to escape. It surely wasn’t the moment to mount a rescue of Vicki either. Instead, I made calculations that would matter when the time was right.
First, I knew we were all standing underground. In fact, we were beneath the private golf course outside the mansions of Serenity Mere. The maps of the property Sophie had shared were fresh in my memory.
Second, the helicopter in the hangar next door was only a curtain away. Logically there had to be a way to the surface from there. Whether it was a massive elevator or only an opening ceiling, that was one option for escape. That it was a slim option didn’t matter.
Next, there was the unknown route deeper down the nearby hall that led north to the heart of Serenity Mere itself. A longer way to potential freedom and a far more dangerous one.
And lastly, there was back the way I’d come, out into the hall, south past the pool’s conservatory then out into the woods and west to the beach of Lake Tahoe.
I glanced at Vicki. She still stood straight, but her head was bowed forward, her eyes closed.
They hadn’t broken her, whatever she’d been through up to that point, but Vicki seemed on the verge of despair.
The machine gun tucked into the small of my back was cool and uncomfortable. I also had my double-barrel still in its shoulder holster. Nobody had bothered to stop and search me, and that was reason for hope.
But slim hope grew slimmer by the second.
A completely bald, unmasked security goon with an obvious earpiece appeared from out of the shadows behind the five ringmasters. Scarred and hard-faced, he looked remarkably like many Secret Service agents. I’d even seen a few up close during a pickup gig for a Congressional candidate on her campaign trail.
Baldy whispered into the Ringmaster’s ear.
Despite the Ringmaster’s blank, human mask, his body language spoke volumes. I focused on him in those seconds, and that’s when another uncomfortable truth manifested—I couldn’t read this man.
I couldn’t read the Ringmaster’s emotions at all. I concentrated, closed my eyes, and focused. I drew in some power from the ambient music in the chamber then actively, forcefully reached out with my mind as I had a dozen times or more since the plane ride to Nevada.
There was nothing. The fucker was a blank page.
The Ringmaster spoke again, at first quietly directed to the guard, but then to the rest of us. “That is unfortunate. Activate the appropriate response.” Baldy nodded, turned, pressed a hand to his earpiece and mumbled words I couldn’t make out. A pair of suited, burly figures joined him as he hurriedly exited the temple.
“Yes, sorry, my friends. It appears the wreckage of one of our agent’s vehicles has been found on a nearby highway. It’s probably just an unfortunate accident, but the timing being what it is, I’m choosing to increase security. I’m sure you understand.” He smiled toothily beneath his human mask. “Not to worry. Let us continue on...”
The Ringmaster pointed his staff in my general direction...and, I have to admit, for a second I stiffened and clenched certain parts of my body I normally pay little attention to. But he pointed past me at the only temple door that still remained closed.
“Bring them in,” the Ringmaster commanded.
The crowd turned, this time to my right. I followed suit and saw another well-dressed, but mask-less security grunt open a plain-looking door. It snapped open with a distinctive metallic clack. Plain to the eye or not, the door was metal with a heavy, slide-bolt lock.
Yet another large goon appeared through that door, followed by a dark-haired woman in a pantsuit. She was talking softly to someone.
Then the first child appeared in the temple's light. A little girl, only five or six years of age, blonde-haired and innocent. She held a hand of the dark-haired woman.
The little blue-eyed girl wore only a simple white t-shirt and white shorts. She was barefoot, and her skin nearly as white as her clothing.
I stood up straighter as the scene unfolded. All around me the audience fussed again, evidently pleased with what they were seeing. Ravenous hunger came off them in a wave so hard and so vile that my eyes snapped shut as I fought back the urge to vomit.
Two more children appeared through the doorway, one after the other. A boy of perhaps ten, and a girl of maybe thirteen. Again, both white and light-eyed, barefoot and dressed in bleached white like the first little girl. The boy had brown hair, but the girl was another blonde.
All three kids were beautiful. All three felt not so much scared as they did curious and confused. Whatever fear I’d sensed from them earlier had been quelled by someone, or some thing. Perhaps they’d been drugged.
I turned and stared at the ringmasters. All five watched the children’s approach, like snakes about to strike a pack of field mice. I still couldn’t read the Ringmaster himself, or another of the men to his right, but the three others were no problem, especially the Lady. Of all the scum in that room who I could sense, she was the most fair and the most vile.
You know the fairy tale of Hansel and Gretel, right? It’s a warning. But don’t be fooled. Not all witches look like bag ladies.