The Devil's Touch

BOOK ONE

ONE

Every male head in the classroom turned at the young lady's entrance. And every male present had but one thought: what they would give to spread the legs of the girl and gently take her. Every male in the room would give almost anything for the opportunity to spend just one night with her.

Every male but one: Sam Balon.

Sam had dropped the name of his adopted father, King, choosing to take his real father's name, Balon. Sam Balon, Sr. had been a minister, pastor of a church in Whitfield, Nebraska back in the late fifties. Young Sam had learned the story—the true story of what had happened in Whitfield—when he had been forced to face the Devil in actual combat. It was there he had met Nydia, and married her, performing the ceremony himself, just as his father had done with Jane Ann, and a son had been created. And just like the father, the son had been forced into combat with Satan, ultimately destroying a coven at Falcon House, in the wilds of Canada. (The Devil's Heart)

And Sam was truly in love with his wife, Nydia, and loved his young son, Sam, Jr., now approaching his third year. The child appeared normal in all respects . . . but both mother and father still harbored lingering doubts about the child.

For it was more than conceivable the child was a spawn of the Devil.

But so far, so good.

Both Nydia and Sam now felt the Devil had ceased in his pursuit of them. Perhaps the Dark One had found more easily attainable prey. They hoped so.

Sam looked at the beautiful young woman who had just entered the classroom of Professor Gilbert. She was accompanied by Professor Edie Cash. Obviously, the young woman was of some special importance to be treated in such a manner. No doubt about it, Sam thought, she is a very lovely woman.

Sam caught the eyes of Xaviere Flaubert, a lovely young lady from Montreal. She smiled at him and rolled her eyes, pointing at the young men all fascinated by the newcomer. Sam grinned at her and winked. They were good friends, Sam, Nydia, and Xaviere, socializing often. Sam looked back at the newcomer.

The young woman wore her hair long, a dark, rich brown that tumbled down to the center of her back. She was tall, with a magnificent figure. Her complexion was flawless. Full lips and very pale gray eyes. Sam thought she and Xaviere looked a lot alike. The pale eyes shifted, and for a moment, lingered on Sam. The young woman smiled at him, and Sam returned the smile. He looked around at Xaviere. The two young women did resemble each other. Same pale eyes, brown hair, tall, and both had great figures.

Professor Cash left the room and Professor Gilbert tapped a pencil on his desk. "Class, I would like to introduce our new arrival. This is Miss Desiree Lemieux. She has just transferred in from Paris. Her parents have purchased Fox Estate and she has come Sam thought Professor Gilbert was going to fall all over himself. That he was quite taken with the young woman was obvious.

"Oh. my," Gilbert said. "We're all going to have to brush up on our French, I see."

The young men in the room all shared the same thought: They would like to brush up against Desiree.

"My English is quite good, Professor," she replied, in a voice that touched the groin of every male.

Again, those pale eyes touched Sam, then quickly dropped away.

"Yes, you certainly do, Desiree," the professor agreed. "Well, why don't you sit—umm—right over there, next to Mr. Balon, and we'll open class."

"Is she as beautiful as everyone says she is?" Nydia asked him.

Sam, Nydia, and Little Sam lived several miles outside of Logandale, about five miles from the center of Nelson campus. Nelson, one of the most expensive private colleges in North America, would have been financially unattainable for Sam had not his father set aside insurance money for his—at that time unborn—offspring. Nydia, who had been attending Carrington College before she met Sam, had transferred to Nelson after their marriage. For Nydia, money was no obstacle, for she was an extremely wealthy young woman, having inherited all of Roma and Falcon's holdings, worldwide, at their death. At the hands of Sam.

Nydia's mother and stepfather had been witch and warlock. Her true father was Sam Balon. Sam and Nydia were half brother and half sister. But they had been forgiven for that and allowed to live as man and wife. Forgiven by the One who has the power to forgive any sin.

"Yes, she is," Sam replied.

"Oh?" Nydia turned dark blue eyes to her husband. "Better looking than someone I might name?" she teased him.

"Well, now." Sam looked up from the research he was doing on ancient civilizations. His eyes sparkled with mischief. "Let me think. Umm? Desiree is—"

"Oh?" Nydia interrupted. "My. With a name like that, she would have to be lovely."

"Oh, she is! 'Bout this tall." He held up a hand. Then, using both hands, formed an hourglass shape.

"Really?" Nydia stepped closer to her husband. "How interesting."

"Perfection," Sam said, not realizing he was about to take the game past the foul line. He opened his hands and made a squeezing gesture. "'Bout like that, I'd say."

"Big boobs, huh?" There was a flatness to her tone that Sam failed to catch.

Sam rolled his eyes.

Nydia took his hands in hers and pressed them to her own breasts. "About that size, Sam?"

The dim light of realization clicked on in Sam's brain. Struggling mentally to get his foot out of his mouth, Sam said, "I would say there is only one person I've seen that is more beautiful than Desiree."

Warning signals flashed dangerously hot in Nydia's eyes. "Oh? And who might that be—dear?"

Sam looked up into her eyes and grinned. "Why— you, Nydia."

The warning lights dimmed, then cut off. "Almost swallowed both feet, didn't you, darling?" she said with a smile.

He closed his textbook and pulled her onto his lap. "I did come close." He kissed her. "But I'm only a man, remember?"

"I'll keep that in mind. What did Xaviere have to say about the new girl in class?"

"She thought the boys' behavior very funny."

Nydia unbuttoned his shirt and tugged at the hair on his chest. "Since Little Sam is with Janet, at her house … why don't we mess around some?"

"Got anything special in mind?"

She whispered in his ear.

"My pleasure," Sam said.

"Is the child one of ours?" Professor Gilbert asked, looking at Little Sam but speaking to the group of men and women gathered at the Sakall home.

"1 cannot tell," the daughter of Satan said, straightening up after her examination of the child. She brushed back her long brown hair. "There appear to be no birthmarks denoting which side of the lineage takes precedent."

Janet Sakall sat in a chair, a pout on her pretty face. She was rapidly blooming into full womanhood. Now in her fifteenth year, the young witch looked older than her years. She was quite pretty, with auburn hair, a shapely body, and fully developed breasts. Her eyes were pure evil. She licked her full lips, her tongue flicking over teeth that could become fanged at the blink of an eyelid.

Janet met the stare of the daughter of Satan without flinching. "Why are we waiting?" she asked. "We could take them any time."

"The impetuousness of youth," the Princess said with a smile.

"I'm older than you," Janet reminded the young woman.

"In the way humans measure time, yes," the Princess acknowledged. "But in my veins race a thousand years of service to our Prince."

"You must not question the Princess," Bert Sakall admonished his daughter.

The Princess held up one hand, the fingers long and delicate, shaped like a pianist's fingers. "She has the right, servant. She performed well at Falcon House." Her pale gray eyes touched the eyes of Janet. "You have the complete trust of Sam and Nydia?"

"Totally, Princess."

"I see." The Princess smiled. "You have a plan, I am sure."

"I want Sam Balon," the young girl said simply.

The Princess laughed, exposing perfectly shaped teeth. "You are worse than my mother." She shrugged. "Or so I have been informed about her. My earth father is a handsome man, no doubt about that. But tell me, do you keep your brains between your legs?"

"Of course not. But I have been chaste now for more than two years, at my Master's orders. I may be only a girl, but I have a woman's needs. Think about it, Princess. What man, young or old, does not desire a young girl? Young girls are the image of innocence, their flesh not yet tainted by the lusts of full womanhood." She laughed. "Or so men think. Should I succeed, Sam Balon would be guilt-ridden, and easy to control."

The Princess of Darkness nodded her head and smiled her approval. "Continue," she urged.

"And there is Jon Le Moyne for Nydia," Janet said. "Divide and conquer."

Janet's mother stirred at the mention of Jon Le Moyne. Sylvia Sakall, a woman in her late thirties, and like her husband, a devout follower of the Prince of Darkness, had dreams of the young man named Jon. She had heard of him, as had most women in the small community of Logandale. But the story went that the young high school boy was to follow in the footsteps of his uncle, Father Daniel Le Moyne. But the Dark One was soon to change all that, so the coven had been told. A female had been chosen for the young virgin boy with, so the rumors went, an instrument of love that would be the envy of male porn stars.

The Princess picked up on the thoughts from Janet's mother. "You are not to interfere, servant," she told the woman. "The Master has plans for young Le Moyne. Do you understand all that?"

Sylvia Sakall bowed her head. "I understand, Princess."

"Yes," the Princess said. "That would be a coup. Nydia and Jon Le Moyne. Yes. And that might be the way to eliminate the priest, as well. And Sam, if you should succeed, would be so guilt-ridden, he could be controlled. Very well, I shall take it up with the Master. Your plan has merit, Janet. Carry it through if the opportunity presents itself, but do not endanger yourself or the coven or me. Is that clear?"

"Yes, Princess."

The lights in the room flickered, faded into darkness, and when they popped back on, the young woman was gone.

* * *

"Please forgive me," the young man prayed in the darkness of his bedroom. "But I am human, with human needs and wants. I try, Lord, I really do. But it's so difficult."

Jon Le Moyne struggled to fight back the erotic images playing sexual scenes in his young fertile mind. His thoughts, as always, were about the dark-haired wife of Sam Balon, Nydia. His mind replayed the scenes, each time adding new twists and turns … and positions.

Jon's hand crept over his belly and gripped his growing heavy erection. He struggled to keep from masturbating. He tried prayer. It didn't work. It was as if his prayers were going unheard. He did not understand what was happening to him; why was this happening? Up until only a few months ago, his thoughts had been almost pure in content.

It was then Jon began experiencing dreams of a highly erotic nature. Then the high school junior had seen the woman in his dreams, and she had haunted his thoughts ever since. It was, Jon thought, almost as if he were possessed.

He gripped his erection harder and began stroking himself.

Desiree Lemieux looked out over the dark grounds of Fox Estate. She smiled at some inner thought. Sam Balon entered her mind and she felt the heat build within her virgin body.

She turned at the sound of footsteps. She relaxed. It was only the groundskeeper, Jimmy Perkins.

"Yes, Perkins?"

"Forgive, mistress," the man said, his eyes dull as they swept over the young woman's lushness. "You sent for me?"

"My mother and father would be very disappointed with the condition of these grounds, Perkins. This afternoon I saw a tangle of brush and undergrowth on the east side of the property. Why has that been permitted to grow?"

Fuck your mother and father, Perkins thought, his dull eyes revealing none of the evil within the man. And fuck the horse they rode in on, too. I know all about your mother and father; know exactly who they are. "It is an unsafe place, mistress. That is the eastern border of the estate. It meets the estate of Mr. Norman Giddon."

"I know all that," Desiree said irritably. "Why should it be unsafe for me?"

"Hollow places in the ground, mistress. With only a thin covering of earth over them. Caves in there that run to the river over there." He pointed with a finger. "It is not safe. That is why the underbrush and thickets are allowed to grow; to discourage intruders."

"All right, Perkins. That will be all."

"Yes, mistress." He shuffled away. He wore an evil smile on his thick wet lips. Mademoiselle Lemieux may be the mistress of Fox Estate, and she might be in favor in the eyes of important people, but Jimmy knew who she was. And he knew she could not really hurt him. He had been around for too long. He had been privy to much information since joining the ranks of the undead more than a quarter of a century back, in Whitfield. He had adored the Devil's agent, Black Wilder, and thought the true Nydia a goddess. This young woman was supposed to be so important in the scheme of things, but she did not impress Jimmy, Not at all.

TWO

Father Daniel Le Moyne stepped from his small living quarters and looked toward the lights of the small college town. The priest had felt an ancient stirring rise from deep within him. He knew what it was. He had experienced it before. And it scared him. He did not know if he could cope with this again. He did not know if he had the strength.

He knew all too well the hand of evil.

He looked at his watch. The LCD flashed eight-ten. He shook his head and walked back toward his quarters. He stopped as the wind whispered around him. The wind rustled the dry leaves on the ground and the starkly naked branches on some of the trees. The wind should have been cool, for this was late October. But the breeze that touched him was hot. And it contained an odor that insulted the priest's nostrils.

Evil, he concluded.

Father Le Moyne shuddered, a cold shaking of both body and spirit.

But not my faith, he thought, and then wondered why he would think that. For nothing had occurred to make him question his faith.

Not lately, the priest amended that thought.

He turned his mind to his nephew, Jon. The boy was battling some inner conflicts, and so far, the priest had not been able to break through to the young man.

Fear touched the priest and he spun around as the sound of heavy, labored breathing reached him. The sound was coming from the side of the church.

The priest walked toward the source of the sound— whatever it, or they, might be. An odor, foul and ugly, reached his nostrils. He wrinkled his nose against the smell.

"Help me," the voice whispered. The words were very slurred. "Help me."

"Who is there?" Father Le Moyne called.

"Help me. For the love of God—help me." Le Moyne could scarcely make out the words. The voice spoke as if it possessed only half a tongue.

The priest walked toward the whispering. His heart was a dull heavy thudding in his chest. And he knew fear. Knew it on a far more intimate basis than ever before. And he could not understand the fear.

The wind picked up, blowing hotly in the priest's face.

The calling, pleading slurred words continued to reach Le Moyne.

Father Le Moyne stepped into the murky shadows.

A bloody hand reached for him as a scream touched his ears.

Chief of Police Monty Draper drove the streets of the small college town. He could not understand the feelings of … doom, was the word that came to him, that had slipped into his mind just after supper. His face must have registered his thoughts, for his wife had asked him what was wrong.

"Oh, nothing," he lied to her, and that was something he did not like to do. "I just remembered some paperwork 1 have to do at the station."

"Will you be late?"

"I—I don't know, Viv. Don't wait up for me."

She had smiled at him. "All right, Monty. Just be careful in dealing with the desperadoes."

It was a standing joke between them. Logandale had the lowest crime rate in the entire state. The college was known as a haven for eggheads, not raucous and reveling frat boys. The town itself was just under four thousand population, with a full-time police force of only four men and one woman. The sheriffs department had a substation in Logandale, with one deputy living in town.

Monty had spent ten years on the NYPD, going on disability retirement at the age of thirty-two after taking a shotgun blast in his legs. He walked with a slight limp that became more pronounced as he grew tired. Unable to put police work out of his mind, and not trained for any other type of work, Monty had answered an ad in a police magazine, driven up to Logandale for an interview, and was hired on the spot. That was three years ago. There had been no major crime in the small town during that time. A few break-ins, some petty theft, a fist fight or two on the weekends. Several domestic situations involving husbands beating the shit out of wives, and one domestic situation of a wife beating the shit out of her husband. No rapes, no armed robberies, no shootings, no knivings, no embezzlements—that came to the attention of the police force—no nothing.

It was boring. But the job paid surprisingly well. But a Boy Scout troop could have handled the job. Up to this point. All that was about to change.

Monty gripped the steering wheel and sighed heavily, trying to shake off the feelings of impending doom. Monty was of average height, average weight, average build; everything about Monty Draper was average, which was the reason he had spent nearly all his time doing undercover and stake-out work for the NYPD. One watch commander had commented that Monty Draper could get lost in a crowd of two.

Logandale, set off the beaten path, with no major highways or interstates running near it, was, putting it simply, a nice place to live. The town was surrounded by dairies, farms, and a sometimes colony of kooky writers and nutsy artists just a few miles out of town. When the colony was in residence—during the summer months—the townspeople viewed them with scarcely concealed amusement. But the writers and artists never caused anyone any trouble.

The man who owned the land where the colony was located was the Writer-In-Residence at Nelson College, Noah Crisp. Noah had inherited an obscene amount of money from his mother and father; had published many books, but had never had a best-seller. As a matter of fact, since most of his books were so off-the-wall, so to speak, Noah paid for their publication. But since he was the nearest thing Logandale had to a celebrity, he became sort of an instructor at the college. The board felt that Noah's babblings really weren't harmful, since no one in control of their faculties would pay any attention to them anyway. His classes were usually titled under something like: The Transcendental Aspects of Creating Salable Fiction. Or, The Haruspextic Pitfalls of Writing.

Classes any serious student of writing should take. Surely.

Noah was fifty, a bit on the pudgy side, and wore a beret, of the type featured in the Village back in the early and mid-fifties, and usually wore a painter's smock over jeans and cowboy boots. To say Noah was a bit eccentric would be putting it kindly. Many townspeople just called him a fucking nut and let it go at that.

As Monty drove the streets of the quiet little town, he recalled the visit by Noah, just a few weeks past. The man had not been his usual flaky self, not speaking in his usual pompous and/or condescending manner.

Monty had waved the small man to a seat.

Seated, Noah blurted, "Chief, are you a religious man?"

The question had caught Monty off balance. He had not expected that. Monty shook his head. "Not really. I was raised in the Catholic church, but I broke away from it years ago. While I was still in high school."

Noah nodded his head in understanding. "I, too, was raised in the church. But I haven't attended in years. Personal reasons. Chief, something very—strange is occurring in this town. I use that adverb in lieu of bizarre."

Monty elected not to tell Noah that strange was an adjective, not an adverb. He thought.

Monty waited.

"My dog disappeared, Chief."

Monty looked at the man.

"But I found him—yesterday."

"I'm … glad, Noah. Do you consider your dog's disappearance bizarre?"

"What! Oh, no. Of course not. But I do consider it quite bizarre when the animal was tortured to death. Wouldn't you?"

"You want to go into more detail?"

Noah laid half a dozen Polaroid prints on the chiefs desk. Monty looked at them and felt like vomiting. The little dog had been hideously tortured, then patches of the animal had been skinned. Strange markings were cut into the skin. Alive, the thought came to Monty. The little animal was alive while this … depravity was done. Monty lifted his eyes from the pictures of pain.

"Where did you find the animal, Noah?"

"About a mile from my home. Down a dirt road."

"What prompted you to look there?"

"Because I had looked everywhere else. Really. Victor, that's my dog's name—was his name, had a habit of running off quite often. But I always knew where to look for him. But this time, no Victor. So I began a systematic search for him. This spot," he said pointing to the prints, "was the last area in the quantum. I was—I became quite ill when I found him."

"That's understandable." Monty looked at the prints. Something was disturbingly familiar about the scene. But he couldn't pin it down.

"You look perplexed, Chief," Noah said.

Monty had mumbled something; he couldn't recall what. Now, driving the quiet streets of Logandale, it came to him: his sergeant handing out prints of a dead man found in an old condemned building. "We got us a bunch of Satan nuts," the sergeant said. "Coroner's office says the old guy was alive when this was done to him. Look at it real hard, boys and girls, and keep your heads up on this one."

That had been Monty's first year on the department. The pictures had made him violently ill.

And the same type of skinning had been done to Noah's dog; the same strange markings found on both the dog and the old man.

They never did find out who tortured and killed the old guy, but department shrinks said it definitely was the work of Satan worshippers.

Devil worshippers … here in Logandale? Monty just could not accept that. College kids up to something.

He rolled down the window to catch some air.

The air was hot and smelled bad.

"What the hell?" Monty muttered. It had been cool for the past few weeks; now hot air that smelled bad. Last week in October and getting summertime weather that smelled worse than the Hudson. Didn't make sense.

That's when Monty heard the shouting.

The hand that touched Father Le Moyne's face was sticky with blood. When Le Moyne recovered sufficiently from his initial fright to run inside his quarters and grab a flashlight, he could see why the man was bloody.

The man was naked, his body covered with strange-looking cuts and slashings and markings. The man was bloody from his mouth to his toenails. Or where his toenails were supposed to be. Father Le Moyne tried to avert his eyes from the man's groin. The man had been castrated. Among other hideous acts. Covering the tortured body with his jacket, Father Le Moyne told him, "Lie still. I'll get help."

He ran back inside and jerked up the phone. The phone was dead. But it had been all right an hour before. "Damn!" the priest said. He ran out the side door of his quarters and toward the street.

The church was located on the edge of town, the nearest neighbor a full block away. The gas station across the street was closed. Le Moyne saw the lights of an approaching vehicle. He ran toward the street, waving his arms and shouting.

Monty slammed on his brakes and jumped out of the car. "Steady now, Father. What's the matter?"

Pulling the chief toward the church, the priest explained as best he could. Monty could not believe what the priest was saying. In New York, yeah, it would not even make the pages of the worst rag in town. It seemed to the rest of the nation—Monty had been told, many times—the people living and working in the Big Apple seemed more concerned about the rights of street slime than in the rights of the citizen. That wasn't true. But just try explaining that to a tourist with a busted head, minus his watch, ring, and wallet. And the punks that mugged him back out on the streets before the tourist is out of the emergency room.

Maybe there was some truth in it, Monty finally admitted privately.

The priest knew his story sounded far-fetched. He held out his hands to the cop. Monty looked at the dark blood and quickened his step.

"There!" Le Moyne pointed to the side of the church.

The ground was sticky with blood. The jacket the priest had used to cover the man was there, blood soaked. But the man was gone.

The Beasts feasted that evening. They tore the intestines from the tortured man's belly and ate them while steam rose from the man's open stomach. The Beasts ripped flesh from bone and devoured the sweet meat. They cracked open bone and sucked the marrow from it. One Beast contented herself with eating the flesh from the man's head, peeling the head like an orange, popping the eyeballs into her mouth like grapes. Then she ate the brain.

The few bones that were left were gathered and taken deep underground, through a hole behind the Catholic church. The hole had at one time been a well. It now connected with an elaborate labyrinth of underground tunnels. The tunnels crisscrossed under the entire town of Logandale, with exits under all church basements, the city hall, the police station, the sheriffs department substation, the public schools, many homes, and into the town's sewage system.

The digging and reenforcing of the tunnels had begun years before, back in 1948. For when one coven falls, as happened that year, in another part of the country, it is written in The Book that another must spring forth so the number will remain constant. The coven in Logandale was one of the oldest in the Northeast, and one of the largest. The coven in Logandale was almost ready to begin its full possession of the town. It was down to a matter of hours.

THREE

Father Daniel Le Moyne sat in Chief Draper's small office. He went over his story again … and again. Monty could not break the priest's version. Not that he wanted to, or expected to, for he believed the priest had seen exactly what he described.

"Do you want to go over it again, Monty?" the priest asked patiently.

"That won't be necessary, Father. I believe you saw a man. Hell, here's your bloody jacket. The ground was covered with blood. I have samples to send off to the lab. But what happened to the man?"

Father Le Moyne shrugged, shrugged as eloquently as only a Frenchman can; even a third generation American of French heritage.

"Father, let me ask you a question you—well, may think odd."

The priest waited.

Monty said, "I don't know how to put this except to just jump right in. But bear in mind I fully realize this is not a question you would expect to hear from a trained cop. Have you felt—evil in this town? I mean, especially over the past few weeks?"

Father Le Moyne lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply. He was thoughtful for a long moment, his eyes hooded with caution. Finally, he said, "Yes. I have."

The chief of police seemed to relax. "Care to elaborate, Father?"

"Are you asking if there is such a thing as varying degrees of evil?" The priest smiled.

"I was raised in the church, Father." Monty's response was dryly spoken.

"Your question about evil concerns the man I found this evening, correct?"

"Yes."

"The poor man had strange, bizarre markings cut into his flesh, Chief Draper."

Strange and bizarre, Monty thought. Those words keep cropping up. First from Noah, now from the priest. "Describe them, Father. We only touched on that."

The priest closed his eyes. When he spoke, his words were slow as he brought back the tortured man's condition. "Stars, moons, upside down crosses. Other symbols I—am not that familiar with. Some I have never seen at all. It looked as though the man had been tortured for several days. Some of the cuttings appeared to be crusted over; others were fresh. There were numbers cut into the poor man's flesh. Sixes and nines. 1 believe part of his tongue had been cut out. His words were so slurred. And as I told you previously, he had been castrated."

Le Moyne opened his eyes. Monty thought them to contain a haunting expression.

"What did the symbols mean to you, Father?"

Did the priest shudder? Monty thought so. "I— would rather not venture an opinion at this time, Chief. If you don't mind."

He knows, Monty thought. Knows more than he is telling me. Without warning, Monty opened the center drawer of his desk and removed the prints of Noah's dog. He flipped them to the priest. Father Le Moyne took one look and covered his mouth in shock.

"What's the matter, Father?"

"That's obvious, isn't it? The poor animal. That's Noah's dog, Victor."

"I wasn't aware you two knew each other."

"The dog or Noah?" Le Moyne asked, with a sense of humor that surprised Monty.

"Go on, Father. But I am glad to see you have a sense of humor. It helps in times like these."

"Quite true," the priest responded, lighting another cigarette from the smoked-down butt of his first. "I have been in Logandale for a great many years, Monty, more than twenty-five. I know practically everyone within a ten mile radius of the town: Protestant, Catholic, Jew. I came here when I was barely thirty years of age. Been here ever since.

"You see, Monty, I am one of the few people who remember the real Noah Crisp. The man who could have been a truly great author. But that was before— well, his breakdown, to put it as kindly as possible."

This was something Monty had never heard. "I always thought Noah was—well, just a little on the strange side." That word again. Strange.

"No. That isn't a fair or accurate portrayal of the real man. Noah was brilliant when I first met him. A deeply religious man, and, I think, perhaps on the edge of great literary success. Then one night—no, it was early evening—he came to me with this idea for a manuscript. He was going to write a book about the occult. The Devil. A fiction book. In it, he was going to kill Satan.

"I'm not saying there haven't been writers who wrote of killing Satan, but 1 can't recall ever reading one of their books. You see, Monty, Satan, like God, is immortal—no human can kill either. I told Noah that; begged him not to write the manuscript. Warned him of the danger of his project. He waved my objections aside. Then Noah became obsessed with his work. He stopped coming to Mass; broke all ties with God. He practically barricaded himself in his house—his parents were killed when he was just a little boy—and Noah seldom came out of the house during this period of— Devil research. He conducted all sorts of Black Masses and the calling out of witches and warlocks. He conducted lone seances. He became quite the expert on Satan."

The priest's gentle features hardened for a moment. "Then—one night, just after midnight, I believe it was, my phone rang. To this day I do not know who the caller was, but it was about Noah. Noah was running around on his property, stark naked, shouting that he had seen the face of Satan; that he had talked with the Dark One. It is written, Monty, by men much more versed in the subject than I, that if one sees the face of the Prince of Darkness, that person dies. Noah was very lucky—in a manner of speaking. He's alive. But he was a broken man, mentally and physically. He spent two years in a mental institution, another five years in deep analysis. Noah will never write another worthwhile book—about anything."

Monty was silent for a moment, mentally digesting all the priest had said. "You believe he saw the devil?"

"I—believe he saw something. Yes. Yes, I believe Noah Crisp met with the Dark One."

"Then you really, truly believe in the supernatural?"

"Yes, Monty. I do."

"You really believe the devil has—followers, covens, if you will; people who are really, actually in touch with the forces of the—well, beyond?"

"With all my heart and faith."

"Jesus!" Monty muttered. "Father Le Moyne, have you ever performed or been a witness to an exorcism?"

Without hesitation, the priest said, "Yes. To both your questions."

"Here in Logandale?"

The priest struggled with that for a moment. "I—can't answer that, Monty. I'm sorry."

The cop surfaced in Monty, and he knew the priest had performed the rite of exorcism in Logandale. But out of respect for the man—and, he would readily admit, fear stemming from his early teachings in the church—he would not press the man for an answer. Monty leaned back in his swivel chair. "So my feelings that something—evil was hovering over this town were correct?"

"Yes."

"Has it, in your opinion, become stronger during the past few weeks?"

The priest met the cop's eyes. "Yes," he said softly. "Quite a bit, I would say."

The weekend dawned gloriously, with the touch of approaching winter cooling the morning air. It was a morning for woolen skirts and shirts; the type of fall morning that makes a hearty breakfast more appealing to the palate. Steam colored the air white at the expulsion of breath. Kids jumped and ran and played in the coolness of this Saturday morning in upstate New York. People busied themselves raking up the multicolored leaves that fell in profusion, painting the landscape a joyous color of bronze and gold and green and red.

But for most of the people in Logandale, the acts were superficial, disguising the evil that lay bubbling just under the human surface. The evil that blanketed the area would soon burst forth, showering all who came close with its stinking pus of depravity.

And … it was also the Saturday morning that Judith Mayberry found young Marie Fowler hanging upside down in the apple grove behind her house. Hanging by her ankles. Marie was naked. Or perhaps it would be better to say what was left of Marie who was naked. Certain parts of her anatomy had been quite crudely hacked off. Definitely not the work of a skilled surgeon.

Judith, when she recovered from her fainting, thought she'd better call the police. She was not conscious of eyes watching her movements from the homes around her. Eyes that contained evil in its blackest form. Judith was on her way to the house when she heard the low growl behind her. Judith Mayberry turned around for the last time—in her human form—and froze rock-still in shock.

She dropped the basket of late-blooming wild flowers she had just picked to decorate her kitchen table.

She opened her mouth to shriek out her fright when a pawlike hand clamped around her left ankle and jerked. Another pawlike hand dropped over her mouth, stilling her yet unleashed howl of terror. She was dragged to a thicket that ran on the north side of the orchard and pulled down into the earth through a hole she never knew existed. When Judith came to her senses she was naked and cold and wished she were dead.

She soon would be. Sort of.

Judith was thirty-six years old, and while no one would ever call her beautiful, she was attractive, with long legs and full breasts. The attractive part of her was about to undergo a drastic metamorphosis. She sat on the cold rocky floor of the cave, or tunnel, or whatever the hell it was—she wasn't certain—and looked at the Beasts who sat squatting, looking at her.

She had never seen such horrible-looking creatures in all her life. Not even in the movies.

An old Beast—one might call him a silver-back—grunted a command. Two younger Beasts seized Judith and forced her to a knees-and-hands position, her buttocks elevated.

The old silver-back then mounted her.

Judith began screaming out her pain and outrage.

The old Beast bit her on the neck several times as he mated with her.

When the sex act was over, Judith was allowed to crawl into a corner of the huge cave room and huddle in pain and shock. After only a very short time, Judith wondered why she was suddenly getting warmer. She looked at the back of her hands. Thick coarse hair was sprouting, not just on the back of her hands but all over her body.

Her face, especially her jaw, was beginning to ache. Her teeth felt odd to her. She ran her tongue over her teeth and found they were fanged. And now, as the rapid change spread over her entire body, it did not seem odd to her. Her jaw swelled to accommodate the new growth of teeth.

Several of the Beasts were talking, and Judith found she could understand them. She crawled over to them and they welcomed her.

She was one with them.

She tossed her head, glad of her new strength and body. One earring gleamed dully in the gloom of the cave room, as it remained pierced in place.

All that was left of the woman once known as Judith Mayberry.

"Sam?" Nydia called to him on this glorious Saturday morning.

The two of them were working out in the yard; more specifically, working by the fence that separated their property from a field to the northeast. Sam straightened from his work to look at his wife.

She stood very still, her face suddenly pale. She was pointing toward the old orchard.

Sam looked. He could see nothing. "Nydia?"

"I—saw something move over there." She again pointed her finger. "Then it just disappeared into the ground, like the earth swallowed it."

Sam knew Nydia was not the type to panic. They had both been through too much horror for that. And if she said she saw something, she saw it, and that was it.

"Let's go take a look," Sam said.

"No," she replied. She put out a hand to stop him. "Sam—it's them." Her eyes were now wide and frightened.

"Them?"

"The Beasts, Sam. They're back. They're here. They found us, Sam."

"Nydia—" He opened his mouth to calm her.

"I know what I saw, Sam."

He believed her. He walked to her, took her hand, and they started toward the house. "Stay with Little Sam. You have your pistol; you know how to use it."

There was no fear in the tall young man. He had faced the Beasts before. He had faced almost everything Satan could hurl at him in black fury. And he had been victorious. While it was something he hoped he would never have to do again, if it had to be, then so be it.

In his heart, Sam had always known he would be called upon to fight again.

Sam unlocked his gun cabinet. Chief of Police Draper had visited the Balon house several times, enjoying the young man's company for one thing, but the main reason for the visits was that the young man fascinated Monty. He had no past that police computers could punch up, other than the most mundane. And Monty Draper, with a cop's instinct, knew there was much more to Sam Balon.

Chief of Police Draper always shook his head and clucked his tongue at the sight of Sam's arsenal. He was like any good liberal New Yorker who had grown up under the most asinine of gun control laws: The Sullivan Act. While Sam displayed no illegal weapons (those were carefully hidden), the weapons visible were awesome. Of course a cap pistol is frightening to many screaming liberals.

Sam was his father's image, physically and mentally. He stood well over six feet tall, stocky, with a naturally heavy musculature. His hair was dark brown and usually unmanageable. His jaw square. And he despised even the thought of any type of gun control.

"If I ever need a one-man riot squad," Monty had remarked dryly, "I certainly know where to come."

"At your service, Chief," Sam had cheerfully replied.

His curiosity heightened by the sight of the most impressive arsenal he'd seen since leaving the NYPD, Chief Draper ran—or attempted to run—a check on the young man named Sam Balon.

He found out what almost anyone could have discovered. The young man had graduated from high school in Whitfield, Nebraska (why did that name ring some sort of bell in Monty's mind, he wondered?) Sam had been an honor student, his mother a teacher, his step-father a doctor. His real father had been killed back in 1958. Sam Balon King—he had since dropped the King—had spent three years in the army, a member of the Rangers.

And there the information stopped. Dead. Cold.

Monty had run into a stone wall.

He called old friends on the NYPD and asked them to run young Mr. Sam Balon. Run him hard, push for answers. Call in markers if they had to.

He received a phone call late that same afternoon from a precinct captain.

"Monty," the captain had shouted in his ear through the long lines. "What the goddamn hell are you trying to pull up there in that hick town?"

Monty was speechless for a few seconds. "Captain—what do you mean?" Monty had known the man for years.

"Sam Balon King. That's what I mean. Why are you running this guy so hard?"

Monty came very close to losing his temper. "Well—goddamn it, Captain, because I want a make on him, that's why."

"Not good enough, Monty." The man was adamant. "What's the guy done to warrant all this attention?"

Monty had never before encountered this much stonewalling. "Nothing," he admitted. "That I can prove. Except he's got the finest collection of guns I've ever seen in the hands of any civilian. Especially one this young."

Down in New York City, the captain's sigh was audible up in Logandale. "Monty, my boy, listen to me. I won't bullshit you. Get off this young man's back. I've had CID and CIA and FBI and NSC people all over my ass this afternoon. Whatever this Sam Balon King did in the paratroops, it was something special."

"Rangers," Monty corrected.

"Haw?"

"The guy was in the Rangers, Captain."

"I thought those people took care of trees!"

"I think these Rangers eat the goddamn trees, Captain."

"It wouldn't surprise me, Monty."

"And they are trained to kill."

Another long sigh from the Big Apple. "Yeah? Well, so are Green Berets, marine Raiders, navy Seals, and lots of other service people. Not to mention the Mafia and other assorted crazies running around. Whatever, Monty. This kid is to be left alone. Just drop it, Chief Draper. For your own good and my peace of mind."

"You can't tell me anything else, Captain?"

"No."

"Can't, or won't?"

"Take your pick, Chief."

"Good talking to another member of the law enforcement field, Captain."

The line went dead.

So the mystery—if there was any mystery about Sam Balon, and Monty felt there was—was never cleared up to Monty's satisfaction. But it would be cleared up. Shortly.

Sam took a Winchester Model 1200 from the gun cabinet and filled up the tube with double 00 buck. He pumped one into the chamber. He took a .41 magnum revolver from the cabinet and checked the loads in that. Fully loaded. He shoved the big pistol behind his belt and turned to his wife.

"Stay in the house with Little Sam. You have your pistol with you and you know how to fire every weapon in this house." He smiled. "Well, almost every weapon. And I know you will if you have to. I'll be back in a little while."

Sam walked out the back door and started across the field. It was then the faint odor struck his nostrils. Nydia had been correct. The Beasts were here. He remembered that smell from behind Falcon House in Canada.

Sam and Nydia were falling in love. They both knew they were in love hours after they met.

They had left Falcon House, walking toward the deep timber behind the great house, holding hands like kids. They walked into the timber, and the silence of God's free nature seemed to make them stronger and draw them closer. The mood was almost religious, the towering trees a nondenominational cathedral silently growing around the young couple. They came to a small, rushing creek and sat on a log by the bubbling waters.

"Tell me more about being a Christian, Sam."

"I don't know that much about it, Nydia. I sometimes think it's a feeling one must have. And I don't have it very often."

"1 think you're a better person than you will admit to being, Sam."

"Maybe."

They sat and talked and both felt the evil from the great house. It penetrated even the deep timber. Nydia told him about a circle of stones not too far away, a place that frightened her. Sam wanted to see that place.

At the circle of stones, Sam knelt down, studying closely and with great interest the largest stone of the circle, which depicted scenes of great depravity: of men with huge jutting phalluses; of women with legs widespread, exposing the genitalia; scenes of mass orgies: men with men, women with women, men with small children; scenes of hideous torture; of grotesque creatures, monsters, leaping and snarling. And finally, on the east side of the great stone, a scene depicting a saintly looking man who was locked in some sort of combat with a beastlike creature.

"Let's see this hole in the ground," Sam said.

They smelled the stench long before they came to the hole, both of them wrinkling their noses at the foul odor. "Can you imagine what it's like deep in that hole?" Sam tried a grin, unaware that his real father had said almost the same thing to a couple of friends back in 1958, standing near The Digging. (The Devil's Kiss).

It was then Sam had put his hand into his jacket pocket, jerking his hand out as if he had touched a snake.

His father's old army issue .45 was in his pocket. But before leaving his room at Falcon House that morning, Sam had put his own .38 revolver in that pocket.

Sam and Nydia looked at the pistol. A brass name-plate was riveted into the handle. SGT. SAM BALON KOREA 1953.

The young couple both felt themselves being overwhelmed by a dark force field. They sank to the ground, helplessly immobile as the strange force took them under its control.

Time took them winging backward. They watched a naked man fighting with a naked woman. Both Sam and Nydia knew, somehow, the identities of the couple. Sam Balon, Sr. and Nydia's mother, Roma, the witch.

Articles of clothing and equipment flew about the struggling couple. Both were bloody from the combat. The woman impaled herself on the man's erect penis, hunching on him. He struck her, knocking her away. But again and again she mounted the man, only to have him shove her away, each shove less forceful than the preceding one.

Then, shrieking her taunting laughter, the witch lunged at the man, wailing her delight as his phallus drove to the inner depths of her. For what seemed like hours, the mortal and the witch fucked their way across trackless worlds of space.

The young couple could see the man was nearly dead.

With one last supreme burst of courage and strength, the man grabbed something out of the maze of clothing and equipment that circled the couple. The objects seemed to fly from his hand, through the years, straight toward the young man and young women frozen to the ground on Earth, 1980.

Nydia screamed. Sam ducked.

They both jumped to their feet. All was peaceful. The scene replayed in their minds was gone. Sam looked at the gun in his hand. His father's gun. From years and worlds away.

When they returned to Falcon House, Sam found his father's old Thompson SMG lying on the bed.

Sam shook off the memories and walked across the old apple orchard, his irritation growing with each step. The smell grew fouler. Twice Sam changed direction as the smell grew fainter. Then he was standing over the hole in the ground. He picked up a rock from the ground and savagely hurled it down the stinking hole.

"Bastards!" he cursed. "I know, somehow, you didn't follow us here, so you must have been here all along. Come on out, bastards—face me."

Only silence greeted his words.

"Satan's filth!" Sam called to the dark hole.

Silence.

The wind sighed as it shifted direction. Sam looked around him. The old orchard was void of life. That he could see.

Then he began putting it all together. This hole was not the entrance to any living quarters for the Beasts, but only an exit and entrance hole. He thought for a moment. The land belonged to Norman Giddon; the man who owned the mansion that bordered Fox Estate. "Uh-huh," Sam said. "And the new girl, Desiree, her parents own Fox Estate. Cute. Odds are, she's one of them."

In the two years that Sam and Nydia had lived next to the old orchard, he had never seen Norman Giddon or any of his company trucks or cars even so much as drive past. The land had once been productive; now it lay barren.

Sam wondered why.

Then the wind once more shifted direction, bringing with it a smell that touched and raised the short hairs on the back of Sam's neck.

The Beasts were close. The smell was stronger than ever. Sam looked up to the Heavens. "I know you're not with me on this one, Dad. I'm on my own, right?"

The skies remained mute.

"It's all up to me this time, huh, Dad?"

The silence prevailed. The wind from the north had ceased. Sam could not hear one audible sound. Not a car, truck, nothing at all.

He turned slowly in a circle. He could see nothing to alarm him. But he knew the Beasts were very close; he could sense them as well as smell their odious presence.

It was an aura of evil.

The Dark One is here, Sam thought. Satan is very near. The Beasts have been here—these Beasts—for a long time. So that means Logandale has been chosen by the Prince of Darkness for his own.

Sam's smile was a mixture of sadness and understanding as he contemplated his future, and Nydia and Little Sam's future. He would have to pay the local priest a visit. Father Le Moyne appeared to be a sensible, levelheaded person. He had no doubts but that when he laid it on the line for the priest his story would be believed. Chief Monty Draper would be quite another story.

Sam could almost hear the laughter of the chief.

Til be back," he spoke to the almost tangible evil that clung to the trees and rocks of the orchard. "Bet on it."

The wind sighed in reply.

It was a hot stinking wind.

FOUR

Chief Monty Draper looked again at the body of the young woman and once more felt like tossing up his breakfast. Marie Fowler had stiffened in death and was becoming a bit on the smelly side. He fought back his sickness.

Monty looked at Sheriff Jenkins, looking at him.

Clark County was a large county, but it was one of the smallest in population. Half of the county was set within the borders of the Adirondack Park, about forty miles from the Canadian border. It was, for all intents and purposes, a peaceful county. The county liked to boast of its good fishing and skiing. One rather well-known ski lodge operated within the county. And there hadn't been a murder in Clark County in two years. Not since those doped up skiers had been found in a naked jumble of sex by the boyfriend of one of the young ladies caught up in the orgy and hauled out a pistol and started blasting away.

Sheriff Jenkins often expressed the opinion that anyone who would kill someone else over pussy was an idiot. Too much stuff prancing around just waiting for a stiff pecker.

Sheriff Jenkins turned his gaze from Monty to a deputy. "You got your pictures, Ed?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then somebody cut the poor girl down and cover her up, for God's sake." His voice sounded too loud, too false, too protesting. Shakespeare came to Monty's mind. Pat Jenkins looked back at Monty. "This happen over at Lecoy or Woodburn or Aumsville, Chief, those guys would be running all over the place in a panic, stomping all over the physical evidence and making damn fools of themselves. But I guess you saw worse than this in the big city, right?"

"Yes," Monty said. "I did. Sheriff, the only physical evidence I found was a basket and a scattering of freshly picked wild flowers."

"Yeah, I know," the sheriff replied glumly. Why did Monty think it was an act? And why? "And if you didn't find nothing, Monty, not much point in my boys covering the same ground."

Not very professional of you, sheriff, Monty thought. What the hell is wrong around here? Monty could not shake the feeling. Something is just not right!

"What do you make of it, Monty?" Sheriff Jenkins asked.

Monty was careful in his reply. He thought of the priest's description of the cuttings and markings on the man Le Moyne had found. Same markings on the dead girl. He decided he would not tell the sheriff of that. Not just yet. Of course, Monty thought, he could be way off base about this whole thing.

"I think we got a problem," he said.

The sheriffs smile contained a hidden meaning. Monty picked up on it but did not know what it meant. "You care to elaborate, Monty? That we got a problem is obvious."

Don't tell him! That leaped suddenly into Monty's brain. "The girl was tortured; cut many times with a sharp instrument." He would not be the one to bring up strange markings. If the sheriff didn't mention it, then that would prove to Monty that something odd indeed was going on. "The girl's genital area was mangled." Monty chose his words very cautiously. "She was raped; no doubt about that."

"By one big-hung sucker," a sheriffs deputy said with a nasty grin.

"Yeah," the sheriff said, a grin slipping onto his lips. It faded as quickly as it came. "Go on, Monty."

The sheriff thought rape amusing. Yeah, Monty thought. About as amusing as a crutch. And the deputy, Vernon Parish, was behaving even more oddly than ever.

Vernon was the locally based deputy. He did not like the chief of police and the feeling was very mutual. Vernon was poorly educated and a cruel and sarcastic man. He was not a good deputy, but was well liked by most in the community. And that was something that Monty could never understand, for the man was too heavy-handed in the few arrests he did make.

Personally, Monty thought the deputy an asshole. That feeling worsened when Monty learned the man abused his wife, slapping her around from time to time. Vernon was fond of saying, "Got to keep the broads in line, you know."

He also beat his kids, sometimes savagely. His son, Fred, was a sullen, uncommunicative boy. His daughters, Judy and Anne, were pretty girls, and, as far as Monty could determine, good kids. He felt sorry for Vernon's wife, Susie.

Monty said, "She was tortured and beaten and God only knows what else. But not around this area." Why did I say that? he thought. "She was brought in here and strung up."

Again, he thought: why did I say that when I don't believe it?

"By more than one person?" Jenkins asked.

"By several, would be my guess."

"Why was it done to her?" Jenkins pressed.

Monty shrugged. Forces battled within him. Suddenly, he did not trust Sheriff Pat Jenkins. Suddenly, Monty didn't know who to trust. Or why he felt that way.

He loaded his next comment. "I think it was done by a bunch of crazies; probably all doped up. And I don't believe it was done by local people. I think they did the deed and then moved on. I doubt we'll ever find out for sure."

Was it Monty's imagination, or did Sheriff Jenkins suddenly relax. No, it wasn't his imagination. The sheriff seemed looser, calmer.

Monty caught Deputy Parish looking at him, a strange sort of smile on his face. A smile of … satisfaction. Yes. That was it.

Something odd going on around here. Something between Jenkins and his deputy. But what? Monty mused.

He didn't know.

And he was oddly afraid of finding out.

"You a damn good cop, Monty," Sheriff Jenkins said. Was that a smirk on his face? Yes, Monty thought. It was. "A damn fine cop. I think you hit the nail right on the head on this one. Sure do. We'll just leave it at that; maybe let the state boys handle it. They like all that gory stuff. Don't you worry about any report, Monty. I'll take care of all the paperwork." The sheriff left.

I'll just bet you will, Pat, Monty thought. I just bet you will.

The body of Marie Fowler was loaded into the back of an ambulance. A blanket covered her tortured body. The driver headed for the county seat, Blaine. Only five towns in Clark County: Blaine, the biggest town, followed by Lecoy, Woodburn, Aumsville, and Logandale.

The big hospital that served the entire county was located in Blaine, although Logandale and Woodburn did have very respectable clinics and several good doctors.

Vernon looked at Chief Draper, and, without speaking, strolled off, got in his county car, and pulled out. Monty stood in the middle of the orchard with one of his men, Joe Bennett.

"Chief?"

Monty glanced at the man.

"I don't like none of this worth a shit."

"Neither do I, Joe," Monty admitted. "But keep that to yourself. I'm getting—bad vibes about this whole thing."

"Yeah. Me, too."

Monty looked toward the Mayberry house. "Odd," he said.

"What's that, Chief?"

"All this activity and Judith hasn't made an appearance. Or no one else, for that matter. Don't you find that strange?" That word again.

"1 was thinking the same thing. It ain't like these folks."

"Let's go up to the house."

Some people claim they can sense when a home is empty. That the home emits a lonely type of force, or message. Whether or not there is any truth in that, both cops felt better when they rested their hands on the butt of their pistols.

"1 just don't like the feeling I'm getting, Chief. I just flat don't like it."

"I know the feeling, Joe. But settle down. Seeing that Fowler girl has unsettled you."

"Something sure as hell has," the cop admitted.

Monty knocked on the back door. After a moment, he told Joe to stay there while he went around to the front. The front door was locked.

"Joe!" he called. "See if the back door is locked."

"It ain't," Joe returned the shout.

Together, with Monty leading, the men entered the silent house. They noticed the electric coffee brewer, still on, a full pot of coffee. Strips of bacon laid out in an iron skillet, uncooked. A setting for one at the kitchen table, unused.

For the moment, the men went no further than the kitchen. Both of them experienced the hard sensation of something being very wrong.

"Take the house to the left, Joe," Monty said. "I'll check the one to the right. Ask if anyone saw Miss Mayberry today."

"Something awful wrong in town, Chief. And I mean the whole town."

"I know, Joe. You haven't mentioned to anybody about what Father Le Moyne saw last night, have you?"

"Not a word, Chief."

"O.K. Let's go."

"Yes, Chief," a lady said. "I saw her earlier this morning, out in the orchard, picking wildflowers. But that's the only time I saw her."

The lady could definitely use a good scrubbing, Monty thought. She smelled very bad. Come to think of it, Monty mused, a lot of folks around town the last three-four days have needed a good bath. Strange. Damn! that word again.

So the basket and the flowers did belong to Judith. But where was Judith?

And the smelly lady showed absolutely no interest in what had just transpired in the orchard. Strange. Crap! Come on, Monty—find another word.

"Ah—Mrs. Clemmings, you haven't noticed anything out of the ordinary this morning, have you?"

"Not a thing, Chief. I've been here all morning. Haven't seen a thing."

Somehow, her reply was not unexpected to Monty. "I see," he said slowly. "You didn't notice large groups of men, an ambulance, nothing like that?"

"Why—no, Chief," she said.

What was wrong with her eyes. They seemed so . . . so dull and lifeless.

"Thank you, Mrs. Clemmings. You've been very helpful." And for God's sake, lady, take a bath! You're a one-woman hog pen.

Monty walked slowly to the rear of the Mayberry house. The woman had seen or heard nothing! Four police and sheriffs department vehicles and one ambulance, and the woman had heard nothing. He knew she wasn't deaf; she had admitted being in the house all morning. So that left one alternative: she was lying.

But why?

He looked up to watch Joe walking slowly toward him, a very puzzled expression on his face. Monty felt he knew the reason for the puzzlement.

"Chief, either we got the most unobservant and deafest folks in all of northern New York State, or we got a bunch of bald-faced liars. Take your pick. And these folks are beginning to stink like polecats."

"I know what you mean, Joe. Nobody has seen or heard a thing. Strange." That word again. Monty made a mental note to avoid using it.

"Strange isn't the word I'd use, Chief."

"Oh?"

"Weird."

"Yes. That, too. Let's take a walk in the orchard before we prowl the house. I want to go over every inch of that old orchard."

"What are we looking for?" Monty glanced at the man. Joe was more than his assistant; the men were good friends. Joe was the oldest and most stable of all Monty's men. "I don't know, Joe. I just don't know."

In the rolling ambulance, beneath the blanket that covered her tortured and mangled body, Marie Fowler twitched her fingers. She opened her eyes. They were not the eyes of the living. They were dull, unfeeling, evil eyes of the undead.

Marie felt no pain. She was no longer of the living world. Her body had not yet been washed of the blood that streaked her marked nakedness, so no one among the police or the paramedics had noticed the tiny fang marks on her neck. They were her vaccination against almost everything pertaining to the human side of living.

Marie was weak. She had lost much blood, and her new form of unlife craved the hot, salty taste of fresh, living blood. She was fully cognizant of what had happened to her; fully aware of her new life-form. She harbored no ill will toward those that changed the direction of her human life, for in this form, she would know eternal life, barring no unforeseen difficulties, such as humans wielding pointed stakes or holy water.

She pushed the blanket from her and wrapped herself in a hospital gown. She looked around. The driver and his partner were chatting. Marie smiled; a grotesque grimace, exposing teeth that had become pointed. Her lips were chalk white, her tongue a swollen bright red.

She opened the partition.

The men turned around.

"Hello," Marie said.

The men began screaming.

"Father Le Moyne?" Sam asked when the door opened.

"Yes," the priest said.

"I'm Sam Balon. This is my wife, Nydia. May we come in? I'd—we'd like very much to talk with you."

The priest looked at the young couple. Good-looking young man, very beautiful young woman. He looked at them for a long moment. The moment he had dreaded had arrived. Thank God in human form. Father Le Moyne longed desperately to close the door to his small living quarters. Wanted to shut out the young couple. But he knew he could not do that.

"You're here to tell me the Devil is in Logandale." It was not a question.

"Yes, sir," Sam replied. "I've fought him before, just as my Dad did back in '58. We both beat him—in a manner of speaking—and I feel I can do it again."

Father Le Moyne's knees felt weak; made of rubber. He did not know if they would support his weight. He leaned against the door jamb for a few seconds. With a deep sigh, and an inner plea for forgiveness from the Lord for his doubts, Father Le Moyne straightened up and reluctantly waved the young couple inside.

When they were seated, Le Moyne said, "Have you heard about the poor Fowler girl?"

Sam and Nydia said they had not.

Le Moyne told them.

"I'm surprised the Beasts didn't eat her," Sam said. "Unless they have other plans for her."

Le Moyne could detect no fear or surprise in the young man's reply.

"The Beasts? Other plans?"

Sam leaned forward, Nydia holding onto his hand. "Father Le Moyne, I'm going to tell you a story that you are going to find very hard to believe."

"No," the priest said with an almost painful sigh. "I've known the Dark One was near; knew the time would come when I would have to face him."

"That time is here, Father," Nydia said. The priest closed his eyes. "Tell me your story, Mr. Balon."

"There's a hole in the ground over here," Joe called. "All covered over with brush. And God, does it stink."

Monty walked across the orchard to stand by Joe. His nose wrinkled at the foul odor coming from the hole in the earth. "Jesus H. Christ! What would cause a smell like that?"

"I ain't never smelled anything like that, Chief. And I worked in the mines down in Kentucky as a kid, 'fore my daddy moved us all up here. I thought I'd done smelled everything God could possibly put in the ground, but nothing like this here."

"I thought you were a native, Joe," Monty said with a smile.

"Sure you did. 'Way I talk? I think like a native, but I ain't. I was fifteen when my dad brung us up here. I've lived here forty years."

The men looked down into the dark hole. A glint of something metallic caught Monty's eyes. It gleamed from just inside the yawning hole. With Joe holding on to his ankles to keep him from tumbling into the darkness, Monty retrieved the piece of jewelry. An earring.

"You reckon that's Miss Mayberry's?" Joe asked.

"I'd bet on it. And I'd also bet the neighbors aren't going to tell us a thing."

"You and me both, Chief. Don't turn around, but there's a face at damn near every window back of us. We're being watched real close."

"What the hell is going on in this town, Joe?"

"I don't know, Chief. But I get the feeling it's—don't laugh at me, now—evil."

"That's as good a word as any, Joe. Did Miss Mayberry socialize much?"

Joe smiled. "I wouldn't want to say she was gettin' any on a regular basis, but she's been seein' that ol' boy owns the hardware store. Will Gibson."

"Let's go pay Mr. Gibson a visit."

"I'm ridin' with you, Chief."

The paramedics were found sitting in their ambulance, halfway between Logandale and Blaine. The body of Marie Fowler was not in the ambulance. Since the highway cop who found the ambulance and the dead men knew nothing of their mission, he did not find it odd no one was in the rear of the ambulance. He had looked, but the stretcher did not appear mussed. The paramedics' logbook was missing, so the highway cop could not check that. He did not call in to Clark County because the men were taking a short cut and were in McGray County when whatever happened to them occurred. It was an independently owned ambulance service, so the hospital at Blaine would know nothing of Marie Fowler.

But what did appear odd to the highway patrolman was the condition of the men. There was not a mark on either of them that he could see. But they were so pale-looking. It looked as though there was not a drop of blood left in either man. But there was no blood anywhere in or around the ambulance.

The highway cop stood looking at the men, a perplexed look on his face. He radioed the McGray County Sheriffs Department. They notified the coroner. But he and his small staff were up to their elbows doing an autopsy on an entire family that had been found dead in their van, parked on the edge of the park. The M.E. felt sure they had all died of carbon monoxide poisoning, but he still had to open them all up. And to complicate matters further, a lot of drugs had been discovered in the van. Of the recreational variety rather than medical type.

"Stick them in the cooler," the M.E. told his assistant. "We'll get to them Monday or Tuesday. Damn this Saturday work."

The assistant took a look at the bodies of the paramedics. He had never seen anything quite like them. "So pale," he muttered. "Almost as if they had no blood in them."

"What'd you say, Max?"

"Oh—nothing."

"Come look at the liver on this guy," the M.E. said. "He must have consumed a quart of booze a day. Liver's hard as a piece of leather."

As Max dropped the sheet back over the ambulance driver, he did not notice the man's eyelids fluttering as new life rose to the surface.

"Yes," Will Gibson said, handing the earring back to the chief. "That belongs to Judith. Why are you asking me these questions, Chief Draper?"

"You've heard about Marie?"

"Yes. A terrible thing. Human animals roaming society. People who would do something like that should be shot on sight. But you don't think Judith had anything to do with the Fowler girl, do you?"

"Oh, no, Will. It's just we can't find Judith, and we want to talk to her. She might have seen something that would be of importance to the case."

But Will wasn't buying that. "Something's happened to her, hasn't it, Chief?"

"Will—" Joe said.

"No. Now you people level with me. If something has happened to Judith, I want to know. I have a right to know."

"All right, Will," Monty said. "We found this earring just inside the mouth of a hole on her property. In the orchard. I'm going to get a search team together; ask for volunteers. I—"

"I am a longtime spelunker, Chief. There is no one more qualified in this town. Let me get my gear together and I'll go down in the hole."

Monty sighed. But he knew the man was right. Will Gibson had crawled around every cave and hole in the ground he could find in the state of New York. "All right, Will. I'll meet you out there in half an hour. But I will insist upon you being attached to a rope and be in radio contact with me."

"Sometimes radios don't work down there, Chief. Not for any distance."

"Those are the terms of the deal, Will."

"All right, Chief. I have no objections to that."

Monty's car radio was squawking when the men returned to the police car. "Logandale One," Monty said. "Come in."

"Chief, what is your ten-twenty?"

"In front of the hardware store."

"Was that ambulance that took the Fowler girl into Blaine a hospital rig?"

"You mean belonging to the hospital?"

"Right."

"Negative. The independent service out of Aumsville. Don't know why Jenkins called that one."

"Ah—O.K., Chief. Can you ten-nineteen?"

"On my way."

"What the hell?" Joe muttered.

"Don't know. So let's go find out."

Father Le Moyne stood gazing out his living room window. He had heard all the young couple had told him, but he found it difficult to believe. He knew in his heart, though, it was true. He turned slowly. "Whitfield was where that giant meteor struck several years ago, destroying the entire town, killing everyone in it."

"That was not just a meteor, Father."

"Are you telling me—"

"It was the hand of God."

Le Moyne crossed himself, his eyes closed. "And the poor Fowler girl is a part of all this?"

"That poor Fowler girl, as you put it, Father, may now be a part of the living dead," Nydia said.

"I cannot accept that premise, Nydia," the priest spoke sharply. "I do not believe in vampires or zombies. Possession, of course. But it ends there."

"You're wrong, Father," Sam spoke bluntly. Another trait he had inherited from his father. "Would you like for us to show you?"

"I—" The priest hesitated.

"Why are you afraid, Father?" Nydia asked, tilting her head to one side, brushing back a strand of midnight hair that fell over one eye each time she did so.

The priest glanced at her. "Perhaps, Mrs. Balon, I know things about Satan you do not."

"I'm sure you do, Father. But I can assure you I have been on a much more intimate basis with the Devil's workers than you."

"How do you mean, child?"

Nydia met his gaze and said bluntly, "A warlock raped me."

* * *

Roma had won. She had managed to seduce young Sam—at the orders of Satan—thus guaranteeing a demon child would be born from Sam's seed. She had done so by trickery, placing Nydia in a state of suspending animation. Sam believed her dead.

Upon reentering Falcon House, Sam had followed the sound of sad funeral music. Upstairs, Nydia lay in a coffin. Weeping and sobbing people lined the room. They had—to a person—told Sam they wanted to accept Christ into their hearts, and turn their backs on the Devil. In his confused state, Sam believed them. He allowed Roma to set him on a couch, the witch beside him. He did not know her perfume was drugged with a powerful ancient aphrodisiac. He fell prey to its black power.

Sam was conscious of cool air on his groin, but he felt it wasn't worth the effort to open his eyes and look. He realized his underwear shorts had been removed. That seemed all right to the young man.

Roma touched his groin, brought him to stiffness. She brought him almost to the point of ejaculation with her skillful fingers. Then, with one swift movement, the witch mounted him, laughing as she did so.

Everything returned to Sam, coming in such a rush it almost overpowered him: the warnings he had received from his dead father; the sight of his father struggling with the witch through boundless space. This woman! Roma was the woman his father had been fighting.

Young Sam began struggling with the witch, attempting to dislodge her from his erection. Her strength was incredible. He exploded within her. She milked him of every drop of semen. Leaving the young man exhausted and confused on the couch, Roma padded naked to a table and drank deeply from a small bottle of fresh blood.

Sam was too weak to move as she began speaking in a language he could not understand. She was calling on the forces of the Dark One, the incantation evil as it rolled from her tongue. Lightning licked around the mansion, thunder boomed, ripping the countryside, the smell of burning sulphur strong in the stormy air.

Laughter reached Sam's ears, spilling from the room where Nydia lay in her coffin. Dead, or so Sam thought. He stumbled into the room.

The scene that greeted his eyes was of the vilest imaginable: Nydia had been lifted from the casket, pillows placed under her. She was naked in death, her lifeless white arms hanging over the sides of the coffin. Her legs were widespread, knees to feet hanging out of the coffin. Falcon was between her legs, his gross maleness swollen to full erection. He was fucking the dead girl.

Sam shouted his rage and charged toward the sickness. Someone tripped him, sending him sprawling on the floor. He was kicked and beaten into semiconsciousness, vaguely aware of the hideous necrophilia before his eyes.

Nydia's head was thrown back, her mouth open, a gaping black hole, eyes closed in surrender on her voyage to the stygian shore.

Sam could but lay helpless, bloodied and weak on the floor, watching through a red mist as Falcon rammed his long thickness into the dead flesh of Nydia. The man began howling like an animal as he ejaculated.

Falcon rose arrogantly from the satin-lined casket like some monster from the grave. He stepped onto the floor and wiped his penis with a towel handed him by one of those as lost as he.

Sam put his head on the carpet and wept for the dead young woman he loved.

Roma's laughter reached him. "Oh, don't be such a crybaby, Sam. You may have her now."

Sam lifted his head as Roma raised her hand toward the casket. A quick movement of her fingers and the sounds of weeping came to him.

Sam thought he was going utterly mad as Nydia's eyes opened and she looked around her in confusion. She looked at her nakedness, then at her temporary home, and screaming joined the weeping.

Sam got to his feet and staggered toward the casket as Roma's words reached him.

"Take your darling, Sam. Take her, and witness when the time comes, what marvelous parturient pops from her womb. How does it feel to be beaten, young man?"

Sam ripped drapes from the walls and covered Nydia's nakedness. When he turned to face the witch, she hissed with fright, drawing back from his burning eyes.

Sam said, "We're not beaten, you whore. I'm whipped for now, but I'm not out for the count. But I have realized something from this—ugliness: You can't kill us. God won't let you kill me, and you have to keep Nydia alive. So, yeah, bitch, I'm going to beat you."

Jeering sounds followed his words. A party began as Sam and Nydia walked from the room with as much dignity as they could muster.

Father Le Moyne crossed himself as Nydia finishing her telling of the rape. He visibly paled when she said, "And Sam and I are not certain if Little Sam is our child, or the child of Satan."

"You have no way of knowing?" he asked.

"No," Sam said. "Do you think you can tell?"

"I—don't know. Perhaps it is not yet time for the true body of the child to surface."

"That's what we think, too," Nydia said.

"But with the sightings of the Beasts," Sam said, "we both feel that time is not far off."

Father Le Moyne walked to his kitchen and poured a tumbler half full of whiskey. He downed it in one gulp. He started to refill the tumbler, then thought better of it and put the cap back on the bottle, screwing it down tight. He put the bottle in a cabinet and shut the door hard.

When the priest turned to walk into the small living room, there seemed to be a fresh new strength to the set of his jaw.

"All right," Le Moyne said. "Let's go see your Devil Beasts. Let's face them."

FIVE

Jon Le Moyne listened to his mother and father leave the house. He had already told them goodbye, see you late Sunday, have a good trip, and all that bullshit. He didn't give a damn whether they had a good trip, a bad trip, or even if he ever saw them again. Fuck you both! he thought bitterly. The vulgarity did not shock the young man any more than his thoughts of their never coming back. A month ago it would have. Now it was just a natural part of him. As much a part of him as the sex magazines he kept hidden in his dresser junk drawer. But the magazines were rapidly becoming inadequate for him; did not give him the kick, the heady erotic feeling they had originally produced a few months back.

Jon wanted to feel real breasts beneath his hands; wanted to touch the flesh of a real female; wanted to feel female hands on his body, touching him, their pretty pouty mouths going oohhh and aahhh at his hot, heavy long erection. And he knew—if and when he got the chance—they would do just that, too, for Jon had studied pictures of other men, and knew he was equipped large in that department. He wasn't as freakishly built as that black guy he'd seen in sex ads; wasn't as hefty as that Texas fellow; but he sure as hell wasn't average, either.

Jon felt a flush spread over his body. His face felt feverish and his hands were trembling. His mind replayed pictures of high eroticism. But he vowed he was not going to masturbate.

He was going to find a woman. Or a girl. Didn't make shit to him. Long as it was female. He was going to experience the sensation of getting some pussy.

"Jon?" a voice called to him in a whisper.

The boy spun around, his face pale, his mouth hanging open in shock and fright.

He knew the house was empty. Supposed to be anyway.

"Who—who are you?" Jon whispered. "What are you?"

"A friend."

"Invisible!"

"But very real. Talk to me, Jon. Tell me your troubles. I'll listen and give you real answers, real solutions to your problems."

"All right," Jon said, taking the first step into the dark arms. "I want a woman."

"Then you shall have one."

"You promise?"

"I promise."

The room began to fill with a slight odor, not unpleasant.

"I know someone who desires you," the voice said. "She is not fully aware of that desire, but it is there."

"Who desires me?" Jon was becoming more relaxed. Something seemed to be calming him. He didn't know what; he didn't care. He was in such a high emotional state he was ready to accept anything; ready to believe anything… just somebody, anybody, do something to relieve the high sexual frustrations that had reached the boiling point within him.

And that somebody had arrived. Had waited for just this moment in the young man's life. That somebody would not fail this time.

"You have prayed for help, have you not, Jon?"

"For all the goddamned good it did me, yes."

"I see. Well, I keep my promises. You shall see this afternoon."

"Who desires me?" Jon pushed for an answer.

"Patsy Catlett," the voice whispered.

"Patsy? Nobody gets to Patsy. She's untouchable. Not even the school jocks can get to her. She's a religious freak. Like I used to be before I wised up."

"You have—ah—wised up?"

"Oh, yeah. Believe it. I've rejected quite a lot of that shit I was taught about God."

"I'm glad to hear that, Jon. You know, quite a number of the young people here in this community have done the same."

"Yeah? Well, that's good. It was gettin' kind of boring around here."

"But I need your help with Patsy."

"You got it."

"No—" the voice laughed obscenely, "you'll get it. The way is open. Patsy is waiting for you. She will be at the spot where she always goes on Saturday afternoons, when the weather is nice. Do you know the place?"

"No."

"By the banks of the St. Regis," the voice whispered. A strange giggle reached Jon's ears. "She'll be reading her Bible."

"She'll be reading her Bible and waiting for me to fuck her?"

"That is correct, Jon. Now, Jon—want to do me a favor?"

"Sure."

"Take your Bible and tear it apart; throw it on the floor."

Without hesitation, the boy did as ordered. It seemed funny. He kicked at the pages, scattering them. The urge to shit came over him.

"You know what to use to wipe yourself, Jon," the voice came to him.

The boy picked up the pages and went into the bathroom.

Will Gibson tied the rope around his waist and with a small smile of farewell to Chief Draper and Joe Bennett, descended into the dark stinking hole in the earth. He was out of sight in two seconds.

Joe said, "I got a bad feeling about this, Chief."

"So do I, Joe. Too many strange—" there was that word again "—things occurring. Marie Fowler's body disappears. The paramedics are found dead. Don't know what killed them. Judith Mayberry falls or was pushed into this hole, and the people of this town are behaving—at least to my way of thinking—damn weird."

Will keyed the small radio attached to his belt. "More rope," he said. The signal was strong.

Will crawled on through the darkness, the gloom penetrated only by the single light on his hard hat. The smell was awful, and getting worse. Will thought he heard something just up ahead. He stopped. Using the flashlight from his small backpack, he cast the hard beam forward. He could see nothing. He crawled on. There it came again; that sound. Like an animal's growl.

He slipped forward cautiously, just the first twinge of fear touching his belly, like a snake's crawling on his bare skin. God! That smell! He lifted the yellow/white beam of light. Will scampered backward as wild, red eyes were caught in the single beam of light. He scraped his knees on sharp rocks. Something grabbed at his arm, missed, then clamped down hard on his wrist. He was jerked forward. Terror gripped him with numbing force, paralyzing his vocal cords. He could only make tiny grunting sounds. The flashlight fell from his hand, shattering on the rocky floor. His hard hat was knocked from his head, but the light did not go out. The beam from the hard hat picked up a shard of gold from one of the creatures that held the man pinned to the floor of the tunnel. It was an earring dangling from the lobe of one now pointy ear. It matched the earring Chief Draper had found. It belonged to Judith. The Beast looked long at Will Gibson. Recognition flared in the wild eyes.

My God! Will thought. That's Judith!"

The beast with the single earring leaned forward, her breath stinking on Will's face. The foulness made Will gag, vomit pushing up to his throat.

"No!" a voice spoke from the blackness. "I must do that."

While clawed hands held Will numbed and frightened to the floor, the rope was removed from his waist. He was dragged into a large underground room. A human form knelt down and sank her teeth into Will's neck. Pain lanced through his body as blood was sucked from him. A darkness crept upward in the man's body, beginning in his feet and moving slowly, coldly, throughout his entire body. Will Gibson sank into unconsciousness.

"Release him near the opening when the men have gone," the woman said. And the Beasts trembled with fear.

On the surface, Joe gently tugged on the rope. He looked at Monty. "We lost him, Chief."

Monty spoke again and again into the radio. Only silence returned to the men.

The men waited for half an hour. Joe said, "We lost him, Chief."

"But to what?" Monty looked at him.

One more time Monty knelt down and shouted into the hole. "Will! Will Gibson! Answer me."

Only the awful stench and the darkness greeted Monty's words.

"Shit!" Monty said. He turned around. Every window facing the orchard was filled with a grim-looking face, unblinking eyes staring at the two men.

"Crazy," Monty muttered. "It's just—crazy!"

Joe started to pull the rope topside. Monty stopped him. "Leave it, Joe. Maybe Will is all right and he'll find the rope. That'll help guide him back up."

"He ain't comin' back up, Chief." There was a dead quality to Joe's remark.

Monty looked at the man. "Say what's on your mind, Joe."

"I always thought it kinda foolish, Chief."

"I thought flying saucers were foolish until I saw one one night."

"You saw a UFO?"

"I saw something I couldn't explain. Yeah. So tell me what's on your mind."

"Let's get out of this orchard and away from them goddamn starin' eyes."

"They make me uncomfortable, too," Monty admitted. "What in the hell is going on with this town?"

"Evil," Joe said. "Pure evil."

"There is a perfectly logical explanation for all this," Monty said. But he could feel … something crawling around him; an invisible … he didn't know what. Couldn't put it into words. But he was glad to be leaving the orchard. And from that stinking hole that was claiming lives.

But what was claiming them? Not just the hole. It was something in the hole. But what? And what in the hell was the matter with the people of the town? They seemed to have turned into a bunch of liars, zombies, and unwashed. Strange. Crap! That word again.

"I never liked people starin' at me," Joe said, as the men got in the prowl car and pulled out.

"I know the feeling."

"You going to report this to Sheriff Jenkins, Chief?"

"I don't know what I'm going to do, Joe. Not yet. Tell me what's on your mind."

"There have been sightings, from time to time, of— well, monsters in this area—"

Monty sighed. "Joe—"

"No, let me finish, Chief. I moved here with my folks in '43. I was just a kid. I told you that. I was a man grown 'fore I ever heard the stories 'bout the Giddon House and Fox Estate. You know what a coven is, Chief?"

"A Devil's coven?"

"That's the one. Norman Giddon's great-grandfather was supposed to have made a deal with the Devil. In return for riches, the Giddon children were all to be handed over to the Devil. You ever been inside the Giddon place, Chief?"

"No."

"Neither have I. Rumor has it the place is filled with—well, Satan stuff. Pictures of orgies and sacrifices and crap like that. And most of the sightings of monsters have been around his estate, Fox Estate, and lands he owns out in the country. Several sightings have been reported from near the old orchard, out next to the Balon house."

That got Monty's attention. "What? Whose house?"

"That young couple goes to college over at Nelson. The Balon couple."

"Before I make up my mind on what to do about Will Gibson—for some reason I'm even leary of calling this in—let's take a run over to the Balon house."

"You're driving."

Will Gibson crawled from the hole in the orchard. He looked the same as when he entered, with the exception of muddy clothing. He rubbed his hand on his neck. His neck hurt. There were two tiny puncture wounds on the side of his neck. And his head felt … odd. And he found his walk peculiar; more a lurch than a step.

He stopped and looked back toward he hole. Very well, he had found Judith and she was content. So be it. Now Will had things of his own to take care of, matters to attend to. The voices in his head told him that. He shielded his eyes from the sunlight as he lurched from the orchard. He remembered he had left sunglasses in Judith's bedroom. He entered the house, found his dark glasses, and put them on. He felt better then. He smiled and looked at his image in a mirror. His tongue and teeth felt strange. His tongue was swollen and bright red; his cuspids had grown pointed, into fangs. Everything was normal.

He willed his teeth to return to normal shape and size and watched as they did so. Fascinating.

His lurch was beginning to resemble a normal step as he walked to his car. But somehow he knew he would always walk rather oddly. No matter. He could hardly wait for darkness. There was something important he had to do and do it only by night. He didn't know what. Not yet. But he knew it would come to him.

Jon did not want to startle the lovely young woman sitting by the river, reading, so he deliberately back-tracked several hundred yards and then returned, whistling as he walked.

Patsy looked up from her Bible. She smiled as she recognized Jon. Jon was a nice Christian boy—even if he was Catholic. Jon didn't try to hit on her all the time like most of the other boys.

Patsy was a petite brunette with an hourglass figure. And she was a Christian girl without being overbearing and/or obnoxious about it. Patsy did not preach to others about her feelings toward Christ. She just went her own way, within her own small circle of friends— but lately that circle had grown much smaller, and she couldn't understand why—and carefully avoided those whom she felt were not subscribers of the teachings of Jesus Christ.

Jon smiled at her. "Hi, Patsy. If I'm disturbing you, I'll leave." The hell I will.

"Not at all, Jon. I'm glad to see you. Would you like to sit down?" She patted the ground beside him.

I'd like to play with your titties. "Sure." Jon sat beside her just as that heady hot feeling he had experienced back in his room once more swept over him. He looked at her Bible and felt a feeling of revulsion looking at it. How could anyone read that shit? What a fool he had been all those past years.

She closed her Bible and laid it aside. "It's so beautiful this time of the year. This is my very favorite season."

"Mine, too," Jon lied. He didn't have a favorite season. He just wanted some pussy.

Three months before, that word could not be found in his thoughts, much less in his vocabulary. Now it seemed a natural part of him.

She studied his face. "Is something troubling you, Jon? Would you like to discuss it with me?"

I'm going to discuss it with you. I'm going to stick some meat to you. "I know why you're here," he blurted.

"Oh?" She smiled at him.

"Yeah. So what are we waiting for?"

"Jon—are you all right?"

I'll be fine in about two minutes. "Look, Patsy, let's just get comfortable and get down to business."

"What?"

He reached for her, grabbing her roughly, one hand fumbling at her breasts. She fought away his hands and slapped him across the face.

Jon returned the slap, only much harder. The force of his blow stunned her. She fell limply into his arms.

"I knew you were just playacting," Jon said. His eyes were wild and hot with lust.

He tore her jacket from her and jerked off her shirt. He licked his lips at the sight of bare female flesh. She regained her senses and tried to fight him, but her struggles seemed only to give him more strength. He savagely tore her bra from her. The sight of her bare breasts was almost more than Jon could cope with. His growing erection was painful confined within his jeans.

He confused her by saying, "Stop pretending with me, Patsy!"

"Jon! Don't do this to me!" She fought his hands and again slapped him.

He hit her twice, rocking her head, addling her, her long hair whipping around her heart-shaped face. She felt the coldness of earth on her bare back.

Jon removed his leather belt and secured her wrists, binding them tightly. He tied the other end around a small sapling. "I've read about girls like you," he panted the words, lust making the words almost incomprehensible to her. "You bitches like it rough. Bondage. That's the word. That's the way you like it, huh—O.K., then that's the way it's gonna be."

She finally opened her mouth to scream and Jon slapped a hand over her lips and painfully wound the fingers of his other hand in her hair. His mouth close to her face, his breath hot on her cheek, he said, "If you want to live, don't scream. I don't know why you're doing this; don't know why you pretend you don't want to fuck me, but if you scream, I'll kill you. Do you understand that?"

Her eyes wide and frightened, she nodded her head.

Jon removed his hand from her mouth. "If you scream, Patsy, I'll make the hurt last a long time before you die. You'd better understand that."

"I believe you," she said softly.

He bent his head and sucked at her breasts and nipples while he worked off his jeans and underwear. He seemed oblivious to the cool air from the river. She felt his erection flop hot and heavy on her leg. She offered no resistance as he quickly undressed her and parted her legs. He tried to force his length inside her, but he was large and she was dry. He worked a finger inside her, then two. Finally moisture began to dampen her virgin tightness.

He tried again to force the head of his penis inside her. But he was so large and swollen all he accomplished was pain for both of them.

"Goddamn you!" he swore at her.

"It isn't my fault!" she returned the shout.

He slapped her. "I told you not to yell!" he hissed at the girl.

She turned her face away and wept. Her wrists ached from the leather bindings and her genital area hurt from Jon's attempted rape.

She opened her eyes and looked at his swollen maleness. The … thing seemed abnormal to her. It was. She pulled her eyes to his face. She could see evil written plainly there. "The Lord is my shepherd," she began praying. "I shall not—"

Jon slapped her. "Oh, shut up with that crap. You don't believe that shit any more than I do."

"I do!" she cried.

Black evil colored the boy's eyes. "Tell me you don't," he urged her. "Say it and it'll be easier for you."

"You won't hurt me?"

"I'll try to be easy with you. Come on, Patsy, say it. Say it." He slapped her again and again, bruising her face.

She spoke the damning words, over and over until he stopped slapping her. She repeated them.

A hot wind began blowing over youthful flesh. Something clouded Patsy's mind. The words came easier to her, and for the first time in her young life, she truly blasphemed.

Jon lay between her legs and began licking at her. Patsy tried to feel shame and revulsion at the oral act but found she could not. She felt his tongue enter her and she twisted and moaned. She was not aware of the hot wind matching her moaning and thrashing. She became wet and wanting. Jon worked fingers inside her, spreading her. He removed the leather belt.

He positioned himself and pushed. It hurt her, but still she felt something else over the pain. She laughed hoarsely and kissed him as his manhood tore through maidenhead.

Both of the young people were so involved in the heat of the act they did not notice the dark laughter rising from the river like an invisible mist.

"Oh, goddamn, that feels good!" Jon whispered.

She pulled his mouth to hers and rammed her tongue between his lips.

As he drove deeper with each thrust, filth began rolling from the mouths of the young couple in dark rivers of blasphemy. They were unaware of the black mist that covered them and the area in which they rolled and hunched and lunged at each other. The girl experienced shattering climax after building climax, finally shivering as the young man filled her with hot fluid.

They lay on the piles of clothing. "We'll rest for a time," he told her. "Then we'll do it again."

"Fucking right," Patsy said.

"Logandale one," the call came through.

"Go ahead," Monty replied.

"How'd the search go, Chief?"

"We—" Monty hesitated. "We didn't find a thing."

"I just wondered. I just seen Will Gibson getting out of his car at the hardware and he looked kind of grim. Clothes all muddy. Walked kind of funny, too. O.K., Chief, ten-fifty and out."

Joe sighed and Monty was speechless.

The cops pulled into the drive at the Balon house, parking behind Father Le Moyne's car.

"Uh-huh," Joe said.

"What does that mean, Joe?"

"Means the shit is about to hit the fan. Look over there." He pointed to the old orchard.

Sam, Nydia, and Father Le Moyne were standing in the center of the old orchard, the three of them looking at the cop car. Nydia held Little Sam in her arms.

The men got out and Monty called, "Hold up, folks." The cops walked briskly across the now rocky field.

Monty spoke to all and Sam said, "What's up, Chief?"

For the first time, Monty noticed the big .41 mag belted at Sam's waist. "You got a permit for that hand cannon, Sam?"

"It's registered," Sam told him.

"That's not what I asked, but I'll let it slide for now. But I am curious why you think you have reason for wearing a gun."

Monty felt Nydia's dark gypsy eyes searching his face. He felt she was picking his mind and was uncomfortable under her silent scrutiny. He could not hide his shock when she said, "He knows, Sam. Or suspects. And something awful other than Marie has happened. That's why they are here."

Joe grunted and visibly paled. The pull of the superstitious mountains was still strong within him, not fading with the passage of time.

"I was not aware you could read minds, Mrs. Balon," Monty said, with a touch of irritation.

"It's something I picked up from my mother's side of the family," she told him.

"Your mother must have been a very interesting woman," Monty spoke dryly.

Nydia smiled. "She was a witch. She was the daughter of Satan."

"Bitch,'itch" Little Sam said.

Father Le Moyne crossed himself. Joe muttered a softly spoken prayer. Monty experienced a giddy feeling sweep over him, muddling his thoughts.

"It's all true," Father Le Moyne said. "Chief, Joe, there are many of them in this community, and very few of us. I suggest we go to the house and talk."

"Them?" Monty questioned.

"Satan worshippers," Le Moyne told him.

"I told my daddy we ought not to leave Kentucky," Joe said, a mournful expression on his face.

Monty experienced cold fear as Sam suddenly jerked the .41 from leather, pointed the muzzle in Monty's direction, and jacked back the hammer.

"No!" Monty screamed.

SIX

Jon did not remember loosening the belt from Patsy's wrists, but the leather was gone, tossed to one side. She sat with her jacket around her bare shoulders. The young man seemed impervious to the cool late fall air. He sat naked on his jeans.

Patsy had become somewhat lucid, and could not believe the things she had done and had allowed to be done to her. "When are you going to let me go home?" she asked.

"As soon as we fuck again."

"I'm sore. You hurt me." She was careful not to mention anything about going to the police, but she was thinking it.

"You'll enjoy it more the second time. And put all thoughts of the police out of your mind."

"How did you know I was thinking of the police?"

His grin was pure black evil. "I know many things I didn't used to know. I'll teach them to you. For I know you want to learn."

"How do you know that?" A faint odor came to her, a rather pleasant odor. She inhaled it and it seemed to calm her mind.

"You cummed when I ate you."

Her blush covered her from nose to toes. But she laughed, that odor affecting her perspective. "I guess you're right. But what makes you think I won't go to the police?"

"Because it's too late for that. I just know. It's all been arranged by forces much more powerful than mere mortals." He did not know how he knew that; he just did. "I have accepted another—plan," he struggled for the word. "And so will you. I think the police are on our side."

"Our side?"

"Yours and mine. Yes. It's so easy and simple once you relax your guard." He stretched out beside her. His flaccid penis large even in softness. "And why not?" he questioned her. "There is nothing wrong in feeling good."

"The Bible says what we—you did—is wrong."

The mist once more drifted over the couple.

"Oh, shit, Patsy! Don't be so stupid. Have you ever in your life experienced anything like when you cummed today?"

The mist touched her. "No," she said.

Jon continued speaking. As he talked, a strange feeling began sweeping over the girl; an alien sensation never before experienced. It was as if she was being transformed from one person to another; her old self being stripped from her just as a snake sheds its skin. All her teachings, all those things once so good and dear to her were being tossed aside.

Patsy was unaware that dark forces were hovering nearby, working their ageless magic on her. And somewhere, squatting near black-tinted flames, the Master of all that is evil howled in triumph, pointing his face Heavenward, screaming oaths toward his enemy.

Patsy's eyes changed as she lost both faith and innocence. Clouds of darkness swept over the sixteen-year-old. She reached out and laid her hand on Jon's penis, her fingers gently caressing the softness. She felt him stir at her touch, the blood coursing through him, thickening him, lengthening him. She felt power beneath her fingertips. She stroked him into hardness. She leaned forward and took him. The Dark One howled. She was his.

The report of the .41 mag was shockingly loud in the early afternoon. A scream of pain from behind the small group spun the chief around. He could not believe what ran limping away, to disappear into the ground.

Little Sam had covered his ears. Now he was tuning up to cry. Nydia comforted him.

The … whatever in the hell it was was the most hideous thing Monty had ever seen. "What in the name of God was that!"

"A Beast," Nydia said, holding Little Sam tightly. "One of Satan's creatures. They live underground; they're probably all over this area. They live in groups, only coming out at Satan's request. It must be getting close to the Black Mass for them to surface."

"The Black Mass?" Joe managed to croak.

"It's a Saturday," Nydia explained. "The High Black Mass could be held tonight. Some covens differ from others in their choosing of a night of the week in which to call upon the forces of darkness."

Joe stood with his mouth hanging open, staring at the beautiful young woman. Monty thought perhaps all this was a dream, and he would soon wake up. He hoped to God it was all a dream. Monty pointed to where the Beast had dropped into the ground.

"Where did that thing come from?" he asked Sam.

"From its lair in the ground. I've been watching it for about a minute, circling around, coming up behind you. It probably was a young Beast. From what I know about them, the older ones would never take such a chance, for as you see, they can be hurt and killed."

"Well, you're goddamn calm about all this!" Monty screamed.

Sam shrugged his shoulders. "I know what we face, and I know what I have to do."

"Who are we facin' and what is it you got to do?" Joe asked, his face ashen.

"We face Satan and his worshippers. And I have to fight them. It's just that simple."

"There ain't nothing simple 'bout all this!" Joe almost shouted the words. "Man—tell me this is some kind of joke. Please tell me this is a joke!"

"It is no joke," Father Le Moyne said, and his words chilled Joe Bennett.

Monty seemed to come out of his trance. He looked nervously around him, as if expecting some other type of monster to come leaping at him from out of the ground. He snapped his fingers. "Whitfield, Nebraska. You were born in Whitfield. That's the town that was destroyed back in 1958. A few survivors were left, and they rebuilt the town. Then about three years ago, a giant meteor struck there, killing everybody and completely wiping out the town and the land around it for several miles."

"It was the hand of God," Sam corrected the man.

' "Lordy, Lordy, Lordy!" Joe said. He looked upward, as if expecting to see a mighty fist forming.

"The Devil's agent in Whitfield, back in 1958, was a man named Black Wilder. My father killed him. Not as you know death, but he sent him from earth. My father agreed to fight Nydia, the witch. He both won and lost."

"Lordy, Lordy!" Joe said.

"And Nydia is your mother?" Monty looked at Nydia.

"No," she lied. "My mother's name was Roma. But she was also a witch." She was not about to tell these people anymore about her links with Sam.

The odor of the Beasts was strong in the old orchard. Father Le Moyne grimaced his disgust. "Let us please retire to the house. I don't want you people to think me cowardly, but that smell is making me physically ill."

"You just ain't whistlin' Dixie 'bout that," Joe said.

"I hit it hard," Sam said. "It will probably die. Its own kind will eat it."

Joe's stomach rumbled at the thought. "Monty," he said clutching at the Chiefs arm. "We gotta call the state police or the National Guard, or—hell, somebody.

"It's too late for that," Nydia said in a matter-of-fact tone. "Everything has been set in motion. Satan will allow no interference from this point forward. Not until the game has reached its conclusion."

"Game!" Monty shouted. "This is a game?"

"I'm afraid it is," Father Le Moyne spoke. "Although some of my collegues would argue that. It is a game that is as old as time and earth itself; perhaps as old as the worlds we know exist in the galaxies, and those we can only speculate about."

"Lordy, Lordy," Joe said. "I gotta go to the bathroom."

Late afternoon in Upstate New York. Already the shadows were darkening pockets of landscape, creating gloom. Street lamps were coming on, and motorists were turning on headlights.

The chief medical examiner of McGray County was surprised to see his assistant enter the room. "I thought you were going home, Max."

"Changed my mind," the young assistant replied.

"My wife is out of town and I thought I'd try to catch up on the backlog of work we have piled up."

"Ah, youth," the M.E. said, leaning back in his chair. "I keep forgetting how it is to be young."

"Fannnntastic!" Max grinned.

The M.E. laughed. "I said young, Max, not over the hill." He stood up, found his topcoat, and shrugged his way in it. "Ridiculous to be working on Saturday. I'm going home."

"See you Monday, John," Max said.

The door hissed. The room was silent, sterile. Max worked at paperwork for a time, but found his mind kept wandering back to the paramedics. Something very odd about them. Very strange. He could not concentrate for thinking about them. So pale and seemingly bloodless. Max finally tossed his ballpoint to the desk in frustration and walked into the cooler room.

Max looked at the vaults containing the backlog of cadavers and then walked to the center vault, pulling it open. He pulled out the sliding tray and stood looking for a moment at the sheet-covered paramedic. Max flipped back the sheet. He leaned closer to get a better look at the marks on the man's neck. Max remained in position, in numb shock, as the man's eyes opened. Hands suddenly grabbed the young doctor's neck and face, pulling him forward. Max struggled for footing on the tile floor, his leather-soled shoes slipping. He could not yell, for his mouth was held tightly together by hands that seemed to possess superhuman strength. Max felt the hands that gripped him pulling his face closer, closer. The paramedic's breath stank of the dead, the breath putrid and evil-smelling.

Max cut frantic eyes downward. He could see the red gaping mouth of the dead man, opening and closing as if in anticipation of the bloodless lips touching living flesh.

Max tried to scream as the hps pulled back, exposing fangs where there were once normal teeth. The undead pulled the living closer, then lunged upward, his mouth closing on Max's neck, fangs sinking into the young M.E.'s neck. He drank and sucked greedily, while Max slowly felt life—as he knew life—leave him. His heart began to strain and convulse in his chest as life-sustaining blood was pulled from him.

The paramedic staggered from the coolness of the mat and allowed Max to slump, still alive, to the tile floor. He opened the cooler containing the body of his friend. The dead man opened his eyes and smiled, looking up into the pale face of living death. He was helped from the mat and the two men lurched toward Max. There, the second paramedic drank thirstily, draining the blood from the young M.E.

Both men smacked their lips and grinned grotesquely at each other.

The paramedic named Dan Golden pointed to the dead—more or less—young doctor. "Can't leave him here." His words were pushed from his mouth, slurred while moving around the swollen tongue.

"I know," his friend, Jerry replied.

Their voices were hollow-sounding, and their breath left the odor of decaying flesh hanging in the sterile room.

The men then spoke silently to one another, the thoughts of the dead yet living transmitted from out of dead brains. They began searching for clothing. They found surgical jackets and pants in a closet and hurriedly dressed. They placed the young M.E. on a rolling gurney and covered him with a blanket. They would get out of the hospital proper first, worry about transportation when that was accomplished. A sense of homing told them they must return to Clark County. To Logandale. To the Master.

No one stopped them in the busy hospital. The shift that had seen the dead men come in had already gone home. The new ground floor shift were busy, and gave the pale-looking men pushing the gurney only a brief glance.

The paramedics found an ambulance with the keys in it, loaded the young M.E. into the back, and drove off. Toward Logandale. Home. To the Master.

Fully dressed, if a bit rumpled, Jon and Patsy walked slowly out of the woods by the river. Patsy had responded even more the second time, with Jon's being much more gentle with her. She had bitten her lips as one shivering climax followed on the heels of another. She could not understand the strange new feelings within her. But she found she did not possess either the will or the strength to fight them.

"I'll pick you up at your house at seven," Jon told her. "We'll go to my house where we can be alone."

"All right, Jon," Patsy said. Whatever the boy ordered her to do, she felt compelled to obey.

"You will not go to your house," a voice spoke to Jon. He knew who it was; all the pieces were falling into place. Everything that had happened to him over the past few months now added up. Jon was a very intelligent young man, and he had silently suspected something of this nature all along. He didn't care.

"You and your recently deflowered young lady friend will come to the Giddon house. You will be there at nine o'clock. Do not be early, do not be late."

"As you command," Jon replied. He glanced at Patsy. She was hearing none of the conversation.

"You do not seem to be overly concerned about silent messages, young man."

"I'm not. I don't care."

"Very good. I think you shall find the events of this evening most interesting and pleasant. We will have a task for you later on."

"Tonight?"

"That, too. But that is not the task I speak of."

"Then what?"

"The young woman of your dreams. The one occupying your mind while you practiced self-abuse in the darkness of your bedroom."

Tired as he was, Jon's heart quickened at the thought. "Nydia?"

"None other."

"Will you answer a question for me?"

"Possibly."

"Are you Satan?"

"Possibly. The Master is always close—one form or another—to those who choose to serve him."

"The Master!"

"Of course, young man. I am now your Master. We made a deal. You said you would return a favor for a favor. My side of the bargain has been—" The voice giggled. "—Consummated. Now it is your turn."

Jon did not give it much thought. He didn't care. "All right," he said.

"Ta-ta, Jon," the voice cheerfully replied, then faded away.

"If you know so much," a badly shaken Chief Draper spoke to Nydia. "If you can read minds and—whatever else it is you do, how come you didn't see all this— whatever is happening—and warn people about it?"

"Because I was blocked out. Because Satan knows I renounced his dark faith and became a Christian. Satan rules the earth, Chief, God the Heavens. But my mother was, remember, a witch, and some of her powers did show up in me."

"Lordy," Joe said.

Monty shook his head in confusion and disbelief.

Sam answered the knock on the front door. Janet stepped in, smiling as usual. "I'm a little early," she said. "But I knew you wouldn't mind." She spoke politely to Father Le Moyne, Chief Draper, and Joe. "Is something the matter?" She looked at Sam.

"Nothing we can't handle, Janet," Sam said, returning the smile.

All could see the afternoon had melted into dusk, with the sky overcast, already dripping moisture and sculpturing hollow pockets of gloom around the land.

"Do you want me to leave, Sam? I get the feeling I'm interrupting some grown-up talk."

"No, you stay, Janet. Nydia and I won't be going to the movies this evening." He glanced at Monty. "We usually drive over to Blaine for dinner and a movie on Saturday evenings," he explained. He swung his eyes to Janet. "But there is some community business we're—involved in. And we might be late. Your parents won't object if you stay over?"

"Oh, no. I'll just call and tell them." She hefted a large purse. "You know I always bring a change with me, just in case you want me to spend the night."

Her eyes were bright and clear and full of innocence, despite the rape she had endured as a child kidnapped and brought to Falcon House in Canada. The teenager had been rescued by Sam and returned to her parents. Rescued, so Sam and Nydia were led to believe. Janet had been Little Sam's babysitter since his moment of birth.

Janet had plans for Little Sam.

Monty, Joe, and Father Le Moyne rose as if on silent cue. Monty said, "Well—Sam, Nydia, we'll see the both of you at the house in about an hour. We'll continue this—discussion there. You'll stay for dinner, of course." The men moved toward the door and the approaching night.

Outside, the door closed behind them, Joe looked toward the old orchard. "Can you imagine eating on that goddamn thing out there?" He looked at Father Le Moyne. "'Cuse me, Father."

"I couldn't have put it more aptly myself," the priest said, taking no offense. "Gentlemen, I have mass to attend to. I'll see you both around eight-thirty." He walked to his car, backed around the police car, and disappeared into the night.

"Monty?" Joe said.

"Yeah?"

"I'm scared and confused."

"Join the club, Joe."

"How come you didn't level with Sheriff Jenkins this morning?"

"I—don't know, Joe." But he did know.

"You think he's one of—them?"

"I don't know. Maybe. Yeah," Monty said, his voice containing resignation. "Yeah, I do."

"Me, too. Monty, something just came to me a few minutes ago. We're in a box. There ain't nobody on God's green earth gonna believe any of this even if we was to call for help. Hell! They'd lock us up in the loony bin."

"I know that, too."

"1 used to look forward to the night. Meant gettin' off work, goin' home to the wife and dinner. Maybe a few beers and some TV." He looked around him at the wet gathering darkness. "I ain't lookin' forward to this night, Chief."

"Not one word of this, Joe. To anybody. Not a word. We'll firm it all up at my house. Come on. I'll drop you off at your car."

Janet went to Little Sam's room and stood for a moment, watching the child play with his toys.

Are you or aren't you? She silently questioned. Are you one of us, or one of them? Are you a child of my Master, or are you a whimpering Christian? I wish I knew.

The child looked up at her and grinned.

Janet heard the sound of water running in the bathroom. That would be Sam, taking a shower. She stood for a moment, mentally conjuring pictures of him in the shower, naked. Then other pictures of high sexuality played erotically in her mind. She wanted Sam Balon. Wanted to feel him entering her. She became wet with passion. She fought the pictures away.

Janet again looked at the child. She thought: If it is determined that you are not one of us, but a spawn of them—I am going to kill you.

SEVEN

"Princess," the young woman was addressed. "We have word that the Christians are massing. They are few, yes, but Sam Balon's offspring is among them. As well as the turncoat, Nydia."

The young woman with the long brown hair and pale eyes looked at her servant. She was tall, with a magnificent figure. Very stately and very regal appearing. She was Satan's child. The daughter of the Devil. A demon. She served only the Black Master of evil. Her father: Satan. She had burst forth from her mother's womb in a shower of blood and torn flesh. Roma the witch had died this earthly life giving birth to her. The young woman looked to be about twenty years of age.

By earth time, she was three years old. She had been born on the sixth day of the sixth month, at precisely the sixth minute of Roma's pregnancy. At precisely the exact moment Little Sam was birthed. They were half brother and sister.

But this child was as old as evil—by the hands of the clock that served the Dark One.

"We have the time to delay," the Princess instructed the gathering at Giddon Estate. "As much time as is needed. My father has put us on no firm timetable. But this time you shall not fail him. The Christians are no matter. Masses have been held at this place for over a hundred years. And tonight shall be no different. We shall honor my father—your Master, the King of Darkness—tonight."

"Yes, Princess. As you command." Professor Frank Gilbert bowed and scurried away.

The lovely young woman smiled in the candlelit gloom of the large room. Her teeth were, for a moment, fanged. She allowed herself the heady pleasure of thinking of Sam Balon for a time. Her mother had left her own images in her demon child: the images of the woman Sam Balon, Sr. knew as Nydia; Sam Balon, Jr. knew as Roma. They were one and the same. The Balons, father and son, were lusty men, well-endowed, and the Princess planned to sample the wares of Sam Balon. And while she was sampling, she would gently introduce Sam into the dark pleasures of her Master. One little bite with her very sharp teeth, and the one obstacle toward her Master's ruling this area would be removed. Then they could move on to greater things. The entire state. The United States. The world!

"Not too fast, my pretty," the voice came to her. The room began to stink of hell. The candles flickered as if in fear. Rain lashed the mansion.

"Father," the Princess said softly.

"It is one thing to be ambitious, dear. Quite another to be foolishly reckless."

"I did not know—was not aware you were so close."

"Yes. I came because I am quite sure my old adversary will stick His goody-two-shoes nose into this affair and fuck it all up. As He is prone to do."

The Princess giggled.

"It is no laughing matter, my pretty," the heavy voice returned her to sobriety rudely. "Your mother died this earthly life birthing you; a gift to me. And don't think for a moment that meddlesome old fart up in the firmament wasn't plenty pissed off about your mother seducing Sam. He claimed I broke the rules—not so. I just interpreted them differently, that's all. So we are going to slow the timetable, my precious. We are going to take it nice and easy and slow, and we are not going to rock any boats this time. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Father."

"As long as you do. Now I am going to have some more fun. It's been entirely too long since I visited this planet personally. And keep your legs together, you horny bitch. You must save your virginity for Sam Balon. In that respect, you are just too goddamned much like your mother. Oh, what a coup it would be if you could birth Balon's child." The wind picked up as dark laughter howled in the huge room.

When the howling had stopped, the Princess asked, "And how is Mother?"

"Well. Bitchy, as usual. But that is to be expected of her. She is ruling an upper level on another planet."

"Black?"

"Which Black?" the voice sounded testy.

"Wilder."

"Oh. He's doing quite well. He is teaching new recruits. A fine and loyal man. But your idiot half-brother is the most useless, whining, malcontented son-of-a-bitch I have encountered since Nero. And that silly shit still fancies himself a poet and painter."

"My half-brother a poet?"

"Oh, no! Nero!"

The Princess hung her head in penance. "Forgive me, Father."

"Oh, stop groveling and get on with matters. And Princess, don't fail me."

A stinking wind blew through the great house by the river. The candles went out, plunging the room into darkness. The Beasts on the grounds below the mansion shook with fear.

And far away, in the firmament, a star twinkled a bit more brightly than usual.

"I left my wife out of this," Joe said, after he had been seated in the Draper's den. "She's not well, and I don't believe she could take anything like this. I don't know whether I'm gonna be able to take it."

"She's not recovering from her operation?" Monty asked.

"No. The doctors always say they got it all—but they didn't, and Nellie knows it. She's dying little by little. Sad thing to have to watch."

And the wind that was hovering silently over the Draper house, carrying within it a foul odor, seemed to sigh and say, "Well, now—how interesting."

The dark mass disappeared into the night.

Father Le Moyne shivered suddenly. His skin felt clammy, as if something slimy had touched bare flesh. He drew a nervous breath. "Was I the only one to hear something just then? Outside, I mean."

"I—thought I heard something," Monty said.

His wife put her hand in his. "I heard something too, honey. It sounded like words."

He looked at her pale face. Lifted his eyes to the others. "I told her all I knew. I don't think she believed me."

There was an amused look in the woman's eyes. "I have a birthday next week. My husband knows 1 like horror books and movies. You people fixed all this up, didn't you? Even got the priest in on it."

Sam looked at the woman. "Viv, we have no reason to lie. None of us. But if we don't panic, I think we can beat this."

Viv laughed. "Oh, you people! Come on. Monty fixed all this up, admit it. You people have someone outside, whispering, don't you?"

"No, Vivian," Father Le Moyne said. "I would have nothing to do with a joke this grotesque. Satan is anything but a joking matter."

Viv shifted her gaze from person to person, touching all eyes, finally settling on Nydia. She saw only seriousness in those dark gypsy eyes. Joe had seemed tense and upset. Father Le Moyne wore lines of fatigue around his eyes. Monty wore a haunted look.

"It isn't a joke," Viv whispered. "You people really believe the Devil is here in Logandale."

"Believe it, Vivian," the priest said. "It is no joke, I assure you of that."

Viv released her husband's hand. She stood up, and Sam could not help viewing her with a man's appreciative eyes. Viv was tall, almost willowy. Sam had heard she had been a fashion model in New York City. He believed it. Her hair was a golden color, her figure slightly fuller than the average model, with none of the gauntness associated with that profession. She was a woman who could turn men's heads. Sam guessed her age at thirty. She had the trimness and vitality about her of a woman ten years younger.

"I don't believe in the Devil," Viv said.

"I have a feeling," Nydia said, looking at the woman, "that will change during the next few days."

Viv tossed her golden hair. "Bull!" she said.

The phone rang. Monty stilled the jangling. He listened for a few moments, acknowledged the call, and hung up. His face registered his shock and disbelief. "The paramedics who were here this morning, those men who picked up the body of Marie Fowler and who were later found dead," he spoke to Joe. "Their bodies have disappeared from Clark County General. And the assistant M.E. is missing."

"Drop the other shoe, Chief," Joe said.

"After being shown pictures of the two men, a floor nurse claims she saw the men walking out of the hospital, pushing a gurney with a man—or at least a body—on it. She swears it was the two paramedics. Said they lurched rather than walked, and their eyes were odd."

Viv gasped once and fainted. Sam got to her before her head banged against the floor.

Nellie Bennett lay on the couch in the den, her eyes looking at but not registering the scenes on the TV screen. She was thinking about Joe. Ol' hard luck Joe, she thought. Had a bad time with his wives. His first wife ran off and left him, taking the kids. Joe had no idea where she was; hadn't seen her or the kids in twenty years. His second wife drops dead of a heart attack right in front of his eyes, playing bridge, and now I'm dying.

Nellie was much younger than Joe, almost fifteen years younger. And before the ravages of cancer began eating on her, she was a very attractive woman. She knew she was and had to smile despite the pain in her stomach. Joe looked like a mournful old hound dog, but he could somehow attract good-looking women. And for a man in his fifties, Joe could still make the mattress jump when the lights went out.

She felt sorry for Joe. She just hadn't felt like sex in more than a year. She wouldn't have blamed him if he'd bedded down another woman. Not at all.

Having thought that, she could swear she heard a voice say something like, "Ummm."

She looked around her. No, it had been her imagination.

She rose painfully from the couch and took another pain pill. Lately, the pills seemed to lose their effectiveness She took another pill and returned to the couch. She was asleep in moments.

"Nellie," the voice whispered to her.

She stirred on the couch.

Her nose wrinkled at the sudden and thick smell that seemed to permeate the den. In her sleep, the smell was scented, but the scent only covered the real odor of burning sulphur.

In her drug-induced sleep, she thought she felt a hand lifting her gown. She thought it was Joe and she mumbled irritably. But the hand persisted. She felt its warmth—almost hot—on the bare flesh of her lower belly.

Then the hand withdrew and for the first time in months, she was free of pain.

She stretched until her bones popped and creaked, something she had been unable to do in months because of the pain it caused. It was a luxurious feeling.

"Isn't that nice, Nellie?" the dark-sounding voice entered her head.

"Oh, my, yes," she murmured.

"As compared to this."

Intense pain doubled her up on the couch. The pain was so hot and hard she cried out. It was more pain than she had ever experienced.

As quickly as the nightmarish anguish struck, it stopped, leaving her body. She sighed with relief. Sweat dotted her face and body.

"That's ever so much better, isn't it, darling?" the voice asked.

"Yes," she murmured. The harshness of the agony had dulled the effects of the drugs in her system. She was in a state of semiconsciousness.

"How would you like to live forever, forever free of pain?"

She giggled, enjoying her dream.

"Would you like that, Nellie?"

"Yes," she whispered.

"And you would give anything for that privilege?"

"Yes."

"Anything, Nellie?"

"Yes."

"Well," the voice held a smugness. "I think we are going to get along just fine, Nellie. Oh, my, yes."

"I don't like this place, Jon," Patsy said, holding very tightly to his hand. "It's spooky."

The young couple stood several hundred yards from the Giddon mansion, looming dark in the wet night. Not one light shone through the thin drizzle.

"It'll be all right," Jon assured her. But he was not that sure himself.

"Do not be afraid," the mysterious voice once more spoke to him. "I can assure you that soon you will have all that you have dreamed of."

Patsy stood as if in a trance. She was hearing none of the conversation.

"And Patsy?" Jon asked. "What about her?"

"She had her dreams as well, young man. She combated them, but they were there. Soon she will have them fulfilled."

"When do we go in?"

"Now," the voice said, then faded.

"Let's go," Patsy said. "I'm ready."

The heavy iron gates leading to the curving driveway opened as the young couple approached them. Neither Jon nor Patsy questioned how the gates opened, even though no one could be seen nearby. As they walked up the drive, they were conscious of red eyes watching them from the gloom on the wet hedges and shrubbery on both sides of the concrete. They were aware of a foul odor surrounding them, but somehow the odor never left the grounds of the estate. They did not know how that could be, but they did not question it.

They looked back only once, as the massive gates closed behind them. They heard the snick of a lock. It was as if they had entered another world, another time, another land, cut off from the outside. They could not see past the gates.

The huge oak and iron doors to the mansion swung open. Norman Giddon stood smiling at the boy and girl. The man was dressed in black robes.

"Welcome," he said. "Welcome and enter the kingdom of the Prince of Darkness. Welcome and embrace your new life."

Jon and Patsy stepped inside.

The doors closed behind them.

Patsy clutched at his arm.

Jon felt his heart pound with fear at the dark, hooded shapes gathered in the candlelit room.

The dark shapes moved toward the young couple.

"How's your wife?" Sam asked.

"She's awake," Monty replied. "She apologizes for fainting; she really isn't the fainting type. But I think all this finally got to her. Let's get down to it, people. What in the hell are we going to do?"

"Interesting choice of words," Father Le Moyne muttered. "Very apt."

"Let's count down our options," Joe said. "Assuming all this is true, and I guess it is. One: if we call in help—even if we were believed and not put in the cuckoo house—what would these—people do?"

"Sit back and wait," Sam spoke without hesitation. He wondered how he knew that. But he had experienced message after message from higher powers before, and he had learned not to question, just obey.

"Why?" Monty asked.

This time it was Father Le Moyne who replied. "I think what Sam is saying is this: Those who practice the black arts are in no hurry. They can wait us out."

"And bear in mind this is a game to Satan," Nydia said.

"You reckon we could get the Raiders in here to give us a hand?" Joe tried a joke. When the obligatory smiles had faded, Joe said, "Two: Who do we trust?"

"No one," Sam said quickly and firmly. "Both Nydia and myself have had experience with these types of people, and we can tell you to trust no one. Be suspicious of everyone, but don't be overt with your suspicions. Let them think everything is all right. And keep this in mind: We are going to be far outnumbered.

Joe counted it down. "Three: What do we do?"

"I can't speak for anyone else," the priest said. "But I am going to contact all the ministers in this town. I won't mention what we know is happening, but I want to see if they have sensed it, or are a part of it." He crossed himself at the conclusion of that last remark.

Nydia said, "Look for sudden changes in personal appearance, like Joe mentioned, the way many people smell bad now. Many times coven members will forsake cleanliness, for Satan is known as the Prince of Filth, remember. Look for the numbers six-six-six. Look for a cross placed upside down. And few true Satan worshippers can bear to look at a cross. Other than that, there is little more I can tell you. Just be very careful."

"We'll know what to do after they make the first move," Sam said. "We can't do much until we see if this is going to be a war of nerves or of violence."

"A war," Monty said. "It sounds like we're planning a war."

"We are," Father Le Moyne said. "And more than our lives are at stake. We stand a good chance of losing our souls.'

EIGHT

Will Gibson stood in the darkness of his hardware store. He was so thirsty he was weak and trembling. He knew he had to appease his new thirst; knew his body would not be satisfied with anything other than the hot salty taste of human blood. But some inner communication with the forces of darkness warned him that he must not kill—not yet. It wasn't time. Will could not explain how he knew that. He just knew.

He watched as that rich bitch Xaviere Flaubert drove past. Looked like she came from the direction of the Giddon house. Will watched her fancy car fade into the misty night.

He stepped out of the darkened store and stood in the stoop, shrouded in night. He heard the tap-tapping of a woman's high-heeled boots coming down the sidewalk. His heart quickened, his pulse hammering in his throat. He stepped out of the shadows just before the woman reached the edge of his storefront showcase window. The woman stopped, jerked with fright, put a hand to her throat, and then grinned when she saw who it was.

"Hi, Mr. Gibson," she said. "You really scared me for a second."

"I'm sorry," Will said, returning the smile. His teeth flashed very white in the gloom of the damp night. "I didn't mean to startle you, Judy."

Judy Parish, oldest daughter of Deputy Vernon Parish, looked up at the man. Her yellow hair caught the mist and bounced back shards of light. Judy had graduated high school that year and now was employed as a cashier in a local supermarket. Lovely young thing, with blue eyes and fair skin. She had that month moved away from her abusive father into a small apartment of her own.

The cold rain suddenly picked up in intensity and Judy ducked into the stoop, standing close to the man.

"You can't walk all the way to your apartment in this weather," Will said. "It's turning colder and you'll catch your death. Let me give you a lift."

She hesitated, looking at the man. Then she made her decision. Will Gibson was known as a good church-going man. A member of the Logandale Baptist Church. Sang in the choir. It was rumored that he and Miss Judith Mayberry were to be married. So it would be safe to accept a ride from Mr. Gibson.

"I hate to be a bother, Mr. Gibson."

"No bother," he said, trying to keep the impatience from his voice. He took her arm. Felt nice under his hand. "Come on. The car is unlocked." Typical small town.

They pulled away into the downpour. No one saw her leave with the man.

"I'm sorry about Miss Mayberry," Judy said. "I just heard about it this afternoon. Have you any word on what might have happened to her?"

Will had to fight to keep from laughing at the absurdity of her question. The near hysteria of the question and its truthful answer struck him hard. He controlled his black mirth before opening his mouth.

"No word, Judy." Never will be any further word from her mouth. Hairy bitch just squats and grunts, now.

"She'll turn up," Judy replied, with the eternal optimism of the young. "I bet she's all right."

He turned on the road leading out of town and Judy glanced sharply at him.

"This isn't the way to my apartment, Mr. Gibson."

"I know."

"Then—" She let the question dangle in the closed air of the car. It was then she noticed Mr. Gibson sure needed a bath. He smelled bad.

Will looked at her and smiled. In the dim light from the dash, she saw his teeth. His blood red swollen tongue. She noticed his very pale lips.

She felt panic rise up strong within her as he reached for her arm. She tried to pull away, but his grip was as powerful as a man three times his size.

"Please, Mr. Gibson!"

"We're going to have some fun," he told her. "Just the two of us."

"I want to go home!"

He clamped down with his new strength, bruising her flesh. She screamed in pain.

"Please take me home!"

"No more talk of home, girl. You just sit quietly and don't start any trouble. I'm not going to hurt you." Not much, that is, he thought.

She opened her mouth to protest and he slapped her, bloodying her lips. The sight of her blood filled him with the strange new hunger. Glancing in the mirror, he saw the road was clear behind him. He pulled over and turned down a seldom used country road, then turned off that onto an old logging road, now grown over with brush.

Judy began crying and begging.

Will cut the engine and turned off the lights. He pulled the frightened crying girl to him. To her disgust and horror, he began licking the blood from her lips while his free hand roamed her body. His breath was foul-smelling, sickening her almost as much as his tongue licking at her lips and face.

She began screaming and fighting him as he ripped the clothes from her. The rain grew heavy, drumming on the roof of the car parked in the woods. Her screaming could not be heard more than twenty yards away.

She fought him harder, but it was a useless gesture, for his strength came from the supernatural. He hit her with his fist and banged her head against the door, stunning her. When she came to her senses, rising out of a red painful mist, she was naked and Will was positioned between her legs. She could feel his throbbing hardness pushing at her.

She screamed as he took her, penetrating her with one hard shove.

She could not understand why he was biting her on the neck.

Jon and Patsy stood away from the circle of men and women in the huge room. After recovering from their initial fright at seeing black-robed men and women and a dark-haired woman, lying naked on a black-draped altar, the strange sights and sounds and smells began to intrigue the young couple. Norman Giddon had apologized for thrusting them too quickly into the scheme of things that evening. Said he could understand their fright. He had escorted them into a smaller room and given them refreshments. The drinks were very cold and very sweet. One seemed to call for another, and then another of the cold sweet beverage. Soon fear of the unknown had vanished as the drugged drinks began soaring through the systems of Jon and Patsy.

Norman Giddon stroked the arm of Patsy and said, "My, you certainly did enjoy your initiation into sex this afternoon, didn't you, my dear?"

She looked at the middle-aged man. The drinks had loosened her tongue as well as her inhibitions. "Yeah, once he got it in it felt good."

"I suppose it was a bit on the rough side, dear, but you have laid in your bed many nights and—how do I say this?" He giggled. "Let your fingers do the walking, so to speak. Correct, my child?"

She did not blush. Those days were past and would not return. Not only for Patsy, but for the majority of the residents of Logandale. "How do you know these things, Mr. Giddon?"

"That is something that will be explained in time, my dear. For now, just be content that you are one of us."

Good attempted to override its counterpart. "I am a Christian, Mr. Giddon."

"No, you are not, dear." He met her gaze. "You have mouthed the words since childhood, but your inner thoughts have betrayed your true feelings many times. You see, dear, my, or I should say, our God," he waved his hand toward the gathering of the coven, "finds none of what you have thought offensive. Our Master encourages the hedonistic life rather than discouraging it. While you did not realize it, for the past several months, you have been ever so slowly but surely edging toward us, and away from the God you profess to worship."

Patsy drank another cup of the sweet drink and thought about his remarks. She realized he was telling the truth, although he was twisting the words all out of context. "Perhaps you're right," she said. She looked at the altar. "Is that woman dead, or what?"

Norman smiled. "She is very much alive. And she is there of her own volition."

"Why?"

"She is a part (of the proceeding this evening. You shall see."

Patsy nodded her head in agreement. "All right. It won't hurt to stay here for a little while, I guess. Just to see what's going on. I can always leave whenever I choose."

The black-robed man smiled again. The battle was won, and he knew it.

"Will you tell me the truth if I ask you something, Mr. Giddon?"

"Call me Norman. Certainly, my dear. We have nothing to hide."

"You worship Satan?"

"Yes, we do, dear."

"And you really believe in what you're doing? I mean, this is not just a game to you people?"

"My dear, it is not a game to us. I can be quite adamant on that."

"And if I stay for a time, find I don't like it here—I can leave? Your people won't try to stop me?"

"You may leave anytime you wish, darling."

"All right," she said. She drank the rest of her cup of sweet juice. She looked at the cup. It had been refilled—somehow. "I'll stay for a little while. Then I really must be getting back home."

"Of course, you do. Well, you just wander about a bit; get acquainted. As you can see, there are many more like you and Jon here this evening. Many of your own age group. Socialize—just think of this as a club meeting." He licked his lips at the sight of her young breasts, pushing against the fabric of the blouse. Soon, dear, he thought. Very soon.

At Balon's house, Janet had put Little Sam to bed an hour before and had busied herself preparing a potion and a lust perfume. The potion would be given to Nydia; Janet would wear the perfume. The potion would not kill Nydia—under the rules of the game she could not be killed—but it would knock her out for a time. Long enough for Janet to carry through her plan. The potion would kill a pure mortal, but Nydia was half witch—even if she did reject that side of her—and the dark side of her would throw off the deadly effects.

For her heady perfume, Janet mixed carefully measured portions of lavender, aloeswood, jasmine. She added patchouli oil and allowed that to rest for a few moments. Then she added musk, civet, ambergris, and clove.

She found Sam's hairbrush and carefully removed a few of his hairs. She cut them into tiny pieces and mixed them into the perfume, along with a strand of her own hair.

She added three drops of her own blood.

She recited the Devil's chant as she waited for the perfume to ferment.

I come from the place of my Master,

The Prince Of Darkness.

He lives in the northernmost corner

That is void of light.

I am but a traveler in his Service.

I am his child of Darkness, and

I seek his wisdom and cunning to

Aid me in my endeavor.

For it is all in his behalf.

Oh, Prince of Darkness,

Help me.

The house began to stink of sulphur; the rain hammered on the roof, as if suddenly alive, a thousand demons screaming and flailing the air with fists of watery silver.

Janet cupped her breasts with her hands and gently squeezed, imagining Sam's hands on her body. She shivered in sexual anticipation as the wind and rain built in fury, pounding the home.

"Are you here?" Janet whispered.

The returning whisper came to her in a breath of stinking air.

Janet's smile was of the darkest evil. "Prince of the lower firmament, giver of light to the worlds beyond, I hear you and I will obey."

The perfume began to boil and steam in its glass container. Janet stood up and quickly stripped naked. She dipped her hand into the boiling mixture and it did not burn her.

She rubbed the mixture on her body, lingering long at her breasts and pubic area.

The wind pushed a tentacle of darkness into the house. The mist wound around Janet's ankle and traveled upward, to gather at her lower belly. Its touch was almost a caress.

The wind spoke to the young woman.

"I will do my best," she replied.

The mist snaked its way out of the house. The rain and wind abated in their furious assault. The tiny demons that seemed to possess each raindrop slipped back into the nether worlds.

Janet dressed in clean clothes, then poured the knockout portion into the glass of tomato juice she had prepared for Nydia. She knew Nydia liked a glass of juice each night before retiring.

On her way back to the den, she passed Little Sam's room, illuminated by a tiny night-light. The girl hissed her anger and fear at what was taking place.

Two halos of light had encircled the bed upon which the small child slept peacefully. The halos met in the center of the bed. One of the halos was pure white, clean-looking and brilliant. The other halo was dark and ominous appearing, with ragged edges and a filthy appearance. The halos seemed to be battling each other for control.

And the halo that was purest appeared to be just barely hanging on.

Janet tried to enter the room. A force prevented her from doing so, blocking her entrance with an invisible field.

"Leave!" she was instructed. "There is nothing you can do to prevent victory or defeat."

Janet backed away from the door and continued on to the den.

The child slept on, unaware that its future was being decided.

Judy Parish huddled on the front seat of the car. She was completely naked but not cold. She had been raped, but was feeling no anger toward her attacker. She had been beaten, but experienced no feelings of revenge for Will Gibson. She could not understand any of these emotions. Or lack of them.

The rain was now a quiet drizzle.

Judy looked over at Will. The man lay against the door on the driver's side. His breathing had slowed and his color had returned. He was naked from the waist down. He opened his eyes and looked at the teenager.

"How do you feel, Judy?"

"Strange."

"Yes, I know. I only became one of them a few hours ago."

"One of them. What am I?" She sat up on the seat. She made no attempt to cover her nakedness.

"I—am not certain," Will answered truthfully. "But I know that we are not—we have left some part of us behind and have entered into a new—dimension, I guess we could call it. Somehow I know it will all be explained to us a week from Monday. On October the thirty-first."

"Why then?" She reached over and began stroking his soft penis.

"I don't know."

She moved across the seat and bent her head. She opened her mouth and took him.

Will groaned and wound his fingers into her golden hair, and pushed his growing penis further into her mouth.

Just before leaving the Draper house, Sam said, "Halloween. October the thirty-first. That is when their time will run out. At midnight." He glanced at Nydia for confirmation; to see if she had received the same silent message. She nodded her head.

"But remember, Sam—all of you—Satan can and will change the rules in the middle of the game," Nydia cautioned.

"Game! Rules!" Monty said. "I keep hoping this is all a bad dream. That in the morning it will all be only a memory."

"I still have memories from the siege at Falcon House," Sam said. "Believe me, Monty, it isn't a dream; it's a nightmare."

"I still have doubts," Viv said. "I simply refuse to believe any of this is actually taking place. It's a joke of some sort, that's all."

"I believe it," Joe said grimly. "I don't want to, but I do. Well, I'm goin' home. Check on Nellie. I'm worried about her. See you tomorrow, Chief. Night, Viv, Father Le Moyne." He nodded his head at Sam and Nydia. Young couple spooked the hell out of him. Woman looked like a damned gypsy, and everybody knows them people are real funny. Can tell your fortune and all that stuff. Joe resisted an urge to back off the porch.

Sam glanced at his watch. Eleven o'clock. "We are reasonably safe on a Sunday," he said. "Covens don't like to tempt the Almighty too much. But not all of them fear Sunday. And if the Devil himself is here, Sunday won't make a bit of difference to him."

"That's nice to know," Monty said with a sigh.

"Bull!" Viv said.

NINE

Patsy had been amazed to see so many of her friends and fellow students at the Giddon mansion. It appeared that at least a full seventy-five percent of her class was in attendance. None of them appeared to be overly surprised to see her.

She walked up to a group of young people gathered near the black-draped altar. They were staring at the naked woman on the altar. She seemed to be in some sort of trance. Alma Nelson, a girl in Patsy's class, smiled at her.

"I was wondering when those goody-shoes of yours would begin to get dirty, Patsy."

"I'm only here to see what's going on," Patsy said with a primness that didn't quite come off. "I'll probably leave in a few minutes."

Claude Sullivan laughed at her. "No, you won't." Claude was sixteen, in Patsy's class. "You're not about to leave."

"I can if I want to," Patsy said defensively.

"Yeah, maybe," May Kendall looked at her and smiled. "But I don't think you really want to leave. 'Sides, look across the room, Patsy. Over there by that big picture of a man and woman screwing."

Patsy looked, squinting her eyes to peer through the gloom. She should have been surprised. Should have, but was not. For the past several hours, beginning with her struggles by the river with Jon, and ultimately her surrender to her lusts, Patsy had known she was only fooling herself; had been kidding herself about her feelings toward her faith. She had sensed something evil in this town some months back; had known it was real the times she lay in her bed and masturbated, allowing erotic scenes to play through her young fertile mind.

The girl sighed and let the Dark One have his way with her. She accepted the Prince of Evil. She drained her cup of juice and stared at the man and woman who stood quietly, looking at her, smiling across the room. The man unzipped his pants and removed his penis, holding it in his hand and smiling at the teenager.

It was Patsy's mother and father.

The old man opened his eyes, trying to make out the shapes standing by his bed. He could hear the sounds of his wife's breathing beside him. The man hoped she would not wake up and have to see what faced them out of the night. Was he awake? Marie Fowler, Dan Golden, and Jerry Jackson stood at the foot of the bed. Marie was still wearing her blood-stained sheet, circles of dried blood denoting where her breasts had been. The paramedics were dressed in hospital garb. The three were grinning at him, their grins a terrible sight in the darkness of the bedroom.

"You are old," Marie spoke to the man. "You have lived your time and more." Her words were hollow sounding, as if coming from far away. "But we are prepared to give you eternal life."

"I'm dreamin'," the retired farmer said.

"You are not dreaming," Dan said.

"I knew I shouldn't 'ave watched 'at 'oddamn movie 'ast night," the old man said. His teeth were in a glass by the bed, the words coming out slurred. "I 'new 'at sum-bitch would gimmie nightmares."

"He is a fool," Jerry said.

"Then we shall send them both to the pits," Marie said.

She stepped around the old four-poster bed and put a hand on the old man's chest. He tried to rise but found he could not. It was then, while he experienced the supernatural strength of the mangled woman and the coldness of her hand, that he knew it was not a dream. This was real.

He opened his toothless mouth to scream.

The bloodied woman covered his lips with hers. Her breath was foul, stinking of death. She gnawed at his mouth, sucking the blood that began to flow. Then he felt lances of pain in his mouth. The woman was eating his tongue. His mouth filled with blood. Beside him, his wife of fifty years thrashed on the bed as the paramedics sucked at her neck, pulled life from her.

Marie tore open the man's neck, lapping at the blood that erupted in fountains from the wounds. The old woman had ceased her strugglings. Only the twitching of her hands signaled that within her a spark of life remained. Soon that was gone.

The trio dragged the old man and his wife from the blood-soaked sheets, dragging them out the back door. In the darkness low growls greeted them.

The bodies were dumped on the ground. The two men and the woman lurched and faded into the night. The Beasts lumbered forward, red-rimmed eyes hot in the night.

They feasted.

Janet Sakall heard the car doors slam. Lying on the couch in the den, she smiled. Janet had no fear of Sunday. Very few in this coven did.

Janet heard the storm door open. She hid her smile. All was ready in her dark world.

For Sam Balon, a young man whose faith had been tested to the limits and had stood firm against the evil; a young man who had spoken with and fought alongside the mightiest of God's warriors ... his faith was again to be tested. As was his wife, Nydia. The town of Logandale was set to erupt like pus from a large boil, spewing its corruption over all who came near.

Sam stepped into the room.

"Hi, Sam," Janet said, smiling sweetly.