The Many Misadventures of Master Mystery: Murderous Mohrgs from the Moors, Part Three

Previously...

Reginald rolled with the vicious strike, tumbling haphazardly into a bin of rubbish. The creature scuttled along the wall, hissing as it grew ever closer to his prone form. Another leaped from high above, jumping from the opposing wall to the one Reginald was propped up against, clambering down the wall with sinister intentions glimmering behind its twisted visage.

“Is there a reason you’re attacking me, or should I take this as a breach in the Treaty of Thames?” Reginald blearily asks aloud, rubbing at the side of his head where he’d been struck. Both creatures, their boneless arms stretched out with tentacles spread out to grasp at him. “So I assume this isn’t an attack?”

“Oui…” One of the creatures slowly exhales, pulling back its offensive limb to better perch itself upon the wall. “’Ow is eet dat ‘ou speak?”

“With my mouth for the most part, though I do know how to do so with my hands should the need arise.” Reginald replies as he pushes the accumulated garbage away from him, pulling himself to his feet with the aid of the wall. “Do I need to speak with my hands gentlemen, or shall you explain yourselves to me?”

The second of the creatures, these Chokers as they’re so well known, are the twisted forms of orphans that have been kidnapped and transformed under the full moon. All of them are generally considered male, though they are actually genderless; they breed through their twisted kidnappings and witchcraft. Servants to those that bend the universe to their will, they generally act as protectors ever since they made a pact nearly two centuries ago stating as such: they protect the practitioners of magic, and they don’t get hunted down for the abominations they are.

“We… we though you was a Dead ‘ead milord… thought we might make a bit ‘o coin off ya, heh heh…” The first one answers, chuckling nervously as he extends a snake-like arm, tentacle fingers spread wide. “Me names Abner, and ‘e be Francois... we guard the alley, we do.”

I shake his hand in greeting, dusting off my coat as I do. The rain is dripping from the awnings overhead, and the trash had been hiding a rather nasty puddle of water tainted with the stink of past meals and rot. Reginald grimaced as the dampness soaked through his coat to his sensitive frame, and made a sweeping gesture with his left hand, forcing the water out of his clothes drop by drop.

Both Chokers wince at the sight of Reginald using magic, confirming their fears over what they had just done. Reginald let go of the offered tentacle mass, stooped low to gather his pipe from the ground. “We be nothing but full of shame, dear sir… we never meant to put the hurt on one so distinguished as yerself! It’s just…”

“I look undead; yes I get that quite a bit.” Reginald finished for the Abner, relighting his pipe and taking a few puffs from the treated tobacco, sighing once more as the relaxing chemicals entered his bloodstream. “But no worries gentlemen, I see no need to mention this to anyone so long as you don’t need to either. The very notion of telling this tale… it sickens me, I daresay.”

Both Chokers faces broke into horrid grins as they looked at each other in glee, before turning back to Reginald. “No, no need at’all! Go right on in, and tell Lucy the Abner says ‘ello. She’ll grant ye a spot of spirits, she will.”

“Lovely,” Reginald replies, stalking up to the door, knocking on it three times, “I’ll be certain to pass on your regards.”

A small window slides open on the door, revealing a pair of beady eyes beneath a heavily wrinkled brow. “And you are?”

“A man positively giddy upon hearing the Queen’s English spoken as it should be,” Reginald muttered before clearing his throat, “A fellow walking from the East, hoping to meet a fellow from the West. And you?”

“A fellow from the West well met.” The man replies from behind the door, sliding the window shut as a series of locks could be heard being lifted from the other side, the door finally opening after a minute of work, revealing the door to be heavy and thick, with numerous dangling locks and chains hanging from the side. The man was stooped and old, wearing a green cardigan and a thick woolen sweater. “Come on in then, out of the rain.”

Reginald stepped through the doorway, tingling as a wave of magical barriers and protections passed over him, making his way into the brightly lit pub full of men and women of all stripes and sizes. The entire room was kept warm by a central hearth, over which several spit pigs slowly turned on their own, filling the room with a delicious aroma that made Reginald smile a rare smile. The bar, low and set along the far wall, was bustling with patrons and servers alike, all laughing and drinking from great glass steins.

Taking off his coat as he moved into the light, he sighed as he heard a collective gasp come from those around him. “How in the world did one of them get in?” He heard someone ask from the gathered crowd.

“I assure you, I’m in no way one of them, whoever they are.” He said allowed, annoyed at being forced to defend himself once again. “And I must say, I don’t think I like the attitude I’m receiving from you lot. I thought the English were polite?”

“And I thought the Americans to be handsome!” A voice called out, creating a great stir of laughter throughout the entire pub. A large man, heavy set with a broad jaw and even broader shoulders sidled up to Reginald, throwing an arm around him to pull him closer to the fire. “We’re just playing around is all, no harm innit. Now, what’ll ya have?”

“Abner told me Lucy would provide me with some spirits on his behalf, and to send her his regards.” Reginald replied a bit stiffly, lowering himself into a seat at a table with the large man, along with two others. “Now who might you be?”

“Oh, so sorry then! The names Charles Clooney,” The gigantic man said with a gap-toothed grin. “And this ‘ere be Bill O’Donahue and Mickey McNully. We all work as porters down on the docks for Lucy o’er there.”

“Well my name is Master Mystery,” Reginald replied, ignoring the stifled laughter coming from O’Donahue, “And I am a detective, of sorts.”

“A detective are you now?” Charles said with a wide grin, slapping the table with his hand as his two friends both break out laughing. “And wot brings a Yank detective to the sunny side o’ England, praytell?

“The Whitechapel murders, actually.”

That brought silence over the three, as well as the surrounding tables that had apparently been listening in. An older woman with a long blond braid and a wide midsection marched up to the table with a tray of drinks, three glass tankards full of a dark frothy beer and one small bottle of green liquid, cork firmly stuck in place.

“Here ya go gents, one bottle of Absinthe for the stranger and three drinks for my own boys,” the waitress said with a smile, passing the drinks out. “I hope Abner didn’t do anythin’ too embarrassing sir. ‘E only offers to buy someone a drink if’n he does something embarrassing.”

“No Lucy, he was a perfect gentlemen.” Reginald replied, picking up the bottle. Snapping his fingers to shrink the cork, he took a long sniff from the rising air of the bottle as it let out its first breath, savoring the sickly sweet smell as if it were a fine wine. “Ah, a fine bottle. My thanks to you and your pub.”

Perhaps this wasn’t such a terrible day after all…
Next Time

Fire up the Kindle!

To Hell

Got my short story "To Hell" published by the fine folks at Dark Moon Publishing, for their sixteenth installment of Dark Eclipse Magazine. As you can only read it online, the above link is for Kindle users.

The Many Misadventures of Master Mystery: Murderous Mohrgs from the Moors Part Two

Part One

Today most certainly was not a good day.

While Reginald had suspected this day would be like so many bad days, it was confirmed upon entering the Pink Swan to find himself grappled from the sides by a pair of young giggling girls, squeezing his thin limbs between their scantily clad breasts in a way they assumed he found enticing, cooing their greetings into his ears.

This lasted as long as it took for the girls to get a good look at him in all of his ghoulish glory, swathed in his black cloak and black silk clothes with ashen skin and sunken eyes; they leaped back with girlish shrieks, his appearance terrifying them into a mindless stupor as they began to make a scene. Reginald glowered at the cabbie and an older busty redhead who were both laughing at the scene, while the rest of the bar all stared at him in abject horror.

“’E’s the Ripper! The Rippers ‘ere!” One of the girls, a younger blonde in a slinky green dress, shrieked as she backed away from him, pointing a shaky finger.

The rest of the working girls all began screaming as well, their various clients rising from their seats, menacing looks etched upon their faces. Before things could get ugly, the older redhead fired a gun into the air, sending broken pieces of wood and plaster showering down around her, but effectively silencing everyone. Looking up, I could see the ceiling dotted with so many holes, so this was apparently commonplace.

“He’s no Ripper more than I am, ya lot of wankers an’ poofters!” She bellows across the wide bar, a tightly bound corset forcing her prodigious assets up and almost out of her tight dress. “Robert here jus’ brought ‘im in from tha’ docks, a travler from America. ‘E’s been trapped on a damned boat fer tha’ better part ova month, so ‘e ain’t killed anybody!”

Reginald’s head hurts from both the gunshot’s loud clamor to the matron’s horrid grammar, but he merely sniffs once to show his disdain for all of this… indignity he must suffer through. He tugs his coat forward with both hands and walks over to the bar, keeping his face as stoic as he can as every pair of eyes in the room follow him.

“One room, madam,” He says to her with a slight bow, before bending over in search of a guest registry, “Under the name of Master Mystery.”

“Wot kind of name is that?” She asks with a bit of skepticism, leaning over the counter to get a good look at me.

“The same kind of name as your manner of speaking; a silly one.” He replies curtly, snapping his fingers towards the cabbie, Robert, and his pile of luggage. “Nevertheless, I shall require one of your more spacious rooms for the time being and am willing to pay for it. Tell Robert which room is to be mine and he’ll bring my belongings up forthwith.”

“Uhm… I ‘spose room numbah four Robbie, the last door on tha’ left.” The madam says, tearing her eyes away from Reginald for the briefest of moments. “An’ how will you be payin’ fer this room Mister Mystery?”

“Master Mystery,” he corrects her before pulling a thumb sized emerald from his pocket and sliding it across the bar to her, smirking as her eyes widen at the sight of the sparkling jewel. “That should cover my stay so long as I don’t stay longer than a month, wouldn’t you agree?”

She nods mutely, snatching the gleaming gem from the countertop the moment my fingers leave it. “M’lord, for this you’ll be gettin’ the royal service fer this, you will!”

“How charming,” He replies before turning towards the door and making his way out. “I’ll be returning in the wee hours of the morning. I trust my room will be prepared by then?”

“O’ course! It’ll be as spick and span as a freshly scoured chamber pot!” The madam said with an enthusiastic nod, motioning for the two girls that had flanked him (bouth still quivering like leaves in the wind). “This ‘ere is Sara,” she said, motioning to the blonde, “an’ this be Annie! They be the help I ‘ave running this place when they ain’t working the floor or the streets. Jus’ ask ‘em for anything at all and they’ll get it for ya.”

Delving his mind into the Ethereal, Reginald quickly wound a few chords of stray energy around the two girls so he could find them should he be in need of anything, the protective ward he’d cast over the structure still settling into the nooks and crannies of the old building. Pulling a small pocket watch from within his cloak and flipping it open, he gazed at it with his eyes full of ethereal vapors, the long minute hand spinning about wildly in search of the nearest concentration of magical energy.

South, more South East, and from the way the arm was twitching it was actually rather close considering the size of London in general. Flipping the copper top closed he tucked the wind-up trinket into his cloak once more before wordlessly pushing out the door and back into the dismal grey skies of London, curtains of foul smelling rain pounding the cobblestone roads as if they were beneath a waterfall.

“Lovely,” He muttered to himself, fishing in his coat for his dark wooden pipe, standing beneath the awning over the brothel’s wide doors to remain warm and dry, well drier. Packing the pipe with a special blend of tobacco he had personally steeped in several medical solutions, he lit the pip with a casual wave of his hand over the bowl, smiling as the feeling of a warm blanket wrapped about his frame ever so snuggly. To everyone else it appeared to be a thin gentleman enjoying a pipe while walking through the rain.

To a Sorcerer like himself, it would look like a man using a brand of Indian folk magic to ward away the rain, allowing it to slide off his gaunt body like water off a frog’s back. “And to think we call them savages,” He muttered to himself around the pipe, puffing a few times to get the relaxing effects of the tobacco into his system, “The have cities bigger than London dating back a thousand years ago that thrived on a barter system, we have cities that destroy the rivers that we drink from with our own waste.”

Walking down the street with his shoulders hunched over and his wide brimmed hat pulled flush over his head, Reginald headed South along the river, occasionally pulling his pocket watch from his coat to get his bearings, trying to find the largest concentration of Ethereal energy in the area.

After an hour of sloshing through the flooded streets of Whitechapel, he finally found the damnable place, cursing his own stupidity over having literally walked over it at least a dozen times, usually while cursing at his own device for being broken. A drainage grate just outside of Dorset street revealed the large concentration of supernatural activity beneath his feet, forcing him to walk down the darkened alley looking for an entrance that would lead him down.

The alley was dark, the overcast skies doing little to help him see the litter cluttered alleyway, several barrels of trash overflowing next to one another, great swarms of flies and gigantic rats happily gorging themselves on the leavings of man. Heaving a sigh, Reginald closed his eyes and pulled himself into the Ethereal, leaving his physical form to stand in the pouring rain.

The world, once dark and grim, was now grainy and bright, colorless with great swathes of black and white to contrast one another. Walls were translucent, as was the ground, showing Reginald the various doors and tunnels leading about the darkened alley, one door in particular bearing an invisible marker above it, labeling it a safe haven for the supernatural.

Sadly, that would have to wait as he could see three sparkling souls descending down the walls towards his deserted body, their souls writhing and pulsing with hunger and need. Pulling himself back into reality, he opened his eyes just in time to make out the blazing red eyes and glistening teeth of a creature the size of a small boy, its arms twice the length of a tall man ending in thick serrated tendrils, the elongated head letting out a low screech as it whipped one of its arms out towards Reginald faster than one could see
Today was turning out to be a terrible day.
Next

The Many Misadventures of Master Mystery: Murderous Mohrgs from the Moors

Today was not a good day.

“Gods, the weather is just dismal in London,” complained a man of gaunt appearance and lean frame. For those to first look upon him, they would be reminded of the recently risen dead, ones that were heavily considering returning to the grave out of apathy rather than any true desire to harm. “How in blazes do you people live here? It’s always raining!”

The cabbie, a surly man with a much healthier build and skin color, turned and glared at the sallow skinned youth for a brief moment before turning back to the reins. “Ya get used ta tha rain after ah bit… where was it ah was takin’ ya?”

The passenger sighed, the rings under his eyes along with his sunken features made even more disturbing by the shadows cast by the cover preventing the rain from soaking him to the bone. His bags were safely stored in the undercarriage of the… well, carriage, and while he wasn’t against travel to the old country, he was most certainly against travel to England.

He hated the rain.

Well, in reality he disliked pretty much everything that could be offered in this fine world, but he chose to keep that to himself. Like others in his field, he was peculiar to the extreme, and the general public rarely felt at ease with him around.

Again, this might be because he looked like the recently deceased. He liked to think it was because the universe hated him.

“For the third time, take me to any inn or brothel in Whitechapel. I don’t care which.” He said with an annoyed huff, watching the rain pour in sheets onto the narrow London roads of cobblestone and mud.

“Whitechapel, eh? ‘Ou know wot’s goin’ on there, right mate?” The cabbie asked, whipping his horse once for slowing down. “Not a lot o’ folk willin’ to risk the alleys o’ Whitechapel, they is.”

“Hard to believe you’re English the way you speak…” The passenger muttered before raised his voice. “Yes, I’ve heard the tales, however tall they are. Just take me to my destination and be silent and I’ll tip you an extra twenty pounds.”

That shut the driver up, who merely pulled the collar of his coat higher to protect his neck from the pouring rain around him. Reaching into his coat, he pulled a flask of his favorite beverage, a colonial brew that fortified the nerves while providing vigor to the senses. Taking a long pull, he gazed out the open window at the rainy streets of London and sighed.

This was going to be a long one. He could already tell.

Master Mystery, as he was known by the many he chose not to reveal his true name to, was by far one of the world’s most well established Parapsychologists, Exorcists and all around Hunter of the Dead. This was not to say he liked his job, but with his gifts also came the curse of possessing those gifts. And so when he was relaxing in his New York flat with The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, only to be interrupted by the sudden appearance of a ghost wailing about her murder, one could say the Master, his true name Reginald, was most displeased.

The spectral image bore the horrific markings of her death, a great slash across the throat deep enough to cut into the spine, along with far more precise cuttings along her abdomen. Swirling green mists enveloped her, chains of the underworld wrapped about her lithe frame but unable to pull her to the great beyond due to her unfinished business. Wailing and moaning, she’d been taken aback when Reginald had politely asked her to “silence that racket and act like the lady you once were!”

And so over the course of an hour, and several cups of tea served by a very understanding butler, Reginald interviewed the spirit of Mary Ann Nichols, a streetwalker from London. She claimed to have been slain by a man with glowing red eyes and the ability to breathe flames, with “knives for hands, and steel for teeth.”

The dead were well known for being overly dramatic.

Still, when she told him of a secret cache of savings she and her friends had been hoarding, offering it as payment should he avenge her death, who was he to say no? After all, Master Mystery was a man of action! A man of vision! A man who had bills to pay!

And so here he was, sitting in a leaking wooden carriage with an Englishmen doing his best to butcher the language in the middle of a “light rain shower” that would have drowned out the Midwest. Snapping his fingers, a sudden twist of reality warped before him, green mist forming the face of a clock telling him the local time. Waving his hand through the vapors to clear them, he leaned back in his seat and took another sip from his flask.

Peering out the window, he saw that the street sign bearing the name of “Whitechapel” slowly pass them by, the stained wood cracked and worn from the constant beating it took from a very angry Mother Nature.

“We’re ‘ere Guvner!” The cabbie announced, pulling back on the reins of his trusty steed to slow the carriage to a stop. “Tha’ best brothel in all o’ London it is, wit’ cheap room and cheaper women!”

“How lovely,” Reginald replied drolly as he studied the building from his seat. Two stories high, the place was obviously an inn due to the small swinging sign bearing a bed and a bottle, paint-stripped lettering proclaiming the dank building to be the “Pink Swan,” “Go ahead and bring my luggage inside and rent a room for me. I’ll be in shortly.”

The cabbie looked ready to protest, but a pair of twenty pound notes shoved into his face quickly silences him, as well as hastened his rather rickety movements as he unloaded his large from the driver’s seat and quickly began to take the luggage into the inn. Clapping his hands, Reginald pulls on the spiritual chords of London, trying to sense any disturbances in the local area, before throwing a cheap alarm ward over the inn.

Pulling his cloak around his shoulders, he takes a deep breath before pushing open the door to the carriage and quickly climbing down the ladder, wincing as mud spatters up onto his favorite pants, a silken set of black pants from the Far East.

Looking to the sky and then back to the inn, he heaved a sigh and moved to the door.

Today was not looking like a good day at all.
Part Two

Authors Note: Like The Son of a Preacher Man series, expect to see additions to Master Mystery's story quite often. He's an older character of mine, a sort of magical Sherlock Holmes that deals with supernatural crimes. I enjoy his character quite a bit, and hope you will too. 

Zombie Games, Part One

“Welcome, one and all, to Doctor Dead’s Island of Fear and Dread!” Crackles an overly cheerful voice over a loudspeaker, a loud squawking noise honking out from the old set directly above me with almost every word. I grab at my head, trying to will the pounding headache away, but have little luck.

“I’m sure you’re all wondering what you're doing listening to my dulcet tunes this fine morning instead of waking in your oh-so-comfortable beds like you would any other morning!” The voice screeched over the intercom, ignoring my pleas to just shut the fuck up. “Well remember that dreamboat or hottie you were talking to last night, that you were planning on bringing home to shag rotten? Well, turns out they’re kind of a bunch of dicks: you see, I pay them to drug people for me and then load them onto my boats, bringing them to my private little island.”

I blink my eyes, rubbing at them as best I can from inside this strange metal coffin, looking down at my feet, I can just make out that while there’s no lid to this thing, there is a small door. I quickly begin kicking at it, cursing the damn bitch who I thought was so into me last night; laughing at my jokes, twirling her hair, blowing me in the parking lot… the signs were all there that she thought I was a catch.

Turns out she was just a slutty mercenary.

Why do I always attract money-hungry whores, I wonder. With the first few, you think it’s them, but I’m well past the counting stage now… so it must be me.

Fuck.

“For those of you that haven’t heard of me, you’re obviously not a big fan of the internet or the news, so I’ll fill you in,” the voice continues, grinding into my hangover like a screwdriver in my ear, “We all know the dead are a very real, very dangerous thing, yes?”

Of course, I think bitterly. Fucking zombie outbreak every other week on the news, the CDC must be working overtime cleaning all that shit up. It’s why I quit watching the news actually… to damn depressing.

“Well I’m the cause of all of those fun times. You see boys and girls, Doctor Dead here actually is a Doctor! I invented a fun parasite based off a few existing ones that essentially brings George Romero’s nightmares to life!” The voice was entirely too cheerful for this time of day. A-ha! My boots have dented the door and a ray of blinding light is now filtering into my tiny metal case.

“Since I’m hiding from all the major governments of the world, I’ve decided to have a little fun with my projects… by testing them on you!” He cackles over the intercom, not the laughter of a sane man. “Right now you and five other men and women are sitting in a time locked vault on my little island maze, with the great prize at the center: a case of antidote for any who get infected, one per person of course, and a speedboat fully stocked and loaded with a GPS locator to send you to the closest friendly nation. All you have to do is survive.”

Oh fucking hell…

“Despite many governments best wishes, I stream this live from my island via a few hundred cameras to over a dozen different casinos throughout the world. Should you survive, and added bonus is you automatically have a fifty thousand dollar bet placed upon you to live, payable to an account in your name. I of course, as the master of ceremonies, get a ten percent cut of all winnings from the happy gamblers and their addictions, and the populace at large finally gets a reality television show worth watching.”

“Now that we’re all on the same page of the playbook, I say let’s let the games begin shall we? This time around, I’ve decided to divide the teams evenly, with three men and three women per team. Now, just to be a fair host, I’ll just remind all of you that while you are indeed suffering from a hangover, that pain in your head is actually from a pair of microscopic cameras I inserted into your eyes, so the audience can see what you see.”

Thought this was a rather harsh hangover… I think bitterly, kicking again at the door before a loud buzzing noise emits from it, popping it open. I yelp as the metal sheet I’m lying on rolls out, revealing we were all in morgue-style cadaver boxes, and that we’re all cursing and cussing at the sudden infusion of bright light.

“Ten minutes before the vault door opens, boys and girls! Ten more minutes before I release the lever that holds back a good deal of the zombies at bay.” The voice crackles over a new intercom coming from the center ceiling tile of the room. “You should find plenty of supplies to make weapons or armor as you please, so go ahead and have fun… and to quote a man I love ever so dearly, let the games begin!”
Next Time!

Dark Eclipse Magazine #15

     A new issue of Dark Eclipse Magazine is out, and yet again it's full of thrills and chills! Swing by the Amazon page if you own an e-reader and contribute to a local publisher, the cost is only a $1.99, and helps local writers get their creative juices flowing!

Dark Eclipse Magazine #15

Son of a Preacher Man: Pound for A Pound

Son of a Preacher Man Part One

        Night in New York has always been a comforting time for me, for as long as I’d lived here. After migrating here in the early sixties, I’d had the fortune to blend into the growing crowd of delinquents and hippies that were fighting for basic human rights, allowing my rather illicit nightly activities a bit of leeway, the police more worried of some Satanic cult springing up than of a Vampire stalking the streets. I always made certain, especially in those days before the organ trade was worth noting, to thoroughly loot my victims.
Back then such finds were easy to move through pawn shops, or to melt down into small bars of gold or silver. Cell phones with tracking devices were never anything I needed to fear, nor credit cards; cold hard cash was easy to find so long as I looked hard enough.
I can feel the harsh rays of the sun ebbing as the fiery orb slowly sets over the horizon, my rigor stricken body gaining mass and strength as it did every night. My burrow or grave dirt, dug beneath my hall closet, was far too narrow for a man to try and fit into.
Thankfully I wasn’t a man.
Death has a funny way of granting you a new perspective that not many are so fortunate to know. For example, flexibility. With my body being nothing but rubbery bones that suffer from nightly decay, I can squeeze and slither about like the fabled serpent of Eden. Twisting my limbs, groaning in pleasure as my joints crackle and pop from the tunnels tight grip on me, I writhe and push with my muscles, inching my way up from my sunless burrow, pushing the trapdoor up and away from the hidden tunnel with one gangly arm as I emerge, covered in dirt and grime that mars my pallid flesh with dark streaks of mud.
Pulling myself bodily from my nest, I lean back and allow my bones to realign themselves within my body, cracking and grinding as they slide back into the proper positions to allow me the grace of appearing human. Reaching up with long fingered hands, I pull one of the many towels I keep here from a low shelf, wrapping it around my naked lower half as I struggle to stand.
Even the dead have modesty you know.
I push the door open, ignoring the gagged cries of my house guest dangling in the spare bedroom, and slowly pad my way to the bathroom in hopes of getting a hot shower. I do so love my hot showers these nights, as they not only make me feel human, if only for the slightest  while, they also heat my the stolen blood coursing through my dead veins, allowing it to move faster than the sluggish, clotted rate it moves now.
The hiss of the shower reminds me of my nightly chores that I have to do, from finishing the new set of jewelry for the upcoming wedding at the Temple to checking in at one of the many businesses I own. Stepping beneath the scalding water, I sigh as my pale flesh begins to grow pink.
“The only one who could ever teach me…” I begin singing softly, watching the swirling brown water, carrying the filth of my warren, down the drain in a lazy circle. My shower, like all showers, is brief; I don’t sweat and have no discernable odor to speak of, so bathing is a rather pointless endeavor barring I dirty myself.
I spritz on a few pumps of cologne before dressing myself. My thermostat tells me the weather outside is a tad frightful, so I make sure to dress appropriately. A navy blue sweater with a black vest and matching slacks should be more than enough to ward away the cold. My wrist length gloves fit nice and tight, as do my boots. One thing I learned from my time in Poland was, despite their horrid war crimes, the German’s knew how to dress for the cold.
I check on Oleg before I leave, tapping his catheter a few times to make certain I didn’t need to change it yet, his IV bag still half full with fluids. He scowls at me (as best as one can with a ball gag strapped into their mouth) and gurgles what I can only assume to be an insult at my. I smile and pat his face lovingly.
“Now try not to get too crazy while I’m gone,” I say to him with a smile as I move to set up the stereo, turning it to the classical channel just in time to catch the beginning of one of Traetta’s operas. “A little culture would do you some good, my dear Oleg. Try and absorb the tragedy within the music. Perhaps you’ll learn something from it.”
He howls in rage as I get my overcoat and keys, turning to leave him. As I grab my hat from the rack by the door, I snap my fingers as I remember. Moving quickly, I stride down the hall to the spare bedroom where Oleg hangs from the ceiling and pull the door closed, and move to set the heater to a comfortable setting for him. Grabbing my hat, I hum my favorite song as I lock up and make my way out for a night on the town.

***

The young woman shrieks, a high keening wail that echoes from the high walls of the tall buildings surrounding us here in Lower Manhattan. The street lamps are all out, darkened by a mere force of will to allow me an easier hunt. The young woman who was waiting for the bus noticed the darkness that had swallowed her up and, just as I was climbing down the lamp post, ready to pounce, pulled a flashlight from her purse and turned it on mere inches from  my face.
The sight of my distended jaw and jagged teeth was apparently too much for the poor thing, as she’d taken off running whilst screaming her lungs out. I wasn’t about to allow her to escape, as there were enough rumors going around about murderers and serial killers thanks to my extra curricular work harvesting organs. The last thing I needed was some terrified teenager telling some reporter about a monster that tried to eat her.
Leaping from pole to pole, boots bouncing from my shoulders where they hung from knotted shoelaces, I follow as silent as the stars above her, carefully guiding her into a narrow alley that ended with a high brick wall. Every time she tries to veer away, running in a different direction, I drop to the ground, hissing and swiping at her with my extended claws. Between my gaunt features, rows of needle teeth and blazing red eyes, its enough to corral her where I want her.
And want her I do. She may not know it, but she’s someone I’ve been stalking for years, waiting to find a chance to make her mine.
As she runs into the darkened alley, tripping over discarded newspapers and other assorted garbage I drop at the mouth of the alleyway, sealing her in. She screams even louder as she runs into the wall, scraping at the uneven bricks loud enough for my ears to hear nails cracking, for my nose to smell the slight coppery scent of blood rising room her hands. She cries, begging me to stop, begging for God to save her… begging for someone to save her from me.
Nobody can hear her, save for me.
I slowly begin strolling down the alley, allowing the light behind me to flicker back on, granting her a small reprieve from the darkness that had consumed her. Now she stares at my silhouette as I approach.
“What do you want?” She cries at me, her face puffy and red. She throws her purse towards me, its contents exploding out from within it at my feet. “Money? Just take my money and leave me be!”
I stop, looking down at her offering. Bending down, I casually root through her assorted make-ups and feminine products before finding her wallet, tugging it free from one of the many compartments of her rather expensive wallet. Flipping it open, I ignore the checkbook and the credit cards, as well as the line of crisp bills folded neatly into the money clip. I smile as I yank her drivers license free, tossing her wallet behind me carelessly.
“Angelina Leopold… what a beautiful name.” I say aloud, reading from her drivers license as I begin walking toward her again. “I can assume you have no clue as to why I’ve been hunting you, do you?”
She shakes her head, her breathes short sobs and far too erratic for her to speak. I press on closer to her, earning a keening cry from her as I close in on her.
“I’ve come for you this cool Autumn night as I have you have a debt to be paid to me, Mrs. Leopold. One that has been owed to me for over eighty years.” I rasp, my teeth dripping with saliva as I close in on her, her pounding heart music in my ears.
“I’ve never don anything to you!” She all but shrieks, shaking uncontrollably. “I don’t know who you are!”
“That’s of no consequence.” I dismiss, walking slowly until I stand a mere three feet from her. “My grudge is not against you, but your bloodline. You are the great-granddaughter of  Julius Schreck, a man who did so much wrong in his lifetime that his crimes must be paid for be his descendents.”
“I don’t even know who that is!” She wailed, backing away from me until her back hit the wall. “You have the wrong person.”
In the blink of an eye I’ve slammed into her, pinning her against the wall with my forearm, my other hand grasping at her bleeding fingers, pulling the hand up. “This is all I need to know who you are child.” I rasp, my eyes flaring red as I begin to lose my temper. Reeling it in, I allow my eyes to smolder as she stares at me in terror. “Your grandfather was a cruel man Angelina… a very cruel man. He and I had a deal some eighty years ago that he reneged on, throwing me into Hell instead of allowing me to live free.”
She gurgles at me in protest, fighting to breath despite my elbow in her throat. I press into her harder, causing a pained whine to slip past her lips.
“I told myself I would get my revenge, one way or another.” I say with a feral smile, dropping her limp hand as I reach into my coat pocket, fishing out a scalpel. Holding it up just high enough for the light to glint off of the stainless steel, I smile as she begins panicking once more. “Good, you realize what I’m here to do then?”
I take her choked rasps and sobs as a no. “I’m here for my proverbial five pounds of flesh, as it were. Not many are willing to settle their debts to me it would seem, so I’ve decided the Bard’s tale seems to possess a fitting punishment for those unwilling to settle their debts.”
Twirling the blade between my lithe fingers with precision, I bring it up in a flash of glinting metal, slashing through the side of Angelina’s blouse with a single swipe, revealing the pale white skin beneath. A slight scar, faded by time, ran from her bottom rib and up beneath her black silky bra.
It seems like a good place to start as any. Looking her in the eyes, I smile reassuringly at her tear streaked face, making shushing noises to silence her choked sobs.
“Be quiet child, shhh…” I whisper comfortingly, as well as I can with my forearm pinning her to the wall of a darkened alley. “I seek only what your grandfather owes… for my time in Hell, for every month I suffered, a pound of flesh is but a paltry sum if you think about it.”
She begins to scream and scramble against my grasp, though I quickly silence her movements with an ample amount of pressure to her throat, silencing her with the blissful state of unconsciousness. Using my glittering tool, I quickly shed her outer layer of clothing and lay her down in the alleyway, her back partially in a puddle of stagnant rainwater. Looking around, I smile at the cover provided by a large green dumpster, and quickly set to work.
Pulling a long length of several plastic garbage bags, I lay them flat next to her body, which now lies nude before me in the light of the full moon. My bloodlust tingles in the back of my mind, tickling at my senses in it’s desire to be sated.
Not tonight, I’m afraid.
Reaching for my ear buds, I slip them on and press play on my mp3 player, smiling as Dusty’s voice takes me back to a time when things were simpler, hunting was easier and those that deserved punishment didn’t try and hide themselves.
Humming softly to myself, I pull a small white scale, no more than a few ounces in weight and completely digital, and set it gently on the ground. Pulling a lighter from another pocket, I flick the flint a few times before the flame erupts forth, basking us in a warm orange glow. The sharpened edge of my scalpel needs to be properly cleaned if I’m to do this right.
The next ten minutes are pleasantly spent listening to the wiles of a preacher man’s son while I slowly, carefully, begin to carve away nine pounds of flesh away from the young woman. The first to be carved away are her cheeks, then her breasts, all tissue that is unnecessary to stay alive. Both index and ring fingers join my collection, leaving my an ounce over nine pounds, which just isn’t fair.
Pulling my bloodied gloves free from my pallid hands, I reach into one of my inner coat pockets and fish out an old necklace, one warn by a kind French woman who’d had the displeasure of encountering me whilst hunting some fifty years ago, lone before I migrated to America. I wrap the golden chain around her wrist, avoiding the golden cross dangling from the end, and cup her ruined hand around it. Cauterizing the wounds is a trivial matter, as is wrapping up my gathered meats, wrapping them tightly in plastic wrap before bagging them in old grocer bags, stuffing them within my jacket.
I pull a bottle of filtered water from my coat, rinsing off my blade, as well as my leather gloves, before taking a small squirt bottle full of ammonia and spraying the entire area down. While I may leave no fingerprints, and DNA testing merely reveals a hodgepodge of who I’ve been eating, I’ve learned over the decades not to take chances. Pulling my gloves back on, I reach into her purse and rifle around until I find her phone. Flipping the strange device open, I dial 9-1-1 before merely dropping it on her body and leaping up the wall of the alley; she’d live, but she’d always carry the scars of the past, just as I did.

***

I return home late, with only a few hours until the sun rises remaining. I carefully stow away my liberated justice within my fridge and make my way to the back room to see Oleg. The radio has abandoned Traetta’s work in favor of some of Mozart’s later symphonies, forcing my to turn the damnable thing off lest my ears begin to bleed. Oleg hangs from his hands, naked as the day he was born, with tubes running in and out of him, carrying nutrient-filled fluids and waste to and from his body.
His eyes flutter open weakly as I close the door behind me, shucking off my long overcoat as I hum the last chorus of Dusty’s song. Looking to him, I smile. “The only boy who could ever reach me, was the son of a preacher man oh yes he was… was… was…”
He grumbles behind his ball-gag, a tired and thoroughly defeated noise. “My my Oleg! Have you finally admitted defeat?” I ask in mock surprise. “Well that changes how this evening will be going drastically.”
He looks at me, his dead eyes full of nothing but curiosity and loathing. “What would you say to an actual meal, instead of all of this needle-food I’ve been forced to give you?”
He looks at me as if I’d grown a second head before hesitantly nodding his head. I move forward, a smile on my face as I remove the ball-gag from his mouth, granting him the ability to talk for the first time in three days.
He moves his jaw back and forth, stretching it out as he clears his dry throat. “Wh-what you gonna feed me? Poison?”
I laugh, patting him on his sweat drench shoulder gently. “By no means would I do such a thing. To murder you wouldn’t teach you a lesson. And after all, that’s why we’re here isn’t it? To learn a lesson.”
He ignores my bait and instead shakes his head slowly. “What you gonna make me?”
I smile, flashing all of my sharpened teeth to remind him of his manners. “I’ll make you some lean meats, if it’s all the same to you; chicken breast, maybe some pork chops… a few ribs if you behave while the restraints are loosened.”
“Oh my god, yes… yes, of course I’ll behave… sir!” He says, tears coming to his eyes at the very thought of getting real food into his growling stomach. The gastric feeding tube I’d cut into him some months ago was, while wholly nutritious, in no way filling. He was perpetually starving with the small amounts of nutrient rich glop I forced into his system, and an actual meal would be a small slice of heaven to him right about now.
Well… more like a slice of Angelica. But he needn’t know that.

Authors Note: A stand alone story that has always left me wanting to write more. Shylock is an interesting character in my eyes, as you rarely find a Vampire story that not only identifies with his victims, chooses to try and help others while maintaining his needed supply of blood. He metes out punishment as he sees fit, and has a long memory. In this story Angelina is the descendant of a former SS Officer that was a personal friend of Adolf Hitler and was known for his rather volatile actions taken against Jewish and Gypsy populations.

Enjoy!

The Art of Fear

            Not a horror story, but more of an analysis on what fear truly is. I’ve commented before in previous publications, but true horror to me is something that is different with each person as it grows, but it all spawns from the same tool.

            Suspense.

            Suspense is what separates the good horror from the bad, allowing an author (or director) to craft a scene and plant the seeds of fear in the reader (or viewers) mind. Once planted, the author can manipulate the story however he pleases, so long as he watches his Crop of Fear. If used properly, he can use Suspense to elicit a maximum amount of fear from a reader with minimal effort.

            Here is a fine example of how to use Suspense to create a memorable moment, while also being scary on a psychological level.

            View even if you do not know the game, as the video also shapes and introduces the characters as needed. A perfect showcase on how to use Suspense visually, in my eyes.               

A Warrior's Tale Part Two

Previously...
The pitch-eyed dead come at him faster than he'd like, a slow lumbering gate that while not exactly fast, promises that it will never slow down. All three have similar wounds, a simple torn out throat, and a carving of the Horned One’s emblem upon their foreheads. James recognizes one of them to be his comrade in arms Heinrich a fraction too late as he is forced to raise his arm in defense of the grasping fingers of the first of the groaning corpses.

As these zombies were once soldiers, all of them seem to have retained their strength and then some. James had hoped the leather handle of the whip would have been enough when draped over his arm, but the hungering maw of the dead merely bit into it, the bloodied teeth scraping so close to James’s arm in the process, and begins to chew through the tough leather like it’s a slice of roasted ham.

Ignoring the jeering crowd above, James kicks Heinrich in the stomach, sending him tumbling back into his fellows, and makes a break for one of the spears lying on the ground some ten feet away. The dwarf squawks in fear, and runs back with me, scooping up a sword with both hands. He looks to James in desperation, the dull gleam that James had grown accustomed to seeing in the dim jailers eyes pleading him for aid.

James merely nods before moving forward, slowly. The downed dead right themselves seamlessly, requiring neither hands nor knees to pull themselves up from the ground, merely the muscles of their body working in complete and utter concert together.

“That is not right,” James grumbles at the sight, choking back the bile billowing in his throat from the smell of the rotten flesh pervading the air, as well as whatever fluid they were covered in… ale?

The undead move in unison, shambling forward, one with a whip dangling from its mouth as it continues to choke the weapon down, the long cords of leather slowly disappearing down the dried gullet of my former friend.

Before they even get within striking distance, James lunges forward with the bronze-tipped spear, sinking it deep into the throat of the largest undead, yanking it to the side to sever the esophagus and vocal cords, but sadly not the spinal column. Some damage was done it would seem, as the ghoul drops to the ground, seemingly forced to drag itself with one arm while kicking out with one leg to propel itself in a truly bizarre shuffle.

The Dwarf is trying his best to handle Heinrich, and failing utterly due to my former-allies superior strength. The Dwarf sank the blade deep into Heinrich’s hip, causing his right leg to go slack. Sadly, going slack doesn’t prevent Heinrich’s probing hands to gain purchase on the Dwarf’s leather jerkin, ripping into it with the full ferocity of a starving wolf, the whip now waggling about like some obscene tongue. The other undead, a hulking mass of rotting flesh that could have only been Baldric, reached over Heinrich and grabbed at the dwarf as well, his jagged nails tearing a deep gouge into the hapless jailer’s semi-exposed chest, blood spurting out from the wound in thick gouts, splattering across the cold floor in a messy streak that only seemed to excite the dead further.

James whirled his spear around and once more stabbed at his crippled foe, this time scoring a solid meaty wound into the beasts swollen back, the bronze tip sinking into the creatures back like a knife slicing into undercooked meat, black blood welling up from the wound, dribbling onto the cold floor like heated tar. The dead thrashed about at the end of his blade, but it allowed him enough leverage to kick the beast in the side of the head, cracking it’s skull open and dislocating its jaw with a meaty thump. The creature shuddered and collapsed, its energy spent and its body done.

James released the spears haft and made his way to the two undead ripping into the jailer. His jerkin had finally been peeled off; revealing his hairy folds of greasy fat to the hungering dead’s questing fingers. Heinrich, the tail of the whip now dangling past his swollen and torn lips, was twisting and pulling on the screaming dwarfs arm with a fervor bordering on the mad, the arm in question cracking and snapping at the rough treatment it was receiving, already dislocated from a brutal yank.

Baldric’s titanic form had pushed Heinrich out of the way, lifting the dwarf bodily into the air as he sank his rotten teeth into the jailers flank, tearing away a wide strip of flesh with wild thrashings of the head, chewing on the meat noisily as the Dwarf screamed and pleaded for aid. Above it all, this disfigured man had begun a sermon concerning the Horned One’s kindness, his love for us all, and how we could repay it.

Wrenching the sword from Heinrich’s hip, James brought the gore-spattered blade in a high arc before flashing it low, sinking it deep into the back of Heinrich’s neck, tearing through sinew and spine alike as he yanked it free to stab once more into the rapidly expanding wound. By the third strike Heinrich fell to the floor truly lifeless, his head dangling from his neck by mere strips of worn and leathery flesh.

Turning on Baldric as he tore into the Jailer, James took a moment of ignoring the dwarf’s dying screams to take in all that Baldric had become. Pitch black eyes, with skin pale enough to see the dead veins beneath his cold flesh, heavily muscled limbs seeming to strain with every movement as Baldric’s body and muscles moved in complete tandem, unlike James’s own living body, which would scream in agony should he try and move like Baldric.

Despite his terrifying size and strength, he was dispatched easily enough as he was too enthralled by his captured dwarf, the light sword taking four hearty chops to fully remove his head from his taut shoulders, the dwarf falling to the ground like a forgotten chicken bone. James stomped on the poor dead things head, just to make sure he wouldn’t have to fight a diminutive zombie next.

“The Champion of Light has showed us the way!” The disfigured priest declared before a distraught audience, silencing their growing anger with his jubilant praise. “The Horned One desires the merchants to be better tested upon later, gifted with a more potent plague perhaps or some other amazing boon from the Horned One. For now, Champion of Light… what is your name?”

“Uh… James. James Hartglow.” He calls up, a tad embarrassed, and confused. He’d never had so many eyes upon him at once.

“Well than praise to James, Champion of the Light of Truth, shining unto us the true will of the Horned One through sacrifice, going so far as top slay the jailer that held him for us.” The disfigured man bellowed, clapping his hands three times in a slow rhythmic way that his congregation followed. “Go now my children, and come back once the New Moon has come, when the eyes of jealous God’s will be turned away.”

As the crowd apparently began to disperse, James looked up to see the smiling face of the disfigured priest. “Go on then Champion, the jaw is also a set of stairs to the kennel. I will have someone meet you there.”

***

The climb up the stone stairwell was slippery, slick with whatever the three walking dead had been soaking in, the sweet smell of decay mixed with the strange alcoholic stench confusing James’s senses far too much for him to hazard a guess. After climbing perhaps forty steps, he arose in a well lit room inside a high walled bowl of sorts, the thick glass walls of the bowl reaching the ceiling almost.

When he leaned in to look at the glass closely, he heard the grinding of gears and the clatter of chains once more, the path behind him closing up with a smooth piece of stone rolling over the stairwell, and undoubtedly the jaw was closing outside. A closer rattling of chains began, spinning off of a pulley and being pulled by some sort of cloven animal, from all the commotion going on past the glass barrier.

Which was slowly sinking into the ground until it was only knee high, revealing the disfigured priest and a pair of armed guards wearing the same grey robes. The room was long, carved from the same stone his jail cell had been made of, and containing a number of iron-wrought jail cells, deeply cut alcoves with iron bars and doors covering them, holding back the moaning dead, at least forty to fifty of them between four such cells. Opposite of the lowered glass barrier was a turn sty with a bound horse, the flank hairless and torn into by some savage beasts, or men, before it had died. Now the dray beast served eternally as a beast of burden, an iron muzzle strapped over its mouth and an iron backing keeping the creature from rearing up and hoofing people to death, or trying to eat people.

James could not even imagine how terrifying a flesh-starved horse from beyond the grave could be, and prayed to God he’d never find out.

“Here’s our dear Champion.” The disfigured Priest said happily, holding out his arms as if presenting James a present. “How are you feeling James, are you hungry? Thirsty?”

Looking around at all of the rotting meat, James swallowed the bile in his throat before clearing his throat. “A, um, a little thirsty?” He half said, half asked.

“Of course!” The priest said, his hearty voice not something James would expect from the emaciated, diseased body standing before him. “Let’s get you out of here and into some more comfortable clothes, get some food and wine into you!” 

James couldn’t argue, save for when the priest slung his arm over James’s shoulder, patting him on the chest with a leprous hand as he guided him out of the kennel and down a well-lit corridor, the two guards following them, but at a respectable distance.

They entered a smaller room, two long wooden tables adorned with bowls of fruit and small casks of wine dominating the majority of the room, both curved around the center which held a roasting pit, red hot embers cooking what appeared to be a sheep or hornless goat, slowly being turned on a spit by the skeletal remains of some poor soul.

“Spicer, is the mutton ready yet?” The Priest asked the skeleton as he forced James into a seat, and to James’s horror the skeleton remained silent while an unseen boy, emerging from a shadowed alcove he hadn’t noticed, probably due to the presence of a skeleton that upon closer inspection as it moved around the fiery pit and into a better source of light, looked like it was wet with recently spilled blood. Yet he left no sanguine smears as he patted the boy on his shaven head, running his fingers almost lovingly down his bare back. The boy was clad merely in stitched leather pants, with a leather cloak and hood that he wore, which were folded over his tiny arm.

“Ready enough for the killer over there, yes. I prefer mine more burned, and I know the child prefers it well done.” The little boy spoke in a flat tone, looking at James the entire time with a lost, dead stare. James took a moment to stare at the boy before realizing with a terrifying revulsion that the bloody skeleton somehow spoke through the child.

The skeleton seemed to pick up on James’s thoughts, and the child merely shook its head. “You misunderstand Champion, the boy was a needed sacrifice to grant me a voice, true. But he was also a volunteer from amongst the followers of the Horned One. He has served me now for a little over a week, and probably will survive a full year as my voice before I must select another child.”

“That’s horrible!” James cried, looking on in revulsion as the young child moved to tend to the spit sheep, grasping the handle and turning it slowly.

“That’s debatable, but most would agree that I’ve spared the poor boy a horrid life of disease and famine that seem to run through this region fairly often. Even when we’re not spreading the disease ourselves.” The skeleton said with the child’s voice, the small body of the boy straining as it spoke for the unholy creature. “And afterwards, he’ll go to the afterlife to be with the Horned One. You’re Christian I assume?”

“Yes? What’s that have to do with anything?” James hotly demanded, looking between the speaking child and the seated skeleton.

“Just look at me, not the boy,” The boy said as he finally managed to get a rhythm to the spit sheep. “It just means you’re familiar with sacrifices and slavery is all. I find it strange you view this so poorly.”

“What the Hell do you mean?” James asks again, this time focusing on the skeleton, and the baleful green glow that radiated from the empty sockets.

“Well let’s see…how about the story of Jephthah, who burns his daughter alive for God as an offering, in thanks for his great luck as a competent general? Surely that’s far worse than what I’m doing here, especially as the young lass hadn’t accepted Jesus as her Lord and Savior, and so she went to Hell afterwards for essentially committing suicide by allowing her father to do such a thing.”

“That… that’s different! The Lord commanded that!” James protested, only to see the skeleton go into a fit of convulsions as the boy let loose a string of high pitched laughter.

“That… That is rich. Your Lord commands it, so it must be fine. Well I serve a different Lord and no,” the skeleton rose its bony hand before James could interrupt, “I don’t serve Satan or whatever. Hardly a point in siding with the losing team after its already lost.”

“Then who the Hell is this Horned One supposed to be?” James demanded, taking an apple from one of the fruit baskets as he only now realized how hungry he truly was.

“A God that backs up his word with actions, not just sending his son in some lame excuse for a loophole out of eternal punishment that hadn’t been known before said son came about.” The boy snorted as he took a long fork and a sharpened dagger and began slicing off long juicy pieces of flank, placing them on a wooden platter at his feet. “I mean really, why the sudden need for a Hell?”

“It’s always been there, we just didn’t know about it!” James cried, not really knowing how to argue with a skeleton and his boy-puppet. That seared sheep did smell good though, and the disfigured priest smiled as he nudged a small decanter of wine towards James with his elbow. “Thanks, I guess.”

“Don’t mention it,” He waved a thin hand at my thanks before pointing at the skeleton. “And don’t argue religion with Spicer, he’s as cruel with his words as he is knowledgeable. You’ll regret debating him about your God or his existence.”

“So you all are Atheists?” James asked, remembering the word from the Latin Mass.

“Please,” the boy laughed as the skeleton convulsed once again. “We know of your God’s existence, that’s why we denounce Him. After all, He’s just one of many to choose from.”

“He’s the one true God!” James argues, giving the priest a pointed glare as he chuckles and shakes his head.

“According to him.” The boy says dully, placing the platter of steaming sheep flank before me. “Dig in, more than enough to go around. And to quote your God in reference to other deities, ‘You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me.’”

“Yeah,” The priest says around a mouthful of pear. “That just shows he’s not the only God.”

“And that he’s jealous of other deities taking what he views as his.” The boy said with a tone of finality to his words, slicing away a rather crispy piece of leg meat, and chewing on it thoughtfully.

James found that he knew no way to argue as he ate, especially against a Pagan priest and a skeleton using some sort of twisted magic to use a boy as his voice. It was all too surreal for him to even try and argue.

The food was good, at least.
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