“The icon?”

  Dhevic opened his leather folder and removed the polycarbonate sheet he’d shown her in her office. “You know what the icon is,” he said.

  “The—” She tried to remember the pronunciation of the word. “Campanulation? The bell?”

  “No.” He pointed down. “The striker.”

  Jane looked at the engraving again. At first she was bothered that the church in the engraving was identical to the church in her dream but, again, the power of suggestion. She’d seen the engraving in her office already, and her subconscious mind remembered that and inserted it into the dream. The striker, she thought. She squinted. The ball of the striker was star-configured. It stands for the Morning Star—Lucifer. “So this striker, this icon—”

  “Is what’s called a Power Relic,” Dhevic finished. “Think of it this way: the striker is the object of your cult’s worship, like a crucifix in a Catholic church.”

  Jane tried to sort her thoughts. “And you’re here…because…”

  “I’m here to for the icon. I’m here to retrieve it, to confiscate it—and return it to a secure location.”

  More silence.

  “I don’t believe for a minute that a striker from a bell in Hell—”

  “The Cymbellum Eosphorus,” Dhevic intoned.

  “—is in my town, causing people to become possessed.”

  The man nodded. “I understand. I’m not asking you to believe it. Just help me retrieve it. I believe it’s hidden somewhere in the West Branch post office.”

  She thought further. Okay. There’s some hokey piece of iron that people believe is part of this bell. I can deal with that. Dhevic thinks it’s in my branch. If it is, the logical thing to do is let him get it, and maybe all of this will end.

  “You want me to let you into my post office to look for this thing, is that it?”

  “Yes,” Dhevic said.

  “Well, I don’t know if I can do that,” she told him. “People will ask questions, and the police already want to bring you in for questioning. I’m probably breaking some law by not telling them that I know where you’re staying.”

  “I’ve committed no crimes.”

  Jane peered at him. Everything was opposites. Whenever she looked at him, she couldn’t believe he was anything but benevolent, if a bit bizarre. “Tell me how to find the icon. If I find it, I’ll bring it to you.”

  “It’s a very dangerous object. It’s very powerful—”

  “It’s only powerful if you believe in it. I don’t believe in it. I just want this to stop. I’ll go along with whatever charade I have to to end it.”

  “Is this a charade?” he asked in a softer voice. “Look at me. I want to show you something.”

  Jane grit her teeth. “No.”

  “You’ll believe…if you look at me.”

  “No! You’re hypnotizing me—”

  “Very well.” The man was smiling gently. “The icon will be hidden in some dark place, below ground, a basement, a crawlspace or a conduit—”

  “Of course. How creepy,” she mocked.

  “Because its owner exists in dark, low places.”

  “Fine.” She thought about it and thought about it. Maybe I should let him go with me, find this thing, and be done with it. She kept feeling like she could trust him, without knowing why. “I have to go to the bathroom,” she said, distracted.

  “Right over there,” he told her and pointed.

  She got up with hesitance, looked around at the dilapidated accommodation. “I mean—there aren’t, like, roaches and rats in there, are there?”

  Another smile. “No. I evicted them all personally. I told them that if they expected to stay, they’d have to split the cost of the room with me.”

  Jane spared a laugh and went in. Actually, Dhevic had cleaned the bathroom quite well—that or the housekeeping staff, but Jane doubted that this motel even had a housekeeping staff. She sighed and looked at herself in the mirror over the sink. Her eyes had dark circles; she was tired, worn out. All the more reason to get this over with, she thought.

  She stiffened at a skittering sound. Roach, probably… The things made her hair stand on end. Forget about going to the bathroom and just leave, she suggested, but a morbid curiosity seized her.

  The skittering came from the bathtub behind her. She pulled back the shower curtain and, indeed, saw a large palmetto bug roving around on the tub mat.

  But that’s not why Jane nearly had a heart attack.

  Lying on top of that rubber tub mat was a slim naked woman with her throat cut. Jane’s feet felt nailed to the floor. The woman was young, with long flowing mocha hair, her mouth agape in death.

  At the end of the tub sat a pile of clothes. Jane recognized the colors at once: the light-blue shirt and the slate-blue shorts. A post office uniform. And that’s when she knew who she was looking at; it was Doreen Fletcher, one of her newest employees.

  Carved on Doreen’s chest was the likeness of a bell with a star-shaped striker.

  Jane sucked in her scream. She popped open the narrow bathroom window, crawled out, and ran.

  There was no time to think. Her biggest fear was that her heart might begin to fibrillate from the shock of what she’d seen. The car, the car, she thought manically. What if Dhevic was waiting for her? Fortunately, she’d parked toward the end of the motel, in front of the office. When she peered around the corner, her car remained, and there was no sign of Dhevic.

  She took a chance, jumped in, drove away with her foot to the floor.

  Police, police, police, came the next staccato of thought. Steve, I’ve got to find Steve. She could pull over right now and call him, but she didn’t want to stop. It would only take a few moments before Dhevic realized that she was gone—and what she’d seen—and he would be after her. She pulled off the main road onto a side street, cutting across town. There was a county sheriff’s station just up the road. I’ll be safe there. I can call him from there—

  But the rest of her thoughts severed.

  Hands were on her from behind.

  Rough hands first cupping her breasts, then sliding up to her throat. Now she truly believed her heart would stop.

  Dhevic’s right behind me, in the back seat…

  But as the hands tightened, her terrified eyes shot to the rearview mirror, and that’s where she saw the face.

  Not Dhevic’s face at all.

  It was the face of Aldezhor…

  Suddenly ghosts of the Fallen Angel’s hands were covering her own on the wheel. She heard a chuckle and a whisper, felt the faintest kiss at the side her neck, then a foul hot tongue licked her skin.

  She heard words not in her ears but in her head.

  You will not foil me. And you will not challenge my servants.

  The hands were forcing Jane’s to steer to the side—

  The arrival of the Messenger is at hand…

  Jane’s car thudded over the curb, plowed down into a ravine, and collided with a yard-wide oak tree.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  * * *

  (I)

  Jane awoke in a murk, the most obscene nightmares tittering at the fringes of her memory. Had she awakened to the sound of a bell?

  She raised a hand to her throbbing head, felt a fat bandage there. When her vision cleared, she noticed with some shock that she was in a hospital room.

  What happened? Her memory was a blank.

  “Hi, Jane.”

  She looked aside and saw the smiling Dr. Mitchell peering back at her through his circular spectacle. He was holding a clipboard.

  Steve stood worriedly beside him, holding Jane’s hand.

  “Don’t worry, you’re going to be okay,” Steve said.

  “What happened?”

  “In clinical terms,” Dr. Mitchell answered, “you have a minor orbital concussion and sequent but extraneous abrasions…”

  “In not so clinical terms?” Jane asked.

  “You dumped your car into a ravine off of Craker Avenue, banged your head pretty hard. One of my patrol units spotted you and called an ambulance. Jane, what were you doing out there?”

  She felt bewildered. “I—I don’t remember.”

  “A retrograde amnesic effect, Jane,” Dr. Mitchell said. “It should pass in twenty-four hours, and so should the blurry vision and grogginess. If symptoms persist, though, call me.”

  “I think you should stay the night,” Steve said.

  “No, I don’t feel that bad, just a little lightheaded.” She winced in frustration. “I just…wish I could remember what happened. Is my car—”

  “Totaled, I’m afraid,” Steve let her know. “We towed it into town. And the kids are fine; I posted a female officer at your house to look after them. Christ, Jane, I was worried.”

  “Well, I still am…. What the hell was I doing so far away from the post office?”

  After Dr. Mitchell had released her, Steve took Jane home to his house. She wanted to talk about what happened, but the frustration just kept overwhelming her. Why can’t I remember anything? “This is just so aggravating…”

  “You heard the doctor,” Steve said. “That smack on the head gave you a temporary loss of short-term memory. But you gotta do what they say, get some rest, take it easy for a few days.”

  Sure, she thought. Take it easy. Gimme a break. She couldn’t remember anything. But in a moment, her eyes widened as a single memory popped into her mind. “Steve…I think—”

  Steve brought her some coffee to the kitchen table. “What? You remember something?”

  “Dhevic,” she whispered. “That’s where I was.”

  “Dhevic? His motel?” Steve stood poised at the information. “How did you get there?”

  “He…left his address the day he came to my office.”

  “We’ve been trying to find out where he is all week, but— Why did you go there? I told you the guy’s dangerous!”

  “I had to talk to him. There were so many things he’d said, things that were too uncanny. There was no one else to ask, Steve. But when I got there…” Jane closed her eyes, struggled to remember.

  The next flash of memory slapped her in the face. Her new employee, Doreen, lying naked and dead in Dhevic’s bathtub. “My, God, Steve, I remember now. You were right…”

  “What?” He was leaning over, intent. “What do you remember?”

  “There…there was a dead body in his bathtub, one of the girls who works for me. Her throat was slashed and…she had that bell-shaped symbol cut into her chest—”

  “Jesus Christ!” Steve exploded. “I told you he’s the guy behind all this! You’re lucky he didn’t murder you, too!”

  “I got out through the bathroom window before he could get to me…”

  “Where’s he staying?”

  Jane gave Steve the slip of paper; he snatched the phone. “Dispatch, this is Chief Higgins. We finally got an eyewitness for capital murder against Alexander Dhevic. Send all units ten-six to the Palms Motel on 34th Street. Arrest Dhevic on site, multiple homicide. And put out a statewide all-points.” He paused to ask Jane: “Any idea what he’s driving?”

  She’d seen that, too, hadn’t she? The big SUV right in front of his motel-room door. “A Ford Explorer,” it came to her. “It was silver. I know the make and model because I almost bought one once.”

  Steve piped the vehicle description to the dispatcher, and he hung up. Then he hugged Jane. “I’m sure he’s not dumb enough to be anywhere near the motel now, but at least we can take him in when we find him.”

  “Where do you think he’d go from there?” Jane wondered aloud.

  It was almost as if the woods conspired against him. Dhevic’s footsteps crunched through heavy thicket; fallen branches snapped like firecrackers. He knew he had to be very careful now; he’d avoided the main road and came in through the other side of town, on foot— They’ll be looking for me, he realized.

  He wasn’t terribly worried though. He knew that his Lord and Master would protect him.

  Where is it? he thought. Had he lost his sense of direction? It should be coming up any second…

  His hand reached out and pushed away some branches…and there it was.

  The West Branch post office sat alone in moonlight. Dhevic looked for signs of police, saw none, then jogged to the building, using shadows for cover. There were no cars in the lot—would there be maintenance people here this late? I’ll find out real soon, he thought. He opened a tattered briefcase, extracted his lock picks, and was in through a back door in little more time than it would take to open with the key.

  Dhevic stepped inside and closed the door behind him.

  The coffee was helping her feel better, even after the grisly recollection.

  “You’re right, though,” she said at the table. “I’m sure he would’ve left the motel once I got away.”

  “Sure, but now that I’ve got an APB out—plus your description of his vehicle—every cop in the county is going to be looking for him. There’s no way he can get away, Jane.”

  “God, I hope you’re right.”

  “Relax, I am right.” He poured more coffee for them both, then grabbed the phone again. “Let me call in and get a status report.”

  Jane went to the kitchen sink while Steve was on the phone. She needed some cold water in her face. It livened her, as she’d hoped, but it also sharpened the images of her memory: Doreen in Dhevic’s bathtub. She could hear Steve talking in the background.

  “Yeah, dispatch, it’s Chief Higgins again. I need a status report on that APB…”

  The strong flashlight beam roved over the darkened aisles, feeders, and collators. Just doesn’t feel right up here, Dhevic thought. It would be an easy vibe. He spotted a door, hoped it led to the basement, and when he opened it, he was right. The only problem, now, was going down there.

  I better not be afraid of the dark…

  His stomach flipped when he began to step down. The darkness was so complete, it seemed to soak up half the flashlight’s power. Downstairs was a clutter of shelves and storage bins. Columns of stacked boxes, in the shifting darkness, looked like men standing in wait.

  He was scared, yes, but when his head began to hurt, he knew he was getting close.

  There, he thought.

  The beam hovered over a crawlspace.

  Dhevic got on his knees and began to crawl in.

  Jane walked to the window in Steve’s dining room, still playing over her thoughts. She didn’t know where to start, what to do next; too much had happened for her to assess anything with any logic. “Good work,” Steve was saying to the phone in the kitchen. “I can’t believe it. And he had some of Doreen Fletcher’s clothes in the car with him? That’s lock-solid.”

  Jane’s eyes widened as she looked in the kitchen.

  “I can’t believe we got him so fast,” Steve went on. “That psycho son of a bitch. Book his ass and put him in the detention center. I’ll be down shortly.”

  Steve hung up. “Jane, great news. One of my mobile units arrested Dhevic a few minutes ago. He was heading for the interstate—”

  Then Steve’s look of confidence corroded to a frown of failure. He was looking directly at Jane.

  Jane had the dining room phone to her ear. She slowly lowered it. “Really? And who told you that? The dial tone you’ve been talking to the whole time?”

  “How did you know?”

  “I never specifically told you it was Doreen.”

  Steve signed. “Smart girl, stupid me. But I kept you strung along long enough.”

  Jane’s heart felt like it was twisting in her chest. “Why? You’ve been lying about this whole thing from the start? Why?”

  Steve smiled sheepishly. “Well, not from the start. Just a few days ago, actually. When I met the Messenger…”

  The crawlway was hot; cakes of dust stuck to the sweat on Dhevic’s hands and face. A panel at the end of the cubby was pushed out, leaving a maw of utter black. Would a Rive be waiting for him? I’d be able to see it, he thought. Or at least I hope so.

  It was hard to remain fearless; nevertheless, he crawled right up to the stinking opening and reached in.

  What would he do if something reached back?

  He closed his eyes and felt around. Yeah, if they’d used the striker to open a Rive, I’d definitely know by now…

  There was nothing.

  Then his hand landed on something:

  A box.

  Don’t count your blessings, he told himself. He pulled the box out. It was just a standard cardboard shipping box, oblong in shape. Its flaps stood open; Dhevic shined the flashlight in, and—

  My God. This is it.

  The iron striker of the Cymbellum Eosphorus lay at the bottom of the box. Dhevic grabbed it, kneed backward until he was out of the crawlspace.

  But when he stood up and turned around, he could plainly see that he was no longer in the post office.

  Jane shirked into the corner. I guess this is it, she thought with amazingly little fear. This is the end.

  “I was looking around in your West Branch the other day,” Steve began, “just looking for any clues or evidence, anything that might give me a lead as to how your employees all became connected to a cult, and, well, I found it. I found it in the basement…”

  The Rive opened before Dhevic’s eyes. He was standing at the threshold, that most narrow strip of anti-reality that exists between two worlds. To his back was his own world, to his front a byway to the abyss.

  Dhevic looked across the blood-red sky, saw the black church in the pestiferous valley. Tall pale things encroached, tumid sex organs swinging at their groin, enlarged fruit-like heads, stick-thin limbs, all showing black veins beating beneath translucent-white skin.

  Dhevic stepped back. Can they cross? he wondered, face glazed by sweat. Does the Rive allow them to cross from there…into here?