He was interrupted by another voice.
'Shall we run up the flags?' One of the faithful called. His single eye stared out from beneath the brim of a faded cap. Beside him, a short, stocky man with a humped back leaned on a cane. His teeth were a cemetery of crooked stones grown over with mildew, and his hair, long and scraggly, hung over his shoulders like dead seaweed.
'We shall indeed,' The Deacon said, inclining his head. 'Will you do the honors, Cy?'
The big man nodded.
'Andy, will you assist?'
The short, gnomish man nodded as well. The two bowed, turned, and disappeared through the door of the tent to set about their task.
The Deacon stared after them. Wind gripped the door of the tent and nearly tore it from Andy’s hand. It billowed like a sail. Cy passed behind his friend, his one eye raised to the sky, staring into a knife-slash of lightning. He didn’t flinch.
'I will need a deposition to go into town,' The Deacon said. 'We must move among them and spread the word. They need to know the danger that descends upon their souls. We must speak to them of the darkness.'
'We must promise them wine and song,' a cracked voice called out. The tent grew silent. The Deacon turned. Lottie grinned back at him.
'The will not come for their souls alone,' Attie cackled. 'They will come because not coming leaves them empty.'
'Their souls could be saved any day, any night,' Lottie added.
'They will come,' Attie added. 'They are empty.'
'Soul cages,' Lottie intoned.
'Yes…'Attie finished.
'Indeed,' The Deacon said. 'Would you three ladies lead the group into town? I would go myself, but I have preparations to make.'
'We will go,' Lottie said.
'We will bring them,' Attie nodded.
Chessie sat, silent as the grave. She did not meet The Deacon’s gaze, nor anyone else’s. Her sisters sat very close on either side of her, giving the illusion that they were joined at the hip.
'Take as many of the faithful as you need,' the Deacon said, 'so long as you leave me enough to prepare the tent. I have other tasks to assign, other preparations to begin.'
He might have glanced to the heavens at that moment, but he did not. He might have called them to prayer, or read to them from The Bible. They would pray with him. If he asked it, they would pray
'Three days,' he said. 'I will allow three days to prepare. On the night of the third day, as our Lord and Savior, our spirits will rise. We will roll the stones from the tombs of our hearts and open them to the good people of Rookwood.
'As the sisters say, there will be song. We will raise a glorious noise and drive the darkness from our doorstep. There will be wine. There will be a healing such as we have never seen. We will drive the darkness into the desert where it will wither, hungry for the souls we deny it.'
'Amen!'
This time it was a chorus – a cacophony of sound. They spoke with one voice, and they rose in one motion, streaming from the tent like ants from the top of a very deep, very dark hole. The Deacon watched them go. He neither smiled, nor frowned.
As they opened the tent to the darkness, the wind roared with the voice of an angry demon. Flickering candle and lantern light glittered in the wet puddles and mud beyond. Lightning flashed, and he saw his people scatter out through the camp. He waited until the last of them were gone before he snuffed out the lights. He doused them one by one, picking up the last of the lanterns by the wire handle.
The Deacon stepped out into the night. There was a light burning in his wagon, and he smiled. Colleen was awake. He breathed in deep, trying to taste her on the air. He exhaled. The child was awake. It took no magic to know it. He could hear the infant mewling. He wondered if Colleen was in the mood for a story?
‡‡‡
When Mariah finally woke, the wagon had long since lurched to a stop. It was dark, and her head felt as though it was stuffed with cotton, but when she pressed her palms to the wooden floor, she found she could sit up without much effort. Her body ached. It wasn’t a localized pain; it pulsed through her, every vein and every muscle. She felt her heartbeat, strong and insistent, but each beat burned like fire.
She was hungry. She rose shakily to her knees and crawled to the rear door of the wagon. She reached up to test it and see if she was locked inside. As she did so there was a rasping sound. The doors swung wide and Balthazar stood in the open doorway gazing at her with a mocking grin.
Behind and beyond him, lighting raked the sky. There was no accompanying rumble of thunder. There was no moon, and the stars had been doused by the storm. She heard the wind and the rain, but where she knelt, staring up into Balthazar’s dark, unyielding gaze, she felt no mist or breeze. She saw the rain, but it stopped somewhere short of the wagon leaving their camp dry. She heard the wind, but not a lock of her hair lifted from her shoulders, and Balthazar’s long coat hung around his legs, unruffled.
'I wondered if you would sleep your life away,' Balthazar said. 'There is bacon, and eggs. A tin of coffee is brewing. Hungry?'
'Yes,' she said. She tried to rise, but dropped back to her knees. She gritted her teeth and levered herself to her feet. She had to brace herself on the wall, but Mariah managed to walk shakily to the rear of the wagon. Balthazar held out his hand. He provided no support as she stepped down, but her legs didn’t buckle under her.
'Much better,' he said.
She grinned fiercely, despite the wave of nausea that rushed through her. She hated that his approval mattered, but for some reason it did, and it was suddenly important to her that something mattered. If he wasn’t lying to her, then her child waited for her somewhere in that storm.
Balthazar led her around the corner of the wagon. She tried not to think about what kept the rain at bay. She saw that the chairs sat before the fire once more. She stared out into the darkness. There were hills surrounding them, and a few gnarled, twisted trees were in sight.
'Where are we?' she asked.
'Not where we seem to be,' was his cryptic answer. 'We have little time, I’m afraid. We are going to need to speed your recovery, and your training.'
'My training?' she frowned.
'Sit,' Balthazar commanded. 'Eat, and listen. I am not in the habit of saying things twice where once will do. There are a great many powers in motion, and my patience, which is rarely tested, wears thin.'
Mariah took her seat by the fire. She had no idea what the man was talking about, but she’d caught the scent of freshly cooked bacon, and the amazing coffee he’d offered her the last time they'd talked. She reached for her plate and began eating without a word. Balthazar didn't sit. He paced beside the fire. Now and then he gazed out over the storm-swept desert, as though he expected to see something important out there beyond the curtain of rain.
When Mariah had finished, she washed the salty bacon down with coffee and set the plate aside. Balthazar turned. It was eerie how he sensed – or knew – the exact moment she’d finished, as though attuned to her. She thought about the moment she’d reached for the door to the back of the wagon and shivered.
'You had better get used to stranger things than that,' Balthazar said, snatching the thought from her mind.
'I don’t understand,' she said.
Balthazar turned to stare out into the storm. 'There are things you need to know, and others that you need to learn, and only some few things that you need to
