don't?'
'They don't work in Whitfield,' Balon replied.
'He says then maybe you would be so kind as to explain how it is he is talking with me on the telephone this very minute?'
'Tell him to think about it. The answer will come to him.'
She relayed the message, then stood listening for a few seconds. She laughed. 'He says he understands. He really doesn't, he said. But to please you, he says he does.'
'Hang up the phone and come over here and sit on the couch,' Balon said.
When she was seated in front of the only man she had ever loved, she smiled at the misty face and said, 'All right, Sam.'
'I will be able to protect you through most of what will occur during the coming days. But … in the end it will have to be your strength and courage that see you through.'
'Can you tell me why?'
'Not yet. Most of it you will be able to guess. After … all is done, then you will know.'
She smiled. 'I love question and answer games.'
'None of this is amusing, Jane Ann!' Balon fired the thought at her with such intensity it caused her head to ache. 'Sorry,' he said. 'But enough is enough. Miles is treating this as some sort of comedy burlesque; Wade is his usual smart-ass reporter self.'
'Sam! Angels aren't supposed to talk like that.'
'I'm not an angel. Even if I were, it wouldn't make any difference. Michael has been known to loose some oaths that caused tidal waves.'
'Do you two get along? You and Michael?'
Silence greeted her.
'Sorry,' she muttered. 'Conversing with the spirit world is not something I do every day, you know.'
'There you go again, being flip. I can't seem to get through to you—any of you—the horror that is beginning … for all of you.'
'Don't you think we know, Sam? We lived through it once.'
'But none of you will live through this. None of you. And your death, Jane Ann, is not going to be pleasant.'
'I realize that, Sam. Last night I prayed for help.'
'I heard you.'
'Did He?'
'I am sure He did.'
'You don't know!'
Silence.
'All right. Knowing Jean Zagone, I'm sure whatever is in store for me will be of a sexual nature.'
The mist projected no reply.
'Rape, I'm sure.'
Silence.
'Am I to be served up for the Black Mass?'
The mist gave no clue. Balon's unblinking eyes could not be read.
And then she knew what was in store for her; the culmination of the awfulness preceding the final hours of hideousness. She put her hands over her face and wept.
Balon could do nothing except silently watch, and invisibly weep with her.
A gentle rain began to fall over Whitfield.
Sam jacked a round into the automatic, eased the hammer down, and shoved it behind his belt. He glanced at Nydia. 'Let's go see this hole in the ground. See the Beasts.'
She grabbed his arm. 'Why did you say Beasts?'
'Because I know, now, that's what they are. I don't know how I know. But they are the Devil's Beasts. My dad fought them—or some like them—in Fork. And now I know for certain I have been tapped—chosen, if you will—to pick up where Dad left off. Just another part of the country, that's all.'
'And Roma, Falcon, Black … all those at the house?' she asked, almost running to keep pace with his long stride.
'I have to kill them,' Sam said.
'Or try,' she was forced to add.
'Yes.'
'You won't run?'
