'What?'
'I … saw you and Roma.'
'But you were …'
'I know. But I could still see you both. I was so proud of you when you fought through the drug and began to resist.'
'The food was drugged?'
'No. The perfume she was wearing. An ancient aphrodisiac. She stayed within the rules of the game in using it.'
Sam shuddered. 'A game. Like no other game in the world.'
'While we're here, Sam, we're not of this world. 'We're kind of in limbo.'
Sam was conscious of that mighty presence near, but no voice sprang into his head. The force withdrew. At the door to their rooms, Nydia stopped him. 'You take a shower, Sam. You smell like … well, like her. I've got to do something; maybe it will help.'
'What?' Sam asked innocently.
She looked at him and shook her head. 'Douche,' she said flatly.
* * *
Sam tended to his face after the shower, applying antiseptic to the small cuts. One eye was puffy, the area under it turning a shade of greenish-blue, and there were numerous smaller bruises on his face and chest and legs. But he concluded he would live.
'How long and what for is the question,' he muttered.
'How skeptical you are,' the voice spoke to him. 'Weren't you warned you would be tested? And wasn't it I who told you not to fear should you sometimes fail?'
'I did a pretty good job of failing this night, didn't I?' Sam said glumly.
'So did your father, but he found a place beside God.'
'Am I right in doing what I'm … we're about to do?'
'I cannot answer that. That is something only you and the young woman can decide.'
'What if Falcon's seed takes hold?'
'She would birth something truly awesome and terrible. Your seed within Roma was strong, and she will please her dark master.'
'So I have to try and overcome Falcon's seed?'
'I told you: I cannot answer that for you.'
'Why do I feel that what I'm about to do is right, but with a nagging feeling of guilt that it is somehow wrong?'
But the mighty force had gone, Sam feeling the invisible presence fade from his brain. He looked up as Nydia entered the room.
'You said we'd know His reasons for throwing us together like this, Sam. And it wouldn't be a moral question … or issue. Are we facing the real reason; doing what is right?'
'I … think so, Nydia.'
She smiled. 'I hate to quote an old line, Sam, but please be gentle with me. I hurt.'
And he was, and they both felt their lovemaking was somehow pure, somehow sanctified. And when it was over, and they were asleep, lost in exhaustion, something entered the room, something awesome in its righteous power, and it guarded the two as they slept.
And they were truly not alone.
Miles and Wade stepped out onto the front porch, both of them wincing as the sickly sweet odor of death struck them again, assailing their sense of smell. They had just been around to the back, dragging the bodies of the Coven members from the backyard.
'I wonder why we can't smell it in the house?' Wade asked.
Miles smiled through the awful permeation. 'I would guess this house is off limits, Wade. Protected.'
The golem stared mutely ahead of him, unseen eyes never leaving the perimeter it was created to protect. It took no notice of the two men.
Somewhere in the distance, a thin yowl of pain could be heard, at first only a faint howl, then gradually building into a flesh-crawling shriek that wavered its way to the ears of the two men. The painful howling would then fade into a low moan, only to build again.
'Let's go back inside,' Wade suggested. 'I don't believe I care to leave the house again.'
'Not until Saturday night,' Miles said.
The editor glanced at his lifelong friend. 'And where do we go at that time, pal?'
'Home, old friend.'
