Father. Are you ready?'
'Yes. Did you get the articles I asked for?'
'I got them,' Sam replied. 'They're in the hall. One for you and one for me.'
'You're a brave young man, Sam.'
Sam didn't respond to the compliment. He was as scared as the next person; but he knew fear was contagious, and he could not let his personal fear show. 'Come on, Father. Let's do it. Noah? Even though a bullet won't stop them, enough lead will knock them down in case we run into—'
'Sam!' Joe yelled from upstairs. 'Them folks that was by the gate—they're gone. I think I seen them walkin' on the grounds.'
They all heard the back door open and close. The smell of the grave permeated the house.
THREE
'I sure would like to dip my wick in that Balon woman's snatch,' Sheriff Pat Jenkins said to Vernon. 'Sexy bitch.' They stood a safe distance from the mansion, both of them looking at the hugeness of Fox Estate in the night. 'Then I'd stem Monty's wife.'
'Fine-looking cunts,' Vernon agreed. 'But Mille's the one I want.'
'Miller Jenkins laughed. 'Hell, Vern. She's been spreading that pussy around town since she was twelve/thirteen years old.'
'It ain't wore out,' the deputy replied. 'Other than a woman's mouth, the pussy's the most durable part of her body. Besides, there's only two kinds: big ol' good ones and good ol' big ones.'
The crowd of unshaven and unwashed men laughed at the old joke. The stench of them was foul. Dan Evans said, 'And you ain't never had no bad, huh, Vern?'
'Nope. Just some that was better than others,' Vernon said. He looked at Jenkins. 'Why don't we rush them, Pat? Just rush them and take them out of that mansion?'
'The Master says no. The Princess says no. We have to obey. The Master is going to win this time, and he knows it. He wants to play with them for a time.'
Vernon nodded his head in understanding. He looked around him. 'Anybody here wanna come home with me and fuck my old lady?'
A huge fat man stepped up, an equally fat man with him. 'Me and Jesse'll take a whack at her, Vern.'
Vernon looked at the pair, an amused look in his eyes. 'Yeah. One in front and one in back. That ought to be a sight to see. Wanna come see the show, Pat?'
'Bet she'll holler,' the sheriff said with a smile. 'Yeah, let's go.'
The grounds of Nelson College lay dark and quiet in the purple of Satan's night. A light mist clung to the land, undisturbed by even a whisper of wind. Inside the dark structures, however, it was quite a different story. Low moanings could be heard from nearly every room; weeping and crying out for mercy came from the basements; the begging and pleading for God to put an end to this suffering and degradation whispered and echoed around the deserted halls and corridors of the buildings. The slap of flesh against flesh, the gruntings as male hardness hunched in and out of female softness played a rhythmic tune without melody or meter as dozens of rapes continued into the night.
In the basement of the administration building, a bloody and naked young man clung to life and love of God. Life was rapidly leaving him; but love of God had not. He refused to renounce his God.
Another young man, his clothing blood-splattered, stood over the naked young man, a stained knife in one hand. He turned to a group of men and women. His smile was macabre.
'Are you ready to take the pledge to forever serve the Master?' he asked the crowd of young people.
'Yes.' The reply came as one voice. All eyes were on the hideously tortured young man tied to a table. To a person they had enjoyed the horrible cries from the torture. Yes. They were ready to take the pledge of submission.
Professor Edie Cash began intoning the chant that would forever seal the fate of all who repeated the damning words.
And all present repeated the chant of the damned.
Screaming filled the basement as the knife-wielding young man began cutting into living flesh. He removed the still beating heart and held it in his hands, blood leaking from life's muscle, dripping onto the floor.
'Now you are and always will be one with us,' Edie told the group. 'For you, there will be no turning back. Now, go! Seek out and find all nonbelievers in the word of the Dark One. Bring them to us.
The room quickly emptied.
Edie looked at what was left of the young man on the bloody table. 'Stupid fool,' she said. 'He could have had eternal life with us.' She lifted her eyes to the young man standing with the knife and heart in his hands. 'Have him taken to the Beasts.'
'Yes, mistress.'
Sam and Father Le Moyne ran from the room and jerked up the sharpened stakes leaning against the wall in the hall. Sam paused for a moment at the door.
'Lock all the doors to this room and don't let anybody you don't know inside. No matter what they might say. And be sure it's who you think it is. Father Le Moyne, Noah—let's do it.'
The smell of the undead was strong in the mansion. The smell was of rotting flesh and blood. The lights flickered off and on, finally settling into a dimness, shadowing the corners and pockets of the hall.
