it rose.
As the three frightened men watched, a bolt of lightning struck the top, sizzling and charring its uppermost layer as if it were flesh. Steam rose as the whole mass shrunk in spasm. It stretched once more, continuing to ascend. They thought they could hear a shrill wailing beneath the roar of thunder.
'What is it!' Flynn shrieked close to Shay's ear, the grip on his leader's shoulder tight.
Shay could only shake his head in a stupefied gesture.
'Let's leave this heathen place, Danny! There's no good for us here!' The leader climbed to his feet, bringing Flynn up with him, his eyes never leaving the monstrosity growing from the lake, this seen through a screen of driving rain. McGuire joined them, afraid to be left standing alone. He clutched at Shay's other arm.
'There's no turning back!' the leader yelled. 'Whatever devil's work this is, it doesn't matter! It'll not stop us doing our job!'
'No, it's a bad business, Danny!' McGuire protested.
Shay hit him, a back-swipe of his hand. 'You'll do as you're told! The house is close, an' he's in there!
We'll not leave until it's settled!' He shoved both men from him, forcing them to turn their backs on the lake with its phenomenon that could only be some kind of illusion—there really couldn't be any reality to such a vision. Although . . . although didn't he see for himself two of his own men dragged down into its terrible depths?
Shay began running, cutting out further thought, intent on one purpose alone, urging McGuire and Flynn to follow. They did for, scared though they were, disobedience was unthinkable.
They did their best to ignore the squishy gurgling of the sinuous island as it heaved itself from the water, resisting the temptation (it was as though there were whispered entreaties in their minds to do so) to turn round and watch. They kept their eyes on the manor house which was now but a short distance away.
Most of the lights were on, a welcoming relief despite the duty they were bound to perform, a glorious beacon in the darkness they had travelled through.
They found themselves on firmer ground, gravel crunching under their feet as they dashed forward, no caution in their untidy gait. There was a porch at the front, an entrance like a darkened cave. Flynn strove to keep up with the others, the pain in his ankle a handicap, his hand tucked into his anorak pocket touching the revolver there for comfort. He suddenly slid to a halt.
There were headlights coming towards them!
A car on the road, moving fast, freezing them in its searching beams. It skidded to a stop twenty yards away. Doors were opening. Someone was shouting.
46 TOWARDS DESTRUCTION
Candle flames flickered and dimmed momentarily, smoke curling from them, as Kline came closer, his hands livid against the blackness of the robe he wore. In them he held a black chalice, a cloth draped over the top.
All eyes were on the shuffling figure emerging from the alcove and instinct told Halloran that this was the time to make his move. Yet he could not. Like the others, he was mesmerised.
Kline faltered, as though the weight of his burden was too much. But after drawing in a deep, grating breath, he continued to approach.
Thunder grumbled in the distance and it seemed to came from below, from the earth itself, rather than the atmosphere above.
At last Kline, or the disfigured thing that Kline now was. reached the stone slab. He attempted to grin, perhaps in triumph. but his lips merely wavered, his stained teeth bared only, partially. His hands were trembling when he placed the chalice on the altar. He removed the cloth, allowed it to fall to the floor.
Then Kline dipped both hands into the vessel, the abject he removed still unseen by the others. He held out his prize across the furred belly of the paralysed bodyguard.
A husky whisper. 'His disciples, his loyal priests, preserved his poor mutilated body. They hid Bel-Marduk away, a deep place where no one could find him. Hidden in darkness, his secrets around him, waiting out the centuries far one such as I . . .' He placed the object on the stone beside the bodyguard” and there it rested for the others to see.
A blackened, crisped shell. A thing almost rotted away, shrivelled stumps that had once been tubes, but which now had no function, protruding.
And as they watched, the ancient withered heart pulsed.
Just once . . .
Mather had jammed on the handbrake and was opening the driver's door even before the car had rocked to a halt.
'Stop there!' he shouted, but the three figures either did not hear him over the storm or had no intention of heeding his command.
'Draw your weapon, Phil,' he ordered. 'Whoever they are, I don't want them to get inside the house.'
Both men used the car doors as shields, the operative clenching a Browning with both hands, using the triangle between passenger door and frame as an armrest.
'Hold it!' he warned, but one of the figures, someone who appeared to be limping, whirled round, bringing something from his anorak pocket as he did so. Flame spat out into the rainy night.
'Pacify him!' Mather yelled at his man as a bullet scythed sparks off the car roof. The-operative would have preferred to have 'retired' the gunman, a more permanent condition, but he knew better than to disobey an order. He took quick aim at the enemy's shoulder; unfortunately the target had changed position, had tried to follow his companions. The Shield operative knew by the way the man violently jerked, then dropped like a stone, that the bullet had taken him in the head or neck.
He muttered a curse, but didn't take time to shrug an apology at Mather, for the other two intruders were disappearing into the porch.
He gave chase, skirting around the vehicles parked in front of the house, flattening himself against the outside wall of the porch, keeping out of sight until he could position himself. Realising Mather had not followed, he looked back at their car. The Planner was facing the opposite direction, towards the lake.
They had noticed a strange shining from that area when they had broken free of the woods moments earlier to descend into the valley, but the rain had been too heavy to see clearly. Even this close it was difficult, for there was a mist rising from the peculiar incandescence that was the lake itself, creating a swirling fog which the rainfall failed to disperse. Mather tore himself away and began limping towards his companion, body crouched, cane digging into the gravel.
'What is it out there?' the operative asked when the older man reached him.
'I've no idea,' came the breathless reply. 'Some kind of disturbance in the lake, that's all I can tell. Let's worry about our immediate problem.'
'Here comes the other patrol.' The operative nodded towards the lightbeams descending the hill at a fast pace.
'We can't wait for them. Check inside.' The other man ducked low, quickly peering into the tunnel of the porch and drawing his head back almost immediately.
'Shit,' he said. 'The door's open. They're inside the house.' It was a dream. It could only be a bad dream.
Yet Cora knew it wasn't. The nightmare around her was real. She tried to focus her mind, desperate to understand what was happening, why Monk, that bloated, repellent creature, was lying naked on the stone, and . . . and . . . Shock broke through the haze.
The black-robed figure standing on the other side of the prone bodyguard was obscene in its deformity.
Only the eyes allowed some recognition.
'Felix . . . ?' She imagined she had said the name aloud, but in fact it had been no more than a murmur.
She held up her hands to her face, not because of the unsightliness in front of her, but to clear her thoughts . . .
. . . While Halloran's mind was sharp by now, all grogginess gone. He stared disbelievingly at the blackened object lying on the stone altar.
'It can't be,' he whispered.
