anything like this droning sound—never in his life. Whatever in the hell it was—and he could not know how apt his choice of adjective—it wasn't supposed to be on this range.
'Bunch of damned beatniks!' he mumbled. 'Havin' a party. Dope fiends, I bet. I told Herman something was wrong around these parts.'
Herman had agreed with Slim, that something was wrong, but he didn't know what it was. Slim wished Herman were here, now, for he suddenly felt uneasy, like when he was a little boy, walking past a graveyard. He could whistle then, but something warned him he'd better not whistle now.
Slim dismounted, ground-reined his horse, and slipped quietly up the hill. He'd been riding fence all day, repairing it when broken, and he was tired. He'd missed evening grub because his horse had tossed a shoe, and fixing that had taken some time. But more than tired, Slim was still pissed-off at the attitude of most of the guys he worked with at L-R. He was thinking of handing in his notice and walking. Loading up his pickup and maybe heading north, up into Wyoming. He'd heard there were good jobs up there for cowboys who still gave a day's work for a day's pay. Yep, that's what he'd do, by God, he'd drift up north.
The guys at L-R, he couldn't figure them out. They kept tryin' to get him to join some kind of club. Diable, or something like that. Well, piss on them! Ole Slim wasn't about to join no damn club that meant the devil. He wasn't no fool! Some kind of silly college-boy club, more than likely. Now his friends wouldn't even speak to him. They were crowding him out; laughing at him behind his back. Well, okay, but he'd still do his job and then draw this pay. Then he'd drift up north.
Slim climbed the fence to K/S range, trudging up another hill, the noise growing louder. He was tired, but all weariness left him as he gazed upon the sight in front of him, illuminated by torchlight.
'Good God Almighty!' he whispered, dropping to his hands and knees, crawling to the crest of the hill. 'Look at all them naked people!'
Slim had never seen an orgy before—which was what he presumed this to be—nothing more. But he'd read of them. After his eyes became adjusted to the small, torchlit valley, he soon realized this was far more than an orgy.
He picked up the shape of Sheriff Addison, buggering the mayor, Carl Warner. 'Queers!' Slim whispered hoarsely. 'I got friends who voted for that bastard, too. Wait'll I tell them!'
Squinting his eyes, he found the naked shape of that psalm-singin' do-gooder, Dalton Revere. 'My God! That's the preacher's wife. Oh, no!' he watched Michelle Balon pull a naked woman to her. Locked in each other's embrace, the two women and the man slid to the ground, mouths and fingers busy.
Slim wanted to puke.
He also had a slight hard-on.
Soon, the participants lay recovering and defiled on the ground. Slim wanted to run, wanted very much to leave this place, but he felt frozen to the ground.
Coven women went among the sprawled members just beginning their initiation with the Devil. They cut off a piece of each woman's hair, giving that to the Devil's agent, Black Wilder. He placed a few strands of hair in the huge book, beside each name.
Just as I have done for so many hundreds of years, he reminisced. Beginning with the people who lived in the caves.
At midnight, Wilder waved his hand and all became silent. The Beasts stood placidly, jaws lolling saliva, red eyes unblinking, the torches glittering from them.
Slim almost shit his pants when he saw the Beasts up close to the light. If he was not frozen to the earth before, he was now—with fear.
A young girl, in her teens, was led to the altar by her stepparents. She was naked, and offered no resistance. She had been inspected and found to be a true virgin. She was placed on the altar, a crude stone structure. The girl had been beaten into submission, her young body carrying the marks of the whip. She was spread-eagled on the stone, arms and legs tied down. A huge wooden cross, driven upside down into the earth, stood starkly behind the altar. The crowd began to hum as Wilder, now naked, his manhood huge, crawled upon the stone, between the legs of the girl.
The men and women of the Coven began to dance while the Beasts howled and whined and slobbered. Their dancing was a grotesque, obscene hunching, a filthy expression of perversion of body and soul. As they danced, they chanted, 'Prince of Darkness! King of the Night! Monarch of all that is Evil! Lord of the Flies and Beasts! Take this unworthy one!'
And Nydia said, 'She could not be convinced to join us. She refused to accept the pleasure of the Master. Take her!'
The young girl screamed as Wilder lunged, his erection driving inside her, impaling her, splitting her. 'It's cold—it's cold!' she shrieked.
Other young people stood off to one side, away from the adults of the Coven. They watched, waiting for the signal that would officially begin their night's orgy. Some of them held torches, the flickering flames brightening the site of the altar and the defiling—just begun—of Annie Brown. They smiled. They hummed. They awaited their pleasure, for the only true Master had promised them all the fleshy pleasures of this earth and the next world for them. They had only to serve him. Such a small price to pay for eternal debauchery.
The adults droned their chant, dancing about the altar as Wilder hunched on the teenager, each lunge bringing screams of pain from her throat. He shuddered his finish, and withdrew, as a woman rushed forward to catch his semen in a bowl.
Wilder stepped from the altar, his grotesque maleness swinging between his thighs. He urinated in the bowl, then slipped into his dark robe.
While the mixture was being stirred, the young girl was removed from the altar and a crown of thorns jammed brutally upon her head, the barbs ripping her flesh. She was carried, screaming, to the huge cross, and crucified, spikes driven into her hands, sides, and feet. She was left there, hanging upside down, wailing out her pain. Her blood-filled eyes watched in horror as the Devil's Ceremony continued.
Each new teenager and adult to be introduced into the Coven was brought forward for the final pledge. A tiny portion of the evil mixture from the bowl was smeared on their lips. They knelt, en masse, naked, in front of Wilder.
While Annie's screaming filled the small torch-lit valley, Wilder asked each new member, beginning with the children, 'Do you renounce your parents, all blood relations, all friends not of this unholy Coven, God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost, the Saints, and the Holy Cross?'
'Yes,' the children said.
'Do you wish to serve Satan with all the growing blackness in your hearts?'
'Yes,' they replied in unison, conviction growing stronger in them. They had been introduced to all the sexual perversion known to humankind, and they were anxious to experience more.
'Do you know who I am?' Wilder asked.
'Yes. And we are your servants.'
'You are firm in your renunciation of all the weakness of God and Christian religion?'
'Yes!' the children shouted.
'And while I am here on this earth,' Wilder's eyes flashed evil, 'I am?'
'Our God!' they screamed.
Wilder opened his robe, holding his penis, as the young people rose from their prostration to kiss the icy member. Wilder turned, and they kissed his red buttocks.
He repeated the pledge to the adults, and they agreed, doing as the children had done. The woman lingering at Wilder's maleness, loving it.
Wilder nodded to the beautiful witch standing by the upside-down cross, a knife in her hand, the curved blade gleaming in the light from the torches.
'Nydia,' he said. 'Let it begin.'
The woman with the hair the hue of night smiled as she stood by the tortured young girl, hanging upside down on the cross. Slowly, very methodically, savoring the girl's wailing, Nydia began cutting her flesh. She cut obscene tracings on Annie's skin, until the girl was nothing but a bloody rag, screaming out unbearable pain. Nydia chanted as she worked, calling upon all the forces of darkness, of evil, of filth. The ancient rite, as old as humankind, as old as evil, took a long time to conclude. Finally, Nydia cut out Annie's heart, still pumping, and the
