Iona Portal (8 page)

 And she’d been smart.  She graduated from high school near the top of her class and was accepted at NYU.  Her first two years in college she studied hard and earned a 3.5 average… but her third year she met Botis.

She was at a party at a friend’s apartment when Botis tapped her on the shoulder.  That night she smoked her first joint with him.  “Come on, Syl,” he smiled, “You’ll like it!”

After that she saw Botis more and more frequently.  They would sit and talk for hours, and he always brought drugs, all kinds of drugs.  She hadn’t known there were so many.  Over the next few months a whole new world opened up to her.  And she thought she was in love.

Botis was unlike anyone she’d ever met.  He seemed young, almost a teenager, but he assured her that he was much older than he looked.  He was dark and mysterious, and always wore black.  And he was brilliant… he seemed to know
everything.
  His knowledge of history, art, and religion would put any of her professors at NYU to shame.  Many evenings they’d sit together on the floor of her apartment sharing a joint, and she’d listen in fascination while he expounded some complex point of esoteric philosophy.  Then, just before they slept, he’d hold her close and they’d make warm romantic love.

One night he told her that Botis was the name of a powerful demon from medieval lore…  To the ancient writers, the demon Botis was a prince in hell with many legions of demons under him.  At the time that seemed very exotic.  Syl reached out her hand and lovingly tousled his raven-black hair.

As the months passed, Botis became her life.  Her old friends gradually stopped coming around, and she spent more and more of her time stoned.   She skipped class and her grades plummeted, but she no longer cared.   Knowing she was failing anyhow, she dropped out of school.

The day she quit NYU, Botis introduced her to heroin.  And after that, the heroin was all that mattered.

A year later, when she’d lost her job and was evicted from her apartment, her mom pleaded with her to come back home and get her life together, but instead she went with Botis. 

That night he took her to the house.  She was frightened at first.  She had never been to a place like the house.  But Botis assured her that the best drugs were always plentiful there.

He led her up darkened stairs to a back room, and they did drugs together… but then, without warning, he began to beat her.  It was a side of Botis she had never seen.  He screamed obscenities, shoved her into a corner, and pounded her body with his fists.  Terrified and confused she sank to the floor and tried to shield her face, but he kicked her repeatedly, then—with seemingly superhuman strength—he picked her up and threw her across the room.  Finally, he raped her brutally and left her in agony, barely conscious. 

When she finally awoke the next morning, she was alone on the mattress and the door to the room was locked.  Her purse and cell phone were gone.  Sylvia was trapped.

That afternoon Botis came again.  Again he beat her and raped her and left her locked in the dingy room.  For a full week the pattern repeated, with never an explanation.  Occasionally he brought her food, and always heroin, then left her alone—imprisoned in darkness. 

In anguished tears, she pleaded with him to tell her what she’d done… why he was doing this to her… but he just smiled and beat her more. 

Then others in the house began to come.  They came at any hour, individually and in groups.  Some raped her savagely and left her bleeding.  Others came gently in the night, whispering words of love while they were on her.  Some felt sorry for her and promised to take her away, but never did.  A few were so stoned they barely knew she was there.   Gradually, as the agonizing months dragged by, she’d grown numb to them all.

The only one she dreaded anymore was Botis.  She knew now what he was. 

One night, two weeks into her imprisonment, Syl had been hunched over on her mattress sobbing.  Hearing a noise outside the room, she looked up and saw Botis appear—walking right through the closed door—leering at her with his demonic grin.  At first she thought she was hallucinating.  But then she knew.  Botis truly was a demon.

The day after that encounter someone left her door unlocked and Sylvia made her first escape attempt.  She almost succeeded, but they caught her a few steps from the front door, and beat her severely.  In the following weeks she tried several more times with the same result. 

After a while, even escaping didn’t matter.  The last few weeks they hadn’t even bothered locking her door.  Syl was just the freak in back room.  And she was numb… she didn’t care about anything, as long as she got her next fix. 

Botis still came every day.  He rarely spoke, and didn’t even seem to enjoy the sex.  He just wanted to hurt her.  And each time he came, her depression and hopelessness deepened.

Her mixture was boiling now.  The heroin had dissolved.  She sat the spoon down on the floor in front of her.  Rolling a small wad of cotton into a ball, she placed it in the spoon, then pushed the tip of the syringe into the center of the cotton and pulled back the plunger until all the heroin was sucked in.  She tapped the syringe with her finger, checking it for air bubbles.

Then she picked up the electrical cord and tied it around her arm as a crude tourniquet.  With her forefinger she palpated her skin, searching for a vein.  She inserted the needle, drew back on the plunger and looked to see if blood was entering the syringe.  It was not.  Syl shifted the needle under the skin probing for a vein.  Four times she pulled back the plunger but without success.

The voice was louder now… she could hear it plainly.  It was pleading with her, screaming at her, telling her to stop.  To run.  To try
one last time
to escape.

Finally she found a good vein… She carefully pressed the contents of the syringe into the vein, and in a few moments felt the warmth spreading through her body.  And then nothing else mattered.  The voice stopped screaming.  She lay back on the mattress in momentary bliss.  For the moment she didn’t hurt anymore.  That was what mattered.  Sylvia closed her eyes and sank into a dreamless sleep.  

***

There was a flicker of light, then the rasp of leathery wings sounded from the dark alleyway.  Three gaunt figures emerged from the alley and walked purposefully down the row of crumbling, three-story tenements.

In the lead was a woman who called herself Kareina.  A tall, thin, plain-faced woman with a pallid complexion and long black hair, Kareina looked to be in her early twenties, but was, in fact, much older.  Her subordinates, Botis and Turell, followed a few steps behind her.

The street around them was a picture of devastation.  Broken glass crunched under their feet and the stench of garbage rotting in the gutter assaulted their nostrils.   

Tremont Point had been an exclusive suburb of New York City in the late 1800’s.  After the First World War, however, when its aging mansions were supplanted by cheaply constructed apartment blocks, the neighborhood became a melting pot for the city’s immigrant masses.

As the community aged, living conditions deteriorated.  By the late 1970’s, a dramatic rise in violent crime and random shootings forced the city to cut off essential services.   When police patrols, fire services, and even garbage removal finally ceased, there was a mass exodus from Tremont Point.

Those bold enough to drive through Tremont Point today pass block after block of burned out or abandoned tenements.  While other neighborhoods in the Big Apple have experienced a measure of renewal in recent years, Tremont Point remains one of the most dangerous in the city, a haven for gangs and drug dealers.

Near the middle of the block, the trio turned and climbed garbage-strewn concrete steps to the door of an abandoned tenement.  Not a single pane of glass remained unbroken on its dingy façade, and the front door had long ago been ripped from its hinges.  As they crossed the threshold into the dim interior, a rat ran across the hallway in front of them.

The stench of urine and feces permeated the hall.  Fearful eyes peered through the narrow cracks of chained doors as the three intruders walked past.  Through an open doorway they glimpsed a cluster of emaciated people lying motionless on soiled mattresses scattered around the floor. 

Ascending a narrow, creaking stairway, they made their way to the third floor and walked a darkened corridor to the back of the building.  They paused before the closed door of the last apartment.  On the door, someone had clumsily scrawled two words in dark red paint,
“THE FREAK.”

The three did not knock.  They simply walked through the closed door.

The only light in the room came from a small window opening.  The glass was broken out, leaving an open hole overlooking the trash-filled alley far below and the shell of the burnt-out tenement next door.

The room reeked of vomit and the floor was strewn with piles of garbage and scattered remnants of soiled clothing.  In one corner sat a grimy, lidless ice chest where roaches skittered around scraps of moldy food. 

In the center of the room Sylvia Romano was sprawled, naked, across a filthy mattress.  At the sound of intruders, Syl stirred slightly.  Empty eyes peered through a tangle of matted hair, struggling to focus on the figures standing over her.  Finding it too much of an effort, she sank back into unconsciousness.

Botis gave her a leering grin and took a step in her direction.  A hard slap in the face from Kareina stopped him in mid-stride.  “That’s NOT what you’re here for this time.”

Like her companions, Kareina was a killer, and one of the best.  She was sent to do only one thing… to destroy human life, and she had a long history of success.  But Kareina had grown weary of just killing.  Like a cat with a mouse, she liked to play games with her prey.  When the assignment allowed, she would get to know her victims, befriend them, earn their trust… and then look into their eyes in their final moments to see their helpless terror.

But she couldn’t do that on this assignment.  This assignment required a human instrument.  She needed a body she could possess.  And Botis had offered Sylvia.

Kareina eyed Syl for several minutes. 

It was obvious that Sylvia had once been attractive, but long months of neglect and abuse had taken their toll.  She was emaciated, almost anorexic, with track marks up and down both arms.  From the bruises on her limbs and face, it was clear that she’d been severely beaten many times… and recently. 

Kareina twirled a wisp of her long black hair around a slender finger and smiled.  She found it amusing that her easiest recruits were always found among self-righteous religious fanatics… or among the burned-out husks of humanity in a crack house.

Approaching Sylvia, Kareina leaned down and gently touched her forehead.  If a casual observer had been present, they would have been shocked at what happened next.  For Kareina suddenly faded from sight and disappeared, slipping effortlessly into the concealment of the shadow realm. 

A moment later, the body on the mattress contorted in a violent spasm.  Sylvia’s head rolled back and thrashed from side to side.  Her eyes rolled up, exposing only the whites.  Another spasm, and then her body sat up. 

Botis had almost done his job too well, Kareina thought with disgust.  There was barely any humanity left in this body.  She preferred at least a moderate amount of resistance when she took possession, but this ruined creature offered none.  It was hardly worth the effort to destroy her.  
Still, she’ll be a useful tool for our purposes.

Under Kareina’s control, Syl stood shakily to her feet.  The drugs coursing through her veins made her body sluggish and unresponsive.  Sylvia’s lips opened, and in the gravelly voice of one possessed, she barked, “Quick, help me dress.”   

From the parcel he’d been carrying Turell unwrapped a loose-fitting garment. 

“No, first the bomb,” Kareina directed.

Botis and Turell hastily fastened a harness around Sylvia’s torso, then lifted the explosive device into place.  Sylvia’s frail body could barely support the weight of the 30 pound suicide belt, but Kareina would provide all the strength she needed.  Kareina quickly pulled on the rest of the clothing.

  Her eyes fixed on Botis and Turell.  “Quickly, now… we must be in Manhattan by four o’clock.”

Chapter Eight:  The Island of Iona

THE ISLE OF IONA, ARGYLL, SCOTLAND

For Patrick’s first morning on Iona the sun rose bright in a cloudless sky.  From the window of his room in the Saint Columba hotel, Patrick could see sheep grazing contentedly in the nearby fields.  Beyond them, the early morning sun glistened across the calm waters of the Sound of Iona and starkly illuminated the distant, red granite mountains of Mull.

Michael was already eating breakfast when Patrick entered the hotel restaurant.  He motioned for Patrick to join him.