Righteous04 - The Blessed and the Damned (32 page)

The woman had no sooner slipped out of the room when a huge, thumping explosion sounded somewhere in the building. Fernie’s bed shuddered. Her spare hand flew out and grabbed the railing around the bed. The other hand tightened around her infant, less than twelve hours old and tiny and vulnerable at her breast. Someone screamed. A gunshot.

The panic she’d felt after her nightmare now returned full force, and suddenly she understood. The dream hadn’t been about anyone else. It was a warning for herself.

Fernie punched at the call button, then closed her eyes to pray. “Dear Heavenly Father…”

The door swung open and a man burst in. Blood splattered his face and clung to his thick, dirty beard. He held a gun in his hand. Blisters climbed from his hands to his elbow, as if he’d burned himself.

Fernie’s heart felt as though it would leap out of her chest. She clutched her baby tighter.

“Fernie Kimball,” the man said.

She recognized him now. Aaron Young, Stephen Paul’s younger brother. She hadn’t seen him since that day several years earlier when he’d betrayed them in the temple, helped his brother Israel and Gideon Kimball murder Enoch in the Celestial Room. His hair was thinner, his beard thicker.

“That’s not my name. My name is Fernie
Christianson.
”

“By what authority? You were sealed to Elder Taylor Kimball for time and all eternity.”

“And the prophet dissolved the sealing. I’m not his wife.”

“The prophet? Oh, you mean Abraham Christianson? That apostate is dead. So is your so-called husband. Taylor Junior is the prophet now, and you’re Elder Kimball’s property.” He waved his gun. “Get out of bed. Let’s go.”

“No.”

“Get out of bed or I’ll drag you out. And then I’ll smash Jacob Christianson’s baby against the wall until its brains are bashed out. You like that?” He started toward her.

“Please, no.” Panic flooded her. “I can’t get up, don’t you see? I was injured in the car accident, I can’t walk. I’ll go with you, don’t hurt my baby. Get a wheelchair. You can find one in the hall or in the nurses’ station, just don’t…”

Her voice trailed off at the look in Aaron’s eyes. He stared at her and it wasn’t disbelief she saw, but a cold, calm understanding. He believed her, but he wasn’t going to get a wheelchair. That would take too long. Whatever was going on out there, he didn’t have time to waste on one crippled woman, Elder Kimball’s former wife or no.

So this is how it ends. This is the day that I meet my Savior.

Aaron Young lifted his gun.

* * *

Elder Kimball was in the parking lot loading screaming, hysterical women and children into vans when the black Crown Victoria flew into the lot and stopped with a screech of brakes.

Several men and women poured out of the car. Guns appeared, voices screamed at him to surrender.

There were still three women and maybe twice that many children outside the vans, resisting as he herded them in, and this saved him. They scattered or threw up their hands or went running toward the newcomers as if expecting to be saved.

Kimball ducked behind the van’s bumper, gun in hand. His mind, sluggish since Aaron murdered Eric, suddenly felt sharp and alert. Up to that point, he’d seen the attack on the hospital as if watching someone else commit the horrific deeds with his body. He couldn’t control it, he could only watch as he stormed into the building behind Aaron Young. Aaron pulled the pin on the chemical artillery shell and rolled it down the hallway past the nurses’ station. The two men threw themselves out the front door just as it detonated. Glass shattered. The concussion rolled over them. They regained their feet.

Moments later, screaming, injured people began pouring out of the hospital. Aaron grabbed an elderly man and shoved him to the pavement. It was Josiah Bird, Aaron’s first cousin, once removed, and Kimball’s second cousin through the Griggs line.
He was over eighty, had never held a calling in the church higher than counselor in the bishopric, and had been suffering a degenerative eye condition for twenty years that left him nearly blind.

Aaron put his gun to the back of the man’s head and pulled the trigger. Blood and bone sprayed out the front of his skull, and he fell to the ground. Aaron turned and barked, “Grab that woman! She’s getting away.”

Elder Kimball let any gentiles go free, but grabbed any woman in a prairie dress and all the children with them and herded them roughly into a clump. An elderly nurse ran past, hands on her eyes, screaming.

Aaron pulled someone else from the crowd. It was a boy, one of the Peterson kids, Elder Kimball thought thirteen or fourteen. Kimball tried to force his way through, but Aaron already had him on the ground. Another shot to the head.

Suddenly, a male nurse was grabbing for Kimball’s gun. Aaron shot him too, then finally, a doctor who tried to run. Why he killed that man, it was hard to say—Aaron was letting other gentiles go free. They grabbed more people from Blister Creek. Elder Kimball searched the group, saw a few women he recognized, including Fernie’s mother. Blood streamed from her nose, and she clutched a teenage girl to her breast.

No Eliza, and even more surprisingly, no Fernie. He assumed that two of the children screaming and bleeding from cuts must have been his own offspring by his former wife, but it had been so many years since he’d seen the two kids—Leah and Daniel, he remembered with some effort—that he couldn’t recognize them to ask about their mother. Aaron pulled aside Fernie’s mother and threatened her with the gun.

After Kimball promised there would be no more killing, the terrified women gave up Fernie’s location, down the hall in the maternity wing. Aaron had disappeared around the side to bring her back while Kimball herded the women and remaining children toward the van. He threatened to send them back inside unless someone produced a key. A woman handed it over.

Some of the women were bleeding, others coughing and rubbing at their eyes. Contaminated. He didn’t touch them, imagined that in a few hours they’d be like Eric Froud, writhing in agony as chemical blisters spread along their bodies. Would Taylor Junior kill them, too? Toss them in a ditch to be picked over by crows?

He’d almost had them packed into the van, was just moments away from pulling around to the side, where he could pick up Aaron and Fernie and flee the scene, when the car pulled up and scattered the remaining women and children.

He crouched behind the bumper and fumbled off the safety on the gun.

“FBI! Come out with your hands up!” a woman shouted.

In answer, Kimball reached around and fired three times. Gunfire returned. Glass shattered on the van window. Inside, women and children screamed and cowered. Protected by the van, he made his way toward the driver’s-side door, thinking he could get in and make a run for it, but the enemy fire continued, this time at the tires. They burst and the van sagged on the far side.

Kimball leaned to shoot around the front bumper. Maybe he could convince them there were two gunmen, then use the chaos to get away. But when he stuck his head out, he saw two of his enemies coming around that way. The first was Sister Miriam, the FBI agent turned polygamist, and the second was Jacob
Christianson. His heart leaped into his throat. They saw him and dropped behind a car, and then one of them snapped off shots. More gunfire came from the other direction.

Kimball ducked behind the van again, but then he froze. Jacob Christianson. Alive. Elder Kimball squinted his eyes shut and ignored the gunfire.

Today I die.

“Oh Lord, I throw myself on thy mercy. Forgive my weaknesses. Let me—”

A familiar, stentorian voice cut through the morning air. “Taylor Kimball! In the name of Jesus Christ, I command thee to cease thy wicked behavior!”

It was Abraham Christianson. And then he knew that Taylor Junior’s plan had failed. His enemies had all lived. They had either seen his trap or been warned by the Holy Ghost.

Kimball continued his prayer. “Thou hast prepared a table for me in the presence of mine enemies and anointed my head with oil. If I die, let my death atone for my sins.”

“Kimball!” Abraham roared.

“Don’t shoot! I’m coming out.” Kimball walked stiffly around the edge of the van. His vision swam.

They were screaming at him to drop his gun and lie down where he was, but he didn’t trust them. If they were going to murder him in cold blood, let it be out front, where the women and children could see. He walked into the open, the gun held high overhead.

There was the female FBI agent, weapon in hand. Jacob and Sister Miriam, the latter with her own gun. David Christianson, also armed. And one final woman.

“Charity?”

“Put down the gun!” the agent shouted.

“What are you doing here?” His wife looked to the ground and Kimball stared, only gradually understanding. “Did you help them? Is this it? Is this why you waited for me all those years? Don’t you need to kiss me first, so you can receive your thirty pieces of silver?”

“I said put it down!”

He hadn’t seen Abraham yet, but now the man stepped out from behind his son. He placed his hands on his hips and turned his arrogant gaze toward Elder Kimball. Abraham had worn that look for fifty years, the look first of a boy, and then a man who knows he is the anointed one. Chosen to lead, to reign, and to rule. And yet through some trick of fate, his wife Charity had been given to Taylor Kimball, not to Abraham Christianson. How that must have eaten at her over the years as she saw her husband put in his place and knowing that she’d been meant for a better man.

Kimball said, “You want him, don’t you? This is the only way you could get out from your covenants. If I were to die. Then you could throw yourself on him, beg him to take you.”

“No, Taylor, no.”

Years ago, she’d been a lively woman, engaging and witty. Beautiful and young. Now she was old and worn, like an ax that has been used for too many years without sharpening, its blade chipped from striking rocks and nails. Charity’s hair was gray and stringy. She walked with a slump. Her eyes were dull.

Abraham handed his gun to Jacob and then walked toward Kimball. He held out his hands, palms up. He didn’t look frightened or alarmed. He didn’t even look angry.

The FBI agent said, “Stand back, Mr. Christianson. Do not—”

“Dad, what are you doing?” Jacob said. “Get out of the way.”

“I knew you’d fallen,” Abraham said. “I knew you had surrendered your blessings. But this? Killing women and children? What kind of monster are you?”

“If I am, it’s your fault,” Kimball said. “I tried to come back, I tried. I repented, I would have done anything you asked. I would have licked your boots clean if you’d told me, washed in the river with lepers. You kicked me out. You shook the dust off your feet and condemned me. What choice did I have?”

“Only one thing can save you now,” Abraham said. He approached until he stood a few inches from Elder Kimball. The others were still screaming at the two men, telling Abraham to step away and Kimball to put down the gun and lie on the ground, but the voices had become noise, a distraction, like trying to talk over a thunderstorm.

“What is that?” Kimball asked.

“Your blood atonement.”

“And you’re going to kill me, is that it? What will it be? Disembowel me in the temple?”

“Like you did to my son Enoch, you mean?”

“I didn’t do that,” Elder Kimball said. “But my son did, so yes, that would be fair. Is that what you want?”

“What is your choice? The FBI will arrest you, and then you’ll spend the rest of your life in prison. And that will be a mercy, because when you die, you will suffer in Outer Darkness with Lucifer and his angels for time and all eternity. The only thing to save you now is a blood atonement.” He paused. “And there is one sure way to bring about your death.”

Kimball glanced over his shoulder at the ring of enemies surrounding him. His arms ached, and he’d shortly have to either drop the gun or use it.

You prayed for this. You prayed to let your death atone for your sins.

He looked back at his enemy, the man who could save him with a plea to the Lord, but instead required his death. “Do I have thy word that my death will atone?”

“Thou hast the Lord’s word, not mine, but I shall pray for thy soul. That much I can promise.”

“And has the Lord chosen thee above all other men, Abraham Christianson?”

“Thou knowest that He has, Taylor Kimball.”

“Then let Him prove it to all men by protecting thee from death.”

Abraham frowned, and then a look of comprehension spread across his face. Too late he tried to duck out of the way, but Kimball had already lowered the gun. He didn’t aim at the prophet of the Church of the Anointing, or at his son, but at the lead FBI agent. He used Abraham as a shield and fired.

The enemy fired back.

The streets of Blister Creek were deserted. Eliza looked out the windshield, bewildered that there wasn’t a single car or truck on the road.

“Where the hell is everybody?” Krantz growled. His oversized hands gripped the steering wheel of Charity’s truck as if he intended to rip it off.

“Maybe you should swing back around. I’ll go through the big house, see if I can—”

“Wait,” Stephen Paul interrupted. “What day is it?”

“Sunday,” Eliza said. “Of course. They’re at church.” She pointed to a side street that cut east, toward the temple and the chapel. “Turn there.”

Eliza led Krantz through the streets. She sat in the middle, practically on top of the stick. She slammed alternately into
Stephen Paul to her right and Krantz to her left as the FBI agent took the turns with increasing ferocity.

They took the final turn and pushed the complaining pickup down the last few blocks, past the gas station and the farm store and the ruins of an abandoned farm house. Eliza saw the chapel, its lot filled with vans, trucks, and station wagons. Nobody in sight—inside they’d be singing the sacrament hymn, waiting for the deacons to pass the bread and water.

The truck shuddered and there was a loud bang. They’d pushed the old pickup too fast and too hard for too long, and the engine had thrown a rod. Or so Eliza thought. But Krantz was still accelerating down the road.