The Brotherhood of the Wheel (30 page)

“Sir,” the receptionist said, “if you're here about being abducted by aliens, or something like that, you need to call the tip line they talk about on the radio show, not—”

“No, no,” Mark said. “I actually have an appointment with Mr. Norse, for real.”

The receptionist gave him a look that Mark was sure she wore often—resting bitch face, the look of being a few seconds away from calling security. “Name?” she asked, almost accusingly.

“Mark,” he said. “Mark Stolar. I'm here representing Dewey Rears.”

The receptionist tapped the information into her keyboard and scanned the screen. She frowned, and then her demeanor underwent an amazing transformation. “Oh, Mr. Stolar. Mr. Norse will be with you in just a moment. Would you like a bottle of water or some coffee?”

“Yeah,” Mark said. “Water would be great. Thanks.” The receptionist delivered the water as if she were passing it to a leper and then made for the safe barrier of her desk. Mark chugged the water and tried to straighten his hair. After a few moments, a man walked out of the back corridor. He was of medium build, with black hair, dark, intelligent eyes, and a thick mustache under his prominent nose. He wore an off-the-rack houndstooth sports coat, a white broadcloth button-down, tan slacks, and worn but expensive leather loafers. Mark recognized the man from TV and stood to meet him.

“Mr. Stolar,” the man said, shaking Mark's hand, “I'm George Norse. It's nice to meet you. Come on back to my office; we'll talk.”

Norse's office was on the corner of the tower and gave an impressive view of the Atlanta skyline. One wall of the office was covered with awards, plaques, and photos of Norse with numerous celebrities.

“I'm a huge fan of your show,” Mark said as Norse offered him a plush chair in front of his glass-topped desk. “I used to listen to you on the radio all night long when I was a kid. Your show scared the crap out of me, man.”

Norse laughed and nodded toward another man, dressed in a very expensive suit. “Thank you, Mark. This is Brandon Sanjuro; he's IPRN's legal counsel.” Sanjuro rose from his seat on the couch against the wall opposite the awards. He was Latino, with an expensive haircut and a well-trimmed goatee. He nodded to Mark but made no attempt to shake his hand before sitting again. Norse sat behind his desk and folded his hands in front of him. “So have you seen the show yet?”

“Oh yeah, me and Dewey never miss it,” Mark said. “It's very cool. Dewey said you guys are number one in your time slot. Congrats.”

Norse gave Sanjuro a nod and a slight smile. “Thanks, Mark. So Dewey said you had something for me, something for this weekend's show.” Mark nodded as he reached into his pocket. He held up the small black plastic wedge of the drive.

“Listen, man,” Mark said. “People have already died because of this guy. He's evil, and he's hooked up to something really, really old and powerful, man.”

“I see,” Norse said. His hands remained still and folded.

“I don't think you really do, Mr. Norse,” Mark said. “Dewey said you guys were tight. You did a lot of work together a few years back?”

“Yes,” Norse said. “Dewey's a damn good reporter. Fearless, professional, and thorough. That's why I offered him the money for the video. He's—”

“He's dead,” Mark said, his voice cracking a little.

“Dead?” Norse looked at his attorney and back at Mark. “What happened?”

“This Pagan asshole killed him,” Mark said. “Right in fucking front of me. He's going to kill a couple of kids he's holding if you don't run the video on the April 30th show.”

“We need to notify the police,” Norse said, “the FBI. Don't we, Brandon?”

Sanjuro shrugged. “Well, at this point we don't know if this is even authentic yet,” the lawyer said. “It will take a few days to do all that, and we need to run it past the rest of legal to make sure we can run it without any liability on the part of the network. We can notify the authorities the afternoon before the broadcast if we have something here. It's too late for them to shut us down, and it covers the network's ass.”

“Covers the network…” Mark said, looking back at Sanjuro, shaking his head. “Liability? Man, this guy's a fucking psychopath! He said if you get the cops involved he will slaughter a whole bunch of people on Saturday, and those two kids he's got will be the first to go! How's that for liability, man!”

Norse raised his hands. “Mark, look, I understand being upset, but we have to make sure we're not doing anything illegal here. Dewey was my friend, too, and I have to admit I'm a little wary of helping the lunatic that murdered him out by showing this video. We'll get the police involved quietly. Hopefully, this person claiming to be the Pagan will call in, as Dewey said he would, and the police can locate him.”

“Okay,” Mark said. “Sorry, sorry. I haven't slept for a week and … Dewey…”

“I understand,” Norse said. “Dewey said this Pagan was connected to some supernatural power or force—is that true?”

Sanjuro snorted a little, but Norse quieted him with a simple raise of his palm.

Mark nodded.

“You look at this video, and then you tell me, man,” he said, handing Norse the USB drive. Norse slid the thumb drive into his computer and moved his mouse about, clicking. After a moment, the office was filled with the sounds of a young girl screaming. Mark closed his eyes and rested his forehead on the edge of Norse's desk. His stomach clenched every time he heard the girl scream. He'd seen the video before—back when Dewey first encountered parts of it during his investigation of the Black-Eyed Children and the disappearing kids. He saw it for the first time in its entirety when Chasseur forced him to watch it on a battered old laptop, shortly after butchering Dewey. He had no desire to see it ever again.

“Jesus!” Norse muttered. Sanjuro moved behind the desk to watch as well. “The video time stamp on this is 1998. Is this for real?”

“The quality is shitty enough for 1998 phone-cams,” Sanjuro said. “Very
Blair Witch
–looking.” Mark looked up briefly to glare at the lawyer's bland face. Norse, at least, was clearly horrified by what he was watching. The girl was panting, running. The sounds of dogs howling pursued her as she staggered through the bright afternoon sunlight, deep in the maze of the woods.

“I … oh God,” the girl shouted, her voice warbly, distorted. “Please, Jesus, please help me!”

“He uses dogs to chase them down?” Norse asked.

“Not, not real dogs,” Mark said, wiping his eyes. “Shadows, living shadows.”

“Shadow people!” Norse said. “They've been witnessed in haunted houses, on deserted roads, since the early 2000s.”

“Well, these shadow people can shift into shadow dogs,” Mark said. “He uses a pack of them to hunt.”

“I don't know if anyone will ever see this,” the girl said, sobbing. She had fallen and was panting. There was the sound of growling beasts all about her. “But I'm going to try to send it before he … before he gets me. He grabbed me at the gas station off I-81. He … Oh God … Mom, Dad, I love you. Jill—big sissy loves you.… Oh God, please, no, no!”

Mark knew this part of the recording, too. It was branded into the flesh of his brain. She was swinging the camera around. Catching part of her pursuer's jeans-covered leg, the bone-handled hunting knife clutched in his fist. A few of the shadowy, blurry figures of dogs. The quality was grainy, jerky.

“Why are you doing this?” the girl said. Her voice was bubbly, almost choking, from phlegm. Mark could almost see the snot running out of her red nose, mixing with the river of her tears, to mingle and drip down her chin. For an instant, he was lying near the nature trails again, his underwear wet, cooling on him. The smell of ammonia, of animal fear, the circle of bigger boys around him, kicking him. He wished he knew the name of the girl in the video.

“For him,” the cold, monotone voice of the faceless hunter said on the video. Mark knew the voice—it was Chasseur. “For his glory, to grow his power in this world, so that he may be the strongest of the houses. To strengthen the hunt. Your sacrifice will feed him, like all those before you. Look upon him, now. Look. Truly see what has pursued you, has devoured you.… See.”

Both Norse and the lawyer gasped audibly as they saw what the girl had swung her camera around to behold. Mark didn't want to see, didn't want to see it rise out of the woods, to plant one great, giant, cloven hoof onto the decaying toppled tree trunk, the dark hounds gathering around their creator. He didn't want to watch it turn a massive, antlered head, the face hidden by shadow and static, toward the girl and her camera. Mark put his head down and wished he'd wake from this nightmare.

“Oh, my God,” Norse said. “What … what is that thing?”

Sanjuro had visibly paled and crossed himself.
“Santa Madre, nos salve
,
”
he uttered. “This shit can't be real, George. It's got to be fake, it's got to be!”

The video ended abruptly, snapping to black. The office was silent for several moments.

“I want the ten grand to go to Dewey's mom,” Mark said, finally. “And I want cash, at least a thousand, right now.” He looked at Sanjuro. “Yeah, it's fucking real, man. That kid is dead, and my friend is dead. That fucking real enough for you? That enough liability for you? Nobody, no one, is gonna stop that thing, whatever the hell it is, and I am getting the fuck outta Dodge before it's in Bethlehem's zip code, okay?”

Norse closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose. He looked at Sanjuro. “Pay him out of petty cash,” he said. “Give him five thousand.” The lawyer blinked a few times, as if coming out of a trance. He nodded and exited the office. Norse stood as Mark did. “I'll make sure the check is mailed to Dewey's mom by the end of the day, Mark. I'm so sorry to hear about Dewey. Very sorry.”

“Yeah, me, too,” Mark said. “You take care, Mr. Norse. Be safe.”

They shook hands. The lawyer paid him, and Mark shuffled out to the elevators. In a few moments, he was back on the streets of Atlanta. He had his credit card and a pocket full of cash. He knew where he had been ordered to go now, where he was supposed to be picked up by the fucking Scode brothers, but he was never going back to Four Houses, never. He saw a liquor store. He'd stop there and then find a hotel. That was enough thinking for one day. Mark Stolar vanished into the crowd, eager to be swallowed up among humanity. In the back of his mind, he could hear the hounds baying above the sounds of horns and car alarms.

*   *   *

George Norse sat at this desk, silent, his fingers steepled. There was no doubt that he was going to air this video on Saturday night. He was already visualizing the promotions and getting ready to call the network to make sure the commercial budget for the show was doubled. This was going to be huge, their best show ever. He was troubled, though, about allowing his program to be used as part of some madman's scheme. He would contact the FBI, and he would do all he could to locate this missing girl on the video. An odd thought struck him as he picked up the phone: Prophets came in all shapes and sizes. Maybe disheveled, smelly, fear-crazed Mark Stolar was the wisest man on the planet right now, to be running for cover ahead of whatever was coming.

 

THIRTEEN

“10-59”

“So,” Lovina said, picking up another steak fry off the huge platter, swirling it in the gravy bowl, and taking a bite of it, “this ghost girl led you guys to her body hidden in the drainpipe? You know how crazy that sounds, right?”

“No, not exactly,” Heck said. “Jimmie gave her a ride to her parents' house, she told him what happened to her, and then she vanished. He somehow or other got hooked up with Turla, and the three of us figured out where she had gone to hide from those Black-Eyed Kids that got her friends. And, yes, I am very aware that I sound like I need medication and a court-appointed guardian, telling that story.”

“And you're his what again?” she asked, finishing her fry.

“Squire,” Heck said, looking down at his burger and pushing his pickle spear around the plate. “Which, as far as I can tell, is King Arthur–speak for “butt monkey.”

Lovina laughed. Heck shrugged and flipped her off.

“You watch that, Red,” Lovina said. “Or I'll kick your ass again.”

Heck shook his head. “Whatever. You had some good moves,” he said. “I got better.”

“If I hadn't seen those things back there and saw two of my missing kids among them,” Lovina said, pausing to take a long sip on the straw bobbing in her glass of Cherry Coke, “I'd think you and Aussapile were huffing diesel.”

They had doubled back after the cops finished their job and found Karen's body. They recovered Jimmie's truck, Heck's bike, and Lovina's Charger and drove about twenty miles out of Granite City, finally pulling up at the Road Ranger truck stop just off Route 117 and I-64 to grab food and allow Jimmie to make a few phone calls.

“And these Black-Eyed Kids have been dogging you?” Heck said.

Lovina nodded. “Ever since I started looking into Dewey Rears's disappearance. What the hell are they?”

“Beats me,” Heck said. “But I think fearless leader is getting that intel right now.”

“From whom?” Lovina asked.

Heck shrugged. “I've been riding with him for a few days now, and I'm no closer to knowing who or what these Brethren are than when I started.”

“Then why do you want to join them?” she asked, stealing one of Heck's onion rings.

“To save my family,” Heck said, “my MC. Got no choice.”

They ate quietly for a few moments. Lovina glanced over at Aussapile, who was still on the pay phone next to the trucker's library—spinner racks of paperbacks—stocked with Westerns that had names like
Longhorn
and
Lonestar
and action series with names like
The Destroyer
and
The Executioner
, and, of course, plenty of porn—
The Widow's Bed
and
Naughty Co-eds
, for example.