The Digger's Rest (43 page)

Desert Rose,

……
..As performed by Sting

Jed had to help Mitch to his room that night,
drunk, stumbling and mumbling nonsense about being cursed. He
couldn’t make much sense out of it. He had enough on his mind. With
Malcolm in the hospital, Deck sick and Ivy in a temper, he’d
practically been running the inn by himself. Then with the added
stress of worrying, caring for and…loving Sandrine, it was a wonder
he hadn’t taken to drinking himself. He was so tired he just wanted
to see his bed. So, after he dropped Mitch off in his, he went
straight to his own, leaving Ivy and the girls to finish closing
up.

Mitch just lolled to one side, mumbling to
himself. “…wolf…Jack…Sean…Simon. Cursed. Help.”

He heard a woman’s voice in a language
he didn’t understand, but somehow did.
“Open your eyes,”
she said, and he did. He was
standing at the entry of the path to the site. It was dark, pitch
black. He heard another voice, muffled, echoing, calling to him,
pleading. “Help me, Mitch. I can’t breathe.” It was Simon. It was
coming from the site. He ran into the path.

“
Simon, where are you?” he called out
into the night. A vision came into his mind; Simon was locked away
in a dark, wet dungeon. He was dirty and his clothes were torn. He
was shackled to the dripping wall, his big blue eyes staring at
him, pleading with him. “Help me. I can’t breathe. I’m dying.” Then
it was gone.

***

“
Okay, Fi. You can go now. I’ll finish
up the kitchen myself,” Ivy said, starting to load the professional
sized dish washer with the cutlery.

“
Are you sure, Vee? I don’t mind
staying.”

“
No. I’ll finish up. I’m going to need
you again early in the morning anyway. With Malcolm in the hospital
and Deck not feeling well, I’ll need to count on you more until
things sort themselves out,” Ivy said, pushing her hair out of her
face, exhausted.

“
That’s alright by me. I could use the
money. I’d really like to go to Spayne this winter anyway,” Fi
said, grabbing her coat from the hook by the back door.

“
So would I,” Ivy said with a sigh,
waving to Fi as she walked out the door, then stood with her hands
on her hips at the mountain of pots, pans and dishes on trays in
front of her. “Better make a start of it,” she said out loud to
herself and picked up the large roasting pan closest to
her.

The bottom of it was swimming with
grease and blood from the special of the night, prime rib. The look
of it made her nauseous as it swirled around the bottom of the pan.
She put it back down and went to the dishes, more blood and more
meat juices. Her head started to spin and she backed away so she
wouldn’t have to look at it again.
“Touch
it,”
she heard a voice say in the back of her
mind.

She moved back to the table slowly and
reached out, putting her hand in the pan; running her fingers over
the blood and juice wet bottom. She raised her fingers to her face
and smelled it.
“Taste it,”
the voice said to her, so she did. It was salty
and…greasy.

She felt warm, so warm she had to take
off her apron, then her over shirt.
“More,”
the voice said to her, and she rubbed her
whole hand in the pan.
God, I’m so
hot
, she thought, and took off her under blouse,
leaving her in only her bra.

***

He ran as fast as he could toward where he’d
heard the voice, but the path seemed endless. He heard Simon cry
out in pain, a shrill, terrified scream of agony and another vision
appeared before his eyes. It was Simon in the dungeon, he was
sobbing. But he wasn’t alone.

There were other sounds, wet sounds of
something crawling in the mud around him, slithering and the
grinding of teeth. He looked down towards Simon’s feet. There was
something the size of a large cat, then two of them, and they were
gnawing on his lame foot. Simon screamed, his face twisted in
agony. He called out to him. “Simon, I’m coming!”

The things turned back and looked at him.
They were like nothing he’d ever seen before, or not alive anyway,
only in stone carvings on his trip to Syria with Jack when he was
young.

They turned back and bit into Simon’s foot
again. Simon screamed. Then it was gone. He was standing in front
of the two towers. “Simon, where are you, please tell me. I can’t
find you,” he called out. The earth moved under his feet.

***

“
Touch yourself,”
the voice said to her. She dipped her hand back into the
roasting pan and wiped the blood and juices all over her chest. The
smell of it rose in her nose.

She took off her bra, then her jeans
and panties.
“More,”
the voice
said and she began rubbing the blood and drippings from the pan all
over her naked body; her hair, her face.

She heard music, rhythmic tribal music
with…flutes.

“
Dance,”
the
voice said, and she began moving. The rhythm engulfed her and she
stretched her arms out over her head, twirling in a circle, working
her naked hips around, undulating.

Chanting came from somewhere off in the
distance to match the rhythm of the music; the pace rising to a
fever pitch. She began to spin wildly, gyrating and writhing
uncontrollably in the middle of the kitchen floor, pulling at her
soaking hair, whipping it as she whirled.
“Fly,”
the voice said.

***

He looked down at his feet. They were bare.
The ground was rumbling, vibrating, pulsing like it was alive,
breathing. He heard Simon’s muffled cry, “I’m down here. Please
hurry. Iiiiiit’s eaaaaatttting meeeeee.” Another shrieking scream.
“You pro-mised you’d never let anything hurt me again,” he begged,
then another scream. Mitch’s mind splintered, his heart
exploded.

He ran to the cross. “I’m under here,” he
heard Simon’s voice cry out. “Down here. Please hurry,” and he
screamed in pain again.

Mitch pushed the cross with inhuman strength;
toppling it over. He dropped to his knees and began to dig
furiously with his bare hands as he heard Simon cry out,
“Huuuuurrrryyyyyy!”

“
I’m coming, Simon. I’m coming,” he
cried into the hole in the earth. Somewhere above him he heard
another voice, a woman. He looked up. It was the statue, the one
from the desert dream that he’d forgotten, twenty feet high with
haunches like a lion and long talons like a hawk on its
feet.

He looked higher and saw its many arms
and wings and breasts. He looked higher and saw its face, horns and
row after row of fanged teeth; hungry eyes.
“Dig!”

***

As the music reached its frenzied
crescendo, Ivy ran to the window and opened it, crawling onto the
counter top on her hands and knees.
“Fly to
me,”
the voice said again, and she leapt out into the
darkness.

***

Mitch woke up in his bed, screaming and
calling out for Simon. He looked at his watch. It was already after
noon. Still dressed in the clothes from the night before but
shoeless, he bounded out the door and down the hall, dazed and
disoriented. “I’m coming, Simon,” he called out to the air as he
ran down the hall, through the courtyard and into the SUV.

***

Hours passed before Simon realized he
was conscious again. He looked down at his hands and for the first
time in his life they looked like a man’s hands, veins pulsing in
their backs and he felt strong, so strong inside himself. He
started, feeling another hand on his shoulder.
“Thou art complete now, my boy, Holly. Thou art a man called
upon to do a man’s work and love with a man’s heart,”
The old man said with a sigh from behind him, shaking his
head, his voice trembling and echoing with his own emotion.
“But we must hurry. His father is here, coming for
him.”
Simon didn’t understand.

“
But he doesn’t have a father,” Simon
said aloud, perplexed, still groggy from his transformation, his
face still wet from the sweat and tears he couldn’t remember. He
wiped his face in his sleeve.

“
He has two, one good and
one…and they’re here,”
the old man said, his tiny
black eyes getting even blacker. Simon looked into the black eyes,
puzzled.

“
Two?”

“
All I can tell is that one
smells of fertile earth and the other like…rotted earth and they’re
here, close.”
He put his hand on Simon’s
shoulder.
“But more important, she called
him last night and he has gone to her. We must prepare.”

Simon jumped out of his chair.
“Let’s go!”

“
Wait,”
the old
man said, putting his hands out in a ‘slow down’ motion.
“We have time. We must wait until she is at her
weakest. We have until nightfall. We must deal with the fathers
first.”
This time they walked out the door and out
into the courtyard, standing behind the tall hedges at the side of
the inn, waiting.

When the limousine pulled up, they stood
hidden behind a tall shrub and watched as the driver opened the
door. Simon gasped as he saw Jack Edgeworth get out slowly, holding
onto the car door to pull himself out. “Dr. Edgeworth?” Simon
whispered to the old man.

The old man nodded and said in his soundless
voice, “Go to him and bring him here.”

Simon stepped out from behind the hedge and
called out, “Dr. Edgeworth!”

Jack stopped, turning to him. “Simon, am I
too late?” he asked with tears in his eyes, walking slowly toward
him, his face ashen, his lips already an alarming shade of blue.
Simon took him gently by the arm. He was weak and struggling to
breathe.

As soon as they turned the corner behind the
hedge, the old man swiftly took Jack by the shoulders, pinning his
back against the wall and bringing his face close to Jack’s chest,
smelling him.

“
What the fuck?” Jack croaked, barely
having the energy to move his lips, his frightened eyes looking to
Simon.

“
Fertile earth,”
the old man said to Simon with his soundless voice, then
raised his hand in front of Jack’s face.

“
Wait!” Simon said.

The old man stopped.

“
You’re not too late,” Simon said
quickly to Jack. An expression of relief came over Jack’s face.
Simon turned to the old man, “Now!” and the old man finished waving
his hand in front of Jack’s face.

“
Sleep.”

Jack’s body crumpled against the wall.
Simon grabbed him to steady him. The old man took his other arm and
said,
“Walk.”
Jack’s feet
began to move, shuffling as Simon and the old man guided him into
the cottage to Mitch’s room.
“Sit,”
the old man said, and Jack sat. From there they laid him down
on the bed.

“
He’s very sick, dying,” Simon said to
the old man.

“
And he loves thy Master very much,”
the old man said, shaking his head.

“
What do we do now?” Simon asked,
panicking.

“
We wait,” the old man said, taking
Simon back out the door, past the church and down the lane to his
own cottage, “…and prepare for nightfall.”

The other father, Julian Bramson, the third,
was just stepping off the plane in London, still six hours
away.

***

Dr. Mitchell Bramson arrived at the site and
walked, his mind muddled with images of death, destruction over
thousands of years; plagues, wars, faces of men and women, corrupt
and decaying before his eyes; languages and costumes from the
deserts of the ancient world, Egypt, Babylon and Persia to
Phoenicia and Crete, from Rome and Gaul to Renaissance Italy, and
the dark ages of France and Spain. His mind whirled with images of
demons and carved statues coming to life, voices in languages both
modern and long dead calling to him.

Above it all he heard Simon’s voice crying
out, screaming in pain as the creatures gnawed at him. “I’m
coming,” he slurred, no longer able to maintain any of his normal
balances. “I’mmmm Cooommminngg, Siiiiimmmmoonn.” He couldn’t stand.
Something was draining the life out of him, weakening him to his
knees until he was crawling past the two towers into the heart of
the site.

Coming to the cross, he pulled himself up on
it and pushed with all the strength he had left, toppling it, more
with his weight than with his strength, falling over with it,
passing into blackness as he called out to the sky. “I’mmmm
cooommminnnnggg, Siiiiimmmoooonnnnnn.”

***

Simon and the old man sat in front of
the fire at his cottage, drinking strong smelling tea and marking
their faces with symbols from the small pots of color, each wearing
a garment of sack cloth; sack cloth bags at their side.
“‘Tis almost time,”
the old man said
in his soundless voice.
“Do not be afraid.
I have taught thee well and given thee my power, and thou hast
learned well and accepted what I have given thee. The strength of
thy heart is all that matters now.”

Simon looked deeply into the old man’s
eyes.
“I will die before I let her take him
away,”
Simon said, the knowledge of what he learned
about her making his eyes darker and bluer than ever in the
firelight.