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Of course, this night could come to a peaceful conclusion. Maybe in an hour or so, she’d be back home with her babies. But was that really what she wanted? Didn’t a part of her hope things would go awry tonight? Wasn’t that what had truly pulled her from her home on Christmas night? Certainly she must have considered this confrontation might bring her to her own deliverance.
Even if she survived whatever evil was destroying the church, she could end it herself. Not rely on these fools. Reuben’s old razor. It was still packed away at the house. She could turn around. Go home right now and unpack it. One quick slice across her throat was all it would take.
May stopped dead in her tracks. These were not her thoughts. These thoughts were coming from outside of her, playing on her weaknesses. The voice of the White King. Seducing her with the promise of an easy rest. No, she was not going to let his malfeasance take root in her soul. She shook her head. “Not me, you old devil. Your brother might get me. Hell, he’s waiting for me just around the corner, but you ain’t ever gonna get May.”
She crept out of the graveyard to where she could witness the fire’s devastation. A group of men milled around in the hellish glow of the flames. She could hear them talking, but their voices were muted by the roar of the fire that was destroying the wood-frame church. Then the steeple tilted and fell, eliciting a powerful roar from those who had set the building alight. She approached them, unnoticed, from behind. Their attention was fixed on their handiwork. They stood there, not wearing the white robes she had expected to see, their faces not hidden by the pointed hoods. No. They stood out there in the open for all the world to see. Proud of themselves. Proud to be performing their civic duty. Jones was on his knees, o
ne hand pressed against a wound on his head, staring up at the destruction with horror in his eyes.
The heat of the blaze beat back the cold of the black night. It would’ve felt pleasant had the fire not been the flames of hell.
One of the men looked back and noticed her arrival. “Well, who do we have here?” he called out, causing his fellows to turn.
She stretched herself to her full height and swallowed before speaking, praying her voice would not crack. “I’ve come for the preacher.” She strode up to them, trying to look confident, trying to act like she was in charge of the situation. She held out her hand to Jones.
He looked up at her through his one good eye, the other having swollen shut from the abuse these monsters had dealt to him. He waved her back with a bloodied hand. “Go. Go on. Get out of here.”
“No, sir,” May responded, walking up to him, taking his sticky hand in hers. “I ain’t leaving here without you.”
The reverberation of a gunshot caused May to jump, despite her determination to appear calm. A fat man with a rifle ambled up toward them, the other men parting to let him through. “Just who the hell do you think you are sticking your black nose in where it don’t belong?”
May released the pastor’s hand. She would try to solve this peaceably. Find a way to reason with these people. Yes, the church was lost, but it could be rebuilt. They’d hurt Jones, but he would heal. She would heal him. If she could get these men to let them go willingly, she could prevent any more bloodshed. But before she could respond, another spoke for her.
“Good heavens, Bobby. You mean to tell me you don’t recognize the great Mother Wills?” Sterling Maguire walked around the fat man and pulled the rifle from his grasp, breaking open the barrel and removing the remaining shell. May gaped in amazement. Sterling pushed the shell into this Bobby’s shirt pocket and handed the rifle back to him. “Y’all are done here now. You can go.”
Another man stepped forward and pointed down at Jones. “Come on, Mr. Maguire. You promised us a little fun with that one.” He pushed past Maguire and grabbed the pastor by the collar.
Maguire turned on this one, and the flames of the disintegrating church could not begin to match the fire in his eyes. “I said y’all are done here. Now go.” The man holding Jones seemed to know he’d overstepped. He released Jones without another word of protest.
The other men milled around, grumbling, but they left as they’d been ordered.
As the last of the men made his way beyond the fire’s glow, Sterling drew near May. Her eyes forced her to think of this man as the younger Maguire, though she knew for a fact it was the father walking around in the son’s skin. Same old hate in a different package. “Long time no see, huh, May?” For reasons May could not begin to imagine, Sterling began to undo his tie. He undid the knot, then pulled it out from under his collar and flung it to the ground. Then his fingers went to his shirt and began unbuttoning.
“Whatever the hell you think you’re doin’, you better stop it right now,” May raised her hands, fingers pointed toward each other as a ball of blue lightning, the largest she’d ever mustered, formed there, ready and waiting to be launched. She guessed it’d burn a hole clean through a normal man, but this servant of the Red King, with his monstrous living tattoos, well, she hoped it would at least buy her enough time to get Jones to Henry’s truck and get back to her house.
“My, my, my, how you have grown, my girl,” Maguire said. “You’ve been practicing.” He stopped for a moment, but then resumed what he was doing. “I, too, have seen many changes since we last met.” He shrugged off his shirt, and May prepared herself for the demonical sight of his markings. But they were gone, and his pasty white skin was now a clear canvas. He drew closer, presenting himself for inspection.
“Who did you kill? What child did you offer to your demon for this?”
Maguire leaned back, clasping his hands before him. “Ah, May, can’t you tell the world is changing?” He paused. “No. Not changing. Returning to the normal, rightful order. Sanity is being restored.” He released his clasp and shook his head. “Not a single little one was harmed for this miracle, although I would’ve gladly commissioned a new slaughter of the innocents for it. No, I no longer have any need of the Red King’s crumbs. There is magic out there, the likes of which neither you nor I ever imagined. We, you and I, your mother and I.” His eyes widened. “Your grandmother and I. And hell, even her mother before that. Honestly, girl,” he said with a chuckle, “I’ve done lost track of how far back we go. Over the years, we have been slinging pebbles at each other with home-crafted slingshots. Our magic has been like the power of steam. But there are those out there with the power of lightning. The power of the very void from which existence sprang. The power . . .”
“The power of devils,” Pastor Jones surprised May by speaking.
Maguire stepped forward and used the sole of his foot to push the battered man from his knees, causing him to land on his side. “The power of gods,” he said, then spat on the minister. Maguire looked at the pastor as if he’d like nothing better than to gut him, but his expression smoothed over in the next instant.
“The old order is returning,” he said, turning toward May. “As soon as tomorrow. And when it does, there will be a need for men like me. There are those who recognize that need, and they’re the ones who did this for me.” He waved his hands before himself. “Old lines are being redrawn. Old ways renewed.” He took another step closer, and May prepared to aim her shot, but Maguire reached out and placed one hand above and the other below the ball of energy she’d been cradling. He brought his hands together, and though his face contorted in pain, he squeezed the ball tighter and tighter until it collapsed and went dark. May stumbled back, feeling all her energy fail her. When she raised her arms, it was not in attack, but in surrender.
Pastor Jones pushed himself back up to his knees and made a failed attempt to rise to his feet. “Do what you need to do with me, but this woman is innocent. Just let her go.”
Sterling went to the preacher’s side and squatted down beside him. “Oh, Pastor. Don’t fool yourself. No one who knows that kind of power is innocent. And”—he held a hand out to Jones—“don’t be so quick to assume this is about you.” The pastor slapped away the white man’s hand.
“Fine,” Sterling said, rising, “have it your way.”
A movement some yards away caught May’s eye, and her heart fell at the sight of Henry stepping out of the shadows. The last thing she needed was for him to get mixed up in her struggles with Maguire.
“I told you to stay put,” she said, anger punctuating each word. Henry came forward and helped the pastor up.
“And I told him to come along,” Maguire said. The dance of the wicked flames turned Sterling’s lopsided sneer into a demon’s mask. “You can get on home now, boy,” he said, giving Henry a rough shove. “Your work here’s done.”
