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“Your clothes, shithead,” said the third.

  “The wifford wants you ready,” Melanie added.

  “The what?” Martin asked.

  “Just shut up and get your clothes off.”

  Strangest of all, Martin obeyed these commands. The pink moon beat down on him, glare in his eyes. Next thing he knew he lay sprawled on the thatchy forest ground. The girls converged. Their hands ran all over him. His erection throbbed as if to burst, pulsing with his heart. All Martin could do was lie back and cringe.

  No, no, he thought. This was perverse. These girls were teenagers, he was a thirty eight year old man. And Melanie, for God’s sake…

  It’s got to be. It’s got to be a—

  “That’s right, asshole,” Melanie said. “It’s a dream.”

  But that knowledge did not legitimize the wrongness of this. Lust felt stuffed into his head; his entire body throbbed with it. Without preamble, Melanie straddled his face. “Eat it, peow,” she said. “Stick your tongue in it.” Martin tried, but couldn’t. She was keeping it too far away. She laughed, touching herself. Her thighs clenched against his head.

  And the other two girls… What were they doing? Martin couldn’t see, but he felt rough, swirling sensations. They giggled with their work. As Melanie brought herself to orgasm, little daubs touched his penis, his testicles—though the contact was insubstantial, Martin thought he might explode.

  “We’re initiating you, peow,” one of them said, giggling.

  “We’re making you ours,” said the other.

  He realized then what they were doing.

  They were painting him. They were painting him with whatever they’d been painting on the trees.

  This was crazy. They were just girls. Martin easily had the strength to overpower them, but even the thought of that weighed him down more. He felt as though roots had emerged, had lashed him to the pulpy ground.

  “Poor little lamb must be thirsty.”

  “Give him a drink, Melanie.”

  The three girls shrieked laughter—a mad, clicking, witch-like sound. Then Melanie began to urinate into his face.

  The hot stream inundated him. He gagged, eyes squeezed shut as their laughter rose. Is she going to piss forever? he thought.

  Martin wasn’t used to this kind of humiliation, even in dreams. He thought how wonderful it would be to lurch up, shrug them off. Yet his hate collided with his paralysis and broke apart, as though any thought of rebellion weakened him further.

  “Bet he’s not thirsty now.”

  “Look at his cock! Let’s cut it off!”

  Martin’s heart raced.

  The girls scurried away. Suddenly, a curvy shape blocked out the moonlight. Martin could only move his eyes. They roved up the figure, up sleek white legs, over a bushy pubis, over breasts and nipples. Then to the face: Maedeen’s.

  Yes, it was Maedeen, the shopkeeper. She was grinning, looking down at him with her hands on her hips.

  She straddled him at once. “Fok, peow. You are wreccan now.”

  Martin shuddered. She traced his cheek with a nail that felt inches long and sharp as a pin.

  “You belong to us.”

  She inserted him into her sex, which seemed inordinately hot. As she rode him, she looked up to the moon, whispering words he’d never heard. Her bare hips pounded him, her breasts bobbed. Despite the sensation, Martin wanted to throw up. The three girls crawled forward to watch, still giggling. The third pressed her palm over his mouth—she pressed down hard. Then Melanie, her pink face floating above him, pinched his nostrils shut.

  Martin lay frozen. They were killing him, but he couldn’t budge. Each time he thought his lungs would burst, Melanie released the pinch on his nostrils, gave him a second to breathe, then pinched them closed again.

  “You can play, Melanie. Just don’t kill him,” Maedeen said.

  “Let’s cut him up while she’s fucking him!” enthused one girl.

  “Let’s cut off his balls when he comes!” suggested the third.

  Martin felt buried in terror. Melanie continued to pinch and release. The palm pressed harder against his lips. The youngest girl began slapping at his testicles between Maedeen’s colliding strokes. Their laughter smothered him like a tarp.

  But something was happening. Martin’s eyes bulged in the pink light. He felt death sliding close. Melanie was giving him less air. The younger girl squeezed his testicles so hard he thought they’d split as Maedeen’s sex gulped his erection. He could see them only in mad glimpses, in blurs. Their nails seemed heinously long, like talons. And their faces… Their faces…

  “Every night, peow. Every night we do whatever we want with you.”

  But the words seemed sunken now, a black rattle. Maedeen’s voice barely sounded human.

  And her face—

  My God—

  —her face didn’t look human at all.

  —

  Chapter 17

  I can’t, the words seemed to loll in the dark. You’re special.

  Melanie awakened, frowning. A slant of sunlight lay across her eyes from the gap in the curtains.

  I want to, but I can’t. You’re too special.

  She’d slept like a bag of rocks. It only took a moment to remember last night’s embarrassment. Zack must think I’m a slut. She couldn’t believe how forward she’d been. She’d initiated everything—she’d practically dragged him to the bed. It had been great at first. Melanie had made out with a lot of guys in the past, but this had been different. It seemed they were on the bed for hours, just kissing and touching each other. You’re so beautiful, he kept whispering. Then everything had fallen apart as quickly as it had started.

  She’d never gone all the way before. She’d had plenty of chances, she’d just never really wanted to. But with Zack… After a while, their petting had wrung her out. She could feel her own wetness seeping, and his own arousal was plain each time she ran her hand across his crotch. The sensations that swelled in her made her feel like a tightly wound wire. A few more twists and she would break. She skimmed off his T-shirt and ran her hands over his muscles, his strong back and chest, his abdomen. She wasn’t afraid, she was ready. She took off her own top. Her breasts felt hot. Then she unsnapped her jeans, began to slide them down, and—

  Zack got up. He was putting his T-shirt back on.

  “Zack, what’s wrong?”

  He stared at her. He looked hurt. “I can’t,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “You’re special.”

  Melanie’s embarrassment flared. He couldn’t have picked a worse moment. She was naked from the waist up and her jeans were halfway down, and now he didn’t want to?

  “I want to, but I can’t. You’re too special.”

  She pulled her clothes back on. “I’m sorry, Melanie,” he was saying as she fled the little basement. He came up the steps after her. “You don’t understand!”

  I understand, all right! She’d almost been crying as she’d scurried off into the woods.

  Special. You’re too special.

  Hadn’t Wendlyn and Rena said that she was special?

  Now she lay in bed, the sun in her eyes. What would she say the next time she saw Zack? And what would he say?

  Special. The words kept nipping at her.

  You’re too special.

  She fingered the tiny stone pendant around her neck. “What’s so special about me?” she muttered to herself. A tear formed in her eye.

  «« — »»

  The hospital videotaped all preliminary admittance interviews. It was protocol. Dr. Harold pressed the Play button and sat back. Erik Tharp looked quite different back then. He looked scary. Long hair. Beard. Slim but muscular, a physique honed by hard work.

  Yes, of course. Digging graves was very hard work.

  There was an aura about him on the video tape, a presence that five years of inactivity and starchy psych ward food had drained. Erik Tharp waited at the interview table. Every so often he looked up at
the hidden video camera and smiled.

  It was Dr. Greene who sat down across from him.

  “Good morning, Erik. That’s your name, right? Erik?”

  “I’m called brygorwreccan,” Erik Tharp slowly replied. His voice sounded corroded, unearthly.

  “Okay. Is that what you’d like me to call you?”

  “You can call me Erik. They call me brygorwreccan.”

  “Who’s they?”

  Erik stared, stone faced, through long strands of hair.

  “What happened to your voice, Erik?”

  “Doctor said I only got one vocal cord left.” He smiled vaguely. “They always had a hard time controlling me. Said it was because I used to do drugs.”

  “What kind of drugs, Erik?”

  “Crank, dust. Dust, mostly. Coke sometimes.”

  “And they couldn’t control you because you used to use drugs?”,

  “That s what they said. The other peows, they could control them easy. Sometimes I got out of hand, though. They thought I was gonna blow the whistle on them. So they’d punish me.”

  “How?”

  “Sometimes they’d tie me up, burn me.”

  “They burned you? How?”

  “They’d lay a metal rod in the fire.” Erik stood up and raised his black T shirt. Several long scars could be seen along his abdomen. Self induced, Dr. Harold concluded. He was sure Dr. Greene had made the same conclusion.

  Erik sat back down. “I could handle that, though. Sometimes they made me look in the mirror. And they always made me watch the hustig.”

  “The what?”

  “The rituals. Watching those was worse than torture.”

  “Why didn’t you just leave?”

  “Couldn’t. The closer you are to them, the more power they have over you.”

  “I see,” Dr. Greene said. “But let’s backtrack a minute, okay? We were talking about your voice. What exactly did they do?”

  “Oh, yeah. They stuck an awl in my throat.”

  “As punishment for insubordination?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Erik, the night you were arrested, you told the police that muggers stuck an awl in your throat.”

  “I lied.”

  “Why?”

  “I was scared. I didn’t know what was happening. But I know now, so I can tell the truth and it won’t matter.”

  “Why doesn’t it matter?”

  Erik laughed. “Because I’m in a mental hospital now. They don’t care what I say because they know no one will believe me. They’re the ones who got me put here.”

  “Erik, the police caught you burying bodies in a field off Route 154. Do you deny that?”

  “No,” Erik Tharp said. “That was my job. After a hüsl, I had to bury the bodies. They decided I was too hard to control, so after the last hustig, they told the cops where I’d be. The whole thing was a setup.”

  “Okay, Erik. Tell me more about the bodies. Some of them were children, babies. Why did you kill them? For the hüsls?”

  “No, no, I didn’t kill any of them, I just buried them, and, yeah, I snatched some people, sure, but I never killed anyone.”

  “You snatched people?”

  “I abducted people for them, that was my job too. Hitchhikers, runaways, people like that, people who weren’t local.”

  “What about the babies, Erik? Did you abduct the babies too?”

  “No.”

  “Then who did?”

  “No one. They weren’t abductions.”

  “Then—”

  “I don’t want to talk about the babies anymore.”

  Dr. Greene nodded. “All right, Erik. Tell me about the—”

  “I don’t want to talk about anything anymore.”

  Erik Tharp put his head down on the table and began to cry.

  Dr. Harold ejected the tape. Now he knew exactly what Dr. Greene meant. Erik Tharp displayed no signs of story-mixing, referencing, or even lying. Most clinical psychiatrists could spot lying in a matter of minutes by gauging facial inflections via question structure. Only a pathological mind set could repress such inflections, and Erik Tharp clearly was not pathological.

  Next were transcripts of a court authorized narcoanalysis, a process in which all conscious mental barriers were dropped with hypnotic drugs. “T” was for Tharp. “G” was for Greene. A light dose of a drug called scopolamine maintained unconsciousness without dropping most brain wave activity. It was even harder to lie under narcoanalysis.

  G: How many people did you kill, Erik?

  T: None.

  G: Why were you burying bodies?

  T: Bludcynn.

  G: Erik, were you part of a satanic cult?

  T: Dohtor.

  G: What?

  T: Dother fo Dother.

  G: Erik, tell me about the cult.

  T: Hüsl. Blood. Bludcynn. Dother fo Dother. I am peow. I am wreccan. We are all wreccan for the face in the mirror.

  G: What do you see in the mirror, Erik?

  T: Hell.

  G: You see hell?

  T: Her.

  G: Who?

  (patient begins to convulse. A waves erratic.)

  T: They make us wreccan for her. I am wreccan. I have no soul.

  G: What happened to your soul, Erik?

  T: They gave it to her. They fuck.

  (A waves still jumping. Heart rate 121.)

  T: They fuck us and make us wreccan. For her.

  G: Erik, who is her?

  T: Dohtor.

  G: Erik, what is dohtor?

  T: Dother fo Dother. Liiiiii… Liiiiii… Liiiii

  (Patient’s eyes are open, lacrimation evident. Heart rate 148.)

  T: I am brygorwreccan, I am digger. Scierors cut, cokkers cook. We are hüslpegns. We work for them. They eat, they fuck, they kill—for her.

  G: Who is her, Erik?

  T: Liiiiii… Liiiiii… Arrrrrrdaaaaa—

  (Patient screams. A waves cessate to REM levels, heart rate drops steadily, Narcoanalysis suspended as patient no longer responds.)

  Two weeks later they’d attempted hypnosynthesis: hypnotic vocal commands in conjunction with fluctuating doses of sodium amobarbital, which kept the patient’s subconscious accessible without inducing high autonomic responses. The idea was to solicit the patient in the first or second stage of sleep, which weren’t dream stages.

  T: They practiced these rituals.

  G: What kind of rituals, Erik?

  T: They worshipped this…thing.

  G: Yes?

  T: This…demon.

  G: Tell me about the demon, Erik.

  T: They made me watch, they made us all watch.

  (Patient’s voice is regulated, monotonal. Heart rate 67.)

  G: What did they make you watch, Erik?

  T: They cut people up alive. They hate all outsiders.

  G: Why do they hate outsiders, Erik?

  T: They hate anyone out of the bludcynn, especially men.

  G: Because of the demon? They hate men because of the demon?

  T: It lives on hate.

  G: What lives on hate, Erik? The demon?

  T: They like to cause pain, because it likes pain.

  G: Who, Erik? The cult? The demon?

  T: They like to cut cocks off of guys.

  (Interviewer pauses.)

  G: What?

  T: They eat people after they’re done torturing them. They cut off their heads and make us cook the heads. On feks they’d sacrifice kids. It was all part of the preparation.

  G: Preparation for what, Erik?

  T: The Fulluht Loc.

  G: What’s that, Erik? I don’t know what that is.

  T: They love to fuck. They love to fuck and kill people, torture people. That’s their power—fucking. It’s in their eyes. Their eyes are like the mirror. They make you look in their eyes while they’re fucking you. Lots of times they made us fuck corpses, ’cause it gets them off.

  (Interviewer pauses. Patient is trembling, pe
rspiring.)

  G: Tell me about the fulluht, Erik.

  T: I buried the bodies when the feks were over. That was my job. It was also my job to bring in the hüsls.

  G: What’s a hüsl, Erik?

  T: They cooked heads.

  G: What?

  T: Girls they pretty much just sacrificed. They’d chain them up downstairs, save them for the important hustigs.

  G: What’s a hustig, Erik?

  T: They did the worst shit to the guys. Guys were their fun. They hate men because it hates men.

  G: Erik, I want you to tell me about the terms you’re using. Tell me about fulluht, wîhan, hüsl. What do these words mean?

  T: Fucking is their power. That’s how they worship her.

  G: The demon, you mean. What’s the demon’s name?

  T: I got a lot of hüsls picking up hitchhikers or drunks. Girls I got mainly hitchhiking.

  G: Erik, let’s backtrack a little, okay?

  T: I’d bring these guys down, usually at gunpoint. Sometimes I’d have to knock them out. The munucs would take it from there.

  G: What’s a munuc, Erik? Is a munuc someone in the cult?

  T: They’d fuck these guys, and sometimes they’d kill him while they were fucking him, they really got off on that. The wifmunuc loved it, she’d do it all the time.

  G: Is the wifmunuc the leader of the cult?

  T: This guy, the wreccans held him down and they cut the guy’s cock off just like that, and then the scierors skinned him right there on the slab, and I swear to God this poor guy was still alive when they tossed him in the fire. They did all kinds of awful shit like that, things you wouldn’t believe, like sometimes the scierors’d cut a guy open while the munucs were fucking him, and a lot of times the wifford would sit on a guy’s face so he couldn’t see what was going on while the other munucs took turns blowing him, and then just like that they’d cut his cock off, he’d never even know it was coming, and he’s shooting blood all over the place running around screaming and then they’d throw the guy right into the fire, and I’ll tell you something, it takes a while for a guy to die in a fire pit, I’ve seen them lashing around in there screaming their heads off while they’re turning black, and a lot of times they’d try to crawl out and the munucs would just laugh it up and order the cokkers to push him back in, it’s a sight I’ll tell you seeing some poor guy sizzling alive in the pit and screaming and screaming and the girls in the pens would be watching this and they’d be screaming too there was so much screaming man screaming and shrieking and the munucs laughing it was so bad you couldn’t think it was so bad sometimes you’d just want to die…