Dead Mans Hand

3.00 P.M.

The sound of footsteps on the stairs made Jay open his eyes.

It was very quiet. He had been sleeping… or drifting in and out of consciousness, it was hard to be sure. He glanced over toward the mattress and saw Blaise staring at him. The boy's eyes were wide open, fixed in terror. A froth of blood bubbled out of his mouth where Charm had knocked out some teeth. He didn't seem aware of it. He didn't seem aware of anything.

The footsteps got louder. Jay squirmed along the couch, his useless hands still bound behind his back, and tried to get a good look into the next room.

Hiram Worchester stepped into the basement.

Jay blinked. For a moment he thought he was hallucinating. Then he gathered all the strength he had in him and screamed. "Here! Hiram, I'm back here!"

Hiram's head snapped around. Charm lurched to his feet and moved slowly out of the shadows. "Watch out!" Jay yelled.

He heard Ezili laughing.

Hiram was carrying a suitcase, huge and black, closed with three bright brass hinges. It was so large it was almost a trunk, but he carried it as easily as a normal man might carry a briefcase, and Jay realized he had made it light. Charm took it from him and set it on its end, reverently. Six hands began working simultaneously on the latches.

Jay Ackroyd went cold all over.

Hiram looked at him across the length of the basement. The ace looked rumpled and tired, his impeccably tailored suit stained with sweat. Jay met his eyes; they were full of pain, and shame, and something that might have been terror. He looked as though he was going to cry. When he raised a hand in a gesture that had grown all too familiar to Jay and rubbed at something on the side of his neck, Ackroyd wanted to cry himself.

Sascha stepped into view beside Hiram, his head moving slowly from side to side in tiny birdlike motions as his telepathy tested the waters. It was safe; Sascha nodded. "Open it."

Charm opened the suitcase.

Inside was a young girl, no more than four or five. She was tiny, fair-skinned, blond, naked. And smiling.

Clinging to her in an obscene embrace was a thing that looked like a cross between an aborted fetus and the biggest maggot Jay had ever seen. Its mouth was pressed to the side of her neck, and in the sudden quiet Jay could hear faint sucking sounds.

But its eyes were alive and alert. They found Jay in the darkness and considered him hungrily.

My nightmare, Jay thought wildly. He almost expected it to howl. Warmth spread across his thighs as his bladder let go.

"He is very afraid, master," Sascha said.

"Later I will taste his fear," the little girl replied. She climbed awkwardly from the suitcase and put a dainty hand on Charm to steady herself. She had a voice out of a Shirley Temple movie, but the words belonged to the thing on her back.

"Hiram," Jay pleaded. "Do something."

"There's nothing to be done, Jay," Hiram Worchester said softly. "I'm sorry"

Jay twisted helplessly against his bonds, trying to wrench his hands free. It was useless. He couldn't even feel his hands; for all he knew, they had fallen off an hour ago.

"They are strong, master," Ezili said. "Both aces," Sascha confirmed.

Hiram looked as though he was going to say something. Instead he turned to stare at a wall. Jay called out to him. "Make a fucking fist, Hiram. These guys are nothing compared to you. Pile on the weight until the goddamn leech is a thin film on the floor!"

"You don't understand," Hiram said. "Ti Malice is my master. I couldn't live without his kiss. How could I hurt him?" His huge body shook. "I could… never… hurt him."

"I will try the boy first," the little girl announced.

If Blaise heard or understood, he gave no sign. They came into the room one by one; the girl first, with the creature Hiram had called Ti Malice glistening against her flesh, then Sascha, Ezili, the centipede, even Charm and the others. Only Hiram remained back in the other room. Blaise stared up at them blankly, then seemed to wake, as if from a deep sleep. "No!" he shouted, scrambling back across the filthy mattress, as far from Ti Malice as he could go. It wasn't far enough. "No, please."

"Interesting," the girl said. "I can feel it touching the mount's mind, trying to push her away." Stunted vestigial limbs stirred feebly as Ti Malice prepared to move to a new host.

"Not the girl," Jay screamed, "the thing on her back." Blaise gave him one quick, desperate glance, and in that moment, Jay truly knew the meaning of fear.

"Hold him for me," Ti Malice told Charm with the mouth of its child. The huge joker shambled forward.

The boy's violet eyes went back to Ti Malice and narrowed in a last desperate act of courage as his mind reached out for the parasite's.

Then Blaise began to scream.