The Devil's Heart

FRIDAY MORNING

Sam catnapped from four in the morning until the first red streaks of dawn filtered through the timber. He cautiously moved a mile from his resting place before he squatted down and ate a sandwich Nydia had fixed him, washing it down with cold water from his canteen. With that in his stomach to soften the blow of the diet pill, Sam took one of Nydia's amphetamines, knowing he had to be alert, and knowing he had not had the rest to maintain the vigil he must keep … in order to stay alive and win this fight.

He smiled at the carnage that lay on the soft blanket that was the forest floor. The warrior had indeed meant his words when he said he was going to destroy the Devil's spawn.

Sam inspected the dead creatures, and found them to be as hideous in death as they were in life. So there was some truth to what is mistakenly called mythology, he concluded. The scientists and the professors and the arrogant atheists aren't as wise as they profess to be.

"So what else is new?" he muttered.

He left the dead ugliness of the Devil to rot and made his way back to a ridge, this one on the east side of the huge mansion. It was by far the best vantage point he'd found, for his shooting distance was shorter, and he would be able to see if anyone tried to slip from the house and circle around behind him.

Smiling, he noticed a bell hanging from the rear of the house. Nydia had said it was very old, an antique her mother had picked up in Europe—Holland, she'd said. Sam jacked a round into the heavy, .460, braced himself for the recoil, and sighted in the bell. "Ring my bell," he muttered, then gently squeezed the trigger, allowing the weapon to fire itself.

The bell clanged, then jumped from its bracings, blown from the brackets by the force of the heavy slug. But the men and women of the Coven, trapped inside the mansion, were ready for Sam this time. From every window came an answering volley of shots, forcing Sam to scamper back below the lip of the ridge. He crawled to the slight protection of a small clump of trees and carefully eased his way forward, until he could see the house. He sighted in one man, firing from the third floor, and eased the trigger back. The butt pounded his shoulder. But Sam had been shooting downhill, the scope adjusted for that angle, and his shot was high, not catching the man in the chest, but in the throat, almost decapitating the Coven. The .460 slug flung the man backward, his bubbling scream cut off before it could reach his lips.

Sliding backward, Sam changed positions, running several hundred feet before dropping to the earth and easing his way up to the crest of the ridge.

He spent the morning harassing those in the mansion, but taking no great personal risk in doing so. He knew he would have to go inside the mansion, and he was not looking forward to that, for that would put him on Falcon's territory, and the warlock would then have the advantage. But as long as he could, Sam intended to cut the odds … down, at least make it fifty/fifty, even-up, the scales tilting in no one's direction.