The Hanging Hill

90

Reginald Grimes stood in the center of the scenery storage room, staring up at the gleaming brass statue of Moloch.

Grimes was dressed in white tie and tails, a satin-lined cape, and a jeweled purple turban—a costume constructed to be an exact duplicate of his grandfather’s. Hakeem stood beside him, decked out in elegant acolyte robes and his red felt hat. Badir and Jamal had installed a massive stove hood directly above the statue, as well as all the ductwork needed to vent the smoke of their sacrifice directly into the playhouse’s chimney system.

“All is in readiness, Exalted High Priest of Ba’al,” said Hakeem, scraping into a deep bow.

“Excellent,” said Grimes. “Let us proceed upstairs to retrieve the children. You are prepared to deal with their mothers?”

“Yes, Exalted One. The playwright and her child as well.”

“Excellent. Tell me, Hakeem: Where is this portal? This power spot you speak of? Where is it that I shall first welcome my army of demons?”

“Come. I will show you.”

Hakeem led Grimes around the statue, where he saw four ragged posts, about eight feet apart, poking up through the concrete floor like pilings for a dock that had long since rotted away.

“Behold the original foundation for the scaffold on Hangman’s Hill,” said Hakeem. “Feel the floor.”

Grimes touched the ground. It was hot and thrumming.

“This is the spot cursed by the Pequot chieftain Sassakus for what the white men did to his daughter, Princess Nepauduckett,” said Hakeem. “The mighty chief decreed that when the full August moon, the Dog Moon, rose in the sky, so too, in this cursed spot, would the foulest dogs of the demon white race. The white man’s prayers, begging for deliverance from evil, have kept this doorway sealed for centuries with only the most heinous souls being able to seep through its cracks—and then only with the assistance of a powerful necromancer, such as your grandfather.”

“Or me!”

“Yes, Exalted One.”

Grimes worked his hands together in anticipation. “And if I invoke the resurrection ritual of Moloch at the precise moment Sassakus’s Dog Moon rules the night sky …”

“You shall unleash the hounds of hell! All the demons summoned to this place as well as those who gather here every August shall rise up from the dead, return to their bodies, and take on renewed life! You shall be crowned the King of Pandemonium.”

Grimes felt his chest swelling with pride. Even his lame arm felt strong and rippling with purpose.

“You and the mighty Moloch,” Hakeem went on, “shall rule the world from this sacred spot as we, the proud brothers of Hannibal, once ruled the world from our temple in Carthage. All shall tremble in fear before you and Moloch Almighty!”

Grimes’s smile stretched across his face. He ruffled out his cape and swept around to the front of the statue, where he could already feel the heat radiating off the grill situated between the beast’s knees. Badir and Jamal stoked the roiling inferno below the gridiron with shovelfuls of fresh coal.

“Is the Tophet ready?” Grimes cried out, using the Hebrew word he had learned from The Book of Ba’al for the place where the fires burned constantly, where children were sacrificed in the worship of Moloch.

“Yes, Exalted One!”

Despite the searing pain, Grimes forced both arms high above his head. The three Tunisian men dropped to their knees.

“Hear me, mighty Moloch!” Grimes proclaimed. “Soon shall I feed unto you two children in exchange for that which I desire!” He lowered his eyes and spoke to the floor. “Hear me, foul fiends trapped below. These children, pure and true, shall die in this fire so that Moloch might resurrect you!”

It was time to fetch the two children born under the full moon.

Time to slay Derek Stone and Meghan McKenna.