The Right Hand of Evil

CHAPTER 37

It wasn't possible. None of what she was seeing could possibly be happening.

Janet's last scream hung in the air, fading away, only to build once again, as if somehow the vast chamber into which she'd stumbled were amplifying it and reamplifying it.

Every muscle in her body had gone flaccid, and for a moment that went on forever, she thought she would collapse to the floor.

Her mind cast out in every direction, seeking something, anything, that would make sense of what she was experiencing.

A nightmare?

But she was awake! She knew she was awake.

An hallucination. That had to be it-everything she'd seen, the strange look to the house, the bizarre alterations to her trompe l'oeil, none of it could be anything but an hallucination.

Her eyes flicked over the impossible vision before her. Jared's room, that musty, black-walled chamber, had vanished. But what had taken its place couldn't exist. As the door had swung open, the piercing light from within blinded her for a second, but then her vision had cleared and she'd seen it: a space so vast it seemed to go on forever, its farthest reaches lost in shadows so black they devoured the harsh, cold light that seemed to come from everywhere-and nowhere. But what had made her scream-the image that had ripped an anguished howl of pure horror from her throat-was the altar that loomed in the distance, dominating the entire space, although it appeared so far away as to be unreachable.

Bones. The whole thing was made of human bones-thousands of them. The altar was covered with flickering candles from which the scent of burning flesh billowed into the thick, smoke-filled atmosphere. On the altar lay the desiccated remains of a hand.

A human hand.

A right hand.

Its nails split with age, its rotted skin falling away, its forefinger curled as if beckoning to her. She knew instinctively where it had come from: the desecrated tomb of George Conway. Even as its image burned into her mind, Janet forced herself to look away, only to be faced with something else. It, too, she recognized in a flash: the severed right forepaw of her son's pet, Scout. Next to it lay the foot of another animal, but that one, blessedly, she did not recognize.

Nauseated, she tore her eyes from the grisly objects, only to face an even more horrifying vision: above the altar, floating unsupported by anything she could see, was an inverted cross.

From the cross was suspended a figure, held to it with a single spike piercing both feet, its head dangling down. Two more spikes pierced the figure's wrists, pinning them to the transverse of the cross.

A great gash was torn in the figure's right side, and blood oozed from the wound. Blood, and something else as well.

A squirming, roiling mass of maggots, erupting from the great wound.

At last her eyes fastened on the figure's face, and her screams built until her own voice filled the vast space, then buffeted back at her, perverted into taunting laughter. For it was her own features she beheld above the altar, twisted in anguish, blood dripping down the planes of her face to mat her hair.

She felt the pain now. Her feet and wrists throbbed with agony, and the wound, churning with the ravenous maggots, burned unbearably in her side. She could feel the heat of blood streaming from the gash, and her nostrils filled with its coppery odor. She tried to take a step forward, collapsed to her knees and screamed again as her bloodied hands struck the floor.

Drugs!

That was it! Somehow, she had to have been drugged. But even that made no sense, for she could remember everything perfectly clearly, from the moment Ted came home last night.

Their lovemaking.

Falling asleep in his arms.

Waking up, filled with a sense of well-being and contentment.

She'd eaten nothing-drunk nothing.

Then how…? But the question was never completed, for even as it formed, two new figures appeared. Although their backs were toward her, she recognized them immediately.

Her husband.

And her son.

Together, they placed a bundle on the altar, something she couldn't quite see, for it was wrapped in some kind of animal skin.

A skin covered with golden fur.

Then, even before realizing what the skin must be, she knew with terrible certainty what was inside it.

"Molly!" she screamed.

Ignoring the agony in her feet and wrists, Janet raced toward the grotesque altar. From out of nowhere, a terrible peal of laughter rolled over her, and both Ted and Jared turned to gaze at her.

Ted raised his finger to point at her, and she felt a stab of heat lash into her, as if she'd been struck by a laser. Still she lurched toward the altar, her arms outstretched, her baby daughter's name shrieking from her lips. "Molly… Molly… Molly… Molly…"

The howls of mocking laughter swelled, and over and over again she felt the whiplike flick of the unseen force emanating from Ted's hand. Then, when she was still ten yards from the altar, Ted spoke.

"Stop her!"

Jared, a glittering dagger clutched in his right hand, started toward his mother.