Disclaimer: see Verse 1.

The Everblack Bible

Verse 12

Backlash

By Random1377

"Yuri… Yuurrriii… wake uuuup…"

Yuri groaned his discontent, trying to ignore the insistent shaking that was interrupting his extremely pleasant dream. It was not often that he was visited with passionate visions in his sleep – let alone the variety wherein he had the company of both of his traveling companions – so he was VERY reluctant to let it go.

"Oh, just kick him."

"I'm UP!" Yuri growled, forcing his eyes open and rubbing them irritably. "God, can't you women let me get a decent night's sleep??"

Gazing up at the two, he frowned, concentrating his attention on Margarete for a moment. I'm seeing things, he thought, blinking hard as the blonde seemed to fade almost to transparency before solidifying completely.

Somehow, this vision gave the harmonixer the shivers, and he quickly rose to his feet, stealing another quick look at Margarete to ensure that she was entirely there.

"See something you like?" the spy asked, sounding honestly curious as she caught his sideways glance.

"Just thought you had a bug on your chest," Yuri muttered lamely, nodding to Alice as she gave him a soft smile of greeting.

"So you were staring at my chest, huh? …again, see something you l-"

"Ahem!"

Yuri and Margarete focused their attention on the exorcist as she cleared her throat with far more force than was necessary.

"I found the church," she said abruptly, "and I talked to the nun who lives there. She said this is definitely the place."

"Well that's good to know," Margarete said, pursing her lips, "I'd hate to think we traipsed all the way up here for nothing. How far to the temple?"

"Less than a mile," Alice said, regaining her good cheer now that Yuri's attention was no longer on any bugs that may or may not have been on Margarete's sizable bosom. "She said there's only one priest that watches over the temple… but he's very powerful, and a little on the cranky side, so we need to treat him with respect."

"So YOU," Margarete said, jabbing a finger at Yuri, "should just stay quiet."

"I got it, I got it," the harmonixer said irritably, "geez, you make it sound like I start fights just for the hell of it!"

"Don't you?"

"NO!"

"Come on, you two," Alice said, fighting the urge to grab them both by the ear and tug them along like willful children.

"Alright, alright," Margarete sighed, waiting until Alice's back was turned before sticking her tongue out at Yuri.

Yuri just rolled his eyes, tiring of the game as the exorcist started off towards the temple. "Did she say anything else useful?" he asked, hurrying to catch up.

"Mmm, not really," Alice said after a moment's thought, "she really… just asked about me, after telling me where to find the temple."

"About you?" Margarete mused. "Like what kind of stuff?"

Alice frowned. "About my mother, actually," she said hesitantly. "She kept asking if my mother was a good woman, if she treated me well, things like that… and she looked, I dunno, relieved when I said that I've always gotten along great with my mother."

Almost as if she was expecting her to be a wretched person, she thought, pondering the look of gratitude Sister Moira had on her face when Alice told her about her upbringing. It… kind of felt like there was something else she wanted to say. Maybe I'll go back there after we're done here and ask her about it.

The troop fell silent as they marched towards the temple, each wrapped in their own thoughts.

"Is that the place?" Yuri asked finally, tilting his chin towards a small, cobblestone building on the edge of a clearing in the woods.

"Uh-huh," Alice nodded, "now let me go in first – I have a note from Sister Moira explaining our situation."

The other two nodded, falling back a step as Alice walked towards the structure, un-slinging her backpack as she went.

"Father Morris?" she called, setting her backpack just outside the door, "Father Morris, are you here? I've… I've come to use your font, if I may. Sister Moira said to tell you it's alright. …Father Morris?"

She jumped slightly as Yuri's hand landed on her shoulder.

"Looks fishy to me," he said grimly, eyeing the closed door warily. "Where would he be at this time of the day?"

"Maybe he went out for a walk?" Margarete offered. "Maybe he catches fish a stream nearby? Who knows?"

Yuri looked frustrated. "Well, do we wait, or just go in?" he asked uncertainly. "I don't like walking into other people's houses…"

Biting her lip for a moment, Alice said, "It'll be fine… it may be small, but it's still a temple of the Lord, and His house is always open."

"That's a great justification for breaking and entering," Margarete muttered dryly.

Slowly, Yuri reached out and pushed on the door, shrugging as it swung open with a loud creak. "Not breaking," he winked, "just entering. Hell, if we hurry, we could be gone before-"

"Don't say 'Hell,' inside the temple," Alice cut in sharply, her tone conveying not a single hint of humor. "This is a holy place, Yuri… alright?"

Yuri rolled his eyes. "Got it," he said dejectedly. "Maybe I'll just shut up entirely."

"Good plan."

"No one asked you!"

"Enough!"

The two arguing travelers jumped at the snap of command in Alice's voice, their backs going unconsciously stiff as she stepped across the threshold. "Sorry," she whispered, bowing her head, "it's just… let's get this over with. I want to be free of this burden."

Nodding, Yuri and Margarete followed her into the dimly lit temple.

The inside of the temple was the same as the outside – unrelieved cobblestone surrounding them and making a twenty-foot square room, furnished only with a single cot, a reading chair, and a low bookshelf, populated entirely with handwritten tomes bearing dates rather than titles.

"Diaries," Alice said, gesturing towards the books. "Notes and observations on the priest's feelings towards God."

"He must have a lot of thoughts on the matter," Yuri said seriously, "there's like, fifteen of them."

Alice was about to reply when Margarete nodded to the center of the room. "Is that it?"

"Yes," the exorcist replied quietly, "that's the font…"

Directly in the middle of the room stood a hexagonal pedestal, its sides curving four feet gracefully into the air to form an eight-inch deep, bowl-shaped indentation. Water bubbled up from a spring somewhere underground, coming up through the center of the font and spilling down over its sides to pass back into the ground that had issued it.

"A symbol of renewal," Alice murmured, crossing herself and pressing her hands together in front of her chest as she knelt on the ground in front of the font. "Forgive us our trespass, Lord… but our need is great."

"So all we do is dunk the thing in the water?" Yuri asked skeptically. "That seems a little… easy."

"Well," Alice shrugged, keeping her voice low and reaching into her backpack to carefully pull the Everblack out, "Sister Moira said that the temple's waters have the power to purify even the most tainted objects, but she said the older or deeper the evil, the longer the purification takes… so it's not just a matter of 'dunking' it, as you put it, but soaking, watching, and guarding until it's safe."

Margarete frowned. "And how do we know when it's safe?" she asked, arching an eyebrow. "Will a bell go off? Maybe a little flag marked 'done'? Seriously – are we supposed to just guess?"

With a weary sigh, Alice began unwrapping the Bible. "The waters are holy," she explained, hesitantly pulling the cloth away from the book's black cover. "I should be able to use my Demon Eyes to watch the reaction between the waters and the book – and when they stop reacting, it'll be safe."

"So we just have to watch your back and make sure no one sneaks up on us until you give the all-clear," Yuri concluded with a shrug, "I think we can swing that."

"Most definitely," Margarete nodded, her confidence returning now that she knew all of the angles. "So… let's get started."

Alice lifted the book off the ground. "Alright," she said, trying to shake off the feeling of unease slowly seeping into her bones. "First, a prayer of thanksgiving, for all that we have been blessed with… then, a prayer of atonement, for any transgressions we have caused… and finally, a prayer of cleansing, to free the spirits within the book from their unrest."

Yuri scratched his nose. "Do we all have to pray?" he asked doubtfully. "I'm… not that good at talking to the Big Man, you know?"

"You and me both, brother," Margarete muttered under her breath. "Maybe we should just step outside – before WE get cleansed!"

Rolling her eyes at the ill-placed humor, Alice rose to her feet, clutching the Everblack in her hands. "Just bow your heads and concentrate on my voice," she said patiently. "No matter how much you pretend not to be, you're both good people, so your spirits will automatically lend themselves to the prayer."

Finding that he could not think of any stronger word to define this concept, Yuri said, "Neat."

"Neat?" Margarete echoed. "What are you, twelve??"

Before they could start ribbing each other – a common response to nervousness, for these two – Alice stepped towards the font, holding the Everblack before her. "Our Father who art in Heaven," she began, noticing that her companions fell silent at the beginning of her prayer of thanksgiving. "Hallowed be thy name…"

Even reciting these simple, rote words, Alice could feel the waters in the temple responding – as if the very eddies and currents themselves were filled to overflowing with the love of the Father. This idea helped to dull her growing sense that something was not right, keeping her voice even as she completed one prayer and began on the second.

All is as it should be, she told herself insistently, forcing down her doubts as she stepped closer to the font. I can feel Yuri, and even Margarete, lending me their support… this is the Lord's holy place… I shouldn't feel this hesitant.

Another step closer to the font, and the second prayer was at an end… though Alice could easily feel sweat sliding listlessly down her pretty face and making its way down her throat to collect uncomfortably in the hollow of her breastbone before trickling slowly down the front of her shirt.

"…we ask thy blessing, Father," she whispered, halting uncertainly halfway through the third litany as the font loomed – huge and imposing – before her. This was it… seven more words, and one quick movement, and this whole nightmare would be over.

Well, she thought, slowly holding the Everblack out in front of her.

"In the name of Jesus Christ…"

Here goes!

"Amen!"

It all happened so fast that Alice's conscious mind could not register it.

The moment her fingers released the Everblack Bible, the runes on its surface began glowing an angry, vibrant red, and the cover snapped open of its own accord, the pages blurring past until chapter fourteen had been reached, a certain incantation blazing with unholy silver light as the book tumbled towards the waters.

Yuri and Margarete must have seen it, as Yuri cried out, lunging forward and wrapping his arms around Alice's waist, bearing her to the ground behind a stone outcropping as Margarete threw herself forward in a vain attempt to catch the Everblack before it could touch the font.

She almost made it – her fingers brushing briefly along the book's red-hot spine before sliding off, scorched, and leaving her face to face with the results of the disastrous attempt to free the world of the Everblack's influence.

An all-encompassing roar filled the air as the waters of the font caressed the unholy black book, and in that nanosecond… a geyser of flame and water erupted from the font, blasting a hole in the temple's roof and spewing the sacred fluid high into the air in a spectacular display of furious, unleashed destructive might.

And in the center of it all, its black pages burning with silver fire, the Everblack stood immobile in mid-air, seemingly impervious to the angrily buffeting currents of vaporizing holy water – a testament to evil itself in the eye of a storm of Heaven-sent moisture.

- - - - -

Yuri coughed raggedly, shaking his head to clear the ringing from his ears as spots of light and dark danced in and out of his vision. "Alice?" he croaked, clearing his throat. "Margarete??"

All around him, shuffling, secretive sounds echoed through the woods, giving the night an ominous, frightening cast.

Woods…? he thought dizzily, trying to force himself to his feet, but finding his arms and legs too heavy to move. Weren't we… inside?

"It seems he's coming 'round," a smooth, aristocratic voice murmured, "what about the girl?"

Another, more familiar voice replied, "Still dazed… but she should come to her senses sooner than later. It doesn't appear that she has broken anything."

"Pity."

Yuri took a deep breath, fighting a wave of nausea as he opened his eyes, finding the world canted sideways, cool grass rubbing his cheek as he found himself in the middle of a large group of men.

"Wha…?"

His eyes widened as he realized that they were not men… but Shadow Knights – demon-like monsters made from the reanimated corpses of fallen soldiers, some of them still bearing fragments of armor or rusty swords, though the unholy power in decaying bodies made such accoutrements superfluous at best.

Ten feet directly in front of him, he could see Alice lying on her back in the grass, her face contorted in obvious pain as she groaned and shook her head, seemingly caught just between a dream and waking.

Of Margarete… there was no sign.

"What about the other one?" the tall man demanded of one of the monsters, "There were three of them."

The Shadow Knight shook its head, gesturing around as if to say, 'there's no one else here.'

"She may have been killed in the blast," the shorter man pointed out, coughing into his fist, "or thrown clear and knocked senseless. In either case, she is out of the way… like that meddlesome priest we were forced to eliminate upon our arrival. Throwing away his life so cavalierly… such a waste."

"You're probably right," the tall man said, bowing his acquiescence as Yuri tried to struggle to his feet.

"If she's dead, I'll kill you!" Yuri snarled, desperately working at getting his hands free.

"Ahh, so much vigor!" the tall man declared jovially. "Truly worthy of the one known as Godkiller… but don't lay your venom at my feet, my good man – t'was your young exorcist friend that caused the explosion."

Yuri sneered. "You're lying," he growled, "the book was booby trapped to blow up when-"

"My young friend," the smaller man said, his voice wheezing and feeble as he shook his head, "when, in the world, would we have had the opportunity to lay such a trap? If we had… why not just take the Everblack for ourselves?"

The taller man grinned. "Not much of a thinker, is he?"

With a sigh, the smaller man continued, speaking as if there had been no interruption. "You simply cannot bring that much evil into contact with that much good without expecting some kind of backlash, my young friend," he said simply, "it is only common logic."

"Something you lack, it seems," the taller man interjected, ignoring the look of admonishment from his associate.

"Regardless of the genesis of the explosion," the shorter of the two said, holding a small white bible up for Yuri to see, "the results are what matter. Behold… your friend was successful. The Everblack is now untainted by the emotions of man, waiting like a blank slate to be used and filled by a proper owner."

"You?" Yuri spat disgustedly.

The shorter man nodded. "Precisely," he said evenly, "and I believe there would be no better time to start plumbing its knowledge than the present. To you, my good man," he turned to his companion, "I leave their fate. Do as you will… I have no regrets, now that I possess the Bible."

Yuri finally managed to buck the Shadow Knight holding him down, shooting to his feet as the short man bowed and turned away.

"Kill them both," the tall man ordered, his lips twisting up in a cruel smile as he added, "Start with the girl… make sure this one is alive to see her breathe her last."

One of the Shadow Knights reached down and wrapped its massive hand around Alice's throat, lifting her easily into the air as the two humans started for the far end of the clearing.

"No!" Yuri screamed, ramming his fist into the face of the closest Shadow Knight as the one holding Alice began to squeeze, gauging the distance between them as more of their kind closed ranks all around him, cutting him off entirely.

"NO!!"

To be concluded…

Author's Notes: yes, sadly, there is only one more chapter to go. Fortunately for the… what, two people that read this? I wrote 12 and 13 concurrently, and I actually finished 13 first. That's right – before this chapter was even half finished, the last one was complete and sitting on my hard drive. Hate me yet? Well, don't… you'll get the end of the story in less than a week, I promise. Think of it as my way of saying thanks for still reading after the extra-long break between 11 and 12.

Pre-read on this Verse was done by Aegis, who said something like, "Oh, you're still alive??"

…it's nice to be loved.

Feedback is always welcome on any site with reviewing capabilities or by e-mailing me directly at random1377(at-sign)yahoo(dot)com.