Justin woke with a gasp and sat bolt upright.
Wh-what happened? Where am I?
And then he remembered.
The nightmare on the Ferris Wheel, which he'd only been able to endure without losing consciousness because he'd anticipated something of the sort, and steeled himself mentally.
The fight in the cornfield, where he'd been too quick to claim victory, and had foolishly taken his eyes off the wounded boy.
The dagger thrust into his chest, into his very soul.
But...but...it's daylight, and I'm still alive. Alive, in no pain. How can that be?
He suddenly became aware of his surroundings. He was sitting where he'd fallen, in the cornfield. But the corn was dead, withered. Beyond the cornfield, the grass was brown, the trees inexplicably bare of leaves. A dozen people lay sprawled, motionless...
A voice behind him said "Boo!"
He spun around, then instinctively scrambled backward.
He'd never seen the appearance his eyes and face took on when his demonic aspect came to the fore - though he knew, of course, that something changed. Now he saw how he'd looked to others: eyes dead-black yet smoldering, face a pallid mask.
He was seeing this in a woman? In Sofie?
Can't be, he told himself. Sofie's dead, and I'm dead. I'm in Hell. That's where I expected to go when I died. But instead of being welcomed as a powerful lord, I'm being punished because I failed. Having a crazy hallucination.
Sofie laughed at him.
He noticed for the first time that she was holding a gun.
"You look befuddled, Brother Justin," she said archly. "Do you need me to fill you in on what happened last night? You were defeated. You were killed. The great Justin Crowe, killed by a puny nineteen-year-old boy!
"I brought you back to life. You couldn't do it yourself...but a simple housemaid could."
The longer she talked, the clearer his mind became.
We're both alive, he realized. Everything she's saying, everything I'm seeing, makes sense - if I just make the leap of accepting that she's an Avatar. It's understandable that Stroud would have failed to kill her. And it seems plausible that another Avatar willing to wreak wholesale destruction could have brought me back.
He knew instinctively that any dark act committed by an Avatar - himself included - strengthened him, the Lord of Shadows. Any use of Avataric power to do good weakened him, at least temporarily. If an Avatar had tried to revive him out of some sentimental love for him, the attempt would have failed. But if the motive were something else, his savior reveling in a new-found power to kill...
Very plausible.
Everything I've learned - from Talbot Smith, from the Gospel of Matthias, from Scudder's boon - has indicated that only males can be Avatars. But "experts" can be wrong.
If Sofie is an Avatar, whose child is she? There's only one realistic possibility: she's mine. Mine and the Gypsy Apollonia's - there was no other woman in that time period.
I am unique. I am the Usher! Of course my seed is unique as well.
I should, in theory, have been able to sense a younger Avatar of my House. But I didn't, because I was so sure there wasn't one.
He said softly, "That's very impressive, Sofie. May I ask how far this devastation extends?"
She smirked. "I have no idea. Probably farther than necessary. I was enjoying myself."
"Yes, I can see that. Did you kill Iris?" He wondered, at times, why he still cared about Iris.
"I don't know. It depends on where she was."
Justin glanced up at the hilltop - the house. The trees there were still alive.
So it's confined to the valley. All of the valley?
Sofie leered at him. "Do you want to know why I brought you back to life, Brother Justin?"
"Yes indeed, my dear."
"So I can have the satisfaction of killing you myself!"
He wasn't surprised. "Why, may I ask, would you want to do that?"
"Because you're my father. You raped my mother!"
He got to his feet, letting himself shift into demon mode as well. "So I did. You're showing remarkable loyalty to a mother who devoted her life to keeping you from realizing your potential!" That was a guess, but her involuntary flinch told him he'd been right.
"Shut up," Sofie hissed. "I care nothing for her. Or for you. You both held me back."
He shrugged. "I didn't know you. How did you learn we're father and daughter?"
"Your tattoo. I saw it in visions." As he took a step toward her, she said, "I also saw the rape."
"Unpleasant," he acknowledged. "But would you prefer that Apollonia hadn't been raped? That you didn't exist?"
"Oh, I'm delighted that I exist! But my existence has only one purpose. To end yours."
Justin began laughing. Softly, at first. "Go ahead, Sofie. Kill me!"
She hesitated, seeming to realize something was wrong. But then she aimed the gun at him and pulled the trigger.
Again and again and again.
Again and again and again, the gun misfired.
Sofie's eyes changed. She transformed back into an ordinary-looking young woman, confused and frightened.
She backed away...and Justin kept advancing.
As he walked, he bent and picked up his scythe. He held it out to her. "Kill me with this, Sofie!"
Her eyes were brimming with tears now. But she grabbed the scythe and tried to strike.
When she drew her arm back, she couldn't bring it forward. It was frozen, useless, until she gave up and let the scythe drop. She stood, weeping helplessly, as Justin reclaimed his weapon.
Then he grabbed her by the hair. "Do you know what you've done, infant? I think not. Listen, and understand the evil you've wrought!
"I am the Usher of Destruction. The strongest of all Avatars. I had actually defeated your little friend Ben - I just made the mistake of looking away, thinking he was too badly wounded to return to the attack. He 'won' by a fluke.
"It was a victory, because he was still alive when I died. But he may have died later, or been maimed for life. Do you know whether he walked out of the cornfield under his own power, or was carried out?"
The stricken look that came over her face gave him his answer.
"You brought me back to life," he snarled, "exactly as I was before. That means that I can only be killed by a Prophet. Even he must use a certain kind of weapon, a blade that's killed another Avatar. And Ben - if he's alive - no longer has one."
She struggled to free herself. "You're lying -"
He laughed harshly. "You know I'm not. Your own powers will tell you I'm not." He wrenched her head back and pressed the scythe against her throat. "I could kill you easily. But you can never kill me! Your eyes told me that you are a Prince - or rather, a Princess - of the House of Darkness. I am its Prophet. As the Usher, I can only be killed by someone who's already a Prophet. And you can only become one upon my death!"
He released her, and she staggered away from him, sobbing.
"I could kill you," he repeated. "But I'm going to let you live with the knowledge of what you've done.
"You've undone everything for which your friend risked, and may have lost, his life. You can't kill me. And he can't possibly kill me again unless he provides himself with another suitable weapon - by killing another Avatar!"
She turned and fled. He saw that she was headed for Stroud's car.
What had been Stroud's car.
"Do you understand?" he shouted after her. His voice rose to a howl. "If Ben is still out there and wants to kill me, he first has to kill another Avatar! And the only one remaining is you!"