Perfumed smoke from several incense burners veiled the warm air, lending the suite's bedroom an ethereal dream-like quality. Clusters of candles flickered in all four corners of the room and made the shadows dance. In the king sized bed, bodies writhed and twined. Lips and tongues met. Hands caressed and clawed. Low moans melded with sharp gasps of pleasure and pain. Dark energies gathered, drawn to the sexual charge and absorbed by the revelers.
The orgy ended several hours after it started. Only Michael remained awake at the center of a tangle of pale limbs. The triplets were worn out by his voracious appetite. The older girl, Tisi, would have some nasty bruises the next day but she was beyond feeling them at the moment.
The young man stretched hugely and extracted himself from the pile of siblings. He slipped into the satin boxers Aunt Fiona had given him and went in search of a cigarette. He'd started smoking the Cloves she favored. He liked the spicy flavor and the black paper. In the apocalypse, obtaining such luxury items was tricky for the common man who had to rely on traders, who marked their goods up according to how difficult it was to get them. Fancy cigarettes were expensive but money meant little to Fiona, or anyone Michael knew. He understood the concept of economy but was immune to it. What he desired, he got.
What he desired next was a large glass of something cold to drink. So he went out to the sitting area of the suite, smoke trailing behind him.
"You should finish the ritual first," Pietre advised from the couch when Michael emerged from the bedroom. The blond warlock had an old scroll he was consulting but it was the huge, ugly leather-bound tome on the coffee table that the older man indicated with a tip of his head.
"They're all unconscious," Michael said. "They're useless till they wake up."
Pietre chuckled. "Hardly. Dear Michael, they're best when they're in this state. Less drama." He put aside the scroll and got up. As ever, he was barefoot. Michael had never seen him wear anything on his feet.
"Come," the man said when he reached the bedroom.
He waved Michael over, and produced a long knife in the other hand. He offered it hilt-first to the younger man. Michael took it and examined the jeweled pommel and intricate detailing.
"It's beautiful," the younger man admired.
"The Dagger of Aamon," said Pietre. "Go on. It doesn't matter which one. They all share the same blood."
Michael hesitated only a moment then crossed the room to the bed. He paused again, then plucked a random arm from the heap. It was Meg's arm, the last-born. Michael glanced over at Pietre, who made an encouraging stabbing-and-twisting motion. The young man pressed the point of the blade into the meaty palm of the girl's hand. He expected her to wake, but she merely moaned softly, quieting once the knife was removed.
Some of her blood spilled on the carpet but Michael wasn't concerned. He dipped his fingers in the flow and used it to draw three symbols on his bare chest in angelic script—the ones Pietre had shown him in the book. Then he repeated the incantation Fiona had taught him from the same source. He lifted the girl's injured hand again. He could feel the energy building up inside him, even before he got the bleeding wound up to his mouth.
Her blood was coppery and hot as he hungrily drank it directly from the source. It was the most delicious thing he'd had. Better, even, than the stuff Mother Constance had been giving him. His heart thundered in his chest like a herd of wild horses, making him want to run or kill something or fly like the Dragon.
He let her arm drop before he gave in to the urge to rip it off. Flexing his muscles to do something with the pent-up energy, he turned to Pietre and rubbed his arm across his mouth. It only smeared red across his cheek.
"That was good," he said, giving the older man a messy smile.
The warlock closed the distance between them and draped an arm around Michael's shoulders. He drew him close. "They are good children. They will help you find the Daggers of Armageddon," Pietre murmured in that thick German accent, his lips right next to the young man's ear. "And end those who plan to use the weapons against you."
...
-= AMERiCAN HoRRoR SToRY =-
...
The Order had mounted the crude cross outside the church. The demonstration would not only be punitive, it would serve to show the citizenry who held what sort of power in the settlement, and the new world.
Jeremiah was stripped and provided only a wrap around his waist to spare him the humiliation of public nudity. The two Brothers strapped him to the splintery crossbeam with bailing wire. It didn't have the sharp thorns that barb wire did but the pressure quickly cut into his flesh, when his full weight was on it.
Once he was mounted in place, the disgraced priest shut his eyes. He could hear Father Thomas nailing his proclamation to the post beside the cross. It described Jeremiah's sins against the Order and against Michael, and what his punishment was. He had hoped that the people in the settlement would have the decency to ignore him, but the church was centrally located in the town square. It didn't take long for gawkers to gather.
The first voices he heard were young people and kids, asking questions about what they were seeing and trying their best to come up with answers. One tried to ask Jeremiah a couple of questions but he didn't answer. He hoped if he ignored them, the kids would think he had passed out.
Then one of the younger kids threw a small rock. He flinched in surprise and blinked down at the small gaggle of young people.
"See?" said a brown-haired boy of about nine years. "I told you he's not dead."
Jeremiah rolled his eyes then shut them again.
"Don't you filthy brats have chores to do?" Constance's accusing voice cut through the children's chatter. "Get out of here before I report all of you!"
The priest cracked his eyes open again and saw the kids had all disappeared into the fog. Constance and Billie Dean were the only ones left below him. Constance had a wedge of watermelon and the medium had a painter's pole. They worked a chunk of the melon onto the end of the pole and Constance lifted it to the man's lips.
"You shouldn't—" he started to object.
"Just take it," Constance demanded, trying to mask her need to cry beneath a veneer of pushy impatience. "No one said you couldn't be shown basic human kindness." She paused, then added: "Tate's coming by later with a sanitary bucket. For... you know." She eyed his hip wrap meaningfully.
He laughed ruefully. It might have been hysteria but the whole thing struck him as very funny just then. "Always looking out for me," he said.
He found himself short on breath. Laughing was a mistake. He had to haul himself up by his hurting wrists in order to get another good lungful of air. Settling back down again was agony. He tried to distract himself from the torture by nibbling the melon. It helped slake a thirst he hadn't yet registered. He devoured the piece and the women replaced it with another, and another, till the fruit was gone.
"I'm so sorry," Billie Dean said, near tears. She hated to see the man suffer. "Is there anything more we can do?"
He shook his head in a twitchy way. "You're both... just great."
They stayed with him, sometimes taking shifts so that one could fetch something or take a bathroom break. Many of the settlement's citizens slowed in their daily activities to stare at the man on the cross and the women at his feet but none bothered them.
—
Michael floored the gas pedal of the car and the needle of the speedometer pegged 110 mph. Mother Constance would be mad if she knew he was wasting fuel, which was the very reason he was doing it.
They had argued that evening about Father Jeremiah. She was understandably upset about Michael's decision, but she spoke to him like he was a child again. Like he didn't know what he was doing. She was smart enough to keep her opinion to herself till they got home, so it wasn't a public spectacle, but he didn't appreciate her lack of faith. He knew what he was doing. Better than she did.
He saw something four-legged and dog-sized in the mist ahead and aimed the car at it. It made a satisfying thump when he hit it and he felt it crunch under the driver's side wheels. It wasn't as fulfilling as he wanted, though. He was still amped up from the morning's ritual and needed something more tangible than roadkill to burn it off with.
His thoughts went to sex first, then violence. Then violent sex. Any of the three sounded good but when he thought about 'with whom', no immediate answer came back. There were the triplets, of course, but he knew what that was like. He wanted to explore new territory. His thoughts grazed over the Coven. There were some hangers-on there that he'd met in passing but again came the urge for something different.
Michael slammed on the brakes and whipped the steering wheel to the side, causing the vehicle's tires to screech loudly as it slid sideways down the road. He floored the gas pedal again before the car could come to a complete stop, which sent him rocketing up the side road. He shot out of the foggy zone right near the Hollywood Hills.
That gave him an idea.
—
Author's Note:
We're into Episode 3 now. It takes its name, New Line, from the Warner Bros. studio that produced the A Nightmare on Elm Street series, among other things.
Pietre (also known as Pieter) is from my Coven fanfic, as are his creepy triplets. For the record, though he calls them such, they're not children (they're older than Michael) and they're not his. That's a long story I haven't written yet. Might someday but it'd be its own story. It's too weird and convoluted to cram in as backstory. Pietre was originally inspired by the main character from the movie Warlock. He's been appearing in my fiction since 1997, which gives him a peculiar sense of immortality most characters I write for don't have. He's Fiona's anti-aging secret. He's of the camp that it's no good to live forever if you look like crap.
The Daggers of Armageddon are from the Omen series of books and films, about the Antichrist's rise to power. I've taken some inspiration from that story line, as well as Rosemary's Baby and Justin Bieber's young adult life.