S. Cedric: Of Fever and Blood

They turned to the second door, which also was open. They could hear a loud rumbling, as though the thunder was right in the building.

“Over there,” Vauvert said.

“That’s the Lombards’ apartment,” Leroy said. “You hear that? A window must be open…”

Leroy got into position on the right side of the door. Eva did the same on the left. They held their guns at arm’s length as Vauvert, crouching, carefully stepped inside the Lombards’ living room.

There were no corpses, but the furniture had been thrown all over the room. Vases had been hurled to the floor, and the bookcases had been swept empty of their contents. Smashed chairs lay in pieces in a corner. On the far side of the living room, the sliding door to the balcony had been shattered. Shards of glass were strewn all over the place. Rain was furiously pelting the linoleum floor, and the long drapes were flapping in the wind.

Vauvert crossed the wasteland and stepped onto the balcony to make sure no one was there. It was deserted. A bolt of lightning momentarily illuminated the glistening zinc, tiles and chimneys on the roofs all around him. Then he hurried back inside.

“All clear,” he told his colleagues.

Leroy, his back pressed against the entrance wall, scanned the small kitchen, its floor littered with smashed dishes.

“All clear here, too.”

“There’s blood on the floor,” Eva pointed out.

She crouched to inspect the red puddle that was almost unnoticeable in the bluish and ever-changing light of the storm. Deep inside, her stomach protested, and a familiar feeling ran down her spine. In spite of her exhaustion and the morphine they had given her at the hospital, Eva’s reflexes were still spot-on. She concentrated on breathing slowly as her senses blurred and changed, becoming those of someone else-those of the victim trapped in this apartment and fleeing a terrible, impossible tormentor.

“Those aren’t Eloise’s footprints. It was Saint-Clair walking barefoot. The girl, she was trying to hide.”

She looked down the apartment’s hallway, which was plunged in thick darkness. Leroy headed that way, toward one of the bedrooms, while Vauvert covered him.

“Can’t see shit.”

“Be careful.”

Leroy pushed the door open with his foot. A fetid stench greeted them.

But no monster lunged out.

The room looked as deserted as the rest of the apartment.

“God, what is that smell?” Eva said, covering her mouth and nose.

“I have no idea,” Leroy answered.

In the blue glow coming through the window, they could see bedsheets in disarray. The night stand had been toppled, and pieces of a broken lamp were all over the floor.

“Looks like animals rolled around in the bed,” Leroy said.

“That’s what happened,” Vauvert said.

Without moving any closer, he pointed to the black globs all over the sheets.

“I’ve seen that before. It’s shit. That’s what stinks so bad.”

“But where are the animals that did it?”

“I have no fucking clue,” Vauvert answered.

They opened the other doors, took a look inside a second bedroom, the laundry room, and the bathroom and found nothing. The apartment was deserted.

“I can’t believe this!” Vauvert fumed. “They couldn’t have vanished just like that.”

Eva was still in the living room, her stomach burning with terror. It was the same terror that Eloise Lombard had experienced. It was palpable in this room. The inspector slowly felt her way through the living room debris, recreating the girl’s flight.

She momentarily steadied herself against a wall.

The world was swaying.

In front of her, the full-length mirror was split in two. She called out to her colleagues.

“That’s how the beasts from hell got in.”

“What?”

Eva pointed at the broken mirror.

“They go through mirrors. I haven’t stopped thinking about it. It’s a form of very old magic. In ancient times, the seers used mirrors to perform their rituals. These beasts are doing the same thing. They use mirrors like doors to go from one world to the other.”

“And you think that Saint-Clair can walk through mirrors, too?”

Eva weighed the idea before waving it away with her hand.

“No, I don’t think so. Those beasts are spirits. They come from the netherworld. But Saint-Clair is still human.”

She turned. Her heart was thumping wildly. The danger was very near, so very near and yet invisible. She let out a cry of rage.

“She can’t be far, for Christ’s sake! She took refuge here just before Saint-Clair managed to get in. She was looking for a way out.”

“But where the hell to?” Leroy asked, also losing patience. “It’s not like she jumped off the balcony or anything.”

“The balcony,” Eva said.

Vauvert understood. He rushed to the shattered doors and stuck his head into the rain. Once again, he scanned the roofs, a sea of gray chimneys and steep inclines. Some of the new buildings had flat concrete roofs. Others were covered with corrugated iron and pierced by skylights that reflected the lightning.

At the end of the balcony, an old ladder was bolted to the wall. It was probably used by the chimney sweeps to reach the roof.

“Wait,” Eva screamed, a high-pitched note of panic in her voice. “What if you slip.”

But Vauvert had already put his gun back in his holster and grabbed the ladder. With his suit sticking to his body in the pouring rain, he determinedly planted his right military boot on the first rung.

Lightning uncoiled in the black clouds. Thunder shook the entire neighborhood.

The ladder swayed. A little.

Vauvert climbed the first rung.

Eva hurried along the balcony and grabbed the ladder with both lands to keep it steady. Leroy did the same.

Vauvert kept hoisting himself up.

About seven feet up, he reached the edge of the roof. Slate and metal spread as far as he could see, forming a vast and hilly landscape of peaks and slopes. He walked cautiously along the gutter, carefully scanning the rooftop terrain. Interspersing the roofs were chimneys, abrupt ledges and ladders. On the horizon, the lights of the Eiffel Tower glowed through the rain.

“Can you see them?” Eva shouted.

Vauvert stopped before he could answer.

“Oh, my God,” he finally managed to say.

He could see them, all right.

About fifty yards from him, Eloise Lombard was inching along ledge that was not much wider than a hand. The girl was moving very slowly, her balance more than precarious, trying to reach the next roof.

On the slanted tin roof right above her was a naked woman on all fours. In her hand shone a tiny blade, no doubt a scalpel. Vauvert watched as the woman stabbed the air around the girl, trying to destabilize her.

“Saint-Clair!” he screamed.

The women and the girl were too far away to hear him.

He raised his gun and aimed at Saint-Clair.

The rain was blinding him.

From this distance, he probably would not be able to hit her. Besides, there was the risk of hitting someone in the building if the bullet went through a window.

He could only watch as the woman continued to swipe while the girl tried to move faster along the ledge.

What had to happen soon did. Eloise Lombard began to wobble. When one of her feet slipped, she grabbed a pipe on the wall above the ledge.

“No! Goddammit, no!” Vauvert shouted.

He saw the pipe bend under the girl’s weight and snap away from the wall.

He screamed, powerless as he watched the girl lose her balance and fall.

“No! No! No! No!”

The masked woman turned to him, and despite the distance, he could make out her insane smile. She leaped off the roof.

He could not see either of them anymore.