Darren Shan - Hell's Horizon

Could true evil never be eradicated? Did horror live on in the collective unconscious? Or had the villacs just failed to deal adequately with those who’d known of Paucar Wami? I still wasn’t convinced they were as powerful as The Cardinal claimed. The green fog that covered the city for ten days following The Cardinal’s death went a long way toward backing their extraordinary claims, but the ability to summon a fog doesn’t mean you’re able to create life at will. The Ayuamarcans could have been ordinary people under the control of the priests. Having served their purpose, they were then exterminated, and those who’d known them were subjected to brainwashing, which accounted for the lost memories.

Far-fetched? Absolutely. But that made more sense to me than the alternative.

Of course, if the Ayuamarcans were ethereal creations — and I was only saying if —Wami had been unique. The rest were sterile and city-bound, but the assassin was capable of reproducing and exploring the outside world. Had that something to do with his lingering presence? Through me and his other children, he had a toehold in reality. Were we sustaining his legend, by our very existence keeping part of him alive? And was that the reason I could clearly remember him and the other Ayuamarcans?

I thought of confronting The Cardinal’s successor, Capac Raimi. As the man I’d been destined to share the city with, perhaps he remembered the Ayuamarcans too. It would have been interesting to discuss the situation with him. But that would have been playing into the hands of the villacs , and I’d no intention of doing anything that might favor those meddling bastards.

I kept expecting the blind priests to turn up, but they appeared to have been put off by the deaths of their envoys. There were no late-night visits, no sign that they were following me, no threats or evidence that they were conspiring against me. They might have given up on me and gone after one of Wami’s other sons, or they could be biding their time, letting me recover and build a new life, so they could step back in and wreck it all over again.

Tough luck if that was their game. I was through building. It was isolation for me from now on. I would never leave myself open to personal annihilation again.

I cycled out to the Manco Capac statue one afternoon, drawn to it as I had been before. The statue was coming along nicely. It was a long way from completion, but the skeleton of the upper body had been maneuvered into place. It was a pity Ziegler hadn’t lived to see it. He’d have appreciated it more than I could.

While there, I thought about the decision I had made back at Bill’s. I’d never been a dreamer. I’d believed I’d been born to a life of drudgery and had brushed aside any nobler aspirations as idle fantasies. But in light of the villacs ’ offer…

Was I crazy to turn it down? I didn’t regret my choice — Bill was right, I’d have made a lousy leader — but I couldn’t help thinking what life might have been like if I’d accepted. Al Jeery, lord of the city.

Heh.

I never returned to my apartment. I couldn’t face it after what I’d done there. I steered clear of Ali and the other well-wishers who tried bringing some light into my dark hell of a life. I couldn’t risk getting close to anyone. I had to be by myself from here on in. No lovers, friends, associates — nothing. I rented a tiny apartment in a cheap sector of the city, into which I pretty much cemented myself, cutting off the external world.

After a while I bought a bottle of vile vodka and laid it on a shelf over the foot of my bed. I’d lie for hours on end, gazing into its clear depths, seeing hell, Bill reaching out to me from its fiery pits. I often reached back and, though we never touched, our fingers were getting closer every day. It was only a matter of time before I surrendered to its charms and sought the sanctuary of drunken oblivion.

While waiting for my resolve to crumble and the vodka to take me, I walked to Bill’s house during one of my few outdoor sojourns, to face the ghosts of my past. Nobody had cleared the debris and the rain had turned the mess to ashy mud. It was filthy, stinking, offensive. I walked among the ruins, stepping over broken bricks, scorched scraps of wood, bits of vases and even a few soggy fireworks.

I didn’t notice the discrepancy until I was about to leave, though it was in the back of my mind the whole time. I think that’s why I went. Part of me suspected all along.

I retraced my steps and checked the rubble again, this time with purpose. They weren’t there. Not a trace of them.

I went home, washed and shaved for the first time since getting out of the hospital, then popped across to Bill’s station. His ex-colleagues were sympathetic and let me study the photos of the site that had been taken back when the ashes were smoldering. There were photos from every conceivable angle. I went through each with a magnifying glass. It took hours but I was patient. Eventually I returned the file, said nothing, thanked the curious officers for their assistance and left.

There were no books.

Amid the rubble, the bits and pieces from Bill’s past, ragged strips of clothes and blankets, splinters of porcelain and wood, there wasn’t a single page from any of Bill’s thousands of precious books. He’d cherished, loved and adored them. He’d spent so much time and money on them, but had often said he didn’t care what happened to them once he was dead.

Bill’s books — which only mattered to him as long as he was alive — had been removed. He’d known things were reaching a head, yet even with so much else to do, the villacs to cross, bombs to wire, his speech to compose, he’d taken the time to spirit the books away.

Why? So some other bibliophile could profit from his years of collecting? Nuh-uh. I didn’t buy it. Bill shifted those books for one reason and one reason only — he wanted to take them with him.

I stayed locked in my apartment for months on end once I realized the voices were right, that Bill was still alive, out there somewhere, waiting, planning. I lay on my bed, stared at the vodka and reviewed my ruined life. I thought about Nic, Ellen, Wami, the Incas, and marveled at how much I’d lost. Mostly I’d think of the bottle and its demons, how easy it would be to let them have me, forget everything and place myself beyond Bill’s reach, and the villacs ’, and anyone else’s who might have an interest in me.

Each day I grew closer to the bottle. I took it down and clutched it to my chest, slept with it, lived with it, unscrewed the top a hundred times a day, never sure if I’d replace it or down the liquid damnation. I was nearing my limit and couldn’t have lasted much longer — a week, maybe two, and I’d have succumbed. I’d have lost all control, direction and purpose. I’d have been ruined, but free.

But things changed. A thought sneaked through the barriers of pain and grief and altered everything. I was recalling Bill and our conversation, as I’d been doing every day, when suddenly I flashed on his expression near the end, when I referred to Wami’s triumph. I said the killer would come out of this laughing. Bill sneered and said he wouldn’t laugh long, then muttered something about rising from the dead and getting even with him.

Rise from the dead my ass! Bill’s not dead and Bill’s not finished. He plans to return, but not from the grave. He’s out there, alive, scheming. I wasn’t Paucar Wami’s only son. I’m sure Bill’s sights are fixed on one of my half brothers, that he’s intent on using him as he used me. I was a fool to think he’d give up, that he’d stop with me. There are others to do his dirty work. His hatred for Wami is so strong, and his thirst for poetic justice so overwhelming, that he won’t be able to rest till one of Wami’s children lays low their father.