Christopher Golden: Ararat

Walker stiffened, all of the self-loathing and guilt burning right out of him.

“You’re not getting anywhere near my boy,” he said.

Again the demon laughed. He spoke again, more quietly this time, but Walker bent forward and he could make out the words, even in the storm.

“You’ll never get away from me, you fool. You’ve taken me with you.”

Sneering, Walker raised the gun again, this time in full control. But then the light went out of Olivieri’s eyes—both natural and unnatural—and the professor’s head slumped to one side. His body went still.

Walker got up, legs unsteady.

“It isn’t right to just leave him,” Father Cornelius said.

“What else can we do?” Meryam asked weakly.

Walker spun and took aim at her left eye. Meryam froze, but he swung the gun over to aim at Adam’s chest, then at Father Cornelius.

“It’s me, Walker,” the priest said, his voice a tired rasp. “It’s only me.”

For a long, breathless moment, Walker stared at him, then glanced around at the others. They were all just themselves, it seemed. But only for now. It had gotten inside of him. Adam had been possessed as well. Father Cornelius and Kim had each been at least temporarily tainted by it. It could take any one of them, any time it wanted. Which meant that Walker had to start thinking differently. He was not going to let the demon off this mountain. It would never get the chance to threaten the people he loved. If that meant he had to kill them all, and then eat a bullet himself, then that was exactly what he would do.

A last resort, he thought.

But as a shaking Mr. Avci came stumbling along the trail, his own gun trembling in his hands, Walker wondered how long he could wait before the last resort became the only choice.

Somewhere out there in the storm, Hakan and Calliope might still be alive, but he wasn’t counting on it. Without them, that left six survivors.

And a long way still to go.

“Adam, lead the way,” Walker said.

Hesitating, Adam stared down at Olivieri’s corpse. At last, he gave a nod, but his eyes were devoid of hope. He took Meryam’s hand and they started down again. The others fell into step, all of them keeping close now.

Walker knew the demon moved with them. There was only one way to stop it.

Father Cornelius walked with Kim’s assistance, with Mr. Avci taking up the rear. The officious little man had his gun out and his gaze shifted left and right, peering into the storm, as if what they had to fear was out there somewhere, instead of within.

“Walker, you must listen,” Kim said. “Cornelius and I have been talking. There’s no way to know what limitations this creature has—”

“It’s a ‘creature’ now? I think we all know what it is,” Walker replied.

Father Cornelius erupted in a rattling cough, then spit into the snow. After all they’d been through, he looked his age at last. More than his age. He looked a hundred years old, but Walker figured they all looked like walking cadavers by now.

“In all the priesthood taught me and in all I’ve learned in my secular research, there’s never been any reliable account of anyone dealing with demons like this,” Father Cornelius said. “Exorcisms, certainly, and loads of ancient writings about evil spirits, but always with the caveat that they could be driven out… and once they were driven out, they would either lose their power or one could guard against the return of that evil. I’ve never run across an account in which a demon could move from one person to another with such ease.”

“In your vast experience,” Walker said drily.

“Walker, you’re being an asshole,” Kim observed. “He’s the only one here who’s ever been to an exorcism, and I don’t know about you, but he’s certainly spent a lot more years researching all of this than I have.”

Shuddering, Walker reached up to pull shut the collar of his coat. The more tired he became, the more the cold sapped his strength and will.

“I know,” he said. “That’s frustration talking.”

“The charms are not working,” Father Cornelius said. “That much is clear. But what if they’re actually hurting instead?”

The question made Walker falter a step, so that Kim bumped into him. He kept moving, but shot the priest a hard look as he went.

“How do you figure?” he asked, but his own thoughts were already shifting.

“Maybe it’s not a good idea for us to have taken anything from the ark that had any contact with the cadaver,” Kim answered. “Maybe the demon’s consciousness was still in its bones or still in the ark—we have no way of knowing—but if so, do we want to walk around with bits of its sarcophagus around our necks?”

Seemed like a good idea at the time, Walker thought. Olivieri had convinced them the bitumen shards could protect them, but Olivieri was dead now. The fingers on Walker’s right hand twitched, muscle memory from the moment he had pulled the trigger and murdered the professor. Only he hadn’t pulled the trigger at all, had he? The demon had done that.

But Walker’s body remembered it.

“I’ve been thinking the same,” Mr. Avci said, closer behind them than they’d realized.

Walker flinched and glanced back at him, watching the gun in Avci’s grasp. The man seemed himself, but there was no way to be sure.

Mr. Avci reached his left hand up to his neck and dug through the layers of fabric, pushed his fingers in and then yanked hard, tugging out the gleaming black bitumen shard and the twine on which it had hung. Without hesitation he flung it away and Walker saw him visibly relax, as if the charm had been a terrible weight on his spirit.

Anger rippled through Walker and he felt his brow furrow. He faced forward again, picking up his pace to catch up with Meryam and Adam. Kim and Father Cornelius did their best to keep up.

“What do you think, Walker?” Kim demanded.

“I think you should do what you want.”

“But—”

“Wait a second,” he said, shaking his head as he slowed again. Meryam and Adam kept going. Mr. Avci caught up, but Walker paid him no attention. His thoughts had drifted back to the cave—to the first time he’d seen one of those charms. Nearly the whole descent he had been ruminating, flipping through images in his mind, trying to find any hint at the demon’s nature. Something that would help them.

Father Cornelius put a hand on his shoulder. “What is it?”

Walker trudged on, staring at his feet without seeing them. His mind returned to the ark, to the moment he had first encountered Helen Marshall.

“The archaeology team found them on some of the cadavers in the ark,” he said, as much to himself as the others. “Why not all of them?”

“Maybe they had the same disagreement we’re having now,” Father Cornelius suggested.

“When we first got there,” Walker continued, “I talked to Professor Marshall. She and her team were working on several sets of remains, but one of the passengers had died trying to claw her way out of the ark, through a door that had been jammed shut against the side of the mountain. She’d lost her mind, obviously, but she was trying anything she could to get out of the ship… to get away.”

He glanced over at the priest. “There was no charm on that cadaver.”

“I remember it,” Mr. Avci said, behind them.

“Are you saying the demon drove her mad because she wasn’t wearing one?” Kim asked.

“Maybe,” Walker replied, boots crunching on snow. The cold slithered inside his clothes. He’d gone numb inside and out. “But what if it wasn’t just madness? What if she was trying to escape the others on board the ark, the ones who were wearing the charms, because she’d figured out that they’d made the wrong decision? That instead they were making it easier for the demon to possess them?”