Shaun Hutson - Heathen/Nemesis

Dashwood clapped his hands to his face and pulled them away dripping. Flesh was liquefying on his bones, the bones themselves crumbling.

In a corner of the room the Grimoire was dissolving into a seething puddle of reeking muck, a gelatinous mess that looked like the contents of a huge, freshly milked boil.

Dashwood fell forward and his body seemed to fold in on itself, his chest collapsing, lungs transformed into reeking sacks which burst, spilling more black fluid into the cavity of the torso. His legs seemed to shrivel, shrinking up inside his trousers, already stained with blood.

Donna finally managed to stagger away from the sight. Julie followed.

They headed for the door through which they’d entered, hurdling the body of Farrell, aware now that the breathing that had been ever-present since they entered the house had stopped.

Blood oozed from the walls.

All the way up the flight of stone steps and along that corridor the dark fluid coursed down the plaster and stone.

They burst free into the hallway, then through into the room beyond, and struggled out of the window by which they’d first entered.

The cool night air washed over them but could not drive the stench of decay from their nostrils.

Julie was already running for the alleyway that ran alongside the house. Donna took one look back at the building, then ran after her.

The wailing of sirens already filled the air.

It would be a matter of minutes before the first police car arrived.

Ninety-Two

From where they sat they could see the uniformed men approaching the house in Conduit Street. Donna watched them scrambling out of their cars, running towards the front door. Others headed off up the alley at the side of the building.

She watched impassively, her mind blank, her eyes devoid of emotion. She felt as if every last ounce of feeling had been sucked from her. She was drained, incapable of movement let alone rational thought.

And yet still Dashwood’s words echoed in her mind:

‘He was one of us.’

She lowered her head momentarily and closed her eyes.

‘The police will be looking.’

Julie’s voice seemed a million miles away.

Donna raised her head and looked at her sister.

‘The police will be looking for whoever killed those men,’ the younger woman continued.

‘They won’t be looking for us,’ Donna said.

Julie gazed at her for long moments.

‘Are you satisfied now?’ she said finally.

Donna didn’t speak.

‘They’re dead. You’ve got what you wanted. How does it feel?’

‘We have to go back to the cottage,’ Donna said quietly. ‘Dashwood said I’d find the truth in the cellar. Only the cottage has a cellar. We have to go back and look there.’

‘Not we, Donna. You. I’m finished. I’m leaving now. If you want to stop me, you’ll have to kill me.’ There were tears in Julie’s eyes.

Donna looked wearily at the younger woman.

‘I wanted to hate you for this,’ she said softly. ‘For what you did. For taking Chris from me.’

‘I didn’t take him,’ Julie protested.

‘I know he didn’t leave me, but like I said to you before, you shared part of his life. A life that should have been just mine and his. And I do hate you.’ She felt her own tears beginning to run warmly down her cheeks. A bitter smile creased her face.

‘You’ll never see me again, Donna, I promise you,’ Julie said, wiping her eyes. She opened the car door.

‘You think I’d just let you walk away?’

‘What else are you going to do? I’m sorry. Believe that, at least. I am sorry for what I did.’

Julie held her sister’s gaze for a moment, then moved to pull herself out of the car.

‘I can’t let you walk away, Julie,’ Donna said almost apologetically.

‘You can’t stop me,’ the younger woman said, and swung herself out of the car.

Donna slid her hand inside her jacket and pulled out the Beretta, keeping the pistol low, aimed at Julie’s stomach.

She shook her head, tears streaming down her face.

A look of fear flickered behind Julie’s eyes.

‘You’re right,’ Donna said, her voice cracking. ‘It is all over.’

Donna turned the gun round quickly, bent her head forward and opened her mouth.

She pushed the barrel into her mouth and squeezed the trigger.

Ninety-Three

Julie wanted to scream but the sight of her sister with the pistol jammed in her mouth seemed to freeze her vocal cords.

Instead she made a frantic grab for the Beretta as Donna fired.

The hammer slammed down on an empty chamber.

The metallic click reverberated inside the car as Julie tore the pistol from her grip and stood panting beside her.

Donna merely looked at the younger woman, then leaned across and pulled the passenger door shut.

Julie looked down helplessly at the gun she now held in her hand.

‘Donna, I ...’

The sentence trailed off, lost in the sound of the Fiesta’s engine as Donna started it up.

She guided the car away from the kerb, away from Julie. As she pulled away she glanced one final time in the rear-view mirror.

Julie was standing on the street corner, the empty gun clutched in her hand.

Donna drove on.

The journey became a blur of passing traffic and dark roads.

She didn’t look at the clock when she left London; she had no idea how long it would take her to reach the cottage. Donna merely drove, her mind spinning. Two or three times she had to brake sharply to avoid hitting vehicles in front of her. She considered stopping at a service station for a coffee, but then decided against it. If she stopped she’d never start again. It was as if she was being forced on by instinct alone. All she felt was a crushing weariness, a similar feeling to the one she’d felt in the days after her husband’s death. A feeling that she had become an empty shell, sucked dry of feeling, unable to think straight.

She stopped for petrol, standing on a deserted forecourt, the cold wind whistling around her. She shivered but the chill she felt came from within.

She had achieved her goal. Parsons and Dashwood were dead. Farrell was dead.

Why then did she not feel a sense of triumph?

Perhaps because she felt that she too should be dead.

All she felt was a growing feeling of desolation. Death and loss had become engrained in her life.

She had no one now.

She thought how easy it would have been to drive the car into a tree. She gripped the wheel more tightly and drove through the night.

Ninety-Four

It seemed like years, not days, since she’d been to the cottage.

The assault on the property, which could have cost her and Julie their lives, seemed to have faded into the mists of time. Supposedly the mind pushes unpleasant things to one side in an effort to forget them. Donna had tried to do that with the events at the cottage, but as soon as she saw the building the memories came flooding back in an unwelcome tide.

She sat in the Fiesta gazing at the structure. Even in the darkness she could see bullet holes in the stonework. The wood she’d used to board up the windows was still in place, although a couple of the sheets had come loose. One was slapping against the frame each time the wind blew.

Donna slid out from behind the wheel and approached the cottage, fumbling in her pocket for her key-ring. She selected the front door key, pausing for a moment before turning it, images of her last visit running through her mind like a video recorder on fast-forward. She could see Farrell and his men trying to break in. She could see the blood. She could see Julie.