Nemesis

The air was oppressive, heavy, but the thick smell of smoke was now gone. He felt something stir behind him. It was the presence he’d felt in the forest. It was here. He turned slowly, but there was no one there.

He called out, his voice clipped and impatient, “You went to a lot of trouble to bring me into this elaborate dream with you. I smelled your smoke and found you, as you wanted me to. Time for you to show yourself and stop showing off.”

Savich heard a laugh, a man’s deep laugh, not the sort of laugh you’d join in. It was crude, mocking. He turned toward the arched doorway. It was no longer empty.

A man stood there, his hands crossed over his chest. He was swathed in a hooded black robe with long, billowing sleeves. The robe seemed to twist and swirl around his dark boots, as if stirred by an unseen wind. A thin gold cord was tied around his waist, the ends dangling nearly to his knees. His face was long and thin, his head covered by a hood. From what Savich could see of his face, he was pale, with long black hair that spilled forward from his hood onto his shoulders. He looked like an ancient scholar, or perhaps a monk from an old religious order who might have worked in a dark tower like this. He’d seen pictures of witches in robes like that, dancing in their ceremonies, their faces exalted while they chanted to the heavens, carving the air with sharp-bladed Athames.

“You are not frightened,” he said in a deep voice. “I admit that surprises me. I brought you here to instruct you about what you’re going to do for me.”

His voice was resonant yet strangely hollow, like an old recording played too many times. He sounded faintly European. Savich said, “You mean the kind of instruction you gave Walter Givens and Brakey Alcott, to stab their friends?”

“You’re quite intuitive, I see. Perhaps that is why you are not as afraid of me as you should be. You realized quite quickly my beautiful forest wasn’t a dream, that I had eased into your mind, created this splendid setting to bring you into.”

“I should be afraid?”

“You will do as I say, as they did, whether you are afraid or not. Before we are done here, you will revere me, worship me. And you will remember nothing.”

Savich waved his hand around him. “I don’t see much to be afraid of, actually. Look around you. You couldn’t manage to get the lighting right, so many shadows, so many blurred corners in your tower. And you couldn’t provide heat, either, could you?

“Worship you? If you don’t mind, now I’m too cold.”

The hooded figure didn’t move, stood with his black cloak swirling about his ankles. If Savich wasn’t mistaken, he looked surprised at the mockery. What would he do? Savich hated to admit it to himself, but he was afraid. He had no idea what would happen if he were killed in his mind. Would his body die as well?

The witch, or whatever he was, cocked his head to one side, sending more of his black hair to fall out from under his hood and slide along his face.

“Enough of this melodrama. Who are you and what do you want?”

“My name is Stefan Dalco. I have told you what I will do.”

“Is that name part of this Romanian fantasy? Who are you, really? How does all this concern you?”

“I will kill you before I allow you to find that out. You are not here to question me. I brought you here to stop all these questions, whatever it takes. And I will.”

“You say you have that power, yet you’re afraid to tell me who you are?”

Savich felt a burst of anger from Dalco, so real he almost smiled. “You are nothing like the others,” Dalco said. “They could not think beyond their fear, they could not reason. For a time they believed they were mad. Yet you remain yourself, even here. You are not a witch, you are something else entirely. There are not many like us, you know.”

“If that’s the case, you can stop looking like a Hollywood villain from a melodrama. Why don’t you pull your hood back, show me your face?”

A pause, then a stiff voice: “I provide the trappings one expects to see. These hands, for example”—he raised narrow hands with bulging purple veins and long, thin fingers, their nails filed to a point. “A fine touch, don’t you think?”

Savich didn’t answer. He was looking toward the medieval tapestries. Only now they were large dirty-brown woven rugs hanging on the walls, as if Dalco had lost concentration and the hunting scenes had disappeared. Interesting. Was Dalco really strong enough to hold him here? Until when? Until he died?

He looked back at Dalco. “Why did you kill Sparky Carroll and Kane Lewis?”