Chapter Fifteen

 

 

"Go low!"

 

Trader's familiar and well-remembered instruction when tackling someone with a scattergun was still so potent that Ryan actually heard the voice of his old chief ringing in his ears as he made his move against Father Sandor.

 

He dropped his stick, powering himself off his good leg, face contorted with pain at the enormous effort it took, diving across the eight feet or so of the cellar that separated him from the fat, brown-robed figure.

 

He heard Krysty start to scream out, and thought he heard the monk blaspheming at the attack.

 

There was the shattering boom of one of the 20-gauge barrels firing, and the scorching breath from the explosion that burned his hair, the immense force of the shot raking across his shoulders.

 

Then he collided with the enemy, shoulder striking Sandor just below the knees. Despite the man's considerable bulk, the power of Ryan's attack sent him staggering backward, off balance. The broken lamp was rolling around on the stone floor, at the center of a small pool of spilled, burning oil, casting a purplish glow across the crypt.

 

Just because the first stage of his plan had been successful, Ryan knew that the secret of winning a hand-to-hand combat was continuity. You attacked with all of your force, and you kept on attacking and attacking until your opponent was down and done.

 

Sandor kicked out at Ryan, but the one-eyed man had a good grip on his right leg, just above the ankle. He levered up with all of his strength, trying to ignore the stabbing pain from his wounded thigh. He hefted the huge figure backward, keeping himself tucked under the man's belly, so that the monk couldn't reach him with the scattergun.

 

"Fuck you!" the murderous priest yelled, swinging down the barrels, catching Ryan a glancing blow on the shoulder, but doing nothing to loosen his hold.

 

Krysty had screamed only once, then came quickly in to help Ryan, launching herself feetfirst at Sandor, the heels of her Western boots catching him waist high.

 

The man grunted in pain and shock, swaying backward, giving Ryan the chance to try a second heave on his leg, toppling him right off balance.

 

"Get blaster," he panted, crawling up the sweating body, wincing as Sandor clubbed him across the temple with a massive forearm.

 

Krysty had rolled on hands and knees, moving with the agile grace of a big cat. She grabbed desperately at the barrels of the Winchester, keeping them steered away from Ryan as Sandor fought to fire the second 20-gauge round at his attackers.

 

Apart from Sandor's brief curse and the heavy breathing, the fight was carried on in almost total silence.

 

The priest was rolled on his back, close now to the larger of the braziers, one chubby hand gripping the stock of the Winchester, the other scrabbling down at Ryan, trying to beat him away from his face.

 

The man was extraordinarily powerful, preventing Ryan from getting a good stranglehold on him, while also hanging on to the shotgun.

 

"Bastard shitters"

 

"Love you, too," Ryan panted, finally managing to snatch the monk's left hand, twisting and snapping the thumb out of its socket, eliciting a scream of pain.

 

Sandor's robe had ridden up over his knees, and he kicked out at Krysty, catching her in the ribs, the air whooshing from her lungs. She flew sideways, still holding desperately to the semibeavertail forearm. Her weight pulled on the shotgun, and the second trigger was released.

 

Ryan heard the thunderous boom, filling the cellar with noise, and was aware of Krysty's body flying to one side, landing in a heap against the wall near the dangling corpse.

 

And the killing rage overwhelmed him.

 

He batted aside the flailing shotgun, sending it spinning into the shadows, where it clattered against a crudely built rack. He brought his elbow around in a cracking blow against the side of Sandor's face, making the fat man gasp.

 

"You're fuckin' dead," he panted, straddling the monk, raining blows on the upturned face, breaking the nose into a bloodied pulp, closing both eyes. The priest coughed and spluttered, spitting out shards of broken teeth through his cut lip, mouth sagging open as be fought for breath.

 

Ryan's sole desire was to end it and end it quickly and brutally.

 

Sandor was semiconscious, breathing noisily, blood bubbling from his shattered mouth. Ryan glanced quickly around, seeing that Krysty was struggling to sit up, rubbing the side of her head.

 

He was aware of the scorching heat from the iron brazier at his side, with the wooden handles of the torture instruments, mostly wrapped in steaming wet rags.

 

Ryan grabbed at the nearest, seeing that it was a straight iron poker with a twisted end, like a corkscrew. The tip glowed almost white hot. The handle, despite the protective rags, was almost too hot to hold.

 

Sandor blinked open his puffed eyes, shaking his shaved head as if he couldn't recognize what was happening, or couldn't quite believe it.

 

"What?" he said quietly, pink blood frothing over his layers of chins.

 

"So long," Ryan panted. "Enjoy Hell!" He carefully placed the almost molten iron tip over Sandor's mouth, then thrust with all of his weight behind it.

 

The hissing of steam and the stench of blistering flesh flooded Ryan's nostrils, almost making him puke into the priest's upturned face. The doomed Father Sandor thrashed and kicked like a blubbery landed whale, a muffled, choking scream of living horror erupting from him.

 

But Ryan was inexorable and as cold as granite, pushing the probe down to the back of the monk's mouth, over the burned tongue, into the top of his throat, filling the dying man's lungs with the stink of his own body burning. He drove the poker deeper and deeper, until it was nearly two feet deep inside the murderous priest's chest.

 

The body shuddered, and tears flooded from the bruised eyes. There was a trickle of bright arterial blood from the open mouth, hissing on the hot iron.

 

And then stillness.

 

 

 

KRYSTY HAD A DARK BRUISE flowering on the side of her forehead, close to the hairline, and she was still trembling from the horror of the experience. But apart from the residual shock, she was in good shape.

 

Ryan had retrieved his stick, limping heavily and biting his lip in the fresh pain from getting a kick on the bullet wound from Father Sandor.

 

But at least they were both still alive and relatively unharmed, and hadn't joined the poor maimed corpse that still hung reproachfully in the chains from the wall of the noisesome crypt.

 

Krysty had found a large barrel of lamp oil among the shadows of the cellar.

 

"Be good to clean out this nest once and for all," she said. "Cremate that vile piece of human shit at the same time." She kicked the corpse of the fat monk with the chiseled toe of her dark blue boots.

 

"Sounds good. Let's do it."

 

They managed to heave the barrel halfway up the steps from the crypt before knocking out the bung, letting the liquid gush down onto the stone flags.

 

"Heat from the braziers won't ignite it, will it?" Krysty asked.

 

"No. Not like gasoline. Chuck a couple of the pews down into it to feed the flames once they start."

 

Safely out in the body of the picturesque church, they each picked up and reholstered their blasters. Ryan took the blasphemous Bible from the lectern and pitched it down into the crypt, having torn out a handful of pages first, twisting them into a makeshift torch.

 

"Ready?"

 

She nodded, handing him a self-light. "Sure. Let's do it and get out of here."

 

He flicked the match, applying it to the bundle, watching the flare of flame, bright in the dim interior of the church. He tossed it down the flagged steps, pulling back at the whoosh of flame from below. They moved toward the door as black smoke wreathed out into the chancel.

 

On an impulse, Ryan hobbled to the altar and picked up the bloodied whip, heaving that into the sea of flames that surged up the stairs.

 

"More pews?" Krysty asked.

 

"Why not?"

 

 

 

THE WHOLE BUILDING was ablaze.

 

As Ryan and Krysty looked behind them, there was a huge pillar of smoke, dark at its base, lighter as it rose into the blue sky, billowing through the shingled roof, which was blazing fiercely. More smoke came through the open door, and tendrils crept from the slitted gaps in the tower.

 

"Won't be working any more evil," Ryan said.

 

"And it was such a pretty building." Krysty shook her head, her dazzling red hair gradually easing out across her shoulders as the tension relaxed.

 

"I'm sure that Doc would have some neat little saying about there being a worm at the heart of the red apple," Ryan told her. "Something like that."

 

He winced and shifted his balance again, aware of the warm stickiness of fresh blood trickling down the back of his wounded thigh.

 

"Hurting?"

 

"Some."

 

"Get Mildred to take a good look at it when we get back to the raft."

 

He nodded. "Sure will."

 

They were out in the beautiful gardens, still staring back at the flaming church.

 

There was a great crash that made them duck, and the exquisite stained-glass windows on the one flank of the doomed building exploded in a shower of multicolored splinters, bright orange, purple, crimson, emerald, turquoise, gules and argent.

 

"Gaia! It's like a fountain of glass. Lovely."

 

The rope had to have burned through at the bottom of the belfry, as the bell began to toll, slowly at first, then faster.

 

Its sonorous tones echoed out across the fertile land of the old gardens, as though calling the news of the death of the wicked Father Sandor.

 

"Leaves the place a mite cleaner than when we arrived here," Ryan said thoughtfully.

 

"Generally do, lover. We generally do."

 

 

 

THEY MADE THEIR SLOW WAY back toward the clean-running river, where the others were waiting for them. The column of smoke had been spotted, and J.B. had been preparing to lead a recce party to find out what had happened.

 

The corpse of a large wild pig, shot neatly behind the right ear, lay on the ground, being butchered by Jak, ready for cooking on their own bright fire.

 

"Have any adventures out there?" Mildred asked. "You both look like shit."

 

Krysty began to laugh and Ryan joined her.