The Rites Of Mythos
The body of a woman lay prone on the jewelled altar, naked save for a gold disk suspended from a chain around her neck. Five hooded figures circled the altar in a slow dance of forbidden magic. Music—the eerie, other-worldly wail of a flute—filled the air, a nerve-jangling, demonic dirge of death.
Suddenly, as on an unseen signal, the music disappeared, the dancers halted. A still, heavy silence choked the stench-filled air. Seconds passed without the slightest movement and then the godhead took its form. A small ebon statue shook on its pedestal. In the shape of a spider, the icon began to grow larger. Features became apparent, a disturbingly human visage ensconced between arachnid limbs, as the form loomed larger. Its chest heaved, emitting a ghastly mist from misshapen mandibles, and it moved all its limbs at once, no longer a statue but a mighty beast, larger than a man, black hide glistening in the fetid, rank air.
The demon awaited his due.
DEATHWALKER 1
Rites of the Demon
Roman Gastevano
tempo
books
Grosset © Dunlap Publishers • New York A Filmways Company
For Jim Frenkel
Copyright © 1976 by Grosset & Dunlap, Inc.
All rights reserved
Published simultaneously in Canada
ISBN: 0-448-12112-3 A Tempo Books Original
Tempo Books is registered in the U.S. Patent Office Printed in the United States of America
Prologue
Twilight spread a purple glow over broad lawns. A circle of hemlock trees below a balcony threw long shadows across the grass. Their partly shadowed branches moved and whispered with the spring breeze, like a troupe of dancers conspiring. In the stillness of the elegantly landscaped grounds, a fountain of water spilled from a porpoise's mouth, falling back into marble bowls where Japanese goldfish swam, quick, wraithlike ghosts moving in the silent depths.
A mockingbird laughed, darting quickly across the lawn. The bird bounced over the grass as a stone skips across water, its wings opening and closing quickly as it hopped, closer and closer to the circle of hemlocks.
A worm, sluggish and obtuse, pushed itself up through the soil, attracted irresistibly by the smell of rain. The bird struck sharply with its beak, first to slash and then to grasp at the barely struggling creature, too dim to perceive even the moment of its own death. The mockingbird planted its talons firmly in the ground, yanking the stringy
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worm with all its might, using its body as a lever against the soil.
Slowly and inevitably, the worm was drawn upward, shackles of earth breaking around it.
Without warning, a slash of furry grey darted through the air from among the bushes of hemlock, landing neatly and precisely on its surprised prey.
The mockingbird jerked under the weight of a fat Persian cat. Its wings fluttered uselessly as it struggled to escape the terrible claws and teeth. It shrieked once, then fell silent as the cat hunkered over it, its yellow eyes impassive as it bent to its reward, sharp teeth glittering wetly.
The music of the fountain played gently on the wind. The sun, sinking slowly over the rolling hills, dropped behind a bank of purple clouds and spread its yellow-orange rays across the landscape one last time. The cat waited.
The mockingbird, sensing the stillness, struggled to be free. For one second frozen in time, it almost believed that it was free. Something birdlike and soaring, an orin-thic hope rose in its soul ... and then, with a soft, ugly miaow, the cat swiped with its soiled claws at the bird's head, stunning the smaller creature.
The deadly game had begun.
The DC-10 sailed through the dark night, humming gently with power. In the cabin, sleepy passengers dozed, talked softly, stared out the windows into the desolate blackness of the night sky, wrapped in their own thoughts,
A small child stirred in her sleep and moaned crankily, nuzzling into her mother's side. Three men in first class laughed as a fourth slapped his cards down on the table with an original obscenity. The stewardess leaned against the galley counter, her mind far away in a bestselling novel. The pilot and co-pilot argued inarguable politics.
And the plane travelled on through the night.
Lucas Payne sighed softly, turning uncomfortably in his
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seat. He stared out the window into the black sky, thinking. And trying hard not to think.
His long thin frame, in clothes that did not fit, folded itself this way and that in the stiff seat, trying to find a comfortable position. After nearly twenty-eight hours on planes and in terminals, it was not easy. His thin hands clutched the arm rests until his knuckles were white, his long jaws worked nervously back and forth as he stared into the void, looking for some sign, some hint of hope.
His own face stared back at him from the double glass. Payne studied it with vague surprise. Never vain, he was still taken aback by the changes in his own appearance, etched during five long years in a POW camp. The ordeal had aged him, like wind and weather against a rock cliff. The youthful pinkness of his skin was gone with the heavy flesh that had once padded the high cheekbones and long, almost Indian nose of his ancestors. His face was longer, now craggy. There were small lines of sun and wind around his eyes and mouth. His own grey eyes stared at him from an old face, older than his twenty-eight years. His mouth, broad and slightly amused, was now pressed into a thin, tight line. Between his eyebrows, a faint greyish scar, no more than a quarter inch long was now almost invisible, yet the slight shadow it cast over his high forehead also served to make him look older.
He put up his hand to his shaggy hair. His. reddish brown curls were tinged with grey streaks.
He touched the glass pane with his long fingers, as if he could extract his lost youth from the essence of himself. But it was gone.
He felt sad for a few flying seconds, angry at all that he had missed in a twist of fate. His youth had been passed in a strange country, among strangers, in a bitter battle for survival. And now it was gone.
He felt abandoned, that once he were gone, no one had bothered to look for him nor even attempted to find out if he were alive or dead. Somewhere a world he had left be-
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hind had gone on without him, until there was suitable time to ransom him. He had felt betrayed and angry. And somehow afraid.
The small greyish white scar burned faintly. Payne closed his eyes and thought of the small surgeon who had saved his Me. The enemy. "Risky operation; unexpected success," the small man had said in halting French, trying to explain how he had saved Luke's life.
And a week later, the surgeon and his hospital were blown to dust. Payne sighed again, as if the air were a precious thing. And to a man who bad been dead and come back, it was.
Prisoner exchange, he thought bitterly, and his lips twisted. Perhaps now the nightmares would stop. After all, now he was coming home.
An evil ghost, deadly and cold, stole through his mind. Home to what? it asked mockingly.
Luke continued to stare out the window. Angry, hopeful, bitter, happy, waiting. Emotions tumbled through his mind.
The nightmare is not over, he thought. It's just beginning. Lazarus must have had one hell of a time returning from the dead.
One
The woman who stood on the balcony laughed softly as she watched her cat torture the bird.
It was an unpleasant laugh, cold and without mirth.
As in reply, the slight breeze began to stir the trees. To the east, there was a dim roll of thunder, like the drams of a distant army. A small flash of lightning burst across the dark horizon.
The woman leaned against the stone wall of the house, looking up into the sky where a sickly grey moon was just beginning to make itself known in the sour milkiness of the sky.
In the gathering darkness, lightning bugs began to dot the lawn. There was another thin distant roll of thunder.
The woman lifted a beringed hand to her face. She touched her hair softly, assuring herself that the black tresses were still in place. The weather was oppressively thick and sultry, despite the slight breeze. It was as if the whole world were holding its breath, waiting.
The woman glanced at the black crystal goblet she held in her hand, frowning slightly. It held a dark brown
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liqueur that came from the fruit of a tree in West Africa. It had a thick, sickly, bittersweet taste, but it was the closest one could get these days to the real thing, the dark wines of trees and fruits that no longer grew in this world.
For a single second, the woman remembered the ghost of another wine. Philosophically, she shrugged. She had not come all this way by mourning the past
"Symrna, my dear!"
Slowly and with grace, the woman turned to the lighted window. She could have been anywhere between twenty-five and sixty. In the light, one was struck first by her presence, and then, only secondly by her beauty. She was not as tall as she appeared, nor as slender. Her olive skin was deceptively lush and warm looking; the rose of her smooth face was a mastery of cosmetics, yet nothing known to science could have produced the almost opaque violet eyes under slender, sharply curved brows, the perfect nose, neither too long nor too short, the lush red-pink mouth, the perfect blue-black hair. All that marred the perfection of that beauty was a certain expression, a slight glint in the eyes, hard as jewels.
Charitable people would call it character; those who dared to be her enemies called it ruthlessness. And yet, as the woman turned in the doorway to greet her newest guest, the soft violet of her dress rustling about her body, the brilliant jewels glittering and reflecting her eyes, she was almost perfect. Regal as a lioness, with something of that power.
The small man was in his early thirties. His blonde hair was carefully styled, his white dinner jacket of impeccable Savile Row tailoring! A neatly trimmed beard accented his sanguine, rather boyishly WASP good looks, making him look the yachtsman and sailor he was.
Symrna offered her hand.
"Dawson!" she exclaimed happily. "I hardly recognized you—in your new disguise," she smiled. "As it were," she murmured after a beat.
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The two exchanged a polite peck on the cheek. Dawson smiled.
"Just flew in," he said softly. "And I can't stay very long. Just here long enough to say hello to everyone and scoop up the divine Diana."
Symrna nodded. "Ah. So Payne comes back tonight?" she murmured.
"Mmm," Dawson said, glancing at the wafer thin gold watch on his well-tanned wrist. "The eleven thirty-two. I suppose it's going to be a bit rough of course, but. . ." he shrugged elegantly. ".. . We'll make do, for the time being. I don't see that it throws our plans off one way or the other."
Symrna pursed her lips. "It probably will help us a great deal. He could be a valuable tool."
Dawson nodded. "Even so."
Symrna glanced into the large room. A famous actress, currently in demand after the success of her latest film, was leaning against a small baize table, her elegant back hunched forward as she stared at her husband, a very powerful rock star engaged in a most intimate conversation with a honey blonde woman in a Halston dress. The actress sipped at her drink, looking unhappy. As she became aware of Symrna's eyes, she looked up.
Symrna smiled. Her teeth were very sharp and very white. The actress did not smile back. Instead, she turned and walked through the crowd to the bar, clutching her glass as if it were a life preserver.
Symrna made a clucking sound. "I don't like that one. I wonder what Holt had in mind when he married her."
"Well, it was a mistake, that's for sure. But you can't blame David. After all, he didn't know what he was doing. His voice was flat.
Symrna sighed. "You're right. Well, I don't think she'll give us any trouble. But she ought to be watched carefully just the same. She's Spanish, you know, and they can be unpredictable." She coughed delicately.
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"Exactly," Dawson said, catching her meaning. "And they have some tricks, if you will, of their own."
"Mmmm," Symrna said slowly. A slight frown creased her brow, and then, her face composed, she walked into the room on Dawson's arm, all smiles.
Wealth and power glittered in the huge hall like jewels ; in a treasure chest. Here was a genuine piece of royalty talking to a tobacco heiress who took too many pills; while an exiled Czech playwright watched a powerful publisher dance a shaky tango with a presidential aide. A diplomat's wife chattered to an artist whose work sold in six figures, attended by the Greek shipping magnate and his dark wife. Hangers-on and the very powerful, the dubious and the honest, all gathered together in this s...
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