“You?  Afraid?  Maker of golems?  Traveler of strange worlds?”

“I didn’t survive this long, doing this job, by being stupid.  I can tell when things don’t add up.  And this place is seriously wrong.”

“So you work for them, then?  The people Father Billy told me about?”

The man looked up at him, surprised.  “‘Father Billy?’  Really?”  He laughed.  “That’s a bit of a stretch.  But yeah.  Them.”

“Bad people.”

“Good, bad, what’s the difference?  They pay good.  It’s a fun job.  Speaking of fun, wait until I tell them I found William Lonneskey hiding out in an old church out here.”

Eric glared at him.  “Just leave him out of it.”

But the young man ignored him.  “That should be interesting.”

“What’s your game?” Eric asked, eager to move off the subject of Father Billy.  “What are you trying to accomplish?  You try three times to kill me and then at the factory you just sucker-punch me and leave?  Now you want to have a heart-to-heart?  You beat me here.  You had almost a whole day’s head start.  Why didn’t you just take whatever’s down there and leave before I even arrived?”

“I already told you, it’s wrong down there.”

“It’s been wrong everywhere I’ve been today!”

“It’s extra wrong down there.  I arrived yesterday evening and stood right here, looking down into that darkness.  Immediately, I knew I couldn’t just go down there.  All my tricks failed me.  I couldn’t sense anything.  It was like looking into absolute nothingness.  I climbed back up into the crater, where my tricks still worked, and I looked for somewhere in the spectrum where this place was safe, but no matter where I went, it was always the same.  It was death.”

If this man could do his “shifting” thing in the crater, then that explained why Eric never saw him as he approached.  He was likely shifted as he approached the cathedral.  The better to catch him off guard.

“So how did I fit into it all?  How did you even know I was coming?”

“I didn’t.  I have a few rules that keep me alive in my line of work.  The first one is always watch your back.  Jobs like these, I leave golems covering my trail, just in case someone decides to follow me.  When one of them is disturbed, I know about it immediately.  They’re a part of me, as I’ve said.  I also instantly know the results of those confrontations.  I know when my golem does its job and I know when someone manages to get away.  So I knew you were following me.  I knew you managed to beat the first two golems.  But then you never found the third one that I left at that village.”

“Village?”

“I went back and found out you took a little detour.  Visited Lonneskey at that church instead.”

The village must have been what he missed.  He’d recalled a building or two, but because he circled so far around it, that part of the dream never recurred to him in enough detail to reveal what he’d found there.  Now he knew.

“I saw you there, saw who you were with.  I don’t know what business you were up to.  I didn’t care.  I just needed you both gone.  So I left another golem.  And I made sure you saw me leave it.”

“I didn’t have any ‘business’ with Father Billy.  I left the path because I was chased by a bunch of corn creeps.  He was a good enough man to not let me die on the lawn of his church.”

“Lonneskey is hardly a good man.”

“People change.”

“No.  They don’t.”

“How did you get back to us if you were already here?  Some of these paths are one-way.  It’s impossible to go backward.”

“The fissures create disturbances in the spectrums.  I can feel them.  I can see the paths.  All of them.  Including the ones that lead backward.”

“Convenient.”

“It is.”

“So then what was up with the factory?”

“After I left that golem at the church, I realized something.”

“What’s that?”

“I realized that it probably wasn’t a coincidence that you were here.  I realized you were probably looking for whatever’s hidden here.  That’s also when I realized that I might need you.  Lucky for me, you managed to survive a third golem.  But then I had to keep you alive long enough to meet you here.  The problem with that was that I left a particularly nasty golem in the factory.”

So there was another golem at the factory.

“My second rule is always remain flexible.  I had to distract you so you wouldn’t stumble across the golem and finally get yourself killed just when I needed you.”

“The residuals.”

“Residuals?  Yeah.  I suppose so.  I can’t really take credit for that trick.  I learned that one from an old friend.  Just before I killed him.”

“Your mother must be so proud.  So you put the residuals there to hide the golem from me?”

“That, and to spy on you.  I wanted to know what was so special about you, how it was that you defeated three of my golems.  I saw you talking to someone…  But after knocking you out, I couldn’t make that device work.  It looked like an ordinary, cheap phone.”

It figured that someone would knock him over the head just to get a closer look at his stupid phone.  “It is an ordinary, cheap phone.”

“You weren’t using it like a phone.  You were talking to someone.  They were feeding you information.”

That’s right…  He was talking to Isabelle.  And he wasn’t simply talking on his phone.  He’d been talking to it.  Isabelle was sending him text messages, warning him that something seemed off in there.  And he hadn’t sent any texts back to her because she didn’t need him to.  She could get into his thoughts.  To someone who didn’t know about Isabelle, it would seem that his device was communicating with him independently and despite the lack of a signal.

But this man had already threatened Father Billy’s life.  He had no intention of letting him know about Isabelle.

“Someone was talking to you,” the foggy man insisted.

“Yes,” admitted Eric.  “The crew of the Enterprise.  They’ll be beaming me up shortly.”

“I don’t care for sarcasm.”

“I don’t care for pompous, murderous little pricks.”

The young man shrugged.  “Fine.  I dragged you safely around the office where I hid the golem and I sent you on your way.  Even gave you your phone back.  Didn’t want to risk you not making it here for our little talk.”

“You’re a real saint.”

“I also took care of that cat for you.  I’ll bet that could’ve ruined your day.”

“You have no idea.”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

Eric met the young man’s stony gaze.  For a moment, they both remained silent.

This man didn’t seem to know anything about his dream, or about the old folks who had helped him along the way.  He was under the impression that he must be some kind of government agent, specifically sent to either confront him or beat him to the prize in the cathedral.  And his peculiar use of the cell phone only reinforced that fantasy.  It was clear that he didn’t trust him, but the irony was that he would never in a million years believe the truth.

And if he was really lucky, that would give him just a sliver of an advantage.

Finally, Eric asked, “So what now?”

“Now, we’re going to go down there.  And you’re going to lead the way.”

“That’s not going to happen.”

“Isn’t it?”

“No.  I’ve heard enough.  There’s nothing scary about you.  You’re just a rotten kid who needs his ass kicked real good.  I’m not playing your game.  You can go to hell.”

The foggy man, no longer foggy at all, barely even a man, pulled a handgun from under the back of his tee shirt and pointed it at Eric, instantly regaining his full attention.  “One more rule:  I never rely solely on my talents.”

Eric stared into the barrel of the gun.  “How prudent of you.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine