C3 Chapter Three

Cade spent the next three days wrestling with his thoughts, trying to come to grips with the doubts that had arisen in the aftermath of his conversation with the Necromancer. They had burrowed deep within the heart of him, their questing tendrils seeking out the soft places of his soul and anchoring there like some kind of cancerous mass, growing roots, oozing outward unchecked, until they were so large that ignoring them was not an option. Not knowing would eat him alive, would consume him from the inside out. There was no other choice, he would have to see for himself.

For that, he was going to need help.

Later that afternoon he knocked on the door to Riley’s quarters in the senior noncoms housing unit. “I could use your help,” Cade said to him without preamble when Riley opened the door.

The other man shrugged. “Sure. Anything you need.”

“You might want to hear me out first,” said Cade and something in his voice made Riley do just that.

Cade had his personal vehicle there at the commandery and so the two of them took a leisurely afternoon drive, wandering the back roads as Cade laid out the problem and exactly what he intended to do.

Riley was silent as Cade talked, letting him get it all out without interruption, but when he was finished Riley didn’t hold anything back.

“You know Logan’s a lying son-of-a-bitch, don’t you? That he’s probably telling you all this just to mess with your head?”

Cade nodded. “That was my first reaction, too. But what if he’s not?”

“What do you mean ’what if he’s not’? Of course he is! He’s the freakin’ Necromancer. Lying is all that he does.”

“Maybe. And maybe not. But I can’t take that chance. If there is even the slightest possibility that some part of what he told me is the truth, then I need to find out. And there is only one way of doing that.”

Riley shook his head. “What you’re proposing is nuts. It’s public property and the cops are always cruising by the place. You wouldn’t last twenty minutes.”

Cade shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. I don’t have any choice. I’ve got to try and see for myself. I’m going nuts second guessing it all.”

Riley didn’t reply.

They continued driving in silence for a time, each of them lost in their own thoughts. The December landscape unfolded around them, empty fields and stark, barren trees that reached outward with skeletal branches, the road winding up and down, around this hill and over that, headed everywhere and nowhere. Cade knew the idea was risky, and he had no desire to explain everything to the police should they be caught, but he was willing to take the chance. The only issue was whether his friend was willing to go along with it.

After a long while, Cade spoke up. “So, are you in or not?”

Riley looked over at him. “Of course I’m in.”

And at that, Cade just had to smile.

It was a simple headstone, plain grey New Hampshire granite, its front polished to a glistening shine so that the words carved into its face contrasted sharply with the smooth surface. Unlike the other stones around it, this one did not contain a name. Nor was there the usual assemblage of dates. Cade had not seen the need for them; he knew who rested here, knew when she had been born and the awful day that she’d died. He didn’t need a set of dates to remind him. He’d known that he’d be the only one returning here after the funeral was over and he’d chosen to leave them off the marker. In their place he had selected a line from Dickens that seemed particularly appropriate to him during those dark summer days immediately following Gabrielle’s death.

It is a far, far better rest I go to,

than I have ever known

Now, looking at those words in the pale light of his flashlight, he was struck with an overwhelming sense of bitterness. What foolish arrogance had made him choose that quote over some other? Rest was certainly the last thing she had received and he suspected that it was his fault.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Riley asked. Cade knew it was his friend’s way of giving him one last chance to think about the potential consequences, but he’d already made up his mind. He had to know. It was as simple as that.

In answer to Riley’s question, Cade picked up his shovel, drove it deep into the earth in front of the headstone, and began digging.

Riley watched him for a moment and then joined in.

They worked in companionable silence, save for the sound their shovels made biting into the dirt and the whispering of the wind through the trees around them like a watchful taskmaster urging them on. The recent rains had softened the earth, but all the moisture it retained made it heavier and Cade soon found himself sweating from the effort. His only focus was getting to the casket below so that he could quench the growing sense of urgency unfurling in his gut.

They piled the dirt beside the grave, knowing they were going to need it again before they were finished. Its rich ,full scent filled Cade’s nostrils and he thought it strange how the aroma of life could be found here even surrounded by so much death. The work was hard, the dirt heavy and seemingly unwilling to reveal that which it hid from prying eyes. A backhoe would have made the effort far easier, but Cade dared not risk it. This was a public cemetery, after all, and the machine would only call attention to them. A passerby might miss a pair of men digging in the glow of a flashlight but ignoring a bright yellow piece of earth moving equipment was another story entirely. Getting caught was the last thing Cade wanted to happen; grave robbery had a fairly serious sentence attached to it. He’d taken as many precautions as he could think of. They’d parked his Cherokee in the woods a couple hundred yards away from the cemetery entrance and had cut through the woods until they’d reached the stone fence that surrounded the property. They’d clambered up and over it and from there made their way through the maze of headstones until they’d come to the secluded area where Gabrielle had been laid to rest. It was in the rear quarter of the cemetery, as far from the road as it was possible to get, and their flashlights were covered with red filters to limit their visibility.

Two hours after they started, Riley’s shovel hit something hard, something that wasn’t dirt. He drew the shovel out of the ground and pushed it back in again, this time a few feet to the left of his previous strike. Another dull thud came back to them.

They worked more quickly after that, reenergized by the discovery, and it wasn’t long before the top of the casket was revealed, its black lacquer surface, so polished and shiny the last time Cade had laid eyes on it, now dulled from the patina of dirt that coated it. Once the lid was uncovered it took only a short burst of effort to clear the earth away from the sides of the casket, giving them room to open it. As Riley climbed out of the hole to get the necessary tools, Cade got down on his knees and examined the lid. Even in the limited light of his flashlight he could tell at once that it was still sealed shut, just as it had been the day it had been lowered into the ground.

As he waited, Cade’s thoughts turned to what was before him. Gabrielle’s death had not been an easy one. The damage the Adversary had done to her face had been horrible. In the autopsy that followed, a legal requirement in the case of a homicide, the medical examiner had been unable to determine a specific cause of death. The idea that a mortician would continue the process the ME had begun, heaping further indignities on her earthly remains had been more than Cade could bear and he’d had her immediately buried without even the benefit of being embalmed, wanting to get the whole process over with as quickly as possible. To be certain the funeral home carried out his wishes, he insisted on being present throughout the preparation process and had them seal the casket in front of him.

Now, seven years later, he knew little would remain of the woman he had once held so lovingly in his arms. The human body began decomposing shortly after death and nature was remarkably efficient at the process of tearing it down. Cade knew that within just a few weeks the hair, teeth, and nails become detached from the rest of the body, the body itself swells with gases, the skin splits open, and the tissues begin to liquefy. After about a year all that’s left are a bare skeleton and teeth.

As Cade cleaned the last of the dirt from the lid of the coffin, Riley jumped back down into the pit, a pair of tire irons in one hand and a battery-powered electric drill in the other.

Handing Cade the drill, he asked, “Are you ready?”

Cade nodded.

Nothing but dust and bones, he thought, dust and bones. I can handle that.

The lock on the casket wasn’t a typical pin and tumbler device but actually a simple cranking mechanism. A narrow key, similar to an Allen wrench, was inserted into the lock and then the key was turned several times to crank down the lid and seal it tightly. Cade had no doubt that moisture from the spring rains and melting winter snow had gotten into the lock over the years, corroding the interior, sealing together the moving parts deep in the core, and so he hadn’t even bothered trying to get his hands on a proper casket key. Instead, he’d brought along a battery-powered electric drill and he used it now to drill out the lock itself, driving deep holes into the center of the mechanism, effectively rendering it useless.

When he was finished, Riley handed him one of the two crowbars they had brought with them and each man took up a position on either side of lock with about three feet between them. Inserting the flat ends of their wedges into the thin space along the rubber seal between the side of the casket and the lid, Riley counted to three aloud and then they pushed down with all their weight.

At first the lid resisted the effort to open it. But after working at it for several long minutes, they began to make some headway. Finally, there was a sharp crack as the lock broke and the lid jumped open a few inches before coming back down to rest against the edge of their crowbars.

Riley stepped back a few feet, giving Cade some distance out of respect for what he had to do, and for that Cade was grateful. Cade put down the crowbar, placed both hands on the lid, bracing himself for what was to come. Gathering his courage, he said a quick prayer for forgiveness, and then pushed the lid fully open.

For a long moment all he could do was stare. Somewhere in the back of his mind he dimly registered Riley’s whispered “Mary, Mother of God!” but didn’t acknowledge it. He couldn’t have, even if he’d wanted to, for what lay in front of him stripped him of his ability to do anything but stare in shocked amazement.

His wife Gabrielle’s body lay inside the casket just as it had on the day they’d sealed it away, perfectly preserved and without even the faintest hint of decomposition or decay. It was as if she belonged in some storybook fairytale, Sleeping Beauty or Snow White or some such, the princess resting peacefully on the bed of white silk that lined the casket, dressed in the sky blue summer dress that Cade had selected for her so long ago. Her hair shone as though a brush had been run through those auburn tresses only moments before and her skin was firm and taut, just as it had been in life. Her good eye was still closed, adding to the illusion that she was just sleeping, and it was so perfect, so real, that Cade found himself reaching out with one hand, intent on checking for a pulse, half-believing for just a moment that maybe she wasn’t dead, that there had been some horrible mistake and that she had been waiting here all this time for him to come and rescue her.

Reality came rushing back in with a crash, as his gaze landed on the thick piece of gauze that had been used to cover the other side of her face, the side that the Adversary had sloughed the skin from, leaving the tissue and muscles beneath exposed to the light, and on the end of the autopsy incision that could just been seen near the scooped neckline of her dress. Gabrielle was dead, Cade knew that, knew it with the certainty of one who has loved and lost, and yet…and yet something clearly wasn’t right here.

“What sorcery is this?” Riley asked, stepping next to Cade so as to get a better look at the tableau laid out before him.

Sorcery indeed, Cade thought, and he knew that Riley had it right in one. Sorcery was exactly what had happened here, sorcery of the type that only a creature as powerful as the Adversary could pull off. With a sudden flash of understanding, Cade reached up and pulled the eye patch off his right eye. He turned his bad eye just so, activating his Sight, and the shimmering web of arcane energies that surrounded his wife’s body sprang into view, wrapping her so deeply in their depths that she resembled a spider’s prey encased in a cocoon.

Cade let Riley know what he was seeing.

“This is not good, boss, not good at all,” the big master sergeant said and for the first time that night there was a hint of fear in his tone.

“Tell me about it,” Cade muttered back in reply, still examining the black glistening bands of energy that shimmered with power in front of his eyes. He’d never seen anything like them and considering all the strange and unusual things he’d dealt with in the years since he’d joined the Order that was saying a lot.

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m taking her home,” Cade replied, hesitantly at first, and then with more conviction. “Yes, taking her home.”

Riley ran a dirty hand over his bald head. “Man, I don’t know,” he said. He started pacing in the small space in front of the unearthed casket. “You sure that’s a good idea?”

Cade laughed and there wasn’t anything close to humor in it. “Of course it’s not a good idea. But what else am I going to do? Leave her here? Just cover her up again and pretend that I don’t know anything about it? Not bloody likely!”

“Damn it, Cade, for all you know she’s some kind of ticking time bomb, waiting until she’s close enough to her target before going off with a bang. You can’t bring that kind of power into the commandery without knowing more about it.”

Cade shook his head. “Who said anything about the commandery? I’m taking her home. To my place. I can put her in the workshop, get someone I know to erect a series of wards around her. That way, if anything does happen, it will be confined within the bounds of a sacred circle, limiting its impact.”

“How do you even know it’s safe to touch her?”

Cade gave that one some thought. His Sight hadn’t manifested itself until several weeks after Gabrielle’s funeral, so he hadn’t known anything about the mysterious web of power before unearthing her body, but he suspected that whatever it was, it had been there since the moment the Adversary snatched her life away. Which meant that the police, the coroner, and even the funeral home staff had touched her without disturbing it and that reinforced Cade’s suspicion that he could do the same. Impulsively, he stripped off a glove and reached out toward her. Riley shouted “No!” but wasn’t in time to stop Cade from laying his hand upon Gabrielle’s.