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He closed his eyes; his head fell back; his expression was one of corees, first his arms and chest, then his neck, until for the last ti and unconcerned

"For Elizabeth," he whispered

He vanished into the bloody froth I threwaway from the spot as fast as I could The earth heaved, the walls rocked, huge chunks of ceiling shook loose and ca down The concussion of the subsequent blast sent s, the body of the juvenile that Malachi’s bullet had brought down Draped over it, I lay stunned for a , drenched in water and mud, flecks of flesh and bits of bone I sat up and rubbedin the air like a fine aerosol burning in the back of my throat I looked toward the epicenter of the holocaust The explosion had created a ten-foot crater, in the center of which bubbles lazily ascended to the rosy surface

Where was the doctor? I turned tofor the opening Had it collapsed? Were he and Kearns now trapped beneath tons of earth? Had the entire structure, weakened by water and ripped apart by the explosion, crashed down upon their heads, crushing the thes, took a shuffling step toward the wall… and stopped The s; it had not collapsed; but it wasn’t this welcoaveout of the bloody bombed-out crater behind me

The hairs rose on the back of led, the muscles twitched Slowly I turnedform rear up, like an obscene mockery of Venus from the surf, her pale skin pock-marked with shrapnel wounds and painted with her and Malachi’s blood, one arled horribly but her will unbroken In the cruelest of ironies, Malachi’s body had shielded her from the brunt of the blast

And now she, the i, with her one reeny, whom her instincts demanded she defend, as the doctor had said, to her last breath with ruthless ferocity Her own pain did not matter The fact that she was herself mortally wounded did not matter What animated her was as old as life itself, the same irresistible force that the doctor hadis thecompulsion now drove her toward the spot where I cowered, frozen in fear’s icy grip, wavering in indecisive agony, for even in her injured state shespeed and would catch ehich may or may not still have been open

The space between us had shrunk by half when I regained my wits, pulled the doctor’s revolver fro as I started to pull the trigger the thing that had nagged atI should have reotten to ask the doctor for more bullets There was but one left

One bullet One chance A wild shot or one that an and it was over I was bound by the bitter fruit of athered herself for the final, finishing leap Her extant arood eye with merciless malevolence shone I had to stop her before she h not with a bullet Instead I turned herainst its lifeless side, screa that no anier lived My feet slipped out frorunt upon my backside, my left arm curled aardly around its headless shoulders My desperate gambit had worked, however, for she did not jump but came to a complete and sudden halt She snuffed the air She issued a low, gurgling call, like a cow in the pasture lowing for her calf

She did not hesitate long, perhaps only a second or two, and then she renewed her charge, leading with the shoulder that held her re down upon me until I could sed three-inch teethtoward the back of her cavernous et close You et close! Closer Closer Ten feet Five feet Three Two…

And when the beast was close enough that I could see my own reflection in its black, soulless orb, when all the world was her rotten stench and her snapping teeth and her slick, glistening, pallid skin, when I reached that instant wherein a hairsbreadth separates life froroin and pulled the trigger

THIRTEEN"You Bear His Burden"

On a May rave-robber’s ular curiosity of the Anthropophagi affair, as the doctor had taken to calling it, I was bounding up the stairs in answer to his incessant su (I did not appear upon the first shout, in other words) and now shaking the house at 425 Harrington Lane to its foundations

"Will Henry! Will Henreeeee!"

I found hiht razor in hand, his half-shaven chin dotted in styptic, the water of his bowl a not unpleasant shade of pink

"What are you doing?" he demanded upon my breathless entrance

"You calledbefore I called you, and why did it take you so long to stop doing whatever it was that forbade you fro breakfast, sir"

"Breakfast! What time is it?"

"Nearly nine o’clock, sir"

"I detest shaving" He held out the razor and sat upon the commode while I finished up his chin "Is it finished?" he asked

"There’s still the neck," I answered

"Not the shave, Will Henry Breakfast"

"Oh No, sir, it isn’t"

"No? Why not?"

"I had to stop"

"What happened?"

"You calledcheeky, Will Henry?"

"I don’t try to be"

He grunted I wiped the blade clean His eyes followed my hand "How is the arm, Will Henry? I’ve not taken a look at it lately"

"Much better, sir I noticed last night the scars seelow in the dark"

"That is an optical illusion"

"Yes, sir That was my conclusion too"

"What is for breakfast?"

"Potato pancakes and sausage"