A soft grin, completely at odds with his costume, his knife, the blood, and the organ in his hand, stretched across his lips, and the woman whimpered, then fell silent as if the dark lord had reached out and taken her tongue. He nodded once, still smiling in that warm, fatherly way he’d cultivated over the years, and the believers who made up the core of his congregation stilled, ceasing their whispered conversations, their excited burble. An air of expectation built and built and built, and still, he stood, arms outstretched above his head, knife and organ dripping the goat’s blood onto the rough concrete floor.

The wind seemed to pay homage to the dark lord, dying to a silent whisper, though the heat lightning continued to dance along the horizon, and the flames continued to leap and dance and cavort like so many devils dancing on the head of a pin. He let the atmosphere take care of itself, building and building the way pressure in his lungs had built in the vague, childhood memory he had—hands holding him down, under the surface of the clean, clear water, the face of his would-be murderer fuzzy and blurred, the dark brown face that seemed to match his own soot-black skin despite the difference in hue. For a moment, he lived that memory again, feeling the fear course through him, growing stronger and stronger with each passing moment, the demands of his body that he open his mouth and breathe despite the water that buried him, the strange, almost-calm curiosity that slowly overcame his fear, edging it out the way dawn closed out the night.

His reminiscence served a purpose—he imagined the young brunette on the altar before him felt something similar—the fear, at least, then the sense of calm that came with knowing her begging, her pleading, her praying, all would come to naught. Behind and around him, the elite members of his flock stood swaying, hands joined, rough-spun black robes hanging, their worn work boots peeking out from beneath the hems, red cotton sashes hanging from their waists. None of them spoke, not now, not at the cusp of it all.

He opened his eyes, his head still tilted back, and his eyes alighted on the bloody Damascus blade, its fine edge showing proud, telltale signs of other forays into other bodies. He drew in another deep breath, then loosed his booming, orator’s voice into the depths of the night.

“Brother, hear me!” His voice rolled around them as if amplified, as if cast from the speakers of a giant public address system suitable for a stadium. He spun in place, turning to his right, now facing north. “Mother, hear me!” he shrieked, pouring all his dredged-up fear from the memory—the memory of when she’d tried to drown him—all his rage at the stupid cow, and before the echoes settled, he spun another ninety degrees so that he faced east. “Father, hear me! Father, see me!” he boomed, and to his joy, thunder answered him, rolling toward him from the far-away Gulf, buffeting their ears, and he imagined he could feel the awe of the worshippers behind him. He stood for an extra moment, his head thrown back, arms dropping, luxuriating in his father’s acknowledgment. But after a few heartbeats, he sobered and spun once more, this time, to the south. “Great One! Hear us! Come! Partake in our ritual, the sacrifice we perform in your honor!”

“No! No-no-no-no!” cried the woman.

This time, he couldn’t ignore her senseless noise. His eyes snapped down to her face, and he lifted the knife. “Your part in this comes later,” he grated, his tone full of menace, full of the promise of things to come. “There are worse things than death, woman, and if you disrupt this ritual, you’ll learn that out firsthand.”

She whimpered and closed her eyes tight. “Don’t hurt me!” she whispered.

“I won’t,” he said. “I promise I won’t…not more than I have to. Not unless you make me.” He tossed a grin at his followers, then lifted his gaze to the south once more. “Great One! Drink this blood, eat this flesh!”

“Come and feast!” intoned the group—ten men and a woman—surrounding him.

“Great One! Consume this girl’s pain, partake in her suffering!”

“Come and feast!”

The woman’s tears rolled down her cheeks in fat drops, splattering the blade-scarred surface of the ironwood altar.

“Great One! We seek you out, Scaled One. We call upon your holy name, O Snake of the Desert! We invoke the ancient rites, the old covenant, Sea Dweller! Walk among us! Lend us your power! Come, Walker on the Wind!”

“Come, Shadow!” cried his chorus.

“Come, Darkest Night!” cried the coal-black man, and his nostrils flared at the scent of alkali and flint, of heat and desolation, of desert, of brimstone, of plague and disease. “Come, Bringer of Chaos!” he screeched.

“Come!”

Eyes too-wide, too intense, the man dropped his gaze to the brunette on the altar. She took one look at his face and squeezed her eyes shut, her lips moving in silent prayer. He lifted his chin, and his eyes grew wider still. He lifted his hands, shaking, flinging dripping blood hither and yon, and screamed at the night sky—a sound of inchoate insanity, of incipient murder, of inarticulate rage against everything that was. He brought his hands down, slicing the air with the Bowie, flinging the goat’s heart onto the ironwood with the other. His burning gaze settled on the girl tied to the altar, no pity it in, nothing but lust and avarice, and she recoiled, pulling against the rough ropes that bound her, stretching herself out in a vain effort to get away from him. There was nothing intelligent in her eyes—no plan of action, no pleas for mercy—just blind panic, wide-eyed terror, just the emptiness of the void, and the man smiled the way a cat smiles upon a mouse. “She’s ready,” he whispered, and his disciples fell into an expectant silence. “She’s ready,” he repeated, louder this time.

He lifted his gaze to the Stygian night, to the pall of the moonless night, eyes dancing, and drew the Bowie high above his head in a slow arc, playing the flickering light of the fire along its fine edge. Somewhere in the world, one of the Brethren held its mate. Somewhere, men sworn to the dark lord’s service wetted that other blade in blood. Somewhere, another woman screamed in terror—or died in silence, the man hardly cared which, so long as she died, so long as her sacrifice powered his incantations.

“Veni, tenebris noctis! Veni, lator chaos! Veni, tempestatum lator! Age, amator noctis! Veni, ambulator cum vento! Age, serpens magne de eremo!” The man’s rolling shout echoed across the desert plain that surrounded the compound, reflecting back at him from the night sky, filling the roofless room, rattling the glassless window frames. A small smile quirked the corners of his mouth—he knew the Latin was nothing more than an affectation. His father had told him so time and time again, and if anyone would know, it would be his father. Neither his father nor the Great One he called cared a whit about Latin—or any other language he knew of—but he found he couldn’t resist the drama of it. “Age, draco magne! Age, bellua profundi! Veni ad nos desolationis, pestilentiae et morbi baiulus!”

Silence wrapped him in its sweet embrace, not even the woman tied to the ironwood plank dared break it. “Veni, vocator chaos, bibe hunc sanguinem quem in tuo nomine effundo!” Behind him, his disciples drew in a collective breath and held it. His eyes rolled down to the altar, and a moment later, the Bowie came whistling down, and the woman screamed, long and loud, a cut, long and shallow, traversed her upper arm from shoulder to elbow. “Oh, come now,” he said to her, “that’s barely a scratch.” He leaned forward, his gaze locked on hers, until their noses almost touched. “And if you are rejected because you’re a sniveling bitch, there’ll be much, much more to come.” He straightened, giving her a stern look.

The man watched as the blood mingled with the tears already on the altar, watched as the red swirled in a macabre dance, diluted by the water. He stood loosely, his hands at his sides, the wide Damascus blade tapping against his right thigh, leaving a smudge of blood on his dark habit. He waited a moment longer, not looking at her, not listening to anything but his own inner voice, then he lashed out, lightning-quick and another gaping wound appeared—in the woman’s thigh this time—and another ringing scream echoed into the night.

Again, he shushed the woman, waving her pain away, and again, he adopted his frozen-limbed aspect of patience, of listening to the still, sweet voice within him. He glanced up at the smoke curling into the sky, watching for signs, for portents, for messages, for a reflective swirl in the smoke, then his gaze swept from horizon to horizon, searching for omens, for harbingers, for heralds. He heaved a sigh and closed his eyes a moment, then bent down to put his face in his victim’s once again. “Don’t ruin this,” he grated. “We don’t have much time left, and if you’re rejected, you’ll rue the day you were born!” Her only reply was a whimper, but he nodded as if she’d acquiesced.

He straightened, cast a glance at Marcus, the best of the best, his second-in-command while his brother was elsewhere, his mouth a grim line slashed through his face. Marcus nodded once, then gestured at the woman on the altar. The matte black man closed his eyes a moment, returning the nod, but not willing to give up so quickly. Without looking, he slashed across the brunette’s torso, the razor-sharp Bowie leaving a long, red gash in its wake. “Is she not suitable, Great One?” he murmured as the woman shrieked and cried. “Does she not please you? Is her pain not to your taste?” He waited, listening with every fiber of his being, listening within himself, not without, as his frustration mounted.

He knew the Great One he sought was willing to make the journey if only he could find a suitable vessel. Hadn’t his father told him so? But he’d never heard the Great One’s voice, never experienced a vision, felt the tug of a great intelligence pulling at his own. His father said he had to have faith, he had to bide his time, to perform his rituals often, to attract the Great One’s attention, to call out into the void, to provide a beacon, a signal, for the Great One to follow. He knew his father spoke the truth. He knew it.

Again, he cast his gaze to the heavens, and again, it fell back to earth, unsatisfied, frustrated. He shook his head sadly, then motioned his disciples forward with each hand. As they approached, each of them withdrew a smaller Damascus knife from sheathes tucked into the bloodred fascia they wore, and each muttered words of thanks to the dark lord, his father. They ringed the altar and turned their expectant gazes on him.

He nodded, and they threw back their cowls, letting the dancing light from the fire wash the shadows from their faces. He met each person’s gaze with a solemn glance, seeing lust in the eyes of the men, and seeing great hunger in all of them. He bowed his head. “Dear Father,” he intoned, “thank you for this bounty we are about to receive. Thank you for your guidance, your protection, your blessings. Tonight, we failed yet again to summon the Great One. Forgive us for what we lack, Father. Forgive us for our failures in this and in our daily lives. We consecrate the flesh of the woman in your name, Father. We sanctify her blood to your will, your purposes. Bless us with divine nourishment that we may better serve you. Help us—help me—find the way to complete the ritual in a way that pleases both you and the Great One. Guide us, Father.” He paused a moment to see if his father might speak, as he sometimes did, but the only answer to his prayer was the whistling of the wind in the keyhole of the time-grayed wooden door behind him. He shrugged—he had the vague sense that his father was busy, that his attention was somewhere to the east. “Amen,” he said simply, and his followers echoed the word.

The Primo turned his gaze on the pig strapped to the altar and grimaced as he bent down to put his face inches from hers. “You’ve failed us, bitch,” he whispered. “The Great One has rejected you.” When she sighed with relief, he laughed. “Don’t worry. We’ve still got a use for you.” He raised the Bowie and let it fall like a butcher’s cleaver, its heavy blade slamming through her flesh and clunking into the scarred ironwood altar. Her eyes widened with the shock of it, and he chuckled as he picked up his pound of flesh and turned to impale it on a spit and set it over the fire.

The woman screamed and screamed and screamed as the men and the woman went to work on her, their blades thirsty for her blood. The leader held out his hand, and someone—most likely Marcus—put a warm cup of blood into it. Smiling, he sipped, watching the dancing flames darken the hunk of the woman he’d selected for his dinner.