Fear the Wicked (Illusions Series Book 2)(73)
All was quiet around the parish property except for the faint murmur of noise leaking out past cracked windows to echo across the yard. It was obvious that the pews were filled inside and that Mass was ongoing, which made me wonder even more what Jericho was doing.
A chorus of voices became louder the closer I approached, and I was genuinely surprised that I hadn’t yet been spotted or encountered. Perhaps enough time had passed that Jericho was complacent in the misguided belief that I would never return, that I would never think to find out what happened to my former parish.
His complacency was good for me. It made it easier to sneak up and in position. Through a small window I remembered that looked into the sanctuary, I peeked in and damn near froze in shock.
Jericho stood at the altar speaking a blessing that had no roots in the faith. Instead of the relics and religious symbols that used to cover that altar, a woman was laid out over its surface. The entire fucking town was sitting in the pews praying in unison with my twin brother, not a single one of them concerned about the naked woman lying beneath him.
My world spun around me at that moment, reality twisting and bending before finally snapping back into place. What the hell had Jericho done to make everybody believe blasphemy like this was okay?
The prayers ended, the parish growing quiet as the parishioners rose from their knees to resettle their bodies in the pews. Jericho’s smile stretched his face as he lifted his head to face them.
“She’s possessed with the demon of lust,” he called out, his hand resting on the poor girl’s shoulder. I craned my neck and narrowed my eyes in effort to recognize his victim.
Molly Harrison was stretched out before him, a fourteen year old girl with the face of an angel. Her blonde hair was swept back so that it fell from the table’s edge, her body exposed to the eyes of the parishioners. And rather than appearing afraid or embarrassed for exposing herself to the entire town, she lay there with a peaceful expression.
“But she can be saved. Just like we’ve saved the others before her. We are powerful as a united front. We’ve eradicated the other demons. One by one, we are freeing this town of the evil that attempted to consume us. On our own, and individually, we were weak, but together we can face down any of Satan’s demons and send them back to the darkness from which they sprung. Who will assist me now in ridding this young girl of the lustful sins that infect her?”
How in the name of all that’s holy had Jericho pulled this off?
The answers wouldn’t come to me no matter how hard I racked my brain. The only thing I could comprehend at that moment was the force of my building rage. This wasn’t what the faith was about. I’d spent twelve years teaching this town about what God intended for his faithful and none of it allowed for something like this. Yet, in a few months, under Jericho’s control, the townspeople had become nothing more than the brainwashed members of his cult.
“My son would like to help,” Addy Marks called out as she raised a shaky hand into the air. “I know he’s young, but I believe it would do him some good to see how much of God’s power is inside him.”
My eyes rounded into saucers. Addy’s son, Jeremiah, was only seven years old.
Jericho grinned like a fox in a henhouse. “Send young Jeremiah up. Don’t be shy, young one. We all have the power of God inside us.”
The boy pushed from the pew where he’d been sitting beside his mother. His brown hair was cut short to his skull but still managed to look wild. Dressed in a white shirt that was freshly ironed and brown slacks that matched his shoes, it was clearly obvious he was frightened by the changes that had taken place at his parish. His mother, having noticed his hesitancy to approach the altar where Jericho stood, reached out to prod him along by pushing her hand against his back. She whispered something to him that I couldn’t hear, but the words had been enough to spur him along. Slowly he walked up the center aisle, his head turning this way and that to see the rest of the parishioners smiling over at him.
I had to fight not to reach for my gun and shoot Jericho before the boy could reach him. But unfortunately he was too far away for the weapon I had. All I would do is alert every person inside the building to my presence.
Once Jeremiah reached the altar, he reached out to accept Jericho’s hand. Led around the side, he was positioned to stand where Jericho had previously been, a blade pulled from a jeweled box by my evil twin and placed in the boy’s hand.
“Now, young one. What do we know about sin?”
Jeremiah’s voice was so tiny that I could barely hear his response. “Sin is bad.”
Jericho laughed. “From the mouths of babes. Yes, young man, sin is bad. You are right in that. And how do we get rid of it?”
Shifting his weight from foot to foot, Jeremiah looked less convinced of the answer he was about to give, but still he held on to the handle of the knife and looked over the naked body of the girl laid out on the altar in front of him. It was most likely the first time he’d seen a woman without clothes. “Through pain,” he finally answered, shifting his weight once again.
“Yes,” Jericho crooned, “That’s very good. It shows that you know how to listen. You’ve watched me release the sin from a woman’s body, right? You know what to do with the knife.”
One would think that Molly would be struggling against the fate Jericho had assigned her, but instead, she lay on that table smiling up at the man who was convincing a small child to hurt her. I shook my head, far too focused on what was occurring at the altar to notice much else.