Chương 5: Dies Irae

Someone stole Henry's corpse in the morning. The asylum was in uproar at the news, though I wasn't entirely surprised. I'd expected someone to come investigate Henry's death soon. That they'd been brazen enough to break into our cemetery, unearth his corpse, and abscond with it the day after I slew the Coach-Eater did take me aback. The two events had to be linked, and I could see how. Whoever desecrated Henry's tomb thought he had been involved in the Coach-Eater's death and wished to confirm his demise.

This could only mean that the Coach-Eater wasn't working alone, as scary as it sounded. Others of its kind had probably taken note of its disappearance and would hunt down the one responsible. Did these monsters socialize like men? Did they keep in touch from a distance? I somehow couldn't imagine such primeval horrors acting so human. It was more likely that they could sense each other's destruction like sharks smelling blood in the water. How long would it take until they tracked its destruction back to me?

I was sure I'd left no trace nor been seen by anyone, but if the graverobbers knew about the Lost Deaths, then they could simply have to interrogate the staff to put two and two together. I better watch my back from now on. Neither did it surprise me when Director Rochard summoned me one morning to his office without an explanation. What took me aback was his two guests sitting on the other side of his desk: a pair of gendarmes in uniforms.

They looked like nothing to write home about until I spotted the familiar, silver insignia on their chests. The Bureau des Moeurs' all-seeing owl. It took all of my willpower not to show my unease and distaste. I'd been careful to hide the Lost Deaths, the blood vial, and my other research in the asylum's basement where I doubted anyone would ever find them, yet I knew these two had come for me.

"Laurent, my dear, come in," Director Rochard said upon inviting me in. A graying man with spectacles going on in his middle-age, he was always scrupulously clean at any hour of the day. More than that, he had always been open-minded about my research and always looked the other way. I hoped he wouldn't change his mind today.

"Let me introduce you to Officers Delacroix and Giroud. They are here to ask you some questions." As I feared. I hid my unease behind a tired smile. The gendarmes' names were carved on their insignia now that I took a closer look at them. I'd always expected a visit from the Bureau since I began collecting forbidden books and rehearsed this conversation in my mind many times.

"Greetings," I said with the utmost politeness before shaking their hands and suppressing a wince of pain. The necrosis patches beneath my gloves remained terribly painful, and neither pills nor poultices did much to lessen the agony.

"Is this about the grave robbery? It was quite shocking."

"I am afraid we are here for a potentially unrelated case, but be certain that my colleagues are investigating the incident as we speak," Officer Delacroix replied with icy grey eyes. He assessed me for a second and then went straight for the throat.

"What relationship did you have with Gérard Leloup?"

"Gérard Leloup?" I frowned in genuine confusion.

"The name means nothing to me."

"Yet you were listed among his clients." Officer Delacroix grabbed a notebook and began to read a page.

"Perhaps he approached you under an alias then. Would the name Marcel Devereaux be more familiar to you?"

"Devereaux?" I repeated, my pulse quickening with dread while I struggled to keep a straight face. Did that ruffian sell me out? I knew it was odd he hadn't contacted me in nearly two weeks!

"Yes, I've met a man with that name. I've consulted him on a few books I've acquired but whose legitimacy I doubted."

"Did you now?" The officer raised a skeptical eyebrow.

"I hope you knew that the man was a forger and grifter."

"Hence why I consulted him." I feigned curiosity.

"Did something happen to this man?" The way the gendarmes looked at me confirmed that yes, something did. Officer Giroud shifted slightly.

"Where were you yesterday Mr. Valmore?" The tone implied that whether or not I would have to follow them to a police station depended on my answer, so I told them the truth.

"I visited the Universal Exposition with another alienist colleague, and we returned later in the evening," I replied.

"Afterwards I went to assist Director Rochard until late at night and then went to sleep around… eleven, I believe?" Rochard backed up my words with a nod.

"I can confirm it."

"Which colleague?" Delacroix pressed and wrote down Germaine's name the moment it escaped my mouth. I knew they would interrogate her as soon as they finished with me.

"When did you last meet with Mr. Devereaux?"

"Nearly two weeks ago, officers." He's dead or in trouble. I was sure of it now. The only reason gendarmes asked those questions was to confirm alibis or interrogate witnesses.

"Did something happen to him?"

"We fished him out of the Seine this morning," Officer Giroud replied bluntly. I scowled.

"Was… was it an accident?"

"No, clearly not. His murderer cut him open from chin to groin." Delacroix uttered those awful words with the casualness of a law officer who had seen dozens of such cases before.

"The murder took place yesterday according to our preliminary analysis." I didn't hide my shock. That kind of barbarism was beyond what most criminals would go for; and I knew, deep within my bones, that it was related to his investigation of Nelson's past.

"That is awful," Director Rochard said with sincere horror.

"What kind of savage could do this?"

"That is what we are here to find out," Delacroix replied before focusing back on me.

"What did you consult Mr. Devereaux on?" If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"A copy of the Lemegeton Clavicula Salomonis," I replied. Officer Giroud clearly struggled to stifle a laugh, and I couldn't blame him. I'd seen what a real demon looked like, and those demonology books clearly missed the mark.

"It was mere curiosity, I assure you. I do not believe in witchcraft."

"Good for you. You understand that we will have to confiscate this book as part of our investigation, of course." Delacroix moved on without pause.

"Did the victim question you about Henry Nelson?" They knew. They knew Devereaux died because he had been investigating a dead man's contacts.

"Do you think this is connected to the graverobbing?" I asked while feigning surprise.

"Answer the question, young man," Officer Giroud replied icily. I stroked my chin and pretended to be deep in thought.

"I do not recall for certain," I lied through my teeth.

"I may have idly mentioned our patient's death during our conversation, but it was weeks ago."

"I see," Officer Delacroix replied. I could tell from his icy stare that he found me suspicious, but not enough to arrest me on the spot.

"We will keep in touch. If you remember anything pertaining to the case, please inform us."

"I will," I lied through my teeth. Afterwards, the gendarme promptly confiscated my censored copy of Lemegeton Clavicula Salomonis —whom I was sure I would never get back—interrogated the asylum staff about my whereabouts yesterday, and then left disappointed once my alibi proved foolproof. They would return, of course. The Bureau knew who I was now, and they would never keep me out of sight.

"Did you do it?" Director Rochard asked me in private the moment the gendarmes left. I shook my head.

"No. No, of course not."

"Were you involved then?" The Director was no fool. He could tell this was no ordinary murder.

"Is this about your research?"

"Mayhaps. I can't tell yet, but I assure you I'll do everything to ensure the asylum's reputation remains clean." This had been the director's price for tolerating my more unsavory activities. Should anything happen, then I would take the blame.

"I appreciate that you didn't mention Henry's book to them." Director Rochard frowned at me.

"Which book?" I stared back at him, saw the genuine confusion in his gaze, and then didn't push the subject further. After completing my work for the day, I descended into the asylum's basement. Portenoire was built on old sepultures and quarries whose rooms now served as cells for our more troubled inmates, and Director Rochard allocated me one of them for more problematic experiments such as dissections. I had stored the Lost Deaths there alongside the Coach-Eater's blood.

The book was open when I found it in its hidden alcove, waiting for me under a gaslamp's pale glow. Red words awaited me on the pages.

"My congratulations on your first hunt, master," the book praised me.

"Death's grip on mankind has loosened a bit more, and true power is now within your grasp by right of conquest." The Coach-Eater's demise was worth celebrating, but I had too many questions in mind for now.

"You are like that thing," I wrote down.

"You can only be perceived by us mortals if you choose to."

"Yes; I appeared to those whom I sensed within the potential to become my new master, such as you and that woman, Germaine. I have faded away from others' minds until none but you may remember me. This Devereaux did not betray our secret, because he had forgotten it." So his murder was indeed about the Nelson investigation.

"Did a Mortality slay him?"

"No," the book said.

"The Mortalities do not leave any remains. They take everything." A chill went down my spine. Devereaux died by the hands of men, not monstrosities. I could think of a potential culprit.

"Was it the so-called Ankou Society then? Who are they?" The Lost Deaths' answer proved most disturbing.

"A cult of humans dedicated to worshiping the Hecatombs, who rule lesser Deaths like gods lord over men." I sneered in disgust upon recalling the Coach-Eater.

"How could anyone worship such an abomination?"

"The Mortalities can provide many blessings to the desperate and the weak-willed, the least of which being the privilege to live one more day and a sliver of their power," the Lost Deaths replied.

"Many of my previous masters died at the hands of such men." A chill traveled down my spine.

"Why not Henry?" The book's pages rustled as its response appeared on the soft paper.

"Because there will always be a Chassemort to hunt the Mortalities. I will always return to my master, and when lacking one, shall find my way to another." I pondered those words for a moment. The Lost Deaths appeared bound to a single master until their death. They only passed on to me after Henry's demise. It didn't take me long to figure out a likely sequence of events. Henry had hunted creatures like this Coach-Eater and then he attracted their worshipers' attention.

They attacked his library with a handful of Mortalities, set it ablaze, and somehow drove the man insane. A demented, mentally-disturbed patient could not harm them; and since his death would lead to his vigil passing on to someone else, it was much easier for them to simply leave the man alive under close supervision. The cult's surveillance of Henry had likely grown lax after eighteen years of internment, but the Coach-Eater's demise suddenly jolted them back into activity.

They must have unearthed Nelson's corpse to confirm he was dead, and likely murdered Devereaux when he dug too deep. I worried about this society's reach. If they were willing to murder investigators and brazenly rob graves, then they were capable of anything. They would investigate the asylum and anyone Henry had been in contact with during his internment. I would have to lay low and be careful. Maybe even leave Paris altogether.

"Who created you?" I asked the Lost Deaths.

"Who had the power to create you?"

"You will see them during the rite." Them. Somehow that word sent chills down my spine. If the book required that I see its creators, then… then it meant I would likely not believe its words otherwise. Another question hung on my mind since I had seen those poor souls inside the Coach-Eater's gullet, all those corpses crushed by hungry wheels and reaching out to me with empty black eyes.

My body would have joined them had I failed, but I wasn't sure anything of the people they had once been remained within those horrors. Still, enough humanity remained in them that they could feel pain at least.

"Then answer this, if you can," I wrote down.

"What is on the other side of death? What happens to men after death? Hell's torture? Heaven? Another life? Or one of those things' gullets?" The book absorbed my words into its pale pages, and left them blank for a moment as it considered my questions. Then the answer came on pale red ink, blunt and unambiguous.

"There is no other side, master," it said.

"This life of yours is all there is."