The Venerer

“Please, don’t do it.”

   Her voice is small, innocent even, but with the lingering intensity of a woman who, deep down, possesses great strength.

  “There must be some sort of mistake,” she says. Now, her voice is pinched. Het throat feels like an ashtray filled with freshly stubbed cigarettes.

  “Can’t you understand?” he says. His voice is gravelly, like the stones he will have to cut through to dig her grave. “I’m just following orders.”

  “No,” she says. “No one is telling you to do this.”

  He is at an arm’s length from her. Not far enough to give her enough time to run. Not close enough to give her the opportunity to swiftly snatch the knife from his trembling hands. All she can do is use her words, but her throat is growing dry and the nausea is building up. There is no one around to see them. Not here, in the woods of Pinestead Park, where the soil is rich and soft and deep, perfect for burying a body.

  “You’re pregnant,” he says. A bead of sweat travels down his forehead.

  She cannot help but expel a rush of air. Laughter or fear, she cannot tell, but she needs to breathe. The air refills her lungs and her voice is no longer small. “I’m not pregnant, Sir.”

  “Oh, but you are.” He inches closer and crouches down so his eyes are in line with her belly, flat as a plank of wood. “You are carrying a Demon.”

  She releases another rush of air. This time it’s laughter. “Sir, is this some sort of sick joke?”

  He brings the knife up in front of his face so she can see her reflection in the steel of the blade. Her face is red and blotchy. She needs to seem strong, but her face is giving her away.

  “I’m just following orders,” he says again, drawing the knife closer to her face. She tries not to flinch. A cloud passes overhead and obscures the sunlight.

  “Whose orders?” she asks, holding his gaze. She cannot fathom the reality of this absurd situation she is in, but seeing her eyes twitch in the mirror of the knife reminds her that it is real. “I’m sure its all just a big misunderstanding.”

  He laughs nervously. His teeth are coffee-stained and his crow’s feet are deep, as if etched into his skin with precision. He brings the knife back down to his side, and she feels her shoulders relax. “You wouldn’t know,” he says. His lips tremble. “You wouldn’t know until a single horn pierced through the flesh of your belly and killed you slowly.” She gives him a horrified look. He continues speaking, but this time his voice shivers. “I’m so sorry, Miss, but I was born with the sixth sense. I can feel it in my bones. I’m just following orders.”

  She is frustrated now. She can see his fear practically simmering in his body. His hands shaking, lips trembling, eyes flickering round like a ticking clock. He is scared, so she shouldn’t be. She just needs to buy time.

  “Are you going to kill me?” she asks.

  He lets out an anguished sigh. “ I must,” he cries. “You’ll die anyway, but the Demon inside you won’t. It’ll grow old and live long and go on many killing sprees.”

  “But Sir,” she says, choosing her words carefully, “you still haven’t told me whose orders you are following.”

  He slaps his empty hand against his spindly thigh. “The Demon’s, goddammit.” She watches as he raises his arm behind his neck and squeezes it. When he brings his hand back down, she can see that it is clammy. “I can sense it inside you, and it’s telling me to kill it.”

  “The Demon inside of me is telling you to kill it?” she asks, though it sounds more like a statement than a genuine question. She wants him to hear the absurdity of his own words.

  He pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs in defeat. “Yes, they are innocent when they are in the womb. Just like normal babies, Demon new-borns are innocent. It’s how we find them. They call to us and we track them down.”

  “Us?”

  He hesitates before he speaks, but she still gets her answer. “I’m a Venerer,” he admits. “I hunt Demons.”

  “And you’re saying that I’m pregnant with a Demon?”

  “Yes, unfortunately you are.”

  “And my unborn Demon child has called to you? What did it say?”

  He furrows his eyebrows. “It didn’t say anything, Miss. Like I said, I have a sixth sense. I can sense its presence.”

  “So it didn’t actually tell you to kill it.”

  “No, but that is what we are trained to do. It’s like fight or flight. We are trained to fight.”

  She smiles now. She takes a good look at him now. Her fear has dissipated and her vision is clearer, crisper. She takes in his lanky frame, his thick black hair, his crusty lips. The skin around his eyes is young, but the rest of his face looks weathered, like he hasn’t slept in weeks. He has boyish features and a five o clock shadow. His gravelly voice does not match his appearance.

  He is young. It is why he is so inexperienced.

  “Who trains you, Sir?” she asks. His initial frustration at her abundance of questions is still evident, but she can now see that his frustration stems from his inability to kill. The whites of his eyes have turned red.

  “The Academy.”

  “How old are you?”

  He grips the knife harder. “Twenty-six.”

  “Makes sense,” she mutters, and this makes his ears perk. He realises how stupid he is being, letting her indulge in conversation.

  He raises the knife again, but this time, she kicks him in the knee. The knife flies out of his hand as he buckles to the ground. Instinctively, she swipes it and holds it out of reach. 

  A gust of wind blows through the park, causing the leaves to rustle. A pinecone falls from a distant tree and pellets down, hitting the soil with a soft thud.

  He rolls onto his back and raises his arms up in surrender. “Please, Miss, you have to hear me out. I need to kill you. Think of it as sacrificing yourself for the rest of the world.”

  She laughs, twirling the knife between her fingers. “You remind me of Hennelly.” 

  His eyes widen. “What did you just say?”

  “Hennelly,” she repeats. “The Venerer who tried to kill my mother.”

  He sits up and leans back against his elbows. He opens his mouth to speak, but fear lodges in his throat and turns his voice into sandpaper.

  She flashes him a conniving grin. “He was an amateur,” she continues. “Just like you.”

  “Excuse me?” He manages to say, failing to hide his wounded look.

  “You must have learned all about Hennelly, no?”

  He rubs his eyes, painting a layer of dirt of his face. “Yeah,” he says, “The Cursed Venerer…wait, you said he tried to kill your mother?”

  She is enjoying herself, watching his face contort with realisation, and then absolute horror. “No,” he says, “no way, this can’t be real.”

  “Oh, believe it.”

  “But, we were never trained…”

  “To kill the ones who survived?” she says. “It’s because the Academy is lazy now. It has been over a century since a surviving Demon was encountered, so why bother keeping up with the training?”

  He releases a shaky breath. “You. You are the surviving Demon.”

  She nods. “Correct. You sensed me. Thankfully, you’re an amateur, because I am unarmed today, but luckily you brought a knife.”

  His breathing quickens. His mind is screaming for him to react, to fight back, but his body remains sedimentary.

  “You see,” she says, enjoying his fear, “Hennelly was a coward. He had every single chance to kill my mother, but each time, he backed out. When he finally summoned the strength to kill her, she had him all figured out, and she cut his throat.”

  He shakes his head in disbelief. He speaks, but his own voice sounds faraway. “I don’t get it. We learned that Hennelly plunged the knife into the Demon Carrier’s belly, but it wasn’t deep enough to kill. A dog walker found her and got her to the hospital, and her demon child – by some miracle – survived. As punishment, Hennelly was slaughtered at the Academy.”

  She raises her eyebrows, amused. “That’s what they told you, huh?”

  He nods.

  “They’re wrong, Sir.”

  “What?”

  “Hennelly never wanted to kill my mother. He was her husband. My father.”

  He collapses onto his elbows and falls back onto the ground. His head hits the soil and the impact causes bright colours to flash before his eyes.

  “Hennelly was the Cursed Venerer because he happened to marry and impregnate a Demon Carrier. Not because he failed to kill her. That Demon Carrier – my mother – gave birth to me. I grew up, killed a hundred-and-forty-two people – including my mother because I must by nature – and now I get to tell you, Sir, that I’m not pregnant. In fact, I have been utterly stupid and careless today, allowing you to find me here.”

  He continues to stare at the sky, but he takes her words in, each syllable bringing him closer to the dreaded truth. He curses himself for having been so hesitant, for flapping his goddamn mouth.

  “You shouldn’t talk so much to your prey, Sir,” she says, as if sensing his thoughts. “It gives them time to think.”

  He opens his mouth to protest, but she plunges the knife into his heart and feels the tip of the blade reach the soil beneath his body. The lights switch off in his eyes.

  “A hundred-and-forty-three.”