Nocturne In Ashes

Prologue

PROLOGUE

THE SUMMER HE turned thirteen, he took his first life. His first human life.

He’d killed scores of animals. His mother had taught him that.

“We’re living off the fat of the land and sometimes that calls for killing,” He watched her work over their latest kill, her long hair tangled and dangling, her arms bloodied to the elbow in the belly of the deer.

He’d learned to heed that call.

He gathered what he needed, sharpened the blade, laid everything ready to hand, the small pile of sticks and stones, the strip of cotton fabric. A three-quarter moon peered down through the trees, smoothing a layer of silver over the crisped and browning leaves and waving grasses, gilding the rippled lake. The last of the summer warmth came now in brief snatches, like the kiss of a capricious child. Autumn approached, and with it the familiar melancholy, the stirring ache of loss, after so many years, still sharp.

He felt the mantle heavy upon him, mourned the lonely course he was compelled to follow. So few understood his work. No one alive could appreciate his sacrifice. Was it necessary, what he did? Must he continue?

As he had that first time, in his thirteenth year, he asked the questions. As every time since, he has asked the questions. So many times. And every time, her voice comes back to him in a whisper. Yes.

And so he plods on. He has seen the fruit of his works, his gift to the world. And yet the hunger, the need grows stronger. Always, more is required.

The killer let his gaze and his thoughts wander to the clump of bushes to his right. No sound or movement drew his attention, but he strained his eyes through the blackness and wondered if the slight shape he discerned was real or a product of his hyped-up imagination. He remained still, regulating his breathing and the beat of his heart.

The scrape of metal against metal reached his ears, raising him from his seat against the smooth bark of an aspen. He watched through the low branches, his eyes focusing across the small clearing. The sound was repeated, made by the door of an RV scraping across the ill-fitting steps which extended from it. A figure emerged and lurched down the steps, weaving and muttering as he staggered between the tall birch and pines. Into the silence of the night came the splash of an over-burdened bladder being released, and it was under cover of this noise that the killer moved.

The man in the trees zipped up and dug into the pocket of his grungy, low-slung jeans. He came up with a twist of paper, lighting it, puffing on it while he gazed up at the distant moon. Spread over his bare chest and biceps, a parade of inked figures swayed slightly with the gentle movements of hand to mouth. Cricket song resumed. The night’s gentle pulse beat out.

The killer waited, letting the man finish his smoke. He listened as the man sang and repeated an unfamiliar phrase. He sang, revised, and tried again. The man was a songwriter, a guitarist and talented musician. Two nights ago, the killer sat in the twentieth row, enjoying the man and his band in concert. A Tuesday night, in a half-filled auditorium. Rolling Stone had featured an interview with the man in one of last year’s issues, but the great band’s comeback tour was falling short of expectation.

The man flicked the butt onto the urine-dampened earth and blew one last lungful into the velvet air. The killer nodded, gripping the knife, and stepped forward.

The man stopped singing.