At Fear's Altar by Richard Gavin Read Free Book Online Page B

reins, a being with no boundaries. But as fast as he was moving, Colin felt as though the world was spinning faster still.
    Form and structure and meaning were pulled to bits and scattered every which way, so great was the world’s new velocity. He could still hear the pounding of feet close behind him, and the distant sound of his name ringing through the trees. He was lost in the night that was swallowing him, lost in the night inside his head.
    Yet for all the searing panic, there was also a mild breeze of carelessness, of freedom. He’d become unfettered from all the littleness to which he’d clung in order to stake his place in the world. All was lost, every bit as lost as he was.
    He kept running. He no longer feared for his safety, for Colin knew that before any of his hunters could find him he would first have to find himself.

    “I am numb
    With the lonely dust of devildom.
    Thrust the sword through the galling feter,
    All-devourer, all-begetter;
    Give me the sign of the Open Eye,
    And the token erect of the thorny thigh,
    And the word of madness and mystery,

    O Pan! Io Pan!”
    —Aleister Crowley,
    Hymn to Pan

The Abject

1

    E arth’s End was only moments away and she still had nothing to say to him.
    As the jeep negotiated the rugged mountain road, Petra caught herself meshing her hands across her middle in a protective gesture. When she remembered this was unnecessary she crumpled inside and allowed her arms to drop.
    “Jee-zus!” Tad blurted as they bounced over a pernicious pothole. After the next hairpin turn, the steepness of the incline forced Tad to fumblingly jerk the gearshift into second, then first. He thudded his foot down on the accelerator. “Do me a favour, call Charlie and ask how much farther it is. I’m afraid this thing’s going to fall apart around us if we don’t get there soon.”
    She reached for her purse and began the quest for her cellphone. Charlie’s hello was a peep beneath the rumble of engines and the roar of the jeep’s open windows.
    “Hey,” Petra cried. “How much farther is this place? Tad’s getting a bit nervous.” She pressed the phone hard against her ear. “Charlie says you should chill out.” She hoped her tone was not too gleeful; just enough to jab at Tad’s already ornery mood. “He also said to tell you the End is nigh.”
    As she snapped the phone shut, Petra heard Tad mutter something she was sure was an insult.
    “First a flight from Providence to Vancouver,” his hand moved in prima donna sweeps as he ranted, “now a four-hour drive up this mountain range. Your friends really know how to show their guests a good time.”
    A dozen retorts, ranging from witty to outright caustic, swam through Petra’s mind. Certain that whichever reply she chose would be the wrong one, she opted to look silently out at the sycamores and yews, which were reduced to grey-green smears as the vehicle rattled past them.

2

    “What do you know? You made it!” Charlie was dragging a plastic cooler out of his jeep while Douglas stood fidgeting with the clasps of a large backpack.
    “No thanks to your lead,” Tad called as he exited the second jeep, “or this deathtrap you stuck us with.”
    “Hey, go easy on her,” Charlie replied. “That jeep took a hell of a beating when Doug and I drove through the Badlands a few years ago. Besides, what’s to complain about? It got you here, didn’t it?”
    “Barely.”
    Gravel crunched beneath the soles of Petra’s runners as she crossed the tiny roadside inlet where the vehicles were parked. Charlie’s description of their destination as “breathtaking” and “out of this world” had clearly been hyperbole, for as she surveyed the tall, pervasive hemlock trees, Petra saw only common woodlands. The boughs all seemed to mesh, forming a spider’s web, or perhaps a shroud, above her.
    Craning her head back, shielding her eyes, Petra discovered that the sky was only visible in shards. She felt foolish lugging