He opened his mouth and stuck out his tongue, displaying a cluster of beetles clinging to it. He closed his mouth, and when he spoke again, he did so normally. Lori had no idea how he could do so with those insects on his tongue. The thought made her shiver with disgust.
“After they took their payment from me, they decided to stick around. Don’t know why. Maybe I make a good home for them. Whatever the reason, they’re happy to help me out – especially if there’s a meal in it for them. So I got more protection than most folks who travel this road. I can afford to take a chance on you. Besides, if helping you means I get to fuck over the Cabal, so much the better. I’ll do anything to hurt those bastards.”
“Anything?”
He turned to look at her and gave her a frown. “Do you have something in mind?” He sounded half suspicious, half intrigued.
“You said you searched the Nightway for answers to what the Cabal thinks you did, but so far you haven’t had any luck.”
“That’s right.”
“Any place you haven’t tried yet?”
Edgar didn’t answer right way. He gripped the steering wheel tighter, and she could see conflicting emotions warring on his face.
“Just one,” he said. “I’ve never been there, but I’ve heard about it from people like us, stranded on the Nightway, running, searching….” He took a deep breath, then said, “They call it the Garden of Anguish.”
“Sounds like fun,” Lori said. She meant this sarcastically, but Edgar responded as if she was serious.
“You wouldn’t think so if you went there. There’s no place worse on the Nightway. None.”
Considering what she’d experienced on the Nightway so far, she thought that was saying something.
“But it’s a place where I could get the answers I need?”
“Yes. But there’s a good chance you wouldn’t survive the asking.”
“Which is why you never went there?”
“No. I’ve never gone there because I’m afraid I would survive.”
Lori didn’t know what to make of his response. But she knew one thing: if her friends and family were in danger from the Cabal, she had to do whatever was necessary to save them.
“Take me there.”
He gave her a sideways glance. “You did hear the name, right? The Garden of Anguish?”
“I did. I still want to go there.”
He considered for a time, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel nervously and chewing his lower lip. Finally, he said, “Okay. But I’m just going to drop you off. I won’t step into the Garden with you.”
“Could you wait for me and give me a lift to an exit when I’m finished?”
“What the hell do you think I am? A goddamn cab driver?” He sighed. “Fine. I’ll wait. And if you survive with enough of your mind intact, I’ll take you to an exit. If you don’t—”
He broke off, cocked his head as if listening to something only he could hear. A moment later, he turned toward her. “My friends say they’ll be happy to devour you if you live but your mind’s destroyed. They promise to make your end as quick and painless as possible.”
She felt a cold twist in her gut.
“Tell them thanks, but I’ll need to think about it.”
Edgar nodded. A faraway look came into his eyes then, and she thought he was likely delivering her message to his ‘friends’.
They continued on toward the Garden of Anguish. Lori hoped they’d get there before she could change her mind.
* * *
Edgar was right about time passing differently on the Nightway. They could have traveled for days or merely hours. There was no way to tell. She couldn’t check the time on her phone. She’d retrieved it, along with her purse, from her wrecked Civic, but the device wouldn’t work on the Nightway. And since the sky was nothing but unbroken blackness, it seemed like they traveled in an eternal now, where time was frozen and forward movement only an illusion. Time still existed for her body, though, and she became hungry and thirsty. Edgar had some energy bars and bottled water in the back of his van – he said he made supply runs to Earth from time to time – and he offered her some. Later, when she had to pee, he pulled over to the side of the road. He told her not to go very far from the van, and he stood outside with his back to her to keep watch. He didn’t have a gun or anything, but with his friends inside him, he didn’t need any other weapons. The ground felt like hard black sand beneath her feet, and she had to squat to do her business. She was only halfway through when she heard something big and heavy let out a chuffing breath not far from her. Her urine stream cut off instantly, and her head whipped in the direction of the sound. Before she could react further, Edgar opened his mouth and his beetles flew forth. They streaked past Lori toward whatever had made the noise. She couldn’t see it, but she heard it shriek as the beetles fell upon it. There was a loud thud as it hit the ground and began thrashing, trying to dislodge the insects, no doubt, but its actions did no good. Seconds later it fell still, and a couple moments after that, she heard the beetles as they buzzed lazily back toward their host. Whatever that thing out there had been, it was nothing but bones now. She thought she was too shook up to finish peeing, but she did. When she was done, she stood and hurried back to the van.
“What the fuck was that?” she asked Edgar.
He cocked his head in the way he did when listening to his friends. He smiled. “They say it was delicious.”
* * *
They passed several vehicles as well as a couple structures – one that resembled an upside-down pyramid, another that looked like an arrangement of gigantic crystalline shards floating in the air. She didn’t ask Edgar what these structures were, and he didn’t volunteer the information.
After a time, Lori said, “What is the Cabal? What do they want from us?”
“I don’t know for sure,” Edgar said. “I’ve asked around the Nightway, and I get different answers from different people. Some say the Cabal delight in tormenting people, that they feed on our suffering, and that the whole ‘confess and atone’ bit doesn’t mean anything. It’s just a lie to cover their true intentions.”
“Do you believe that?”
He shrugged. “Some days I do. Others I don’t. Who the hell can know for sure?”
The idea that the Cabal tortured their victims solely for the pleasure of it didn’t feel like the right explanation to Lori. Or at least, it wasn’t the complete explanation. The Cabal might enjoy the pain they caused, but during her encounters with them, she’d sensed a driving purpose behind their words and actions. More than that – an urgency – as if there was a vital importance to what they were doing, even if she couldn’t understand it.
“What else have you heard?”
