"You're expecting some sort of sacrificial ritual down here, right?"

"All the psychic clues point to that." She fussed with the purse's narrow strap.

"What if I'm the sacrifice? We could be walking into a trap."

"Perhaps," Ann whispered. "The psychic images, though, seemed to come from the intended victim, not from the sacrificer. The blood symbols were feminine."

"So are you. You're not planning to play mumblety-peg on me with one of those toys, are you?"

She stopped at the third step from the bottom-the last step above the level of the stagnant, crusted water.

I took the extra step and slogged into the mess, shin-deep in the atomic sewer.

"What do you mean?" she demanded. In the overspill of the MagnaLite, her eyes glowed savagely.

Hmm. Maybe I could get her to leave, I thought, if I got her worked up enough.

"Sister, for all I know you could be leading me here for a little sacrifice of your own. You own a black blade-"

"The hilt is black-"

"You seemed a bit too eager to help a stranger do something as odd as hunt down God and kill Him. Either you're crazier than I am or you're not playing your full hand. Which is it?"

"We all have aces up our sleeves in this game, Dell, but I'm not the only player. Let's keep going."

I drew my automatic and held it at my side. The heat and the cloying atmosphere were getting to me. I wanted her to get the hell out.

"I've never plugged a dame," I said. "At least, not without a contract." I turned wearily, held the muzzle pointed ahead of me, and stepped further into the brackish, cool water. It sloshed against my thighs.

Ann made no sound following me in. She slid the flame dagger into her purse, leaving the black-hilted one in her right hand. She grasped it in the correct position for both gutting and pommeling.

The little hairs along the back of my neck stood nervously at attention.

Between the water and the floor rested a layer of scum-coated metal and masonry. I walked over the terrain as gingerly as a pickpocket stepping past a precinct house. Sometimes my toes or heel hit something soft or rolled across a formless, pulpy mass. I didn't want to know…

We veered off to the right. I stopped.

"Welcome to Fifth Avenue," she said, looking up at a peeling sign.

"Shh." Something buzzed in the silence. Rats cavorted off in the distance. How they could stand the smell was beyond me.

I flicked off the flashlight. We stood silently in a pitch darkness thatafter a few moments-didn't seem so black. I must be getting old. Blondie was the first to see the light.

"Over there." She pointed.

I glanced squintily around until I saw a faint sliver of light illuminating a corner of the far wall.

"Could be light from the hole where South Tower stood," I whispered.

"Not at this hour. Come on." She slogged forward. "That's what we're looking for." At least we were heading toward shallower water.

Ann's foot stepped on something and slipped out from under her.

I was close enough to catch her just by reaching toward her sounds in the darkness. My arm tightened around her waist as though both had been built for that single purpose. I pulled her close. She smelled like summer would smell to someone who'd spent his entire life in winter.

Her arms wrapped around me-fists that clutched a purse and a knife thumping lightly against my back. She pulled me even closer. Her hair brushed against my cheek, softly as a fawn's touch.

Somewhere, someone began to recite poetry. It didn't fit the mood. It wasn't particularly romantic.

"That's him," she whispered.

She untangled herself quickly to crouch low, listening.

Off in the dim glow ahead of us, a deep voice rumbled in loud, fearless tones. He must have surmised that no one would be around to hear him. He'd taken deadly enough precautions.

"In the name of the Ruler of Earth and the King of the World, I command the Forces of Darkness to gather and heed my call!"

Whoever was in there sounded insanely serious. And just a shade too familiar.

I thumbed on the flash and dripped forward as quietly as the first rays of dawn sneaking into a war zone. Ann kept by my side, holding her pigsticker with tight knuckles. We followed the buzzing noise and the light.

"The time of the Usurper is nigh!" the voice bellowed. "I call upon the Legions of the Night to rise up around me! Throw open the Gates of Hell! Come forward from the Abyss. Serve me, your brother and ally, your Father and Master!"

We rounded an oblique passage to wade through a small atrium. Twin open stairways cascaded into the slime pooled at their bases. The light from around a low corner at the far end of the corridor grew more intense.

The buzzing sound grew louder. An acrid aroma of some exotic incense filled the damp, oppressive atmosphere.

"Flies," Ann said, waving her knife around as if to slash them away.

The voice droned on, louder and more imperious. "By all the Gods of the Pit, I command these things to come to pass! Fire and Death! Blood and Victory!"

His voice cracked and boomed in a rich baritone, with all the force of a general marshaling his troops.

We splashed closer, wading through calf-deep water and insects. The flickering light turned a shade more orange. I took another step forward and the swarm of flies closed behind me like a curtain. Ann followed me into the clearing and gasped as if she'd been stabbed in the stomach.

"Come on," I said. "We're almost out of the water."

The silt-smeared floor had bulged upward sometime in the past, leaving the part of the mall called Place de Bruxelles high and dry. We passed a jewelry store that some maniac had looted in spite of the radiation danger; I marveled at my own lunacy quotient.

I doused the torch again to concentrate on the harsh stream of light angling out of a wooden doorway ahead of us.

"In the names of the Princes of Hell; Satan, Lucifer, Belial, Leviathan! I summon forth the Powers of the Night! Crush the Enemy! Take this sacrifice, that His blood should drain as hers. Let His essence be cast to the eternal Winds as her life is thrown to the Void! As she dies, so dies my Enemy!"

I edged toward the doorway. My shoes had picked up an irritating squishy sound.

The place had been a chapel, years ago. Now, in the glow of a hundred black candles, a variation of Mass worthy of Disney County was in full swing.

A hooded figure in robes of unrefulgent black loomed over an altar draped in the same jet material. Atop the oblong slab lay the body of a girl, her face turned toward him, away from my view. I couldn't tell if she was alive or dead.

The chapel's decor had undergone a few minor modifications. The heavy wooden cross behind the altar had been inverted. From the cross hung a red and black image of an upside-down star. Inside the star was a stylized goat's head. Scores of black candles burned on the pews and railing. Their light flickered in the stifled atmosphere.

The robed figure continued to face the pentagram. I had a pretty good idea what was going on.

A long, thin dagger appeared from the folds of his outfit. He raised it high to the symbols above him. Its blade was as black as his intentions.

"In the name of Ahriman and Marduk," he thundered, "of Coyote, Baphomet, and Sekhmet! Take this virgin blood and drink! I command thee to rise forth in beauteous terror to impale my accursed Enemy on the bifid barb of Hell!"

He whirled about with a rustle of fabric, raising the blade to drive it home.

I saw the man I most expected to see. I took aim with my pistol.

The girl turned her head away from the blade, screaming toward the door. And I saw who she was.

I almost burst out laughing. He had managed to pick an astoundingly inappropriate victim!