-119-

was something of an enigma to her, and always had been. She stepped up to the altar and placed the bowl of fruit carefully on the velvet cushion.
"Hungry, Lucia? Please join us..."
It was the unmistakable sound of Johan's deep, booming voice. Lucia turned to see a table laden with meat and vegetables, with Johan and the boy sitting side by side in front of empty plates.
"Come now, my dear. There is food enough for all of us."
The boy flinched at the sound of the man's voice. Lucia stepped closer to the table and looked at Johan for the first time in many months. His eyes seemed sunken into his face, and his beard was matted with pus and phlegm.
Lucia cleared her throat. She would have to speak - there was no escape now.

"Johan... I thought you were..."
"Dead? Oh no, my dear. I'm very much alive and in tune with my surroundings. I can feel your breathing, your heartbeat, your thoughts."
Lucia felt as though Johan's gaze was boring through her, and though she was repulsed she could not look away. Suddenly, he broke off his gaze and turned towards the boy.
"Eat now, boy."
The boy hesitated before reaching out and taking a sausage from a nearby bowl. He had barely placed it on his plate before Johan's voice boomed throughout the church.
"With your HANDS? You touched it with your filthy HANDS? If you're going to behave like an animal you can eat like one!"
He threw the crockery on the floor and began to force the boy to eat from the smashed plate.
"Stop!" screamed Lucia, running over to the table. Johan ignored her and pushed the boy's face to the floor until the broken plate was cutting deep into his flesh.
Lucia took a wrought-iron candlestick from the table and held it above Johan's head with both hands. He did not look up. The boy's nose began to break against the cold stone floor and he screamed out in pain.

Lucia brought the candlestick down hard on the back of Johan's head and he immediately collapsed. But Lucia could not bring herself to stop - she hit him time and time again, until his skull cracked open and her face was splattered with his blood.

Eventually she stopped, and collapsed on her knees out of breath. She dropped the candlestick on the floor, and it bounced with a hollow clang.
She looked down at the shattered remnants of Johan's head. She thought that she had seen him die back at the old boathouse and she had been wrong. But now he was definitely gone, and now power on Earth could bring him back.
The boy sat up, blood dripping from his nose. Lucia looked at his lacerated face, and he met her gaze. He sniffed several times before he spoke.
"The duck... It's bigger than you said..."