The Midnight Riders

The Midnight Riders

Marcel Vasquez

Ella heard the faint fall of approaching steps seconds before the tapping on the front door, and feared the man she buried was the one knocking. Then wrote off the ridiculous idea as the fault of her tired mind. As Ella lie there with memories and possibilities running rampant through her thoughts, her first instinct was to reach for a gun. Another ludicrous notion since she neither had nor owned one. Just a symptom of her days with the Midnight Riders, she supposed while sliding off the chaise and making her way to the door. She moved swiftly, as if on air, her feet causing no discernible noise; yet felt that her steps thundered through the shadows of the little safe house.

Over her three days there not one person had come calling, nor did any animals linger about, for what she protected kept unwanted visitors at bay. Thus, the only sounds that accompanied her solitude were the occasional winds and crackling fire. As if the world itself had agreed to conceal her. But she had made no such bargain, and someone was at the door.

Ella couldn't help wondering if this was the scenario in which she died?

Images depicting the moments of her demise had played on her mind almost daily in recent weeks. Yet, she could never see how it ended or what awaited her thereafter. She saw only the beginning: The darkness that would surround her, pierced by a fragmented light. Much like now, when only the whispering embers in the fireplace provided any sort of illumination to guide Ella toward the fate that had literally come knocking.

But to better understand, she would explain, one must go back to the beginning. To that majestic place of dreams and real magic, where Ella's life had irreparably changed, and her end had begun.

Three more taps upon the door pulled Ella’s attention back from the wonderment of days past and onto the depth of fear that encroached from just outside. The knocks weren’t loud or hurried, the cabin was miles away from anyone that could possibly hear them, from anyone that could help Ella. She had to face whatever it was alone. Just as Geordie Kinane, leader of the Riders had taught her. “In the end, when all the magic is used up, we’re all just ordinary people, capable of suffering and susceptible to death.”

She glanced back toward the fireplace, where the iron stokers rested in their holster, heavy, deadly, and uselessly far away. If she went for them now, they would know. They would burst in, and it would all be much worse.

Ella reset her gaze onto the door, took a deep, silent breath and unlatched the little chain. Doing her best not to chuckle at the absurdity of the thin metal providing any sort of protection. Or, at the fact that she had remained there for three days, despite every fiber of logic and rationality she possessed screaming for her to simply run and leave it all behind.

Too late for that now, she chided herself and opened the door only a crack while placing her boot firmly against it. All the while steeling her resolve for what awaited, for the questions she would fight against answering, no matter what they did. Because the Codex had to be protected. Yet, as she saw the face outside, as Bernard’s eyes met hers, Ella’s whole world crashed down.

The utter shock of seeing a dead man standing there, the man she herself killed—and buried—sent her reeling back allowing the door to fully open. But he didn’t rush in to enact any vengeance—yet. Merely nodded at her, and fixed Ella with that soft gaze of his, searching her soul from the cabin’s porch.

In all her days Ella had never been so frightened as she was in that moment, for it went beyond anything she had ever known. Not even the Riders had cheated death. And not one of the wonders she experienced since learning of the Codex amounted to this. Because she knew with every part of herself that she had not screwed up or misread the situation before; Bernard had died as Ella watched. No life remained in him when she lowered him into the cold ground a hundred yards from the cabin; not a single breath escaped his lungs as the dirt piled atop him.

“Are you simply going to stand there gawking, or allow me in? It’s dreadfully cold in these woods at night.”

“H-ha-how?” She finally managed to ask.

“Time enough for that later, it really isn’t getting any warmer out here.”

Ella shook her head, trying to convince herself that this was a nightmare. But he was still there no matter how many times she blinked or looked away. She considered slamming the door and not letting him in but knew that it would only delay the inevitable. Hiding in that cabin forever wasn’t an option, and Bernard wasn’t going anywhere.

Still, she hesitated to let him in. For so many of her current problems could be easily traced back to when he entered their lives with his off-color jokes and musings about how much better the world could be, if only they had the power to change it. Then the Riders found that power. Now they were all dead. All except for Ella… And apparently, Bernard, who had never quite become one of them. Yet, with cruel irony Ella accepted that he was simply the only friend she had remaining.

With a heavy sigh she said, “Come in.”

Bernard followed with awkward steps, as if he’d forgotten how to walk, or those days in the ground had damaged his legs beyond repair.

Ella waited for him to be seated then moved her chair as far from him as the room allowed before sitting down. The fire was dying but provided enough light by which to watch his movements, and to grab a weapon if she needed it.

After several quiet moments, she asked, “Are you real?”

“Are any of us?”

“Bernard…” Ella wasn’t at all sure what she should be talking about but knew that she hadn’t any time for his philosophies. She needed sleep; the more tired she became, the harder it was to hold onto the present, to know full-stop at what point in time she was living.

“I’m here, in the cold flesh, if that’s what you mean.”

“Aren’t you tired?”

“Like you are? No… I mean, I was. But you ended all that. Now, I’m just mostly afraid.” He looked to the floor then off to the entrance before returning his gaze to her.

She hadn’t expected that answer, but as he said it, Bernard looked more innocent and kinder than Ella had ever seen him be and was reminded of herself back at the start. Then just like that, as she blinked, Ella found herself standing inside the 180 speak-easy in Chicago on the night Geordie and his Midnight Riders first found her.

The room was dark yet easy enough to navigate beneath the illumination of a crystal chandelier, along with the tips of cigarettes and cigars—their haze adding to the mystique of it all. A terrible setting for any one aspiring to maintain healthy lungs, but the patrons of the 180 weren't planning to live very long anyway.

Theirs was the fabulous, fast-paced, tragically romantic lives of runners, gunners, courtesans and artists most admired. Those for who tomorrow was never certain, but to which the night belonged.

All the more reason for Ella to be just as confused as she was enthralled by being there in their midst. For she wasn’t even a city girl—had only been to Chicago twice before in her earlier youth—and wasn’t one to venture further than her parents’ home or work, contentedly discontent with her simple lot in life. But on this night, like so many dreams still swirling in her young heart, Ella could be everything she had ever wanted.

So she moved into the room—determined to fit in—languidly, dominantly, in ways very unlike her personality. A truth alluded to by her tentative smile, which managed to be as alluring as it was demure. Much like the black high-necked dress that showed more leg then polite company would tolerate, all of Ella's movements and words were a grand juxtaposition to her Rust Belt roots. That place which was certainly the furthest notion from her mind tonight.

“Ella.”

She was there in the cabin, Bernard’s dead yet concerned eyes fixed on her. Ella no longer became nauseated as she shifted through moments of her recent life, but the experience was still unnerving. “Sorry.”

He leaned forward, “Time getting away from you?”

Ella nodded as if agreeing, but his words weren’t the truth. Time hadn’t gone anywhere, and neither had she. But ever since the Riders inducted her back in Shangri-La, all of time from that moment on existed for her—for each of them—at once. An experience known as the Resonance, which made it hard to keep her reality intact, and drew them closer.

Yet, despite it being unnerving, and the dangers that followed, Ella, like many before her found it increasingly difficult to not succumb to memory, or slipping back into those precious moments in which she still had Geordie close.

“That’s a nice name,” She was saying to him back at the 180. Geordie wasn’t like anyone she’d ever met, and when he pulled her aside to introduce himself, all words were lost. That was the most she could get out.

“It was my father’s, and I hated the bastard, but thank you.”

“Why do you still go by it then? I mean, seems around here everyone remakes themselves daily. Or maybe I’m just too new to really understand.”

His eyes widened, then narrowed, allowing her a brief glimpse of the blue specks dotting his irises. “No, you’ve got it pegged correctly. But that’s not me, see. I know you can’t run from things you don’t like, you just gotta take them head on. So, I embrace the name, and make sure I use it better than he ever could.”

Geordie sipped his drink and she looked out at the crowd, unsure what to say. Ella wasn’t used to anyone being so forward about their life. After he put the cup down, he asked, “How about you, little bird? What’s got you flying so far from the nest tonight?”

“My friend Carla, over there in the blue dress, she just got a new job here in the city and wanted to celebrate. I don’t know how she found out about this place, but I’m glad she did.”

“Me too, little bird, me too.” Geordie took her hand, and Ella suddenly found herself in Shangri-La three months later on the night of her induction. Ella’s last moment of having a safe, normal life.

Of course, that’s not what anyone not of the Riders called it, despite everyone that stepped foot inside the two-story juice joint knowing it was unlike any other place on earth. Despite them all feeling the inherent magic, the pull and pulse of something beyond their threshold of understanding, it’s as if each of those patrons had signed some silent pact to simply think of it as any other club in town, and never speak of it outside those hallowed walls.

But the Riders knew the reality. They understood that the reason it wasn’t visible from outside, the source of the golden light that permeated the whole space, the sense of all-consuming peace and electric joy that captured everyone within its walls was because of the Codex. And on that night, while Geordie lit up her life with his smile, Ella learned that truth.

“You sure about this, Geo?” She heard Eugene, his right-hand man, ask at the bar.

Geordie slapped Eugene’s back and replied while looking at Ella. “Genie my boy, I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.”

Eugene turned to Ella then, “Don’t go unless you mean it. Geo will love you anyway, but once you’re on the other side of that door… Nothing is ever the same.”

Minutes later Ella stood among six of the Riders, in what they had called the inner sanctum, listening to some ancient rite in a rough foreign language she didn’t understand. But each of the others had their heads bowed as Doris recited it. Shortly after that as the people she’d known for months congratulated and welcomed her, the Codex was revealed and as Eugene had warned, everything changed.

Yet, in that moment, Ella was merely repulsed and enthralled by its magnificence, filled with more questions than she ever thought possible. And as she reached out toward it’s golden-white luminosity, a thought occurred to her, which she spoke aloud: “The Codex isn’t here.. It’s back at the cabin.”

Everyone turned and looked at Ella as if she’d lost her mind. Geordie simply took her hand and asked, “You alright, little bird?”

But before she could explain, his hand became Bernard’s as the dead man pulled her back to the cabin. “Ella. There isn’t time for any of that now. You need to stay present.”

After she had regained her bearings, Ella finally said, “I know, I’m sorry… And really sorry for what I did to you.”

“No, you did what was best. You had to protect the Codex, and I… Well, I jeopardized it’s safety. You acted exactly as any Rider would in that instance, so I can’t blame you.” After a long pause he added, “But I can’t forgive you. I rather liked my life. Wasn’t always as I had hoped, especially these last few months, but it was mine and I lived every minute of it best I could. There was so much more that—”

He looked abruptly toward door, “Well, at any rate, that’s all over now. We must focus on the task at hand.”

“Which is?” Ella asked, trying to hide the trepidation rising inside her.

“Turning you over to Golden Dawn, of course.” She began to protest, as much about his plan as the fact that he uttered their name, which was something all Midnight Riders knew never to do. But Bernard cut her off, adding, “It is the only way to save him, and keep the Codex out of their grasp.”

Before she could ask what he meant, the front door and window were smashed in by Golden Dawn Neophytes. Two of them rushed into the cabin dressed in their black robes, and Ella rolled over the chair’s arm scrambling to grab a fire-stoker then back as far away from the intruders as possible. At the same time Bernard had leapt up and grabbed them, though he meant for her not to fight and simply give in, he still tried to give her a few more seconds of freedom.

As Bernard struggled to hold them back, Ella frantically scanned the room looking for an exit while battling that and every other instinct of fight and flight. As Geordie had said, she couldn’t outrun her fears and simply had to face them head on. Yet, she couldn’t bring herself to just give up, and waved the fire-stoker before here, warning, “Stay back, both of you.”

They did, but then an Hierophant entered, wand in hand, and Ella lost all hope of escaping that night. The Neophytes were little more than interns in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, but the other held true power. Bernard looked back at her, for a moment locking eyes, wanting her to focus on him as he said, “Don’t believe their lies, Geo’s alive.”

Then in an instant too quick for Ella to register the shock of it, and of what he said, the Hierophant thrust his wand against Bernard and her old friend exploded into thousands of little pieces, his minced remains splattering all over the cabin. And on her. Ella hadn’t even enough time to scream before she was grabbed from behind and a dark bag was fastened down over her head.

But somewhere below the cabin, in a place only she knew, the Codex pulsated, and her night started anew.