The Devil Sheds a Tear

Excerpt: I made it to the door and yanked the knob with sweaty hands, but it wouldn’t open. I swung around. Ken emerged from beneath a library table across the room. He held the knife. Tim lay flat on his back with a pool of blood around his head. Though I’d never been violent in the past, I hoped I’d killed him. Ken strode over to the body and commanded, “Get up.” Tim stood. He straightened his nose, fetched two teeth from the floor, and reinserted them. Then he lifted the hem of his robe and swiped blood from his face. He looked at me and grinned. “Naughty, naughty.” The Devil Sheds a Tear A Seattle Coven Tale by Robert Herold A Friday the 13th Story This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental. The Devil Sheds a Tear COPYRIGHT © 2023 by Robert Herold All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. Contact Information: https://[email protected] Cover Art by Robert Herold and Alicia Dean Published in the United States of America Publication Date: January 13, 2023 Dedication To my fabulous editor, Alicia Dean About the Friday the 13th Stories: 13 different authors each wrote a stand-alone, suspenseful short story in the series, to be released on Friday, January 13, 2023. We hope you enjoy them all and that they bring a chill to your spine. We would love to hear from you. You can find us here: Friday the 13th Facebook Page Get your Fright on… Sincerely, Friday the 13th Authors About The Devil Sheds a Tear: Hiding from a murderous coven of modern witches, Steven Metcalf thinks he is safe. The devil-worshipers are not through with him, and a deadly game of cat and mouse ensues. Will joining forces with a witch-hunter save his life? Contents Dedication 4 Chapter One 7 Chapter Two 13 Chapter Three 16 Chapter Four 25 Chapter Five 32 Chapter Six 37 Chapter Seven 40 Chapter Eight 46 Chapter Nine 48 Chapter Ten 51 Chapter Eleven 54 Chapter Twelve 57 Chapter Thirteen 61 A Note From the Author: 63 Other stories in the Friday the 13th series: 64 Other Titles by Robert Herold: 66 Chapter One Friday, November 13th, 2015 Halfway through translating a chapter on demons, I saw the library door open and Brother Jordan poke his head into the room. “You have two visitors.” I sat back in the chair with surprise. “Who?” “Brothers Morrison and Lane from the Benedictine monastery on Orcas Island. They said it’s important.” What could it be? How did they know where to find me? Were monks gossips? I recalled the World War Two slogan, “Loose lips sink ships.” Then I reminded myself of the date, Friday the 13th. I was free of the curse. Time I started acting like it. “Thank you, brother. Please show them in.” Patty Allen, the old medium who lost her life trying to help me, stated I would be in peril until the following Friday the 13th. That day finally arrived. The Seattle coven of witches intended to kill me as part of a ritual to restore youth and bring wealth and power to its members, but they needed to do so before today. I eluded them by hiding in the St. Francis Monastery outside Yakima, Washington. Giddy with relief and the joy of being alive, I took the opportunity that morning to post about it on the Steven Metcalf (my real name) page on Facebook. I glanced at the photos on the site. Me grinning in Red Square when I arrived at the University of Washington, hanging with other grad students at a local pub, pictures of friends and family. My former life. Using social media in the Witness Protection Program was prohibited, but I took care. I didn’t reveal my location nor the real reason for my absence, but I did apologize to family and friends for “going dead” for many months and said I would soon be amongst the living. During my stay, I tried to help the brothers as best as possible, working in their orchards and assisting in producing their juice, apple butter, pies, and renowned hard cider. I never left the monastery grounds, where most monks were cloistered. Only the abbot knew the real reason for my being here. Since I wasn’t a member of this order, the abbott gave me leave to spend my non-working time in the monastery’s excellent library, which contained a surprising number of liberal titles, such as Ulysses and Sons and Lovers I didn’t know when I’d be leaving the monastery. Participating in the Witness Protection Program was something I owed to Detective Hunter, formerly of the Seattle Police Department, now deceased—another person who lost his life on my behalf. And I owed it to him to wait until they gave me the green light. Moreover, I came to appreciate life in the monastery. In addition, I wanted to complete a translation of a truly significant find: The library contained a dusty leather-bound copy of Friar Anton Liguerre’s The Devil’s Legions, a fantastic compendium in Latin of the supernatural and ways to defeat it. No one seemed to know how this 16th Century tome ended up in a Yakima monastery. Abbot Rodale permitted me to copy it by hand (the abbot, it seems, is a traditionalist). Instead, I’ve been putting my translation into their old desktop computer and backing it up on two thumb drives and the cloud. I know Latin and can read the text without translation, but the abbot mentioned that the volume would not be leaving with me when my stay was through. The November light faded as