NEW: Pale Horse, Dark Rider NC-17 1/?

[Bliss]

Disclaimer: Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, Walter Skinner and
Albert Hosteen and the Lone Gunmen all belong to Chris Carter
and Ten Thirteen Productions. No infringement upon their
copyrights is intended.


TIMELINE: 1995--After Anasazi, before the Moon trilogy: Dark of the
Moon, Bad Moon Rising, and Eclipse of the Heart.

RATED NC-17 for violence, nasty people, bad language, sexual
situations and general subversiveness

Stop here if you are under 18

No flames, although constructive criticism is not rejected, and all
intelligent humane response will be
answered....eventually.

Pale Horse, Dark Rider
by bl...@southwind.net


New Orleans: April 2, 1995

It was New Orleans in June, sultry already in the day, the night air as damp
and warm as a lover's skin after the loving.

Congo Square had once been the site of rituals that were public; now it was
tamed to the tourist eye, but night was the same as it had been two hundred
years before, when slaves had stirred uneasily, shaking free of their
shackles long enough to worship their gods, to forget their capitivity, to
speak to the loa. There had been slavery in Martinique and in Haiti, and
vodoun as well. Vodoun had brought the slaves there to freedom, at least in
Haiti, but it had nourished their spirits in Martinique from the first days they

had been brought there, unfree, tormented and half dead.

The man knew all these things; although he had educated himself, he was a
man who knew his history, believed that it was necessary to understand the
present. His blood was the blood of those slaves in Martinique, for his
people had come only recently to America. Here in New Orleans, he was
houngan to his people, to the people who worshipped with him, as his
mother had been priestess, mambo, before him; His name was Henri
Champlain, although he used Henry. It seemed more American.

In all the years he had followed the gods, he had tried always to serve them
with honor and with honesty, and had never felt the desire to cross over the
line to the shadows, to earn the title of bokor. However, unlike other paths,
vodoun had a path that lay between the good and the evil; it was this he had
finally turned to in an effort to protect the innocent from the guilty.

Though nearly sixty, Henri was tall and broad; arthritis pained him fiercely in
the damp New Orleans winters, but he stood straight always, hiding the
ache. It was spring now, though, and the pain had subsided as it always
had.

Standing inside the small room he had dedicated to the loa, he lit a candle
on the altar, set a bowl of plums and cherries before it. In a cage on the
floor, a pigeon ruffled its feathers, sensing the reason for its presence,
perhaps. "Papa Legba," he murmured, "ouvrier la porte." But the words
stopped before he had finished the invocation. It should not be here, not
now. It must wait until they were at the gathering place.

What he had planned for this evening was ugly, but it had to be done;
human death was always ugly, and he was no bokor, no sorcerer of the
Cochon Gris or the Secte Rouge to take pleasure in it.

But what Robert and Celine Beaumains planned for their younger brother
Remy was an abomination worse than anything he had ever dreamt of in
nightshade fantasy, or feared in the dark hours of the night. Perhaps what
was planned was wrong, too dark for the middle path, but those whose
judgement he had consulted had only listened gravely and offered their
strength, their help, joining him in it. He had sent his mother and his
daughter away, wanting them to have no part in it, keeping it secret from
them, the two people closest to his heart.

Rightly or wrongly, the Beaumains twins must die. Dangerous or not, he
would take the lead in this. Robert Beaumains must die, and Celine
Beaumains must follow him.

Washington DC: June 16, 1995

Robert Beaumains had been a handsome man, before someone had
hammered his face with their fists, cut his throat, and proceeded to ventilate
the well-muscled body with approximately 90 plus stab wounds. A little
sickened, Mulder turned the police photos over and began to read the
attached police report and coroner's report.

"Scully," he said, frowning, "What do you know about voodoo?"

She slanted him a look from under her brows. "About as much as the
average American," she said drily, "Except for the fact that the so-called
zombie is much more likely to be a person who has been given a certain
toxin and that the so-called zombification process is a combination of
psychological deconstruction and brain damage."

He almost smiled. "No, I meant about the religion, not Serpent and the
Rainbow."

"Heh, heh," she said, sounding a little testy. "What is it?"

"We've got a new case," he told her, leaning back in his chair. "Seven
deaths, no clear trend in gender or color, but with what appears to be the
same style in each case."

She arched her eyebrow. "Weapon?"

"Nope. The victims were beaten first, then stabbed, and then had their
throats cut." He turned a page, frowning at the paper. The second killing
was almost six weeks after Beaumains, but the killer's escalated--the last
two were only four days apart, according to the coroner."

Rising, she came to read over his shoulder. "New Orleans? Mulder, don't
tell me we're going to New Orleans, please don't."

He slanted her a surprised look. "Okay, I won't. But we are, Scully. What's
wrong?"

She grimaced. "In June? Sultry heat? 100% humidity? Cockroaches?"

Glancing at the calendar, Mulder was conscious of astonishment. It was
that late in the year already? God, how had it flown past him? "I didn't think

of that," he confessed, amused in spite of himself. "Sorry, Scully, but the
last killing was in Mississippi--Skinner gave this one to us, I didn't glom it."

Her eyes were fixed on the less than even print of the police report.
"Beaumains was found in an abandoned house reportedly used as a
gathering site for voodoo rituals. A hounfort," she added, slanting him a
somewhat complacent smile.

"Heh, heh, yourself," he laughed. Sometimes she made him crazy, but
other times she delighted him by surprising him. "Okay, fine, tell me
everything you know about voodoo."

"Will it keep me out of New Orleans during the summer?" she asked, giving
him one of her patented Scully looks, only the hint of a curve to her mouth
giving away her amusement.

He only wished, thinking of the temperatures and the cockroaches. He'd
had enough of cockroaches in his life already. And that wasn't even
counting the human ones. "Not likely." He grimaced and raised a hand in
helpless gesture. "Like I said, Skinner gave us this one."

"Ah, right." She leaned a hip on the edge of his desk, frowning as she
continued to read. "Beaumains was an artist. None of the others were
found anywhere near this abandoned house. How do you get voodoo from
that?"

"The last victim was the houngan and he was found in the hounfort," he said
and grinned unrepentantly when she gave him a narrow look. "Hey, I'm
trying to get the scientific viewpoint down, Scully. I've already got the
occult
one pretty well under control."

She whacked him on the head with the folder and tossed it back to the desk.
"Nobody loves a smart-ass, Mulder."

His smile dimmed. "There's a few," he said mildly and picked up the folder
again. "They're supposedly sending our travel arrangements down when
that's done."

"I'm calling this time. You are not making the hotel arrangements on this
one."

"Coward," he told her, amused again. She *hated* his choice in hotels, she
always had. "What have you got against American kitsch?"

Her only answer was another narrow look as she picked up the phone.

New Orleans: June 4, 1995

New Orleans was everything that Scully had said and more, but he still
found it interesting, he always had. It was one of the oldest cities in the
country, and the international history it had seen still fascinated him. The
hotel, thanks to Scully, was bland, but extremely comfortable; he found
himself forced to admit that to himself, if not to her.

They went to the crime scene first, and he was bemused to find that an old
friend of Scully's from Quantico, Jackson Tyler, was the agent detailed to
guide them. He knew, from reading the reports on the Harcourt affair, that
Tyler had taken a political risk in assisting Scully when he'd vanished; the
bureau office in Baltimore had not forgotten or forgiven the Tooms affair.

Scully and Tyler immediately began playing catchup, names and places that
Mulder didn't know, and he was content to just listen, soaking up the
atmosphere as they drove to the site.

The house had once been stately and fashionable; now it was in an area few
would want to frequent after dark. Urban decay was a natural part of any
city's life, but he found himself saddened by that, and wondering what the
house had looked like in its heyday.

Leaning forward from the back seat, he rested his chin on his hands and
slanted Scully a dangerous grin. "This place isn't haunted, is it?"

Tyler laughed, a little uneasily. "Not that I've ever heard, particularly, but
I'm
finding that most of New Orleans is haunted." He looked at Mulder, his
eyes assessing.

Mulder nodded. "Good." Turning toward the door, he opened it and stepped
out into the steamy heat of midafternoon; he felt the first beads of sweat
forming under his arms and sighed. Scully slanted him a smile as she
stepped out and he rolled his eyes. "You were right, Scully, it's like a
jungle."

Tyler's expression was amused. "Welcome to summer in the Big Easy," he
said lightly and led the way up the broken sidewalk. They ducked under the
yellow tape, now faded with the sun and tearing in a half-dozen places, and
stepped into the cooler darkness of the house.

"Beaumains was an artist," Tyler said and slanted him an apologetic look.
"You've read the file."

Mulder nodded absently. "Where was he found?"

Tyler gestured. "In the ballroom." He hesitated, as if to add something, but
then changed his mind, leading them across the wide foyer to the room.

The walls had been painted in blood. Beaumains' blood? Wondering, he
stepped in, letting the impression of the room soak in. There were figures
clear in the design of the spattering. "Veves," he said, nodding at one wall.

Tyler had taken his jacket off. "Yeah, so they tell me."

Scully stood beside him, her mouth a thin line. "Beaumains' blood?"

"Supposedly. Some of them, anyway. Some of them are older, probably
animal blood--chickens, rabbits." He shrugged, clearly uncomfortable.

"Are there photos of these?" Mulder approached one wall, studying the
crude lines. Beneath the blood, he could see older veves, lines drawn finely
and neatly in paint. Making a mental note to look the meaning up, he tried to
memorize them.

"Yeah, I've got 'em in the car for you." Tyler walked forward to the outline on

the floor. "Looks like he was either unconscious or drugged, no sign of
struggle here. Just Bobby and his blood." His mouth twisted. "The other
victims struggled pretty hard for their lives--you've seen those pictures?"

"Yeah," Mulder said and stepped back. "So, I would imagine the members
of the societe have already been questioned, but I didn't see the transcripts
in my file."

"I'll get 'em for you," Tyler said and sighed, looking around. "You aren't
going to have an easy time of it, I'm afraid. People down here don't like
talking about this stuff."

"I don't doubt that." Scully was bent over the chalk outline when Mulder
turned around. "It's pretty deeply embedded in their culture. Was
Beaumains Creole?"

Tyler smiled faintly. "Yeah, if you talk to his family. They're a real mix--
there's always been some talk they were descended from some planter's
quadroon mistress, passed for white after the Civil War. It's gonna surprise
you, I think when you realize how much *that* still figures down here."

"I've been down here before," Mulder said and slanted him a weary smile.
"The battles goes on, I know that."

"It's more than that," Tyler sighed. "Some people still think the ante-bellum
period was a golden era."

Except for the blood encrusted on the walls and the floor, the room was
surprising clean, surprisingly well tended. "Who owns this? The city?"

"No, they've traced it back to some old man who is the last living relative.
He pays the taxes on it, enough to keep if from being sold on him, but
doesn't do much else." Tyler shrugged. "He lives in an apartment down in
the Quarter. He's about ninety and as shriveled as a walnut, but his mind is
still pretty damned sharp. You want to see the ritual area?"

Mulder slanted him a look. "Yeah," he agreed, surprised that Tyler had
recognized that the ballroom was *not* the site of rituals. It impressed him;
the last Quantico pal of Scully's he'd met was Colton, not that she'd have
crossed the street to spit if Colton was on fire, these days. "Lead on."

Scully straightened. "Any leads on the weapons?"

"In Beaumains case, there were about ten different blades used, according
to the ME." Tyler slanted her a look over his shoulder, leading them through
the house to the back. "Did enough damage it's hard to define much--one
stiletto type blade about nine inches long, a shorter broader blade with one
serrated edge, and another he seemed to think might be a scalpel."

"The variety pack," Mulder said, mordantly amused. "I suppose we'll have to
go on photos, I imagine the body's been released to the next of kin already."

"Yeah, Beaumains twin sister had him cremated." Tyler slanted them
another look. "Now there's a piece of work, let me tell you--Celeste
Beaumains."

"Piece of work?" Scully sounded amused. "In what way?"

Tyler grinned and opened the back door. "You remember that movie where
Sharon Stone goes in for questioning without wearing any panties?"

Mulder grinned and noticed that Scully flushed faintly. "Oh, yeah."

"Well, Celeste Beaumains makes Stone's character look like a shrinking
violet." Tyler gestured and let them step past him.

The peristyle stood in the center of the yard, the grass long since worn to
the damp earth. Mulder stepped out into the humidity and found himself
grateful for the trees that helped to shade them. There was blood at the
base of the pillar, doubtless animal blood; he looked at Tyler, arching one
eyebrow and received an answer quickly.

"Yeah, animal blood."

God, it was a pleasure to work with this guy, he didn't have to spell things
out--he slanted Scully a wry smile and moved around the circle. "I'd like
those transcripts as soon as possible. Did they know Beaumains?"

"Yeah." Tyler stood back under the sagging roof of the kitchen porch.
"They knew him. They taught his little brother, and before that, his mother
was involved with them for a while."

He turned and met Tyler's gaze, curious. "Really," he said, musing. "I think
I've seen enough--Scully?"

She nodded, her mouth crimped with distaste as she surveyed the beaten
dirt and the few feathers that had been tramped into the ground.

Definitely, he would need to see those transcripts of the witness interviews.


Their first visit was to Robert Beaumains' apartment studio in the French
Quarter. The smell of all the artist's paraphenalia was strong, still, after
the
weeks since his death, and paintings were stacked, hung, and displayed on
easels everywhere, lending the studio a cluttered, crowded air that seemed
to fascinate Mulder.

"He was pretty good," he finally said, hunkering down to peer at a small
painting of a dark room, candles flaring on what looked like an altar in the
background. In the foreground, a nude woman stood, her bloody hands
raised, a feathered mask on her face, while a shadowy shape seemd to
uncoil before her.

For no reason Scully could think of, it made her shiver. Mulder picked it up,
examining it. "Some kind of ritual, I think," he murmured thoughtfully.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" A strident voice startled them all;

Mulder rose, the painting still in his hands. A tall, broad-shouldered blonde
stood at the door, stiff with anger, both fists clenched. Nearer the door,
Tyler whipped out his badge, murmuring something conciliatory that
loosened those fists.

"Who are you?" Mulder said, a trace of annoyance in his voice. Scully
heard it and bit back a smile; he hated being taken by surprise, even more
than she did.

"Michael Murphy." Murphy regarded Mulder warily. "What are you doing
here? Bobby's dead and burned."

"We're investigating his death," Mulder told him shortly. "I take it you're a
friend of his."

Murphy's mouth quirked. "You could say that, yeah."

"How well did you know him?" Mulder put the painting down carefully and
straightened again.

"I already gave a statement to the police." Murphy's chin lifted slightly. "I
knew him well enough to fuck, and to look after his studio when he was
gone, so if that's all, I'll leave you to your investigation."

There was a brief silence, almost unnoticeable. Mulder's eyes were
thoughtful, a little startled and Tyler was looking elsewhere deliberately.
He'd known, then, Scully thought. "We're actually looking for someone who
might have shared his, ah, religious preferences, Mr. Murphy. His sexual
preferences appear to be irrelevant to this investigation."

Murphy gave her a bemused look. "Well, that's all we shared," he said and
ran a hand through his hair. "Bobby was a little bent on the subject, I'm
afraid, I used to just tune him out. I think his sister's really the only one I

knew who did share his," he slanted Scully a faint grin, "religious beliefs."

Another man appeared in the doorway, thin to the point of emaciation.
Scully sighed inwardly, recognizing a sick man when she saw one. "Mick?"

Murphy turned. "Yeah, Davey, I'm here, it's okay, they're FBI, investigating."

He moved back toward the door. "Just asking a few questions."

"Are you a friend of Bobby Beaumains, too," Mulder asked, but his voice
was soft, almost conciliatory.

The thin man laughed. "Friend? Bobby didn't have friends, he had fuck
buddies." He leaned against the door jamb, eyeing Mulder. "You'd be just
his type--or Celine's, whoever got to you first."

Mulder flushed slightly, but said nothing, clearly taken aback.

Murphy chuckled. "Yeah, I'm afraid he's right, you would be."

Mulder flicked an embarrassed glance at her. "Are you looking after this for
him? Would it be all right if I took this painting for a while?"

Murphy shrugged. "I guess. The cops took other stuff, too. I can write you
out a receipt."

Mulder already had his notepad out and was scribbling. Handing the pad
and the pen to Murphy, he flicked Scully another bemused look.

"What do you want the painting for?" Davey asked curiously.

Mulder smiled faintly. "A teacher of mine once said that to understand the
artist, you have to study his art. He was talking about tracking killers, but I

find it also works to know the victim."

There was a brief silence.

"Look," Davey said, giving Murphy a truculent look. "I wouldn't have wished
that kind of a death on Bobby, but he brought it on himself. He was an
asshole, pure and simple. He was dying, his heart was going, but he lived
like he was going to live forever, and he didn't much care who he hurt in
doing it."

"Davey," Murphy began, his tone irritable, but Davey kept going, ignoring
him.

"He was an angel in bed, he could steal your soul--he could even turn out a
straight boy like you, I've seen him do it, but he was a devil everywhere
else." Davey's mouth curved maliciously. "And he painted like both."

There didn't seem much else to ask.