Shadows in the Mist

by Jeri Westerson

  He smirked, flicking a glance at me. “It’s not as bad as you think.”

  “So the gold!” I said a little louder than necessary. “Once we get it, does anyone know what we do with it? I mean, do we need a ritual to get rid of the Draugr?”

  “As I understand it,” said Doc, “we simply leave the gold out where they can see it, they take it, and disappear back to…wherever they came from.”

  “Valhalla,” said Ed. Everyone looked at him. “Isn’t that where dead Vikings go?”

  “Dead Viking zombies?” asked Jolene.

  “Zombie Valhalla?” Ed offered.

  “Doesn’t matter,” I said. “As long as they’re gone.”

  The only sounds were the sipping of tea and coffee. Time ticked away.

  The sound of a car roused us, moving as a group to the window. Nick and George pulled up in front of the shop and got out, George scornful of the row of bikes. He looked toward the shop and took out his gun.

  “Uh oh,” Doug and I said at the same time.

  Ed went to the door. “I’ve got it,” he said back to us. “George! It’s me, Ed. It’s okay. We’re just having a little parlay with the Ordo. You can put your gun away.”

  “If it’s okay with you, sheriff, I’d like to see that for myself.”

  “I’m opening the door, George, slowly and carefully so you can see me.”

  He did so with his hand up. George two-handed the gun and rushed in. He looked over Doug and his gang and slowly lowered his weapon. “What’s going on, sheriff?”

  “We’re just working out a little negotiation.”

  “About the zombies?”

  “What the hell?” said Doug. “He knows, too?”

  George slipped his gun away. “Yeah. We’ve got you covered, Doug.”

  “You’re no fun at all, deputy. But I see you and your boyfriend are a little more open these days.”

  Someone was growling. It was Nick. His eyes were becoming green, his ears and snout growing.

  Doug stepped back.

  “It’s even worse than that,” I said. “We’ve got some werewolf power on our side.”

  This time, Bob and Dean stepped back.

  “Whoa,” said Dean. He suddenly didn’t look all that big and bad with his shaved head. “Doug, they got werewolves. That little faggot is now a fucking werewolf.”

  “I wouldn’t go throwing those epithets around, Willis,” said George, hand on his holster. “I don’t think Nick likes it.”

  Nick hadn’t returned to normal yet, his teeth elongating while his growls grew louder.

  “Nick,” I said. “You need to dial it down.”

  Nick caught his breath and blinked at me. His snout and ears receded. The last things to go were his fangs, slowly slipping up behind his lips.

  Doug looked like he was on his last nerve. “Damn.”

  “So you see, Doug.” I walked forward until I was right in front of him. “We do have the upper hand.”

  He looked panicked. Then suddenly he wasn’t. He even smiled. “Not quite, sweet thing. There’s still my Lord…BAPHOMET!”

  The sky rumbled. Oh, shit. “You didn’t. You didn’t just call on him, Doug. You are such an asshole!”

  I rushed to the window. Yup. Dark, threatening clouds gathered fast, clumping into angry roiling masses and blotting out what was left of the sun. Lightning lit the underside of the clouds, searing across their underbellies in bright flashes.

  The center of the clouds suddenly rolled away, and Baphomet slowly descended through the partition, like some upside-down Renaissance painting where he was the cherub.

  I turned toward Doc, who clearly had nothing.

  “What’s the plan, Doug? Did you think this through?”

  By the look on his face, he obviously hadn’t. He seemed as terrified as the rest of us. And when the mist began to rise, I knew we were in for a world of trouble.

  “Great. The Draugr.”

  Baphomet landed, his hooves digging potholes into the asphalt. The sky was dark now, dark enough for zombie Vikings.

  Baphomet noticed the mist swirling around his legs and smiled, his weird goat eyes shining. He cocked his head and watched as the Draugr dragged themselves out of the forest, weapons raised. They almost looked like they were riding the clouds of mist, heading toward the shop. They ignored the giant goat god in front of them, as if his presence was an everyday occurrence.

  “Any ideas, Nick? Is that enchanted fire working?”

  “I, uh, think I’m a little bit terrified right now.”

  I whirled toward him. “Well, snap out of it! We have a situation here.”

  “Okay. You’re right. I have the pouch. Haven’t tested it yet.”

  “Wait,” said Doc. “What if he goes out there, and Baphomet tries to stop him? He’ll need cover.”

  “What have we got to cover him with?”

  Ed and the deputy looked shocked and frightened. George wasn’t even grabbing at Nick to pull him back. So they were useless.

  Something hit my leg. When I looked down, I saw the Booke nudging me. The Booke. Maybe…

  I grabbed it, felt its power throbbing within me. “Are you ready, Nick?”

  “Ready? I don’t…I don’t…”

  “Now or never, Nick.” He gave me a nod, opened the pouch, and reached his hand in. I held the Booke in front of me and rushed out the door.

  Baphomet immediately turned toward me. “Kylie Strange,” he said in a gravelly voice.

  Nick slipped out the door and headed for the other end of the shop, ducking just around the corner. He began to chant.

  “Why do you keep saying my name like that?” I said, stalling. “I get that you know who I am.”

  “I want my words to be the last you ever hear.”

  “Oh, blah, blah, blah. You talk like a comic book villain.”

  He frowned. Creases formed between his eyes, on his forehead, and around his mouth. He sneered with his big goat teeth. Of course, he was twenty feet tall, so everything seemed more exaggerated. He leaned over, like a building suddenly tilting toward the ground. “Your words are foolishly brave.”

  “That’s me, all right. Foolishly brave. Can’t you just go back to wherever you came from? What do you want with this place anyway? You’d never fit on the furniture.”

  “To enslave Mankind. They belong to me. As do you.”

  “Yeah, well.” I snatched a glance at the Draugr as their snarling, rotting selves drew closer. Come on, Nick! “We’d make really terrible slaves. We don’t like doing what others tell us to do. Especially these Mainers. They have their own minds.”

  “Their will shall be taken from them. Their only thoughts will be to please me.”

  “Look,” I said, sobering. “Why do you have to kill? Why can’t you just—I don’t know—talk with us. Impart your wisdom. You know things we can’t begin to know. You’ve lived a thousand lifetimes. More. I’m sure there are tons of people who’d love to hear about you. Can’t we all just be friends?”

  “You are a fool, Kylie Strange!”

  I didn’t like the fact that he was cocking back his arm. It was almost certainly bad for me. A ball of light…power…something formed in his curled fingers. When he shot his arm forward, the ball careened toward me. I had a split second for my life to pass before my eyes just as I instinctively raised the Booke to hide behind.

  I expected either a blow or an explosion. I expected to be pulverized by that ball of power. And yet, time kept ticking, and as far as I could tell, nothing happened. I opened my eyes to a squint and looked to either side. The Draugr were still coming, Moody Bog was still there in the misty, gray distance, and my shop still stood behind me. But now there were also waves of light pouring from behind the Booke.

  I lowered it slightly and felt what the Booke was feeling. If it could laugh, that’s what it would’ve been doing. It held the ball of power to its cover, letting it roll there like a soft tickle, before the Booke absorbed it through the leather an
d into the parchment, where it simply… dissolved.

  I looked up at Baphomet. That was one unhappy goat.

  “What have you done!”

  Where was Erasmus? The pussy was hiding somewhere in the shadows. “I, uh, didn’t do anything.”

  He trembled in anger. And then he threw back his head and roared.

  The Draugr in front of me burst into flames and twisted in the sudden inferno. At first, I thought it was Baphomet, but he was just as surprised as I was.

  But not as surprised as Nick, apparently. He wore an astonished look on his face, before he jumped in glee. “It worked!”

  The Draugr turned tail and ran, arms and weapons flailing, into the woods.

  “No!” I cried. Now I was going to be responsible for setting Maine on fire.

  But as their tormented bodies hit the trees, the flames went no further. Come to think of it, the fire was sort of greenish, not the color of a proper fire at all. It caught neither brush nor tree, only glowing around the zombies that had been hit. The others—who seemed to be multiplying each time I checked—didn’t appear to like the look of it, retreating into the mist away from their burning brethren.

  I had no time to celebrate Nick’s success. Goat Guy was still on the warpath.

  “Doug! Get the hell out here and deal with this!” I called.

  He came timidly to the doorway and looked up. Baphomet glared down at him. Doug came out the rest of the way and dropped to his knees, head down. “Lord Baphomet.”

  “Why do you consort with this creature?” said Baphy, gesturing toward me. I bristled. Look who’s calling who a creature!

  “It was necessary, my lord. To get information from them.”

  “I do not like her or her book. She should be dead by now. If the demon will not do it, you are to see to it.” In a final fit of petulance, he swept out his arm and knocked the bikes on top of each other. They fell like dominoes, the crunch of metal and the clatter of chrome on chrome echoing through the night. Baphomet turned without flicking an eyelash at me, then pumped his wings, lifting into the sky. I hoped he wouldn’t be inclined to kill tonight, not that there was anything I could do about it.

  I held the Booke tightly, knowing it had saved my life. The wheels in my head began to churn. If the Booke could be used as a weapon, then I intended to use it.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  There was a lot of whining and cursing as the Ordo disentangled their bikes from one another and checked their engines for damage. I resisted the urge to gloat about the dented and scratched chrome, the leaking oil.

  In the meantime, I scanned the skies and was pleased that I didn’t hear any explosions or see any plumes of smoke in the distance. I was glad Baphy didn’t end this appearance with a killing spree.

  We all waited for Shabiri’s return. At first, I thought she might have been waiting to come back because of Baphomet, but now he was gone and she still hadn’t come back. Maybe she’d forgotten where she put it. Her continued absence gave me a chance to confront Ed.

  “That was fast.”

  He postured. “You told me to seduce her. And it worked. So what are you complaining about?”

  “I…” Well, Kylie? What are you complaining about? “It’s just… Nothing. I’m not complaining.”

  “Okay then.”

  “All right.”

  Ed raised his shoulders, hitching his faux fur coat collar up around his neck. “It’s just…when I got to know her, she seemed more vulnerable than I expected. It’s kind of a weird life. And she knows it.”

  “Well…yeah. I mean, that’s the same with Erasmus, only worse. He’s only awake for a few weeks every few hundred years. And I think he’s just beginning to understand all that he’s been missing. And he can’t do anything about it. That’s got to be incredibly frustrating.”

  Ed huffed. His breath gathered around his face in white clouds. “Are we comparing our demons?”

  I laughed. “Oh my God, I think we are.”

  “They’re more complicated people…or something…than I imagined.”

  We stood for a moment in thought.

  “So…do you like her?”

  “What is this, elementary school? Are you going to start passing me notes?”

  I knocked into his shoulder. “I’m serious. You’ve seen her vulnerable side. Is she legit?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know that I really trust her. She likes playing games.” He raised his chin toward Erasmus, who was across the parking lot brooding. “What about him? Is he legit? Do you trust him?”

  I looked, too. I’d really come to like the idiot. “Yeah. I do. My life depends on it.”

  “But…if it wasn’t life or death…would you…you know, stick with him?”

  Erasmus turned and suddenly looked directly at me, as if he knew what we were talking about. He had super-hearing, so there was a chance he did. His penetrating gaze roved over me.

  Would I stick with him? What about Ed? Wasn’t he the smarter choice? The…safer choice? Ed was everything I wanted: security, faithfulness, a future. It was everything I thought I needed. So what the hell was wrong with me? Hadn’t Jeff taught me that the exotic choice wasn’t the best of decisions? Still…

  I glanced back at Erasmus. He stood stoically. And with his duster blowing around him, almost…heroically. But he was no hero. He was a stone-cold killer and I really wasn’t certain I could trust him. Except…I did trust him. With my life. And maybe something more.

  “Yeah,” I said at last. “I would. I’m sorry. I know I said we might…”

  “It’s okay. Really.”

  Then I laughed and kicked at the gravel. “He’s so pathetic. Like a lost puppy.”

  “A lost puppy with devastating magic. That can kill.”

  I looked right into Ed’s face. “But so can I.”

  “I guess so, Ms. Crossbow. But…what about that book? It shielded you from that Baphomet guy.”

  “It did. It’s not afraid of him. In fact, it thinks that Baphomet is afraid of it.”

  “It ‘thinks’?”

  “It speaks to me. From deep down. Like we’re part of the same person.” I felt warm inside talking about it.

  “That doesn’t sound good, Kylie. Or safe. We’ve got to detach this thing from you. Before it drags you down to whatever world it belongs to.”

  I rubbed my forehead. I knew all this…intellectually. But the Booke was speaking to me even now, reassuring me, telling me not to listen to the nice man with the sheriff’s badge and gun.

  “I think you’re right.”

  “I hate to interrupt this charming tête-à-tête,” said Doug, suddenly behind us. “But we’re gonna roll out, since who knows when Shabiri is coming back. Text me when she does.” He gave us both a lopsided smile before walking toward his bike.

  Ed was about to open his mouth when I laid a hand against his chest. “Don’t bait him, Ed. He’s pretty vulnerable, too.”

  “Vulnerable, my ass.”

  Moody Bog’s own little soap opera. Ed and Doug didn’t even know they were starring in it.

  Someone’s phone rang. It couldn’t be Shabiri, could it?

  But it was Deputy George’s phone. He answered the call, glancing toward Ed. “Oh, uh, hi there, Mrs. Russell.”

  Ruth-freaking-Russell.

  “No, I haven’t found your locket yet. Kylie Strange said she turned her place upside down looking for—Yes. Yes…” He flicked a glance at Jeff, who had come up behind him, and he looked straight at the locket hanging from Jeff’s neck. “I’ll be on the lookout for it. Someone from the community might turn it in. Yes, I will. Good-bye, ma’am.” He ended the call and gave us all a look. “The heat is on.”

  “Don’t worry about Ruth,” said Doc. “I’ll make sure to throw her off the scent.”

  “But Doc,” I said, “I don’t know that she’s too keen on you.”

  “Ruth and I…well, we have a history. Besides, it’s a good way to find out about that darned locket
. Maybe I can get something out of her about it.”

  “Better you than me.”

  We all went back inside where it was warmer. I decided to make some dragonwell tea in a proper clay pot—I needed a clear mind.

  The rest of the coven gathered listlessly, not quite knowing what to do. Nick decided to help me in the kitchen. When we brought out the aromatic green tea, only Jolene seemed to be doing anything at all. She was hunched over her tablet, typing furiously, brows crunched over her eyes. Ed and George were talking quietly together, and so were Doc and Seraphina.

  Erasmus and Jeff eyed each other suspiciously from across the room. I hadn’t even noticed when Jeff arrived.

  Jolene stood. “I think I’ve got it.”

  Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at her.

  She smiled, holding up her tablet. “I…I think I’ve got it.”

  “Got what, squirt?” said Nick.

  “The ritual. For the de-summoning.”

  Erasmus appeared in front of her. “Let me see that.” He snatched the tablet out of her hand and began to read. Nick was suddenly by his side reading over his shoulder. And then Doc, his lips silently moving, and Seraphina, with reading glasses perched on the end of her nose. Erasmus scowled as he read…then raised an eyebrow.

  He glanced at me and then turned to Jolene, handing the tablet back as the others scrambled to continue reading. “Your reasoning is very sound,” he said. “And your knowledge of R’lyehian is outstanding for one so young.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Dark.”

  “But I still have my misgivings.”

  “Is it because of the rift?” asked Doc.

  “That and…I don’t trust him.”

  Seraphina whipped off her glasses and held something up from the folds of her velvet cloak. “That’s why I had this made.” It was a small iron rod with metal fletching attached to one end. She held it in her palms and showed it to Erasmus, who took a step back. “I didn’t have one of Kylie’s arrows to measure the circumference, but I think we got it close enough. Maybe just a little magic to make the arrowhead fit.”

  I took it from her outstretched hand and turned it over in my fingers. It was heavy, but I was sure it would fly. “You know, if you got this wet, rolled it in some sea salt, I bet this would get him good.”