It took ten minutes to get the Winghalla-bound Maurice’s mortal coil onto the trailer, and another twenty to get the stupid trailer to the swamp’s edge.
“One more push, ready?”
“Go!” Little Ed shouted, throwing his shoulder into it, as together we set the trailer in motion toward a dark and muddy end.
Blub, blub, blub…
The younger peanut man and I collapsed at the water’s edge to watch the final voyage of the road-side roaster.
“Hey, I know it might be nothing,” the younger Demon Hunter said, pulling something out of his pocket. “But I found this on the truck bed.”
The picture wheel.
The paper disc and its sixteen dark squares shined in the coming dawn.
Little Ed frowned. “I’m really sorry we did that to you.”
“Me too, kid.” I held up the wheel to get a better look at the images. Half of them were completely black, but the eight images remaining appeared to be still frames from my life. There was an image of my son’s toy cars from the last day we raced them around the living room, along with a handful of images from my daughter’s later years. But there was one image, a single still frame, that stood out among the rest—not because it was special, but because I didn’t understand it.
A single still of Cathy’s first bike lying on the street.
“Can you do anything with that?” Ed’s son asked, watching me spin the disc slowly.
“Without my Magick? No. It looks like in unmaking the Viewmaster, the Darkling left us with a sort of reconciliation wheel.”
“A what?”
I gently tucked the paper in my back pocket. “Sixteen images, half of them mine, and half of them lost to the Darkling. Those images keep track of the score.”
“Huh?”
“Which soul-half is the one that should take over in a merger. We’re even, as long as I can keep my cool he won’t get the upper hand—but don’t worry about it. I’ve got something back in Tampa that’ll make all this moot.”
Little Ed nodded and watched the last of the bubbles reach the muck’s surface.
“Nice work wrangling that Sobek,” I said, breaking the silence.
“Thanks, but I didn’t do anything. As soon as Maurice was on the chariot it just… vanished.”
“Yeah, that’s pretty much what I expected.”
Little Ed frowned. “You did?”
“Well, it was a guess. I figured it was only there because Maurice had banished one in his time.”
Little Ed got to his feet. “Right, yeah.”
“And since you’ve never banished anything in your life, it was going to all but ignore you.”
The junior Demon Hunter’s face turned red. “Huh? No, I have. I totally have—”
I cut Ed’s son off before he could dig himself an even deeper hole. “No, you haven’t. I can tell. Besides, you really aren’t the Demon Hunting type.”
Little Ed folded his arms. “What do you mean I’m not the type?”
“I mean you aren’t the type. It takes a special breed of crazy to do that job, and you don’t have it. I hate to break it to you, but you’re a good, smart, and level-headed person. These are traits not frequently ascribed to Ed Lovely, or Demon Hunters in general.”
“And how do you know all this? We met only a few hours ago.”
I got up, brushed the mud from my slacks, then headed for the truck, patting the young kid on that back as I walked past. “I know this because I saw you with the bowl, and how you interacted with the dead. You are no Demon Hunter, you’re a Magician—whether you care to admit it or not.”
“What? That’s crazy.”
I climbed into the passenger seat and waited for the junior Magician to get in.
“Believe what you want to believe, but I know what I saw.”
Little Ed reached under the dash and fiddled with the wiring. In a few seconds, the truck engine turned over.
“We’ve got to get to Tampa. I know that’s where the Darkling headed, and wherever my evil twin goes, Donnie and your father won’t be far behind.”
“We can’t face that thing again empty handed,” Little Ed said, dropping the shifter into drive. “We need to stop at my mom’s place first.”
“Your mom’s?”
“Yeah, she made the hat.”
Bingo.
“I assume that was her bowl too?”
Little Ed nodded.
“Good, we can tell her you were the one that broke it. Let’s go.”
The pickup lurched forward, then stuttered to a halt—a bright orange light on the dash bathing us in its angry light.
Low fuel.
* * *
It had been really nice of that family to call us a tow. We’d looked like quite the pair I’m sure—two muddy hobos sitting on the front bumper trying to flag down a passing motorist.
Thank God they’d stopped, as we hadn’t seen any others for hours.
The sun had already baked the mud on my jacket and pants a nice muted brown when the tow-truck showed up.
Little Ed lay down in the back seat, no doubt exhausted from the events of the previous night. I on the other hand couldn’t do anything but wring my hands in frustration. If those damn Demon Hunters hadn’t Soul-Split me I’d be neck deep in the lakes of fire and on my way to finding Cathy—but no, here I was, sitting in the tight confines of a wrecker cab, with a beefy-looking woman at the wheel.
She wore her hair in a tight mass of ringlets, tucked up under a hat not unlike the one that had Magickally squeezed the truth out of my head a few hours earlier. The rest of her was a mess of oil stains and cigarette burns, but I couldn’t complain—I resembled one of my son’s finger-paintings.
Is he even still finger painting?
“He sure is, sugar.”
The House!
The truck driver smacked the steering wheel. “Bingo, Gene. You’re getting so good at this. I haven’t met a monkey with that kind of talent since—how long have you been around? It’s so easy to lose track.”
Anger roared in my blood and I ripped open the glove box—flare gun. I grabbed the bright red plastic pistol and pointed it at the truck-driver-shaped House. “You cheated!”
“Uh, no, sweetheart, I most certainly did not.”
“Stewart told me! He said Cathy is still in Hell, you didn’t save her! You lied to me. Our whole deal was to get her out. There is no contract.”
The House smacked her lips on a piece of gum and chuckled. “You are trusting an Imp to tell you the truth? You know they’re basically rubbery, little lying machines right?”
“He is bound to me. He has to tell the truth.”
“Wrong,” the House said before dropping into another gear. “You have tremendous talent, Eugene Law, but you really don’t study much do you?”
“I know about Imps. I dealt with one in college. Stanley Flaterhaus covers them in his—”
“Flaterhaus! Oh, man, well that explains everything. It’s amazing you are even still alive. Flaterhaus? Really? That guy was a self-inflated hack. He couldn’t conjure up a cold, let alone manage Minor Demons.”
“No.” I put a finger on the trigger. “I don’t believe you.”
“You believe what you want to believe. I’m not in the ‘believing’ game, Gene. You see me out there gathering up worshippers? Do I require fasting on certain days? What about the lighting of special candles or incense? Nope, nada, and a resounding no. You want to shoot me in the head? Go for it.”
I started to squeeze, my hand trembling.
“But,” the House said, switching on the blinker to change lanes. “I’d hate to think about what happens to Porter and Kris if you do. You know he’s growing up so fast. Would you believe he’s in first grade now? Kid’s far more like your wife—which is great for him. He’s a beast on the playground. You should see him run.”
The cold plastic bit into my finger.
“Yep,” the House ignored the shaking flare gun, “kid sure can run,
but can he outrun me?”
I lowered the weapon, my hands still shaking.
“Smart,” the House said, patting my leg. “I’ve always said monkeys were great at this sort of thing. All that juicy moral compass stuff. I mean, your whole noggin is one great mess of competing values and confusion. It’s like a cauldron of crazy all wrapped in a nice ball of readily manipulated flesh—damn near perfect.”
I held up the gun again, but found it wasn’t a gun at all—it was an old pen, heavily chewed on one end.
“Didn’t think I’d give you a real one, did you?”
The House chuckled, then slammed a meat-hook-sized hand against my chest, pinning me to the seat. “Now, we have a problem you need to solve. You let yourself get split by the three stooges back there. Limitless cosmic power, yet you find a way to lose it to Mr. Peanut and the cashew crew.”
Is that concern I hear?
“You’re damn straight it’s concern. You know how long I’ve been working on this? Of course you don’t, your tiny little primate brain would tear itself apart at the mere hint of that sort of complexity.”
“I don’t know how you expect me to stop him.”
Those truck driver fingers dug into my chest. “He may have taken the Magick, but he didn’t get that special bit of Eugene Law that we all know and love. I bet if I dig a little deeper I’ll find it.”
I tried to push those sausage fingers off my sternum, but the wrecker woman was too strong.
“I…”
“Say it with me, Gene. ‘I’ll get my shit back together’“
"I’ll…”
The hand pressed harder, and I was sure my ribs would crack at any second. “I’ll get my shit back together.”
“Splendid!” the House said, letting go of my chest and turning the big tow truck onto a dirt road.
The landscape changed quickly. Gone were the rolling fields of north central Florida with their lazy cattle and short barb-wire fences. Now there were only dense trees and hanging vines. We were in swamp country now, Green Swamp country. Cypress, with their long trunks that swelled up in the murky water, lined the road. The noonday sun quickly vanished, lost among the dense canopy, and taking with it the warm light.
Our wrecker pulled into a muddy clearing and slowed to a stop, its tires dipping gently in the soft earth.
“Why are we stopping?”
The truck driver smiled and smacked her gum, her voice no longer the House’s. “Far as I can go, otherwise I’d need a tow myself.” She looked at the rear seat with Little Ed fast asleep, then turned her attention back to me. “So, who’s paying?”
12
Trolls in the Mist
I placed my last few bills into the truck driver’s hand. Little Ed and I watched her deposit the pickup, then three-point-turn that exhaust-belching monster back onto the dirt road.
“Eddie, where the hell are we?”
Little Ed opened the back door of the truck and retrieved a small backpack. “Green Swamp.”
“You don’t say.” I swatted at a mosquito setting up on the back of my hand. “Let’s try another one. Why are we in the Green Swamp?”
“Mom lives here.”
Very little wind made its way down to the forest floor, but what breeze there was brought with it the unpleasant smell of rotting vegetation, fetid water, and Bridge Troll.
“Your mom lives here?”
Little Ed nodded and shoved his hands through the backpack’s straps. “Sure does.”
“And why are we seeing your mom again?”
The young Demon Hunter patted me on the arm before taking a narrow path between a pair of short and spiky saw palmettos. “I saw what that thing did. We need help.”
“And we’re going to find that help here? Does your mom know this place is thick with Bridge Trolls?”
“Yup, she wouldn’t have it any other way,” the young man said before slipping out of the clearing.
“Don’t tell me this is one of the ‘Bridge Trolls in the Mist’ sort of things?”
Little Ed didn’t respond.
“It is, isn’t it?”
I brushed another mosquito away from my neck and flipped my collar up, knowing full well it didn’t look half as cool on me as it did on my evil twin.
Jerk.
* * *
The Green Swamp of central Florida took its name from the overabundance of dense vegetation that grew in it. Tall cypress soaked up the shallow water like great straws, while long globs of Spanish moss hung like animal pelts from the lowest branches. Black mud squished under our feet, each step another opportunity to sacrifice a shoe to the swamp gods. Yet, thanks to Little Ed—and I’m guessing his mother—we had a narrow trail to follow through the stifling greenery.
“You grew up here?” I said, my shoe sinking in the muck just enough to make me stumble.
“Sure did.”
“Wow, Ed lived here.”
“Nope.” The junior Demon Hunter pulled back on a springy lower limb and ushered me past. “Dad and Mom didn’t see eye to eye. They separated when I was little.”
Safely on the other side of the whipping branch I stopped to let the younger man retake the lead. “What’s your mom’s name?”
“Kaylee.”
Nope, doesn’t ring any bells.
“And she lives way out here by herself?”
“Yup.” The young Demon Hunter shimmied over a moss-covered log.
“Why?”
My guide placed a hand on my chest and another against my mouth the second I came down from the fallen log. Little Ed’s eyes directed me to a dense mound of saw palmetto—something was moving on the other side. The young man crouched down behind that bush and turned my attention to a small gap in the fronds.
Bridge Troll.
The Volkswagen-sized beast had his back to us, thick legs standing in murky, hip height water. He wore clothing, or what you could loosely describe as clothing. It was more a patchwork of skins, furs, and discarded tent material. Bridge Trolls were bald by nature, and this Magickal wrecking ball was no exception. A slate-gray head was perched on shoulders that had long ago consumed his neck.
If Bridge Trolls could play football, they’d win the division every year—unless they were arrested for eating the cheerleaders.
“What’s he doing?” I whispered.
Little Ed shook his head. “Just wait, she’s working.”
“That’s a 'she’?!”
The Troll tilted its head slightly, and Little Ed gave me a glare not unlike the ones my wife had been so good at doling out.
“No, damn it. Just wait,” he whispered.
The black water rippled gently as the beast spoke. Well, it sounded like words, Bridge Trolls weren’t known for their fine oratory skills. Most of the communications I’d ever had with a Bridge Troll centered around crushing, grinding, breaking, and a fantastic process for repeating that same general thought in perpetuity.
Now, not all Bridge Trolls were that unintelligible, but the rare ones that weren’t were typically cursed souls like the young Tommy Tillerson from my daughter’s first Teeball team, or the half-troll I’d worked out a few trades with at the Brooksville Flea Market. Still, a full-on Bridge Troll, in the dim light of the Green Swamp, was more than enough to put my short hairs on edge.
“So we go around?” I asked, my feet slowly sinking in the muck.
“No, just wait, she’ll be fine.”
“Who’ll be fine?”
A few of those hits to the head I’d taken in the last twenty-four hours must have been stronger than I’d thought, as somehow it hadn’t occurred to me that if the Bridge Troll was talking, it was most likely talking to someone else. They weren’t known for their rousing monologues.
Little Ed shifted his position just enough to point past Troll-mountain. “There. Look.”
Jutting out of the swamp like an impromptu pulpit stood the thick stump of a dead Mallaluka tree. The paper-bark invader was not native Floridian flora and appeared
to have been cut down years ago. Parchment-like strips of the tree peeled back like the curled pages of a beaten down book. At the top of that stump, nose-to-nose with our Bridge Troll, was one freckle-faced redhead.
She sat cross-legged on the crumpled paperbark. She held a clipboard in her hand, while a ratty ball cap pressed down over her shoulder-length auburn hair.
“That’s your mom?” I said, craning my neck to see farther.
“Yeah, that’s what she does.”
“Risk her life for no good reason?”
Little Ed frowned. “No, she studies the Trolls.”
“What’s there to study? It’s not like they put on Shakespearean plays or are known for their keen talent at differential equations.”
“I assume you do both of those things?”
He had me there. “Well, no, but I’m also not a Bridge Troll.”
Little Ed’s mother couldn’t have been much older than me, but she had a youthful energy about her that was easy to admire. It was clear she loved what she did, even if it did make her just short of bat-shit crazy.
I leaned forward to get a better look.
“Be careful,” the young Demon Hunter said, grabbing the back of my muddy collar. “They don’t take kindly to strangers.”
“Right, right…”
Something bright pink flashed in the Bridge Troll’s hand. Pink certainly didn’t seem to be a color you found in the Green Swamp, especially not manufactured hot pink.
“What’s it got?”
“Huh?” Little Ed leaned around the palmetto with me. “I don’t know. Looks like a… flamingo?”
“A plastic flamingo?”
“Yeah,” the young Demon Hunter said, leaning against my back. “I think so, why?”
The Bridge Troll’s tone shifted into a more animated, almost aggravated one, as he swung the pink plastic flamingo against the palm of his massive hand.
Relax, Gene, it’s most likely just some trash.
The pink bird’s coal-black eyes stared at me from beneath the shadowy canopy, then blinked.
Or not.
What was the Flock doing here?
I pondered this thought, and others, and was completely engrossed in those worries when Little Ed’s weight shifted, sending me, my thoughts, and what remained of my dignity headfirst into the swampy water.
Beaten Path Page 7
