Ivy pulled the car up outside a huge home with a brick facade, white pillars, and a wide porch.
"Where are we?" I asked.
"Vincent’s house."
"WHAT?" the word echoed in the car. "Are you insane?"
She shrugged. "He came to my house, so we’re coming to his."
"I just told you it’s not like I can kick in his door."
"Er…" she said. "I sort of kind of did a thing."
"What?"
"I stitched a talisman into your chest," she said in a rush. "It’ll let you control Regnos’ strength without losing control. I knew it was going to be an issue when I saw the damage to your tattoo."
"Holy shit, woman. Boundaries."
"Look who’s talking, Biff Meatmissle."
We got out of the car. "I’m just saying, you did it first. You ever hear of informed consent? This has got to be some sort of HIPAA violation."
"You ever hear of shutting the fuck up?"
I didn’t have a reply to that, so I did. We stood in front of the gate to Vincent’s home. If the outside was any indication, he was doing better trade at the Stone than I’d imagined. I wondered how many pies he had fingers in.
"What kind of nasty shit you think he’s got in here?" I asked.
She shrugged and pulled a small glass jar from her pocket. It was full of glitter.
"What’re you gonna do, annoy him to death?" I asked.
She tossed it over the gate and onto the drive, where it shattered with a tinkling sound, glitter expanding in a cloud. As it did, small bursts of static shot between the flakes. The gate made a screeching sound and popped open. I looked at Ivy, one eyebrow raised. She grinned at me.
"Hexed, motherfucker," she said, and walked in.
The grounds to Vincent’s home were empty. A Maserati in the drive, the hood cool, birds in the trees, and a squirrel zipping through a bush. No alarms buzzed, no guards leveled automatics at us. I took the direct route, climbing the porch and peering in the windows. The place appeared empty.
"Got a way to open the lock?" I asked.
Ivy shook her head.
"Guess we do it the old-fashioned way," I said.
I kicked the door, hard, breaking the lock away from the jamb, and it slammed into the wall, smashing drywall. Rizzo stood from the chair he’d been occupying and lifted the shotgun he held.
"Good night," he said, and pulled the trigger.
The rock salt blasted into my skin, embedding itself with an aggression I hadn’t before thought possible from a mineral. I screamed and dropped to my knees, blood running from a dozen holes. I was also pretty sure it’d aggravated my most recent. Literally rubbing salt in a wound is a shitty thing to do.
Ivy shouted something and a flash of light seared my retinas, dazzling me for a moment. I tried to get up, forcing my legs to work, but another blast knocked me to my back, and I squirmed on the ground in pain. I rolled to one side, trying to keep moving, to not let the pain settle in, but a boot caught me in the ribs and I screamed again. I managed to blink away the light just in time to see another boot coming.
Ivy shouted again, something dark, with thick guttural syllables. The word hung in the air like greasy smoke, and the foot fell as the rest of the body exploded into a shower of meat and gore. I rolled onto my back, the pain drawing tears from my eyes. Ivy appeared over me.
"Shit. You okay?" she asked.
"I don’t think so," I said as the skin on my back rippled like a wave.
"Is it—"
"Get out, Ivy."
"What?"
"GET. OUT," I screamed, as my back tremored again. "DEMON."
Her eyes widened, and she bolted as new waves of pain rolled me onto my stomach. I felt flesh tear, blood rolling and pooling into the small of my back. With a sound like a ripping sail, the demon tore its way free from its circle, bounding onto the tile floor with clicking claws. It leaned down and looked at me, head on one side, then bounded off, fading into the aether as it moved through shadow.
Praedolor was free, and I had no idea where it was headed.
When I woke again, it was to Roberts sitting beside me on a curb, smoking. A set of handcuffs pulled my hands behind my back and cut into my wrists. Agony strobed and roared through me like a crowd at a parade and I vomited. Roberts patted me on the back, sending more aches across my body.
"Sit up, sport. There you are."
I coughed once and looked at him. "How fucked am I?"
He drew on the cigarette and threw the butt away, blowing a plume of smoke into the breeze. "Depends. Did you break into a prominent crime lord’s home and kill his lieutenant?"
I shook my head. "That was a friend. I just broke a ketchup bottle. That’s why I’m all red. Might’ve cut myself a little."
Roberts chuckled, and then looked off into the distance. "So, here’s the problem. I don’t like Vincent. I don’t think you’re a terrible person. But. I do think I just found you in his home amid a shitload of blood and damage. So, I need to blame someone. I could blame Rizzo, if Vincent weren’t around to contradict my story."
"Are you commissioning a murder, detective?"
He shrugged. "I’m just saying, the way I see it, there are two positions open. At the cemetery or the prison. Only need one person to fill it though."
"And you’re not picky?"
"I’m not picky."
I sighed. "All right. Get these cuffs off me."
He reached back and ratcheted them off, then patted me on the back again. I winced and stood.
"Go on, Mr. Nyx. Don’t let me see you again."
I wanted to say something witty. Instead, I just limped around the corner and down the street.
Ivy’s door was open when I got to her apartment. I heard voices within and stepped through, nerves tensed, ready to rip whoever I found inside to shreds. I’d been keeping Regnos at a low rage to take the edge off the pain, and my nerves were tuned tighter than piano strings.
I rounded the corner in a rush and stopped short. Ivy sat across from the man I’d seen a few days ago in the alley. His skin was pale, and thin scars ran across several parts of his exposed flesh. He smiled gently.
"Jack. You should sit down," she said.
"Why?"
"This is Cory."
And then I passed out.
I was doing a lot of that lately. Between the beating I’d taken, the nightmares, the exhaustion from tapping the demons, and dead exes returning, my brain just decided to reboot. I sat in Ivy’s chair while she and Cory sat on the couch. She’d brought me a tall glass of water and I sipped it while they talked.
"So, Vincent had Rizzo break Cory out, then they stuck him in this body and blackmailed him to trap you," Ivy was saying.
I finished the water and set the glass down.
"Still doesn’t explain why he killed the old man," I said. "Or the body in the alley. Or why Rizzo didn't kill me in my sleep instead of all this."
"You were never the target. Vincent wants Ivy gone. Everyone else is a tool. The body was one of those," Cory said. "As far as Ramirez, the old man was using you."
"Who told you that?" I asked.
"Vincent."
"Vincent," I spat. "Figures. I don’t know why you let him in here, Ivy."
Pain warred with sadness on Cory’s face. It wasn’t his, but I saw it anyway.
"What else do you know?"
He shrugged. "They let me go once I helped wake the demon."
"Okay," I stood. "Congratulations on being alive, but I’ve got a cop breathing down my neck."
"What?" Ivy asked.
I told her what happened after she’d escaped.
"You can’t take on Vincent," Cory said.
"Why not? It’s that or end up in prison again. Or dead."
Cory looked at Ivy. "Reason with him," he said.
She raised an eyebrow. "Man’s got a job to do."
"Thank you, Ivy," I said. I stood and stretched.
"Please, make sure he does
n’t try to kill you or get himself killed," I said.
Ivy nodded. Cory opened his mouth and shut it. I left. I had enough ghosts and demons of my own without needing live ones.
I had a new plan. Which I put into action by waiting until the bar locked its doors and then kicking said doors in. Vincent had cleared out the tables, leaving an open space in the middle of the floor. How convenient, I thought.
"Vincent Cagliostro!" I shouted.
A sound came from the back, and I turned toward the office door in time to see it blow off the hinges. Something massive barreled through, slamming into me, spikes on its flesh ripping into mine and reigniting pain from still-fresh wounds. I hit the ground in a heap, and the thing skidded to a stop, heavy breathing filling the air. I rolled to my stomach, seeing Vincent transformed.
He stood seven feet, razor-sharp bone radiating from his body like the quills of a porcupine. His skin had turned a sickly off-white. He smiled, and a tongue roughly the size of a chihuahua lolled from his mouth. I’d guessed this is what had happened to Praedolor, but the demon had become too strong for Vincent, resculpting his flesh, ruling his mind.
The demon attacked again, black claws tearing a chunk from my ribs. I felt blood spill down my side and fill my waistband, and I lashed out, Regnos snarling at the fore. I connected, barely, and Praedolor’s wrist snapped. The demon bellowed and spun in place, talons clipping my face. Blood flooded my vision, and I sincerely hoped he hadn’t got the eye as well. I tried again for the beast, but it had already moved.
I spun in place, unable to see fully, wiping my eye. An impact flung me into the wall, and I screamed for the third time that day as I felt ribs shatter. I struggled to my feet, swaying, then leaning into the wall for support.
"Praedol-," I started.
My vision swam and
Summer days spent fishing. Building rockets and watching them fly into the blue above, the puff of smoke that ejects the parachute like a signal of trouble. Sitting side by side, trying to puzzle out games and riddles.
I shook my head to clear it, to hold it at bay.
"Praedolor," I said.
The demon, a pale blur in the corner of my eye, skidded to a halt. It turned its head toward me on creaking tendons. I grimaced and straightened, wiping blood from my face. I’d named it. I could handle it. As my mother was fond of saying, I brought you into this world, I won’t hesitate to take you out.
"Praedol-," I started for the third time.
The demon screamed, a sound that made my head ache like I'd just come off a three-day bender, and part of me wished for the whiskey to back it up. I stared the thing that had been Vincent in the eye once again and set my jaw, straightened my back.
And despite these things, despite these attempts at normalcy, the struggle with toxicity sending out flares that motivate limbs and mouths in spasms of violence, the words that fly when fists don't, the hammer blows to self-esteem and ego, the knuckles that bruise skull and tender flesh still come. I see it again, and in the context of those attempted moments of reconciliation, it makes the pain all that much worse, bitterness that follows the sweet, a chocolate so dark as to burn the tongue.
And still the demon stood.
"PRAEDOLOR," I shouted, something in my throat snapping.
I tasted copper. The demon started, body jerking as if hit with a live wire, and I met pale lidless eyes, red threads of vein running through the sclera. I stared it down as I approached, the world wavering. I felt our minds connect as my mouth formed the words to bind it, and I fed it everything.
Every pain. Every sorrow. The blasted landscape of my life laid bare like a nerve flayed fresh from muscle and sheath. The demon flinched, and I bore down, showing it every single rotten stinking moment, every shining bauble of triumph, and it cowered as black rage and pain poured from me like a busted sewer pipe. The world flickered, and darkness rose up to swallow me.
He raises a hand, curled into an instrument of pain, and rage tears through me. No more. I lash out, small fists connecting with his throat, small feet connecting with his groin. He staggers back, and I scream as I attack him, a deep wellspring of rage and sadness no longer held back by the antiquated dam of respect. Sharp teeth spill his blood, raw throat screams its sorrow. Some things you don't get back. Some things, once bled, stain stone indefinitely.
When I woke, it was on the floor. Ivy had torn up my shirt to stop the bleeding, and knelt over me. Vincent huddled in the corner, weeping, alone. He made half-intelligible animal sounds through the tears, and his hands pawed pointlessly at the wooden floorboards.
"Where’d you come from?" I managed to rasp out when she let me sip from a water bottle.
"Cory gave me the slip, so I decided to follow you."
"Vincent?"
"Broken."
I laid my head down. I hurt all over. But at least no one was trying to eat my face. Ivy leaned into my view of the ceiling.
"Not bad work, for a white boy, I guess," she said.
"Not bad w-?"
"Shush, honey. Take the compliment."
For once, I shushed. Maybe it was the blood loss, but she looked lovely in the half-light. Llyrial tried to raise his head, lust rippling through me. I punched the demon down, let my head fall back, and closed my eyes. Even living with them all these years, you could never fully tame your demons. But you could keep them on a leash.
Connect With the Authors
Angela Boord
Fortune’s Fool
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Krystle Matar
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Clayton Snyder
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D.P. Woolliscroft
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