Baptisms of Fire and Ice

by Nadia Sheridan

The force of the impact flung Belphegor backward. He landed twenty feet farther down the street, the thump of his flesh smacking the asphalt complemented by the snapping of bones.

  When the last flicker of light faded away, Belphegor lay still. Steam rose from his blackened skin.

  Adara sat stunned, drenched to the bone, every hair on her body arcing with static electricity. Right up until the moment the clunker car screeched to a stop beside her, and Enzo yelled, “Get in!”

  The sound of his worried voice sent a trickle of adrenaline through her veins. With the help of the car’s hood, she hauled herself to her feet and shuffled around to the front passenger seat, whose door had already been wrenched open. She flopped onto the seat and used the momentum of her fall to drag the door shut. She didn’t even have enough energy to tug it closed.

  “Drive,” she mumbled to Enzo before he could ask any questions. “Just drive. Away from here. Away from him.” She jutted her chin toward Belphegor, whose charred body was twitching like a snail covered in salt. “Get us away from that goddamn demon as fast as you fucking can.”

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Adara drifted in and out of awareness on the flight from Maynard Avenue.

  Now and again, she caught snippets of conversation between Enzo and the man in the back seat. Pieces of what seemed to be an argument about his manipulation of the weather, about how long he should keep the hard rain coming down to obscure their car from the authorities. Every second his god shard was active after all, it acted as a beacon to the demons. There was no point in hiding themselves from the police if it drew more imps down on their heads.

  Each time she managed to open her eyes, Adara also caught snapshots of the world around her. Flashes of red and blue police lights from what seemed to be an endless procession of cruisers barreling down an adjacent street. Burned-out storefronts that had been looted the night before, their interiors choked by a haze of smoke. Blood spatter clinging to walls and sidewalk squares, spreading out like watercolor paint as it mixed with the pouring rain.

  Is this really my city? she thought wearily. It fell so far in just one day.

  It would keep on falling too, she knew, if the demons were not stopped.

  By the time they were done, there would be no city left.

  Gradually, the effects of Belphegor’s energy-sapping ability diminished. Adara returned to wakefulness just as Enzo was parallel parking across the street from an ultramodern apartment complex in what she recognized as the high-end Tarly Square neighborhood.

  The eight blocks that made up the square held a mix of expensive shopping options and apartment buildings far beyond what a middle-class grad student could afford. Adara had, to her knowledge, set foot in Tarly Square a total of three times since she’d moved to Edgerton. Only once had she bought something.

  Still slumped against the window, Adara observed the fifteen-story apartment complex across the street. She had the idle thought that if any of the stuffy residents were watching their windows as well as their TVs, Nadine’s unsightly clunker car would wind up getting towed by the end of the day.

  Enzo and the man in the back seat, however, didn’t seem too concerned about the car staying put. The former hopped out onto the street and came around to the passenger side to help Adara up. The latter grabbed Adara’s pack before he clambered out of the car.

  Adara attempted to wave off Enzo’s helping hand. But when she stumbled her first couple steps, he grabbed her arm to keep her steady.

  Together, the three of them headed to the front entrance of the apartment building. While Enzo and Adara waited for the other man to dig his key fob out of his briefcase, Adara glanced at the sky. It was now the same crystal-clear blue it had been earlier, no sign of the manufactured thunderstorm remaining.

  Controlling the weather is a powerful skill, she thought. If he can create all sorts of weather phenomena, he’ll be a huge boon when we assail the library.

  Assuming he was willing to help them.

  The man clearly had a nervous disposition, maybe even a genuine anxiety disorder.

  As he led them through the hotel-like lobby of the building, he looked over his shoulder no less than twelve times. Like he thought the demons might be hot on their tail.

  His hands were shaking so badly that he fumbled the press of the elevator button and hit down instead of up, forcing them to wait an extra thirty seconds for a car going the right direction.

  When they were finally in the elevator, crawling to the fifth floor, the man repeatedly whispered a mantra to himself that Adara was certain had come from a self-help book about confidence and self-esteem.

  It might not be hard to convince this man to join their cause hypothetically. But when it came down to the actual fighting, she was worried he’d run for the hills. She wasn’t sure how Enzo had convinced him to get in the car in the first place. Unless there’d been imps lurking around Latham Court, which made jumping into a strange car seem like the safer option.

  Regardless, she was certain the man hadn’t agreed to drive straight into the Maynard massacre and confront Belphegor to save Adara. Enzo had forced his hand by virtue of being in the driver’s seat.

  We’re going to have to handle this guy carefully.

  The man lived in an efficiency apartment a sliver bigger than Adara’s studio but with much nicer furniture and fixtures. As Enzo guided Adara down the short hall toward the main living area, the man stuck Adara’s pack and bow in the coat closet off the foyer.

  Once Adara and Enzo were sitting side by side on the couch, the man shuffled over to the reclining chair adjacent to the couch and sat down. Instead of making eye contact, he glued his gaze to the circular glass coffee table positioned in the center of his furniture arrangement.

  Adara finally took a moment to appraise the man. He was younger than she’d initially thought. The outdated navy suit that hung off his body and the old-fashioned haircut with a part down the middle had made him come off as middle-aged at first glance. On purpose, she assumed.

  Judging by his ritzy address, he probably worked in some sort of “executive” setting, surrounded by older, more distinguished businessmen who gave younger guys a censorious side-eye.

  Looking at him now, with his smooth tan face and his watery brown eyes, Adara pegged him as late twenties at the most. Only a few years older than her and Enzo.

  He had a diverse mix of ethnic features, the bulk of which she thought were Chinese, a slight epicanthic fold obscured by his thick-framed glasses. When he spoke, his voice was soft and unassuming, with the faintest Boston accent. It carried with it an edge of anxiety that matched the rest of his demeanor.

  “Um,” he said, “I guess we should start with introductions? I’m Solomon. Solomon Novak.”

  Adara swallowed to moisten her raw throat and replied, “Adara Caine.”

  Enzo followed with, “Enzo Vega.”

  Solomon produced a tepid smile. “Nice to meet you. I think.”

  An awkward silence settled between them. But Adara didn’t let it stand for long.

  They didn’t have enough time left till doomsday for her to take this slowly or gently.

  Trying to minimize the rasp in her voice, she said, “So, you’re probably wondering why you’ve suddenly acquired the ability to control the weather.”

  “Well, Enzo here already confirmed it had something to do with those glowing rocks that fell from the sky yesterday.” Solomon shrugged off his suit jacket. Both the jacket and the pristine white shirt he wore beneath it were damp, presumably from when he’d been standing in the rain.

  The soggy fabric made it a struggle for him to roll his sleeves up. But eventually, he tugged them both to his elbows. Which revealed two very interesting bruises. One on each of his forearms.

  Solomon held his arms together to emphasize that the bruises were two halves of the same starburst shape that Adara had on her back and Enzo on his left bicep.

  “When the windows of my office shattered during the impa
ct event,” he continued, “I held up my arms in front of me to block the glass, and something hit them so hard I got flung across the room. Didn’t think much of the weirdly shaped bruises at first though.

  “But about an hour ago, I got really upset about something, and out of nowhere, a tiny raincloud formed above my head. That freaked me out even more, and the worse my anxiety got, the bigger the cloud got, until it covered almost ten whole blocks. At that point, I started crying…and the cloud started raining.”

  Enzo stifled a laugh.

  Solomon frowned.

  “Sorry,” Enzo said. “But you’ve got to admit that’s kind of funny. It sounds like a cartoon.”

  “I guess it does seem rather silly in hindsight,” he replied, sheepish.

  “Don’t let Enzo get you down,” Adara said. “The first time he used his god shard, he fell through a door. Your debut as a shard holder was far more impressive than that, especially when you threw that lightning bolt at Belphegor.”

  Solomon gawped at Adara over the rims of his glasses. “I understood about half those words.”

  “Yeah? Well, you’re going to understand them all when I’m finished telling you what your bad luck has gotten you into.”

  Adara launched into another retelling of Selaphiel’s visit and the explanation of the Shattering of God. While Solomon was processing that with a pale face and a dead man’s stare, she relayed to Enzo the grim details of the massacre trap on Maynard Avenue and her encounter with Belphegor.

  “Next time we see him,” she finished, “or any other greater demon, at least two people need to cast the banishment spell simultaneously. It’s the only way we can kick those bastards back to Hell.”

  Enzo drummed his fingers on his knees. “Can’t they just come through the barrier again and possess another body?”

  “They can, but not immediately,” she said. “Selaphiel said that the barrier produces resistance proportional to the strength of the demon trying to cross it. Any demon who wants to get through, even in that partial possession form, has to slowly worm their way past that resistance. So if we can manage to boot Belphegor, or any other greater demon, off the planet, we’ll temporarily lighten the load that we have to fight to get to the cornerstone spell.”

  “Sounds like we should save our next banishment attempt until a strategically opportune moment arises. Maybe when we’re right outside the—”

  “Excuse me,” Solomon cut in. “But are you two honestly planning to confront a horde of, er, demons head-on? And attempt to repair a magical barrier created by the actual God? Using a spell written on a scroll that was given to you by some kind of creature that claimed to be a legitimate angel?”

  “Bizarre, isn’t it?” Enzo said. “Welcome to your new reality, pal.”

  Solomon gulped. “I’m not comfortable with this. Any of this.”

  Adara threw up her hands. “Too bad. You have a god shard, and you can’t get rid of it, so you’re involved in this nightmare whether you like it or not. Either you can help us fix the cornerstone at the campus library and save the city from being overrun by a demon army. Or you can cower in your apartment and pray the demons don’t break down your door and beat you to death, or just burn down your whole building.”

  Solomon lowered his head. “Is there no option to run?”

  “Where are you going to run to?” she said. “If the demons come through to Earth in force, nowhere on this planet will be safe.”

  “Oh lord.” He vigorously rubbed his face. “Why me?”

  “Why any of us?” Enzo asked. “Probability is a bitch like that.”

  “I’m an accountant, not an investment banker,” Solomon groaned. “I hate probability.”

  “Accountant?” Adara looked over her shoulder at the window to the apartment’s small balcony. Through the gaps in the blinds, she could just make out the bright golden glow from the pillar of light, now more than four miles away. “Let me guess. You work at Barnaby and Pruitt?”

  “I did,” he said morosely. “But when you combine the extensive damage done to the office suite by the impacts with the fact the entire building is now magically glowing, it’s pretty clear I’m going to be in the unemployment line by the end of the week. In fact, that’s what upset me so bad that my, uh, god shard activated.”

  He gestured to the apartment in general. “I thought my biggest problem was that I wasn’t going to be able to afford next month’s rent. Then my own personal thunderstorm popped into existence and started following me around.

  “People saw it, you know. They took pictures of me while I was trying to run away from the cloud. I’m going to end up all over the internet. And then the government’s going to come after me so they can use me for experiments!”

  “The government has bigger problems to worry about right now,” Adara said. “The whole wide world saw the people on Maynard get massacred by a variety of malicious supernatural beings that aren’t supposed to exist. I think your storm cloud trick will fall under the radar. At least for a little while.”

  He didn’t appear convinced, but he let the matter drop.

  Enzo gave him a searching look and asked, “Are you with us or not?”

  Solomon’s shoulders drooped. “Doesn’t seem like I have much of a choice in the matter, since my only two options are go to the demons or wait for the demons to come to me.” He let out a dry laugh. “Demons. Life could’ve thrown anything at me, from bankruptcy to black holes, and it picked demons? I’d say God has a funny sense of humor, but God’s dead…”

  He let that statement linger in the air, and no one spoke for a long moment.

  Then Enzo clapped his hands. “So, who’s ready to plan a library break-in worthy of a Mission Impossible movie?”

  Solomon snorted. “It’s more like Harry Potter, if you ask me.”

  “Yeah,” Adara said, “if Harry Potter was written by H.P. Lovecraft.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Adara stood beneath the hot spray of the shower with her eyes closed. She didn’t want to see the blood of countless people run down her skin and circle the drain. Now that she was two hours removed from the Maynard massacre, the whole sequence of events had taken on a dreamlike quality in her memories. But that blurry edge wasn’t enough to lessen the weight in her heart.

  Though she wasn’t responsible for any of those deaths, a lead ball of frustration and regret was suspended in her chest. She couldn’t let Belphegor get away with what he’d done. And she couldn’t let him do it again.

  Smacking her palm against the tile wall, she promised herself that she would utilize a better attack strategy next time she encountered the greater demon. No matter what, she would defeat him.

  While Adara was busy scrubbing her hair, Enzo knocked on the bathroom door and told her that lunch was on the way up.

  There was a café off the building’s lobby that delivered to residents. Despite the chaos and fear that had gripped the city, they were still open. Likely because the café’s owner lived in one of the top-floor suites and had a large stake in the building’s equity. He didn’t want to inconvenience any of the well-off tenants, who stuck up their noses at even the smallest of slights.

  Adara finished her shower, quickly dried off, and dressed in a fresh set of clothes she’d grabbed from her pack on the way to the bathroom. Before she clasped her bra, she turned her back to the steamy mirror and examined the star-shaped bruise.

  It was starting to change color, but unlike a regular bruise, it wasn’t changing from purple to green to brown. Rather, the edges were being leached of all color, leaving behind a pale imprint that looked like a faint scar.

  She had a funny feeling that mark would never disappear. All the shard holders would be branded as such for the rest of their lives.

  That could be a complication, she thought warily, if the government does antagonize us at some point.

  But that issue could wait another day.

  They had enough on their plate right now.

>   Adara emerged from the bathroom at the same time Solomon opened the front door to reveal a young delivery man, his arms laden with paper bags that had the café’s logo stamped on both sides. Solomon accepted the bags and set them in the foyer while he dug a few bills out of his wallet and offered them to the delivery man.

  The man smiled at the generous tip, but Adara noticed his expression was strained. It was hard to appear genuinely happy when the whole world was falling apart in front of your eyes.

  Door shut, Solomon scooped up the bags and took them over to the living area, Adara trailing him. Enzo was on the couch, attention glued to the TV, the same state Adara had left him in earlier.

  He was watching the local news coverage of the massacre on Maynard, which had now expanded to include dozens of phone videos, live feeds from news crews on the ground, and sweeping shots from a chopper that was circling the Barnaby and Pruitt building.

  After the three of them had grown tired of discussing the logistics of sneaking onto campus and assailing the library, they had switched on the TV to find the news right in the middle of playing a video of Adara facing off against Belphegor. Fortunately, the video had been taken from over a hundred feet away, and the person who’d taken it had a very shaky hand. So the most you could glean of Adara’s identity was “pale woman with auburn hair.”

  If they kept having confrontations with the demons in public, however, eventually someone was going to be identified. Then that person would end up at the center of a veritable shitstorm.

  “Any new developments?” Adara asked Enzo as she helped Solomon unload paper plates and plastic utensils from the bags.

  He shook his head. “Belphegor’s meat suit has been lying in the same place the entire time the news has had cameras on it. I’m guessing Solomon’s lightning strike dealt the body critical damage, so Belphegor was forced to abandon it and go in search of a new host. Depending on how long it takes him to find one, we might be able to avoid fighting him when we go for the cornerstone.”