Demon Demon Burning Bright, Whisperings book four

by Linda Welch

  I hooked my arm over the chair’s back and swung my head away. He was right. Coming here was a waste of his time, and mine.

  “I know. Happens all the time.” I rubbed my knee where the denim had worn thin, then met Mike’s eyes, letting him see the true depth of concern in mine.

  He sighed, eyes half-closed, tented his hands and lowered his brow to them. “The best I can do is put the word out, tell the guys to keep their ears and eyes open, maybe ask a question or two in the right places.”

  Better than nothing. I’d take it. “Thanks. I’m grateful for anything.”

  “I’ll be in touch.”

  He kept his head down so didn’t see me nod. I stood and walked out.

  Near the exit, I paused at McMullin’s desk and smiled down at her. “We haven’t met.”

  She came to her feet, putting her eyes level with my chin. “You’re Tiff Banks,” she said nasally.

  “Ah, so my reputation precedes me,” I said with a dramatic twitch of my eyebrows. Knowing cops and their sense of humor, she heard some rare tales about me, particularly as what I do makes some of the guys at the PD nervous. An embellishment here, a snide remark there, makes Tiff Banks a less scary person.

  She gave me a puzzled frown. “No. Should it? Mike said he expected you.” She presented her hand. “Grace McMullin. I transferred in from Vice four months ago.”

  So I wasn’t famous. I made a face at her hand. “Not to be rude, but I don’t want to catch whatever you’ve got.”

  “Sorry.” She wiped her hand on her shirt, as if cotton can sterilize bacteria.

  “You don’t look good.”

  “Just a bad cold, but it went to my head. Can’t breathe through my nose at all.”

  I grinned. “On the bright side, I imagine you can’t smell the ingrained bouquet of a police squad room.”

  She smiled back. “Not a whiff.”

  As I thought.

  I fished in my coat pocket and produced a tube of breath mints. “Grace, do me a favor. I forgot to give these to Mike.”

  “Sure,” she said as she took the tube.

  “Thanks. I gotta go. Nice meeting you.”

  “Likewise.”

  I got out of there fast. Yep, cops have a different sense of humor, and I know how it works.

  I pulled to the curb yards short of the Manson place, letting the engine idle. Sure enough, after a minute or two a small stick-thin figure emerged from the privet bushes and headed over the road. She stopped about four feet from the curb, where she died seven years ago.

  I accelerated from the curb and pulled up beside her. “Hello, Gillian.”

  Gillian smiled up at me. “Hello, Miss. Can you see Jezebel?”

  I looked at the far side of the street. “No, not a whisker.”

  Jezebel died two years ago, but I hadn’t told Gillian. On the day Gillian died, on her way to school, she saw Jezebel on the far side of the street. She sped after the cat without looking both ways. She didn’t see the car heading for her. The paramedics said she never knew what hit her. Gillian’s small pixie face wears a permanent smile, because she smiled as she ran across the road after her cat.

  I cannot blame the person behind the wheel. The way Gillian darts from the bushes, the driver most likely didn’t see her until too late. I do blame them for not stopping, for leaving her little body crumpled in the street.

  “She’s a bad cat,” Gillian stated. “She shouldn’t be outside.”

  “Gilly, did you see Mr. Mortensen’s car drive past three days ago, in the middle of the night?”

  She nodded, thick black bangs shifting on her forehead. “He had his lights on. You hafta have lights on when you drive at night.”

  “You sure do,” I agreed. “You’ve seen him leave my house a lot of times – did he look different, maybe worried? Did he drive fast, like he was in a hurry?”

  Gillian spun to face my house, her school backpack smacking her spine. “I can’t see his face from here. He stood outside for a minute and looked up at the windows. He drove really slow, like he always does.”

  “Thanks, Gilly. You get out the road, now.”

  “I will, Miss. Have a nice day!”

  “You too, Gilly.”

  I drove on. In the rearview mirror, I watched Gillian back up until she disappeared in the bushes.

  Think, Tiff. Forget about the truck and cell phone for now. If he’s not in Clarion – though he may well be – where did he go? He had an appointment with Cicero. Maybe he went there. He could have left in another vehicle, or did the demon dash. Or… .

  Holy heck. My hands clenched the steering wheel. The Xterra’s right front wheel nudged the curb as I swung the car to park in front of my house. Why didn’t I think of it before?

  Or he walked.

  I sat in the car with the engine idling. Jack watched me from the kitchen window.

  I waved, pulled from the curb and drove back down the street.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Montague Square is three blocks from Royal’s apartment. I regularly shopped there for my favorite blends in Coffee You and Me, and the best bread rolls and sausage in the valley from Valley Market. I saw the door which gives access to Bel-Athaer, but never went near it; I liked to pretend it wasn’t there.

  It is an old, heavy oak door, perhaps the original. If it ever had stain or varnish, time wore it away. The knob is discolored and dull. There is no keyhole. I took hold of the knob, turned and pushed. To my surprise, the door opened. I sucked in an involuntary breath and twisted to look at the street. The few pedestrians walking back and forth took no notice of a woman entering a building.

  If I went in, would I see the entrance to Bel-Athaer?

  I’d used the door before, but always with Royal. The first time, he brought me through after rescuing me from his brother Kien. Kien wanted me to give him the High Lord of Bel-Athaer’s whereabouts and used a nasty whip to encourage me. Royal killed him.

  I went through with Royal, Gia Sabato and Daven Clare the second time and we ended up in Russia to witness the death of a Gelpha traitress so I could question her shade.

  The third time, Royal and I went to Bel-Athaer’s High House to warn them about a mass-murdering Gelpha, but it turned out to be Dagka Shan.

  I pushed the door wider and entered an empty, dusty square room of dull gray plaster walls and concrete floor. There were no locks or bolts on the inside of the door, but something kept it closed to intruders. Gelpha do not have magic at their fingertips, they have technology, but I couldn’t see anything.

  The door shut behind me with a hollow thump.

  Another old wood door in the corner must open to the rest of the building, but the facing door gave access to the passage which leads to Bel-Athaer.

  I never asked Royal why an entrance to Bel-Athaer was inside a building. What would happen if someone who should not go in there had to get inside? If I can imagine reasons humans would force an entrance - such as a fire spreading through the block and firefighters breaking open the door - so can the Gelpha. A door which refused to be breached would cause headlines. But once inside, they’d see the door to the passage. What would stop anyone going through there? Is it invisible to someone not supposed to see it? Would it blink out of existence?

  Curious, I crossed to the door in the corner. It opened to a large, empty, dusty windowless room with a rickety wood staircase on the north wall. Investigating seemed pointless; it was just a regular room with access to the second floor.

  With no reason to linger and before I could deliberate too much, I strode to the other door and pushed it open.

  Gareth told me Bel-Athaer was closed to me. It was open now, perhaps it always had been.

  Holding the door open, I looked along a wide, straight corridor which dwindled in the distance until lost in shadow. Yet the corridor was not dim, light seemed to emanate from the smooth, creamy tiles on walls, floor and ceiling.

  I felt the grain of the wood as my hand tightened on the edge of the
door. I wasn’t prepared. I had my Ruger in the holster beneath my armpit, my cell phone, nothing more.

  I should at least go home and tell my roommates. But announcing I was going to march into Bel-Athaer would worry them and they couldn’t help me if I got in trouble, and it wasn’t as if I could tell anyone else I meant to venture into another dimension.

  And what if Bel-Athaer would not open to me again later today, or tomorrow, or ever? Would I have missed my only opportunity?

  I looked over my shoulder at the street door, then returned to make sure it would open. The knob turned easily. I peeped out at the now empty street. Ducking my head back in, I let go and the door shut of its own accord, yet it was not a self-closing door.

  Slightly freaky.

  Gathering courage, I opened the other door again and started down the corridor. The glowing tiles confused me, creating a kind of optical illusion so distance lost all meaning. Straight as an arrow, the corridor could well go on forever.

  I walked fast for fifteen minutes. My sight began to blur, a defense against the glowing sameness of the passageway which by now bore through my eyeballs into my retinas.

  Thankfully, I reduced my speed or I would have run headfirst into the wall which blocked the corridor. I stopped, blinking. Not a wall; I faced a door covered in the same creamy tiles. With no doorknob or recess in which to slip my fingers, I put my palms to it and pushed hard.

  The door swung open and I strode through. The angry honk of a big, steel-gray pickup made me jump back. Disoriented, I gasped in a breath of air tainted with gas and diesel.

  My confused periphery vision spied a sidewalk, but it curved in to the wall on either side of the tall brown brick building I just left. I’d stepped right into a street. I backed up farther till I felt rough brick through the down of my winter coat.

  It could be a business district. Buildings of white, red, gray, cream and brown brick, three, four and five floors high, lined a divided avenue straight as a ruler. I imagined the structures were stores, restaurants and business offices. One with a long red canopy could be a theater. A tiered rack of magazines sat outside the big plate glass window of the store on my left. To get a better view and not risk being run down, I walked to my right and hopped up on the sidewalk.

  Wispy clouds dotted a pale-blue sky. In the distance, mountains towered over the city. Traffic whipped along in both directions. Men, women and families towing small kids strolled along the sidewalks on both sides of the street, some pausing to check out window displays. A crowd at the crosswalk opposite me waited for the light to change.

  I threw my hands up. “Ha ha.”

  I bet someone, somewhere, laughed their ass off at me. This sure as hell was not Bel-Athaer. Bel-Athaer was a place of rolling green hills, forests and clean air.

  Damn. I spun, and barreled into something solid.

  I staggered back to keep my balance and looked down at a short, annoyed man who climbed to his feet and glared at me. He bent to pick up his soft, wide-brimmed felt hat and slapped it on his thigh to beat out dust from the sidewalk. Settling it back on his shining amber hair, he continued to glare from glinting sulfur-yellow eyes.

  Reality hit me. Fear rooted my feet to the ground. Gasping, a sick feeling in my stomach, I met his eyes across the space separating us.

  His face lost a little of its glow. His features smoothed and became expressionless. He spoke slowly, tone flat with no inflection as if he forced the words out reluctantly. “Forgive me, Lady. How may I assist you?”

  What the fuck?

  Bewildered and intimidated by my surroundings, my head whipped back and forth from the man to the street. I was in Bel-Athaer, but a Bel-Athaer I had never seen or imagined. People on the sidewalk, driving the autos, waiting at a bus stop - oh my god is that a taxi? - were demons.

  I tried to speak and croaked an unintelligible sound.

  He came closer. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

  Would telling him why I was here get me in trouble? “I’m … ah … looking for the High Lord’s House,” I said hesitantly, ready to bolt.

  He pointed his index finger at the far side of the street. “The next bus will take you there.”

  “Thank you,” I managed to say. He nodded and walked down the street until he disappeared among other pedestrians.

  Take a bus to the High House?

  I should have known better than come here. Acting on impulse rarely turns out well for me. But I was here now, slap bang in the middle of a Gelpha city with transportation to the High House at hand. I could go back through the brown building’s door and head for home. Or I could take a bus to the High House.

  Why did demons have vehicles, anyway? Why not zip to their destination? Maybe demon speed was not used habitually. Perhaps it would result in mass confusion, accidents, injuries when demons slammed into one another.

  I walked to the crosswalk and to the other side of the road, marveling when autos stopped for me. I couldn’t adjust to the fact that a demon city seemed little different from one back home.

  Gelpha at the bus stop watched me coming, but I detected no hostility in their eyes. Curiosity, perhaps? Adults looked away when I joined them, although children peered at me curiously.

  People were being well-mannered, even the guy I knocked over. He didn’t used the term “lady” as in What the hell do you think you’re doing, lady? but as a polite form of address. Once he got past his ire at being knocked on his tush, he didn’t seem astonished to see me. They must be used to humans.

  Were human beings here commonplace, regular people, or like me see demons as they actually are? Did they have demon friends or loved-ones? Did any live here? Demons live in my world; they have friends, families, businesses and I thought nobody was any the wiser, but maybe some are.

  How many human beings knew about Bel-Athaer and kept the secret?

  How bizarre, to see a small host of demons patiently waiting at a bus stop. They wore a strange miscellany of attire. One man’s long, carrot-colored hair stuck in all directions from beneath a brown porkpie hat. His black suit was too tight, the sleeves and pants too short. He nonchalantly leaned on a silver-topped walking cane. A woman with smoldering saffron hair in an intricate braid and loop design wore a short crinoline skirt in glowing autumn colors and a black waistcoat, and nothing on her feet. The child who held her hand wore pink velvet PJs. Others wore attire I see in Clarion: Tshirts, jeans, modern suits, dresses, skirts, etcetera.

  Their clothing was a lighter weight than mine. The temperature was milder here. Heat built beneath my down coat.

  I arrived at the back of the queue. A small boy said, “Mumma, why doesn’t - ?”

  She bent over, her long, waving cinnamon and steel hair washing over her cheek. “Hush, Simmy, we’ll talk about it later.”

  I tried to pretend I stood at a bus stop in downtown Clarion, although I rarely use a bus. I felt conspicuous and nervous down to my toes. With a show of nonchalance, I watched traffic cruise past as if standing with a crowd of demons at a bus stop was nothing out of the ordinary. Cars, trucks, minivans were similar to those back home, with small differences. They rose higher off the ground, the wheels were a fraction out of proportion to their size; they had fat buttons on the doors instead of handles and no license plates. They sure didn’t sport emblems or insignia which read Ford, Dodge, or Toyota. I did spot odd symbols in metallic colors on the hoods. The buildings across the road bore something similar above the doors or stenciled on the windows. Gelpha writing?

  Funny, it looked familiar. I could swear I saw it before.

  A smallish blue bus chugged to a stop, the doors concertinaed open, but nobody got off or on. I craned to look over the people in front of me.

  They parted like the Red Sea. One by one, they turned to me.

  My eyes edged right to left. I didn’t know what to do. Then a demon with glittering brown hair done up in a topknot turned remarkable peridot eyes to me, smiled, and gestured at the bus.

&
nbsp; I poked my chest with an index finger, a question in my eyes because I couldn’t force the words out. Me? I should get on first?

  He nodded. I cleared my throat, gave him a wavering smile in return, walked to the bus and climbed in.

  What in God’s name was going on?

  All seats were occupied, so I moved along the aisle to the back, pretending not to see how passengers looked me over. Straps hung from the ceiling, so I grabbed one. My need to hang onto something had little to do with the way the bus lurched as it drove off. I was in Bel-Athaer, using Gelpha public transportation, surrounded by demons with hair and eyes of every imaginable hue.

  I had to be insane or hallucinating.

  “Lady?”

  I lowered my gaze to an elderly Gelpha. Her shimmering blue eyes smiled into mine as she struggled to get upright, but the bus took a turn which put her off balance and she plopped down. Wisps of silvery-blue hair came free of a pretty wood barrette and dusted her neck.

  Come on, Tiff. You can do it. Open your mouth and let the words out. “Can I help you?”

  “Yes, dear. You can help me up and sit yourself down here.”

  The elderly don’t stand for young people where I come from. As I opened my mouth to politely reject her offer, a male voice from behind me said, “No, please, take mine.”

  I glanced back at a tall young demon with spiked cerise-pink hair and stared for a few seconds. His black leather pants and jacket adorned with loops of silver chain, the clunky black elevated boots, the black T-shirt, made me think punk. Put rings and studs in his ears, nose and lips, stick him on a street corner in downtown Salt Lake City and I’d not know him for a demon, provided he kept his silver-mist eyes down.

  I smiled, hitched one shoulder. “Thanks, I’m fine.”

  Okay, this went beyond courtesy and was creeping me out.

  As we rolled along, I reflected that Gelpha transportation was not as smooth as ours, or maybe the roads were rougher. I had to keep a tight grip on the strap and the back of a seat or be tossed from one side of the aisle to the other. The old lady and young man had distracted me and we were now in another part of the city. I silently cursed for not watching and remembering the surroundings as we traveled. Getting back to the door when I didn’t know how posed a problem.