Shaman

by Chloe Garner

  “It’s awesome,” Ash said, gripping the handle inexpertly and slashing at the air. Samantha leaned out of range.

  “And very sharp,” she said. “I’ll say it because your mother is choking on it. Be careful.”

  He held the blade up in front of his eyes, catching light reflections off of it, then handed it back to her.

  “It’s awesome,” he said again. She smiled. Even a deeply gifted, powerful demon with some miraculous loss of memory couldn’t hold an angel blade like that without reacting to it. Which eliminated most of his possible motivations for lying to her.

  “Do your fingernails grow, Ash?” she asked. He watched the blade go back into her bag, leaning forward to try to see what else might have been in there. She smiled despite herself.

  “What do you mean?” he asked. She held out her hand, palm up, asking for his, and he hesitantly put his hand over hers. She held his fingers between her thumb and fingers, looking at the nails.

  “You chew your nails,” she said. He shrugged. “That means they grow?” He shrugged again. “How about your hair? How long can you go between haircuts?” This time he grinned at his mom.

  “He hasn’t been to see a barber in a couple of months. He likes his hair long like that,” she said in the tone of voice that indicated she didn’t. Samantha nodded and flipped his arm over, taking a pulse.

  “Temperature normal?” she asked.

  “Unless he’s sick,” Beatrice said. Pulse was normal, too.

  “Can you jump from here to here?” Samantha asked. He frowned again with focus.

  “I don’t know,” he said. He closed his eyes, then scrunched his face for a second, then popped his eyes open again. “I’m already here,” he said.

  “Can you skip time?” Samantha asked him. He thought about it.

  “Where would I be, in the middle?” he asked. “I have to be somewhere.”

  She grinned.

  “Inescapable logic,” she said, nodding. He checked to see if she was making fun of him, pulling his hand away, but seemed satisfied that she was simply agreeing. She scratched the back of her head.

  “You’re human,” she said. “Well, okay, one more thing for the brutes over there. Iron nail,” she said, putting her hand over her head. Jason had one ready. She rolled her eyes and handed it to Ash. He took it, waiting for something to happen. “Push it against your skin hard enough to make an indentation, but don’t hurt yourself,” Samantha said. He pushed it into his palm with rather more force than she had intended, but to no harm. She held out her hand to take the nail back and handed it up over her head back to Jason. “Happy?”

  “Kid’s not a ghost,” Jason said.

  Samantha crossed her legs on the couch and leaned forward to rest her chin on her palms.

  “So what am I?” Ash asked.

  “Human,” Samantha said. “That’s the important part, and the good news. Your mom should come sit with us for the bad news, though.”

  Beatrice slid around the end of the couch and sat on the edge of an arm chair, fingers worrying over each other. Samantha licked her lip.

  “You’re special. People come in lots and lots of kinds of special, and I’ve never seen one do what you can do,” she said. “The problem is, moving through space like that makes me think that you’re…” She looked over at Beatrice, then at Connie. “How much background does she need?”

  “Just give me the facts,” Beatrice said sternly.

  “Your son may be a target for demon possession. There is a very good chance that his gifts are related to a thinner boundary between the planes, which means that a demon who possessed him would bring across a lot more of their native power. They’re always hungry for targets like that.”

  Beatrice looked at Connie.

  “Do you believe that?” she asked.

  “I didn’t believe people could do what Ash does,” Connie answered. “I don’t know.”

  “What do you think I should do?” Beatrice asked.

  “Three options. I know which one I would pick, but it’s between you and Ash. You can leave him alone. Hope he stays under the radar, try not to jump any more and potentially attract attention. You call us the second he starts to act weird. Any time. Every time. Two. You can send him away somewhere that he can be trained with whatever power it is he has, and where he would be much less likely to be possessed.” She held up her hand at Beatrice’s bottled protests and shook her head. “I wouldn’t do that one, either. Just being thorough. Three, I can try to bind him. It’s how you tie off… other gifted people. It isn’t painful and it’s reasonably low risk. It would make him just a normal kid, so long as the binding takes and holds.”

  “God made me like this,” Ash said. “There’s nothing wrong with me.”

  Samantha smiled and looked him in the eye, summoning all of the genuine seriousness she had.

  “You will never meet anyone who believes that as much as I do. That’s the truth. But he also sent me to help you. That doesn’t mean that binding you is the right answer. It just means it isn’t wrong, either.”

  “He’d be normal?” Beatrice asked. Samantha didn’t move.

  “Yes.”

  “What is the risk?”

  Samantha considered.

  “I’m trying to find the words that are going to mean the most to you. We call it dark seep. When I strengthen the boundary at a neural level between the planes, I favor straining the other side over this one. Strain this side too hard, I would cause psychological scars. Mistrust, social malfunction, sometimes intellectual malfunction, but that would be truly careless of me. Strain that side too hard, you get tears that cause dark seep. Which look a lot the same, but they’re fixable. It would just be an ongoing fix.”

  “I don’t understand,” Beatrice said.

  “Like pizza dough,” Samantha said. “You want to separate two halves of a ball of dough, you squeeze the middle smaller and smaller, but in this case, you don’t want any tears. So you do it slowly and carefully, and you don’t pinch it off entirely.” Sort of, she thought.

  “And you know how to do that?” Beatrice asked. Samantha nodded.

  “There’s nothing wrong with me,” Ash said again.

  “Ash, honey, you could go to sleep overs again,” Beatrice said, then looked at Samantha. “He wakes up in his own bed, every time.” She came and knelt next to him. “You could go to sleepovers, and you could play soccer, and you could have friends over…”

  He glanced at Samantha.

  “It wouldn’t hurt?”

  “No, beloved.”

  “Could you undo it, if I wanted?”

  She shook her head.

  “You can talk about it with your mom and dad today. You don’t have to make a decision right now.”

  “Do it,” he said. She was taken aback.

  “Why?” she asked.

  “You’re here. You’re here for a reason, and…” he stuck a finger in his mouth and chewed the nail. “I want to be normal.”

  She opened her mouth and, finding an emotional constriction, closed it again, swallowing hard.

  “Being normal is overrated,” she said, “but I think that this is the right thing, anyway. People aren’t made to live the life we lead.” She looked at Beatrice. “I think it’s the right call.”

  “You’re sure you know what you’re doing?”

  “All I can ask you to do is trust me. All the reassurances in the world won’t change what I can do. I wouldn’t recommend it if I didn’t think the risks were small enough.”

  “What do you do?”

  Samantha was watching Ash now. He was going to be such a strong man.

  “All I need you to do is close your eyes and relax,” she said. “I’m going to put my hands on your head.”

  He watched her fingers until they were out of his range of vision.

  “We don’t have to do this today,” she said as he stared at her palms.

  “No. This is right,” he said. “Do it.”

&nbs
p; He slammed his eyes closed, bracing. She felt horrid.

  “Just. Don’t jump.”

  <><><>

  Samantha drew a long breath and let it out.

  “It’s done,” she said, dropping her hands. “It was clean.”

  Ash opened his eyes.

  “I can’t jump anymore?”

  “No.”

  “He’s going to be okay?” Beatrice asked. Samantha nodded. She had taken more time than she normally would have, since his brain was so young, and she was exhausted. But it was done right. The boundary was even thicker for him than most people, and she hadn’t damaged his connection to it, or torn seep holes. She took another long breath and blinked hard a few times. Sometimes she forgot to blink for minutes at a time when she was focused like that. She didn’t know why she left her eyes open at all. Strange nervous habit.

  “I need to lay down,” she said.

  “Are you okay?” Beatrice asked. Samantha put out a hand and Sam was there to help her up. She had been so focused she hadn’t even noticed him while she was working. She wondered what her mind had looked like to him.

  “I’m fine. I just need something to eat and to sleep,” she said.

  Ash put his hand on her arm.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  “I hope you think we made the right decision, next week and next month and next year,” Samantha said. It was a translation of an angel blessing, but it didn’t translate very well. He smiled sadly. Being normal was a hard prize to root for.

  “I hope you find what you’re looking for,” he said. She frowned at him. Where had that come from? What did it mean? It was another classic angelic blessing - one that translated much better - but he couldn’t possibly know that. Jason handed Beatrice a card.

  “Call us, even if you’re sure you’re imagining things,” he said. She nodded, then hugged Connie.

  “Thank you,” the woman whispered, just loud enough for Samantha to hear it. Connie hugged her harder.

  “I’ll call you tonight,” she said, then went to the front door and held it as Sam helped Samantha out to the car. Jason carried her backpack. With her head leaned against Sam’s arm, she wondered if she should have been more defensive about the backpack, but the world was beginning to spin, she was so sleepy. Sam got in the back seat with her and Jason took the driver’s seat in the Cruiser next to Connie.

  “You can stay tonight, if you want,” Connie said, “but…”

  “We’ll head out at dawn,” Jason said. “Give you your life back.”

  “You really think demons would have possessed him?” she asked weakly.

  “Yes,” Jason said. Connie shook her head.

  “Boys…”

  “It’s okay, Aunt Connie,” Sam said. “We understand.”

  “Sam understands,” Jason said. “I don’t.”

  Sam shifted to pull his cell phone out of his back pocket.

  “Think we could make it to Atlanta by tonight?” he asked.

  “Why?” Jason asked.

  “Simon has a lead on what looks like another mass goblin infestation out west. I figure we could make it to Ericka’s if we pushed it.”

  “Sure, no sweat,” Jason said. “It’s only, what, four?”

  Samantha frowned. She had a score to settle with the pit lord that was rounding up all of the peewee fire demons. She focused.

  “A little help, Abby?” she asked.

  “What?” Connie asked.

  “Her friend in New York,” Jason said. “She talks to her all the time.”

  Samantha glanced at Connie, but was just a little too tired to be deeply bothered by whether the woman was concerned or not. She rubbed her face.

  “I want that pit lord,” she said. “Tell him we’re on it.”

  “You got it,” Sam said.

  “So… you’re going?” Connie asked.

  “Looks like,” Jason told her.

  “I want to stop by the storage unit on our way out of town,” Sam said. “I promised Sam.”

  “Another time,” Samantha said. “I’m too tired right now.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He assured her silently that it didn’t bother him. It wasn’t a lie. Another time. She leaned her face happily against his arm, drifting.

  “You’re weirdly okay with how Sam acts with your girlfriend,” Connie observed to Jason.

  “You always did think I was the unhealthy one,” he said.

  “We were friends, Sam and I, before she and Jason started dating,” Sam said. True. Connie looked back at them, and Samantha sat up far enough to switch her weight to the door, squaring her head into the spot where glass met upholstery.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” the woman asked.

  “Worked hard,” Samantha said. “I’m just tired.”

  They got back to Connie’s house to find a box on the doorstep. Connie picked it up and frowned.

  “It’s for you,” she said, handing it to Jason. Samantha grinned.

  “Pack it. We’ll open it in Atlanta,” she said. “I want to be awake to see your faces.”

  “This is from Abby?” Jason asked.

  “She sent it the day before yesterday,” Samantha answered.

  “You can do that?” Sam asked.

  “Why not?” He could, too. She wondered if he’d figure that out. Jason nudged her as he went to take the box back to the car.

  “You go lay down,” he said. “Sam and I will get Gwen packed up.” He jerked his head at her. “Good work today.”

  She kissed his cheek.

  “Thank you.”

  She didn’t remember anything after that until Atlanta.

  <><><>

  Jason was itching to get into the box bad enough to be willing to wake Samantha up by ‘accident’ when they got to Ericka’s. He swerved at the driveway before hers, then back into his lane, shoveling her headfirst into the door. She groaned.

  “Sorry,” he said. “Wrong driveway.”

  “Where are we?” she asked.

  “Just got to Ericka’s house,” Sam told her.

  “What time is it?”

  “A little before midnight.”

  “Did you guys stop for dinner?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Sorry.”

  “You hungry?”

  “No.”

  The porch light was on at Ericka’s house, but the rest of the house was dark. Jason found the spare key in the gardening boot at the end of the porch and let them in. He had every intention of being on the road in the morning before she got up; he’d leave his card on the table with a quick note in the morning. The only waypoint where they wouldn’t do that was Arthur and Doris’. They always stayed for breakfast with Arthur and Doris. Just Doris, now, he revised with a brief stab of grief.

  The box.

  Sam was mothering Samantha into the house as Jason brushed past them on his way back into the house with the box. Samantha laughed.

  “It’s a present with his name on it,” Sam said. “His favorite thing.”

  “I hope I don’t disappoint,” she said.

  Jason switched the light on in the kitchen and pulled a knife out of his pocket to slit the box open. He paused with the blade poised over the tape and glanced at Samantha.

  “Do I need to be careful?”

  “You aren’t going to hurt anything in there,” she said. He slashed the box open and frowned at the sea of styrofoam peanuts. Samantha folded her arms on the table and leaned her chin on her crossed wrists, grinning.

  “Abby has a good sense of humor.”

  He fought for a moment, deciding between caution at the unseen and the urge to plunge his hands into the box.

  “She wouldn’t pack open blades,” Samantha said. He dove. His hands found metal and he pulled out a gun barrel that ran from corner to corner of the box. He looked down it appreciatively.

  “Four-five-eight,” he said appreciatively. She nodded.

  “My favorit
e.”

  He looked over at her, surprised. She grinned.

  “If you’re going to shoot something, put a big hole in it,” she said.

  “I already have a barrel for my .458,” he said. She nodded.

  “Keep going.”

  He found a ziplock bag and pulled that out. Ingots of metal clinked against each other.

  “That’s mine,” she said, reaching for it.

  “What is it?” Sam asked. She held it up.

  “Tin, copper, aluminum, lead, and…” she reached into the bag and pulled out a fifth block. “Silver.” She looked back at Jason. “Keep going.”

  He ran his fingers along the bottom of the box, spilling peanuts everywhere. He hit a smaller box and pulled it out.

  “Ammo.”

  “Open it.”

  He slid the lid off the box and whistled. She grinned and stood, walking around the table to look.

  “She only buys the best,” Samantha said. Jason picked up one of the bullets and held it up. Sam took another. The casing was normal, but the bullet was unlike any he’d ever seen before. Samantha picked a third round and held it in her palm.

  “Tungsten cap,” she said, pointing. “Solid steel bullet with a soft-metal shell to prevent stripping out the barrel. And…” she said, looking over Jason’s shoulder at the round he held. “Unique demonic curses imprinted on each bullet.”

  “They’re shiny,” Sam said.

  “Fresh smelted tin,” Samantha said.

  “This is a demon-killing bullet, isn’t it?” Jason asked. She nodded.

  “Just for you.”

  “Wow.”

  “And the barrel is for steel bullets.”

  “Yup.”

  “Wow.”

  “Beat that, Simon,” Sam observed.

  “I need to sight these in,” Jason said, feeling the weight of the bullet in his hand.

  “There should be a box of blanks in there, too,” Samantha said. “For targeting. These,” she said, pointing, “you’ll only want to use to shoot actual demons.”

  “Blanks?”

  “Sorry. Un-stamped ones. You hit a target with them, they splash or shatter or whatever. You hit a demon with them, the demon stops them perfectly and they land in the ash. I can re-cast them and you can use them again. That’s a three-thousand dollar box of bullets, low end, and Abby only buys the best. That and finding someone to make them takes time. You don’t replace them until they wear out.”