Pockets of Darkness

by Jean Rabe

  “The feckin’ witch,” Bridget cursed through clenched teeth. “Where the hell is she?” She waited for her pain to lessen to a more manageable level, and then started to uncurl herself.

  Was the ward meant to kill a burglar or just discourage one with a thousand volts of eldritch energy? Kill the sucker, she guessed. If Bridget hadn’t been so blessed and cursed with the demon buckle—the thing she was certain had saved her when the Yankee Fan jammed a knife in her stomach—she would have died to Adiella’s security measure, and maybe been incinerated in the process. The witch’s magic probably would have wholly eliminated a normal burglar, not left a body behind that had to be explained or disposed of.

  She got to her knees and grabbed a nearby shelf, using it to help pull herself up.

  “Adiella?” Bridget called for the witch a few times. The only reply was the demon babbling. “Yeah, I heard you. Free the Aldî-nîfaeti. You’re a broken record. Well, I did free two of them. You ought to count that as one in the plus column.”

  Bridget had no intention of freeing even one more demon. She had too much blood on her hands and wasn’t going to add another drop to it. Again the image of the museum guards popped into her mind. There had to be a way to keep Otter safe … other than him living in one of Adiella’s holes for the rest of his life.

  There had to be a way to get rid of the demon.

  The demon snarled at her, acid goo spilling over its bulbous lip and hitting the floor, sizzling. It belched a cloud of something noxious that made her head spin.

  “Free Aldî-nîfaeti,” it said, adding a string of words she couldn’t comprehend.

  “Adiella!” Bridget walked to the back of the shop, the demon stopping under the poster of the dog with a Frisbee and seeming to study it. “Frisbeetarianism is the belief that when you die your soul goes up on the roof and gets stuck,” she read. “My soul’s not going up.”

  She paused a moment, listening. Then: “Adiella!”

  Maybe the witch would show up here if Bridget kept hollering. Maybe her painfully triggering the ward at the shop door would alert Adiella, and the witch would arrive soon. Or maybe Bridget could find Adiella’s other holes if she rummaged around here for clues: that was what she’d anticipated doing by coming here.

  Bridget padded to the back counter, flipped the switch on a single fluorescent light that hung above it, and laid her hand flat against the side of the cash register. Maybe by using her psychometry to call up an image of the witch, Bridget could discover the woman’s whereabouts.

  Bridget’s palm tingled and her mind pressed in. The cash register gave up its details: Model 356 Brass National Cash Register, manufactured in 1909, a crack in the marble plate below the keys, good working condition, not cleaned or restored, value $900 dollars. Looking out from the cash register she caught a glimpse of the witch’s fingers, smooth in this image from yesterday, bedecked with baubles that might have been costume jewelry.

  Bridget watched Adiella ring up a customer’s purchases—a stack of more than a dozen paperback fantasy romance titles with scantily clad busty women and shirtless musclemen on the covers. The buyer was an elderly woman with wrinkles poorly masked by too much pancake makeup. The smile was nice, though, and her eyes looked engaging. She spoke Spanish.

  “Espero que la lectura de todos estos,” the old woman said. Bridget understood every word: I look forward to reading all of these.

  “Podrá disfrutar de ellos,” Adiella returned. “Vuelva cuando se necesita más.”

  Yes, lots of romance books, Bridget noted from the sign above a wide set of shelves. Still looking out from the cash register, she saw Adiella close up the bookstore and leave.

  Bridget removed her hand from the cash register, balled her fists and set them against her hips. What the hell had she really hoped to accomplish by coming here? Listening to an image of Adiella say where she was going, hopefully. Catching some comment about where the witch lived, where her holes were under the city. Bridget indeed might get one of those crucial tidbits of information, but it could take some time, delving deeper into the cash register or the counter or the stool worn smooth by the witch’s posterior, flipping through days or perhaps months with her psychometry. Or simply waiting until the witch showed up to open the store.

  The demon waddled toward her and reached out a claw, nudging her leg. “Unshackle Aldî-nîfaeti.”

  “Yeah. Yeah, I know, unshackle all the Aldî-nîfaeti feckers in New York.” Good thing the beast couldn’t wholly read her mind. It would know she’d never bust another Sumerian bowl again.

  Bridget unbuttoned her coat and took it off, draping it over the counter. Adiella obviously craved the heat and didn’t bother to turn down the thermostat even when she wasn’t here.

  She sat on the wooden stool and steadied her breathing, looking over the cash register to see the demon squatting in front of the counter, tracing a whorl in the wood floor with a talon. It still babbled, but softly, and nothing Bridget could understand other than “Aldî-nîfaeti” and “Dustin. Mmmmmmmm.” She wished she would have brought some coffee … or anything for that matter to drink. So thirsty. There was a small refrigerator under the counter, and Bridget cracked it open to see three bottles of Jarritos grapefruit soda, a package labeled chili-flavored salted plums, and a half-full jar of pinto bean dip. Maybe the witch had warded her larder, too; Bridget didn’t want to be on the receiving end again of Adiella’s magic. Besides, grapefruit soda didn’t sound thirst quenching.

  Just work, dammit, she told herself. Get to work and delve into this and find Adiella.

  Bridget reached for the cash register again, and then stopped, noticing an open shoebox just under the counter, filled with scraps of paper and business cards. Perhaps there were bills in there. Even though Adiella lived off the grid, chances were she had to pay bills for the shop, and maybe some other address or a phone number was listed. It was worth a look.

  The demon squatted in front of a sale rack and appeared to study the titles on the lowest shelf. It looked over its bumpy shoulder and regarded her. “Unshackle Aldî-nîfaeti. Else unshackle Otter.” It paused. Streams of putrid goo ran out of sores on its sides, disappearing before they struck the floor. “Mmmmmmmm.”

  She did her best to ignore the demon, brought the box out and sat it next to the cash register, started rifling through it, her fingers stiffening when something caught her eye. An ivory business card that felt like it had a linen content, dark brown small caps printing: Elijah Stone. And beneath that: Consultant. There were phone numbers and a FAX number.

  ***

  Twenty Eight

  “Why the hell would Adiella have Elijah Stone’s business card?” Had the witch been researching the demon for Bridget? Trying to find out more about researching its previous owner? She turned the card over and spotted an ink scrawl on the back that matched the address where Bridget had stolen the cursed briefcase.

  Researching the demon? Researching Stone? Bridget doubted it.

  “Well, let’s break the devil’s dishes and take a closer look.” Her heart felt like it was being squeezed, and a part of her said: put the card back, keep looking for Adiella, you don’t want to delve into this. But Bridget didn’t listen to that part. She closed her eyes and rubbed her thumb across Elijah Stone, felt the raised ink on the linen-stock business card, and let her senses dip inside, concentrating until she felt Stone’s manicured fingers on the card. Easing outward just a smidgen, she noted the card—and his hand—were in his pocket; and that there about a dozen other cards there.

  “More,” she coaxed, centering herself and hooking the tips of her shoes behind a rung in the stool to give her more stability. “Follow the card.”

  “You have acquired a demon,” Adiella pronounced.

  Bridget nearly lost her perch, hearing the witch’s voice. For an instant she thought Adiella had come into the shop, and then she realized the voice came from the image pulled from Elijah Stone and the card he held, from her exploring the m
emories of the paper. Adiella had appeared only inside her head.

  Bridget closed her eyes to better concentrate. Her senses spiraled outward, seeing Elijah in the bookstore, feeling his fingers nervously play with the corner of the business card inside his pocket, pull the card out.

  Then she saw Elijah push back from the counter. “A demon? You know for certain that’s what it is? It’s a demon? A real demon? Fire-and-brimstone from hell?”

  “An old demon, a soul beast.” Adiella shook her head. Bridget noted that the witch looked old in this image, cobweb strands of white hair protruding from a colorful scarf wrapped around her head.

  “Can you see it? This demon?” Stone asked. Bridget got a good look at him. Middle-aged, librarian-complexion pale, slightly paunchy, good-looking face though, strong chin. Fancy shoes, an expensive overcoat that he’d unbuttoned.

  The damnable briefcase at his feet.

  Bridget felt her blood boil. The witch had known about the briefcase prior to Bridget stealing it. She continued to let the image play out. She’d known about the demon affixed to it.

  “Did your … spell … whatever it was you did … let you really see it? The demon?”

  “See it? The beast is here? In my shop?” Adiella looked furious. “You brought a demon into my shop? You dare?”

  “Of course it’s in your shop.” Bridget noted that Elijah was sweating, probably had been for some time. Nerves or the heat of Adiella’s bookstore.

  “You dare! You brought it with you? You dare!” Adiella made the sign of the cross.

  “I can’t help but bring it with me! It goes where I go. I could have explained that if you’d—”

  Adiella interrupted him by mumbling. Bridget realized she was casting some sort of spell. “I cannot see the demon, no, Elijah Stone. “Where is it?”

  “Right next to me. It’s always right next to me. It’s staring at you.”

  “Ah, that is what I feel. I feel its eyes on me.”

  “So … get rid of it! That’s what I’m paying you three thousand an hour for, right? Get rid of it. That’s what I came here for, what Lady Lakshmi sent me here for. Just get rid of the damn thing.”

  Bridget’s heart hammered as the scene progressed. Her throat tightened as she realized how this was going to play out.

  “Is it gone?” Adiella asked after a fashion.

  “No. It’s not gone. It’s still watching you, and it’s babbling in some language I can’t understand. It’s always babbling. It only shuts up when I’m sleeping.”

  “This demon, describe it to me, yes.”

  “It’s fuckin’ ugly.”

  “In detail, please.”

  Bridget ground her teeth together, and she felt the card twist between her fingers. Still, she held to the image. Elijah Stone had described it accurately enough, though he’d left out the part about the rivulets of goo that ran down the beast’s hide.

  “It is not a demon I am familiar with, Elijah Stone. And I have faced many demons. I have exhausted my magic in an effort to sever this particular beast from you. It should have worked. My magic is strong. It should have worked, but it is a dominant demon that has attached itself to your soul. As I said, old. Very, very old. It defies me. And that it can hide from my sight … its power is great. You say it babbles?”

  Yeah, constantly, Bridget thought. In fact, when she opened her eyes to check on the demon, she saw it, still chattering in the background about its fellow Aldî-nîfaeti. It had moved along to the “classics” shelf, its claw running across the bindings. She kept watching the image nested in the back of her mind.

  “Powerful,” Adiella pronounced.

  “Powerful? Horrible is what it is. And it’s caused me nothing but grief. It’s ruined my life, ruined everything. It’s killed. Because of that … that … thing I have no one left in my life. My girlfriend, gone. My mother, sister, a niece. It’s never hurt me, just the women in my life I cared about. It’s just me now and that … that … damnable demon.”

  Oh. Dear. God. Bridget worked not to fall off the stool. Adiella had been told the demon was murderous and that it killed women close to Elijah Stone. Had the witch thought that because women were the victims … wait … had she wanted Bridget to be one of the demon’s victims? The witch hadn’t deduced that it also killed men. Apparently only the holder of the buckle was safe.

  “Lakshmi could do nothing, not exorcise it. And I cannot sever it—”

  “So why the hell am I here? Why—”

  “But unlike Lakshmi, I can save you, perhaps save your soul. I cannot sever it, but I can provide a remedy. And it is not such a difficult one, Elijah Stone.”

  “You can’t get rid of it, but you know—”

  “—someone who can.”

  “You came by this demon, Elijah Stone, by stealing it, yes?”

  “Pissmires and spiders,” Bridget cursed. “Yeah, I was set up.” She had a little trouble believing it was her ex-mother-in-law.

  “My magic told me that much, that greed is the trigger to the horrible curse. The covetous pockets of darkness in your soul stirred the demon and attached it to you. That man, the previous attendant, he lured you—perhaps not intending you specifically, but lured someone, you—to steal the demon. He must have divined the nature of his curse … and the remedy. You solved his ugly problem by willingly … eagerly, in fact … taking it on yourself. It is how the curse and the beast pass from one to the next. Greed, desire, ambition, those pockets of darkness, all of those things wrapped in the trigger.”

  “Curse. I am cursed. I stole the briefcase,” he admitted.

  “Thou shalt not steal,” Adiella whispered. The words were as loud as thunder in Bridget’s mind.

  The witch had never approved of her, of the thieving, smuggling, was openly happy when she and Tavio announced their divorce. And here Elijah Stone had walked into the bookshop and presented Adiella with an opportunity to curse Bridget. Adiella’s hands would be relatively clean.

  “I know someone who will steal it from you, Elijah Stone. I know an individual who will unwittingly take your soul beast and your curse and thereby save you.”

  “You do? How? When?”

  “Your address,” she said. “I will need that.”

  He smoothed out a crinkle in his business card, turned it over and scrawled an address. “That’s where I live.”

  “Eighty-Fifth and West End. Expensive.” She took the card and placed it in the little box where Bridget had found it.

  “How much will all of this—”

  “You owe me twenty-seven thousand, five hundred—”

  So Adiella made a good chunk of change and managed to get Bridget cursed in one of those proverbial fell swoops.

  “And this thief—”

  “Is very good.”

  Good? One of the best, Bridget thought.

  “The thief is very good.” Adiella put his check under the drawer in her cash register. “Now to the matter of the bait.”

  I took that bait, Bridget fumed.

  “The cuota, so to speak. You will have to put something valuable inside your Goodwill case. Lure the thief just as you were lured with that promise of a corporate secret.”

  My greed, Bridget thought, caused this. My greed, Adiella’s hatred. She missed some of what was said in the image.

  Adiella was talking again. “Nothing mundane, but something valuable. One hundred minimum, I would recommend. Two hundred. Three hundred if you can afford it. Truly, much more to be safe. Something very, very old and worth a great deal. The thief I will send your way likes very old things, antiquities. Things that are singular, one of a kind. It should be ancient.”

  “An antique.”

  Adiella cackled. “Ancient, I say. Babylonian, Assyrian.”

  “Babylonian?”

  “Egyptian, Persian, Osirian, even Mayan or Aztec or from an Ugir tribe … that is if you really want to be rid of your demon. Ancient, I said.”

  “A relic. You’re talking about a r
elic. Museum pieces.”

  “To be certain the thief takes your bait.”

  Adiella knew Bridget’s weaknesses. What was the saying by Gauguin? Concentrate your strengths against your competitor’s relative weaknesses. Adiella had done that.

  “Something that will fit in that briefcase.”

  “Of course. Something valuable. Who is this thief—”

  “Not your concern. I will tease the thief, Elijah Stone, to take the bait that you dangle.”

  “What’s to keep him from just taking the contents, leaving the damnable briefcase behind? What guarantee do I have that—”

  “Elijah Stone, just as you took the Goodwill briefcase because you thought something important was inside, this thief will take your briefcase. Then it will be … what is the expression? Yes, the demon will be the thief’s cross to bear.”

  “I almost feel bad about this, giving the demon to someone else.”

  “Thieves, Elijah Stone, deserve damnation. Buy something soon, yes. And something extra, something for me to use in the luring, a sweet treat to catch the mark’s attention. I will need that, a seeding. Then call me to confirm that you have the necessary bait.”

  The seed had been the shabti at the warehouse, the lure that led Bridget to Stone’s apartment and to the damnable case under his damnable bed and had started this damnable mess.

  Set up by Adiella, who clearly had no idea it would turn out like this.

  Adiella’s only son slain by the demon.

  Her grandson in jeopardy.

  What Adiella had wanted was for Bridget to suffer.