by P. R. Frost
I found an obscure and dusty tome translated by G.K.L. Smythe in the thirties from an even more obscure Italian scroll dating to the 1540s. It listed and described a myriad of demons. Most of them quite accurately.
This should have been in with the rare books but wasn’t in the best of condition.
The original had been written during the heart of the Reformation when Catholics accused Protestants of consorting with demons and monsters, and the Protestants accused Catholics of being the tools of the Devil Pope. They both had it wrong. The book was a true treasure nevertheless. I thumbed through it greedily.
“If you are looking for references to your monster dog, you won’t find it in that book,” a man with a clipped accent said from about a foot above me.
“How… how did you find me?” I looked up anxiously at the nerdy stranger from the skate park this morning.
“Would you sign my copy of your book? I’m afraid it’s a little dog-eared. I’ve read it three times. The picture of you on the back does not do you justice. It makes your hair look nondescript, but it really has a wonderful golden translucence.” He held Imps Alive open to the title page and produced a pen from his shirt pocket.
His slacks still had a sharp crease and the collar of his navy shirt lay flat and neat. He smelled faintly of a spicy and exotic aftershave. I wondered how he’d managed to remain neat, tidy, and clean after the chaos of this morning.
But then, he hadn’t fought a demon in the shape of a dog. I had.
The reminder brought back the burning intensity of the bite on my arm. Not as bad as before, but still uncomfortable.
“Only once have I heard a reference to your Sisterhood, Ms. Noncoiré. Perhaps you could enlighten me on their origins.” He looked over the top of his tinted, wirerimmed spectacles at me. “Is your imp around? I would dearly love to examine him, or is it a her?”
Chapter 4
The common brown bat can eat up to six hundred mosquitoes in an hour, including disease-carrying insects, and thus are necessary in controlling the spread of insect-borne viruses like West Nile.
“EXCUSE ME, WHAT are you talking about? Do you see an imp on my shoulder?” I blinked up at the tall meddler in wide-eyed innocence. His broad, long-fingered hands still clutched my book with an odd intensity.
Inside, I quaked with fear that he really could see Scrap sitting on my left shoulder.
Maybe he was just an obsessive fan. I’d run into them before, borderline stalkers.
He’d seen my scar.
“Your assistant?”
“Who are you, and why am I talking to you?” I made to move around the all-too-perceptive man before he saw more of my secrets.
What kind of powers did he have? Did I need to go into attack mode?
Nice evasion, Tessie-babe, Scrap snorted in my ear.
His gray skin had a faint pink tinge. He wasn’t happy, but he wasn’t about to transform. The base of my spine remained tingle free.
And yet this stranger knew about him. He’d seen my scar!
Scrap’s cigar smoke wafted in front of my nose. I resisted the urge to fan it away. A sneeze began building.
I had to bite my cheeks to hold it back. I wanted to wiggle my nose, but that would be a dead giveaway to my stranger that something was amiss. Or that he had touched upon the truth with his observations.
“Sorry.”The man actually blushed! “Guilford Van der Hoyden-Smythe.”
I stared at his proffered hand as if it were contaminated.
“Good day, Mr. Van der Hoyden-Smythe.” I clutched the treasured book to my breast and once more tried to pass him. He shifted slightly to block my path.
“The book does not mention the monster dog that was in the park this morning,” he said. “My friends call me Gollum.” Again he held out his hand.
“Gollum, as in the Tolkien character?”
“Gollum as in… Gollum.” He shrugged and looked uncomfortable.
“Have you read this book?” I held it up between us.
Then the translator’s name jumped out at me upon the cover. “G.K.L. Smythe.”
“My great-grandfather. I was named for him. So, of course, I have studied the book extensively. He inspired me to get a Ph.D. in cultural anthropology. The book covers only European myth and folklore. The dog’s attention to the Native American girl leads me to believe he derives from a more local tradition.” Van der Hoyden-Smythe paused for breath. But before I could reply, he plunged on. “Interesting that your imp did not assume the Celestial Blade configuration while you battled the beast.”
“I think you need to consult medical help for your imaginings. You seem to have lost touch with reality.”
I tossed him the book. While he grappled with it, I ducked beneath his arms and away from him. I’d come back later to buy the book if it was still there. If not, I’d find it online.
“With my luck, Guilford Van der Hoyden-Smythe deals in rare and antique books and has locked up every copy of that tome,” I muttered as I wended my way through the crowds of Saturday afternoon shoppers.
Hey, chickie-babe, you need a disguise? A greenish Scrap tweaked one of my stray curls, all the while puffing like a steam engine on his cigar. The smell nearly gagged me. I had to get out of the confines of Simpson’s.
When had I ever hastened out of a bookstore? Nearest thing to blasphemy I’d ever committed.
Blasphemy is a state of mind. I didn’t believe in anything anymore; therefore, I could not commit that sin.
“Just lose the cigar. Maybe that meddling stranger will follow the smell rather than me.” I dodged through the security detectors at a side door. Nothing in my tote set them off. A minor miracle. They usually reacted to the metal in my lipstick case, or something in the tampon packaging. Sometimes they just did not like Scrap.
I’d gladly have left the imp behind if the things had blared out their warning of theft.
I walked as fast as I could, without drawing undue attention.
As I ducked into the driver’s seat of my anonymous rental, I spotted Van der Hoyden-Smythe’s tall figure hastening toward me with long and determined strides. Some perverse inspiration made me honk my horn and wave at him as I merged into traffic. I turned two corners at the first opportunity and lost sight of him running behind me.
His offhand compliment lingered, though. I checked myself in the rearview mirror.
“Golden translucence, my ass,” I scoffed. Same old dishwater-blond curls packed into a tight mass. Though they did look a little lighter than usual in the evening light.
Now where, Tessie? Scrap eyed my cold coffee cup longingly. He’d gone back to his normal peckish gray.
I grabbed the tempting cream-laden coffee away from him and dumped the dregs out the window. “Back to the hotel and some downtime. I need to work. What’s on the schedule for tomorrow?”
The imp grabbed my PDA out of my purse. He handed it to me rather than fight the electronics. He hadn’t quite mastered the art of turning it on or tapping the screen with his talons. I dreaded the day he figured it out and moved on to my laptop. All I needed was his acerbic insertions into my novels.
Actually, I wondered, not for the first time, how he could manipulate physical objects in this dimension and yet weigh nothing on my shoulder and appear to have no mass. Another mystery for another day. Scrap didn’t talk about himself or his abilities often. He just did things.
“Nothing on for tomorrow but a flight home.” I glanced at the schedule page while driving one-handed up Broadway. “How did that happen?”
Remember how you bitched at the publicist that you had to have a week to work on your book? Scrap said.
He levitated to the dashboard and pointed excitedly at a cigar shop. He turned royal blue in anticipation of a new blend of tobacco.
I was mightily sick of black cherry cheroots. I ignored his wild gestures and salivating, though.
“I remember bitching. I don’t remember getting any time off from this interminable public
ity tour.”
You compromised on four days. Monday through Thursday.
Sunday, tomorrow, is travel day. Thursday morning we head out to the next convention. Scrap shifted his concentration to a department store with a display of perky autumn hats for ladies. He remained a happy blue, but not as intense a hue as when he wanted a new cigar.
“Then I presume I have airline tickets home tomorrow,” I commented absently. My concentration centered upon finding the shadowed driveway into the hotel’s underground parking garage.
Please, Tess, can we go back to the hat place? Scrap looked positively innocent sitting on the dashboard with his paws clasped neatly in front of him and his bat-wing ears folded downward. He’d taken on a lovely shade of lavender, one I hadn’t noticed before. His pleading color?
“What? No sarcasm? No demands? This must be important to you, Scrap.” I glanced away from the street for half a heartbeat and missed the driveway. Damn.
Now I had to go around the block again.
My skin turned clammy and my spine crawled as if big ugly bugs skittered up and down my back. I squirmed and twisted.
What? Scrap demanded. He scrambled around and around, turning deeper and deeper red. His big eyes moved back and forth and his ears twitched.
“Just a weird feeling.” I flipped on the blinker and turned right.
Park, babe. We got work to do.
“Now what?” I sighed. A car in front of a parking meter signaled his intent to merge into traffic. I let him, then twisted the wheel and claimed the spot.
The driver behind me yelled something obscene out his window and leaned on his horn.
I resisted flipping him the finger. No sense in aggravating him more.
Still sitting in the air-conditioned coolness, I unfastened the wraparound skirt and shed the overblouse.
The moment the light changed and traffic eased around me, I was out of the car clad in shorts and tank top. I barely remembered to pocket the keys after locking the vehicle.
“Think you can manage the Celestial Blade this time?” I asked Scrap as I jogged back toward the underground parking lot.
Scrap did not say a word. He became so insubstantial and colorless on my shoulder I had to look to see if he had remained in this dimension.
“I can’t do this without you,” I said quietly, mindful of the crowds on the sidewalk.
Still no answer.
I stopped short just shy of the shadowed entrance. My skin twitched all over my body. My heart rate sped up and my focus narrowed to a dark recess just beyond the last visible car parked against the right-hand wall. A cream-colored BMW, I thought. Maybe one of the Detroit luxury cars that tried to imitate a Beemer in styling.
Definitely not a Mercedes.
“Stand by, Scrap,” I whispered. Slowly, I edged into the structure, keeping to the shadows at the left of the door. From there, I could keep an eye on the sleek car and not be noticed. Hopefully.
The sudden relief from the relentless sunshine brought goose bumps to my arms and thighs. I did not know if I should welcome the coolness or heed it as an additional warning.
My eyes adjusted gradually to the dim lighting. I watched a tall man, silver streaking his dark hair at his temples, emerge from the luxury sedan. Long legs, nicely tailored dark slacks, and an equally dark knit shirt. For a moment I thought it might be Van der Hoyden-Smythe, but this man had broader shoulders and wore only sunglasses, not the thick spectacles of my stalker.
My senses continued to hum. A part of me knew that the sun neared the horizon. Twilight descended.
A tiny winged shape materialized out of nowhere in the dark corner above the cream-colored Beemer.
“Yeep!” A tiny sound of huge fear escaped my lips. It overrode the humming need to confront the menace in the garage.
I dropped into a quivering crouch, my head between my knees and arms covering as much of my head as possible.
A bat! All I could think of was the animal tangling its claws in my hair and yanking it out by the handful. Or worse, nesting in there.
The logical adult part of my brain called me an idiot.
The childish nightmare fears knew better. My newly attuned warrior senses had warned me there was a bat in here.
Up, Tess. Get up. We need to do something! Scrap implored.
I peeked through my crossed arms to see what had become of my imp. Surely he’d transformed into my Celestial Blade in the face of the evil vampire bat.
It’s just a little brown bat, and it’s gone, Scrap said. Did he whisper out of mutual fear?
I knew that. I hated my stupid phobia. But every time I caught a glimpse of the winged mammals, even on TV, my skin crawled and I grew short of breath. Panic overrode logic.
Then out of the corner of my eye I saw the man turn around and face me. His eyes seemed to seek mine. He removed his sunglasses. Our gazes locked. He smiled at me.
All my fears dropped away like water flowing over a deep fall, leaving me almost light-headed and giddy with relief.
The bat was gone. “Stupid, stupid, stupid,” I muttered to myself. “Grow up, bats can’t hurt you.”
At the moment I truly, I mean truly believed that.
I registered that the man’s smooth skin showed no signs of a five o’clock shadow on his prominent jaw. A deep dimple appeared in his left cheek as his smile increased.
My heart went pitter-pat in excitement.
All memory of the bat and my phobia disappeared.
He took two steps toward me.
I remembered that I had spent the morning at Dill’s grave site and backed out into the evening. No man could replace Dill. I did not want any man in my life again, not even a casual flirtation.
Whoa, Tess. Scrap pulled my hair with both paws as if yanking on reins. Why are we running from a fight?
“Hungry yet, Scrap?” I asked rather than face my own fears. Which was greater, the atavistic fear of bats?
Or the fear of finding another man attractive?
“I think we’ll explore Chinatown. You need a good dose of MSG to counteract the lactose intolerance.”
Don’t ask me why the food additive negated his noisome gas, but it did.
Can we stop at the hat place? my imp asked eagerly. There was that rust-colored one with the long feather. It would look spectacular with your new winter suit. He salivated into my hair. And maybe the cigar store?
Thank heavens he did not truly exist in this dimension and did not soak me with lavender slime.
“If you insist. I also want to go to the Chinese Gate and gardens. They are supposed to be spectacular, real landmarks. We should sightsee a little bit tonight before we pack to go home. Stay away from the hotel,” and this bat-filled garage, “for a while.”
If you say so, Tessie-dahling. I was born to serve. He produced a new cigar, already lit, and proceeded to blow smoke rings across my face.
“I’ll believe that when I see it,” I snarled at him as I pulled the car into traffic and sped away from my hotel and my phobias.
But did you stop to think long enough to wonder why your demon-sense started tingling before you knew there was a bat inside? You normally don’t react to bats until you see one.
Interlude
IMP LORE WILL TELL YOU that what drew me to the Timber Town Bar and Grill in Alder Hill, Oregon, that slushy day in early February two years ago was the potential warrior setting herself up to contract The Fever. I’d been drifting aimlessly around the Pacific Northwest for a few weeks gorging on mold, replenishing my energy reser ves after using all my wits and a good deal of my strength battling the Sasquatch who guarded the portal out of my home dimension.
I think it was all of the outrageous puns passed in a circle with each new round of beer that pulled me into the dim tavern that smelled of smoke, stale beer, peanut shells ground into the floor planks, and, of course, a wealth of mold. What better place to find mold than in the damp foothills of Mount Hood in February?
“Have you heard
this one?” called a man with a black beard and mustache that compensated for a balding head. “I swear it’s true; read it in the paper the other day.”
“What now, Bob?” A collective groan went through the crowd in anticipation.
“Some guy was arrested for throwing rocks at seagulls. But the judge let him off ’cause he took a vow to leave no tern unstoned!”
More groans and slurping of beer.
“Moldy oldy, Bob.”
“I got a better one,” Tess said. She slurred her words just a little and her eyes were rimmed with red from all the tears she had shed. I could tell she was hurting inside from the way her in-laws (or are they outlaws in this culture?) had cut her out of their grief. She needed to share her emotions, This crowd of her husband’s friends from science fiction conventions and colleagues from the local community college where he taught geology gave her the best outlet.
“We’re going to have to change all of the breakfast menus in this country. The restaurants are calling them ‘Pope’s Eggs’ rather than ‘Eggs Benedict’ now.”
“Boooooo!”
Someone threw peanut shells at Tess.
She ducked, laughing and crying at the same time.
“Dill told me that one just as we were going to sleep that last night. Before the fire broke out,” she said quietly.
I think I might have liked this guy Dill.
The room sobered instantly.
The Bob person began singing in a gravelly baritone, “There’s a bimbo on the cover of my book,” to the tune of “Coming ’Round The Mountain.”
“Come on, Tess, sing it, sing the greatest filk song ever written!”
Color drained from Tess’ face. More so than what her prim little black dress drained from her. She looked terrible in black, and I hoped she never had to wear it again.
“I can’t sing,” she choked and took a long draught of beer.
I think that was the beginning of the fever.
Anyway, the party broke up soon after. By this time Tess had me hooked. I had to follow her. She left the party with only one lingering look at the substantial house on the hill behind the white church with the red door. All of her hurt and anger and guilt for living when the love of her life had died so tragically saving her was caught up in the gaze.
