by Ira Robinson
"Are you really not that bright, boy?" she hissed, turning away from him to sit on a small stool next to a table covered in objects he couldn't recognize. The rest of the cave, too, seemed to be filled with all the cast-offs she could not fit into the main part of her shop, and she looked tiny in comparison to the great rows of dark wooden shelves everywhere.
Her words made him indignant. "I guess I am, Talia. Why don't you enlighten me?"
"Don't get pert with me. You're the one that came to see me, remember?" She sighed, a rattling in her lungs spilling into the silence of the room. She fixed her gaze on him, drawing his eyes toward her own. They stood like that for a few moments before she finally gestured at the other stool nearby.
He moved to it, huffing as he put his weight on it. It creaked a bit as he settled and he wondered if it would hold; it had to be as old as the rest of the place. But it remained steady and he let himself relax into it as he leaned his elbows on the empty spot on the table in front of him.
"You can't expect to interfere with the balance of power and not have repercussions, boy." She shook her head and coughed a little. Reaching for a ceramic cup next to her, she sipped it while he mulled over what she said.
"I didn't think I was doing that much," he responded, shrugging.
"You've done more than you realize. Going after a tempting demon is one thing. They hardly matter in the scheme of things, doing nothing more than pushing people to do what they already have it in their hearts to do. Destroy it, and there are ten more to take its place." She prodded his arm, ramming her finger into the scar embedded there. "But when you start messing with the big power players, you're upsetting the whole cart. Can't you see that? Are you that much of a fool?"
"Listen," he sputtered, jerking his arm back. "I don't have any choice. It's not just myself I am doing this for. I have someone I have to answer to, and if I don't do what he says, I risk everything!"
He waved his hand toward the front of the shop, beyond the solid door. "I risk my little girl, and I can't let that happen!"
She nodded, not fazed by the vehemence of his words, but leaned back from him as he shouted. She waited for him to settle for only a moment.
"You don't understand anything, do you?" she asked, her head trembling from more than her age.
He opened his mouth to retort but was interrupted by a loud squeal, echoing through the room. He whipped his head around and stared at the closed door, a gasp flying from his throat.
It was Lisa's scream.
He bolted up from the stool, kicking it aside as he whirled and burst to the exit, flinging it open with a crash as the wood pounded against the wall behind it. His feet flew toward the front of the place, where, shadowed by the light from outside, four figures stood.
Jessup was massive, grown to three times his size, the fur on his body matting out as his true form asserted itself. A low rumble of a growl swept the building as the dire wolf backed away two steps and bent down, making himself ready to pounce on the tall figure clad in black standing next to Lisa.
She was trying to cringe from the skinny man, his face a jumble of tattoos and scars of his own, his dark skin barely visible beneath it all. Two earrings dangling from his ears moved back and forth as he grasped her arm while the other hand reached for her cheek.
Jessup leaped with a furious howl, his jaws cavernous as the teeth gleamed in the yellow-white light streaming in through the hazy windows, saliva dripping down. In a heartbeat that mouth clamped down on the outstretched arm, gnawing into it through the thick padding of the clothes of the tall man, who screeched in pain.
Carver ran, his heart pounding within his chest as he raised his hand and felt the dam ready to release the instant he commanded it, while the other two figures behind the big one grinned, their demonic faces wide and gaping, barely more than skulls and skin.
The man flung his elbow aside, slashing out at Jessup. The hound yelped as the punch slammed into him, knocking him backward toward the far wall. He tumbled to his side, but got up in an instant and made to jump again.
Another scream from Lisa as she cowered, her hands raising to knock away the touch of the tall being accosting her.
The light within Carver's hand flared, and he howled in rage at the guy and his audacity to touch his daughter.
"Stop!" a voice said behind him, so loud it reverberated against the walls, shaking every object held on them. The force of it knocked Carver from his feet and he saw, as he jumbled forward, the others suffering the same.
He bounced back up and turned briefly, seeing Talia's face lit by a blue and red swirling ball of light hovering over her outstretched palm.
"I will have none of this here." Her shout, as loud as it was before, raised the dust from the books and artifacts, pelting them all.
Lisa scuttled backward, edging away from the figures in front of her, until her spine met a shelf and she could go no further. Jessup made ready to launch himself at the man again, but Carver shouted for him to stay and the hound obeyed, but the slaver from his jowls poured to the floor, along with bits of blood left behind from the arm of the stranger.
"I see you'll grant your services to any sort of rabble," the man said, his voice high-pitched but steady. His eyes were on Carver, his body slightly bent, bracing for any moves Carver might make. "I thought you had better wisdom than that, old woman."
"I deal with whom I wish, Indris, and none of it is your concern." Talia's own tone was much stronger than it had been, perhaps from the excitement, or tapping into a well of power Carver didn't know she had.
Indris. Carver looked the man up and down, recognizing the name.
He had been a king, at some point in the distant past, thoroughly nasty in ways most people could not imagine. His life was one of decadence and depravity, and instead of seeing it come to an end, he made an arrangement with a demonic force to sustain his body, gladly giving himself over to the service if it meant staying alive.
Once residing in his Middle Eastern kingdom, he now lived somewhere between life and death.
"What the hell do you want?" Carver growled, inching himself toward the man. He spared a glance at Lisa, who was getting to her feet and holding her fists out, ready to engage with him should he move at her again.
"You'd be surprised," the man hissed, his lips parting into a grin. "But I saw you come in, and I told my friends here I just had to see the Hallow for myself." He gestured toward the two demons accompanying him. They shifted, their fingers stretching out like claws. "I must say, I am disappointed. I thought you'd be more."
Carver's own opened wide as he asked, "More what?"
Indris pointed to Jessup, his legs bent low and an angry gasping growl still seeping from his mouth. "More than a cur, like your little pet there."
Carver's feet moved of their own volition, stalking toward the tall man in black clothing, a twisted version of a suit. He raised his hand, the edges of the symbol embedded there beginning to form a light.
He was gratified to see the pair of demons behind Indris step backward, their backs bumping into the door to the outside street.
Indris, however, turned his head and smiled even wider at Lisa, his tongue slicking out from between his teeth. She cringed again, but Carver rushed between the two of them, blocking her from the sight of Indris.
"Get out, right now," Talia shouted, her body much closer than he realized, no longer bent and frail but standing with her back straight and the ball of blue fire sending intolerable heat all around.
Crunching and scraping came from outside as the footsteps of the giant golems came toward the shop. A bass groan shook the building as they approached.
Indris raised his own fist and Carver made ready to fire his light, the power welling up from deep inside as his hatred for this man and all he stood for fueled his ire.
But the man did nothing, merely waved toward the people in the shop, the sleeve of his jacket ripped and shredded from the bite Jessup gave, but Carver could tell the skin
beneath was already knitting together again.
"We'll meet each other again soon," Indris said, looking past Carver.
The fingers snapped and he, along with the two demons behind him, dissolved away, the whoosh of air as the vacuum created by their teleportation filled again.
The light faded from Carver's fist and he clamped down on his power, though it wanted desperately to be released. The huge torso of the first golem slid into view, the front of the building trembling with the great weight of the monstrous stone creature, a pure creation of magic.
He turned and saw Tania's ball of flame whirl out of existence and her body beginning to return to the same old woman he first encountered in the shop.
But her position was strange, and as he spun his head from Lisa back to Tania, he realized it was not the elder Indris had been smiling at and said the last words to.
It was Lisa.
Chapter 12
The shoe box was old, perhaps more than Carver himself.
The cardboard was tattered in some places, thin and thread-bare, dust coated parts of it in patterns, but it was no matter. He didn't pull it off of the shelf often enough to warrant replacing it.
He hated having to take it down at all, but there were times when it called him, louder than any sound his sensitive ears could harness, and impossible to ignore, since it was a part of himself in so many ways.
The past few hours had been hard, among the worst he could remember in a long time. Lisa was inconsolable. As strong as that child was, as ready as she thought she might be for a fight, there were some things she was not prepared to face.
The wicked grin of Indris was one, and the companions he had with him were the first real glimpses she personally had of the demonic.
She was still shaking when he led her to bed and helped her in, starting only moments after they were shooed from Tania's shop. Jessup had returned to his smaller dog form, the adrenaline kick that changed him over into the dire wolf faded with the removal of Indris from his presence, but he remained at Lisa's side every second. His steady nose snuffled the air frequently, trying to glean the scent of evil in any way he could.
Carver did not force him from his daughter. Encouraged his behavior as much as possible, in fact. He had no doubt the animal would do anything in his power to make sure nothing happened and would give early warning if there were any signs of trouble.
She didn't want the light in her room turned off, and Carver could not blame her. He crept from her bedside as soon as she seemed to fall into at least a fitful form of sleep. Jessup was still awake, but laying down beside her, lending Carver an almost imperceptible nod as he backed from the chamber and tipped the door most of the way closed.
By the time he reached his basement den, he, too, felt the shakes, his insides quivering uncontrollably as he plopped into the chair and breathed a sigh of relief.
Not right. None of what happened made any sense at all.
Indris had practically begged for Carver to attack him. What did he expect to get out of it? For Carver to be attacked by the golems and destroyed? To be able to claim vindication and justice at the destruction of the Hallow at the hands of beings who were hardly more than semi-intelligent stone statues?
What kind of game was the demon king playing? What temptation of fate was he getting at by appearing in Tania's shop to begin with, knowing if he touched Lisa, there would be consequences? Had Carver not so much respect for Tania, herself, he feared the threat of the golems coming down on him would do little to assuage him from doing everything in his power to destroy that heinous being once and for all, just for touching his daughter.
The look on his face before he left made Carver shake with an unquenched desire to grab the thing by his throat and mangle it into uselessness with his bare hands.
The demonic world had reason to hate Carver, thirsted for his blood the same as he did theirs, he was sure. Was that enough for Indris to do what he did? Or was there something else going on? Carver could not quite grasp it because of his anger and being too close to it all.
None of it was right. None of what happened had sense, and whenever Carver felt that way, the forcefulness of the old need asserted itself.
He pried the lid from the box and set it aside on the wooden desk. The weight of it was not much, but as it crossed over his thighs, he could barely look into it, his hands following the familiar ritual without pause.
He needed answers. Things were happening beyond his control and there were so few reasons for it all. They taunted him, scattering his thoughts just as it seemed he could grab them, haunting him even here in the place he considered to be the safest, his sanctuary from the outside world and the horrors that waited every step he took.
If only he could talk to Biel. He could force the answers from that bastard, drag them from him if need be. It would not matter to Carver if the powers he wielded came from that thing or not, he would use everything at his disposal to make sure he walked away with the knowledge he needed.
But the communication between the two of them had always been one way, from Biel to Carver, and he had no means of being able to reach him, to call him and drive the truth from his throat.
All the times he tried before had been to no avail, an empty response until, maybe days after, the next mission target was given.
Biel was a part of all of this, Carver had no doubt. What part he played was unfathomable, and Carver despised feeling like he was little better than a pawn. But for all the power he had, for all the abilities he possessed to rid the world of any demonic influence he chose to focus upon, he was an errand boy for a struggle in the heavens he could not even see.
It galled him, rankled him to the core.
Carver glanced into the carton, its contents as familiar to him as the scars lining his skin, and just as upsetting to look at.
He wasn't sure why he kept them around, really. Maybe they were a reminder of the person he used to be, and that was, somehow, important to him. It seemed silly, but in some ways the substances of the box were more real to him than most of the past three years of his life had been.
The baggie was small, sitting in a corner, the lump within still containing a potency his mind screamed he needed. The gleam of the needle as it reflected the dim light was a sight he had seen dozens, hundreds, of times and was always grateful.
He touched the syringe, running his fingers over the lines of it, the dimples of the markings on the plastic showing the measuring spaces inside Braille-like and solid, and he closed his eyes with the sensation.
One more fix, a tiny bit to take the edges off of the need, the fire within burning so hot he could almost die. The feel of the needle as it pricked the skin, sliding into the deep vein beneath and forcing the liquid embers in, their warmth suffusing every iota of his being as the high smacked like a meteor into his consciousness.
Oh it was all familiar. All so comfortable, a friend unseen for so long one might expect tension, yet picking up a conversation that had been taking place with no effort, as if no time had passed at all.
All so natural. Why not do it? His hands knew the movements it would take to make the hit ready, to snatch a taste of the freedom he craved so badly.
Carver opened his eyes again and stared down at the companions that had kept him in good company, the thing in his life he thought he could command in those days after Sasha was gone. Oh sure, some things had to be out of his grip, such as ensuring the fix could be found and the cops could be avoided. But that was always simple for him. It was a matter of who you knew, and how well you could hide the fact that the monkey was riding your back like a crazed cannoneer.
The touch, though, the sensations, the way and amount he put into his veins, that was in his control, and that was good enough.
Even as powerful of a being as he might be now, Carver felt he had more authority over his life in those days of addiction than he currently did. The lack of communication with Biel, the way he was treated like a servant dog instead
of an equal, the expectation that he would do and ask no questions, all for the sake of being out of control, these things and more wracked Carver with guilt and weakness he could not afford.
Biel did not have to mediate a daughter who still cried out for a mother who wasn't there and would never be back again. He did not have to watch his child laying in a bed in the hospital as the life slowly seeped out of her inch by inch. He didn't have to deal with the threats against that small life that depended on Carver so much. For all Carver knew, the first meeting between the two of them never really happened, and he had been set on this path by something else entirely.
That he had his skills was real, though, proving at least something took place that night in the flop house, and his physical need for the nails the needles provided gave him assurance what he perceived true now was something.
