‘‘There are subtle differences. Shading around the gills and thickness of the webbing between the fingers. ’’ Jamie’s voice sounded light and easy, an ‘‘all the spells are working and we’ll be out of here by lunchtime’’ lilt. ‘‘I’ll go over them with you after we get out of here.’’
‘‘If we get out of here.’’
‘‘Caro, my girl. Have I ever led you astray?’’
‘‘Yes.’’ I fielded his surprised look and tossed it back. ‘‘That day you tracked me through the university library and told me that I absolutely needed to take you on as a partner.’’
‘‘Luckiest day of your life.’’
‘‘Even more than the day I broke my leg, lost my car keys, and found out that refrigeration won’t prevent demon eggs from hatching.’’
Jamie grinned brightly—the expression wavered as he looked me over. ‘‘Do I look as bad as you do?’’
‘‘How do I look?’’
‘‘Like an exploding cigar with legs.’’
I felt for my eyebrows, assured myself of their presence, then pushed my hands through my hair—the last couple of fireballs that the scuttle and his friends had tossed at us had whizzed a little too close. Hair’s still there. No shorter than it had been when we arrived at dawn and likely blacker than ever given all the soot floating around. It pays to wear black on this job. I gave the front of my T-shirt a self-congratulatory pat and raised a small cloud. ‘‘I’d say we look equally riveting.’’
‘‘Hottest housecleaners in town, in more ways than one.’’ Jamie took hold of my hand and squeezed. ‘‘So, that makes five, you said. One scuttle, two storms, a wattle, and a stench.’’ He glanced at his watch. ‘‘Ten ante meridiem, and we’re still in the Minors. Pokey little First Housers. Twelve demon Houses to go.’’
‘‘That agent didn’t expect to show this place today, did she?’’ I looked up at the ceiling and the floor joists visible through the gaping holes in the tiles. ‘‘I didn’t see a sign out front.’’
‘‘Kincaid Associates doesn’t do signs. They show by appointment only. You go to one of their offices, and look through their catalog—’’ Jamie mimed leafing through pages ‘‘—while they look through your bank account.’’
‘‘Doesn’t seem to be anything special about this place. Eight small rooms. Only one bathroom.’’ Besides the flame-scorched washer and dryer, I could see the smashed remnants of some storage cabinets. In one corner, a set of golf clubs. Assorted empty boxes. ‘‘Full basement’s nice, but still. Nothing special at all.’’ Beyond the fact that it came equipped with a passageway to the underworld and was infested with demons to a degree I had never before seen. ‘‘We should be able to pay it off eventually.’’
Jamie frowned. ‘‘What are you talking about?’’
‘‘Well, we broke it, didn’t we? You break it, you buy it.’’
‘‘We won’t have to buy it.’’
‘‘I always wanted a nice little ranch in the ’burbs.’’
‘‘Will you shut up?’’ Jamie worked into a sprinter’s crouch. ‘‘On the count of three, let’s go.’’
‘‘Go where?’’
‘‘To seal up the hole. Things keep emerging. We need to stop them. That’s our job.’’
‘‘I’ve already tried every sealing spell I know!’’
‘‘So, try one you don’t.’’ Jamie peeked over the top of the bin. ‘‘I have the utmost faith in your powers of improvisation.’’
‘‘I can’t—’’ I lifted my head as high as I dared, ready to dive back down at the first sign of further demonic hiccupping. ‘‘I can’t do it by myself. You don’t help, and I can’t—’’
‘‘One.’’
‘‘Damn it, Jamie Sheridan, if we live through this—’’
‘‘Two.’’
‘‘—I’ll bloody kill you myself!’’
‘‘Three!’’ Jamie plunged forward into the dark.
‘‘Did you hear me?’’ I scrambled to my feet and bolted after him, dodging around melted mangles and through a do-it-yourself passageway that had once been part of a wall.
‘‘You can kill me later.’’ Jamie slid to a stop behind the smoking husk of a television cabinet. ‘‘Having you kill me would be infinitely preferable to anything else that could happen, believe me.’’
I ducked in beside him and peered around the side of the cabinet. We stood in the finished half of the basement, which contained a fireplace, wet bar, and pool table. The remains of a pool table. Distant pool table memories.
Now, in its place, there was a hole. It had opened up unbidden soon after we’d arrived, swallowing the table, a throw rug decorated with an ace of hearts, and a small figure of a donkey holding a daisy in its mouth. It seemed to curve upward above the level of the floor, like a shallow bowl. It also . . . pulsed. Which didn’t make sense as there shouldn’t have been anything there to pulse, seeing as ‘‘nothing’’ was sort of the definition of ‘‘hole,’’ except— It’s like a vast black heart. If I concentrated, I could hear the sound it made, like the thrum you get when you crank up the volume on a set of cheap speakers. ‘‘It’s as though it’s alive.’’
‘‘It is.’’ The lightness had left Jamie’s voice. He seemed transfixed by the hole, like the proverbial deer in the headlights.
‘‘Does it lead down to Hell, you think?’’
‘‘Eventually. But it makes a few stops along the way.’’
I shivered, even though the area close to the hole had grown warm enough to make me sweat. ‘‘I might have something.’’ I had to repeat myself three times before Jamie finally looked at me. ‘‘It’s not an officially recognized spell. I read it in one of my mother’s grammars. It might not work.’’
‘‘All the ones you tried that should’ve worked didn’t. What’ve we got to lose?’’ Jamie tried to smile, but this time he couldn’t quite pull it off. ‘‘Don’t answer that.’’
I backed away from him, then stood still for a time, hands clenched. Fear had me by my soul’s throat, and my mind was a scatter. I needed to focus, to clear my head so I could concentrate. Normally, I’d fix on something innocuous, a plant or a picture frame or the sound of my own breathing. But everything down here had been either burned or broken, and my breathing stuttered in counterpoint to my heartbeat. I had nothing solid. I needed rock to stand on and could manage only sand.
Then came the throbbing hum, worming past my thoughts, offering itself to me. I trusted it like a salesman’s smile, but it was all I had. The only sliver of light in my darkness.
I stepped out from behind the cabinet. Shook off Jamie’s restraining hand and positioned myself before the maw. I had no trappings, no accoutrements. Candles, feathers, charms—all had been shattered or incinerated over the course of the morning. All I’ve left is me. Well, that’s what it always came down to in the end, didn’t it?
I closed my eyes, felt the vibration come up through the floor. Did you ever listen to a band at a club, and find yourself at just the right place in the room? That place where the sound hits your ears perfectly and the bass rattles your bones, settles in your sternum and takes over for your heart? Pumps your blood? Drives your brain?
I let the pulsing dark take me. Let it go to that special place in my brain. Let it open the door and release the words.
Let the beast trap itself.
‘‘Clean for the—’’ I staggered as the floor quaked. Scrabbled for the cabinet, missed, and fell backward. Felt arms close around me from behind and jammed my elbow back. Felt it connect with—
‘‘It’s me, you idiot!’’ Jamie held me, steadied me. ‘‘That got a reaction.’’ He pushed me upright but stayed close, hands resting on my hips. ‘‘Try the rest of it.’’
I stepped closer to the hole. Felt its heat through my T-shirt. It looked different now, the empty throbbing gone gray instead of black. The beat of the vibration had quickened. ‘‘Clean for the new. Cleansed of the—’’
The hole flared dirty white. The floor buckled upward and snapped like a whip end.
Three guesses who stood at the end of this particular whip. First two don’t count.
‘‘—ooold!’’ I flipped and spun through the air like a human daisy cutter. Luckily for my bones, I landed on an old overstuffed sofa. Unfortunately, the impact smashed it into the wall behind, sending loose chunks of wallboard and sheets of paper-thin paneling raining down. Shaken, but not stirred—lucky, lucky me.
I closed my eyes to keep the plaster dust out. Jamie must have thought I’d passed out because next thing I knew, he had crouched beside me and started patting my cheeks. ‘‘I’m fine.’’ I opened my eyes wide, then batted his hands away.
Jamie stared at me as if he didn’t believe me. His eyes looked strange in the half-light, the brown darker, the whites brighter. Crayon eyes. ‘‘Caro?’’ His voice sounded strange as well, throaty and rough, as though he had a cold.
‘‘I don’t think anything’s broken.’’ I moved my legs, and flexed my knees.
‘‘You’re fine.’’ Jamie’s voice sounded more normal as he worked to free me from the splintered pile. ‘‘Do you remember the title of that grammar?’’
‘‘Assorted Spells and Cookery.’’
‘‘Spells and Cookery. You’re sure this is a spell you’re remembering?’’ He grabbed my hand and pulled me to my feet. ‘‘I can see the headlines now. ‘Giant Beef Wellington Avenges Ancestors and Devours Town.’ ’’
‘‘You want to do this?’’ I yanked away my hand and brushed off a layer of plaster dust that had already mixed with the soot to form a milky gray layer. ‘‘Because I have reached the limit of my expertise.’’ I scratched my arm—the stuff irritated like itching powder. ‘‘I need help.’’
Jamie shook his head. ‘‘You’re the spellworker. I handle research and accounting.’’
‘‘No reason why you couldn’t try. You have some ability. I keep telling you this, and you keep blowing me off.’’ I took a step toward him—he took a step back. ‘‘We could double the power.’’
Jamie eyed the stairs the way a lost hiker would eye a cell phone. ‘‘I can go to the house and pick up your grammars.’’
‘‘I can’t handle this one alone. It isn’t a simple haunting or visitation. This is something else.’’
‘‘I can go to the house—’’
‘‘I don’t need more words. I need power, and I don’t have it. All you’d have to do is stand there and clear your mind. I’d hold your hands—’’
‘‘No.’’
‘‘Why?’’
‘‘No, all right. Don’t ask me again.’’ A darkness fell across Jamie’s face that had nothing to do with the surrounding dimness, a dying light in his eye that put an end to any argument. ‘‘I can’t help you.’’
‘‘What happened?’’ Behind me, I heard the noise from the hole elevate in pitch, paining my ears like a change in air pressure. ‘‘Someone died because of a spell you worked?’’ Jamie only looked at me, and I jammed my hands into my pockets to keep from grabbing and shaking him. No time—not for this. I needed him with me, and I knew that for the first time in the three years we’d worked together, he might not be there. Knew that the things in the hole would sense his inner turmoil and use it against both of us. Knew that we needed to talk, now, at this, the worst possible time. ‘‘You hurt someone . . . ?’’
‘‘Some people . . .’’ Jamie folded his arms, hunched against the fractured wall. ‘‘Some people shouldn’t do magic.’’ He looked at me, shrugged. ‘‘You’ve known a few. Something happens to them. They forget that others can break. That others can bleed, and weep. I’m one of those forgetful ones. I become . . . not myself.’’
I felt a rumble come up through the floor and rattle my knees. ‘‘Could ‘not myself’ close that hole? Because if it’s tears and blood you’ll be needing as payment, you could wind up with more than you’ll ever spend.’’ I looked back toward the hole. It had grown more active, the air around it shimmering dully, like tarnished silver. ‘‘I don’t know if it’s going to stay this small. I don’t know if the things we’ve seen come out of it are as bad as it gets or the point demons for something we really don’t want to see.’’ I took a deep breath, and uttered the words I dreaded. ‘‘We need to call in a specialist.’’
‘‘An exorcist?’’ Jamie shook his head. ‘‘Exorcists mean permits, and permits mean publicity. People call us because they want to avoid publicity.’’
‘‘People also call us when they want to get by on the cheap.’’ I positioned myself so I could watch Jamie and keep my eye on the hole at the same time. ‘‘I’m a housecleaner. An unlicensed technician. Simple spells for simple demons. Cleaning out the odd bodkin that gets caught in the corners.’’ The ceiling above the hole reflected movement in waves and flutters, shadowy hints of convection currents and steam and whatever else drew near the surface. ‘‘This isn’t something that got lost and wants help finding its way home. This wants to stay, and I can’t clean things that don’t want to leave.’’ I sniffed the air, and swallowed hard. That smell that hits you when you open a shed on a hot summer day and you know something crawled in there and didn’t get out in time . . . that smell. ‘‘Our client—’’
Jamie watched the hole now, too. ‘‘Rina Kincaid.’’
‘‘Rina Kincaid.’’ I had only caught a glimpse when she visited the office. Patrician blonde. A navy blue suit so severe you could slice a finger on the seams. ‘‘She underestimated her problem. She needs to call—’’ My heart skipped as something struck my arm, then started beating again when I realized it was Jamie tapping me with his hand to get my attention. ‘‘What’s wrong?’’
He pointed toward the shattered television cabinet. ‘‘We have company.’’
I looked toward the cabinet. Saw nothing. Squinted to try to sharpen the gloom and saw only diffuse shadow.
Then the shadow darkened and began to flow toward us. Stopped. Then started to flow again, more slowly this time, as though it knew we’d seen it but thought it could fake us out all the same. See—I’m moving so slow that you don’t see me . . .
‘‘What is it?’’ I looked at Jamie, who watched it draw near with what I had come to call his ‘‘science stare,’’ curious but detached.
‘‘Could be a shadow or a stench.’’ He sniffed and winced. ‘‘Stenches usually have a more solid form, though.’’
‘‘If it’s a stench, we can’t make any sudden moves—’’
‘‘—or it could go off like a skunk. I’m glad you remember that from the last time.’’ Jamie smiled sadly. ‘‘Not much imagination to these names, is there? Scuttle. Stench. They are what they appear to us to be and nothing more. Not much of a life.’’
‘‘You always say things like that. It’s as if you feel sorry for them.’’ I struggled with the urge to step out of the way as the demon drew near and the smell grew stronger. ‘‘Is it dangerous?’’
‘‘It could nauseate you.’’ Jamie edged his foot toward the stench. It wrinkled to a halt, then straightened and curved around his shoe like a ghost of a reptile. ‘‘Ruin your clothes.’’
‘‘Like that’s an issue at this point.’’ I tried to side-step the demon, but as soon as I moved, it sped up, snaking out a tendril that wrapped around my ankle while the rest of it formed into a ball and stilled in front of me.
Then, slowly, it stretched out until the front half rested atop my shoe.
‘‘I’ve never seen anything like this.’’ Jamie’s voice emerged soft with wonder. ‘‘I think it’s laying its head on your foot like a dog.’’
I looked down at the shadowy mass and imagined it staring up at me with rheumy, bloodshot eyes. ‘‘It’s making some sort of noise.’’ I strained to hear it through the hole hum. ‘‘Kind of like wheezing.’’
Jamie bent close to the stench, and listened. ‘‘Snoring. ’’ He looked up at me with watering eyes. ‘‘I think he fell asleep.’�
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‘‘How can you possibly tell that it’s a ‘he’?’’ My head started to pound as another sound cut to the front of the line, past the humming and the demonic snoring. The worst sound of them all. ‘‘Did the front door alarm just beep?’’
Jamie looked down at his watch. ‘‘Oh, hell!’’
I fought to stay upright as the floor rippled and the stench slid off my foot and darted into a corner. ‘‘I don’t think you should say that word.’’
‘‘Hello?’’ A woman’s voice, from the head of the basement stairs. ‘‘Jamie?’’
Jamie closed his eyes. ‘‘We’re—we’re down here, Ms. Kincaid!’’
‘‘Kincaid?’’ Just when you thought things couldn’t get worse, fate went and slammed your fingers in the door. ‘‘What is she doing here?’’
‘‘I told her we’d be finished by eleven.’’ Jamie’s face flared. ‘‘Don’t give me that look—this has never happened before. This is Elysian Fields subdivision, not the House on Haunted Hill.’’
‘‘You never saw Poltergeist, did you?’’
‘‘Yes—you forced me to watch it three times. Need I remind you that it was a movie.’’
‘‘In my house, it was a training film. This is what happens when you get in over your head. This is when a smart housecleaner bails and calls a pro.’’ I looked around the blasted basement and swore under my breath while the stairs squeaked, announcing our client’s descent.
Rina Kincaid wore taupe and pearls and held a thin brown briefcase in one manicured hand. ‘‘I’m sorry I took so long—’’ She stopped in her expensively shod tracks, eyes widening as the condition of her surroundings sank in. ‘‘What—?’’
‘‘Ms. Kincaid.’’ I nodded to her but kept my distance. Every time I moved, I shed plaster dust and soot, and I didn’t want a bill for a designer suit on top of my impending mortgage payment. ‘‘You have a portal problem, which is beyond the expertise of any housecleaner. We can’t help you, but I can refer you to one of several discreet licensed practitioners.’’
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