by S W Vaughn
Another pause. She could just about hear Angie’s jaw clench. Finally, her sister said, “I thought you were dead. Now I’m disappointed.”
She actually felt the punch in those words. It landed right in her gut and knocked the wind from her. She’d anticipated fury and shouting. This flat dismissal was much worse. She couldn’t even come up with a response.
“What do you want? Money? A place to crash? Fuck you. Crawl back in your hole.”
“Rehab,” she blurted, and some of the pain cleared. “I’ve been in rehab. Six months. I’m clean, Angie. I’m getting my life back together.”
“Well, good for you.” Sarcasm twisted through the phone. “Dad’s dead.”
“What—”
“Five months ago. Heart attack. Gone.” Angie clipped out the words with machine precision. “So were you.”
The bubble of grief welling in her chest was a shock. She hadn’t expected to feel anything for the man who’d delivered a command performance at having only one daughter, who blamed her for the death of a mother she’d never known, the woman who died giving birth to her. Who’d get drunk and chase her around the house with a butcher knife, screaming it should’ve been you! You should have died! Not her!
The man who’d suddenly decided, around her sixteenth birthday, that Invisible Girl should take over the bedroom duties of his deceased wife.
Angie filled the silence she left. “I tried to find you. I even went to Crystaltown. God, that place. Nobody knew who I was talking about, or else they were too fucking stoned to care.”
“I’m sorry.” She wasn’t sure whether she was saying it about Dad or because Angie had gone looking for her. Either way it didn’t matter. “Where was he—”
“Don’t pretend you give a shit, Logan. If you did, you wouldn’t have…” For just an instant, her sister’s cold front wavered. There was a muffled sound that was almost a sob. Then the bitch returned full force. “Don’t call me again. Far as I’m concerned, you’re dead too.”
It took a minute to realize Angie had hung up. When it penetrated, she dropped the phone on the table as if it were diseased. Some closure. Well, at least now she could try to work through whatever she felt on her own, without trying to factor in her sister’s thoughts. Or her father’s.
She told herself she wouldn’t cry about it, even while the tears rolled down her face.
* * * * *
It had taken Jaeryth nearly a full day, but he’d worked out how to get Logan back. Unfortunately, his superior was not going to be pleased with his plan.
When night fell, he made his way to Independence Hall and took the stairs to the basement, then a second set of stairs leading further down. These stairs existed only in Shade. The first room in the sub-level contained a few dilapidated chairs, a desk not in much better shape than the chairs and a door at the far end that was always locked. Behind the desk sat a female Tempter who didn’t so much as look at him when he entered. Not surprising. He took a seat and the Tempter said without glancing up, “Are you expected?”
“Likely not.”
“Wait, then.”
“I’d planned on it.”
He settled back and folded his arms. Already the increased heat pressed against his skin and formed beads of sweat on the back of his neck. By the time the DIC deigned to see him, his clothing would be soaked through.
For a time he studied the scorched walls, and occasionally felt the rumble of a train blasting through the Underground below. The demonic transportation system left something to be desired. He rarely used the trains himself, preferring to navigate air currents through mortal space. It took longer—but it smelled better.
After nearly an hour, the Tempter behind the desk acknowledged Jaeryth’s existence. Reacting to nothing apparent, she looked up with a bored frown and said, “Ronwe will see you now.”
“Excuse me while I leap for joy.” He stood and stretched the stiffness from his spine, thinking once again what a bad idea this was. Ronwe, demon-in-charge of Philadelphia and its suburbs, did not like him. Thought he was after the job. And definitely didn’t believe Logan was a prophet. Still, he hadn’t been able to come up with a better plan.
He crossed to the massive red doors leading to Ronwe’s office. “Shall I bow or curtsy?”
The Tempter waved a hand and the doors opened.
He walked inside with murmured thanks that were also ignored. Calling this cavernous room an office was an insult to working demons. It was a damned temple. Took up most of the entire floor and it had been difficult to transport the furnishings into Shade. He knew—he’d been ordered to help when Ronwe claimed Independence Hall for a dominion.
To the left was a massive conference table flanked by chairs with skull headrests. Real skulls, of course, designed to make sure everyone was as uncomfortable as possible in Ronwe’s presence. Shelves of ancient tomes lined the right. Several hundred candles lit the room, connected by thick and blackened cobwebs. A cauldron-sized eternal flame pot marked the halfway point between the door and Ronwe’s desk.
The doors slammed behind him. Candles flickered. “Jaeryth. How unexpected.”
“You’ve had an hour to expect me, Ronwe.” He moved down the room, skirted the flame pot and stopped several feet before the desk. “Funny. You don’t look busy.”
Ronwe stared at him. The head demon appeared every inch a businessman, from his sharply tailored suit to the ruthlessness carved into his lean features and radiating from his focused brown eyes—which had a tendency to flare blood-red on occasion. Often that flash of color was all the warning Ronwe gave before pain was caused, either by him or his lieutenants, who seemed conspicuously absent.
As though reading Jaeryth’s mind, Ronwe raised a hand and gestured, and two bulky shapes materialized from the shadows behind his chair. Kyr and Lazul, in full demon form, came forward with steps like thunder. Ronwe’s lieutenants were powerful, fiercely loyal—and Lazul, at least, possessed as much intelligence as brawn.
Kyr didn’t need intelligence. He carried a massive spiked club.
“I assume you’ve come here with something important to say, Jaeryth.” Ronwe leaned back casually in his chair, as though he’d already dismissed the conversation without ever having it. “Because if you haven’t, I’d suggest that you leave now, before I decide to let Kyr use you for target practice.”
Kyr bared his fangs in something that resembled a grin. “Don’t go, Jaeryth. Stick around.”
Jaeryth bit back an acid response. “I want to take a few days off,” he said. “Perhaps a week—”
“No. Anything else?”
He forced himself to stay calm. He’d anticipated this. “My district is in excellent shape,” he said. “It would take a miracle to reverse the damage we’ve done. Xanu can handle maintaining things for a few days.”
“Xanu would fail to corrupt a lawyer, given half the chance.” Ronwe straightened slowly, his cold gaze never leaving Jaeryth. “We’re stretched thin as it is. There are barely enough demons to cover this city and I won’t risk losing ground.”
“You mean you won’t risk having Samael discover that you can’t cut it without me and offering me your job.”
Kyr growled and lunged forward.
A single gesture from Ronwe halted the brutish lieutenant. “Fortunately for you, I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” he said. “Punishing you formally would require too much paperwork. It would also cause the same problem as giving you time off, which is removing you from your duties. Much as I loathe admitting it, you are very good at being bad.” He frowned and folded his hands on the desk. “The answer is still no. Lazul, Kyr…please escort the quartermaster out.”
“With pleasure.” Lazul offered a cold smile and both lieutenants started around the desk.
Though Jaeryth knew it was an exercise in futility, he had to try. “Logan’s left the city,” he said. “I want her back.”
“Stop.”
The lieutenants froze—Kyr with obvious
reluctance. Ronwe rose from his seat with a glare that could have boiled an iceberg. “Jaeryth. Are you telling me that you came to me with a disruptive, pointless and potentially damaging request, just to fuel your ridiculous obsession with this mortal woman?”
“She’s a prophet, Ronwe.”
Ronwe’s eyes flashed red. “Out.”
Before he could blink, Kyr and Lazul were flanking him, each with a taloned hand gripping an arm and digging into his flesh. Then Kyr spun the club and rammed the butt end into his stomach.
His knees buckled and he sagged breathlessly in their grip.
“Oh, and Jaeryth,” Ronwe called as the lieutenants dragged him toward the doors. “If I find out you’ve gone after this mortal, which I am now officially forbidding you from doing, I will flay you open front to back and leave you hanging in the square for a week. With the proper paperwork, of course.”
Jaeryth managed to glare silently at him. He’d let Ronwe think he would cooperate for now—but with or without his permission, he was going after Logan. Soon.
Chapter Three
Recovering addicts were supposed to be plagued with excessive sleep. But the night stretched on to the small hours and Logan’s eyes refused to close. By one in the morning, she gave up and got out of bed.
The talk with Angie hadn’t helped. Her sister had always known what to say that would hurt her the most. Bitchzilla had outdone herself this time.
She lit a cigarette, wandered into the cat-laden living room and switched on a lamp. God, it was quiet here. The silence gnawed at her like a bone. After years of constant noise, this was a false peace that invited temptation.
Her stomach voiced a protest that she’d skipped dinner. She frowned at it and briefly considered trying the cat food. It probably wasn’t much worse than Thursday night chipped beef at the clinic. The idea that she’d have to cook for herself from now on lurked somewhere in her mind, vague and threatening. For six months she’d been served three meals a day—not that she could manage to eat that often, but she’d tried. Before that it was scrounging whatever food happened to be lying around at whoever’s place she found herself. When she bothered eating at all.
She started for the kitchen. There were bowls, a can opener, a microwave. She could handle warming up peas or something. Halfway there, she stopped. They’d passed a convenience store on the way here. One of the hundred Wawas in the area. Couldn’t have been more than three blocks away.
Nothing stopped her from leaving this house whenever she wanted. She didn’t need a pass, didn’t have to check in or out with anyone. And she wouldn’t be subjected to a search when she came back. She was accountable only to herself.
A frightening thought. She was the last person she’d trust.
It took more willpower than she expected to walk out the door. By the time she closed and locked it—as if anyone would want to steal a bunch of used cat paraphernalia—clammy sweat filmed her skin. She caught a breath and descended the steps of the low-slung porch.
No orderlies burst out after her. No stern-faced security guard demanded her pass. Her only observers were a bright nickel moon and more stars than she ever imagined existed. For a moment she stood on the sidewalk, pinned in place by the sheer weight of freedom.
Finally, she forced her feet to move.
At first every step required a conscious effort. One foot forward, then the other. Repeat as necessary. The first block seemed to stretch forever. But she reached a side street, crossed without even a suggestion of traffic—and when she hit the other side, the storm within her calmed. The slight tremble she’d barely noticed left her hands. Her breathing evened and her coiled muscles relaxed. She could do this.
Four more blocks took no time. A blaze of florescent lot lights made a beacon of the Wawa, and she was surprised to see three cars slotted in front of the store and another at the pumps. Good to know there were other human beings populating this sleepy town.
She pushed through the door. Machine-cooled air and canned music enveloped her as she stepped inside. The woman behind the counter spared her a glance and went back to swiping the credit card of a man in grease-stained Carhartt coveralls. Besides them, there was an elderly man standing before a wall rack of newspapers and magazines, engrossed in the day’s Inquirer, and three teenagers—two boys near the auto supplies, one girl in the chips aisle.
Logan turned down the first row and tried to decide what she wanted to eat. Preferably something that didn’t require cooking. Cereal wasn’t a bad option. Or granola bars or Pop Tarts. There was yogurt if she felt like being healthy. Maybe something salty—chips, crackers, peanuts. Or sweet, like snack pies. Ice cream. Snickers.
Christ. Why did there have to be so many choices?
She reached the end of the aisle and turned absently. The two teen boys had migrated to the back of the store and stood in front of racks filled with over-the-counter medicine, their backs facing her. One wore an oversized blue windbreaker that hung almost to his knees, the other a plain long-sleeved black shirt and black pants. The one in black leaned in and whispered to the other. Windbreaker turned his head and caught the girl’s attention two aisles away, and she gave a bare nod and headed for the counter.
Windbreaker reached out slowly, hesitated. The black-clad boy whispered again and his buddy completed the reach and grabbed a box of pills from the shelf. He threw a furtive glance over his shoulder.
“Excuse me.” The girl’s voice rang loud as she hailed the clerk. “Hey. I was in here yesterday, and I lost my cell phone? And I was wondering if somebody turned it in?”
From back here, Logan couldn’t hear the clerk’s reply—but she understood what these kids were doing. One distracted, the others stole. Not candy bars or cosmetics, but cold pills that would give them a temporary high. And probably lead to stronger stuff when the thrill wore off down the road.
Confrontation wasn’t on her shopping list, but she had to try something.
She approached the boys. Everything inside her churned and shook, but she managed to keep her outsides still. She tapped the one in the windbreaker and said, “Hey. Kid.”
His head jerked around. Wide brown eyes blinked and twitched. “Yeah, what?”
“You don’t want to do that. Put it back.”
He looked away fast. “Dunno what you’re talkin’ about,” he muttered. His friend in black hadn’t moved.
“The pills.” Deciding this little pep talk should be about more than shoplifting, she drew a fortifying breath and pushed up a sleeve. Most of her scarring was on her inner thighs, but the marks on her arms were ugly enough. Keloid patches clustered and overlapped on the inside of her elbow. A few marked her forearm and one the size of a half-dollar rested midway up her biceps.
“Jesus, lady,” the kid said. “You got a disease or something?”
She shook her head. “Crystal meth. Keep doing what you’re doing, and you could have pretty spots just like mine. You’ll also lose your teeth, your hair and eventually your life.”
The kid’s mouth opened, closed. He reached in a pocket. She hoped it was to get the pills and put them back. Still no response from the black-clad boy.
“Your friend should see this too,” she said.
“What, Lisa? She doesn’t do this stuff.” He flushed and dropped his gaze as he realized he’d just outed himself, along with their scheme. “I mean…”
She tried not to laugh at his fumbling. “Your other friend,” she said and nodded at the silent boy.
The boy in black pivoted slowly. Not a boy—a man. With glittering eyes that were completely black, corner to corner, top to bottom. They focused on her and he cocked his head in a quick, birdlike motion.
Sclerals, she thought with a frantic bid for sanity. Gotta be scleral contacts.
The kid glanced at the man, then back to her. His brow furrowed. “What other friend?”
She pressed her mouth closed and stumbled back a step, heart banging wild against her ribs. She couldn’t tear her gaze
from those alien black eyes. “You’re fucking with me, right? That guy right next to you. He was—”
The black-eyed man’s face twisted in rage. He uttered a feral hiss, turned and dove at the medicine display. Through the display. His passage disturbed nothing and left only a few wisps of smoke curling toward the ceiling.
The bottom dropped from her stomach and the world took on a grayish cast that blurred around the edges. She couldn’t—would not—pass out. If she ended up in an ambulance for any reason, they’d cart her ass back to rehab first and ask questions later.
She bit her tongue. Hard. The colors sprang back, everything sharp and blazing neon for an instant before returning to normal. If you could call a guy disappearing into a wall normal.
The kid stared at her as though she’d sprouted wings.
“Never mind.” She forced a weak laugh and hoped she didn’t look as bug-eyed crazy as she felt. “I must’ve been seeing things for a minute. That’s what this stuff does to you.”
“Um. I gotta go.” The kid turned away. Without looking at her, he put the pills back.
A corner of her mouth lifted. “Thanks,” she whispered. “You’ll be okay, kid.”
He mumbled something and made a beeline for the girl, who was still haranguing the clerk.
Logan tugged her sleeve down with a shaking hand. Maybe she really had been hallucinating. Not once, even on her worst trips, had she seen something that vivid or defined. But anything was possible. Wasn’t it?
It had to be. Because she wasn’t crazy. Fucked up, yes, but completely sane. Probably a little too sane.
At least she didn’t have to worry about deciding what to eat. She wasn’t hungry any more.
* * * * *
The crowd gathered on the lawn, in the streets and the parking lot, anywhere they could view the figure balanced precariously on the ledge above a window of the church steeple. A few enterprising souls took pictures or recorded movies with cell phones in hopes of capturing a possible jump. They could all see the priest leaning from the window, his upper body twisted strangely as he attempted to calm the troubled soul poised to leap.
