It was too much to hope for.
When the beat began, she pushed the tip of her blade into the rooftop and fell to one knee. She held herself ready to summon the wings, but didn’t as the percussion rumbled into a beat unlike any she’d heard before.
The Call That Followed was strong, but it didn’t urge her to go anywhere, and yet her body teemed with the heady grace and vigor as if she had complied.
Perhaps the cinder failed to open the doorway or a demon refused to come through. But, she reasoned, the Call should not occur if there was no demon to cause it and there should be no reward of grace unless she answered that Call and challenged her prey.
So, there must be a demon. And if she wasn’t required to fly off and find it, then logic dictated that the loosed demon rose close to this building.
That couldn’t be a coincidence.
A voice hissed, “Aww, poor Jovienne.”
Dread filled the night air as she rose and spun, right hand extended to monitor the horizon and edge of the building. With each breath, foreboding swarmed into her lungs and filtered into her bloodstream. The hair on her neck stood up and she felt a sensation like multiple burning cigarettes being pressed to her palm.
Evil was coming.
Her prey was not supposed to hunt her.
Dislodging the sword tip embedded in the rooftop, she held the weapon ready. Geist appeared around the edges of the rooftop. This is going to be bad.
A giant lobster-like claw reached over the edge of the building, and then another. Behind her, similar claws rose from the opposite side.
She called the wings and scolded herself for not having done so already. As they formed, she pushed her ghost hands out to create a perimeter.
Four more sets of legs appeared as the heads emerged over the edge. She hadn’t faced two demons at once, let alone a single demon of this size. These were each the size of a bus. And ugly.
Their heads were triangular like a mantis, and the larger front claws were right off a crustacean. Their bodies mimicked a scorpion, tail curling over the back. But the legs were tarantula-like, with thick hairs protruding from reptilian skin.
The skin-shivering, multi-legged way they moved drew out her primal need to feel something die under a thick-soled boot. But they were far too big to stomp.
Since news helicopters weren’t circling the building, she knew only she could see them. She reached one of the ghost hands out to inspect the bug.
The creature responded to her unauthorized probe: the front claws swatted at the ghost hands. The bug before her mimicked the move.
Jovienne turned and waved her sword at the one now in front of her as she shifted the ghost hands toward the other. As she suspected, the ghost hands felt nothing.
Ugly bug mirrored his image.
With the ruse revealed the bug-demon stopped wasting energy on the game. The illusion bug disappeared.
Jovienne planted her feet firmly in a ready stance and held her weapon horizontal before her.
“Poor Jovienne,” it repeated. “What do you want?”
The question surprised her, but not as much as the realization that she didn’t have a good answer other than, out of this slavery. Beyond that, she wasn’t sure, but she was certain she wanted to be free to explore all options.
The bug cocked its head. “I want to help you. I know He doesn’t understand you.”
“Who?”
“You know Who we speak of. The One who gave you the quintanumin. The One who toys with you through them.” He laid his big claws on the rooftop and posed not unlike someone putting their elbows on the table as if to indicate the conversation had become more serious.
Things were more serious. Demons, in her experience, snarled and made threats. They didn’t declare a desire to help her and sit down to talk.
“Tell me,” it said, “why is a mortal human man on this Earth allowed to choose if he wants to be good or evil? And why, even if a man has chosen to be evil all the days of his life, can he be forgiven in his last seconds if he but asks for salvation? Meanwhile, a demon cannot be permitted to live on Earth and cannot be given the opportunity to choose to be good or evil?”
“Demons are evil.”
“Are you sure?”
She said nothing.
“Evil hurts you in your core and you are outraged by evil deeds. Because of that outrage, you feel empathy for victims. And you do, don’t you, Jovienne? More than other mortals. Do you know why? Because your soul is an uncommon one.”
Any demon garnering pity was suspicious, but a demon trying to engage her with flattery was a demon to flee from… or kill. Jovienne swung her sword point up toward the demon. “Pretty words won’t save you, bug-face.”
It did not flinch. “And what will save you, Jovienne? Your heart? Ah, you may yet have your soul, bound as it is to the quintanumin, but what if all you are forced to be and do destroys your heart?”
She thought of Damnzel’s behavior and she thought of all she endured to destroy the heart of the demon she’d called up out of the Hellgate.
Jaw clamped shut and wings open, she turned toward the edge. Geist moved out of her way.
“Abhadhon! Wait!”
Inches from the perimeter ledge, she stopped. With all the calm she could muster, she faced the inhuman maw that could have easily bitten her in half. “Why?”
“You are unique among your kind and He dares chastise you for mastering your other talents as if they were not the reason you were chosen. It is an insult. Because of this you, and you alone, have an inkling of what our pain is like.” It retreated, probably meaning to show itself as non-aggressive, but the pose could have been strike preparation. “This is why I have an offer for you.”
“Not interested,” she said. Her knees bent to jump backwards and fly away.
The bug grabbed her sword arm.
“Let go!”
“You must hear the proposition.”
She drew a lion-headed dagger in her left hand and sliced it across the claw, scratching the thick crustacean exterior. “Let go!”
“There’s no need for that!”
When it didn’t release her, Jovienne stabbed the dagger at the claw and cracked the exoskeleton.
“Please, I mean you no harm.”
Her heart thudded in her chest. This was no minor, subservient being. Hell wanted to make a deal and sent a big demon to impress her. Every instinct told her to run. She pumped her wings hard. The ugly bug’s grip was firm.
“If you fly away you won’t hear what I have to say!”
“I don’t want to hear it!” With all her might, she stabbed at that small crack.
The exoskeleton gave. The long dagger plunged deep and rammed straight through the underside to pierce Jovienne’s wrist. The blade slid between bones, severing veins and slicing tendons. Emerging from the underside of her arm, the weapon cracked into the lower portion of the demon’s claw and wedged fast.
Jovienne screamed. The long-sword dropped away.
The bug jerked, screeching. Its legs carried it unsteadily this way and that. It tripped, pulling her up into the air and slamming her down hard on the rooftop in order to regain its balance. Pain blackened her sight and stars shot through that darkness.
When she was able to see, Jovienne’s arm was sliced from wrist to elbow. Blood seeped from her stinging wound. It was trying to heal, but could not close around the blessed weapon.
The bug halted and strained to open its claw, but her dagger bound it closed. Liquid—not magma—bubbled out from the demon’s wounds and oozed down the blade. This was the deepest, blackest red she’d ever seen and the air around it steamed. In seconds, it would burn her.
Jovienne yanked on the hilt to no avail. She couldn’t even rock it to loosen it as the thick exoskeleton kept it in place. “Ikaika, ikaika, ikaika,” she chanted, beckoning strength.
Desperate, helpless, screaming, she couldn’t tear her eyes from the darkblood so near her skin. She could smell it. Trace
s of cinnamon underneath an intense level of that earthy scent she’d detected in her own heart-blood. She could identify it now, like oak-moss and vetiver rolled in ash.
“Ho’akaaka!” she cried, begging the divine power Gramma told her about to inspire her to the right action.
The scalding fluid dribbled down the blade’s razor edge and onto her, into her. She screamed as the inside of her arm seared. Flapping her wings to rise up, she kicked at the hilt.
Darkblood continued to ooze. She kicked again and again and again.
The hilt snapped.
At that moment, the bug still strained against the blade and its claw snapped open wide. It shook Jovienne free from the broken end of the blade, slicing the length of her forearm open again, and then the bug lurched away to tend itself.
Jovienne fell to the rooftop and rolled. Stopping on her belly, she watched darkblood sink into her wound. It burned. Blisters formed, burst, and healed. Then, new skin formed and closed the wound. The burning inside her felt like it was roasting her bones. She drew another dagger and sliced the underside of her arm to speed the exit of the darkblood, but in the same instant as the weapon’s serrated edge left her skin, the wound closed and blistered over.
The darkblood didn’t come out.
Warmth spread across her chest. The demon bug’s transfused darkblood had merged with hers, found an artery, and flowed toward her heart.
IN THE HEIGHTS, Andrei crouched beside a roof access door and pulled his knees to his chest, wrapped his arms tight. He fidgeted and rocked, waiting.
When the cringe hit, the intensity was cranked up. Pinpoints of cold sliced down his body like a blade edge flaying him. It was followed by the sensation of skin being ripped off and that skin hung loose over an open flame. He roared his breath away, and then refilled his lungs to scream it out again. As the torture lingered, screaming became his focus, his war cry against this torment.
He kept his eyes wide through it all, staring at his hands, terrified they were going to blacken and wither, certain that this was making him a cinder.
At long last, it ended. When Andrei could move, he left the heights, but he did not go to McGhee’s as he had planned. Instead he hurried home, pausing only to rush breathless into the small convenience store on the corner of their building.
“Andy,” the man behind the counter said. “What’s de rush? Out of orange juice?”
Without answering, Andrei entered the liquor aisle. He grabbed the Stolichnaya. The bottle was cold in his hand.
“Andy? Are you okay, my friend?”
Andrei studied the label, but he wasn’t reading it. The alarm in Raazaq’s tone made him realize he had to calm himself. He took a deep breath, and another.
At a regular pace, he headed toward the register and spied two receipts in front of the counter. He picked them up and handed them to the clerk as he sat the alcohol down. “Don’t you ever clean the place, Raazaq?” he rasped, trying to be normal.
The man’s dark eyes locked on the bottle. He accepted the receipts as if in a daze, wadded the paper and dropped it into a trash can near his feet. “I’m on dees side of de counter ‘til closing.” He jabbed buttons on the register. “I t’ought you deed not drink de hard stuff.”
“Bad day.” Andrei handed him the twenty he’d found earlier.
Raazaq touched his own throat. “You sound bad. Are you sick, my friend?”
“Maybe. Any news worth knowing?” This was his usual question. Without electronics or a newspaper subscription, Raazaq was his source for the world’s goings on.
“Same sheet different day,” Raazaq replied. Then he smiled. “Supposed to warm up for de Easter egg day.” He handed over the change and slid the bottle into a paper bag. “Where ees your daughter? I have not seen her for several days…I put back a peanut butter egg for her.”
“She flew away.” Andrei grabbed the bag and left.
Inside the apartment, he flipped the deadbolt and secured the chain lock. Leaving the lights off, he shoved his duster onto the hook. His stomach tightened when he noted the empty spot where Jovienne’s coat used to hang.
Something bad had happened out there tonight. The fear he felt contemplating what ‘it’ might be left him cold and confirmed his belief that he wouldn’t have survived long as an abhadhon. But knowing Jovienne was dealing with it didn’t make him feel any better. In truth, that made him feel worse.
In the kitchenette, he scanned the sink-side drying rack. It held one plate, one bowl, one glass and one set of flatware.
Holding the neck of the bottle, he let the bag slide away. He grabbed the glass from the drying rack and added ice. Carrying both toward his bedroom, his steps stalled in the hallway in front of Jovienne’s room. Index finger and thumb around the glass, the other three digits stretched out as his hand strayed near the knob.
She isn’t in there. Those words didn’t hurt as much as admitting that she wouldn’t ever be in there again.
The pitiful pale child bit her lip as she stared around the nearly empty living room. He feared she hated it here. Nothing was pink or girlish. He forced a happy tone into his voice. “I will sleep here in the living room for now. You can have my bedroom. Come see.” He led her down the hall.
She sat on his bed, and then rolled into the middle as if testing it. When she buried her face into his pillow, he thought she was crying and he struggled for something to say.
Her head lifted. “You don’t smell like my dad did.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“He was hiding his stink with aftershave. You smell like the park when it’s raining. You smell honest.”
“Well, that’s quite a compliment. I thank you,” he said, relaxing. “We’ll contact Family Services tomorrow and soon we’ll be able to get your bed and your clothes from them. We’ll set up the other room as yours.”
“They have my bed and clothes?”
“Yes. Everything your family owned was moved from base housing into storage. When you’re ready, we’ll go and you can decide what you want.”
Andrei sat on the corner of the bed near her feet. The old bed frame creaked under his weight. He made a face. She giggled. “I like this bed.”
“It’s old, but it’s comfortable.”
“The hospital bed was hard. It pushed me away like it didn’t want me there. But this bed lets me snuggle in.”
Maybe she would like it here. He smoothed her hair back. “Then snuggle in and rest, Jovienne.”
She jerked. “Ouch! That hurts.”
“What? Where?”
“Here.” She touched her temple.
He pushed her thick hair back and examined the small, cross-shaped scar. He wore one just like it. He’d forgotten. “Looks like you had stitches there for a while, kiddo. They must have removed them before you woke up,” he lied. The truth, what he knew of it, would scare her and cause questions he didn’t want to answer, yet. “It will scar, but it’ll be a small one.”
“I want to see,” she said. “You have a mirror?” She touched her fingers gingerly at the spot.
“In the bathroom. Back of the door.”
She returned a moment later, frowning hard as she sat on the bed next to him.
“Well?”
“It’s sore.”
“It will be for a little longer.” He put an arm around her shoulders and hugged her. “You like tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches?”
She nodded. “My mom made the best grilled cheese ever.” She drew a shaking breath.
He rubbed her arm. “Well, you’ll have to tell me how I compare, but first you should snuggle back in. Maybe take a nap.” He rose and walked to the door. When he turned back, her eyes were glassy with unshed tears and she was biting her lip again. “You okay?”
She didn’t answer.
“Jovienne?”
“I’m scared.”
“Of what?”
“The doctor said I slept for thirteen weeks. I don’t want to not wake up again. The
dream…” She didn’t finish.
“It was horrible.” He’d not forgotten that part, but he’d put it far from his recollections. “I know.”
She half-squinted and considered him for a long moment, but said nothing.
“You are safe here, Jovienne. It’s okay to sleep, I promise. I’ve got you.”
Leaving the door open, he went to start the soup. When it was simmering on the stovetop, he checked on his new housemate. Finding her under the covers asleep, he decided to wait a bit on the sandwiches. He shut the door quietly.
Though he intended to fold laundry next, he couldn’t help pausing in front of the other bedroom door. Beyond this flimsy, hollow door was the main bedroom of the apartment, larger than his. Once, it belonged to his pedagogue.
Remorse kept that door shut, but no longer. New days were ahead. Eyes shut, shoulders tense, he touched the knob. It was cold. He remembered the iron bed with green covers and plaid sheets, stacks of old books, and the aroma of pipe tobacco mingling with whiskey and Old Spice. For an instant, he heard the jovial old voice, “What is it, Andrei?”
Slowly twisting the knob, the mechanism clicked. He gave it a gentle push. The expected wave of shame didn’t crash onto him. Cold air didn’t swirl against his skin like the chilled grip of a ghost squeezing guilt into his heart.
His eyes opened.
White walls blinded him with reflected sunshine. Gone were the dark curtains, the still-life paintings and the globe-shaped terrarium with orchids. Just a faint lingering of tobacco. The empty room wasn’t a vacant hole anymore. It was a blank canvas, ready for Jovienne’s colors, her life and energy.
Crossing that threshold empowered Andrei, and reinforced that this would be her room and that new memories would live. He swept the dust from the wood floor and wiped cobwebs from the corners. In his heart, he cleaned away the pain of a dead father and replaced it with hope for Jovienne.
Once again, that particular door in his life was shut to him. Sealed inside it were the hopes and dreams he pinned on the person who’d slept there. The person he ate with. The person he lived with. The person he relied on.
And once again, that person was gone.
His hand lowered, leaving the knob untouched. He continued on, stepped over the laundry basket, and placed the bottle and glass on the bedside table. He sat on the mattress and, face in empty hands, he rubbed at the scar on his temple.
Jovienne Page 14
