The Others 03: The Demon You Know

by Christine Warren

  Heather nodded. "We take it into our circle with us and call on the Goddess to open our minds to the child's mind. Once we've tapped into the little one's energy through the toy, it's much easier to locate that energy somewhere else. Wherever it's gone missing to.”

  "Of course, we didn't want to do that in this case." Daisy frowned in distaste. "Not only did we not have a personal object from the fiend, but allowing its mind to join with ours ..." She shuddered. "Well, that would have just been dangerous.”

  "Very. You did give us the fiend's proper name, though," Heather said. "And that meant a lot. Not that we normally dabble in summoning, you know—nasty work, that—but we do pride ourselves on knowing a little bit about most of the major forms of magic. And when it comes to summoning magic, the most important tool you can have is the name of the demon.”

  Rule growled. "The fiend.”

  Daisy and Heather jumped a little in their seats and eyed him suspiciously, as if they'd forgotten he was there and now that they remembered, he'd be feeling all noshy.

  Tess sent him another glare and he subsided back into his chair. "So with its name, you were able to call on it?" she prompted the women.

  "Oh no. That would be the equivalent of a summoning, and we certainly didn't want a creature like that popping up inside our temple room," Daisy said, aghast. "We'd never get the taint out.”

  Not to mention the bloodstains that would be left behind when Uzkiel tore the three of them limb from little old limb, Rule thought uncharitably.

  "No, we wanted to sneak up on the creature, so to speak," Heather agreed. "To find out what it was up to without it doing the reverse. That type of snooping requires quite a bit of stealth.”

  Rule closed his eyes. In that case, his hopes for getting any useful information out of them were doomed.

  "Oh, for the Lady's sake," Claire snapped, setting her cup down on the table with a thump. "These children don't want a blow-by-blow account of your highly innovative method for psychic spying, Heather. They want to know what we found out.”

  Rule could have kissed Claire. In fact, he'd talk to Abby about naming their first daughter after her.

  She turned to face Rule and Tess and continued. "We can't give you an address. Our magic doesn't work that way. In fact, I can't think of a single kind that does. But we can tell you that it's some kind of old warehouse or factory and that it's located on the river.”

  His heart sank. Manhattan was surrounded by water on four sides, and most of the waterfront areas had been commercial property at one time or another. All this information had done was eliminate the interior of the island.

  "Now don't look so stricken, boy," Claire said, shaking a finger at him. "That's not all we saw. If you look out straight over the water, you can see the sun going down behind the Statue of Liberty.”

  Tess looked at him. "It's got to be Battery Park City.”

  Claire nodded. "That's what I said. But there's one more piece of information you two should have. The building this fiend is hiding in, it's not just using it because it's abandoned. It's got a bigger reason than that. First off, the place has a basement. It's wet as a well-digger's arse down there, but it keeps out the light, and the fiend likes that.”

  Rule nodded, but he was already sorting through possibilities in his head. He didn't know Manhattan that well, but Tess had grown up here, and even if she couldn't name the building, they could probably get blueprints from the Planning Authority. Not many of the places on the water had full basements. Like Claire said, they tended to leak.

  "You listen to me, boy." Claire grabbed Rule's hand, interrupting his thoughts and dragging him back to the present. "I wasn't finished with my story. The other reason that fiend has set up shop in this building is the energy in the place. It's as foul as he is. I don't know the history, and I tell you here, I don't care to. Not after feeling it for myself. But I'm telling you, something nasty happened in that place, and happened more than once, I can tell you. Enough misery and pain in that building that it's sunk into the brick, and that fiend is only adding to it. You ask me, when you're done, you should tear that place down to rubble and salt the land good. Maybe after the earth gets wiped clean, something decent can spring up in its place. But for now ..." She shook her head. "If a place can be called evil, that one is. Mark my words.”

  Rule nodded and turned to Tess, trying to ignore the uneasy feeling the old witch's words had caused.

  "The Council library will have records we can go through," Tess said. "It had to have been a pretty high-profile case to have been as bad as Claire says. I'll call a friend on the Witches' Council and ask her to start digging." She grimaced. "I know it's not as fast as we would have liked, but at least now we have someplace to start.”

  Rule nodded.

  "Thank you, ladies." He rose and pulled back his chair. "You've been very helpful.”

  Claire struggled to her feet, waving away the hand Tess offered to assist her. When she had steadied herself on the handle of a carved wooden cane, she lifted her pale blue eyes to Rule and pursed her lips. "I'm going to help you just a little more," she said, nodding as if to herself. "I'm going to tell you that if you move fast and trust her good sense, it will all work out in the end. Mark my words.”

  The jingle of the cheery little bell Tess had mounted over the door of the shop told them someone had entered, but it was the pounding of heavy footsteps that alerted Rule that something was wrong.

  Noah shoved his way past Tess's assistant and into the back room. From the way he was sucking in air, it almost looked like he'd run all the way from the Upper East Side.

  "Abby," he gasped, leaning over and bracing his hands on his thighs as he struggled for air.

  Rule felt the world shift on its access and suddenly stop spinning. He shook his head, as if he could deny what he knew was coming. His heart froze in his chest, and his stomach clenched before he even heard Noah's next words.

  "Abby's missing."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  How Tess got Rule back to Vircolac, he never knew, but she managed it with almost frightening efficiency. Noah helped, too, primarily by restraining Rule from tearing the entire city apart brick by brick to find his missing woman. Between the two of them—ably assisted by Bette, Tess's shop manager, who herded the curious covenmates out the back door and out of the way—they got him into a cab and unloaded him into the front hall of the club in less than fifteen minutes.

  If their cabbie didn't quit his job and join the NASCAR circuit, he was wasting his life.

  Rafe was waiting for them in the hallway, along with a distinctly unhappy Tobias Walker, the head of Vircolac's security.

  "What happened?" Rule demanded, almost before his feet hit the hallway tile. "What do you know?”

  "We're working on it," the Felix said, holding up his hands in a useless calming gesture. "As far as we know, she is unharmed. There is no sign of a struggle, and we've already interviewed the last employee who spoke to her. According to him, she was alive and well, although a little miffed at you, at around noon.”

  Rule glanced at the ornate clock on the hall table. "That was almost an hour ago. No one has seen her since then?”

  The Felix shook his head.

  "No, but we have security cameras covering almost every inch of this club," Tobias said, stepping forward, his expression grim. "I've already pulled the tapes, and I have my entire staff combing through them. Trust me, Rule, we'll find her.”

  Rule had met Tobias the last time he'd been Above, and he knew the Lupine to be both reliable and very good at his job. But that didn't mean Rule didn't want to tear someone—anyone—into little bloody pieces just then.

  "She was supposed to be under twenty-four-hour surveillance. She wasn't supposed to go near a window unsupervised! Who the hell fell down on the job?”

  Tobias gritted his teeth. "No one fell down, Rule. The club is under twenty-four-hour surveillance, and it's completely inaccessible to anyone who isn't either a member
or part of the staff. There were guards, footmen, and waitstaff on every floor. Abby wasn't left alone. We did our jobs. And we'll keep doing them until we find out what happened to her.”

  "Find out now.”

  Rafe stepped between the two men. Later Rule might be grateful for that, but now he just wanted to get his hands on someone, and Tobias was convenient. Plus, the Lupine was tough. He'd put up a nice bloody struggle.

  "We are working on it," the Felix said. "Not just Tobias's staff, but mine as well. We will find her, I promise you. Even Fiona has gotten involved. She has called in some favors of her own and sent a small army of changelings out into the city to look for her. Abby will be all right.”

  “Tell them to concentrate on Battery Park City," Tess said, stepping forward and linking hands with her husband. "That's where the sisters think Uzkiel is hiding, and I have a bad feeling that if Abby is missing, that thing has something to do with it.”

  A shiver of pure fear ripped down Rule's spine. "If Uzkiel has her, we don't have a second to lose.”

  "Perhaps, but perhaps not," Rafe said. "We do have one thing going for us. It is the middle of the afternoon. Daylight. Even if one of Uzkiel's minions has captured Abby, the fiend will not be able to harm her until nightfall.”

  Tess winced. "The building they're in has a basement. Windowless. He'd be able to function down there.”

  Rule took a deep, steadying breath. As hard as the panic fought to overtake him, he knew he'd be no use to Abby unless he maintained control. "Function, yes, but not well. He would not be able to perform magic, and since the solus spell is what he wants, he will not be able to harm her until tonight. Fiends are not only affected by the light of the sun; they are weakened by its energy. Even if they cannot see the light, they are not at their full power until nightfall. So we have a little over four hours to find out where she's gone.”

  Tobias raised a hand to his ear and turned his head to the side, his expression intent. It took Rule a second to realize Tobias was listening to something in a wireless earphone.

  "Still not sure where she's gone," he said after a long, tense moment, "but I think we know how she got there. Camera on the back entrance recorded Abby leaving at twelve-oh-seven this afternoon, and she wasn't alone.”

  "At least there's that," Tess said, sounding slightly relieved. "She had the sense not to go anywhere alone. Who did she take with her?’

  "Carly," Tobias answered, "but it was Carly who did the taking. The alley camera shows her hitting Abby on the back of the head after they exited the building and knocking her unconscious. She carried her out of the alley and, we suspect, into a waiting vehicle.”

  Rule swore. "So you won't be able to track her then. Not if they drove away.”

  "Not by scent, but I have a very large staff and a very big grudge to settle. We'll start looking for treads and knocking on doors. If we have to interview every person in this city, we'll do it. Carly was pack. Her betrayal is a disgrace to us all.”

  Everybody turned when the front door slammed open and Samantha came skidding to a stop on the polished tile. "Oh, my God! Is it true?”

  Tobias nodded shortly. "It looks like it is. What have you heard?”

  Samantha shook her head and gulped in a deep breath. "Just the alarm. Since Graham and Missy are out of town, I was covering a meeting for him with one of our liquor distributors. I ran all the way back here. Scott told me about the tape just now. He was leaving when I came up the steps.”

  Rule looked past her businesslike skirt suit and down at her bare feet. Little shreds of nylon clung to the fair skin, the ragged remains of which had probably started the day as panty hose. The Lupine's shoes were nowhere to be seen.

  "When was the last time you saw her?" Tobias demanded, all his attention focused on sniffing out any potential leads.

  "Carly?" Samantha looked vaguely green as she said the name, as if the idea of her friend's involvement nauseated her. "I was hoping I'd heard wrong. I can't believe she would do something like this. I just talked to her the day before yesterday. On the phone. She was having a rough shift that night. A lot of people got hurt in the rioting in the Financial District.”

  "Did she say anything odd?”

  "Not a word. She sounded completely normal. Tired, but normal.”

  "And she never gave the slightest indication she might be planning something like this? Never hinted that she had any reason she might want to hurt Abby?”

  "Of course not, Tobe! Carly is a sweetheart. You know her. She's pack." Samantha looked hurt and confused, but no more so than any of them. "And even if she had said something like that, you know I would have told you. It would have set off every alarm in my head. I would have thought she needed serious help.”

  "Well, Abby is the one who needs our help now," Tobias said. He didn't look at all reassured by what Samantha had told them. "Do you know if Carly has a car?”

  "She does. I always said she was crazy, but she said that once you've driven an ambulance through Manhattan at rush hour, a regular car seemed positively sane.”

  "What kind is it?”

  Samantha frowned. "A little thing. Used. An old VW Rabbit, I think. Gray. It's almost more primer than paint. She said she didn't see the point in getting it repainted when it would just get scratched or dinged again inside of a week.”

  "You don't know her plate numbers, do you?”

  "I'm her friend, Tobe, not a witness to her hit-and-run accident. That's not the kind of thing I pay attention to. Why would I?”

  Just in case she got mixed up in a demonic plot for world domination?

  Rule turned to Tobias. "Can you find out that kind of information?”

  "I can try. I'll see if any of our people works at Motor Vehicles.”

  "I will contact her employer," Rafe offered, "and see if I can obtain copies of her logs to determine exactly where she's been working over the last few days. Maybe we will find something valuable in tracing her movements.”

  "You can get that stuff? Those call sheets are usually as confidential as hospital records." Tobias sounded impressed.

  Tess snorted. "You'd be amazed at what Mr. Pussycat can get his hands on when he lays on the charm and waves around a big stack of money.”

  "We all have our little talents," the Felix demurred.

  "Well, for the moment, mine is going to be good old-fashioned legwork." Tess grimaced. "I'm going to find out the name and address of that building the sisters pointed us to. If Uzkiel is involved in Abby's abduction—and I think her disappearance is too big a coincidence to discount the possibility—we're going to want to know where he might be hiding.”

  Rule nodded. At the moment, it was the biggest gesture he could manage, given that every muscle in his body had locked down in rage and fear. He turned blazing eyes on Tobias. "I want to see these security tapes. Then I want the best trackers you have to go over every last inch of the alley with me. If there's the slightest chance of picking up her scent, I'm going to find it." His hands clenched until the knuckles turned a stark, bloodless white. "And when I find her, there will be more than just hell to pay."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Abby woke with the feeling that a very large person had placed her head under the leg of his chair and then sat down. Hard. If her skull wasn't cracked straight through, it would be a miracle.

  You can thank me for that later.

  Abby didn't even try to lift her eyelids, let alone move her jaw. The most she could manage was a thought, and she couldn't even do that loudly. Louamides ?

  The one and only. How you feeling?

  Like last week's moldy cat food. You?

  Hey, all I can feel is you, but judging by that, I'd say that's a fairly accurate summary.

  Where am I? Er, I mean, where are we?

  Damned if I know. You’re the one with the eyes. How about you open 'em and take a look around?

  Abby groaned. I was afraid you were going to say something like that.

  I would
say take your time, but under the circumstances, I'm not going to be able to recommend that as a first-line strategy.

  The only thing Abby could see when she first opened her eyes was blackness, and considering even that felt like an ice pick to the retinas, she could only be grateful no one had thought to leave a light burning for her. After a moment the darkness began to take on depth and she found that if she held her hand about six inches from the end of her nose, she could just barely make out that there was something there.

  She discovered simultaneously that any movement beyond shallow breathing sent nausea rolling through her like an invading army.

  "Okay, that was so not worth it," she muttered, concentrating very hard on breathing very, very slowly through her nose.

  Sheesh, this human thing is so limiting. Let me help with that.

  Abby didn't know what the demon was talking about, and until the urge to vomit subsided, she didn't really care.

  "I think I may have a concussion.”

  She did not get the world's most sympathetic feeling from Lou. You're going to have worse if you don't take another look around and see if there's a way to get us out of here.

  "Why is that my job?”

  You're the one with opposable thumbs. Actually, you’re the one with any sort of corporeal being of any kind at the moment. You've been appointed.

  "Swell.”

  It took Abby another minute or two to tamp down the nausea enough to open her eyes and take another look around. This time, she could actually see things.

  It was a little like watching one of those TV shows on ghost hunting, where the people wandered through old houses with all the lights off, filming everything with night-vision cameras. She could see the walls and the doors of the small room around her, but everything had the appearance of black-and-white and grainy shades of gray.