The Darkest Gateway

by Jeri Westerson

  Wendell looked up and nodded to Nick. “Be with you in a sec, Nick. Just finishing up here.”

  The woman looked at me and popped her gum. She never seemed to flinch.

  Wendell wiped her knee with a cloth and looked it over. “Finito, Jean,” he said. “You know the drill,” he said, carefully taping a piece of gauze over it.

  “Yeah,” said Jean. She jumped up right away. “That was awesome, Wendell.”

  “Come back soon. We’ll get the rest of that leg done.”

  She nodded, walked past me looking me up and down, and left through the glass door.

  Wendell stripped off his rubber gloves, stuffed them in a stainless-steel pail, and donned more black latex. “So what have we got? That your homemade ink?” He nodded toward the blender.

  “Yup,” said Nick carefully placing it on his work table. “There’s more than enough to do it. Did you get the design I texted you?”

  “Yeah. Printed it out.” He grabbed a piece of tissue paper from the table. “Who’s the victim?”

  I swallowed and edged forward, raising my hand. “Tattoo virgin here.”

  “Hey, no problem. Have a seat. This is going inside your left wrist?”

  I looked back at Nick and Jolene for confirmation. They nodded.

  He spotted my amulet. “Wicked cool necklace. Where’d you get that?”

  “Got it off a dear friend.” I flicked a glance at Erasmus. The demon couldn’t help but come closer, standing on the other side of me protectively.

  “So this is Kylie,” said Nick, introducing us. “This is Jolene. And that’s Erasmus…Kylie’s boyfriend.”

  Erasmus shot him a deadly look.

  My glare at Nick wasn’t too far from Erasmus’.

  “The, uh, specifications must be exact,” said Nick after clearing his throat.

  Wendell glanced up at the demon standing awfully close to my chair but didn’t seem to mind. He turned my wrist over to examine it. “I got Nick’s instructions. It’s a pretty simple design.”

  Wendall swabbed my wrist with what I supposed was antiseptic. “Okay, Kylie. I’m going to put an imprint of the design on your wrist and you tell me if this is right.”

  He put some cold gel on my arm and stuck some tissue paper on my wrist with the design facing the right direction, as per Nick’s instructions. The tissue paper had the design on one side and what looked like a carbon paper image on the other. When he peeled it off, the design remained on my arm in a blue outline. “Look good?”

  “As long as it’s filled in entirely with the ink,” said Nick.

  Wendall looked toward Erasmus, but he was stone-faced.

  “All right. Let me get some of that ink in a cup, and we’ll get this party started. Allergic, huh?”

  “What?”

  Nick leaned in. “I told him how you’re allergic to a lot of these inks and that’s why we had to make our own.”

  “Oh. Yeah.”

  “You should be fine with this, then,” said Wendell. He put the ink cup on his work table, and poised toward me with his machine in hand.

  I sat forward. “Aren’t you going to use any anesthetic?”

  He chuckled. “You know, Kylie, I’ve been doing this for like twenty years…” He didn’t look that old to me, but maybe he had good skin. “And I’m not gonna lie. It’ll hurt. Kind of stings. Lots of little needles jabbing in you at the same time. But it won’t kill you. Do you have a low tolerance for pain?”

  I shrugged. “I guess not.”

  “All right then. Lie back and think of rainbows and unicorns.”

  Erasmus snorted but I didn’t look at him.

  I rested my arm on the armrest, tipped my head back against the paper-covered lounger, and grasped Erasmus’ hand.

  The tattoo machine buzzed in Wendell’s hand. As soon as he touched it to my skin, I jumped a little. Yeah, it did sting, but as Erasmus squeezed my hand harder, the pain just…went away. He was healing me. I looked up into his intense eyes with as much gratitude as I could muster. His gaze softened and he even smiled a little.

  Before I knew it, it was done.

  I looked at it. It was attractive in its way. The skin puffed pink around it, but it was small, no more than three inches long.

  “No emersion in water,” said Wendall, sticking a gauze pad over it, “No baths, and especially no pools or Jacuzzis for a week. Keep an eye on it and change the dressing tomorrow. It will feel a little tender for up to a week, depending.”

  “It feels fine,” I said. “Doesn’t hurt or anything.”

  “Oh yeah? Well, good. Now toss the rest of this ink. It won’t be good tomorrow. If you want more work done, you’ll have to make more.”

  “I think this is all I’ll be doing.”

  “So, what’s it mean?”

  It looked like Erasmus was about to tell Wendell to mind his own business so I rushed in with, “It’s a very special symbol to me.”

  Wendall seemed satisfied with that. Nick and Wendall exchanged a bro handshake and hug, paid the man, and then we were back in the Jeep again.

  “I don’t think I’ll be getting any tattoos,” said Jolene, looking a little green.

  “So this will do the trick,” I said, glancing now and again at the gauze on my arm.

  “Perhaps,” said Erasmus, “but I am not entirely convinced it will protect you one hundred percent.”

  I glared at him. “You approved!”

  “I said it might help. But Satan is a very powerful demon.”

  “Well…we’ll just have to see. When should we go?”

  Nick grabbed the headrest in front of him and pulled himself forward. “Hold on, Kylie. We still have research to do and more protection spells to cast. And we’ve got to think about the book. You had to kill five creatures. What makes you think something else hasn’t already come out?”

  “We’re running out of time, Nick. What happens if the Booke is still active on Halloween? It could be far more than even I can handle. And they could still kill me.”

  “I will never let that happen,” rasped Erasmus.

  “They could overtake you, too, you know.”

  “Let them try!”

  “I don’t want to let them try. I want to stop the Booke now.”

  Jolene said quietly, “We still have to research how to unbind Mr. Dark from the book.”

  That shut me down. If we couldn’t release Erasmus, then there was no use in my going at all.

  Erasmus brooded. He faced away from me and stared out the window. Everyone’s good mood seemed to have flown.

  I pulled in front of my shop. Doc and Seraphina emerged to greet us.

  “Everything all right?” asked Doc, searching each of our faces in turn.

  I lifted my bandaged arm. “Everything’s peachy,” I said.

  “Yes,” he muttered. “I can see that.”

  I pushed my way into the shop. I could tell that Doc and Seraphina hadn’t been idle. A load of charm pouches were laid out on the kitchen table.

  Erasmus walked through to the kitchen and stopped dead. He raised his arm to cover his face. “I’ll wait outside,” he coughed and vanished.

  “Well,” said Doc. “That’s a good sign. Looks like these are powerful.”

  I should have been mad at Doc, but I couldn’t summon up the emotion. I was glad, in fact, that they’d made these.

  We each put our charm pouches on leather straps and hung them around our necks under our shirts. No need to advertise. Ed called and said that he and George would meet us at the town meeting. Now all we had to do was…wait it out.

  Jolene was busy on her tablet consulting with Nick, who was on his laptop. They argued back and forth about possible unbinding spells, but nothing seemed quite to be what they were looking for.

  I couldn’t resist looking at my tattoo so I peeled back a corner of the gauze. All the red puffiness was gone. I suspected that Erasmus had healed that too. I plucked the rest of the medical tape off and threw the gauze into t
he fireplace.

  “Maybe Doc has a book or two,” said Nick. “Should we go over to yours later, Doc? After the meeting? If we aren’t burned at the stake, that is.”

  “No one’s going to be burning anyone at the stake,” he said wearily.

  I snorted. “I’m sure they said that in Salem, too.”

  “Actually, no one from the Salem Witch Trials was burned at the stake,” said Jolene. “They were all hanged.”

  “Oh. Well, that makes me feel much better.”

  I wandered around, doing a little dusting. When some cars slowed by the shop, I decided to unlock the door and put out the open sign. Those customers doubled back and parked out front. I was happy to have something to do as I rang up their purchases. It was nice to get the cash register working again.

  I thought about stashing my crossbow in the car, but I got the sense that I could carry the Spear of Mortal Pain with me instead. That was some ancient Irish weapon called Gáe Bulg I’d stolen off of Doug. Shabiri had gotten it for him, but now it was mine. It was a handy size that I could fit in my coat, telescoping down. I went to where I had stashed it in my kitchen and snuck it through the shop into an inside pocket of my coat, like a magic wand. I felt better armed.

  Sooner than I’d thought, it was time to head over to the town meeting. What was the saying? Start every day with a smile and get it over with.

  Chapter Eight

  Because of the charm pouches, I hadn’t seen Erasmus since the tattooing. I was beginning to wonder if it wasn’t a better idea to get rid of my pouch so he could be with me. I glanced quickly at Doc and while he wasn’t looking, I took it off and stuffed it in a seat cushion. Almost immediately I felt that rush of wind as he appeared behind me.

  “Thank the gods you finally got rid of that,” he muttered.

  “I’m sorry. I thought it was a good idea at the time.”

  “I can protect you from any villager attacks.” He seemed insulted that I would use any other methods. I could see his point.

  “I’m sorry.” I looked again to see if anyone was paying attention to me before I reached up and gave him a soft kiss.

  He seemed more than mollified. A little melty, if truth be told. Some big bad demon he turned out to be.

  He vanished again when Doc turned our way. “Shall we all ride together?”

  I thought of all of us crammed in Doc’s Rambler. “I’ll take my Jeep. You all go with Doc.”

  I could tell that Jolene wanted to protest, but Seraphina gave me a knowing eye and steered the teenager toward Doc’s car. Good old Seraphina. She knew exactly what was up.

  Once the Rambler had pulled away from the shop, I got in the Jeep and wasn’t surprised when Erasmus appeared beside me. Before I could do or say anything he reached over and kissed me. When he sat back, he seemed a little proud of himself.

  I started up the car. “No hocus pocus when we get there.”

  “I haven’t the least idea what you are talking about.”

  “No magic tricks. Just let everyone have their say. They’re naturally worried. I mean, this would be a really bad time for Baph—I mean, Goat Guy to show up.”

  He shook his head the way he always did when I used my nickname for the god Baphomet. But he was the one who’d told me not to use his name in case the god interpreted it as a summons.

  I couldn’t help but touch the amulet, feeling its familiar and somehow comforting warmth.

  We pulled into the driveway of the church parking lot, crowded with cars from the village. “Hey,” I said, turning to my companion. “The church hall is hallowed ground, isn’t it? You won’t be able to get into the building.”

  He scowled. “I hadn’t thought of that. I will be near, however. And if you should need me, I’ll…” But it didn’t look like he knew what he could do.

  “I’ll be fine. Maybe you’d better disappear for now.”

  Frowning, he glared at the cars in the parking lot and vanished.

  I pulled into a spot and wrapped my coat around me as I slammed the door. I supposed the church hall was the natural place to meet. A central location with perhaps the biggest auditorium in Moody Bog. It was stifling hot inside so I quickly slung my coat over my arm. Seraphina was waving at me. Jolene waved too, though she was sitting with her parents. Jan and Kevin Ayrs looked rumpled in their corduroy and patchwork sweaters. I gave them a nod when they looked my way. They ran the plant nursery in town, seemed like nice people.

  I was able to slide my way through the crowd. It was standing room only now, but I managed to get next to Doc and the coven.

  “I think everyone’s here,” said Nick, stretching his neck to look around. “There’s Deputy Mustache,” he said, pointing, and using the nickname I had used for George.

  I grinned. “He looks good in a uniform.”

  “Don’t I know it,” he said proudly. I was glad to see that George was taking Nick out in public these days. It had to be better than sneaking around hotel rooms. Maybe becoming a werewolf had been good for Nick…in a strange way.

  Nick pointed in the opposite direction. “And there’s the sheriff. He looks pretty good in uniform, too. Though…I guess he’s off the menu, huh?”

  “Yeah.” But I looked anyway. He did look good. I sighed. Even if all of the rest of it wasn’t happening, I still would have chosen Erasmus. It made me feel better to realize that.

  Besides. Wasn’t Ed seeing Shabiri, the other demon in town? What had started off with my suggestion that he get in close to her for a little undercover work had turned into…well, something. I don’t know if I really trusted Shabiri, but then again…I don’t know that I trusted Erasmus not to lie to me either.

  Demons, I thought. Trouble all around.

  I saw Hezekiah Thompson, the council manager, make his way through the crowd. Maine didn’t seem to have mayors but that’s basically what he was. He was a big man with a reddened nose. Friendly and boisterous. He had come to my grand opening and seemed genuinely pleased that I had opened my business.

  The council members had assembled at a long table at the front of the room, flanked by a Maine flag and an American flag. I recognized some of the people there from the Chamber of Commerce Get-Together at the beginning of the month: John Fairgood of the Fairgood Gun Shop, Sy Alexander who owned the Coffee Shack where Nick worked, Reverend Howard and, of course, good old Ruth Russell. Two other people I didn’t know sat at the table beside them.

  Hezekiah tapped a gavel. “I’d like to bring this town meeting to order,” he said loudly. He didn’t seem to need a mic. “If we’d all be quiet and settle down… There. We’re here tonight because…well…because we’ve never had such horrific things happening in our town before.”

  The crowd murmured.

  “Murders, some really quite…unspeakable. I wonder if we can have Sheriff Bradbury come up and talk to us, if he can, about what’s been happening and how far he is in his investigations.”

  More murmuring. I turned and spotted Ed. He didn’t look too happy about being called up, but I could see him putting on his sheriff’s mask and striding forward. He was taller than most and I could easily follow him through the crowd. He made it to the front and stood to Hezekiah’s side.

  “Good evening,” he said.

  “Good evenings,” echoed from the assembled crowd.

  “I’m not going to lie. Deputy Miller and I have had our hands full. Because of the nature of some of the deaths, we have had the help of the staties. But we are only one town and they have a lot on their plate. Beginning in early October, there were the deaths of Karl Waters, the tourist Joseph Mayes, Bob Hitchins, Nicole Meunier, Dan Parker, the Warrens, more recently the Browns, and the, uh, desecration of several graves in Moody Bog Cemetery. There are several missing persons that we are presuming dead at this point.”

  He looked like you wanted your sheriff to look: determined, calm, statesmen-like.

  “We have no leads at the moment,” he went on, “but we are working closely with the s
tate on a forensic level.”

  Hezekiah shook his head. “Do we have any idea if…well, if such a thing was done by a person or persons living here among us?”

  “It’s too early to tell,” he said, keeping his steady gaze out over the crowd, “but it is my professional opinion that it is not someone local.” What else could he say? He now knew exactly what it was but certainly could never admit it.

  By the sounds the audience was making, they weren’t buying that.

  “How could it not?” cried a man in the middle of the crowd. “It’s all so personal, these attacks. Have you looked at Hansen Mills?”

  “Yeah!” said a woman from the back. “How about that motorcycle gang?”

  The crowd seemed to be in agreement about the Ordo. Some well knew that Doug was Ed’s younger brother.

  Hezekiah raised his hands. “Now folks, we can’t all speak at once. We’ve got to be orderly about this.”

  “I’ve seen some odd things here!” said a man from the far side of the audience. “Weird stuff.”

  “Me too!” said another man. “Flying monsters! That wasn’t no exploding gas lines. I seen the beast!”

  Uh-oh. I exchanged a glance with Doc. I suddenly felt naked without my charm pouch.

  “Let’s quit pussyfooting around,” said a man with a deep voice near the front. “I know we’re all thinking it. None of these things ever happened…until she came to town!” He swung his arm to point…right at me.

  Well, shit.

  Ed’s voice rose above the angry murmuring. All eyes were aimed at me, and not many were being nice about it. “Now hold on! This isn’t a witch hunt.” I think he might have winced a little, because he knew that the next words would be—

  “And those Wiccans, too!”

  Doc’s expression was furious, as if he would leap up at any second. Seraphina even put a hand on his arm to hold him back.

  How could I blame any of them? Because for once, they were right. None of this would have happened if I hadn’t come to Moody Bog.

  Reverend Howard stood with hands raised to quiet the crowd. And there was Ruth, just sitting there, her mouth in a pruney frown, her arms crossed over her chest and that damned Babylonian locket around her neck.