The Devil's Been Busy

by J. D. Blackrose

  I felt the vibrations in the wooden floor and knew he was coming at me again.

  I scuttled back to the top step of the second set of stairs and placed my hands on the landing. He was on the fifth step.

  The fourth.

  The third.

  His wet, stinking breath grew closer.

  The second step.

  I crouched low, leaning on my left leg, and kept my fingertips light on the wood, concentrating on the vibrations, waiting until…

  …he hit the landing.

  My arms shot out, and I grabbed both of his calves just at the knee, shoving up and over, and threw the bastard down the second set of stairs, where my bare feet told me he landed heavy and hard.

  I bit my lip as pain shot through my injured leg but forced myself to scramble on all fours up the next flight of stairs. I could feel Pascal drawing to his feet and knew I had to get to Liam now or we’d both be dead. Out of breath and out of time, I forced myself to climb the last flight of stairs. My chest was tight, banded close by a corset of fear, and my mind shorted out, static replacing thought.

  A light broke through the ceiling, and in the opening, Blaze stomped with his giant-ass, crazy Tweety-bird feet until he had created a sizeable hole. I lifted my arms, and the damn bird reached down and grasped me in his beak by the back of my shirt, pulling at me as I hoisted my body up and through the hole.

  I almost made it, but Pascal caught up and pulled on my bad leg. I fell back to the floor.

  “Is Liam up there, Blaze? Get him to safety!” I yelled this as I pulled out my grill lighter and flicked it on, shoving it into Pascal’s face. We froze, his face only a few inches from mine.

  His chest wound was oozing a thin, bloody mucous, and his face still looked like Dali’s melting clocks. One eye was glued shut, and the other blinked in a continuous quick rhythm, like it was trying to clear a persistent eyelash.

  He hissed at me. “I know you don’t have the ball. I heard about the fire.”

  “You’re wrong.” My voice was strangled as I battled fatigue, pain, and stress. He pinned me down on my bad leg, and every tiny movement of his body caused a fresh wave of agony. I panted so hard that I was afraid I’d pass out.

  “Get up,” I said. “I do have it.”

  “Liar!”

  “There’s only one way to know,” I choked out. I could feel the tears flowing down my face onto the floor. I wouldn’t stay conscious much longer.

  Curiosity won out, and Pascal lifted his weight from me. I gasped at the lack of pressure, and though my leg hurt, I could think again. I inched backward until my back was close to the wall, removed my string bag, which had remarkably stayed on during my tumble down the stairs, and pulled out a six-inch square of Styrofoam. I twisted the top section off, revealing the outer curve of a small crystal ball.

  “I thought it would be bigger,” Pascal said, crouching to take it from me.

  “I’m sure you’ve heard that a lot, Pascal, but this isn’t about you.”

  “Give it to me.”

  “Blaze, is Liam safe?” I shouted this to the sky, through the hole in the ceiling.

  Yes.

  Relieved, I heaved myself to my feet and gingerly backed out the door using one hand to hold the ball, still nestled in its protective foam bed, out in front of me. “Stay at the top of the stairs, Pascal. I’ll drop it if you don’t.”

  He stayed, and I backed up to the last flight of stairs, where I placed the ball on the landing. As I did so, I used my other hand to gently shake my bag, letting the rest of the contents fall to the floor with little clinks. I talked to cover the sound.

  “Why do you want this ball so much, Pascal? What is it you’re trying to see?”

  “None of your business, little girl.” His chest wound made a sucking sound.

  “All these years. All this experience. All the power, and here you are, your face a watercolor in the rain, your chest a cratered moon rock, and you’re following a human down the steps panting at the bit to get to this tiny crystal ball. How sad. How pathetic.”

  It was dark as we descended, having left the light of the fifth floor behind, so I couldn’t see what his face looked like, but I could hear him growling.

  I kept up the prattle, covering the tinkle as the vials of Manischevitz hit the floor, little land-wines covering the first set of stairs and the entranceway, where they cracked open and leaked their contents on the ground.

  I hobbled out the door, and Shura met me, supporting my right side. I hopped out the door to the minivan. Liam lay in the back, beaten, cut and bruised. I flung my body into the car, threw my injured right leg over the passenger seat, and started the car with my left, just in time to see Pascal at the front door, holding a useless snow globe, his shoes and pants legs wet, his feet and legs glowing like hot coals beneath them.

  I hit the gas and tore through the streets, knocking over a few overflowing garbage cans as I went. I caught a face at a window, but it quickly withdrew. Liam was silent in the back, which scared me more than anything. I was reminded of a pediatric emergency room doctor who once told me it wasn’t the crying children who scared him, it was the silent ones. It’s true. I’d rather he was screaming and cursing, but no, he stayed mute. I wasn’t even sure if he was awake.

  Chapter Thirteen

  We rushed Liam to his apartment, grateful that his key was still in his pocket, even after what he’d been through. His wounds were hideous, big bruises that would turn all sorts of colors, dried rivulets of blood caused by something sharp, and a bite mark at his neck where Pascal had drained him. He seemed in a twilight, not awake but not fully unconscious.

  I gathered all the blood Liam had in his fridge and fed him one-by-one. He sucked them down by instinct, now aware of his surroundings, but the speed with which he consumed the blood convinced me we didn’t have enough. I grabbed my phone and punched in some numbers.

  “Father Paul?”

  “Jess?”

  “Liam needs more blood than we have in his apartment. We need an immediate delivery. Can you help?” My voice was strained and unusually high-pitched.

  “What happened to him?”

  “Pascal.”

  “Pascal attacked him again?”

  “No. Pascal kidnapped Liam to get me to do something for him. I don’t have any more time to explain this, Father. Please come over with more blood.”

  I hung up, done with that conversation. He’d either show or he wouldn’t, but I believed he would.

  We had two more pints of blood left, and I considered what I could do after they ran out. Donating my blood would be fine, but we didn’t have any way to get it except Liam’s teeth, and with the way he was, that wasn’t a good option. He might not let go.

  I wondered if I could bleed into a cup so Liam could sip it and was ready to give it a go when the doorbell rang.

  “Jess. It’s me, Father Paul.”

  Blaze flicked a wing and unlocked the door, then glamoured himself so he blended in with the heavy drapes. If he didn’t move, you couldn’t see him. Interesting.

  Father Paul entered, stooped, dragging a blue and white picnic cooler behind him. He opened the latch, pulled out a pint, and slapped it in my waiting palm so I could shove it at Liam.

  “What happened, Jess?” Father Paul wasn’t wearing priestly garb and looked like your everyday grandpa in jeans and a Cleveland Indians t-shirt. His voice was low and modulated, but I braced myself anyway, guessing what was coming.

  “Pascal kidnapped him.”

  “And…?”

  “He used him to blackmail me into finding an object he wanted.”

  “Which was…?”

  I didn’t look at him. “A crystal ball. It was hidden in a shopping mall.”

  “The Beachwood fire?”

  I pointed to my nose and then to him.

  “What did he want that ball for? What made it so important that he threatened your friend’s life to get it?”

  I shrugged and stuffe
d another blood bag from the cooler in Liam’s hand. “It gives glimpses of the future, or futures, possible scenarios, so Rabbi Stein says.”

  Father Paul paced a few steps to the right, almost walking into Blaze, but he turned in time and re-tracked to his left, continuing to wear a spot in the carpet as he considered the situation. Meanwhile, I fed Liam. He depleted more than a dozen bags of blood, but, thankfully, he was slowing down.

  Father Paul spoke. “He’s trying to see the future, maybe get ahead of us and the Church.”

  “Possibly, Father, but I get the sense this is personal. I’m not sure that Pascal gives the new Knights Templar any thought, other than his singular focus on me.”

  Father Paul stared at me, then looked at his shoes, seeming to make up his mind about something. “You know he had a, ahem, what’s the word I’m looking for? A relationship of a kind with your mother.”

  I whirled on him, suddenly reminded that he was one of the people keeping important information from me. “Yes, I do know that, not because you or anyone else in the Church saw fit to enlighten me!” My anger, pushed aside by recent events, returned in full force. I’d already had it out with my dad, and Ovid, but I’d forgotten about Father Paul’s role until he reminded me of it.

  Father Paul held his hands together in supplication. “Jess, your father didn’t want you involved in monster hunting. We promised we’d keep you out of it.”

  “Fat lot of good that did, and yet, still no one told me, even when Pascal attacked Liam.” I gripped the bag of blood in my hand so hard it almost burst. I handed it to Liam and put my hands behind my back to keep from socking the priest in the mouth. That wouldn’t be good karma under any belief system.

  Liam lay on the couch, eyes open, staring at nothing, but he didn’t drink anymore. I didn’t know if this was good, bad, or indifferent, and I took my frustration out on Father Paul.

  “Anything else you are keeping from me, Father? Any other information slipped your mind that you might need to impart? Does Father really know best? Do you know who killed my mother?”

  My knee took that moment to collapse out from under me, and I hit the ground with a moan. Father Paul approached me with caution, not sure how I would react to him touching me, but I let him examine my knee. Silently, he pulled out a small first-aid kit from a backpack I hadn’t noticed he’d been wearing and handed me four ibuprofens. I popped them dry. He wrapped my knee and gave me an ice pack.

  He left without looking at me, worry in the creases of his face. I didn’t have the energy to care.

  Liam blinked, and I breathed a sigh of relief, until he focused on my face and leapt from the couch, screaming, “Get out! Get out! It’s not safe here!”

  I hopped up on my good leg, reaching out to touch him, but he jerked back. “Liam, you’re back in your apartment. We got you away from Pascal, and you’re safe now.”

  Liam’s eyes glittered diamond black as he held onto the back of an armchair, his fingers pressing into the fabric, his knuckles white. He was holding on by a thread.

  “By all that is holy, Jess, get out! It’s not me I’m worried about. It’s you. It’s not safe here.” He gasped, a sudden intake of breath, and his whole body twitched. He managed to choke out, “Run!” before his fangs dropped.

  Blaze, Shura, and I moved, me and the wolf to my minivan and Blaze to the sky. I was as weirded out as I wanted to be that night, and my knee pulsed in pain. I had no idea what had happened to my friend, but that was going to have to be a worry for tomorrow. We went home, and I was beyond thankful to see Nathaniel’s car in the driveway. He greeted me at the door with arms open wide. I hugged him for dear life, crying tears of pain, anger, sadness, and frustration.

  Nathaniel stroked my hair. “I’m sorry I left so abruptly,” he whispered into my ear. “But, I’m scared, honey. The universe sent us a guard wolf, a guard wolf. What does that mean?”

  “It means we are being taken care of,” I replied, but I screwed up my face to mirror his, both of us concerned about our children. I told him what happened to Liam. Without a word, early in the morning, Nathaniel, my rock, my calm in the storm, turned, walked into the kitchen, and pulled a bottle of vodka out of the freezer. I didn’t even know we had it. I didn’t keep alcohol in the house. Recovery is always, and I never wanted to make it more difficult on him.

  Nathaniel held it, staring at the cold, clear liquid while I waited with bated breath. I hadn’t seen this side of him since we’d been married, and I held my hand out, grasping his arm, clinging to him, begging him with my eyes to come back to me.

  He did. Nathaniel shook his head and returned the bottle without taking a sip. I gripped his hand and led him to a chair, turning back to make him a cup of tea.

  He jumped up. “You’re hurt!”

  “My knee is messed up.”

  “Who wrapped it?”

  “Father Paul, but he’s on my doody list right now, so don’t talk to me about him. He mentioned that my mother had a ‘relationship’ with Pascal, and I lost it.”

  “You mean, he knew, too, and didn’t tell you either?”

  “Just so.”

  “Bastard.”

  “Easy there, big guy. He’s a man of the cloth.”

  “Who kept information from you that you needed. I don’t think that gives him a pass; in fact, it makes it worse, in my book.” He guided me by the arms to the couch so I could sit and turn long ways to prop up my knee. “I’ll make you tea.”

  He busied himself with the kettle. Our kitchen and family room were all one large space, so we could still talk to one another.

  “Let me tell you about Pascal, Nathaniel. It may give you more peace. He’s badly hurt, and it’s going to take time for him to be at full strength. We’ve got time to plan.”

  “You know, he’s a mathematician by training, a follower of logic. It feels weird that he wants a crystal ball.”

  “A lot of time has passed since the 1600s. Who knows what he believes now? He’s still crafty and intelligent, and he obviously knows magic is real.”

  Nathaniel gestured toward our overflowing bookshelves. “I read about him recently. He had some kind of mystical, religious experience on November 23-24, 1654. Do you think that’s when he was turned? He continued to work but disappeared from society after that.”

  “Possible, but I’m not sure where that leaves us.”

  “Just data. I’ll keep digging into his past.”

  “Mommy! You’re home!” Devi ran in and jumped up on the couch to snuggle beside me. I couldn’t help the smile on my face. We were together again, and together, we could face anything.

  Normal mayhem took control, much to my relief.

  “Dad, can I have eggs for breakfast?”

  “Okay, David, what kind of eggs?”

  “Scrambled, please!”

  Daniel tugged at my shirt and pointed at his mouth.

  “You want eggs, too, Daniel?”

  “Yeggs!” I started to correct him but realized that “yeggs” was a brilliant combination of “yes,” and “eggs.”

  Devi decided on cereal but wasn’t happy with the options. Nathaniel began the negotiation while I limped into the kitchen and slipped some raspberries and juice in front of her to get her to eating before she had a total meltdown. David brought a toy car to the table and raced it across the butcher block to his sister, veering close to knocking over her glass. Devi batted it out of the way, and it flew to the floor where Daniel picked it up and placed it in his mouth. David yelled at his brother.

  Ah. Home.

  The day went on, and I pushed my worry about Liam to the back of my mind, hoping that a day’s rest plus the blood would return him to normal, or as close to normal as a trauma victim could be. I knew it was going to take time for him to heal mentally.

  I was in the middle of washing dishes, enjoy the satisfaction of a mundane job well done, when Nathaniel hurried into the kitchen, holding the Buddha, who was now full-sized and whistling like a train. I b
arely had a second to register this warning when someone screamed my name. I dropped the sponge and detergent and dashed to the front door, which was almost buckling from the pounding it was taking.

  “What? Who is it?” I yelled, as I unlocked the door.

  “Jess, it is me, Judy. Joseph is missing!”

  I finally got the locks undone and opened the door to find a red-faced, crying Judy in front of me. She was wringing her hands and speaking so fast I had trouble understanding.

  “Jess, we need your rescue pony! Please! Joseph is missing. I can’t find him anywhere!”

  I grasped her hand. “When did you last see him?”

  “Last night. I tucked him in, and he rolled over onto his right side, as he always does, and I closed the door, since he likes it dark in his room. But he didn’t come down this morning for breakfast. I thought he must be tired and sleeping late, so I didn’t go up for a while.”

  “How long until you looked for him?”

  “Maybe an hour? I got worried, thinking maybe he was sick, so I knocked on his door, to no answer. I peeked in, and he was gone. The window was open, but no Joseph. I can’t find him anywhere!”

  “Can you bring me his pillow, please? I’d like to have something with his scent.”

  Judy wiped snot from her face with the back of her hand and nodded, turning to run to her house to do as I asked. Blaze and Shura crept out of their sleeping places and stood with me on the front lawn, one disguised as a pony, the other not bothering to disguise herself at all. I threw her “Dog at Work” vest on her and figured that would have to be enough.

  “Nathaniel, can you please bring me Buddha?”

  Nathaniel appeared, mouth tight, and held out the jade statue. I took it and held it in my hands.

  “I’m assuming by this warning that the kidnapping is real and not by a human entity?”

  The Buddha warmed slightly, but there was no reply.

  “I was kinda hoping for a little more notice.”