Beaten Path

by Martin Shannon

  I slid back slowly, my body still smarting from its introduction to the shed’s steel wall. “Ed, it’s me, Eugene Law. Damn it, man, we lived together. We did the Demon Hunting together for a few years, before I got busy with… other things.”

  “Stop,” the bandana-wearing man said, his machete dangerously close to my neck. “Get him up.”

  Maurice pulled me to my feet, but Ed’s razor-sharp blade never wavered. My old roommate held up the plastic ring, the tiny spider’s legs still twitching. “The Eugene Law I knew would never have made a deal with whatever the heck it is you made a deal with.”

  Donnie returned with a dingy trucker hat. He held it with the same reverence a normal person would reserve for religious artifacts.

  Ed kept me at the pointy end of the blade. “Last hole…”

  Donnie hesitated. “Are you sure? No one’s ever done the last hole…”

  “He’s a Magician, he can take it. Last hole, Donnie.”

  “Correction, he was a Magician. Larry and Moe here ripped my Magick from me, and you let it slip out the door.”

  The junior Demon Hunter adjusted the sizing strap, and it gave off an audible pop as he clicked the plastic into place.

  Ed pointed to the dirt-smeared hat. “This is a—”

  “It’s a Truth Cap. Damn it, Ed. I know a Truth Cap when I see one. Sure, you know what, give me the damn hat and I’ll tell you the same thing I would have told you before. It’s me, I made a terrible mistake and now I’m going to put things right.”

  “We’ll see, Mr. Magician.” Ed tossed the cap at my feet. “Put it on. I’ve got questions.”

  The sharp smell of burnt peanuts filled the small shed.

  “Damn it, Maurice. Toss those out and start over before you ruin the roaster.”

  Donnie’s brother hurried out the screen door.

  I picked up the hat and felt the Magick immediately. This was different from the Viewmaster. It had a soft, almost feminine touch to it. Ed wasn’t a Magician, but this clearly had the trappings of a deft hand.

  I placed the hat on my head, or at least I tried to. Donnie hadn’t been kidding—the hat was about as tight as humanly possible. I pulled it past my hair and down to my ears. The undersized band squeezed the blood vessels of my temples like a pair of vise-grips. It reminded me of that time in High School I’d tried out for the football team and blacked out from the undersized helmet.

  Ah, the days before lawyers and safety waivers.

  I blinked back the pain. “Okay, Edwin Lovely, ask away.”

  Donnie tilted his head. “Lovely? Your last name is Lovely?”

  The machete swung around. “Sure is—you got a problem with that?”

  “Nope.”

  Ed brought the pointy end of his blade back to me. “Good. Okay, Eugene-Law-looking-thing—who are you, really?”

  “I am Eugene Law, now former Magician, and all-around idiot,” I said, the words falling out of my mouth without the slightest hesitation.

  Yep, this hat was made by a woman.

  “Just as I thought, you—” Ed started to press in with the machete, then paused. “Wait, what did you say?”

  “I’m Eugene Law, now former Magician and—”

  My old college roommate lowered his blade slightly, then ran his hand over his head. The brightly colored bandana fell away to reveal a shiny bald head.

  “Holy shit, is it really you?”

  “Yup. What happened to your hair, Ed?”

  The Demon Hunter ignored me. “It’s been years—”

  “More than twenty, to be exact.”

  “But, if you really are Eugene, then tell me, why you set off Sal’s Spidery Sense?”

  “I made a deal with the House.”

  Donnie scrunched up his face. “Does he mean the Seminole Casino? Oh crap, are we not supposed to make deals with the casino? I’m asking for a friend…”

  Ed shook his head slowly. “He’s not talking about the casino.”

  “He’s not?”

  “No,” I said, the hat band digging into my scalp like an overzealous boa constrictor. “I’m not. I’m talking about the—”

  “Stop.” Ed cut me off. “The less they know about 69 Mallory Lane the better. Why did you do it, Gene? Why did you sell yourself to… to that?”

  “My daughter.”

  Ed’s hard exterior softened. He stepped into the light just long enough for me to watch his sunburned face droop. I’d known that swamp-dwelling cypress rat since our early days in Gainesville. He was a good bit smarter than he looked, but then again he also was quite adept at wrestling alligators, so some of those smarts could be called into question.

  “You have a daughter?”

  “I did… I do… I honestly don’t know anymore.”

  Ed rubbed a hand over his gray stubble. “Wait, you didn’t get back together with Morgan, right?”

  “God no. Wait, how did you know she’s back?”

  The Demon Hunter let his machete droop a little more. “Yeah, I didn’t, but I had a feeling. She’s too cunning to stay trapped inside that place forever.”

  “Well, thanks for the warning.”

  Ed waved me off and gave me one of his signature grins, even if it was far more wrinkled than I remembered. “Nah, you’d just have worried.”

  “And for good measure,” I said, equal parts happy to see my old roommate, and ready to choke him to death—Ed had that effect on people.

  The Demon Hunter shrugged his shoulders. “Just so long as you didn’t end up with her. She was a bad girl, Gene, and not the kind I’d have wanted you to be with.”

  “You’re telling me. If I recall, weren’t you the one that directed me toward her in the first place?”

  “I didn’t know that at the time. I mean, she puts on quite an act, and I know how you are with… you know.”

  “Boobs? Yeah. Thanks for airing my weaknesses, and for having Larry, Moe, and Curly here Soul-Split me. Now I am right and properly screwed. May I take this off?”

  Ed nodded, and Maurice popped the suction-cup Truth Cap from my sore noggin.

  “Eugene Law.” Ed shook his head. “It’s been a long time.”

  “Too long,” I said, hoping time and tides had washed away the last things I’d said to my old roommate.

  I extended a hand, but Ed ignored it. He threw his arms around me and pulled me into a warm embrace. The peanut vendor’s arms felt like steel tongs, but it had been so long since anyone had touched me I wasn’t quite sure how to respond. “Uh… it’s good to see you too, Ed.”

  The Demon Hunter patted me on the back with a bit more vigor than I might have preferred—still smarting from hitting the wall and all—then let go to get a good look at me. “You have a daughter?”

  “And a son,” I replied, the heady smell of peanuts and fried chicken lingering on my clothes.

  “No shit?”

  “None.”

  Ed handed the machete to Donnie, then clapped his hands together. “You ended up with Porter didn’t you?”

  I dusted the broken peanut shells and dirt from my jacket. “How’d you guess?”

  A hint of disappointment appeared in Ed’s eyes, but it vanished just as quickly as it came. “Because you two were good together, really good. She’s a special one, Gene. Don’t screw that up.”

  “Too late.”

  Ed’s face got serious. “What do you mean? Is Porter okay?”

  “I don’t know anymore, Ed. I lost her. I lost all of them.” Bile bubbled up in the back of my throat, the painful memories of the Hellgate flooding my empty stomach with an acid-wash reminder of that fate-filled evening.

  Don’t let me go, Dad!

  “That’s what I’m here for, Gene,” Ed said, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Tell me what happened.”

  * * *

  “I can’t believe it,” Ed said, shaking his head slowly as I rolled my sleeve over the Hellfire scar. “You did all that and still lost Catherine?”

  “Well, I d
idn’t know that until now.”

  “I can’t say I approve of the Imp binding. You could always have called me. You know I’ve been doing this a couple of years and would have given you a decent rate.”

  “Yeah, well, now I’m screwed. The House has double-crossed me, or found some loop-hole I didn’t know about. Cathy’s lost in Hell and I’ve got to get her back. Then, to make an already terrible situation a thousand times worse, my Magick just walked out that door.”

  Ed nodded, his face processing my words. “Yep, you are right screwed, my friend. Now let’s get you unscrewed, eh?”

  For a moment I hesitated, and not from the truth-telling hat that had all but cut off the flow of blood to my higher brain functions. It wasn’t that overly tight band that kept my mouth from working, it was the mild shock of having someone call me friend.

  I hadn’t heard those words since I’d all but dropped off the face of the earth, and I was surprised at how they made me feel—wanted—and not in the ‘kill him now’ way I was used to.

  “You aren’t going near the House, Ed. It’s stronger now, and I don’t care how many relatives or kids you’ve got in the swamp around here, you’d need an army to take on that place.”

  “Who said anything about the House—”

  “Ed, the Darkling could be anywhere by now.”

  The peanut vendor ran a hand over his shiny bald head. “And it would appear that one’s on us. I think it’d only be right to get you and your Darkling back together, but I’ve got to ask, are you sure you want to?”

  “What do you mean?”

  Ed wiped his face with the bandana. “I mean, you’re free now. You can just be Eugene Law, fastidious man of the people. You could start a new life, walk out that door and be a new man. The House won’t care about you, it’ll find new victims. You can live a normal life.”

  I grabbed my old roommate’s shoulder. “Damn it, man, I don’t want a normal life. I want my daughter and my family back. I want to fix my mistakes.”

  Ed smiled, that mischievous grin returning from a past I’d tried to bury, then tied the bandana back on his head. “And that’s what I wanted to hear. Now, let’s go find your Darkling and get that daughter back.”

  “Did you not hear me? I’ve lost my Magick. I’m about as useful as man-nipples.”

  Ed shook his head. “I’m no Magician and I do just fine. Guys, load up the gear. We’re on the clock.”

  5

  Midnight Riders

  A rust-stained, ruby red pickup roared over the jagged ribbon of country road outside of Dade City. Behind that truck, swinging dangerously and bobbing along with the poorly maintained pavement, was a trailer filled to the brim with the tools of the trade—Demon Hunting and peanut vending both.

  “It’s a calling, really,” my old roommate said, adjusting the rear-view mirror.

  I gestured to the bouncing trailer. “A calling, eh?”

  “Yup. I get a great deal on salt.”

  Ed wasn’t the only peanut-vending Demon Hunter in the Sunshine State, but he must have been one of the more successful ones. The red rust-bucket did have a nice extended cab, yet even with that extra leg room, two muscly Demon Hunters, a skinny kid, and one Magickless Magician made for tight ride.

  Ed rolled the windows down and let the cool night air wash over us. “Eugene Law,” he said, shaking his head. “Didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”

  “Why not?”

  “Have you forgotten our last conversation?”

  I hadn’t, but I’d sure hoped he had; it wasn’t a conversation I was particularly proud of. “What conversation?”

  “Exactly,” Ed said before checking the rear-view mirror. The road behind us remained dark. “That’s how I feel about it as well. Besides, you’re here now, and that’s what matters, isn’t it?”

  My fingers absently traced the window edge. “No. I’m sorry. I’ve been saying that a lot recently, but still, I’m sorry for how all that went down.”

  “Gene, you don’t apologize to me again. I mean it. I was a piece of work back then anyway, and you were right to push back. You were going places, and I was standing in the way of that.”

  “No you weren’t. You were just trying to get me to see the bigger picture.”

  Ed leaned back in his seat. “Well, I’m guessing you did… eventually.”

  “Yeah, you can thank Porter for that.”

  My old roommate chuckled. “Why does that not surprise me?”

  Headlights flashed in the side-mirror—close enough to be concerning, yet far enough away that I couldn’t tell exactly what was behind them. “Ed, should there be anyone else on this road?”

  The Demon Hunter adjusted his rear-view mirror. “No…”

  The lights separated perfectly and slipped into outside lanes; those weren’t car headlights.

  “Ed?”

  The Demon Hunter flipped open the center console and removed a silvery six-shooter. Ornate Scrollwork covered the gun’s dingy metal. He checked the cylinder before tossing it in my lap. “One-shot Willie’s Pistol. It’s dinged up, but I loaded it with Dead Sea salt rounds. It’s not much, but it’s better than nothing.”

  Each side-view mirror now held a single light, and they were gaining on us.

  “What are they?”

  Ed didn’t answer me; instead, he directed his attention to Donnie and the boys in the back seat. “Look alive, boys. We’ve got incoming.”

  Donnie turned around to get a look out the back window. “I don’t get it. We had a truce. We stay out of their business, they stay out of ours.”

  Ed tugged the wheel. “Damn it, they’re Demons, they don’t follow logic. We should have banished Viten the Curdler when we had the chance.”

  “A truce? I thought you never dealt with Demons?”

  Ed fished a machete out from the gap between the seats and handed it back to Donnie. “By policy I don’t, but this was a special occasion—one I will not repeat. Banish first, ask questions later. Donnie…”

  The back window slid open and the meathead hunter pulled his considerable bulk through it and onto the truck bed. “I got it. Come on, Maurice.”

  “Don’t either of you fall off. I’m not going to explain to your mother why their sons aren’t coming home for Christmas, you understand me?”

  The roaring wind mixed with the rumble of motorcycle engines made it all the more difficult to hear the elder Demon Hunter.

  Ed turned his attention to the youngest member of the peanut crew. “Little Ed, you—”

  “I know, Dad, I’ll keep my head down.”

  Dad?

  “He’s your son?”

  Ed nodded. “Yeah, but now’s not the time, Gene. I’ll fill you in later.”

  The first rider’s howl split the air and sent my now non-Magickal fingers racing for the six-shooter.

  “Viten the Curdler wouldn’t happen to be the Imp also known as Sear Spit, would he?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  I checked the cylinder of Ed’s salt cannon, letting the rounds spin before flicking it closed—I’d watched a few westerns in my day. “And you had a deal with him?”

  “No… Well, it’s complicated. I’ll explain later, what are you getting at?” Ed said, his eyes switching rapidly between the road and the truck’s various mirrors.

  “What I’m not telling you is I killed Sear Spit roughly,” I glanced at my watch, “three hours ago.”

  “Killed?” The truck jerked under my roommate’s surprised fingers. “You killed an immortal Demon?”

  I shrugged. “It comes with the job. What do you think I do for the House, cut the grass?”

  Ed got the truck back under control and gunned the pickup’s engine. “Seat belts on!” The peanut hauler roared down the dark pavement, but the lights still gained on us. “Wait, that’s been you?” He pushed the accelerator to the floor. “You’re the idiot killing off Demons and turning the whole state sideways?”

  “Uh, yeah…”


  “Damn it, Gene! There’s an order here: good and evil, up and down, left and right, Yin and Yang.”

  “Throw an ‘A, B, Start’ on the end of that and you almost have the Contra cheat codes,” I said, unhooking my seat belt.

  “Damn it, I miss our gaming nights,” my old roommate said, a hint of sadness coloring his words. “Still, I’m serious.”

  “So am I. I do what the House says and my family stays safe. I’m not risking Porter, Kris, or Cathy for some outdated notion of cosmic balance.”

  The Demon Hunter frowned. “But the balance is all we have.”

  I cocked One-shot Willie’s Pistol and used the overhead bar to pull myself partially out the window. “It might be all you have, but I have this nifty salt gun and nothing left to lose. So, if you don’t mind, I’m going to put it to good use and deal with Sear Spit’s posse.”

  “You’re not getting out of it that easy. We’re going to continue this conversation later.”

  “Sure thing!” I shouted over the roaring wind and motorcycle engines. “Let’s just wait until after I send the Riders to summary judgement.”

  Midnight Riders.

  It wasn’t technically midnight, but I wasn’t going to waste my breath asking the screaming undead roaring up alongside the trailer if they could tell time—that answer was likely a resounding no, anyway.

  Riders were revenants, a word that had made its way into Webster’s Dictionary a few years ago. The official definition was spirits of the wartime fallen that had come back to haunt the battlefield. The Rider’s shrieks cut what remained of my soul to the core.

  Thanks, Webster, but I’ll take it from here.

  Sear Spit had been a nasty Imp, but a well-connected one. He’d made a few enemies, mortal and otherwise. His revenants had been necessary muscle to try and keep the little purple Demon safe from people like me.

  It hadn’t worked before, and it wasn’t going to work now.

  Last time you escaped them you had access to a nigh-infinite source of Magickal power…

  I took aim with the revolver, but it bounced around like crazy as the truck roared across the broken road.

  These particular revenants had been Civil War deserters. To them they were still living out those last few semi-heroic charges and hadn’t fled to the swamps of Florida to make a deal with one very nasty Imp.