Demon Dance

by Brian Freyermuth

  “Just shut up and listen!” she yelled. I stopped again as a roaring filled the phone. Screams pierced the background. “I’m in a penthouse at One-Fifty-Five Second Street. Downtown. Get your ass down here!”

  “Cate, I—”

  “Please, Nick!” Gunshots cracked the phone. “Jesus, the thing has no eyes, how can it see—”

  The line went dead.

  CHAPTER SIX

  I pulled away the phone. Cate had disconnected.

  Part of me wanted to go back to my room and drink it all away. This wasn’t my life now. I couldn’t save her. All my gifts were nothing but parlor tricks and mirrors.

  Forget her, a nasty little side of me whispered. You can’t save her. You couldn’t even save Ann…

  That part of my life was over. Dead as yesterday.

  And yet I hurried into the bedroom and grabbed my jean jacket and a new baseball cap, this one black and green with the triple letter logo of a wrestler on the front. Yeah, I know, priorities.

  Walker stood staring at me from the bed.

  “I know,” I told him as I searched behind a stack of bills on my desk. “Stupid human.” I finally discovered the artifact I sought: a set of old car keys.

  I rushed out of the house, barely remembering to lock the front door. The rain had stopped and the afternoon sky had begun to lighten, but the bitter wind howled through the apartment complex like a banshee. I hurried down the stairs and into the courtyard.

  The apartment’s single-car garages were separate buildings that overlooked the Fremont neighborhood. I hadn’t entered mine in a couple of months, and when I pulled up the rolling door, the musty stench was a direct accusation. Shelves lined the right wall all the way to the ceiling, each holding a plastic bin with vague shapes inside. These weren’t the standard knickknacks, but rather various items from my years as a private detective. Most items I had no clue how to get rid of. Some came back when I threw them away.

  And then there was the antique sitting to the left of the shelves. The old pickup sat like a giant rusted golem, waiting for the spark of life that would let it roar into being. A thick layer of dirt made the tan paintjob almost black.

  I only hoped the damn thing would start. There was a reason I took the bus most of the time.

  A tiny spider had woven an elaborate tapestry across the broken driver’s window. A stench of mildew soaked the seats along with something else. I didn’t want to think about the something else, so I brushed the web away and slid in.

  After a short prayer, the truck belched smoke from the tailpipe and rattled out of the garage. It stalled once when I jumped out to lock the garage door, but after a few minutes of cursing I managed to coax it into moving again.

  A quick glance at the gas gauge told me the tank was half full, which was good, because I didn’t think Cate had enough time for me to stop off for gas and a hotdog at the local mart. So I slammed the pickup in gear, and we shambled our way forward.

  The ride down the 99 freeway left my nerves jangling. My body wasn’t fully recovered from the push I gave it this morning, and the pickup threatened to die every time I hit one of the inclines along the highway. Cate needed me, and here I was almost twenty minutes from where she waited.

  The hero in the movies didn’t have to worry about traffic. After the damsel calls, he’s running through the door in the next frame. He didn’t have to worry about traffic lights and motorists drifting ten miles below the speed limit.

  I made a right turn onto Broad Street at around forty miles an hour and had to slow down as the truck threatened to rattle into tiny pieces. After an eternity, Second Street finally loomed, and when I turned I almost slammed into a wall of cars. The truck stalled, but it didn’t matter. A sea of red lights stretched before me.

  This wasn’t lunchtime traffic, even for downtown. This was something bigger.

  “Sorry, old girl,” I whispered to the truck. Ripping the keys out of the ignition, I tore open the door and sprinted into the lighter foot traffic that flowed past the cars.

  Faces blurred as I rushed madly down the sidewalk. A college student stumbled as I shoved past. I didn’t wait for green lights but sprinted through intersections. I rushed past expensive restaurants and coffee shops, as well as a theater advertising The Tempest on the marquee. All around me the crowd parted and the cars sat like mourners waiting to see the casket.

  The crowd thickened as I made my way down Second Street until I had to push and shove my way through a thicket of bodies. A hush of excited and anxious whispers washed over me as I made my way through the crowd. The skyscraper at 155 loomed ahead like a skeleton finger stretching into the heavens. When I neared the building, I slowed my dash and my mind took a moment to catch up with my eyes. I understood why the traffic had stopped.

  Two fire trucks sat outside the high-rise, blocking the street. A half dozen policemen tried in vain to direct traffic down a side street, but the heart of downtown had stopped beating. And looking up, so did mine.

  Thin gray smoke drifted up from two blackened and hollowed out upper floors. The fire trucks were dormant now, silent and waiting in the gloom. My stomach twisted as I pushed forward.

  A bear of a man dressed in the dark blue of a patrol cop intercepted me as I ducked under the police tape. He had perfectly combed brown hair and just a bit of sweat touched his bronze skin. He looked like a Greek god standing at the gates of Hades.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” the policeman told me, his voice as solid as his chiseled face, “but you cannot go inside.”

  “But my sister-in-law is upstairs.” I said, the truth coming out before I knew it.

  “I’m sorry, but no one can go in.”

  I stepped back. “Why are the police here?” I asked. “Is this a crime scene?”

  “I can’t say more,” the policeman said, his voice as hard as the asphalt under our feet. “Please step back so we can do our job.”

  Their job meant standing around and looking tired. Damn. That meant the fire was out and there was nothing left to do but wait for the crime unit.

  I melded back into the crowd. The policeman’s dark eyes followed me, but he turned away when another officer approached him. I took my chance and swam through the crowd toward the building next to the high-rise.

  The neighbor was an old brick liquor store. The owner stood outside with the others, trying to see over the heads of the crowd. He didn’t even glance at me as I squeezed between onlookers and made my way into the alleyway between the two buildings.

  Two dumpsters crouched like somber gargoyles amid a congregation of refuse. Distant sirens filled the gloom. I didn’t have much time.

  A brand-new card reader sat next to the back door, a deterrent to any would-be thief. I didn’t have time for fancy lock picks so I grabbed the handle of the metal door, closed my eyes, and let my breath get low and steady. It was like riding a bike, I told myself as I pulled.

  Even in my lax state the door buckled. I pulled harder, grunting with the effort. Sweat broke out on my forehead, dribbling into my right eye. Then, right when I thought it was time to check out a good hernia surgeon, the handle and the latch ripped free, screeching like a demon coming from the pits. I sucked in air between my teeth, but the only movement in the alley was a newspaper tossed by the wind. After a moment of watching the entrance with bated breath, I threw the locking mechanism aside and kicked the door wide.

  A stairwell led up into the darkness above. The power was out, probably as a precautionary procedure. I took another deep breath, stabilizing my metabolism.

  It was time to truly see what my old muscles could do.

  I sprinted up the stairs. The first and second floor flew past. A pressure in my head built right when my lungs began to burn from the run, and then pop. My speed rose, and adrenaline surged through my pores. I took a deep breath and truly opened myself up.

  I sailed up the stairs without even looking at the numbers on the wall. Wind rushed past my face, and the darkness became as cl
ear as the false dawn of morning. I never worried about missing a step as I flew up the stairs. I never worried about anything.

  I don’t know exactly how long it took me to reach the penthouse of the skyscraper, but it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes. The stairwell door swung freely as I pushed through.

  Details stood out in my heightened state. Thick carpet with gold trim lined the floor. Large eight-foot-tall mirrors hung on the sides of the short hallway, the borders of the glass carved with Celtic symbols. The hall led to another door, also broken and swinging forlornly on its hinges. Smoke thickened the air.

  Remember what they say about what goes up?

  The adrenaline drained as I stood in that smoke clogged hallway. My muscles shook and I had to lean against the wall before I fell over. My lungs couldn’t get enough oxygen.

  I knew what brought me out of the high. The missing door to the penthouse stood before me like a gateway to a blackened, burned-out hell. I didn’t want to go through that portal. I didn’t want to see.

  I’ve seen death in my life, but this was different. As I stepped toward the broken door to the penthouse all I could see was Ann’s bloody face in a pale headlight.

  But I had to know. I stepped across the threshold and steadied my nerves. Smoke mixed with the harsh odor of burned metal and melted plastic. I stopped in the entrance. Another odor danced under the smoke, like a wisp of fog crawling over the ground.

  Sulfur.

  Damn. The front hallway was relatively untouched, and my shoes tapped a dirge on the marble floor. Two art prints hung on either side of me. I recognized both as Dali, one a naked virgin asleep on a rock with fantastical tigers and elephants floating above, and the other the famous clock melting scene.

  Drifting forward, I made my way into the cold heart of the destruction. For a moment I couldn’t tell where the Dali paintings ended and reality began.

  The living room was gone; there was no other way to put it. Blackened furniture lay like kindling, discarded and flung around the tomb. A heavy wind raced through the shattered window that overlooked Puget Sound. The arctic air caused me to shiver, although I didn’t know if it was the cold or the silence.

  Scraps of burned paper lazily swirled through the destruction. One piece, I think it was a page of sheet music, caught my eye, and I followed it through the gray light until it landed on blackened bone.

  “Cate?” Nothing moved in the darkness. I called her name again, louder this time, but only the wind responded.

  I didn’t want to move. I didn’t want to gaze at the horrid skeleton that took up residence in the center of the room like some dreadful queen residing over the dead. For a moment I could do nothing but look out into the broken sky.

  A siren broke my paralysis. The police were coming with their horde of detectives and scientists, if they weren’t here already. I had to move, and move now.

  As I approached the skeleton, the stench hit me first. The sickly odor of burned flesh drenched the air. The victim had been lying on his or her back when the fire hit, maybe lounging around watching television. There had been no time to move before the blaze consumed everything in its path. The bones were burned so drastically that I knew if I touched the surface they would crumble into dust. This was the origin of the hell blast.

  I knew the cops would tan my hide, but I had to see. I reached forward and gently separated the skeleton’s jaw and the upper teeth. The jaw broke with a soft, brittle snap and fell to the ash-covered floor. The upper teeth contained normal human canines.

  I let out the breath I was holding. “Cate?” I called again. I moved into the middle of the room and pulled out my cell phone. Taking a deep breath to steady myself, I called her number.

  She could’ve left. She could’ve jumped out the window and survived the fall. There were plenty of ways for her to escape this deathtrap. Hell, we had escaped more dangerous situations when working together.

  I closed my eyes and willed her phone to stay silent.

  As I stood, the wind howling around me, the opening refrain of “Crazy Train” echoed through the room and through my heart.

  I turned and stepped toward the sound. Light from the phone flared in the gloom. It had landed in the outer ring of destruction, just beyond the reach of the controlled burst. The victim in front of the phone wasn’t so lucky.

  The body lay curled in a fetal position, legs drawn up under the chin. Hairless, blackened skin stretched tight over the bones. It looked like a mummy dug up from a thousand-year-old tomb. It was also missing its head.

  Ozzy’s yells faded away. The cell phone light went out, leaving me in the dim afternoon glow, but before it did, the light flashed on something in the body’s chest: a glint of metal. I doubt anyone else would’ve seen it, but I did.

  I knelt and reached a tentative hand toward the ribcage. My mind screamed. It wasn’t true, no matter what I found.

  I brushed away the soot, and there, burned and melted into the breastbone of the body, was a small silver cross. The heat had melted the silver into the flesh.

  Tears came to my eyes. When she became a vampire, Cate loved playing against convention. Right before I had left San Diego, she had taken to wearing a little silver cross, just to spite the clients.

  Crosses couldn’t hurt vamps, but fire could.

  I had failed her. Just like Ann, Cate was dead because I wasn’t fast enough.

  Police sirens wailed. I touched the cross one more time before I fled back into the hallway. I managed to slip out of the building as the army of CSI made their way up to the crime scene.

  The tears came and I didn’t care. Cate was gone.

  Just one more ghost to follow me around.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  My brain refused to shift out of neutral as I walked back to the truck. Surprisingly it was still there and in one piece. A dozen cars honked their horns at me when I sat down and started the truck, but I barely heard them.

  A hard, driving rain whipped in through the broken window, almost drowning me by the time I made it back home. The steady tempo did a nasty little tap dance in my brain. For a moment I sat in the garage and believed it was all a dream. I would go inside and continue my normal day.

  But I could still see the blackened skeleton in my mind. I could still see the melted silver embedded in the breast of one of my best friends. All the years we dodged the bullet, and now it had finally hit home.

  “I’m sorry, Ann,” I whispered as the tears came again. “I failed you again.”

  A part of me wanted to shut down. The circle around the bed would protect me from even the nastiest bastard, so I didn’t have to worry. I could go to sleep and let the whole situation pass.

  But I couldn’t fail Ann a third time. So I called Jake.

  “Hello?” His voice shook, never a good sign.

  “Jake, it’s me.”

  “Nick? Jesus, I’ve been trying to get a hold of you all morning! Didn’t you get the messages?”

  “What happened?” I asked him even though I already knew the answer.

  There was a pause and a deep breath. “The heart’s gone.”

  “When?”

  “About an hour ago. Didn’t that thing attack you this morning?”

  “Yeah.”

  He whistled. “It usually takes days to get the needed sacrifice, and this took a few hours? Jesus, what kind of shit are you in?”

  The proof was there. Cate’s last words came to me. Good old No-Eyes had nuked the penthouse, with my sister-in-law inside.

  “Nick, you there?”

  “Yeah. So the heart crumbled?”

  “Into goo, man.”

  “Did you trace it?” I asked him.

  “No, I tried to follow the leash and its master shoved me out. Almost split my head down the middle, too. I still have the damn migraine.”

  “Jake, this is extremely important. I need to track the demon.”

  “Track it? What the hell are you talking about?”

 
“I need to find where it went. Can you do that?”

  Silence answered me. “You’ve gone crazy, that’s it,” Jake finally answered. “It’s the only explanation. You heard what I said? This guy threw me out before I could get a fix. You don’t do that if you’re a two-dollar street thug. And then this guy has a sacrifice ready in a couple of hours? You’re out of your fucking gourd.”

  “I understand all that,” I told him, “but it doesn’t matter. I need to trace this thing. If anything, I need a warning, because it came after me.” And Cate. I closed my eyes and pushed the image back into the vault of my mind.

  More silence. I was fed up with his reluctance, even though the rational part of my brain told me to hold back the anger. Jake was a hustler, but a powerful one. If this thing scared him, it was truly bad mojo.

  “Fine,” he said finally. “But meet me someplace other than the store. Betty will skin me alive if a demon comes rampaging through here. I’ll have some kind of vessel for you in about an hour.”

  “Thanks, Jake. I owe you one.”

  “You’ll owe me more if the store burns down again.”

  “You have another place we could do this?” I asked.

  After a moment of contemplation, he answered, “I know a place. Little coffee shop on the corner.”

  The little tug of déjà vu yanked at my neck hairs. “You mean the African Queen?”

  “Yeah, you know it? It’s my sister’s shop.”

  I stopped. Did I hear that right?

  “Nick, you there?”

  “Thelma’s your sister?”

  “Half-sister, but yeah.” A suspicious tone crept into his voice. “Why?”

  “Nothing. Uh,” I paused a bit, “have you talked to her today?”

  “No. Why?”

  I sighed. “Nothing, just meet me there. You sure she won’t mind us performing a ritual in the middle of her place?”

  “The shop is covered. Thelma knows a little something, and I put in a bunch of wards a while ago. We should be fine.”