by Devon Monk
I should have killed her when I had the chance.
The parade would be starting in a couple hours and I’d need to be on crowd control.
Delaney was in a coma.
Any minute a new vortex might open.
Xtelle was gone.
But Bathin was still trapped at my house.
Than was right that summoning a minor demon was a bad idea. I was too tired to do it now anyway.
“This isn’t how I wanted any of this to go,” I said, rubbing at the headache creeping up the back of my skull. “But hey, I have a pair of evil scissors, a vacationing god of death, and a kiss-my-ass attitude.”
I picked up my bag and swept my spell supplies back into it, erasing the chalk triangle on the counter. “I say it’s time I do what I should have done over a year ago.”
~~~
Step three: Break up with my evil not-boyfriend.
Than was silent on the drive, taking in the calmness of the town, the gray and damp. In moments like this, I thought I could see Ordinary as it had once been, dirt roads and foot paths between the sea and shore, little cozy cabins and bungalows built from the wood harvested from the forested hills. Peaceful, beautiful, hidden.
Moments like this, I knew what the gods saw in the place, the breathing of life in the rivers and streams, the churning ocean breaking itself against the rocky cliffs, the high, open sky calling eyes and dreams up and up.
It was like living inside of a beautiful pearly marble.
Or a beautiful stone. My mind flashed back to Bathin, to his hands, his eyes, his body. We had been there, in that beautiful stone, and he had promised we could live that way, together, safe and tucked away from everyone and everything.
But I couldn’t leave this town. This life. My family. No matter how much my stupid heart wanted to.
“Myra Reed,” Than said quietly. “Why are you crying?”
“It’s the salt in the air.” I quickly brushed away the tears I hadn’t felt falling and parked the car.
I killed the engine and turned to him. “I need you to use the scissors on him. And I need you to be gentle. For Delaney. I need you to be gentle and careful for Delaney. I don’t want her hurt. I don’t want her to die. If anyone’s going to an early grave, it has to be Bathin.”
He waited to see if I would say anything else, then nodded solemnly. “I will be gentle in my undertaking.”
I blinked. Blinked again. “Was that a joke? Did you just make a joke?”
“Did you enjoy it?” He looked terribly pleased with himself.
“I…uh…it was good.”
“Excellent. Shall we?”
We strolled into my house, and I smelled cinnamon. I wondered if Jean had found the leftover cinnamon buns I’d tucked in the freezer.
I dreaded every step into the living room. I half hoped Bathin wouldn’t be there. If he had found a way to break the trap like his mother, then I wouldn’t have to do this, see this, watch as Death shoved a weapon of demonic origin into his heart.
But then I pictured Delaney unconscious, strapped to the gurney, and loaded into the ambulance. All the soft, worried thoughts about the demon disappeared.
He had cheated his way into this town, he had used my sister, and he had done it with no regret or remorse. He couldn’t be trusted. Not really. If I forgot that, if I let him make me forget that, there would be no one to blame but myself.
Bathin raised his head as I entered the room.
“Myra.”
He stood right where I’d seen him last, at the fireplace, his back leaning against it, arms crossed over his wide chest.
“Than,” he added.
Bathin was power controlled, a fire burning in silence, steady as the heart of a distant star. When his gaze took me in, slowly, from head to foot, and then back, lingering on my face, my lips, my eyes, I could not look away.
Didn’t want to be away from him.
Didn’t want to be alone.
Here. This. This.
“Hey, boss.” Hatter strolled in from the kitchen.
I looked away from the questions in Bathin’s eyes and heard him sigh.
I’d forgotten we’d left someone here to keep an eye on the prisoner. “How long have you been here?”
“Just relieved Shoe.” He held up the cinnamon bun from the plate in his hand. “Hope you don’t mind. Jean said to raid the freezer.”
“I don’t mind. I’m here now, so you can go.”
“You sure?” he asked through a mouthful. He nodded at Than, who walked across the room to stand directly in front of Bathin. “Parade’s coming up, and I’m pretty sure you haven’t gotten any sleep. I could stay a little longer. Say an hour?”
“No,” I said, “I’m good. I got this.”
“All right. Good. Good. Just leave you and Death alone with the demon, that right?”
“That is correct,” Than said, never once looking away from Bathin.
To Bathin’s credit, he didn’t back down, didn’t move, didn’t stir under Death’s gaze. He just stood there, every line of his body radiating a mix of confidence and ease. Like he could escape at any moment if he wanted to. Like this was a picnic. A cakewalk. A breeze.
“Really,” I said to Hatter. “We have it covered, thanks.”
He nodded, then ambled out of the room, shutting the door behind him.
I stepped right up next to Than.
“You’re done here,” I told the demon.
“Is that so?” Bathin still stared at Than, and yeah, I didn’t blame him, because: death.
“I’m done, Bathin. With this. With…us.”
And it was that, the words that came out too softly, his name catching before it fell out of my mouth, that made him look at me.
And see me.
Understanding hit him, hard enough he opened his mouth and his pupils dilated. This was it. The end of the road. The end of him in Ordinary. The end of whatever we’d almost had, before we’d even had a chance to really begin.
That tug in my chest went hot. Burning.
“You can’t keep her soul.” I wanted the words to come out with the anger I’d been building over the last year or more, but all I had was sorrow and regret. “She’s hurting, you’re hurting her. And those holes in her soul…that’s how the vortexes are opening. You’ve broken her. You’ve broken Ordinary. And I can’t let you do that anymore.”
“Myra,” he whispered. But he didn’t move, didn’t plead. He just waited, as if he’d accepted his fate, had seen it coming from miles away.
Maybe he had. I’d been after him to let go of her soul ever since we met. If he had compromised, if he had met me halfway—hell, I would have been happy if he’d met me a quarter of the way—this could have been different.
Maybe it could have been a happy ending.
Maybe.
“You had to be such an ass,” I said.
He blinked in surprise before a small smile softened his expression. “I’m a fan of putting my best self forward.”
“You know I have to do this,” I whispered as if it were just he and I. As if our sky and air was a safe, turquoise stone.
He shifted slightly, tilting toward me. But his arms remained crossed, his hands clenched. He knew what was coming. From the anger I could feel burning off him beneath that calm exterior, he was fighting not to lash out.
I wouldn’t blame him if he did. He was a demon, and a demon’s nature is to keep what they claim.
“There is always another choice,” he said.
“Not anymore.”
I stepped back, not trusting myself this near him. It would be too easy to reach out, touch him, hold him, or shake him until sense finally rattled into place in that head of his. “You didn’t give me any choice. Because you never trusted me. You never really wanted to be a part of Ordinary.”
He opened his mouth, but I plowed right on over the top of him. “If you wanted to be here, you would follow the rules. Sign a contract. Let her soul free. You don’t. If
you wanted me, you would follow my rules. You don’t.”
The last came out rough, like my voice had picked up gravel, dragged on the bottom of the river.
“So, no. You didn’t give me a choice. But all your choices added up to this. This choice, this now.”
He was silent, eyes steady on me, only the muscle in his jaw ticking.
“Than?” I asked. “Do you have the scissors?”
Than produced the velvet bag stitched with spell-soaked threads and withdrew the scissors, holding them between his finger and thumb.
Bathin didn’t even look at him. “You don’t know everything,” he said to me. “But know this. I have never lied to you. Never about what I feel for you. And this…this is more than it seems.”
Yeah, he wasn’t going to long-suffering-hero his way out of this. I felt no pity. I didn’t dare risk pity.
Than slipped the scissors, gold and bright, over his boney knuckles, opened them once, exposing the flash of ruby and obsidian.
Bathin jerked and took a step back. “Wait!” He held up his hands as if that would be enough to stop Than from doing the deed. “Wait.”
But Death did not wait. He crossed the spell’s barrier, the scissors dripping with light and heat.
Bathin’s gaze cut to me. “It’s opening.”
Than pressed his palm down on Bathin’s shoulder and, demon or not, Bathin shivered under that hold.
“The vortex,” Bathin said. “You need to stop it. Myra. Now. Now.”
And wasn’t my chest tugging, hard, hot, echoing Bathin’s words: Now, now, now.
Than paused. I paused too. This could be a trick.
Oh, who was I kidding? Of course it was a trick.
But didn’t I feel the need to go? Didn’t I feel the heat in my chest that tugged and twisted, painful because in a moment I would need to be not here and instead be there wherever there might be? Be there now, now, now.
I had seconds before I’d be grabbing my bag and running out the door, no matter what was happening with Bathin.
I let out a groan. “Are you kidding me? Did you trigger it? Did you make this happen?”
“No.” Bathin scowled. “I don’t care if you don’t believe me, that’s the truth. It was coming. Ever since Delaney fell. Now it’s here.”
The ground trembled, shook. “Earthquake?” I asked.
“Vortex,” Bathin said. “You’ll need Xtelle. She’ll know how to close it. But for the love of Hell, keep Delaney away from it. The closer she is, the more pain she’ll be in.”
“If I take her soul back now? Will that close the vortex?”
Bathin shook his head, hard. “You do not want a soul floating free, not even for a second when a vortex is open to the Underworld. We already know the vortex lures humans to it. A human soul, even Delaney’s soul, would be gone in an instant.”
“But Than can—” I said.
“No,” Than interrupted. “He is correct in this, Myra Reed.”
“Which part? The vortex thing or the soul thing?”
“Both.”
The little tremble got a lot bigger. It sounded like a huge, monstrous train speeding past my house, close enough the windows rattled and the dishes in the cupboards clattered.
I met Bathin’s eyes. He was waiting. Letting me make the call. But he was worried. If I didn’t know him better, I’d say he was very close to panicking.
“Can you close it?” I asked.
He frowned. “Xtelle will do it faster than I can, cleaner. And she’ll do it. She doesn’t want more demons pouring into town any more than I do. I’m not the only one running and hiding. I promise I’ll be here when you’re done. We can pick this up right where we left off.”
I scuffed my boot over the spell line, breaking it with a bubble-wrap pop.
“Xtelle is gone. You’re the only demon I have left.”
Chapter 23
Than returned the scissors to their bag, which he handed to me with a sniff.
“Can you close it?” I asked Bathin again. I was already at the front door. I had to go, drive, be there now, now. Now.
“Yes,” he said.
Something in my chest warmed and solidified. I liked how certain he was. I liked the illusion that he was on my side, that he had my back. A brief, insane image of him beside me, always right where he needed to be just like I was always right where I needed to be, flashed through my mind before I shoved it away.
This.
I didn’t have time for fairytales. I had a demon gate to close.
Thunder rolled, and the lights in the house sputtered and died.
“Do you know where it is?” I was out the door and in the garage. Sirens wailed in the distance. The power outage was widespread. All the houses on the block were dark, and the streetlights were out too.
The garage door wouldn’t rise with the electric motor. I started toward the override cord, but Bathin jogged past me. “I got it. Get in the car.”
I corrected course and slid into the driver’s seat, starting the car almost before I got the door closed.
Death was in the passenger seat, looking wholly unconcerned.
“You know this is part of your job now,” I said.
“And that is?”
“Protecting Ordinary.”
“Yes, Myra Reed,” he said patiently. “I am aware. Shall I turn on the lights and siren?” He studied the instrument panel in the dash, looking like a starving kid who had just been given keys to the bakery.
Sometimes I forgot how much all the details of living—the little ordinary things—were still new and exciting to him.
“Not until we hit the main road. We don’t want to scare the neighbors to dea…”
“Death?” he suggested when my voice faded. “No, we wouldn’t want that, would we?”
The humor was so dry, it could have soaked up the Nile in a nanosecond.
Bathin opened the back door and dropped down into place behind Than.
“Go,” he said. “It’s south.”
The radio filled with Jean, Hatter, Shoe, and Kelby checking in. So far we had a car accident—the lights were out and someone had slammed into oncoming traffic—but no fatalities.
I gunned it out of the garage and onto the street, headed toward the main road. It was still early enough there shouldn’t be too much traffic, but with so many people in town, and the parade almost ready to go, I decided to use a side street instead of the main drag to swing south.
“Tell Jean I’m headed south,” I said to Than. He operated the radio as if he’d been doing it for years. But still, his other fingers poised over the siren and light buttons, at the ready.
The moment I turned onto the side street instead of onto the main road, he made a little moue of disappointment and folded his hands on his lap again.
“Don’t pout,” I said. “There’s plenty of time for flash and bang. River?” I threw over my shoulder to Bathin.
“I think so.” He had planted one hand on the door to counter-balance the turns I was whipping through. The other hand gripped at his chest like he was in pain.
Come to think of it, his color was off.
“Are you having a heart attack?” I asked, too loud in the confines of the car. That was the last thing I needed to deal with. If a demon died and still possessed my sister’s soul, what happened to her then?
“I don’t have a heart, remember?” He tried to deliver that with his usual smirk, but did not stick the landing. “When we get there, to the vortex, I need you to let me handle it. Handle whatever we find.”
“No.”
He shook his head and stared out the window.
And that was strange, him not pushing back, not fighting me. All my internal alarms went off. “How bad is it?”
“Bring your gun. And any other weapon you have.”
“I brought Death,” I said.
“Who is on vacation,” Than reminded me, “and would prefer to remain so.”
Which meant he didn’t wan
t to pick up his powers and do the big, Death things that would make him have to leave Ordinary for a year.
If push came to shove, I hoped he’d change his mind.
“This is it,” Bathin said.
“What are we facing?” I asked.
“Something worse than we’ve ever seen.”
“Details, Bathin.”
“A demon. A very powerful demon.”
“You know which demon is opening the vortex?”
“Yes.” He sounded like it pained him to admit that.
“Who is it?”
“My uncle.”
I didn’t even have a second to process that because a crowd of pirates was blocking the road.
Yes, pirates.
The road was filled with human beings of every size dressed as pirates. A few wore other costumes—I spotted a couple princesses, an astronaut, and that hockey mascot who looked like a psychotic Muppet—but mostly it was pirates.
“What is this?” Bathin asked.
“I don’t know.”
“It is the Slammin’ Salmon Pparade,” Than said. “Costumes encouraged. Nautical theme.”
And, yeah, as soon as he said it, I remembered hearing Jean say something about contributing to the event to make it more fun, and gods knew she loved a Halloween party.
I swore. There would be no getting through this crowd with the cruiser.
The street wasn’t even one full lane, and it was uneven, with no sidewalks or shoulders. Houses rose on one side stacked up on a rise, and hotels closely packed the other side between us and the beach. This was one of the older roads that had originally been used by horse or bicycle. There was barely room for one car when the street was clear.
The street ended at the beach, where the short river from the lake wandered out to meet the sea.
“Shall I turn on the sirens and lights now?” Than asked politely.
“No, we’ll go on foot.” I muscled the car onto the edge of someone’s yard, blocking the mailbox and half the driveway.
I scanned the crowd for Bertie, but couldn’t spot her in the throng. What I did see was a weird green light coming from the beach where the river met the ocean.