by R W Thorn
It got dark early at this time of the year in the city of New Sanctum, but the row house that hid the Brotherhood’s Lair was lit by a nearby streetlamp. Lennox ran a finger along the Ducati’s sleek, black frame to where she had locked her helmet, then turned to Jack.
“Want a ride?” she asked, and this time there was a hint of her usual playfulness to go along with her sly grin. She knew he usually travelled by bus or train, and teased him about it every chance that she got.
Jack shivered in the cool, night air. He took a moment to look at the Temple across the road, and thought it might have looked ominous if it weren’t lit up so the stained-glass windows shone brightly. Jack was reminded of Christmas tree lights. He could never again experience what it was like to walk within those hallowed walls, and turned from the building with a bitter snarl on his lips.
Samuel’s murder had hit him surprisingly hard. He understood that death was a specter that loomed over all life with nothing but time to keep it at bay. Jack had accepted this harsh truth just as he had accepted that he would outlive most others. The demon blood in his veins granted him both longevity and durability, and he had already watched too many people he’d loved pass away.
As for Samuel, Jack hadn’t even liked him that much. He found the old man’s friendly, jovial nature irritating. Yet Jack had known him for nearly half a century, a not insignificant length of time. In some strange way, Jack had expected Samuel to just continue. To be a fixture of the Brotherhood’s Lair and to be there every day, forever.
Now, from this day onwards, the old man wouldn’t be there ever again.
“Jack?” said Lennox.
“It’s my fault,” Jack replied. He was unable to keep the sadness and grief from his voice.
Lennox looked at him with a puzzled expression.
“You heard what Deedee said,” Jack said. “The wight we fought at Coven Street station was likely a trap set by this warlock. He followed us from there back to the Lair. I should have seen him. The Daemonicon would still be safe if I had. Samuel would still be alive.” There was a deep well of anger in his voice, and it was directed squarely at himself.
Lennox wasn’t fazed. “By that logic, it’s my fault as well.”
Jack shook his head. “You are still learning. You can’t be expected to see everything.”
“And you can?” She raised an eyebrow, a clear indication that she didn’t accept Jack’s words. “Jack, I think that wound in your leg is more serious than you want to admit. The blood loss is affecting your judgment.”
Jack glared at her in annoyance, but she continued before he could come up with a suitable retort.
“And even if it is your fault, which it isn’t, what are you going to do about it?” she said.
Jack continued to glare at her for a moment longer. Then he shook his head, not relenting as much as putting her argument aside. “Nathanial isn’t the only one who has access to information,” he said. “There are people in this city who have an interest in the supernatural. They tend to know what’s going on. I’m going to see if I can talk to one of them.”
Lennox just kept smiling. “Sounds good to me. But wouldn’t it be quicker just to give them a call?”
Jack knew that he sometimes failed to consider the technology that now existed in the world. But this wasn’t one of those times. “Do you think I’m the only one in this city who doesn’t have a phone?” he asked.
Lennox didn’t even hesitate. “Yes,” she said, grinning broadly. “I do.”
Jack was unsure how to respond to that, so he just glared at her again. “Well, I’m not,” he said.
“Fair enough,” Lennox said, still grinning. “Well, what are you waiting for? Get on, and don’t get any blood on my seat.” Then she gave him a wink. “We’ll call it a date,” she added.
Deep in the back of Jack’s mind, Amelia gave voice to a murmur of approval, before fading away once more.
An Unexpected Message
Jack climbed onto the bike behind Lennox and placed his hands around her waist as she put on her helmet. Then she half-turned in the seat so she could look at him.
“Where are we going?” she asked. Her visor was raised and Jack could see her knowing, mocking grin clearly. He was unsure of the reason behind it, but couldn’t help wonder if it had something to do with how he was holding her.
Whatever the reason, he decided to ignore it. “There is a woman,” Jack said gruffly. “Madame Brigette. She has demon blood in her. It gives her power over glyphs and symbols. She designed the tattoos we wear. If anyone knows who the warlock is, it will be her.”
Lennox’s grin grew broader beneath her helmet. Jack couldn’t see, but he suspected she had raised an eyebrow. “A woman with demon blood, huh?” Lennox said. “And why haven’t I heard of her before, hmmm?”
Despite looking as if he was still in his thirties, Jack had lived for far longer than most would believe. He had loved and lost many times, and had known all sorts of people. Yet he had a grim and somber appearance that made others anxious. There were few who felt comfortable enough to tease him. Jack wasn’t used to it, and as a result, Lennox’s mocking could leave him slightly confused.
But this time, he thought he understood her intent. He cracked half a smile. “There’s a lot in my past that you haven’t heard about,” he said.
Lennox’s expression didn’t change. “Really?” she said archly, making the simple reply into a challenge. “Do tell,” she said.
Jack wasn’t blind to her flirting. He understood the rules of the game she played. Yet, as well as his own hesitation, he’d never been entirely sure of her intent. To him, she was cheerfully outgoing, and the very definition of beauty. A ten on anyone’s scale, while he was the opposite. He was surly and gruff and could go for days without having a shower, to the point where even he could sense that he was starting to smell. And he was ten times her age.
Was Lennox really open to something more than what they had? Or was she simply playing with him because he was ‘safe’?
It was a question that Jack couldn’t answer without asking her directly. He knew that this was an opportunity to do so. He could challenge her back and say something like, “Why? What does it matter to you?” and see what she said.
Instead, he left the door slightly ajar. “Maybe I will, one day,” he said. “But for now, we need to get to the other side of town. Oracle Drive. Madame Brigette’s Arcane Emporium.”
Lennox seemed satisfied with his answer. “Right you are, gov’nor,” she said in a fake Cockney accent. The Ducati roared to life, and Lennox carefully maneuvered it off the sidewalk and onto the road.
As soon as they reached one of the major arterial routes that kept the New Sanctum traffic flowing, Lennox opened the throttle so wide that the front wheel left the ground. Despite her helmet, Jack caught fragments of her exclaiming in utter delight. He didn’t know what speed they were doing, but knew that it must be a long way past the limit. It was more than enough to turn his trenchcoat into a cape that billowed out behind him.
On another day, he might have leaned close and yelled a caution through her helmet. Not that she would have listened. She found too much joy in the danger of riding too fast.
On this day, however, at this time, he had no intention of asking her to slow down. The road was wide, and they had the fast lane almost entirely to themselves. He had no fear that she would lose control, and the wound of Samuel’s death and the Daemonicon’s theft still felt too raw.
Instead, he silently willed her to go even faster, not to arrive at their destination sooner but out of a primitive need to feel something more than the anger and sadness that threatened to consume him.
He just wanted to relax and enjoy the sensation of speed for as long as he could. It was like a balm for him, a freedom from the rest of the world, and it was what he needed most just at that moment.
Unfortunately, they had been on the road only a short time when he felt a familiar vibration at his hip. It w
as his pager, and it surprised him that it should go off just then. Only the Brotherhood knew the number, and Deedee and the others had much to attend to.
Jack had ignored the pager in the past with dire results. He would not make the same mistake again. Holding onto Lennox with one hand, he awkwardly fumbled at his belt, clipped the pager off, and rested it against Lennox’s back in order to see clearly.
- Demonic disturbance detected. Main and Chalice. Acknowledge message receipt to indicate attendance. -
There was no mention of what the disturbance might be. For all Jack knew, it could be no more an imp scaring some children. Or it could be the warlock himself, although surely the message would have included that piece of information.
Either way, Jack couldn’t help but stare at the message in disbelief. The Brotherhood had other demon hunting teams at its disposal, and it was unusual for Jack and Lennox to attend more than one demonic disturbance per day. Sometimes there were stretches that lasted for days where they weren’t called at all. During those lulls, Jack whiled away his time talking with Amelia, either in his shabby apartment or at a bar somewhere. He usually had a Scotch in front of him as he waited for something vile to show itself.
Sometimes he got frustrated and ended up picking a fight. Sometimes he sat in deliberate isolation and did his best to pickle his liver. Occasionally, he would go for a walk and watch the clueless people going about their day-to-day lives. Other than that, he had long ago given away anything resembling a real hobby, and he had largely forgotten what he used to think of as fun.
He now lived to carve the tripes out of those who had let the demon blood in their veins take control, and to send fiendish beings back to Hell.
Waiting was far from his favorite activity. But to attend three demonic attacks in one day? Jack felt stunned. He couldn’t remember if such had ever happened before.
He looked about for a moment to gain his bearings. They were only half way to Madame Brigette’s Emporium. The corner of Main and Chalice was not far away.
“Lex!” Jack shouted over the wind. “Pull over!”
Inner City Labyrinth
Lennox and Jack were no longer on the main road. Instead, they were making their way through a part of town that most sensible folk would avoid.
The streets were narrow and twisted and wound their way between grimy apartments that were put together with no effort to match the normal New Sanctum aesthetics. Instead of Gothic structures wrought from granite and speckled with gargoyle grotesques, these buildings were made of bland and ugly concrete. They were dismal enough to rouse Amelia from her slumber to shudder in Jack’s mind. The type of buildings that bred despair and resentment among all those who lived there.
The type of buildings that could suck away any semblance of hope, and loom above the streets like mountains of corruption ready to fall.
It was darker than on the main road. There were a few streetlights, and the buildings cast ominous shadows. Lennox had slowed her bike to a crawl, and it felt as if they were winding their way through tunnels instead of streets.
Jack had hoped for a moment of peace, of freedom on the back of Lennox’s bike. Instead, he was grimly alert. There were dangers hidden among the piles of refuse stacked behind the buildings, and those dangers weren’t limited to unseen potholes or discarded syringes filled with tranquilizers and disease.
This was where many of those who had given in to the tainted blood in their veins liked to hunt.
The whole area had become known by the residents of New Sanctum as Hope Town, mostly out of a sense of irony. It was unrelentingly squalid. If it were the setting for a comic-book series, there would be dark, brooding heroes glaring down from the rooftops in search of miscreants up to no good.
Those miscreants were not hard to find. The demon blood in Jack and Lennox – and in Amelia as well – was both under control and strong enough to give them abilities beyond the norm. But there were many who gave free rein to the cruel desires and vile needs that their blood yearned to explore. These were the thieves and druggies and murderers who preyed on the homeless and weak. These were the revenants and low vampires who skulked in the shadows living on rats and reveling in their own filth.
Not that all such people had demon blood in their veins. There were plenty of ordinary humans who were either down on their luck or had abandoned normal society and chosen lives less savory. But having demon blood made such choices more likely.
The throaty exhaust of Lennox’s Ducati echoed off the walls. It was the loudest noise Jack could hear, although somewhere in the distance a police siren wailed, and every now and again, he caught the sound of scampering. Jack didn’t know if the scampering was caused by humans or beasts.
Like near an open trashcan where the rubbish had started to rot, a miasma of foulness hung over the whole area. Jack had grown largely immune to such odors, but after they had been crawling through the filth for a while, even his stomach started to turn. It was enough to peel the skin from inside his sinuses and to make his scalp start to itch. It made him start to feel even more unclean than usual.
What it might be like for Lennox, he didn’t know, but he figured she must be glad of her helmet.
“So sad,” Lennox said. They were going slowly enough that Jack could hear the empathy and compassion in her voice clearly. She was looking toward one of the buildings, and at first, all Jack could see was a pile of rubbish. Then he realized Lennox was looking at a pair of almost invisible bums huddling against the wall.
Jack had to agree. It was sad. Nor were these bums the only ones they had passed. There had been some warming themselves over open grates and others hiding in the darkness. Jack knew that but for a twist of fate, he might have been one of them.
It was a sobering thought.
Then he realized Lennox had never known her true parents. The Brotherhood had raised her from when she was young. She knew only that either her mother or her father had demon blood in their veins. Likely, that blood had been strong like that of Lennox herself. But if the blood of both parents had been tainted, then Lennox’s blood could have been stronger than either of theirs.
In that case, maybe her parents had spent much of their lives in places like this.
Jack gave an affirmative grunt. “Keep your eyes open,” he said in reply. “We’re close to Chalice Street.”
“Yes, oh ancient one,” she replied, and her voice had regained its usual playful tone.
Moments later, Jack heard something from the darkness up ahead: a scream of primal fear. He instinctively tightened his grip on Lennox’s waist and grated, “Hurry,” through jaws clenched with sudden urgency. He couldn’t help it. He was hard-wired to try to help.
Lennox didn’t need more encouragement than that. She opened the throttle and the Ducati roared to life, chasing the light from its headlamp into the darkness.
The rapid acceleration forced Jack to lean back on his seat. He peered into the gloom, trying to see the cause of the shout, trying to see what might have given rise to the fear. But this was the darkest part of Hope Town, with the narrowest streets surrounded by the most awful of apartment buildings. There were labyrinths with simpler designs. Jack could see only a little way ahead.
The fearful shout might have been due to a demonic disturbance. Equally, in this part of the city, it might have been due to a more mundane crime, a mugging or other kind of attack.
All Jack could do was hold onto Lennox and hope that whatever the cause, they found it soon enough to do some good.
His urgency roused Amelia from her slumber enough to ask, “What’s happening?” But Jack didn’t respond. In her ghostly state, his dead wife could rummage through his thoughts just as easily as she’d done when she’d been alive. She didn’t always do it, but the ability meant Jack could keep his attention focused as he needed to.
Moments later, Lennox uttered a curse that was equal parts shock and disbelief. Jack had no time to wonder at its cause before he felt a sudden drop. Insti
nctively, he flinched his leg up, jerking his foot off the passenger peg. He felt Amelia flinch in his mind, then the bike hit the ground with a crash! and started to skid.
Jack tucked his elbows in as he tumbled and rolled to a stop. When he did, he took a moment to breathe, to steady the beating of his heart, and get over the shock of what had just happened.
“Are you all right?” Amelia asked.
Jack grunted an affirmative answer. He had a new bruise on one of his knees, and the wound in his thigh throbbed more painfully than it had done before. But other than that, he was fine. Except that he was face-down with his nose inches away from a layer of sludge on the road that smelled faintly of sulfur and rot.
He knew what that odor signified. Despite this and the shout of fear still echoing in his memory, his first thought was for Lennox. With the crash-induced adrenalin in his veins granting him strength, he heaved himself up to his knees to look about.
It was almost as dark as the inside of a tomb. The Ducati’s engine had cut out, but the headlamp was still casting a beam of light against one of the walls. Other than that, there were no street lamps nearby, and the night sky above was a starless, inky black.
Yet Jack could sense where Lennox was by her grunting and cursing.
“Lex? Are you okay?” Jack said, aware that he was echoing Amelia’s earlier words.
The light from the Ducati was pointing the wrong way. Jack could make out no more than a dark shadow that might be Lennox on her hands and knees. He made his way over to her as she turned over and sat on the ground. He reached out and awkwardly rested his hand on her shoulders in an attempt at reassurance.
“Are you all right?” he repeated.
Lennox was still cursing. She fumbled about at her chinstrap and then removed her helmet. “Stupid, dumb-ass thing to do,” she muttered, then took a deep breath and almost gagged. “What the Hell?” she exclaimed. It was too dark to see, but Jack imagined her face twisted into a grimace of disgust. “Stinks like the back end of a skunk!”