“Asmodeus?” he whispered.
He saw his error too late. It wasn’t his familiar seated on that shoulder, but a much larger, much younger bird. It spread its wings as he spoke, taking flight. This dislodged the hood from the intruder’s features, but Alistair never saw them. The smoky mist stopped circling him and hung motionless in the air. He dropped his gaze to the second book and searched for the point that he needed to recapture the rhythm, but as he spun, his hand caught the rim of the cup and toppled, it. The thick, murky contents splashed over the page and obscured the words. He reeled back, and as he moved, the stranger outside the circle reached out with the toe of one boot and scraped a small break in the circle.
The smoke billowed and was sucked in through that breach so rapidly that all sound and most of the air were sucked from the cathedral. In that instant, the robed figure reached back and flipped his cowl forward. Without air to hold it aloft, the raven tumbled, but his master stepped toward the door, held out an arm, and the bird thudded to a landing, gripping tightly. Without a word the intruder spun and sprinted toward the back of the cathedral toward the rectory and the street beyond.
The circle had become a white pillar stretching from floor to ceiling. It was impossible to see into the interior, and no sound escaped from within, but the air hummed with energy and then, with a shudder, the remnant of the circle blew asunder. Air and sound raced outward, pounding the windows from the old cathedral outward and sending a shower of broken wood frame and glass shards in a long arc, pummeling the street and homes beyond. The sound was deafening, half scream, and half roar. A cloud rolled out, low to the ground, billowed, and rose until the entire structure of the cathedral was cloaked in cloying fog.
Inside, still standing, Alistair clutched his throat and tried to stagger forward. The breath had been ripped from his lungs in the explosion, and he was blind, but somehow he had the presence of mind to try and move away. Above him he heard Asmodeus cry out, loud and long. He heard the flutter of the old bird’s wings, but he saw nothing.
Near his ankle the air shimmered. At first it was just a darker patch against the polished wood floor, but it widened, and as it did so, something moved in the space beyond – something that glowed sickly green. Alistair staggered in a circle, and his foot came into contact with that dark patch. There was a great cry, and Asmodeus dove from the rafters, riding the thin air in a long, slow arc toward his master. The bird flew all out, making no attempt to land on a shoulder or minimize its own risk - the goal was clearly to knock Alistair clear, but it failed.
As the great old bird soared closer, something reached through that dark patch, touched Alistair’s ankle and groped its way upward. Whatever it was sank into Cornwell’s flesh and dug deep. The crow hit its master hard, knocking him back, but as the body fell, something inside ripped free – something bright white and glowing. The taloned claw that had stretched up out of that darker place gripped it tightly and yanked. It disappeared, and the portal closed with a bright snap of energy. Cornwell’s body toppled to the floor, and Asmodeus soared back toward the rafters, wings flapping madly.
At the door to the passage leading to the rectory, the cowled figure re-appeared. The old church was silent as a tomb. Dust still rose from where the windows had blown out; moonlight and the artificial illumination of streetlights filtered in through the haze. The cleared bit of floor and its broken, arcane circle stood out stark in that void, empty props. Cornwell’s body lay limp and unmoving.
The figure glanced up, spotted Asmodeus clinging to a rafter above, and raised his arm, as if to send his own familiar in pursuit. Then he hesitated, cocked his head, and stood very still. Someone was coming – not the men and women of the neighborhood, or the police, but someone with power. The figure whispered something to his bird, scuttled forward, plucked the oak wand from Alistair’s altar, and then spun on his heel and was gone. Far above, Asmodeus let loose a fierce cry that echoed through the rafters and shot out the windows and open doors into the night.
ELEVEN
Donovan had traveled the streets of the city for many years, and he was no stranger to the barrio. A wide variety of practitioners of strange arts called that area home. There was Martinez, for one, and though Donovan respected the old man’s abilities, he had no wish to renew that particular acquaintance. There was something in the white haired old guy’s gaze that didn’t sit well on the heart, and rumor had it that he was fond of leaving certain dimensional doorways open a bit too wide. He also played a lot of games with the gangs and other parts of the everyday city, and Donovan liked to remain as clear of that world as possible.
Donovan didn’t have the sight, though he knew several others who did, but he could occasionally sense something in another’s aura, a taint of odd coloration, or a hint of impending doom. Martinez gave him that sensation, and since he had no way to express what he could not quite bring to the surface of his mind, Donovan preferred avoidance.
There were others as well, some respected, some feared, and a few to be avoided at all costs. The Latin wings of the arts were varied, and tended toward darkness. Santeria, various forms of voodoo, and gris-gris flourished on the vermin infested streets. Their symbols lurked in the colorful graffiti and the tiny altars sprouting around street corners.
It didn’t surprise him to find that Cornwell had chosen this area of the city to call home. There was less chance of someone stumbling in on him and interrupting his experiments. There were ways to find ingredients and objects of power in the lower east side that existed nowhere else, and that were less likely to draw unwanted attention.
Donovan stood for a while on the corner of 42nd Street and watched the old cathedral. There was no doubt that something was wrong. Several windows were shattered, and he saw from the larger shards that remained they had been blackened from the inside. Whether this was something Cornwell had done on purpose, prior to the breakage, or whether it had happened as the result of some out-of-control arcane explosion was impossible to tell from where he stood.
Energy crackled in the air. Something was happening, or had happened very recently, and it shivered over Donovan’s scalp and down his spine in an electric tingle. Before advancing, he turned seven times in place and muttered a charm of protection. He had no idea what he’d be walking into, but he had no intention of finding out unprotected. He didn’t fear Cornwell, but there were things Cornwell could have unleashed. Also, there was something not quite right about the entire scene. Donovan didn’t know the renegade from any close association, so it was difficult to sort out the energies that rippled around him. He thought he sensed two distinct patterns.
There was no sense in lingering on the street. From the look of things, something had happened in the church, and it hadn’t been very much before Donovan’s arrival. If that were true, and whatever had happened had been loud or intrusive, there could be others arriving any moment. There would be police, and there would be locals. Even if they feared the place, they would come, and some of them, followers of Martinez, and others, wouldn’t fear the place at all.
Donovan crossed the street to the front of the church. There were wards in place, glamours and cheap charms meant to cause ripples of fear and to start shadows dancing at the periphery of any intruder’s vision. It was meant to frighten mundane visitors, or to distract those of incidental power. Donovan’s protection charm deflected these easily, and he frowned.
The amount of energy he sensed in the cathedral wasn’t in line with the level of magic he was encountering on the street. Whoever had set these protections was not particularly talented. In fact, he was downright sloppy. If Cornwell was behind them, then there was no telling what Donovan might face inside. Either someone else was involved, or Cornwell had gotten in way over his head. If he had, there was no way to gauge at what point things had gone south on him, or what forces might lurk within the shadowy cathedral.
Donovan hesitated at the door. He wished he had Cleo with him, or had thought to ask Amethyst to a
ccompany him. He took a deep breath and crossed the threshold, quickly dodging to one side as he stepped through the door. As his eyes adjusted, he noted that there was still dust in the air from whatever had broken the windows. The light was dim, but adequate, and after a moment he was certain that no one was moving. Drawing the green crystal pendant from around his neck, he clutched it in one hand and inched forward slowly.
The carpet down the center aisle was worn, and the dust on it wasn’t as thick. Someone had walked that way often. Most of the pews were clotted with debris and there was a musky, animal scent in the air that tasted of rot when he breathed. Most of the windows had blown out, and a light breeze wafted across the cathedral. It helped. Donovan wondered briefly how Cornwell, or anyone else, could have breathed in the place when the windows were still sealed.
In the rear, a hallway led back to what must have been the rectory. As Donovan approached the front row of pews, he noted that there were supplies stacked to either side of the center aisle. There were books, scrolls, vials and crates. Most of it had already gathered a light coat of dust, but there were signs that some of it had been used recently.
He snorted as he saw a pile of what looked like everyday Tupperware. With a glance at the back wall to be sure no one watched from the shadowed hall, he stepped closer. The plastic containers were labeled with the names of various common roots and powders. Donovan shook his head.
“Tupperware?” he asked no one in particular.
Turning from the supplies in the pews, he stepped forward and stood before the kneeling rail at the altar. Cobwebs dangled between the once polished wooden slats. The carpet had been scarlet, he thought, but had faded from moisture and ground in dirt to the color of dried blood.
Something lay sprawled on the floor beyond the altar, and Donovan was about to mount the short steps and have a look when the air above him exploded with sound. A high-pitched, keening cry rang out, accompanied by a rush of heavy wings. Donovan ducked left, spun, felt the wooden altar rail crumble under his weight and toppled to the side. Something sliced the air cleanly where his face had been, and without thought he etched a symbol in the air with the forefinger of his right hand and breathed a word through it.
There was a screech, a second flurry of sound, and then a heavy thump. Donovan braced himself on the floor with one hand, felt the damp, rotted carpet seep between his fingers and recoiled in disgust. He staggered upright and looked down at his attacker. It was a crow. It wasn’t as large as the bird that had invaded his office, or as young. There were feathers missing here and there, and it was scrawny. It was either very old, hadn’t eaten regularly, or both.
“Asmodeus,” he said. He remembered what Amethyst had told him about Cornwell’s familiar. If this was it, then Cornwell wasn’t his man. No way was this the bird that had invaded his home and made off with Le Duc’s journal.
He let his gaze slide up from the bird to the floor beyond the altar, and he stopped, standing very still. There was a body on the floor. It lay across the lines of a large circle of protection, arms stretched out to either side, and one leg bent at a nearly impossible angle.
Donovan stepped over the stunned bird. He was careful not to touch the body, or to cross the lines of the circle. The body had broken the plane those concentric lines represented, but the circle itself might still be active. He needed to study it and be sure. If he stepped in and whatever had been summoned was trapped on the other side, he might not be able to escape with his life.
There was something odd about the inert form, and Donovan frowned. He stepped closer and reached out with the toe of his boot to turn the face upward. What should have been a light enough tap to show him the fallen man’s face sent the body sliding sideways and flipped it. Donovan stared.
Skin wrapped tightly around a framework of bone was all that remained of Alistair Cornwell. The empty sockets that had held the man’s eyes glared up at Donovan sightlessly. Within moments, as if the stress of being moved was too much for it, the body began crumbling in on itself. First the flesh fell away, then, with a jittery vibration that might have been the wind catching something very dry and very light, the bones shifted and fell away to dust.
The bird fluttered weakly on the floor. The tiny gust of wind its wings stirred up caught the dust and sent it swirling up in a tiny spiral. It should not have been enough of a breeze for this; Donovan stepped back and watched carefully. The whirling cloud glinted in the illumination from a streetlight peeking in through one broken window, and then, with a sound like one of the tiny pockets of air in bubble wrap being popped, it disappeared into the shadows. Nothing remained but the circle.
Donovan examined this, and found that his fears had been unwarranted. Whatever had been contained by this circle, or kept at bay, was gone. There was a clean break in the white chalk like, as though something had been dragged across it. He frowned. Such a breach of another’s protections was unthinkable. Even if the ritual had been a particularly dangerous one, the thing to do would have been to set up a second circle and contain the possible damage.
There was a small altar in the circle, and Donovan knelt to examine it. He took in the toppled brass cup, the colorful and worthless blade, and the two books, one on either side. One was older, and he picked this up first. When he realized what it was, he frowned. He thumbed through it to the point where the text ended.
He glanced down at the other book, where the cup had spilled its contents. He reached down gripped the tome gingerly by one corner and shook off the excess moisture. Walking back down to the first pew, he laid it out and glanced through it quickly. Most of the first part of the text had been obscured by a dark, blotchy stain, but he was able to make out enough to see what it was. Cornwell had tried to recreate the ritual in his own hand. Donovan read a few lines, shuddered, and glanced back at the circle. Had he done it? This was a powerful ritual. Had it just backfired, allowing the demon to drag its summoner back through the portal that was created, or was there a more sinister answer?
Donovan quickly inventoried what lay closest to the circle, and within it. Almost everything was there, the braziers, the candles, a variety of powders and the symbolic sacrificial cup and sword. There should have been more though. He turned back to the older book, flipped through the pages, and found what he wanted.
The wand was clearly pictured and not difficult to assemble. Assuming that Cornwell had gathered the proper crystals, and the three flexible oak saplings, it would have been simple to create the instrument that was called for. Even a rank amateur would understand that there was a huge distinction between substituting one item for another and leaving something out altogether. And if something were left out, it would not be the wand.
He turned back to the circle and began a search, moving in a spiral pattern, starting in the center and working outward. He was careful to check the corners, and the shadows. Whatever had blown the windows out of the cathedral had probably originated in or near the circle, and the wand could have been blown free. He found nothing, and after a quick look down and through the pews, he concluded that if the wand had existed, it had either been taken, or destroyed.
He turned to the rear of the cathedral and the hallway leading out and back. As he approached this, something in the aura of energy shifted. He stood very still for a moment, and then drew a flat piece of colored crystal from his pocket. He held this up to his eye, and studied the floor.
Small lines, like gossamer, floated in the air and trailed off down the hallway. Someone had passed through there recently – someone with a great deal more talent and power than Cornwell had possessed. There was no way to tell what this other might have carried with them. Donovan stepped into the hall and something along the wall caught his eye.
He leaned down and plucked a single black feather from the dust. It gleamed blue-black, and he knew that, despite how it would look to the casual observer, this feather had not come from the ragged, decrepit old crow in the next room.
Donovan thought ba
ck to the winged intruder in his study, and his frown deepened. He could not imagine why, but he knew now that the wand had been taken. He’d have to look for a connection in Le Duc’s journal when he returned to his office. For now, he had some quick cleanup to take care of, and not much time to do it.
He heard the distant wail of a siren. It could be that the locals had finally broken through their innate dislike and fear of the police and made the call the authorities. If the windows had just blown out, the sound might have alerted someone on patrol. It was possible that the sirens might not be headed his way at all. In any case, Donovan didn’t want to be caught in the old cathedral. It would be awkward trying to talk his way out of such a situation, and even more awkward trying to charm them long enough to escape. Better not to be seen at all.
He walked quickly back inside and headed toward the pews. He couldn’t leave all of Cornwell’s supplies lying about. Some of what he’d gathered was dangerous in the wrong hands, and it was going to look damned strange to the police as it was.
He quickly sorted through the books and scrolls. Most of it was garbage, things that could be purchased in any mundane used bookstore, but there were bits and pieces of genuine material in the lot, and he wished he had enough time to go through it all carefully.
The powders and ingredients were easier. These he dumped on the floor and kicked away beneath the pews. Without the proper ritual and words to transform them, they were nothing more than herbs, dust and powder. No one would think twice about a homeless person leaving behind an empty pile of Tupperware.
The sirens grew louder, and he hurried. He gathered up all the crystals, books, parchments and odds and ends he could carry and hurried toward the rear of the church. When they arrived, they’d come to the front. If he hurried, he could be off and down the street before then. They wouldn’t figure out what it was that had caused the explosion. They also wouldn’t find any trace of the inhabitant. They’d get vague stories from the locals, but none that would help. They wouldn’t be looking for a pile of dust, so there was no concern that they’d stumble across something important.
Vintage Soul Page 11