• • •
“Okay, Father. What’s the big— Ow!”
Menchú grabbed Liam’s ear and dragged him down the hall outside the Archives. Outrage bubbled up in Liam at the treatment and he almost punched Menchú, but decided against it. The priest pulled him toward a door that said “Manutenzione.” Liam had always assumed it was a broom closet.
Inside was an asymmetrical architectural afterthought, about a meter and a half wide. It was about the size of a broom closet, but held no cleaning materials. Instead it was furnished with a wooden bench, a crucifix on the wall, and a stained glass window high up. As they were still underground, the melancholy light that came through must have come from a recessed lightbulb.
Menchú pushed Liam through the door and he stumbled, coming to sit painfully on the bench under the crucifix. Menchú loomed above him, the blue light on his face giving him a morose aura. But his face was anything but morose.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he snarled.
Liam blinked at him. Father Menchú seldom swore. “Me? I’m the only one with sense around here! We’ve lost team members before! It’s a tragedy but it’s part of the job! Suddenly Sal gets possessed and you’re willing to drop everything and save her?”
“Sal is not gone. I have faith.” Menchú’s jaw was clenched.
“Why?” Liam asked, utterly baffled.
“Because she has to be all right,” Menchú said, his face finally falling. He slumped, and then sat on the bench beside Liam. He rubbed his face with his hands. “This one feels different. I’ve done this long enough to know at least that much. Either way, the Hand has the codex, and we have to get it back. If we can save Sal in the process, is that so bad?”
Liam gritted his teeth. “Even if we save her, we can never trust her again.”
“That’s something you’ll have to work out yourself,” Menchú said, standing. “But don’t presume to speak for the rest of the team. You deal with your own demons, Liam. I’m tired of holding your hand. Now go do your damn job.”
He left the room, and Liam sat, stunned, in the weak blue light.
3.
Sal always had a sense that fashion companies were probably inherently evil, but she had not expected the walls of this corporate office to begin bleeding as soon as the Hand entered the room.
“Vogue,” he said, and Sal could feel her face smiling.
The blood coalesced into a shape. It wasn’t a woman’s shape, it was more like a floating being of fire and blood, like a puffer fish but without the ridiculous bulging eyes. The spines around it reached out and licked at her, and she winced inwardly at the pain that shot up her arms as the demon investigated her and the Hand.
“You’re back,” she said. “I like this form.”
“I am,” the Hand said. “And we’re finally ready to open a door.”
The shape laughed. The spines contracted a bit as she chuckled. “You’ve been saying that for centuries. Besides you devouring this very fine body, I don’t see what’s different.”
Something welled up inside Sal, and she realized it was gleeful anticipation on the Hand’s part. She groaned inwardly.
“So you won’t help me?” it said. Sal could tell the demon was hoping Vogue would say no.
“No.”
The Hand revealed the Codex Umbra, and Vogue began to scream.
• • •
Sal had read a fantasy book once, Unlikely Destiny, in which a peasant became a field medic during a bloody magicians’ war. He feared the sight of blood, trembled when sewing up a cut, felt sick amputating a limb, but the alternatives of actually going to war and fighting were much worse than learning this skill on the fly.
It was a terrible book. But Sal remembered it because she had felt for that one cowardly character and the role he had to take, whether he liked it or not.
And so she paid attention as the Hand tortured and dismantled Vogue, with a mixture of magic and brute force. Her hands blistered and bled as it tore at the being of blood and fire, breaking her to its will and then, once she submitted to it, tearing off her spines one by one. As he did so, the walls bled more, pooling on the floor and but not soaking into the carpet. The demonstuff held together like a gelatin mold, quivering slightly. There was a strange sense of expectancy to the gore.
“That was fun,” the Hand said when it was done. “Who’s next?”
• • •
Between Sal’s cell phone, reading passages from the Codex Umbra that made her throat bleed, and apparently a sort of demonic rumor network, the Hand had soon filled the office’s front foyer—which had grown somehow to accommodate the newcomers—with demons of all kinds. Some looked fearful. Some looked as if they were there against their will. Others looked like Christmas had come after their wealthy, mean grandfather had died.
“More to come,” the Hand said, pacing back and forth as the demons from Rome answered his call. He picked two as his deputies, a purple pig-headed demon with snakes for fingers that Sal mentally called “Oh-Christ-What-Is-That?” and a huge, bulky, chalk-white creature that Sal was strangely relieved to see looked like a normal everyday ugly demon. It left a white residue on anything it touched, including the desk where the Codex Umbra lay open.
Chalky and Oh-Christ-What-Is-That? stood on either side of the desk, protecting the codex. Some of the demons, those that had answered the call of the book itself, tried to get closer, but the Hand’s command to stay back kept them obedient. Some still got too close for the Hand’s liking, and they died messily. Still, many more remained.
He’s building an army, Sal thought. Those he’s not killing, anyway.
Unsurprisingly, the Hand dismantled the ones who were there against their will. The demons may not have wanted to be there, but they obeyed the codex, and they submitted to the Hand even while they screamed as it tore them apart. The quivering piles of demonstuff grew.
You’re taking them apart like LEGO toys, but what are you going to do with the leftovers?
It had been a while since she had talked directly to the Hand, and she wondered if it would reply to her. She didn’t have to wait long.
You’ll see.
The Hand pulled two more demons forward, relatively human-shaped, and gave them instructions. Their language sounded like grunting and screaming. Sal tried to pay attention, but she could feel her sanity slipping. To learn that language would be to lose everything else, she figured, so she retreated inside.
Her body had become a painful vehicle she recognized, but no longer remembered how to drive. She felt like a Roman noble in the time of Caesar who found herself in a modern car instead of chariot of her time. She relished the pain she felt, and tried small acts of disobedience as the Hand continued its work. She succeeded in blinking once. To make sure it wasn’t a chance, she tried to curl the toes of her left foot. The toes obeyed.
Sal thought how wonderful it would be to have control of her body again, and then how it would feel to have control of her body again amidst a room full of demons. Waiting was safer.
She retreated further, and thought about Aaron’s bright white light. The Hand’s chanting continued, and the walls kept bleeding.
• • •
Asanti stayed at her desk, cataloguing the damage and watching the Orb. It lurked silent and sullen by her hand. “Lurking” and “sullen”—the pathetic fallacy at play, her own imagination investing the Orb with consciousness. Probably. Though, considering the volatile nature of most artifacts, it wouldn’t be out of the question for the Orb to have emotions. Sometimes, like now, with a team member possessed without anyone’s knowledge, she thought the Orb picked and chose what to report. Nothing would surprise her anymore.
Well. Not quite nothing. She had, for example, been quite surprised when Sal turned out to be housing a demon.
Sorrow warred with rage inside her, but she kept her face calm as she reviewed the wreckage of her life’s work. No truly valuable (or, as Menchú would have said, dangerous)
books seemed to have been seriously hurt, but in Asanti’s line of work there was no such thing as an acceptable loss.
Which brought her to the second list, of missing books, which contained only one entry so far: the Codex Umbra.
“Can we talk?” Menchú asked in a low voice, pointing at a chair beside her desk that was piled with charred books.
Asanti nodded and rose to move the books herself. She had to make sure she knew where they all were, so she didn’t allow anyone to touch them once they had been counted. She set the stack beside the chair, and dusted some ash off the seat before offering it to Arturo.
“How is Liam?” she asked.
“I’m worried. I think he’s becoming unhinged. He’s deeply frightened. And he’s diving into the grieving process too quickly, as if he’s trying to get it over with,” Menchú said.
“We don’t have time for that,” Asanti said flatly. “Normally, yes, but right now Sal really needs help. Liam can’t split our focus.” She paused, looking around the library until she spotted Grace, still stacking books. “Send Grace after him.”
Menchú followed her gaze. “You think?”
“Liam needs some sense knocked into him. Possibly literally. And they have to find Sal.”
Menchú checked his watch and grimaced. “I have a meeting shortly. Team Two wants a briefing.”
“What are you going to tell them?”
Menchú sighed. “The truth.”
“Really?”
He nodded. “The truth is we’re on the case and are doing our jobs. When we need them, we’ll call them.”
“Do you think that’ll work?” she asked.
“It’s all I’ve got right now,” he said.
• • •
Two hours, thirty-seven minutes, and fifteen seconds after Sal had left the Archives in a maelstrom of fire and chaos, Grace punched Liam in the face.
She held back, of course. She didn’t want to break anything. But she did punch harder than she usually did while sparring with him, so he went down, hard.
“Why. THE FUCK. Did you do that?” he asked, lying on his back and cradling his cheek, rage twisting his face into a snarl.
“Because I knew I’d find you here. I knew you’d be coming down this corridor to sell her out. You are the pettiest man I know.”
Liam lay on the rich carpet of the corridor that led to the Team Two offices. The Vatican’s labyrinth of halls and rooms usually managed to stay simple, with the flashier displays of wealth either where the public could see them or within deep vaults. But Team Two did not scrimp. The carpets were blue and gold, and showed no sign of wear. Damask wallpaper covered the walls, also blue and gold. Grace found the display offensive.
“You’re supposed to be working with me,” Grace said. “Menchú is taking care of the higher-ups and the other teams. Do your job, and we can take care of this mess.”
Liam stayed down, glaring at the ceiling, which was painted with intricate cherubs and lit with small chandeliers.
“You’re as deluded as the rest of them,” he muttered.
Grace strode forward and stood above him, one booted foot on each side of his head. “Did you go to Team Two yet? Did you tell them what was going on?”
“No,” he said, sliding away from her boots and wincing.
Grace stared at him, and nodded once. “Then let’s go after Sal.”
“She’s gone.”
“You don’t know that. You weren’t.”
“Don’t you get it, Grace? I don’t know that I ever came back.”
His voice echoed in the empty hall.
Grace was not a good person. She knew it, because she let him lie there at her feet, at war with himself, for what felt like a long time before she held out her hand. “Come on. Let’s do our job.”
He did not look at her until they hit the street.
• • •
Menchú touched the crucifix around his neck and said a quick prayer for guidance. He promised to not bear false witness, but he gave no promise to say everything that he knew.
The crucifix in his hand grew warm as he waited. Perhaps he should simply avoid this meeting. Hurry, he thought. Just go after Sal.
He paused, and then turned around.
Peter Usher, the monsignor in charge of guiding Team Two, turned down the hallway with a smile, the kind that doesn’t reach the eyes, on his face. Behind him trailed Monsignor Angiuli, Team Three’s council representative, looking fretful.
Menchú ground his teeth. He prayed for forgiveness, and took his hand from his crucifix. “Father, I’m glad to see you. I was about to let you know that cleanup will begin soon on the Archives, but we have a lead on the demons that attacked us. We have to strike now. I will let you know the details when we return.”
Usher put up his hand, stopping Menchú with the gesture. “We know what happened, Arturo,” he said. “Monsignor Angiuli described the breach. The Archives have been compromised, as well as your team. As of right now, Team Two is taking over this investigation.”
Menchú nodded once. “That’s for the best. I think that’s for the best. Yes. Let me know if we can assist in any way. Any way.”
Both monsignors raised eyebrows at his stumbling words, and he cursed silently. “Sorry, I’m rather overwhelmed. Tired. I’ll go tell my team they can stand down and wait for debriefing from Team Two, shall I?”
“We have some points to discuss,” Monsignor Usher said, gesturing to Angiuli. “About the future of the teams. I’ll send someone to get you after we work some things out.”
“Good, good,” Menchú said.
“You’ll need to remove Asanti from the Archives for now, until we figure out what’s going to happen with Team Three.”
Menchú swallowed the lump of rage in his throat. “Understood.” He leaned away from them, eager to leave. He didn’t care about the existence of Team Three at this point, he just wanted to get Liam, Grace, and Asanti away from the Vatican.
• • •
The inside of the shoe design office looked like an abattoir. Sal wondered why no security alarms were going off—but if the Hand had blocked her phone communications in her apartment, it wasn’t too big a logistical leap to think that it could block cameras and alarms.
If the human race lives through whatever is currently going down, there’s going to be a huge carpet-cleaning bill.
“Quiet,” the Hand snapped. Sal’s voice sounded strained.
She was distracting it. Which meant it needed its full attention for the task at hand.
The Hand had slaughtered many of the visiting demons and dismantled them, starting with Vogue. It then laid the bits of smoking flesh on the floor, taking care to put each in the right spot. Making itself a body.
Chalky and Oh-Christ-What-Is-That? were busy cutting various bones free from the dead demons (and a few live ones) and adhering them to the bleeding walls. They were building something that looked like an archway, long leg bones making the sides and cracked ribs forming the arch.
The demons that were neither slaughtered yet nor working directly for the Hand milled around, some of them hanging back in fear, some of them eagerly watching. A few masochists were offering themselves to the Hand to help it achieve its greatness.
The Hand snared one of these, a small, six-legged, catlike demon with black spines instead of fur, and broke it in half. The spines cut Sal’s hands, but she barely felt the pain anymore. The Hand muttered some words, glancing at the codex as it chanted, and formed each side of the cat demon into horns it fixed to the forehead of the body on the floor.
Oh, now that was unnecessary. You had to kill that cat-thing just so you could have horns? What’s next, kill someone else to make sure your dick is big enough? She wasn’t sure why she was defending a demon, but the Hand’s actions still seemed pretty shitty.
“Quiet,” the Hand said again, louder this time, and the demons around them subsided.
You don’t like me in your head bugging you? You’re re
ally going to complain about that after the last few months? You’re nothing but a hypocrite. Sal was enjoying herself, in a perverse way.
“Soon enough,” the Hand panted, “I will be free of you.” It took a breath. “And then ending you will be the first thing I do.”
The wall inside the bone arch began to shimmer and crack, and blood-red light spilled into the room. The Hand kept reading, and the wall shattered, giving Sal a good look into the world beyond. It was a world she remembered having seen while glimpsing the Hand’s memories, and for a moment she was worried the Hand would take her there.
No. It’s an exit. And it’s not for us.
Demons teemed around the portal, waiting for it to stabilize so they could come through.
The room pulsed with energy, and the demons inside roared and cheered and hissed. The Hand positioned Sal’s body between the portal and the piles of gory bits of slaughtered demons.
The portal pulsed again and Sal’s body shook from the pressure of the magic around her. Light shot out from the opening and around Sal, then through her, to fall on the cobbled-together body on the floor. The bits melted to form a more recognizable shape.
It was going to be quite tall. Sal thought the Hand was getting ambitious; it could have built a shorter body and killed fewer demons in the process, but then, people who thought like that probably didn’t tend to end up hosting demons. The body lying in the center of the foyer would be at least eight feet tall, with huge muscular thighs and shoulders, hands that ended in three claws, cloven feet, and horns that had previously been the six-legged cat thing.
Sal could feel the strain the Hand required to focus the magic into its new body. She looked at the huge, inert form, and thought for the first time that perhaps getting the Hand out of her head wasn’t the best idea at this moment.
I miss my team, she thought. Grace would have a field day in here.
The body had formed almost completely. The new skin was brown and bumpy and tough. The flesh underneath looked hard as stone, and fangs grew from its gums.
Bookburners: Season One Volume Two Page 17