Darkborn

by Matthew J. Costello

  “Great. So now what?”

  “On the way out I kinda nodded to Kiff . . . toward the water. If he gets something, he’ll follow us there.”

  “And if not?” Whalen asked.

  Tim grinned. “He’ll still follow us there. But then we’ll send him out to find another store.”

  Will trailed behind them, listening to Tim. And Narrio was even further behind because — Will saw — Narrio kept looking back to see if Kiff was coming, if Kiff was following them down to the water.

  But the streets were empty, absolutely deserted.

  The dog even stopped barking.

  Will looked ahead. He saw the ocean now, but nothing else. The road that ran from here to Sheepshead Bay was high, above the beach.

  Tim hurried, his walk breaking into a run.

  Will picked up his pace too . . . until he got to the edge of the road and saw that there was no beach.

  No beach . . .

  Because the beach was covered with a jumble of rocks — great, flat slabs of concrete. It was a cracked highway that ran from the jetty — where the bay met the ocean — and on toward the bay, as far as they could see.

  “Where’s the beach?” Will asked.

  The wind was in his face, blowing continuously, clear and clean, but laced with the salt water, the tangy taste of the ocean only yards away. Waves kicked drunkenly against the rocks while an occasional big surge sent a thin geyser rushing straight up into the sky.

  Tim turned to him.

  “There is no beach,” he said. “It’s all like this.”

  “And what is this?” Whalen asked. Will saw Whalen’s eyes squint against the constant wind.

  “It’s a walkway,” Tim said. “It’s a fucking promenade. There used to be a hotel here, a monster . . . forty years ago, maybe more. Manhattan Beach used to be a resort and it had this big sidewalk running from Brighton to Sheepshead Bay.”

  No one said anything for a few seconds. The wind echoed in Will’s ears. Then . . .

  “Well, what happened to it?” Narrio asked.

  And everyone laughed, laughing at the way the question sounded, rolling so flatly and quietly out of Narrio’s mouth.

  “Look at the water,” Tim said. “Right here, Jamaica Bay meets the Atlantic, Mikey. And when a mother of a storm hits, it can get real nasty. The people around here probably get their houses flooded out a couple times each year.”

  Well, thought Will, that explains the low-rent look to the neighborhood.

  “My old man said that there was a bitch of a hurricane in 1939, the same year Adolf started playing Risk with Europe. The hurricane hit Long Island and Brooklyn straight on.”

  “No shit,” Whalen said.

  Will looked out at the water, all bubbling and foamy, and so close. But he stood on the tilted chunks of concrete walkway, above the water, as if he were on the prow of a giant ship.

  No, thought Will.

  Not a ship.

  More like a raft.

  Adrift on the sea.

  “Yes, Whalen. And the storm blew salt water two hundred miles away. Two hundred miles! To Vermont and New Hampshire. It ruined the apple crop, lifted houses up and tossed them miles away. And,” he said, taking a properly dramatic pause, “it did this . . .”

  He gestured to the concrete walkway.

  And — as Will turned — he saw something.

  Just out of the corner of his eye.

  Something small, and blackish gray.

  Barely there-almost in his imagination.

  Except — except . . . he got a real good look at something long and snaky as it disappeared between two big chunks of concrete, swallowed by the open crack.

  “Hey,” Will said. He licked his lips. “Hey, guys, I think I just saw a rat.” He turned to Tim, who looked like the commander of this ill-fated vessel. “Are there rats here?”

  Tim shrugged. “Beats me. I guess there are.” He looked around, sniffing the air, as if that would tell him something. “Sure . . . I guess there’d have to be. Sure. Probably water rats.”

  “Oh, great,” Whalen said. “Now we’re going to get our butts chewed by rats. I always did want rabies.”

  Will saw Narrio look around, holding his bag as if it were a weapon. And Will felt more and more empathy with Narrio. An early evening might be in order . . .

  “You don’t bother them, and they won’t bother you,” Tim said.

  Everyone considered the wisdom of those words until they heard a voice . . .

  Above them, from the road.

  Kiff.

  Looking down at them.

  He was grinning.

  “Hey!” he yelled. He had one arm behind his back. He waited until everyone was looking.

  Will looked up, but he also checked the crack that the rat had entered. It was a black hole.

  And it would get blacker as the sun set . . .

  Wherever the sun was in this cloudy sky.

  “Hey!” Kiff yelled. And then he pulled his arm out in front of him and hoisted his prize, a brown bag, which he held aloft.

  “Shit, the a-hole will probably drop it,” Tim said.

  But Kiff reached over with his other hand. He looked delirious, mad with excitement. And he pulled out his treasure, the amber-brown bottle that was — Will realized — the only spot of color amid the gray stone and the gray sea and the gray sky.

  Kiff held it high.

  “Success!” Kiff yelled.

  And with a whoop he bounded down to them.

  * * *

  11

  Kiff leaped down, taking awkward, lanky steps that would be comical if they weren’t so spastic.

  He’s going to drop the bottle for sure, thought Will. But miraculously Kiff landed next to them. He pulled the intact bottle out of its bag.

  “Way to go,” Whalen said, sounding almost sincere.

  “I even got four cups.” Kiff grinned. “That old man in the store was half blind. He asked me if there wasn’t something else I needed. I could have bought two quarts.”

  “Let’s keep that store in mind,” Tim said, reaching out and taking the prize from Kiff. He unscrewed the cap ceremoniously.

  Kiff handed out small wax-covered cups that seemed more suited for Kool-Aid. Will held his and waited his turn.

  The wind nipped at his ears and he heard the constant churning sound of the ocean. So close, but held back by the jagged crunch of rock.

  Tim poured himself the first taste. He moved the half-filled cup under his nose, savoring the aroma as if it were a rich Bordeaux. He wrinkled his face in approval and then chugged the bourbon in one gulp.

  “Perfect,” he said.

  Whalen stuck his cup under the bottle. “Hit me, Tim,” Whalen said.

  Everyone was up now, Will saw. Everyone was feeling real loose.

  Will took his sip. The warm booze trickled down his throat, burning with such a pleasant warmth, pushing away the wind, the water, the cold gray clouds. And Will thought:

  This is fun.

  We’re going to have a good time tonight.

  But he thought about the reason they were here. The whole point behind coming to Manhattan Beach.

  Supposedly . . .

  The crazy bullshit reason.

  To put ourselves between the devil and the deep blue sea, he thought, smiling to himself.

  And he turned and looked around, seeing the ships waiting at the mouth of the harbor, darker now as night came closer. And further out, the Barnegat Lightship, a welcome sight for ships trying to find the harbor. He kept turning, watching the hypnotic dance of the foaming water. He saw the strip of land directly across from them: Breezy Point, ending in a bony finger of rocks that stretched out into a rough, hungry Atlantic.

  I’ve been out there, Will knew, in a sixteen-foot boat rocking back and forth, up and down, until my cookies weren’t the only thing that I was in danger of tossing.

  He thought his brother, Danny, was going to fly overboard. Danny was, like Dad, three or
four Rheingolds south of okay, and his grip on the side of the boat looked tenuous.

  And Will’s look was scared. Dad was no sailor, and Will remembered his father screaming at Will, yelling right at his face.

  Hold on, for Christ’s sake. Will you hold on to the goddamn boat?

  Will thought for sure that the Coast Guard would have to save them. But somehow, his father got the boat past the worst of it, back toward Jamaica Bay.

  And when they got home, Mom wanted to know where all the fish were that they had caught.

  No one told her that they had almost lost Danny.

  Will kept turning around, taking another sip of the bourbon. He saw the desolate-looking Riis Park Bridge. No one was taking it to the beach today. Nobody was running away to their Breezy Point cabanas this weekend. He saw two lights, one on each tower of the bridge. They blinked on and off, probably to warn the airplanes streaming toward La Guardia.

  “Another shot?” Tim said, startling Will.

  “Oh, sure,” Will said. He gulped the last sip and Tim gave him a full cup this time.

  Will didn’t worry about how bombed this would make him.

  That didn’t seem important.

  He turned back to the others. They had found perches on the rocks, holding their dainty white cups with the fringe of blue flowers as though this were a picnic.

  “Hey, how are you doing, Willy?” Kiff yelled.

  Nobody called him “Willy.” He hated that. But right now, Will didn’t give a damn.

  “Super, Kiff. Great.”

  He saw Mike Narrio smiling, looking — God! — as if he was actually starting to relax.

  “How’s it hanging, Mike?” Will said to him.

  Narrio laughed and tilted his cup to Will. “Straight down, Dunnigan. “

  And everyone laughed, as Kiff, the sommelier, the wine steward of Club Atlantic, went around refilling glasses.

  The bourbon was moving fast.

  Will felt the first shock waves of the alcohol.

  He found himself laughing at something Whalen had said, something about one of the sumo-cooks in the cafeteria, a woman with arms shaped like meaty hams.

  Laughing at fucking Whalen, he thought. That’s a first.

  But Kiff — who always seemed so goofy, so ready to laugh — was quiet. He had his shirt collar up as if he were cold and he hadn’t said anything for a few minutes.

  The booze seemed to be taking Kiff somewhere else.

  But then he saw Kiff get up.

  Tim was down by the ocean taking a leak right at the water’s edge.

  A streetlight — the only nearby light — came on. It was half a block away, but it might send a bit of a glow their way. Whalen was telling more funny stories to Narrio, who laughed his ass off.

  Kiff walked over to a big piece of shattered pavement, the biggest in sight. He pulled a sheet of paper out of his pocket —

  Oh, yeah, Will thought. The paper. From Scott’s apartment.

  And Will shook his head. Why the fuck bother? he thought. We’re all relaxed, having a good time. Maybe we can hit a movie later. Get some late breakfast at a greasy spoon.

  But Kiff held the paper up, catching the glow from the streetlight. He dug in one of his front pockets.

  “Shit,” Will heard him say. Then Kiff worked his bony hand into the other pocket. He pulled out something black, in three or four pieces.

  Will started to take a sip of the bourbon, but his cup was empty.

  He walked over to Kiff.

  Kiff knelt down on the stone with the paper in his hand.

  Tim came up behind Will.

  “What’s he doing?” Tim asked.

  Will shrugged. But Kiff heard the question. He looked up, his face serious, determined.

  He’s scarier this way than when he’s acting like a madman, thought Will.

  ‘‘I’m drawing the circle,” Kiff said as he made an oblong shape with his arms. “It’s got to be nine feet in diameter, but I don’t have a fucking ruler.”

  Tim laughed, and grinned dopily at Will. “Me neither. I guess we’ll just have to fucking estimate!”

  “Or use my wang!” Whalen said.

  And Will laughed.

  As a sudden wave exploded behind him …

  Kiff had trouble getting everyone to quiet down. Narrio was giggling, laughing at everything the suddenly happy-go-lucky Whalen said to him.

  “You have to stand on the circle,” Kiff said, talking over the wind and the waves. He looked ridiculous, a skeleton man with red hair, holding his pathetic piece of paper in the air as it fluttered.

  “Or we’ll be blown to Oz,” Whalen said, and everyone laughed.

  Everyone except Kiff. Kiff looked at them, but his washed-out blue eyes were invisible in the dark. He was at the wrong angle to catch any light.

  Will grinned. The bourbon was — what?

  Gone? Nearly gone? And he felt good. Happy. As if this was the greatest place in the world, right here. As if he could jump in the water — it had to be cold, just had to be — and swim to France.

  “If you don’t want to do it, then screw you,” Kiff said. “We won’t do it.”

  “Great!” Whalen said.

  But Tim spoke. He wasn’t laughing.

  And that was odd, thought Will. Isn’t this hilarious . . . absolutely the funniest thing ever? Why isn’t Tim laughing?

  “Hey, come on, guys. This is why we came here. Let’s do it.”

  He sounded serious.

  How could he sound serious? Will thought. This whole thing is one big goof, isn’t it? Just for grins.

  And we’re already grinning plenty.

  “Okay, okay — Christ, Hanna, you know how to interrupt a party.” Whalen got to his feet. Narrio was still sitting, squatting like an Indian on the stone. “C’mon, Mikey,” Whalen said, reaching down and pulling Narrio. “Up and at ‘em.”

  He jerked a hysterical Narrio to his feet.

  Mikey’s gone, thought Will. Mamma Narrio’s boy has lost it.

  “Okay,” Tim said, “we’re listening.”

  Kiff gestured out with his arms, quieting the natives. Whalen was still giggling. Narrio rocked back and forth on his feet.

  But Will heard Kiff, listened to what he said.

  “You each have to stand on the circle, at the tip of one of the star points . . . the tip. It says that you’re not safe if you move off.”

  Whalen hooted like an owl. Everyone broke up. Everyone fell off their star points.

  Ooops.

  But then, like rowdy Cub Scouts, they hustled back to their assigned places.

  Will looked down. The white concrete was tilted so that it caught whatever light was here. And he saw Kiff’s handiwork.

  The irregular circle was filled with a five-pointed star. The lines were wavering, but it was definitely a star. Inside the star were symbols, looking like Arabic squiggles, a Greek cross, and other scrawls all looking properly exotic.

  Will found himself staring at one of the symbols. It looked like a key but it ended in a dagger point. Something about it fascinated Will, as if he had seen it before.

  He shook his head.

  Probably from an old Hammer horror film.

  Curse of the B Movie.

  “Once I begin the ceremony, once I start chanting, you can’t move. Not the slightest! The demon — if it desires — will make its presence known to us.”

  “How?” Tim said, as if that was a reasonable question.

  Probably in the form of a cop doing a quick zip by the beach looking for nuts like us, thought Will.

  “I don’t know, Tim,” Kiff said with the best professional tone he could muster. He sounded like a stumped Mr. Wizard.

  It was all crazy . . . absurd.

  Whalen exploded in another volley of repressed laughing. Narrio collapsed into him, giggling.

  “Doesn’t look like such a good night to summon the demon world,” Will said, gesturing at them. Whalen and Narrio — an easy audience — co
llapsed some more, but then Tim turned to him.

  And grabbed Will’s shoulder hard.

  “Hey,” he said, “let’s just fucking do it, okay?”

  Will smiled at his friend, his best friend. But Tim didn’t smile back. And Will saw that his friend was not a happy camper.

  The alcohol has taken him someplace not so friendly, he thought.

  “Okay,” Will said, trying to sound chastened. “Can you tell me something, Kiff? Just who the hell are we trying to contact?”

  Kiff nodded. He took a breath. “He’s called Astaroth.” Kiff said the next words with relish. “It says that he’s the Grand Duke of Hell, the numero uno Adversary.”

  More giggles, but Will asked another question. “Adversary of whom?”

  “Of God, of course. He’s also called ‘The Handler,’ since he’s so adept at handling human contacts.”

  Whalen laughed. “That’s reassuring.” Still laughing, he turned to Will. “But I don’t know why we’d like to contact this sucker, do you?”

  Now Will laughed until he heard Tim say, “Hey, c’mon, Dunnigan . . .”

  Will took what he hoped was a sobering breath. “Okay, I’m ready. Let’s do it.”

  Tim nodded, in the darkness.

  And Will checked that he was standing right on the point of the star, at the edge of the circle.

  Kiff said, “Okay . . .”

  And then he began.

  Everyone tried not to laugh, Will guessed. Will knew that he sure was trying. But it wasn’t long before Kiff was a few syllables into his chant, the all-powerful words from The Book of Enoch, before the suppressed laughter was a dam ready to erupt, ready to wash them into the sea, rolling and laughing.

  “Bagabi, laca, bachala . . . meisto lamal, cahi, meisto . . .”

  The sputters turned into giant belly laughs.

  “What the hell kind of language is that?” Whalen said between wipes at his eyes.

  Will laughed some more. His stomach hurt. He had to piss from laughing.

  But Kiff only repeated it. And again. And again. Until the laughter eventually faded.

  The joke grew sour.

  Kiff paused.

  The waves smashed against the stone. Will felt a tiny salt spray touch the back of his neck, chilling him. This wasn’t fun anymore, he thought. I’m cold. And his stomach was starting to feel as if it were moving in time to the water.