by Sonya Clark
The phone buzzed and I snatched it from Blake. “Bubba?”
“May I please speak to Roxanne Mathis?” A dull, unfamiliar voice. A generic eight hundred number showed on the caller ID. Crap.
“Who’s calling?”
“Ma’am, I’m with Liberty Credit Solutions.”
I snapped the phone shut, closing my eyes against Blake’s curious expression. The last thing I needed right now was a collection agency hounding me. I dug a ponytail holder out of my bag and struggled to put my hair up. Blake looked like he wanted to ask obnoxious questions so I gave him my meanest, nastiest glare. He left me alone.
I had the cabbie drop us at the bottom of the driveway and started running as soon as the guy was off the property, not waiting for Blake to limp along. Pounding on the door, I hollered Daniel’s name. No answer, everything too quiet. I stuck my hand in the dirt of a planter full of marigolds next to the step, searching for the spare key.
“Is there somewhere else he would go if there was trouble here?” Blake climbed the porch steps with care. White bandages glowed against dark chest hair and his open black jacket.
“Yeah but not without telling me.” I was about ready to dump the flowers out on the porch when I found the key and ran for the door.
The foyer was dark. Looking over the top of my glasses revealed nothing. The smell of lighter fluid and charred wood, and something that might have been organic, assailed me. If there was trouble in the house during daylight Daniel would head for the cellar. Down the long hallway, left turn past the kitchen, a claustrophobic set of stairs led to the room. I got as far as the kitchen before finding the first snake.
The sound of the rattle brought me to a sudden stop. Blake collided with me and I flung my arm out to brace against the wall to keep from falling. Crowding me, his hands on my shoulders, he started to speak but stopped when we both saw the rattlesnake slide across the floor. Some kind of viscous red slime covered the snake and left a trail in its wake.
“Does he normally have snakes in the house?” Either Blake sounded queasy or my own sudden nausea colored my perspective.
“This is not good.” We watched the thing slither away. I slid my glasses down far enough to take a look at the red trail left by the serpent. A smudgy haze reminiscent of ectoplasm leaked around the edges. Once again I yelled Daniel’s name.
“He’s in the cellar.” Seth walked up behind us. Startled, I jumped closer to Blake, backing into the wall of his chest. He squeezed my shoulder and, as much as I didn’t want to accept comfort from him, I was glad for his presence.
Seth looked trashed. Blood stained his clothes and left part of a crimson handprint on one pale cheek. His white-blond hair stuck up at crazy angles, purple bags weighing down his eyes. Worst of all was his empty, lifeless expression.
“What happened?” Scared of the answer.
“Levi’s dead,” Seth said.
Blake said, “Was Delia here or did she send others?”
For the first time Seth seemed to notice Blake’s presence. Bit by bit the lifeless expression turned to rage, the peeling back of a lid holding in something ugly. Seth grabbed me and pushed me away. Caught by surprise, I hit the floor as Seth shoved Blake against the wall, trying to connect his fist with the older man’s face. Blake was too big and too quick. He had Seth down in a few fluid moves that looked more Tai Kwan Do than Tai Chi. Whatever it was, it stopped the fight before it had a chance to get started.
Crouching over Seth, Blake slapped him once, the sharp sound reverberating in the hallway. “You know better,” he said, voice low and dangerous. “You know what I can do, so don’t fucking push me.”
“Yeah, I know what you can do, all right.” Seth scooted away to lean against the opposite wall. “You’re real damn good at lying and getting people killed.”
Blake ignored him but as he pulled me to my feet I saw a tightness around his eyes, a shadow of something that might have been self-doubt. Spotting another snake wending its way up the wall made me forget all about it, though. Instinctively I gripped Blake’s hands tighter.
“Seth, what’s going on? Why are there snakes in the house? Where’s Daniel?” I could hear panic in my voice and tried to breathe evenly to keep it at bay.
“I told you, he’s in the cellar. He said to lock him up down there after the snakes, after there were so many.” Seth leaned his head against the wall, closing his eyes. “The room was just full of them.”
Another snake curled around the corner, rattler hissing. I stomped at it, hoping to scare it away. It worked. “What happened?” I was damn near frantic now for Seth to just tell us what the hell happened.
“They were all in his bedroom first. We heard him screaming. He said to set them on fire to kill them all because they were poisonous. I did it, but there were just so many. They got to Levi.” Seth started to cry painful, uncontrolled tears. “He was bit all over. Like they swarmed him or something.”
I knelt before him, trying to make eye contact. “Where did the snakes come from? Was Delia here?”
Seth shook his head. “They came from Daniel. They keep on coming from Daniel.”
I rocked back on my heels.
Blake said, “I don’t get it. Is the guy summoning snakes?”
“No,” I whispered. “Delia did this to him somehow.” I stood. “What did you do with Levi?”
“Wrapped him up in some sheets in the guest room.” Seth kept running his hands through his hair and began to rock back and forth. He’d be lucky to get out of this with his sanity intact, if I could manage to keep him alive.
“Okay. Okay.” Trying to come up with a plan, I took a few steps away from them, rubbing my face. I’d gone from in over my head to drowning and there was no lifeguard on duty. Before I could deal with Daniel I needed a way to deal with all the snakes.
I faced Blake. “There’s a storage building out back of the house. I know there’s at least two garden hoes there, a shovel or two.” He looked at me as if he didn’t understand. “Best thing to chop the head off a snake is a garden hoe. Follow this hallway to the veranda and you’ll see the storage building.” I pointed at Seth. “Take him with you and bring back anything else you think might be useful.”
“What are you going to do?” Blake reached for Seth to help pull him to his feet. Seth didn’t fight this time. His blank obedience unnerved me.
“Go see about Daniel.”
Blake raised his hand and for a moment I thought he meant to touch my cheek. He let the hand drop then turned to leave with Seth in tow.
I ran into the kitchen in search of the long barbecue lighter Daniel used to light the wood stove. Fiddling with it, I worked the short, polite flame into a somewhat bigger, more effective one. As I hoofed it to the cellar I wondered if maybe waving it around like Indiana Jones would help.
A thick funky smell crawled up my sinuses and threatened to stay there forever when I pushed the cellar door open. The coppery tang of blood, burning wood and charred meat seeped out of the room. A single bare bulb in the middle of the low ceiling threw off a waxy yellow light. A small fire burned in the wood stove. The limp body of a snake hung out of the door, its head presumably adding fuel to both the fire and the stench.
A pair of old cauldron-style iron planters had been left in the cellar by the home’s previous owner. One had been dragged next to the wood stove and turned into a makeshift fire pit, with more snakes dumped into it. Dead and live snakes littered the floor. I found Daniel collapsed behind a stack of firewood.
Rushing to his side, I cried out his name. He felt too heavy when I gave his body a shake, his limbs locked into place and his pallor a sickly gray. Looking over the top of my glasses, I saw no sign of his usual yellow-gold aura. There was nothing at all.
Daniel was dead.
* * * *
I waited. I’d seen this happen once before. It was scary and nerve-wracking, but the guy was a vampire. His head was still attached so I knew he’d wake. I just hoped he did it before I
had to start fighting off snakes. A cottonmouth was giving me the eye from its perch on a ceiling beam.
I gave Daniel a hard poke in the chest. Then another. A rattle sounded behind me and I jumped up, waving the lighter. “Goddamn snakes,” I said behind gritted teeth. “Why did it have to be goddamn snakes?” I kicked Daniel’s boot. If he didn’t wake soon I might have to try dragging him out of here.
Movement drew my gaze to the ceiling beam where a cottonmouth had been moments before. Now it was nowhere in sight. The lighter’s flame kept going out. Pulling the trigger got me nothing but clicking noises.
Something grabbed my ankle. I screamed and kicked as hard as I could. The lighter responded, giving me a good three inches of flame to brandish.
“Roxie!”
At once relieved and embarrassed, I let go of the lighter’s trigger and dropped to Daniel’s side. “Come on, we gotta get you out of here.”
He rolled over and pulled himself up on all fours, moving as if he’d been hit by a truck. Streaks of blood and fluid painted his skin and clothes. “It’s better if I stay down here, trust me.” His voice sounded terrible, like someone took a cheese grater to his throat.
“Tell me what happened.”
Daniel sat against the wall, hugging his midsection. “Tainted blood, I think. Didn’t even drink much of it but I guess I got enough.” A coughing fit shook his body. He leaned over to spit blood.
I mentally filed through everything Rozella taught me about tricks to introduce live creatures into the body, whether they be snakes, spiders, or something else. None of those spells could do what was happening here in such a short time. These weren’t true snakes, either. More like supercharged constructs that behaved in whatever manner her spell commanded, rather than real snakes that couldn’t grow so large in such a short time. This was hoodoo on steroids. Would it be immune to the remedies I knew? Even if they worked, it would take days.
“I got a lot of things I can try but it’s going to take some time.”
“Roxie, please.” His head lolled back against the wall. Skin gray and slick with sweat, pain contorting his features, he looked sicker than I’d ever seen anyone. “I can’t keep doing this.”
“I know it’s bad, bubba, but I’ll get you through this. I promise.” I placed my hand on his forehead, shocked at the fever I found. What kind of spell could do that to a vampire?
He tried to respond but his words were cut off by another coughing fit. “You don’t understand,” he managed to choke out before winding up back on all fours.
I held his shoulders, trying to keep him steady. He pushed me away. He still had plenty of vampire strength and I wound up crashing into the stack of firewood. Several pieces dislodged from the stack, rolling to the floor to reveal a number of snakes that had found refuge in the wood.
Jumping up, I ran back to Daniel’s side. The coughing became a retching, blood and fluid and thick chunks of tissue falling from his mouth to the floor. The diamond head of a snake pushed its way out of his throat. Its thick body stretched Daniel’s mouth. His neck muscles convulsed as he struggled to get the thing out of him, sweat pouring in sheets. The snake’s long body wriggled as it found its way to the floor to slither off, skin glistening with a coating of Daniel’s blood. He vomited more blood and tissue, the smell hitting me hard. I took an involuntary step back, covering my nose and mouth with my forearm. Larger chunks of tissue hit the floor and I realized it was viscera. The snakes were tearing up Daniel’s insides, ripping out his intestines as they formed then worked to free themselves.
My screams bounced off the walls of the cellar. Daniel collapsed, immobile. I fought against panic and nausea, my breathing ragged gasps. I wanted to run from the room, I wanted to run to my cousin’s side. I wanted to breathe sweet clean air in a snake-free environment.
I backed into the doorway, trying to settle down so I could function. By the time Blake came down the stairs, I was just about there. In one hand he held a garden hoe as if he’d never touched one in his life. No wonder he ordered all his herbs online.
He looked at me expectantly. “How’s your friend?”
“He’s my cousin. Right now he’s dead.” I was pleased to hear my voice sounded steadier than I felt.
Blake placed his empty hand on my forearm. “What?”
I waved him quiet. “He’ll wake up in a few minutes. Can you help me get him upstairs?”
For once Blake was rendered speechless. “Uh.”
“Daniel’s a vampire.”
His grip tightened on my arm and the muscle under his right eye twitched. I waited for shock, denial, jokes about glitter. After a few seconds Blake nodded. “Okay then.” He handed me the garden hoe and entered the cellar.
I followed, using the hoe to push away snakes. Blake heaved Daniel over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. I led him to one of the guest rooms on the second floor, directing him to place Daniel on the bed as I retrieved a towel from the bathroom to start cleaning him up.
“Where’s Seth?”
“Sitting on the veranda, probably plotting my death. What do you need me to do?”
I shook my head as I wiped blood and gore from Daniel’s face and arms. “I don’t know yet. Maybe go to his room, get him another shirt.” I gave him directions and he left.
My messenger bag had a lot of stuff in it but I’d need to go through it to see exactly what I had. Recipes and remedies ran through my mind. Delia had laid a powerful trick with this hex and it would take at least as much power to uncross.
Blake returned as Daniel started to wake. Blake had not only brought Daniel a clean shirt, he’d appropriated one for himself. A plain black t-shirt too small for him stretched across his form.
Daniel blinked several times, the initial confusion of awakening fogging his perception. He reached for me, a wet cough rattling in his chest.
“Hey, bubba.” I gripped his hand in mine. “You can’t keep dying on me like that, now.”
“I feel like shit.” He tried to sit up, couldn’t manage it and fell back against the pillows. “You gotta make this stop, Roxie. You gotta.” He gasped, clutching his stomach. Rolling over on his side, he pulled himself into a fetal position. “Oh son of a bitch! I’ve been tortured before but this is fucking unreal! It’s tearing me up on the inside. It’s why I keep dying.”
His voice was shredded, full of pain. Veins bulged across his face and neck, stark blue ropes against gray skin. His blond hair was soaked with sweat and matted. I met his eyes. “I’m gonna stop this. Somehow, some way.”
I let go of his hand and sank to the floor, opening my bag and pulling out the contents. “You just hold on, bubba.”
Blake sat next to me and started pawing through the various bottles and bags of herbs and roots. “Is there a specific cure for this?”
Daniel raised his head just enough to glare. “What the hell is he doing here?”
“He hired me to protect him from Delia while we try to find a way to exorcise her.” I divided everything into three piles: stuff I knew wouldn’t help with this, stuff that might and stuff I was fairly sure I’d be using.
A harsh laugh turned into a coughing fit. Daniel started to heave, leaning over the side of the bed. I scooted over to the nightstand and grabbed a wastebasket, placing it under Daniel to catch whatever came out, just a small snake this time, with only a little bit of tissue. Blake turned several shades of green and dropped a bag full of devil pods. I grabbed the hoe and carried it and the can into the bathroom, dumped the can’s contents into the tub and took the little rattlesnake’s head off with the business end of the hoe, leaving a gouge in the porcelain.
I turned around to find Blake standing in the doorway. “Think I should keep the rattle?”
“And people call me a sick freak.” He jerked his thumb in Daniel’s direction. “What are you going to do about this?”
“I need to get the snakes out of him. Cleanse and purify him and the property.”
“Yeah, but how?”
“I know a few different ways to get live creatures out of the body but this came on so strong, I don’t think we can afford to mess with the ones that take time. There’s one method I know of that can be fairly quick, but it is going to be hell on him.”
“The guy’s barfing up his insides, how much worse can it get?”
“You have no idea. I need you to go get something. There’s a little supermarket a few miles up the road. Will you do it?”
He nodded. “What do you need?”
“Garlic.”
* * * *
I mashed the puree button on the blender again then strained the garlic juice into the pot on the stove.
“So I take it this means all that stuff about vampires and garlic isn’t true?” Blake sat at the kitchen table peeling the papery skin from cloves of garlic.
“Oh, it’s true.” I stirred the garlic juice into the holy water clockwise, then counter-clockwise, then clockwise again. “It won’t kill them but they are allergic to it. That’s why it repels them.”
“What about your holy water there?”
“Same thing.” While Blake had gone to the store I had filled several containers with water and blessed it with sea salt. I also talked to Seth, who was stable enough to help me by keeping an eye on Daniel. I figured as long as I kept some distance between Seth and Blake there wouldn’t be a blow-up. At least, that’s what I hoped.
Blake carried another bowl of garlic to the blender, dumping the contents in. “I have to say, this is weird even by my standards. What the hell is this?”
“It’s hoodoo, Blake. Your demon lover has moved on to hoodoo.” I had some ideas about that percolating in the back of my brain, but I needed to get Daniel healthy before I could go any farther.
“That’s ex-lover.” He came up behind me, parting my hair to touch the back of my neck. I twisted out from under his fingertips and stepped to one side so I could face him.
“I’ve only dealt with live creatures in the body a couple of times.” Nervous chatter, but better than letting him touch me. “I was still working with Rozella. The first time was spiders. I pretty much just stayed out of the way and watched while she did everything. The second time was snakes and she had me mix ingredients before taking over. Either I did something wrong, which was unlikely because she stood right there the whole time, or he didn’t follow instructions. He was supposed to drink the tonic every day for several days. The snakes came back worse. Rozella made this very thing, garlic and holy water. It drove the snakes out all at once.” My stomach flipped at the memory. “I didn’t eat for three days after seeing that.”