Poison City

by Paul Crilley

  To be honest that appeals to me the most. The UK version of the Division – the Ministry – grew out of some secret society called the Invisible Order back in Victorian times. They have whole rooms devoted to Ouija boards. The Victorians knew their stuff when it came to ghosts and the spirit world. Maybe I can get in touch with them to see if they could help out.

  But then I click on something that makes me straighten up and concentrate.

  Creating a revenant. Or bringing someone back from the dead.

  A revenant isn’t like a zombie. It’s someone who comes back to life, but who still has their consciousness and soul intact and doesn’t have that pesky craving for human flesh.

  I lean back and stare at the ceiling. Can I do that to Armitage? Bring her back? She won’t like it. Hell, who would? But she’s the only link I have with Cally’s killer.

  Sorry, Armitage. I need you back here.

  I scan the article, then put in a call to Parker. It rings for a long time before she picks up.

  ‘London? What the fuck? What time is it?’

  ‘Time for action!’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Sorry. Always wanted to say that. I need you back at Division.’

  ‘Can’t it wait till tomorrow?’

  ‘No. I know who’s behind the killings.’

  ‘Who?’ Her voice sounds more alert now.

  ‘Lilith. You know, from the bible? Well, not the actual bible. The Apocrypha.’

  ‘I know who Lilith is. You sure?’

  ‘Pretty sure. I was attacked by vampires tonight, ended up in a boat out in the middle of the ocean where I met her. It’s . . . complicated. Can you get over here?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Um . . . I want to resurrect Armitage as a revenant.’

  ‘Oh.’ A pause. ‘You got permission from Ranson?’

  ‘Of course! Wouldn’t be calling you otherwise.’

  ‘You know we need her soul, right?’

  ‘On my way to get it right this minute. Should be back in an hour.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘Yup.’

  She sighs. ‘Fine. But don’t complain if I’m grumpy tomorrow, OK?’

  ‘Parker, you’re always grumpy. How am I supposed to tell the difference?’

  She hangs up on me. I smile, grab the keys for one of the company cars, and head out to find Armitage’s soul. I nudge the dog gently and quickly pull my foot back. He opens one eye and glares at me.

  ‘The game’s afoot.’

  The building that Tiurakh operates from is called The Towers, a twenty-three floor apartment building shaped like a three-pointed star. It’s been there for decades, dominating the Pinetown skyline, the only tower block in the entire city and impossible to miss. I’ve noted it every time I drive along the freeway, but I didn’t know Tiurakh used it as a warehouse.

  I take the off-ramp and turn right, heading across the bridge. I follow the road around the Knowles shopping centre and onto a slip road that curves towards the residents’ parking lot. The boom is down and I don’t have a card, so I reverse and park by the side of the road.

  The dog and I approach the glass door leading into the building. There’s a security guard sitting behind a little metal desk. I wonder how I’m going to get past him. I could try the Jedi mind trick I’ve been practising. It’s basically using your own strength of will and mild shinecraft to overpower the will of another. I’m not very good at it, though. My whole being reacts badly to that kind of violation. I think it hampers the effects if your heart’s not in it.

  I knock on the door instead. The guard looks up and frowns. He makes shoo-ing motions and doesn’t move. Cheeky bastard.

  ‘Show him the chit,’ says the dog.

  Good idea. I take the little token out and press it against the glass, knocking on the door again. The guard sighs and puts down the book he’s reading (Fifty Shades of Grey, I notice). He heaves himself out of his chair, acting as if I’ve just asked him to move a mountain for me.

  He frowns at the token, then takes a keycard from his pocket and swipes it over the lock. The door opens but he doesn’t step aside to let us in.

  -He’s an orisha,- says the dog in my mind. -Low level. Nothing impressive.-

  Makes sense. If Tiurakh is operating from here he’s going to want a supernatural guarding his business.

  ‘Tiurakh in?’ I say.

  ‘You collecting?’

  I hold the token up again. ‘What do you think?’

  He chews his lip and finally steps aside, indicating one of the elevators. ‘Hold the token in front of the keypad.’

  The elevator doors slide open as we approach. I wave the token around in the general area of the buttons. The doors slide closed and we start to rise.

  Loud music bursts full blast from the speakers, making me leap about five feet into the air. ‘Jesus Christ!’

  ‘. . . Don’t fear the reaper . . .’

  ‘Nice song,’ mutters the dog. ‘Appropriate.’

  ‘Yeah.’ I straighten my clothes and watch the elevator numbers count upwards, all the way up to twenty-three, the top floor. Except it doesn’t stop there. It carries on up another floor.

  The doors open into a huge circular room with small windows running in a band all the way around, the glass shielded by angled concrete ribs on the outside of the building. I step out of the elevator and turn in a slow circle, impressed despite myself.

  The room is how I imagine Aladdin’s Cave must have looked. Gold and silver are strewn everywhere. Goblets, necklaces, trays, swords and shields with Celtic symbols engraved on them.

  Huge cauldrons hold glittering emeralds and rubies. Persian rugs are tossed carelessly around. About a hundred tapestries hang on frames inside a wooden construction, each frame mounted on coasters that can be moved aside to view each one. Statues, some marble, some bronze, some, I think, gold, stand in random positions around the room, some of them clumped together so that it looks like I’ve just interrupted a party.

  To my right are five full-length mirrors framed in antique wood.

  There’s a person standing in the mirrors, the same guy in all five. He nods at me and smiles.

  ‘You Tiurakh?’ I ask.

  ‘I am the god of belongings, the orisha of objects, the valiant lord of–’.

  ‘Save it for the tourists.’

  Tiurakh frowns. ‘Come on, man. I don’t get to do my schtick anymore.’

  ‘Not interested.’ I hold up the token. ‘Someone came in here yesterday, a deposit.’

  ‘I can’t give you whatever it is unless you are the depositee.’

  ‘Don’t talk crap. I’ve got the token.’

  ‘You might have stolen it.’

  ‘I didn’t.’

  ‘I don’t know that.’

  ‘But I do.’

  ‘Yeah, but . . . you know. Why should I believe you? You could have killed the owner.’

  ‘As it happens, she is dead. But I didn’t do it.’

  ‘You might have.’

  ‘I didn’t,’ I say, feeling my temper start to rise.

  ‘But you might have, is what I’m saying. Only the person who brought me the item can reclaim it. I have a reputation to uphold. I mean, look around. Some of this stuff has been with me for thousands of years.’

  ‘Yeah, I noticed. You ever think whoever brought it all here might not be coming back?’

  ‘That’s not the point!’

  I sigh and walk deeper into the room. I look around and realise I’m standing in the circular concrete crown on top of the Towers. I look out the window. It’s a clear night. I can actually see the lights of ships out in the harbour from here.

  The dog is sniffing the carpets.

  ‘Don’t,’ I warn him.

  ‘Don’t what?’ asks Tiurakh from the mirror. ‘I can’t see. What’s your dog doing?’

  ‘Where are you anyway?’ I ask. ‘Why aren’t you here?’

  ‘I’m in Jozi.’

  ‘
God, you call Johannesburg Jozi? Really? Doesn’t everyone hate that?’

  ‘Yeah, that’s why I do it.’

  ‘So . . . how does all this work?’

  ‘I have mirrors all over the country. When I need to deal with a client, I can appear before them.’

  He does a little twirl. The blackness around him snaps out of focus briefly, and I think I catch a glimpse of snapping teeth, rending jaws ripping flesh, blood pouring over bodies. I blink and it’s gone. I’m not a hundred per cent sure it was even there. The briefest flash of something . . . other.

  ‘To tell you the truth, I’m thinking of starting a franchise.’

  ‘A franchise?’

  ‘Sure. So I don’t have to appear in person all the time. Except for my most important clients. Solomon. Judas. Those types.’

  I have no idea if he’s screwing with me. I hold up the chit.

  ‘It’s urgent.’

  Tiurakh spreads his hands in the mirror. ‘Sorry, man. I can’t. Like I said, got my reputation to think of.’

  I gave him a chance. Nobody can say I didn’t. I pick up a heavy goblet and throw it at the closest mirror. The glass shatters, the noise obscenely loud in the room. I see flashes of broken bones and ripped skin in the falling fragments, a fire-lit sky and people screaming at the clouds. Christ, where the hell was that mirror from?

  ‘What are you doing?’ shrieks Tiurakh. His reflection is facing the empty frame. I note with interest that there is blood on his left arm, as if the falling glass wounded him. ‘That . . . that was over two thousand years old!’

  Huh. Didn’t think they had mirrors that far back. I pick up another goblet and heft it in my hand. ‘Your call. Where do you want to go from here?’

  The orisha gives me a look of disgust and waves his hand. A glowing green line appears in the air, thin like a piece of string. One end is attached to the token in my hand and the other end disappears out the door.

  ‘Follow the light,’ says Tiurakh. ‘And I won’t forget this, human. You’ll rue—’

  ‘Yeah yeah. Rue the day. Yadda yadda yadda. Come on, dog.’

  I head back into the elevator. The glowing string is touching the button for the fifteenth floor so I hit it and lean back against the mirror, tapping my foot.

  ‘He was annoying,’ says the dog. ‘You should have broken all the mirrors.’

  The elevator pings and the doors slide open onto a tiled corridor illuminated by harsh white strip lights. The green string disappears into a door a few feet away.

  ‘What now?’ asks the dog.

  I shrug, then knock. The door opens to reveal an old man. He frowns, staring left then right, but not directly at me. I wave my hand in front of his face. He doesn’t blink.

  That makes it easier. He steps back and starts to close the door. I slip inside before he does so and follow the glowing string into the lounge. The TV is on, some programme with hot vampires and manly werwolves. The string vanishes into an ancient ashtray, one of those metal ones with the collapsing lid to keep the ash inside. I open it up and shake it. The ash parts to reveal what looks like a little black marble.

  I pick it out. The green string comes with it, attached to the ball, but it fades away as I let the marble nestle in my palm.

  ‘This is it?’ I say to the dog. ‘This is a human soul?’

  No answer. I turn around and see him sitting on the couch next to the old man watching TV.

  He glares at me. ‘You see what you’re doing? You’re making me miss my shows.’

  I sigh and hold the marble up to the light. I see a tiny flash of red, an even briefer flash of white, but the rest is complete blackness.

  Pretty representative of Armitage, all things considered.

  Chapter 10

  By the time the dog and I get back to the Division, Armitage’s body has been laid out on the post-mortem table, dressed in her old mac and a spare set of clothes she kept in the accommodation block. Her face has been cleaned of blood.

  Parker is waiting for me, sipping from a cup of steaming coffee while staring at Armitage’s body. She rounds on me as I enter the room.

  ‘You can’t bring her back.’

  ‘We can. I looked it up.’

  ‘I don’t mean that. I mean you shouldn’t. She’s dead. Leave her be.’

  ‘She’s not really dead, though. She backed up her soul because she was worried something like this might happen. That means she wanted to be brought back.’

  At least, that’s how I’m justifying it to myself. I quickly explain everything that’s happened since I last saw Parker. She doesn’t look impressed.

  ‘I still don’t like it. It’s not natural.’

  I laugh. I can’t help it. ‘Not natural? You’re Delphic Division’s resident resurrectionist. It’s your specialty.’

  She scowls. ‘Point,’ she says grudgingly.

  ‘So, are you going to do it?’

  She puts her coffee down and leaves the room, reappearing with a cardboard box filled with paraphernalia. She places it carefully on the desk and starts laying out her tools in neat rows.

  ‘What do I do?’ I ask.

  ‘You stay out of the way.’

  ‘I can do that.’

  Parker takes a thick piece of chalk out the box and draws a closed double circle around Armitage. Next, she unstoppers a clay vial. An acrid smell fills the room. Vinegar, garlic and some kind of sharp spice. She taps the powder out between the lines of the circle.

  ‘Did you bring her things?’ she asks me.

  I’d just come from Armitage’s office. I hand over a shopping bag, and Parker takes out Armitage’s cigarettes, her pocket watch, and her ‘special’ magazines. Parker glances at the cover. It shows two male models posing without shirts.

  ‘Seriously?’

  ‘You said to bring things that mean a lot to her. Those mean a lot to her.’

  Parker places one of the magazines over Armitage’s solar plexus. The cigarettes go onto her throat and her pocket watch over her heart.

  ‘Her soul?’

  I take out a yellow Lion matchbox and shake it. The soul rattles around inside.

  ‘Yeah, if you wouldn’t shake the immortal soul of our boss I’d very much appreciate it,’ says Parker.

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Place it on her forehead.’

  I step forward.

  ‘Don’t scuff the circle.’

  I step carefully over the chalk and open up the matchbox. Armitage’s soul gleams dully inside. I take it out, surprised again at how heavy it is. I place it over Armitage’s forehead and move my hand away. The soul rolls off, smacking loudly against the metal table.

  ‘Jesus,’ snaps Parker. ‘Be careful!’

  ‘It’s a ball! What do you expect me to do?’

  ‘Just make it stay in one place.’

  ‘Can I hold it there?’

  ‘No, you can’t hold it there. Not unless you want to end up like that dude from The Fly.’

  I shudder. Me and Armitage fused into one body? While the sitcom possibilities are endless, it’s not really something I’d be up for. I duck out the mortuary to the office, returning a minute later with a roll of duct tape.

  Parker sees it and bursts out laughing. ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’re going to duct tape her soul to her head?’

  ‘Why not? It’s a remarkably adaptable product. I’ve used it to bind demons before. No good exorcist should leave home without it.’

  ‘Fine. Just get on with it.’

  Two minutes later we’re standing on either side of the autopsy table, staring down at Armitage. Her face is pale. Composed in death. At rest.

  With a great big strip of grey duct tape stuck to her forehead holding her soul against her skin.

  ‘Well . . . it works,’ says Parker doubtfully.

  I step out of the circle and stand against the wall. Parker picks up an old jam jar filled with yellow gloopy stuff. She takes the lid off an
d spreads it onto Armitage’s hands, feet and face.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Unguent. Made from griffin fat, the tears of possessed children, the tongue of a liar, and skin scrapings from an innocent man hanged for murder.’

  ‘That’s . . . disturbing.’

  She puts the jar down and picks up a sheet of clear plastic. Actually, it’s two pieces of Perspex with a page of old parchment wedged between them.

  ‘And that?’

  ‘This, my friend, is a talismanic scroll. It’s what encourages her soul to re-enter her body.’ Parker holds it up for me to inspect.

  ‘Nice,’ I say, because she clearly expects me to be impressed. ‘Very . . . antiquey.’

  ‘It was created by the Mad Emperor Fatim Caliphate in Egypt. He used to conjure demons to entertain at his parties. He was obsessed with them. Wanted to be one. It’s written in Kufic text.’

  I point to the top of the parchment. ‘And the picture?’

  Something in blue. It’s so faded I can’t see what it is. A pentagram, possibly?

  ‘Solomon’s Seal. It’s said Emperor Fatim had Solomon’s ring – that he used it to control the demons once he conjured them.’

  ‘Solomon’s Ring? Like, with the name of God written on it?’

  ‘That’s the thinking.’

  ‘Where’s the ring now?’

  She gives me a look. ‘Come on, London. If anyone had the ring, you think we’d even have a job? We’d just order the orisha to do what they were told and that would be it.’

  ‘Fair enough.’

  ‘Right. Be quiet now. I need to concentrate.’

  ‘Don’t you need to light candles or something? Incense?’

  ‘Would it make you feel better?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Then I’m good. Don’t disturb me when I get started, yeah? That’s very important. If you interrupt the invocation, anything can happen.’

  ‘Anything, as in . . . ?’

  ‘As in,’ she says, deadpan, ‘Armitage’s body is about to become a beacon, a spotlight in the eternal darkness of Limbo, and the foulest creatures of hell and the nether planes are going to be swarming towards her, hoping to use her as a gate through to our world. If even one of them gets a foothold, they’ll claw their way out her body, ripping it apart and opening up a permanent door that will condemn the world to hell on earth in a matter of days.’