by Robyn Bachar
Mr. Sanders looked skeptical. “It’s just a game.”
“Only it’s not. Did the activity start after you brought it into the house?” I asked. The girl pondered it for a moment, and then nodded. “Well there you go. So where is it?”
“Under my bed.”
I glanced at Harvey, and he left to take care of it. There’d be nothing left of the thing except for a layer of ash when he was done. Good riddance. I fucking hate Ouija boards. One of these days I was going to find the Parker Brothers and end them, provided the apocalypse didn’t do it first.
“I’m going to need everyone out of the house while I clear it. I suggest a hotel room if you don’t have friends or family nearby. This might take a while.”
The father began to argue, but was interrupted by the low bass rumble of a growl that shook the glass trinkets in the curio cabinet. I blinked, startled. That wasn’t Harvey—sometimes I’d have him pull a few parlor tricks if the straights argued with me, but only when I gave the order. It was a bad sign. Time to eject the family so I could get down to business.
“Here,” I reached into my jacket and withdrew my money clip. “This should cover your expenses, and any damages.” I peeled off a few hundreds and pressed them into the father’s hand.
“Damages?” he repeated. Another growl knocked a photo from the wall behind them, and the glass shattered in the frame when it hit the floor. Okay, very bad sign. The sudden local summoner extinction meant that bigger, meaner demons were slipping through the wards.
“Everybody out,” I ordered.
The family hustled, spurred on by more ominous growling. Dan frowned as he turned to me. “Do you want my help?”
“No.” The word was almost a snarl, and I paused as his brow rose. “Sorry. Long day. You and Andy can stay out front until I give the all clear, if you want.”
“All right. Good luck.”
He followed the family out—the man was good with orders, I’d give him that. I waited until the count of ten before shucking my coat and tossing it on the couch, followed by my suit jacket. I rolled up the sleeves of my blouse, and the steady beat of approaching footsteps caught my attention as I fished through my bag for my bottle of salt.
“How bad is it, Harv?” I asked without looking up.
“There appears to be a demon infestation in this house,” Faust replied. I jumped, spilling spell components across the living room floor. He stood in the doorway, his hands neatly folded in front of him, calm and serene while my heart revved to one hundred miles an hour.
“Lord and Lady, don’t do that,” I sputtered. “You’re supposed to be talking to the Oberon.”
“I did. He asked that I keep an eye on you in the meantime, so here I am, at his request.” He smiled his Cheshire cat grin, and I sighed. If I kicked him out I’d piss off the Oberon, which I couldn’t afford to do at the moment. Duquesne was still harboring ill will toward me because I’d stabbed him once, despite the fact that he’d deserved it. Some people just can’t let things go.
“All right, fine. Just stay out of the way.” Irritated, I snatched up the supplies and tossed them back into the bag. Faust nodded, and then kissed me quickly. “Cut it out, I’m on the clock,” I warned him with a sharp poke to his ribs.
“Of course.” He scowled a bit, but he followed as I went in search of Harvey.
True to form, the NIPS investigators had turned off all the lights in the building. They seem to think that darkness helps paranormal activity, but that’s not true. The magical world works 24/7/365, rather like me lately. But I left the lights off, hoping to prevent the impending throw-down from being spotted from outside, or worse, caught on one of their cameras. I paused in the hallway to put my specs in their case in my bag, and then withdrew my police brutality model flashlight. Not that I needed it to see in the dark with my special eyes, but the flashlight kept up the illusion of being normal and gave me a lovely bludgeoning weapon to bash a demon in the head with.
Harvey peered past me and twitched his spindly ears in irritation at Faust. “Mistress, I thought you dismissed your lover for the evening.” He sounded a little whiny, but it was hard to tell, because his voice was difficult to read. Pookas are different from most demons, because they were made demons, not born that way. When the elves were about to become extinct, a group of pookas made a deal with a demon to save their lives, not knowing that the price of their salvation was permanent demonhood—a lesson in being careful what you wish for.
I snorted. As if it was that easy to be rid of Faust…well, it would be, if I knew his True Name, but no such luck there. “Play nice, boys. Did you 86 the Ouija board?”
“Yes, Mistress.”
“Good.” At least one thing had gone right. “Did you spot our troublemaker?”
Harvey shot a meaningful glance at Faust before replying. “I spotted an envy demon that appears to be the source of the growling theatrics. There is, however, a stronger presence I have not identified yet.”
“We’ll bag the small fry and work our way up then,” I said.
I worked my way through each room of the house with my entourage behind me. The air was charged and heavy, at odds with the bland surroundings. There were a few personal touches here and there, but otherwise it looked like every other family home I’d seen. With my colorful upbringing, I had little experience with what the average home was like, so walking through one made me feel like a stranger in a strange land. The simple trappings of dolls and pop band posters were foreign to me. Normal families don’t sacrifice small animals at holidays, right?
On my first pass I warded the doors and windows, ensuring that the uninvited guests stayed in and couldn’t escape. The growling increased in protest, and I didn’t like that one bit. Almost all demons are a pain to banish, but envy demons are particularly stubborn buggers. Like beautiful, unique snowflakes, demons come in more varieties than can easily be counted, because there are several hells. Some demons take after sins and vices, some stick to elements like fire and ice, and some are just fucking scary bogeymen from our worst nightmares.
Because I had extra backup, I sent Harvey outside to keep an eye on the NIPS brothers and make sure they weren’t trying to film me. We had an agreement that they stayed out of my way and didn’t record any of my work, but though I liked them, I didn’t trust them, and I didn’t want to end up on YouTube.
I cornered the vociferous demon in the teenager’s bedroom, which I assumed was where the bastard had gotten into the house in the first place. The closet doors shook with another warning growl, and after I stowed my flashlight my hands burst into flame with a soothing tingle of magic. Fire magic typically falls into sorcerer territory, but thanks to my faerie lineage it’s one of my special skills.
“Look, we can do this easy, or we can do this the hard way, but you’re going to be evicted,” I warned.
The doors exploded outward as something the size of a Rottweiler launched itself at me. My breath rushed from my lungs as it knocked me down and started for the door, but Faust blocked its exit. This time I tackled the bugger, and it howled as I grabbed its hind legs. Greasy dark green fur singed at my touch, and it turned and snapped at me with a mouth filled with shark’s teeth. I held tight and spat the words of a simple banishing spell, but nothing happened.
The demon took the opportunity of my failure to sink its teeth into my arm. Sharp pain lanced through it as the demon shook its head back and forth, digging in deeper, and I swallowed a scream. As I started a second, more powerful banishing spell a flaming sword appeared in Faust’s hand—neat trick, that—and he stabbed the demon in the chest. The second spell worked, and the demon vanished with a wail and a hint of smoke. I doused my hands before I accidentally lit the carpet on fire.
“Let me see,” Faust insisted. He knelt next to me and examined the wound. My forearm was a bleeding mass of raw meat. It hurt like hell, but I sternly reminded myself that I’d had worse, and I couldn’t afford to panic. “I’m not adept at healing.”
“Bathroom. I’ll clean it in the sink and wrap it,” I said.
My heart raced from the adrenaline and I trembled a bit, but I got to my feet and hustled out of the room. With my good hand I flipped the lights on and blinked at the yellow décor. Who paints a bathroom yellow, honestly? Blood dripped on the tile floor, and I hurried to the sink and stuck my forearm under a stream of cold water. Lord and Lady, it looked bad. My stomach heaved, and I snarled another string of expletives before nodding to my bag.
“I’ve got healing potions and bandages in there,” I said.
“Does this happen often?” Faust pulled the bag’s flap up and searched through the contents. He stood close, and I indulged in resting my head on his shoulder for a moment.
“Often enough. I swear they’re getting bitchier the past few days. Most go without a fight once they realize they’re cornered.”
“Perhaps I should handle the next one,” he suggested.
“You can banish demons?” Any magician can handle a mild to average demon, provided they know the basics of what to do. Faust wasn’t technically a magician though—faeries are magic itself.
“Of course.” He handed me a plastic bottle filled with a healing potion, and I popped the top and chugged it down. Cool magic spread through me, and the deep tears in my flesh knitted together. The potion wasn’t powerful enough to completely mend it, but it closed the worst of it and slowed the bleeding to a manageable trickle instead of a stream.
I breathed a sigh of relief, and I didn’t argue with Faust when he took the liberty of bandaging my arm. “Well, when we find the second one, you’re welcome to try to banish it.”
“Perhaps you should wait here while I take care of it,” he suggested.
“I’m not that injured.”
“You nearly lost an arm.”
I rolled my eyes. “Please, it’s only a flesh wound. That’s good enough for now.”
My arm tingled as I flexed my fingers, but I could deal with it. I had stronger healing potions at home for emergencies, though I hoped I wouldn’t need them. I cleaned up the blood trail with a hand towel—the money for damages I’d given the dad would cover a new set of bath towels—and tossed it into the sink.
One down, one to go. The second demon was a sneaky bastard. I sensed its presence like a spike of magic stabbing me behind the eyes in a summoner’s migraine, but I couldn’t pinpoint his whereabouts. As we checked through the house I caught a few flashes of movement out of the corner of my eyes, but the figure vanished the moment I turned toward it.
“I don’t like this,” I said as I paused outside the master bedroom.
“What’s wrong?” Faust asked.
“I hate this cat-and-mouse bullshit.”
“Are you the cat or the mouse?” he teased.
I turned and pointed at him to warn him that I was not amused, but when I did I spotted a shadow standing behind him. “Get down!” I shouted.
Faust ducked as ordered, and I hurled a handful of fire at the shadow. It dodged to the side and dove through the doorway to the master bedroom.
“It’s a shadow demon,” I warned. Rare for one to have slipped into a family residence, because they prefer abandoned buildings where they can roam freely in the dark.
“Understood.”
Faust stepped into the room, and when I followed I slapped on the lights. I blinked for a moment, but the more light there was, the fewer places the shadow demon would have to hide. The room was empty, and I frowned.
“Hello, Patience,” a voice said from behind me.
Before I could turn I was yanked back and thrown down a flight of stairs. I crashed to the floor at the bottom in a heap of tangled limbs and indignation. My shoulder screeched in protest as I sorted myself out. Dislocated. Shit.
Faust appeared at my side. “Are you hurt?”
“Yes. Where’d he go?”
“I didn’t see.”
“Fine. Help me up. And pop my shoulder back in if you can.”
He helped me to my feet and then relocated my shoulder as requested. This time I did scream, but I felt it was warranted considering the amount of holy-shit pain it caused. Afterward Faust held me close. The comfort was nice, but I spotted the shadow demon behind him, standing in the middle of the living room. I tensed, and Faust whirled, his fiery sword reappearing in his hand.
The demon tilted its head to the side as it regarded us. “So Patience Roberts has a sweetheart. How quaint.”
“Kris?” I questioned. The voice sounded like Kris, but it couldn’t be. Kristoff Valkyrie was an ancient shadow demon, and ancient demons didn’t travel to earth. They couldn’t.
“In the flesh, as it were,” he replied. The demon smiled his dark grin. As a shadow demon, he was made of darkness from head to foot, and he moved with fluid, languid motions as though walking through water.
“That’s not possible.” I shook my head, and a trickle of blood slid down the side of my face. Guess I hit my head when I fell. Maybe I was hallucinating, because that was the only way this made sense.
“And yet here I am.” Kris stepped closer, and I flinched as Faust growled at him.
“Keep your distance,” Faust said.
I swallowed hard. I couldn’t banish an ancient demon. No one could. There just wasn’t a spell for it, because no one had ever needed one. I also couldn’t kill the bastard, because you can’t kill a demon on Earth, only banish them back where they came from. We were pretty much fucked, but I wasn’t about to go without a fight.
“And why are you here? I never pegged you as a voyeur, or a pedophile,” I said.
Kris hissed, apparently offended. “I came to see you, Patience. I did tell you that we would see each other again.”
“Next time, feel free to send an email instead.”
The demon smiled and stepped toward me, and Faust raised his weapon.
“You’ll not touch her,” he warned. I had a moment of warm fuzzies. He was defending me. That was a first for me.
“Go get him, babe,” I encouraged. Not because I needed defending, but he’d make a great distraction for what I planned to do next. Faust leapt at Kris, and they became a blur of shadow and flames.
First I unwove the ward blocking the front windows. I couldn’t send the bastard back to the shadow realm, but I could evict him from the premises. Glass shattered and wood splintered as the shadowspawn faerie versus ancient demon rumble raged in the living room. I knelt on the shag carpet and dug through my bag, grabbing salt and water and other summoner trinkets. Witches and alchemists are better known for needing spell components, but we’re almost as bad. I drew a rough circle with the salt and began chanting in Latin, casting the biggest warding spell I could manage on the fly.
“Don’t you dare,” Kris snarled at me.
I paused between verses to warn Faust to get down, and with the final words of the spell the magic flared and exploded. The shockwave hurled Kris out the front windows, raining glass across the lawn, and I lurched forward and warded the empty space. Kris tumbled over the grass, and then he disintegrated, off to haunt somewhere else for now. Probably to Gary. Demons love Gary, Indiana. It was a temporary solution, but hopefully it would give me a few hours to breathe—or better yet, to sleep.
“Are you all right?” Faust asked.
Nodding, I glanced up at him. A trio of slashes marred his face, and blood oozed from the wounds. The blood was a reminder that faeries are ageless, but not immortal. He could be killed, especially by something as powerful as an ancient demon, and the fear of it grabbed my chest and squeezed with icy fingers.
“Yes. Are you?” I blurted. I touched his face, and he smiled reassuringly as the wounds healed and vanished without a trace.
“It’s only a scratch. Is your work here finished? I would like to take you home.”
I laughed dryly, because with Kris involved my work was really just starting, but I nodded. “Yes, for now. Let me settle up with the straights and we can go.”
&nb
sp; I hoped that the NIPS boys hadn’t recorded that, because I had no idea how to explain it, and I didn’t want to have to threaten to break their legs if they didn’t delete it. Harvey appeared at my side, his ears twitching in disapproval as he glared at Faust.
“Mistress, was that Kristoff Valkyrie?” Harvey asked.
“Yes it was,” I replied.
“How bothersome.”
That was Harvey, king of understatements. I fished my specs out of my bag and started combing through the chaos for my coat. “Just go wait in the car,” I ordered. “I need to stop Dan and Andy before they tweet about this.”
Chapter Three
“I’d really rather just go home. To my home,” I repeated as I pulled into the parking garage. At this point I was just being whiney, but I couldn’t help it. I’d had a bad night—a series of bad nights, thanks to the demon invasion.
“I know, but your place isn’t safe.” Faust rubbed my knee in what I assumed was meant to be a comforting gesture, but it sent my mind spinning in another direction, specifically of the conversation we’d had in my office earlier. I didn’t want to continue that conversation. “You can park there. It’s one of my spaces.”
“One of? How many do you have?” I asked.
“Three. I keep one open for guests.”
Parking spots are prime real estate in the city. I only have one spot at my condo, and I pondered adding more as I pulled my car into the spot.
“May I stay here, Mistress?” Harvey asked from the backseat.
“Here? In the garage? Really?” I asked, surprised.
“I would rather not be in the area should you and your lover become amorous.”
I sighed. I didn’t think that was on the menu, considering how injured I was at the moment. My tumble down the stairs had turned me into a walking bruise.