by Hannah Jayne
I considered that a big, positive checkmark in the “not evil incarnate” column.
Oliver was sitting at a kid-sized table in a kid-sized chair with a piece of paper in front of him. He was coloring something that could have been the beginning of a cheery sun and rainbow scene or the fiery gates of Hell. He dropped the red crayon he was holding when I walked in the room, and his grin widened when I pulled the mini chair next to him and attempted to sit in a remotely ladylike position.
I wasn’t particularly great with kids—and wasn’t even as a kid. I have no cousins or siblings (except for the one I shish-kebabed and she seriously deserved it), and when I’d grown up it was mainly just my grandmother and me. I’d gone to school and had a few acquaintances there, but when you’re weird—or when you offhandedly mention that you know for a fact that pixies cheat at cards—you tend to get branded as the kid that no one wants to play with. Or be field trip bus buddies with. Or lab partners, hall monitors, or summer camp friends with. Thus, I’d spent the bulk of my childhood years refilling the bridge mix at Grandma’s weekly mah-jongg games and shopping for school clothes at Misha’s Mystical Clothing Mart and Cauldron Emporium with a fashion-forward shape-shifter named Juan. Or Aretha.
I put all of that out of my mind and attempted to talk to Oliver the way social workers talked to all the scarred children on the various Law & Order iterations.
“Hi, Oliver. My name is Sophie.”
Oliver glanced at me with his hot-chocolate eyes, his grin still wide and, up close, toothless. He was a darling little boy and everything inside me raged against my father for using this tiny little vessel, who smelled of strawberry shampoo and waxy crayon, as an instrument of evil.
“I know your name,” Oliver said, picking up a crayon. “He said you’d be here.”
A chill ran through me.
“He said?” My heart started to thud. I looked up toward the enormous glass window that ran horizontal across the front wall and Alex gave me a thumbs-up.
“Oh! You mean Detective Grace.”
Oliver dropped his crayon with a tight little snap. “Not him, silly.” He picked a yellow crayon from the pile in front of him and started coloring, bright, brilliant slashes across the page. “Lucas.”
My heart dropped into my socks. “What did you say?”
But the little boy was onto something else now, scribbling a sea of orange over the yellow as he hummed something that sounded a little like a hymn. Having heard very few church hymns— unless you count “Jesus, Take the Wheel”—I tried to take a couple of deep breaths while I convinced myself that I was totally projecting my neurosis and daddy issues on this sweet, little evil child.
“Oliver? You said a name before—what was that name?”
Oliver very deliberately set down his crayon, careful to line it up with the others. Then he turned to me, his pale lips pressed in a serene smile. He stared at me in silence for a beat, then scooted to the edge of his chair. I thought he was going to bolt until he reached out one hand and cradled my cheek. His hand was tiny, his fingers warm against my skin.
“Lucas was sorry he had to go before, but he’s ready now. He can’t wait to see you. He told me you were pretty. You look so much like her.”
My heart lodged firmly in my throat. “Her?”
Oliver nodded, his hands leaving my face as he selected another crayon. He started coloring again, splashing bright red streaks across the page and bubbling over them so they looked almost like hearts. “Your mom.”
Someone sucked all the air out of the room and ripped out all the lights. I saw the blackness, then felt like I was being shot out of my chair, zipped backward, pulled by some imaginary rope. I saw my mother’s eyes, blinking first and terribly bright and behind her was Lucas, his face in a fog that quickly dissipated to show the hard planes of his bleak expression. I thought my mother was smiling at me, but it was a grimace, a tortured, silent scream on her lips as her eyes held mine. Lucas lunged at her—around her—arms outstretched toward me, and something happened. A loud clatter, a flash of light, and I was staring into my mom’s eyes again, but the brightness had been replaced by a dull, lifeless sheen, her blue eyes as pale and as flat as stone. I felt a crack in my chest and my lungs burned, feeling as though they were being squeezed with an impossible force. Then Lucas’s face flashed before my eyes, this time at a distance, at the schoolyard as he held Oliver’s hand, leading him away from the burning building.
I blinked furiously and desperately sucked in air. The lights were on and one of the admins outside gave me a funny look as my eyes darted around the room, as if I were an animal in a cage.
“What just happened?” I clamped my hand over Oliver’s. “Did you do that? Do you have some powers, kid? Some way to make me see things?”
But Oliver just smiled that serene, unnerving smile and swiveled himself back to the table. He chose another crayon, bent his head, and started coloring again.
I burst out of the observation room. “Alex, Will!”
“Will got a call from the chief. He went down to the fire station.”
I was breathing hard, working to keep air in my deflated lungs.
“What’s wrong?” Alex put down the stack of papers he was reading and hurried to me, concern creasing his features. “What? Lawson, what happened?”
“That kid. That kid!” I was pointing toward Oliver, panic vaulting through me with every heartbeat.
“Did he say something to you?”
The admin who had given me the weird look before was staring me and Alex down now so I grabbed the front of Alex’s shirt and shoved him farther down the hallway. He glanced down at my hand fisted on his shirt and wrapped his own hand around mine.
“Lawson, what is it?”
“Your office.”
I could see eyes darting toward us, cutting through the main office, eyebrows rising, but I didn’t care.
I slammed the door to Alex’s office, downed a cup of water from the bubbling jug, and raked my fingers through my hair.
“So, did he admit it? Did he say anything to you about the fire?”
I stopped mid-pace. “The fire?”
“The fire. The fire? The whole reason the kid is here?”
“He knew about Lucas, Alex. He knew about him.”
I waited a good twenty seconds for Alex to gape, to drop his jaw, to grab his cuffs and demand we go martial law on this creepy kid’s ass. But all he did was sit behind his desk, arms threaded across his chest.
“We knew that, Lawson.”
I nodded. “I know. But he said it. To me! He said Lucas was ‘his friend’”—I made air quotes—“and he set the fire because ‘his friend’”—more air quotes—“told him to.”
“Son of a bitch,” he said, shaking his head. “It looks like the devil—or someone pretending to be him—is walking the earth.”
I stopped dead in my pacing tracks, feeling my jaw drop open in what I was certain was a look of pure disbelief. “What? You think there is another Lucas out there masquerading as the devil and my father?”
Ales sighed. “I’m trying to get to the bottom of this, Lawson. He’s an eight-year-old kid who just murdered and burned his parents.”
“Yes.” I pumped my head. “Evil incarnate. Little evil incarnate. Isn’t there something in the Bible that says, ‘and a little child shall lead them’? That, that could be that kid. He’s like Satan’s apprentice.” I top a step closer to Alex’s desk and pointed to a yellow legal pad. “You should probably write that down. “A little child shall lead them.”
Alex didn’t pick up a pencil or break his gaze from me. “That’s Isaiah 11:6.”
“I knew it! So what is this? Armageddon? And didn’t you get some kind of heads-up?”
Alex dropped his head in his hands in a gesture of either “You’re absolutely right. All hell is about to break loose at the hand of this little Satan protégée” or “Lawson, you’re out of your mind.”
Alex looked up and sighed. “L
awson, you’re out of your mind.
“The little child is leading a wolf, a lamb, a leopard, a fat goat, and a lion in that passage. Literally, he will be able to lead them.”
“Right. Oliver Culverson, little child. Fire and mayhem, the lion. Or maybe that fat goat. Either way, shit is getting real, Alex. This is biblical.”
I could see Alex biting the inside of his cheek and using all his strength to clench his lips. His shoulders quivered just the smallest bit, giving him away.
“Wait, you’re laughing? How are you laughing?”
“What happened to the cool, new Sophie?”
I gestured in the general direction of Oliver Culverson. “Biblical, Alex!”
TWELVE
I stormed out of Alex’s office and stopped, frozen, in front of the elevator doors. It had been less than twenty-four hours since I was expelled from the Underworld Detection Agency, and though I wanted to be haughty and over it, I felt a profound sense of longing, as if I had been evicted from my childhood home. I attempted to convince myself that what I was missing was the free and unlimited access to Post-it notes when the doors slid open.
Nina was slumped against the back wall, her shoulders sloped. Her usually pouty pink lips were pulled downward in a full-on frown so severe that even her eyelashes seemed to sag a little.
“Neens, what’s wrong? You look like a pitiful little puppy.”
She blinked up at me when I spoke and brightened slightly, stepping out of the elevator.
“I’ve been looking all over for you.”
“Didn’t you hear? I’ve been banned.”
Nina’s eyebrows rose a minute amount. “Banned?”
“I’m surprised Sampson didn’t tell you.”
Nina crossed her arms in front of her chest. “Sampson shouldn’t have to tell me, Soph, you’re my roommate and my best friend. You tell me everything! Even things I don’t want to know.”
“Hey!”
“You know what I mean: Alex, Will, Will, Alex. Blech. You’re going to have to make a decision one of these days, you know. Only one of us is going to live forever.”
“Is that why you were looking all over for me? To tell me that?”
Like one of those tragic masks, Nina’s face fell, going directly back to the piteous look of three minutes prior.
I led her to a bench in the vestibule and cocked my head, forcing myself to look adequately concerned even though I was seriously annoyed. The whole Alex-Will thing is kind of a sticky subject for me.
“Okay, Neens. What’s wrong?”
She patted my hair absently, then turned to me.
“Soph, what’s my purpose here?”
I straightened. “What do you mean ‘what’s your purpose?’ Neens, you’re indispensible at UDA. The place wouldn’t function without you!” I was stretching the truth into tall-tale category, but it was a time for sympathy, not accuracy.
“I know that, Sophie. I mean, overall. Why am I here? Why was I brought back? Was it just the sexy bloodlust of a ruined count, who couldn’t resist the temptation of a twenty-nine-year-old virginal French ingénue?”
I cocked an eyebrow. “Virginal?”
“It’s an expression. Anyway, you know your purpose. I mean, people are trying to kill you because of what you are, but what about me?”
I stiffened. “People are trying to kill me because what I have inside of me.”
Nina patted my hand. “Oh, honey, don’t sell yourself short. It’s just that I wander around here for decades coming to work here, looking ridiculously adorable, but what for? I can’t possibly just be part of the scenery. Can I?”
Although Nina could be—and at that very moment, was—incredibly obnoxious and a little bit self-centered, she had the uncanny ability to flash puppy dog eyes so pitiful that they made even her fangs look huggable.
“You’ve never been part of the scenery, Nina. You’re so much more than that.”
“But what do I add?”
“Uhhh . . . you . . . add fashion. You helped me to stop dressing like a blind librarian.” I showed off my slightly less librarian-ish blouse, but Nina didn’t brighten.
“But it didn’t even stick. Look at you.” Her lower lip pressed out, and even her puppy-dog eyes were starting to grate on me.
“And you help me every time there’s a case or someone is trying to kill me.”
She nodded slightly. “Well, yeah, that does happen a lot and I haven’t let you get killed yet.”
“And hey, look. Maybe you just haven’t found your purpose yet. I mean, no one does that easily. Aside from this whole thing”—I gestured to my belly, where I had always assumed the Vessel of Souls lay—“I really don’t know why I’m here either. Maybe you should just start looking.”
Nina sniffled. “You mean like when I was finding out what I was really good at?”
All of her past professions and hobbies marched in front of my eyes in a terrible parade of fangs, video cameras, and poorly written vampire sex scenes. As far as I knew she hadn’t come across a real marketable skill set, but I wasn’t ready to point that out.
“Yeah, exactly like that. You’ll find your purpose.”
Nina nodded, considering. “Yeah. I can try a few things out.”
Although I knew the only thing worse than vain attempts at searching for purpose and meaning in life was having Nina vainly attempt to search for purpose and meaning in life, she was smiling, with a little bit of a flush in her cheeks. Granted, the flush was due to her afternoon snack of someone else’s blood, but still, it made us both feel better.
You know things are bad when you are cast out of the Underworld Detection Agency and onto the streets of San Francisco and immediately miss the comfort and normalcy of an office filled with wailing banshees, drunken zombies, and trolls using all manner of excuse and stepladder to try and fondle your girlie bits. But that was exactly the way I felt the next afternoon stepping into the crosswalk, shuttled along with a crowd of sneaker-wearing secretaries and hipsters texting every step they took. Suddenly, I was out in the world and I was exposed. I didn’t know the dangers; I couldn’t look at someone and think, “Kishi demon—don’t eat anything she offers, don’t let her turn her back on you.” All around me were normal-looking people in Gap clothes or slim suits and at any moment, one of them could advance on me carrying one of those crazy daggers and screaming something that sounded like “For Narnia!” as they came racing forward, stabby bits first.
It was very disconcerting.
When I finally slid into my car, my blouse was stuck to my back and a sheen of sweat had broken out over my upper lip. My heart was thundering and my stomach was a constant mass of batting butterfly wings. I jumped when someone honked driving by, I clawed at my heart when a crumpled McDonald’s bag sailed on the wind and stuck to my shoe. Post panic attack, I sunk my key into the ignition and kept my eyes focused straight forward, hand on the door locks, as I raced by hordes of tourists and locals, and turned onto Larkin, slowing to find a spot in front of the San Francisco Public Library.
I stopped the car amongst the usual clatter and bang of the city sounds: the huff of a Muni bus stopping ; the rush of cars, honks echoing off the high concrete buildings; the guy on the corner telling me that “Jesus saves.” Once I walked into the library and the heavy door felt shut behind me, it was as if the outside world just stopped. The library was so silent that I was certain everyone in there was privy to the sound of my thundering heart and my heavy, probably-should-get-a-bit-more-cardio breathing. I immediately slipped my hands into my purse and switched my cell phone to off, turning a bright lobster red when it shouted out its loud “you’re shutting me off!” protest music. Someone shushed me. Someone else coughed.
I could see the library staff behind the checkout counter. One woman with a nose ring and a fishnet turtleneck smiled at me as she stamped the inside cover of a hardcover book. I considered going over to ask for some guidance, but strolling up and asking, “Can you point me in the direct
ion of Satan and Armageddon?” seemed to be inviting trouble on every level. Instead, I made my way to the computer system, doing my best to remain quiet and make as little spectacle of myself as possible, which was why my shoulder bag reached out and snagged on a wooden chair, dragging it a good three feet before I could untangle myself. The same kid who shushed me before did it again. I mouthed a brief apology and decided after I found the information I was looking for, I would look up “holes one could crawl into.”
Finally, in front of the search computers and facing away from the general, judgy and shoosh-y public, I set my hands over the keys and typed: Satan, Satan’s minions, Grigori.
The entire page populated with entries.
I was relieved to see that the “evil books” portion of the library was on one of the upper floors rather than relegated to the basement in some scary movie knock-off. The stacks were well-lit and bathed in sunlight, making the spines—Nebuchadnezzar’s Watcher; The Rebellious; Hell on Earth—look only slightly less terrifying. I knew that the text Will had on the Grigori mentioned the Book of Enoch so I went directly to it, surprised to find that it was an old set of leather-bound books rather than just a single one. When I pulled them out of the stacks, the two books on either side fell out as well and I started a spastic coughing fit at the cloud of dust they kicked up. I slid the other two back in, my nose wrinkling at the quarter-inch of dust that still stuck to the covers and littered the shelves—everywhere, except where the Books of Enoch had been.
I glanced down at the intricate patterns cut into the leather on the covers of the books; they were absolutely clean, as though they hadn’t sat on the shelf long. As though someone may have accessed them very recently. A niggling of fear shot up the back of my spine, and I could feel the little hairs at the back of my neck prick up.
Who else was reading up on Armageddon?