by A. J. Aalto
I understood in a rush what had drawn her out of hiding in that moment; she suspected I was going to use black magic again, at which point, our severing would be complete. She wanted to see the spell. She wanted to touch it. She was drawn to it the way I had constantly been drawn to Ruby’s grimoire, because she was a part of me, the dark part of me. The best way to fight the dark side of myself, and the Blights and the Fetch and the demon and Beau, was to preserve lives using light. To heal and save. To sacrifice for others.
I showed the spell paper to the Fetch, held it up, waved it around for the incubus to see, too, wherever he was; black magic at hand. Hey, kids, come and get it! The incubus Felt wary when I picked up the sense of him, but the Fetch was eager to watch me use it.
“Maim,” I said, “I need you to go back inside, get downstairs by Harry’s door with some salt, wall yourself off with it, and stay out of this. Take my phone with you. Text Chapel to get his ass out here. He’s listed as Boss Man. And call the cops, since we've got a limp-dicked fugitive humping my lawn.” I knew it would take any of them a while to get here, even if Chapel was still at the motel; he'd be up to his nipples in paperwork even without the long drive. By the time he arrived, the metaphysical dangers should be dealt with and he could help me with Beau, or whatever might be left of him by that point.
Umayma flapped her hand at the Fetch and then the yard to indicate the unfinished demon business.
The spell page flapped in my hand and the wind; I let go, tossing it. “Let it go. Don’t touch it. We can’t use it.”
I Felt a giant wave of relief wash off of her.
“Go protect yourself. Please, do this for me, Maim. I got this,” I assured her, tightening my thighs around Beau. He was sniveling something, but I wasn’t interested. “I need to know you’re safe before I start.”
Maim nodded and backed away, still holding the gun. It would do me no good against a demon or my shadow. The Fetch was standing just outside the salt circle, wavering.
Beau rolled onto his back and immediately regretted it, as lying on his handcuffed wrists hurt like hell. He made another whiny noise, and I shoved him back onto his belly. “Stay still, you skinny jackass. I’m trying to help you, believe it or not. Not that you deserve it. But I do.” I sat cross-legged on the back of his thighs and muttered, “So, I stink of embertides, do I? Well, good. Whatever they are, I’m gonna get more of them and rub them all over me. Eau de Embertide makes Marnie a stinky, stinky gal.”
“You’re an idiot,” Beau groaned.
“Now, now,” I said with a tsk. “Wait until you see what I’ve got for you next. I promise, you’ll thank me.”
I heard the incubus again, somewhere in the yard, and the echoes of my encounter with Berith in Ruby Valli’s cellar returned, his footprints across the desecrated floor mere sludgy marks, the smell of him overwhelming. The threat of him didn’t stop me; and I knew what I had to do. Placing both of my hands firmly on Beau’s back, I closed my eyes and drew my focus inward, spinning my connection to psi tighter and tighter until it was taut and rigid. Earth magic awakened, but it wasn’t physical strength I needed right now, or grounding, or prosperity. Fire was the next element to spark under my palms, easy and eager like it had been in my office, passionate and eager to attend to my anger. I released it, snuffing it like a candle.
What I needed was the healing tide of Water and the freeing lift of Air, and it was to these elements that I fine-tuned my will. It didn’t matter that my Fetch began to twist and writhe outside the circle, to flit back and forth along its edge like it wasn’t quite committed to appearing. It didn’t matter that the incubus was closing in; it didn’t see me as a threat, but it was wrong.
It was very, very wrong.
Chapter 33
“Blessed Aradia, Mother of house and hearth, hear Your daughter, hear my plea,” I begged, casting my eyes to the slowly darkening sky, only to be captured by the faint sight of a full, glowing white moon. Use what you’ve got, Marnie, I told myself. Right hand path and all that jazz. Let’s do this…
“Wolf and horse, signs of might, give me strength to do what’s right,” I said. “Bird and ash, light as wind, hear my words as we begin.”
For a moment, my vision blurred with the sight of sleek wolf bodies and my ears rang with the thundering of hooves. I felt the lycanthropy virus, very much like the snap-spark of Harry’s revenant magic, roll through my veins, warm and sleepy as it woke up and rejoiced. Magic had taken the reins, and though I did not deny its company, I fought to remain in control of it. My belly shuddered with the thrill and intensity of the waking virus. The Fetch’s black wings fluttered close by and I imagined that across the ocean, my companion’s immortal master let his own dark wings unfold and rise from his shoulders.
Imagination, Toots? A devious little whisper.
I squeezed my eyes shut and continued, “Draw the dark from this man as poison from a wound. Wash him in the cleansing waters of the Mother’s tears. Release him, release him, release him. Come darkness, and take me instead.” If you fucking dare, I mentally finished.
The hoof clatter grew and the wolves in my mind’s eye began to howl and yip, while a solitary fox screamed in the dark corner of my mind. Beau stirred under my hand and I pressed on him firmly to keep him in place. I opened my eyes to watch the Blight on his chin begin to fade. Overhead, the clouds swept over the moon, plunging us into a darker shadow, but I refused to let my thoughts be affected. The Great Lady did not abandon me, and Her light surged through me as I drew the evil influence from Beau’s twitching form.
My Fetch made a noise then, a high-pitched mewl, as the side effects of my sacrifice began to sink in; she would no longer have her freedom. Shrinking back to me, she flopped to the ground, grasping ineffectually and incorporeally at the grass as though she could do anything about it. I didn’t blame her; who wanted to be a part of me? Dragged into the salt circle, her speed increased as the demon began to detach itself from Beau’s soul. There was a juicy schlorp like someone had stuck their foot in a kiddie pool full of Jell-O and wrenched it free, which was either my half-shadow reattaching to the limp right half or the incubus surging out of Beau. I didn't expect demons to schlorp. It was undignified.
I stood unsteadily, wrestling with the warring magic inside me, the tugging in my guts, a warm, fuzzy feeling in the front of my skull, and a dull ache in my bones like they were healing from a break. My pulse throbbed in my extremities. Feeling fragile and jittery, I called, “Okay, Mother Mine, guard this wretched little shit while I do battle, eh?”
My feet froze in place as the rest of me was battered by the wind, and I promptly forgot my plea. Beau groaned and bucked on the ground as the taint of the incubus left him, and I Felt the gaping chasm left by its departure; Beau had been so needy and desperate, had been so empty and hungry, that his soul had been easy pickings. The incubus had chosen him, not the other way around. I didn’t know how the demon found Beau, and I didn’t care. I knew that allowing the passage of the demon to flow out of Beau and through me would likely smear me with its noxiousness, too, but I didn’t care. It was a sacrifice I was willing to make to free the sad little pervert that was my client. I'd put an extra line item on my invoice for “Taint Cleansing.” Maybe, if he had an accountant for his porn business, they'd file it as a business expense if they thought it was a fancy take on asshole bleaching.
I raised my voice over the noisy breeze. “Here do I open myself fully to the blessed wind, Dark Mother, and by my sacrifice do I absolve this man of his sins. As the darkness flees, so let Your light follow, to fill him with health.”
Suddenly, my energy level dropped, and I knew I’d swapped places with Beau in a way; his Blight and the taint of the demon was now weighing heavily on me, and what remaining vigor I’d had was flowing into Beau to heal him. It was hard to breathe through the process despite Harry's yoga lessons and all my cardio with Hood. I sucked wind, leaning over to brace my hands on my thighs, dizzy with head-rush.
>
I heard Finnegan’s warning again. (“The virus is eating you alive. If you don’t let her out, she will consume you — body, or mind, or both.”)
“It’ll try,” I spat, furious at my life, at my loss, and my illness. “I’ve fought worse.”
That was the worst thing I could have said aloud, apparently, as it finally enraged the unleashed demon. The wind became a gale blowing directly at my face, threatening to sweep me off my feet, and I knew it wasn’t natural; it stunk of sulfur and brimstone. My ghost hair was a tangled tornado around my head, a disturbed nest of snakes. Oh, to have Medusa’s powers. It wasn’t going to stop me. I lowered my head like a bull ready to charge, and hunched my shoulders against the tempest.
“Do your worst, stink-breath!” I bellowed, but the wind snatched my words. Rage rumbled through me, rattling my limbs, and I felt I was suddenly teetering on the brink of losing myself to something. My bones ached fiercely, grinding inwardly on the sharper edge of pain. The visions returned, flipping now from fox to wolf to horse to less recent but familiar forms: the Raven of Night, the frost wyrm of Remy Dreppenstedt, Mithridates the manticore in the jiekngasaldi, the yeti in Kathmandu, the jackal-headed tomb guardian in Egypt. And hybrids, so many hybrids, swapping places in the forefront of my mind; centaurs, mermaids, harpies. Is this it? Am I shifting? I set my jaw tightly, remembering Batten’s jaws clenching and unclenching with frustration; oddly, at the moment, the thought of him helped. No, I thought. I am not shifting against my will. I thought of Dr. Delacovias trying to force and coerce me into changing, and the visions that had flashed before my eyes, the black orb in my hand, the jackal, the wolf, the fox, and that massive, mange-savaged, two-headed hound. Anger swept through me again and I fought it by focusing on the memory of Batten’s jaw.
The demon took my words personally enough to roar. Beau curled into a ball, shaking and begging me to shut up. I Felt his terror; he did not want the demon to return to him, and he sure as hell didn’t trust me to keep the demon out.
“Silence!” I heard.
When I turned, there was a maggot-pale, one-eyed demon straddling my sidewalk, his flesh hanging in loose folds, hooked talons tipping too many fingers on too many hands on an odd number of arms, but I was too grossed out to do a count. A long, skinny wang was fully erect between scrawny, shaking legs.
“Satan’s Barnacles!” I said. “No wonder you need help fornicating. Are all incubi this disgusting?”
The incubus dropped his jaw open to his chest, revealing a slick, gory mouth full of black ooze.
“Hawwwwwwt,” I deadpanned. “Look, I know you dig the switch in my hips, but you’re gonna have to get your freak on somewhere else.”
“Who are you to say, human?” he snarled, and something oily slithered across the whites of his eyes. His shattered, uneven teeth, nearly as bad as the Overlord’s, dripped with the gelid stuff of nightmares.
“Who am I?” I said. “I’m someone who brushes my damn teeth. Daily oral hygiene, ever heard of it? Colgate, motherfucker, get you some. And brush your tongue. People forget that. I can smell yours from here.”
“I will coat your throat in my sin,” he told me.
“Oh, yeah? I’ll introduce your sin to my fist,” I threatened, and then frowned, wondering how that would actually work. I tried showing him my fist, but it sort of looked like I was offering to jerk him off, so I put it behind my back. “I will coat your throat in my sin. How you like them apples, maggot-face?”
He roared; hell-breath blasted my hair straight back from my face, stung my eyes and clogged my nostrils, forcing me to double over and terror-vomit. I shuddered hard, heaved twice, and then stared in disappointment at the barf on my lawn. This was not going as planned.
Frustration made my cheeks flare hotly. I wrestled down another urge to shape-shift, recognizing that I was in very real danger of tipping over into something distinctly furry if this demon pissed me off beyond my ability to control it. I took some deep breaths despite the rotting flesh stench, and the thought of skin crawling brought Ruby Valli’s grimoire flashing dangerously through my mind tempting me yet again as my shadow flitted in the corner of my eye. No, no, no, I thought firmly.
“You will leave this place,” I choked out, hating how weak my voice sounded. I ramped it up and tried again, stronger now. “You will leave Beau’s life, and you will leave Elyse alone, and you will get off my goddamn property and out of my life. You are not welcome. You are not wanted.”
The demon keened again like a wounded animal. One of his many hands clutched his cock like I’d slashed it.
“Let that go,” I demanded sourly. “Nobody wants a spankshow, and I don't want your fuckspooge on my lawn. That shit's gotta be worse than Roundup.”
He stepped forward, leaving a melted depression in my old concrete path. The ground shook as he approached, vibrating underfoot. Knowing demons, this was pure Intimidation Tactics 101 bullshit. Only lesser demons did that. Asmodeus didn’t have to shake the ground; He was scary enough without the tricks.
“Nothing can take him from me,” the demon declared.
“Watch me,” I said, clearing the bile from my throat and spitting it in front of him with a grimace.
The incubus snarled again, “Who are you?”
“I’m the bitch who’s gonna shut you down,” I said, and felt a smile blossom across my face. “You better scram if you don’t want a taste of this.”
“Alone?” the demon said, and flashed those nightmare teeth in what I assumed was a smirk. The vision of him began to shimmer, a wrinkly blur, as though he were shaking his parts into a new form. Jittering in place, jerking inside his skin, the demon crunched and oozed. I wondered, not for the first time, at demon physiology and their ability to conjure solid flesh at will. I shifted my earlier diagnosis from lesser demon to minor demon as I watched what seemed to be bones moving under his worm-like skin.
“Human, you are out of your league,” he rasped, and his voice made my skin crawl. “No one stands before the lust of Naraneeran’Chalagalilin-Basan’Saragoughse.”
I felt my eyebrows rocket up. “Fucking excuuuuuse me, but that’s quite the mouthful. I’ll just call ya Neener-Neener.”
“Naraneeran’Chalaga—”
“What-the-fuck-ever!” I flailed my arms skyward. “I’ll never get that right! You can’t get offended about people getting your name wrong if it’s thirty fucking letters long!”
Thirty-eight, Toots, a voice purred in my head, and I felt my eyes go wide with horror as the brush of the Overlord rolled through me, a dance of blood and silk and fur and snakes and death.
I hadn’t called Him. I hadn’t even thought of Him.
Didn’t you? A papery whisper called to me from inside the cabin, and I knew that in my herb cabinet, the grimoire was squirming against the surface of my desk. Again, I was assaulted with visions of a smoking black orb in my hands and canines, and above it all, the soot black raven wings of my Prince.
“Listen up, Neenerpants.” I didn’t wait for his hell-breath roar or his cheeky demon retort. “We’re gonna get a few things straight, here. You’re not dealing with just any human. So if you wanna take me out, you better buckle up, buttercup. I ain’t going down easy. And for the record, I’m never alone. Don’t make me call for back-up. You won’t like it.”
The gale picked up again, wrapping me in its draw, pulling me right off my feet like a riptide. I went flying back out of the salt circle, coming down hard on my ass with a surprised whoop!
With startling agility for a bundle of bones in loose flesh, the one-eyed demon shot forward toward my personal space. I kicked into a back somersault, rolling to maintain my distance, and launched to my feet. Probably, Hood would have been super-impressed.
The incubus pelted forward again and I yelled, “Do not want! Do not want!” and took off running in a wide circle, a trick I learned in an underground yeti fight club and had cleverly maintained for just such an occasion. This time, instead of going in the
complete circle and ending up tangled in a heap with my opponent, I stopped at a safe distance.
“No service is free,” the demon told me. “It is time for him to pay. He must pay in full. His bill is overdue. Pay now for services rendered or I will send the Collector!”
“Demon collection agency: also a thing I don’t want,” I muttered. “Haven't you assholes heard of invoices? Net thirty? Online billing? Jeez.” This was just getting me nowhere, and what’s worse, I had heard of the Collector. He went by the name Jungcsezep and was under Taziel the Incubus, two bigger names, big enough that a white-witch like me, not well-versed in demonology, had heard of them. Best get rid of the small demon with the big name before he called the big demon with the smaller name. “Look, what do you want?”
“Perhaps I am here to ruin your virtue,” the demon said, tongue slurping the air in front of him.
“That would be a neat trick,” I said, “since I don’t have any.”
What I needed was a white magic version of Ruby’s demon banishing spell. Trouble was, I didn’t have one. Toe-to-toe with a cycloptic incubus, I scrounged for other options. Call in the big guns? What big guns? You have no guns, Marnie-Jean, I reminded myself. Or do you? I couldn’t involve Umayma, or Hood, or Morgan Sally. I couldn’t call on Batten, alive or undead. Nor could I call on his buddy, Mitch Dunlop, who would be worse than useless here. I could have used Finnegan Folkenflik and the skulk, but they were too far away. The PCU would try to help, but what did they know about demons that I hadn’t taught them? Besides, I’d already caused them enough grief lately. I needed a favor, but I was running out of favors to call in. Was it late enough in the evening for my revenants’ rest to be subsiding? There was only one person that I could think of who owed me big time, and I would need to ask for their help now, despite the risk.