“Yes,” I said.
Roy moaned in pain. I tried to ignore him.
“Then it is Her you shall have,” said Gaspar.
Gaspar leaned in close to me and whispered. His breath stank of sulfur, of lit matches and fire and the dust of a thousand years.
“A person is a kingdom, a mansion, and inside each soul there are rooms and rooms. Does the girl know that? Of course she does. Inside her there is a kingdom of rooms, and she must go inside herself, the girl must enter into the locked door and pass down the great hallway and she must find the spirit’s room, the one that she has given to Her. The girl must light a lamp in that room for Her to see by, that the spirit may find Her way home from whence She wanders. Does the darling little wretch not see?”
“Yes,” I said. “Yes, I can see it.”
It was true. I saw the vast insides of myself, like a Heaven of rooms, a whole city of me. Of possibilities, of desires, of who I could become. I saw my mom ancient and grey and dying in one room. I saw my stepdad Larry asleep on the sofa in another, each memory and person assigned a place and an order. Some doors I was scared to open, rooms that I knew held my dad, that held Luther Simpkins and Richard Holbrook, that held myself fanged and bloodied and wild, the old-lady me, my own death waiting for me tucked away in some secret room like a bride at the altar.
And another room, the most important room, one that wasn’t a room at all. It was the wide-open air of a mountaintop, surrounded by cliffs, with green grasses and bluebells and white taffy clouds whisking above. The Hidden Place. This was Her room, I knew it, this was where I kept Her. But how? I thought it was a place She had made for me, and not the other way around. Had I carried it inside me this whole time? I set a lantern on a rock overlooking the ocean and I willed it night there, I watched the sun darken and the moon rise and my lamp glow like a lighthouse over the churning waters.
I was breathing heavy now, panting, my chest heaving up and down. I felt as if I was running, like something was chasing me on the inside of myself.
“The boy and his father placed a mark on you, did they not? A protection,” said Gaspar. “Yes, yes, they did, the fools. And now we shall break it.”
He giggled, and the fire shot sparks from the hearth.
“I needn’t tell you that this will hurt.”
My body shook, and I was sweating. I couldn’t get any air, like something was sucking the breath out of my throat before I could breathe it. I felt white-hot spiders crawl inside my veins. I heard a great rushing of wind, as if the moon and the sky and the stars all reared back and howled.
Gaspar was quick. He grabbed my hand and slid the knife across my palm.
Blood came out like a secret. It whispered onto the floor.
The purple candle lit itself, a flame rising like a small tongue of fire.
I could hear myself screaming.
Then . . . then, I don’t know exactly.
It became like a dream.
The colors shifted and brightened, the world focused. I could see the cracks in the grains of the wood, see the blue flecks on the backs of a horsefly, every tiny miracle of everything. Time flooded through me, thousands of years in an instant, forgotten things, horses and camels, drowned islands, a broken statue in front of an altar, a column of fire, a great wind on a mountain. I saw a ball of entwined rats scuttling over the bloated bodies of children, I saw a one-eyed witch drinking blood from a snake, I saw two men in suits shaking hands in a barren field in the snow. I saw the stars and the cosmos, the swirling bright order of things, the fire of the beginning and the end. I saw all of it, felt it all, time eternal and every moment fire-hot and burning in my veins, all of it inside me, roaring in my blood.
I felt Her with me again, Her warm and flooding light, all the goodness and hope of Her, the love, the love, the deep and knowing love.
“I missed you,” I whispered.
I missed you too, Clare.
Gaspar laughed.
“I brought Her back to you, did I not? Yes, Gaspar did, he did just what you asked. Oh, it has been so long. It has been so long for Gaspar to work his magic, to have the fire dance in his bones again.”
I felt Her take my hand, I felt Her petting me, Her fingers on my skin, stroking my arms and my face and my hair, whispering, I am yours, I am yours, I am yours.
“Thank you,” I said to him, and it came out in Her little girl’s voice.
“Now it is time for Gaspar to take his boon, is it not?” he said.
Roy’s head perked up and he stopped praying.
“His boon?” said Roy. “Clarabella, what is he talking about?”
“Clare is sorry,” She said through me, in Her high, lisping little girl’s voice. “Clare is very, very sorry. But you’re the boon, Roy. You’re his present.”
Gaspar rose to his feet. He took the tuxedo jacket off, loosened the tie, unbuttoned the shirt, let it drop to the floor. I saw his tattoos, hundreds, his whole body a mystic scroll, scars that lifted like caterpillars off his flesh. He carried the curved knife. In the fireglow it gleamed gold.
“You do me honor, little boy, you filthy disgusting creature,” said Gaspar. “You pay tribute to me with your flesh, with the fresh parchment of your skin. I shall do wonders with you, boy. I shall carve your name upon the stars.”
Roy prayed out loud now. He begged God for mercy.
“We had no choice,” She said through me. “When you cast me out, I was lost. I wandered and I wandered, but I could not find her. I could not find my Clare. Only he could call me back, and he would only do it for a price.”
Gaspar crouched before Roy. He smoothed Roy’s hair back, laid his hand softly on Roy’s cheek. Roy went still, his voice silent.
“Shhh,” he said. “Quiet now, little boy. It picked you, yes, it did. It chose you itself.”
“Who?” Roy whispered.
“Clare’s very sorry for you,” She said, giggling, petting me. “But I’m not.”
Gaspar stood tall and began to sing, his voice loud and rich and full, a reverend’s singing voice. I realized the whole room—the animal carcasses, the writing on the floor, the symbols, all of it—was part of a spell prepared just for Roy, a putrid cage to bind him inside. I backed into the corner of the room, into the darkness. I listened to Her whisper to me, cooing softly, like a little girl does to a new pet.
The room grew hotter. The darkness thickened, it became an ocean surrounding us, a swirling, gasping creature. The bloody symbols on the wall began to glow. Something was coming, I heard the vast beating of a multitude of wings. The Wish House shook, the floors trembled, the walls throbbed, a living heartbeat. Demons circled the room in a murky spiral like vultures over a carcass—picking, preening things, the fetid fanged demons that spent decades wandering—summoned down to a feast of blood.
Roy screamed for someone to help him, for his dad to burst into the room alive, for his mom to come back from the dead. He screamed for me to rise up and save him.
Gaspar had his back to me. He was bent over Roy, holding the knife. Demons filled the room thick as smoke, shrieking in their ancient voices. I could hear them, I had Her ears now, I had Her mind. I heard their stories of torment and woe, the clacking of their chains, the groaning and pain they endured on their horrible trek through this earth. But most of all I felt their power, a ravening mob desperate to find a home in Roy, the first human friend I ever loved, the boy who broke my heart.
Gaspar flipped Roy onto his stomach. He would doom Roy now, spill a little blood and let the demons feast. They would fill him, a treasure chest of magic for the One Wish Man to plunder at his whim. The Paradise Society would gather round him, the parties would begin again, the lust of the flesh, the money and power, Gaspar’s world restored. Roy would be chained in this room, his skin hacked to pieces, rippled with magic to keep him still, to keep the demons sated. Roy would spend the rest of his life here, unless he got lucky like Kevin and someone cut him loose, or else chewed through his own skin and go
t run over quick on the highway. That was Roy’s fate, and it would be forever.
Gaspar took Roy’s hand and raised the knife.
I saw in the corner of the room a girl. I recognized her from a photograph—thin and pretty, with long hair and a white billowing dress, black holes where her eyes once were. It was Cléa, and she smiled at me.
Roy screamed.
I could tell you this was the story of the fourth time She took control over my body, but that would be a lie. I did this. Me and Her did it together.
With all Her power I leapt onto Gaspar’s back and dug my teeth into his throat. I thrashed and shook my head, wrenching the tissue from his neck, slicing the veins, ripping through his esophagus. Gaspar swung the knife at me but missed. I knocked the knife away and clamped on tighter to his throat. I wrapped my legs around Gaspar’s waist and sunk my teeth deeper into his flesh. I tasted bone. I gnawed and ripped and tore, like a sick wild dog. I swallowed Gaspar’s blood, and it didn’t taste bad, it didn’t turn sick in my stomach.
I didn’t let go of Gaspar until he fell to the floor.
All around me I heard the shrieking of betrayed demons howling in the void. I heard the thousand-year agony of doomed spirits denied their feast of flesh. I heard the gears of the world groaning with all that pain and time.
Roy was crying. I took the knife and cut the scarves from his wrists and ankles. He stood up, gazing at me in horror. I could see myself reflected in his eyes, my torn and blood-splattered dress, the gore slathered on my teeth.
“Clarabella . . .” he said. “Clare?”
I dropped the knife on the floor.
“Go,” I said.
Roy turned and fled. I watched him vanish into the darkness of the house, his terrified footfalls fading toward the front door. He would make it out. Roy would be free.
Gaspar’s body twitched. He crawled himself toward the knife.
It didn’t make any sense. How could he still be alive?
But She knew the answer to that. She told me that no one could kill Gaspar, or at least not the spirit that drove him. That Gaspar was from forever and he was a part of mankind, same as goodness was. I kicked the knife away, watching it clatter across the floor. I took the candle and set flames to the curtains, let them billow up in sickness and black smoke. I watched the animal hides catch, the poor slaughtered beastflesh. I watched the room blaze in a hot fury.
I walked through the doorway, into the darkness of the rest of the Wish House. I could see it now as it truly was. Critter bones scattered across the floor, the shredded curtains, the busted windows, the carpet gone fetid and rank. The ruined chandelier dangling above me like an eye plucked from its socket. The warped hardwood of the floor, the long red carpet like a mildewed tongue stretched down the hallway. The paintings cracked and broken on the walls, the portraits ghastly and torn. The knickknacks replaced with rotten fingers, teeth, and bones. Rats skittered around my feet. Doors hung from their hinges, the furniture was cobwebbed and splintered, melted candles were frozen in puddles of wax red as blood. Flies buzzed in swarms around my face. I didn’t dare use the front door, I didn’t dare risk someone coming for me. I found a busted window and crawled out it. I realized my hand was cut. But it didn’t hurt, it didn’t matter. The fire had caught, it was spreading. I could smell the stink of the Wish House burning.
The night was clear now, the Milky Way slathered across the sky. I saw through Her eyes, my soul rose a great distance and I could see everything.
Roy’s father, stumbling through the woods behind Miss Mathis, his eyes bright with fear and love for his son, mumbling a silent prayer that She let me hear, a prayer begging forgiveness from God and from Roy and even from me. Tears muddying the dirt on his face, the limbs scratching his forehead, drawing blood. I watched his eyes widen as the Wish House came into view, as he saw his son running through the darkness of the forest, away from the flames and into his arms.
Miss Mathis marching ahead of them, holding aloft the skin of Kevin Henrikson, singing in her scratchy strange voice the secret words inscribed on his flesh as they began to glow, lighting the pathway. She would finish what Cléa had started. She would destroy the magic surrounding the Wish House, let the fire I started consume it forever.
Farther She let me drift, higher and away.
I saw the Simpkins mansion, rich folks filing out in a rush, stumbling in high heels, rushing to cars parked out front, the gates wide open for once, while from upstairs came a horrible cackling laughter.
Mom wrapped up in a blanket on the couch, Larry off snoring in the bedroom. Mom crying, curling and uncurling her fists, a new toughness growing inside her, all that pain finally becoming something like power.
Uncle Mike asleep in his bed, his eyelids fluttering, his lips mumbling in the night. He was dreaming, and I could see his dream: Uncle Mike on a beach in Patmos, his wife and Cléa at his side, all of them smiling and happy, a family forever. I wished the best for Uncle Mike.
I saw other things too, nearby visions, I heard every drip of rainwater fall from each leaf, I saw the air bend the starlight as it fell to earth. I saw the creatures of the forest gather around me like saints, a crowd of witnesses assembled. It was the reckoning of a grave injustice, punishment meted out for centuries of pain. The wind carrying the news, the night birds like angels gazing down from on high. Above them the galaxies spiraled in the blackness, the teeming world hidden far and away, the silky light stretched across the vast universe, the burning heart of everything that gave our world its life.
The forest dirt cold beneath my bare feet, the moon just a half wink in the sky. I felt Her inside me, warm and good.
Don’t be sad, Clare, She said. Gaspar was an awful man, and he deserved what he got.
“I know,” I said.
We have money now. We have the old lady’s car. We can leave. We can leave and go wherever we want.
I found a knocked-over tree and sat down on it. My jaw hurt from chewing, my stomach swirled. I plucked a hunk of Gaspar’s throat out of my teeth, and I thought I’d be sick.
What’s the matter? She said.
I felt the moon like a single squinted eye gazing down on me, wondering at what I was going to say.
“This was Your plan all along, right?” I said. “You wouldn’t have let Gaspar take Roy, would you?”
Of course it was, silly. I’d never let anything happen to that boy. He helped you, didn’t he? He helped us.
But the thing was, I knew She was lying. I knew it in my heart.
“Why are You lying to me?”
I’m not.
“You are too. You’re lying like I don’t even know You.” I was getting mad now, my feelings hurt, all the months of pain writhing in my belly along with the blood and gore of Gaspar. “This isn’t the first time either, is it? You’ve lied to me before.”
It’s my nature, She said. I never lied to hurt you. Hasn’t it always been for our good? Didn’t I bring us back together, just like I said I would?
“Will you please just tell me the truth?”
She was silent a moment. I could feel the forest pressing in, all the lost souls from outside the Wish House, those Gaspar had tortured and murdered, the spirits he held captive. All of them watched and listened.
Are you sure you want to know, Clare?
“Yes.”
Okay, then. If you must know.
“Tell me.”
Gaspar sent me back into the world when you were just a little girl. I was supposed to bring a child here to him. You were to be his next.
My hands shook, and I could feel the old panic coming on. That had been Her plan from the beginning. To take me to Gaspar, to have me locked in a room and tortured. That’s what She chose me for.
“Were you Kevin Henrikson’s demon?” I said. “Were you Nicolas?”
I have been called by many names.
She was Nicolas, not that nasty Wish House spirit. It was Her—it had always been Her. She lied to me from the ve
ry beginning. I began to cry. I was sobbing in big gasps, tears streaking the blood down my face.
Shhh, Clare, don’t cry. You don’t understand, not one bit. This is an old story, and a very long and sad one. I don’t think you will want to hear it.
“Tell me everything,” I said. “All of it.”
That I can’t do, silly. There are some things that are not for humans to understand, not even you, my Only. But this much I can tell you.
When Gaspar first summoned me, my job was to trick the children. I was to draw them close to me and then guide them to him. I was the lure, do you understand? Gaspar sent me into the world to find him a child, one who would come willingly, who would submit himself to be united with me. And then Gaspar would invite other demons inside, and they would bring him power. Do you know what this world is like for us, for my kind?
“No.”
Shall I show you?
I nodded.
My eyes went foggy, the night dissolving into a haze, and I knew this was a vision. I saw before me the earth stretched out cruel and empty, all blackened ground and not a tree in sight, nothing but the dark shadows of vultures circling miles above. The light was unbearable. The demons straggling in the burning sunlight, dragging limp legs and slumped shoulders, faces eaten away by maggots, searching for even a drip of water to wet their tongues in. The horrible thirst, veins gone dry as dust, the gouging emptiness inside. It was Hell for Her, the earth was, an endless doom. The misery of knowing it was impossible to die, and that She would wander the earth like this forever.
Then I heard a whispering in the darkness, what began as a hiss and became the boom of thunder: Gaspar’s voice summoning Her. I felt the burn of Gaspar’s binding words, how they snatched Her like a hook in the flesh, seared lightning-hot, and dragged Her back to him, how powerful that bond was, a blood covenant stronger than family. How Gaspar sent Her to ensnare the first kid, how She crawled inside the child, the simple relief of a hiding place from that hideous sun. I felt Her like it, the adoration of the children, the weak and simple and easy, how She fed on the lonely and brought them to Gaspar. It wasn’t just Kevin Henrikson, and it wasn’t just in this town. No, there were others. Maybe the Wish House could be anywhere.
The Good Demon Page 22