by Jean Rabe
Rob thrust one of the awful energy drinks at her and she took it. The too-sweet syrupy drink felt amazing going across her tongue and down her throat.
“Mom! What happened? Are you okay?” Otter jostled her shoulders again.
She nodded and drank more of the Monster.
“You’ve been out of it for a while, boss.” This from Rob, who hovered. “Like two days. We’ve been stuck down here the whole fucking time.”
Two days? Bridget had hoped she’d pull her senses back to the present shortly after delving the bowl, Hilimaz had suggested that would be the case, and that no “time was nothing.” But two days was better than four years—which the old potter had claimed she’d spent in ancient Sumer. It could not have been that long, could it?
She groaned and stretched, realizing nature and taken its course and her bladder and bowls had emptied while she’d been linked to the past. Her legs and arms and neck were stiff like she’d been turned to concrete.
Rob and Otter continued to chatter, her demon babbled too: “Bridget must unshackle all of the trapped Aldî-nîfaeti. Bridget must leave this cave under the world and unshackle us all, else I will unmercifully rip the heart out of Otter, unshackling him from life. Bridget unshackle Aldî-nîfaeti and release me. Please, Bridget.”
Every word. The demon spoke Sumerian, and Bridget understood every syllable.
“Two days nearly,” Marsh said. “We’re like mostly out of food ‘cept for one can of Pringles and half a jar of pickles. We didn’t know what the hell to do. Couldn’t snap you out of it. And we tried just about everything until—”
“—until I told them to leave you alone.” Adiella was in her rocker, hands folded in her lap, postcards spread on the floor nearby, nothing written on them. “I told them you would snap out of it … eventually.”
“But Alvin didn’t want to wait, Mom. He … he went out there.” Otter gestured behind him, to the crevice that led from the tunnel to Adiella’s pit. Bridget’s demon squatted there, four eyes opened and looking from one person to the next, fifth eye so tightly closed that it appeared to be a wrinkle on its warty forehead.
“We didn’t see what got him, boss,” Rob said. “Had to be that demon, the one that set your house on fire.”
“We heard my brother scream.” Quin was sitting on the cot, elbows on his knees and head hung low. “Heard him die.”
“I kept him from going after Alvin.” Rob again, pointing to Quin.
“You kept him? It took all of us,” Marsh said.
They continued to chatter, one question after the next as she sat in her own waste and tried to gain some feeling back in her limbs. “Did you kill the old man who left this pit? Bridget asked her demon in the Sumer tongue.
“Mmmmmmmmmm,” the demon replied. “Tasty, that old man.”
“Where were you, Mom?” Otter’s hands were still on her shoulders. “I mean, you were here, but you weren’t. Adiella said you look through things, like the bowl you were holding. She says it’s what you do, that you like very old things ‘cause you can see their story. Is that where you were? It’s what you were doing in the warehouse, too, wasn’t it? Looking inside old things?”
“Yeah, Otter.” Bridget flexed her fingers. “I was inside the bowl, my mind anyway.” Feeling was coming back, along with the uncomfortable sensation of a thousand little bees stinging her. “I was delving the bowl. I call what I do delving.”
“Delving. To figure out what to do about the demons, right? Somehow you were doing that?”
“Yeah, Otter. I got some of it figured out.”
“Good, then we can get out of here, right?” Rob started pacing, a short course because he had little space in the crowded room. “We can—”
“Help me up.” Otter tugged Bridget to her feet and she shifted her weight back and forth. “God, but I stink.”
“Well, yeah, there is that,” Otter said. “You sort of … sort of ….”
“Yeah, I stink.”
“So you can get us out of here now? I’ve missed school. I’ll get in trouble for that. I’ll need a written note. I’ve Dad’s funeral. Geeze, Mom, that’s tomorrow night. I’d set it up for tomorrow night. We gotta pay the place, and I’d set it up, put a notice in the paper, on-line, and for—”
“We’ll take care of it, Otter.”
“So you know what to do about the—”
“Demons? Give me a minute.” Bridget took a good look around. Rob paced. Marsh leaned against a wall, hands in his pockets, scraggly growth of beard. Everyone looked tired, bags under their eyes, fatigue clear on their faces. Except Adiella; the witch looked like she could step behind the counter of her bookstore and open it for business. Adiella met Bridget’s gaze, then looked toward the crevice.
Bridget approached her demon.
“Bridget is well. Good. Now Bridget must unshackle all of the trapped Aldî-nîfaeti. Bridget must release me, please. Together we will master the realm, crush the skulls of those who oppose us. Unshackle us all, Bridget, else I will unmercifully rip the heart out of Otter and eat it before your innocent eyes. Bridget unshackle Aldî-nîfaeti and—”
She crouched until she was eye-level with it, her still-stiff legs protesting. “You listen to me you gobshite.” All the words except for the last were spoken in Sumerian. “You’re not going to kill any more of my people. I’m through with your threats. Free you? Hell, I’d do it in a heartbeat if I knew how.”
“Release me, Bridget. Release me and I vow not to eat the hearts of those you love.”
“And how the hell do I manage that? Releasing you?”
“Say the words,” the Aldî-nîfaeti said. “I will tell you the words to say and—”
Bridget bolted upright. “What did you say, demon?”
Behind her Otter and Rob talked softly.
“What’s she saying?”
“Is that a language? Is she growling?”
“Do you think she’s talking to a demon? An invisible one? Michael said there was an invisible one.”
“Think there really is an invisible demon there?”
“Is that what got Alvin?” The last was whispered. “An invisible demon?”
“Bridget, I spoke that I will tell you the words you need to free me. I have no power with the words, but you do. And you must say them and—”
“So I can release you? Just like that? Just like the spell that caught your feckin’ Aldî-nîfaeti fellows in the bowls?”
“Say the words. I will tell you—”
“What if I don’t release you, eh? What if I keep you bound to me until my last breath?”
“Please, Bridget.” The beast’s voice had changed. It was softer, and its eyes were cast down. “Freedom, please. Else I will rip out Otter’s heart and eat it before your innocent eyes. I will kill your son.”
“No you won’t. I forbid it.” She felt the vibrations of another subway train and heard Otter and Rob talking. Quin mentioned something about his brother, and Michael grumbled and sat on the cot next to Quin. “You’re bound to me. I didn’t understand that before. And because you couldn’t understand me … because I couldn’t communicate.”
“Please, Bridget. I will eat Otter’s hot beating heart unless you—”
Bridget slammed her fist against her hip. “Dear God.” This she said in English. Instantly the pit behind her quieted. “Oh, dear God.” She went back to the Sumer language. “You’re bound to the buckle. You’re bound to me.”
“Bridget, please—”
“I’m right, aren’t I? You’re bound.”
“Yes, Bridget.”
“I can order you around. You have to do my bidding, not the other way around. It was never ever the other way around. I don’t have to free the damn demons that were sucked up in old pieces of pottery. That’s just what you want me to do.”
“Yes, Bridget, I want my Aldî-nîfaeti brethren free.”
She remembered what Hilimaz had told her only minutes … years … thousands of years ago: “
Your toad-thing is bound to metal? Metal cannot capture the Aldî-nîfaeti. Only clay. I have told you this in all the days you have spent here.”
She thought back to her delve of the buckle while she sat in her warm study on her oushak rug. A man’s voice had said: “She can make a slave of evil that will in time conquer. That will allow us victory. A slave that she can bind like a mother unto a child.” Bridget had heard then that her demon was an instrument; she just hadn’t understood. She’d let it be the master.
“Unshackle Aldî-nîfaeti, Bridget. Free me. Together we can—”
Again she dropped to a crouch until her eyes were even with it. The stench from it overpowered her own stink and her eyes watered. “You’re bound to me, demon, to this metal. She pulled the buckle out of her pocket and dangled it in front of him. She’d delve the buckle again later, when she was clean and rested, no matter the physical and mental cost. She’d delve it to be certain. But she played her hunch now.
“You’re bound to this metal and so to me.”
The demon regarded her icily.
“You’re mine,” she continued in the Sumer tongue. “Aren’t you? It just took me some thousands of years to realize it. And if I’d been able to really talk to you from the very beginning all of this would have played out differently, wouldn’t it? You’re bound to me.” Her lip curled up in anger. “If I had figured it out, Tavio would still be alive.”
“Mmmmmmm Tavio.”
“What’s she saying?” This from Otter, who must have recognized his father’s name.
“Jimmy, he’d be alive.” A pause. “Did you kill Dustin? Did you eat his heart?”
“Mmmmmm Dustin,” it said.
“You fecker.”
“Bridget unshackle all the—”
“What’s your name, you damnable beast?”
“Ijul,” it replied.
“Yaqrun,” Bridget said.
“You unshackled the mighty Yaqrun,” the demon said. “Slayer of farmers, burner of children, destroyer of—”
“Yeah, I freed him. Your name is Ijul.”
“Ijul of the Seventh Waste, decimator of—”
“Let’s just go with Ijul.” She stood again, her legs cramping.
“Mom, what’s—”
She waved Otter’s question away with an impatient gesture.
“Close your eyes, Ijul.”
The demon did.
“Turn around, Ijul.”
The demon complied.
“Christ on a tricycle,” Bridget said, those words in English. She felt a wave of weakness crash through her. If only she’d realized, she could have saved Tavio and Jimmy and Dustin, kept the museum guards alive. Hell, she wouldn’t have released the Aldî-nîfaeti in the museum.
Sumerian again: “Turn around again and face me, Ijul.”
The demon did.
“Twitch your tail, Ijul.”
It did.
“You are bound to me.” She continued to speak in Sumerian, so effortless a language now. “Ijul, you are not to eat another human heart. Ever. You are not to harm my people. Do you understand? I command you.”
“As you command, Bridget,” Ijul said. “As you command, I obey.”
“You are not to disappear on me, Ijul. You are not to leave my side.”
“As you command, Bridget.”
Son of a bitch! Bridget thought. If only she’d commanded it from the first, ordered it—in a language it could understand, used its name as that was power over it—she could have kept Tavio and Dustin and Jimmy alive. Otter would not be with her now; he would be in school, chatting with his girlfriend, talking about swim competitions. The museum … it never would have happened. The buckle had never been meant as a curse, it was a means of control. The buckle was the leash that connected the dog to its owner. She’d just not known she could tug on that leash. Her demon, not commanded, had been free to roam on its own and slay who it desired. The dog analogy fit: a dog with no boundaries, no instruction, was free to wander and do what it will. She wouldn’t free it—not yet—even though she wanted to be free of it. It would go bounding away to cause death and havoc. If she kept it, she could keep it in check.
“Yaqrun,” Bridget repeated.
“Slayer of farmers, burner of children, destroyer—”
“Yeah, that son of a bitch. We’re going to get Yaqrun, Ijul. You understand?”
“Please, Bridget. Please do not—”
“Please, Bridget your sorry ass. You’re going to find Yaqrun for me. Can you do that, Ijul?”
“As you command, Bridget.”
“Yeah, I command. We’re going to deal with the slayer of museum guards and the burner of children.” And then we’re going after the other fecker, too.
“Mom?” Otter had crept up behind her. “Mom, what are you doing? Is there something there? Are you possessed? You’re talking gibberish.”
She stood and rubbed her thighs. “Is there any more of those nasty sweet drinks?”
Otter shook his head. “We’re pretty much out of everything. Are we gonna—”
“Get out of here? Yeah, in a while. I need you … all of you … to stay here a little while longer. Can you do that? Just to be safe? I’ll come back for you. Then we’ll all go out to a fine dinner. You must be hungry.” She looked around Otter. “Michael, Adiella, please keep everybody here.” A pause. “Adiella, do you have a spare change of clothes in that trunk?”
“Please, Bridget,” the demon said. “Do not do this. Together we can crush the skulls—”
Bridget grabbed the clothes Adiella reluctantly offered, stepped through the crevice and beckoned her personal Aldî-nîfaeti to follow.
“Yeah, well together we’re going to deal with Yaqrun.”
“The slayer of farmers,” the demon said.
Bridget paused as she stepped over the heartless body of Alvin, crossed herself, and felt the vibrations of a subway train purr up through the souls of her boots.
***
Thirty Five
Bridget borrowed a phone book at a corner convenience store and scanned the Yellow Pages. The clerk behind the counter gave her a serious up and down. She’d cleaned up in a restroom in the subway as much as possible, discarding her old clothes, save the coat, and changing into the outfit Adiella had provided. The witch was smaller than Bridget, and so the pants fit tight and were effectively capris. They were orange, the sweater—three-quarter length sleeves to her—was a thick cable knit mud brown, the colors looking more suited for fall and pumpkin harvesting than walking the New York City streets in the height of winter.
Bridget thought she still smelled funky, the sink and hand soap not enough. Maybe it was the demon’s stench. She wrinkled her nose and traced her fingers down the entries. Outside, she heard horns blaring, sirens keening—though softly, indicating they were several blocks over. She’d emerged in the wee hours of the morning, and so the sidewalks had people, but not the rush of to-work or to-breakfast or heading-home. Music played, some Latin station with words she couldn’t understand. Maybe that’s why her finger gravitated toward a Latin-owned pottery shop. It had a small boxed add: Full Range of Classes for Children and Adults, hand-thrown, and wheel. Eight-week sessions, low-cost materials fees. It was on West 26th, only a dozen blocks from here, between Sixth and Seventh Avenues.
She and Ijul would hoof it; the cold air would keep her alert.
“Thank you,” she told the clerk, passing back the book and handing over a five for a steaming cup of coffee, which she finished it before the end of the first block.
Lord, but she loved this city.… the bigness of it, the brassiness, all of the clamor and the color, the people of all stripes, the trash and the glitter, and the buildings that stretched like long skinny fingers into the sky grasping for the clouds. Bridget loved the feel of it too, from the brush of women hurrying past her on the sidewalk to the swish of air caused by a passing subway car to the vibrations that pulsed up through her feet. Sending her mind back to Sumer had in
tensified her passion for New York. The land was so quiet, and though that ancient city was sizeable there’d been nothing tall, no steel fingers aimed skyward, and no rattle from cars. She smiled at the recollection of the goats and sheep, and their funny sounds; she’d enjoyed watching them, rather relaxing while Hilimaz pulled clay from the riverbank. But she hadn’t been able to touch anything there. Odd that she could feel the breeze and smell the air that was so clean it barely carried a scent, and she could sense the warmth of the sun. But true tactile sensations had been denied to her.
Bridget stopped outside of the shop and placed her fingers against the building. It was red-brown brick, sooty from the city, cold to the touch and rough as her fingers rubbed against it. She concentrated on the feel of it as she caught her breath. Bridget had taken the dozen blocks at a fast clip. She hadn’t realized she’d been delving, the brick’s memory flooding at her as easily as the memories had come from her prized and lost Turkish oushak rug.
“Momma I don’t want to wait here.” In her mind’s eye, Bridget saw a girl, about twelve, leaning against this wall, back of her head pressed against this brick. Judging by her clothes, it was the 1960s, and it was summer. The brick held other memories, but this one was the strongest. It flashed forward and Bridget saw the girl wait until dark, mother never returning, but eventually a policeman came and tugged her away. Bridget shook off the memory and went to the front of the shop: Arcilla Mundo, the sign read. Smaller words under it were in English: Clay World.
She’d walked around the city long enough that hours had melted. It was a little past ten; Bridget saw a clock through the storefront window. They didn’t open until eleven. She retreated to the corner and leaned against the building, letting her fingers play over the bricks and—with a little work this time—taking their memories. The conversations in her head helped deaden the chatter of the damnable demon. God, if only she’d known, if only she’d been able to truly communicate with it from the beginning. She pushed thoughts of Tavio, Dustin, and Jimmy from her head and listened to the bricks.
“Ijul,” Bridget said an hour later when she heard a bell jingle and the shop door open. “Follow me.”