Hounding The Moon: A Tess Noncoire Adventure

by P. R. Frost

  “GOLLUM, I’M SCARED,” I whispered into my cell phone at two in the morning. Only midnight back at Half Moon Lake, Washington. He was still awake, still working on the translation of the demon language he’d channeled.

  “What happened?”

  I could almost see him straightening from his slump in the armchair of my suite, pushing his glasses up his nose, and planting his big feet firmly on the plank floor.

  “What do you call a shadow that takes on three dimensions and freeze-dries everything around it?” I tried for a flippant tone but failed miserably.

  “I don’t know. What do you call it?”

  I rolled my eyes. He couldn’t be that oblivious to my emotions. Could he?

  My gut still churned with fear. Why now? Why were demons coming after me now? I’d been going to cons this last year, promoting the new book. Were the shadows local and opportunistic?

  Or were they in communication with the Sasquatch and out to get me wherever they could?

  “A pair of demons who tried to kill me,” I informed Gollum. Sarcasm helped me quiet the roiling acid in my stomach.

  Dead silence.

  “Are you there, Gollum? Is the line still open?” Cell phones had a bad habit of dropping calls in Half Moon Lake.

  Well, cell phones had that bad habit everywhere.

  “Yeah, I’m still here. Describe them.” He sounded clinically detached, once more the anthropologist deep into research.

  I knew he opened files on his laptop—a twin to my new one. Trying to separate myself from the awful reality and fear, I matched his tone, giving him as much detail as I could. Surprisingly, I had observed more than I thought. I described shades of black, height, estimated mass, a clear description of how the surviving demon dissolved, and how it grunted when my spike heel connected with its groin.

  “You have to get out of there, Tess. Come back now. Take whatever flight you can grab.”

  “This is Madison, Wisconsin, not Chicago or New York. Planes don’t come and go at all hours here. I’d be stuck in the airport. Alone. For hours and hours.”

  “Better the airport with lots of people around. Demons won’t attack where there are witnesses.”

  “I’m not alone here, Gollum. Any one of a hundred people could have stumbled across that attack.”

  “Get out of there,Tess. Rent a car and drive to Chicago.”

  “Alone in the middle of the night on the road? You call that safer? Besides, I have to stay for the awards banquet. My publisher paid for it. I’m up for an award. I have to stay for that. This is my career.”

  “I mean it, Tess. You aren’t safe there.”

  “I have to be. Scrap just crawled into the temperature control unit under the window. He’ll gorge on mold and be fine in a couple of hours,” I said too brightly. Actually Scrap had resembled a wounded mole limping back to his dark tunnel.

  “I don’t like this, Tess.”

  “I don’t like it either, but I have to do this. Tomorrow evening I’m on the seven o’clock flight to Chicago, then to Seattle and Pascoe. I should be back in Half Moon Lake by midafternoon.”

  “Call me. Every hour.”

  “In the morning, after I get some sleep.”

  “Every hour, Tess. In the meantime, I’ll see if Gramps can call in some favors and get you reinforcements.”

  I snorted at the idea of two octogenarian anthropologists hobbling into a battle with canes against demon claws. “I’ll call you when I wake up.”

  I did call him. But first I called Donovan to see what information I might pry out of him. If I admitted to being a Warrior of the Celestial Blade, would he admit to having demon ancestors? Not likely, but I felt like I had to talk to him.

  He didn’t answer his office or his cell phone. My heart sank toward my belly.

  Being really stupid where he was concerned was getting old.

  “Eat something,” Sylvia admonished me at the awards brunch the next day.

  I’d picked out crepes and eggs and sausage rolls from the better-than-average buffet. The fruit had tasted good and three cups of coffee had helped make up for the hours of lost sleep. For a few moments I felt almost human, almost normal. Then I remembered freeze-dried grass and tree bark. My appetite vanished. I kept harking back to the feel of the Celestial Blade biting into demon flesh and the sight of black or green blood spilling on the ground with the horrendous scent of sulfur and other noxious things.

  I kept wondering who in the room might be a demon and who I had killed last night. I scanned the crowd constantly, wondering who was missing. The comb in my hair revealed only normal auras. No extra shadows or braids of black within the variety of colors.

  The awards portion of the day wouldn’t start until after we’d all eaten, about an hour from now. It couldn’t come soon enough.

  “I wonder where Val got to?” Sylvia asked, looking toward the untouched place setting across the round table from me.

  “Val Littlefield? Steve’s wife?” I gulped. No wonder Steve had had such an intense interest in the Celestial Blade. But he’d touched it. I didn’t think a demon—even a halfling—could touch it with impunity. And I’d asked him to walk me home last night!

  “No. Valerie White. The new author I introduced to you. You two share an editor as a matter of fact. Gryffyn Books bought her ticket to this brunch. The least she could do is show up.” Sylvia searched the room, her mouth turning down in distress. “There really is no excuse for not showing up for a free meal with your agent and publisher.”

  Tom Southerby, the publisher of Gryffyn Books, wandered around the large room, networking rather than eating. We’d be lucky if he sat anywhere long enough to do more than say “Hi,” before he took off again.

  My stomach sank. I knew of a very good excuse why a new author might miss a free meal that could make her memorable to the publisher and launch her career to a new level. I’d killed her last night.

  My cell phone sang again. Gollum, of course. I leaped to take it outside the banquet room.

  “Jealous Romeo again?” Sylvia leered at me knowingly.

  “Who else?”

  The hush of the lobby outside the banquet room came as a relief from the constant noise of conversations and cutlery clanking against fine china.

  Gollum continued his litany of complaint that I had not checked in with him every hour. I apologized and cut him off.

  Then I stepped outside for a breath of fresh autumn air, lightly chilled and redolent with the scent of fallen leaves. I missed the trace of stale cigar smoke that used to pervade my life. Scrap’s failure to recover from last night’s ordeal added on top of everything else that had happened to us recently twisted my gut with apprehension.

  Demons all over the country wanted me dead.

  After about five minutes, the bite in the wind penetrated my good wool rust-colored suit—the one Scrap had wanted me to buy a new hat with a feather for.

  Damn, I wish the imp would come back from his hidey-hole. There was still a shadow demon out there who wanted my blood.

  I yanked open the door and stepped back inside, grateful for the relief from the wind.

  Maybe my eyes took longer than usual to adjust from bright autumnal sunshine to a remote inside corridor of a hotel. They shouldn’t have. Since the fever that had made me a member of the Sisterhood, my senses reacted more quickly than those of a normal person. The moment I stepped inside, I felt shrouded in shadows, chilled beyond the seasonal temperatures, dull and heavy.

  Just like I’d felt before I cleaved shadow mists with the Celestial Blade.

  Quickly, I inventoried my assets for another fight. No heels. No shawl weighted with glass beads. No energy.

  And no Scrap.

  The shadows began to coalesce around me.

  “You killed my mate,” someone whispered through the growing darkness. An androgynous voice. Menacing.

  “Your life is forfeit.”

  “Not today, buddy.” I turned on my flat heel and dashed
back outside into the minimal shadows of noon sunshine.

  Half running, I made my way around the hotel to the main entrance. Knots of people laughed and joked and talked very loudly in the lobby.

  If any shadow demon followed me, I denied it privacy for the kill.

  Hunching my shoulders a little and dropping my head, I assumed a posture of meekness. One group of seven people had two other hangers-on who listened intently but offered no contributions to the conversation.

  I joined them, sidling closer to the center, using these people as a human shield.

  “Hey, looks like they’ve finished serving the overpriced brunch and will let us poor peons in now,” Suze Naggar said. I’d known her for years. A marine biologist by day, she wrote hard science fiction and had a small but solid corps of fans. She only produced one book about every two years and had yet to break into the big numbers of publishing.

  Feeling like part of the wallpaper, I followed her back to the banquet room. Even Sylvia didn’t notice me until I sat heavily in my chair and nibbled at a cold crepe stuffed with strawberries and cream cheese.

  “Have you been running?” my agent asked. “You’re breathing heavily.”

  “Sylvia, I think I just had a panic attack. Post-traumatic stress and all. Would you…” I gulped and swallowed heavily. “Would you stay with me while I pack and check out? Maybe ride to the airport with me?”

  “Honey, I’ll stay with you until you get on your plane. I’m scheduled to leave an hour after you, same airline. No problem.” She patted my hand and waved my publisher back to the table as the organizers began the award ceremony.

  Val, the missing new author, breezed in wearing swaths of floating rayon and more bracelets than I could count.

  She glittered and clanked and gushed apologies. Something about a panicked phone call from her teenage son who thought the microwave had died.

  I had trouble deciding if the layers of floral prints and garish background colors covered a fat body or disguised a thin one. Her middle-aged face sagged at the jawline but not badly. Her hands were pudgy—and heavily beringed—but that didn’t mean the rest of her was.

  My hands used to swell at that time of the month and during the summer when I ate too much salt and drank too much iced tea.

  “Where’s your husband?” Sylvia asked, after she’d hugged Val and kissed her cheek.

  I’d had to publish three novels before I got that kind of affection from our agent.

  “He’ll be along in a minute. There’s a glitch with our flight reservations.” Val dismissed his absence with a wild gesture that almost took out the publisher’s eye with one of her rings. It looked like a hinged casket, one of the “poison” rings so popular with the con populace.

  This woman’s style was very different from mine and not what I considered professional. Some writers could carry off flamboyance. I’d never tried.

  Steve Littlefield, the toastmaster and previous winner of the World Fantasy Award, finally wound down his humorous speech. Most of it went over the top of my head.

  I was concentrating too hard on who was missing—besides Val’s husband—and who I might have killed last night.

  If Val and her husband were the shadow demons, she might decide to eliminate me now that I was competition to her own career. Any con we had been to together before this, we weren’t in the same league.

  I kept looking around, too nervous to pay attention to the ceremonies that captured the attention of the entire room.

  The presenters went through the long list of publications up for awards, short stories, novelettes, novellas, editors, artwork, anthologies and collections, even industry magazines. Finally they came to the last and most coveted category, novels.

  I gripped my chair with white knuckles and bit my lip.

  I’d never been nominated before. I’d never had a work sell well enough to gain this kind of recognition before.

  I really wanted to win, though I knew the voters in this contest favored obscure literary pieces over commercial successes.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, I don’t remember this happening before. For the category of Best Fantasy Novel of the Year, we have a tie,” the presenter, an editor from a rival publisher announced. “The winners are…” dramatic pause while he opened the thick cream-colored envelope. “The winners are, Steve Littlefield for The Dragons of Banesfield Manor and Tess Noncoiré for Imps Alive!”

  I sat there numbly, not daring to believe what I heard.

  Sylvia pounded my back. Tom pumped my hand and pushed me up to the dais. I bowed to the thunderous applause as Steve grabbed the microphone. He said a few words I couldn’t hear over the roaring in my ears, then he handed the mike to me.

  “I… uh… I need to thank my agent Sylvia Watson, my editor and publisher Tom Southerby, and um… and my mom, as well as all the readers who voted for me,” I stumbled.

  I had to give credit where credit was due. Editors and publishers invested a lot of work and money in putting a book on the shelves. This was a big feather in Tom’s hat.

  Scrap loved hats with feathers. He should be here to share the moment, too.

  I gave the mike back to Steve. He rambled on quite nicely, covering for me.

  My attention riveted on the tall black man who took a seat next to Valerie White. He had to be at least seven feet tall and wore a conservative business suit.

  Was he the shadow demon? If so, then who was his mate? Certainly not pudgy and flamboyant Caucasian Val.

  I couldn’t see their auras even wearing the comb.

  If the Whites weren’t the shadow demons, then who were?

  Eventually the crowd let me sit down again. One more award, the previously announced lifetime achievement award to Howard Ebson. More speeches and intros.

  Finally Lilia David stood up to accept the award for Howard. She wore jeans, a flannel shirt, and hiking boots. Very inappropriate to the occasion. She mumbled some kind of apology for Howard. Everyone knew his reclusive nature. He hated crowds and ceremonies.

  I barely comprehended a word she said. Her aura revealed layers upon layers of shadow shifting in the wind.

  Last night, I’d killed her mate, Howard Ebson, the shadow demon.

  While my babe is safe aboard the airplane, I have a little freedom to roam. I’d like to bust into the chat room and put the bad guys on notice they’ve caused a Sister enough grief. Next time we stop pussyfootin’ around. Next time I won’t be showin’ no mercy.

  Speaking of pussycats and no mercy, I’ve made plans for Gollum’s little playmate. That cat is goin’ down. I’ve earned a couple of new warts and my wings actually look like wings now instead of stubs. I’ve taken out shadow demons and I’ve neutralized a tribe of renegade Sasquatch. I’m ready for that cat.

  But first I think I’ll just zip back home for a moment and see if the garbage dump holds any more little treasures for Tessie-babe. She needs a little gift to make her feel better.

  But I’ve got to be careful. She won’t appreciate an old 286 CPU, like some people. Nor will she want a leather leash and slave collar with metal studs. Some of the Sisters might like them. But not my babe.

  My babe has class. Like the comb. Now what other useful little talisman can I find?

  Interlude

  THE ENTIRE SISTERHOOD filed out of their various quarters. Each woman wore a red gown, all different designs, revealing or hiding cleavage, clinging or full, but all long and flowing. Each woman carried a red candle, not yet lit. Quite an impressive display when they gathered in the courtyard on the night of a waxing quarter moon. Seven initiates stood to one side, on a little dais. They all wore white.

  Except for me.

  Sister S had given me a new pair of jeans, a flannel shirt, low-heeled boots. Clothing for the outside world.

  Sister Gert stepped forward. She wore her gown cut low on the bodice, empire waistline, and falling in straight folds to her feet. Thus clad, she looked younger, more vibrant, less stern than I knew her to be. Sh
e’d swept her short, blunt-cut hair behind her ears and secured it with a glittering barrette that might have diamonds and real gold in it. It looked very elegant and expensive.

  And old.

  “Before we induct seven new members into our order, we must deal with one who is not suitable, but has certainly been chosen by the Goddess.” Sister Gert’s voice rang out, caught and echoed on the stone walls, compounding in volume and authority.

  I firmed my shoulders and faced the assemblage with defiance. I’d not conform to their rules, so they wouldn’t let me play their game. Fine. I didn’t like them or their game. But I respected their dedication and their training.

  Even if I did feel like the entire thing was a bogus excuse to withdraw from reality.

  A little more sanity, and they’d probably all fit in nicely with the con culture.

  Easy, babe. There’s a time to speak out and a time to hold your tongue. Scrap stuck out his long forked tongue and grasped it between two talons.

  I bit my cheeks rather than laugh at him, and thus at the Sisterhood.

  “Teresa Noncoiré, you have been privileged to share many secrets with the Sisterhood of the Celestial Blade,” Sister Gert said more quietly. But still her voice carried to the far corners of the Citadel. “We charge you to keep those secrets close to your heart, nurture them, and be aware that evil walks abroad, enemies to those secrets and all we fight for and hold dear.”

  Oh, my, she was serious.

  I could only nod mutely. Otherwise I might laugh out loud. This was more solemn than the most serious of cults within fandom.

  “Do you swear by all that you hold sacred to keep the existence of the Sisterhood secret?”

  Swear it, Tess, or we’ll never get out of here alive.

  If the matter was so important, why was Scrap making faces at Sister Gert from his hiding place within the folds of her skirt on the ground?

  “I so swear.” In the face of the solemnity that graced every face and demeanor I could see, I had to agree.

  “Do you swear to nurture your imp and prepare for the day you must combat evil and protect the innocent from its ravages?”