by Sloan, J. P.
Yellow eyes blinked open several yards in front of me. I shined the flashlight in their direction. Instead of simply vanishing, a full-figured silhouette remained in its light, detailing a humanoid shape against the ragged brick and mortar wall of the cellar. The silhouette didn’t approach as much as it grew larger against the brick. I brandished the darquelle nonetheless.
“Are you ready?” I muttered to the dark figure.
The yellow eyes blinked away.
Skittering.
Pain.
Fresh slashes across my chest and right arm sent pain flashing through my chest. This felt deep. Internal.
Like a heart attack.
I swished through the air with the blade, but the pain grew unbearable. I lost my breath. My chest heaved, trying to suck in any kind of oxygen. The floor slammed against my knees, but the only thing that cut through the panic of suffocating was the mind-shattering pain inside my ribcage.
The flashlight beam dulled into darkness. It couldn’t have been the battery. I was blacking out. The remaining shadows scurried. The frenzy had begun. The damned shadows had been waiting for this moment for several months, now. They were ready for me to perish, and then escort me to whatever Hell awaited me.
Part of me was prepared. I had spent so much energy hunting down my soul. It was draining. It had robbed me of every good thing in my life. My career was in ruin. I lost my last chance at wealth. My friends had all suffered as a consequence of my actions or inactions. I was so damn tired.
The pain dulled, and on a deep level I understood I was dying.
Well, I had tried.
My vision blurred into the final darkness, and I sucked in one breath.
And saw Emil Desiderio.
He was hunched over his desk in our flat in London, hand-copying some stupid text he had loaned from a smelly Baltic fellow in the East End. This was his usual Saturday night thing. Copying. Translating. Doing anything but living a life that, by God, I was entitled to live. Ten years we had lived in this moldy flat, couched between a charming Pakistani family with an unbearably noisy toddler, and a twenty-something from Kent who liked to play punk music in the middle of the night.
Our flat was a maze of books, scrolls, cabinets, jars of reagents, and bric-a-brac from Emil’s travels. I had long since explored the interesting items in his collection. All that remained was more work.
And I was sick of it.
He was particularly engrossed in this one particular translation. I caught a glimpse of the original text. Looked like Cyrillic. Whatever. The last important magic that came from Russia was wiped out by the Golden Horde. The Huns had well and truly driven magic west of the Caucasus, and all that remained were minds eager to explore every practical element of life. Ah, the Russian perspective. It was refreshing, really, but useless to a man like Emil.
So whatever had held his attention so thoroughly had to be historical, and thus of no use to me. I decided to take this opportunity to slip out. This was getting to be my regular thing. Weekends avoiding Emil, ditching and spending an evening at the Carpenters Arms with Genie and her friends. I had been working up the nerve to ask Genie out for weeks, but Emil’s demanding schedule had made that nearly impossible. Still, she always managed to find me at the Arms, probably because she figured I would always find a way to sneak out on a Saturday night. That had to mean something.
“You’re done with the Diometrides, then?” Emil grumbled as I tried to turn the door knob. Busted.
“Yeah.”
“Care to present it for inspection?”
I sighed and stomped over to my desk. I had, in fact, completed my translation of the Diometrides text earlier that day. I hadn’t double-checked it, though. That could take a good week. At that very moment, I didn’t care. I snatched my composition book and tossed it onto Emil’s desk.
He lifted his hand, keeping his quill from smearing onto his page, and turned slowly to glare at me with those bushy gray eyebrows. His eyes were deep, constantly ringed in dark circles as if he applied makeup each day to sell the whole world-weary look.
“You’re angry,” he cooed. “What is this?”
“The Diometrides.”
“No. This attitude. This recent distaste for the studies you requested of me.”
“Emil. I’m tired. I’m thirsty. Frankly, I’m bored.”
He turned away. “You’re allowing the demands of the flesh to cloud your focus.”
“Too right, I am!”
“Then you will succumb to the flesh. This is what is left for you, Dorian. You have chosen to awaken to a reality that has no respect for the flesh.” He turned back to me, his eyes oddly drawn and soft. “You cannot choose to return to ignorance.”
“I just need a bitter, Emil. I did my work. I did the translation. I even cataloged that stupid box of crystals that Joe from Australia brought you. I need to blow off some steam.”
“It is important to realize you are young now. When you are old enough to feel the weight of this other Life we have chosen, then you will realize the simple things are no longer available to you.”
He reached up and gripped my hand. I jumped. He never moved this quickly.
“I have given you the key to a Cosmic endeavor, Dorian. Open the door. Step through the passage that leads to gnosis.”
I pulled away, trying not to completely freak.
“Emil? You’re hitting the vodka early tonight, aren’t you?”
His eyes fell, and he shook his head, turning back to his text, though his quill didn’t move.
I stood behind him. He was being completely weird. I mean, weirder than usual. I was ready for a tongue-lashing, some sermon about my responsibilities. But instead he gave me a half-drunk diatribe on gnosis.
The beer sounded real good at that moment. I stepped out of the flat and hustled down the street to the Arms. Genie and her usual crew were already there. They had bought me a pint. God, their faith in me was eerie! That night I had three pints, and I managed to get Genie’s phone number. The beer gave me the courage to ask her out. Her beer gave her the grace to say yes.
It was going to be the best night of my life.
Then I returned to the flat and found Emil. He was lying on his bed. His arms and legs had been hacked away from his body. His face lay to the side, calm and accepting. Whoever had done this to him had his cooperation. He seemed ready to die, and my stomach dropped when I realized that he knew this was coming. That diatribe he gave me was to be his last words to me. And I practically ignored him.
Those words had been forgotten.
Until that moment as my flesh perished.
Another breath.
The pain rushed through my chest again.
This flesh. This agonized flesh. The heart could stop, and I may die. I may not even have a soul, but something of my mind remained. And that mind had broken free in that one fleeting second from this shadow world into which it was born.
I opened my eyes and took in the room. It was no longer dark. At least, it was perceivable. The walls were made of living shadows, all sharp-toothed, all reaching for me. These were imps, blasted, hateful little creatures of death no more potent on this realm than a swarm of hornets.
As my body crumpled away under the pain, my mind hummed with thoughts aflame.
I thought of Emil. I asked myself how he would have judged me at this moment.
That was easy enough. He would sniff at these simple creatures. They were nothing a basic Banishing Cross couldn’t repel.
The Banishing Cross.
How utterly simple. It was the first lesson Emil had taught me, even before we had left New York for London. It was the cornerstone of all hermetical workings, at least for any novice. As one became naturally attuned to one’s personal energy, the Banishing Cross became unnecessary.
But I had never visited this realm of existence. I had never crossed the Veil. And my heart was still pumping.
I centered my mainline and released a pure white light in the form of a cross, emana
ting from my heart chakra. I situated myself in the center of this cross, then fired the third axis out from my heart chakra. All lines of white light extended out as far as I could perceive the Cosmos, and at once I was anchored, an immutable fixed point in my personal universe.
The light intensified and awaited the banishing ritual. Some used the Sephiroth of Qabbala. Some invoked archangels. Emil had trained me in those early days to choose my personal angels, the forces of Good in my life that possessed the strongest meaning. In those early days, I had chosen my parents, Aunt Viv, and Emil as my banishing angels.
But this was a new life. I had new angels.
One by one I called them, firing them against the imps clouding me.
Edgar.
Wren.
Julian.
Ben.
The light burned away the shadows. One by one, the imps wilted, fled, dissolved.
Leaving only one shadow glaring at me with yellow eyes, wreathed in the white light of my burning intent.
I forced myself to my feet, gripping the darquelle with my palm against the hilt.
“And this one is for Elle.”
I thrust forward, stabbing directly into the heart of the servitor.
White-hot energy spilled across my arms, against my chest, and out into the Cosmos along with a final baleful moan.
My face hit the floor.
Dust filled my nose.
The light dropped into immediate darkness.
My flashlight lay several feet away, shining at a few innocuous bricks.
Someone called my name. It was Edgar. Yes. Edgar.
I pushed against the filthy stone floor, wincing at the slashes in my back. I took several deep breaths, coughing out dust. But otherwise, my chest felt fine. No arrhythmia. No tightness.
My back, on the other hand, still hurt like hell.
“Dorian? You okay?”
I coughed again and tried to speak.
“Yeah,” I croaked. “More or less.”
A flicker of silver reflected the flashlight beam as I rolled to my feet. I snatched my darquelle and considered it in the low light.
Footsteps bounded down the stairs to the room behind me.
“Hey, man.” It was Edgar’s voice. “Holy shit!”
“I’m in here.”
“What’s back here?”
I turned to find Edgar peering through the hole in the sheetrock.
“Apparently I have a coal cellar.”
“What about the thing?”
I paused and re-centered myself. The energy in the dank space was utterly terrestrial. Nothing was in flux. Nothing was drawing energy. I looked down to the darquelle and noted its disposition. When a ritual blade is first “blooded,” it takes on a kind of life of its own. A kind of sinister cognizance that only seasoned Netherworkers can stomach. It wasn’t easy to describe the fullness of character the blade exuded at that moment, but the best single word I could conjure was “sated.”
“It’s gone.”
“For good?”
“Yeah. For good.”
Edgar stepped into the darkness, putting a hand on my shoulder.
“You did it.”
“I had help.”
I dusted off my pants and picked up my flashlight. As the two of us returned to the artificial light of the work space and rounded my table toward the stairs, I paused by the cabinet housing Emil’s Library. Placing a hand on top of the dark wood, I released a single simple thank you out into the Cosmos. If there was any kind of meaningful existence for Emil, if the Dark Choir hadn’t utterly consumed his soul by this point, I hoped he had the means to sense that one thin point of light I had sent out into the hereafter.
When I reached the top of the stairs, there was no sign of Gillette or Carmody.
I turned to Edgar. “Where’s Gillette?”
“She called a cab. Stuffed Carmody in it like some drunk asshole.”
“Didn’t even say goodbye. Figures.”
“If it’s worth anything, she did ask me to tell you never to call her again.”
“So, the usual then?” I looked over Edgar’s shoulder. “How’s Elle?”
“See for yourself.”
I stepped into the front room, and found Wren holding Elle’s head in her lap, stroking her hair as Elle stared up at the ceiling. Those eyes shifted to me as I stood in front of them, and one thin, but glorious smile spread across her face.
“Hey, Dorian,” she wheezed.
“Hey, kiddo. How are you feeling?”
“Hungry. Got any cereal?”
I have never been happier in my life to pour a bowl of Captain Crunch.
o, how’s your replacement handling the campaign?”
Julian’s brows lifted in disapproval as he took a sip of his martini. “She’s doing her best.”
“Doesn’t sound promising.”
“She has to cut her teeth on my dropped work load just in time to find a new job, so I’d say she’s coping better than expected.”
“Oh, have some faith,” I snickered as I did my level best to get the old man’s attention behind the bar. He finally noticed me and nearly snapped back to life as he labored over pouring a whiskey. “I think he’s going to die of old age before I get my Scotch.”
Julian leaned back and shook his head. “How did you find this place, anyway?”
“It’s not the Club, but it’s cozy. Reminds me of a pub I used to frequent in London. Except, you know, there were actual people there.”
Julian looked around the dark interior of the old pub at the foot of the Belvedere and smiled. “It’s peaceful, anyway. I’ll give you that.” His face drew long as he folded his hands nervously in front of him.
“What’s next for you?” I ventured.
“I was going to take a couple weeks in the Hamptons, but I’m already getting cagey. They’ll have to put me on medication if I don’t find something to do with myself.”
“Any leads jobwise?”
He grimaced. “I’m not actually free to pursue anything at the moment. Ongoing investigation.”
“You’re lawyered up, I assume.”
“I’ll be fine.”
The old man set a fresh lowball on the table in front of me, and I gripped it tightly, mustering the will to ask the question.
“So. This kid.”
“You’re asking me this question, aren’t you?”
“The individual who leaked this had to assume the allegation was genuine.”
“Just political mudslinging. Doesn’t have to be actual mud. The public just has to think it’s dirty.”
I wasn’t eager to detail my involvement with Carmody’s actions. It wouldn’t have helped.
“I’m not trying to butt into your personal business, Julian. You know that. I’m just trying to support you, for what that’s worth.”
He withdrew for a moment in his chair. Something clicked in his brain as he unfolded himself and leaned toward the table.
“I was nineteen. He was sixteen. We met at the Dayton Academy. We were kids, and we weren’t smart enough to know what we wanted. We were just feeling our way through the emotions we had, and we didn’t exactly have a lot of people we could talk to about it. I graduated and went to Georgetown, but that was still only a couple hours’ drive away. My mistake was in not realizing the relationship needed to end, not because I had turned this magical number that made the relationship inappropriate. No, it needed to end because I was finding myself, he was going to find himself, and we were just chaining ourselves together out of fear of heartbreak. If I could go back and change how that happened, I would. In a second. That’s my regret. We could have done so much more with that year than we did.” He took a long sip of gin. “He ended up at Stanford, anyway. Haven’t spoken to him since.”
Julian sat straight, his chin up. Though his eyes were heavy and pinched, he didn’t seem the slightest bit broken by the memory.
“I think we all have people we should have cut loose before it was too
late,” I offered.
“Do you?”
“You remember Carmen, right?”
“Oh. Right.” He chuckled awkwardly. “What about now? You have someone new, right?”
“That got complicated.”
Julian lifted his brow and nodded wearily.
That was something I hadn’t made a plan for yet. Ches was still in Baltimore. We maintained our veneer of affection for the Swains when the business with Carmody was over. I hadn’t told Ches about Gillette’s ultimatum. The proper time never came to mention it. Besides. I deserved a small vacation from all of this.
The door opened, and a massive figure stepped inside, eclipsing the sunlight from the street as he moved into the bar.
“There he is,” I quipped as I stood up and held out a hand.
Big Ben shook my hand and slapped my shoulder, nearly knocking me over. He was wore a polo shirt and jeans. I had never seen him out of white shirtsleeves before. The image was jarring.
“How you been, Dorian boy?” he sputtered.
“Busy as hell. Did you bring it?”
Ben reached under his arm and produced my bottle of Glenrothes.
I smiled and turned to the table. “You remember Julian Bright?”
He nodded and reached to shake Julian’s hand. “Of course I do! Sorry to hear about your job.”
Julian smiled and waved off the comment. “I’m fine.” He gave me a lift of his brow. “Is this a meeting? Did I miss a memo?”
“Didn’t send one, but yeah.” I gestured for Ben to take a seat at our table. “Way I see it, each one of us finds himself at a crossroads here.”
“I don’t follow,” Julian muttered.
“Well, Ben’s hung up his towel after, what, twenty years at the Club?”
“More like eighteen,” he corrected.
Julian frowned. “Retirement?”
Ben cocked his head, a chin roll puffing out as he grinned. “Forced retirement. I got a little hands-on with the Club staff.”
“That was my fault,” I added.
“So I was courteously asked to beat the bricks. Ain’t that a kick in the ass?”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Julian offered, still giving me a dubious look. “You were a real asset to that place.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” I said. “And I feel that wasting an asset like Ben would simply be criminal.”