Double-Barreled Devilry

by D Michael Bartsch

  “Such as?”

  “Such as the fact that when I went to Glyph's place the first time, he was there. When I went back, there were acolytes waiting for me.”

  “I can guarantee you that Mr. Kessler is very much dead.”

  “Then surely you can understand my confusion when I had a conversation with him, or at least, someone who looked exactly like him. Someone who could work magic the exact same way he did. Surely you can understand why I might have been baffled when I had him practically blind me and try to kill me in his kitchen.”

  Prufrock looked interested for the first time. His smarmy shell was disappearing, and he seemed curious about my encounter.

  “You spoke with him?”

  “Yup. Bit half his damn finger off.” I said. “You know what happened next?”

  “Do tell.”

  “I took some of the blood to a friend. When I gave it to him, we found out something. There was more than one soul inside of the body that it came from. What do you think could have caused that?”

  Prufrock looked at me long enough to become uncomfortable. Apparently he wasn't as all knowing as he wanted me to think.

  He broke his gaze off long enough to signal Jesse.

  “Scotch, the oldest you have. Neat.”

  Jesse looked at me before moving. I nodded. He walked over to the locked cabinet where he kept the really good stuff and pulled out a bottle of twenty-five-year-old Macallan.

  When Jesse poured a glass, Prufrock gestured to my glass. He heavy poured mine and put the bottle back.

  “Two-hundred,” Jesse said when he walked back.

  Prufrock gave him three and waved him away. Douche. Good tipper, but still.

  “If what you're telling me is true, then this situation is much more complicated than I was originally told.”

  “Well gee, I hadn't noticed. I only walked into a house with a damn Soul Monger who seems to be in league with Moloch. You don't seem nearly as surprised as I was.”

  I took a pull from the glass. Smooth as water, it filled me with a lovely warmth.

  “Who is he?” I asked.

  Prufrock looked around. There wasn't anyone within earshot as long as the music stayed on.

  “His name is Jean-Paul Sartre. He sold his soul to Mephisto in 1736.”

  The name was familiar. I swallowed the scotch and stared at Prufrock hard.

  “Bullshit,” I said. “I met Sartre, a hundred and fifty years ago. He can't be alive.”

  “The Frenchman is quite resourceful. I've heard of your encounter with him, and I can assure you that he did indeed survive it.”

  “Demons can't grant eternal life. Even if they could, they'd never get the soul. What incentive would they have?” I asked, trying to change the subject.

  Prufrock took a drink from his glass, holding the scotch in his mouth and breathing in. He savored the liquor, closing his eyes as he swallowed.

  “He did not ask for eternal life. It was simply an unforeseen byproduct.”

  He paused to take another drink.

  “As you no doubt know, Sartre was a thief of some renown at the time. He'd robbed barons, dukes, and even attempted to steal from King George II in 1735. That particular job got him into trouble. His face was seen and by 1736, they were closing in on him. He hadn't had enough, though. He desired to be the greatest thief who ever lived and that meant that he needed more time. He also needed a new face.

  “I'm told he found a gypsy woman to perform the summoning for him. From there, he asked for the ability to change his appearance to evade capture. Mephisto thought it would be a lovely joke to turn him into a Soul Monger. Most who wish for that particular talent are warlocks looking to steal the powers of their fellows.

  “When he granted Sartre the power, he told him how to change his appearance. It required him to kill someone and absorb their soul as it left the body. The poor gypsy woman was the first soul added to his collection of faces.”

  “That doesn't explain how he's still alive,” I said. “Even if he survived what I did to him, I've never heard of a Soul Monger lasting more than a decade, much less almost three-hundred years. They go crazy and off themselves long before then.”

  “The extended life is a byproduct of absorbing another's soul. It's more than just their appearance, but their power as well. Even the most mundane humans have power inside of them. As they age, they lose it. Sartre simply renews his well each time he takes a new soul.

  “However, he also absorbs a piece of their personality with their soul, a hint of a whisper always present in the back of his mind. Each time he adds another soul, it's another voice whispering to him. Most do end up either getting killed or killing themselves within a few years, depending on how many souls they take.”

  “But not Sartre?”

  “From what I'm told, Sartre found an item with a curious use, a locket with a mirror inside. The mirror stores the reflections of anyone who looks at it. More than just a cheap trick, the mirror actual captures a small amount of the person's soul inside of it.

  “If anyone were to use the mirror, they wouldn't even notice the piece missing. However, Sartre found a way to push more of the soul inside of the mirror. He uses it to store his captured souls, limiting the amount of whispers to a manageable level.”

  “And Mephisto just let this happen?”

  “Well, I can tell you that he isn't happy about the situation. Sartre didn't technically nullify the agreement. It's somewhat of a cautionary tale in Hell. The other Lords of Hell all laugh at him for the misstep.”

  I took another drink. Talking about Demons and contracts was starting to get overwhelming. They were always about following the letter of the law, never paying any attention to the spirit. They would twist and bend anything that they could. You needed a damned good lawyer to stand a chance of cutting a deal that wouldn't leave you completely screwed. Sometimes it's kind of comforting knowing I wasn't the only one who got bent over in a deal.

  The fact that Mephisto was down there getting his balls busted by other Demons was somewhat comforting. It was good to know that at least one time, the Demon had got the short end of the stick. It also made me nervous.

  “What's Sartre doing here now, and how's it connect to Moloch?”

  “Unknown. It may just be the opportunity that Mephisto has been waiting for. If Sartre has stolen a soul that belongs to Mephisto, the Lord of Lies would be well within his rights to get it back, and there's only one way to take a soul.”

  “Death,” I said.

  “Exactly. You may have just found yourself in a most fortuitous situation, Mr. Cain.”

  Prufrock pulled a cell phone from the leather holster on his belt.

  “Wait here.”

  I watched as he disappeared outside. Once he'd made it out the door, I went back to my drink. My glass was almost empty. It was too expensive for Jesse to give me anymore without someone paying for it.

  I looked back at the Mountain behind me. His eyes were black in the dim lighting. Back against the wall, he was scanning systematically, his eyes always returning to me.

  “So, where's Tweedledee today?”

  No response.

  I turned back around and grabbed Prufrock's glass. I glanced behind me; the Mountain was watching. I upended the glass, pouring the Scotch into my own. I slid the empty glass back and drank, keeping my eyes locked on his. If he wanted to say anything, he didn't.

  It took five minutes for Prufrock to come back in. I'd already finished the rest of his drink by then. When he sat down, I watched his eyes move to the empty glass. The faintest trace of a smile crossed his lips.

  “There is a new offer,” He said. “Now that we know that Sartre has the soul, you're to kill him, retrieving both souls for Mephisto.”

  “Let me guess, if I don't, I get turned into the Venatori.”

  “Yes. However, there will be an increase in your compensation. The Lord of Lies has been waiting for the chance to claim Sartre's soul for a long time. T
here is an offer of ten million dollars for the soul's return to its rightful owner.”

  I almost threw up in my mouth when he said it. I felt twenty-five-year-old scotch bubble up from my stomach and burn on its way back down as I swallowed it again. Ten million was enough to set me up for life. I could take it and disappear, drink the rest of my life away in peace. I'd need it if Moloch decided it was open season.

  “Ten million.”

  “Yes. To be paid when Sartre's soul is safely in Hell.”

  Prufrock stood. The Mountain detached himself from the wall and moved to flank him.

  “Call me again when it's done.”

  “What about Moloch?” I asked.

  “I'm not sure what the Lord of Hate's interest is. I've made some calls. I will inform you of anything I discover.”

  “Sure,” I said.

  With that, he walked out, leaving me at the bar. My head was starting to hurt, and it wasn't from the liquor. I'd had too much excitement in the past twenty-four hours.

  Something more was going on, and I needed answers. I'd never heard of Prufrock, but you don't just make collect calls down to Hell and talk with Demons. If he worked for Mephisto, he was either entitled to make decisions for the Demon Lord, or he was able to communicate with him on the fly. Either way, it meant he was a major player.

  9

  Eye of the World is a fortuneteller's shop in South City. It's in an older part of town, and everything around it has been slowly decaying away for decades. The brick building has faded from deep red to a ruddy brown, the gray motor flaking and cracked. Another ten or twenty years and nature threatened to reclaim the building for itself.

  The windows are blacked out and the All-Seeing Eye is painted on one of the windows in gold paint. It's not inside of a pyramid, like on the back of the dollar bill, but it's recognizable despite that. A neon sign advertised tarot readings and another below it showed a picture of a hand, palm out.

  The place was, from an outside perspective, a rundown hovel held together with sheer will of an owner who refused to sell. Unbeknownst to the general public, Eye of the World was the real deal. There's a lot of pomp and circumstance that goes with the territory, but the place did employ legit psychics, and it was also the home of a rather nasty informant for the magical underworld. That's what brought me around.

  I had the cabbie drop me off out front. I wasn't drunk, but I had enough of a buzz to know driving wasn't a great idea. That, and I didn't want to run the risk that something would happen to my car in that part of town.

  Pushing in through the front door, the tinkering of a bell hanging above the doorway greeted me. The smell of incense was thick in the air as I walked in. The lighting was dim, and I could see lazy tendrils of smoke licking the air.

  Doubling as an occult bookstore, the place was bigger than you would think looking in from the outside. Shelves crammed packed with a variety of different books filled the front room. There were sections on spell craft, things I'll call Wiccan lifestyle magazines and a variety of grimoires.

  A glass counter opposite the front door was filled with pendants, bracelets, quills, vials of ink, and a smattering of herbs. I saw an old school scale, like the one Lady Justice holds up, filled with bundles of sage. Billowing smoke wafted off of several of the bundles, choking the counter in clouds of smoke. Everything up front was for show. It got sold to the idiots. The good stuff was all kept in backrooms and a secret stash upstairs.

  There was a small table off to my left with two women sitting at it. It was decorated with candles, and the circular table had a pentagram painted in a bright enameled white on the top of it. The old crone flipping over tarot cards was Carol.

  Carol had thinning gray and white hair that was always pulled back into a bun. Her face was littered with deep wrinkles and crows feet jutted out from both of her eyes. She was wearing a simple blue dress that came up to the neck and the long sleeves ended in white lace that frilled about her hands.

  She'd worked there since I'd first found out about the place. Unlike most of the other people in the fortune telling business around the city, Carol was an actual hedge witch. She had just enough magic to push her will into the deck of cards. Not that she did it often. Most of the time she just took people's money and read them some mumbo jumbo. If you paid extra, though, you could get the real thing.

  The blonde girl getting her fortune told was dressed in a short denim jacket and a pink dress that barely covered her crotch. She was giggling as I walked in; no doubt amused at something Carol had told her. When the bell sounded, both women looked up at me.

  The blonde was older than I would have thought. She looked to be in her late thirties, clinging to a lifestyle she should have given up years ago. She disregarded me and turned back to the table. Carol, on the other hand, stared up at me with her old blue eyes.

  I don't think Carol likes me very much. To be honest, I'm not sure why. Usually, I can tell you what I've done to gain someone's disdain, but with Carol, I drew a blank every time.

  I paused long enough to give her the nod, and then, I walked through the room to the door behind the counter. I heard the scraping of chair legs on wooden flooring as Carol pushed back from the table. I looked over and saw her getting out of her seat.

  “Hey, what are you doing? You have to finish the reading.”

  Carol turned back to the blonde woman sitting in front of her. She looked down at the cards.

  “You'll find true love within a fortnight. Look for a man dressed in black. He'll come with the dawn.”

  The woman looked down at the cards, seeming confused.

  “What? You just said that I needed to move on. What changed? Was it the King of Cups?”

  Carol huffed. “Yes. The King of Cups in the reversed position. It changed the reading. Now, we are actually closing the shop down. You'll need to leave.”

  The woman looked offended.

  “What? I just got here a few minutes ago. I wanted to look around.”

  Carol reached into some hidden pocket and pulled out a wad of cash.

  “Here, take your money back for the inconvenience. Now please, you must leave.”

  “What about him?”

  The blonde pointed at me when she said it.

  “Me?” I said. “I'm just here to see if any of you are interested in learning more about the benefits of solar energy. We live in a time where the power of the sun is finally a viable option.”

  Carol rolled her eyes. The blonde just cocked her head like a dazed golden retriever.

  Carol practically pulled her from the chair and pushed her towards the door.

  “I apologize for the inconvenience. We'll be back open tomorrow. If you need anything else at all, you can feel free to come back then.”

  “I don't think I will. I don't like the way I'm being treated. I'm a paying customer.”

  “Not anymore.” I said.

  Giving up the polite routine, Carol opened the door and shoved the woman out onto the street.

  She threw the deadbolt and turned back to glare at me. The blonde must have got back to her feet because the glass shuttered as she pounded on the outside of the door. She screamed a variety of curses and hit the door over and over again. I waited, something was going to break, didn't matter if it was the glass or her hand.

  “She’s probably going to leave a nasty Yelp review.” I said.

  “You owe me a hundred bucks.”

  I smiled.

  “Put it on Balthazar's tab. I'm here on business.”

  Carol looked me up and down.

  “You're working with Balthazar again?”

  I nodded.

  Knowing I was here on business seemed to placate her. I was hoping that Balthazar still did a good amount of work with the shop. He had five years ago, and I couldn't imagine why he would have stopped. Still, I was happy to be right, being wrong would have been embarrassing.

  “You look like shit.” She said.

  “You look like you died
twice already.”

  The matronly looking woman gave me the classic devil horns, followed quickly by a gnarled old middle finger.

  “I need to see him.” I said.

  “He isn't going to want to see you.”

  “Feeling's mutual, but it's gotta happen.”

  I turned and walked to the door behind the counter.

  “Fine. It's your funeral.” She said.

  “Not today.”

  I climbed the stairs to the second floor of the shop. The upper level was dimly lit like the one below it, but it was devoid of the wafting smoke and reek of incense, the smoky smell replaced with the hint of lavender in the air.

  Cresting the top of the stairs, I turned left. The old wooden flooring squeaked and creaked beneath me as I walked, sneaking up on someone in an old building is next to impossible.

  I didn't knock when I reached the door. I should have, but I knew that it would annoy the hell out of him. I figured since he wasn't going to be happy to see me anyway, I might as well be a dick. Turning the handle, I felt the slow ooze of magic seeping into my skin as the door cracked open.

  The door led into a modest office. It was lit by a series of lamps, their yellow light throwing shadows at different angles around the room. A small oak desk sat in the middle of the room, a series of black filing cabinets lined the walls. There was a single window behind the desk, the panes behind had all been painted black long ago.

  Sitting behind the desk was Ted. Ted is a gremlin, a minor Hellion. I don't know what his real name is. Gremlins can be controlled by anyone who speaks their true name. That makes them pretty skittish.

  The little green bastards usually root around sewers and parking garages in bigger cities. They're pack rats, finding junk and taking it back to whatever hovel they are calling home. Ted was peculiar among Gremlins in that he had a decent head on his shoulders. He was old and had given up scavenging other people's trash long ago. Now, he made his money as a fence for stuff that you shouldn't be able to buy. He specialized in magical artifacts and information, the evil kind.