Jack/Obidiah doesn’t seem fazed by my outburst. He casually rights Reece’s chair, squeezes his shoulder and whispers something in his ear, and then he pulls up a chair for himself. He lowers himself into it with grace and decorum. “Good evening, Friedlander family.”
The waiter hurries over with another menu before any of us can say anything more but Obidiah waves it away. “I won’t be needing that, thank you.”
Mom’s busily smiling at Obidiah across the table although I can’t fathom why. This is the devil worshipper who was behind the death of her husband and her parents, yet she’s grinning at him as if he’s a minor celebrity come to join us for dinner. “Hello, Jack. You must be Ellie’s friend. It’s so nice to meet you.”
“Mom! His name isn’t Jack! This is Obidiah. Didn’t you hear what Reece said?” I turn on my brother, who is now staring with undying devotion at Obidiah. “Why didn’t you tell me that this was how he’d disguised himself this time around? Reece, I’ve been dating him!”
“Huh? He looks the same as he’s always done. There’s no disguise.” Reece’s voice is sing-songy and far away. I know I won’t get any real sense out of him while he’s like this. Obidiah has always been able to manipulate Reece, to render him into this vaguely catatonic state by his mere presence. The dark demon attached itself to Reece when he was only a toddler and at his most vulnerable. It seems his hold on him is still as powerful as it ever was.
“Hey, Jack.” Organza flips her hair over her shoulder and smolders a sexy glance at Obidiah. She’s obviously forgotten he gave her the cold shoulder at the coffee shop the other day. She’s also plainly taking no notice of the fact that he’s not who he said he was.
Honestly, I’m ready to jump up onto the middle of the table and scream like a lunatic. Why isn’t any of this getting through to my addle-brained family? Choosing to give up on the entire useless lot of them for the time being, I turn my attention back to Obidiah. “What do you want from us?” I hiss. “Why can’t you leave us alone? Haven’t you done enough?”
His lips twitch with amusement. “My, my. How the worm has turned. It feels like only yesterday that you were moistening your lips and batting your eyelashes at me.”
Ugh, that actually sounds sick, especially with the underlying coating of sleaze he’s added to his words. “Only because you purposely deceived me. You know if you ever appeared in front of me in your real form I’d probably vomit right down your throat.”
“Ewwww, Ellie.” Organza fans the menu in front of her face. “You’re revolting. Can’t you at least pretend to have some manners in front of our guest?”
“He’s not a guest. He’s an insidious lurker trying to weasel himself into the inner sanctum of our family. What do you want, Obidiah? Are you finally going to man up and tell us?”
His eyes flash, red and dangerous, but he keeps that smug smile glued on his face. “I thought that would be obvious to someone of your own advanced intellect.”
I make sure to drop a shit-ton of sarcasm into my reply. “Seems you thought wrong. Looks like you’re going to have to make yourself clear for once in your sorry un-life.”
His lips curl back, all pretense at a smile now gone, and I catch a glimpse of sharp yellow fangs. “In that case, I’ll give it to you straight. I want you. I want you to suffer as no one has ever suffered before.”
“Yeah, but why?”
“Because it annoys me to my back teeth that I’ve never been able to break you.”
I have to admit that I’m fleetingly left speechless. There is so much venom and hate behind his comments and I’m at a loss as to what I ever did to him to incur such targeted acrimony. However, I don’t know why I’m trying to see reason in his statements. The guy’s a demon. Reason and logic escape him.
Obidiah solemnly bows his head at Reece, who is still gazing at him with adoring puppy dog eyes. “Happy birthday, young master. It has been a pleasure to serve you over the past two decades, although I fear that as your childhood recedes so must I.” He slides his eyes toward me, no longer bothering to hide the red glow in their depths. “Good evening, Angel. I’m happy to tell you that we aren’t quite done yet.”
Then he’s gone – he’s quite literally gone. He was there one minute and the next minute his chair is empty. I bang my fist down hard on the table in impotent anger, drawing a cross look from the waiter and whispers from the other diners. “Christ on a Crouton! What are we going to do?”
“Ellie!” Mom shoots me a disapproving look. “Watch your blasphemy.”
“Mom, we’re dealing with a Satan Botherer here, a Devil Worshipper, a Demon Fiend. I think blasphemy went out the window a long time ago. Did none of you hear what he said to me?”
She purses her lips in so tight that I think she’s about to turn herself inside out and says nothing.
“Okay.” It’s clear she’s not going to allow us to move on until I backtrack with my cussing. “Just for you, Mom, I’ll revise what I said. Jiminy Crickets and Six Little Rows of Violet Pansies, what are we going to do?”
“Maybe I can ask Dixie to help. I’m meeting him for a coffee tomorrow morning.”
“Since when has a small town cop ever helped any of us? Mom, can you hear what you’re saying?”
“What’s wrong with Reece?” Organza is waving her hand frantically in front of Reece’s face. His eyes are glazed over and he’s grinning inanely at nothing as he slowly comes down from his Obidiah high.
“He’ll come right. He always does this when he’s around Obidiah.” I’m suddenly so mad at my family that I want to strangle them. “How have you never noticed!??”
Organza glares at me as she signals to the waiter that she’s ready to order. “Pull your head in, Ellie. You’ve always been so damned bossy. I don’t know what you’re on about. Jack Hemlock is charming and he’s so far out of your league it’s not funny. You should be groveling at his feet, not screeching in his ear.”
“He’s not Jack…” I grab Reece and roughly shake him. “Reece, wake up. Tell Mom and Organza who just popped in to say happy birthday.”
He blinks at me for several seconds before he slowly comes back to himself. He smiles happily across the table at Mom. “That was my friend Obidiah. He always told me my 21st would be a very special birthday.”
Chapter Thirty
We somehow make it through dinner although I have no recollection of eating anything. My mind is working at one hundred miles an hour. I can see that my family aren’t going to be any help with this. Who can I call on this time around? Father Lucerne has long since passed on to that great chapel in the sky, my old friend Dave never really understood the demon-zombie aspects of my life, and Mr. Devall nearly gave himself a stroke with the stress of the whole Bedeliah Farnsworth thing.
I’m nervous as we leave the restaurant to walk home, constantly glancing over my shoulder to make sure we’re not being followed. Mom, Organza and Reece are oblivious to the danger we’re in and it doesn’t help that I appear to be the only one who can see Jack Hemlock for what he really is. Well, Reece does see him as Obidiah but then the demon has never revealed himself to my brother in his truly evil form. It’s all part of his cunning plan to entrap Reece’s mind and make him bend to his will.
I make sure my family is safely inside the house before I go to the kitchen to collect some things together. I take a candle and matches from the drawer, fill a small crystal bowl with water, touch my fingers to the gold cross around my neck, and walk back to the door. “I’m just going outside to look at the stars,” I say cheerfully, but no one is really listening as they squabble amongst themselves over which TV shows they want to watch. Television and its dubious attractions is deeply ingrained in this family. We were stuck in that house on Cemetery Hill for so long that it became an indisputable fact of life.
Once back outside in the darkness of the evening, I touch my cross again and mumble the Lord’s Prayer under my breath. “Our Father, who art in heaven…” I make my way over to where
the silver birch trees are gently whispering and swaying. I set the bowl of water down on the ground, light the candle with shaking hands, and settle myself down on the damp grass. I repeat the Lord’s Prayer twice more for luck, rub the tips of my fingers against the cross, and call up into the branches. “Jane? Are you there? I need your help.”
A wind picks up then, a dancing breeze that teases the candle flame, rustles the leaves, and lifts my hair from my neck. I try again. “Jane, I need to defeat a demon operating in the guise of a man. I’m sure you know plenty about those sorts of scenarios. Can you help me?” I dip my hands in the bowl of water and throw a few sprinkles around, although I’m not really sure why I’m bothering. It’s certainly not holy water – it’s recycled water from Euthanasia’s water treatment station – but it does make me feel a little better.
Something moves under the ground beneath where I’m sitting, sending me jumping to my feet. I stoop down, using the candle flame to light up the area, and I’m amazed to see the tree roots writhing like a bunch of tangled snakes. “Jane? Is that you?”
There’s a small flash then, not much bigger than the blaze of a newly lit match, but I’m not sure if it comes from behind me or beneath me. “Jane?”
Seconds later, I hear a woman’s voice. “We’ve been expecting you.”
“Jane Oakleigh?” I step back into the shadow of the house and watch in amazement as the slim, slender silver birch trees transform into four gowned and hooded women. The tallest one inclines her head politely. “Greetings. This took far longer than it should have. We told your brother to tell you to invite us in.”
“He did mention it, but I think something got lost in translation. Your constant tapping on the window was also kinda disconcerting so I can’t say I was in too much of a hurry to throw the doors wide open and offer you tea and cake.” To be honest, I’m not sure if I should be scared. I’m effectively conversing with four dead witches and who knows what they’ll do next?
The other women shuffle up to stand close behind Jane like three shawled and hooded musketeers supporting their captain. She glances at them before speaking again. “We’ve wanted to help since you first moved in.”
“So the old stories are true? About the rift, the Sacral Decree, and the zombies?” I’m trying to be courteous by not stepping up and staring into the women’s faces, but I’m dying to see what witches look like up close. A morbid fascination with the new smoky smell in the air is also driving my curiosity. I’m not sure if it’s candle smoke or the faint whiff of a long ago bonfire still clinging to the women’s clothes.
“All true. This was the very spot on which our fate was decided, the place where the ill-deeds of men decided the sorrowful future of Euthanasia.” The other women nod and whisper amongst themselves.
“And you’re all real witches?” This is compelling stuff.
“Define witches. If you meant to ask if we were women who knew our own power and thus confounded the minds of men, then yes. You could call us witches in that instance.”
“And you’ve just been hanging around acting like trees ever since the trial and bonfire?”
Jane laughs. It’s a pleasant, tinkling sound and I get the impression that Jane must’ve once been a fun person to be around. “We come and go.”
“Yeah, I did notice you weren’t here when I walked out the other day. Where do you go when you leave?”
“Here and there,” Jane says vaguely. “We do get small breaks. Anyway, enough about us. What do you want us to help you with? Is it anything to do with the dark entity who’s been shadowing you ever since you first stepped foot in this town?”
Ugh. I’m not sure if I want to hear this. They can only mean Obidiah but I ask anyway. “What entity?”
Jane moves slightly, shifting her face into the full light of the candle for the first time. She’s a sweet-faced woman, with round cheeks and blonde curls peeking out from beneath the hood of her robe. Probably about the most un-witch-like person you ever did see. “The dark one from ancient eras. His red eyes give him away immediately.”
“How ancient? From before your own time?” I’m interested to discover more about Obidiah. Most of the conversations I had with him while he was pretending to be Jack Hemlock centered on his love of historical places and on gothic buildings scattered across Europe. Maybe this quartet of witch ladies can through some light on his history.
One of the other women, a slender lady with her dark hair worn in long plaits, speaks for the first time. “We have a lot to tell you and it’s cold out here. Are you going to invite us in?”
“Um, I guess so.” I wondering how I’ll explain my four new friends to my family, especially as the women are dressed like extras from an outdoor scene of Pride & Prejudice. “Could be a little crowded in there. I’d take you through to my bedroom but I’m sharing it with my sister.”
“We’ll use your brother’s bedroom,” Jane says briskly, picking up her skirts to lead the way over to the front steps. “He won’t mind.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Mom and Organza look startled as I walk in with the four merry widows but Reece barely bats an eyelid. I hustle the women through to Reece’s bedroom and shut the door behind us. They take a few minutes to ooh and aah over the wonders of the modern world that lie scattered around the room and then the other three perch on the bed while Jane sits at the desk chair and I lean up against the chest of drawers.
“It’s a very large house,” says the woman with plaits, who has since introduced herself as Maisie. “Almost as big as a rich lady and gentleman’s mansion.” Myrtle and Agnes nod their heads in agreement at their witch sister’s words.
“Nah, this is just normal for this day and age. People have grown greedier about what they have and become more size-oriented about the stuff they possess. It’s just the way the world’s gone.”
“How long has that black demon been in your life?” Jane asks, clearly keen to keep to the subject.
“Ever since my ornery old grandfather refused to listen and went ahead with building his house on top of an ancient cemetery. There was a devil worshipper’s grave among the other graves and that’s basically where it started. A room in our house was built directly above the grave. It became the Nothing Room but we eventually managed to escape from there. Unfortunately, Obidiah followed us to a house I purchased a few years back. That in turn became a Nothing House once his evilness seeped in and turned everything on its head.” This story is getting old now.
“And now here you are in Nothing Town,” adds Jane as she removes the hood that covers her head.
I feel defeated at her words but I suppose she’s right. Euthanasia, complete with zombies on the outskirts and Obidiah walking the streets is nothing but history repeating itself. Welcome to Nothing Town, where your worst nightmares are about to come true and nothing is what it seems. We are deja voodoo, we know more than you doo.
“Men,” Myrtle mutters darkly as she picks out a silver birch leaf that has caught in Maisie’s plait. “Nothing but trouble.”
Jane rolls her eyes and I get the feeling that she’s heard Myrtle stomp down this particular lyrical path many times in the past before. I guess it must be hard to find new things to talk about when you’ve spent the best part of the past two centuries rooted to the spot with the same bunch of girlfriends.
“Obidiah has got it in for me. He told me so himself. He said he won’t be happy until he sees me suffer like no one has suffered before.” A bleak wave of depression rolls over me. I think I have the right to feel a little victimized here.
“Ridiculous man. He needs to find a new hobby.” Jane is singularly unimpressed by Obidiah’s oath. I’m starting to like Jane a lot.
“So you’ve come across him before?”
“You hear a lot when you’re standing still day after day. He’s been walking this earth since he was cast out of the faith for dabbling on the wrong side of the spiritual fence. As you know, he worships the Dark Lord.”
“He was talking about an old cathedral in Germany. Was he involved with that?”
Jane nods. “Apparently so.”
“He killed the keeper of the books,” Agnes puts in. This is the first time she’s spoken and everyone turns to look at her. She’s a tiny woman with a freckled nose and auburn locks and her pale face floods with color under our steady gaze. “We all know it,” she says defensively. “It’s not like it’s a secret.”
The keeper of the books. I’m about to pass her words off as a quaint phrase from the past when it hits me like a bullet between the eyes. “The librarian? Obidiah killed Miss Oxley?” I remember the speeding pickup, the squeal of tires and the plume of smoke. I also remember the gory, creative arrangement of her body. “Did he kill her as Jack Hemlock or as Obidiah? And why?”
“He used his human disguise to get in the door but he used his dark arts to kill her by inflicting catastrophic injuries without physically touching her. He never did like to get his hands dirty. And as to why he did it, she simply annoyed him – he thought she knew too much and she’d been running her mouth off.”
“Well, she was surrounded by thousands of books. You’d have to be a bit thick not to absorb some of that knowledge.” Ugh, I feel sick to think that not so long ago I was mooning around over the murderous, demonic Obidiah. The only small mercy is that I never kissed him. I rub my hand over my stomach in an attempt to rid it of the queasy feeling.
“He might be hard to get rid of,” Jane warns. “If he’s been following you for so long he’s probably managed to build up his powers. The fact that he can now appear before the general public as a man, can walk into a library and kill a woman, and can fool you into thinking he’s your beau shows you just what he’s capable of.”
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