“So it tried to fuck you?” Roy asked.
“I don’t know,” Steven said. “The feeling I got was that it really wanted me to want it. Like it wanted me to be on its side. It wanted me to give myself over to it, willingly. It was a secuction.”
“To willingly let it fuck you?” Roy asked. A patron in the booth next to them turned to look at Roy.
“Will you keep your voice down?” Steven asked. “It wasn’t about the sex. It was about desire.”
“You have a desire to be fucked?” Roy asked.
“Will you drop the ‘fucked’ part?” Steven asked. “I’m trying to tell you what it was like. Stop concentrating on that.”
“Damn hard not to,” Roy said.
“It was a mind fuck,” Steven said. “Like how it twisted Robbie’s thinking. I actually considered stabbing myself. I thought it was a great idea. If I’d taken that swallow of protection two seconds later, I might be dead on my kitchen floor right now.”
“Christ!” Roy said. “What do we do?”
“I’ve been reading up on that,” Steven said, taking a sip of coffee and pulling a book out from his jacket. “Judith’s book. There’s more inside it than just the book itself. Turn to where I’ve marked.”
Roy took the book and turned the pages to Steven’s bookmark. He started reading the page. “What am I looking for?” Roy said.
“Didn’t it pop out?” Steven said, looking over the top of the book.
“What pop out?” Roy said, tipping the book top down so Steven could see it.
“Huh,” Steven said, looking at the pages, which appeared normal. “Can I have it back?”
“Sure,” Roy said, handing the book back to Steven. Steven closed the book and reopened it to the bookmark. The new book appeared. He tilted the top of the book down so Roy could see it.
“Look,” Steven said. “This book pops up within it.”
“Wow,” Roy said. “Didn’t pop up for me.”
Because it’s only intended for me, Steven thought. “I’ll bet it’s responding to my markings,” he said.
“Oh, now there’s special books for you, too,” Roy said sarcastically.
“I read most of it this morning, while I was waiting for you to wake up,” Steven said. “It basically describes how to handle a demon. It says once you’ve formed a connection with one, you only have two choices: either submit or resist. You can’t break the connection and you can’t kill the demon. You can only give in or make yourself unpalatable.”
“Unpalatable?” Roy asked. “Like your markings?”
“I think Aka Manah is an old demon,” Steven said, “and I don’t think he’s as afraid of my markings as most demons. I think he’s encountered my type of markings before, and he considers them a challenge. And I think that’s why he’s interested in me. The challenge of it.”
“Could be,” Roy said. “Like people who play with snakes, even though they know how dangerous they are.”
“Exactly,” Steven said. “He gets off on it.” The image of the demon’s erect phallus entered Steven’s mind. He shook his head to clear it.
“I hope you’re not basing any of this on what Evie had to say,” Roy said. “I don’t trust Evie. She’s so enamored with Vohuman. Perhaps it’s some kind of a trick. Why trust a demon whore?”
The people in the booth next to them turned to look at Roy again.
“Would you please keep your voice down?” Steven said. “There’s kids eating in this restaurant. You’re going to get us thrown out.”
“Demon whore,” Roy repeated, whispering.
“I don’t trust her either,” Steven said. “But there’s no disputing the fact that something is after me. I don’t know if it was Aka Manah, or Vohuman, or something else. But I get the feeling it’s not going to let go until I deal with it somehow.”
“So if your markings aren’t enough to scare it away,” Roy said, “then what?”
“This book seems to understand it,” Steven said, pointing at it. “It describes demons being drawn to the markings and being repelled by them at the same time. You have to use the markings, but there are things you need to do to give yourself an advantage.”
“Like what?”
“Well, one thing it suggests is amplifying them.”
“Amplifying?”
“Yes,” Steven said. “They’re strong enough to frighten away normal demons on their own, but like I said, not old powerful ones like Aka Manah. You have to amplify the effect of the markings on him, or he’ll not back down.”
“How do you do that?” Roy asked.
“That’s where I’m going to need your help,” Steven said. “The book describes a three-step approach. First you get the demon into a setting where it’s comfortable. That makes it lower its natural defenses, which sets it up for the next step. When it approaches you, you ‘shock’ it with an amplification of the markings. The demon has an extreme reaction, going from a relaxed state to a stressed state. Apparently they hate that.”
“That’s enough to get it to back down?” Roy said.
“No,” Steven said. “You have to make sure it echoes. That’s the third step.”
“Echoes?” Roy asked.
“When the amplification is done, the demon’s biology resets back to the relaxed state almost immediately, but within a split second the demon goes on alert, and is no longer relaxed. At that point the amplification won’t shock it nearly as strong. You have to shock it again, before it goes on alert. Each time it relaxes you have a split second again to attack and achieve the extreme reaction. It’s like an echo, you can attack the thing a hundred times very quickly before it can react. According to this book, it’s effective. I get the feeling the book was written by someone with experience.”
“How do you amplify it?” Roy asked.
“I do it with my mind,” Steven said. “But there’s a substance I have to ingest in order to be able to do it. There’s an ingredient list in the book.”
“And the echo?” Roy asked.
“Mirrors,” Steven said. “You position the demon between mirrors when you do it.”
“Of course,” Roy said, becoming enthusiastic about the idea.
“That leaves the place,” Steven said. “I have no idea where you’d do this, where a demon would be comfortable.”
“I do,” Roy said. “I know just the place.”
“Where?” Steven asked.
“Tell me the ingredient list,” Roy said. “We have to be sure we can get them all.”
Steven flipped the book to the pages that contained the items they’d need for the amplification. He read them off to Roy, who nodded his head at each one. When he was done, Roy smiled.
“There’s only one item I’m worried about getting,” Roy said, “but I know I saw some at Eliza’s when we were at her house in California. Remember her third floor lair?”
“Yes,” Steven said. “But she’ll want to know what we want it for.”
“We’ll tell her,” Roy said. “Then she’ll want to come up and help. And we’ll accept her help, because this is going to be tricky to pull off.”
◊
Eliza was to arrive on a flight that evening. Steven and Roy used the day to read through the entire book within the book, Steven reading aloud to Roy since the book wouldn’t appear for Roy.
They took breaks, and Roy mixed up more protection. Steven asked him if he could watch, and to his surprise, Roy agreed. Sure enough, the concoction was mostly vodka. Roy was insistent that it be Popov.
“That would explain the burning,” Steven said. “Could you use a better vodka, something top-shelf?”
Roy glared at him. “I’ve been making this protection since before you were born. It’s what’s protecting you from a demon that wants to fuck you. Why would you want to change it?”
“How many times do I have to tell you it doesn’t want to fuck me?” Steven said. “What it wants are my hands, like Robbie, and it’s trying to get me to give in without
a fight. And I thought if you used, say, Grey Goose or Belvedere maybe it wouldn’t burn as much going down.”
“If you think I’d pay that much for vodka you’re crazy,” Roy said.
“What if I chipped in the difference?” Steven said.
“You’re messing with the recipe,” Roy said. “Shut up and watch.”
To the vodka Roy added a variety of ingredients. He seemed to be eyeballing them all, except for one that he took extra care to measure out very precisely, using a very tiny spoon.
“Remember when I told you about that mineral purchase I and Dixon made from Jurgen?” Roy said as he dropped the contents of the spoon into the liquid in the Mason jar. “Well, this is it. I discovered this gives it a pep.”
“A pep?” Steven asked.
“Everybody makes protection their own way,” Roy said, “usually the way their parent or whoever winds up training them shows them how to do it. The way I’m showing you is exactly like my father’s way, except for this mineral.”
“What made you decide to change your father’s recipe?” Steven asked.
“Not change,” Roy said. “Enhance.”
“Enhance then,” Steven said. “How did you figure out the mineral would pep it up?”
“By accident,” he said, placing a lid on the Mason jar and swirling the ingredients around inside. “Mine shaft in Utah. I thought I was chasing a ghost there, but it turned out to be something from the evil side of the fence, as you put it. This mine was unstable, and pieces of the walls would fall as I walked through it. Lots of abandoned mines like that in Utah. I had just swallowed some protection from a canteen I brought in when a section of the roof ahead of me dropped, billowing up a huge cloud of a thin, white powder. I couldn’t help but inhale it. I noticed I felt stronger. So I stopped and took a sample of it, so I could have it analyzed and figure out what it was. I experimented with adding it to protection until I got just the right amount, which is why I measure it out carefully whenever I make a batch. It’s goddamn expensive. And, if you use too much, you have hallucinations and you become useless.”
“That’s why you wanted to buy a large quantity from Jurgen?” Steven asked. “A lifetime supply?”
“Exactly,” Roy said. “That and I wanted to buy in bulk for a cheaper price. You know, like Costco. I have enough to last you and Jason for years.”
Steven stopped for a moment. He tried to imagine showing this process to Jason, and he couldn’t. I still don’t know enough, he thought. Until today, I didn’t even know how to make protection. I’m still a million miles from being prepared to tutor him.
“Buying from Jurgen was a mistake,” Roy said, “but at the time I didn’t know where else to go to get it. Dixon and I were young, and we didn’t know many people with the gift. Since then Dixon has met a lot more people, and keeps track of them, better than I do. What do they call that, when you meet lots of people and then meet their friends? There’s some word people use to describe that nowadays.”
“Networking?” Steven asked.
“Yes,” Roy said, “that. He has a lot of people in his network. There’s a lot of places we could go now to get more if we needed it, from legit dealers, not scum like Jurgen. We didn’t know any better at the time.”
Steven watched the liquid slowly settle down inside the Mason jar as Roy stopped swirling it.
“Do you think you could make it, if you needed to?” Roy asked.
“I think so,” Steven said. “Of course I don’t have all the ingredients.”
“I want you to start collecting them,” Roy said. “After we’re past this mess, I want you to make your own batch and see how it works.”
“Then I can try a good vodka instead of this shit,” Steven said.
Roy glared at him again, then softened. “I improved my father’s formula, so you will too. But wait to do it until we’re in a risk-free situation. Don’t mess with what works when we’re in the middle of the shit.”
“Makes sense,” Steven said. He picked up the bottle and held it up to the light. The liquid was clear; he couldn’t see any particles in it.
“Everything dissolves completely,” Steven noted.
“That’s the Popov,” Roy said. “It’ll eat through anything.”
◊
“It was bound to happen,” Eliza said. “And it’ll happen again. You’re going to run into a lot of strange things as you return these books, Roy. You’ll see a lot of things you normally wouldn’t run into.”
“I suppose,” Roy said. “But I’m sure you run into lots of strange things down in California with your barrier, no?”
“Oh, I do,” Eliza said, smiling at him. Her wildly chaotic hair was even more wild, having survived the plane flight from Sacramento. She leaned back into the sofa at Steven’s house and sighed. “Sometimes I’m amazed at the characters that try to dig things up inside the barrier. I wasn’t sure if you were prepared for the variety of characters you might run into, that’s all.”
“Comes with the territory, I guess,” Roy said.
“Are we allowed to talk openly about your barrier here in my house?” Steven asked. “I have a few questions. I don’t want to violate my oath.”
“I appreciate your concern,” Eliza said. Steven and Roy had taken an oath to not reveal anything about Eliza’s work in California, and he wasn’t sure if he could discuss it openly in front of her given their current circumstances. “We shouldn’t discuss California unless we’re in a protected area where others couldn’t overhear us. I’m guessing your house isn’t protected, in light of the recent demon appearance.”
“Not to mention Ben’s death here,” Steven said. “My house is probably still full of bad mojo.”
“You should consider getting it professionally cleaned when this is over,” Eliza said. “I know some good people who could do it for you that are experts. They can tell you right up front if they can do it, or if your house is beyond hope.”
“Really?” Steven asked. “Beyond hope?”
“It’s rare,” Eliza said, “but some houses are. They’re better off torn down. They can tell you. In the meantime, I can institute a temporary protection. It’ll only last a short while, and we’ll have to converse in the River in order for it to be private.”
“Let’s do it,” Steven said, closing his eyes. Soon he slipped into the flow, seeing both Eliza and Roy. He glanced around the house, looking for signs of trouble or the demon from last night. Everything looked normal.
Within a few moments, Steven felt that the consistency of the flow around him had changed. He saw Eliza open her eyes, and they started communicating.
We’re OK to talk now? he thought.
Yes, she thought back. We’ve got a short while to talk openly.
I wanted to ask you about demon fighting in general, given your operation in California. What do you think of our plan? Do you think it will work?
What I’m doing in California, she thought, is a little different than this. The demon buried there has been underground for centuries. It was buried by others; I don’t have any direct experience with how they incapacitated it enough to bury it. The people I work with now are all focused on keeping people away from it – that’s one of the reasons for the barrier.
As if it could be set free, if someone could get at it? Steven thought.
Yes, Eliza thought. Exactly. So my experience has been all about that. I’ve never had to face the thing directly, since that work was accomplished years ago. As for your plan, I can only guess that the book you’ve got here is correct. It seems consistent with other things I’ve read about demons. I know they can be shocked, I’ve heard of people doing it. But I’ve never done it, and I’ve never seen it done.
I wonder if there’s a way to bury Aka Manah, Steven thought, the same way that your demon was buried years ago?
It was done by people with greater knowledge than I, Eliza thought. It might have been a whole team of people who had been trained for generations to fight it.
They might have been executing a huge plan. I don’t think we’ve got that kind of firepower here. If your plan is enough to put Aka Manah off so he moves on to easier targets, you should go with it. It’s something we might be able to achieve. I don’t think any of us has the expertise or ability to actually kill or bury it. We’ll have to stop talking about the California demon now, I can’t keep the protection going much longer.
Steven let himself slip out of the River and soon Roy and Eliza joined him. He felt a sharp pain shoot down his back; the exit was more painful than normal. Maybe because of the protection Eliza was using, he thought.
“Where did you want to do this?” Eliza asked.
“Well,” Roy said, “maybe you’ve heard of this place in Japan, it’s a forest at the foot of Mt. Fuji. People go there to commit suicide by the hundreds. The tops of the trees form a canopy that makes it hard to know where you are, so it’s easy to get lost. Years ago the Japanese would abandon their elderly there to die. The ground is riddled with holes into the earth, a result of volcanic flow. It’s said the place is a home to demons, because of the deaths and because of the holes.”
“Japan is a long way away,” Steven said.
“What many people don’t know,” Roy said, “is that there’s an American equivalent, right here in this state.”
“I’ve never heard of it,” Steven said.
“That’s because the authorities quashed it before it could become popular, like the one in Japan,” Roy said. “The Japanese try to discourage people from killing themselves in that forest, but it’s become too well known to suppress. There are signs encouraging people to remember their families, contact help lines, that kind of thing. When people began to kill themselves in the forest here in Washington state years ago, the state government kept it quiet so it wouldn’t become an attraction.”
“Where is it?” Eliza asked.
“It’s just like Japan,” Roy said. “It’s a forest at the base of Mt. Rainier. It’s got a canopy that makes it easy to get lost, and the ground is full of volcanic holes. Hundreds of people died there more than forty years ago. It’s east of Eatonville. It’s had the same reputation for demons as the one in Japan, to those of us who know about it. I can’t think of any other place close by where a demon would be more comfortable.”
The Suicide Forest (The River Book 5) Page 13