by J. R. Mabry
“Um…yeah. I have something to show you,” she said. In her right hand she gripped the rustic frame of the mirror. Carefully, she set it on a chair and removed a random picture from its nail. Then she hung the mirror in its place.
Brian stopped mid-shout, spatula in hand, his eyebrows akimbo. “I think that looks better up in the bedroom where I put it.”
“I agree,” Kat said. “It doesn’t go here. I just wanted you to see it.”
“Uh…that thar’s a very nice mirror,” Dylan pointed at it with his knife, which was dripping butter. “Where’d it come from?”
“I found it in the yard,” Brian said.
“In the yard?” Terry asked suspiciously.
“Leaning against the side of the house,” Brian finished.
“Anyway, we can’t hang it in the bedroom anymore,” Kat said, unsure about how to broach the subject.
“Why not?” asked Mikael. “It’s a handsome enough mirror.”
“Because I don’t want my brother watching us every time we have sex.”
It was like someone had yelled “freeze!” in a childhood game. No one spoke. No one moved. Everyone just stared at her. Kat shifted uncomfortably. “You remember my brother, Randy?”
“Idiot magickian,” Terry answered, “Comatose. Not fond of avocados, as I recall.”
“That’s him,” Kat nodded. “Except that he’s not comatose. Anymore.” She pointed at the mirror, looking vaguely like a prophet of doom in a Greek tragedy.
Nobody moved. The phone rang. Susan rolled her eyes. “Make it stop!”
“Ah don’t get it,” Dylan said to no one in particular. “Why is Kat pointing at the mirror?” He eyed Kat suspiciously. “Is this a test? ’Cuz Ah suck at tests.”
“No, just look closely at the fucking mirror!” Kat said, on the verge of losing her patience.
Terry was the first to approach it. He leaned in and squinted slightly, then jerked back suddenly. Kat saw her brother waving at Terry—at all of them.
“Hey, it’s the Addams family!” Randy called, his voice barely audible.
Terry leaned in again. “Randall fucking Webber,” he breathed. “Alive and kicking. Sort of.” He shot a look at Dylan, then at Brian. “He seems to be trapped in the mirror.”
One by one, the others got up and peered closely at the mirror. Randall met each of them with a grin and a wave.
“How is that possible?” asked Susan, resuming her place.
Terry rubbed at his chin, still not able to take his eyes off Randall. Brian turned back to the bacon, apparently just in time to save it. “Sorry,” he called, “bacon’s a little crispy. I got distracted.”
“Ah’ll say…” said Dylan, throwing his leg over the bench again, back in his place. “Can we eat yet? Did anyone say grace?”
“Grace,” said Terry, waving at Dylan. “Eat. Eat. We gotta figure this out.”
“The Lord don’t need to do nuthin’ to make me grateful for what Ah am about to receive,” Dylan said, and tucked into his eggs.
Terry speed dialed Richard and hit the speakerphone button. “Richard here,” came the familiar voice.
Terry spoke quickly and efficiently, bringing Richard up to speed. Richard whistled. “Okay, so it sounds like Randall’s spirit is trapped in the glass,” he said. “That’s why people used to cover mirrors whenever someone died, to keep that from happening.”
“I think I know what happened,” Brian said, leaning on the table and speaking up so Richard could hear. “We sent the angel’s spirit back to Heaven in that mirror, remember? When it transferred to its old body, Randall’s spirit must have traded places with it.”
“Huh…I guess that frame does look familiar. So, who brought the mirror back?” Terry asked, still puzzled.
Tobias barked.
“Has he been fed?” Susan asked.
Brian nodded. “He has. I…huh…” Brian paused and considered. “Okay, this might not seem relevant, but hear me out. I’ve been meaning to tell you all this, but every time I’ve tried I got interrupted. Tobias has been acting…strangely lately. Not sick, just…weirdly clever.”
Tobias barked and nosed at the back door. Brian pointed at the door with the spatula. “Don’t ignore him. Go watch him. Tobias, go to the backyard.”
“The screen door is shut,” Dylan said.
“Just watch,” Brian said.
“Hey, idiots!” called Randall from the mirror. “What, do you guys have the attention span of gnats or what? Don’t you think this is odd? Aren’t you going to help me?”
But no one heard him. Their attention was riveted on Tobias, who went up on his back legs, felt at the door handle with his paws, and fell forward as the door swung open.
“Well, Ah’ll be…” Dylan breathed.
Mikael picked up the cell phone on his way to the door and briefly described to Richard what had just happened.
Once outside, Tobias ran to where the angel’s body lay, barely depressing the grass beneath it. The yellow lab circled the body and barked.
“He did that yesterday, too,” Brian said.
Kat watched as Terry approached the spot where Tobias circled and held out his hand as if feeling for energy signals—which, she realized, was probably exactly what he was doing.
“What do you see, Terry?” asked Susan. Of all of them, Terry was the most sensitive to spiritual phenomena, often able to see and interpret auras. That had made Kat nervous at first, until she realized it wasn’t some kind of supernatural lie detector talent.
“There’s a shimmering field here.” He traced an outline around the grass. Terry stepped back and tried to see it from different angles. Finally, he knelt down and extended his hand to the grass. “That tingles,” he said.
“What is it, dude?” Dylan asked, still munching on a handful of bacon clutched to his chest.
“Dylan!” Susan slapped at his sleeve. “Now you’ve got to change your cassock. I swear to God.”
“Well, I could be wrong…but I don’t think I am,” Terry said. “I think what we’ve got here is a rotting angel corpse. It’s almost gone, in fact.”
“Wait, what?” Kat asked. “Can angels have corpses?”
“Well, what would you call an angel’s body when it dies?” Terry asked.
“I…” she was momentarily flummoxed. “I guess I didn’t think that angels died. Don’t they have eternal life?”
“Nope,” Terry said, getting up and wiping his hands on his jeans. “Just very, very long lifespans. Unless they get sick or are struck down.”
“What happened to him?” Kat asked.
Terry shook his head, “Can’t say.”
“So how do you explain Tobias’s behavior?” Richard’s voice called from the iPhone’s speaker.
Terry watched the dog and narrowed his eyes. A look of shock came over his face. He knelt down again. “Toby, come.” The dog trotted up to him and licked his face. Terry looked into his eyes and felt at his head. Finally, he stood up.
“Okay, don’t freak out…” he said.
“Ah am not freakin’,” Dylan said. “But go ahead and say somethin’ trippy.”
“Wait, let me try something first.” Terry faced the dog again. “Toby, noromi ol vonpho a-ai-om?”
Instantly, Tobias lay down, silent.
“Toby,” Terry called again, “noromi oiad a-ai-om?”
At this Tobias leaped up and began barking excitedly.
“What did you just say, dude?” Dylan asked.
“Well, first I asked him if a demon was in our midst.” Terry shrugged. “I think the lying down and playing dead was a no.”
“That’s how I’d read it,” said Brian, hands on his hips.
“Next, I asked if an angel were among us, and he…Well, you saw him. I’d say that was a yes.”
“Wait, are you suggesting that Toby can answer yes-and-no questions?”
“Well, he can if you speak Enochian.”
“Let’s try English,” Mikael said. “Tob
y, do you want a bath?”
Tobias looked at Mikael but only cocked his head.
“Here’s what I think,” Terry said, starting to make his way back to the house. “I think an angel brought the mirror back to us—probably because it contains Randy’s spirit. It was an act of mercy, of kindness. But before the angel could return, it died.” He stopped and looked back toward where the angel’s body was slowly fading out. “Or he was struck down.” A dark look crossed his face. “Maybe he disobeyed orders in bringing Randy back to us. Justice is swift for angels.”
“And Toby?” Kat asked.
“I think the angel knew that his body was dying, and he decided to possess the most complex living creature around at the moment.”
“Mah Toby,” said Dylan with wonder in his voice.
19
Larch breathed deep of the incense, waving it over his body as part of his purification ritual. He felt like a high school kid with a first crush. Pim filled his every thought. He knew he was obsessed; he just didn’t know what to do about it. Well, if he were honest, he did know a couple of things he could try, but the truth was, he didn’t want the feelings to go away or to diminish in any way. She thrilled him, and he hungered for her like he had hungered for no human woman. Not ever.
His hands shook as he removed the velvet cloth and settled into his meditative pose. His eyes unfocused, he gazed into the viewing stone and waited for the images to take shape. “Pim, come to me,” he called. His hands were shaking and they radiated cold.
He caught a glimpse of her gauzy shift, and he saw her ankle flash by. An ear. She’s playing with me, he thought. Giggling, she finally emerged into full view. The slit in her dress tormented him. He would have traded his soul for her to be flesh. The danger, he knew, was that she was probably aware of that. What is her real form? The thought was fleeting, and he pushed it away forcefully.
“Pim, it’s so good to see you,” he gushed.
“Hi there, handsome,” she winked at him.
“I did what you asked me to do,” he said. “I said an octave of invocations to the twenty-four guardians. It was supposed to open the gates. Did they open?”
“What do you think, Sweetie?”
“I think I did everything right.”
“You did everything just perfectly.” She blew him a kiss.
“Did it please you?”
“Oh, poop, it isn’t me you have to please, silly,” she waved him away. “Let’s just say the guardians were pleased, and when you please them, it’s always good for me.”
Larch thought he was about to cry. He would do anything to please her—anything to make her grateful to him. He wanted her to feel about him the way he felt about her. Desperate. Is that even possible? he wondered.
“And now I suppose you want something from me?” She looked down and twisted one leg fetchingly. “A little knowledge, perhaps?”
“Um…I’m just happy to have pleased you. But well, sure, if you have some knowledge you’d like to give me.” What am I, a pimply teenager? he scolded himself. Could you possibly be any more uncool? The truth was, he wanted to use her in two very different ways—ways that were in conflict with each other.
“I spy with my little eye,” she said, “that one of your birds has just flown the nest.”
“What does that mean?” he asked, his brow furrowing. But she just winked, and that was all.
20
Charlie—the magickian formerly known as Charybdis—knocked on the door of the friary, his bags piled on the porch next to him. He turned to watch as the cab driver pulled away, no doubt still grumbling at the lack of a tip.
No one answered. He knocked again. Still no answer. He walked to the large picture window and, shielding his eyes, peered inside. He saw the living room, and the chapel in the distance, but no living soul was stirring.
Hesitantly, he tried the front door. It opened with a soft “click,” and the heavy door swung open easily. He shrugged as he started to move his bags into the foyer. “I guess I can come in,” he said to himself. “I live here now, after all.”
Intuitively, he gravitated toward the kitchen, the main hub of activity in most houses. No one was there. Food was laid out, and places were set. It looked as if an entire household of people had been raptured in the middle of breakfast.
Not sure what to do, Charlie sat with his back to the wall and just waited.
“Charybdis?” said a tiny voice near his ear.
He turned his head but saw nothing.
“Charybdis…Charlie, it’s me. Randy.”
Charlie’s head spun, trying to discover the source of the voice. Finally, he caught motion in the mirror. Randy was there waving at him, standing by the stove. He turned and looked at the stove, but Randy was not there.
He looked back to the mirror. “Randy?”
“I am, it seems, only in the mirror,” Randy smiled at him, but it was a pained smile. “I didn’t expect to see you here. Actually, I didn’t expect to see a lot of things I’ve seen since I got back. But what are you doing here?”
“Why are you in that mirror?”
“Um…I don’t really know. I think it’s this or death. So, while I’m not happy about it, I think I prefer this.”
Charlie nodded, not really understanding, but understanding enough to agree.
“And you?” Randy asked. “My sister has apparently fallen in with a bunch of Jesus freaks who are turning her brain to mush. I’m really not happy about it. So why are you here?”
“I’m moving in. I’m…I left the lodge.”
Randy looked shocked. “Larch must be furious.”
“He will be when he finds out.”
“But why are you moving in here?”
“I’m going to join their order.”
“What? Are you fucking crazy?” Randy put his hands on his hips, looking angry. “Have these people put a spell on you and Kat? Are they magickians or witches?”
“I think that’s a complicated question when it comes to them,” Charlie said. “But no, I don’t think they’ve put any kind of a spell on us. In fact, I’m sure of it.”
“So, what are you and Kat doing here?”
“Um…I can’t speak for your sister, but my guess is that this is the only place in the world where she feels safe right now. I know that’s why I’m here.”
“Safe?”
“Oh, Randy, you have no idea what we went through after you…well, you went to Heaven, I guess. How was that, anyway?”
Randy rolled his eyes. “Oh my God, it was unbearable. Very uncomfortable. I have to say, I’m bummed to be stuck in a mirror, but I’ll take that to being in Heaven any day.”
“Was it Heaven that was so uncomfortable, or the fact that you were in a body that you…well, that you weren’t made for?”
Randy thought about that, but he didn’t have time to answer before the back door slammed open and Tobias rushed in, the housemates immediately behind him.
“Charlie!” Susan called and gave him a hug. He stiffened, not used to affection. “Are you here for breakfast?”
“I’m here.” He didn’t know what to say. “I’m here.” He left it at that.
“Well, if you’re here, you’re eating,” Brian said and put a fresh plate in front of him.
“Okay, so I’ve got a question,” Kat said. “If the angel is inhabiting Toby’s body, why is he happy and active? When that other angel was inhabiting Randy’s body, he could barely move for days.”
“What? Who was inhabiting my body?” called Randy from the mirror, but only Charlie heard him.
“The situation is different,” Terry explained. “Toby is still in there; the angel is residing as a guest. Hanging back and watching most of the time, I’ll wager. I mean, Toby is still really excited about kibble and belly rubs, which, I would imagine, the angel would not be.”
“It’s kind of like my situation with Duunel,” Richard’s voice emitted from the speakerphone.
“Right,” said Ter
ry. “So, it’s the angel that knows how to work the door handle and understands Enochian. But it’s Toby that wants to sniff your crotch.”
“I don’t know,” objected Brian, goosing Terry’s butt. “We know very little about angel fetishes.”
“That sounds like a great fantasy for nookie night,” Terry said, leaning up and planting a wet kiss on Brian’s lips.
“Oh for God’s sake,” moaned Randall in Charlie’s ear.
Mikael resumed his place in the doorway, but Charlie could see he was scowling. Suddenly, he perked up like he had an idea, and a moment later could be heard pounding up the stairs.
“We need a plan,” called Richard’s voice from the speakerphone.
“Right!” Terry said, sitting back down at the table and picking up a piece of toast. He spread jam on it while he spoke. “Who’s doing what today?”
Everyone looked at Dylan. He shrank back as if someone had just brandished a torch in his face. “Okay, stop looking at me that way!” he yelled.
“It’s your job to make assignments, mon capitaine!” Terry said.
Dylan stared at the remnants of his breakfast, apparently paralyzed.
“Okay, fine, I’ll do it,” Terry said. “Someone has to plan Bishop Tom’s memorial. I’ll do that this morning. This afternoon, I have pastoral visits to make for Trinity North Church. Richard, you find us a new bishop.”
Mikael walked back into the room, holding a small guitar amplifier and some wires. “That’s harsh,” he said to Terry. “Who died and made you prior?”
“Dylan is falling down on the job, so someone has to take up the slack,” Terry said defiantly. “Things have to get done. It’s sad that Bishop Tom is dead and we need to mourn him properly, but if we don’t get episcopal oversight immediately, we’re out of business here. Now, true, we own our building outright, but we have bills to pay, and property taxes are due in a couple of months. So, we need to get cracking.”