Soul Catcher

by Bridger, Leigh

  I swallowed my fear and said cheerfully, “We’ll find you a new ax. Even it’s just an ordinary one, it’s better than nothing.”

  He feigned a smile. “Ay, ’twill be all right. I’ll feel fine soon as I get a weapon in my hand.”

  We ran to the bike.

  *

  When we reached the outskirts of the city I steered the cycle off the main drag and took a maze of isolated two-lanes. At a mom n’ pop convenience store I turned in and parked. “I’m going to call the gallery. I have to take the risk. I’m worried about everyone.”

  “Ay, I’d like to hear that all are well. If they stayed in the gallery under Sheba’s protection they should be fine.”

  Ian followed me inside. Pay phones are rare as these days, but the old man at the counter pointed us to a scruffy unit in a corner between the donut racks and the soft-core porn.

  I punched the gallery’s main number. No answer. I tried the phone in Charles’ pottery studio. Nothing. I didn’t risk leaving a message on the answering machine. As I hung up the phone I looked at Ian worriedly. “They’d answer if they were there. This scares me, Ian.”

  His face grim, he nodded.

  Tap, tap, tap. The sound of a knuckle rapping on thick glass. Tap, tap, tap. We looked around quickly. The ATM machine was located on the other side of the porn rack.

  Leonidas’s angular face looked out at us. He rapped his knuckle on the glass again. Ian and I crowded up to the screen. Hi, I mouthed. I assumed he could see us. Leo drew his finger tip in a horizontal line on his side of the screen. Words sprang up.

  Trouble. Dante left the gallery last night to pick up groceries but came back acting odd. Left again this morning. Everyone’s worried. Went looking for him downtown. Sheba and I think it’s a trap.

  I wasn’t sure how to communicate. Finally I put my finger on the screen and drew invisible words on the glass. We’re going downtown to find them.

  Leo scowled then drew another line with his finger. Dangerous. I’ll alert some friends. I’m putting the word out that a true soul catcher is joining the game. I never doubted you. Not much, anyway.

  I replied, Yeah, sure.

  He shrugged but smiled. The screen returned to normal.

  “That damned ATM ain’t working right today,” the old man said as we left. “Must have got a bug in it.”

  “A big one,” I agreed.

  *

  We heard the drums even through our helmets. Asheville throbs with rhythm at Pritchard Park on Friday afternoons from spring to fall. On a good night there are several dozen musicians of every race, sex, age and creed, seated or standing in a semi-circle on the wide steps of the park’s small amphitheatre. The energy is incredible: a mind-hooking, rhythmic boom and clatter as sweaty people pound waist-high djembes and big congas, women in dreads shake gourd rattles, rednecks whack cow bells and kids paddle their little bongos or beat an occasional snare drum.

  Crowds of old hippies, dopers, young slackers, bums and white bread citizenry gather to listen and dance in one big, excited stew of community jiggyness.

  Ian and I parked the bike in a nearby alley. The pulse of the drums pounded our ears. We stepped onto a sidewalk, furtively studying the strolling downtowners for anyone trying to hide claws, wings and fangs. Asheville’s most venerable office buildings towered over us.

  A steel door opened slowly. Service entrance. We side-stepped it, expecting an after-work secretary or sales rep to pop out. But there was no one there. I glanced into the dark interior and saw two large, silver eyes looking back. They blinked. No face. No body. Just a pair of eyes floating in the dim light. I’d heard there was a soul catcher and a soul hunter patrolling the city, a voice said, but I could barely hope it was true. Soul hunter, I’ve been told you need an ax to use? I can open the emergency fire box for you.

  I put a hand to my heart in thanks. So did Ian.

  With the red Asheville Fire Department ax tucked blade-down in Ian’s backpack, we walked up the sidewalk to Pritchard Park. The crowd numbered at least two hundred, filling the tiny downtown green space with a clapping, gyrating street party. Asheville police officers supervised the event casually, chatting with the street people, chilling.

  “Oh, feck,” I said in a small, anguished voice. The officers were a problem, but they weren’t the main reason my blood congealed.

  “Ay, dammit,” Ian whispered.

  Gigi, Sarah and Charles stood stiffly, huddling close together, under the park’s main tree. Trapped. Pale. They looked like they’d been roughed up. At least two-dozen banes surrounded them. The banes squatted around them like weird monkeys or hung from the tree limbs over them. Some even hunkered by their feet, clutching their ankles so they couldn’t try to run.

  “We have to get closer before we make a move,” I whispered. “And don’t pull out your ax unless I need help. It’s hard to explain an ax-wielding man to the Asheville PD.”

  “Ay.”

  “Those officers are watching everyone. If they recognize you or me from Detective Beaumont’s alerts . . . ”

  “Illusions,” a voice sang out. “Get your fresh, hot illusions right here.”

  We looked over. A young, tattooed street preacher, standing atop a low plywood box, waved us closer, using his Bible like a scoop. The slightest glow surrounded his earnest boon face and clean-cut boon outfit—rumpled khakis and a tie-dyed Jesus Saves t-shirt.

  “What would you be suggesting?” Ian asked him solemnly.

  The boon waved the Bible over Ian. “And the Lord said, let the soul hunter look like a little blond man in knee shorts. With an overbite.”

  “Oh, feck,” Ian said.

  The boon swooped his Bible over me. “And the Lord said, let the soul catcher look like an obese grandmother in a sundress that shows the big moles on her arms.”

  “Oh, fuck,” I said.

  “And the Lord said, let the soul hunter’s ax look like an umbrella.”

  Ian scowled. “Do no’ be messing with my weapon.”

  “Chill out,” I told Ian. To the boon I said, “It’s still an ax under the illusion, right?”

  “The Lord says yes, it’s still an ax.”

  “Hallelujah, brother.”

  The boon nodded to us. “Go ye and confront the devil on our terms, not his.” He lifted his arms and his Bible to the sky and shouted, “Because the Lord told his disciples, Heal the sick, cleanse the leper, raise the dead and cast out the demons.”

  We walked on. “Am I waddling?” I asked. “Do my moles have hair growing out of them?”

  “Only a few short sprigs. And as for me?”

  “I don’t mind the buck teeth so much. But your scrawny knees really suck.”

  He grunted his amusement then reached over his shoulder, grasped the ax handle sticking up from his backpack and pulled out an umbrella. “This makes me a wee bit worried.”

  “Ay,” I admitted.

  We made our way through the crowd in the park. Gigi, Sarah and Charles looked stoic but tormented. A bane slithered its clawed hand inside Sarah’s peasant skirt, and when she kicked at it another bane pinched her hard on the arm. All of this happening in the middle of a crowded event where regular people saw only three twitchy, unhappy looking adults huddled under the tree.

  Gigi snatched one of her potion vials from a front pocket of her overalls. Banes grabbed for it but she popped the lid off and flung one of her herbal powders at them. Two banes screeched and fell to the ground, rubbing their eyes, but others grabbed her around the waist and legs then shoved her against the tree trunk. A third one reached down from a limb and slapped her in the head. When Charles lunged at them two large banes grabbed him around the throat while Sarah punched them uselessly.

  My heart twisted. At the same time a raw new feeling rose up inside me. It was time to do my job: To protect the innocent of this world from the sleaze balls of the other ones.

  “Let’s rock n’ roll,” I told Ian.

  “Meaning?”

 
“Attack the banes.”

  “Ah! Ay.”

  There we went; a roly-poly grandma sprinkled with moles the size of prunes and an anemic blond guy with rabbit teeth, carrying a fucking umbrella.

  Gigi and the others, unsuspecting, looked at us askance as we reached them. “Folks, you probably don’t want to join us under this tree,” Charles said politely. “We’re dealing with some personal . . . some personal demons at the moment.”

  “Oh, I dunno,” I drawled. “Looks more like to me that y’all got yourselves a nasty infestation of ectoplasmic yard apes.”

  Ian jabbed a bane with the tip of his ax slash umbrella. “Let go of my friends, you filthy fecker.”

  “Ian and Livia!” Gigi squealed.

  Two dozen banes, hunched on the ground or hanging from tree limbs, whirled toward us with startled red eyes. Their jowls and beaks and muzzles and lipless holes parted in shock.

  I drew a bead on the tree division first. “I see you,” I said. “I banish you.”

  The tree filled with dark sparkles as every one of them burst apart.

  The ground division scattered like terrified squirrels. Ian chopped two to sparkling pieces and hit a third with an agile toss of the illusionary umbrella. I waddled after the rest, pointing and pronouncing. “You’re gone. Fuck you, too. Go to hell. You, too. Bye, fucker. Feeling lucky, punk? Don’t. Yeah, that’ll do pig, that’ll do. Here’s looking at you, bane. Hey, Rosebud, say hello to Kane. Howdy, bane-bro. Squeal like a pig, would ya? And you? Fuck you up the ass. Because nobody puts Baby in a corner.”

  Quoting old movie lines made me giddy with small victories and stupid with overconfidence. The surviving banes escaped into alleys between the restaurants and shops.

  I could have enjoyed my creativity if I weren’t terrified that Pig Face lurked around a corner somewhere. And where was Dante?

  “Livia,” Ian called. He grabbed me by one arm.

  “Livia?” Gigi cried. She and the others crowded around Ian and me. “Is it really you guys?”

  Sarah stared at me, then Ian. “The boon who disguised you two certainly has a sense of humor.”

  Charles hugged me then clapped a hand on Ian’s shoulder. “Come on. People are staring. All they saw was our little group making a lot of strange motions at thin air.”

  “And Livia wandering through the bushes pointing and muttering,” Gigi added.

  I raised anguished eyes to theirs. “Where’s Dante?”

  “We don’t know,” Sarah admitted.

  The five of us hurried down Patton Avenue, turned right and walked quickly. A few minutes later we darted into the privacy of a big parking deck. There were only a few cars on our level, and no other people around. “We’ll go back to the gallery and get a plan together,” Sarah ordered, huffing as she dragged Gigi by one hand and me by the other.

  I looked over at Ian. The illusion had worn off. He was back to normal—big, brawny, bearded. “Thank God, it’s you again,” I said hoarsely.

  His newly blue eyes lit up. “’Tis good to see your old self again too, love.”

  The others cast curious looks at us. Gigi burbled, “Livia and Ian bonded while they were gone! I’m so happy!” She pressed a hand to the heart of her black overalls with pink trim.

  A dark figure stepped from behind Charles and Sarah’s van. We all halted.

  “Dante?” I whispered. His black t-shirt was smeared with grass stains and a dark mystery blotch on one shoulder. His dark chinos also had stains and a tear in one knee. The ebony sheen of his face showed a red scrape on one swollen cheekbone.

  Gigi rushed forward. “Are you all right?”

  He took her in his arms. “You bet, sweetheart. Just chasing Pig Face all over Asheville, that’s all.”

  Sarah and Charles frowned at him. “Where have you been?” Charles asked.

  “I didn’t want to worry you all. Last night at the store I earjacked a couple of banes whispering about Pig Face. I’ve been tracking him.”

  Charles frowned harder. “I want to hear the details, but let’s go back to the gallery first, where it’s safe.” He pointed at an old, oversized, Econovan with a magnetic sign on the driver’s door that said Ablehorn Folk Art Gallery. Outsider Art For The Insider Soul.

  Dante sighed. “I didn’t want any of you to come looking for me. I was trying to take care of Pig Face by myself.”

  Dante, who preached teamwork, had become a loner, suddenly?

  An icy glove closed around me.

  I was not the rookie who’d said goodbye to him when Ian and I headed to the mountains. My perceptions were stronger, my instincts more practiced. I had traveled to the dark side of my past and returned with a far keener sense of trouble.

  I looked at Dante and knew he was lying.

  Ian stiffened beside me. We traded a careful glance. Yes, he suspected trouble, too.

  “But you’ve always preached teamwork to me,” I said, frowning. “You can’t take down a demon by yourself.”

  Dante’s dark eyes flashed. “Sweetheart, we all have our mission in life. Don’t question mine.” That sounded curt by Dante’s laidback standards. As if he realized he was being a douche, his face softened. “Look, your situation is personal to me, all right? I can’t play it safe.”

  I stepped closer. “I know the truth, now. You were my father in the seventeen hundreds. And you were my dad in this life, when I was a kid. You’ve probably been my dad in a lot of lives, always fighting for me, always willing to die for me—and for Gigi, and Sarah and Charles, and Ian. The demon who stole my mother’s identity pushed you off a cliff at Ludaway Ridge when I was ten years old. I thought I’d never see you again. But you found a way to come back into my life when I needed you most. You’ve been trying to take care of me here in Asheville the past few years. Are you still my dad?”

  “Yes,” he said softly. “I’m dedicated to tracking you down in every life.” He had one arm around Gigi. He opened the other to me.

  “No time for hugs,” Ian said quickly.

  “Just a quick one.” He’s got Gigi.

  I felt Ian’s ax hand twitch as he touched my arm. Take care.

  I slid into Dante’s embrace and pressed my face to his shoulder. I shut my eyes and searched every sensation.

  The stink of evil rose in my brain.

  Get away from him, Nahjee whispered.

  I can’t desert Gigi.

  Tabitha added a shrill warning. He will kill you both.

  Dante kissed Gigi’s head. She smiled up at him, completely fooled. Then he kissed the crown of my head, almost as if he were tasting me. He smiled at the group. “Follow me into the stairwell over there. We need to discuss a plan for confronting Pig Face. I agree that standing out here in the parking rows isn’t a good idea. Let’s get some privacy.”

  “No,” Ian said. His hand went over his back and gripped his ax handle. Asheville FD was stamped on the handle’s butt.

  Dante studied that emblem, his eyes gleaming. “What happened to your anointed blades?”

  “I think you ken what happened to ’em, you fecker.” Ian pulled the fire ax from his pack, positioning it with lethal grace, his legs shifting into a power stance.” Let go of Livia and Gigi, or I’ll split you like kindling wood.”

  Charles and Sarah, who had been staring at the scene in growing alarm, gasped as the truth sank in. “Let them go,” Sarah ordered. “If there’s anything left of Dante in that body, I’m talking to him. Dante, listen to us.”

  “Honey, Dante’s gone,” Charles said hoarsely. “I can sense it now. He’s not there.”

  The thick arms of Dante’s body tightened into a strangle hold around mine and Gigi’s necks. He glared at Ian. “Throw that puny ax, Soul Hunter, and I’ll crush their throats.”

  Gigi’s expression collapsed into horror. She struggled and rasped out, “Livia, how could I have been so stupid . . . ”

  “Let her go,” I ordered, strangling, coughing. “You’ve got me. That’s enough.”

&
nbsp; Pig Face laughed loudly. “I intend to kill all of you.”

  He backed toward the stairwell, dragging Gigi and me, squeezing harder every time we struggled. Gigi’s eyes rolled back. Stars flitted across my vision. As my sight dimmed I saw Ian closing in on us, his face carved in rage and frustration, the ax raised but frozen.

  Sarah started for the van.

  “Stop, bitch, or I’ll kill them,” Pig Face warned again. “Don’t bother getting a gun.”

  Ian called over his shoulder to Sarah and Charles, “He means to trap us all on the stairs. Keep back, I’ll go. Just me.”

  Pig Face sneered. “You don’t make the rules, Soul Hunter. You never have.”

  A huge, flying bane materialized in and caught Ian’s ax with pronged feet. Ian wrestled him.

  I tried to raise an arm and to call out a banishment.

  Pig Face choked off my air. He continued dragging Gigi and me into the stairwell. Sarah and Charles followed us doggedly.

  They’ll all die for me. Just like always.

  The bane jerked Ian’s ax free then sailed out of the parking deck with the ax in his grip.

  Ian leaped down the steps behind Sarah and Charles. Another bane suddenly blocked their way. A big one, ten feet tall, a furred Sasquatch with a head like an alligator. It bellowed.

  I waved my weakening hands. Beside me, Gigi was already slumping, her face going blue. Be gone, I gasped through numb lips.

  The bane exploded, but was instantly replaced by another bane, larger, looming over Ian and the Ablehorns.

  On the landing below us, howls of hungry glee arose. More banes, heading our way.

  “Poor Livia,” Pig Face said to me, kissing my forehead again. “After the others are dead I’ll take you some place private. You always die after such slow and interesting tortures. I look forward to watching.”

  I could hear Nahjee and Tabitha trying to pierce the fog in my brain, to keep me conscious, but it wasn’t their guidance I needed now.

  It was my own.

  Through all the past lives, the mistakes, the unending stubbornness to go it alone, came a surrendering and a new understanding. Asking for help in a desperate situation was merely obvious and convenient, not a sign of true wisdom, and would never save us. But welcoming our friends to the fight, and embracing them as partners, would. They were part of me. Facets of my soul.