by J. P. Rice
I asked, “What about the other two sorcerers?”
Felix answered for Fukutama, “They joined much later, around the time when the Seven Sorcerers were officially formed. They wreaked havoc around Japan until they needed new areas to torture. I can’t understand why they chose Pittsburgh and why they kidnapped Cyclone Woman.”
I explained to him about how it could be a bigger plan to draw Great Grandmother out to end the world. Fukutama agreed that the Seven Sorcerers could be trying to end the world. That wasn’t the confirmation I was looking for. Controlling the weather locally was one thing. Ending the world was a whole other issue.
How could I find Great Grandmother? Could I keep her safe until all this was over? I didn’t even know where to look. Stupid. I should have asked Blodeuwedd to find out where Great Grandmother was.
I finally asked the real question on my mind, “So how do we use the Blood Goblet to defeat the sorcerers?”
After a long pause, Felix said, “We need to fill the Goblet.”
Was that a joke? “Excuse me? Fill the Goblet with what?” I asked, unamused.
“Blood,” Felix clarified.
Right. How silly of me. That was why they called it the Blood Goblet. “Whose blood do we need to fill it with? One of the sorcerers?”
Felix immediately responded, “Shuten dōji.”
I stood up out of the hammock. “You’re saying we need to fill this with the blood of an immortal demon?”
Felix nodded while maintaining eye contact with his mentor. “That is correct. You will need to travel to Japan and traverse Mount Oe. You need to go to Shuten dōji’s castle.”
Of course. It couldn’t be any other way. “This is a joke, right? I can’t be going to Japan. I need to stay local in case...”
Felix translated, “You need to find a lodging house on the south slope of Mount Oe. There you will find a guide named Okumura. He can get you to the castle on the vanishing slope. From there you will need to draw enough blood from Shuten dōji to fill the Goblet and bring it back here.”
“I still don’t understand. Will that give the Goblet power so that we can use it against the sorcerers?”
Felix explained, “No. If they put a curse on Cyclone Woman, she needs to drink the blood of Shuten dōji to reverse the spell.”
Nasty. “Won’t it be rancid after all that travel?”
“No,” Felix stated loudly. He went back to his normal tone. “Shuten dōji’s blood in the Goblet will not make anyone sick. Magic will preserve it until it is consumed.”
Good old magic to save the day as usual. “That’s cool. Does this give us any advantage over the Seven?”
“It does not,” Felix said plainly as he shifted around. It looked like his ass was falling asleep. “He says we are going to have to use our entire arsenal to defeat Shuten dōji. He said it wouldn’t be a bad idea to recruit someone to go with us.”
“Do you know of anybody?” I asked Felix.
The mage spoke for himself, “I might be able to gather a few names. But I can’t pay them. And for something like this, these people will want to get paid.”
Of course. “It’s almost like you know I have money now and are trying to insinuate that I should pay them,” I hinted with the subtlety of a spiked club.
Felix turned to me with his all white eyes, and said, “I’m just saying that I don’t have that cash. You can do whatever you want.”
“We’ll talk about that later,” I said, gesturing with my head toward Fukutama. “Is there anything else we should know before we start setting up the particulars for our little vacation? And don’t worry Felix, I’ll pay for your plane ticket too.”
The old man chuckled and Felix talked over it, “He says there’s not much else to say. It’s time to take action. And good luck.”
I bowed to the wise man. “Thank you. Do you want to come with us, Fukutama sensei?”
Fukutama chuckled again, and Felix said, “He says he would love to get back to Japan, but that he would only slow us down. Okumura will do that enough for the both of them. He’s laughing inside our private room. I don’t get the joke.”
Me neither. I knew finding the Goblet was too good to be true. Nothing could ever be simple in my life. Speaking of which, I had to get home to my son. Who was going to watch him when I went to Japan? I was stuck in a horrible position.
I could quit as the magical guardian of Pittsburgh and risk the wrath of the Celtic Gods. Or be an absentee father. There didn’t seem to be any middle ground on the issue. Hell, I had just found out five minutes ago that I had to travel to Japan. Had to. I said ‘had to’ because if I avoided the responsibility, people would lose their lives.
Kobayashi could be orchestrating the ultimate destruction of earth right now. I wasn’t about to bring my son along for a ride like that. It would be nice to have someone to help out with the responsibility. Someone steady. Someone like a wife.
I couldn’t even believe I was entertaining the thought about giving up on Burn. However, I had to start thinking about Dante’s future. It wasn’t just about me anymore. I needed to get my mind back on the case.
Japan, huh?
Chapter 13
Kicking a branch off the dirt path, I cleared the way for Reg. I couldn’t believe I was hiking through Trillium Trail with my best friend who had been paralyzed for decades. It had seemed like an odd request at the time, but the vampire had wanted to hike during daylight.
As we got moving again after a short break, Reg powered ahead, setting a brisk pace. His Eastpack backpack didn’t slow him down one bit as he pumped his arms to aid his power walking. I wondered how deep into the woods Reg wanted to go as we passed the huge boulder on which I had talked to Blodeuwedd.
The beaten path had disappeared a while ago and we headed deeper into the drab brown forest, speckled with dull green. A patch of moss on a fallen tree trunk brightened things up momentarily until we returned to the vapid scenery.
I planned to leave for Japan in a few days. Jonathan was letting Felix and me use one of his private planes to get to Japan. He’d even offered up his limo service to get us to the airport. Before I left, I wanted to spend some time with Reg before I left to help him through his rough transition into a vampire.
Reg finally tired out and leaned his forearm against the trunk of an oak tree as he caught his breath. “It’s nice out here.”
I spoke through my heavy breathing, “Yeah...it’s not bad at all. For it being winter.”
Reg pulled a knife out of his hip pocket and opened the blade. What the hell was he doing? He stood up straight and began to hack away at the trunk. “I always wanted to do this. Mark my territory.”
I didn’t exactly get his sentiment, but he kept chiseling through the bark and into the trunk. A few minutes later, I recognized the faint outline of a capital R. “So I’ve got to go to Japan. You ever been there?”
“I did some training there.” Reg stopped for a second and scratched his temple with the handle of the knife. “On one of the little islands. Shit, I can’t remember the name now. I guess it was over forty years ago. I do remember they liked to eat horse. Why you need to go there?”
I explained, “I have to fill the Blood Goblet with the blood of an immortal demon. Apparently, he lives in Japan.”
Reg laughed and went back to his carving. “It’s always something with you. I wish I’d never done this stupid vampire shit. I could still be going on adventures with you.”
“We all have to live with our decisions.”
He slowed down his knifework and turned to me. “Speaking of which, has that implant been giving you any problems lately?”
“Not really.” I didn’t want to tell him about the rough times. He didn’t need to hear that. “Maybe the demons forgot about me. That would be nice.”
“I assume they have a good bit of stuff going on. More pressing matters might have come up. Hell, if I were you, I’d be trying to cause trouble to create a distraction for them to d
eal with.,” Reg suggested, and I liked it.
“Not a bad idea. A diversion. That’s something to think about. Thanks.”
Reg shrugged his shoulders as he continued to mark his territory. “Least I can do. You accepted me, wheelchair and all, when we first met.”
That was an odd thing to bring up out of the blue. “I didn’t think that was exactly noble. Just decency.”
“Decency is evaporating by the second in this world. My son viewed me as a burden because of the chair. Then you, a perfect stranger, were willing to take me anywhere to do anything I want.” Reg turned away and mumbled, “I’m not going to get all sappy, but thanks. It meant a lot.”
I waited for the buzzing sounds of the locusts to die down, and said, “I see it with Dante. The looks some people give him makes me want to beat the shit out of them right there on the spot.”
Reg used his shirt to clean off the blade of the knife, and locked eyes with me. “People are scared of that which they don’t understand. I still need to meet the little guy, but if you explained him accurately, he’s different. Most people don’t like different. Times are a lot better now, though. I grew up during the civil rights movement. That was a true struggle on a systemic level.”
I could only imagine what it had been like for Reg. “America wasn’t ready to accept people of another race back then and they don’t seem ready to accept a demon these days. I’ve learned that not all demons are bad, but I can’t make everyone else understand that.”
“And you never will.” Reg took a step back and inspected his work. “People need to come to that conclusion on their own. Some never will. Racism is still alive in America. Some people will never accept equality. It infringes on their tenuous hold of power. You can’t convince everyone.”
I missed our talks. “I know. It just hurts me when we walk past a group of people who have their eyes popping out of their heads and are whispering about my son.”
He brushed some of the scraps out of the high relief R that stood out on the tree trunk. “That just means you care about Dante. And you should. I was going to yell at you about growing up and stopping all the whining, anyway.” He laughed. “It looks like you are headed down that path right now. Growing up, young blood.”
I kind of took offense that he was calling me a whiny bitch, but it was time to grow up. “It’s weird. And I can’t even have a drink to relax since the Gods made me take that pill that erases my magical prowess if I have a sip of alcohol.”
Happy with his work, Reg tucked the blade back into the black handle and stuffed the knife into his pocket. “Are you sure it wasn’t a placebo?”
“Maybe. I’m sure I don’t want to find out the hard way. I needs my magic,” I said, aiming for a joke. Reg didn’t laugh. In fact, he was shaking and pulling on his earlobes.
Reg turned to me with a crazy fire dancing in his eyes. Almost snarling, he said, “I need you to do me the biggest favor of my life.” Thick white spittle shot out of the corners of his mouth. It was like a switch had been flipped. Like he was suddenly under someone else’s control.
He dug around in the backpack and extracted a wooden stick. Upon closer inspection, it was the sharpened wooden stake from the backseat of my car. Why had he brought that in here?
We locked eyes and he extended the stake toward me. “If you’re my best friend, you will do this. Right here. Right now. It’s time to stop fucking around. I can’t take it as a vampire. It’s tearing me apart and I’m going to go crazy soon. Fucking take it,” he demanded in a guttural throat and held out the stake.
I took a step back, keeping my hands at my sides. “What the hell? You were just fine a few moments ago. What happened?”
His forehead wrinkled and his nose scrunched up. Coupled with the crazy look in his eyes, he was scaring the shit out of me. He stated, “This is what I am. I can hide the killer for a while, but he always escapes his cell. I can’t keep him locked up. He always finds the key.”
I needed to get this train off the rails before we ended up in Crazytown. “Slow down for a second and relax. Fucking breathe. There’s no way I’m going to kill you. No way.”
He pulled the stake back and mumbled, “I thought you were my friend.”
I hadn’t realized this was a friendly activity. “I am your friend. And you know what. Friends don’t kill friends. It’s just not something they do.”
He tilted his head to the side and softened his tone, “Even if their best friend is suffering. And it would be the best thing for him. I wouldn’t be asking if I wasn’t a danger to all your innocent citizens you’ve been tasked with protecting. If I escape that Purple House and cause some destruction, you’ll be forced to kill me then.”
That was one hundred percent correct and not something I wanted to think about right now. “Don’t say that.”
“Why? It could happen. Then you would be forced to do it under much bleaker circumstances. I’ve lived a nice long life and maybe it’s time for me to move on. Being immortal just isn’t for me.” He extended the stake toward me again.
I took another step back and waved my hands in front of me. “If you just ride it out for another few months, you will be fine.”
He stepped closer to me, leaned in and spoke gruffly, “Listen motherfucker. You better do this shit. Because if you don’t, I’ll find someone who will. And then I’ll come back and haunt your ass for the rest of your days.”
He sparked anger in me. I didn’t like being threatened, no matter who was hurling it. But this was my best fucking friend. Eckkkk. So confused right now.
His hand lashed forward and he jammed the stake flat against my chest. “Come on. Do it. Put this monster down.” The white foam built up on his lips and the corners of his mouth, making him look like a feral beast.
I threw my hands up and backed away. What had just happened? We had just been having a great conversation and it had turned on a dime. “There’s no way I’m doing this. You’ll thank me later. Trust me.”
Reg’s eyes widened and bulged, somehow making him look even more insane than before. “Fuck you. How about that?”
“Sorry Reg, you aren’t going to insult me into doing it either.” I turned to walk back to the car as a sudden pang centered in my calf. I wanted to continue walking, but my body stopped. No. Not the fucking implant now.
I turned around, staring blankly at my best friend. Words came from my mouth, “Fuck it. I’ll do it.”
What? No. That’s not what I wanted to say. Please. Stop. This.
“That’s my man.” An evil smile started with his wrinkled chin and washed up over his entire face, lighting up his eyes like a jack-o’-lantern. “I knew I could count on you.”
I kept walking toward him. The demonic implant had taken full control of my body functions. A warm rush ran down my pant legs and I looked down to see my clothes darkening. Those cruel puppet masters were having fun with me. I tried to force myself to stop and run the other way. Wasn’t happening.
I grabbed the stake out of Reg’s hand and firmed my grip. Reg said, “Now you gotta hit my heart or it won’t kill me for good. The only way I can never come back is if you hit my heart. Don’t miss. I want off this train completely.”
“I won’t miss.” Who was saying that? How were they manipulating my words and actions?
I placed the sharpened end of the wooden stake under Reg’s ribcage on the left side of his chest. Staring into the glossy, bloodshot eyes of my best friend, I wanted to cry. I’d become a monster. Not Reg, the vampire. Me. The supposed guardian of the city now had a stake in position to end the life of one of my citizens.
Reg should be using this stake on me. I was the danger to society. Why couldn’t I tell him that?
Instead, I broke the skin of my best friend and burgundy blood oozed out onto his white track jacket. What was I doing? I sunk the stake in a few inches and Reg gasped and his eyes rolled back momentarily. The demons weren’t satisfied with that and caused me to drive the stake in further. Clo
ser to his heart.
Reg coughed, and blood flowed from the corners of his mouth. My erstwhile best friend started to shake, but I kept a firm grip on the stake. I drove the stake in further and I could have sworn I felt it pierce Reginald Danforth’s heart. The warm blood of my best friend streamed down over my hand forever staining it in shame.
Reg dropped to his knees and I let go of the stake. He coughed again, expelling a spritz of blood that stained the belly pocket on my hoodie. I stood there and watched my best friend dying right in front of me. I didn’t help. I didn’t call for help. I watched. The implant made me watch every second of my treachery.
I wanted to cry, but my tear ducts wouldn’t oblige. Reg collapsed on his side and ripped the stake out of his chest. He just looked at the pointed end, soaked in blood. He asked, “Why’d you do it?” Then his spastic movements suddenly came to a disturbing halt.
Why had I done it? He’d asked me to do it. No, begged me to do it. I really didn’t need that phrase to fuck with me for the rest of my life. But it appeared I deserved it. Something should haunt me for what I’d just done.
My mechanical movements guided me to Reg’s backpack. I unzipped it wide and pulled out two little garden spades from my trip to West Virginia. Reg had grabbed those off my backseat too. He’d known exactly what he was doing in organizing this hike.
With the implant still in control of me, I began to dig a grave in an area of Trillium Trail that nobody normally ventured into. It still left me vulnerable that someone could find it on a random hike. Or if the vampires called the authorities to investigate. Nevertheless, I continued to dig the hole.
About an hour later, or it could have been a few hours, I completed the grave. I kicked Reg into the hole with the same delicacy as throwing away a defective inanimate object. I was a monster. Plain and fucking simple.
I threw the stake and the backpack into the grave and began to fill it back up with dirt. I still couldn’t cry, although that was the only thing I wanted to do at the moment. Like a soulless machine, I filled in the hole and stomped the dirt down. Finally, I scattered some brush and dead leaves over the grave to hide it.