by N. P. Martin
Ray stepped over beside Sanaka, leaving me standing with Blaez by my side and Barney perched on my shoulder. "Driven by desperation," Ray said, gesturing at me. "My nephew did something extremely foolish and nearly lost his soul forever."
"Again?" Sanaka said deadpan.
I couldn't help making a face at him. "Ha ha, Sanaka," I said. "I think what Ray meant to say was, go and get the sake, please. If you don't mind, that is."
Sanaka held up his hand, and a clear glass bottle materialized into it. Ray went to grab it straight away, but I used my magick to snatch the bottle out of my mentor's hand and into my own before Ray could get his fingers near it. "What happened to respecting your elders?" Ray asked.
"I nearly got eaten by the bastard cross of Cthulhu and a fucking angler fish," I said as I uncorked the bottle. "I need this." I stuck the bottle in my mouth and took a large swallow of the fiery liquid inside. It burned its way down my throat and into my still anxious belly, going some way to dousing the flames of fear that still danced in there. Putting the cork back in the bottle, I tossed the bottle over to Ray, who reflexively caught it with magick first before wrapping his hand around it.
"Who is your new pet?" Sanaka asked as he stared at the barn owl on my shoulder.
"This is Barney," I said.
Ray laughed. "Barney," he mocked. "Give me a break."
"I didn't fucking name him, Ray," I said. "Margot Celeste did. The owl is her familiar."
"Ah yes, the witch," Ray said. "And where is she? I'm assuming since you went to find her that your current predicament is down to her."
"Baal took her as well," I said. "And I don't blame her for what happened. Everything is Baal's doing. He took Leona because he thought I had betrayed him."
"And did you?" Ray asked.
I sighed and shook my head. "I wanted to help Margot."
"You slept with her, didn't you?" Ray said casually before tasting the sake.
I looked away for a moment. Ray and Sanaka exchanged glances. "He would have taken Leona anyway," I said, not very convincingly, not even to myself. Baal could just as easily have kept his word if I'd just done what he asked instead of allowing myself to get bewitched by someone I hardly knew.
What a fucking amateur I am, I thought.
Sanaka looked at me then with a rarely seen sympathy in his dark eyes as if he had just read my thoughts. "Come," he said. "You can make us tea. The ritual will calm you."
The last thing I wanted to do was make fucking tea, not when every moment that passed meant more pain and suffering for Leona in the Underworld. But I was wise enough to know that I wouldn't be able to pressure Sanaka or Ray into doing anything until they were ready. It had been firmly established by then that I needed their help to rescue Leona. There was nothing I could do except wait for that help.
"Fine," I said eventually. "But Blaez and Barney aren't big tea drinkers. They need water. And Blaez is probably hungry so get him a steak. And a mouse for Barney. You got any mice in the fridge?"
Sanaka looked at me as if he didn't know if I was serious or not. Eventually, he just nodded. "I'll see what I can find."
Blaez had already walked over to Sanaka's side in anticipation of the steak he was about to chow down on. I told Barney to go with Sanaka as well, and the barn owl flew over and landed on my mentor's shoulder. Sanaka flinched slightly as the bird of prey landed on his gleaming black turtle neck. I wasn't sure, but I didn't think he was a big fan of birds. Something about being attacked by a flock of ravens one time.
"Alright then." I grabbed the sake from Ray on the way past and headed for the tea room. Before I got there, though, my phone rang in my pocket, and I pulled it out to see who was calling. It was Brentwood, and I suddenly realized that he would probably be phoning about Leona. "Shit." I clicked accept. "Brentwood."
"Creed, finally," Brentwood said, sounding more agitated than usual. "Don't you ever answer your damn phone? I've called you a dozen times in the last twenty-four hours."
"I've been busy."
"Doing what?"
"I don't think that has anything to do with you. What's up?" A pained look came over my face as I asked the question for I knew what was coming.
"Have you seen Lawson?"
"Leona?"
"How many other Lawson's do you know? Yes, of course, Leona. She's disappeared. I tracked her phone to Morgan County, but there's no sign of her. Is she with you?"
"Eh, no. She's not with me."
Brentwood sighed sharply. "Well have you seen her?"
"Not since she left for New York." I took no pleasure in lying, but I wasn't about to tell Brentwood the truth. He hated me enough as it was.
"Shit!" Brentwood lapsed into angry silence. "I'm beginning to worry something has happened to her. The case she was working on in New York was a difficult one."
"Difficult?" I said, still pretending like I didn't know a thing about Leona's whereabouts.
"The killer is a fucking sorcerer. You know what it's like hunting you people. You're all dangerous and unpredictable."
"You people?"
"You know what I mean. I'm concerned that whatever psycho she was chasing may have taken her somewhere. Leona's the toughest damn soldier I have, but even she's no match for magick on her own. Can't you track her somehow? She's your girlfriend, after all, Creed."
"Yeah," I snapped. "Thanks for reminding me. I'll call you if I hear anything. Bye, Brentwood."
I angrily stabbed the disconnect button with my thumb, and then in a fit of rage, I threw the phone as hard as I could at the wall down the end of the corridor. "Fuck!" The phone smashed into pieces against the wall, bits of useless plastic scattering across the polished wood floor.
When I turned around, I saw Ray at the far end of the hallway, standing there staring at me. I stopped and held his gaze for a moment. Then I walked off into the tea room.
Sanaka and Ray arrived into the tea room five minutes after I had started the tea making ritual. Both men, shoeless as I was now, knelt down at the low table and proceeded to sit in silence for the entire time it took me to finish the ritual. That was Sanaka's way of restoring calm. He disliked emotional turmoil, explaining to me many times over the years that it clouded judgment, as well as the flow of magick. I couldn't disagree with him on either front, but Sanaka had been around for a long time. He and Ray had had plenty of time to get a hold on their emotions. I didn't think I would ever get a hold on mine. By their very nature, they took me by surprise every time.
By the time I had finished arranging everything on the table and had knelt down between Ray and Sanaka, I felt a lot calmer than before. Most of my emotions had been brought under control, though that horrible sense of guilt still gnawed at my belly, giving me a sickening feeling that I did my best to ignore.
Besides, I told myself. The best way to alleviate guilt is to make up for it somehow. In my case, the only way to do that was to save Leona from eternal torment at the hands of an evil demon. And to do that, I first needed a plan to do so, which meant hearing what Ray and Sanaka had to say first.
The three of us sat in continued silence for several more minutes, sipping tea, each of us slightly lost in our own thoughts. It was Sanaka who finally broke the silence when he laid his gaze on me. "I will take you to the Underworld so you can try to save Leona," he said in a quiet, measured voice.
I looked back at him for a moment, more grateful than I could say to hear him tell me that.
"I will accompany you as well," Ray said. "There's no way I'm letting you two go there without me. You'll need my help."
Sanaka looked at Ray. "You forget I spent a long time in the Underworld myself."
"I know," Ray said. "But if you're going to take on Baal, you'll need my help. My magick. And to tell you the truth, I'm not even sure if we three will be enough to take down a demon like Baal."
Sighing, I shook my head. "Listen, this is too dangerous for--"
"Stop," Ray said, cutting me off. "Don't even say it,
August. I don't care how dangerous it is. I'm not letting you go there alone."
Sanaka nodded in agreement. "He is right. We are...family."
I have to say, a lump formed in my throat when I heard Sanaka say that. It was the first time he had ever referred to me--or to anyone--as family. I respectfully bowed my head at Sanaka, and he did the same.
"Alright," Ray said, breaking up the moment. "First things first. We need a way into the Underworld, which, fortunately, I can create for us. Right here in this Sanctum."
"What about the Outer Reaches?" I said. "I fail to see how we could cross it without getting swallowed whole."
"You're right," Ray said. "We would never make it, which is why we aren't even going to try. We can take a more direct route into the Underworld, bypassing the Outer Reaches."
I let out a small breath. "You have no idea how glad I am to hear you say that. I thought I would have to go back to that place again." Then it occurred to me. "I wonder how Margot managed it."
"Obviously her former master granted her safe passage," Ray said.
"Probably via another portal in the Outer Reaches," said Sanaka.
I nodded. "We still have to find Baal once we enter the Underworld. Any ideas on how we're going to do that?"
"The Underworld is very nearly infinite in scope," Sanaka said. "It is expanding all the time, along with the rest of the universe."
"Yes," Ray said. "And within the Underworld, itself are countless other worlds, regions, domains. To find Baal and your girlfriends--"
"Girlfriend," I said. "Margot is not my girlfriend. Just pointing that out."
"Fine, your friends then," Ray said. "To find your friends, we have to find out where Baal's domain is."
"The owl," Sanaka said. "It is the witch's familiar, correct?"
"Correct," I said. "And I know what you're thinking. I've already done it, to find out how to open the portal. You think there might be a clue to Baal's location in the owl's memories?"
"It is worth a try," Sanaka said.
"And if there's nothing?" I asked.
"Then we think of something else," Ray said before smiling at me reassuringly. "Don't worry, boy. We'll find her."
I nodded back, not quite as confident about things as Ray seemed to be. And could you blame me? The task ahead was a mammoth one, and terribly dangerous for all concerned. But if I had to have anyone on my side, it would have been Ray and Sanaka. So I allowed myself to feel some measure of confidence, knowing they would both do everything they could to help me.
No matter what the cost to themselves.
27
No Rest For The Wicked
While Ray and Sanaka worked on extracting information from Barney the barn owl's memory, I teleported to my own Sanctum because there were a few things I needed to get. Now that I was thinking a bit more clearly about the situation, I thought it pertinent that I at least go into the Underworld with some kind of protection on me. There would doubtless be hordes of monsters in the Underworld, and I wouldn't have enough magick to deal with them all. I needed an equalizer. A real weapon of power. Something I could hold in my hands to wield against whatever came at me.
I entered into the Operations Room from the living room. In the far corner was a huge armoire, carved from a fallen ancient oak tree that used to stand in a Druidic field of power in Ireland centuries ago. The armoire had been used by many over the centuries when I bought it at an underground auction nearly three decades ago. I since used it to store whatever weapons I had collected over the years, of which there were many.
Needless to say, the armoire was Leona's favorite thing in the whole of the Sanctum. When I first showed her it--and the tools of destruction inside--she had sat for hours handling each of the weapons, in awe of their very existence it seemed. Her handling was done under strict supervision from me though as most of the weapons had magickal properties and could prove to be hazardous in the wrong hands.
I couldn't help but smile at the memory as I crossed the room to the armoire. Then my smile disappeared as I thought, Jesus, I'm reminiscing like Leona is already dead.
"She's not dead," I said as I stood in front of the armoire as if saying it out loud kept her in reality.
But she could have been dead all the same.
Stop it, I told myself. She's alive until we know otherwise.
Clenching my jaw as I fought to control my emotions once more, I pulled open both doors of the armoire to reveal the tools of death inside.
Much like the gun locker that Leona coveted so much in her apartment, the weapons in the armoire all had their place as they were attached to the walls and inside doors of the cabinet. I stood there staring for several moments at the array of deadly weapons, wondering which one would be most useful to me. There were four different swords in there, including the demon killing Sword of Rishanti which I had threatened Baal with before. Of course, I didn't know until Margot told me that the sword would have been all but useless against a demon like Baal because he was no ordinary demon, was he? Baal was the spawn of creatures far more powerful than even him. Ordinary means of destruction would therefore not work on him as they worked on some other beings. When it came to Baal, we would have to think of some other way to handle him before he most definitely handled us.
But before we got to Baal, there would no doubt be many of his Underworld minions to protect against as well, which was the main reason I needed a weapon.
Besides the swords, there were other types of bladed weapons. There was also a mace, a battle axe, and a crossbow. Not to forget the nunchakus that used to belong to Bruce Lee, and which were excellent at dispatching the walking dead should you ever find yourself surrounded by them, which I did once (a long story, and one with a messy ending).
I was still deliberating over which weapon or weapons to chose when I heard a faint knocking sound. Frowning, I listened for a second and then went to lift a spiked gauntlet from the floor of the armoire. But before I got my hand on the gauntlet, I heard the rapping sound again, louder this time. Sighing, I realized it was the front door being knocked.
Fuck it, I thought. Whoever it was could come back another day when things were a little less life or death. It was probably just Brentwood anyway, come to give me a hard time over Leona. I had no doubt the Division boss suspected that I had something to do with Leona's disappearance. It was instinct with Brentwood to think the worst of me most of the time, despite the help I had given him over the years.
I heard the door knocking again. "Goddamn it!"
Angry and annoyed now, I stomped out of the Operations Room and through the living room to the front door, intending to tell whoever it was standing outside to fucking do one before I turned them into a cockroach.
When I flung open the front door, I was greeted by the sight of an obviously distraught Hispanic woman standing there. She looked about forty, and her eyes were red and puffy as if she had been crying for the last several hours. "Yes?" I asked the woman, trying not to come across as being too annoyed in case I upset her further. I couldn't deal with the heavy emotions of others right then.
"August Creed?" the woman asked, her dark skinned face a mask of desperation.
"Yes."
"I need your help." The woman's eyes were wide and pleading. Despite the cold, all she wore was a thin T-shirt and jeans, as if she had run out of her house in a hurry.
I started to shake my head. "Listen, lady, you're calling at a really difficult time and--"
"A monster stole my baby," the woman blurted out before balling her eyes out right there on the doorstep.
Inwardly, I sighed and thought, I don't need this. Not now. And what the hell does she mean a monster stole her baby?
I almost told her I know the feeling, but I got the impression she may have taken that the wrong way and attacked me or something. The last person you want to poke with a stick is a mother who's lost her cub. Or baby. You know what I mean.
"I'm not sure how I'm supposed to help you,"
I said to the woman, still hoping she would turn around and leave.
But she didn't. "Someone told me about you, said you'd be able to help, that you help people like me." The woman stepped forward, her dark eyes a window to her inner pain and desperation. "Can you help me get my baby back? He's all I have. Please, help me..."
As I looked into the woman's face, I couldn't help but feel her pain, the agony she felt over not knowing if her son was alive or dead.
But Leona...
The woman's wet eyes were still on me. I felt myself caving. "Look..."
"Bridget. My name is Bridget."
"Look, Bridget, I'm not going to lie to you. You've come to me at the worst possible time. But..." I paused for a second, still on the edge until I saw the hope rising in Bridget's eyes. "I can give you a small amount of time. I can't guarantee you anything either."
Bridget nodded as she did her best to smile, knowing that was the best she was going to get. Doubtless, anyone else had agreed to try and help her anyhow. "Okay. Thank you."
I stood aside and ushered her inside the Sanctum. She held her arms folded tightly across her chest as she walked through the door and into the hallway.
In the living room, I offered her a drink, which she accepted as she sat down in one of the armchairs, trying to keep from staring too much at the strangeness all around her.
"Tell me what happened to your son," I said, wasting no time as I sat in the chair opposite Bridget with a whiskey in my hand. "You said a monster stole him."
Bridget nodded as she sat on the edge of the chair, her glass clasped in both hands resting on her knees, which were pressed tightly together. She was a ball of tension and emotional turmoil. It was uncomfortable, more so because I was probably as bad as her. My legs felt like iron weights they were so tense, and my guts felt ripped out of me. But that's the way it had to be until I got Leona back. Even if I could've relaxed, I wouldn't have.
"I was at home, as usual, earlier this evening," she began. "It was just after dark and I hadn't long put Carlos to bed. He was suffering from a tummy ache all day, so he didn't go to sleep until late. Then I heard a noise upstairs, like someone walking across the floorboards..." Her restraint gave way for a second as her face cracked and fresh tears sprang from her eyes, but she quickly wiped them away and continued. "I was scared by the noise, but I had to check on Carlos. So I went up the stairs and..."