Unbroken Vows

by Christine Pope

  “But why would they release the videos? Caleb made it sound as though that was the last thing they wanted.”

  A derisive chuckle came through the phone’s speaker. “Yeah, because Caleb Lockwood is such a paragon of truth and plain dealing. What’s even worse is that they did a pretty slick job of hack-and-slash on the footage — none of the sequences are shown in their entirety…they’ve been edited to show Audrey getting attacked by demons, some of the sequence in the basement, but not the conclusion, not the part that showed the two of us driving those bastards straight back to Hell.”

  Will absorbed this latest wrinkle, then said, “Sounds like they want to frighten people.”

  “Exactly — and make it seem as if there’s no real way to fight a demon, which we both know is plain wrong.”

  And probably the timing of the videos being dropped on YouTube two days before Halloween had some significance. Was this yet another example of the demons wanting to cause whatever chaos they could, or was there something else going on here that neither he nor Michael had yet been able to figure out?

  A chill worked its way down his spine as he asked, “Who uploaded the videos?”

  “They were sent to a well-known YouTuber who does a lot of supernatural and occult stuff with a little conspiracy theory shit thrown in,” Michael replied. “I reached out to the guy — we’ve had some interactions in the past — to say that it was all copyrighted material and that whoever had given the videos to him was violating the copyright, which now belongs to Colin Turner’s sister Emma. But Troy just told me it was fair use and that if Emma wanted to have her lawyer talk to him, that was just fine. I very much doubt Emma will want to get involved in any of this, so it’s not as if any of my threats have much weight behind them.”

  Will could tell that Michael was angry and worried and annoyed all at once…not a very good combination. And he couldn’t really blame him. They’d been sort of waiting for the other shoe to drop — Rosemary’s elaborate Halloween plans notwithstanding — but he didn’t think any of them had been expecting something like this.

  “So…what do we do now?”

  “I’m not sure,” Michael said. “My email’s going crazy, and I’m sure I’ll get a call from the cable network any time now, demanding to know what the hell’s going on, but this is one situation where I can plead complete innocence. I didn’t upload the files, and there’s no way they can prove I did. On the other hand, we all need to keep quiet about the hard drive I do have in my possession. The network doesn’t know about that, and we have to keep it that way.”

  “I won’t say anything,” Will told his friend, although he doubted the network would ever reach out to him. His connection to Michael Covenant was tenuous enough that most people didn’t even know it existed.

  “I know you won’t. But let Rosemary know, too.”

  “I will.” He hesitated for a moment, then went ahead and asked, just because he knew Rosemary would expect him to. “Is this going to change any of our Halloween plans? Because I need to tell Rosemary if that’s the case.”

  Michael’s reply was immediate, and emphatic. “No. Actually, I’m kind of relieved that we all had plans to get together — it’s probably better if we’re all together as much as possible. We already had decided to go out with Fred and Isabel tonight, so I don’t think I’ll cancel those plans, but Audrey and I will definitely be in Glendora tomorrow for this trick-or-treat thing.”

  “Trunk-or-treat,” Will corrected him, although he allowed himself an inner sigh of relief. Rosemary wouldn’t have been happy to have Audrey and Michael cancel, although anyone would have understood their reason for doing so.

  In this case, though, there was strength in numbers, and Michael seemed determined for them to be together. As to what the demons intended with the unexpected dumping of the Project Demon Hunters videos on YouTube, Will honestly didn’t know, but better for them all to be as prepared as possible.

  Because the Lord only knew what might happen next.

  Chapter 15

  Rosemary kept asking herself if there was something she’d overlooked when she was in Greencastle, some hint Caleb had given her about the footage that she’d simply missed because she’d been so bound up in the sheer awfulness of learning her father might actually be a cambion, a half-demon. However, as often as she mentally replayed the scenes of the two days she’d spent there, she couldn’t come up with anything that felt like a missing clue. In fact, the subject of the footage had barely even come up. It was as if Caleb and his father — and the rest of the Greencastle demons — had decided Project Demon Hunters was no longer an issue.

  Except it had turned out that wasn’t the situation at all. Actually, it was the exact opposite. Because the store was busy — she was covering Celeste’s hours as her sister worked feverishly to finish Tyler’s costume so it would be ready for the trunk-or-treat — Rosemary didn’t have any time to watch the YouTube videos Will had called her to tell her about. To tell the truth, even if business had been slow, she wasn’t sure she would have wanted to watch the footage while she was by herself. It had been much better to wait until she got home from work, and she could sit on the couch and hold Will’s hand as he played it for her.

  She’d seen some of the footage before, and so she could tell how it had been edited, how key elements had been cut to make it seem as if the demons had had the upper hand in all those encounters. A decent job, too; she guessed it must have been Caleb who’d made the edits. He was the film school guy, after all.

  And it was obvious that the videos had gone viral, because even though they’d been posted around 10 a.m. Central time and therefore hadn’t even been up a full twelve hours yet, they all had more than two million views each. Word was spreading fast.

  After they’d watched the last video — there were ten in all, some of them only a few minutes each — Will set down the remote. For a long moment, neither of them spoke.

  Then Rosemary said, “It’s bad, isn’t it?”

  “Well, it doesn’t look good,” Will replied. His eyes were shadowed with worry, and she couldn’t blame him. What kind of effect would those videos have on the general population? Would people dismiss the whole thing as a hoax of some sort, or would they look at those terrifying pieces of footage and realize there was no way any of that could have been faked, that — impossible as it might seem — it was all real? Will went on, “I talked to Michael again this afternoon. By that point, the network had gotten in touch with him to demand an explanation. He told them the truth — that he hadn’t uploaded the videos and didn’t know who was responsible.”

  “Oh, come on, Will,” Rosemary protested. “We all know who’s responsible.”

  “All right, we know it had to be one of the Greencastle crew,” he said. “But we don’t know which one for sure, which is probably good enough when it comes to denying all knowledge…at least, for now. Even so, they were making noises about a lawsuit, so I think Michael is probably going to be forced to lawyer up even though he had nothing to do with it.”

  Ouch. While she knew Michael could afford a damn good lawyer, legal troubles were still probably the last thing he needed to deal with, especially since any litigation would be handled here in California, and presumably he and Audrey planned to head back to Tucson after Friday. Although maybe it wouldn’t come to that — maybe the network’s lawyers would figure out soon enough that Michael had nothing to do with the leak and that they needed to look elsewhere for their culprit. Most likely, they’d attempt an internal audit, since of course they knew nothing about the backup footage Colin had hidden on an external hard drive and therefore would suspect that it had to have been one of their own people leaking the files stored on the network’s servers.

  “I’m sorry about that,” she said. “Michael doesn’t deserve to get that sort of mess dumped on him.”

  “He’ll handle it. He sounded a lot more pissed off than worried, so it’s probably going to be more of a nuisance than anythi
ng else.” Will ran a hand through his hair and then reached for the glass of water he had sitting on the coffee table. After taking a sip, he said, “You can’t see the comments because we were watching the videos on my Apple TV interface instead of watching them online, but there’s a lot of chatter about this — and not just in the YouTube comments. It’s gotten picked up in all sorts of forums dedicated to the supernatural and the occult.”

  “People trying to debunk the videos?” Rosemary asked, knowing she sounded a little too hopeful. Because the best possible outcome would be to have everyone decide the footage had been faked somehow and move on with their lives.

  “Unfortunately, no.” He paused, then amended his statement, saying, “Well, of course, there are a lot of skeptics. But there are also a number of people using all kinds of technical arguments to show how the footage couldn’t have been faked, that it truly is real. And those voices seem to be getting louder.”

  She shrugged, although she knew trying to act dismissive probably wasn’t going to work here. “It’s blowing up right now because it’s fresh. I’m sure in a day or two, people will have moved on to some other sensation. After all, there’s no real way to prove those videos are real…or fake. People can argue the subject ad nauseam because that’s what people do, but it’s not going to change anything.”

  Will gazed at her for a long moment, expression troubled. At last, he said, “I hope you’re right, Rosemary. I really do.”

  “But you don’t think I am.” She didn’t bother to phrase the words as a question, not when she could see the truth of his feelings on the matter in his eyes.

  “No,” he said heavily. “I really don’t.”

  Maybe he should have been expecting this. Word of the footage had continued to spread; when he checked YouTube that morning before heading off to All Saints, he saw that most of the videos now had more than three million hits each. That was a lot of impressionable minds getting bombarded with images the human brain wasn’t quite equipped to handle.

  The voicemail on his office phone at the church was filled with messages from people asking questions about the videos, needing some kind of reassurance that Hell wasn’t real and they’d only been the victims of an elaborate YouTube prank. Will knew he needed to return every single one of those calls and offer what comfort he could…but at the same time, he also knew he’d be lying if he told those people that yes, it was all a fake, that Hell and the demons who were supposed to dwell there were nothing more than products of the human imagination.

  Whatever he would have liked to believe on the subject, Hell was very real…as were the demons who made it their home.

  So he picked up his phone and returned the calls one by one, doing his best to sound calm and soothing, to tell people they had nothing to fear. Even as he spoke, though, he knew he was offering half-truths at best. No, he hadn’t faced down those demons with Michael and Audrey, and yet he knew they were all too real. In some cases, belief in the power of the Holy Spirit was enough to hold those demons at bay…but not always. And especially not with the Greencastle demons, whose human blood paradoxically made them much more difficult to fight.

  He knew he’d promised Rosemary he would try to leave early, but he had to spend so much time on the phone that it was doubtful he’d be able to get away much before five. The traffic heading eastbound would be horrendous, too.

  “Troubling day,” came Stan’s voice from the doorway, and Will looked up from his satchel, where he’d been stuffing a few bits of paperwork to take home.

  Damn it. While at any other time, he would have been glad to stop and talk with Stan, to get his take on the situation with the Project Demon Hunters footage, Will knew he didn’t have the luxury of a leisurely chat, not if he wanted to get to Glendora any time close to five-thirty.

  “Yes,” Will said. “I’ve been trying to reassure people that we don’t know for sure that any of those videos are even real, but it’s been an uphill battle.”

  Stan crossed his arms and frowned slightly, deepening the lines around his dark eyes. “The footage does look fairly convincing.”

  “Wasn’t it all from a failed TV show? They can do pretty amazing stuff with computer animation these days, even on projects that don’t have typical big Hollywood budgets.” There, that sounded reasonably skeptical, but not so vociferously so that it might make Stan suspicious.

  “That’s what I read. But even so — I’ve watched the videos for myself, and if those were truly effects and not real-life action, then they were some of the best computer animation I’ve ever seen. I also tried to offer what comfort I could to those who called asking questions, but it’s difficult when even I’m not certain what I’m looking at.”

  “I’m sure a lot of experts are dissecting every frame,” Will said, doing his best to sound unconcerned by the whole thing. “And I think I’m going to wait to hear what they have to say on the subject before I try to pass judgment.”

  “Probably a wise course of action,” Stan replied. “I’ll try to do the same.”

  “Anyway,” Will went on, “I have an event in Glendora I need to get to. Something I promised I would do with Rosemary and her family.”

  “Well, then, don’t let me keep you.” Stan paused there for a few seconds, then added, “She seems like a lovely young woman. I’m glad you brought her to the service on Sunday so she could get acquainted with the congregation.”

  “Yes, she told me she had a very good time,” Will responded. That was mostly the truth — Rosemary hadn’t been effusive about the experience, and she hadn’t promised that she would return any time soon, but neither had she said she’d felt uncomfortable or unwelcome. Which was probably the most he could hope for, considering how out of her element she had been.

  “Good to hear. And have a good evening, Will.”

  He returned the pleasantry, then closed up his satchel as Stan left the doorway and returned to his own office down the hall. Probably about time for him to be packing it in for the day as well, although Stan didn’t have far to go, since his house was only about a mile away, in the lovely historic neighborhood that bordered CalTech.

  As expected, the traffic on the eastbound 210 was miserable, but at least it was just usual rush-hour sluggishness, no accidents or road construction or anything that might have made the situation any worse than it already was. Will pulled into the parking lot behind Sisters We at exactly 5:25. Cutting it close, but technically, he wasn’t late.

  There were already families with young children heading out from the parking lot to the street, so he knew he didn’t have a moment to spare. Rosemary had told him to come and knock at the back door, since that was where the shop’s bathroom was located and where she planned to leave his costume hanging up for him.

  A minute after he rapped on the door, she opened it, looking harried — but also pretty spectacular. She hadn’t allowed him to see the costume she’d ordered for herself, and so he didn’t know quite what to expect, but what he hadn’t expected was to see her in a purple brocade corset with a lacy black camisole underneath, black flounced skirts revealing fishnet hose underneath, and lace-up Victorian boots. Her mass of curly hair had been pulled up away from her face and adorned with a purple feather held in place with a jeweled clip, and her makeup was much more dramatic than anything she normally wore.

  “Wow,” he said, duly impressed.

  “You’re late,” she replied, her severe tones at odds with her flamboyantly seductive appearance.

  “Sorry — it was crazy today. I had to do a lot of hand-holding.”

  At once, the slight frown that had creased her brows disappeared. “Oh, wow — I hadn’t even thought what you might have to deal with at the church today. It’s okay — Isabel is holding down the fort, but I need to get back out there and help her. All your stuff is hanging in the bathroom, steamed and ready to go.”

  She went on her tiptoes and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, then hurried off toward the front of the shop. Will s
aw the bathroom door standing open, the light on, and so he went in there and inspected his costume. It looked just as impressive as her saloon girl outfit, although far more sober — a long black frock coat and matching black wool trousers, a vest in subtle shades of slate blue and black, a white shirt with a high winged collar.

  He got dressed as quickly as he could, marveling a little at how well everything fit. When he was done, he placed the wide-brimmed black felt hat on his head and grinned into the mirror.

  “Eat your heart out, Wyatt Earp,” he said, and turned off the bathroom light.

  Up front, Rosemary and Isabel were busy handing out candy to the first wave of trunk-or-treaters who’d arrived on the scene. Isabel was costumed as Professor McGonagall from Harry Potter, her curly hair pulled back from her face into a severe knot and her elegant, slender form made even more striking by the dark green velvet robes and tall pointed witch hat she wore. The entire ensemble was so professional-looking, he wondered where she’d gotten it.

  When he greeted her and then asked about the costume, she gave him a pleased smile. “Oh, I made it — well, everything except the hat. I bought that on Etsy.”

  Rosemary had mentioned that both her sisters sewed, but for some reason, he hadn’t thought they were skilled enough to be professional costumers. He wondered why Rosemary didn’t sew as well, although he supposed it was possible she just wasn’t interested. “It’s an amazing costume,” he told her. “You look like you walked right off the set of one of the Harry Potter movies.”

  A faint flush spread along her cheekbones, emphasizing her resemblance to her younger sister. Still, she seemed to brush off the compliment, saying, “Wait until you see what Celeste made for Tyler.”