Dragonsword

by Chloe Garner

  The demon showed up with the car, but they waited, leaning against the wall, until Samantha joined them to get in.

  “Everything go okay?” Sam asked.

  “Yeah,” Samantha answered. “I need a shower. Let’s go.”

  “Calling it a night pretty early, aren’t you?” the demon asked.

  “Eustace, you try to dig any information out of me, I’ll have Nuri add you to my garden crew.”

  The demon scratched his nose and looked away. Samantha smirked at the back of his head. Well, they hadn’t blown up again, whatever had happened, Jason thought. Sam was on edge and Samantha was having a good night. He looked at his brother, finding him gone again, and frowned. Sam wasn’t on edge; he was sharp. Jason smiled. It certainly hadn’t gone wrong. He wondered if Sam would tell him.

  “Stop looking at me like that,” Sam said, blinking unfocused eyes.

  “Oh,” Jason said. Sam was still gone. Dammit. He’d forgotten how much Sam could see at once, now. “Whatever. Sorry.”

  “Like what?” Samantha asked, twisting in her seat.

  “What do you think?” Sam asked. Carson folded his hands and looked up at the ceiling, whistling. Jason winked at Samantha and she spun in her seat. She might have flushed. Jason looked out the window and covered his grin with his hand, pretending to scratch his nose.

  Samantha dismissed the demon and they took the elevator upstairs. Abby was sitting at the table with a cup of tea, eyes unfocused, and Kelly sat on the couch, back straight, sword laid across his knees.

  “Dude, that’s a nice piece,” Carson said. “Can I see?”

  “That’s not a good idea,” Samantha said, and Carson checked.

  “What?”

  “It’s okay,” Kelly said. He stood and held the sword on two palms for Carson to take it. Carson was suddenly aware that he was the center of attention, and he only briefly inspected the blade before giving it back, seeing that Kelly wouldn’t just take it from him, and mimicking the angel’s handoff with good grace.

  “You can sleep in my room or on the couch. Abby will be in Carter’s room,” Samantha said.

  “What about you guys?” Carson asked.

  “Once I get cleaned up, we’re going back out,” Samantha said. Carson gave her a skeptical look, but shrugged.

  “I’m not going to argue with a bed,” he said, giving the angel and Abby a salute as he disappeared into Samantha’s room.

  “Give me five minutes,” Samantha said.

  “Take your time,” Sam said. “I’m going to get something to eat.”

  Jason threw himself onto the couch next to Kelly.

  “Have a good day?” he asked.

  “This building is full of demons,” Kelly answered. Jason looked up at the ceiling for a second.

  “Keep your enemies close?” he asked. Kelly bristled, visibly shaking.

  “We should not be here.”

  “Sam says it’s okay,” Jason said.

  “She takes foolish risks with the dust of my brothers. We should not be here.”

  “Child,” Abby said, standing. Kelly twisted to look at her, and Sam froze with his spoon frozen midway between his bowl and his mouth. Jason had never heard Abby sound harsh before. It brought out the sharp English accent that normally lay under a soft, happy personality and a lot of years in New York. Kelly stood to face Abby.

  “Tell me the purpose of the world,” Abby commanded.

  “To support God’s creation,” Kelly answered.

  “And tell me your place in the universe,” she said.

  “You are below me,” Kelly said. She shook her head.

  “Only until you came here with a purpose. You can’t interfere with her, and I know she told you that. I was listening. She has an incredible weight on her, and I will not tolerate you adding to it, her valet.” She waited, and he finally dropped his head in submission. She put her hands on her hips. “Now let me tell you about this apartment. The walls, floor, and ceiling are iron plate, where there aren’t windows. The windows are marked and strengthened - every one of them individually. I’m no magic user, but the only ones who can do anything inside these walls are Carter and Sam. It’s shielded from external dark magic, external natural magic, and most external light magic. The building is reinforced to withstand a hurricane, an earthquake, or a bomb up to some hideous level of force that boggles my mind. There is no handle on the outside; the door only opens if you have the magic to open it, and it and its frame for three feet in any direction are four inches of steel plate. And if I wanted to banish you, all I’d have to do is paint anything in the apartment in lamb’s blood. Carter lets demons live here because they feel the weight of this room, over their heads, every day. Sam doesn’t have the time or energy to explain everything she does to you, but you will stop questioning her decisions. Do we understand each other?”

  Orange light from the rising sun sliced across her face as she stared at the forlorn angel.

  “I understand,” he said. Jason motioned to the walls.

  “So what you’re telling me is that if someone blocked the door, we’d be stuck in here?”

  Abby turned to him and crossed her arms.

  “Sam washed you clean, didn’t she?”

  He shrugged, knowing what she was talking about, but not wanting to seem argumentative.

  “You don’t know what real soulburn is like. Neither do I, for that matter. The paranoia that comes with it. Carter built this building in the midst of a paranoid craze that you would think he could never come back from. You’d be surprised what he’s got hidden away in here.”

  He gave her half a smile.

  “It’s going to be okay,” he said. She sat back down with her tea.

  “Yes, but I can’t see that, do you understand? I’ve not been this blind since before…” She shook her head. “If anyone can find him, it’s Sam.”

  “She said she’d get him back,” Sam said.

  Jason nodded.

  “Has he still got granola bars back there?” he asked.

  “Whole box of ‘em,” Sam answered.

  “Throw ‘em here,” Jason said, holding up his hands. “I swear, I’ve actually looked for these and can’t find them. They’re really good.”

  Samantha came out of the shower, drying her hair, dressed for demon hunting.

  “Did I hear Abby raise her voice?” she asked.

  “Couldn’t be,” Jason answered. Kelly huddled on the couch miserably. She paused, glancing at Sam, who ate his cereal contentedly.

  “You guys ready to go?” she asked. Jason held up the box of granola bars.

  “I’m taking these.”

  She raised an eyebrow.

  “Okay…”

  “Good luck,” Abby said, standing.

  “Stay in. Carson’s a nice guy; I think you’ll like him. Get some sleep. Call if you need anything.”

  Sam took out his phone and waited.

  “Doris,” he said.

  It rang.

  “Is everything okay?” he answered.

  He listened, then laughed and handed the phone to Samantha.

  “She wants to know about the proper feeding and care of demons.”

  “That sounds like Doris,” Jason said, standing.

  “You aren’t leaving me here again, are you?” Kelly asked.

  “No, you’re coming,” Samantha said. “Today you get to prove how much you’ve learned about fighting demons.”

  She turned her face to the phone.

  “Hi, Doris.” She put her finger in her other ear. “No, demons eat…”

  Jason picked up Samantha’s backpack from against the couch and Sam rinsed his bowl out and put it in the dishwasher.

  “Oh. Well, she shouldn’t eat anything she doesn’t think she should eat…”

  Sam got the door and the elevator opened when they pushed the button.

  “You know, I think she should be fine eating anything I would eat…”

  “Sorry, what was that? … No,
I’m in an elevator… I don’t see why not. If she wants to try it and you don’t find the idea of eating it distasteful, it should be fine…”

  Jason snickered behind his hand.

  “Chewed food…” Kelly said, making a bleak grossed-out face. “I’m glad I don’t have to experience it.”

  “Angels eat, too,” Samantha said, putting her hand over the phone. “She can shower, yes. She’s not allergic to water.”

  Kelly shuddered.

  “Do not,” he said.

  “Do, too,” she whispered. She laughed. “Doris, she’s not a gremlin, she’s not a vampire, and she’s not a witch. She doesn’t have secret, devastating addictions or allergies. If she thinks she probably shouldn’t eat something, don’t talk her into it, but other than raw meat and blood, I can’t think of anything I’d keep her away from. Don’t let her carve her skin or pierce anything you wouldn’t pierce…” She paused, laughing. “Okay, anything you wouldn’t let Krista pierce.” There was another pause as she got into the back seat. She jerked her head at Sam. “Give us a destination.”

  “Who do you want?”

  “Ozy.” She turned the phone back. “Okay, Krista when she was eighteen. You and she aren’t going to manage to screw her up. You’re going to be the best influence she’s had since she died.” Jason looked at Kelly, who had somehow gotten promoted to the front seat, and who still looked a bit green at the thought of eating.

  “You’d like pickled pigs feet,” he said. Kelly put his hand over his mouth and Jason grinned. Sam said an address and Jason handed Kelly his cell phone.

  “Which way am I turning?”

  “What?” the angel asked.

  “He needs you to map it,” Samantha whispered. “You’re going that way, though,” she pointed. “I guess she can go to the movies with you if she wants…”

  Jason grinned wider.

  “No, I don’t know what will happen if you cut her hair…” Pause. “No, it might just all grow back.”

  Kelly fumbled with the phone, and Sam leaned forward, trying to help. It didn’t. Jason took a route generally in the direction Samantha had indicated, waiting for the angel to figure out the phone.

  “I am a member of the armies of God. I don’t need you to tell me how to use this device.”

  “I don’t know of any demons who get mani-pedis, but I don’t see any reason why not.”

  Jason grinned at the road.

  Finally, the angel got directions pulled up on the phone and Samantha hung up with Doris.

  “She misses having Krista around,” Jason said. “I don’t think she comes home much.”

  “Apparently,” Samantha said. “I’ve never thought that hard about what demons do in their spare time. There are too many other answers than ‘spa day’.”

  “But Maryann is staying close,” Sam said.

  “Yeah.”

  “You ever worry that she’ll try to go find her old life?” Jason asked.

  “She doesn’t remember it,” Samantha said. “Not enough of the important details to go find it. I don’t think it would ever occur to her.”

  There was a silence.

  “I told you… if I got him back, it probably wouldn’t be him any longer.”

  Kelly looked like he had something to say to that, but he caught a look from Jason and swallowed it.

  “Okay, so I’m as eager to see Ozy again as anyone,” Jason said, twisting in his seat at a stoplight, “but explain to me how this helps us find Carter?”

  “I want to know if Ozy knows where he is,” Samantha said. “But mostly I need to set an example. You respect my authority or you die. Ozy is a good test case to see whether the other demons that I don’t normally work with are going to go along or not.”

  “Hold on,” Jason said, watching the light. “Your authority?”

  “That’s what I did last night,” Samantha said. “I established a claim.”

  “Why?” Sam asked. “You don’t want Carter’s job. You just want to find Carter.”

  “You find a man,” Samantha said. “He’s alive, but he’s been shot. He’s bleeding. What do you do?” There was a moment of silence before she went on. “You stabilize him. Put pressure on the wound, try to stop the bleeding. You don’t go digging after the bullet. Some demon out there has just snatched the biggest prize of his or her life, and every group of demons in the city - and a bunch of them from around the world, too - are looking at each other, wondering if they could figure out who and steal him before he gets handed off. It’s going to mean war. We don’t know where he went; maybe the demons do, maybe they don’t, but if they don’t, they’re going to attack each other, looking for him. Even if he doesn’t get killed in the meantime, they aren’t careful with who they hurt. I need to make it clear that I’m not going to tolerate it.”

  “And then we look for Carter?”

  “Then we look for the buyer,” Samantha said. “Every demon in town is going to be bluffing and double bluffing that they have him and that they don’t have him, trying to out-game each other. There’s only one buyer. Find him, and the incentive to hold Carter goes away.”

  “I’d just kill him,” Jason said. “Especially if he knows who I am.”

  “With the information openly available right now…” Samantha paused for a long time. “I wouldn’t say his chances of survival are that great, no matter how I play it.”

  “I think we should bash skulls and search basements,” Jason said.

  “You know how hard it is to keep him locked up?” Samantha asked. “You can’t keep him unconscious, not if he’s angry, and you can’t lock a door in front of him. He isn’t handcuffed to a chair somewhere.” There was a long silence. “Sorry.”

  “All right. So your beloved mentor is harder to hold on to than I am. Where would you keep him?”

  “Hellside,” Samantha answered. It was too quick. She’d already thought about it. “The problem with that is, you need a human on this side who can open the gate for you, and there aren’t that many. I think he’s here. I just have no idea how I would hold him. I have ideas on how I would try, but… I’m not convinced any of them would work. And you don’t want to grab Carter until you’re absolutely sure you can hold him.”

  Jason stopped in front of a tall office building.

  “Here? Seriously?”

  “It’s what the device says,” Kelly answered.

  “Park in the garage underneath,” Samantha said.

  “What is this?” Jason asked, leaning toward the window to look up the front of the building.

  “It’s his office,” Samantha said.

  “His office.”

  “I told you, dayside, he’s a legit businessman. Well, people believe he’s really a businessman.” She paused. “He really does business.”

  A man in sunglasses and a standard-issue security hat stopped Jason at the entrance to the garage.

  “Who are you here to see?” he asked, peering into the car.

  “Ozy,” Samantha answered.

  “Are you on my list?” he asked.

  “Carter,” Samantha said. The man raised an eyebrow.

  “I’m Carter,” Jason said. Why not?

  He looked at his list, up at Samantha, then at Jason for a long time. Jason smiled.

  “Fine,” he said. “I’ll let him know you’re coming.”

  Jason rolled his window up.

  “Doesn’t that mean he’s just going to leave?”

  “That’s the first test,” Samantha said. “The demons have a bit of a symbiotic relationship with the head of the gray. They need enforcers, and Carter does that enforcement work when it isn’t appropriate for anyone else to do it.”

  “Even demons have rules,” Jason muttered.

  “So if he accepts me as the head of the gray, he’ll stay to see why I’m here. It’s not like I could lock him in, anyway. Not in his own office.”

  “So how are we supposed to get information out of him?” Jason asked. “And when do we get to st
art breaking things?”

  “It’s a dance, Jason. You’ll get your turn.”

  They found a long bank of elevators past a well-dressed receptionist. Jason had winked at her on the way by and she gave him a coy smile and folded her arms to make her cleavage press harder out of her blouse. He nearly stopped to talk to her, but Samantha grabbed his elbow and kept walking.

  “Demon?” he asked in the elevator.

  “No. Inconvenient,” Samantha answered.

  A woman in a tight-fitted black skirt got into the elevator with them halfway up, and Samantha drew Lahn.

  “Renouch, the one who always comes back, like a greasy beggar that you just can’t get rid of. Who tracked you in this time?”

  Demonic hellspeak, distorting the woman’s elegant, faintly-Asian face as she spoke. Kelly made a sound like a bee against a window and Jason put has hand back to find the kid’s chest. It didn’t change that he was ready to draw his own weapon, but they didn’t need the angel picking a fight too early.

  “Keep walking, Mathilda,” Samantha said. Jason looked over at Sam, warning him that this could get ugly.

  “And you brought your monkeys with you,” Mathilda said, still speaking the guttural, snarling language. Jason knew that the term she used for him and Sam was unflattering, but he didn’t have a clear understanding why, other than the obvious primate accusation.

  “I’m looking, and I can’t find any reason for you to be here,” Samantha said. “I don’t have to rise to the bait if I don’t want to, but we’ve all killed demons for lesser insults. Are you really here to pick a fight?”

  Jason drew Anadidd’na. It felt like the right time.

  The demon laughed, the sort of smug chest-surge pretty girls did when they were making fun of you.

  “Mortals,” she said. “You know what the bidding war looks like on the other side for these two?”

  English. For Sam’s benefit. And maybe Jason’s, he realized.

  “You can’t protect them,” Mathilda said, hellspeak again.

  “Oh, but I could send you back ahead of them,” Samantha answered in the same. Mathilda made a pouty face in the reflective elevator doors as they slid open.

  “Back off, Renouch. You can’t save him, but your pets are going to die. He’s ours now.”