Misfit Page 6

  Then she smells something burning.

  She looks around, but none of the altar servers are burning incense. And anyway, it’s not that spicy sweet smell. This is more like a fireplace mixed with melting plastic. Other people start shifting around in their seats, and someone behind her coughs.

  “Your bag,” hisses Britt next to her. “It’s something in your bag.”

  Jael looks down and sees a tendril of smoke curling out from under the flap of her messenger bag. She doesn’t know what’s going on in there, but she’s sure that she doesn’t want to deal with it in the middle of All-School Mass. She grabs her bag, climbs over Britt and out into the aisle, then heads toward the exit at the back of the chapel.

  “Miss Thompson,” says Father Aaron as he holds up a hand to stop her, a frown beneath his walrus mustache.

  “Sorry, Father,” she mutters. “Female trouble.”

  He flinches and immediately steps aside. It’s a cheap shot, but as long as she uses it sparingly, it’s always effective.

  Once she’s out of the chapel, she sprints down the main hallway of the school and into the bathroom. She checks the stalls to make sure no one is hiding out, then she dumps everything from her bag onto the floor. She swats away a puff of smoke and scans the contents.

  She sees her necklace first and grabs it. She should have left it at home. What was the point of carrying it around with her if she couldn’t wear it? But moments before she left that morning she changed her mind and shoved it in her bag anyway.

  She examines it carefully now, but it seems fine. Then she looks down at the rest of the stuff and sees a roughly circular shape burned into her history textbook. It’s still smoking a little, and the edges of the hole glow orange. She kneels down and flips through the book. It’s one of those thick, five-hundred-page monsters, and the hole goes down to about page three hundred, with brown scorch marks another twenty pages deep.

  She hurriedly spreads out the rest of the things in her bag. A few of the pens are halfway melted, a notebook is a little crispy at one edge, and her lip gloss is destroyed, but the history book seems to have absorbed most of the damage.

  But damage from what?

  She stands up again and nervously rubs her thumb across her necklace. She notices tiny black bits stuck to some of the chain links and she absently begins to pick them off. Then she realizes that they look like burned paper. She looks back at the history book. She kneels down again and holds the gem over the hole. It fits perfectly.

  She slowly stands up and stares at the gem. Deep in the center, she can just make out an angry red pulse.

  “What are you?” she says. “Where did you come from?”

  The pulse grows larger until the entire gem flashes red in slow, regular beats. She sees a slight movement in the center, and a sickening fear shoots up through her stomach. Not now.

  Not here in the school restroom, in the middle of the day. . . .

  That weightless vertigo feeling hits again and she finds herself somewhere else. But it’s not like anyplace she’s ever seen.

  It appears to be a cavern about the size of a football field. The ceiling is ridged with off-white, curved beams—like being inside a giant rib cage. Six-foot-high gray stalagmites protrude from the ground in regular intervals. She can’t tell if they’re made of stone, wood, or bone. Balanced on top of each one is a crab shell the size of a car. Some of the shells are mottled with red and orange, others with green and blue. All of them leak thick black smoke and sprout tongues of flame. Something like grease drips from them and runs down the sides of the pillars.

  Then she hears heavy footsteps accompanied by a dry, scraping sound. A figure roughly the shape of a person, but more than eight feet tall and massively built, walks down the line of shells, its face hidden in shadow. For a moment Jael panics, thinking it will see her. But then she remembers that it’s just like last night. Even though it all seems so real, she’s not really there.

  The creature shuffles down the line of columns, stopping at each one to examine the giant crab shell on top. It pokes a stick of some kind into one of the shells, and she hears screams and whimpers in response. As the creature gets closer, she sees that what she thought was clothing or armor is actually fish scales covering its entire body. The scales are yellow and have a sickly, dried-out look. The creature’s thick arms stretch out to either side, ending in thin, curved claws.

  The fish creature uses the stick to lift up the top half of one of the shells. A puff of black smoke escapes, followed by something fast and wriggling. The creature slams the shell back down, trapping whatever it is back inside. Then it stands there for a moment, staring at the closed, smoking shell. It scratches its hairless, earless head with one claw.

  Then it turns suddenly and looks directly at Jael with black, impenetrable sharklike eyes.

  A pathetic little squeak of fright escapes from Jael’s throat.

  “Well, well, well,” the creature growls in a voice like sandpaper. “It looks like you’re more clever than your father thinks.”

  It smiles. Cracked fish lips stretch wide, showing rows of needle teeth as long as her fingers.

  “He won’t give you the answers you need. When you’re ready for the truth, use the necklace to call me. Just call for Dagon. . . .”

  The hard heat of the cavern drops away and she is left huddled on the bathroom floor, shaky and cold. But the visions of that place and that creature still fill her mind. It’s all she can do to keep from hyperventilating.

  The door opens.

  “Jael?”

  Ms. Spielman. Jael hears the soft clack of her sandals coming closer. Ms. Spielman kneels down next to her.

  “Jael, what’s wrong?”

  Jael looks back at her with wild, frightened eyes. “I don’t know,” she manages to say in a halting whisper. Then a strange laugh bubbles out for a moment before she’s able to stop it. “I don’t know.”

  “Okay, Jael, you’re Okay,” says Ms. Spielman in a voice as soft and soothing as honey. It helps a little. “I’m here. What can I do to help?”

  “Don’t . . . t-t-tell my dad about this,” Jael says.

  “About? . . .” says Ms. Spielman. Then she notices the burned history book. “What happened?” she asks, unable to keep the shock out of her voice.

  Jael says nothing.

  “Okay, well, forget it for now,” says Ms. Spielman, her voice back to soothing sweetness. Almost singsong. She places her cool, soft hand on Jael’s cheek and smiles at her. “Why don’t we get ourselves together a little, huh? Put your necklace back on and we’ll clean up the rest of your stuff.”

  “It wasn’t . . . ,” Jael begins. But if she puts the necklace back in her bag, it could start burning things again. She’s already come this far; she might as well go all the way. So she holds the chain up in both hands and slowly puts it over her head. The gem rests against her chest and feels so nice on her skin that she lets out a quiet sigh.

  “Feel better?” asks Ms. Spielman.

  Jael nods.

  Then the two of them gather up Jael’s stuff in silence and put it back into her bag.

  “Jael, I have to get to my next class,” says Ms. Spielman.

  “But I think Father Ralph has this period free. Would you like to talk to him for a bit?”

  “Okay,” she says. She feels like she has to talk to somebody.

  And Father Ralph might actually be the perfect person.

  Jael slouches in a neon green IKEA chair in Father Ralph Frizetti’s office. Father Ralph is the youngest of the three priests and he does his best to make both education and Catholicism as accessible and hip as possible. But he tries a little too hard to

  “keep it real,” as he says. He always wears the regular priestly black with the white collar, but he also wears a funky cartoon character belt buckle, as if to let students know that he can be fun, too. And the single hoop earring and scruffy hipster beard just don’t look right on him. But at least Jael can relate to him.<
br />
  Unlike the drill sergeant Father Aaron or the saintly Mons, Father Ralph just seems like a regular person who happens to be a priest.

  Father Ralph leans back on the edge of his desk, scratching his beard thoughtfully. They’ve been sitting like this for more than five minutes in complete silence. But if Father Ralph is getting impatient, he doesn’t show it.

  At last, feeling like an idiot but not knowing any other way to start, Jael says, “Father, do you believe in . . . uh, supernatural stuff?”

  He looks surprised by the question. “Well, Jael, yes as a matter of fact, I do.”

  “Really?”

  “I believe that God counts as supernatural.”

  “Oh,” says Jael. “What about . . . magic?”

  “I prefer the word ‘miracle.’ ”

  “Right,” says Jael, her faint hope of real communication with Father Ralph already starting to fade. She gives it one last try. “What about stuff like evil spirits and, uh . . . demons?”

  He looks at her for a long time, like he’s trying to figure out if she’s messing with him. Eventually, he says, “Well, in a way, I do.”

  “In a way?”

  “Hell isn’t a place, you know?”

  “It isn’t?”

  “No, it’s a state of mind. A state of being. Hell is the absence of God.”

  “Okay. . . .”

  “So, technically, you don’t even have to be dead to be in Hell.”

  “You don’t?”

  “Nope. You just have to have alienated yourself from God to the point where you no longer see Him or feel Him in your heart.”

  “Uh-huh,” says Jael. She doesn’t like how he’s trying to maneuver the conversation. “And do you feel Him in your heart, Father?” she asks with maybe a little snottiness.

  He pauses for a second, adjusting his SpongeBob Square-Pants belt buckle, then smiles and says, “Of course. Now, the question is, Jael, do you?”

  “Look, Father. It’s all kind of complicated for me. You know, there’s a lot of . . . family history.”

  “Your father has made his doubts in the Church known to the rest of the faculty. Doubt is healthy and it’s only natural for you to begin to explore similar questions.”

  “Okjay, but what if some things in the Bible were . . . wrong.

  You know? Like what if demons weren’t really . . . evil? At least, not all of them.”

  “Well, Jael, I don’t really believe in demons.”

  “Okay, so you think they’re just a state of mind too?”

  “Well,” says Father Ralph, rolling his eyes. “Some of the older members of our faculty would disagree with me, but the way that I interpret scripture is that Satan is not an actual person who walks and talks and creeps into your room at night to tempt you into doing evil things. Satan, demons, and all of those scary things are merely symbols of the weakness within us. Our human weakness that comes from Original Sin.

  We separate it from ourselves and give it the label of Satan, or monster, or any number of things. But Satan is no more real than, say, Superman. They’re both icons that we, as members of this society, all identify with because they reflect something about ourselves. We are all a little bit like Superman. And we are all a little bit like Satan, too.” He smiles a little smugly, probably thinking he’s picked a good comparison. Then he glances at the red gem around Jael’s neck.

  “Wow,” he says. “That’s a very pretty necklace.”

  “Thanks,” says Jael. “I think it might be from Hell.”

  THE AVENGING LOVE 6

  Paul liked to watch his wife sleep. astarte was such a complicated being that sometimes it was difficult to see her clearly. But when she slept, all of those layers dropped away.

  Her perfect tan face smoothed out and almost seemed to radiate peace.

  He brushed back a ringlet of her black hair and wondered if demons dreamed and, if so, what they dreamed of. He’d have to ask her later when she woke up. Let her sleep for now. They had been traveling hard for weeks.

  He gently kissed her cheek, then slipped on pants, a sweater, and his overcoat. It probably wasn’t wise for him to go out alone. But he was tired of being cooped up in the hotel. Back at the monastery, all those years ago, he had been able to stay in confined spaces for days on end. Now even the respectably sized hotel room pressed in on him. He couldn’t decide if that was a sign of growth or something else.

  “Paul?” Astarte whispered sleepily from the bed.

  He paused at the door. “Yeah, hon?”

  “Pick me up some breakfast while you’re out.”

  “Sure,” he said, and quietly slipped out.

  Their hotel was just off Union Square Park. He wandered the park and square aimlessly for a little while, then down Broadway, no real purpose or destination in mind. The morning air had a nice brisk bite to it that kept him moving. There was something so comforting about the anonymity of New York City. He could be anyone from anywhere. It didn’t really matter.

  “Father Paul?”

  He stopped, the hand in his overcoat pocket going to the little vial of holy water he always kept with him. Then he slowly turned, ready for fight or flight, whichever seemed more practical. But it was Father Poujean, an old friend from seminary. The dark-skinned Haitian priest sat at a small table outside a café, the only occupant on this chilly early morning.

  He flashed a bright smile, then took a demure sip of his espresso.

  Paul walked over to him and they clasped hands. “It’s just Paul now. Remember?”

  “Yes, yes,” Poujean said. “Still playing the same old game, eh?” He gestured to the other seat at the table. “Please.”

  “You think we should settle down?” asked Paul as he sat down. “Get real jobs and buy a house in the suburbs?”

  Poujean stirred his espresso in silence for a moment. “You know, it doesn’t matter how many rogue demons you destroy.

  It won’t earn you a get-into-heaven card. So why do you do it?

  Why do you risk your life like that?”

  Paul shrugged. “We do it because somebody has to keep them in line, and we are uniquely qualified for the job.”

  “It can’t pay well,” he said.

  “No,” agreed Paul. “It doesn’t. But we get by.”

  Poujean gave him a searching look. “How do you earn anything at all?”

  “She handles the financial aspects of the business,” said Paul with a wry smile. “I don’t pester her for details.”

  Poujean sipped his espresso. Then he said, “Do you really think you’re making a difference?”

  Paul leaned back in his chair and rubbed his temples. “I don’t know. Sometimes I do. But . . .”

  “There’s more of them coming over,” said Poujean.

  “They’re getting bolder,” said Paul. “More confident.”

  “People aren’t expecting demons at the supermarket, Paul.

  So they don’t see them.”

  “Sometimes I think people would believe in aliens before they’d believe in demons.”

  “That’s how it is, now,” said Poujean. “But what are they doing, these rogue demons? What are they playing at?”

  “I don’t know,” admitted Paul. “They’re changing tactics.

  It’s not just possessing some poor mortal and terrorizing the locals for a bit of fun like it used to be. All of a sudden they’re turning up in financial institutions, in real estate, in politics. I think they’ve been working their way into the infrastructure for some time, but lately they’ve been getting more bold. They’re changing the world from the inside, and it seems like they’re being organized by someone in Hell with real authority.”

  “To what end?”

  “Astarte has theories. She believes it’s all coming to a head sometime soon. That everyone is digging in. Bracing for something big.”

  “What do you think?”

  “I think it’s been over a century since she’s been in any sort of influential position in
Hell. The few demons she still kept in touch with cut her off when she made our relationship known.

  Most demons think that falling in love with a mortal is blasphemy.

  The only one who still talks to her is her brother, Dagon. He’s nice enough, but not real bright. So she doesn’t really have any hard evidence on any of it. She’s just taking shots in the dark.”

  They sat in silence for a little while. The waiter came over and asked if Paul wanted to order.

  “Better not,” said Paul. “I have to get going. I promised I’d bring back some breakfast before we head out.”

  Once the waiter had left, Poujean asked, “On a case, I assume?”

  “We got the lead back in Tel Aviv and followed it to Moscow.

  Had a little tussle with some low-level imps there. Nothing too serious. Astarte was able to get some more out of them, though.

  Seems like whatever their game is, it’s something with real estate and urban planning here in the city.”

  “I know a man who might be able to help with that particular area. Real estate and such,” said Poujean.

  “Is he . . . understanding?” asked Paul.

  “Of ex-monk mages with demonic spouses?” asked Poujean.

  “I think he’s flexible enough to handle it.”

  “Interesting,” said Paul. “Mind introducing us?”

  “Well, I did have plans today. . . .”

  “But there is that little matter of me saving your ass from that spider cult back in Paris a few years ago,” said Paul.

  Poujean nodded. “There is that. Although if memory serves, I believe it was actually your lovely wife who saved my ass.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” said Paul. “We’re a package deal. Not intended for individual sale.”