8
Not long after Priya left, Lon called at the bar, catching me right before I left. He didn’t say much, just gruffly asked me to come out to his house. My first reaction was to insist that we meet at a restaurant or some other neutral location, but he refused, claiming that he had books to show me—rare books that couldn’t be carted around. My curiosity got the better of me.
However, now that it was getting dark and I was lost in the woods, that curiosity was quickly dying. I pulled over to the side of the road and put my car in park so that I could study the GPS screen without running off the road.
“Turn left in two hundred feet,” the computerized voice said in a cheery voice.
“There is no turn in two hundred feet, you bitch,” I yelled toward the screen. “Zoom out.” Nothing happened. “ZOOM. OUT,” I said again, louder, before the screen responded to the voice-activated command. I studied the roads on the map; they didn’t exist. I was stuck on the side of a small mountain, in the middle of the woods, at night. Beautiful.
I held down the button to turn off the GPS, then put the car in gear and began following the road up the mountain, hoping I could just find it on my own; I wished that I’d written down the verbal instructions Lon gave me over the phone. The road was narrow and made hairpin twists as it snaked back and forth up the rocky, heavily wooded landscape. After five or six of these sharp, steep turns, I found one road branching off, but it was headed down the mountain, not up, so I kept going.
Just when I thought I couldn’t go any farther, the road suddenly ended and turned into gravel, then a few feet away, the iron gates to his house appeared, just as he’d described; I stopped in front of them. A small speaker box sat atop a bent pole. I rolled down the window and pressed the button.
“Umm, hello? It’s Arcadia.”
I waited for a response. Nothing. When I leaned out the window to press the button again, a buzz sounded and the gates began swinging open.
The gravel driveway was steep, but at least there weren’t any more twists. Who the hell would choose to live way up here and navigate all those dangerous curves every day? A mentally unstable person, I thought, that’s who. After a short time, my headlights fell on a break in the trees and his house came into view.
“Well, well, well,” I muttered to myself. It certainly wasn’t a mountain cabin. The modern house was constructed from dark gray stackstone with clean, horizontal lines and large plate-glass windows. Several of them were brightly lit from the inside, radiating a pleasant orange glow.
The driveway curved into a loop. Gravel crunched under my tires as I drove to the front of the house and parked.
A set of dark red double doors marked the entrance. No doorbell that I could see, so I knocked cautiously and tugged my purse higher up on my shoulder. With a force that suctioned wisps of my hair forward, both doors flung inward and orange light flooded the stone-paved entrance.
An adolescent boy stood inside the open doorway. Taller than me, he was lean and gangly, all arms and legs. Dark brown hair rose up in a mass of long, frizzy spiral curls that defied gravity and sprung out several inches from his head in all directions. His skin was the color of a chocolate milk shake.
“Hi,” he said, unabashedly looking me over from head to foot, his eyes lighting up with curiosity when he spotted my halo.
“Hello.”
He looked so much like his father—same green eyes, same long face and high cheekbones. A few things were different. His race, obviously. He was also skinnier and longer than Lon, which wasn’t surprising, I supposed, his mother being a model. His halo was the normal demon green, not gold and green like Lon’s.
“What’s your name again?”
“Arcadia.”
He scrunched up his nose and smiled. “Arcadia, that’s right. What a weird name. It sounds like you should be a movie star or something, especially with that crazy silver halo of yours and that Bride of Frankenstein hair.”
I laughed. That was better than the skunk comments I usually got. “Nope, just a lowly bartender.”
“Do you like classic movies?”
“Sure.”
“Ya know which one I’m talking about? Bride of Frankenstein? Elsa Lanchester had her hair kinda like that. She was really the Monster’s bride—Frankenstein was the doctor. People always screw that up.”
“Wow, I’m impressed. I dressed up as her last year for Halloween.” I pulled up my hair to better show him the bleached-white strands that contrasted against the dark.
“Yeah, that’s it! Cool,” he said brightly. “You’re human, right? My dad said you weren’t demon, but you’re not a savage either, so I should just treat you like another demon.”
“Yep. I’m human, but I can see your halo. What’s your name?”
“Jupiter.”
“Jupiter?” I teased. “Talk about a weird name.”
He grinned and leaned against the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest with a geeky sort of grace. “I know. Stupid, right? I was named after some poet—not the god. I hate poetry.” He rolled his eyes and made a fake vomiting noise. “You can just call me Jupe. That’s what my friends call me.”
“And you can call me Cady if you want.”
“Cady,” he repeated, as if he were trying it out on his tongue. He was barefoot and dressed in jeans and a loose white T-shirt that fell at a crisp angle from his bony shoulders.
“Whoa, is that a charm?” He reached out to grab my necklace. I instinctually jerked back—I don’t like people invading my private space, and I’m not a hugger—but he didn’t seem to notice. He leaned closer and inspected the small metal pendant, holding it in his flattened palm.
After my worrisome visit from Priya, I realized I needed more continuous protection than my tattooed sigils offered. They were convenient, quick fixes, but because they wouldn’t hold a permanent charge—allowing me the flexibility to turn them off and on at will—they required a constant influx of Heka to power; the longest I’d ever powered one was about an hour, and I passed out afterward. Seeking something more substantial, I dug out an oldie-but-goodie charm I’d created a few years back, at a point in my life when paranoia was getting the best of me. It was a basic deflector, which should keep me safe from hostile magical attack, and, with any luck, hidden from anything malicious originating from the Æthyr.
“Did you make this? Is it magick?” Jupe asked.
“Uh, what? Magick?” I said, as if he were crazy, pulling the pendant away from him and tucking it under the neck of my shirt.
“Yeah, magick. Dad told me you’re a real magician. That’s so cool!”
“He did, did he?” Shit, what the hell was I supposed to say? How much did he tell his son about me, anyway?
“I’ve read tons of books about famous magicians like Aleister Crowley. I have some questions for you—”
Lon’s hands appeared on his son’s shoulders and pulled him backward. “Don’t talk her ear off yet. You’ll scare her away before she even gets in the damn door.”
“Hi,” I said, smiling. He smiled back and an unexpected feeling of relief flooded through me. Call it instinct—or fool-ishness—but I was instantaneously confident that I could trust him; all my worries about his discretion over my true identity vanished on the spot.
“Come on Jupe,” he said, “where are your manners?”
“Huh? Oh, come inside. You’re letting flies in.”
“Jupe,” Lon chastised.
“What? That’s what you always say.” As his father wearily shook his head, Jupe grabbed my arm and pulled me inside; I guessed my no-touching rule was out the window too.
Their house was much larger than mine, but still comfortable. The foyer opened up into an expansive great room with a floor-to-ceiling stone fireplace at the far end and a wide, curving metal staircase to the right with gray, slab-stone steps. The decor was minimalist and modern, lots of blond wood and stainless steel—like something out of an IKEA catalog, but higher-end. Very tidy and clean.
“Nice,” I remarked.
“You want a tour?” Jupe suggested with great enthusiasm.
“She doesn’t want a tour,” Lon said. “This isn’t the Louvre.” Jupe frowned, then his face brightened again. His pale green eyes were not as intensely colored as his father’s, but they were bigger and enfolded by thick, downy lashes. Quite arresting. “We’re having mashed potatoes for dinner. Do you like mashed potatoes?”
“Uh, yeah …”
“Then you’ll like these. My dad’s a real good cook.”
“You’re supposed to ask her if she’s had dinner first, then ask if she’d like to eat with us.”
Jupe rolled his eyes. “Blah, blah. What he said.”
“Jupe.”
“Sorry. Would you like to eat dinner with us, madam, please?” Jupe said with a terrible attempt at something close to a prim-and-proper accent, which apparently in his mind was a broad mix of British and Australian.
“There’s more than mashed potatoes,” Lon added.
“I haven’t had dinner yet, so sure. Yeah.”
“Sweet! I’m starved, let’s eat, Dad.” Jupe paused, then shouted at the top of his lungs—quite impressive, I can tell you—“Foxglove! Come here, girl!” He whistled with his hands cupped around his mouth, and headed off into the next room, leaving Lon and me standing alone.
“Sorry he’s such a motormouth,” he said. “He doesn’t get it from me.”
“Really? Color me shocked,” I said dryly. He gave me a single grunt in return, which made me laugh. “He seems sweet. Cute, too. The girls are going to be all over him in a couple of years.”
“You think?” He looked over his shoulder at Jupe, who was well out of earshot and continuing to whistle and call.
“God yes—he looks just like you.” I realized, too late, what I’d just implied when one of Lon’s eyebrows slowly raised and the corner of his mouth twitched in amusement.
“Who’s Foxglove?” I quickly asked before it got too awkward.
“Our dog—a black Lab.”
“Ah.” Not a cat. Big points.
“She’s outside, but don’t tell Jupe. Looking for her will keep him occupied for a few minutes and give your ears a chance to rest.”
He grinned and turned away, then starting walking out of the room. I guessed that meant that I was supposed to follow, so I did. We walked under a wide archway into a kitchen with gobs of white subway tile and stainless steel countertops. A long, curved island sat in the center, bordered with six stools. As he walked around the island, he motioned for me to sit.
“Whatever you’re cooking smells terrific,” I admitted.
It really did; my stomach was trying to eat itself.
“Thanks.”
I waited for him to tell me exactly what if was, but he didn’t.
“The food’s not dosed like your cigarettes, right?”
“Like you’ve never dosed someone.”
“How would you know?” If he’d been snooping, asking around about me, God only knew what he’d heard. A couple of my regulars at the bar suspected that I concocted medicinals; had they been gossiping?
He gave me a mysterious smile, then turned away and changed the subject. “I’ve found ten albino demons so far,” he said as a timer went off. He took the large stockpot off the range and turned his back to me to dump out the contents into a colander. The infamous potatoes. “When we get finished eating, I’ll let you look at them and you can tell me what you think.”
“That’s great news.”
“Hold off on getting too excited. I’ve only been through a handful of goetias.”
“Oh?”
“It could take me days to finish with what I’ve got. If we can’t find it, I might know someone we can call.”
“Anything you can do to help is much appreciated. I know this is probably taking up a lot of your time, and you’ve got a job and your son—”
“I don’t have a shoot scheduled right now. Don’t worry about it.”
Lon smashed the steaming potatoes in a large bowl as the sound of a slamming door echoed in the distance. Jupe’s voice carried from somewhere in the house. “Goddamn dog, where the hell are you hiding?”
“Jupiter!” Lon yelled crossly.
“Oops, sorry,” Jupe replied. His footsteps thundered across the wooden floor before he appeared in the kitchen.
“No swearing around company.”
He flopped onto the stool next to me and spread his long arms across the counter. “I said sorry, jeez. I’m sure she’s heard it before.”
“I have … in the car earlier, when I was trying to find your house.”
Jupe looked at me with a strange expression, then got it, and laughed, rearing back his head. “See. She cusses too.”
Lon threw me a scolding look. “Not helping,” he mumbled.
“Don’t let him fool you,” Jupe said, “he drops the F-bomb like a billion times a day, but he only pretends it’s wrong in front of other people. H-Y-P-O-C-R-I—” he began spelling.
“Goddammit, Jupe.”
“Language, Dad.”
I covered my mouth with my knuckles to muffle a laugh.
We ate at a small table in a nook off the kitchen— braised short ribs that melted on the tongue, in a thick, dark wine sauce; a simple salad; and the hand-smashed potatoes, which were doctored with a sinful amount of cream and butter. After a long, dry spell of living off microwave dinners and cold cereal, anything homemade would’ve tasted good, but his cooking skills were surprisingly refined. I had to force myself to eat everything slowly so that I didn’t appear desperate or greedy. Jupe had no such concerns and finished off two helpings with remarkable speed and gusto.
Throughout the meal, I was torn in two directions by two very different men. Jupe was bubbly and talkative, a fireball of innocent energy that contrasted with Lon and his understated way of thinking and speaking.
Strangely, though, I found a few subtle similarities between them as well. Jupe obviously considered himself a budding comedian and constantly tried to make me laugh— which he did, many times—but I also caught fleeting looks of amusement on Lon’s face, and they lapsed into several bouts of gunfire-fast witty repartee. Yet, underneath all his manic energy, Jupe had his father’s easy confidence, and occasionally made remarkably concise observations that caught me off-guard.
It was pleasant, being in a normal house with a normal family. My mind wandered to the last few years I’d spent at home with my own family, when I was a teenager. My mom was never much of a cook, and making the meal that Lon had just served would have been beyond her expertise. Besides, my parents were vegans, so meat was never part of our meals at home—though I’d regularly sneak hamburgers and meat loaf in the school cafeteria and tell my parents I’d eaten salad instead. But there was an Indian restaurant close to our house in Florida that made awesome samosas. We used to get take-out from them every Friday and would eat it outside on our back patio. Afterward, my father would point out constellations and tell me stories about the myths behind them. Even though he repeated many stories, I never got tired of hearing any of them; Friday was always my favorite day of the week.
After clearing the table, Lon exiled Jupe to his room so that we could discuss business. I trailed him as he retreated to a door at the end of a small hall past the dining room. The door was locked electronically. He stuck a finger onto a small blue light over the handle of the door and a dead bolt slid open.
“Wow, serious security.”
“There’s dangerous information in some of these books,” he explained as he flipped on the lights and let me inside. “Jupe’s fascinated with magick right now. I don’t want to risk his fooling around in here and getting himself in trouble.”
Once inside the room, my mouth fell open. Hundreds and hundreds—maybe thousands—of rare occult books lined all four walls of the windowless room, and even more titles neatly filed around a large rectangular pillar in the center. On one side of the room was a chunky antique desk and a small fireplace with two stuffed armchairs in front of it anchored the other side. Six frosted art deco pendant lights hung from a high ceiling in two neat rows. A rolling wooden ladder attached to a track that extended around the room.
“Jesus, Lon.” I studied the endless rows of cracked leather spines. “This is larger than the collection in the vault in our main lodge.”
He walked alongside me with his hands behind his back. “I’ve spent twenty years collecting it. Almost got myself killed a couple of times in the process.”
I didn’t doubt it. He was right about there being dangerous information in some of those books. Theurgia Mallecta Gotetica, Hellanicus Magica Infernal, Speculum Artis Bene Moriendi … it was an occultist’s wet dream. Plenty of people would go to less than ethical lengths to get their hands on these.
“Is this a first edition?” I asked, squatting down to inspect a tall, fat book with a green leather spine: Liber Ceremonialle Magicke.
“Yes, 1416. One of five known existing copies. Would you like to look at it?”
“Could I? I’ve only seen the later editions printed on paper.”
“Sure. Let’s wash up first.” The mark of a serious, obsessive collector. He retreated to one of two small doors at the far end of the room, which contained a sink, hand soap, and paper towels. I washed and dried my hands, then returned. The book was sitting in the middle of his desk on a fresh white paper blotter. He motioned for me to sit down, then stood over my shoulder as I opened the book.
It smelled wonderful as I cracked open the cover—old leather mingled with the slightly musty scent of parchment. Lon smelled good as well, like the dinner he’d just cooked. It made me wish I’d ditched my pride and asked for seconds.
“Turn the pages by the corners,” he instructed.
“Yes, I know.” Sheesh. It wasn’t like I’d never handled a valuable old book before. The pages were stiff and brittle, and I carefully turned each one, marveling at the old astrological calculations and tedious ritual instructions. “The illustrations are so bright.”
“The previous owners took good care of it.”
“Very well preserved,” I agreed.
After a couple of minutes of browsing, I thanked him and gave it back. He shelved it, then brought a small stack of goetias over to the desk. The old tomes were each roughly the size of a coffee table art book; their cracking paper pages were swaddled in worn leather covers embossed with the names of the magicians who wrote them. Lon pulled up a wooden side chair next to me, sat down, and took a book off the stack.
“These are all the albino demons I’ve found so far.” He scooted his chair closer until his shoulder brushed mine. A rush of chills spread over my arms at the accidental contact. I stole a quick sidelong glance at him, eyes roaming over his arms and the hint of defined muscle there, just visible through his long-sleeve T-shirt. Christ, I thought. How long had it been since I’d been on a date? I really needed to work less and get out more.
As I tamped these thoughts down, he opened the first book in front of me, gently turning past pages of scrawled arcane symbols, handwritten in ink centuries ago. Calculations for moon phases and detailed charts of summoning variables covered the entries: size of the summoning seal, what was used to draw it (red ochre chalk, soot, blood), where the ritual was performed. Crude drawings and engravings depicted the evoked beings. One had the head of a frog and the naked body of a boy. Another was covered in scales below the waist and had massive twisting horns; he was riding a flying crocodile.
Lon stopped at a pair of pages; tucked between was a small scrap of blue paper.
“This one is Lemansus,” he said, removing the blue paper marker. “He fits all of your descriptions but two.”
I leaned closer to study the small woodcut rendering. “No horns … oh, no eyes at all—blind,” I said after a few seconds. “What else?”
“Not primordial. The text claims that the magician who first conjured him was told that this demon was born sometime in the fifth century.”
He carefully flipped to the next marker in the book. “Eligostanzia. He mostly fits the description, but there’s no mention of the rolling tongue that you’re looking for, and it’s hard to tell if those are talons or long fingers. The magician doesn’t say.”
“Hmm.”
“He’s also allegedly skilled at divinatory favors, not killing.”
“Maybe I should copy down his name, just in case. Do you have something I can write with, or—”
He opened a desk drawer and pulled out a stack of papers; he’d already run off copies of the marked pages. “Let’s make two stacks: Maybe and No. You can take the Maybe stack with you.”
At that moment, it crossed my mind that I really shouldn’t have needed to come all the way out there. He could easily have met me somewhere and handed over the copies.
“I thought you’d like to see the details on the original pages yourself,” he explained, as if he’d read my thoughts.
Wait—my thoughts. A terrible realization struck me.
“Umm, Lon?”
“You never told me what your knack is.”
Knack. Earthbound slang for a demonic ability. Healing, telepathy, controlling weather … Most of the Earthbounds I knew had useless knacks that weren’t even interesting enough to nab them a job in a carnival sideshow. But I had a sinking feeling that Lon’s knack wasn’t ordinary.
“I didn’t?” He looked down at the desk, avoiding my eyes.
“No.”
He shrugged. “I don’t really have one.”
“Liar.”
Seconds ticked. “I’m an empath,” he finally said, still gazing at the book in front of us.
“You sense other people’s emotions?”
“Yes.”
I instantly became anxious. I thought back to when we first met at the coffee shop, and how he must have known everything I was feeling. Crap. In my house, too. Could he tell when I was ogling him, then? What about a couple of minutes back, when I was getting all hot and bothered by our shoulders touching? Exactly how much could someone tell about you by reading your emotions?
He sighed.
“You can tell how I feel right now, huh?”
“Yes.”
I tried to relax and clear my head. “I’ve heard of empaths, but I’ve never met one. How detailed is your skill? You can’t read minds, can you?” Please say no, please say no …
“No.”
Paranoia got the better of me. “Are you just saying that because I was thinking it?”
His smile was fatigued, like he’d been forced to explain this a billion times before; he probably had. “I really can’t read your thoughts. Just emotions. Simple ones are the easiest. If there are too many at once, it gets garbled. But I can sense you’re relieved that I’m not a mind reader, and that you’re putting up a barrier to keep your emotions guarded right now.”
“Sorry.”
A long, awkward pause filled up the space between us.
“Can you block it, or do you just sense emotions from everyone you’re around?”
“No, I can tune people out. If I couldn’t, I’d never be able to leave the house.”
“I suppose that would be … overwhelming.”
“When other Earthbounds find out, they start avoiding me. Relationships are hard.” One corner of his mouth puckered as gave me glance from the side. “The only person who doesn’t mind my ability is Jupe. He’s … well, an open book, so to speak.” He closed the tome in front of us and smiled at me weakly before pulling the next one off the stack.
A low wave of pity rolled over me, and I let it, even with the knowledge that he could sense it. “Is that why your marriage broke up?”
“It didn’t help. It’s hard to stay together when you know someone’s cheating on you and doesn’t care that you know it.”
“That sucks. I’m sorry.”
He shrugged. “I married her after she got pregnant with Jupe. I thought it was the right thing to do, thought we were in love—or at least that we might be one day—but her demonic ability …” A scowl darkened his face for a few seconds. “Turned out, staying together was bad for us and bad for Jupe. So I divorced her eight years ago and took Jupe with me. He’s a good kid.”
“It’s kinda admirable that you’re raising him by yourself.”
“I’ve had help. I employ an elderly couple who live on a small house on the property. They help take care of the house and watch out for him.”
Housekeepers. Hmph. I knew a man like him couldn’t possibly keep a house like that so clean by himself; I tried to erase that thought before he caught my smugness.
“Has Jupe’s knack surfaced yet?” Abilities usually didn’t until mid-teens, from what I’d heard.
“No, but as much as I hate my knack, I hope like hell he inherits mine and not hers.”
He didn’t offer any further information about her ability, so I didn’t pry.
“Well, like you said, he’s a good kid. You’ll teach him to handle it fine.” I smiled, and his tightly creased eyes relaxed.
“I’m glad you like him,” he said. I wondered if that was just a casual observation, or if he sensed that I did. Before I could ask, he cracked open the second book.
“Here’s the third demon I found,” he said, going back to our shop talk as if his revelation was inconsequential. As if nothing had changed between us.
And maybe it hadn’t.