16
The Three Shadowed Ones
I left the house and walked out onto the beach, a pale strip before the black of the ocean. It was almost dawn. As soon as it grew light, we would depart. Meanwhile, our sloop rested peacefully beside the dock, the tall mast with its reefed sail silhouetted against the faint light along the horizon, its rigging clinking softly in the low breeze.
To either side of the tall Victorian house stretched woods, black and murky save for the gleam of a single pair of eyes. As I walked along the edge of the forest toward the shore, swinging my flute, the door of the house creaked behind me. Turning, I saw Mab approaching.
“You okay, ma’am?”
“I guess so.” I stopped swinging the flute and hugged my arms, suddenly cold. “It’s just . . . difficult to hear such things about my family. I know I haven’t always liked them, but I didn’t . . . I didn’t think we would betray each other.”
“Are you sure your sister’s accusations are legit?”
I nodded sadly. “Several times over the years, I’ve seen Theo get very enthusiastic about something only to have a sudden dullness come over his eyes. That’s the effect of the Staff of Persuasion. I’ve seen it before. I’m dismayed I did not recognize it, but who would have imagined one of us would do such a thing? To think Theo might die, because of Cornelius! It’s . . . ” I trailed off and stood a time, watching the pale light slowly spread across the sky.
My mind was not on Theo or Cornelius, but on Father. Cornelius’s betrayal hurt, but it did not shock me. I had liked Cornelius quite a bit when he was a boy. Over the last century or so, however, he had become devious and subtle, so much so that I almost expected something like this from him—though why he would strike out at Theo baffled me. I had thought everyone loved Theo.
Father, on the other hand, I loved and respected—or thought I did. But Father had wielded the Staff of Persuasion throughout my entire youth. Did I admire Father? Or had he enchanted me so I could not believe otherwise?
I stared off into the starry horizon. My family was crumbling away, falling to death, madness, and betrayal. For the first time, in as long as I could remember, I felt lonely.
“Mab,” I said, “do you recall the day I told you about the Three Shadowed Ones? You thought Father was probably dead already and said, ‘Sorry to hear it, ma’am.’ What if our positions had been reversed? What if it had been Father telling you the Three Shadowed Ones were after me? Would that have been your only reaction, ‘Sorry to hear it, sir’?”
Mab had been staring out to sea with his hands thrust into the pockets of his trench coat. As he turned toward me, an object fell to the ground. He stooped, picking up the partially carved wooden figurine of him Mephisto had made, the one I had slipped into his hand the previous evening on the ship. Mab stood a moment, gazing at it, before answering.
“Yesterday, ma’am.” He slipped it back into his pocket. “But not today.”
“There’s something you should see, ma’am,” Mab said presently, after we had stood silently a bit longer. “I don’t know what it means, but I think you oughta see.”
He led me around the back of Logistilla’s house. Amidst the slender trees, decomposing leaves had been kicked aside, revealing a set of storm cellar doors.
“Found this place because the bear was scratching around over here. Figured it was a food store, but it had a funny smell about it . . . enchantment funny, I mean. So I thought I should take a look—just in case.”
Mab opened the doors and started down the stairs, descending into utter blackness. He gestured for me to follow and, once I was below ground level, he scurried back up again and shut the doors behind us, leaving me floundering on a rickety wooden stairway in pitch darkness. The air was cold and smelled of damp earth. Somewhere in the distance, water trickled over rock.
A light flicked on, revealing Mab’s hands and legs. He had lit the headlamp I had given him back at the warehouse. Apparently, he had stuffed it into one of the many pockets of his new trench coat. Strapping it to his head, he turned and shined the light down the stairs.
Below lay a vast underground cavern, a natural cave complete with an irregular stone roof and stalactites. Covering the floor, stacked one upon another as far as the eye could see, lay naked bodies.
“Are they . . . dead?”
“Don’t think so, ma’am. No stench of death.”
“Then . . . wha . . . ”
“Empty bodies, ma’am. Far as I can tell with my instruments, these have never seen life. My guess is Madam Logistilla made them.”
“But . . . why?” I cried. “Why make a stadium full of bodies? What does she plan to do with them?”
“Don’t know, ma’am.”
“Could they be for her clients? Could there possibly be this many animals on this island?”
“Don’t think so, ma’am, not unless she’s turned some of ’em into birds and bugs.” Mab shook his head disapprovingly. “Seems like a rather macabre hobby. If you ask me, your sister should give up this shady business of hers and turn her attention to some wholesome pursuit that does not stink of the arcane. If she must be a collector, let her collect lacy picture frames or those little porcelain Hummel dolls. Something decent!” Mab’s voice held more than his customary touch of bitterness. I did not fault him. He had been through a difficult day.
Gesturing for Mab to bring the light closer, I descended the staircase into the chilly cavern and examined the expanse of naked bodies stretching out before me. Some lay neatly with arms crossed across chests and eyes closed, like corpses. Others had been casually tossed, one upon the other, vacant eyes staring outward. Nearly all the bodies had olive skin, Roman noses, and dark, shiny hair. Italians. My sister was living above a cavern filled to the brim with the naked bodies of Italians.
I stepped around a stack of them, and my stomach lurched. The bodies I could see from the stairs had all been adults in the prime of life. These were children. Little dark-haired boys and girls lying lifeless on the ground. One of them reminded me so much of young Theo that tears came to my eyes.
I backed up slowly.
Mab came up beside me and swore softly. “Maybe she’s bonkers, ma’am . . . went the way of Mephisto. All this living alone with animals can’t be good for her. Not to mention . . . ” His voice died off.
“Not to mention what?”
“Well, ma’am, I don’t like to spread rumors. I’d rather not speculate just because of a hunch.”
As I walked back to the staircase, I tried to recall an instance of one of Mab’s hunches being wrong. “Go ahead, Mab, speculate away.”
“All right, ma’am, if you insist, but I want you to remember that this is just speculation.” When I nodded, he spoke hesitantly. “There’s a . . . smell upstairs, a smell I didn’t like.”
I chuckled. “Which one? Bear? Dingo? Or wild boar?”
Mab was not amused. “I wish, ma’am . . . unfortunately, I’m not talking about anything so wholesome as animal musk. I’m talking about a real stink, as in ‘stink of corruption.’ In one of the side rooms, one of the rooms we passed by, I could have sworn . . . now mind you, ma’am, I didn’t go in to investigate . . . ”
“Yes, Mab, get to the point. You could have sworn . . . ”
“Smelled like demon, ma’am.” Mab spoke in a quick rush.
“You think the Three Shadowed Ones have been here?” I asked, dismayed.
Mab rubbed the back of his neck, “With all due respect, ma’am, the Three Shadowed Ones are posers. I don’t mean they haven’t caused trouble for you and your family, or that they’re not dangerous, or that we should not be wary. But in the grand scheme of things, they’re just posers, lesser minions in service to the Powers of Hell. This . . . this smelled like a Power of Hell . . . one of the big Seven.
“Those big guys . . . they leave a stench you never forget! Had some dealings with the Lord of the Flies long ago when I was—well, I think you know I wasn’t so nice a guy back then.” He hunched his shoulders. “Let’s just say there are reasons those Greeks used to call me the ‘Bad One.’
“Anyway, the big guys, they have this . . . call it a smell. The stink of corruption hangs about them like a cloud of ill omen. It reeks like nothing else on Earth or below. Your sister’s room? Whatever was in there, it reminded me of that.
“And did you notice how nervous she was acting when she told you about Mr. Cornelius using his staff on Mr. Theophrastus?” Mab’s eyes narrowed. “Almost like she expected someone to be looking over her shoulder.”
I whistled softly to cover my shock and fright. “When you said demon, you meant devil? As in The Devil? As in the Prince of Darkness and his cohorts, the Rulers of Hell?”
“Yeah. A devil.”
“That’s bad,” I whispered, shaken.
I grabbed for the rail, but the staircase did not have one. My hand closed on empty air. I wobbled perilously but managed to retain my balance. Beside me, Mab opened his mouth, shut it again, then shook his head.
“Gotta say it, ma’am. This project your sister was working on with Mr. Prospero? Well, I just wish we knew more about it, is all.”
“Me, too, Mab,” I said. “Me, too.”
We retreated rapidly up the stairs, leaving the cavern of naked bodies behind us.
Mab and I returned to the docks, where we gazed out across the ocean at the rosy fingers of dawn. The vista was lovely, but it was hard to shake the memory of stacks of naked bodies and pale children, as still as death. My imagination, overly vivid from lack of sleep, pictured armies of Italian zombies rising to serve some nefarious cause.
If my supposition the night before was correct, perhaps Father intended these bodies for Aerie Ones. I found this theory difficult to accept. Where could Father intend to put such a large group of people? Back in the 1920s, they could have arrived at New York Harbor on a boat and no questions would have been asked. But today? To mingle with modern society, they would need birth certificates, driver’s licenses, or, at the very least, passports.
True, documents could be forged. Mephisto, Erasmus, and Ulysses were each a fair hand at forgeries. Nowadays, however, identification documents required secret watermarks, special materials, and electronic histories. Updating my ID, which our trip to Joliet had shown would soon be necessary, was going to prove difficult enough. False IDs for thousands of people? Including a credible history for credit checks and other computer-related identity searches? Such a project would require a tremendous amount of effort.
Perhaps, Father intended them to blend in among one of the dwindling indigenous populations, somewhere in the Southern Hemisphere. If so, why were they all Italians? Surely, Father realized that Italy had moved into the modern age and was no longer the idyllic land of pastures and country villages of his youth!
Could Father intend the Aerie Ones to live as their own community, either here or on Prospero’s Island? Playing the roles of adults and children alike? A clever idea on the surface, but the more I thought about it, the more I doubted it would work. The incarnated Aerie Ones who showed signs of developing self-control, like Mab and my dear departed friend Gooseberry, were the ones who interacted with human beings. Those that did not—such as our enforcer Boreas, another of the incarnated Northerlies—remained as fierce and uncivilized as they had been before they put on a fleshly form. It was not his body that had transformed Mab into a being with judgment and perspicacity, I realized, but his interaction with mankind.
And then there were the little bodies. I did not think Aerie Ones would make good children, as their whimsical nature would be encouraged rather than curbed. But maybe I was wrong. Perhaps they would make excellent youngsters.
“Ma’am! Watch out!”
Startled by Mab’s shout, I swung about to find Logistilla’s bear looming over me. The enormous creature, even larger than Osae the Bear, stood on the dock, blocking any view of the island or the house. Its huge paws, with long curved claws, reached toward my face. I shouted and leapt back. Mab’s shoulder knocked into me as he thrust his body between me and the bear. Despite the difference of their size, he courageously brandished his lead pipe before the bear’s nose.
The enormous towering bear hesitated. Then, slowly, it continued to stretch out its arm. It reached past Mab and, very gently, brushed my face. The soft pads of its paw rested against my cheek. Mab stood there a moment longer, then stepped back, frowning.
“Poor sucker was a man once.” He put away his pipe.
I reached up and touched the thick matted fur of the bear’s paw. The musky smell was nearly overpowering, yet had a pleasant quality. The creature plaintively gazed back at me, its huge eyes looking sadly into mine. In the dim dawn light, I could just make out their rich brown color.
The door to my sister’s house swung open. Logistilla’s voice cut through the darkness.
“Miranda? Where did you . . . No! You! Get away! Get back in the forest now! Shoo!” When the bear did not move immediately, she brandished her staff, pale beams of green light emanating from the ball at the top illuminated the darkness. “Quickly now, before I turn you into something more vile!” The bear drew back and lumbered off into the forest. “And stay there! What impertinence!” She turned toward Mab and me, smiling. “I’m sorry. He’s harmless, really. But, just to be on the safe side, why don’t you two come inside?”
As we followed my sister back into her house, I watched the bear disappear among the dark trunks. Whispering to Mab, I said, “The poor man. I wish there was some way I could stop Logistilla. Men should not have to live this way.”
“No one should have to live this way, ma’am.”
I questioned Logistilla about the bodies when we returned to her house, but she merely became enraged that we had been prying into her business, called me a snoop and a sneak thief, and accused Mab of trying to make off with her silver. Finally, she sniffed haughtily and declared that if Father chose not to make me privy to his secrets, who was she to go against his wishes? We could get nothing else out of her.
The three of us departed my sister’s house at dawn and slept on the sloop, leaving the Aerie Ones to sail the craft. Five hours later, we sailed into the harbor at St. Thomas, returned the chartered boat and then set off for the airport.
The afternoon was beautiful. We strolled through the Royal Dane Mall on our way back to the airport, peering into the quaint little shops tucked in among alleys and walkways off Dronnigens Gade. Warm palm fronds tickled our faces, and brightly-colored banners rustled in the light wind. In these pleasant surroundings, it seemed almost surreal to recall that my family was in danger, our staffs hunted by demons who wished to destroy us. And yet, it was so.
The warm breeze brought back memories of our family’s great journey, the one that transformed the Staff of the Winds into the weather-mastering instrument it was today. Ever since Father whittled my flute from that cloven pine back on Prospero’s Island, it had been his dream—and mine, of course—to capture all Eight Winds and thus control the weather in all directions of the compass. Ariel and Caurus Father captured in my youth, and in the early 1500s we tracked Zephyrus to his lair in the Outer Hebrides islands (which was how we came to take up residence in Scotland). Some two hundred years later, we still controlled only the Southeast, Northwest, and West Winds.
Our travels in the company of Peter the Great took us deep into the heart of Russia. When the tsar returned to his court, we continued north, passing over the Rhipaean Mountains into Hyperborea. There, we finally cornered the elusive North Wind. With Boreas at our command, we were able to capture the fiercest wind of all, the Northeast.
After the bone-chilling cold of Russia and Hyperborea, Father promised our next journey would be through gentler climes. Some fifty years later—after that terrible earthquake in 1755 brought us to Lisbon—he kept that promise. All of us, except for Logistilla who was pregnant and remained with her husband, departed Europe for places farther east, setting out on what we later called the Great Wind Hunt.
During this extended journey, we supped on exotic food and subdued menacing spirits while tracking the remaining winds. We cornered Afer, the Southwest Wind, in Egypt, and captured Notus, the South Wind, below the Cape of Good Hope. We then chased Eurus, the East Wind, through India and China, before it escaped us by hiding in Japan. We did not follow because, at the time, the Shogunate had declared the country closed to foreigners. Outsiders found on Japanese soil were slain.
We dwelt in China for a few years. Then, in 1792, we received a request for help from En the Ascetic, the immortal Japanese sorcerer, whom we knew from the Centennial Masquerades. Mount Unzen had erupted, and the ensuing tsunami had killed over 14,000 people. En wished us to come and subdue the oni responsible.
With the help of the Staff of Persuasion and the Staff of Transmogrification, we crossed the Japanese countryside in disguise, hunting down numerous tengu, oni, and violent kami. The dragons, who dwell beneath the islands and shake the earth, eluded us, but no Japanese volcano since has slain so many. To show his gratitude, En brought us to his secret temple. There, by playing upon his enchanted shakuhachi, he lured the East Wind into the open. Finally, three hundred years after Father first captured Ariel, all eight winds were ours!
Throughout these journeys, Father would pause and touch the Staff of Transportation to the earth, so the staff could return to that spot. The Great Wind Hunt took us thirty-six years, all told. The return trip was accomplished in under one minute.
Where was Ulysses now? I wondered, sighing. That staff was wasted on him!
“Ma’am,” Mab called. He had gone ahead to find a shop that carried newspapers from the mainland and now stood before a newsstand, scratching his jaw. “That Priority Account you decided not to sail back and check on yesterday. What was it for?”
An icy jab of fear traveled through my stomach.
“Why?”
“Better take a look at this.” He jabbed a finger at a paper. The headline read: RUMBLING AT MOUNT ST. HELENS: ASH FALLS ON NEARBY TOWNS.
Frowning, I handed him some change. He bought the paper, and I read the article on the spot.
“This doesn’t bode well, Mab.” I folded the paper and tossed it into a nearby trash can. My cell phone still read “out of range.” “This is definitely a breach of contract. I’d better call headquarters as soon as we reach the airport!”
We picked up our pace. The sights were still lovely and the air balmy, but the afternoon had lost its charm for me. What would I do if our Priority Accounts stopped honoring their word, now that Gregor and Theo were not around to oathbind them and terrify them into submission? Currently, as a stop gap, I was requiring new contracts be sworn upon the River Styx. Our meager supply of Styx water grew smaller each year, however, and some of what remained was needed for other purposes. More than once, I brought this up with Father, but he had never given me a satisfactory answer. Now he was missing, and the problem was on my shoulders.
Mephisto tripped along in front of us, kicking stones and shouting instructions to them. I could feel Mab glaring at me. He was waiting for me to tell Mephisto that we were deserting him. I figured there would be plenty of time for that on the plane. After all, I was not going to abandon him on St. Thomas.
As we reached Vimmelskaft Gade, Mephisto turned into a narrow alley that the map showed to be a shortcut, then suddenly backed out again, bumping into Mab and exclaiming excitedly, “Uh-oh!”
“Hey, Harebrain, what’s your prob—oh . . . ” Mab trailed off, staring down the alley. He threw out a hand to indicate that I should stay back. I ignored him and rounded the corner. A shiver of dread passed through my body from the roots of my hair to the soles of my feet.
We were gazing down an alley paved with dusty yellow brick. A few palms grew on one side. There was an opening into a café, and the air smelled of fragrant spices, though I also caught a whiff of decaying flesh. In the middle of the alley, blocking the way, three demons stood shoulder to shoulder.
The first was an inky figure with sharp horns, wrapped in a billowing opera cape. His scarlet eyes matched the runes carved into the staff in his hand. Next to him, a stocky man in a robe of thick gray fur leered menacingly. His red hair stood in caked peaks that resembled a punk hairdo, though he followed a far older custom. The third, clad in moldering mummy’s wraps, towered over the other two. A gold pharaoh’s death mask hid his face, and the red-and-white double crown of the Egyptian kings adorned his head. The eyes of the mask were dark slits, so the direction of the gaze beneath could not be discerned. It was from this last figure that the stench of death wafted.
Quick as the wind, Mab pulled a container from his pocket and, deftly pouring it, formed a protective circle about us. Mab’s face was slick with sweat. Putting his finger to his lips and then drawing it across his throat, he indicated that we should keep silent if we valued our lives. Then he passed his hand in front of his eyes, while pointing toward the demons with his elbow, which I took to mean that we should avoid glancing in the direction of the splendid golden pharaoh mask, lest we accidentally make eye contact with the mind-reading Baelor.
So, the three of us stood bunched together, trying not to look at the demons while still not daring to look away, lest they catch us off guard. Mab’s precautions are often excessive, but this time I applauded his quick thinking and vigilance. The palpable malice that issued from the demons—sweeping over us and causing me to feel sullied, unclean—diminished after Mab completed his salt ward. Even so, the sensation was as frightening as it was unpleasant, for the demon’s infernal presence conjured up memories I loathed to recall.
The alley fell away, and, suddenly, I was back several centuries, following Theo and Titus into an abbey that had been visited by an incubus. The demon’s unholy get had eaten their way out of their mothers’ wombs, leaving the dead nuns lying with their entrails spread about them in pools of blood. It was the smell of Baelor of the Baleful Eye that brought back this particular memory. The sight had been terrible, but the odor had been worse, as the stench of the nuns’ rotting corpses mingled with that of the decayed matter spilled from their exposed innards.
I pulled my attention back to the present, only to again breathe in the demon’s stink and find myself transported yet again into my past: the time we found a corpse in an abandoned boneyard, its limbs spread out about the graves, the head bloated and hollowed, as if some creature had been wearing it like a mask. That one gave Logistilla nightmares for years.
This memory was followed by another equally ghastly: a visit to an asylum with Erasmus and Cornelius to question inmates driven mad because some sorcerer had trafficked with a demon. The poor souls screamed horrifically, flinching from invisible foes. They gnawed on their own lips until their mouths were raw and torn. They would have done worse had they not been restrained. The first few had been found eyeless, with gnawed stumps where their fingers should have been. The would-be sorcerer was dead, his blood splattered across the walls of his house. The patients in the asylum were his unsuspecting neighbors. Their only crime: they lived too close to the wrong man.
As bile rose dangerously in my throat, I felt I could not bear much more of this. I closed my eyes and prayed.
Like a soft breath of cool freshness, my Lady’s blessing embraced me. The glaring images of mangled bodies and lives gone wrong faded from my thoughts. I felt cleansed, pure. Mab and Mephisto also raised their heads and stood straighter. Apparently, my Lady’s blessing extended to them. I thanked Her.
Ahead of us, the third demon moved. From behind his back, he brought out a tall staff topped with a winged lion. It consisted of small figurines similar to the one Mephisto had begun of Mab, strung together like a long totem pole. Birds and angels carved from pale woods made up the first two feet of the staff. Mundane creatures made of apple, cherry, and oak followed, and dangerous mythical beasts of dark mahogany or ebony made up the bottom. The jeweled eyes, set into the carven faces, winked in the bright sunlight like so many points of colored fire.
“My staff!” Mephisto darted forward.
Mab and I both lunged, grabbing him by the hair and shoulders. My brother struggled, twisting and writhing, but there were two of us and only one of him. Furthermore, his recent injuries and vagabond life had taxed his strength. After a brief struggle, he went limp and confined himself to muttering darkly, never taking his eyes off the staff.
Mab wildly glanced about us. One-handedly, he drew out his salt and fixed the circle where Mephisto had scuffed it. From his scowl, I gathered that he would have liked to redraw the ward entirely, but to do so he would have had to release Mephisto.
The stench of death was growing. I fought off the desire to gag and wished I had an extra hand to cover my mouth. I noticed my arms, were trembling from the effort of restraining Mephisto. This was not good.
We could remain here, but for how long? The sun would set soon, and the demons’ power would only get stronger as night approached. True, we had a ward, but salt was used to hold off ghosts, ghouls, and vampires. More powerful beings, such as these, could cross such a barrier if they exerted a little effort, especially now that Mephisto had scuffed it.
What other options remained? Run? If so, where would we be safe? Where could one run when fleeing demons? A properly consecrated church would offer sanctuary, but nowadays one could not rely on churches having been properly consecrated.
If we could not stay and we could not run, that left fighting. Fight with what? My flute? Lightning hurt demons, but the sky was blue, and there was not a power line in sight. On a clear day like this, raising enough of a storm to draw a lightning bolt might take as long as twenty minutes, and that was assuming I let go of my brother to play. By then, we could all be dead.
A tornado? Calling up a twister did not require a storm, and I could do it one-handed. In an enclosed alley like this, however, it would be as likely to suck up us as them, not to mention the effect upon the town.
That left us facing demons of Hell with a fighting fan, a lead pipe, and Mephisto’s new lute—and that was assuming Mephisto would fight beside us, rather than commit suicide by lunging for his staff. Of course, it might throw the fight in our favor, if Mephisto suddenly reverted to his giant black bat-winged form. If he was not transforming now, to gain his beloved staff, then I doubted we would get help from that quarter. Besides, I did not necessarily want help from a demon, even if it thought it was my brother.
What we needed was Theo’s Staff of Devastation, or the Ring of Solomon, or one of Mephisto’s mythical beast friends. Alas, the mythical beasts were on their side now.
Seir of the Shadows spoke in soft dulcet tones. “Children of Prospero, our quarrel is not with you. Return that which has been stolen, and no harm will come to you.”
His voice flowed like music, as pleasing to the ear as his handsome sable features were to the eye. Yet, it was a repulsive pleasantness, evoking passions I did not care to experience. My Lady’s breath encircled me again, shielding me from his influence.
Mab, too, stood grimly, refusing to speak. Mephisto, however, showed no such restraint.
“Stolen? You stupid Inkie! We’re not the thieves, you are! Or at least that Irish Setter guy with the Celtic hairstyle is! He stole my staff. And look. It’s right there! King Tut is holding it in his hand! Do something, Miranda! Make them give it back!” Mephisto stamped his foot.
He had begun to squirm again, and I feared Mab would deck him, or worse, let him go and abandon him to the demons.
Seir replied courteously. “Long ago, Dread Prospero stole nine books that were in his trust. We, the Three Shadowed Ones, are the guardians charged with their return.”
“Daddy didn’t steal anything!” Mephisto cried. “Unless you count grumpykins Mab here, who wasn’t stolen, just compelled; so he still didn’t. Besides, we don’t even know where those books are!”
Seir gestured with the Staff of Darkness, then pointed it at the Staff of Summoning. “Two we have already retrieved. A third, the lady Miranda holds in her slender hands: the eldritch flute known as the Staff of Winds.”
His words made no sense, even to Mephisto, who cried out impatiently, “Those aren’t books!”
“Great Prospero altered their form, but we are not deceived.”
Was this true? Could that be what Father meant by they have been put to a greater purpose from which they cannot now be retrieved? I dared not let the question distract me now.
Osae the Red cocked his head and leered at me; his gaze traveled over my pale peach sundress in a fashion that turned my stomach and caused a frisson of fear as I realized I was not wearing my enchanted tea dress. He rasped, “Just give us the flute, and there won’t be any trouble.”
“Are you crazy! No!” Mephisto put his hands on his hips, even though we were still holding his arms, and stuck out his tongue. “What’s with you guys, anyway? Are you culturally challenged? Shouldn’t the guy with the Irish name do his hair like a Celt, and the goofy shapechanger wear the mask? With a name like Baelor, if you want to hide your face, you should paint it with woad!”
The tall Egyptian figure touched two fingers to the golden lips of the pharaoh mask and pointed them at Seir. The incubus’s face went slack, and his body became rigid. A deep, jarringly inhuman voice issued from his mouth. The voice made my hackles rise.
“Puny mortals, vile flesh worms. I know the secrets of your innermost thoughts. I know your insatiable desires, your pathetic hopes, your private fears. I know why the once proud Prospero Family has grown twisted and warped; why Theophrastus’s wrath leads him to embrace death, and Titus grows too slothful to maintain his vigil; why Logistilla is consumed by envy, while despair gnaws upon the innards of the once-proud sorcerer. I know your petty secrets, too, Prince Mephistopheles, and yours, O Maiden of Ice, and I spit upon you both in my contempt.”
Mab stiffened, and I felt my heart beating in my throat. What did Baelor—I assumed this was Baelor somehow speaking through the incubus—mean? Was there a reason for all this madness that had been afflicting us, an explanation?
I longed to cry out, to beg him to tell me, but, of course, he was a demon. Anything he said would most likely be a lie. This did not mean his boasts were empty. Demons were notorious for telling just enough truth to lead men astray.
Seir continued in his inhuman voice, “I know you as well, Caekias Boreal, who currently plays at a guise called Mab. Why do you allow yourself to be enslaved by these mortals, born but what must die? I know your inner nature. It is akin to mine, filled with wrath and boiling desire. Why do you aid their efforts to oppress you?”
Mab had remained granite-faced since completing the ward, but I saw him wince when Baelor called him by his ancient name. Was it a name of power, by which Mab could be compelled? Or was he merely reluctant to be reminded of his past?
Before the demon could continue, Mephisto begin to shout. His voice rose in panic, but I noticed a subtle gleam in his eye.
“Come on, Miranda! Detective! Do something, or they’ll use it! If they use my staff, we’re doomed! All kinds of horrible things can come out of my staff. We’ll never get away!”
I shook my head, embarrassed for him. Even demons could not be that stupid. Mab must have felt similarly, for he muttered very softly, “Oh, great one, Harebrain. What you going to do next? Ask them to throw Br’er Rabbit in the briar patch?”
“I give you one last chance, vile vessel of clay,” the deep voice of the mind reader spoke through the incubus’s sable mouth.
The incubus relaxed, glanced about alertly, and spoke in his own sweet voice. “Lady Miranda, will you surrender the Staff of Winds?” When none of us replied, he continued. “Then, as Prince Mephistopheles suggests, his own handiwork shall bring about your demise.” Seir tilted his head, his scarlet eyes regarding Baelor, who raised the Staff of Summoning.
They had fallen for it. I could not believe it.
The masked mind reader placed his long gold-clad fingers upon the jeweled eyes of one of the figurines, and tapped the Staff of Summoning upon the ground. A trick of the light made the pattern of shadows on the hot bricks look remarkably like some great beast.
Then, a real great beast crouched in the alley. The creature had three heads: an enormous lion with a thick tawny mane, a goat with huge curving horns, and a dragon with a mouthful of cruel teeth. Behind these came the agile body of a goat. Its tail, which was curled up over its shoulder, ended in a great orange stinger, shiny with poison. As the creature stalked toward us, it opened its sharp-toothed serpent mouth and breathed curling bursts of hot, fetid fire.
Mab let go of Mephisto and gave him a push toward the thing. Then, he stepped back and put his hands in the pockets of his trench coat, frowning. Reluctantly, I released my brother.
From beyond the beast came Osae’s breathy laughter. Seir’s soft voice followed. “Surrender the Staff of Winds, and we will call off the chimera.”
“Death first!” Mephisto called back, grinning widely.
Seir’s voice floated over the back of the monster. “As you wish.”
The chimera growled and charged, its steel hooves throwing up sparks as they thundered against the yellow bricks. Fire curled about the green scales of its serpent snout, smelling of brimstone. Mephisto rushed forward. Stopping abruptly in front of the thing, he spread his arms and yelled at the top of his lungs,
“Hello, Chimie! Don’t you recognize me?”
The great beast piled forward, ignoring the greeting. Too late, I remembered Mephisto’s words when his lute broke: My friends don’t recognize me. Horrified, I watched as the creature set upon my brother, knocking him to the ground and opening its giant lion maw to swallow his head. My mad brother was about to meet a very unfortunate, yet sadly fitting, end, eaten by his own chimera. I leapt forward to help him, but the dragon head breathed fire at me. Jumping back, I patted out the flames on my skirt.
“Damn,” whispered Mab. “We’d better run for it. Maybe, if we run out into the traffic, the mythical beast’ll get hit by a car.”
“If we’re not hit first.” I drew back slowly, my hand gripping my flute tightly in one hand and my fan in the other.
“Hey . . . wait a second.” Mab paused. “Well, would ya look at that!”
The chimera had halted. Slowly, the lion released Mephisto’s head and sniffed him with its huge wet nose. Mephisto lay absolutely still, his dark locks singed. From where I stood, I could see his eyes were squeezed tightly closed. Perhaps, he was praying.
The chimera’s three heads sniffed Mephisto. The lion’s great pink tongue slipped out and licked Mephisto’s cheek, its goat head butted his stomach, and the serpent head began to rub against his leg. My brother opened one eye and then the other, an expression of unadulterated joy spreading across his face. Reaching up, he scratched the lion head behind the ears. From its body came a rumbling noise. Could the chimera be purring?
“Hi, there, Chimie,” Mephisto cried. “It’s me. You know me! Your boss? The guy who loves you and feeds you? The one who is supposed to own that staff?”
Peering under the scaly serpentine tail, Mephisto called to the Three Shadowed Ones. “Pity that staff doesn’t let you command the things you summon, isn’t it, guys? Oh, well. Your loss!” To the chimera, he said gaily, “Get ’em, boy!”
The chimera leapt toward the Three Shadowed Ones, flame spurting from its serpent mouth. Immediately Seir of the Shadows winked out like a snuffed candle.
I caught a whiff of freshly-struck matches. Then, a silky masculine voice whispered in my ear, laughing. “Give me the Staff of Winds, my dearest love, and I shall not trouble you again.”
With a single motion, I whipped the mirrored fan of Amatsumaru behind me and slashed his throat. Turning, I saw my blow had fallen short, merely drawing a razor-thin line across his windpipe. A tiny ribbon of crimson blood appeared across the black satiny skin of the incubus’s neck. It matched his eyes.
“Ah, my mistake,” he said politely and vanished. Reappearing between his two companions, he threw an arm about them both.
“Think not that you have escaped us.” This time, Baelor’s jarring voice issued from the shapechanger’s mouth. “If you keep the staves, you are thieves. If you return them, you aid the cause of Hell. Either way, your place among the damned is assured. By Twelfth Night, it shall be sealed!”
Darkness welled up from Gregor’s staff, and the three demons vanished like a shadow before the sun. The chimera reached the place where they had stood and pawed the ground, sniffing.
“Stupid dopes,” snorted Mephisto. “They could have just used the staff again to send Chimie away.” Turning to us with a hand on his hip, he announced, “Always pays to know your tools!”
We could not take the chimera on the Lear, so we opted to have lunch while we discussed our options. We found an empty café overlooking the beach. Mab and I sat on the rounded white plastic chairs beneath a blue awning that kept some of the day’s heat off our faces. Mephisto rested on top of the chimera, his hands knotted about the mane. The waiter who approached us gazed at the chimera with an expression of puzzlement and growing terror.
“Stage prop,” Mab said tiredly, waving a hand at the monster. “We’re from Hollywood.”
The terror died from the young man’s eyes. He stared, intrigued.
“Is there a role for me in your movie?” he asked, in his lyrical island accent.
“No,” Mab replied flatly.
Cowed, the waiter took our orders and retreated.
“Are we really doomed and damned?” Mephisto asked from the back of the chimera. “These pesky spirits have been flinging about an awful lot of prophecies of gloom lately.”
“Most likely,” Mab replied tiredly. “You play with fire, you get burned. You play with the Powers of Hell, you get damned.”
“We are not damned yet!” I declared. “Nor shall we be, if I can do anything about it!”
“That’s the spirit, Miranda,” my brother cheered. “Knock ’em dead! Or alive. Or something.”
As we waited for our food, I noted that Mephisto was playing with a black dirk with a ruby set in the pommel. I asked to see it.
“I found it at Logistilla’s.” Mephisto handed me the knife.
“It looks familiar,” I said.
“Titus and I made it,” Mephisto explained, “for one of Gregor’s Centennial Masquerade costumes.”
“Centennial Masquerade?” asked Mab. “That’s when all the world’s immortals gather once a century to chat, right? In costume, as if that’s going to help hide their identities. Let me see if I remember . . . on the night of the first full moon after midsummer on the last year before the new century.” Mephisto and I nodded. Mab continued, “I attended once. I was part of a costume with a few other guys. I got to control the left knee. Had a grand time blowing humans’ tunics around and carrying off their hats.” Seeing our frowns, Mab added quickly, “This was a while ago, of course, before we worked for Prospero.”
“You went!” I said, amazed. “I’ve heard gods and spirits come among us sometimes. I never believed it though.”
“Elves come, too,” said Mephisto.
“Yeah, King Alastor usually goes,” said Mab.
“Really?” I asked. “How does he dress?”
“Like himself,” said Mab. “Huge antlers, mirrored purple cloak.”
“Oh, him! I thought he was a Fomori. No wonder he didn’t have an Irish accent.” I had danced with the King of the Elves in a London ballroom and had not known it!
“Miranda’s elf went once, but she didn’t recognize him,” said Mephisto.
“I don’t own my own elf, Mephisto,” I said wearily, though Mephisto’s words prompted me to wonder. Had the elf lord come after all? I remembered the wry humor in his stormy eyes and felt mildly sad that he had not chosen to reveal himself. Of course, I reminded myself, Mephisto might be inventing the whole thing.
Mephisto was speaking happily into the chimera’s lion ear. “Chimie, you and me! We’re going to show this old world. We’ll get my staff back, won’t we! They’ll see!”
“What in creation are we going to do with this thing, ma’am?” Mab gestured toward the chimera.
“Easy,” Mephisto replied. “I just hold on to Chimie until they tap the staff to call him back. They will. They’re demons of Hell, after all. They’re not allowed to leave magical beasts hanging around on the sunlit plane. Then, when Chimie goes back, I go too and grab my staff. Easy as pie!”
“Begging your pardon for asking, but how do you get away after that?” Mab asked.
“Hmm,” said Mephisto. “I know!” He halted and looked at me hesitantly, a speculative gleam in his eye. “What happened to that cloak, the one Mab found at the thrift shop?”
“It’s gone,” I said.
“Gone! Gone how?” Mephisto sat straight up.
“We destroyed it,” said Mab. “It’s gone, finished, kaput.”
“When? I don’t remember!” Mephisto cried plaintively.
“At Theo’s, while you were asleep,” I said.
“You let Theo see it? Oh, you dopey-heads! Now, how am I going to be able to sneak around? I only left it at the thrift shop because I needed money. You had no right to destroy it!”
The hair at the nape of my neck stood on end. I asked softly, “Only left what, Mephisto?”
Mephisto’s face went suddenly pale, as if he only just realized to whom he was speaking. He smiled a nervous smile and babbled, “Anyway, I’ll find a way to escape without it. You see, they won’t be expecting me. And once I can grab my staff, I’ll have all my friends. They can’t make my friends their friends just by tapping the staff, can they, Chimie? I’ll call Behemoth and Leviathan and Nessie. Or maybe the monstrosity from the Black Abyss. See how well the Three Shadowed Ones deal with him, eh?” Mephisto continued rapidly. He swung his legs out so that he was stretched across the chimera as if it were a Roman couch, one hand entangled in its mane, the other outstretched. “Teach them to trifle with Mephistopheles, Prince of H . . . ”
Before he could finish, he and the chimera vanished; fading away as if their presence at the table had been nothing but a trick of the light.