Mojo Queen Page 3

  Tall tow-head’s name was Seth. The shorter stocky one with light brown curls and a pinched face was Gabe. They did not offer last names. Seth did the talking but he did not want to get to the point. “So. Uh.”

  Oh great. “I want you to know that you don’t have to worry about confidentiality here,” I said in my most reassuring voice. “This agency is about helping people. Whatever problem you think you have, I can check it out. If it’s turns out to be something other than paranormal, I’ll see if I can help you find someone who can help you.” Like an electrician. “If it is paranormal, I’ll do everything I can to help you. I’ve been doing this for a while now. I’ve seen a lot.”

  They exchanged wary glances. Seth asked, “What kind of things have you seen?”

  I get this a lot, too; incredulity, reluctance and, most of all, embarrassment. I try my best to let people know they’re not alone in their strange experiences, that they’ll find no judgment in this office. “Well, I’ve dealt with ghosts. A lot of hauntings. I’ve got a pretty good track record of being able to convince an unfriendly ghost to go on its way.”

  “Do you have experience with exorcism?”

  My eyebrows went up before I could stop them. “Are you talking about banishing a ghost?”

  “No.” He shook his head. “I’m talking about a demon.”

  Gabe started shifting around in his seat. I took a long drink of coffee, trying to formulate a reply. “Why don’t you tell me a little more about what’s going on?”

  Oh boy, did Seth not want to do that. Emotions rippled across his face, mostly doubt with a heavy dollop of fear. “We think that our friend is possessed by a demon.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  Gabe let loose with a bark of hysterical laughter. Seth glared him into silence then turned back to me. Keeping his gaze at a point on the wall just left of my forehead, he said, “We were just messing around with some stuff. We didn’t take it seriously. I mean, who would?” He met my eyes for a moment, looking for some kind of reassurance, maybe. Then he went back to staring at the wall. “But something happened.” A mixture of terror and awe weighed heavy in his voice, his face.

  “What happened?” I prompted.

  He stayed silent for a long moment, his hands clenching and unclenching, eyes traveling from the wall to the floor and anywhere else but me. “Our friend…she’s possessed by a demon.” He was on the verge of tears now. “Can you help her?”

  His evasiveness was telling, and what it was telling me was not good. “You guys are college students, right?” I asked. Seth nodded. “Schizophrenic symptoms can develop in your early twenties,” I told him gently. “Have you thought about taking your friend to a doctor for a mental health evaluation?” I’ve seen this a few times too. Mental illness was probably a common cause of behaviors attributed to demonic possession in the past, and even today there are still a few fringe fundamentalists that were quicker to tie someone down and pray over them than take them to a doctor. Not many, though.

  Seth shook his head violently. “No, no, no, it’s not like that. She…” He covered his face with his hands. When he spoke again, his voice sounded choked, strangled. “We didn’t know that it would be like this. We didn’t know…we thought…”

  “You didn’t think what? What happened?”

  He reached across and grabbed my hands, his face twisted with fear, eyes pleading. “Can you please help her? Please help us. Please.”

  Seth was tall and gangly but strong enough to pull me out of my chair and onto my knees on the floor in front of him. With effort I got my hands back and stood. He covered his head with his arms while sobs wracked his body. Gabe sat stone-faced. At least, that’s what I thought until I saw twin tears slide down his face. What the hell did these kids get into? I put a hand on Seth’s shoulder, trying to offer whatever comfort I could.

  Gabe spoke after a long, uncomfortable silence. “Do you think you can help?” he asked quietly.

  “I’ll do whatever I can.” I stepped away and stood in the doorway to the private office. I took off my glasses, wiping the lenses on my shirttail. I looked the two kids over while I did this, my eyes unfocused. A roil of dark hazy grayish black covered their auras in a suffocating blanket.

  These two kids--their auras were a cloud of absolute terror.

  * * * *

  They drove ahead of me and I followed in my car. A fortyminute drive from my office and every other minute of it, I wondered if I should have waited for nightfall, to have Daniel as backup. Ghosts, spirits, poltergeists--hell, even brownies once, but demons? I’d witnessed an exorcism once, by Rozella, but she had kept me far back from the action and I had been happy to stay out of the way. If this was real I would probably need help, but Seth and Gabe did not want to wait.

  I couldn’t decide if this was real. These two guys were certainly scared, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything paranormal was going on. Witnessing someone have a psychotic break can be a pretty horrifying thing. A seemingly normal person devolving into a chaotic maelstrom of emotion in which nothing makes sense anymore, down is up and left is right, and nothing you do helps. It can be heartbreaking. They wouldn’t even tell me the girl’s name, much less if she was dating one of them, but if she was that would explain the panic. Most people would take someone to an emergency room and get them into a psych ward. So why had they come to me? They certainly seemed to believe this was a case of possession.

  They turned off the highway and onto a two-lane road that wound through farmland for several miles then took a dirt track to a falling down abandoned church. Peeling paint, rotting wood, a corner of the roof gouged out, the steeple looked like it could come down at any time. No one had worshipped here in decades. As I got out of my car I checked my cellphone, glad to see I could get service. This place was way the hell out in the middle of nowhere. I had a messenger bag with some books and supplies I draped across my front so I could reach inside easily. I pulled my hair into a ponytail as I walked across the dirt and gravel to the door.

  Seth led the way, Gabe staying outside. Dirty windows turned the light a murky yellow. The stale air smelled of candles, incense and funk I would need Daniel or a CSI team to identify. Most of the pews had long since been removed and the floor was surprisingly clean, probably for the ritual circle marked on the hardwood by a ring of black candles, burnt most of the way down. Five black metal cauldrons were arranged at points just inside the ring of candles. My guess was to mark a pentagram. In the center of the circle was a pile of what looked to be black robes, with a person wearing a matching robe lying on makeshift bedding, head covered with a hood and turned facing the far wall. Around this person and their nest someone had poured a ring of salt three inches wide.

  I spent a few minutes looking everything over before spotting the other kid sitting in a far corner, holding a baseball bat and sporting the same look of fear as his buddies.

  Seth approached me, wisely stopping a few feet away. “I know this looks bad.”

  “You couldn’t have just had a kegger?” I looked at him. “You and your friends had to go dabbling in the black arts?”

  Seth narrowed his eyes. “I told you, we didn’t think anything would really happen. It’s not like--” He cut himself off, and I wondered what I wasn’t being told.

  “I need you to tell me about the ritual, Seth.”

  Silence.

  “Was it designed to actually summon something, or was that an accident?”

  He shrugged, his face closed, a touch of defiance there I didn’t like. Being the Polite Professional works in the ’burbs but it was getting me nothing here. “You said there was a girl.” I pointed at the sleeping person in the salt circle. “Is that her? What happened to her?”

  Seth started making some indistinct noises. Protesting what, I don’t know, because that sleeping person wasn’t sleeping after all. Her soft liquid voice cut through the room. “Tell her, Seth. Tell her what you and your friends did to me.”

&nb
sp; All eyes turned to her. She sat in the middle of her nest of black robes, tiny and pale. Long blond hair framed a tear-streaked face. Heavy rope wound around her wrists. I approached her, kneeling in front of her but careful to stay outside the salt. “What’s your name?”

  Her chin wobbled as she made an effort to hold back a sob. “Delia. My name is Delia. Please don’t let them hurt me anymore.” Tears spilled from her blue eyes. Even scared and dirty, she was a beautiful girl. That didn’t mean I could trust what she said any more than I could what Seth told me.

  “What happened, Delia?”

  “I thought they were my friends,” she said, murmuring barely above a whisper. “They said we were just going to party. The things they did to me…it was so awful.” She reached for me, hands straining against the rope. She reached, but stayed just that side of the salt. “They took turns…they raped me.” Her voice strangled, full of shame and pain.

  “No, no, no, she’s lying. She is lying!” Seth yelled. “You can’t trust anything she says. It was not rape. It was not rape.” He stood over us, quivering with anger.

  “Look, just calm down.” I pushed against his legs to get him to back up.

  “She wanted this! She wanted this just as much as he did!”

  Delia’s tears became a flood as she tipped over into hysteria. “How can you say that? You raped me! You all raped me! You did it, you did it!” Her words were barely intelligible as she began to cry, her body shaking with agonized sobs.

  The screaming brought Gabe inside and the other boy out of his corner, bat at the ready. I stood, pushed Seth as hard as I could and got him a few feet back. Delia’s scream turned into a wail, louder and louder. His friends tried to grab Seth but he spun away from them and ran for a canvas bag sitting on the floor at the edge of the room. He came back with a glass jar in his hands, twisting the lid off. I tried to get Gabe’s attention, to tell him to get Seth outside, but then I realized what Seth had in that jar, and what he was going to do with it.

  The salt hit Delia full in the face, some of it going right in her open mouth. Her wail changed into a cry of pain and rage. Tiny holes opened on her flesh, every place the salt made contact, smoke furling out of her skin. Her body contorted, arms and legs pounding against the hardwood floor. One foot accidently touched the salt ring on the floor, bringing on more screams. She slumped, face turned away from us, screams dying to labored breathing.

  Her laughter was so quiet when it started I wasn’t sure what I was hearing at first--a nasty little giggle. She sat up and faced us, her face already healing, the smoke dissipating but leaving behind a charred flesh odor that did nothing to improve the stink in the room.

  “That wasn’t very nice of you, Seth.” She gave him a dazzling smile. “It really hurt my feelings. I’ve done so many nice things for you.” She turned her gaze to me. “Would you like to hear about all the nice things I’ve done for him? For all of them?”

  “No.” I took my glasses off, letting my eyes unfocus. Black, as I expected, but not the least bit hazy or cloudy. Her aura framed her like polished obsidian. I put my glasses back on and reached into my messenger bag, pulling out a book. “What’s your name?” Lame, but I really didn’t know what to say or do. Run to the car, lock the doors and wait for nightfall and Daniel. At least I wasn’t hyperventilating like the kid with the bat.

  “I told you my name.” She stood, smoothing her robe and her hair as best she could with her hands still tied. “It’s Delia.”

  “Seth?”

  “She wanted this.” His body quivered. “She wanted this, and so did he.”

  “Who is he? Is the demon male?” Sweat trickled down my back despite the cold and I hoped my voice didn’t sound as shaky as I felt. Seth wouldn’t answer me, and I was getting damn sick of that.

  Gabe spoke. “Can you get rid of it?”

  Delia snickered. Clearly she felt about as confident of my abilities with regard to this as I did. Unholy shit. I should stick to ghosts.

  I rummaged in the bag some more and pulled out a cross and a bottle of holy water. I made eye contact with Gabe, gesturing with the cross. He nodded and I tossed it to him. The kid with the bat reached for the bottle. As I handed it to him I asked, “What’s your name?”

  “Levi.” His voice sounded raw.

  “I’m Roxie. It’s gonna be okay.” I put my hand on his arm briefly.

  “Oh, is it, Roxie?” Delia said. “Is it going to be okay?”

  “Seth, you still have salt in that jar?” I asked.

  “Golly, I really hope it’s going to be okay.” She looked very pleased, which made me wonder what else didn’t I know?

  Seth got it together enough to listen to me as I got them arranged around the circle. I opened the book to the page I had marked.

  The Catholic Rite of Exorcism is a long, involved ritual. Priests who become exorcists train for years and only perform exorcisms with the permission of their bishop.

  I began the Litany of Saints. “Holy Mary pray for us.” I walked around the circle, making eye contact with the Seth, Gabe and Levi so they would know what I needed them to do. “Pray for us.”

  “Holy Mother of God,” I said.

  “Pray for us,” they joined in, voices uncertain.

  “Holy Virgin of virgins.”

  “Pray for us.” Still unsure. Delia’s laughter didn’t help matters.

  “St. Michael.”

  “Pray for us.” A little stronger now.

  We kept going down the long list of saints, our mingled voices falling into a rhythm. Delia yawned and began to inspect her fingernails.

  “From all evil, deliver us, oh Lord.”

  They followed my lead again. “Deliver us, oh Lord.”

  “From all sin.”

  “Deliver--”

  Delia cut in. “This is getting really boring. If you’re going to keep this up I might take a nap.”

  All this was having no effect on her at all, and it was making me feel like an idiot, and so far out in left field I couldn’t see home plate. I snapped the book shut, the sudden noise actually getting a little jump out of Delia. That was good. “The Lord Jesus rebuke you and cast you out.”

  I quit going to church once I was on my own, not that too many will accept someone like me, who openly practices all sorts of folk magic. But some things never leave you and by damn I am a Southerner. I know how to roll with the holy. “The Lord Jesus rebuke you and cast you out! The Lord Jesus rebuke you and cast you out of this body and back into the abyss! The Lord Jesus rebuke you and command you to return to Hell!”

  The others joined in, supplying their own calls for the demon’s eviction. Her face twisted with rage. Levi let his bat fall to the floor, opened the bottle of holy water and tossed it at her. Seth threw more salt. She began to sizzle and smoke and scream, a little tornado of pain and fury trapped in a circle. Our chants became louder in an attempt to drown out her screams. A stray thought ran through my brain--this might actually work--then she did something I didn’t anticipate, or even consider possible.

  She leapt across the circle’s boundary.

  Shock tore a curse out of me and I grabbed the nearest kid. “Run!”

  The four of us backed away from her as fast as we could, Levi tripping over the baseball bat as he and Gabe went as far as the door but didn’t leave. Delia’s shrieks went on and on as her flesh burned, melting and reforming as the purifying salt fought with the demon’s essence. Blood flowed from her skin even as it healed, soaking her robe and slicking the floor. Seth picked up the bat, swinging it down across her back as she writhed. She collapsed, the sudden silence making my ears ring.

  I tried to get my breathing under control. “Do you have more rope?”

  He nodded. “In the car.”

  “Get it. Now.”

  He turned to run, feet sliding on the bloody floor. Delia twitched, just a hint of movement. I dug through my bag, hoping I had something, anything else I could use as a weapon, because at this point
all I had left was name-calling and cussing.

  Delia stood slowly. Blood matted her hair and streaked her face like war paint, her expression ice. She raised her hands, wrists still bound by rope, until she jerked them apart, the rope falling to the floor. I planted my feet, spreading my palms at my sides. Reaching out with my senses, I tried to tap into the energy around me, in the earth under my feet and the floor. Too scared--it wasn’t working. I felt nothing but my own terror.

  She rushed at me, her aura spreading into wings. I had no time to run before she sent me flying across the room to crash into a wall. Every inch of the right side of my body screamed in pain as I dropped to the floor. My glasses came off and I lay stunned, unable to move. Blood ran into my eyes and I tried to wipe it away, my coordination not working. Fresh screams sent me searching for my glasses but I couldn’t find them. Flashes of darkness drew my fuzzy eyes to the door. Gray shades of fear, the demon’s obsidian soaking in what little light that gave off. She had one of the boys pinned against the door. Her fingers melted into talons as she held him in place. He tried to scream but couldn’t seem to get enough breath. She raised a hand to his face but then something outside seemed to catch her attention. Letting the kid fall to the ground, Delia walked away, casual, unhurried, out into the parking lot.

  I pulled myself to my feet painfully and wobbled to the door. It was Gabe, clutching his chest but still alive. Levi and Seth came to help him. I stepped around them and through the door, blinking in the bright sunlight. More blood leaked into my eyes. My head felt wrong. Everything felt wrong, my vision starting to dim. A car spun out of the lot and I tried to make out details. All I got was a brief flash of two auras through the driver’s door window as it pulled into the road. One pure black, the other black shot through with bursts of color--shooting stars and supernovas.

  Everything upended and I wound up on the ground, gravel biting into my palms. A glint of sunlight off some kind of metallic litter was the last thing I saw before everything went dark.

  * * * *

  I wasn’t out long. Seth and Levi were loading Gabe into their car when I woke. Seth ran to my side, picked me up and tried to put me in the backseat with Gabe but I pushed away. Keeping a grip on Seth, I told Levi to call as soon as he got Gabe to a hospital. I told Seth he was going back to my office with me. He didn’t like it but I think he realized he’d reached a wall with me. We found my glasses mercifully intact and I left a message for Daniel as we drove back to town, glad of the approaching twilight.