Chapter Sixteen – Luke

 

The false, ornamental wall behind Roxanne’s desk had been hiding quite the secret behind it. A solid steel vault door stood there, completely unadorned by any lock, or lever, combination spinner, or crank. Just four identical holes aligned like a cardinal compass on a paper map, the space between them no more than the length of my hand. One each at the positions for north, east, south, and west.

“Had to pay for the building to reinforce all the lower levels before I could install this thing,” Roxanne said as she stepped up to the featureless steel door, the stones held in the palm of her hand out in front of her like an offering to some strange god. “Ever seen one of these?”

“No,” I admitted as I looked at the strange obstruction. “Is it a retina scan, or something?”

She laughed, the sound like tinkling bells. “Biometrics devices are a little finicky when you’re an incorporeal being that rides around in a host, don’t you think? I’d have to get the darn things rekeyed every few years. But this works like…”

She trailed off as the polished black stones arrayed in her hand began to glow a cold, pale blue as they rose slowly from her palm. They levitated up and began to spin, the light warming and pulsing as they spun faster and faster, chasing after one another in a perfect circle till they were nothing but a blur of blue light and a low hum that seemed to resonate with the bones of my feet.

Roxanne leaned forward till her lips were almost dangerously close to the stones, whispering something too quiet for even my supernaturally sensitive ears. But the stones must have heard, because they rose steadily from her hand, still swirling and chasing after one another in a perfect circle, and flew up to the vault door. Halfway to their destination, they stopped spinning and separated, with each one of them flying home to its little spot in the door. They all settled simultaneously, soundlessly, before sending off two more pulses of blue light. A second later, there was a click somewhere inside the door, as if a lock had been unlatched, and the door swung out six inches towards us.

“Magic,” she finished, going to pull the door open. Either the slab of steel was perfectly balanced, or Roxy was stronger than she looked, because the portal opened more smoothly than my apartment’s front door.

She looked back at me as I stepped up behind her, the twisted and feathered stick gripped in her other hand. “Stick close to me, sugar.”

“What’ll happen if I don’t?”

“You like having all your insides inside, don’t you?”

I nodded.

“Perfectly reasonable. Stay on my ass like you love me, and they’ll keep that way.”

“How about I just stay a few feet behind you?”

She smiled, showing just a little bit of her perfect teeth. “That’ll work, too.”

I was right behind her, and the hair on my legs, arms, and the back of my neck stood on end as my foot crossed the threshold.

The vault itself was a single large room, as long and wide as half a basketball court. Perfectly white walls, much like the rest of the office, surrounded it on all sides. Except for the back, where what appeared to be safety deposit boxes had been installed in the wall. Pedestals no taller than my navel were arranged in an equidistant grid around the room, five up and five down, except for a spot near the back wall where a heavy oaken table had been installed. On each pedestal stood a different artifact or piece, each as varied as the next. A clay water jar here, an ornately carved and lacquered box there, a piece of golden wool on this pedestal, and what might be a broken shard of sword on that one. Soft light, the same quality and feel as the sun, came from somewhere I couldn’t decipher, and covered everything in its warm glow. Despite the magic in the air, and the vault for a front door, the place looked and felt more like a Rodeo Drive or Manhattan boutique, a place that sold collector’s curiosities for the wealthy, than it did a repository of ancient and powerful relics.

“Imports and exports, huh?” I asked as, together, we threaded our way through the miniature boxy forest.

“I export some items, too, but not many. I’m more of a collector—a broker, if you will.”

“So you collect items for people, then?” I asked as I came to a stop next to a large egg, nearly the size of a beach ball. I pointed to it. “What’s this?”

“Phoenix egg,” she said. “Thought extinct until last year, when that handsome little bugger of a security agent saved the last one.”

“You know who Carter is?”

She rolled her eyes. “Come on, Mr. Oldham, I know who all of you are.”

“Right. Tabitha. I almost forgot.”

“Tabs? You really think she’s got loose lips? Oh, honey, y’all are practically celebrities. Think the Joker and everyone else don’t know who Batman is?”

I stopped in my tracks. “Seriously?”

“Oh, word’s been getting around. Ain’t just humans using the internet these days.”

“Huh.”

“Surprised?”

“Kind of. Just never really thought of it, that’s all.”

“Now, come on, let’s see what we can do for you. Don’t forget to keep up, now.” She led me deeper into the vault, past more pedestals and their displayed pieces, and around the heavy oak banquet table, till we came to a stop in front of the unmarked safety deposit boxes lining the back wall. She took the smooth, twisted branch in her hand, the feathers cascading down over her long, perfectly sculpted fingers and elegant hand. She moved to one of the boxes, the third from the bottom and the farthest on the left, and tapped it with one long red nail. Unlike the vault door, each of the boxes had a keyhole on the front, and as she brought up her feathered stick, I noticed that the bottom of it was now shaped like a key.

“Tabitha told you what you need, right, sugar?” she asked as she inserted the end of the stick and popped the deposit box’s lock. It swung open soundlessly, seemingly of its own accord.

“She did,” I replied as she took the tray from its home and laid it on the heavy oak table behind us. On it was an object as long as from my elbow to the tip of my finger, wrapped loosely in black velvet. “Unicorn horn.”

“Exactly,” she said, running her fingers over the cloth. She glanced in my direction, a little bit of girlish glee creeping into her features as she grinned up at me, almost as if she were a child playing with matches. “Ever see one of these up close?”

Back in the PRB, we’d used one on a mission into South America, years before. Elder death god had been summoned up to bring about the apocalypse, and only concentrated purity and life would put it down before it could destroy the world.

Just another Tuesday.

“Once,” I replied as I leaned in, watching her begin to unwrap the horn. “But it was a while ago.”

Roxanne unwrapped it carefully, as if she were unswaddling a baby, careful not to touch the contents with her fingers. A pure shaft, almost like polished ivory, with a slight spiraling crenulation to it, a slight ridge or ribbing that spun as it ran from the base to the tip. It was perfect, unmarred. “Satisfied?”

“Very. It’s definitely the real deal.”

“Know how to use it?”

“Stab him with it, I assume? Or is that too straightforward?”

“Yes, and no. He’ll have a gem in his forehead no matter what form he’s in. You need to get him through that. The horn should shatter it, releasing his life-force, and that’s that.”

“Great. Hit a demon through the middle of the forehead. What could go wrong?”

“Welcome to life,” she said, covering the cloth. “Now that I’ve shown you my wares, sugar, we can talk about price.”

Abruptly, I straightened up. “Price?” I asked with a shake of my head.

She put a hand to her chest in feigned shock, one nail lightly touching the hollow of her throat. “Well, you didn’t think I was running a charity here, did you? I’m a businesswoman, Mr. Oldham, and this, you have to agree, is quite the stunning specimen. Do you know what I could get on the open market with this thing?”

I clenched my jaw, grinding my teeth as my hands balled up into fists at my side. All this fucking time wasted, when I could have been trying to come up with something. Maybe just locating the zmeu directly and working on a way to get Heidi out even if I couldn’t kill the creature.

“Tabitha said you owed her one,” I said. “That this was on the house.”

She tapped a long nail on the front of her teeth. “No, sugar, I let her think that. Because it was a nice thought, wasn’t it? That you’d just have your secret weapon materialize right in front of you, and all you’d have to do was swing by and pick it up?”

My eyes narrowed as I tried to consider my options. Without looking towards the unicorn horn, I judged how far away it was. Easily within reach.

“I wouldn’t, sugar,” Roxanne said, moving a half-step closer to me as she gazed down at the security tray and the horn contained within it. “First of all, you’d destroy the horn if you killed me with it, and that’d leave you with nothing to fight the zmeu with.” She took another half-step before stopping to look up at me with those dark eyes of hers. “Unless, of course, you’re just using the zmeu as a convoluted ruse to get in the door here, just to kill little old me.”

“And second?” I asked through still clenched teeth, even as I felt myself drowning in her gaze. Having her this close was intoxicating, and her slight smell of brimstone was almost pleasant when mixed with her expensive perfume. Idly, I wondered if she’d chosen the fragrance based off that. I was betting she had.

“Supposing you could grab my fetish before it left my hand, allowing you to avoid the security measures covering this place?” She bit her lower lip for a second, like she was sorry to lay out the facts for me in this way. “Well, that’d still leave big bad Mike out in the lobby, now wouldn’t it? With your gun, and enough silver bullets to make you nothing more than a memory.”

I closed my eyes, forced myself to break our stare. I turned away so that, when I opened them again, I was looking at the horn and not her. Shit. I was going to have to pay her. I was going to have to let her have whatever she wanted, or else there was no way I was walking out of here with the horn. And, if I didn’t have the unicorn horn, how was I going to help Heidi? What would the point of this whole trip have been?

And, God, what about Molly? She’d not only be losing her best friend, but also her faith in me. I couldn’t let that happen. Even if I never saw her again, I knew I could never go through life knowing I’d let her down.

Not Molly. Never her.

But here it was. Here was exactly what I needed. All I had to do was make a deal with the devil. Or a devil.

I turned slightly to Roxanne, who was still standing so close I could practically feel the heat of her possessed body. When I went to speak, my mouth was dry. “What do you want?”

“Nothing much, sugar,” she purred more than said as she ran a long, painted nail down the front of my button-up. She was stepping in close before I realized what was happening, bringing her lips closer to mine as she wrapped a lithe arm around my waist and pressed her warm body into mine. “Just you.”