M. Hanover - Graveyard Child

“I don’t fear you,” the rider said.

I didn’t see it move. It was that fast. The Graveyard Child was at the table, popping another cookie between its toothless gums, and then it was on me, its massive hand around my throat, banging my head against the kitchen wall with a violence that cracked the plaster. My hands dug at it, trying to find space between its finger and my flesh. Even with the strength of the rider, I couldn’t do it. I tried to join my will to hers, tried to help. I felt the plaster crack against the back of my head, the hot/cold trickle of blood coming down my scalp. I swung my leg out, hammering at the arch of its foot. It ignored me. I twisted, bringing my elbow hard across its throat. Nothing. It seemed to go on forever, slamming me like a rag doll. Its breath smelled like old meat. Somewhere, Ozzie was barking in a frenzy. Somewhere, Curtis was weeping from wide, horrified eyes. Somewhere else. The world went gray. It would keep doing this to me until it chose to stop, and there was nothing I could do about it.

It was dragging me across the kitchen floor. I didn’t remember exactly how I’d gotten there. Then, with a power that felt like it was wrenching my arm out of my shoulder, it hauled me up and deposited me in the chair it had been in. The plate of cookies was in front of me. It patted my head gently.

“I’m a reasonable guy,” it said. “And really, I think you’ll see it’s a pretty damn sweet deal I’m offering here. I don’t have to go through the extra waiting time while they do all the paperwork. That’s all I get. It’s not much. And look at what you get in return. Your freedom. And Jayné gets to save her whole family. Her poor mommy. Her kid brother. Her daddy who’s her uncle who’s her daddy. You ever see Chinatown ? Great fucking movie. And you want a bonus? I won’t even kill her little playmates outside. Do you think she wouldn’t choose to do that? I know Jayné Heller. She’s a hero. She’d give her life in a heartbeat if it meant saving these people. You’d just be doing what she wanted.”

It nodded. Paused. Looked at me, then up at the clock on the wall, then back at me. The wall it had beaten me against was caved in. There was blood on it. Ozzie was pacing back and forth in front of the doorway, her teeth bared and her eyes anxious.

“Okay,” the Graveyard Child said. “You need to talk to me here. Communication’s a two-way street.”

Dad shifted. I could see him trying to move away, but he was bound too tightly to the chair. Mom’s eyes were closed, her nostrils flaring and pinching thin as she hyperventilated. My body ached. Something deep in my belly shifted in a way I was pretty sure wasn’t a good sign. My vision swam.

“I will not make this choice,” the Black Sun said through me.

“You’re gonna leave it to the meat? I like your style, kid. That’s classy. Okay. Bring the meat girl up and let’s have a little talk. Jayné? You in there? Hey. I don’t know if you’ve been following all this . . .”

I tried to speak, but all I could manage was to shift my jaw a little. I tried to sit up and the pain left me gasping. The Graveyard Child helped me sit forward. I coughed, and the phlegm came up bloody.

“Ooh,” the rider said. “That’s gotta hurt. You’re the kind of girl who really plays it rough, aren’t you? No curb too high for a rental car. That’s what I always say. So what do you think? Kill all your family or let ’em live. No pressure. Totally your call.”

I gathered the strength I could. We were doomed. There was no way I could beat this thing in a fight. Chogyi Jake had warned me once—a long time ago, it seemed. Things work until they don’t. Guns. Hordes of the possessed. Supernatural serial killers. I’d taken them all. This time I didn’t stand a chance. I could save them all, and all it would mean was giving my soul to this thing. I looked over at Curt. My little brother, Curtis, who hadn’t even hit Senior Prom yet. How could I take that away from him?

Okay, I thought. Fine. Take me. Just leave my family alone.

“Get him!” The voice wasn’t mine. I thought for a moment that it was the Black Sun, but it had been a man’s voice.

Ex’s.

The front door burst open, and then half a second later the back one. The report of the shotgun was louder than I remembered. The Graveyard Child reared up, its arms spread wide.

“Oh, come on,” it shouted, and there were storms in its voice. A depth like the deepest canyon. “I was almost done here.”

Chogyi Jake stood by the back door and racked another round. And then another man stepped in behind him. Not Ex. A thicker man, older, whose dark skin made the tattoos on his face only a little less legible. Eduardo Martinez lifted his palms toward us, and I felt the blow of his will. The Graveyard Child stumbled back, its vast eyes going wide.

“By your name I bind you,” a woman said from the front door. Idéa Smith, with Ex standing behind her. “Puer Mórtuus, I bind you.”

“Well, this is fucked,” the Graveyard Child said, and Jonathan Rhodes stepped through the door to the dining room. The power of his will laced with the others, pushing and pressing, fashioning a cage of information, meaning, and intent so powerful, it was almost visible. The Graveyard Child writhed back, twisting at the waist and clawing at Rhodes. The thin young man didn’t even seem to notice the attack.

“By your name I bind you,” he said, and the resonance of his voice made the walls themselves seem to sing and crack. “Abraxiel Unas, I bind you.”

“You know,” the Graveyard Child shouted, “there are other ways we could address this. God, you cocksuckers are—”

It dropped to its knees, and for a moment its skin seemed to run. I saw Jay, kneeling as if in prayer, his hands before him and his eyes pressed closed.

Yes, I thought. Fight it. Come back to us, Jay. You can do this.

“By your name I bind you,” Martinez said. “Graveyard Child, by your name I bind you.”

The house went silent. I could hear the tick-tick-tick of the clock. The soft hushing of the wind. Snow swirled in through the doorways, and the furnace clicked, hummed, and came to life. I tried to stand up but my knees wouldn’t support me. Ex limped over to me and took my hand.

“Hey,” he said. “Look what I found outside. Pretty cool, huh?”

I smiled. Jay lay on the floor in a fetal position. His eyes were closed. He could almost have been sleeping. Waves ran along under his skin. I couldn’t imagine what it was to be him just then. Worse than being trapped in the cage with the monster, he was the cage.

“Exorcism,” I said. “You have to get Jay back.”

“I will,” Ex said. “It may take a while, but it will happen.”

Chogyi Jake and Idéa Smith were to my right, lifting my still-bound father back to where he could sit up. There was blood running down past his ear and his breathing was hard and labored. But he wasn’t dead. He probably wasn’t even badly hurt. Rhodes came toward me, grinning. His teeth were ornately carved, and there were black tattoos on his gums, and despite all that, he looked like a kid who’d just gotten his first bicycle.

“How did this happen?” I asked.

“We followed you,” Rhodes said. “Nothing personal, but we weren’t entirely sure our conversation back at my hotel wasn’t a trick. When you left, we started surveillance. And when we got here, and you went in . . . well, that was kind of the acid test.”

“I told them it would be okay with you,” Ex said. “I didn’t think you’d mind.”

“You get a raise,” I said.

Chogyi Jake had untied my father’s hands and moved on to Curtis. Dad wasn’t looking at me or anyone else in particular. His gaze was fixed on the middle of the table, his jaw set and angry. I tried to imagine how this all looked and felt to him. This was his home. The one place he’d always been able to assert control. And now look at it. Filled with freaks, demons, and unholy magicians. His eldest son caught in the grips of Satan and his disgraced daughter and her friends wandering through the place as if it were theirs. He was humiliated, broken, and embarrassed, and I didn’t even know how to make it better for him. I got to my feet, still unsteady, and didn’t look at him. Pretending not to notice was all I had to offer him now. Mom was being untied, her freed hands fluttering around her like pigeons on strings, frantic and pointless.