On the Verge (28 page)

The woman behind the counter folded one arm underneath her ample chest, and put an immaculately manicured finger to her lips.

“Oh, yeah,” she said with a pert smile. “He’s out back,” she said, gesturing toward the Dutch door behind her.

The top half of it was open and Freya could glimpse a little courtyard there, golden in the afternoon sun.

“He’s lucky we open early,” the woman said. “Been here since sunrise.”

Freya thanked the woman as she and Rusty passed by her and stepped out onto the peculiar bakery’s back patio. It was a small space but full of lush greenery trimmed just enough to keep the shiny ivy and coiled ferns at bay. Two tables, so covered in moss and a greenish patina that they seemed to be plants themselves, sprouted from the cracked cement. At the one furthest from the café’s back door sat Dakryma. He had his chair tipped dangerously back, his hands crossed behind his head, his eyes closed. He could have been sleeping were it not for the metronomic tick of his feet as they rocked the chair back and forth through the late October breeze. Freya looked at him admiringly for a second as the sunshine lit up his aristocratic features.

“You know it’s not polite to stare.” Dakryma’s low, melodic voice floated out into the air, sending shivers up and down Freya’s back. He stopped rocking, his crystalline eyes opening at the exact moment the chair hit the ground with a hollow thud, and regarded Freya with a cool intensity that she hadn’t thought possible from someone who had spent the better part of the day partaking in the baked goods at a place like The Dispensary.

“Freya, my dear girl, this isn’t the kind of place I’d expect someone like you to frequent, but god knows we all have our ways of making it through the day, don’t we?”

“Professor, I’m so glad we were able to find you,” Freya said. “I hate to bother you, but I think you might have something that I need.”

“If you’re referring to the color,” Dakryma intoned, “you are correct. It is in my possession, and there it will stay, I’m afraid.”

“I really need that yellow,” Freya said. She hoped the quaver in her voice wasn’t too obvious. “Believe it or not, it’s actually become a matter of life or death.”

“Oh, you’d be surprised by the extent of my beliefs,” Dakryma said. “But unfortunately for you this gamboge is invaluable, while a life or a death is merely a dime a dozen. And I’m still rather miffed that you never checked in with me like you promised in the park. I don’t take kindly to people who don’t fulfill their promises.”

“I’m very sorry, professor,” Freya said. “This situation has been so overwhelming. I’ve really just been trying to stay alive. I can make it up to you; I just need the color. What is it that you want?”

“Truly, Freya, I admire your pluck,” Dakryma said, “even if your naiveté makes you a bit delusional, but there really isn’t anything you could offer a man like me that could part me from this color.”

“What if we stopped asking?” Rusty said, the gravity of his voice sinking like a rock through the dismissive levity of the professor’s smooth tenor.

“Now, now,” Dakryma chided. “You can’t possibly be suggesting we make this a matter of brute force.” Dakryma stood and smoothed the front of his shirt. “Because you would find yourself egregiously overwhelmed.”

“We have the power of aegis on our side,” Rusty said. “We’ve faced the Verge and survived. You’re just another demon standing in our way.”

“Tsk, tsk, tsk,” Dakryma said, shaking his head slowly. “You honestly think your pitiful little protection plan will really make a difference? I’m the Dark One, big guy. You don’t stand a chance.”

No sooner had the words left Dakryma’s mouth than dark clouds skittered across the wan late-day sun, blotting out the boisterous colors of the courtyard and immersing everything in an almost palpable gloom.

“You see,” the professor continued, “I’m no run-of-the-mill demon. No, no. I’m god damned Lucifer, and not even all the cannabis I’ve consumed today can distract me from how annoying you are. So I’ll give you three seconds to get the fuck out of my sight.”

“Please, professor, I beg you,” Freya said. I’ll do anything. Doesn’t Lucifer make deals? What do you want? Name your price!”

“One,” Dakryma said darkly. His eyes caught fire, burning with their unholy light.

Freya cursed under her breath. She glanced over at Rusty. He looked as though he was preparing to charge, but she was fairly certain Dakryma wasn’t bluffing.

“Rusty,” she said, “don’t. He’s right; we can’t face him physically. We need another way.”

“Two,” Dakryma bellowed, his voice distorted, otherworldly.

The deep shadows filling the corners and seeping across the warren of leaves and vines behind the professor began to coalesce into midnight wings, their magnificent inky plumage joining seamlessly with Dakryma’s sinewy shoulders.

“Don’t worry about me,” Rusty said.

“Rusty, come on, we can’t take him!” Freya shouted. She glanced over at Dakryma and her heart felt like it was filled with ice.

“No, I got this,” Rusty said.

His eyes were focused on Dakryma as he reached behind his back and retrieved what looked like Freya’s biggest butcher knife from the block she kept in the kitchen.

“Three,” the professor whispered and he beat his wings to rise several feet above the patio.

At the same moment Rusty lunged forward, still strangely silent even as he prepared to battle Dakryma. The moment seemed to run in slow motion. Freya watched in horror as he flew through the air, both hands wrapped around the knife, prepared to plunge it deep into the professor’s chest. Then in a split second he was flying across the courtyard, sailing through the gloom, the mighty force of Dakryma’s backhand sending him crashing into the wall of the bakery.

Freya was pretty sure a hit like that would have killed a normal man, or at the very least knocked him unconscious, but Rusty found his feet quickly and shook his head, preparing for his next charge. The idiot was going to get himself killed, but Freya was at a loss for what to do. Then she remembered the dream catcher. She hastily reached into her pocket and retrieved the evil-looking circlet. She had no idea how such a tiny thing was meant to capture a demon like Dakryma, but she didn’t have time to think. She could see that Rusty was already preparing for his next charge and as he began to sprint across the little space to meet the dark one head on, Freya bent her arm back across her body and launched the dream catcher like a flying disc into the air.

She watched with dread as it spun around and around. Rusty had nearly reached Dakryma again and it looked as though this time the dark one meant business. He eagerly reached out his hands to meet the foolhardy man, prepared to rip him limb from limb. Freya’s breath caught in her throat; she opened her mouth to scream to Rusty to stop, but no sound escaped from her fear-constricted windpipe.

Rusty was only a few short paces away from certain annihilation when the ring, still spinning like a saucer, suddenly expanded many times its original size, shining as it did so with a razor-sharp gleam. Freya’s eyes grew wide as she watched it encircle her intended target mere moments before Rusty would have run futilely into Dakryma’s eager, murderous clutches. Just as abruptly as it had widened, the ring contracted around Dakryma’s chest at the level of his heart. The demon let out a shriek when the dream catcher passed through his clothing to his skin. It quickly became a howl of agony as the ring kept going, digging deeply into his ribcage, its surface aglow with a wicked kind of radiance. With a final excruciating scream the dream catcher disappeared completely. The demon’s wings faded away into the creeping darkness and he collapsed onto the hard concrete, clawing at his chest frantically, wild-eyed panic suffusing his aquiline features.

Rusty had stopped midstride when he saw the mysterious ring circle the professor. Freya was fairly certain she had seen an almost imperceptible grin pass across his twisted mouth but it was difficult to be sure. He still had the knife gripped tightly in his fist and was raising it up above the distraught Dakryma, when Freya called out to him.

“Don’t do it, Rusty,” she said.

He looked up at her, confused, the bloodthirsty light in his eyes flickering.

“I’m pretty sure Baba Yaga wanted him alive,” Freya said. “And besides, I don’t think you can kill Lucifer with a kitchen knife.”

Rusty stared at her for a moment longer, a parade of inscrutable emotions marching across his deformed visage. Finally he dropped his hand and tucked the knife back into the waistband of his pants, punctuating his disapproval of this act of mercy with a frustrated growl.

“Fine,” he grumbled. “Now what?”

Freya had no clue what to do next. The inhabitants of the Verge and their emissaries weren’t great about doling out detailed instructions.

“I have no idea, but we need that color,” she said. “Check his pockets. See if you can find it.”

Rusty manhandled the professor onto his feet and began patting him down as if he were under arrest. Dakryma protested the whole time but his complaints centered not on the search and seizure, but rather the apparent discomfort the dream catcher was still causing him. He howled and groaned with such genuine pain that Freya began to feel a bit sorry for him. Then she reminded herself of what he actually was, and she didn’t feel so bad.

“I think I got it,” Rusty said, holding the bamboo tube out for Freya to see.

She took it from him and peered inside at the lumpy brownish contents and wrinkled her nose.

“Are you sure, Rusty?” she asked. “It doesn’t look very yellow.”

“You imbeciles,” Dakryma snarled. “Of course that’s the color. Do you think I carry around bamboo sticks for fun?”

Freya stared at it with uncertainty considering how she might be able to confirm that it was in fact the last color on their list.

“Oh for god’s sake,” the demon sighed. “Give it here, I’ll show you myself.”

“You have got to be kidding me,” Freya replied. “I’m not giving this back to you now.”

“Well, it’s not like I’m going anywhere,” Dakryma said. His breathing was becoming more regular and although he winced every so often he didn’t seem to be in as much pain. He looked pale, but not more so than usual. Freya wished they had fled while he was still mostly incapacitated. Dakryma looked at her concerned face and laughed haughtily.

“Don’t tell me you don’t even know what that delightful contraption was that you flung at me a few moments ago. I mean, really, this is getting ridiculous, Freya. Do you always go about your so-called matters of life and death with such an absurd lack of preparation?”

“You’re an asshole,” she said.

“Just give me the color, dearie. I couldn’t take off with it even if I wanted to. That lovely little dream catcher is solidly wrapped around my little black heart now, so you’re officially stuck with me.”

“What? What do you mean stuck with you?” Freya asked.

“I don’t think much of the idea either, trust me,” he said taking in Freya’s look of perplexed horror. “But when you threw that hoop you effectively linked us together. I’m officially at your beck and call. I do seem to have the worst luck with magical objects. Always getting myself in these wholly disagreeable situations.”

“I don’t trust him,” Rusty grumbled.

“Says the man who snuck a butcher knife out of my kitchen without me knowing,” Freya spat back. “That’s a little serial killer of you, Rusty, just saying.”

“Are you saying you don’t trust me?” Rusty asked.

“No, of course not,” Freya said. “It’s just that it would have been a little less weird if you had told me you were going to bring it along. Now, can we shelve this particular discussion until we take care of Dakryma and the color?”

“Look, if it makes you feel better, just reach in there and scrape off a bit of the gamboge. Just know that it’s a bit toxic to handle,” Dakryma said.

“Why am I not surprised,” Freya said as she used the nail of her index finger to take a sample off the top of the bamboo pipe. She smeared it into the palm of her other hand and held it out to Dakryma.

“Here,” she said.

Dakryma dipped the tips of his fingers in the glass of water that stood amazingly unscathed on the table he had been sitting at when they had first confronted him a few minutes before. He stepped toward Freya and sprinkled the droplets of water onto the brown crumbs in her outspread hand. In an instant they turned a brilliant shade of yellow.

“Whoa,” Freya said. “Is that a Verge thing?”

“No, that particular parlor trick is distinctly of this world, my dear. Nature is full of surprises, isn’t it?”

“Huh,” Freya said, nonplussed. “Well, that is definitely yellow. I think we finally have all our colors.”

Freya smiled despite herself. Maybe she would survive this craziness after all.

“C’mon,” she said. “Let’s get out of here. We have some colors to deliver. We’ll decide what to do with you later,” she said to Dakryma as she sidestepped an overturned chair and headed for the back door of the café.

Rusty and the professor followed her. The bakery was empty. There wasn’t a trace of the beautiful redhead. Freya thought the scene in the courtyard must have scared her away. She was relieved that she wouldn’t have to try and explain what had happened since she barely had a grasp of it herself. She was just wondering if they had any normal pastries to quell the growing rumble in her stomach when Rusty, who had stepped in front of her to open the door suddenly broke into a sprint, racing through the entryway like a runaway train.

“I’ll fucking kill you,” he screamed. “I’ll kill you!”

Freya was shocked into a stunned silence. She followed Rusty’s trajectory and was stunned to see Ophidia, looking flawless as usual, sauntering down the sidewalk.

“Rusty,” she simpered. “Long time no see.”