Misfit (9 page)

But as Jael places her first foot on the spiral staircase, it’s her father’s voice she hears.

“Jael.”

She stops and turns around. He stands in the kitchen doorway. He’s backlit by the harsh bare lightbulb, so she can’t quite make out his expression, but his arms are folded across his chest and she knows that’s never a good sign.

“It’s late,” he says. “Where were you?”

“Dinner with a friend,” she says, attempting a casual tone.

Her father’s head tilts back slightly, so that the light shows his face and she can see just how pissed he is. “I don’t think so,”

he says. “I cal ed Britt’s house. She was there. You weren’t.”

“I do have other friends, Dad.”

He raises an eyebrow, and there’s just a hint of amusement on his face, like he doesn’t believe her.

“Oh real y?” he asks.

“Who?”

“You probably don’t know them,” she says, shifting her weight back and forth.

“It’s a smal school. I’m sure I do.”

“It’s a boy, okay?” She says it quickly, forcing herself to keep both feet firmly on the ground.

“A boy?” The furrows in his brow dig in deep, and he leans his hand on the doorway, like he has to steady himself. That’s when Jael sees that his hand is bandaged. From when he cut himself to contact that demon. For some reason, it’s this tiny little concrete detail that reminds her that she isn’t the only one who needs to be interrogated.

“Jael, we’ve talked about this,” he’s saying. “You are not to date until—”

“What happened to your hand?” she asks, her tone calm.

“Don’t change the subject on me,” says her father, shifting his weight so his hand drops down and out of view. “You deliberately broke one of the few rules—”

“What happened to your hand, Dad?” This time, her tone is sharp, each consonant spit out with precision as cold certainty settles in the pit of her stomach.

“I was fixing something and the screwdriver slipped,”

he says. “Now listen—”

“You’re lying!” she says.

“Excuse me?” he says, his eyes wide in disbelief.

“That’s not how it happened, Dad. And I’m starting to think you lie to me a whole lot. You told me we’re hiding from demons.

So why were you talking to one last night?”

“How did you? . . .” He looks horrified. And for some reason that makes her feel real y good.

She pul s the necklace out from under her shirt. “This necklace showed me. The one you said wasn’t safe. I guess you meant it wasn’t safe for you.”

“You put it on?” says her dad. “Jael, I told you never to

—”

“Stop it! It’s over, Dad. I’m done playing your little game.

You always tel me I’m too young to understand.

You’ve been saying that since I was eight. When are you going to get it through your head that I’m not a kid anymore? Whatever it is, I can handle it.”

“It’s not as easy as that, Jael,” he says. “And if you had obeyed me in the first place, you—”

“What, Dad? I’d stil be in blissful ignorance? Wel , let me tel you, it’s not that blissful. I’m sick of it. Stop bul shitting me and tel me what is real y going on!”

She juts her chin out and braces herself. She’s never sworn at him like that before and she expects him to get pissed. But instead, his face softens. His eyes fil with an anguish that’s so painful to see, she wants to take it al back.

“Oh,” he says in little more than a whisper. Then he looks away, his hand groping for the doorway again.

“Dad?”

“You just . . .” His voice is hoarse. “I just saw it for the first time. How much you look like her.”

“Dad . . .” This isn’t what she wanted at al . To hurt him like this.

“Your mother . . .” His eyes stare off at nothing and his voice is hol ow. “You want to know something true?

About your mother?”

“Look, Dad,” she says uneasily.

“I told you she died in childbirth. That was a lie,” he says.

“The truth is that she died when you were three months old. She was murdered.”

A silence settles in as that last word penetrates.

“Someone . . . kil ed my mother?” she asks final y.

“Yes. There. Some truth.” He looks at her at last, his face bitter. “Are you happy now?”

“No!”

“Truth does not bring happiness, Jael.” He turns away again. “Now, go to bed and let’s forget al of this.” He waves her off. “No punishments. No blame. We’l act like tonight didn’t happen.”

For just a second, she feels a strange sort of relief.

Like, Oh, good, we can go back to the way things were. But then she thinks he must be insane.

“There’s more, isn’t there, Dad? What’s so bad about being a . . . halfbreed?”

Her father flinches at the word but says nothing.

“Is that what they cal me?” she asks. “The demons?”

“Yes,” he says.

“So what’s al that about halfbreeds being forbidden by Heaven and Hel ? Should I be worried about something?”

“Jael, please, can we at least just talk about this tomorrow?”

He reaches out to her. It’s a gesture he rarely does and it’s so hard for her to resist. But she steps away.

“I have a right to know,” she says.

“It’s just . . .” He’s losing and he knows it. “Jael, I can’t just .

. .” His face is pleading with her, but this time the weakness only pisses her off more.

“If you can’t tel me, maybe someone else wil . Like that fish monster in my necklace. What was his name?”

“Jael, don’t do that—” This time he’s the one who backs up.

“Dagon, or something, wasn’t it?” she asks, like she’s taunting him.

“Jael, stop this right now!”

She stares hard at the necklace. “Dagon, are you in there?

I’m ready to hear the truth!”

“You . . . have no idea what you’ve just done,” he says quietly.

Something shifts behind the easy chair. At first it just looks like a shadow. But the darkness slowly gathers and grows larger and more dense. That’s when Jael starts to wonder if she real y did just do something very stupid.

The darkness solidifies into the massive, hulking fish creature she saw earlier in the necklace. But there is a big difference between seeing it inside a gem and seeing it towering above you with gleaming black shark eyes and rows of glinting, needlepoint teeth that splay out in al directions. Her mind goes completely blank as she wails and stumbles toward the door.

“Jael, wait!” cal s her father.

Something strong closes around her waist and stops her.

She struggles to break free and screams so loud and long that it feels like she’s going to pop a blood vessel.

“Help!” she wails. “Oh God oh Jesus HELP ME!”

Her father’s voice: “Be careful with her!”

“I am! I am!” snarls the creature. “She’s wriggling!”

“Jael, listen to me!” her father shouts over her screams.

“Please, just calm down! Just listen!”

She can’t, though. Al she can think about is the demon that has her by the waist, its rotten stench gagging her as it lifts her off the ground. She screams and sobs. She thrashes her body, swings her fists, kicks her feet. This lasts for several minutes until she final y runs out of steam. Her voice trails off into a faint moaning whimper and she droops over like a wilted flower.

“There now,” says the creature. “That’s better.”

She’s slowly turned around until she stares into the face of the demon. Its black, lidless eyes reflect her own terrified, tear-stained face.

“It’s OK,” says the demon around its mouthful of savage teeth. “I’m not going to hurt you.” Then it careful y, almost gently, places her back on the ground.

Her legs are wobbly, and she has to brace herself against the wal with her hand to keep from fal ing over. Her father stands next to the monster with a look of weary resignation.

“Who . . . ,” she says, her voice hoarse from screaming.

“What is that?!”

“That is your uncle Dagon,” says her father. “On your mother’s side.”

Paul thompson had seen a lot in his thirty-five years of life. He had been to nearly every country in the mortal world, and quite a few in Hel as wel . He had seen wonders most people thought impossible, and he had seen horrors born from the col ective nightmares of humanity. He had felt searing hatred, crushing despair, and al -consuming love. But none of it prepared him for the first time he held his daughter.

They had been holed up in a cave in Siberia while Astarte gave birth. The labor took two days. A blizzard howled outside, but it was a whisper compared to her screams. They were so loud and had been going on for so long that Paul was forced to stuff his ears with cotton to keep from going deaf. But final y, the first tiny cries of a baby rang out in the dark cave. Hel ’s physician, Uphir, wordlessly held out Paul’s daughter to him.

She looked so smal and pink in the demon’s long gray hands.

Paul’s hands shook a little as he picked her up and cradled her awkwardly in his arms. Her bright green eyes, just like her mother’s, gazed up at him in wonder as her hands opened and closed. He stroked the sparse, plastered-down black curls on her head.

“Paul,” said Astarte, her voice heavy with exhaustion.

“Is it? . . .”

“She,” said Paul, “is perfect.” Then he laid the baby gently on her chest. The baby immediately began to nurse, and a look of contentment spread across Astarte’s face.

Uphir stood up, his large yel ow eyes gazing at them coldly under his wrinkled forehead.

“As your physician, I recommend that you remain here for at least eight hours,” he said in a dry voice. “But if you don’t leave within the next hour, Belial wil find you and kil you.”

“Thank you, Uphir,” Astarte said. “I know you have put yourself in danger by helping us.”

“I have repaid my debt to you,” he said. “Now I wash my hands of the entire tragedy.” He turned and walked out of the cave into the howling winds, then dissipated like the blinding snow that swirled through the night air.

“Ah, screw that guy,” said Dagon from his spot in the corner.

“Don’t let him get you down, sis.”

“Of course not,” she said, gazing with absolute peace at her baby.

“Kinda fragile-looking,” remarked Dagon as he heaved his large scaly frame up and walked over to where she lay.

“Do you have to get so close?” snapped Paul.

“Hey, just trying to get a look at my niece,” said Dagon.

“I don’t think—” “Paul,” said Astarte. “You promised.”

Paul looked at his wife for a moment, his face tense.

Then he sighed. “Yes. I did.” He gently kissed his little family, then stood up so that Dagon could sit down next to them.

“Wow!” said Dagon as he sat down. “No teeth!”

“They grow those later,” said Astarte.

“Or claws,” he said.

“Now you’re just being sil y. What halfbreed ever has claws?”

“I don’t know,” he said with a shrug. “Haven’t met very many. Not exactly like there’s a lot of them.”

She looked down at her baby. “No,” she said.

“There’s not.

Belial has made certain of that.”

There was silence except for the wind, which stil howled outside the cave, hissing and spitting ice.

“Do you think you can move soon?” Paul asked.

“I don’t have a choice,” Astarte said. “Let’s wait until she finishes eating, though.”

Paul nodded tersely and began to pack their few belongings.

“So, what’s the kid’s name?” asked Dagon.

“Jael,” said Astarte. “Jael Thompson.”

Dagon’s mouth opened wide in a glittering fanged grin.

“Seriously?”

“Do you like it?” she asked.

“I love it,” he said. And then he laughed, a rumble that reverberated so loudly in the smal , icy cave that Paul winced, even with the cotton in his ears.

But Baby Jael stared up at her uncle in wonder. Then she smiled and let out her own little hiccup of laughter.

Paul sat with his baby in the suffocating heat of the tent because at least it was out of the stinging sands that blew in al directions. The baby cried, her shril wail like needles in his ears. He whispered soothingly to her, rocked her, put her down, picked her up again, but she continued to scream. He fed her, changed her diaper, burped her. It didn’t help. So eventual y, he just gave up. He sat on one of the rugs and leaned against the tent pole, placed her on his lap, and let her screams drown out al thought.

Dagon slipped into the tent and winced at the sound.

“I could hear her miles away.”

“Sound carries in the desert,” Paul said numbly.

“What’s wrong with her?”

“You mean other than the fact that it’s a hundred and twenty degrees out?”

“That makes no difference to her,” said Dagon.

Paul sighed. “Astarte can get her to stop, but I can’t.

Not when she gets like this.”

“Where is she anyway?”

“Somewhere out in the dunes,” said Paul. “She said she needed some solitude to think about what we do next.”

“Yeah, I agree that we need a better plan than ‘keep running.’

But Belial is almost here. We have to move soon.”

Paul nodded and stroked Jael’s curly black hair. They sat there without speaking for a while. The tent wal s flapped rapidly in the high desert winds. After a while, Baby Jael fel into a fitful sleep. Paul gazed down at his angelic half-demon daughter.

She was so vulnerable, so helpless. When he al owed himself to think about exactly what was after her, he felt a deep ache in his chest. The threat came not from some petulant imp or even a low-ranking earl like Philotanus. No, it was one of Lucifer’s favorites.

Belial, Grand Duke of the Northern Reaches of Hel .

A demon so powerful, he was almost an elemental force—like cold, hard winter itself. A creature so obsessed with purity and perfection that he would stop at nothing to destroy Jael simply because she was a halfbreed. So they ran, and he fol owed. How much longer could they last?

Evening had started to settle into the desert when Astarte reappeared at the tent flap entrance.

Dagon stood up immediately. “We have to go,” he said.

“I know,” she said, looking strangely at peace. “But it’s going to have to wait a little bit longer.”

“Cutting it real y close,” he muttered, but sat back down.

She kissed Paul gently, then took the baby into her arms, whispering in a voice so soft that Paul’s mortal ears couldn’t pick it up. But Jael squirmed slightly, opened her jade green eyes, and smiled and cooed.

Astarte smiled back, and a single tear dropped onto Jael’s forehead.

“You okay?” asked Paul.

“I think I have a plan that wil keep her safe,” she said.

“At least for a while.”

“Oh?” said Dagon, a strangely suspicious tone in his voice.

“If I draw the demon aspect out of her, Belial won’t be able to locate her directly,” she said.

“But . . . ,” began Dagon, but he stopped while some nonverbal exchange took place between the siblings.

“But what?” demanded Paul.

“But . . . she’l be just like a mortal.”

“Wil it work?” asked Paul.

Dagon simply shrugged.

“Wil Belial stil be able to track us?” asked Paul.

Another strange look between Astarte and Dagon.

Then she said, “For now, it wil just make it harder.”

“But you think it’s worth it?” asked Paul. He felt helpless, not even sure if he knew what they were talking about.

“I do think it’s worth it,” she said quietly. She looked down at Jael and smiled as tears suddenly sprang back up into her eyes. “My sweetest joy.” She careful y laid her down on one of the rugs. From her deep desert robe pockets, she pul ed a smal wooden jewelry box lined with silver, and a silver chain with an empty pendant setting.

“Did Vulcan make that for you just now?” asked Dagon.

She nodded.

“He must have owed you pretty big.”

She smiled bitterly. “Everyone in Hel either owes me or hates me.”

“Or both,” agreed Dagon.

She laid the silver jewelry box and chain on the rug next to Jael. Then she opened the snaps of Jael’s onesie so that her tiny chest was exposed. Astarte gazed at her for a long time and tears started to fal again.

“Sis,” said Dagon quietly, “if you’re going to do it, you gotta do it now.”

She nodded and, tears stil sliding down her face, she plunged her hand into the baby’s chest. It passed through as if it were water, but Jael let out a scream so piercing that Paul had to cover his ears. Then Astarte slowly pul ed out a bril iant, burgundy thread of light. There was a little resistance at the end and Jael cried even louder. But a quick tug and the thread of light was free. Jael’s cry slowly trailed away to a shivering whine.

“Paul,” said Astarte as she wrestled with the thread of light.

“Please . . . I can’t stop what I’m doing. Comfort her.”

Paul jolted as if coming out of a trance, then swooped up his baby. Jael nuzzled her face into his arm and whimpered quietly.

Astarte gathered the thread into the palm of one hand, then pressed her hands together. Her face tensed up with effort and her green eyes blazed. Harsh grunts escaped from her lips and her arms shook. As last she let out a sigh and held out a fist-sized rough-cut burgundy gem to Dagon. As soon as he took it, she sank back into Paul. He shuffled his loads so that he had Jael in the crook of one arm and Astarte nestled into the other.

Dagon picked up the silver chain and fixed the gem inside the pendant setting. Then he placed the necklace into the jewelry box and closed the lid. He looked at Paul, his black shark eyes unreadable.

“We have to go,” he said. “Now.”

Extracting Jael’s demon aspect did seem to slow Belial down somewhat. But it also slowed the family down. Jael didn’t have the same resistance to weather that she’d had before. She required more food, more sleep. In fact, she regressed completely into mortal baby development. She no longer babbled or laughed, and she couldn’t hold up her head. Paul had to assure Astarte several times that this was normal for a two-month-old mortal baby. So while the chase slowed, they gained no lead.

But Astarte seemed less and less concerned about it.

In fact, she seemed calm almost to the point of disconnected. It was so unlike her that Paul began to get suspicious. Final y, one night while they were camped in the Highlands of Scotland, nestled up in the mountains, miles from the nearest town, he decided to force the issue. Dagon was out scouting, so it was just the two of them and Baby Jael, sitting by a campfire that burned the rich peat that was so plentiful in that area.

“Okay, what’s going on?” Paul said.

“What do you mean?” Astarte asked as she gently rocked Jael in her arms.

“You’re keeping something from me.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. And Dagon’s in on it. That why he hasn’t been around as much. We al know he’s a terrible liar.”

“He is a terrible liar,” she agreed.

“But you’re not,” he said.

She said nothing, but continued to rock Jael.

“Why won’t you tel me?” he asked. “You think I won’t be able to handle it?”

“Yes,” she said. “That’s exactly what I think.”

“How can you possibly say that after everything we’ve been through together?”

“Because this is something very different.”

“I don’t understand,” he said, fighting to keep the quaver out of his voice. “We have never kept things from each other before.”

“I wil tel you. Very soon, I think,” she said. “But I fear it wil take a lot longer for you to accept.”

Later that evening, after the fire had burned down and they were settling into sleeping bags, Dagon appeared in the tent opening, his bulky silhouette shimmering in the moonlight.

“He’s here,” he said with quiet tension.

“What?” Paul jumped to his feet, startling Jael awake.

“How did he gain that much?”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Astarte calmly. She handed Jael over to Dagon, who cupped the baby awkwardly in his massive, clawed hands. Then she turned to Paul and held his face in her hands.

“My love,” she said. “You must promise me something.”

“What are you talking about?” he demanded.

“Promise me that you wil give her the necklace on her sixteenth birthday.”

“Why are you talking like this?” he said, panic edging into his voice.

“When she is old enough, you must al ow Dagon to help her understand her demon aspect.”

“Astarte! Stop this! Stop—”

“Please,” she said. Tears streamed down her cheeks.

“Please don’t make this any harder.”

“But why?” he asked, his voice strangled.

“This is larger than you, or me, or even our baby,” she said.

“She has a destiny to fulfil . Now promise me. Please, Paul. Let me face him knowing that my sacrifice is worthwhile. Promise.”

“I promise,” he said, his voice ragged with misery.

“Thank you,” she said. “My dear own love. You are like no other in this world.” Then she kissed him long and hard. He tried to hold on to her, but of course she was stronger than him and she pushed him away at last.

“Dagon,” she said hoarsely. “Take them now. Please.”

Dagon cradled Jael careful y against his chest, then grabbed Paul with his free hand. Paul struggled, but the scaled arm clamped down on him like steel.

Paul had one last glimpse at the love of his life as she stood at the entrance to their tent. There was a look of hard resignation on her tear-streaked face.

Then everything was a howling, wind-lashing blur.

Asmodeus, the broken halfbreed that Astarte had spared the year before in Brooklyn, was the only witness to what happened next. His natural form was a three-headed creature—ram, bul , and man. But since he sacrificed his mortal half, he was far too weak to appear in that form on Gaia. What’s more, he had sworn to the priest that he would never possess another human again. So he stood on a nearby hil top in the body of a ram as he watched Dagon streak off with the priest in one arm and the baby halfbreed in the other. He watched Astarte walk out into the clearing near the smoldering campfire. She simply stood, waiting. She didn’t have to wait long.