The Necromancer's House (22 page)

Night.

A new moon, the sky and the lake beneath it as black as oil.

The woman stands naked atop the cabin, naked but for a canvas bag slung over her shoulder. She readies two bottles, vodka bottles now filled to the neck with blood.

One contains rooster's blood.

One does not.

She takes a swig from that one, then empties both into a bucket from which a birch broom juts. She ties the empty bottles together and hangs them around her neck. She uses the broom to drizzle and flick the blood on her roof, knowing she'll have flies tomorrow, but there's nothing for it. This is how it's done. She doesn't have to coat the whole roof—there isn't enough for that anyway—but she must not leave two handsbreadths unbloodied.

This is an old spell, and the old spells are particular.

She walks backward toward the ladder, walking the bucket with her, sweeping behind so she doesn't get any on the bottoms of her feet. Every yard or so she rests the broom, takes hen feathers from her shoulder sack and sprinkles these on the roof, repeating a verse in Russian and concentrating on what she wants.

The bottles knock together tenderly sometimes, reminding her how testes, breasts, and ovaries—all the genitive organs—come in twos. Three is the number for gating, invocation, and killing. Four is for protection and weather. But two is for creation.

Two babes, a boy and a girl.

Two chickens, a rooster and a hen.

Down the ladder now, and she gives the Man Who Will Not Look At Her the bottles. He puts them in the garbage bag with the bones. The hen and rooster bones, and the bones that are not hen or rooster bones.

And the clothes.

The little clothes.

In the bag that will be rowed out to the lake.

She stands now on the porch watching the Cold Man row.

Moroz.

The Man Who Will Not Look At Her will not row—he will go back to his room hooded like a bird and sitting somewhere between sleep and waking. He learned quickly, hoods himself obediently, goes to town to run errands and never dares to run. Knows the Cold Man would come for him, and for his. He took to it so naturally because he is a coward. Not like the thief.

Things are beginning to move against the thief.

He is strong now, not like then.

He has killed the Baba in the woods, or caused her to be killed.

His bitch in the water killed sweet Misha.

His house is full of tricks.

He has friends, many friends.

First, the friends.

Then the fear will come to him, weaken him.

And then she will close his eyes.

Take back what is hers.

He hid himself, but that magic is waning.

She knows his town, even what road.

He has spread himself too thin with other spells.

She will find him soon.

Tonight's magic must sleep, but it will awaken when the moon waxes fat and full.

“Wait a moment,” she says. “The potatoes.”

The Man Who Will Not Look At Her is tying up the bag, putting it in the boat. He hears her, says,

“Potatoes? Do you need potatoes?”

“Yes. That might be enough for him. You will go tomorrow and find me a bucket of potatoes. Other things, too.”

“Of course.”

“Are you hungry?”

He shakes his head, looking at his feet.

“You'll have to eat.”

He shakes his head again.

A tear falls on his feet.

“Go to your kennel.”

He leaves, still looking down, his shoulders folded in on themselves.

She smells the air.

Smiles.

Garlic, rosemary, wine, black pepper.

And meat.

She salivates.

The first roast is done.

Andrew drives Salvador to the North Star Garage, where Radha's car waits to be driven north to Chicago. Salvador will drive it in a day, needing neither rest nor sleep, looking to all but the very luminous like a handsome young Latino. And the very luminous will be used to seeing strange things; will not think much of seeing a portrait of Salvador Dalí swiveling in the window of a Mini Cooper, checking the blind spot twice as it changes lanes. He will return through Radha's shower, perhaps in time for lunch tomorrow.

Chancho shows Andrew the final touch. Zebra skin seats. He had seen on her Facebook page her post about her new zebra-skin pillow, how much she liked that particular pelt.

She's going to squee.

Chancho looks ashen, distracted.

“You still thinking about the Russians, Chanch?”

“Them? No. One was a pussy, the other didn't care. Not enough to tangle with us. They ain't comin' back.”

Andrew is thinking about the Russians, though. He thinks it might be prudent to acquire a pendant that turns bullets, a lovely bit of sorcery made from Kevlar, lead, silver, armadillo blood, and the ground tooth of someone who died of natural causes, but the user who makes these lives in Rio de Janeiro and doesn't care for tapes of the dead or cars.

What the Brazilian wants is a cloak of feathers that will change him into a hawk. Andrew could make such a cloak, but it would take him weeks, maybe months. Birds are hard, and this is not his specialty. The user in Brazil doesn't know Andrew and has a reputation for being kind of a prick—very QPQ.
Quid pro quo.
Reputation is everything between users, so they tend to trust each other. Not bullet guy. QPQ. He wants payment upon delivery. And Andrew wants the protection pendant stat.

The best shapeshifter, the one who taught Andrew, lives near Québec; she could make the hawk cloak in days, probably has one or two ready for trade. He doesn't know what she might want, other than a really mighty youth potion, and those are in high, high demand. She has asked for stone spells before, though. If so, back to Michael Rudnick, who is sequestered with Anneke until the full moon. Luckily, the
Québécoise
trusts other users, knows Andrew, and would be willing to wait. Unluckily, she's old, very old-school, and doesn't use the Internet. Thinks it's evil. So he'll have to call her on her landline. Again. She didn't answer last night, but that's not unusual; she shifts and spends days at a time as an animal. It's widely thought she's close to opting out permanently, rebooting into a young critter and spending her last years on earth flying or running on all fours.

There's a man in the city who knows about birds and shapeshifting, but he's old, too.

And he helped Andrew once before.

The kind of help you can't pay back, and you can't ask other favors after.

Back to Chancho and his ashen face.

“What's wrong?”

“Saw something messed up this morning.”

“You've seen plenty of messed-up shit.”

“Not like this.”

“Not like what?”

“You wanna see?”

“No. Yes.”

They walk through the employee room. An AK-47 leans in the corner looking insouciant.

“State police brought it in; I'm supposed to clean it up. They took the
muerto
, left the deer. Effing big effer. Look at this
pinché
deer.”

First he's looking at the car.

The crumpled, dirty mess of a car.

Now he looks at the beast stoppering the hole where the windshield should be.

It
is
an effing big effer of a
pinché
deer.

Two hundred twenty-five pounds or better. Fifteen points or more on the rack, if the rack were intact. But it's not. It's through the windshield of the Saturn that clearly also hit a tree. The stag is practically
fused
into the car.

“You can see where they had to cut the poor dude out on this side, cut part of the deer's horns off, too, where they were through him.
All the way
through him. Look at this seat.”

Andrew suppresses the urge to gag.

“But this is what I don't get . . .”

Now he points at a hole in the deer's rear shoulder, another flowering out of the back of the neck.

“Bullets. Homeboy shot this deer. Probably through the glass, but the glass is gone. They took the gun, too. He had it in his hand. They asked for pliers to get it out, that's how tight he had it.”

Andrew tries to process this.

“Yeah, I know. Messed up. But look at this . . .”

His strong, brown finger indicates a broken headlight, blood, fur.

“And this.”

Muddy hoofprints on the roof, scratches on the door.

“More than one deer,” I say.

“Yeah, and it's the
tree
that crunched in the front end, not the deer. Not
this
deer.”

“He didn't hit this deer?”

“Nah. He hit another deer. Wrecked his car. Then deer come along . . . Maybe more than one. Look . . . hoof-ding, hoof-ding. Coming out of the woods and going at the car, looks like. Then the big boy came like a cannonball, ran through the effin' windshield so fast it broke it and put its horns through his heart. Even though he shot it, shot it good. Look.”

He points again at the lethal bullet wounds.

“This is
brujo
stuff, isn't it?”

Andrew touches the car.

“Isn't it?”

Andrew nods.

Brujo
stuff of the first order.

Slavic forest magic.

And very, very strong.

Then it happens.

A young man appears, pale, speared by the deer, writhing in his seat. He wears aviator sunglasses; blood comes out of his mouth, makes bubbles every time he says the word
please
.
He says it several times.

Chancho can't see it, is still examining the hoof and antler gouges in the Saturn's finish as if they were a rude hieroglyph that might explain how such things happened in the world.

The ghost starts to swell up.

Take it easy
, Andrew thinks.
I see you.

THEN HELP ME

The pallid young man puts the phantom of his gun in his mouth, pulls the trigger impotently, coughs blood all over the gun, and cries.

Help me

How?

It shivers. Points the gun at him. Spasms its fist as it pulls the trigger. Nothing happens, but it shoots Andrew several times, then Chancho, then itself.

Get Them.

Who?

Them
, it wheezes.

Becomes frustrated that Andrew doesn't understand, begins to get tired. New ghosts get tired easily.

It vomits black liquid all over itself and fades away.

The dead deer jerks, kicks.

Chancho jumps, crosses himself.

The stag deflates a little, lies very still, won't move again.

Andrew rubs his temples.

“Headache?”

Andrew smiles, shakes his head, closes his eyes.

“I'm in trouble, Chancho. Bad trouble.”

Chancho nods.

“I told you not to eff with this stuff anymore.
¡Cabron!
”

Chancho hammer-fists himself in the thigh, looks angrily at Andrew.

“This is from before, Chancho. From before I met you.”

“Yeah, but you're still
in
it. Don't you see? It's why they can get to you, still. Get
out
of it.”

“It's not like that.”

Chancho throws his arms up.

“No, it's like
this
,” he says, indicating the wreck, the improbable deer, the bloody seat.

Andrew nods.

“I'll stay away from you until this is over. After I help you clean this up. This isn't your mess.”

“Nah, go home. You'll get in the way. And don't stay away after. Just quit with the books and the
chingada brujerías
.”

Andrew laughs a little, still rubbing his temples.

Looks at Chancho.

“I've noticed that you say very bad things in Spanish but not English. Why is that?”

Chancho pauses.

“Because I'm American now. Them other words are in my blood. I can't help it. But I got to start over with American.”

“Ah,” the magus says, clearly unconvinced.

The bigger man walks over, encircles Andrew with a mighty arm.

“I'll ask the boys to stay around,” Chancho says. “I'll pray, too. Get some Jésus down here.”

If only.

Andrew doesn't know if there is a Jésus, and, if there is, whether he was God or man.

If he was a man, though, he must have been a user.

Water into wine sounds really.

Fucking.

Good.

Early evening.

The doorbell rings.

As Salvador is engaged in the garden, Andrew opens the door himself to find Arthur Madden and Mrs. Simpson standing on his porch, Mr. Madden panting somewhat more than usual, Mrs. Simpson smiling broadly and holding a paper plate covered in tinfoil.

“Good evening, Mr. Blankenship,” she says, her massive, jacketed bosom forming a sort of brooched cliff. “Sorry to drop by so late. I hope we're not disturbing you,”

She's doing the talking so Arthur can catch his breath.

“Not at all.”

He thinks quickly, trying to remember if he has anything controversial lying about in the living or dining room.

He thinks not.

“Would you like to come in?”

Now Andrew sees why the older Jehovah's Witness is huffing and puffing so much—a produce basket and two full grocery bags stand on the porch behind them. The climb up the drive is nearly too much for Arthur without sacks to carry, so these really tested the poor geezer.

“Oh, we couldn't impose on your hospitality so close to suppertime,” she says.

A second and a half ticks by like an awkward musical pause.

“We were just in the neighborhood and thought we'd bring you some leftovers.”

Leftovers?

Andrew attempts several polite refusals, but Mrs. Simpson is expert at parrying these. She wears him down. He takes the plate, peeps under the foil.

Looks like pot roast, creamed corn, and coleslaw.

“It's pot roast,” she says. “I made it myself, so you'll have to eat it all up.”

“Mmmm-mm,” he says. “Well, thank you.”

Arthur has enough wind back in him to speak.

“We also brought you some groceries.”

“Mr. . . .”

“Madden, it's okay.”

“I really don't feel comfortable taking groceries from you. I have plenty of food, and I'm sure you can think of someone in need who would love to get these.”

“Well, here's the situation, Andrew. I am too tired to carry these bags back down your drive, and, may the Lord forgive me, too proud to let you or Mrs. Simpson do it. So you are just. Going. To have. To take. The groceries. Call it a favor to me.”

This guy could charm the mustache off a gay trucker.

What the hell is going on?

“What's the occasion?”

“Call it a random act of kindness. Have you seen that bumper sticker? Perform something-something-beauty and random acts of kindness?”

“All right,” Andrew says. “You win.”

“I usually do. I mean, is this stuff that you will eat?”

“I'm sure it is.”

Andrew peeks in the first bag.

First item, weirdly, a ziplock bag holding about half a dozen pickled eggs.

A block of sharp cheddar.

Canned goods.

Tomatoes, peas, chicken soup.

Creamed corn.

“And don't you worry about a thing. I know things may seem tough now, but with the Lord's help, all trials are temporary, and all burdens bearable.”

He peeks in the second bag.

Rice. Mac and cheese. Dry spaghetti noodles in their long, coffinish boxes.

“Trials?”

“It's nothing to be ashamed of, Mr. Blankenship. This recession is very real, and jobs are hard to come by, and hard to keep. A good many of our congregation are also unexpectedly seeking new employment, and I understand you've been off the job for a while.”

Andrew pauses. Looks at Arthur. Looks back down at the produce basket and then pulls the cloth off the top, revealing a prodigious heap of potatoes.

And a mirror.

A small hand mirror.

Sitting on top of the potatoes.

He sees his own reflection in it.

A spell.

His heart skips a beat.

He throws the cloth back over it as if covering a snake.

“She said you might be reluctant to accept help, but I assured her . . .”

“She?” Andrew says a little too loudly.

Heart skidding.

“Why yes. Your mother's friend.”

“My mother's friend who?”

“You know, she didn't tell me her name. The Polish lady.”

“Russian,” corrects Mrs. Simpson.

“That's right, Russian. Very nice. She said she was just speaking with your mother . . .”

My mother's dead.

“. . . and told her she was bringing you potatoes from her own garden because homegrown food tastes best. And promised your mother you would visit her soon.”

“Forgive me, but you have to go now.”

“Pardon?”

“Please go,” he says, gently pushing Arthur just a little, then calling “Salvador!”

“Well, yes, all right, but if there's anything we can do to . . .”

“SALVADOR!”

Andrew takes the mirror from under the cloth, breaks it violently on his porch.

Mrs. Simpson takes her colleague by the elbow and begins to lead him down the long drive.

“Good night, Mr. Blankenship,” she says. “God bless.”

 • • • 

Salvador comes trotting around the side of the house, holding a pair of pruning shears, his prosthetic knees smeared with dirt. Some sort of weed is caught in the wicker of his left arm.

His framed head cocks to one side, awaiting instructions.

Before Andrew can issue any, however, the produce basket turns over on its own and the potatoes roll and bounce away from it like so many tailless rats escaping a ship.

Their paths cone away from Andrew and diverge; he dives, grabs one, but then it flips out of his hand and keeps rolling.

“Find out where they're going!” he shouts at Salvador.

The wicker man obeys, trailing the biggest group of them.

Andrew follows the one he grabbed.

It heads east, into the patch of woods near his house. He sees others moving in the low brush; to his left, one stops rolling, begins spinning in place. Burrows underground with a distinctive skirring noise.

He hears this happening all around him.

“Oh shit.”

His does it, too, as soon as it gets half a dozen yards away from him.

Planting themselves.

I don't know this spell.

I don't like this spell.

Salvador finds him, points urgently, in several directions.

“Okay, okay. Thanks, boy. First, get me a shovel. No, a spade. No, I'll get the spade, you pile firewood in the pit.”

Salvador tilts his head and moves his thumb and forefinger as if measuring an inch.

How much?

“All of it.”