Flesh Circus

She gave me a look that could qualify both as amused and what the hell? “No, it was Co

Safe answer. “Huh. Did he go to church?”

“Nope. She does. Sacred Grace. Rourke’s her confessor. There are a couple of indicators, but not enough to red-flag our boy. I’m stumped.”

Saul’s lip lifted at the mention of Rourke. He was on the ladder leading up into the attic, his shoulders barely clearing the small entrance. He hadn’t said a word since we left the Cirque. It was quiet even for him, and I suspected trouble.

First things first, though.

Huh. I still hadn’t really spoken to any of the priests at Sacred Grace since the last incident with the Sorrows. I had decided, after much reflection, not to tear the whole fucking place apart to find anything else Father Gui and his happy band of priests was hiding from me. I hadn’t forgiven Gui yet, but I hadn’t stopped doing exorcisms for them either.

There was being justifiably angry over them hiding necessary information from me, and then there was being stupid.

“Does she bring home novenas?” I stepped past Eva, clearing the way for Saul to come up.

“Yup. There’s a whole clutch of them on the mantel downstairs. The husband’s supposed to be irreligious, which is a surprise. Part of why I called you. And Avery said—”

“Yeah, Avery. How are you two?”

“He’s good.” She didn’t blush, but she did smile slightly, an ironclad grimace. On her pretty, wide-cheeked face, it was amazing. She has delicate fingers and a strong nose, and is built like a gymnast. It probably helps when she’s wrestling Possessors. Of all of my standard exorcists, Avery comes closest to having the qualities necessary for a hunter, but Eva is the one who thinks fastest—and most thoroughly—on her feet. And she’s also the calmest. She paints eggshells a la Fabergé to relax, I’m told. It’s exactly the sort of finicky, delicate thing I’d expect her to do. “This doesn’t feel like a Possessor.”

It probably isn’t. “Good call. Got a mirror?”

“Of course.” She wasn’t male, so she didn’t bother with useless questions. She just dug in her black bag—exorcists favor the old medical bags, since they’re just the right size and can be dropped in a hurry—and fished out a hand mirror. “The victim’s Trevor Watson. Male, African American. Forty-three, works as an orderly out at Henderson Hill. Likes beer, soft pretzels, and his wife. The marriage seems happy, the financial side stable but not luxurious by any stretch. Scratchin’ is what the wife called it. She’s Hispanic, thirty-eight, registered nurse.”

“He works at Henderson?” That was interesting. Mental institutions can sometimes lead to cross-contamination in possession cases. Not as often as you think, though—plenty of people in institutions are indigent, and Possessors don’t go for that.

“Yeah. The new one.” It went without saying, but she said it anyway.

Our eyes met. I suppressed a shiver at the thought of the old asylum. It wasn’t a nice place for anyone with a degree of psychic talent, and I’d chased an arkeus or two up into its cold, haunted halls. Nobody worked up at the old Henderson Hill but an old, half-blind, mute caretaker who didn’t care what happened as long as he could sit in the boiler room with his quart of rye. He seemed more a fixture of the place than the old furnace itself, and I’d given up wondering exactly what he was, since he didn’t interfere with any case that took me up there.

The man on the mattresses writhed and gurgled. “He chewed through a gag,” Eva said helpfully. “I was worried until nothing happened.”

Since Possessors—and loa—can snap curses at an exorcist with a victim’s mouth, I didn’t blame her. “Reasonable of you. How did the mattresses get up here?”

“I don’t know. The wife said they never used the attic.”

Curiouser and curiouser.

Saul lifted himself up from the steps. “Smells like the other one, Jill.”

I stopped, gave him a quizzical look. “Really?”

“Cigars. And candy.” He sniffed, inhaling deeply, tasting the air. “An orange-y perfume.”

“Florida water?” I hazarded. It was a reasonable guess.

“Could be. But there’s a lot of sugar. Like cookies.”

Huh. Even with my senses amped up and the scar naked to the open air, I smelled nothing but dust, fiberglass insulation, and the remains of a recent fried chicken. “Well.”

“Bruuuuuja,” the victim crooned. “Ay, bruuuuja! Come heee-eeere.”

Eva actually jumped. “What the—”

I shushed her. Jesus. This can’t be what I think it is.

“Bruuuuuuja!” A long, drawn-out sigh. The voice was eerie, neither male nor female, a sweet high piping. “We want to talk to you!”

“Madre de Dios.” Eva crossed herself.

Amen to that, I thought. “Leave your bag. Go downstairs and start saying Hail Marys. Saul—”

“Not going anywhere.” Saul folded his arms as Eva brushed past him. She didn’t even argue—another thing I could be thankful for. Sometimes a civilian will try to protest or object or something.

My mouth was dry. “If he gets loose, keep him from getting downstairs. Got it?”

He nodded, his eyes lighting up. I liked seeing that, and wished I had time to ask him what was going on with him. A good hour or so to worm out what was bothering him and maybe get somewhere would have been nice.

But duty always calls. I dug in Eva’s bag until I came up with a taper candle and a mini-bottle of blessed wine. Father Gui blesses these tiny bottles in job lots, having a dispensation from high-up in the Vatican to perform some of the, ahem, older blessings.

It wasn’t rum or tequila, but it would do. The victim started moaning again, and I uncapped the bottle. It was a moment’s work to stare at the candle wick, the scar prickling with etheric energy bleeding down a vein-map into my fingertips, until the waxed linen sparked and bloomed with orange flame.

The attic shifted around me, turning darker. The shadows took on a sharper edge, hanging insulation moving slightly, though the air was dead still.

One of the oldest truths in sympathetic magic: to light a candle is to cast a shadow. If I didn’t believe Hell predated humanity—having it on good authority—I’d think that human beings had created it. As it is, we do our bargain-basement best up here on Earth, don’t we?

I wonder about that sometimes. Not enough to give myself the blue funks Mikhail used to withdraw into, but enough to make me question this entire line of work.

It’s a good thing. Without the questioning I’m just another vigilante with a gun.

The taper’s flame held steady. The liquid in the bottle trembled slightly, but that could have been the tension blooming in my midsection. This wasn’t your ordinary exorcism, and things were begi

“You want to talk to me?” I pitched my voice loud enough to carry. “Here I am.”

The victim flopped against the restraints like a fish. I wondered how Eva had gotten him tied down. He looked to be twice her size.

But when a girl’s motivated, miracles are possible.

I chose my footing carefully, my dumb eye on the candleflame and my smart eye soft-focused, sca

The flooring creaked. Veils of insulation shifted. It was still warm up here after the day’s heat, and a prickle of sweat touched my forehead. It wasn’t because of the temperature, though.

The candleflame wavered, but I was quick, shifting my weight just a half-step to the side. The strike slid past me, boards groaning, and I heard Saul skip nimbly aside. Son of a bitch. You hit him with a curse and I will tear your face off, goddammit.