Embers, page 16
Anya sat obediently on the edge of the exam table, feeling foolish. Sparky climbed up on one of the stirrups used for gynecological exams and stared at the digital thermometer in her mouth. He batted at it. The temperature jumped and it beeped. Sparky squealed in delight.
The pixie doc returned with an armload of dressings and ointments. She snatched the thermometer from Anya’s mouth and frowned. “You’re running a low-grade fever. That’s a sign of infection.”
“Great.” Anya sighed. “That’s the last thing I need.”
“This is what you need.” Dr. Murdock held up a fistful of green blister packs.“These are antibiotics, two weeks’ worth. You need to get in to see a doctor before they run out, to make sure that the infection’s under control.” She held up a tube. “Silvadene antibiotic ointment. Apply it twice a day, keep the burns covered.”
Anya looked down. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Now, raise your arms.”
Anya did as she was told. The pixie doc began looping gauze around her chest.
“You have to keep those burns covered in the meantime. And, honey, if you aren’t gonna be wearing a bra, you need a lot more gauze to keep those girls contained.”
“I, uh, usually do. Wear a bra. Why?” Anya stared down. “Is there something wrong with them?”
The pixie doc laughed. “They’re great, don’t get me wrong. But if you’re working with a bunch of men in the fire department, I’m sure that they don’t need to see all your womanly charms spilling over, you know?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Anya mumbled, feeling like a chastened teenager. “Thank you.”
“You just keep doing the good work you’re doing.”
Funny. She didn’t feel like she was doing good work.
Ten minutes later, Anya was walking out of the hospital with a bagful of samples and gauze, corseted up to her armpits in bandages. She sported a sticker of a fairy with glitter wings on her jacket collar. Sparky trotted along beside her, looking wistfully back at the place they’d left the pixie doc.
She didn’t want to admit it to herself, but she felt better. It wasn’t the new bandages, or the antibiotic cream. It was the cold chill in her chest soothing the heat of the burns. Taking the ghost had softened the pain. A stab of guilt rattled through her head, but it didn’t disturb the cold humming in her heart.
She’d taken a ghost without real provocation.
Her grip on the bag of medicine tightened. She had never done that before, always adhering studiously to her principle: never take a spirit unless there’s no other choice.
What kind of a monster did this make her?
A small voice bubbled up in her: It makes you like him. Like Drake Ferrer.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
WHATEVER DRAKE FERRER WAS, it couldn’t be said that he wasn’t well diversified.
Anya drummed her fingers on her desk at DFD the next day, scrolling through Drake Ferrer’s property records in the city database. The city’s real estate division showed numerous properties belonging to Ferrer. So far she’d found a former strip mall, a car lot, a gas station, six houses, and a lot on which a video store stood. They’d been purchased in the late 1990s, titled under Ferrer’s name. She noticed they’d all been sold within the last six months, at well below market value, to his Motor City Phoenix Foundation. She’d love to see how the capital losses worked out on his tax returns.
“Are you finally planning to get out of Dodge? Or are you trying to raise money for other purposes?” she muttered.
She paused, her eyes sliding from the blue screen to her right hand. It gripped a pen, poised over a yellow legal pad. The skin between her shoulder blades prickled as she watched her hand scrawl across the page, without her conscious direction. Her meticulous notes on Ferrer’s property acquisitions dribbled away to loopy scribbles that resolved into a childlike scrawl that read:
ME. ME. ME. ME.
Mimimimimimimimi…
She forced her hand to stop, clamping down on it with her left hand. With white knuckles, she slowly released her right hand. The pen began to move again, writing:
ME.
Mimi.
She’d heard of this before: automatic writing. Some mediums could communicate with spirits by allowing them use of their hands. Anya had never done it; she had seen it once, but it had given her the willies. She found her hoarse voice: “Mimi, is that you, you bitch?”
The scrawl paused: Hello, Anya. No need to be confrontational.
“What do you want?”
Actually, you could use some hand cream. Your cuticles are a mess.
“Thanks for the advice. Shouldn’t you be boiling in some netherworld hell?”
Well, government offices are an institutional hell, of a sort. Does that count?
“Actually, I’m surprised you’re literate, Mimi. Most demons of your ilk can’t do much more than drag planchettes around Ouija boards.”
That’s fun. Especially at slumber parties. All those teenage girls with burning questions about their would-be beaux… delish. But that’s not nearly as fun as looking over your shoulder.
“Was that you with me in the interrogation room?” She thought of the voice encouraging her to torture Ferrer.
He’s cute. You should interrogate him more.
“No thanks. I don’t touch suspects.”
At least that one’s conscious. Not like that atrophying bald guy in the hospital.
Rage bubbled up in Anya. “Go fuck yourself, Mimi.”
Gladly. But you should try it. You might like it.
The pen stilled.
Anya reached deeply within herself for the burning core that devoured ghosts. The reactor inside her ignited, and she reached outward, searching for this irritating little demon that seemed to still have one foot in the physical world. She had never failed to entirely consume a demon before. She supposed it was possible, if the demon was stronger than she believed. She planed her hand through the air, searching for the demon to finish the job. She felt nothing, no acidic presence, no shadow of Mimi looming over her desk.
She returned her hand to the pen. “Where are you, Mimi?”
The pen didn’t move.
“Mimi. Answer me. Where are you?”
The pen remained still. Either Mimi was gone or she didn’t feel like talking.
Anya shuddered. Having the urge to scrub her hands, she stepped across the hall to the ladies’ room. Green subway tile created a soothing, if somewhat institutional, ambiance. She emptied an entire soap pump of pink liquid in her hands, scrubbed until the hot water ran out and her right hand was pink and raw. To hell with her cuticles. She wanted to scrub the stink of demon off her, no matter how much soap and water it took.
She glanced up at the mirror. Her reflection startled her. She looked too drawn, wan. The antibiotics for the infection hadn’t kicked in yet. She wanted nothing more than to go home and go to bed.
But she knew that she needed to get some help. Not from the pixie doc, but someone more well-versed in spiritual ills.
She had burnt her bridges with DAGR. There was no one left to ask… so she would have to figure this out on her own.
“Thank you for agreeing to meet me, Father.”
The elderly priest sat beside Anya in a back pew at St. Florian Catholic Church in Hamtramck. This church possessed a much different grandeur than the Gothic-modern cathedral she’d attended days before. St. Florian remained in traditional Gothic form, warmed by red and gold carpets underfoot. The dark wooden pews had been polished to a deep sheen, and the stained-glass windows cast violet shadows on golden sandstone tiles on the walls. Colorful depictions of saints occupied the niches, wreathed with a riot of yellow and red flowers. Unlike the cathedral, this place felt warm and familiar. The irony that St. Florian was the patron saint of firefighters was not lost on Anya.
This had been the church her mother had taken Anya to when she was a child; this was the church that had overseen her burial, and this was the priest who had tried to counsel Anya after her mother’s death. Anya was amazed to learn he was still in the parish, and even more shocked he still remembered her, and that he cleared his schedule to meet with her on such short notice. Anya had spent all night staring at the ceiling, too reluctant to sleep for fear that Mimi would invade her dreams. She’d been amazed that Father Mark himself answered the parish secretary’s listed phone number at seven in the morning.
“Of course.” Father Mark folded his gnarled hands on his knee. He was entirely bald, stooped with age, but his eye still held the level gleam of confidence. “I remember you. You were the girl who wouldn’t speak after your mother’s death.”
Anya looked forward at the gilded altar, overlaid with red and orange flowers. She hoped the shadow of this holy place upon her would be able to lift the seed of darkness she felt growing in her chest. Perhaps the seed had been there a long time, but she felt it stirring, flowering, and needed someone to show her how to pull it out. “I have carried the guilt of her death with me for a long time, Father. I’m afraid it has tainted many aspects of my life, and I’m beginning to think that my life isn’t really my own to control.”
It was Father Mark’s turn to be silent as she confessed what had happened with her mother, how her mother’s death had been caused by Anya’s disobedience. The guilt had left her heart fertile ground for so many tragedies: the careless stealing of spirits, rejecting love. Perhaps it even cracked open a door for Mimi to enter. She didn’t tell Father Mark these things, but simply told him of the great and terrible darkness she felt weighing upon her. She told him of the arsonist, how he seemed untouchable, and that she feared he would continue unless stopped.
She even told him about DAGR, using a broad brush, and that she’d quit. Anya told him she had felt a most unpleasant presence since she had left, her fear that some bits of her former work clung to her.
Anya told him what she had told no one else: that she was afraid. Afraid that she couldn’t stop the arsonist in time. Afraid that Brian wouldn’t emerge from his coma. Afraid of being alone, of being unloved and unlovable.
High above in the vaulted arches, a bird had somehow found its way in. It flitted right and left, trying to find a way out, beating its wings against the impassible light of the glass. Anya watched it as she spoke.
Father Mark followed her gaze. “It will find its way out. They always do. And you will find your way out, too.”
“Would it be too much to ask for a blessing, Father?” The words nearly stung her parched throat. She had not asked for such a thing, ever. She was sure the priest would send her away, tell her to come back for reindoctrination classes or come to the next mass.
“Though it may be out of the ordinary for a lapsed Catholic, I strongly feel it would be good for your soul to take communion, Anya,” Father Mark told her. “You have a task ahead of you in bringing the arsonist to justice and many tasks before you in purifying your heart. I feel the Holy Spirit should be summoned to guide your hands and your heart.”
If I don’t manage to offend the Holy Spirit by nibbling on it, first, Anya thought. And I’d much rather have the Holy Spirit guiding my hands than Mimi.
Father Mark bustled away to prepare the communion. Anya sat alone in the pew, staring up at the bird. She felt a surprising measure of peace. She had hoped that being here might conjure up the smallest shred of belief to help guide her. After quitting DAGR, she felt very, very alone.
Except for Sparky. He laid at her feet, dozing. She leaned down and scratched his ear-gills. He chuffed happily in his slumber. He would always be with her. As long as she had Sparky, she could never be truly alone.
“Father Mark can’t see it. But I can.”
Anya turned in her pew at the voice behind her. She saw the ghost of a young priest in a black suit, sitting a row behind her. A worry mark was pressed into his brow. He seemed barely old enough to drive, much less to have completed the training. She remembered him from her childhood, pacing the halls outside Father Mark’s office. When he lifted his hands to grip the back of the pew, Anya could see the thin white marks of scars circling his wrists like bracelets. A suicide. No wonder he was trapped here.
“See what?” Anya asked.
The young priest leaned forward. His eyes were wild and intense. “The stain of the demon upon you.”
Anya’s hands fluttered up to the bandages on her chest. “You can see that?”
“Yes. And I can see that the demon is taking root in you.” His knuckles whitened to the point that they became translucent. “I’ve been there. I know.”
“How do you know?” she asked, as dread twitched through her. She’d suspected, worried at it, but the priest had given the terrible thought shape and form. Anya had failed to entirely devour Mimi. The demon had moved from Chloe into her.
“It begins simply enough, as obsession. The demon feeds on it. For me, it was an obsession with a woman.” He looked away, and she could see the pain in his eyes. “But you can’t let it take hold. Fight it.”
“How? How can I fight it?”
The priest’s gaze was leaden. “If you cannot defeat the demon through your own virtues, you must transfer it to someone else. Give the burden away.”
Anya leaned back, shocked. She couldn’t imagine forcing Mimi on someone else, couldn’t imagine a priest advising her to do that. The young priest was clearly mad, unhinged from the way he’d departed life. “I can’t do that. This isn’t a cold that I can give to someone by sneezing on them, that they’ll eventually get over.”
“You must. If you can’t destroy it, you must pass it on.” The young priest looked at her. “You are needed for other tasks—to stop this arsonist, to keep Sirrush from waking. For the greater good, it has to happen. Don’t let the demon sacrifice you.”
“But, I—” she sputtered. It seemed that the entire underground spiritual world knew about Sirrush. Could they feel that much? Was he that close?
The young priest’s ghost sank into the pew and disappeared into the floor. Anya heard the footsteps of the old priest approaching.
She turned. In one hand, he held a gold chalice. “Are you ready?”
“Yes, Father.”
She knelt before the altar and recited the Lord’s Prayer with Father Mark. She’d always said the Lord’s Prayer in the company of others, and her voice seemed a tinny shadow compared to Father Mark’s.
Father Mark said, “Deliver us from every evil, Lord, and grant us peace. In your mercy, keep us free from sin. Protect us from all anxiety as we await the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ.”
Anya responded, “For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and forever.”
“May the peace of the Lord be with you, always.” Father Mark presented the transubstantiated body and blood of Christ to the empty church, then lowered the chalice to Anya. “Blood of Christ.”
Anya pressed her lips to the cup. The wine scalded her throat and she struggled to swallow. “Amen,” she croaked.
Father Mark placed the host on her tongue. “Body of Christ.”
The wafer dissolved against the roof of her mouth and she felt it sizzling against her teeth, as if she’d swallowed a fistful of Pop Rocks.
“Amen,” she gasped, lowering her head. She hoped that Father Mark thought her to be simply overcome with the power of prayer.
“Bless this child of yours, Lord. Relieve her of her suffering and assist her on her mission. Thanks be to God.”
“Thanks be to God,” she echoed, but she couldn’t hear her own voice. She heard nothing but the sound of the trapped bird beating its wings futilely against the stained glass.
Anya lit a novena candle for Brian and said a prayer, hoping that wherever his spirit was locked away, it would have some small effect. She waited for the spirit of the young priest to return, but he didn’t make an appearance. Ghosts were never particularly dependable creatures.
She left the church shortly after sunset. Autumn had reached into all the corners of Hamtramck, painting the leaves on the trees gold and red. The lawn around the ruddy stone of the church had stopped growing, splinters of yellow blades prickling into the carpet of grass. Cirrus clouds scarcely moved in the darkening sky, though a breeze rattled litter and leaves along the gutters. Sparky chased a paper cup rolling along the sidewalk.
She decided to walk home. The living priest and the dead one had given her much to ponder. Like it or not, she needed to face the fact she was being haunted by Mimi. Having seen a handful of these cases with DAGR, she knew the signs. Mimi had gained a toehold in her physical body. If she wasn’t careful, she’d come down with a full-blown case of demonic possession like poor Chloe, flailing in her bathtub… and that would help no one.
The old priest’s ritual had stung her. Anya hoped that meant it had worked, that the communion had driven Mimi away, at least for the time being. Passing Mimi on like a hand-me-down pair of jeans wasn’t an option. It went against every last grain of ethics in her; she wouldn’t visit the harm Mimi represented on an innocent. It simply wasn’t going to happen.
She could go to DAGR. She’d thought about that. But her pride wouldn’t allow her to go crawling back to them, to ask for the help that she’d been reluctant to give. No. There would be other solutions, solutions that wouldn’t endanger them or her pride. That bridge was burned and she would find another way.
She opened her mailbox and rifled through her mail in the last of the sunshine. Bills. Junk mail. More offers for aluminum siding. Anya stood back and looked at her house. It didn’t look that bad to her. Why did they keep bothering her? She fingered past three credit card solicitations before her fingers stilled on an ivory envelope. It was hand addressed to her. She recognized the scrawl from the flower card and the sketch Drake Ferrer had drawn of her in the cathedral.
She slit the envelope with a fingernail and pulled out the message. It was an invitation to Drake’s art opening Friday night at the Detroit Institute of Art. Her brows shot up. What the hell? Was he trying to date her or taunt her?
