
Chapter 9
A 1978 survey in “The Oregonian” reported that
most denizens of Oregon welcome the return of rain each
autumn.
WHEN I FINALLY GOT HOME AGAIN, damp
and exhausted, I flopped onto the sofa, foot propped up on three
pillows. Allie brought me soup and crackers at about noon.
Days passed. I wrote a little. The manuscript grew
slowly. Too slowly for my liking. When the words refused to budge
out of my brain I retreated to the balcony. I had things to think
about. Doreen left me more puzzled than informed. She needed help.
From a Warrior of the Celestial Blade.
Why?
Her demon blood should make us natural
enemies.
Only another interdimensional creature could
threaten her. The Nörglein came to mind. Why else would she bring
me information on how to banish the bastard?
I knew the dark elf had some kind of connection to
Cooper’s Furniture Emporium. What had he done that Doreen needed
help getting rid of him?
The rain faded to a thick mist and the wind died
down. A tug hauling three long barges headed north, toward the
ports on the Columbia River. I followed it with my gaze as it
disappeared into the thick air beyond the bridge.
Things lurked in the mist and shadows. Things more
dangerous than gravel barges on the river.
I heard a car door slam. Nothing between me and the
river but a public paved path and access to a marina. All the cars
were parked on the other side of the building. Whoever disturbed
the midday, mid-week quiet had packed some anger into the closing
of the car for me to hear it so clearly.
Serious footsteps clanged on the exterior
staircase; I felt the vibrations in the railing.
Knowing my neighbors and their routine visitors, I
suspected I was the target of all that energy. With a sigh, I
pivoted clumsily and wrestled with the French door that wanted to
close too quickly in the increasing breeze at my back.
I had no idea if Allie had retreated to the bedroom
or gone out to avoid my moody silence or not.
“Who is it, Scrap?”
Hrmf t hmmm grblt.
Since I was out of action Scrap spent more time
with Ginkgo than he did with me.
Jealous? Scrap came through clearer.
“Get your ass back here. We’ve company of the
unpleasant kind.”
I hobbled over to the door, opening it at the first
trace of a knock, before the visitor could pound it to
smithereens.
“Why, Donovan, how good to see you. Would you like
a cup of coffee?” I hadn’t seen him since he’d dropped off and
picked up Doreen from the café two weeks ago.
“How’d you do it, Tess?” he snarled. His fists
clenched at his sides and his face darkened with suffused blood.
The copper highlights in his skin grew dominant. His
chocolate-colored eyes became deep holes of blackness.
The force of his emotions pushed me backward,
almost physically. I raised my hand to the talisman of my pearls.
They didn’t help. This must have been what Scrap felt whenever he
and Donovan were in the same room before Scrap overcame the
darkness in his soul; the repellant force field of an active
gargoyle.
He’s human now, I reminded myself. He’s
no longer a gargoyle.
I turned away and fussed with the coffeemaker in
the kitchen rather than face him. “How’d I do what?” I
returned.
“I’ve just come from my appeal on the custody
hearing for my daughter.”
“I gather that it did not go well. MoonFeather
retains custody.” My aunt hadn’t called in tears to tell me she’d
lost the baby. Therefore, she hadn’t been forced to turn Lilly over
to Donovan.
I added soy creamer and sugar to my cup along with
fresh coffee. Donovan’s cup of black brew remained untouched on the
counter.
“Your aunt has no right to my daughter. I’m Lilly’s
father.” He moved closer, looming over me with barely controlled
anger.
I had the crutches to fend him off if
necessary.
“King Scazzy, prison warden of the Universe,
ordered MoonFeather to raise WindScribe’s child,” I replied
mildly.
“That has no bearing in mundane courts. Lilly is
my daughter.”
“So, what did I do to push the courts to honor
MoonFeather’s commitment to the baby? She is darling. Only nine
months old and trying to walk already.” My aunt emailed me pictures
every week.
“My DNA test. How’d you get it altered? According
to the lab my genes aren’t even close to Lilly’s.” He wrapped his
hand around the coffee mug like he wished it was my neck and he
could strangle me.
“I did nothing. Perhaps Lilly isn’t your daughter.
Perhaps WindScribe slept with someone else.” I shrugged and moved
past him into the living room. If I had to defend myself I wanted
space. “Rumor has it she seduced the king of Faery just before she
killed him.”
Scrap, I think I need you.
Coming. He popped into view behind Donovan’s
head, his wings beating wildly enough to create a draft. He bared
his multiple rows of dagger-shaped teeth and made ugly faces. Then
he turned his hind end toward our guest and farted so loud and
noxiously I was sure Donovan could hear and smell it.
If Donovan did, he didn’t let it divert him from
stalking me.
Scrap landed on my shoulder, glowing pink. He
prepared to turn into the blade and defend us. But he stayed pink,
not vermilion. Donovan wanted to scare me, not hurt me.
“You and I both know that Lilly is mine.”
“WindScribe did not name you as the father. She did
sign a paper requesting MoonFeather, her mentor and friend, adopt
her child. The courts agreed.”
“I am Lilly’s father. How’d you alter my DNA test
showing differently?”
“I didn’t.”
“You must have. No one else ...”
“King Scazzamurieddu has more reason than I to keep
you away from the baby.”
“He wouldn’t dare.”
“Why not? What are you going to do, tattle on him
to the Powers That Be?” My insides quaked in memory of my one and
only interview with the board of seven beings, each from a
different dimension, each with a different agenda, each shadowed
deep within a robe’s cowl, and unidentifiable.
“Why have you dared breach our portal?” I heard
again the deep booming voice. A ten-foot tentacle stretched across
the tall judicial bench toward my throat. “What are you prepared to
offer in return for your audacity?”
Forcibly, I yanked myself away from that
memory.
“Oh, God, they’re still punishing me,” Donovan
gasped, dropping onto the sofa. He set the cup down and buried his
face in his hands.
Scrap faded back to his normal gray-green. Time
for a snack, babe. We going out or eating in?
I didn’t answer him.
In. He popped out, probably to the laundry
room in the basement where mold grew thick and deep behind the
washing machines.
“Maybe they are ensuring Lilly is loved and cared
for by the best person for her to learn about life, from both sides
of the chat room. Maybe they need you to settle down and live a
normal life with a wife and no more plans to create a homeland for
half-breed demons before entrusting you with a precious child,” I
said soothingly.
“Marry me. Help me prove that I’m the best person
to raise my daughter.” He looked up, catching my gaze and holding
it.
“Sorry. Wrong formula again.” His third proposal
and he still didn’t get it that he needed to ask me because he
wanted me, just me, to be the love of his life. He always put his
agenda ahead of that, not realizing that if he loved me, and me
him, then I’d gladly help him with anything he needed. “Why don’t
you discuss it with your girlfriend? I believe you are seeing
Doreen.”
“Doreen can’t compare to you and what you and I
have together, what we can do for each other. What’s it going to
take to convince you that we belong together? The other women are
just diversions to distract me from you.” He rose up to his full
six feet of height, shoulders hunching upward in anger again.
“Figure out what I need and we might have
something. Until then, I’m sorry you can’t have Lilly. Maybe you
should move to Cape Cod. Then you could at least visit her more
often.”
“If you’re trying to get rid of me, I don’t have to
move three thousand miles away. Good-bye.”
The doorframe shook for long seconds after he
slammed it in his wake.

Allie hummed softly as she closed her cell
phone.
“So, when’s the wedding?” I asked casually. Since
I’d discarded the crutches in favor of an ugly strap-on boot over
the cast—Dr. Sean still refused the lighter air cast, wanting to
keep me as immobile as possible—I’d retaken control of my kitchen.
In a few minutes we’d have fish baked in a gentle lime and mango
chutney sauce, brown rice pilaf, and a salad with a variety of
fresh local produce from the farmers market.
At least I had an appetite again. My brain had only
partially awakened along with my stomach. I’d added three chapters
to my manuscript, enough to send to my editor as proof of my
progress. That should buy another extension on the due date.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t squeeze any more money
out of them until I finished the book. Maybe my royalty statement
next month could breathe some life into my checking account.
“We have to decide some things before we set a
date,” Allie said. Her dreamy-eyed gaze and humming halted
abruptly. She began twisting her ring round and round her
finger.
Until that moment, she’d looked happier and more
relaxed than I’d seen her in a long time.
Uh oh, trouble in Lovesville, Scrap chomped
down on his cigar. Don’t want to hear it. Don’t want to deal
with it. He flew from his perch on the wine glass rack, which
now held two glasses, through the closed French doors onto the
patio.
“Decide what?” I hadn’t asked why she lingered in
my apartment a week after she’d been cleared of wrongdoing on her
job, two weeks after Steve returned to his house and job in
Illinois.
“If I want to go back to being a cop. Do we want to
live in Chicago,” she mumbled almost inaudibly. “Can I stand living
in Cape Cod if I’m not a cop? Can Steve tolerate going home again?
Can we find jobs out here?”
A long moment of silence. What did I say to
that?
“Tess, I’ve wanted to leave home for a long time.
But I didn’t dare get too far away from The House without you there
to guard it. How could you leave vulnerable a plot of neutral
ground containing the right energies to open a rogue portal to a
demon dimension? How could you leave your father and his life
partner alone with no protection?”
“Your cop partner can guard it,” I mumbled.
“Mike went back to Miami.”
“Say again?” I’d heard her. I needed
confirmation.
“Mike, the part water demon, went back to Miami now
that Darren Estevez no longer holds his family hostage. The House
is wide open to attack.”
“Would you believe I took out some insurance before
I left?”
“What kind of insurance?”
The scar on my face grew hot and knife fresh. I was
surprised Allie couldn’t see it glowing. “Insurance that cost me a
lot.”
I set my chin in an expression she had to know
meant I would say no more.
I couldn’t say more.
My hand shook as badly as it had when I held a very
special onyx fountain pen. I felt it between my fingers, watched
myself dip the nib in a pool of my own blood and sign my name. My
full name that only my mother used: Teresa Louise Noncoiré. With
each stroke my veins and arteries filled with searing warmth, a
precursor to the flames that would consume the document and myself
from within if I ever violated that contract of silence or returned
to The House for more than five days at a stretch.
The House stood on neutral ground. It had to remain
in neutral hands. As a Warrior of the Celestial Blade I was
decidedly not neutral. My dad and his partner were.
Donovan had signed a similar oath about his past as
a gargoyle after he fell. I’d had to figure out his “Big Secret” on
my own.
Allie set her chin in a similar stubbornness to
mine. “Tomorrow morning I’m going to make some calls, start looking
for a new career.” She pocketed her phone decisively and rose from
her curled position on the end of the sofa.
“Doing what?”
She shrugged and began setting places for us on the
bar.
“Allie, this isn’t like you. You don’t know how to
not be a cop. I remember you breaking up a fistfight between two
bullies when we were ten. You read them their rights!” I paused in
scooping rice onto our plates. “I’ve driven patrol with you, helped
close down bar fights. Being a cop is who you are.”
“I know.” Her eyes moistened. “Police work made me
feel useful. I could protect ordinary people, make the streets a
tad safer, bring a sense of order and balance into our chaotic
world.”
“But then life showed an ugly side you want to run
away from.” Been there, done that. Just now crawling out from
under my rock.
“Yeah. I can’t be a good cop if I’m looking at
every teen as a potential drug addict, every poorly dressed female
with a passel of children she can’t afford to feed as a potential
thief.” She gulped and closed her eyes. “Every adult male as a
potential child abuser and rapist.” She bowed her head and turned
her back on me.
Welcome to my world. Only I look for demons, not
criminals. Same thing, I guess. There’s a reason Earth has no
demon ghetto. We are our own demons.
I gave her a couple of moments to master her
emotions.
“So what will you do?”
“Steve’s not really happy in Chicago. So he’s
pursuing some leads in the job market in the Portland area.”
“What about you?”
She shrugged again.
“Allie. You can hide from yourself, but you can’t
hide from me.” Just like I’d tried a number of times to hide from
myself, only to have her ferret out the truth.
“I got my masters in criminal justice while you
were off getting yours in demon fighting. I’m looking into teaching
at the Police Academy, maybe one of the community colleges.” She
finally looked me in the eye. “Gollum gave me some leads.”
So that’s what she’d been hiding. Not the change in
career, but the source of her contacts.
Gollum was keeping tabs on me through my best
friend.
“You’re welcome to stay with me for a while,” I
said quietly. “I have really enjoyed having you here, appreciated
your help while I recover. I still need you to drive me.”
“Thanks, Tess. I’ll repay you, someday,
somehow.”
“You’ll earn your keep next week driving two
hundred miles each way to High Desert Con.”
“That’s where you met Dill. Where your friend from
college got killed.”
“Yeah, I’ve got a lot of memories tied up with that
Science Fiction convention. Time I stopped running away from them.”
And myself.