Chương 35: Chapter 34 - Calling a King

Conrad, Kappa, and I were up in my room, frantically tossing the place, trying to find a business card that I had put "somewhere safe" six months ago. Before we'd started our search, my room had looked generally messy—you know, clean but cluttered. Fifteen minutes later, it looked like tornadoes regularly visited to throw tantrums.

"I don't know why this is so difficult!" I cried.

"It's not like I have a lot of stuff!"

"Have you ever considered leaving your art supplies laying around only half of your room?" Conrad said.

"You could pick a side and start corralling them in that direction." I stopped and pointed at him.

"Hey! Nobody messes with the art supplies." I went back to stripping the sheets off my bed.

"Even Mrs. Park knows that." Kappa bounced around to avoid getting buried in the sheets, then crawled under the bed.

"But why are they all out?" Conrad asked.

"So I can see where they are!"

"And your clothes?"

"That? Oh. I'm just lazy." Conrad straightened up and rubbed his fluffy forehead with his finger pads. It looked like he was getting a headache.

"Kappa?" I called. Kappa crawled out from under the bed and handed me a piece of paper. It was too big to be a business card, but hope is dumb when it's desperate, so I looked at it anyway. It was a sketch. I sighed and dropped it on the floor.

"Maybe we should be cleaning the room," Conrad suggested, "not tearing it apart." I shook my head and turned to my first nightstand. Yes, I had two. And yes, I used both of them indiscriminately.

"You'd think, but that doesn't actually work for me. Not in this case."

"Why?"

"Because I put it somewhere safe. That means that I hid it. Putting stuff away won't help—we have to take everything out."

"God help me," Conrad grumbled, "that actually made sense." He turned and went over to the desk.

"Kappa," I said, "take the cushions off the armchairs and cram your hand in all the cracks. See if you can feel anything."

"Kay!" He bounded off. Part of the reason we were so frantic was because we were on the second floor—meaning we were that much closer to the top of the barrier. Iset had assured us that it was stable when the magic wasn't being siphoned off to raise yet another horde of zombies, but we had no idea when the next thrilling installment could be expected, and we didn't know how far the barrier would fall when it came.

"Mera," Conrad said. His tone caught my attention; it was too soft and not nearly exasperated enough. I looked up. He was going through a bunch of papers he'd pulled from my desk. He didn't stop as he went on.

"Did Iset and Igor seem nervous to you?" My stomach clenched. Instantly, and without considering any other alternative, I decided to play dumb. It was a good role for me. Typecasting, really.

"We're in a pretty bad situation," I said with a shrug.

"That's not what I meant," Conrad tossed the pile of papers onto the desk, "and you know it." I turned back to the nightstand so I wouldn't have to look at him.

"I don't think they like demons."

"But you've met this one." I pulled out the empty nightstand drawer, turned it upside down, and shook it. Nothing came out. No secret compartment containing the sought-after business card materialized. That was disappointing.

"I have," I said as I put it back.

"What was he like?" I sighed and sat on the edge of my stripped bed. I couldn't focus on two things at once, and trying to answer that question was going to require some thought. I'd met Abraxas shortly after I'd met Big Jacky and everyone else. Jacky had brought me along to look at the scene of a murder, and I was still with him when he arranged to meet Abraxas at a local park to ask him some questions. How could I sum up what meeting a demon was like? Would that even be possible?

I thought about his bright red skin, bald head, and the two curled horns coming out of his forehead. I thought about how he wore his suit with the same kind of familiar confidence that Darius did. I thought about the way he smiled, so friendly, with what felt like an extra yard of teeth—too many of them sharp. And those all-white eyes. No iris. No pupils. Only white. But I could see where he was looking. And I could see how he looked at me.

"You seem like the type that would ask for knowledge." His voice had been so compelling.

"Let me know if you're ever willing to consider a deal…" And here I was! Hoping to ask for a little knowledge. I found myself saying, "He was polite. But he made me feel like a rabbit. There was more to him too. He was… deep. Like Big Jacky." Kappa had found several things jammed into the edges of the armchairs. He tossed them over his shoulder, one at a time, creating a rainbow shower of junk. None of them were paper. Conrad said, "Can we trust him?"

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. I stood up and walked over to the other side of the bed to start raiding that nightstand.

"I don't think we have a choice, and I think that Iset and Igor know it." I had finished tearing apart the second nightstand by the time Conrad finished with the desk.

"Did you ever touch the bookshelves?" he asked. A bleary image flashed in my mind. Paper. Words. A little piece of cardstock.

"A book!" I cried. Kappa stopped pawing through my pile of acrylic paints and looked at me. I put all ten fingers tips against my head. Despite the chill, I was sweating.

"I put it in the nightstand," I said.

"Now it's in a book."

"A book is a safe place?" Conrad asked.

"The nightstand was the safe place. Then I needed a bookmark!" Conrad gazed at me with frank, incredulous wonder.

"Not so safe then."

"It was, like, really late at night. I wasn't thinking."

"Why were you reading that late at night?" I stopped wading through the clutter and looked up at Conrad.

"I couldn't sleep." Conrad's amusement and confusion vanished. He sighed and nodded. Couldn't sleep? The girl of a thousand nightmares? That made sense. Then his fluffy brow crinkled, and he raised his eyes to mine.

"Don't you usually watch TV?" I cleared my throat and tried not to blush too much. I usually did watch TV, but Conrad was too sweet for his own good, and he would insist on coming down to watch it with me. It had been a bad week, and my insomnia had resulted in him losing sleep seven nights in a row. He'd started dragging. On the eighth day, I'd vowed to myself that I would stay in my room, no matter what, and let the poor guy get some rest. The blush was because I'd never told him about it.

I felt silly for some weird reason. I continued wading toward the bookshelf.

"Maybe I wanted to get all smart or something! Does it matter?" I was going out of my way to avoid looking at Conrad, but I still heard the grin in his voice.

"I don't know. You tell me." Yeah. He'd smelled the blush. He came toward me.

"What book were you reading?" Kappa hopped over the mess and took a flying leap to perch on Conrad's shoulder.

"Something Iset recommended," I said.

"Did you know this house doesn't have any comic books? Like Garfield, or Far Side, or anything?"

"It probably doesn't have any manga either," Conrad said.

"And this place is supposed to be cultured!" I huffed.

"What did Iset give you instead?" I sent my mind out to retrieve the memory. It came back with a picture of Iset, standing in front of a bookshelf, puzzling over the books before carefully pulling one out for me.

"It's from the library," I said.

"I should probably return it."

"A library book," Conrad repeated. He looked over the shelf, then reached out and retrieved the only book that was lying sideways over the top of the others. He glanced at the title.

"Rebecca?"

"That's it!" Of course! I'd been…" cleaning"… my room and must have put the book there because books went on the bookshelf. It hadn't occurred to me that there wasn't enough room for it. Conrad glanced at the top of the book and noted, with a slight smile, "You didn't get very far." With a happy cry, I snatched the book out of his hand and let the pages fall open to the bookmark. There it was! The business card! I laughed, pulled the card out, snapped the book shut, and passed it to Conrad.

As I turned on my phone, I said, "Let's get that back to the library."

"You think it matters now?"

"I think that if I don't do it right now, I'm never going to remember." Kappa, who'd been infected by my excitement and relief, started burbling with low-key joy as we left the room. Conrad pressed a finger pad against Kappa's nose. That must have been his stop button; Kappa went silent.

"Emerra, you know this might not work," Conrad warned me.

"No, it's all right," I assured him.

"I'm always like this when I find something." That was mostly true, but there was a sharp edge to my excitement that wasn't usually there, and the tension in my shoulders had nothing at all to do with finding the book. I wanted this to work. We needed this to work. But a part of me was dreading what would happen if it did. When I reached the grand staircase, I finished dialing the number and, with one last cold wrench of my stomach, I pressed the call button and raised the phone to my ear.

The silence was longer than it should've been. I'd held my breath calling someone before—I knew how long it was supposed to take. This time, the pause was long enough to make my chest hurt and my head swim. It started ringing. My head swam even more. I forced myself to take a few deep breaths.

"Hello?" Those deep breaths didn't do a lick of good. I had to stop and grip the banister so I wouldn't tumble. It was his voice. I recognized it instantly. My stomach flip-flopped in the washing machine of conflicting emotions. I had reached him! Yay! I had reached him! Oh no.

"Abraxas," I said.

"Oh, my." He sounded unbothered and cheerful.

"That lowers the number of people this could be considerably, but I'm afraid you still have me at a disadvantage. My phone didn't recognize the number—" I forced my trembling hand to let go of the banister so I could continue down the stairs.

"Why is the king of hell answering his own phone?" There was a long pause. He sounded a lot more serious when he spoke again.

"And that lowers it even further. May I ask who's speaking?" The wide-eyed rabbit part of me was screaming to keep my mouth shut. I had to pry my lips apart to answer him.

"This is Emerra Cole."

"Emerra!" He sounded cheerful again.

"What an unexpected and pleasant surprise! I thought you'd forgotten all about me. Oh! And to answer your previous question—this is my private line. You should never be so powerful that you can't answer calls from your friends. Now, did you call for a chat, or did you want to talk about a deal?" I could feel the frost crinkling around my heart. My hand tightened over my phone.

"How is Big Jacky, by the way?" Abraxas asked in what I'm sure was his patented Casual Tone. Every part of me, from the rabbit on up, had enough loyalty to know that I would never answer that question. Even if I knew the answer.

"I can't give you my soul," I said. He laughed.

"A shame! I suppose it'll have to be a friendly chat then." I'd been walking so slowly that I was barely halfway between the first and second floor. Conrad had stayed right behind my shoulder so he could use his superior hearing to listen to every word that Abraxas said. Kappa was still on his shoulder. I didn't know how good Kappa's hearing was, but his eyes were wide and the fins on the side of his head fluttered.

"Okay," I said, turning away from them to focus on the call.

"A friendly chat. Right. Um. My friends and I are in deadly peril and we desperately need some help."

"Oh, dear." I thought I heard him grinning the same way I'd heard Conrad grinning upstairs. Maybe it was my imagination. Or maybe it was some kind of interference. I didn't know how good the connection was between hell and wherever the heck we were.

"And you decided to call me?" Abraxas hummed, then said, "Well, I couldn't be more flattered. Shall I come to you? No deal or anything. I can just come to talk things over and see if there's any way I can help." I had reached the bottom of the stairs. Ahead of me were the front doors flanked by their broken windows. Slivers of sunlight were all that made it through the boards nailed up across them. My stomach sank.

"That would be nice," I admitted, "but I don't think you can."

"Where are you?"

"I'm at Big Jacky's house." The pause was tiny —a speck, a particle of silence—but it was profound. Abraxas said, "Let me get this perfectly clear—you, Emerra Cole, are inviting me to Jack Noctis's house?" The alarm bells in my head started screaming. Conrad and Kappa might have seen the flashing red lights blare out from my ears. I froze. Emergency Rational Brain took over.

"Abraxas, you are not allowed to come inside!" There was no drawling friendly tone to his one-word answer; it was fired out of his mouth like a bullet.

"Done." I heard a three beep tone. He'd hung up on me. I was still staring blankly at the screen telling me that my impossible call had ended, when I heard a knock coming from the back of the house. Feeling blanker than ever, I walked over to the hall that ran between the kitchen and the washroom. Conrad followed me. Kappa ducked behind his head. Igor leaned out from the kitchen—one eye was wide with surprise, the other was narrowed with suspicion.

There, at the end of the hall, was the only door in the mansion that still opened. The knock came again.

"Emerra?" Igor said. I ignored him, walked over to the door, and opened it. Abraxas was standing outside, smiling his too-many-teeth smile and looking at me with his all-white eyes.

"Well, Miss Cole, fancy meeting you in a place like this."