A Wolf at the Door

The explanations took longer than I’d hoped, first because I had to retell the part with Gretchen kissing me about four times. More for Estéban than Mira, really, but still. I mean, it wasn’t my fault, I hadn’t done anything wrong, but I still squirmed under my wife’s gaze every time I had to say it. Luckily, she didn’t seem to be angry. I think she was more interested in the end of the tale, the part where I got stuffed full of two hundred and seventy-six extra souls.

The second reason the telling took way longer than I wanted was because we kept having to stop for Ivan to take calls on his phone. Some of them were in Ukrainian, some were in his butchered English, but the meaning of all of them was clear. I was being assigned my own set of champion bodyguards until we could figure out how to get these extra souls out of me. Reggie had been right. Once they—whoever “they” were—figured out that I had them, they’d come for me, just like they had Gretchen.

And speaking of coming for me…

Jet lag kept me awake far later than the rest of the household. At least, that was my excuse when I slipped out the back door in the dead of night, crunching my way through the half-melted snow. “Axel…” No sooner had the whisper left my lips than I caught the distinct whiff of sulfur behind me.

The bastard was still wearing my denim coat. “It’s about time. I thought the old man was never going to leave your side.”

“Well, keep your voice down or he’ll be out here and put a boot up your ass before you can blink,” I growled in return. “I suppose you know what all happened?”

“Of course I do. That’s my job.” He smirked in the darkness, his eyes flaring red for the space of a breath. “Let me tell you, people are scrambling now. No one else knows where those souls went, and oh, aren’t they hopping mad.”

“Yeah, well, you need to vet your employees better next time. Reggie turned on you, tried to sell out to the highest bidder.”

“What?” The demon’s eyes flared red and stayed that way, lighting the night in a crimson glow. “The little bastard. I’ll kill him.”

“Don’t think you’ll have to. He was planning on double-crossing the other side too, and if they think he knows where these souls are…”

“I’ll never find all the pieces. Good point.” Slowly, the glow in his eyes faded. “Just as well that fortune smiled on me then, hm?”

“Fortune, my ass.” I knew him, better than I ever wanted to. “You planned this from the get-go. Got two hundred and seventy-six extra souls right where you want them, don’t you?”

Axel chuckled, but didn’t try to deny it. “I’ll say I’m not displeased with the outcome. It could have ended several different ways, most of which were beneficial to me. Though, I have to say, I was actually partial to the ending where she seduced you and added your soul to her collection.”

“I oughta kick you in the nuts. Do you even have nuts?”

“Aw, Jesse’s all mad…” He reached out to pinch my cheek, but even as I moved to slap his hand away, he froze, all the humor draining out of his face. “How many did you say?”

“What?”

“How many souls did you say?”

“Two hundred and seventy-six. Why?” I wasn’t ready when Axel grabbed me by the collar of my coat and yanked me close. “Gah! Get off!”

He took a deep breath, scenting my hair, my skin, like a tracking hound. “No…no this isn’t right…” Finally, he let me go, staring at me thoughtfully.

“What? What isn’t right?” I brushed his touch off of my arms, making it very clear that I was displeased with him coming close to me at all.

“You only have two hundred and seventy-five souls.”

“Okay, fine, two hundred and seventy-five. Whatever.”

“No, not ‘whatever.’” He walked a slow circle around me, shaking his head as he muttered under his breath. “What have you done, Jesse? Tell me exactly what happened out there.”

So I started all over with the saga of Jesse Goes to Hollywood once again. When I got to the part where I blasted the golem into so many atoms, Axel stopped me. “Again. Tell me exactly what you did again.” So I told him. I explained about the thin threads of magic wrapped around the clay figure, how I severed them with a mere gesture of my hand. I pictured it in my head, how the golem burst into a shower of dust, returning to that from whence he came. I told the story again. And then again, and then once more.

“And you didn’t collapse. You had no fever, no seizures, no blackouts.”

“Well…no. Not after. I think I blacked out at the beginning, when the souls hit me…” The demon looked concerned. Or at least as concerned as I’d ever seen him. “What is it? What do you know?”

“You’ve never had magic, Jesse. Never in your entire life. And yet you used it that night, used it to simply unravel a spell far more complicated than most could accomplish. It hasn’t occurred to you to wonder why yet?”

“Well…no…” But you know, now that he mentioned it…“How did I do that?”