MySoultoSave (8 page)

Greenleaf was only a few blocks from the county assistance
office. She could walk from here—here being all the way across the city from
Crystaltown. Definitely a good thing.

While she walked, she called Miss Turner and got the caseworker’s
voicemail. She left a clipped message about successfully reporting to the
interview. Miss Turner was paying her a home visit tomorrow, so she could
regale her with details then. That’d be a fun time. Especially when she
confessed about the band.

A few times along the way, she could’ve sworn she was being
followed. She saw no one familiar, no one paying attention to her, but her skin
still crawled.

She came to the building, a long two-story structure that
for some reason was painted a dull pink. A handful of people occupied the
sidewalk along the place, leaning on the wall or standing in small clusters.
Someone had set up a tent stall that displayed a few t-shirts, some purses and
boxes of knockoff perfume, and a table of DVDs. Probably bootlegs. She’d always
wondered how the sidewalk sellers managed to make any money, since no one ever
seemed to buy anything. Truth was, they probably didn’t. They were on welfare
like everybody else. Or they were dealing.

She hadn’t quite finished her cigarette yet, so she found a
spot on the wall and joined the ranks, taking her time. She knew what waited
inside. Endless lines, endless hoops to jump through, delay after stonewalling
delay. Just another exciting morning at public assistance.

“’Scuse me, hey. You got another cigarette?”

Logan startled and turned toward the voice. Next to her
stood a girl in short sleeves with stringy, tangled blond hair, hands shoved in
her jeans pockets, directing most of her attention at the sidewalk. There was
something familiar about the figure. At first she thought it was just the
stance, the same loose-limbed, spaced-out shuffle employed by junkies around
the world.

Then the girl looked up and recognition came along with
shock. “Deenie?”

It hurt to look at her. She’d crashed with this girl and her
thug boyfriend more than once. Six months ago, Deenie had been all right. She’d
been a social user, preferring pot and the occasional snort over pipes and
needles. Then, she’d still looked like a relatively healthy twenty-two-year-old.
Now there were years etched into her gaunt face, shading dark hollows beneath
her eyes and lining chapped, tight-pressed lips. Track marks on her stick-thin
arms.

And she was pregnant. The slight mound of her belly said
four, maybe five months, but if she was using, she was probably further along.

Deenie blinked a few times and smiled, showing teeth already
starting to rot. “Logan! I thought you…”

“Died?” She leveled a smirk. It was a reasonable assumption.
Most people didn’t leave Crystaltown any other way, with the exception of
dealers striking out in search of bigger turf. “Not yet,” she said and handed
over a cigarette. She probably shouldn’t, but it wasn’t as though Deenie would
quit on the spot if she didn’t. The girl would just bum one off somebody else.
“Need a light?”

Deenie nodded. “Thanks.”

She watched the girl light up with trembling hands, and her
heart threatened to break. Deenie had fallen so fast. She’d seen this rapid
descent into addiction too many times, and it invariably ended the same way—with
a corpse pumped full of drugs that nobody cared enough about to identify,
eventually dumped in an unmarked grave.

Well, she wasn’t going to let that happen. Not this time.

Deenie drew an appreciative drag and plucked at Logan’s
sleeve. “Nice threads. What is it, Halloween or something?”

“Nope. I’m joining the Navy.” Smiling, she dropped her butt
and ground it out. This had to be handled right. She could get Deenie into
rehab right now, bring her inside the welfare office and have her checked in
today—but the girl had to sign up voluntarily. The state could only force
people into it if they were arrested or hospitalized, like she’d been after she
blacked out in the street. And getting a hard addict to volunteer for rehab was
like telling the sun not to rise. “So, when are you due?” she said, gesturing
to Deenie’s swelling stomach.

The girl glanced down and shrugged, her mouth twisting
unconsciously. “I’m just getting fat,” she whispered, but a flicker of panic in
her dulled eyes insisted that some part of her knew the truth.

“Right. Must be all that steak you’re eating.”

“Mm-hm.” Her gaze shut down and she went back to smoking.

An urgent shiver traversed Logan’s spine. She was losing
her.

As she watched Deenie bring the cigarette to her lips, the
world seemed to darken. The shadows lengthened along the sidewalk…and Deenie’s
rose up, thickened, became a substantial black silhouette that draped an arm
around the girl and leaned in to whisper in her ear.

Oh, fuck. Another hallucination.

Heart skittering in her chest, Logan reached toward the
humanoid shape, which was growing more defined by the second. She’d touch
nothing and shock herself back to sanity. But when her fingers brushed the
thing that wasn’t there, a horrific vision slammed into her mind—Deenie sprawled
in an alley, stomach distended, blood trickling from her nose and foam drying
at the corners of her slack mouth. One eye rolled back to white, the other
drifting off into frozen eternity. Dead, along with her unborn baby.

“No!” She clutched the girl’s arm as the shout tore from
her.

And felt something pass through her, into Deenie. A painless
electric shock. Light bursting in darkness.

The shadow-creature hissed and unraveled like smoke.
Hyper-brightness surged through everything, as it had when she’d seen the
black-eyed freak at the Wawa, and faded back to normal. Oh God. What the
hell
just happened?

Deenie stared at her, wide-eyed and stunned. “Um. You okay?”

“I’m fine.” She shook herself and imposed self-control.
She’d have to worry about her own sanity later. Crazy as the hallucinations
were, she didn’t doubt the vision would come to pass if she didn’t do something
now. “Deenie, hon,” she said gently. “You’re pregnant.”

The girl’s lips twitched once. Then she burst into tears.

Logan hugged her and let her sob, rubbing the girl’s heaving
back as the cigarette fell unnoticed from her fingers. A few people threw
glances at them, some sympathetic, others disgusted. She ignored them.

At last, Deenie’s personal storm subsided and she drew back
with a snuffling breath. “Lenny kicked me out,” she said, referring to the thug
boyfriend. “He s-said I was getting too fat and ugly for him.” Her shoulders
hitched and she settled a hand on her belly with something close to reverence.
“A baby,” she whispered. “What am I gonna d-do, Logan? I don’t even have a
bed.” Fresh tears slipped down her cheeks.

“You’re going to come in here with me.” Logan hooked an arm
around her waist and gestured at the pink building. “You’re going to sign some
papers, and they’ll take you to Grothman.”

A shudder went through Deenie and she tried to jerk away.
“Rehab? I can’t. They’ll put me in jail.”

“Do I look like I’m in jail?”

“You mean…that’s where you were? Grothman?”

She nodded. “Six months. I’m clean now, and I’ll never go
back to using.”

“I can’t.” Deenie hung her head. “I’m not strong enough. I
need the hits.”

“I won’t lie to you. It isn’t going to be easy.” Logan
waited until she looked up. “But you
can.
I know you’re a fighter. And
you’ve got a lot to fight for now.”

After a long moment, Deenie offered a tentative smile that
banished some of the misery from her gaze, and her hand strayed back to her
stomach. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll sign.”

Though the sun didn’t exactly shatter the clouds and bathe
them in golden light, Logan could’ve sworn she heard angels singing.

* * * * *

Jaeryth blamed the damned angel.

She would not listen to him. Had progressed to ignoring him
completely—so completely, he almost believed her claim that she couldn’t hear
him. But that wasn’t possible. The Nabi could not turn off their perceptions
once they’d begun to manifest. Her stubbornness had prompted him to try a
different approach.

He would appear to her in the guise of a mortal. Seduce her,
entice her into sin. Preferably the sins of the flesh. And then she would fall,
and he would be vindicated.

He had followed her throughout the day, waiting for the
opportunity to come to her. She had spoken at length with a woman who clearly
disliked her, a job interview, and had left feeling relieved. An odd emotion to
follow rejection. Then she’d spoken on the phone to someone called Miss Turner
and proceeded to the welfare office—where she had banished a Tempter back into
Shade and redeemed a human woman’s soul with a few words and a single gesture.

He’d felt the power emanating from her. She was so strong,
his Logan. More than ready. At any time, she could perform the act that would
cement her Nabi manifestation on one side or another. Miracle or unforgivable
sin. And if he did not turn her quickly, it would be the miracle.

After Logan had seen to the woman and procured something
called emergency assistance, she’d left the area. Now, after an uneventful bus
ride, she entered a Thrift Store—and he caught her intentions to spend quite
some time here shopping.

Here was the opportunity he sought.

He phased through the building, catching brief glimpses of
racks upon racks of clothing, and emerged behind the place. Thankfully, no
humans lurked in this alley. He summoned his concentration and shifted up, into
the perceptions of the mortal plane, and then beyond. Becoming fully material
required a good deal of effort, and sustaining the form would necessitate
vigilance. Demons could not take on flesh at a whim. It would weaken him for
hours afterward, leave him vulnerable. But he would expend the effort gladly
for her.

Once he reached the desired state, the sensory inputs of the
flesh-bound body bombarded him. Sounds and smells sharpened, assailing his ears
and nostrils. His skin tightened and prickled in response to the chill in the
air. But his sight seemed to be affected oppositely, shortened and narrowed. He
could no longer perceive Shade or Citadel, or any indication that planes
outside this one existed.

Disconcerting as it was for him, he knew it did not trouble
mortals in the least. They could not miss what they never knew was there.

He allowed himself a few moments to adjust—pacing back and
forth, feeling the impact of his steps on solid ground and the movements of his
limbs restrained by the atmosphere. His clothing had manifested in the style of
a Tempter. Simple, unadorned black. That would have to change. After Logan’s
encounters with the lesser demons, this appearance might make her uneasy.

Perhaps she would be pleased if he were dressed in a manner
similar to the mortals she preferred. The musicians. Recalling an example from
those she’d associated with in Philadelphia, he pictured a dark short-sleeved
shirt, a jacket with studs and chains, frayed denim pants, heavy boots. Willing
the clothing into existence was difficult in this state, but he managed.

As a final touch, he added a bandanna, and a few chains on
the boots.

Walking around the building to the front entrance took far
more time than phasing. He entered the store and nearly recoiled from the odd
smells that choked the air. Strong, sweet chemicals overlaid, but did not erase
the musty and moldering odor lurking beneath. The other humans inside had to be
experiencing the same scents, but it didn’t appear to bother them. So he
schooled the distaste from his features and sought Logan.

He located her patiently flicking through a rack of clothing
that a sign indicated were Men’s Shirts. Interesting, when across the store
were rows labeled Women’s Shirts that obviously featured a wider selection.

The thought of interacting this directly with her invoked a
primal pleasure that deepened as he approached. He stopped at the end of the
aisle she occupied and watched her, taking in the weary, but determined
motions, the haunted eyes, the lovely face drawn and sharpened by the trials of
the day. So shattered, not yet reformed. Perhaps never to be whole again. A
beautiful tragedy.

As though she’d sensed him, she turned and met his gaze. Her
lips parted slightly. She did not move for a long moment. Finally, she frowned
and said, “Am I in your way or something?”

You are my way.
He smiled and drifted closer. “I was
admiring your taste in clothing.”

A visible shudder went through her as he spoke. Her brow
furrowed, then smoothed out again slowly. “You mean the god-awful suit?” She
rolled her eyes. “Trust me, I’m not walking out of here wearing this thing. In
fact, I think I’ll donate it. Let somebody else have the joy of wearing it.”
Her gaze traveled down the length of him and back up. “Nice boots.”

“Thank you.”

Another shiver. “You…sound familiar. I know that’s a weird
thing to say.”

“Not really.” It pleased him that she recognized his voice,
even through this clumsy mortal filtering. “Perhaps we’ve known each other in
another life.”

She laughed, and the sound coursed through him like sweet
fire. “Reincarnation, huh? Not sure I believe in that. But I’ll give you points
for the creative pickup line.”

“Is that what I’m doing? Picking you up?”

Her mouth opened, closed. Jaw firming, she turned back to
the clothing rack. “No.”

The sudden ferocity stung him. Seducing her might not be a
simple task. Still, it was the best option available to him and he intended to
pursue it. “Fair enough,” he said. “Could I at least have the pleasure of your
name?” As if he did not know every intimate syllable. But humans relied on this
introductory courtship ritual, so he’d have to conform.