Embers (3 page)

After devouring one, it seemed that days would pass before she could feel truly warm again.

“Couldn’t go easy, could you?” Anya bent to retrieve her flashlight, then viciously kicked the winking woman on the soda machine. Her boot left a scuff mark on the woman’s chin.

The front of the machine sprang open like a refrigerator door, startling her. Skin prickling, she shined her flashlight into the metal void, swallowing hard.

At first, she thought it was a doll stuffed inside the machine, curled in the fetal position. But she was not to be that lucky tonight. Blood pounded in her ears. Closer inspection showed the desiccated corpse of a child, dry as a milkweed husk. Tattered lace at the hem of a dress moved, disturbed by Anya’s breath. Plastic barrettes clasped braids in the child’s black hair. Leather sneakers the size of Anya’s hand were curled up against the wall of the machine. The girl had clearly been here for decades, missing and forgotten. Perhaps a game of hide-and-seek gone wrong. Perhaps a homicide. There was no way to know now.

Anya wiped her fingerprints from the front of the door with her sleeve, watching her arm shake. She didn’t want the police to know she’d been here. It would raise too many questions. DAGR would have to notify the police. They had better cover for her, not reveal that she had been here. She worried about what the shock of this discovery would do to the old pickle woman who was afraid to do her laundry in the basement. . . assuming she was innocent of putting the girl in the pop machine.

Dimly, she still heard pounding on the door above. Finally it splintered away, and footsteps thundered down the broken stairs.

“Watch the step!” she called, too late. Max jammed his foot in the breach and fell half through the stairs. Jules tried to reel him in, reaming him out for going first.

Anya stared at her feet. She reeked of pickles. Her hands were sticky with decades-old cola, and her hair was peppered with glass.

And now a dead child. Not a good night.

She stared, blinking at the ceiling, vowing to stop answering DAGR’s calls. DAGR’s calls always led to strange truths, and she was tired of digging for them.

CHAPTER TWO

“I TOLD JULES NOT TO CALL,” Brian said. He stared through the van’s windshield at the deserted streets. He didn’t look at Anya, just focused straight ahead. He’d insisted on taking Anya home, over her protestations that she could call a cab.

Anya glanced at his profile. It was a handsome profile, one that she’d known better once upon a time: strong jaw, aquiline nose, sensuous mouth. That was before Brian had gotten too close. And she didn’t want him to get burned. Anya kept to her side of the van seat, fingers wrapped around a hot chocolate in a Styrofoam cup.

“Oh,” she said.

Brian shook his head. “I didn’t mean it like that. I meant. . .” He blew out his breath, fogging the glass. “I meant that you seemed to want your distance. From DAGR. From all of us.”

Anya stared into her hot chocolate. “Look, I’m just going through some stuff at work right now.”

“Those arsons?”

“Yeah.” Anya sank into her seat, rubbed the bridge of her nose. She worked as an investigator for the Detroit Fire Department during the day. “The chief’s been on us to get those solved. We’re on number three.”

“Are you sure it’s the same guy?”

“Has to be. Same MO. . . no traces of accelerant. Whoever is doing this has time to case the buildings. He knows when they’re going to be unwatched for a long period of time, to let the buildings burn.” She shook her head. “It’s only a matter of time until someone gets seriously hurt.”

Anya stared out the window at the city, which was still covered by the velvet blanket of night before the sun rose. At this early hour, buses had just begun to run, creeping along in the bus lanes like caterpillars chewing along the veins of leaves. The shift had begun to change at the auto plant on the border between Detroit and Hamtramck. Workers trickled from the parking lot to the massive gray building behind razor wire. Anya wondered how deeply those men and women felt the tension that crept over the city in recent years: the increase in unemployment, the crime. These visible and invisible unrests fed an undercurrent of spiritual unease. The psychiatric hospitals were full, as were the church pews. DAGR was going out nearly every night to answer pleas for help from people whose homes and businesses had been invaded by phantoms.

Brian turned past the massive Catholic church at the heart of Hamtramck. St. Florian’s spires reached taller than any other building for blocks. Incorporated by Polish immigrants in 1921, this part of the Detroit area was Anya’s backyard. She’d grown up in the shadow of the church, and she remained within sight of the steeple, even though she’d never passed through its doors as an adult. In its shadow, there seemed to be a bit less decay than elsewhere.

Brian shut off the engine before a modest story-and-a-half white-sided house, identical to every other white vinyl-sided house on the street, only the shutters on this one were green. A crabapple tree grew in the yard, shading curling roof shingles. The blinds inside were drawn tight against the sun.

“I found something in the pickle lady’s house. Something I thought you’d want to hear.”

Brian reached over her knees. Anya flinched. He pretended to ignore her reaction, unhurriedly opening the glove box. He pulled out a voice recorder. “I got something on tape while you were tussling with the pop machine.”

Her cheeks flamed in anger. “I told you not to record me. That’s a deal-breaker and you know it.”

“I wasn’t. I just watched on the webcam.”

Anya crossed her arms. She didn’t like the idea of being watched. Even though she knew there was nothing for ordinary eyes to see, eyes that couldn’t see sprits, she wouldn’t allow it. And Brian was well aware of her stance.

“Look, I just wanted to make sure you were okay.” He blew out his breath. “After all the thumping. . . never mind.” He waved his hand. “This recorder was in the pickle lady’s bedroom. It picked up some sound right about the time you opened up the pop machine.”

He clicked it on.

The faintest whisper blew across a background of white noise:
“Sirrush is coming.”

Anya blinked. It was amazing that he heard it. Damn it, but Brian was a thorough researcher. She couldn’t hide from the facts he uncovered.

Brian shut the recorder off. “Does that mean anything to you?”

She looked down at her hot chocolate. Her thoughts churned and she could feel the weight of his gaze on her. “I don’t know.”

He remained silent, watching her. Finally, he gave up, piercing the uncomfortable silence. “Look. If you need anything. . .”

Anya listened to the engine tick, then lifted her chin. “I’m fine, Brian.” She tried to smile.

“Thanks.” Her fingers brushed the door latch.

“Anya.”

She turned to face him, and the seat squeaked under her jeans, still damp with cola and pickle juice. “Brian, please. I just. . . devoured the soul of a child. A child haunting the pickle lady’s house.” She rubbed her hand over her amber eyes. The sting of vinegar in the pickle juice blurred her vision and her voice caught. “I just want. . . a shower and a couple of hours of sleep. Can we talk about this later?”

Brian, looking as if she’d punched him, jammed the key in the ignition. “Okay. Just. . . be careful.”

Anya often wondered where the souls she devoured went. Did they receive a free-parking permit to some sunlit place of spiritual enlightenment? Did they simply cease existing, snuffed out in darkness? She hoped that they moved on or, at the very least, stopped suffering. Whatever happened, she hoped that they didn’t become food, a spiritual nourishment for the vacuum in her heart.

That vacuum had grown in the last several months. She could feel its numbness, its isolation growing larger, like a black hole. Ever hungry, the hole devoured everything that fell within the reach of her terrible gravity. It seemed to spin faster with each breath, reaching for more. The more spirits she collected, the larger and denser and heavier the hole grew. She was afraid of what else might fall into its event horizon, if she let others get too close.

Anya closed her front door and leaned against it. The taking of the child-spirit disturbed her. She’d expected that the force haunting the pickle lady’s house would have been a run-of-the-mill spirit, turned malevolent by the weight of time and boredom. A mischievous imp, one she could snuff out without her conscience troubling her sleep. But this incident would haunt her for a long time. She could feel the weight of regret dragging at her as she kicked off her boots and threw her coat on the faded couch.

Her stocking feet scraped up static electricity on the rust-colored shag carpeting in the living room. She’d decorated the room plainly, with garage-sale finds: a captain’s trunk standing in as a coffee table, a pair of mismatched ginger jar lamps, a mirror in an antiqued brass frame over a velveteen sofa. Anya had handled each of the items carefully before buying them—she didn’t want to deal with anything harboring negative imprints or spirits of the previous owners. If Anya could’ve afforded it, she’d have bought new furniture.

Katie had helped Anya choose many of these objects that held no residue of anything that came before. The witch had blessed the house and said it had a happy history, which was a small comfort. There were too few houses like that in Detroit nowadays. The house smelled of lemon juice and sage, scrubbed clean of any spiritual or physical dirt. Anya kept her gear from the fire department in the car, reluctant to bring the debris and contamination into the oasis of her home.

She didn’t bother to turn on the lights. All the appliances in the house were unplugged, and the outlets were covered with child-safe plastic plugs. Sparky had an abnormal interest in all things electrical, and Anya couldn’t trust him not to taste the electrical juice and blow a fuse. Lacking opposable thumbs, Sparky had not yet figured out how to pry the plugs from the walls. Last week, she’d bought a microwave. As far as Sparky was concerned, this was the best kitchen gadget,
ever
. It sat, back in its box, on the kitchen table, the white enamel finish charred black and the window cracked. Anya figured the odds of returning it were low, but she’d give it a try.

She stepped into the bathroom and clicked on the overhead light. The black-and-white retro tile gleamed. A collection of rubber duckies lined a shelf on one wall, grinning down at her with cartoon smiles. Anya turned the bathtub tap as hot as it would go, then dropped a fistful of bath salts into the water. She plucked her favorite duck, a jaunty pirate with a plastic eye patch, from the collection and dropped him in the water. He spun in lazy circles under the faucet.

She peeled off her sticky, pickle-stained clothes and stuffed them in the washing machine in the bathroom closet. The chill rippled over her body as she measured detergent into the basin and set the water temperature to hot. When she’d moved in, Anya had the foresight to install an extra-large water heater. As a fire investigator, her work always got her filthy and she didn’t deny herself the luxury of as much hot water as she needed.

She paused, catching sight of her reflection in the mirror. Her light chestnut hair swung over her milky-pale shoulder, which was studded with a constellation of beauty marks. Her fingers fluttered across her chest. Below the salamander collar that housed Sparky, a black char mark was burned into the flesh over her left breast. The wound didn’t hurt. She knew it would eventually fade, like all the other exorcism burns, but it was a lingering reminder of the soul she’d devoured.

She stepped into the bath, wiggling her toes, feeling the warmth begin to radiate up her legs. She sank up to her neck in the water, massaging the hot water through her hair. The pirate duck bumped against her toes. She reached for a loofah and began to scrub hard, as if she could scrub the memory of the dead child away from her skin.

The sepulchral voice captured on the recorder buzzed in the back of her head, and her thoughts nipped at it:

“Sirrush is coming.”

Her brow wrinkled. She’d never heard the name spoken aloud, only read it in books. Sirrush was an old term used for firedrakes and salamanders, a name used only in witches’ ceremonial magick to draw down the element of fire. But the spirit’s message seemed to be aimed at her and she chewed on it, tasting it for any flavor of a threat.

As the water cooled, Anya climbed out of the bath. She smelled no pickles or ash as she pulled the drain plug, just soap and a hint of jasmine from the bath salts. The pirate duck spiraled around the drain.

Anya toweled off and pulled on her robe, which was decorated in a pattern of yellow cartoon ducks. Wet footprints on the shag rug in the hall trailed behind her. She paused in the hallway to turn up the thermostat, looking forward to the warmth of her bed. A simple futon piled high with blankets dominated the small bedroom. Anya couldn’t bring herself to buy a secondhand bed. All beds were stained too much with the dreams of their prior owners.

Anya climbed under the blankets, sighing. She’d be able to get a couple of hours of sleep before her shift began. As she drowsed, the salamander collar warmed around her neck. Sparky unpeeled himself, slipped down to the floor. He padded across the floor to a large flannel dog bed placed against the wall. Resting in the bed was his favorite toy: a Gloworm. The stuffed toy was a flashlight ingeniously disguised in a cherubic plastic head and a caterpillar body. Since it ran on batteries, there was little electrical damage that Sparky could do to it that would result in a hazardous situation—unlike the microwave.

Sparky placed his foot on the Gloworm. It lit up. He removed his paw, and the light winked out. He cocked his head, watching it, then patted it again.

On.

Off.

On.

Anya scrunched her eyes shut against the blinking light. As much as he enjoyed biting ghosts and other ghoulies on the spiritual plane, Sparky could only directly affect two things in the physical world: energy and Anya. The toy had brought him many hours of delight. She’d placed it in the dog bed that he never used, hoping that Sparky could eventually be persuaded to sleep on his own in his own bed.