Darkest Night - Smoke And Mirrors Part 25

"How do I know what?"

He turned and glared at the ghosts. "How do you know what it likes?"

Ca.s.sie rolled her eye and stepped forward. "It feeds off our death, remember? We're its prisoners as much as you are. We've just been here longer, so we know more."

"Stockholm Syndrome."

"What?"

He frowned. "Helsinki Syndrome? Never mind. The point is; how do I know you haven't gone over to its side? How do I know I can trust you?"

"It's working on him now," Ca.s.sie muttered.

Stephen snorted. "You think?" "It is not! It's more likely you two are working with it than with me against it because you and it are . . . OW!" Tony clutched his crotch with both hands and stumbled back through Stephen. Gripping her arms, Mouse had lifted Kate off the floor freeing her feet to swing. In spite of the pain-or maybe because of it-Tony felt more clearheaded than he had in a while. Clearheaded and cold. "Man, you are f.u.c.king freezing!"

"Heat is energy." Stephen adjusted his head. "We don't have energy to spare."

Heat. . . "You used the heat from the lights to look real this morning."

"The lights and the people. We . . ."

"Is that relevant?" Ca.s.sie interrupted, sounding remarkably like Amy. She waved a b.l.o.o.d.y hand at the rest of the crew.

"I mean it was fun and all, but right now you need to do something about this!"

While Tony'd been distracted, the darkness had thickened around the circle of light cast by the lantern. It felt. . .

antic.i.p.atory seemed the only-if cliched-choice. Within the circle, the old arguments went on and new ones had started. Mason and Lee stood nearly nose to nose, yelling about fan sites. Brenda was on her knees between them-the tuxedo jackets covering just what exactly she was doing there-with Zev hauling at her shoulders trying to pull her away.

Tina had left the circle and was banging on the front door demanding that Everett wake up. Her pinafore over her head, Ashley sat cross-legged on the floor singing "Danny Boy" at the top of her lungs.

That's a bizarre choice for an eleven year old . . .

It looked as though everyone had slipped over the edge, Tony realized as he slowly straightened. He had no idea how the h.e.l.l he was supposed to haul everyone back.

"I HAVE TO PEE!".

Okay, not everyone.

Brianna stood in the center of the circle, hands on her hips, and as the echoes of her announcement died down, she glared at the suddenly quiet adults. "I have to pee, now!" Not quite as loud but just as penetrating. One bare foot lashed out . . . "Shut up, Ashes!" . . . and "Danny Boy" died. "Did you hear me? I have to PEE!"

"I think they heard you in Victoria," Amy winced.

"Do they have bathrooms in Victoria?" Brianna demanded. " 'Cause if they do, I want to go there! Right NOW!"

"Okay, okay . . ." Zev stepped up behind her and patted her shoulder. "I imagine there's a number of bathrooms in a place this size." He looked around expectantly at the others, and Tony remembered that the music director had only been at the location for about half an hour before the house closed down. "Right?"

"Yes and no," Peter admitted. "There're six bathrooms, but only the one in Mason's dressing room has been approved for use."

Amy opened her mouth to say something rude, but Zev stopped her with a raised hand and allowed his smile to say it for him. "Given the circ.u.mstances, trapped in a haunted house and all, I think we can ignore that rule."

"Sure, if we're planning on not getting out. But this was one of CB's directives, and I'm not leaping from the frying pan into the fire. I think I'd rather stay in the frying pan."

"She'll pee in the frying pan," Ashley warned ominously.

"Fine." With no time to argue, Zev surrendered. "We'll use the bathroom in Mason's dressing room."

"You won't," Tina told him, taking Brianna's hand from his. "We will. I think . . ." She swept her gaze around the circle, allowing it to momentarily alight on the other three women and Ashley. ". . . that we should all go. All us girls.

Together."

"No!"

"Oh, for Christ's sake, Mason." As Amy lit the second lantern, Tina turned a withering glare on the star of Darkest Night. "Grow up and learn to share."

"f.u.c.k you," Mason muttered. He pulled a battered cigarette out of the inside pocket of his tuxedo jacket and held out his hand for his lighter. "It's not about sharing," he said as he lit up, staring at Tony over the flame. "It's about shadows."

"She'll pee on the shadows," Ashley giggled.

"I'll pee on you, Zitface!"

"Try it, Cheese!"

Brianna lunged out to the end of Tina's arm.

"Enough!"

Everyone stared at Zev, impressed, as both girls quieted.

Then all heads swiveled toward Tony.

He sighed. "There's something in that bathroom," he began.

"Richard Caulfield," Ca.s.sie interrupted. "Creighton Caufield's only son. He was r.e.t.a.r.ded. We think he lived in that room his whole life."

"We know he died in it," Stephen added.

"He's not like the rest of us. He doesn't . , . um . . ." She frowned and sketched circles in the air.

"Replay?" Tony offered.

"Yes, he doesn't replay. He's just . . ." Unlike her brother's, her head remained in place when she shrugged. "He's just there."

"Tony?" Lee's voice had risen on the second syllable. He closed his hand over Brenda's and moved it off his arm, frowning at her while he did. "That hurt." Her lips twisted into a bad approximation of an apologetic smile. "Sorry."

Lee's smile was no more sincere. "Sure."

What the h.e.l.l is up with those two? And then Tony realized that no one else had noticed as they were all-like Lee- waiting for him to elaborate on Mason's shouted no. "Uh, it's safe. It's . . ." He glanced at Mason who sucked back half an inch of cigarette. ". . . shadowy, but safe."

"Who cares!" Pulling Tina along behind her, Brianna headed for the stairs.

"Wait!" Amy came forward with the lantern and swung it three times over the line of salt. "Okay, it's safe to step over now."

Stephen snickered and wafted back and forth over the line until Tony turned to glare at him. He knew Amy was spouting bulls.h.i.+t, but the section of salt the women were stepping over did look duller than the gleaming line that made up the rest of the circle. "Believing is seeing," he muttered thoughtfully.

"What?"

"Christmas movie, Walt Disney Pictures, 1999, John Pasquin directed and . . . never mind, long after your time."

"Brenda?" Amy paused on the outside of the circle. "You coming?"

"I'll stay with Lee."

"No, you won't," Tina said from the bottom step. "Get out here."

"But . . ."

"Now! He won't run off with someone else while you're gone."

"Why's the guy in the hat looking at you?" Stephen asked as Brenda reluctantly joined the others.

Guy in the what? Oh. Zev. Tony had no idea.

"Ca.s.sie?"

She smiled down at her brother from the stairs. "I'll be right back."

"What is it," Peter asked as, up on the second floor, the door to Mason's dressing room opened and closed, "about women going to the bathroom in groups?"

Every man in the circle shrugged.

Stephen adjusted his head.

As they reached the end of the lane, Henry could hear the three remaining crew talking inside the craft services truck, their hearts beating just a little more quickly than normal. He was impressed at how well they were continuing to react to some rather extraordinary circ.u.mstances. Was it because they were in television and used to thinking of the unusual as normal and the bizarre as something to get on tape? Was it because Arra's spell to erase their memories of the battle at the soundstage had a lingering, dampening effect? Was it because no stronger reaction would be permitted with CB on the scene?

Or because no stronger reaction was necessary with CB on the scene . . .

The executive producer of Darkest Night stood by the back porch, hands in the pockets of his trench coat, head sunk low between ma.s.sive shoulders. If will alone could have forced the door open, his attention would have reduced it to a pile of kindling and a few bits of twisted metal.

He turned his head, and only his head, as Henry and the caretaker emerged into the light. "Well?"

"Graham spoke to an actor named Alistair McCall," Henry began.

"An actor?" CB snorted. "That's just what we need, another d.a.m.ned ego on legs."

"This one actually seems to be d.a.m.ned; at least by one of the looser definitions of the word." A quick gesture stopped Graham from speaking as Henry met CB's gaze Prince of Man to Prince of Man. "More importantly, he used to go to seances at this house while Creighton Caulfield was still alive."

The tense line of broad shoulders relaxed slightly. "Go on."

"He says Caulfield started out collecting grotesqueries-the finger of an alleged witch killed during the Inquisition, the skull of a cat that had supposedly been sacrificed in satanic rituals, a vial of dust and ash said to be the remains of one of the bloodsucking undead."

CB raised a single brow.

Henry shrugged. "Probably not."

Both men ignored the strangled choking sounds coming from Graham.

"Anyway, around 1892 Caulfield stopped collecting things and started collecting books. McCall said that some of those books made him very uneasy."

"He said some of them were warm," Graham added, shuddering.

CB's brow lifted again.

"It's possible," Henry told him. "Some books have the kind of contents that require a specific construction." He had, in his personal collection, a grimoire that recorded twenty-seven demonic names. The names were true-he had no desire to discover how the author had acquired them-and both the vellum pages and the thicker leather they were bound in maintained a constant body temperature. Blood temperature. Skin temperature. He'd taken it from a man who was using it to call demons into the world at about the same time as Caulfield had begun to collect the books that made McCall uneasy. He'd been told his was one of the last three true grimoires remaining. There was no reason Caulfield couldn't have gotten his hands on one of the other two.

"With the books," he continued, "came the seances. Seances and spiritualism in general were very popular at the time."

Graham snorted. "Yeah, well, you'd know."

Again, they ignored him.

"According to McCall, Caulfield was interested in contacting something he called Arogoth."

"Arogoth?" CB repeated, punctuating the name with a disdainful snort.

Henry shrugged. "Since the name seems to have no power, I suspect it's one that Caulfield made up. That whatever this thing was, it had no name-so he gave it one."

"Not a very original one. If one of my writers suggested such tripe, I'd take away their Lovecraft."

"So Caulfield was derivative. So what?" Graham demanded. "He was also more than dabbling in darkness." Hands fisted on his hips, his gaze flicked between Henry and CB fast enough to dislodge his comb-over. "And stop ignoring me!"

"Sorry. Would you like to continue?"

"No." Defiance wilted under CB's attention. "It's okay." The toe of one scuffed work boot dug a trench in the damp gravel. "Henry here's doing good."

"Thank you. But Graham's right," Henry admitted. "Caulfield was more than dabbling. According to McCall, the seances were often violent. The temperature in the drawing room would plummet, the darkness would thicken, and the spiritualists he used were never the same again. One of the more reputable died. The doctors called it a brain hemorrhage, but McCall-possessing a unique hindsight given his current condition-said he thought that something she'd contacted had overloaded the woman's brain. After a while, spiritualists refused to come to the house."

"And who can blame them, eh? If they were expected to talk to the thing in the bas.e.m.e.nt." Graham frowned and scratched thoughtfully between the b.u.t.tons on his overalls. "Except, it might not have been in the bas.e.m.e.nt then."

"It makes no difference where it was, only where it is. How do we . . ." CB glanced back toward the house. ". . . they defeat it?"

"Caulfield kept a journal of his research. The seances, and the things he found out from books-he was determined to control the dark power found . . . acquired . . . stumbled over . . . who knows."

"And this journal is where?"