The Dangerous Book for Demon Slayers (32 page)

Harleys crisscrossed the bridge every which way, their supernaturally bright
front lights cutting through the night in every direction.

Grandma barreled out of the shadows, a Smucker's jar in each hand. "God
damn it, Lizzie. You scared the crap out of me! Oh good. Dimitri. We need you
to fly up and—" She screeched to a halt when she saw Dimitri holding
Phil's limp body. "Oh no."

"Grandma, I didn't mean—" This was not how I wanted her to
find out.

"What?" Frieda asked, seconds behind Grandma. She stopped when she
saw. "Oh dang, girl. I am so sorry."

Grandma took Phil's hand and for once, she had nothing to say.

"He sacrificed himself for me," I told her, taking comfort against
a bit of unwashed dog.

Grandma nodded, her eyes reddening. "I'd like a moment," she said,
hoarse. Frieda brought us a blanket and we laid Phil right inside the doors. My
heart broke a little when the doors clicked closed behind her. I should have
done more.

Dimitri wrapped his arms around me from the back and I closed my eyes,
savoring the closeness. The warm desert air scattered my bangs over my
forehead. I chose to focus on that, rather than on my pounding head or
wrung-out body.

Pirate nosed the crook of my elbow. "You okay, Lizzie?"

"I will be," I said, ruffling his fur between my aching fingers.
Keep
it together, Lizzie
. I couldn't afford to fall apart now.

Frieda's heels clacked on the sidewalk. "I know you want to see me as
much as a skunk at a lawn party, but we really do need Dimitri."

"Lizzie?" He ran his hands along my arms.

"I'm fine," I said, pulling away first. It was good to know he
could fly again.

He kissed me on the head and followed Frieda toward the edge of the dam to
get what looked to be a trapped gargoyle off a clock tower. I stood with my
dog, too exhausted to move, waiting for Grandma, mourning Phil, wondering how
it had come to this.

Biker witches scattered along the roadway over the dam. The cars that
usually traveled Ala Meda Boulevard were conspicuously absent.

"Well, look who decided to join the fight after all," a deep voice
rumbled.

I about fell over as the angelic blond hunter strolled into the light. He
looked like he'd been run over by a truck. "Max," I gaped. I couldn't
believe he was here. "How?"

He crossed his arms in front of his chest and scowled down at me. "My
job wasn't done."

My body surged into high alert mode. I was tempted to touch him and make
sure he was real. But it had to be Max. I didn't sense any demonic imposters.
Besides, we'd fried or captured every demon within a three-thousand-mile
radius.

"Is she dead?" Max asked.

Oh yes. Definitely Max. "Serena's a demonic grease stain on the floor.
Now, if you don't mind me asking, what are you doing here?"

"Did you think I'd stand by and watch Serena take you?"

Frankly, I didn't think the man did a day of standing in his life.

Max delivered a biting stare. "Killing demons on my own wouldn't have
solved anything if you screwed up. I told you we needed a slayer to beat
her."

This coming from the person who had encouraged me to keep the dark mark.
"I'm glad you made it out," I told him. And I was.

Dimitri crunched up the road. I'd been so focused on Max I hadn't even heard
him coming. He reached out for Max and I prepared for the fight.

Instead, Dimitri clapped the hunter on the shoulder like an old friend.
"Good to see you, buddy."

Buddy? What on earth had happened since I'd been captured?

Dimitri noticed my confusion and grinned. "We needed Max to get inside
the dam. You should have seen the barriers the demons set up."

I couldn't believe it. I stared at Dimitri, then Max, the tension draining
out of me. "You two actually worked together?"

"I helped," Pirate said, squirming in my arms. "Joe got Ezra,
who got Sid, who got Dimitri. But then nobody understood the message."

"Ghosts are horrible at getting facts right," said Max.
"That's why I don't trust any of them."

"But I understood," Pirate said, his tail thwumping my arm.
"Ezra and I've been playing lots of Scrabble. I know how he thinks. See
that's the trick. You study your opponent like a hunting dog. Sniff out their
weaknesses and—whammo!—thirty-six-point word."

I kissed Pirate on the head. "Ghosts and dogs. I never would have
guessed."

Bob wheeled up, his antidemonic quilt bits flapping in his spokes.
"Hey, Lizzie. Glad to see you're not dead."

"Me too," I said. "I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but what
are you guys doing here?"

Bob huffed. "Saving you. What else?"

Max nodded. "Your witches have a gift for focusing power."

"Red Skulls have always been that way," said Bob. "We get
into trouble and it's trouble times ten. Frieda works a water spell and it's
the Vegas flood of '99." He grimaced. "Talk about a mess. But you
need to intensify a power like Max's, we can do that too." He chuckled at the
look on my face, which must have reflected my pure and utter astonishment.
"And, Ms. Lizzie, when we felt your power grow, we helped you aim your
magic."

I leaned my back against the concrete wall of the dam. Here I thought I had
to do everything on my own. I was the Demon Slayer of Dalea, for goodness sake.
I'd just assumed that power came with complete and utter responsibility. First
Dimitri helped save me, and now the witches had my back. And Max. I didn't know
what to say. This whole time, I'd imagined the Red Skulls as a liability, and
Max as someone not to be trusted. Come to think of it, I still wasn't sure if I
trusted Max.

"I really did need you guys as much as you needed me," I said. It
felt strange to even say it out loud.

"Ding, ding, ding! Finally!" Grandma clapped me on the back,
forcing humor through reddened eyes. "You don't have to know everything,
sport. Nobody does. Not even me."

"I never thought you'd be the type to go all After School Special on
me," I said.

She wrapped an arm around my shoulder and gave a long sigh. "Shut up.
And next time, remember to trust yourself and your friends."

I nodded, knowing she was right. Trust my friends, the Red Skulls, the
witches who tempted the demons themselves to help me. It felt good to be a part
of something bigger than myself. I straightened out my bustier and, despite the
rigors of the night, walked a little taller in my pink zipper pants. I was a
Red Skull and proud of it.

Excerpt from
The Dangerous Book for Demon Slayers:

Sacrifice Yourself: This is the third Truth of the demon slayer. Most
take it to mean self-sacrifice in the face of great danger, looking beyond who
you are and what you want. But it can also mean something that seems much
simpler, but is actually much harder in practice
—
letting go of
what you think you need, thereby opening yourself up to the things, and people,
that have the power to make you truly happy
.

We buried Uncle Phil in green linen pants and a matching Hawaiian shirt. Grandma
said that's how he dressed before Serena had him running around in a white
wedding tux. I had to admit, it looked more like him. She even tucked a can of
Pabst Blue Ribbon into his casket.

I wished I had something to give him, a token of how much he'd meant to me.
I couldn't think of anything that would do justice to the years he'd spent
watching over me, or for what he did in the end.

The night before the funeral, I wriggled out of Dimitri's arms. I sat on the
steps of our cabin and wrote Phil a letter. I told him all of the things I wish
we could have talked about when he was alive. And I told him how it broke my
heart to lose him.

I tucked it into his shirt pocket before the graveside ceremony at St.
Christopher's Cemetery. Witches, fairies and who knew what else clustered in
uneven rows amid a desert field of headstones. I held Grandma's hand while
Dimitri stood on the other side of me, his arm wrapped around my waist. I
marveled at how Uncle Phil's funeral turned out to be a typical ceremony in every
way, except when Sid reached out to catch Father Hamilton's prayer book a
second before the good reverend dropped it.

I couldn't shake the feeling that I'd let Phil down. He'd been willing to
sacrifice for me, but did he
have
to? I wasn't sure what I could have
done to keep him from being used as bait. My original sin was in being a demon
slayer in the first place. There had to be something else afterward, some other
series of choices that would have kept him from making the ultimate sacrifice.
I fully intended to berate myself until I came up with an entire list,
alphabetized.

Afterward, as we walked to the car, I caught a hint of cinnamon in the air.
I squeezed Dimitri's hand. "Can I have a minute?"

Dimitri walked Grandma back to the Harleys while I traced my way over to a
small garden wall where the air was particularly sweet. My heart swelled,
hoping desperately for any sign Phil was okay.

As I rounded the wall, however, my hopes sank. Pungent, dead flowers
assaulted my senses. They lay in half-wilted heaps, tossed aside from earlier
funerals, left to rot in this corner of the cemetery.

I couldn't help it. Images of my fairy godfather in his grave skimmed the
surface of my mind. "I'm sorry Phil," I said, watching the once-sweet
flowers. "I'll figure out what I did wrong, and next time I'll do better.
I promise."

"I think you did just fine this time."

I whirled around, my heart hammering in my chest.

"Phil?" He had a faint glow around the edges. Not exactly a ghost,
but…

"Stop being so hard on yourself, Lizzie. Of course, you're a demon
slayer, but believe it or not, you're only human."

Tears blurred my vision and I let them come. "I'm sorry."

"I know. I read the letter. All twelve pages, or I would have been here
sooner."

I wanted to hug him so hard. "Do you have your soul?" I asked,
hoping—praying.

He tapped the center of his chest. "Got her right here." His face
fell slightly. "It's not that bad, Lizzie. Look," he said, floating a
foot off the ground. "My basketball game has improved. I got to meet
Elvis. And I know where they buried Jimmy Hoffa."

I snarfed, half sniveling, half laughing. "I can't believe I'm going to
lose you before I even got to know you."

"Watch and be amazed." he levitated another foot off the ground
and twirled. "Brian Boitano skating spectacular," he said, ending in
a figure eight.

"Now you're showing off."

His eyes crinkled as he smiled.

I found myself returning it—damn the man—and wiped my nose on my
wrist. "You were supposed to be off the job when I turned thirty."

He chuckled. "Just because you're all grown up, doesn't mean I can let
you go."

And here I thought I'd come to Vegas to save him.

His bulbous nose widened as he smiled. "Glad I could do this for you,
pumpkin."

He'd always been doing things for me, from fairy beans under my pillow to
dragging me out of Lake Newman when I was eight. I couldn't lose him. "I
just found you."

Phil grinned. "Don't think of it as losing a fairy godfather, so much
as gaining a guardian angel."

He couldn't. He wouldn't. "You'll be back?" I asked, voice
hitching, almost afraid to hope.

He nodded, entirely too pleased about the whole thing. "Told you. I
have a hard time letting go. And tell your Grandma thanks Tor the brew."

I had so much more to tell him, I realized as he faded away. It hurt to lose
him, even temporarily. Still, over the pungent aroma of dying flowers, I
detected a whiff of cinnamon. He'd been there to save me—in big ways and
small. He'd sat through my five-hour-long dance recitals, left fairy beans
under my pillow and the more I thought about it, I wondered if he hadn't been
the one who barged up to my corner lemonade stand and demanded old Mr. Steele
pay me the full nickel, even though we'd run out of ice. Uncle Phil, it seemed,
always knew when to show up. And he'd always be with me, no matter what.

We held the funeral reception in the lodge next to the petting zoo. The
building sagged and most of the walls needed paint. There was little furniture,
save for wooden benches and tables. Tire tracks ran up and down the stairs, but
I had a feeling the Red Skulls were responsible for those.

The Red Skulls mingled with the fairies. Plus, we'd found Phil's address
book and asked his friends from the bowling league, plus his boss at work.
Luckily, Mr. Reed had no idea what had happened at the dam. I could thank the
Red Skulls—again—for that.

The murmur of the crowd echoed through the spartan room.

"You going to turn this into a biker bar?" I asked Grandma as I
handed her a cup of punch.

"Nah," she said, pausing for a large gulp. "This doesn't feel
like home. We're going to hit the road, head south somewhere."

I sipped my own punch and nearly choked as acid burned my throat. "What
is this?" I asked, my voice an octave higher.

"Mmm," Grandma tipped the paper cup to her lips again, savoring.
"Not a clue. Ant Eater doesn't share her recipes."

That's not all Ant Eater had kept to herself. She hadn't let poor Sid out of
the corner the entire afternoon. Worse, the short, stocky fairy sported a
Harley Davidson do-rag over his balding head. And, "Why is he wearing
leather chaps?"

Grandma shrugged. "Life on the road can chafe your thighs."

Oh my word. Ant Eater and Sid? They'd kill each other.

Grandma took another swallow. "What? Now you can tell the immediate
future?"

Sid saw me and broke away from Ant Eater with—ew—a kiss to her
cheek.

"I got something for you," he said, unfolding a piece of paper
from his back pocket.