Page 160 of Dead Beat

You can’t save her, Hellie said softly. The real Hellie. The girl she’d loved and who had loved her in return. How beautiful she was, even in death, how unlike the monsters who had pretended to be her. You can’t save her.

And maybe that was the trick of it, the answer to the riddle. There was no way to go back, to make things right. Alex could never save the girl on that bathroom floor. She could not stop all the tragedies that followed. She had one life and it was an ugly one, but it wasn’t over yet.

A cloud of monarchs descended from the trees. For the first time, she wasn’t afraid. They didn’t belong to the nightmare of this place now. They whirled around her, a cape of glittering orange as the dead set her gently back on the football field.

Golgarot scowled.

She remembered what Hector had said, Good Ol’ Hec, a frightened boy. You have to beat the devil at his own game.

Alex threw out her hand and tugged, reaching for the heavy edges of Golgarot’s soul. “Your turn.”

The Auxesis Working—in progress

Finding the proper root for this casting was a challenge. Though they are notoriously unpredictable, there are countless spells and practices targeted at multiplying wealth and my initial attempts focused on the idea of multiplying hellfire in the same way. I thought a talisman might be the path forward, something rooted in the folk magic tradition of the honey jar or even a play on Daikokuten’s wishing mallet. But both proved to be dead ends. And ultimately, as we’ve seen with the use of salt collars, rooting battle magic in talismans can prove clumsy and leave the user vulnerable in situations where quick action is essential. So, a pivot to the tria prima and late Renaissance writings on the Paracelsian concept of archeus. Alex is not short of inner, animating fire, so is there a way to take the subject’s metaphorical ferocity and use it to magnify her use of hellfire?

An old donation from the Armory Catalogue paved the way: A sample of Os et Cor (cheekily labeled “liquid courage”) was procured by Aurelian in 1896 and donated to Lethe in 1902. Notable ingredients include bull’s blood, borage, and potable gold. The provenance of this substance is fascinating, as Aurelian claims the near-empty vial was found on the floor of the Senate following the Webster-Hayne debate on nullification. This foundation has yielded the most positive response for my working, which I based around the idea of bravado, or exaggerated courage, and rooted in auxesis, meaning both abundance and rhetorical exaggeration—a concept I hope will play nicely with Aurelian’s own word-based magic.

—Notes from the Grimoire of Pamela Dawes (unpublished)

59

“He’s going to try to break the bells!” Dawes shouted.

“Keep his familiars at bay,” Darlington yelled. He tore free of his coat and pushed off his boots. He needed to be able to move. But he kept the bag with the Voynich Coffin in it slung over his hip. He wanted it near for when Alex called.

He let rage course over him, the same fear and fury that had possessed him when he’d seen Reiter threaten Alex on the beach. The gentleman had no place here. Let the demon rule.

He threw a salt chain over his shoulder, dug his claws into the stone, and began to climb.

He was clumsy at first, the smooth stone betraying him. But he knew the bricks of Yale too well, every corner and crevice. Here the surface gave way to slats—better for finding purchase, quick work too. Now the brief balconies, an easy place to find his footing. He could see the shape of Harkness in his mind and he leapt, reaching for the stone railing, delicate in its arches. He swung inside.

Reiter was already climbing over the bells. He would try to find the oldest among them, the first to be hung. The thing who had been Lionel Reiter would know exactly where to aim to break the ritual.

Darlington jumped onto the spiral stairs that faced the bells, ignoring the steps themselves, climbing over the railings, higher, higher. Alex walked these steps. She hadn’t called for her second. That had to mean she was alive, that she was still fighting. They still had a chance.

“Reiter!” he shouted, trying to fracture his attention.

But the vampire just laughed. “Can you not hear the bell that rings beneath that sound? We are at the eleventh chime, the final moment. They have entered the arena.”

“Golgarot awaits you,” Darlington threatened, seeking some advantage.

Reiter hissed at the sound of his prince’s name. “I will never kneel to Golgarot again. I will eat my fill and share nothing. If you think I will give my fate over to the flailings of a young girl and her pet, you are much mistaken.”

“What is your true name?” Darlington shouted in his demon tongue.

Reiter startled. Good. He needed him distracted.

“You are not Linus Reiter. You are not anyone. You are a trespasser here. Thief,” he said, remembering the way the wolves had spoken in hell. “You will return to your prince and serve him for eternity.” Darlington knew what that threat meant better than anyone. “Hell’s price must be paid.”

For the first time, Reiter looked truly terrified.

Darlington seized his opportunity. He wasn’t sure if he would survive a fall from this height, demon or not. It didn’t matter. He leapt and landed on Reiter’s back.

Reiter bellowed in rage. Darlington slipped the salt chain over his neck and pulled.

The vampire shrieked, trying to keep his grip. Darlington pulled tighter.

“You’ll kill us both,” Reiter choked out.