Downtown turned out to be three red brick streets. The storefronts were a chaos of green, yellow, and purple, jester hats and painted masks, feathers and multicolored beads. Vendors' booths lined the sidewalks, selling everything from knock-off Prada bags to glittery face paint. A local band blared from a loudspeaker perched on the side of the courthouse-How do you think nightmares are born? Well, tell me, darlin'. Who's side are you on?-and everywhere, children screamed for curly fries and funnel cakes.
Ari turned right at the courthouse and saw a coffee shop halfway down the block. A sandwich board out front named it Big Cypress Coffeehouse-the coffee shop Ceph had texted her to meet him.
As she moved through the crowd, amusement curved her lips. An angel with a cell phone? She wondered if they all had one. Maybe higher-up angels had blogs too, like "Ask Gabe" or "The Daily Beelzebabble."
The aromas of sugary vanilla, warm chocolate, and fresh-ground coffee reached Ari's nose. She'd timed it so she would arrive twenty minutes early. That way, she could enjoy a large double mocha latte. Just as she was close enough to read the specials on the sandwich board, a hand landed on her forearm.
She twisted around to see Charlie, one of the girls she'd met at the post office.
"Hey, Ari." Charlie hooked her thumbs in the pockets of her high-waisted jeans. Her dark curls were swept up in a red headscarf, and around her left eye shimmered a swirl of gold curlicues.
Ari glanced toward the coffeehouse. "Hey. Charlie, right?"
"That's right." She linked her arm through Ari's. "So, what do you think? Mardi Gras's a favorite around here."
"Um," said Ari, unsure of what else to say. "Listen-"
A giant of a man in grease-stained overalls caught Ari's eye. He wobbled to a stop in front of the sandwich board, his gaze fixed on Charlie. His ruddy face twisted with revulsion.
Ari opened her mouth to ask if Charlie knew him when he reached into his pocket and flung something at her.
White granules dusted Charlie's boots. Was that...salt? Ari stared as the man retreated into the crowd.
Charlie sighed and stamped her feet. "I need to talk to you."
Before Ari could reply, Charlie yanked her down the sidewalk and turned left. They passed a hamburger restaurant and a muddy, car-packed lot. Another left, and they were on an empty street. The only building there was an old brick structure shaped like a box. Thick weeds grew up around the building, half hiding it from view. Weathered boards barricaded the front door, and a black-and-white historical marker lay broken on the ground.
In the distance, the local band launched into a cover of AC/DC's "Hells Bells." The smell of corn dogs and smoked turkey legs mingled on the breeze. Yet here, the street was empty.
Ari knew why people were avoiding it. She looked at the rundown building crouched between two bone-fingered trees. Her skin prickled, not unlike before the Legionaries appeared.
She jerked her arm away from Charlie. "This is as far as I'm going."
"Fine." Charlie pulled a compact out of her purse. "But you won't get to see the surprise."
"Is that supposed to make me curious?"
"I was hoping it would." She lifted her left hand, the one with the Mark. "You know what this means."
"I don't..." Ari said automatically, and then realized it wasn't a question. She backed up a step and fell off the curb.
"Don't freak out. I may be a witch, but that doesn't mean I'm planning to bake you into a pie." She snapped the compact shut and traded it for a cell phone. "You met my sister the other night."
The picture on the phone was of Charlie and a woman with black hair thick as dandelion fluff. Ari stared. "Lena is your sister?"
"She told me about you. How you showed up at her house, saying you'd been sent there by a Darklands daeva. And that you had a Cruxim with you."
"His name is Sam," Ari said. Behind her, the sounds of the crowd grew more and more distant as people drifted away to watch the parade. "Look, is there a point to all this? I'm supposed to meet someone."
"You know, most people think this is a scar." Charlie showed her Marked hand again. "But in this town...well, everyone knows that's not true."
"What do you mean?"
Charlie shouldered her purse. "Back in 1932, a daeva committed a murder. It happened in this building." She waved her hand at the crumbling facade behind her. "The daeva suffocated a woman with her own shadow.
"There was a crowd of witnesses. They set out to hang everyone with a scar on their hand. Until a witch made a deal." She dipped her boot in a puddle. "The Great Depression had brought this town to its knees. The witch offered relief in exchange for safety. Now, the people here are more than happy to maintain that bargain."
"Why did that man throw salt at you?"
A wan smile twisted Charlie's lips. "I should've said most people here. Some of them carry around pockets full of salt or blackberries, nail boxwood and iron horseshoes above their doors. They think it keeps us away."
"Does it?"
"All superstitions are misunderstandings."
Ari looked down at her hands. "Why did you and Mai think I was a Shade? I had on gloves when I met you; you couldn't have seen a Mark."
Charlie shrugged. "Mai is a daeva. She could smell it on you. I guess it was that Cruxim she smelled."
"His name is Sam. And anyway, I didn't meet him that day."
"He's a ghost. Maybe he was invisible." Charlie made a face. "That's kind of creepy. What if he watched you while you were taking a bath or something?"
"He wouldn't do that." Ari clenched her hand into a fist. He'd better not. "So what's the surprise? Or were you just saying that?"
"I wasn't." Charlie patted her pin-up curls. "There is something I want you to see."
Ari slid her phone out of her pocket and checked the time. She still had ten minutes until she was supposed to meet Ceph. She nodded at Charlie. "Let's see it then."
"Follow me." Charlie turned and headed toward the back of the building. "This place is supposed to be haunted. In this town, people think every pile of bricks with a tragic past has ghosts." She grinned over her shoulder. "Sometimes they're right."
At the back of the building was another entrance. Two graying boards criss-crossed over it, making a giant "X."
Ari stopped beside Charlie. "We're going in?"
"Don't tell me you're scared." Charlie laughed. "The girl who hangs out with a dead guy."
"His name is Sam," Ari said again, louder than she'd meant to.
"All right, all right. Sorry." Charlie approached the blocked door and reached between the boards. "Open sesame!" She pushed the door wide, lifted herself through the opening, and disappeared.
"Charlie?" Ari couldn't see anything: no movement, no dark shapes. It was like the door opened onto solid nothingness. A familiar curiosity burned inside her, urging her on. She knew she should be afraid, but with the sounds of people shouting for beads and candy one street over, fear seemed far away. She took a deep breath and climbed over the boards.
It was a tight squeeze, but she made it through. She stood in a narrow passageway that smelled of dirt and decay. Her hands skimmed the gritty concrete walls on either side as she moved forward. Something crunched beneath her feet.
"Charlie?" she whispered. "Where are you?"
A bluish light ignited in the darkness. Ari moved toward it. Charlie stood waiting at the bottom of a staircase. She held a mason jar in her hands, full of the same bluish light Ari had seen at Lena's.
A stage splattered with paint stretched to the right. Before it, row upon row of folded seats faded into the darkness.
Ari rubbed her elbows. "What is this place?"
"The McGarity," Charlie said. "It used to be a playhouse, and before that a saloon. Now it's just a place people avoid." She turned away and began to climb the stairs.
The stairs were only wide enough for one person at a time. Ari followed Charlie so closely their shadows merged into one skeletal thing.
Like the Legionaries.
Ari's panic rose in a sharp spike. She turned her face away and sucked in a breath.
At the top stood a door with a jewel-toned knob. More bluish light leaked out from under the door. The hairs on Ari's neck stood up.
Charlie paused, her hand outstretched. "Try not to scream." She twisted the knob and the door creaked open.
Ari squinted against a flood of bright blue, and then her eyes adjusted.
"Charlie!" Mai sat in a molting armchair beside the window. The book in her lap fell to the floor as she jumped to her feet. "You said you were going to get a funnel cake." Her sing-song voice reverberated in the dusty attic.
"Careful!" Charlie cried. "That's my sister's book."
With a frown, Ari stepped further into the attic. Why had Charlie said try not to scream? And then she saw it.
"You," it said in a rasping voice. "I have been looking for you."
A giant pickle jar sat on the floor beside Mai's feet. Inside the jar crouched a creature Ari had seen before. It scratched one claw over its skin and gazed at her with depthless black eyes.
"Did you think I wouldn't bring her?" Charlie picked up the book Mai had dropped and inspected it for damage. "And I did get a funnel cake."
Ari resisted the urge to turn and bolt. "Not this again."
Both Charlie and Mai stared at her.
"It's not the first demon I've seen," Ari explained.
Mai thumbed the paintbrush behind her left ear. "How did you know it was a demon?"
"There were four others. Legionaries. In the woods behind my house."
"This doesn't make sense. What would demons want with you? I mean, this one-" Mai nodded toward the jar- "is odd by itself, but four more?"
"What she means to say," said Charlie, "is what are you hiding? Five demons don't set their sights on one measly human-no offense-without a reason."
Ari thought about the Nanorian, about how she'd promised herself she'd find it. She thought about Mikhail. About Ceph. About her cracked Abraxas. She shrugged. "I'm not hiding anything."
"You hesitated." Charlie plopped herself down in Mai's chair. "And you're fidgeting."
Ari dropped her hands to her sides. "I'm in an abandoned building with a witch, a daeva, and a demon. That's not what I'd call a relaxing atmosphere."
"Speaking of daevas..." Charlie propped her chin in her hand. "Why were you running errands for one in the Darklands?"
"It didn't go well if that's what you're asking." Ari looked at the demon in the jar, at the silver lid screwed onto the top. "How are you keeping it in there?"
Mai, who stood in the corner, uncrossed her arms. "There's a Devil's Knot carved into the lid. As long as that sigil is there, it can't so much as smudge the glass."
"Did you find anything in here?" Charlie flipped through the book in her lap, making the withered pages crackle like leaves.
"No," said Mai. "There's nothing in there about sending Harbingers back to hell."
Ari took a step toward the jar. "You said you've been looking for me?"
The Harbinger nodded. "My messsage isss for you."
"Don't believe anything it says." Disgust laced Charlie's voice. "Harbingers traffic in lies."
"Sometimes they tell the truth," said Mai.
Charlie laughed. "Yeah, but only when the truth is worse than a lie."
The Harbinger sat down inside the jar and crossed one ankle over the other. "You haven't found the Nanorian yet, have you?"
"Did it just say Nanorian?" Charlie stood and jabbed her finger at Ari. "Not hiding anything, huh?"
Ari ignored the tightening in her lungs. "What happened to, 'Don't believe anything it says?'"
"I never take advice," Charlie replied. "Why start now?"
Mai glanced between them. "What's the Nanorian?"
"A demon prince's heart." Charlie tightened her headscarf. "I thought it was just a scary story Lena liked to tell when I was a kid." She swiveled toward Ari. "But it's not, is it?"
"Will you shut up?" The Harbinger smacked its hand against the glass. "I have to deliver my messsage!"
Charlie cracked her knuckles. "Don't tell me to-"
"I'll explain later. Right now, everyone please be quiet." Ari knelt beside the jar. "Except you. What's your message?"
The Harbinger licked its lips. "The heart sleeps in a tomb of mud. Find the grave, and give it blood."
"Thanks for that revelation." Ari rubbed her forehead. "I guessed the Nanorian would be buried."
"I have one more message. They told me to tell you..." It grinned and pressed its claws against the glass. "He'sss running out of time."
###
"Ari!" Mai and Charlie barreled down the stairs after her, but she didn't stop to wait. She crammed herself through the criss-crossed boards and raced toward Big Cypress Coffeehouse. The Harbinger had to be lying. It had to be.
The parade was over now. People milled in the streets, shouting, laughing. Most of them wore handfuls of beads around their necks: red, green, gold, purple. The colors ran together like a rapidly spinning kaleidoscope.
The coffeehouse came into view. Almost there. Ari's shoes skidded on the pavement as she reached the door. When she burst inside, the bells hanging from the handle rang like an alarm. Ceph sat against the wall beneath a hand-drawn map of Uncertain.
He rose from his chair. "What-"
Ari seized him by the arm and pulled him out the door.
###
"Why did you bring the angel!" the Harbinger screamed. It covered its face and began to sob. "I didn't threaten you-"
"No, you threatened my dad." Ari whirled toward Ceph. "Can you make it talk?"
He frowned, as if she should know the answer. "Of course I can."
Charlie and Mai stood as far away from Ceph as they could get and still be in the same room.
"I guess I shouldn't be surprised," Charlie said. She stood with her back against the door. "You can see ghosts, demons deliver your mail, and you have an angel perched on your shoulder?"
Ari kept silent. Right now the only answers she wanted were ones the Harbinger could give.
"Pleassse!" the Harbinger wailed. "Pleassse, don't kill me!"
"I'm not going to kill you." In three strides, Ceph stood over the jar. "Not as long as you tell us everything we wish to know. Where is Ari's father?"
The Harbinger answered from between its fingers. "The Ills have him."
"We already knew that." Ceph moved his hands toward the jar. "So I ask again: Where is Ari's father?"
"I do not know!" screamed the Harbinger. It began to rock back and forth, repeating the words over and over.
Ari's hands trembled as she picked up Charlie's book. The title read Crucem Domini in faded silvery letters. She hugged the book against her chest as if it were a lifeline. "What did you mean when you said, 'Find the grave, and give it blood?'"
"They did not tell me what it meant," the Harbinger said. "Pleassse. I am only a messsenger."
"That's true." Ceph kneeled down and put his hands on either side of the glass.
"You sssaid you wouldn't kill me!" screeched the Harbinger. It began kicking and scratching at the glass. The jar didn't so much as tremble.
"That's true too. To an extent. What I said was I wouldn't kill you as long you told us everything we wished to know. You didn't."
A white light began to glow inside the jar, hot and blindingly bright. The Harbinger loosed a high-pitched scream that Ari was sure someone would hear. The smell of burning flesh filled the attic.
Ceph removed his hands from the jar and the light faded. The inside was empty except for a curl of smoke.
"Where did it go?" Mai stared from the jar to Ceph. "Did you-"
"Dispose of it?" Ceph stood and turned to face her. "Yes."
"You didn't even have to touch it," Mai whispered. She tugged at her sleeve, and Ari noticed a long gash on her forearm, dark with dried blood.
"Did the Harbinger do that?" Ceph had noticed it too. "Allow me to heal it."
"No." She flinched away from him. "I don't need help from an angel."
"But the Harbinger's poison-"
"I'm part demon myself. It won't kill me."
"It won't kill me." Ari had heard those words before. But where...
With a gasp, she leaped up from the chair. Crucem Domini slid from her hands and landed on the floor.
"Careful!" Charlie yelled.
"I have to go." Ari turned and dashed out the door. She stumbled down the darkened stairs and heaved herself over the criss-crossed boards. The night kissed her cheek with icy lips. Shadows swayed over the sidewalk.
"Ari!" Ceph had followed her. "Wait!"
She slid to a stop and spun to face him. Behind him, Charlie and Mai stood in the dew-strewn grass.
"What are you planning?" Ceph asked.
"I have to go to the Darklands. There's a fountain there. It answers any question you ask it." It was the only thing she could think to do. Ester had to let her use it again, and if she said no... Ari wouldn't accept that possibility.
Charlie took a step forward. "You still haven't explained why hell wants you to find the Nanorian."
"How did they..." Ceph dragged his hand through his curls. "Harbingers have loose lips."
"Well?" Charlie crossed her arms. "We're listening."
"Because the Ills kidnapped my dad!" Ari yelled. "They want me to find the Nanorian before they let him go."
"Ari-"
"No, you wanted to know." Ari spun away so they wouldn't see the panic sparking in her eyes. "Is that a good enough reason for you?"
"That's more than enough reason." Anger tinged Mai's voice, and Ari didn't have to turn around to know she was glaring at Charlie. "Not that it was any of our business."
"I'm sorry. I didn't..." Charlie paused. "Let us help. Your ghost-I mean Sam, can only take one soul at a time."
Ari wheeled around. "What are you talking about?"
"Isn't it obvious? You, us, the land of the dead-"
Ari shook her head. "I'll be fine alone."
"The more you argue, the more time we're wasting. Look, the fastest way to get there-" Charlie pulled something smooth and black out of her pocket- "is with a keystone."
She was right: they were wasting time. And Ari didn't know how much time her father had.
"Well?" Charlie tossed the stone from hand to hand. "What do you say?"
Ari chewed her lip. "Let's go."