Demon Hunting In the Deep South (18 page)

Chapter Seventeen

T
he yeasty aroma of freshly baked bread and the rich smell of fried bacon and sausage greeted Ansgar when he and Brand stepped into the Sweet Shop. The early-morning breakfast rush was over, but the dining room was still sprinkled with a few stragglers.

Miss Vi waved at them from behind the counter. “Be right with you, gentlemen, soon as I ring these folks up.”

While they waited, Ansgar looked around. The eatery had once been a holding unit of some sort. He searched his Dalvahni word bank for the correct term. The Dalvahni had the gift of languages, a necessity in the hunt that took them from place to place, but sometimes the subtle nuances of local speech eluded them. That was particularly true in Hannah, where exaggeration and euphemism seemed to be a matter of pride.

The word he was looking for floated to the surface.
Cotton warehouse: A storehouse for the produce of a small plant that produces balls of fibrous fluff used in the production of clothing.

Ah, yes. Miss Vi’s business had once been a cotton warehouse. The plank walls were covered with a strange assortment of signs and adages. D
AIRY
F
RESH
M
ILK
—B
EST
IN THE
L
AND
! a round red and white sign proclaimed. To the right of the milk sign was a smiling picture of a dark-skinned beauty holding a glass bottle in one hand. Beneath her sandaled feet were the words D
RINK
P
EPSI
-C
OLA
! Next to the leggy siren was a narrow tin banner with an image of an elfin boy painted in the bottom right corner. The lad was dressed in a red cap and flowing scarf. The words
Sing it over and over and over again, Frosty Morn
trailed behind him. The signs competed with a dizzying array of printed sayings like,
“If hard work is a virtue, then mos’ folks are living in sin.”
There was also the dented backend of a turquoise automobile and an assortment of rusted farm tools on the plank walls.

Ansgar’s gaze shifted to a blond-haired man sitting alone at a back table. “Is that not Addy’s brother?” he asked Brand, indicating the man.

“Yes, it is. He looks troubled. I must speak with him.”

Ansgar followed Brand across the room.

“Shep,” Brand said to the man by way of greeting.

Shep pushed his plate of uneaten food aside. “Hey, take a load off,” he said. When Ansgar and Brand exchanged puzzled glances, he motioned for them to take a seat. “I mean, sit down. I keep forgetting you two ain’t from around here.”

Brand and Ansgar seated themselves at the table.

“Haven’t seen you in a while,” Shep said, eyeing Ansgar. “You been off chasing boogiemen?”

The question momentarily startled Ansgar until he remembered Shep was in a relationship with the thrall Lenora. She’d been sent to Hannah a few months earlier by Conall, the captain of the Dalvahni, with orders to see to Ansgar’s and Brand’s needs and then return to the House of Perpetual Bliss, the abode of the thralls.

Lenora had seen to Shep’s needs instead.

Even more shocking than her untoward relationship with the human, Lenora had decided to
stay
in Hannah, an unprecedented breach of protocol and tradition. The thralls were created to service the Dalvahni. Theirs was a symbiotic relationship: the thralls craved emotion, and the Dalvahni provided it. In that way, the thralls were fed and the Dalvahni maintained their legendary calm detachment and dedication to the hunt. This arrangement had satisfied hunter and thrall for thousands of years.

Until Lenora got her first taste of human emotion. For whatever reason, Conall had decided to turn a blind eye to her unforeseen behavior. Perhaps he considered it an anomaly. Perhaps he hoped Lenora would come to her senses. One seldom knew with Conall. He kept his own counsel.

“What grieves you, Shep?” Brand asked. “Is something amiss?”

“Yeah, you could say that. The Birth Canal’s back in town.”

“I do not understand,” Brand said. “Who is this Birth Canal?”

“Marilee, my ex-wife,” Shep said glumly. “She dumped me and the kids for the tennis instructor at the club. The
young
tennis instructor. She and her boy toy are back in Hannah. ‘To be near the children.’ ” He uttered the words in a mocking drawl. “I call bullshit on that one. Seems the little turd she’s married has developed a bad case of tennis elbow and can’t work. The two lovebirds have moved in with Marilee’s mother, and Marilee is looking for a job so she can support him.”

“It will be good for the young ones to see their matriarchal unit,” Brand said. “I know that William and Lily have missed her.”

“Oh, yeah, it’ll be great for the kids.”

“But not for you?” Ansgar asked.

“My ex-wife is moving back to town, and Lenora doesn’t like it.”

A thrall jealous? Ansgar was fascinated and somewhat alarmed. Thralls fed on emotion, but they did not have feelings of their own, other than hunger.

“So now I have
three
women riding my ass.” Shep’s shoulders slumped. “My mother, my ex-wife, and my girlfriend. To top it off, I hate my job.”

“I thought you planned to eschew the sepulchral rites,” Brand said.

“Yeah, but Mama’s dead-set against me giving up the funeral business, ’scuse the pun.” Shep stared into his drinking cup. “I’ve put the word out, but so far nobody’s beating down my door to buy Corwin’s. The economy sucks, and Hannah ain’t exactly crawling with morticians. Until I sell, I got no way to make a living.”

“What about your painting?” Brand asked. “Adara has offered numerous times to display your work in her shop. Mayhap you can establish yourself as an artist.”

“A starving artist, maybe,” Shep said. “I wussed out.”

“What is the meaning of this ‘wuss’?” Ansgar asked.

“It means I chickened out, that I was scared.”

Ansgar filed the term away for future reference.

Shep made a face. “That’s something else Lenora’s hot about. She thinks I’m ashamed of her.”

“Are you?” Ansgar asked.

“God, no! I outkicked my coverage on that one. She’s wonderful. What I feel for Lenora is . . . special. I’m just not ready to share that part of my life with people. That’s all. Besides, I’m not sure Hannah’s ready for my paintings.”

“How do you know when you have not tried?” Brand asked.

Brand liked Addy’s brother, Ansgar could tell. Ansgar decided he liked Shep, too. And he felt sorry for him. Loving a thrall could not be an easy thing, even without the man’s former spousal unit and his interfering, demanding matriarchal vessel complicating matters.

“I think I understand,” Ansgar said, spurred by sympathy for the man. “Your feelings for Lenora run deep. She is a lodestar in the dark night of your existence, the distant shining shore you have dreamt of but never hoped to reach, the cool drop of water that soothes the burning heat of your weary soul. She is everything to you, heart’s blood and breath. Mere words are inadequate to express your feelings, so you pour your passion for her into your paintings. To show those paintings to others would be to bare your soul to the world. Contempt for your art you could bear. But to have others scorn your love would be intolerable.”

A strange heat moved up Ansgar’s neck and spread across his cheeks as he realized Brand and Shep were staring at him.

“Or perchance I do not understand at all,” he muttered. “Forgive me if I have misspoken.”

“No, man, that was
beautiful
. I need to write that shit down before I forget it.” Shep grabbed a napkin and motioned to Miss Vi. “Viola, you got a pen I can borrow?”

“Sure thing, sugar.” Hurrying over to their table, she gave Shep a writing implement. She handed Brand and Ansgar each a piece of paper that said
Breakfast Menu
on it. Ansgar buried his face in his menu, willing the heat in his face to subside. If this was what humans called embarrassment, it was a most unsettling sensation.

After a moment’s study, the strange squiggles on the paper arranged themselves into something intelligible. He studied the words on the paper to avoid looking at Brand. Some items he recognized—eggs, bacon, and sausage, for instance—others he did not. What was Spam? he wondered. And “cathead biscuits” sounded alarming.

“What can I get you fellows today?” Miss Vi asked, pulling a pad of paper from her apron pocket.

“We were sent here to retrieve sustenance and take it back to Adara’s establishment,” Brand said.

Miss Vi’s brown brow wrinkled. “You mean you want a togo order for the flower shop?”

“Yes, that is the correct term,” Brand said. “We want a togo order.”

“For how many?”

“Five.”

“That number include you and yo’ brother? ’Cause if the answer’s yes, that makes a difference. I never seen nobody can eat like you two.”

“You know how fond I am of your viands,” Brand said, smiling at her. “Rest assured my brother and I will partake.”

Miss Vi looked pleased and flustered at the same time. “Viands, is it?” She swatted Brand playfully on the arm. “Go on wid yo’ bad self. You talk almost as purty as you look. What kinda viands you wants?”

Brand rattled off a long order from the menu, including a request for something called “grits.” Miss Vi wrote it all down and hurried off.

“Now,” Shep said once she was gone. “Say that again. It was
good
.”

Ansgar felt his face grow hot again. Fortunately, the bell on the door jingled, distracting Shep.

“Hells bells.” Shep slammed his pen on the table. “Here comes Marilee. Dressed for tennis, of course, and loaded for bear, from the looks of her.”

There were bears in this demesne? Intrigued, Ansgar turned. A woman headed across the room toward them. She did not appear to be on the hunt, at least not for creatures of the four-legged variety. Her attention seemed to be focused upon Shep. She wore a short skirt that hit her tanned legs mid-thigh, and a sleeveless top. Past the first flush of youth, with short brown hair and doe-like eyes framed by extravagant lashes, she was attractive in an athletic sort of way . . . or would be if she did not look so unhappy.

“We need to talk,” she said, addressing Shep without preamble. Her trim body was rigid with tension. “I’ve got a match in thirty minutes, so I’ll get right to the point. I don’t want that bimbo girlfriend of yours around my children.”

“
Your
children?” Shep raised his brows. “Last time I checked, they were my children, too. I got full custody of them in the divorce decree.” He jabbed a finger at her. “You and the douche were fine with it, too, as I recall.”

“His name is Parker,” she said through her teeth, “and that was before I found out you were shacking up with that woman.”

“I’m not shacking up with anybody. Lenora rents Rat Godwin’s guesthouse.”

“Which is right next door to you.” Marilee’s mouth turned downward in an unhappy arc. “William and Lily say she’s at the house all the time. They say she tucks them in at night and that she’s there in the morning to eat breakfast with them. I’m not stupid, Shepton. I know what’s going on here. You’re screwing that woman, with my children in the house. It’s disgusting and I won’t have it. I’ll take you back to court.”

“Good luck with that,” Shep said. “Last I heard, you and the Boy Wonder don’t even have jobs. How you plan to support them?”

“That won’t matter. The judge will give me custody when he finds out you’re schtupping that stripper.”

Lenora materialized behind Marilee with a high-pitched whine. Ansgar scanned the room and breathed a sigh of relief. No one seemed to have noticed the thrall’s abrupt and unconventional appearance.

Like all thralls, Lenora was pleasing to the eye, with a body made for pleasure, skin as smooth as silk, and red, pouting lips. She was modestly dressed, for a thrall, in a garment made out of some kind of clingy material. The dress covered most of her assets, but Lenora exuded sex no matter what she wore.

“Greetings, Sol Vani,” she said, acknowledging Ansgar and Brand with the term of respect that meant “most noble lords.” She gave Shep an intimate smile. “My love.”

Marilee whirled around with an angry little titter. “My goodness, you shouldn’t sneak up on a person like that. You’re liable to get hurt.”

“The same thing could be said of you.” Lenora stepped closer to Marilee, her nostrils flaring. The thrall was on the scent. “I detect regret and bitterness, mixed with an unhealthy dose of jealous bile. Normally, I would find such a seething cauldron of emotion alluring, but I fear you would taste sour.”

Marilee drew back. “Are you coming onto me, you freak?” She glared at Shep. “Keep her away from my kids, Shep. I mean it. Or you’ll both be sorry.”

Turning on her heel, Marilee flounced back out the door.

“What is the meaning of this ‘bimbo’ and ‘stripper’?” Lenora demanded of Shep.

He looked as edgy and desperate as a cornered animal. “That’s just Marilee letting off steam. It doesn’t mean anything.”

“I see,” Lenora said. She turned to Ansgar. “Sol Van?”

“I cannot be certain,” Ansgar said carefully. The thrall knew he would not lie. That did not mean, however, that he was eager to spring the trap on Shep. “But, I believe, the term ‘bimbo’ connotes a physically attractive woman who lacks intelligence.”

“I see. And the term ‘stripper’?”

“A woman who performs an erotic dance and removes her clothes, usually for money.”

“Thanks, man,” Shep said. “You’re a big help. Way to throw me under the train.”

“She called me names.” Lenora spoke without inflection, but her long black hair swirled around her as though stirred by an unseen wind. “She insulted me, and you did nothing.”

Shep lifted his hands in a helpless gesture. “Don’t mind Marilee, baby. You said it yourself. She’s bitter and unhappy.”

“I am more than five thousand years old. I am not your
baby.
”

Lenora disappeared with an angry
pop
.

“She is gone,” Ansgar said. “Unless I am mistaken, she is wroth with you.”