Mystic Jive: Hand of Fate - Book Four Read online

  MYSTIC JIVE

  A HAND OF FATE NOVEL

  By Sharon Joss

  MYSTIC JIVE Copyright © 2016 by Sharon Joss

  Published 2016 by Aja Publishing www.ajapublishing.wordpress.com

  Book and cover design Copyright © 2016 by Aja Publishing

  Cover art & design by Lou Harper

  All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All characters, places, and events portrayed in this publication are used fictitiously or are entirely fictional. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the publisher.

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  KINDLE EDITION

  ISBN: 978-1-941544-36-5

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  TITLE

  COPYRIGHT

  START

  CHAPTER2

  CHAPTER3

  CHAPTER4

  CHAPTER5

  CHAPTER6

  CHAPTER7

  CHAPTER8

  CHAPTER9

  CHAPTER10

  CHAPTER11

  CHAPTER12

  CHAPTER13

  CHAPTER14

  CHAPTER15

  CHAPTER16

  CHAPTER17

  CHAPTER18

  CHAPTER19

  CHAPTER20

  CHAPTER21

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  AUTHORS NOTE

  CHAPTER 1

  CHARLIE CRIMMER AND I stood outside the historic clapboard farmhouse in south Webster with a big ‘For Sale’ sign out front. The roof looked new, but the siding looked dingy and the porch sagged like a swaybacked mule. The place had been empty for years, and was in the process of being readied for sale. Charlie and I exchanged a nervous glance. Last week, he’d had fallen right through the rotted second step of a seemingly well-maintained Dutch Colonial.

  “It doesn’t look haunted,” I said.

  Charlie’s dark eyes twinkled. “Ladies first.”

  “Chicken.” The floorboards groaned beneath my feet, but held. “Come on, don’t be such a baby.” I pulled off my gloves and dialed the combination on the realtor’s lock attached to the front door handle.

  When Jillian Safford, a big-name realtor specializing in historical properties first approached me with the idea of psychic cleansing an old estate for one of her buyers, I thought she was kidding. But she said that being able to offer buyers the services of the Hand of Fate to clear the house of any negative karma or restless spirits before they bought was a real selling point.

  And the five hundred bucks a pop she offered changed my mind. A win-win for everybody. And since my secondary source of income had died after Dave’s Killer Burgers shut down, I needed the cash.

  So did Charlie. We were partners on this. Actually, I’m more like the chauffer. Without him, there is no business.

  A couple hundred years ago, Charlie was shaman of the local Senequois tribe. Now, he’s one of Morta’s psychopomps—he escorts souls of the recently deceased through a portal to the land of the dead.

  There are only a dozen or so of these portals in the world, and one of them is right here in Shore Haven. It sits beneath the fun house at Heavenly Shores Amusement Park, and with the park shut down for the winter, Charlie’s hours as a part-time security guard are cut to the bone.

  Even the undead have to make a living.

  A sudden gust of late September wind pelted us with fallen leaves, and I wished I’d worn something warmer than my leather jacket. The realtor lock clicked open and a big old brass skeleton key dropped into my palm. “Oh hey, check it out.” I grinned and held it up for Charlie to get a look at. The key’s filigreed handle was in the shape of a tree with a woody trunk for the shaft, and at the business end, a convoluted root ball.

  “Hurry up, girlie.” Charlie slapped his arms against the first bite of fall. “It’s colder’n a witch’s tit out here.”

  “Hang on.” I slipped the heavy key into the lock. With a little jiggling, the tumblers engaged, and we were inside. A blast of chill air greeted us—it was like a refrigerator inside. Cold enough to see our breath, but at least we didn’t have the wind.

  We stood in the empty entry hall—parlor to the left, stairs straight ahead. There was just enough late afternoon light coming in from the windows to see our way around. Other than a sawhorse and a couple empty paint cans in the parlor, the immaculately restored interior looked move-in ready. The tang of fresh paint and pine-scented disinfectant choked the stale air.

  Charlie hit the light switch, but nothing happened.

  “Jillian thinks it’s a poltergeist. It keeps smashing the light bulbs in their sockets. The workmen finally gave up and quit replacing them.” My voice echoed across the bare floors in the empty house. Good thing we’d brought flashlights.

  “Somethin’ not right about this place,” Charlie said. “Can you feel it?”

  “There’s a demon somewhere in the house,” I answered. This was only the second time we’d come across a named djemon on one of our jobs. Over the last few months, my ability to sense djinn and djemons had gotten stronger. “In the basement, I think. Maybe that’s it.”

  He shook his head. “Nope. Try again.”

  Usually I helped Charlie set up his smudge sticks and followed him around. He’s got a real affinity for spirits and souls—some would call him a ghostmaster, but not in front of Charlie. He thinks that as I gain more of Morta’s power, I’ll be able to detect the presence of departed souls and spirits as well as he does. I closed my eyes and opened my senses to get a feel for the emotional tone of the place, like Charlie had taught me. Using a technique I’d learned from Master Foo, I took a deep cleansing breath and slowly exhaled.

  Nothing. Nada. I’m not all that convinced I’ve got it in me.

  Charlie led me to the stairs and placed my hand on the beautifully polished wood banister. “See if that works.”

  To my surprise, the crescent-shaped scar on the palm of my left hand buzzed like an angry bee. What the hell was that supposed to mean? “Hey,” I pulled away, rubbing my hand on the back of my jeans. “What is that? Expectant? Nervous?”

  He coughed. “Now you’re just guessing.” I knew he wanted a cigarette, but Jillian had forbidden him to smoke on the premises. Charlie went into the parlor and set down his nylon gym bag on the gleaming wood floors.

  Annie, Charlie’s djemon, materialized silently beside him. Annie’s form is that of a pterodactyl.

  I did a double-take when I got a look at her. I hadn’t seen her for a while.

  She’d been a sickly palm-sized kitten at the beginning of the summer. In the past four months, she’d grown into a pelican-sized bat-thing with a long, wicked-looking beak that would have given a heron pause. Her original master was dying when I found her. I’d given Annie to Charlie after I accidentally tore a hole in his soul. Banishing a demon can be tricky, and I’d used the wrong words when I’d banished his first djemon. Fortunately, Annie and Charlie had healed each other.

  “Good night, how did she get so big?”

  Charlie’s usually grumpy expression melted away. He stroked the short black down on her head affectionately.

  Annie used the wrist joints of her wings and her long claws to skitter closer to him, tucking herself under his arm. She pecked tenderly at the week-old silver stubble on his cheek.
When he rubbed her chin, her eyelids fluttered in djemon ecstasy. She emitted a sort of chirrupy clucking sound.

  Charlie made little kissy noises at her. “I talk to ‘er. Read to ‘er.” He gave me an odd, half-prideful, half apologetic look. “She’s smart, I tell ya. Picked it up right quick. I even taught ‘er how to sing. You want to hear it?”

  Any normal person would know instinctively that the noise a pterodactyl might produce would hardly be called a song, but I couldn’t say that to Charlie. It would hurt his feelings. I mean my own djemon, Blix would not win any beauty prizes, but I love him anyway. “Yeah, sure. Let’s hear it.” I braced myself for the squawk.

  Instead, Annie delivered a perfectly charming rendition of ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’. Sort of a cross between a parrot and Miss Piggy.

  I clapped my hands and she preened with pleasure. “Thank you,” she said.

  “Oh man, Charlie. How did she—when did she start speaking?”

  He unzipped his gear bag and began laying out his clamshells and bundles of sage. “A few weeks ago. Like I told ya, she keeps me comp’ny.”

  “I know, but…wow.” Annie had been even smaller than Blix when I’d given her to him. She balanced on the wrists of her leathery wings and used her long toes like nimble fingers to help him, anticipating his needs. “I wish Blix--.”

  “Ya got to talk to ‘em, Mattie—they need to be part of your life. They learn from watchin’ ya. Listenin’ to ya. They take it all in. How you get along with other people. Watchin’ how you figger stuff out. And ya gotta give ‘em a job. ”

  I couldn’t help but notice how attuned Charlie and Annie were to each other. Her sharp eyes followed his every move and anticipated his needs. They were a team.

  Nothing like Blix and me. Blix was happiest curled up in my lap. He loved being petted more than anything. Other than pawing at me when he wanted attention, he didn’t communicate. He could barely squeak.

  Rhys and Henri both had been telling me that I was giving Blix the wrong kind of attention. Rhys said djemons that are coddled and petted become spoiled and self-centered. They needed to feel useful, and he should know, because he used to be one.

  Watching Charlie and Annie work together in perfect harmony was a revelation. Maybe I had been spoiling Blix. A little.

  Charlie lit the first smudge stick and began to chant. He didn’t need me hanging around while he gathered up the restless spirits, any more than I need him when I’m banishing djemons. I pulled the big mag-light out of my canvas bag and headed toward the back of the house to the kitchen.

  The basement door was in the kitchen, just as I expected. A length of two by four had been shoved up under the knob as a wedge to keep the door shut.

  Like that would stop a poltergeist.

  I removed the lumber, and stepped into the stairwell. The lights didn’t work down here either, but it wasn’t entirely dark. A couple of narrow above-grade basement windows illuminated the gloom with the final dregs of daylight. The crescent on my palm itched like crazy. There was a djemon was down here, all right. I’d have it banished in no time.

  It’s what I do.

  “Are you decent?” I heard a crash and scurrying from below. I had a momentary twinge of fear, but shook it off. Rats, maybe. Or mice. They couldn’t hurt me.

  Spiders, though. That was another thing entirely.

  I flashed the light around, checking for cobwebs. It looked pretty clean down there. I clomped down the stairs into the partially finished basement.

  The irregularly-shaped space looked as empty as the rest of the house. I turned slowly, flashing my light around the wide structural columns and into the shadows, reaching out with my senses until the scar on my palm pulsed. I flashed the light into an alcove lined with wine racks—a few dusty bottles left behind by the previous owners. The basement looked as if it hadn’t been painted in decades. On the cement floor, shards of a broken wine bottle lay in a puddle as red as blood.

  Whatever it was, it was hiding. No matter.

  “Here me and obey,” I began. Immediately, a pair of yellow eyes peeked down at me from the top of the wine rack.

  I flashed the light on him. “Oh, hey. There you are.”

  It had the bloated face of a toad, a pot-bellied body, and long-fingered hands tipped with hooked claws. It wore a red fez with a black tassel set at a jaunty angle atop its bald head, and a red wool military-style jacket over its grey-brown mottled skin.

  It was bigger than Blix. Sheesh, bigger even than Annie. I hadn’t run into anything this size in months. I’d never seen him before, but I knew its name.

  Zeypax.

  This guy belonged to somebody. One of the advantages of being Morta’s kin is that I know a djemon’s name as soon as I see it. Whoever his owner was, he or she had designated the wine cellar in this empty old house as the place for Zeypax to stay until summoned. Maybe Zeypax belonged to the previous owners, or one of the neighbors. Zeypax had to be the so-called poltergeist that’d been smashing all the light bulbs.

  The creature stared down at me with a cold, reptilian glare. “Depart immediately, slovenly trespasser.” He sounded like Shakespeare with a mouthful of marbles.

  “Hey, don’t be rude,” I said. “I’m not slovenly, this jacket is a classic. And the jeans are clean.”

  It bared its teeth. They were small, but pointy-sharp. “Hell is empty and all the devils are here.”

  “You don’t scare me. Who’s your master?” I asked.

  “Stupid human. Do’st thou think I would tell thee? Begone! Lest my master lay a dire malediction of plagues and pestilence upon thee.”

  “Yeah, right. Well, I’m the Hand of Fate.”

  “Signifying nothing,” it sneered.

  I’d never had djemon address me like this before. With a flex of my fingers, Morta’s heavy shears slipped into my hand, giving me a little boost of confidence.

  “Flee now the wrath of my exalted master, ere accursed havoc is wreaked upon thee.”

  “What the frack is the matter with you, anyway?” I snorted. “Are you threatening me?”

  It flicked its hand at me dismissively. “Remove thyself from these premises, maggot breath. Thy speech is a malignant canker upon--.”

  I didn’t need to hear the rest. “I hereby banish Zeypax from all physical earthly planes, never to return.”

  The djemon Zeypax winked out of sight in mid-sentence. Yeah, baby.

  “Hold that thought, Zeypax,” I flipped off the empty space where he’d been perched. Never to return. He’d never be able to manifest for his master again. I bet Zeypax’s master would tear his hair out wondering why his little pet wouldn’t come when he called. Served him right. Good to know there were worse demon masters than me.

  I cleaned up the broken wine bottle mess with a wad of paper towels I found in one of the cupboards. It took me a while to get all the glass, but I couldn’t leave it—I’m a professional.

  I wondered who the djemon belonged to. Must be a real jerk. I made a mental note to find out a little more about the neighbors. Maybe one of them had been using his djemon to scare prospective buyers away.

  Of course, if I hadn’t banished him so fast maybe I could have forced him to tell me who his master was. I mean, what good was being the Hand of Fate if I didn’t use the power, right? I should have said, ‘tell me the name of your master’. Not as a question, a command. Yeah, he would have been forced to answer that one. Word choice is everything when it comes to demons. Words matter. Phrasing, too.

  I’d just finished spiffing up the place when I heard Charlie calling me from upstairs. The house was dark by this time. He’d already dismissed Annie, and seemed to be in a hurry to leave. Probably needed a smoke.

  I locked the door behind us and slipped the key back into the realtor’s lockbox.

  A sudden gust of night wind howled across the porch, slamming us with dead oak leaves. Tiny lights swirled among the flotsam, bouncing off us like an angry swarm of Styrofoam bees. I squint
ed against the onslaught, batting them away from me. A strange whooshing sound filled the air—part whisper, part echo, part moan.

  Loosah-loosah-oooh…

  Charlie grabbed my arm and hauled me off the porch toward the car. The mini-tornado of leaves and lights followed us, even banging against the car windows after we got inside.

  “Get us outta here, girlie.”

  I gunned the engine and Trusty Rusty, my ancient Honda, roared to life. By the time I backed the car out of the long driveway, the dust devil had died down, and the fey lights evaporated. I shifted into gear and the car shot forward.

  I stared back at the house. “What the hell was that?”

  Charlie rubbed his mouth with a trembling hand. “Hey, watch it!”

  “Doh!” I wrenched the wheel to the left, narrowly missing the drainage ditch on the passenger side of the road.

  “Sorry,” I glanced over at my passenger. “You okay?”

  Charlie winced. “I’ll live. But back there, that was not good.”

  My heart pounded with the rush of adrenaline. “Ya think? What just happened?”

  “Mebbe I shoulda said somethin’ when we walked in.” He rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. “Them spirits was terrified.”

  I stopped the car. “What are you talking about?”

  “This time of year, the veil between the living and the dead thins. Probably shoulda thought about it, before I released ‘em. But they was so scared…”

  I wondered about the buzzing I’d felt when I put my hand on the railing. “How can spirits be scared? Nothing can hurt the dead. They’re lucky that way.”

  He shook his head. “Somethin’ not right about that place. I don’t like it. Didn’t feel like nothin’ I ever I come across before.”

  I glanced back toward the dark house. Charlie walked with a foot in both the living and the dead. He wasn’t the sort to let a few restless spirits spook him. Maybe there was more to it. I put my hand on his shoulder. “Talk to me, Charlie. What just happened?”

  “Them spirits I released wasn’t lost, Mattie. They was trapped in that staircase. Now I think mebbe lettin’ ‘em loose might not have been such a good idea. Somethin’ about it made me want to leave it alone.”