The continuing story of a human, a demon, and a trixter. It picks up a three months after 'Marby and the Euros.', which in turn is a continuation of'Halloween 2020.' If you haven't read them then this probably won't make a lot of sense.
As always, a cheery and heartfelt thank you to The Dude, and Mr. C. - my stalwart editor.
Camy. October 2021.
Bleary-eyed I woke up to find Marby’s side of the bed empty and a worried-looking Kitty sitting cross-legged on the small table in the nook where Jack and I used to have supper. That the flat had reverted to its original form from the rather more palatial place it generally appeared to be wasn’t that much of a shock; it tended to do that when Marby was distracted, or elsewhere. What worried me was that Marby hadn’t seemed distracted when we went to bed, and that he hadn’t said he was leaving. Naked, I got up and put on my jogging bottoms.
“Where…?”
“He’s downstairs with Alala,” Kitty said, then transmogrified into her cat form to end the conversation.
“Oh, come on Kitty. That’s not fair,” I said as I pulled on a T-shirt and jumper; it was late October and getting cold. In another few days it would be a year since I’d first met Marby and his damned cousin, Beleth, and I had plans for a celebration.
Familiar footsteps got louder, the flat’s front door swung open and there he was: my beloved, a demon in human form.
“I have to go,” Marby said. “Mother needs my help.”
And suddenly we were arguing, which, in my more lucid moments when the rage momentarily faded, I realised was distinctly odd. We had never argued before. Bickered, maybe, over small things like what to have for dinner, or who was going to tell Kitty off for some minor annoyance, but never this. Never.
“Stop!” Kitty shouted as Marby reverted to Marbeth and raised a clawed hand with the obvious intent of ripping my head off. Somehow, she got between us and muttered a string of words I didn’t understand. A nimbus of light rapidly grew around us and the anger bled away. I found I had a large kitchen knife in one hand and dropped it, appalled.
“What…” I managed, then broke into tears. Kitty wrapped her arms around me, followed by Marby, who was now back to his normal human form.
Time passed as we comforted each other; then we broke apart.
“Thank you, Kitty,” Marby said, patting the small girl in the gingham dress on her head.
“You do know what that was?” Kitty asked.
“Beleth,” Marby said flatly. “This has gone too far. Mother will be incandescent when she finds out.”
“I don’t understand,” I said.
“Nor should you have to, Brian.” Marby said. He sighed, then explained. “Demons have the power to manipulate emotions, but it is an unwritten rule that we never manipulate each other. We are supposed to be better than that. Beleth has obviously decided that he can get at me through you. Perhaps it’s personal spite, but I rather think he has played his first piece in what will be a complex… game.
“Game, Marby? Don’t you mean war?”
Marby gave me a wintery smile. “You’re too smart for your own good, my love. Yes. War.” He hugged me, kissed me, told Kitty to look after me, then reverted to Marbeth and vanished.
### The next morning there were two notable events. First, there wasn’t a cup of Kitty-made coffee waiting for me on the bedside table. Second was that when I got up and wandered into the kitchen to make coffee, I found Kitty sitting at the table opposite a very small and scruffy looking child, though maybe scruffy was a bit of an understatement. Tatterdemalion was closer to what she was, and about five years old. The two were staring fixedly at each other and paid me no attention at all, which was peculiar. Normally, Kitty is full of vim and vigour and sarcastic comments when I get up.
“Who’s this, Kitty?” I asked, starting to walk around behind her to get a better look at the child. Kitty’s arm shot out and as she grabbed me by the wrist; a surge of energy connected us and I found myself rooted to the spot and unable to move.
“This,” Kitty said with obvious difficulty and through clenched teeth, “is Yobba, one of Beleth’s new recruits. A sprite. One of the Fae. Marbeth bade me find out what caused yesterdays ructions, and I found this up in the attic, caught in a trap.
“Oh,” I said, finding it hard to talk. Kitty and Yobba still hadn’t broken eye contact. The kitchen was getting hot and I felt sweat trickling down my face.
With an immense effort I looked across at Yobba. Her eyes were blazing red and I felt a wave of gleeful triumph coming from the sprite that swept the room.
“I…” Kitty was struggling to talk “need… your permission to…”
“Yes,” I managed to say, no thought to what Kitty wanted my permission for, and why she needed it in the first place.
The moment I said ‘yes’ the connection between us exploded with power. Where Kitty held my wrist burnt with a flameless fire that both soothed my incipient panic and filled my mind with Kitty’s intent. I knew what she was about to do and found myself pitying Yobba.
Their eye contact became a tangible, visible, horrifc thing as Kitty sent a streak of blue fire directly into Yobba’s blazing red eyes. With a howl the sprite tried to fight back. A small stream of red light began winding around the blue, making its way slowly back towards Kitty, who laughed.
“Think you can best me, do you, Fae? Think you can kill Marbeth’s beloved and his familiar, do you? I have more power at my disposal than you can possibly imagine. Tell that to Beleth if you ever see him again. Now, begone!” With that, the room exploded with blue light, there was a shriek I’ll never forget, and I did the manly thing by collapsing on the floor and blacking out.
### When I woke up I was so incredibly comfortable I nearly went straight back to sleep. I was lying on a couch, my head on a pillow, and I was covered by a gloriously fluffy blanket. I snuggled in. There hadn’t been a couch in the flat earlier, which meant Marby was nearby. I opened an eye. It was dark and seemed too quiet, until a clattering of crockery came from the direction of the kitchen, followed by one of Kitty’s off-key attempts at an ABBA song. I smiled and dozed off.
The next time I awoke it was instantaneous. I found myself walking barefoot though an endless cloud of purples and grays. I couldn’t see my feet, but what I was walking on felt rough, like raw stone. I knew it was a dream, but however hard I tried I couldn’t wake up from it and I couldn’t stop walking.
Eventually, the raw stone under foot started to feel worked and regular and the cloud began to lighten and fade into a stone-walled tunnel with burning torches in sconces providing light.
Still I walked.
The tunnel ended in a vast candle-lit cavern with a black marble floor, in the middle of which a large, inlaid ring of silver surrounded a lighter coloured stone. When I reached the center of the ring I finally stopped.
To my left a log fire in a large fireplace spat and crackled as the juices from something once human dripped onto it from a spit turned by two small Kitty-sized demons.
In front of me on a dais by the back wall, wearing full armour and a crown, Beleth sat in an ornate high-backed chair. To his left a huge thing with folded wings; to his right an unnaturally tall albino woman. She was dressed in white leather with matching coif and carried a carved staff even taller than she was. A panoply of soldiers were arrayed around the walls, their conversational susurrus too low to hear, even if I had understood the language. I was about to say a cheery hello to Beleth when two demons walked by to either side of me. They were dragging a small creature which passed straight through my body as if it wasn’t there.
T he battered and bloodied thing was flung to the floor by its two guards. It landed at the bottom of the dais, right in front of Beleth who glanced at the albino. She struck the dais once with her staff, the sound booming and echoing, ever louder until she raised a finger and it stopped. All conversation, and even the squeak squeak squeak of the turning spit, had ceased. You could have heard a pin drop.
Beleth stretched, belched, and then in one lithe movement, stood. His armour, I saw, ended at his ankles, leaving his golden hooves visible to all. He hopped down off the dais and bent to examine the thing.
“This sprite has been beaten.”
“Yes, my lord.” One of the guards answered him.
“Did I say you could beat her, Faranth?”
“No my lord. But you didn’t say we couldn’t. After all…”
“SILENCE!” Beleth bellowed, tapping one of his toes in annoyance. “She might have failed in her mission, but I needed her report. And, her parents wanted her back unharmed. What, Faranth,” Beleth asked as he absently drew his leg back and kicked the sprite in the head, “do you suggest we do about it?”
Faranth prodded the small sprite with his boot until it rolled over. It was Yobba, her eyes dull and a muted red.
“She was still alive, my lord.”
Beleth screamed. It was a sound so visceral and painful I nearly collapsed. By the time I recovered Beleth had a short sword in one hand and Faranth’s head in the other.
Beleth raised the head, a small rivulet of ichor running from its mouth, and looked into Faranth’s dead eyes. Quietly, he said “I liked you Faranth. But you cheeked me once too often. Lesson learnt, eh?” With that he threw the head at the other guard who caught it by its hair. Beleth clapped, and the rest of the demons dutifully joined in, adding hooting and whistling to the cacophony of sound. The guard holding Faranth’s head was trembling, and I didn’t blame him. Beleth was now inside the circle where I stood, close enough to touch. I tried to back away, but now my feet wouldn’t move. Finally Beleth stamped a hoof and the clapping and other noises abated; order was restored.
“You,” Beleth pointed at the remaining guard, “are now called Faranth. Don’t disappoint me, and get rid of that head. The rest of you,” he pointed to a group standing against the wall and started to turn to encompass them all. Unfortunately, as he turned his arm passed through my body. He froze. “Wait! Wait! He’s here! I can feel him.”
“Who, my lord?” the new Faranth asked as I sank to my haunches, making myself as small as possible and praying to Marby for deliverance.
“Who? My cousin, Marbeth, fool!” Beleth started sweeping his arms around, trying to find me. “He’s here. Marbeth is here. He knows we are at Ygranath and guesting with the Tylwyth Teg. He knows! He knows!”
The silver ring that defined the circle started to glow as a wisp of blue light uncurled itself from the silver and lazily flowed in my direction. I stretched out and, just as Beleth’s ‘he knows’ became a shrieking falsetto, the wisp wrapped around my hand and I was gone.
### I woke confused and with a distinct feeling of deja vu. I was lying on a couch, my head on a pillow, and I was covered by a blanket that was gloriously fluffy. It was daylight and I could hear the traffic outside, which meant it was morning rush hour. With the blanket clutched around my shoulders I swung around and sat up.
The flat remained as it was, with the addition of a large orange bucket that stood in the middle of the coffee table. I pulled it over by its handle. It was full of sweets, and there was a note which read “Please don’t go out, today.” It was signed with a flowery ‘M’ which was surrounded by hearts.
“He really loves me,” I murmured, and heard Kitty sigh.
“Oh, Brian. You have no idea,” she said as she put a cup of coffee on the table.
Like a kid, I’d been examining the haul in the bucket, but Kitty’s voice sounded different so I looked up at her, and blanched. No longer was she a small girl in a gingham dress. Now she was taller, older, and her face was haggard. Her thick raven hair that had reached down to her waist was now much shorter and included a white streak that ran to her ear. Self-consciously, she smiled.
“I’m still me, Brian. In case you were wondering.”
“Kitty… I…”
“I don’t know what to say?” She countered with sarcasm and in a voice that sounded exactly like my own. “I’m confused? What happened to you, Kitty, my sweet? WTF?”
“Yeah,” I tried to laugh, but it was a poor attempt. “All of those, and probably a lot more I can’t put a finger on right now. So what did happen to you, and where’s Marby?
“Wait… I had a dream. A really weird dream.”
“You did,” Kitty said, walking over and sitting next to me on the couch. “And you have that,” she said, pointing at my wrist.
I frowned. “What?”
“Oh, sorry, Marby must have put a glamor on it.” She reached over and touched my wrist with her finger. It tingled, and suddenly there was a tattoo. I blinked, but it didn’t vanish. I turned my wrist over and found that, like a watch strap, it went right around — though I couldn’t tell where it joined. The design was intricate, with three intertwining strings of symbols, one thick, two thin.
I’d never been into tattoos, or body piercings. It’s not that they revolted me, and in fact I’d seen some that I quite liked. But I’d never wanted one myself. Jack and I had once met an old merchant seaman in a bar. He was in his late eighties and had tattoos covering both arms but, like his skin, they were wrinkled and faded with age. Now I had one on my wrist, and though I could cover it up by wearing a watch, I was still dismayed that it was there at all.
“What the fuck, Kitty?” I snapped. Why did Marby…”
“He didn’t,” Kitty said and tapped my forehead thrice with her finger. Memories came flooding back. Of Kitty silently fighting Yobba, the Fae sprite, across the table; Kitty grasping my wrist and asking for help; watching Beleth kicking Yobba in the head and decapitating Faranth.
I grasped my tattooed wrist with my other hand and closed my eyes as the tattoo pulsed with a friendly warmth. “The thick string is Marby, and you and I are the other two,” I said, opening my eyes and looking at her bowed head; waiting, waiting for her denial.
Finally, Kitty looked up, blinked, and wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “You are in a unique position, Brian,” she said. “You know far more about this world than most. You know Demons are a reality and not a myth, and you also know we are generally not what your religions paint us to be.” She licked her lips. “The large majority have given up the old ways. We live and love much as humans do, and we are, on the whole, peaceful.” Kitty got up and wandered into the kitchen. “Cup of tea?”
“Please,” I said, then laughed at the absurdity of it all. I followed her into the kitchen where I found her looking into the sink. “I feel like I should be really angry, Kitty,” I said, putting on the kettle and taking two mugs out of the cupboard. “But I’m not. This… tattoo is somehow calming me. It’s weird, but I can feel Marby. And, I can feel you too.”
“It’s my fault,” Kitty said, putting a teabag in each mug. “When I was fighting that sprite I took power from you without asking, and then I begged a link and you gave it to me without explanation.”
“A link? Is that what it was?”
“Yes. If you hadn’t collapsed when you did you’d have seen Marby as angry as I’ve ever seen him. He forbade me my gingham dress!” Kitty wailed, picking up the kettle and filling the mugs; the smell of tea permeated the kitchen.
“I’ll talk to him,” I said.
“Oh, Brian!” Kitty sniffed, “You silly boy. You don’t understand. Marby wanted you safe from Beleth’s rage. It’s what I am here for; I am your protector. He was angry when he found I’d used your innate power to best Yobba, and incandescent when I told him of the link we forged… and then...” Kitty sobbed, “Then I sent you dream walking.
“I thought it would help. I thought we’d find out where Beleth and his legions were. But, in your parlance ‘two wrongs don’t make a right.’ Marby’s going to kill me when he finds out.”
“No he’s not, Kitty,” I said, giving her a brief hug. “Besides, it really didn’t seem like a dream.” I put the tea bags in the bin, added a little milk to each mug, then handed one to Kitty. We leant companionably against the worktop, blowing and sipping. “You know, right at the end I prayed to be rescued.”
“Yes, of course I know,” Kitty said absently. “The silver ring allowed me to pull you out.”
“So… you were the finger of mist I touched?”
“Mmm.”
“And it was all… real?”
“Of course it was real, Brian. You don’t send a dream-walker into a dream, do you. That would be pretty pointless. But the fact of the matter is that Beleth’s whereabouts are still unknown. Telling Marby ‘Beleth’s in a cave somewhere,’ doesn’t cut it.”
“He’s at Ygranath and guesting with the Tylwyth Teg,” I said smugly, and watched Kitty’s eyes get huge and round. Then she squealed, hugged me, and ran out of the kitchen.
“Back in a mo’,” she said. “Alala is the only one who can get a message to Marbeth.” The front door slammed and I heard her running downstairs. I took my tea, went back to the couch and sat down. I glanced down at my tattoo, opened my senses to it and felt it thrumming peacefully in my head.
Everything was changing, and I hoped it was for the better. I took a sip of tea and closed my eyes.
### 'All Hallows Eve' by Camy With huge thanks to my editor, Mr.C. Marbeth's sigil courtesy of S.L. MacGregor Mathers and Aleister Crowley, CC BY-SA 4.0 ***** Feedback would really be appreciated!
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© Camy - all rights reserved
Written in October 2021.
Any mistakes are mine, and mine alone.
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