Practical Demonkeeping

there’s a seam on one of these, but I can’t grip it. Come open it.”
    “In a minute,” Rachel said. She helped Amanda get to her feet. “Let’s go in the house, Mrs. Elliot. It’s all over. You can go home as soon as you feel up to it.”
    Rachel led Amanda through the front door, holding her by the shoulders. The old woman seemed dazed and listless. Rachel was afraid she would drop any second, but when Amanda saw Effrom tied to the bed, she shrugged off Rachel’s support and went to him.
    “ Effrom .” She sat on the bed and stroked his bald head.
    “Well, wife,” Effrom said, “I hope you’re happy. You go gallivanting all over the state and you see what happens? I get kidnapped by invisible moon-men. I hope you had a good trip—I can’t even feel my hands anymore. Probably gangrene. They’ll probably have to cut them off.”
    “I’m sorry, Effrom .” Amanda turned to Rachel. “Can I untie him, please?”
    The pleading in her eyes almost broke Rachel’s heart. She had never felt so cruel. She nodded. “You can go now. I’m sorry it had to be this way.”
    “Open this,” Catch said. He was tapping a candlestick on Rachel’s shoulder.
    While Amanda untied Effrom’s wrists and ankles and rubbed them to restore the circulation, Rachel examined one of the candlesticks. She gave it a quick twist and it unscrewed at the seam. From the weight of it, Rachel would have never guessed that it was hollow. As she unscrewed it, she noticed that the threads were gold. That accounted for the extra weight. Whoever had made the candlesticks had gone to great lengths to conceal the hollow interior.
    The two pieces separated. A piece of parchment was tightly rolled inside. Rachel placed the base of the candlestick on the table, slid out the yellow tube of parchment, and slowly began to unroll it. The parchment crackled, and the edges flaked away as it unrolled. Rachel felt her pulse increase as the first few letters appeared. When half the page was revealed, her excitement was replaced with anxiety.
    “We may be in trouble,” she said.
    “Why?” Catch’s voice emanated from a spot only inches away from her face.
    “I can’t read this; it’s in some foreign language—Greek, I think. Can you read Greek?”
    “I can’t read at all,” Catch said. “Open the other candlestick. Maybe what we need is in there.
    Rachel picked up the other candlestick and turned it in her hands. “There’s no seam on this one.”
    “Look for one; it might be hidden,” the demon said.
    Rachel went to the kitchen area of the cabin and got a knife from the silverware drawer to scrape away the silver. Amanda was helping Effrom get to his feet, urging him across the room.
    Rachel found the seam and worked the knife into it. “I’ve got it.” She unscrewed the candlestick and pulled out a second parchment.
    “Can you read this one?” Catch said.
    “No. This one’s in Greek, too. We’ll have to get it translated. I don’t even know anyone who reads Greek.”
    “Travis,” Catch said.
    Amanda had Effrom almost to the door when she heard Travis’s name. “Is he still alive?” she asked.
    “For a while,” Catch said.
    “Who is this Travis?” Rachel asked. She was supposed to be the one in charge here, yet the old woman and the demon seemed to know more about what was going on than she did.
    “They can’t go,” Catch said.
    “Why? We have the invocation; we just need to get it translated. Let them go.”
    “No,” Catch said. “If they warn Travis, he will find a way to protect the girl.”
    “What girl?” Rachel felt as if she had walked into the middle of a plot-heavy mystery movie and no one was going to tell her what was happening.
    “We have to get the girl and hold her hostage until Travis translates the invocation.”
    “What girl?” Rachel repeated.
    “A waitress at the cafe in town. Her name is Jenny.”
    “Jenny Masterson? She’s a member of the coven. What does she have to do with this?”
    “Travis loves her.”
    “Who is Travis?”
    There was a pause. Rachel, Amanda, and Effrom all stared at empty air waiting for the answer.
    “He is my master,” Catch said.
    “This is really weird,” Rachel said.
    “You’re a little slow on the uptake, aren’t you, honey?” Effrom said.

29
RIVERA
    Right in the middle of the interrogation Detective Sergeant Alphonse Rivera had a vision. He saw himself behind the counter at Seven-Eleven, bagging microwave burritos and pumping