The Haunted Earth

circle. 'There!' she said, when she was done, beaming as if she'd created a work of art.

'Now, draw a smaller circle,' Brutus said. 'A foot and a half diameter, due north of the circle you just finished.'

'I don't see how this will get Jessie back,' she said.

'You'll see,' Brutus said.

She drew the second circle.

'You know what a pentagram is?' the hound asked.

'Sure.'

'Draw a pentagram inside each circle, with the points touching the circle walls.'

She needed a couple of minutes to do this, but when she was done, the pentagrams were tucked neatly inside the circles, never overlapping at any point, a detail Brutus had made sure of.

'Now,' he told her, 'light the seven black candles and the seven white.'

She did this, while he directed the placement of each taper. Then she placed the leather-bound Bible in the center of the largest circle and went to turn out the lights, like he said.

'What now?' she asked, as the glittering, orange candlelight cast eerie shadows about the room.

Brutus' eyes shone a brighter red than ever, magnified both by the darkness and the flickering flames. 'Come here and stand beside me in the largest circle, and don't step outside of it again until I tell you to.'

When she was beside him, she said, 'What in the hell are we doing, Brute?' He didn't like her nickname for him any more than he liked 'Blakesy' for Blake, but he didn't say anything. If she got mad and walked out on him, he'd have to rely on the robot for anything that needed hands, and he trusted Helena to keep her mouth shut, in court, more than he did that mechanical dodo.

'We're calling forth a demon,' he said.

'With magic?'

'That's right?'

'Chants and spells?'

'That's the sum of it, baby.'

She frowned. 'Why don't we just use the nether-world telephone?'

'Because that's legal,' Brutus said. 'And it doesn't give you any control over the demon; it only lets you talk to him.'

'Who are we calling forth?' she asked.

'Zeke Kanastorous.'

'That horrible little creep?'

'He's the one. He may know where they've taken Jessie.'

'And you want to have control over him, so you can force him to tell you. Is that it?' she asked.

'Helena, you're a genius.'

She stooped and ruffled his furry head, pressed his cold nose between her hefty breasts. 'I like you, too, Brute. Okay, then, let's get on with it.' She pulled away from him and sat down, cross-legged, like an Indian. 'I'm going to enjoy watching that little creep suffer.'

'So am I,' Brutus said.

For a time, they were both silent, letting the night settle down, the air grow still, the ethereal vibrations quieten.

The walls of the room appeared to draw closer as they meditated, and the darkness between the fourteen points of sputtering candle flame grew even more intense.

'Remain perfectly still,' Brutus said.

Helena didn't even nod in response.

Lowering his head, closing his fiery eyes, the hell hound began to chant in a low, monotonous voice, reciting the names of the places where human souls were said, sometimes, to rest in preparation for Judgment Day: Hell, Hades, The Pit, Satan's Antechamber, Limbo, Purgatory, The Black Grotto, and a hundred others. Next, he went through the names of the hundred most powerful demons in the Satanic hierarchy, from that list to a rigidly worded chant which he said in Latin.

Helena thought that the room was growing perceptively cooler, and she hugged herself for warmth, unconsciously shifting a bit closer to the hell hound.

'Kanastorous! Ezekial Kanastorous, answer me!' The hell hound's voice was a great, thundering command as he finished the chant and raised his head like a howling wolf.

In that same instant, before the echo of his cry had died away, the air inside the smaller circle, due north of them, seemed to shiver, to take on a vague phosphorescence.

'It's working!' Helena cried, slapping the hell hound on the back.

'Of course it is,' Brutus said.

Then Kanastorous was there: four feet tall, scaly, somewhat green, flicking his chartreuse tongue and looking anxiously about, bewildered. He caught sight of Brutus and Helena beyond the candle flames that separated them, and he said, 'What is going on here?'

'Just a little black magic,' Brutus said.

Kanastorous looked confused, then angry. He started forward but came to an abrupt halt, as if he had run into an Invisible brick wall, when he tried to step beyond the chalk barrier that Helena had drawn. He looked down at his feet and said, 'A pentagram?'

'Precisely,' Brutus said.

'But this is illegal!'

'Illegal, perhaps, but effective,' Brutus said.

'I'll see that you're given eternal rest for this!' the demon said, his face turning a darker green.

'You're in no position to threaten,' Brutus said. 'Your only choice is to be silent and answer only when spoken to.'

'Forget that, dogface,' the demon said. 'I have my rights, and I know what I can—'

The hell hound padded softly to the edge of the largest circle in which he and Helena were protected, and he blew out one of the seven black candles, leaving six black and seven white, disturbing the delicate balance between the spheres of magical influence.

Kanastorous jerked as if he had been struck by a whip, tottered back until his spurred heels came up against the chalk circle, then leaned forward, swaying dizzily.

'Is he in pain?' Helena asked.

'Some,' Brutus admitted.

'Good,' the woman said. 'If he hurt Blakesy in any way, he deserves every bit of it.'

'I'm an innocent pawn in all of this,' Zeke Kanastorous moaned, staring across the remaining candles at the hound.

'Ah, you've recovered sufficiently to talk,' Brutus said.

'You can't take your anger out on me. What could I do?' the demon asked. 'How could I stop them?'

'Stop who?' Brutus asked. 'Who has kidnapped Jessie Blake?'

'He hasn't been kidnapped,' Kanastorous said. He was holding his round, green stomach as if it hurt.

'You mean he's been killed and disposed of?' Helena asked, tense, her neck stiff, her jaw tight and fierce.

'No, no!' Kanastorous said. 'He's just been — well, put on ice.'

'Why?'

'To keep him out of the Tesserax affair.'

'What is the Tesserax affair?' Brutus asked.

'Oh, how should I know?' Kanastorous cried, still clutching his round gut with both hands, doubled over, blinking stupidly. 'Would you please light that candle again?'

'I'm out of matches,' Brutus said.

'That's a lie.'

Brutus did not reply.

'I'll have your supernatural neck for this!' the demon roared, his tongue flickering in and out, in and out like a snake that lived in his mouth.