Autumn Bones

It’s surprising what an affirmation from a millennia-old monster can do for your self-esteem; and I don’t use the word monster lightly. The truth is, Lurine was a monster by her own admission. In a way, so was I. And it was good to be reminded of it.

Feeling a little better about tomorrow’s prospects, I stopped by Sinclair’s after his last tour was done for the day.

Jojo the joe-pye weed fairy was lurking outside his place, huddled under the juniper bush, clutching her slingshot. She looked weary and bedraggled, a brownish cast to her green skin, the purple clumps of her hair going to seed. It was late in the season for a wildflower fairy like her to be out and about. Usually, they vanished by this time, hibernating or taking to the hollow hills or whatever it was that nature elementals did during the winter.

“I come in peace, Jojo,” I said, eyeing the slingshot. “This is business.”

“Yes, I know.” Although she didn’t insult me, she summoned the energy to cast a disdainful look in my direction. “Someone must needs keep a vigil.”

“Are you expecting the duppy to show up here?” I asked her. “Do you know something I don’t know?”

“Like as not.” Jojo bared her teeth in a pointed grimace. “But not about the spirits of the mortal dead, no.” Her grip on the slingshot tightened. “I would fain keep him from harm, ’tis all.”

“Okay, then,” I said. “Be careful.”

Inside, Sinclair promised to distribute hammers and nails to all the members of the coven and assured me that they had a phone tree in place and were prepared to convene on a moment’s notice at the first sighting of his grandfather’s duppy.

“They won’t be able to help with the hammering thing if that happens, though,” he warned me. “They’ll need to form a spirit circle around him.”

“That’s okay,” I said. “I’m just trying to get as many people armed and ready as possible. God knows, we could be overrun by ghosts before Grandpa Morgan decides to make his grand entrance. We might need all the help we can get.”

Sinclair nodded at the silver acorn whistle hanging around my neck. “Have you thought about . . . ?”

“Summoning the Oak King?” I touched the gleaming metal. “I don’t think this is something even he can help with, Sinclair. The fey don’t wield influence over the dead. Although Jojo’s determined to try,” I added. “She’s out there with her slingshot. Says she would fain keep you from harm.”

He smiled tiredly. “Poor thing. She’s been dogging my footsteps ever since it happened.”

“She’s been dogging your footsteps ever since before it happened,” I pointed out.

“True.”

The front door opened to admit Jen and a tall, lanky, good-looking guy in corduroy pants, a cable-knit fisherman’s sweater, and a chestnut-colored suede jacket. Even given the fact that the jacket was draped over his shoulder to accommodate the cast on his left forearm, it took me a couple of takes to recognize him.

“Lee?”

“Oh, hi, Daisy!” He grinned. The Velcro landing strip of beard was gone from his chin and he had a new haircut. He still had the steel hoops in his earlobes, but now they contributed a mild hint of subversiveness. He looked surprisingly good, in a heroin-chic-meets-Abercrombie-&-Fitch sort of way. “So what’s up? Are we on the verge of a zombie apocalypse?”

Clearly, I’d been distracted. I shot Jen a WTF, girlfriend? look. She shot me a We’ll talk later look in return.

“Um, yeah,” I said belatedly. “I mean . . . I don’t know. I hope not, but we’re on the verge of something, that’s for sure.”

“You’re recruiting ghostbusters?” Jen set down a shopping bag and picked up one of the hammers, hefting it. “Cool. I’m in.”

“Those are for the coven,” I said without thinking. “Not you.”

“Why not?” Her voice turned cool, but the hurt registered in her brown eyes. “I’m not good enough to help?”

I could have kicked myself. “No, I didn’t mean that! But they’ve got spells and magic and stuff to protect them.”

“You don’t.”

“No, but—” I sighed. “Jen, if you really want to help, the biggest thing you could do is convince Brandon and his friends to call off the Easties vs. Townies fight. That would be huge. The fewer kids out there I have to worry about, the better.”

“Fine,” she said promptly. “Actually, I’ve already talked to him about it. Now can I be a ghostbuster?”

“You did say we might need all the help we could get,” Sinclair reminded me. Lee didn’t say anything, glancing back and forth between us. Lee was a pretty smart guy.

“I just don’t want to put you at risk,” I said to Jen.

She smiled wryly. “Look, Daise, I know I’m the Xander in your Scooby Gang. But at least Xander could hammer a nail. So can I. And I promise, whatever happens, I won’t freak out. Let me help?”

I hesitated, then nodded. “Deal.”

Forty-five

As if to mock my sense of impending doom, Halloween day dawned bright and clear and unseasonably warm.

By noon, the festivities in the park were in full swing.

The sky overhead was that deep, vivid blue that you sometimes get in October in Michigan. A light breeze ruffled the river, but the thermometer registered seventy-four degrees. A band played in the gazebo. Grown-ups danced and drank beer. Kids with jack-o’-lanterns and black cats with arched backs painted on their cheeks laughed and shrieked, chasing one another over the grass, bobbing for apples, burying their faces in pies donated by Pomona Orchards, rolling pumpkins for prizes.

“I feel kind of silly now,” Jen muttered to me. She was wearing an old carpenter’s apron she’d appropriated from her father at some point in time, nails in the front pocket, hammer slung through a loop.

“I can live with silly.” I was sporting dauda-dagr on my hip and I had the spirit lantern tucked under my arm. As far as I was concerned, “silly” was a luxury that meant everything was quiet and calm. Ken Levitt was present in uniform representing the Pemkowet PD—Cody was on road patrol until later that evening—and he had a hammer and nails, too. Stefan’s second lieutenant, Rafe, was perched solitary on a motorcycle on the rise at the far end of the park, observing from a distance, his inhuman pallor hidden behind riding leathers and a helmet with a dark visor.

Sinclair was off on his tour bus route, but he was only a phone call and ten minutes away, tops. Sandra Sweddon, Mrs. Meyers, and Sheila Reston were all volunteering to help staff the festival.

So was my mom, which was a bit of a sticking point. Once it was clear that the event was going forward, she’d refused to back out of her commitment when I asked her. At least she’d promised to go home when the shindig in the park ended.

And right now, it looked like I was being an alarmist. If it meant we got through the next twelve hours without a catastrophe, that was okay with me, too.

I nudged Jen with my shoulder. “So tell me about you and Lee.”

She shrugged. “Nothing to tell.” I gave her a look. “Okay, okay! I talked him into letting me give him a makeover.”

“Good job.”

“I know, right?” Jen couldn’t resist a quick satisfied smirk. “He’s got a good frame for clothes.”

“So . . . would you ever?” I asked her.

“Date him?” She started to grimace, then caught herself. “Seriously, I don’t know, Daise. I mean, there’s a part of me that thinks, hey, why not? He cleans up sort of cute, he’s really smart, and a fairly nice guy once you