embarrass.”
Due to unexpected motherboard meltdown a few months ago, we’d been forced to replace Mira’s old computer. Viljo had taken great pride and care in building this new monstrosity before us.
“But enough of that, down to business. Password?” He finally peered at his screen, eyes narrowing suspiciously. The wispy mustache he’d been trying to grow for the better part of a year looked like it might actually have enough hair now to warrant shaving. Or at least a good plucking.
“Viljo, you’re looking right at me. It’s me.” The new computer came with a shiny new Webcam. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that, yet. The improved technology did confirm that Viljo really was as pasty as I’d always thought, though, and that his dyed black hair was even stringier.
“Do not care, new protocols. Password?”
“Viljo, I’m going to come through this computer and kick your ass.” Which was, oddly, my password. “And shouldn’t it be pass phrase ?”
“Password accepted. Hold on to your socks.” Viljo hit a few keys, and suddenly my computer screen blossomed into sights and sounds and colors not known to mortal man. Okay, not really, but that’s how he wanted me to feel about it.
I hunt-and-pecked my sign-in ID into the right fields and finally got logged into Grapevine, flipping to the ITINERARY tab. “I’m gonna be out of town for a few days, Vil, and nowhere near a computer.”
“Does Ivan know you’re going?”
“I mentioned it, a long time ago, but I doubt he remembers. That’s why I’m filling out the nice little form, right?” I was almost thirty-three years old. I was fully capable of leaving the house without “daddy’s” permission.
Don’t get me wrong. I have the utmost respect for Ivan Zelenko and the network of champions he has created out of nothing. Without Ivan’s knowledge and training, most of us would have been dead years ago. But I draw the line at letting him govern my “off hours.”
“Business or pleasure?”
“Pleasure, in theory. Camping trip with my buddies.”
The computer geek paused in his furious typing and blinked at me, owl-eyed. “Like… outside?”
“Yes, with the big glowing ball of death in the sky. Y’know, the sun?”
He snorted. “Now you are just making words up.”
I had to chuckle. I highly doubted that Viljo was as blatantly stereotypical as he pretended to be, but he still made me laugh with some of his nerd outrage. “I’m gonna be in your neck of the woods, actually. Just west of Fort Collins.” Viljo was hunkered down somewhere south of my impending vacation, near Pikes Peak last I knew.
“I will be sure to wave in your general direction, from safely within my tightly closed curtains.”
I finished updating my expected whereabouts-after last spring, I was damn lucky they didn’t want me to let them know when I went to piss-and hit SEND. “I should be back on Saturday. If I’m not, send in the cavalry.”
“Will do.” Viljo grumbled to himself. “Not like I am doing anything else at the moment.”
Work technically done, I settled in the comfy chair for a chat. “Still slow?”
“Not a single contract since April, across the board. Nothing for me to do but sit here and polish my connectors.”
That sounded… never mind how that sounded. “There have been dead spells before though, right?”
Viljo shook his head, his matte black hair falling down into his eyes until he pushed it back irritably. “Not like this. And even the two contracts in April were negotiated long before the incident. So really, there have been no new ones since…”
“The incident.” That’s what we were calling it now. He really meant since Miguel and Guy died. Two champions down in the space of a month, and it would have been three if it hadn’t been for major luck, and (I was fully willing to admit) Esteban’s timely arrival. Six months since I banished the thing that stalked them, killed them. Tried to kill me. And not a peep out of a demon in all that time. Axel didn’t count.
“What’s Ivan got to say about it?” I hadn’t heard from our revered leader-ish person in a couple of months, and even when I did talk to him, he kept things pretty close to the vest. It was just his way.
The geek shook his head, frowning pensively. “He does not say much, anymore. I think he is worried, but I do not know about what.”
Yeah, I got the same feeling from the old man, but trying to get him to talk was like hugging a rabid wolverine. You could do it, but you wouldn’t like what came next. “Maybe I’ll try and poke him a little, when I get back.”
“Would you? I would appreciate that.” There was very real relief in Viljo’s voice, and it occurred to me suddenly just how very devoted the little geek was to our Ivan. “Is Esteban going with you on your vacation?”
“No, he’s staying here to hold down the fort.” I glanced back at the sleeping lump in the bed, trying to decide if he was really asleep, or just faking. I finally settled on faking. No one really snored that evenly. “Listen, if he tries to log in a contract while I’m gone, send someone to find me, okay? He’s not ready yet.” Yeah, kid, hear that? I’m always watching you. I felt rather pleased with myself at being two steps ahead of the kid.
“I do not know who I would send, but I will do something.” Windows on my computer screen started shutting down on their own. Viljo was obviously done with our conversation.
A thought occurred to me, belatedly. “Hey, Vil?” He looked up. “Have the Knights Stuck-up-idus had any contracts?”
The geek pursed his lips thoughtfully. “I have not talked to Father Gregory in some months. I do not know. I will try to find out if you think it is important?”
“Yeah. Just… call it morbid curiosity.” The Order of St. Silvius-holy knights operating in the name of a Catholic saint who did not exist-wasn’t what you’d call friendly with us, the more secular champions. Still, if prodded, they’d usually share information. I wondered if they were having the same dry spell as the rest of us.
“Have a good trip, Jesse.”
“Thanks.” The Grapevine window shut down, redirecting me to some site with nauseatingly cute kittens and poorly spelled captions. I sat in the semidarkness for a few more moments, scratching at the beard stubble on my chin.
Esteban’s sheets rustled as he rolled over to look in my direction. “What does it mean, that no one has been asked for a contract?”
I shrugged my shoulders at the little faker. “Dunno. Maybe nothing. Maybe we scared them all off.” Fat chance.
Esteban knew that as well as I did. The kid’s family had been fighting demons for more generations than I could even imagine. Between his mom and Ivan, we had at our fingertips an amazing catalogue of demon knowledge, and at no point in history had they all just… vanished. I’d asked.
“Maybe you shouldn’t go. Maybe you should stay here.”
“Why, you scared?” I had to grin at the instant frown I got from him. He was so easy to mess with.
“Someone should be here to take care of Miss Mira, and Annabelle.”
“That’s what you’re for, isn’t it?” I stood up, crossing the few steps to roughly mess up his hair. “You take care of them for me, Esteban. Like the big bad champion I know you’re gonna be someday.” Someday would be never, if I got my way, but the grave duty seemed to appease him. “And since you’re awake, roll out. We’re gonna go do forms.”
He grumbled and retreated under his pillow again, but while I gathered up the weapons, he clambered out of bed and met me out in the front yard. Something else we’d worked on over the summer, the idea that he could expect lessons at any time of the day or night, rain or shine, sleepy or not.
Sometimes, I wondered what my neighbors must think of us. There we were at oh-dark-thirty, out in the front yard waving blades around like a couple of lunatics, the kid in just his pajama pants and bare feet despite the early-morning chill.
Esteban’s weapon of choice was a machete, passed down through his family for… Well, I had no idea how long. Suffice to say that he had at least two brothers and a father who had used it before him. He had two younger brothers waiting to take it up when the inevitable happened.
The metal of his blade was dark with age and use, only the edge gleaming brightly where he kept it honed to a razor-sharp finish. The grip had been wrapped in leather so long that the original layers had rotted away and just been covered over with more, sweat and grime melting it into a hard finish. It was a blade with personality, with life
