Al had me drive further down University avenue, toward the place from which the street got its name. I had gone maybe ten of the thirteen blocks toward the familiar territory of academia before he had me stop and park again, this time on Old Vine street. Whistling, he got out of the vehicle and went right into a building that had been given every non-magical form of protection a hardware store had to offer. The windows and the doors were covered in criss-crossing metal that looked like fishnet under the vertical stripes of solid, iron bars. I could barely tell what the neon signs inside said. I did not want to venture into such a forbidding place, so I stayed in the car with the engine running. I had no idea such a horrible-looking neighborhood existed, nestled this close to the university. The apartments above had been boarded up, probably since before the Turn. There was an old brownstone school building across the street, also looking as if it had been abandoned and left to slowly crumble into nothing, with a padlocked, chain link fence surrounding the cracked parking lot and a sign warning trespassers away. The entire block looked condemned.
Al slid merrily back into the car a brown paper bag clutched to his middle that clinked with the sound of full glass bottles when he sat. I pushed my frizzing hair out of my face in a weary gesture and asked, "Where to, next, boss?"
"Make a u-turn," he commanded, carefully placing his bag of 'goodies' behind my seat on the floorboard.
I checked both ways and pulled the maneuver off with a minimum of fuss. There was no one around to see me do it, anyway. "What was that place?" I asked, not sure if I wanted to know.
"That was a liquor store. Staggerlee's, if you must know."
"And where are we going now?"
"The supermarket, of course. Drink your latte before it gets cold."
I drove to a stop sign, relieved to note that there were more cars on the street in this direction. I was beginning to see some familiar sights, although most of the storefronts had changed. A building done in black paint and silver flashing had the remnants of a stripped-out sign, proclaiming the place to be Skincraft before they'd moved to the more fashionable shopping district on Ludlow avenue. I had gotten my pack tattoo at the other location. I realized that he was having me drive down what was commonly known as Short Vine, a little strip of road blocked off on the far end by a plaza of shops at the foot of a steep decline from Calhoun, running parallel to the actual Vine Street. Word was, you could take Vine from downtown Cincinnati all the way north through Columbus to Cleveland, but no one dared make that drive. There were actual chasms in the pavement outside the cities in the abandoned rural areas, and things lurked out there that even a demon had cause to be afraid of.
I stopped at another sign, then pulled forward beyond Bogarts and Sudsy Malone's. I had made one of my first tags as a runner at Sudsy's. I could remember the smell of stale beer and bar nuts mixing with the scent of the washing machine detergent, bleach, and fabric softener from the laundromat/bar. Nostalgia reared its head briefly. I coasted past the Cubbard and the little dive bar almost at the end of the street. Without Al telling me where to go, I flipped on my left turn signal and coasted to a stop when the street ended in a beige stone wall that was the outside of the supermarket. I turned left onto Corey, then made an immediate right into the parking lot, slowing to a crawl so as not to scrape the nose of my car on the sharp incline of the entrance from the metal grille at the bottom that functioned to catch the rainwater run-off from the elevated lot.
I scanned about for a parking space and sighed as I realized the lot was stuffed. I scored the spot that a grandma in an old pontiac inched her way out of, peering over the dash through the gap left by the steering wheel. I clicked the button on my seatbelt and let the reel make the metal clip fly and hit the window. I slid smoothly out of the car while Al did the same. A tingle of everafter made me glance back inside the car, to the backseat where the bottles had been. Suddenly, the bag with the booze was gone. Al had hidden it with an illusionary curse.
"No need to give the thieves incentive," Al answered my unspoken question with a shrug.
I noticed that Bite-me-Betty was still missing from my dashboard and shook my head. "Not that they need much."
"What?" he muttered, and fell into step with me as I bravely crossed the parking lot, dodging runaway shopping carts and the taxis pulling into the fire lane at the entrance of the building.
Grocery shopping with Al was a bewildering experience. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason to the things he put in the cart. He insisted we go up and down every aisle, as he did his best impression of a four-year-old with a bad case of the gimmes. I could't complain, because I wasn't the one footing the bill for the excursion, although I had to tamp down the urge to ask him where he got all the cash.
When we laid everything on the conveyor at the checkout, the cashier had an odd look on her face. As I watched her ring up the marshmallows, gummi weres, prime-cut steaks, chunky monkey ice cream, magic shell topping, bungee cords, a propane torch, a tape measure, a new pair of sunglasses, a romance novel, a fashion magazine, cucumbers, carrots, bananas, ginger, horseradish, a pound of colby jack, a pound of swiss, a pound of oysters, and frozen cocktail shrimp followed by bottle after bottle of Redi whip, I realized that our shopping list was downright suggestive, not to mention bizarre. It had me thinking back to that trip Jenks and I took up to Mackinaw, when he took that curse to make himself big and did everything in his power to make the locals think we were a swinging couple with kinky tastes. She did a double-take at my smile of fond remembrance, which might have had a bit of a wicked glint to it.
Al (still looking exactly like Pierce) just grinned and paid for it all, again with cash, and took the receipt and his change with a wink to the bag boy. He pushed the cart out with a cheery wave and we went out into the chilly air of the parking lot to load everything into the trunk. I unlocked the car and pointedly wheeled the empty shopping cart to the corral, handing out disapproving looks to the guy who was about to leave his parked in the middle of a parking space next to his pickup truck and Al alike, who had been ready to do the same. I smiled a vindicated little smile as I slid into my seat and watched the guy push his cart the rest of the way to the corral with a red face.
I started my station wagon and strapped in. When my eyes returned to the front, the new sunglasses were hovering in front of my nose, the ear guard dangling from Al's fingers.
"Uh, thanks, Al, but I don't wear sunglasses at night. No sun."
"Just try them on," he insisted.
I shrugged and slid them onto my face. "How do they look?" I asked, turning back to him and twirling a lock of my hair around a finger sarcastically.
"Look for yourself," he said, flipping my visor down to reveal the lighted vanity mirror as the pickup truck's engine roared to life. Suddenly, the interior of the car was lit with blaring intensity as the pickup's headlights blared on. Geez, did he leave his brights on all the time or what? The pickup idled for thirty seconds while it dawned on me that Al had seen this coming and had acted to protect my night vision under the guise of trying on my new sunglasses. Even better, I looked great in them.
The pickup's tires squealed as its driver tore out of the lot in a fit of pique. I just watched him go with a strange twisting feeling in my gut.
"Al, did you know he was going to do that?" I asked, turning to my bizarre shopping companion with a worried frown. I could barely make out the features of his Pierce disguise, as the sunglasses were still on my face and the dimmer lighting of the parking lot wasn't nearly enough to warrant eye protection.
He reached over and slipped the glasses up onto the top of my head. His expression was unreadable as he considered what to tell me. My heart made a loud thump as the tension settled into being without a sound between us. "It feels odd," he remarked almost to himself, "that I keep finding myself trying to protect you without thinking about it." I swallowed at the lump that formed in my throat. He still hadn't answered my question, but I figured that I knew the answer, any which way.
"Self-preservation seems more your style," I said, having to strain to maintain a light tone, almost shoving the words out of me.
"Hmm," he grunted noncommittally. "You wouldn't know this, but demons have a protective streak a mile wide for those we care about. It's not often, any more, that we give any one the chance to become important to us. It's especially strong when a male is protecting a female. It's a survival instinct, I believe, and nothing more. Still, it rankles, having my will hijacked by evolution."
"Are you telling me that you, Algiarept, a demon and broker of familiars to the everafter, have fallen victim to white knight syndrome?" I found the entire concept to be mind-numbingly oxymoronic.
"Well, when you put it that way," he sniffed in mock affront and pulled at the cuffs of his shirt, as if he still wore lace, "It does seem far-fetched. Must be someone I ate." His lips stretched wide over suddenly sharp teeth in a thoroughly demonic grin, meant to take back some of his intimidating reputation.
It worked. I stifled a shudder, though I knew what he was doing, fixed my attention to the pavement in front of me and pulled out of my parking space. "Sometimes, Al, I don't understand you, even when I think I do."
"Then all is as it should be, Itchy Witch," he replied, satisfied.
I navigated the vehicle through the maze of the parking lot with great caution while I tried my best not to let my fear get the best of me. I should be afraid, dammit, it would be stupid to do otherwise. That was the problem. Being afraid of Al, however, meant that I must be afraid of myself. It occurred to me that he'd been trying to tell me that for almost as long as I'd known him in his own little ways. Appearing to me as myself, only with all the marks of a true demon, was one of those ways.
I considered the notion, rolling it around in my head until the uncomfortable idea rang true. I felt my denial, my beautiful illusions, wash from me in an icy rush. The barriers my mind had set up to protect my fragile little ego came down with the feeling of a ton of bricks being dropped on my head. It was just as crushing, and just as painful. Great. Just great. I really was terrified of myself, of what I could do and what I would become. I felt a tear snake its way down my cheek as I drove aimlessly without Al's instructions. He was as quiet and lost in thought as I was.
I jolted myself out of my maudlin thoughts as I found us back at the coffeehouse. I snuck a glance at Al, who seemed oblivious to everything except whatever dark thoughts were causing him to scowl to himself. I took that moment of his inattention to swipe away the tear that had could betray me. I parked in a spot next to the rear of the building, gripped the steering wheel and took a deep breath. So my worldview had just shifted in an instant. So what? It had happened before and I had survived it. I was good at adapting to change. Ivy had told me I was too good. But things just kept shifting around me and I had to stay abreast of it all if I was going to stay sane.
According to Ivy, I was a veritable factory of change. I could come to grips with this new truth, and wrestle its ass into submission. I contented myself with the knowledge that demons feared nothing and no one, aside from other demons, perhaps. Newt was universally feared. She was a demoness, so it came with the territory. Therefore, since I was a demoness, I could be universally feared. To demons and most of the rest of the world, healthy fear was known as respect. I could live with that kind of respect.
I squared my jaw and willed myself to take back the power of my new self-knowledge. It took a minute or two, but all the pieces began sliding back into place in my head. There was a very big difference between what I could be and what I was going to be. I left the question of 'should be' alone for the moment. I had already decided to stop worrying about should. The only conscience I needed to follow was my own, and I had a very strong conscience. Whenever I found myself in a moral dilemma, it had never steered me completely wrong, just a little sideways from where I had envisioned I'd be. I was the final arbiter of my fate. I was strong enough to keep it that way. No one was going to make me a victim. Never again would I be at someone else's whim.
I took a good, long look at my teacher, who was staring right back at me. "What furious thoughts are running through your head right now, Rachel?" he wondered aloud, bemusement transforming Pierce's features.
"I need you to promise me something," I told him levelly.
"And you will trust me to keep it?" he smirked.
"About something this important? Yes. I'll trust you to keep your word."
His smirk dissolved, his face mirroring the serious look on my own. "Very well, then. What do you need of me?"
I took a deep breath and let it out. "I need you to teach me everything you know, everything I can do. No holding back for fear I will one day be a threat to you."
He flinched visibly. "You've already almost killed me once. What assurance will I get that you won't use it all against me?"
"I promise, Al. I promise that I will never use it against you, so long as you don't try to kill me or any of my friends ever again."
"And if one of them should try to kill me first?" I knew he was talking about Pierce.
"If you're acting in self-defense," I said levelly, "then it's their funeral. I can't take responsibility for the stupidity of others. Nor should you."
"Why, Rachel, I do believe that's the most enlightened thing I've ever heard you say. We have a deal. May I ask what has brought about such a shift to your stance?"
"All knowledge is worth having," I shrugged.
"Knowledge is power," he agreed. "Power is definitely worth having."
"How soon can we start?"
"There's no reason we can't give it a go this very evening. My place or yours?" He must not have been able to stop himself from making that sound suggestive.
"Yours, but I want coffee first."
He clapped his hands and rubbed them together vigorously. "Well, then. Let's not dally about in the car all night."
Al rushed us in and out of the Highland, a hurried sense of purpose to his pace. He high-handedly took over the car once again, getting us back into the Hollows in record time. I kept glancing in the rearview, watching for flashing lights, but we never even saw a cruiser the whole way back to my church. As soon as I parked and got out of the vehicle, Bis came flying off the steeple and into my waiting arms.
All the lines in the city blazed into my consciousness. I smiled at the feel of my own familiar line out back, determined to give the bond between me and Bis the chance I never would before. I had thought it was as bad and as simple as slavery, but now I knew that it was a symbiotic relationship. Bis wanted to be with me as much as I liked having him around. My change-of-mind might have come from waking up multiple days to find Bis curled up asleep at the foot of my bed, despite his predilection for high perches. I found it comforting and sweet… in a weird sort of way. I think the last straw was when I woke up to find him and Rex curled up around each other on Halloween. He must have done that on purpose, because it was too cute for words and my heart positively melted on the spot.
I wore him like a leather stole to the backyard, relishing his warmth as the night was positively chilly. Al walked beside me in companionable silence, giving me time to chat with Bis about where we'd gone and what was in the bags we were toting along. He complemented my new shades as we arrived at the line in the yard.
I had a distinct sense of deja vous as Al held out a hand for me to take. I had the good sense to slip the bags onto my wrist before reaching out my own.
The instant we made contact, we were spinning off back to the everafter.
a/n: So there we have it. You've all been so kind in reviewing me and I know you've been howling for more fun in the everafter. I promise, I'll get to it in the next chapter.
Next up: More Al and Rachel, more instruction in the art of demon magic, and the first hint of something momentous to come