Chapter 9 ~ A Most Unfortunate Accident

  Lucy sits across from Dr. Brighton at a small coffee shop on the outskirts of Robin. She listens as they talk in hushed tones, the professor explaining why Lucy needs to be more careful about who she tells about the imps.

  "You don't understand, Lucy," Dr. Brighton says. Lucy notices how tightly she grips her coffee mug—so tightly Lucy thinks it might crack. "You can't tell people about what is happening right now."

  "Well—why not?" Lucy asks, smiling. She's ordered her favorite: a white peppermint mocha. She's thankful Dr. Brighton has treated her, since she emptied what little remained on her debit card last night buying salt.

  "No one will believe us. But it's not only that—it's more dangerous than that."

  "Well... what do you mean?" Lucy asks, leaning forward slightly.

  Lucy watches Dr. Brighton take a sip of coffee and lower her head. She senses the professor's hesitation, like she's trying to protect Lucy from something.

  "Unfortunately, Lucy, getting out of this isn't as simple as just convincing everyone that imps exist and that they need to resist their temptations."

  "Well. Why not?"

  "Because when people are experiencing something like Robin is now—mental illness, aggression, and violence—they will turn to those who pointed it out in the first place and they will make them the enemy. Not the imps."

  Lucy nods, listening intently. She feels like a real student now, not just in academics but in something truly important.

  "So," Dr. Brighton continues, "if we attract too much attention to ourselves trying to warn others about what's going on, the attention will come to us as a target and not the other way around."

  Lucy thinks about this for a moment. "So... are you saying it's like the Salem Witch Trials? We end up being the witches that get burned? Not the actual problems that are happening in that community at that time."

  "Yes, Lucy, that's precisely right."

  Lucy nods and takes a sip of her mocha. She lets the puffy foam sit on her upper lip, feeling oddly childish in this serious situation. "So how do we stop them if we can't tell people that they are real? I tried to read about it in your book but the imp took the pages and he ate them!"

  "Wow," Dr. Brighton says, looking genuinely surprised.

  "Yes, he crumpled them up and ate them. I saw what you wrote about demons, though," Lucy explains, remembering the terrifying moment when the creature had shown her the stolen pages before swallowing them.

  Dr. Brighton nods. "Well that's all good. Sadly with imps, it's very hard to clear an imp infestation. Really, it's only been done a few times. You need to attract the imps towards one type of object. Something of purity. And then you need to entrap them."

  "Like the stone?" Lucy asks, connecting the dots.

  "Exactly. And that's why I suspect that what started this was something to do with the stone. Maybe someone broke it or ground it up? But that pure gold, that center of purity is what entrapped these demons in the first place and that's the only way we can stop them. Is to trap them again."

  Lucy nods, processing this information. "So we need gold?"

  "It's not quite that simple. If the legend is true that the stone really held one thousand souls then we need a lot more than just a little gold."

  Lucy shifts in her seat and sits on her hands, something she often does when excited or nervous. This is all so interesting, so beyond anything she'd imagined college would be. She'd pictured herself spending four years taking classes to become a history teacher or a writer, going on occasional birdwatching adventures with Otto, and graduating like everyone else. Never in her wildest dreams had she thought she'd be hunting demons.

  "Now, Lucy, I have to ask you something very important," Dr. Brighton says, looking directly into Lucy's eyes. Lucy feels the sunlight from the window making her blue eyes seem brighter. "Have you told anyone about the imps other than me?"

  Lucy grimaces slightly, feeling caught. "I mean. A few people."

  "Who?"

  "Well... my best friend Otto."

  "Okay... and what did he say?"

  "He doesn't believe me," Lucy admits, the memory still stinging a bit.

  "And who else?"

  Lucy hesitates. "Well... there was an incident at the grocery store last night and I told some police officers that Jim Johnson was being haunted by some imps."

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  She watches Dr. Brighton sigh and put her head in her hands. "You told the police?"

  "Yes... well they had already found Mr. Johnson. They were going to arrest him, but it wasn't his fault," Lucy explains, feeling defensive about her decision.

  Dr. Brighton reaches across the table and takes Lucy's small, freckled hand. Lucy feels the intensity in her grip.

  "Lucy, I have to be very serious and very frank with you moving forward. You cannot talk to the police. Do you understand me? You cannot tell them what is going on or they WILL turn on you. Do you understand?"

  "But—" Lucy begins to protest.

  "Do you understand?" Dr. Brighton's eyebrows are furrowed now, her grip on Lucy's hand tightening. "I cannot work with you if you don't."

  Lucy nods and lets out a deep sigh, feeling chastened. "Okay. I understand."

  "Good. Now. I will tell you how we put an end to this whole thing."

  As Dr. Brighton speaks, Lucy finds herself slipping into a stupor. Despite trying to focus on the professor's words, her mind wanders. She feels a thrill of excitement about this adventure! Lucy has never really had big ambitions for her future, but maybe this is it. Maybe she will become a demonologist like Dr. Brighton, traveling the world to investigate the abnormal and strange.

  "Do you see what I'm saying?" Dr. Brighton asks, pulling Lucy back to reality.

  Lucy blinks rapidly. "Um. Yes. Yes I do."

  "Great. If that's the case, let's do what we can in the next few days to find out how we can stop Pumpkin Fest and try and get our hands on enough pure gold to attract these imps to one place," Dr. Brighton says. "We have to do this quickly and efficiently before it spreads any faster."

  "Aye aye, captain!" Lucy replies with a smile, feeling a mix of excitement and trepidation.

  Dr. Brighton stands up, grabbing her coffee. "Do you need a ride home?"

  "If you don't mind," Lucy says. "It's getting kind of dark and I don't really like walking around at night anymore."

  Dr. Brighton laughs. "Yeah. Me neither."

  Lucy follows Dr. Brighton to her station wagon, climbing into the passenger seat. The fifteen-minute drive back to campus feels much longer as the sun begins to set. Darkness makes Lucy anxious now. Even though there is no evidence that imps are more powerful at night, she can't shake the feeling that shadows aren't safe anymore.

  ~

  As they drive, Lucy listens intently to Dr. Brighton's stories about other imp infestations in Germany, California, and Vietnam. She is particularly fascinated when the professor describes her trip to China in the late eighties.

  "They were everywhere, Lucy," Dr. Brighton says, her voice distant with memory. "It was just a sea of red and black imps running around causing mass chaos and destruction."

  "And no one could see them?" Lucy asks, trying to imagine the horror of it.

  "Not that I could tell. It was so bad I had no choice but to leave. I am just one person, I can't stop an infestation that is that bad or that prevalent. Especially during those times. I was mostly just there for research. I was only just a few years older than you are now."

  Lucy notices Dr. Brighton's attention drifting, her eyes taking on a faraway look as the car begins to drift over the center line. Headlights approach rapidly.

  "DR. BRIGHTON!" Lucy screams, lunging for the wheel and turning it toward her. Her heart hammers as the oncoming car blasts its horn—a long, terrifying honkkkkkk!

  Dr. Brighton snaps back to attention. "Oh my gosh, Lucy, I'm so sorry. I don't know what's gotten into me."

  Through the side mirror, Lucy sees the truck they'd nearly hit making a U-turn on the quiet state route. Her stomach drops as it speeds toward them, getting so close she can almost feel its presence on their bumper.

  "Dr. Brighton, what's going on?" Lucy asks, watching in horror as the truck swerves behind them, high beams flashing, horn blaring.

  "Shit," Dr. Brighton mutters.

  Lucy feels the station wagon accelerate, pressing her back into her seat as Dr. Brighton navigates the windy country roads. In the mirror, Lucy sees the truck trying to pass them on the left—but there are lights approaching from the opposite direction!

  "Oh my God!" Lucy screams, covering her eyes and bracing for impact, certain they are about to die.

  Through her fingers, she glimpses the truck pull alongside them, its driver—a large man in his fifties—screaming and cursing with his window down. Lucy has never seen such rage on a person's face. The man's words are lost in the rush of wind, but his gestures make his meaning clear.

  When Dr. Brighton slams on the brakes, Lucy jerks forward against her seatbelt. They watch as the truck tries but fails to stop, colliding head-on with an Oldsmobile minivan coming around the sharp corner.

  The silence in the station wagon is absolute. Lucy stares at the crash, her mind struggling to process what has just happened.

  "We have to go see if he's okay!" Lucy says, her instinct to help overwhelming her fear.

  Dr. Brighton pulls over, and they watch as smoke begins to rise from the crushed vehicles. When flames appear, Lucy reaches for her seatbelt.

  "We have to help them! What if it wasn't their fault? What if there was an imp that caused it."

  "Lucy! NO." Dr. Brighton's hand on Lucy's leg feels like an anchor.

  "But! But!"

  Before Lucy can finish, a loud bang silences her as the cars explode. She watches, horrified, as fire and smoke billow upward, embers floating through the night air like deadly fireflies.

  "We have to at least get help!" Lucy insists. "Do you have a cell phone?"

  Dr. Brighton shakes her head. Lucy feels the station wagon inch forward as they approach the accident site, looking for survivors, though Lucy knows it is unlikely anyone has survived that explosion.

  That's when she notices a figure standing behind the truck bed. At first, Lucy thinks it might be a child—it is about the size of a young boy. It stands watching the burning truck without moving.

  Lucy hears Dr. Brighton roll down her window. "Are you okay?" she calls over the crackling fire.

  When the figure turns, Lucy's blood goes cold. Those bright yellow eyes... As it walks toward their car, the firelight reveals its burned, blistered red skin. But Lucy recognizes it instantly.

  "That's the imp I killed last night. Or at least I thought I did," she says, her voice barely above a whisper. She recognizes the three thick black lines around its neck, like a necklace.

  "How did you try and kill it?" Dr. Brighton asks, putting the car in gear and pulling away before the creature can reach them.

  "With salt," Lucy admits.

  Lucy sees Dr. Brighton's eyes widen. "Lucy, why would you do that?"

  "Because your book... it said that the best way to ward off a demon is with salt," Lucy explains, suddenly feeling very foolish.

  "That's to prevent it from penetrating your house. You can't just throw it at them! You just burned an imp and you probably pissed it off quite a good deal."

  Lucy's stomach sinks. "What do you mean I pissed it off?"

  "What I mean is that you made it mad and it's going to try and make you pay for the pain that you caused it."

  As they drive away into the darkness, Lucy feels a growing dread. This isn't a game or an exciting adventure anymore. She's made an enemy—one that knows her, can find her, and now wants revenge.