Chapter 6

Mark nodded. He sniffed the air, catching the scent of fried meat — rich, greasy, mouthwatering. The red-haired waitress was passing by with a tray balanced on one arm, three plates steaming with pork chops surrounded by piles of fries, vegetables, and something that looked like gravy.

Mark let out a low breath. He drained his beer in a few long swallows.

Then his right hand started to itch.

Not a normal itch. Something deep — under the skin, like tiny bugs crawling through his flesh. The sensation spread from his palm upward, creeping past the edge of the bandage and continuing toward his shoulder. He scratched at it through the fabric, hard, but the itch only got worse.

Then his left palm started.

Mark’s breath quickened. The bugs were crawling up both arms now, slow and deliberate, like they had all the time in the world.

“Mark?” Silas leaned across the table and touched the detective’s shoulder.

The priest’s fingers felt like ice.

“Just some ointment they put on,” Mark muttered, not looking at him. “Now it itches like a bastard.” He scratched harder. “Damn it — I am going to kill that medic.”

The itch was unbearable now. He wanted to tear the bandages off, dig his nails into his own flesh until he drew blood, just to make it stop.

Silas stood up. He stepped into the red-haired waitress’s path, one hand lightly touching her waist, steering her toward the back corner. “Excuse me, miss. My friend needs to calm his nerves. Urgently. The same as me — whiskey. Twice.”

The waitress did not argue. She glanced at Mark — at his hands, at his face — and walked to the back corner.

There was no proper bar. Just a small counter, barely three feet wide, with a couple of dusty bottles lined up on a shelf behind it. A row of shot glasses sat upside down on a napkin. The whole setup looked like an afterthought — something for the rare evening customer who wanted a drink with their pie.

The waitress poured two shots from a bottle of amber liquid — whiskey, probably cheap — and carried them back on a small tray.

Silas took one of the tiny glasses and held it to Mark’s lips. “Quickly,” he said. “All at once. It will help.”

“I am not supposed to drink,” Mark said through clenched teeth. “This is not nerves.”

“Drink. Now.”

Mark frowned, but he did not argue. He had stopped arguing with this man hours ago.

The alcohol hit his throat like a ball of ice — cold and hard — then exploded in his stomach. The cold spread through his insides, splashing into his limbs, his chest, his head.

And the itch faded.

Not all at once. Slowly. Like something retreating back into the dark. Mark sat there, breathing hard, waiting for it to come back.

It did not.

Silas watched him the whole time. His dark eyes were fixed on Mark’s face, studying him with an intensity that felt almost clinical. Cold. Like a doctor examining a patient who did not know how sick he really was.

“Something new,” Mark said, scratching at his bandage. “Never happened before. My head just used to get heavy. And in the morning, I wanted to die for the first half hour — until I took a pill.”

Silas let out a nervous laugh. He looked tense. Agitated. The same way he had looked in the captain’s office, reciting Latin, slowly closing in on a possessed Peter.

Mark grimaced. “Stop staring at me. I am not a gold coin.”

“That is true.” Silas laughed — a normal laugh this time — and sat back down. “Tomorrow we look for the book. Can you wake up by ten?”

“Easily, I have to be at work at eight.” Mark paused. “By the way — what was written in the church? There were more symbols than the ones on my paper.”

Silas chewed his lip, put a cigarette in his mouth, and lit it. He took his time.

“Do I have to pull every word out of you with pliers?” Mark snapped, staring at that already-familiar suspicious owl-like squint. “I will get a subpoena. You can tell it all at the precinct.”

“Terrifying.” Silas took a long drag. “They performed a ritual of possession.”

“And for us mere mortals?” Mark asked, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “What does that mean in plain English?”

“There is an exorcism ritual,” Silas said, “and there is a ritual for forcibly implanting a demon into a body.”

“Into Peter?”

Silas shook his head. His curly bangs fell over his eyes. “No. Your friend had a very weak entity inside him.”

“Weak?” Mark’s voice rose.

“I did not even have to perform a proper exorcism,” Silas said. “Words were enough. The entity was so weak — it just fled on its own. That is good. There is a chance he will recover completely.” He tapped ash onto the floor. “But when it comes to the ritual of possession — the real one — the entity will not just get scared and run. That kind of bait usually attracts demons from deeper circles. And once the ritual is complete, the soul is permanently displaced by the entity. Nothing can bring it back. At best, you can destroy the entity — but the body remains an empty shell and dies.” He paused. “That kind of ritual requires a sacrifice — a priest — blood, and those inscriptions. The blood has to be plentiful. It does not clot, does not dry. It smears easily. But it gives the ritual the power it needs.”

Mark rubbed his face. “I feel like a black magician out of a grandmother’s fairy tale.”

“That would be fun.” Silas’s smile was thin. “Unfortunately, we are in reality. We need to find the possessed person before he starts killing again.”

“Again?” Mark did not like the sound of that. A possessed person — a psycho, same difference — unpredictable. They needed to find Frederick’s book. Fast. Hope it led them somewhere.

“What happened to your colleagues,” Silas said, “was just an echo of the ritual. They were at the scene. They breathed the air.”

“So everyone who was there is going to start having these episodes?” Mark reached for his phone automatically, thinking of David.

“If they arrived at least five minutes before I did — yes.” Silas nodded. “Communion can prevent it. If they are in time. But the possessed person himself has not killed anyone since the ritual — not since the priest. That is why I cannot track him.”

“And this demon book will help you with that?”

“I am counting on it.” Silas rubbed his palms together — a nervous, chilly gesture. “We will check in the morning.”

“Honestly?” Mark set his phone down. “I am completely lost. You are either lying, or you are hiding half of what you know.”

Silas burst out laughing — loud, genuine, almost too loud for the diner. “More than half,” he managed, wiping his eyes. “But it is safer that way. I do not want you to actually think I am a complete psychopath. There are things worse than a maniac. A maniac is still human. This thing — it has intelligence. Instinct. A mission from its master. Until we understand what that mission is, we cannot do anything.” He sobered. “I really am counting on the book.”

Mark touched the gun under his jacket. He would rather count on that. A bullet stopped any maniac.

Silas smiled around his cigarette. “A bullet will not help. Even a blessed one. So we will have to take small steps.”

Mark barely remembered leaving the diner. Just fragments — the cold air hitting his face when he stepped outside, the red-haired waitress watching him from the window, Silas saying something — he could not remember what — and then walking away, disappearing into the dark.

The car keys were in his hand, but he knew he could not drive. Two shots of whiskey on top of everything else — the exhaustion, the burns, the sheer weight of the last two days — had hit him like a truck. He had learned to drive half-conscious back in his wilder days, but this was different. His hands were shaking. His head was full of cotton.

He left the car in the diner’s parking lot and called a cab.

The ride home was a blur. The driver’s voice, tinny from the radio. The smell of stale coffee and air freshener. Streetlights sliding across the ceiling of the cab, one after another, like a broken strobe. Mark rested his forehead against the cold window and closed his eyes.

He did not remember paying. Did not remember walking up the stairs. Only flashes — the creak of a door, the buzz of the intercom, the metallic taste of exhaustion on his tongue.

When he got to his apartment, the window was wide open. An icy wind had risen outside, cutting through the summer heat like a blade. The room was freezing. He did not bother closing it.

He stripped off his clothes, threw them on the floor, and pulled off his boots. His arms were wrapped from wrist to elbow — thick bandages over burned skin. The medic had said it was not deep, just surface, but it covered everything below the sleeves. Mark did not bother changing the dressing. He fell face-first into the pillow and was asleep in seconds.

The bandages on his right arm had darkened. A yellowish-pink stain spread across the inside, from wrist to elbow.

Somewhere in the alley, a dog howled.

A lone streetlamp carved a small circle of light out of the darkness. Inside that circle stood a short man — curly hair, a prominent nose — crouched by the hood of a parked car. A cigarette dangled from his lips. His hand moved quickly, drawing something on the asphalt with a piece of chalk.