Free In the Blood by Nancy A. Collins Page B

an ant farm in his underwear. He ran through the mental exercises for blocking ambient emotions Sonja had taught him before they left the house that evening, and the horde of invisible ants disappeared.
    "It appears you're not well liked around here."
    She shot him a glance over her shoulder. "Get used to it. Most humans have an instinctual dislike of Pretenders-and sensitives, for that matter."
    Palmer recalled his own immediate, gut-level reaction to Renfield and winced.
    "You've used that word before: Pretenders. What does it mean?"
    "Ever read Lovecraft?"
    "Back in high school. Why?"
    "Remember that stuff about Cthulhu, the Elder Gods and the Old Ones? How mankind is only a recent development, as far as the earth is concerned, and that hideous giant outer space monsters used to rule the world back before the dinosaurs, and how giant ugly nameless horrors are just sitting around on their tentacles, waiting for when the time is ripe to take over the world?"
    "Yeah."
    "Well, it's kind of like that."
    "I don't think I want to know any more."
    "Too late for that. But showing's easier than telling. I can tell you anything I want.
    Whether it's true or not-well, that's up to you to decide. But when you see something, can actually smell its breath and body odor, well, that's a different thing entirely. Those who know call it witnessing."
    "Where are we going?" Palmer was starting to feel itchy again, but it had nothing to do with telepathic intrusion.
    "Do you believe in hell?"
    Palmer blinked, taken aback by the change in subject matter. "If you mean the Christian hell, where people are tortured by guys with pitchforks and pointy ears-no, I don't believe in that."
    "Me neither. But I do believe in demons. And that's where we're going-to make a deal with a devil."
    "You mean Satan?"
    "Are you kidding? He's way too expensive. Doesn't deal for anything less than souls.
    No, the guy I go to is reasonably priced."

    Create PDF files without this message by purchasing novaPDF printer ( http://www.novapdf.com ) Palmer decided it might be better if he stopped asking questions.

    The Monastery was a small, dark bar that had, in a fit of perversity, decided on an ecclesiastical decor. The booths lining the wall had once been pews. Fragments of stained glass, salvaged from various desanctified churches, had been soldered together to create a disjointed jigsaw collage on display in the skylight. Plaster saints and icons in varying states of decay were scattered about. A black Madonna and Child, whether darkened by exposure to too many votive candles or Vatican II's attempt at "modernizing" its appeal, stared at the Monastery's denizen's with flat, robin's egg blue eyes from its perch over the liquor supply. A battered Rockola jukebox played scratchy Rolling Stones records.
    With its cheap prices, slovenly service and haphazard attitude toward hygiene, it was obvious that the Monastery did not cater to the hordes of Visa-packing tourists the Quarter thrived on. A prostitute sat at the bar, sipping a sloe gin fizz while the bartender cleaned a highball glass with a grimy rag. Both watched Palmer and Sonja Blue intently as they entered.
    "What if the guy you're looking for isn't here?" Palmer whispered hopefully.
    "He's here, all right. He's always here."
    Sonja's connection was seated in the back booth, where the shadows were the deepest. Sonja's lips curled into a thin, cold smile. "Hello, Malfeis."
    The demon returned her smile, licking his lips with a forked tongue. "Ah, Sonja!
    Please, call me Mai! There is no need to stand on formalities."
    Palmer frowned. Whatever he'd been expecting, it definitely wasn't a teenaged boy dressed in faded denims and a Surf or Die T-shirt. A skateboard, its belly painted to depict an eyeball wreathed in Day-Glo flames, leaned against the converted pew.
    "Kid, are you old enough to be in this place?"
    Malfeis lifted an upswept eyebrow in amusement. "Who's the renfield, Sonja?"
    "My name's not Renfield."