the makeup of the gathering. He would have known if other demons were present. Be it love or infatuation. Strong feelings account for missteps and Lyric was blissfully ignorant of the fact that he’d just made a big one.
So far as others were concerned, even sensitive elementals, Quicksilver was part of the wall; close enough to listen without proof that he was there. He needed to conclude his business quickly so that he could follow the pair when they left. After all, encounters with female demons didn’t come along every millennium. If she was an actual single female, she could make him more powerful than a god as his mate. On the other hand, if he decided he didn’t like her very much, he could sell her for an eternity of favors. If he could figure out how one went about capturing a female demon. Tricky that.
CHAPTER SIX Goin’ to California
Lyric wasn’t surprised to be summoned by Gray. The opposite, no call, no agreement, would have been a surprise.
Of course, there was the obligatory harbinger of summoning. The demon version of reading the name of a caller on a screen before answering. Naturally, Lyric’s harbinger was musical. While sitting in the club with Shivaun, the singer, who’d been singing torch songs in the extra-dimensional vein of Billie Holiday, Peggy Lee, and Julie London, suddenly stopped. She turned to the accompanists, said something the audience couldn’t hear, and began a new song. “People Are Strange”.
Lyric laughed out loud partly because of the comedy of that song being performed in a club with no humans and partly because it was a Doors song. Gray’s audition for Lyric, though neither knew it was an audition at the time, had been a Doors song.
It wasn’t the first time he’d given summoning privilege to a human, but he didn’t do it often and he’d never done it for a reason as exciting as adding new music to his favorite cache. Being summoned was uncomfortable enough to make a demon extremely irritable. And irritable demons often become spoilers of good human-elemental relations. Such incidents had been known to inspire tales that persisted for eons, eventually being reimagined as religion or myth.
The music demon was old enough and experienced enough to be able to control the anger usually associated with a summons. Gray’d said he wanted three things. Proof that his sister was indeed rich before he left. A week to take his sister and niece to Disneyworld before he ‘left’. And a promise that the demon would keep an eye on what remained of the Darby family after he was gone. Lyric was happy to oblige.
According to plan, after Disneyworld, Gray would tell his sister that he didn’t want to insert himself into her good fortune, but that it had always been his dream to climb Mount Everest. She would be dubious, of course, since he’d never shown the slightest interest in rock climbing. Not even so much as rappelling down the nearby cliffs that rose above the Frio River. But he’d be convincing. She’d fund the venture which would pay a guide to tell an emotional tale about the tragic accident. He'd report that Gray slipped through one of the icy fissures that never thaw, from which bodies cannot be recovered.
Shivaun asked to accompany Lyric on the relocation excursion. Again, he was happy to oblige. ‘Activating’ his project while courting the lovely demon? At the same time? Win. Win.
Haight-Ashbury
A note from Lyric: A handful of very sensitive humans identified the phenomenon of ley lines. And a couple of those were brave enough to tell others what they thought. Speaking up when standing just outside the herd is always risky business. It’s been known to result in grants being withdrawn. It’s also been known to result in humans tying others to vertical poles rising from bonfires and setting them ablaze.
Since reception of new facts or a new perspective isn’t widely welcomed in the best of circumstances, messengers are inherently courageous.
A few of these unusual people recognized a different ‘feeling’ coming from the earth at certain points. They knew the torch and pitchfork crowd would have an easier time with their theories if they claimed the lines were marvelous, positive energy. Humans like to cubbyhole everything as good or bad.
Ley lines are intersections of mystical, or magical, convergences that can just as easily be home to chaos and anarchy as peace. That was one of the great ironies. Just as the ‘peace movement’ was fueled by forces