So there. That was my righteous Southern woman declaration for the month, ala Julia Sugarbaker (bless her heart and rest her soul).

That's when I spotted Bonville. He was in a black robe but he wasn't masked. His robe was all silky and smooth, while the others looked like dime-store knock offs. I laid Dags down on the ground, also taking note of the huge-a.s.s pentagram beneath us on a wood floor, and stood up.

Oddly enough I felt--pretty good.

Bonville held up his right hand. "I command you, oh demon, to be cast out of this circle so that we may continue our ritual."

I don't know what he expected to happen--but it didn't. The others looked a little flummoxed as well. And though I sensed power behind the casting--I sensed it was missing something.

Ah! The book!

He didn't have his big book anymore, 'cause Nona and Rhonda did.

Abruptly the Archer appeared in front me, between myself and Bonville. And I wasn't the only one that could see him. Everyone could. In the bas.e.m.e.nt like this, under all the candle-light, he looked pretty impressive.

"She's wearing bunny slippers," someone muttered.

Yes I am--wanna make something of it?

Mental Note: bunny slippers are cool.

I also noticed TC had the book and the doc.u.ments in his hands. Now how did he get hold of those?

He held the doc.u.ments up, and Bonville looked a little bit more than frightened. "You recognize these, Allard? The doc.u.ments you made all of these people sign?"

All of these people--I looked at the group. The Cruorem. They were all looking at each other.

Allard Bonville nodded. "I do. They gave me their loyalty--"

"No, Allard," TC's voice boomed. "You sold their souls so that you could become immortal."

Well that was a lowering of the boom. I could feel a huge mix of anger, confusion, disbelief and fear running rampant around the room. Oh Mr. Bonville was in trouble now. Neener nee.

"No--what are you talking about? My wife--"

"And what happened to those souls that you were tired of?" TC looked like he was having a good time here--but I was waiting for all these Shadow Folk to come like he told me they would. "You pushed them physically into the Abysmal plane, making them unpalatable for your lord and master."

I frowned. Huh?

Bonville had his hands out. "But I was only doing what she told me to do. Please, don't take the promise from me now--I'll die."

TC smiled. And I didn't like that smile.

"Then are you finally willing to offer her to me?"

Huh? Who?

Bonville looked terrified. "She'll kill me--I can't do that. She'll kill me!"

She? Who was she?

Why did I have the feeling I'd been lied to--again? d.a.m.n TC!

The book in TC's hand abruptly took flight and floated to Bonville. It opened and the pages flipped until it remained still and hovered before his face. "Bring her to me."

"No--" Bonville shook his head. "I only wanted to summon her to find this," he nodded to the book floating in front of him. "You don't need her--"

"Bring. Her. To. Me."

The command in that voice made my head spin.

Bonville looked at T.C. "But the Shadows...he'll send the Shadows..."

"Do it."

What the f.u.c.king h.e.l.l was going on-- And abruptly the whole room's temperature dropped. Bonville was reciting something from the book. There was a swirl inside the circle and every one of the people there were still in their places. I could tell from their expressions--what I could see--they were powerless to move.

Shadows appeared everywhere in the circle. Short, then, tall--but none over three feet in height. Some slithered and some crawled, they walked and they flew! And they flew right at me as well as TC.

"They're coming..." someone whispered.

"We should run!"

"Don't stop, Allard," TC commanded again. "That's why I brought the Wraith."

I guessed this was my cue and so I reached out to the nearest one and-- Poof. It disappeared in the same gold powder poof as the one I'd touched in the closet.

I felt a slight surge of power as it evaporated and I liked it. I touched another one and the same thing happened. I touched all of them I could, feeling my backbone expand, and my feet nearly lifted from the ground. This wasn't like when I ate that lady in the hospital--or like when I leeched off of Rhonda that time.

This was different.

It was much more fulfilling in a base sort of way.

"What--what is it doing?" Bonville called out.

"The Wraith is taking in the Abysmal that you tainted."

"It wasn't my fault! I only did what--" and then he stopped. "She's coming! They're coming!"

The Shadows were gone and I felt as light and as high as a freak'n kite. Man--what rush. I kinda thought on one level I was eating garbage--but man what a great feeling garbage gave me. And even though on some level I knew they were souls, I saw them as tainted souls. Souls twisted by the Abysmal plane.

Yeah...the plane with the flowers and daisies?

Mental Note: okay--something wasn't right here, Zoe.

Dags lay on his back, his arms out in a crucifix position palms up. The circles on his palms glowed brighter and brighter until a white column of light shot out of each palm. Both columns widened until they were three foot wide and six foot high. When the light cleared there were two women standing to either side of Dags' palms.

One woman was in her later years, though I couldn't tell how old from looking at her. I just got a sense of maturity. Her hair was white as it fell around her shoulders and down her back.

The other woman was much younger, with darker hair and a very unpleasant look on her face. I recognized her from pictures I'd seen of her in her apartment. Maureen?

TC turned at that moment and pointed to the white-haired woman. "Betrayer!"

Okay. That's it. I'm confused. I thought dude was the Betrayer. I threw my hands into the air and then popped them on my hips. h.e.l.lo?

The white haired woman laughed. "Did you honestly think I wanted immortality with you inside of me?"

Mental Note: !!!

"I wanted it on my own--with no contracts and none of your hidden agendas," the woman pointed at me. "Have you told her the truth? Does she know what she just did?"

Uh oh.

I realized just then the white haired woman was Alice Bonville. And she was the head of the Cruorem. Not her husband.

Wait...what did I just do to those Shadow People? Was that a bad thing?

The Archer glanced at me--and somehow I could tell this through his shades. "She doesn't need to know because she's not a part of this."

"You made her a part of this, Azreal," Alice smiled. "Maureen, please tell the young Wraith what it is she's just consumed?"

Maureen turned to look at me. That's about the time I realized both of these women were naked. Oh my. Their light was so bright from within them it was hard to distinguish definition.

"The Shadows you took--the Guardians that have protected us since our trans.m.u.tation--were pure Abysmal essence."

What-- "Shadow People as you call them, are nothing more than the primordial essence of the Abysmal Plane. Elementals if you like. It is possible to create corrupted Shadow People by leaving a living body in the Abysmal Plane, which is what Nora Wynne did when she tossed all those members into the Abysmal to dissolve the Cruorem--but that's not what those were. Those were the minions sent to prevent the Archer from cheating the Phantasm," she pointed a long slender finger at me. "You've just consumed over twenty of these Abysmal Elementals."

TC was standing between me and the woman. His shades vanished and I was looking into his solid white eyes. "She's lying. They were corrupt souls."

I didn't believe him. Why should I believe him? He wasn't feeling the untainted euphoria I was feeling, the surge of power that ran along my backbone and into my soul. I thought of Daniel lying immobile in that hospital bed, about him hanging by a thread on that fire-escape, about the raw hatred I'd had for the Archer on that rooftop. And now he'd screwed things up again--and a man lay unmoving in front of me again--possibly dying?

And so it all came to a head just then as I reached out and shoved him away from me.

He blew backwards and smashed into Bonville.

Maureen smiled, the expression of distaste vanishing. "By consuming them I'm afraid you've over-saturated yourself with Abysmal essence. Archer's plan was for you to destroy them all and he believed that would open the path for him to steal the contracts and take the souls for himself."

TC picked himself off the floor. "That's a lie!"

Alice laughed. "Oh Archer. When you came to me with the offer of immortality--you seemed so sincere, and he always does, doesn't he?" she looked at me. I noticed her eyes were milky white. So were Maureen's. And I sort of knew they weren't human anymore. At least not in a physical sense.

Maureen smiled.

"Yes Zoe, he came to me, bent on joining with me. Because you see, I could do what you did before he touched you. I could leave my body and he wanted the same power from me he got from you. I never knew how he lost it--the truth of how. But I turned the tables on him. I discovered the existence of the Phantasm, and that is where my bid for immortality went. All I had to do was hide the book from Allard before he f.u.c.ked things completely up."

And then I got it--sort of. Why TC called her the betrayer. Because she betrayed him--but not in the deal--but to the Phantasm.

Alice nodded. "You understand, Miss Martinique? The Phantasm knew Archer was planning something, and it had something to do with my husband, the idiot. I was diagnosed with the first stages of dementia and Allard was all set to lock me away in an inst.i.tution and take the coven away from me.

"I retrieved the book after discovering his plan to become immortal by using the Grimoire. Too late I'd discovered he tried marking the four souls," she looked down at Dags. "This fourth soul was different. A conduit of untapped power. So I sent Maureen after him to look over him and protect him. Only Allard was a bit better at being devious."

I nodded my head slowly. He had you killed. You and Maureen. And all those other people?

She shook her head. "No. I wish it'd been that simple. Allard had copied a few of the spells out of the book and used them on me, Maureen, and thirteen innocent souls. You'll never find our bodies."

I stepped forward. He transported you into the Abysmal Plane...but he didn't make you Shadow People?

"No, he didn't," Maureen said and I could sense sadness in her. "Our bodies dissolved but the Phantasm saved us, remembering our deal."

Alice spoke. "So here we are, neither shadow nor human, neither dead or alive," she looked down at the unconscious bartender. "And now we are grounded--locked--to the doorways on this man's hands. Because my husband," and she glared at him. "Didn't know what he was doing when he summoned us."

Wait...are you saying you...you're stuck to Dags?

"Allard used him as the conduit, only he got the spell wrong just now," Maureen said. "This was his original intention because he wanted the book back and wanted to interrogate us to get its location. And the Archer wanted the contracts."

I sighed. So where are the contracts?

Alice held up her hand and the contracts I'd seen Archer appear with were now in her hand. She held them up above her head. "Cruorem--you gave your loyalty to me over a decade ago. It was to me you pledged your obeyance. Tonight, I release you of that oath."

I looked at TC. He was coming toward us. "Give me those."

Why? So you can be all powerful again? I don't think so.

TC lunged out to grab them from Alice--but I was faster. I was juiced up to my eyeb.a.l.l.s with Abysmal essence. I was beside Alice, grabbed them and then handed them to Maureen--I don't know why but it seemed like the right thing to do.

"Thank you," she said and abruptly the doc.u.ments burned away.

TC threw his head back and screamed.

And one by one the people in the robes vanished.

I freaked out.

"They're not dead, but returned to their homes," Alice said. "They'll have a headache, and a faint memory of a bad dream. All of this is my fault initially, for believing the Archer. There's nothing I can do about the members that were destroyed in the failed attempt. Their souls are long gone into the Abysmal mist."

I frowned. Explain to me--Allard tried to bring you back but because somehow the ritual failed-- Alice sighed. "We're now bound to this boy. It was his unconscious power that realized what was happening and broke the connection that tried to pull us back into a physical existence that no longer wanted us."

All eyes turned down to Dags who lay oblivious on the floor. I noticed he wasn't looking so good either.

And then, that was you in the loft...the Shadow that showed me where the doc.u.ments were.

Maureen spoke up. "That was me. After seeing what Dags could do--we needed to secure your help." She looked down at Dags. "This wasn't supposed to happen. We wanted to remove the marks. To release him."

Alice nodded. "But now we're a part of the Guardian summoning."

You're Guardians? I thought he was a Guardian?

"We are Guardian familiars," Alice said. "Or that's the best I can do with it. We don't have free will over it, but we're a part of him. We protect him and those he summons us for. He has no memory of us--the spell works mostly on instinct."