I set the bottle into the depression and tilt it so it doesn’t wobble and the opening faces the entrance to the tomb. I draw a circle around it in the dirt with my foot, unscrew the cap and set it aside. Finally, I pour salt into the circle, and add a couple of drops of blood from my thumb.
I can’t see the ghost inside, but I can feel him. Small, insignificant, scared. I kinda feel sorry for him. I don’t even know his name. Probably feels like an eternity in there. Trapped with nothing to do but bang around against the glass like a fish in a tiny aquarium. Suck it up, pal. Things are tough all over.
Normally I wouldn’t have to go through this much trouble. But I need to set it for bigger game than just a ghost, and using my own magic to bait and set the trap might just be a really bad idea. This way I only have to tap a little bit and this small ritual does the rest.
“One makeshift spirit bottle half-filled with the finest Russian spirits a gulag chain gang ever had the misfortune to drink.”
She bends down to look at the bottle. “If it works, it’ll suck in all the demons?”
“That’s the idea.”
“What if it doesn’t?”
“Then we won’t have anything to worry about again ever. But don’t worry. It’ll work just fine.”
The trap set, I turn my attention back to the door. There’s a space in the carving of Mictlantecuhtli’s mouth. It’s not large, but it’s deep. Deep enough for me to shove the marble into it and seat it firmly. The marble’s keyed to me, so it won’t just go off if I drop it.
“Might want to stand back,” I say. We both get behind a column of quartz about ten feet away. I’ve been pretty close to these things when they went off, but I don’t want to take a chance that the blast won’t kill us, too. Maybe I’m paranoid, but these things can leave a hell of a mess. I prime and trigger it with a thought.
A tremendous flash fills the cavern as the marble explodes. When the blast fades Tabitha starts to look around the edge of the column and I pull her back. I learned the hard way that the show’s not over yet.
A sound of rising wind punches through the air with a sonic boom that rattles my teeth. Dirt, dust, anything that isn’t nailed down in this section of the road gets pulled in like a black hole to end with a muffled pop. I can feel the force tugging at my clothes, shifting the quartz column we’ve sheltered behind.
The wind and noise die down. I give it another minute and venture a peek around the column at the stone slab.
“Well, shit.” Nothing. Not even a scratch.
The fifteen feet or so of ground in front of the door is polished clean. All the dust and dirt and crap got sucked into the blast. The only thing left is the spirit bottle and the circle of blooded salt. The spell binding it will keep it in place against anything short of a hurricane.
“There’s got to be another way to open it,” Tabitha says. “Maybe together we can push it aside?”
I’m out of ideas. If Gabriela’s exploding marble trick can’t put a dent in it, I don’t see what else I’ve got that might. “I appreciate the sentiment, but I need to get in there and this is the only way in. I clearly can’t blow it up. I can’t roll a twenty-ton stone slab out of the way on my own. Even with you helping I don’t see it happening. There’s only one way to do this. It’s locked. I’ve got the key.”
“Let me try,” she says. “Our powers are similar. Even the ones we’ve inherited. Maybe it will open for me.”
“Be my guest.”
She steps up to the slab, hand hovering just over its surface and stops. “What happens after you kill him?” she says.
“You know what happens.”
She nods. “I’m going to have to stop you.”
“Thanks for the reminder, Se?ora.”
“Goddammit, Eric,” she says. “I’m not Santa Muerte, all right?” She taps the side of her head. “I have a piece of her inside me, that’s all. I have my own thoughts and my own feelings. I believe she’s right and she’s doing what she needs to. I’m not her goddamn puppet.”
“Careful there, Pinocchio, your nose is growing.”
“Oh, fuck you.” Tabitha reaches up to the slab, fingers resting lightly on the stone. She closes her eyes and a soft radiance grows from inside her to an intense white light. I can see her bones, organs. It’s like she’s burning from the inside out. She takes her fingers from the stone, then slams them hard against it, unleashing all that built up energy into one massive strike.
Two things happen. The first is that Tabitha gets blown back into the road, hitting the dirt and skidding a good five feet before coming to a stop. The second is that the door doesn’t open.
Tabitha stands, shaking dirt out of her hair. Aside from some burn marks on her clothes she looks fine. She brushes more dirt from her clothes.
“It didn’t work at all, did it?” she says.
“Not even a little.”
“You’re sure you don’t have some magical crowbar in that bag?”
“I wish.”
“Shit. Just be careful, then,” she says. “Please?”
“If I were the careful sort we wouldn’t be here in the first place. Stay behind the bottle. Once this thing opens up those demons are gonna pour out like a burst pipe. And, uh, if any of them get past it, might want to duck.”