Saint of Sinners Read online

  I hope they leave you alone.

  “Yeah.” I held him in the crook of my arm and used the other to pull off my backpack and drop it on the floor. I sat on the couch and Mew-Mew settled on my lap, still purring.

  I had an interesting day too.

  “Oh, really?”

  The Queen of Cats requested me at court. She wants me to run errands for her in the realms. Messages and things like that. I’m one of the few who can use all the Paths and I’ve met a lot of gods thanks to you. Mew-Mew rolled on his back and I rubbed his belly.

  “Nothing dangerous, right?” I hated the idea of him getting hurt.

  Says the person who took on Skoll, Fenrir, and the devil. No, nothing dangerous.

  “Good. You’ll have to tell me all about it, then. Unless they’re secret missions?”

  Some might be. He flicked his tail and gave me a mischievous look.

  “Secret Agent Mew-Mew?” I laughed.

  Chapter 6

  I was having such a good day. Really I was. After dinner I curled up on the couch with Mew-Mew to watch some TV. I felt the change in the room first, the sickening rush of power.

  Then my dad said, “Hello, Alex.”

  I jumped up and Mew-Mew took off, headed for the questionable safety of my bedroom. He knew the drill. I spun to face Satan, sick and scared and angry.

  He smiled. “Time to come home, you ungrateful little fuck.” He took a step toward me and reached out.

  Please let this still work. Please, please, please! I backed away from him. “I cast you out in the name of Jesus Christ.”

  He stopped, the smile fading into a frown. “Your little trick won’t work this time.”

  Lying. He’s lying. He just wants to scare you. I’d done this before, and knew he’d be back. I’d prepared myself. “I cast you out, back to Hell. In the name of Jesus Christ, my friend, I cast you out, you fucking piece of shit!” My voice got stronger and louder. Now I was walking forward and he was backing away, and holy fuck did he look pissed. “Get out, get out, get the fuck out!”

  Satan roared, and then he was gone.

  I stood there with my heart pounding and took a long shaky breath. The whole thing had lasted maybe a minute, but it brought all my fears rushing to the surface. Joshua’s blessing still worked; I could still kick my dad out. But how long would this last? I couldn’t count on it forever and I didn’t want to keep going through this. If he got hold of me before I could banish him, he could drag me to Hell where Joshua’s protection wouldn’t do jack shit.

  Is it safe? Mew-Mew asked from the bedroom.

  “Yeah. For now.”

  Flying was well and good, but I didn’t know how useful it’d be in a fight. My fire, ice, and telekinetic powers were strong, but they hadn’t done much damage to Satan in the past. One thing had—Animus. My sword had cut off his hand during our battle and might have done more if Satan hadn’t run away. I didn’t really know how to sword-fight, so I figured it was time to learn. Mew-Mew hurried into the room, and I picked him up for a reassuring hug.

  “I think I need to go back to Japan.”

  ***

  I wondered if I should go right after school on Friday, but I had those movie plans. If I blew them off they might think it was personal and I didn’t want to screw up my chance to make friends. And I wanted to see Hayley. So maybe after the movie.

  With Daddy’s little visit still fresh in my mind, I wanted to start training as soon as possible. I told myself a few days wouldn’t hurt and did my best to put it aside so I could focus on getting through my day.

  It seemed to take forever to get to lunch. This time I went down on my own and found the table. Hayley wasn’t there yet, but Casey was and he seemed thrilled to have me there. “Hey, Alex. Hayley said you’re coming to the movie tonight.”

  “Yep.” Today was a taco with questionable-looking meat and some crappy-ass lettuce. Maybe I should start bringing my own lunches.

  “Cool,” he said.

  “Do you need a ride or anything?” Lucia asked. “I have my parents’ car for the night. I’m picking up Casey and Hayley. I could get you too.”

  I was going to say no, that I could take a cab no problem, but the chance to ride with Hayley changed my mind. “Yeah, that would be great.” We exchanged cell numbers and I sent her a text with my address. This was so cool. I was going to a movie with friends from school, just like a normal teenager. No cemeteries, no weird stuff.

  Hayley slid into the spot across from me, saying hi to her friend. She looked over at me and smiled. “Hi, Alex.”

  “Hi,” I said, and fuckity-fuck I felt myself blushing again. I was all badass in front of the bullies, but with her I turned into a red-faced idiot. Why couldn’t I be all James Bond or something? I didn’t know what else to say to her, so I ended up staring at her like a fool for a few seconds. What the fuck was wrong with me? Finally I managed, “Oh, your friend is giving me a ride to the movie. I hope you don’t mind me riding with you.”

  “No, I don’t mind.” She looked down at her plate like something on it had just gotten really interesting.

  To avoid further idiocy, I turned to Casey. “So, are the jocks leaving you alone?”

  He nodded. “They keep giving me dirty looks, and a couple of them called me names behind my back, but they haven’t touched me or threatened me.”

  “Good.” I looked around at the rest of the table. “If they pick on any of you, let me know. Or if you hear about them picking on anybody else.”

  “Why you? Shouldn’t we let the teachers handle it?” Hayley asked.

  “Adults aren’t always the most reliable.” I thought about how the gods had all sat back instead of trying to prevent the end of the world. Well, a few of them had helped, but in small, sneaky ways. I didn’t really trust adults to get anything done. “If telling adults works, why are people still getting picked on?”

  “Good point, but what are you going to do?” Jayson asked.

  “Yeah, you can’t keep getting into fights. They’ll throw you out,” Hayley said.

  “I can find other ways of making them stop, trust me.” If I was sneaky about how I used my powers they wouldn’t know it was me. It might be fun to come up with different ways to torment them.

  “You’ve got to be full of shit, but you sure sound like you think you can do… whatever secret idea you have,” Casey said.

  I smiled. “Oh, I can do it.”

  “Are you gonna tell us what your idea is?”

  I shook my head. “I kinda like being mysterious.”

  “Dude, you are creepy,” Casey said.

  ***

  The end of the day couldn’t come fast enough. Finally the last bell set us free and I took the bus home. Mew-Mew wasn’t there when I walked in and I panicked. What if Satan had come while I was gone and done something to him? I looked through his eyes and called out to him. I got an image of the streaked colors of the Cats’ Paths.

  Sorry, I’m running a little late. I was on an errand for the Queen of Cats. I’m fine, he added.

  I sagged with relief and set my backpack down. A few minutes later he showed me he was home and I went to let him in. “You know, that might not be a bad idea—for you to run errands when I’m not home,” I told him as we got back to the apartment. “Satan could show up while I’m gone, and you don’t have Joshua’s protection.” The thought of him being hurt made me sick.

  Oh, I didn’t think about that, he said.

  “Yeah.” I picked him up and scratched him behind the ears. “So when I’m gone at the movie, you should go somewhere else.”

  Okay. I suppose I could go hang out at Court. All those soft beds and fresh fish. I guess I’ll survive. He looked up and flicked his tail.

  I laughed. “Yeah, sounds tough.”

  Lucia showed up at seven. I checked myself in the mirror one more time. What are you, a girl? We’ll be in the dark most of the time anyway. But I still wondered if I should’ve picked something with more co
lor. I had on black jeans and a black hoodie. My shirt was dark blue, at least. That counted as color. I shook my head and hurried out with Mew-Mew at my heels. At the front door he slipped out behind me and I waved at the car.

  Have fun, I told Mew-Mew.

  You too.

  “Hi!” I called as Casey opened the back door for me. After he slid back over to the far side, I got in.

  Hayley was in the front and she turned to give me a smile. “Hi.”

  “Hi.” I wanted to pull on my hood to hide my stupid face because I was blushing again. So was she, and I hoped that was a good sign. I chatted with Casey and managed not to embarrass myself too much on the ride there. We met up with the rest of the group at the theater and got some snacks.

  Jayson asked if he could share since he only had enough for a small pop. At the ass-rape prices, I wasn’t surprised. I whipped out my cash and told him to get anything he wanted and offered the same for everybody else.

  Loaded with unhealthy shit, we headed down the hall. “I thought you’d be poor and stuff,” Casey whispered, “having to pay rent and all that.”

  “It’s fine. I have some money put away.”

  He looked at me with a raised eyebrow, then shrugged.

  As we filed down the dark aisle, I tried to maneuver my way to get next to Hayley, but Alice was between us as she slipped down a row of seats. I ended up between her and Casey. Maybe that was for the best, since Casey was the one I was most comfortable with.

  This wasn’t the first time I’d been to a movie. I’d been to a few during the many times I’d run away from home; I’d even gone with my demigod friends once. It still felt special, though. Watching movies with friends was a normal thing to do. The movie wasn’t great, but it was entertaining enough. Afterward we went out for ice cream.

  The theater was part of a strip mall, so we walked down to the ice cream place and I offered to pay for everyone. A few of them protested, but I told them the same thing I’d told Casey. It used up all my cash, but I could just get more tomorrow.

  While we ate, I kept catching Hayley looking at me and she’d smile and say something, or smile and look away. I realized I was doing the same thing. I wanted to ask her if she liked me, but not with all these other people around. Then I worried that maybe she was just being nice. I was the new guy, and I’d stood up for her little brother, so maybe that was it.

  While we were walking back to the cars, Casey pulled me aside. “Dude,” he whispered. “Oh my God.”

  I blinked at him. “What?”

  “You like my sister.”

  “I…” I didn’t know how to respond to that. A denial tried to slip out of me, but that was a lie. But if I said yes, would it make him mad? Gross him out? Would he run and tell her? I swallowed and settled on, “What makes you think that?”

  Casey rolled his eyes. “The way you look at her. You’ve practically got cartoon hearts floating around your head.”

  “Is it that obvious?” Oops.

  “Oh yeah.” He smiled.

  “Damn it.”

  The others were getting far ahead of us, so he grabbed my sleeve and tugged me along. “Alex and Hayley, sittin’ in a tree.”

  “Shhh! Be quiet.” I shrugged him off, heart pounding. I looked ahead to see if anyone heard, but they kept walking and chatting, not looking back. Quietly, I asked, “Do you think she likes me back?”

  He covered his mouth to stifle a laugh. “Dude, she was giving you the exact same looks. I could ask her to make sure.” The one eyebrow I could see under his mop of hair waggled.

  “No, no. That’s okay.”

  “Are you gonna ask her out?”

  What if she says no? “Well… not right now. Please don’t say anything.” I could turn this kid into a messy splatter in two seconds, and here I was begging him not to tell his sister that I liked her. I did a literal face-palm and groaned. I hadn’t known playing normal would be so embarrassing.

  Chapter 7

  One of the kami in Japan had forged my sword from the bits Mew-Mew collected. It was made up of little pieces of power from ghosts and animals, and there was nothing else like it in the world. I went back to the cave where I’d gotten it a few months ago. Only a little over two months, and so much had changed.

  I took my shoes off at the entrance, the spot where the cave merged into another world. I made my way on stocking feet over the smooth floor, tempted to slide across it, but I resisted. I was here to ask for help, and I didn’t want to do anything to make the kami mad.

  A servant had gone ahead to announce me, and I waited outside the paper doors of an inner room. The servant came out. “He will see you.”

  “Thanks.” I gave the woman a little bow and went in.

  The kami had once been human and he appeared now in his human form, a middle-aged man in a house kimono. I gave him a deep bow. “Thank you for meeting with me.” I realized I didn’t know his name. Maybe that was intentional. Some spirits were funny about names.

  “It is an honor to meet with the one who saved the world.” He bowed in return. “What do you wish of me?”

  I unfastened Animus from my belt and held her up. “I was hoping you could teach me how to use this.”

  The kami smiled. “It would be an honor to teach you to wield the sword I created for you. She is very eager for you to learn how to handle her properly.”

  ***

  I spent the next week making googly eyes at Hayley, and Casey kept teasing me behind her back. If I didn’t like the kid so much, I might’ve punched him. The week after, on Wednesday, I finally gathered the courage. Just after the last bell, I met her at her locker. “Hey, you have a minute?”

  She gave me a curious look. “Sure.”

  I led her to a relatively quiet spot between banks of lockers. She looked almost as nervous as I felt. You stood up to Fenrir. You cut off the devil’s arm and sent him running, I told myself. “So I was wondering… if you, maybe… um…” I took a deep breath. “You wanna go out sometime?”

  She’d already had a bit of a blush. Now it got deeper. “Go out? You mean…”

  “Like a date. Yeah.” Fuck, what if this was all in my head? What if Casey was wrong? Or worse, just teasing me?

  Her eyes lit up and a big smile spread across her face. “Yeah. I’d love to.”

  I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. “Awesome. I was afraid you’d say no.”

  “I was afraid you wouldn’t ask.”

  I laughed. “Is it always this awkward?”

  She tilted her head. “What?”

  “Asking people out.”

  “You mean you haven’t?”

  Oh, shit. I shouldn’t have said that. Unless I wanted to lie, now I had to admit I’d never had a girlfriend before. I shook my head. “This is the first time I asked anyone out.”

  She blushed again and smiled again, clearly pleased. So maybe it wasn’t a bad thing. “Why didn’t you do it before? I mean, you’re really cute and you have that whole mysterious thing going on.”

  “My life is really complicated.” I wanted to steer the conversation away from my past. “So, what should we do? We already went to the movies with everyone. Dinner might be nice to have, but I want to do more than that.” I tried to think of romantic movies. Where did they go on first dates?

  “I don’t know. We could just go for a walk in the park. Or we could go bowling or something.”

  Bowling sounded boring. I didn’t want my first date to be boring. “Is there anything different you want to do? Something unusual, not like skydiving or anything. Just something…” I shrugged. “Memorable.”

  “I don’t know. We could decide later, I guess.”

  I didn’t want to leave things like that. “Is there anything you haven’t done for a while you really like? Or a place you love that you haven’t been to for a while?”

  She looked down, thinking. After a moment she looked up, uncertain. “Honestly… the zoo.” She scrunched her face a little, li
ke she was expecting me laugh and say no.

  I’d been to a zoo once. I had mixed feelings about it, with all those animals in cages, especially since I could talk to some of them. But it had been enjoyable, too, seeing the animals close up, talking to them when no one else was in earshot. Few of them were truly unhappy, mostly just bored and restless. “The zoo,” I repeated. “I could go for that.”

  “Really? You don’t think it’s a little kid thing to do?”

  “Do animals stop being interesting when you hit puberty?” I joked. “I love animals.”

  “Me, too.”

  I noticed the stream of kids thinning. “Shit, we better go before we miss the bus.” So we said good-bye and ran to catch our respective buses. I kept smiling to myself all the way home. I was going to have my first date. Operation Normal Life was going well.

  ***

  We worked out the details the next day at lunch. We’d go Saturday and she’d take her parents’ car. I tried not to be embarrassed about Hayley driving me to our first date. This wasn’t the fucking nineteen fifties after all, and I didn’t have a car. Having someone drive both of us would be worse. She’d just gotten her license that summer, so she was nervous about driving that far, but she promised she was a careful driver. I wasn’t worried about that. If I had to, I could use my powers to prevent an accident, or at least keep it from being anything serious.

  The zoo was on the edge of a neighboring town, about an hour away. I hoped being alone with her wasn’t going to be awkward since we’d need to hold a conversation all the way there.

  I’d need to avoid talking about my past so I wouldn’t have to come up with lies and half-truths, too. I hoped she liked movies, TV, and video games because otherwise I wouldn’t have much to talk about.

  She picked me up half an hour after I teleported home from flying practice. I’d had a long phone conversation with Stefan earlier in the week, and he pointed out she was probably more nervous than I was, even a little intimidated. So taking his advice to put her at ease, I wore my geekiest T-shirt—a Firefly reference. Two dinosaurs and the phrase “Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!” It had the bonus of being safe for a location full of little kids, unlike some of the shirts I’d bought.