Page 75 of Book of Night
She shook her head. After a night of drinking what she really wanted was a greasy egg-and-bacon sandwich, but he was the guy with the Glock.
“And a bottle of Château d’Esclans 2018 Garrus rosé,” he concluded. The waiter nodded.
“I’ll just take an iced tea,” Charlie said.
After the waiter departed, Salt put his hands on the table. His nails were clean and buffed. If she were conning Salt, she’d note the veneer of perfection. The need for control.
It manifested in the way Adeline was quiet unless invited to speak. The way he’d immediately taken the gun from his pocket when Charlie refused to go with him. He expected automatic obedience and acknowledgment of his superiority from people like Charlie. And like Vince.
The best way to con Salt would be to let him dominate. Let him win. He’d believe that and he’d never look deeper.
“So,” Salt said, putting his elbows on the table and peering across at her. “We have something in common. My darling grandson wronged us both. He took something from me and broke your heart. Isn’t that right?”
Adeline frowned at her plate. Either she was more on Vince’s side than she wanted her father to know, or Charlie being with Vince had really bothered her. Maybe she hated all of his girlfriends.
“I suppose so,” Charlie said.
“Then let us be allies. You won’t just be helping me by getting back my book. You will be stopping Edmund from committing a great wrong. You see, as I told you before, my grandson, in his idiosyncratic way, treated his shadow like some cross between a pet and a friend.
“To command a shade, one must be a good custodian. Provide blood and energy from our own bodies. We gift unto them life, and in return they give us utter obedience. Theyareus, after all. Formed from us, as we were once made of sculpted clay and the Lord’s breath.”
Charlie was surprised by the religiosity of his description. She had spent a few Sundays at Laura’s church, trying to con Laura’s parents into believing that she wasn’t a terrible influence. The only parts she remembered in detail were the songs, the free doughnuts in the basement, and a lot of language like this.
Salt went on. “But the sacrament is an unholy one. We give our shadows the parts of us that we want to shove down into the dark. Our anger, our jealousy, our gluttony, our most shameful desires. Imagine a hate-filled creature, made of everything monstrous about a person, a thing that feeds on energy and blood. Now imagine coddlingthat,Ms. Hall.”
Charlie tried to picture Vince with a shadow like that and found it easy to see why he’d been willing to overlook so many of Charlie’s faults.
“He named it Red,” Salt said. “Red and Remy, isn’t that sweet? Maybe that’s what it calls itself now.”
“What do you mean?” Charlie asked.
“Once Edmund’s shadow was cut free, it became a Blight.”
“A Blight of aliving person?” Charlie objected.
“Formed in childhood, with a child’s foolish allowance for gluttony. He overfed the thing. Gave it too much blood, and not just his own. By the time Edmund was an adult, his shadow was very powerful. Powerful enough to have desires of its own. It was for that reason Edmund stole theLiber Noctemfrom me—to bring his Blight to full life, a shadow no more.”
“That can’t be true,” Charlie said, not even sure to what part she objected.
“TheLiber Noctemdetails the method by which a Blight can acquire and maintain enough substance to pass for human.” He looked across the table at her, as though willing her to understand. “The author presented this as the secret to immortality. But what no gloamist attempting to re-create the ritual realized was that it wouldn’t be their consciousness that survived. And so, they were deceived unto their own deaths, and their shadows, swollen with stolen energy, walk among us. To all appearances, human. Perhaps to this day.”
That sounded like internet creepypasta.
Impossible. Ridiculous.
But Charlie couldn’t help remembering how Vince had told her that what he’d done was worse than her accusations. Something so bad he refused to explain it.
“You don’t want to believe me,” Salt said. “But you do.”
The waiter came in, interrupting them to bring in the wine. He filled all three glasses with the deep pink rosé, then wrapped a towel around the neck of the bottle and rested it in a silver ice bucket. Finally, he set Charlie’s tea in front of her, a thick lemon wedge decorating the side and a sprig of mint in with the cubes.
Lionel waved him away when he began to ask if they needed anything.
“What did you do to Vincent, Mr. Salt?” Charlie asked.
Adeline gave her a sharp, surprised look.
“What didIdo?” he asked, as though trying out being offended.
