Skeleton Keys (on hold)

Chapter Twenty Three

The bell on the front door sounded as Dad and Mr Ward came rushing in.

"Mary! Are you hurt-" Dad cut off his own sentence as he noticed that Lizzy was standing next to me. "Liz?"

She threw herself at him, sobbing into his shoulder. He wrapped his arms around her.

"What happened?" he asked me.

I glanced over at the chest. It'd grown silent in the last few minutes. "Something attacked us, a spector. Apollo trapped it in that chest, but then..." I glanced down at the demon. He still hadn't moved. "I think it did something to Apollo. He's hurt."

Mr. Ward bent down, reaching out to the chest. It shuttered violently at his touch. The spector inside let lose another scream of rage.

"What is going on here?" Lizzy asked, stepping away form Dad. "First we were upstairs, then it was all dark and I couldn't breathe. Then-"

"Easy, Lizzy," Dad said. "Why don't you go upstairs with Mr. Ward. Mary and I will get Apollo up to his room."

She nodded, wide-eyed. She stepped away, letting Mr. Ward lead her through wreckage of the shop.

After they had disappeared up the back stairs, I turned back to Dad. "What's wrong with him? Will he be alright?"

Dad bent down, his expression becoming unreadable. He reached out with his right hand as if to touch Apollo's forehead. He stopped just shy of touching his skin, but instead let his hand hover. A light filled the gap between them. Dad held his hand there a moment longer, before the light disappeared and he pulled it back.

"He's okay," Dad finally said. "He's just," he paused, scrubbing his face with his hands. "There's not a easy way to explain this. I'd hoped we'd have more time before we had to tell you. Let's get him upstairs to his room, and then Mr. Ward and I can explain. All of it."

I felt my face frown. I didn't like how he'd brushed it aside, but he was being reasonable. It would be better to get Apollo settled first. I'd been almost useless in the fight against the spector. If it wasn't for Apollo, who knows what would have happened to Lizzy and I.

"Okay," I said, and picked my Scythe up from where I'd dropped to the floor. Closing the door in my mind, it returned to it's key form and I hung it back around my neck. Apollo's staff was hidden by a chair turned over on its side, but it wasn't difficult to pull out of the mess.

As Dad knelt to gather the demon up into his arms. Apollo looked barely older than I was, but I knew that wasn't true. The picture on Grandpa's dresser proved that Apollo was older than Dad and I both.

I followed Dad up to the apartment, where we passed Mr. Ward and Lizzy sitting at the kitchen bar. We went up the next flight to Apollo's room, and I stopped at the doorway. Dad placed Apollo on the low twin bed pushed against the wall just left of the door. Three guitars hung on the wall above it; an electric Stratocaster, an acoustic Gibson, and an old classical guitar with a thick neck. An amplifier sat next to the bed with a small collection of items that made it obvious he used it as a nightstand. Other than the guitars, band posters littered the walls, to the point that I couldn't tell what color they where painted. In the far corner, an egg shaped basket chair was strung up from the ceiling to swing about two feet off the carpeted floor.

Except for the odd chair, the room looked - normal. I don't know what I was expecting, but normal wasn't it. He was supposed to be a demon, right? Didn't they need brimstone or fire or something?

Stepping into his room, I leaned his staff against the wall near the bed. Sweat had broken out across Apollo's forehead and his skin looked translucent.