A change of cities

The letters from EP Blingermeyer had become rather frightening.  I was getting pretty good at this Astral Projection thing, and now he was asking for something he never had before.  He wanted me to physically travel with him to another world.  He was prepared to tell me whatever horrific thing he did to accomplish this, and while I knew there were ways to accomplish this, I knew at this point that most of them were not good.  I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

I made one of my frequent trips to the French Quarter and stopped by the Tattered Library, the used bookstore I kept reading a bit at a time when the proprietor looked at me differently, their one good eye open and scrutinizing me.  "You've changed," she asked, her dark lips pursing thoughtfully, "Something different about you."  Her husband had been the one who had been letting me see a page at a time, and I was under the impression she was the reason he had been so reluctant.

"How'd you like to keep that book?" She asked.

My interest immediately piqued.  I had to admit I was obsessed with it.  I wasn't sure why.  Ever since TC had channeled the stories of the Heliotrope book, I was anxious to know more about the world that literally lay right next to my own. I knew more about the strange and frankly monsterous world you call home than I did about the legendary creatures right next door.  "I...might be."  My words were coy but my tone was desperate.

She laughed at my attempt at subterfuge and said,"Then you have to choose."

"Choose...what?"

"Who you going to work for. Blingermeyer...or me."

I blinked.  This was not the way I had expected this conversation to go.  "Um...do you have dental?"

Now she positively cackled though it was a warm throaty thing, filled with high pitched benevolence.  "Yes, we work with teeth.  And we pay well Mr Ticks.  Very well." She put a put a bag of gold coins on the table.  At current exchange rates that was easily two years pay.  Well, anywhere but Texas, Oklahoma or Fresno.

"You have my attention.  What would I do for you? Tour guide suits me but something-"

For the first time, her laugh became derisive.  "That bridge to everywhere and nowhere? We have better ways of getting around Mr. Ticks.  No, we'd want you to read the books we give you and keep up your...unusual arrangement with TC.  Yes, we know about him, we know a lot of things."

"I..." I would have done that anyway.  "What's the catch?"

"You need to move. Blingermeyer is bad news.  Very bad news.  You'd have to set up residence somewhere else."

Now I was upset.  I loved my home. TC might be a tumbleweed driving on the wind, but I'd lived in the Bouyou my whole live.  "Where?"  I asked.

"Magica."

That was another name for Miami, just like some anti romantics still called Terminus Atlanta.  It was too hot for my taste.  I started to say no when she put a second bag of gold on the table.

"That's not all Mr Ticks," she said, not laughing at all anymore,"You already sense something wrong about how Blingermeyer moves between worlds.  You're right.  And you won't be able to tell him no if you stay.  You want to keep your soul? Work for us?"

I told her I had to think about it.  I went home.  Dark formless shapes haunted my dreams, and I felt something terrible enter it...something nightmarish...and IT was warning me as well.  There were horrific consequences for staying, consequences I couldn't even imagine.  I woke in a sheen of sweat to the point that my mouth was dry and my gut was heaving.

I had to get out of there.  So gold coins, books and a small family model T full of my remaining possessions, I headed south.

I have a new employer it seems.