The Unlikeable Demon Hunter (Nava Katz #1)(4)
“Yeah.” I shoved him out the door. “A regular whore of Babylon. Now get outta here. I’ve got to pretty up.”
One thing I’d say in my favor, I was not one of those girls who took forever to get ready. I was showered and dressed in something practically Amish in the allotted ten minutes. I twisted my hair into a sleek chignon, and fresh faced, headed downstairs.
Time for my close up, Mr. Demille. Bowing my head, I shuffled into the living room.
“Forgive me, Rabbi.” I prostrated myself like a wedding guest begging the Godfather for a favor. “I was involved in a car accident on my way home,” I lied. I stood up again. “It’s why I needed a drink. I was so rattled.” I infused as much pathos into my voice as possible while blinking up at him. Tricky, since I was four inches taller, but not impossible. “I’m sure you’ve never had that problem.”
Men, whether straight, gay, holy, or otherwise, could be such suckers. The rabbi patted my hand in forgiveness, his touch papery dry. “You need to show more respect, Navela,” he said, using the Yiddish diminutive of my name.
I nodded, side-stepping around the wet-yet-once-more-spotlessly-clean former puke site on the white, short-velvet-pile carpet. “You’re so right. I should come to schul. Isn’t your son the Cantor at Park West Synagogue? Such a beautiful voice when he prays.”
A look of abject horror contorted the rabbi’s features at the terrifying prospect of me getting my hands on his precious son. Trust me, the guy was a middle-aged balding chub. I had zero designs on his person.
“Start small,” Rabbi Abrams said.
While the rabbi had mentored Ari his entire life, having served as a head demon-hunter coach, my contact with him had been limited. In addition to coordinating training and fight instructors, he also taught my brother everything from demon types to creating wards and learning the various aspects of the Brotherhood itself. Ari tended to get pretty vague on those details.
“Shana,” the rabbi called out to my mother. “Now that the entire family is here, we can start the ceremony again.”
My mother handed him the newly washed chalice. “Of course, Rabbi.” Mom watched him shuffle off to prepare something, trailing a faint smell of mothballs in his wake, then, patting her sleek honey-colored bob, stepped past me with a murmured, “Carnage and lies? A busy morning.”
Mom was a lot harder to fool. A whip-smart, tenured history professor at the University of British Columbia with an annoying tendency to recall events best forgotten, she was also a best-selling author of, big surprise, a tome on King David.
My dad, Dov, dark-haired like me, was a prof, too. Law. Oy vey. Everything was fact-gathering to build a case with him. Case in point, he walked stiffly into the room, courtesy of his recent back injury, all pleated pants and sweater vest, the usual mug of coffee welded to his hand.
I gagged at the smell.
“What’s this about a car accident? Was this in the taxi? Did you get the information from him and the other driver?” His questions were gunfire fast. “You’ll need it for the claim.”
Shit. I hadn’t prepared for questioning.
Ace to the rescue. My brother tugged on Dad’s sleeve, leading him to his recliner. “Sit. Rabbi wants to start the ceremony.” Out of the corner of his mouth he muttered, “You owe me big time.”
I gave him a sheepish grin and sat in the brushed twill armchair at the far end like a good little girl, stuffing my hands under my butt.
Rabbi Abrams motioned for Ari to come stand beside him. While the rabbi was the picture of reverence as he lit the first candle, my brother’s hand jiggled madly in his pocket.
I threw him a thumbs up. Ari was going to be great.
The rabbi lit the last of the dozen or so large pillar candles on thick glass bases placed in a circle around the living room. The soulless space with its white carpet, white furniture and, wait for it, black and white brocade wallpaper was softened by their glow.
The ceremony involved a lot of singing prayer or chanting or something in Hebrew. I’d pretty much spent my Hebrew school classes reading Sweet Valley High so I didn’t understand it, but I’d been to synagogue enough that the singing and ritualistic gestures were familiar. The rhythms and cadence of the language lulled me, even soothing my grating headache a bit.
The old guy didn’t have a bad voice, probably where his son got his talent, and the ceremony itself was kind of lovely. Even my cold, dead heart couldn’t fail to be moved by the reverence and history of this ceremony.
All male descendants of King David–or of any hunter–were tracked as potentials. The first ritual, performed when they were a baby, determined if they could be bumped up to initiate–one who carried the Rasha make-up, versus the regular Muggle descendants. It weeded out about 98% of the potentials. If level two status was unlocked, they were labeled initiates and slated for training. Their second and final ceremony, the official induction to the Brotherhood where they became Rasha, happened at age twenty.
There were a couple of reasons for the wait. First off, it took initiates their entire childhood and adolescence to master the training and studying necessary to take on the gig. And, for more practical reasons, they needed to be inducted once they’d physically stopped growing and were in the prime of health for their body to accept the magic powers that this final ceremony would confer on them. After much trial, error, and loss of life, twenty had been hit on as the magic age.