Carpe Demon: Adventures of a Demon-Hunting Soccer Mom by Julie Kenner

lunged and ripped my throat out?
    “Mind if I use your Hazelnut Coffeemate?” Laura asked, her head in the fridge.
    I didn’t answer. I was too busy watching the plastic. Not now . . . not yet. I didn’t want Laura around when the thing attacked. I didn’t want her involved. I didn’t want—
    Y EEER-OOOO!
    “Oh , shit!” Laura screamed.
    Something small and lithe leaped through the window, half-sheathed in a loose section of plastic garbage bag, screeching in an unearthly way that made the hairs on my arms stand on end. I lunged forward to catch the beast and my fingers grabbed something soft, and—
    “Yer-owwwwwl . ”
    I stopped short, my mind finally catching up with what my hands already knew. No demon. No hellhound. Nothing bad at all—just Kabit, our overweight, overly grumpy, supremely opinionated tomcat.
    Kabit glared at me for a long moment, his fur sticking straight up, his tail three times its normal size. Then he marched to his food bowl and started eating, the picture of quiet dignity. I wanted to laugh, but couldn’t quite manage.
    “Sorry,” Laura said, bending down to pick up the Coffeemate container she’d dropped. “He scared me to death.”
    I looked down at the mess, and suddenly the laughter bubbled up. “Yeah,” I said, breathing through my chuckles, “I guess so.”
    Laura’s sheepish expression faded as she joined in my laughter. Together, we sank down to the floor, our backs against the cabinets as we shook with mirth. The situation wasn’t really funny, though, and I knew that my laughter stemmed more from raw nerves than from humor. Today, Laura had only been startled by my cat. Considering the turn my life had suddenly taken, I couldn’t help but wonder if, before this whole mess was over, Laura would see something truly scary.
    If she did, would I be there to protect her?
     
     
    St. Mary’s Cathedral was built centuries ago as part of the California mission trail. The original cathedral building still stands, though Mass is only held there on High Holy Days, a concession to the ongoing renovations to the beautiful building. In the meantime, the Bishop’s Hall serves as a temporary place of worship.
    From a purely personal perspective, I’ll be happy when the renovations are complete. The inside of the cathedral is awe-inspiring, whereas the inside of the newer Bishop’s Hall lacks some of that holy oomph . And, yes, I go to Mass regularly (well, more or less). I’ve witnessed exorcisms, staked vampires, and put down demons with nothing more than a plastic swizzle stick from Trader Vic’s—so, yeah, I’m a believer. I even got roped into doing some committee work a few months ago. Of course, the project—which was supposed to have been finished during the summer—is still dragging on. What’s that saying about no good deed going unpunished?
    The cathedral is perched on San Diablo’s highest point, the church grounds looking out over the Pacific and the Channel Islands. Like any church, the worship hall is holy ground. But St. Mary’s Cathedral has an added little zing . Everything beyond the communion rail—the sanctuary, the altar, even the basement below and the ceiling above—was built with a mortar that was heavily infused with the bones of saints. It’s pretty common to work a saint’s bone into an altar (well, it’s not as common now as it used to be), but that much saintliness was unique even centuries ago.
    Eric and I had believed that such a powerful sanctuary explained San Diablo’s low demon quotient. Sure, demons could still wander free in the town—or on the nonconsecrated church grounds, for that matter—but we’d opined that the cathedral gave off a strong antidemon vibe. Apparently that bit of conjecture was hogwash.
    Anyway, I had no idea of the identity of my new alimentatore ; according to tradition, a Hunter knows nothing about his or her mentor until the two actually meet. I find that particular tradition to be not only archaic, but