Stalked by Demons

by Trudi Jaye

  If I scream, and it draws them all to me, what will I do then? Killing and then absorbing the energy of the last demon feels like it almost killed me.

  Suddenly, one of the demons behind Blade darts forward, smashing one big glowing arm into Blade’s side. He grunts in pain and is flung to the ground, dust billowing around him as he lands.

  He manages to pull himself to his feet, but another two demons move forward immediately. He stabs out at one of them with the knife, and it screams as the blade sinks deep into its flesh. But the other demon grabs his arm and drags him away. The knife is ripped out of Blade’s hand, and he’s left without his weapon facing three more of the demons.

  If I don’t act fast, Blade’s going to be ripped apart. The only weapon I have is my voice. The demon holding Blade swings its enormous arm and smashes him in the face, knocking Blade to the ground. He doesn’t get up.

  I scream. A ridiculous, teen-horror-movie scream that would have woken the neighbors if there were any around.

  All the demons freeze. Then, as one, they turn to me.

  I take a breath and scream again. This time two of the smaller demons shudder and turn to ashes where they’re hovering. I stop. I don’t want to absorb any more demon energy. I still feel queasy from the last dose.

  But a blue glow emerges from both piles of ashes and dashes toward me like I’m the mother ship. I try to dodge the energy, but both balls of light hit my body and disappear inside. I gasp as the feeling of being burned from the inside hits me. For a moment, my vision goes blurry, but I fight it. I have to save Blade.

  The demons are now moving toward me, almost as one group. Their faces reflect their unrefined hunger for… something.

  Maybe more supernatural essence, like they tried to steal from Ben?

  I don’t know. I don’t know anything about demons and what they want. I thought it was all about killing and destruction. Now I think it’s something worse.

  The little demon inside me rackets around, like it’s trying to tell me something. As usual, it just makes me nervy, without any understanding of what it’s saying. One of the demons snarls, spurring me into action.

  My head feels swollen, and my throat is raw, but I open my mouth and let out another bloodcurdling scream. Three demons burst into flames and end up as ash on the ground. Again the blue glowing lights rise up out of the ashes and speed toward me. It feels like I’m being shot every time one enters my body. I desperately hope Blade’s right when he says it’s just their energy, and not the actual demons. I’m starting to feel weighted down, and my head is a little woozy. I let the scream die off, needing to give my throat a break.

  Thankfully, two more demons slip away, moving swiftly off past the barn.

  The five remaining demons are the biggest of the group. They’re not as affected by my screams, although I see their glowing bodies shimmering whenever I make the noise.

  Blade is still out cold on the ground and I’m worried that he’s not going to get back up again. Is he still alive? Did it break his neck when it hit him? I need to get closer to find out.

  Blade’s phone in my back pocket starts vibrating. I ignore it, circling around to one side, trying to find a way past the blockade of demons in front of me. I scream again, experimentally trying for a higher note, seeing if that affects them more.

  The one on the left-hand side is twitching more than the others, and I turn toward it, focusing all my sound in its direction. I think of my voice like a funnel, reaching out toward the demon, and it moves back, this time its whole body shuddering. It holds out for a moment longer, and then it turns and darts away.

  The silence between the screams is starting to sound more and more ominous. I don’t know how much longer I can keep them up. My throat is almost closed, and my voice feels like it’s more Barry White than Taylor Swift. The phone in my pocket vibrates again, and I grab it with my good hand, intending to silence it, or maybe just throw it away.

  But Damien Walker’s name comes up on the screen. He’s probably the one person who could actually help. I swipe it across and put the phone to my ear.

  “Tell me what to do,” I say quickly. “I’m surrounded by demons, Blade’s out cold with the knife out of reach. How do I kill them?” I gesture with my other hand towards the demons, and the thorns in my hand are jolted, causing stinging pain to shoot through my palm. I don’t know a curse word bad enough to encompass how I feel right now.

  “What?” Damien’s voice is unusually deep, like he’s been talking too much.

  “You heard. Tell me what the fuck to do!” My voice rises to a hysterically high pitch, and the demons all pulse away from me. But they don’t leave. They still think they can beat me.

  “You need to do what you did to the other one you killed.”

  “But that almost killed me. And these ones are bigger and meaner.”

  “You did it wrong. You need to start by singing a lullaby. Find a soothing song, one that will put them into a trance, and then when they’re all docile, ring back.”

  He hangs up.

  My hand clenches convulsively around the phone. If I make it out of this alive, I’m going to prank call him in the middle of the night for the rest of his life.

  Just to teach him a freaking lesson in phone manners.

  A noise makes me look up again. The demons are moving closer again, their black eyes focused on me like a Rottweiler on his dinner.

  I have to act fast. I need a song.

  A lullaby.

  I start singing the first song that comes to mind. “Eternal Flame” by the Bangles. My father used to sing it to me at bedtime if I couldn’t get to sleep.

  I’m only partway through the first verse when it starts working. The demons drift in front of me, the hardness of their stares gone, replaced with dazed expressions that make them look almost goofy.

  Almost.

  I keep singing but move around them to where Blade is lying in the dirt. I check his pulse—thankfully he’s still breathing—and then hustle over to grab his knife from the middle of a pile of demon ash. Briefly I consider stabbing all the demons with it, but Blade told me it only worked for his family, so I’d probably just end up with a bunch of pissed off demons.

  Still singing, I tuck the knife awkwardly into my pants and return to Blade. There’s no way I can lift him, he’s too heavy. I’m going to have to drag him back inside the house.

  There’s something about the singing that’s given me a burst of energy, so I lift his torso, and grab him from behind, under his arms. With my demon-thorn-infested hand held clumsily out in front of his chest, I pull him backward across the yard.

  He’s ridiculously heavy, and the pain from the thorns is shooting up my arm, but I’m not giving up until he’s inside the house with the others. My singing falters to nothing as I grunt with the effort of dragging his body. The demons start moving restlessly again, like they’re about to break their trance. The stairs are getting closer, but I don’t think I’m going to make it without singing again.

  I halt my laborious movement, take a breath, and return to the song. My head feels like it’s splitting in two and my throat is raw. The demons go back under the spell, but they’re not as deep in the trance now. They’re moving a bit more than they did last time. I don’t think I have much longer. I start dragging Blade again, this time with a little more urgency.

  I have to keep stopping to sing, and each time, the demons seem less docile and more agitated, like they’re fighting the effects of the song.

  I’m onto my second time around of “Eternal Flame” when I reach the steps back up into the house. The screen door bangs, and Suzanna appears at the door. She races down the steps and grabs one of Blade’s arms while I grab the other. I don’t know how much longer I can keep going, but I’m not stopping now.

  One of the demons behind us makes a screeching noise, like it’s about to launch itself at its prey. Letting go of Blade, I turn, my arms raised for a fight. The demon is coming directly for
me, snarling like a rabid raccoon.

  Without thinking, I grab the knife from my waistband. Behind me, I can hear Suzanna hauling Blade up the stairs. I step closer to the demon, stabbing out with the knife. I’m so close I can smell brimstone and burning plastic and feel the heat of its breath on me.

  I’ve never used a knife like this before, and my only examples of what to do are from watching Blade kill the demons over the last few days.

  Turns out it’s not as easy as it looks. I almost trip over my own feet as I surge forward. The knife goes wide, slicing a shallow cut through the glowing arm of the demon. It puts me off-balance, and I stumble. With one long arm, the demon swipes at my knife hand, knocking the blade out of my grip and to the ground a few feet away—right in front of the other three demons.

  I growl at it, so lost to instinct, I hardly know what I’m doing. Vibrations of sound echo around me, buzzing along my nerve endings.

  When Blade used the knife on them, the demons burned up in flames. I don’t know why this one is still alive. Maybe the cut isn’t deep enough? Or maybe I was right, it’s only Blade and his family who can use the knife properly.

  But something about my expression seems to affect the demon, and it retreats behind the other three, nursing its wounded arm. I back up, not turning away from the demons, and move up the stairs. Suzanne is almost to the top. I grab Blade’s arm with my good hand, and we haul him into the house, slamming the door behind us.

  I pull out the phone and dial Damien’s number again.

  “Now what, asshole?”

  40

  “Are they nice and docile?”

  I peer out the window, swaying where I stand. The demons are coming to, looking around like they’ve just woken up. “Not really.”

  “Then start singing,” he says sharply.

  I hesitate, wanting to stay inside, maybe lie down on the sofa and pass out. But I don’t have a choice. Suzanne is taking care of Blade and the kids. It’s up to me to sort out the demons. Taking a ragged breath, I hobble back outside the house.

  I sing a few more bars of the song. “Now they are,” I say into the phone.

  “Okay, keep singing while I talk.”

  I hum the tune, and then break out into the chorus.

  “You’ll need Blade’s knife.”

  I look to where it fell, but it’s not there. While we were inside, the one of the demons must have grabbed it. “I don’t have it.”

  Damien swears. “We’re going to have to do this the hard way. You’re going to have to absorb them.”

  I shake my head so vigorously, my hair swishes over my face. “Nope. I’ve already absorbed too many of them. I can barely walk as it is. There’s no way I can absorb all these demons. Can’t we just wait inside until they go away?”

  “No,” says Damien, his voice harsh. “Now that you’ve sung for them, they’ve imprinted on you. They’re not going anywhere.”

  “Why the hell did you tell me to sing for them, then?” I ask, my voice almost shrieking. The demons shuffle away from me, despite their trances. I sing a few more lines of the song to calm them down again.

  “Have you ever sung opera?” asks Damien, ignoring me.

  I stop singing midnote. “Wait. What? No. When would I have sung opera?” I take a couple of breaths, trying to ease my sore throat. My voice is getting deeper and throatier. And there’s no way I can sing freaking opera, even if I knew how.

  “Okay, so we might need to get you some singing lessons when you get back. You’re going to need to sing a certain note. You must have done it accidentally when you killed the other demons. Think back and try to sing that same note. Except you need to keep it going, pure and strong for a good few minutes.”

  “No one can sing one note for that long,” I say, exasperated.

  “You can. Just think back, remember what it was like last time, and keep the note long and pure.”

  “I can barely sing anything anymore. I’m about to lose my voice.”

  “Then do it quickly before that happens.”

  “But I can’t absorb all four demons,” I say, trying to get him to understand the seriousness of the situation. “Can’t I just keep them docile like this?”

  “The docility will wear off. It doesn’t last forever. And when it does, they’ll come for you. Remember, just keep the note going. No break in the note. No stopping.”

  “I don’t know if—”

  “If you don’t get this right, those kids are going to die.”

  It feels like my heart is trying to escape through my throat. “But—”

  “You got this, Hazel. Just concentrate.” His voice is short and choppy, like he’s losing patience with me.

  I know what that means. “If you hang up on—”

  He hangs up. I growl and put the phone back in my pocket. If I could do this without him, I’d throw the damn thing away.

  The demons are hovering close to me, their glowing faces still slack from the lullaby. When I killed the demon earlier, I was screaming. So it must have been a fairly high pitch.

  I take a deep breath and try out a high note. On my raw throat, it comes out like a cat scratching its claws down a chalk board. The demons shuffle together, moving away from me. They’re starting to look less sleepy. I don’t think I have much time to figure this out.

  Maybe it should be more like a scream?

  I try again, this time going straight to the scream. The noise isn’t pure, it’s more like a tone-deaf pig farmer, but it’s all I’ve got right now. The demons move away, clearly agitated, but it’s still not enough to destroy them or help me absorb them.

  I stop, clear my throat and try again.

  The sound is worse this time. My voice is definitely about to go. My throat feels like it’s been rubbed raw by sandpaper. And I’m pretty sure I’m about to throw up.

  Like that will help.

  I glance back at the house. Suzanna and the boys are watching me through the front window. Suzanna’s face is pale, with dark smudges under her eyes that are visible even at this distance. She looks like she’s given up. She doesn’t really believe I can save them.

  But then what will happen to Ben and Finn?

  Taking a deep breath, I turn back to the demons. I have no choice. I have to do this; it’s the only way to save the boys. Not to mention Blade and Suzanna.

  Damien seemed certain I could do it.

  I must be able to do it.

  I think back, trying to remember exactly what happened when I approached the other big demon. I’d just grabbed its tongue. It hurt like hell, and I screamed. That’s what caused it to burst into flame.

  My hand is swollen and red, the blackened tongue lying across it, with about eight or nine thorns stuck into my skin. Around the thorns, the skin is engorged, and pus is starting to form. I have to get the damn things out, and soon.

  But first….

  I squeeze down tight on the thorns.

  Without real thought, I start to scream, the pain is so excruciating. It burns up my arm like someone has just used a knife to cut from my palm to my shoulder. Tears stream down my face, and at first, I’m so lost in the agony, I forget about the reason I did it.

  It feels like the scream is about to wear out when I look up. The demons are directly in front of me, their faces convulsing, bodies shuddering. I can’t stop. I have to keep screaming, no matter what.

  I push myself to keep going, to use the fear and the agony to push more sound out. One of the demon shudders and bursts into flames. Within seconds its body is ashes on the ground. A blue mist swishes up from its body, and my scream draws it in. The mist slithers toward me, and I take a step back. I don’t want to absorb another demon. There are too many inside me already.

  You have to. Damien’s voice is harsh inside my head.

  The mist is glistening with energy as it glides toward me. I’m still screaming, my mouth open wide. Suddenly I’m choking on the blue mist as it invades my mouth and slides down my throat. I take
another step away from the demons, and put one hand up to my throat, like I can stop the choking from the outside.

  I start coughing, and it feels like I’m hacking up a lung. My body is hunched over, and I’m gagging and gasping. It feels like the blue mist is squeezing my throat, holding my body hostage as it’s absorbed into my system.

  And then it stops.

  From somewhere deep inside, a sound emerges. It grows stronger, rising up my throat from my stomach. When it breaks free of my body, it doesn’t just come out of my mouth, it comes out from every pore in my body.

  My body stiffens, and a note so pure it makes me want to cry fills the air.

  41

  Almost as one, the demons around me explode. Instead of flesh and gore, ash erupts into the air, and the smell of brimstone and smoke invades my nostrils. Blade’s knife clatters to the ground where one of the demons was standing. There’s a thrumming noise all around. I’m still singing that one pure note, and when the blue mist appears from each of the demons, all of it swoops for me straight away. Instead of a choking feeling, this time the blue mist energizes my body. I feel like I’m more powerful than any other living creature on the planet.

  The tongue stuck into my hand turns to dust and falls away. The thorns stuck into my palms pop out, one at a time, like they’re being rejected by whatever power is inside me. The swelling dies down and the pus melts away.

  And then it’s over. The power dies away. The energy that was flowing through my body disappears.

  Now it feels like my body weighs twice as much as usual. I’m tired. Not just tired—exhausted. I stumble backward, and my foot hits the steps. I fall sluggishly onto the stairs, my body jarring against the hard wood.

  Blade’s phone rings.

  Somehow, I manage to pull it out of my pocket. “I did it.”

  There’s silence at the other end. “Wow. I’m impressed.”