Demon Underground
Kyra Bell: Book Three
Author: Brittany Rose
Copyright 2020. This is a work of fiction. Names, Characters, Places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
~ Author’s notes ~
~ Book Description ~
Chapter One
The clanging sound of steel against steel rung out in the meadow, while the sun pounded down on my sweat soaked body. The rhythmic blows and attack patterns had an unexpected beauty of form to them, parry, cross block, attack high then low, and my enemy felt more like a partner in a stunning dance of death than anything else.
My opponent retreated slightly when I did a double slash to send his weapons wide and followed with a kick to the chest, the intensity in his green eyes was almost as mesmerizing as our dance as he moved back in and continued the sparring bout. I was hardly an expert after a mere three months of practice, but I was learning to fight with two weapons with surprising alacrity. Maybe not so surprising, given my long experience with hand to hand martial arts, my natural fae grace that made me light on my feet and ambidextrous, along with my mental fortitude and focus from spell-craft.
In short, I already had a solid base to work off of, skipping perhaps years of the mental and discipline side of learning how to fight with weapons.
I wasn’t the only one sweating, William’s short red hair glistened in the sunlight, as well as his muscular arms, six pack abs, and wide shoulders through the sweat soaked white t-shirt. He was a handsome man, with an intensity of purpose that was more than captivating.
It was the first time I was pressing him so hard, and I wasn’t cheating. I’d worked out with Muriel a way to slow down my timeframe by about a third, so my fae speed and superior reflexes equaled out to William’s human ones. She kept the slowly different time field conformed to my body perfectly, no matter how fast or wildly I moved. It was all about time and space having no hold on her, she was beyond those things.
The others learning weapons did so as well, half demons weren’t as fast as the fae, but they were closer to that than they were to human limits. It was the best way to deal with the disparity between us and William, since other than that he was truly a master of weapons and fighting forms and the perfect one to train us. The only effort I had to make was holding back my demon strength to human, which was easy enough, all I had to do was keep my magic suppressed and I’d been doing that for years.
I wondered if my body was as distracting to him in body conforming workout gear, then pushed that out of my head, and stomped on the thought.
Then he rushed forward forcing me to back off with a furious combination of attacks, and the sharp sting to my side which quickly faded told me he got a touch. We stopped, stepped back, and I pouted.
He laughed, “You’re doing excellent, with the basic moves and forms. But that’s a reminder you haven’t learned the advanced techniques or improvisation yet, and you aren’t ready. A true master fighting you will be able to predict your next blow easily and slip past it.”
I nodded, “I know I’m not ready to face a Nephilim in a fair sword verse two metal batons fight, but with all my other tricks going on it should help anyway.”
He grunted neutrally, but he looked worried by the idea.
Three months had passed since William and Celeste had come to live with us. Things were going pretty well, and I’d reached most of the goals I’d set for the community. I was myself in the mound, and when I had to fight, but I was the redheaded witch through enchantment when I needed to be more subtle and investigate.
The dirty blonde human disguise with brown eyes I was most careful with, since it was all caught up with our human investment business, which was doing well enough. There was more than enough income coming in to cover the few things the mound wasn’t self-sufficient for, and then some for a small profit. I hadn’t needed to touch my inheritance in almost two months.
Point being, neither of those personas had been burned yet, but the redhead was far more disposable by far. On the good side, the redhead was the one most likely to be burned, as I worked to find and save other half-demons from hunts.
William said, “Karl, let’s see what you’ve got.”
I moved to the side of the clearing and my mind wandered as I watched Karl and William fight.
Karl was the first half-demon I saved, and him being raised human he’d had almost no experience at all with fighting. The human world wasn’t nearly as violent as the supernatural one, at least for citizens. But he applied himself, and learned quickly, both with weapons sparring and he was making slow but steady progress with controlling his half-demon magic.
He was sixteen, five foot eleven with a medium build, with black hair and gray eyes not so different from my own. Perhaps a half-demon trait, though not a certain one. He was cute, serious, and a consciences young man, and he still had more than a bit of a crush on me, but it wasn’t as bad after three months, a little more on that in a bit. We were also friends with common purpose. He still ran the website, and he took it all very seriously.
His mother Cindy was still with us as well. She was about my height, in her late thirties, and had dark brown hair and gray eyes. The two of them had their new identities already, as well as an address in Vegas. He wasn’t ready for the real world, so they didn’t live there, but I took Cindy there once a week to pick up her mail, and Cindy had a work from home job she handled from their house in my fae mound.
Celeste who was the second half-demon I saved was a stubborn sixteen-year-old woman. She had long lustrous red hair, green eyes, and a body that was quite curvy but still in shape. She was headstrong, but not completely undisciplined. She was familiar with martial arts, so took to that a lot easier than she had controlling her magic, but she put the effort in. It just needed time. We tended to butt heads sometimes.
Her and Karl had circled each other the first couple of weeks, but nothing had come of it, they weren’t compatible on that level.
Celeste’s brother William I already introduced of course, and he was our martial arts trainer. After a couple of weeks, when their paranoia had simmered down, it’d become obvious to me that my shallow chemical attraction to him was returned, but we danced around that. I wasn’t ready for anything like that after the loss of Vic six months ago, three in Earth time. There was also the fact he was human, if a delicious one. I’d barely look thirty when he was an aged man at the end of his life, and that was assuming I’d age as I expected, what if my lifespan was even longer?
Fae and Nephilim lived for millennia, it was only the witch side to my genetics that made me think mine would be shorter, but I could easily be wrong. In the sixty years he had left, I might only age physically by three years, which would make me look twenty-one. About a twenty to one ratio if my witch side didn’t sabotage my age expectancy. Maybe it was a stupid worry, but I was the
one that would have to live on alone if it worked out between us.
Point being, I wasn’t going to date him just for fun, though I was sure it would be that.
There were other reasons I did my best to ignore the distraction. He was built, tough, and a total badass in his world when it came to martial arts and his singular focus, but in my world he wouldn’t last more than a few minutes in a fight against a shifter, and for a vampire, fae, witch, or Nephilim that time went down to a mere handful of seconds.
He didn’t belong in my world, though I’d be sorry to see him go when Celeste moved on.
In the last three months there were also four more additions to the half-demon underground and society. Three new half-demons, of which only one of them had any family left.
Sabine Barsotti was an orphan who had been well-loved and taken care of by her foster parents, but of course they couldn’t come, they had a whole house of kids to watch and had regretfully turned her over to me. She was a ray of sunshine, constantly encouraging the others, and never complained. Her arrival had been the first payoff for the website, there’d been absolutely no violence at all involved in her pickup. She wasn’t perfect of course, but she was a hell of a woman and had more than her share of empathy for a sixteen-year-old.
She was petite at five foot one, actively athletic, and she had dark brown hair and chocolate brown eyes. She excelled and seemed to be a natural at the martial arts side of things, even if she’d never fought in her life. On the other side of things, her naturally perky and inquisitive mind had trouble quieting for the mental exercises involved in magical discipline, but I had no doubt she’d get there in the end.
Sabine was also the one responsible for stealing Karl’s attention, which I was pretty grateful for. He still had a crush, but he liked and pursued Sabine, which made things a lot less awkward between us. She returned his interest rather avidly. They were both only sixteen, but I let Cindy worry about what her son was doing with Sabine behind closed doors, it just wasn’t my business.
The next two that joined us was Carlos and Maria Rivera. Carlos was sixteen, which was standard, that’s when the half-demon horns and powers seemed to come in, right after puberty. He was five foot ten, with black hair and brown eyes, with a wiry hard body. He had a protective streak a mile wide, and was a good kid. We’d gotten him from the website as well, but there was a scuffle when we went to pick him up, one of his neighbors recognized him for what he was, and I’d had to take down a hunter team, but no Nephilim so no deaths.
Maria was just short of forty years old, and she stood at five foot four. She had a lushly curvaceous body, all soft, but that didn’t match her personality. She was fiercely protective of her son, and she tended to bully mother all of us if we let her. She also cooked on the nights the whole community ate at my house at least once a week, to touch base and build those relationships I was hoping for. Maybe we wouldn’t all stay together, but we’d all support each other.
That was the goal anyway, but I knew the reality would fall somewhat short of that.
Linda Johnson, the third new half-demon, was the outlier I’d been fearing and knew would one day arrive, though I’d far from given up on her yet. She was an orphan as well, but she hadn’t found a loving home like Sabine had. She was petite and slim at five foot three, with curly long golden blonde hair and light blue eyes. She had anger management issues, and she was pretty much angry at the whole world. She also rejected the idea of peaceful evolution in society, she wanted to hurt the Nephilim and go on the offensive.
Of course, she couldn’t fight worth a crap, and as our last arrival had only been here a couple of weeks. I hoped by the time she learned self-discipline and how to fight and control her magic, she’d find acceptance here and let go of whatever was fueling her pain and rage toward the world. But I wasn’t counting on it.
I didn’t lack empathy, but I was also a strong proponent of personal responsibility. I’d been raised by an evil demon summoning witch, and I’d been hunted for four years. My life hadn’t been easy, but I’d managed not to turn into a bitter and violent person. Sure, I was a bit of a pessimist, and I was slow to trust, but I didn’t want to punish the world for it or go on a Nephilim killing spree.
Okay, that last one, I kind of did want to hunt Nephilim, but I knew better, violence should always be the last option. That wouldn’t fix anything, and it’d just make things worse in the long run, no matter if they deserved it or not. Ironically, I suspected that insight came from just how violent the supernatural world was, I’d already learned better. We couldn’t force acceptance of our kind at the tip of a sword, it would be satisfying in a way, but it would backfire and turn the whole world against us.
Well, even more than they were against us now.
Point being, Linda hadn’t learned that lesson yet. No matter how hard her life had been, she hadn’t been raised in violence like I had. I feared she never would.
That’s about all that happened the last three months. There were five guest houses now with their own acre, not including my mini mansion where I hosted those joint dinners. I also had a lot of spare enchantments now.
The biggest problem was I was making it up as I went along. I wasn’t sure what was the right thing. I kept the rules at a minimum, and any of them could walk at any time. I was too tentative with it, maybe? The problem was I wasn’t sure where proper leadership for a joint community was, and where ambition and self-aggrandizement took over. I set a few rules, but absolutely refused to give orders outside of magic training class. I feared I was being too careful about that line, especially when Linda went off on a diatribe and denigrated my plans and ideas.
It was… annoying. I worried Linda would corrupt some of the others, instead of me by example showing her the way. But, it’d be hypocritical in the extreme to try and force my view on her, when I refused to force it on the Nephilim like she wished to do.
In short. Life was complicated, and I couldn’t save everyone. I just hoped Linda didn’t turn out to be one of those I couldn’t.
Although I knew how to be a wanderer, and enter groups warily, and cast spells, brew potions, fight with my body, wield hellfire, sneak around and cast glamour, I’d never done something like this before. I was just twenty-one years old, after all. But it was my responsibility, and mistakes or not, I’d keep moving forward.
What else could I do? This felt right to me, and me going back to being alone and allowing my kind to be slaughtered just wasn’t an option I could countenance. I’d figure it out.
Celeste whispered, “Stop drooling over my brother.”
I blushed, “What?”
Celeste snickered, “You’ve been staring at him like a fat man at a cream filled donut.”
Oh.
“Just lost in thought,” I deflected.
Celeste snorted, “Yes, but what thoughts,” then giggled wickedly.
I sighed, and gave up, if I argued she’d just tease me more. Damned kids. The scary part was she was right, I just hadn’t realized it since I was woolgathering, and my eyes had just settled on him for some reason. It seemed like I was always worrying about something, it was hard to put all the responsibility I’d taken on down, especially because I was almost sure I was screwing up somehow.
The only time I could truly relax was when I was fighting, or brewing potions. But I couldn’t walk around in a fighting or casting focus all the time to clear my mind and stress away, I’d be a creepy and cold Stepford person if I tried.
Celeste said, “We need a break. This is all great and all, but we’re too isolated, and everything’s starting to get on my nerves. I don’t think I’m the only one either, but the others haven’t been here as long as I have. We need a class trip, I vote for an amusement park day.”
I smirked, “Too dangerous, and Karl’s been here longer.”
Celeste shook her head stubbornly, “He’s so smitten with Sabine he doesn’t count. We have the enchantments to make us look human and hide our power, and
even Linda has enough control that she’s stopped sparking during arguments. At least, while not channeling our power on purpose. We all know how to open gateways now too, if anything happens or we feel a supernatural presence, we can just leave. Life is risk, and you’ve minimized them, but you can’t expect us to stay here in total isolation in your mound for two whole years of training and not go bug fucking nuts.”
“Language.”
Celeste rolled her eyes, but her lips twitched, “Sorry if I offended your delicate senses.”
I sighed, that so wasn’t a genuine apology, more mocking actually.
“I’ll think about it, maybe we do need to get out of here, if only so I don’t strangle someone.”
She giggled, then nodded, “You leave all the time, so you probably haven’t really noticed.”
True, in my human form to deal with business, or to take Cindy to Vegas for one reason or another, or because we had a hit on the website I needed to check out. I was also used to being solitary, if anything I was having the opposite problem, but they were all raised human and around hundreds of others constantly in high school before coming here.
“You win, let me think about how, and what precautions we should take.”
She shrugged, “The buddy system, and Muriel can track our enchantments if something goes wrong. That should be good enough.”
“That’s not good enough. I’ll also need to take you and Billy shopping, everyone else has Earth clothes, what you have on won’t last in the real world. Unless you want your clothes to disappear when you’re on a roller coaster?”
She blushed furiously, “Shopping sounds good.”
I let the conversation go, since I’d finally got the better of her in an exchange.
Chapter Two
They must’ve been feeling more stress from the isolation than I’d thought, because they were all excited by the idea of getting out of the mound. I even caught Linda smiling about it, and she never smiled. I was probably the only one that was leaving my comfort zone, as we discussed plans. It’d be more stress for me, not less, but that had more to do with being in charge and feeling responsible for them all than anything else. We finally decided on Great Adventure theme park in New Jersey, but it took a few days to prepare.
Demon Underground: Kyra Bell Book Three Page 1
