by Ryan Attard
“Of course,” he said. “Why do you think your sister kept her by her side while she sent us out here?”
I stopped in my tracks. “You can sniff out Berphomet and I can take him.”
He snickered. “Please. Berphy ain’t no slouch but he’s not the toughest guy around. Your sister could have deployed other resources to grab him.”
“So what are you getting to, Amaymon?”
The demon looked me in the eyes. “I’m saying there’s something off between those two ladies and you.”
“Me?”
Amaymon walked past me and kept on going.
“Ever since you came back, you’ve changed,” he said.
“Yeah, I came back from the dead,” I said. “Why does everyone keep underestimating the impact that has had on me?” Anger flooded me. “I mean, with all due respect, but fuck all of you for thinking that shit was easy. I got chased by Samael, the goddamn Angel of Death, I had to live as a ghost, now I'm finding out that my resurrection was part of a plot by Greede to keep fucking with me, to play me like a fucking fiddle, and you guys think I should just walk it off?”
I didn’t realize I was yelling, but when I stopped there was a dead silence, the sort that seemed to suck in all other sound. I felt a ringing in my ears.
Amaymon remained unfazed by my outburst.
“Erik, I took a vow to protect you,” he said. “First time I’ve ever done that. First time I fought for anyone else. It’s the contract, making me more… human. A contract I allowed because of who you are and what I see in you.”
He was now almost face to face with me.
“There is something broken inside you,” he said.
“Yeah, no shit,” I retorted.
“Then you better fix it,” he said. “Before it destroys who you are, the person inside you we fought so hard to bring back from the dead.” He cocked his head. “Also, we might wanna shelve this for later. We’re here.”
I looked around me. All I could see were more trees.
“Really? Cos I don’t see anything-”
Amaymon’s hand slammed right by my side, smacking the tree trunk I had been leaning on. I dashed aside just as several spikes shot out of the bark.
“Holy crap.”
Amaymon grinned. “Traps mean we’re close. Also, I smell goat.”
“I’m sure he’ll appreciate that,” I said, scanning the area for more traps. “Are there any more?”
“Goats or traps?”
“Amaymon.”
“No more traps,” he said. “Here.”
“Oh good,” I said. “Lead the way.”
He nodded and stepped ahead of me.
Amaymon saved me from several other traps, and finally came back after a scouting trip to let me know there was a shack up ahead. I tucked away a water canteen and followed him.
From the outside the shack looked abandoned but there were little things that contradicted that fact. The hinges were new, eliminating the creepy, creaking sound. The windows had been boarded shut, except for a gap running across, wide enough to fit a rifle barrel and scope. Around the house was muddy, and when I stepped into it, my entire foot sank in.
Perfect for slowing down the enemy.
“Is he in there?” I asked Amaymon.
The demon shook his head. “No.” He stepped on the mud and it instantly hardened into solid rock.
I followed him inside the shack—Amaymon pushed the door and I heard a bolt snap. The interior of the shack was spartan and drab. A few sigils were painted on the walls with rudimentary wall paint, symbols that were the equivalent of a cheap alarm system.
A small stockpile of firearms and knives rested on the table. I spotted a few handguns, two hunting rifles, several packets of plastic explosives, clusters of grenades, and an assortment of other devices I had never seen before. I picked up a cylindrical object that looked like the hilt of lightsaber.
“Don’t play with that,” Amaymon warned me.
“What is it?”
“A ticket to Hell,” he said. “Miniature portal device.”
I set the device down. I’d been to Hell once—not as fun as you’d imagine. At best, a three-star Yelp review.
The shack was small enough that I crossed it in ten paces, and found a back door. I went through it and came face to face with more trees.
“Okay,” I told Amaymon, “so we need to find a place to lay low and wait him out.”
BANG!
They say you never hear the bullet that kills you. Well, I did hear this one and after a beat I was strongly wishing I was dead.
The pain started from the hole in my left shoulder and spread out like water bubbling from a boiling pot. Agony paralyzed me, and I bent over.
Which luckily saved me from a second bullet.
I watched as the tree trunk exploded, a hole the size of my thumb drilled into it. Strong hands seized me. Amaymon dragged me inside, just as a third shot made one of the window boards explode.
“I think he’s found us,” Amaymon said.
I clutched my shoulder. “Bastard is still using anti-magic rounds,” I groaned. “Get it out of me.”
Amaymon grimaced. “This ain’t gonna be pretty.”
Another shot, this one close to my ear.
“Just hurry up and do it!” I screamed.
Amaymon stabbed one of his clawed fingers into the hole in my shoulder. I screamed, a lot. He dug around until he wrenched the bullet out. The pure silver round clattered on the ground, deformed. I could see part of the sigils etched on it that endowed it with its particular magic. Amaymon hissed, his finger blistering from where it had come in contact with the bullet.
Meanwhile, the agony subsided, becoming a dull ache. The wound in my shoulder slowly began mending, but it was taking its sweet time. Blood streamed out and made a mess as I got back to my feet.
A loud rustling from outside.
Amaymon stomped his foot, and I knew that the ground outside had exploded. A shadow shot by the windows. I fired at it, missing.
“After him!” I raged, blazing past the doors.
I saw his silhouette again among the trees and fired at it. Berphomet leapt among the branches, hidden except for the sun glinting off the silver barrel of his favorite rifle.
A series of rocks rained down from above him, forcing him to retreat to ground level, and bring him out of hiding.
Berphomet was exactly how I remembered him. A tall humanoid demon wearing an outfit of practical black, with feet that ended in hooves. From his head, twin ram-like horns curled backwards, and he still retained his Ray-Bans, concealing yellow eyes with horizontal slits like a goat’s.
Two silver revolvers were tucked on each hip, while a long rifle rested comfortably in his hands and pointed straight at me.
“Greede sent me here, jackass,” I said, holding my gun steady at him.
Berphomet’s gaze shifted a fraction of an inch to the left, where Amaymon had just emerged.
“My orders are to eliminate the aberration,” he said. “I was never told to expect partners.”
“Don’t flatter yourself, asshole,” I said. “I’m not working for Greede. But we also need to eliminate the Knightmare, this aberration I’m guessing you’re referring to.”
“I work alone, human,” Berphomet said. “Amaymon, I can feel your pull on the ground. Another inch and I shall kill your human master.”
Amaymon snarled. “Careful, Berphy. I might just make you eat those words.”
“I heard of your battle with the former Emperor,” Berphomet said. He nodded his head by a few millimeters. “My congratulations. But like I said, I will kill the human if you engage me.”
“I’m gonna engage your skull with a hammer.”
“Amaymon, stand down,” I said, lowering my gun. “Look, Berphomet. I’m not here to pick a fight with you. Greede hired you to kill the Knightmare—great. Problem is, that guy has screwed me over. I can’t have you kill him before I find out exactly what he is and ho
w he killed all those people.”
“Your concerns are not mine,” Berphomet said. “I was told to wait here, that the Knightmare will come to me. Instead, it is you that showed up…” He trailed off, before cocking his head in a sudden realization. “Impossible.”
Before he could utter another syllable, the forest came to life.
“Police! Put down your weapons!”
Amaymon swept with his hands. Debris exploded, covering us. All around me, SWAT officers in full gear put on their goggles and raised their weapons.
Berphomet swiveled his rifle.
“No!” I yelled.
I lunged but crashed into an oncoming officer. Amaymon kicked Berphomet, sending the assassin sailing through the tree.
“Amaymon, retreat and get Gil,” I yelled, throwing the officer off me. “Go!”
I watched the demon disappear.
“Stand down!” someone yelled.
“I didn’t do anything,” I yelled back.
Here’s a hint: never yell back. Particularly not to people with guns.
And tasers.
I heard several pops go off before my body seized up. Usually my magic can counter one or two taser shots.
I counted at least eight pops before I went down.
My arms were wrenched behind me and cold steel secured them behind my back, while another officer stripped me of my weapons.
“What the hell is this?” I screamed from the ground. “I’m a consultant for the police department.”
“Erik Ashendale, you are under arrest,” said one of them as I was hoisted back to my feet. They had to hold me because my legs were jelly.
“For what?” I asked.
The officer’s face was covered but I saw the dark contempt in his eyes.
And there’s only one thing that can make a cop hate you like that.
“For the murder of Detective Gloria Diaz.”
Chapter 17
It was an old trick: throw the bad guy in a room, crank up the air conditioning, turn the damn place into an icebox, and leave them shivering for an hour or two.
To make matters worse, they had removed my coat, and given the nature of my last mission, I wasn’t wearing anything other than a thin shirt.
They even had me cuffed to the table. I was getting the full criminal treatment.
All over a misunderstanding. I hadn’t killed anyone, much less a detective. Sure, I had wanted to punch Diaz in the face a couple of times, but that didn’t mean I would have done it, much less committed murder.
No, this was a mistake. Any second now, Roland was going to come through those doors and tell me I was being framed, that shit didn’t add up, and that he needed my help.
Typical.
A knock on the door—here we go.
The door opened and two women walked in. My sister took the seat directly opposite me, while Abi sat next to her.
“Hey,” I said. “What are you two doing here?”
Neither one of them said anything. Gil rifled through a briefcase she had brought in and set a file in front of me.
“Um, Gil? What’s going on?” I asked. “Come on, you’re starting to freak me out.” I looked at Abi. “Do you know what’s going on?”
She nodded very slowly.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“For what?” I snapped. “Can someone please tell me what’s going on?” I lowered my voice. “One minute I’m out looking for Berphomet—we found him, by the way, and he tried to blow our brains out—and the next I’m accused of murdering Detective Diaz.”
“We know,” Gil said. She spread a few crime scene photos in front of me. I recognized Diaz mangled and brutalized in one of them. In another were several bodies—this one I recognized as the bar I had gone to, where the Knightmare had struck the second time.
I looked up. “The Knightmare did this? It killed Diaz?”
“Not it,” Gil said. “He. It’s a him.”
“Okay, fair enough,” I said. “So why am I in here?”
“You really don’t know?” Abi asked. “You really don’t remember?”
“Remember what?”
Abi blinked, fighting back tears. Had this been a few years ago she would be in tears by now. But not this new Abi. This Abi was strong, and tough, and when she looked at me, her expression was like granite.
“The night I found you standing outside in the street, with Djinn in your hands,” she said. “You told me you had a nightmare and ran outside because you thought you had seen something.”
“Yeah, I remember,” I said. “I had a dream about the Knightmare. Amaymon thought it was a premonition, some kind of new power manifested when my magic got scrambled when I came back to life.”
Gil shook her head.
“No,” she said. “That was my theory too, but any changes in you would have been reflected in me. We share the same curse, brother.”
“Erik,” Abi said. “That night… you were never in your bed.”
I felt my blood chill. “What?”
“You never came home,” she said. “I came downstairs because you set off the wards.”
“No,” I argued. “No, I remember. I remember coming home.”
“And what did you do? This was a few days ago. What did you do, Erik?” she insisted.
“I… I-” My memory failed me. “I don’t know,” I said. “Probably just passed out on the couch.”
“Where was I?”
“I don’t know. Class maybe?”
“Erik, I haven’t been to class in two weeks,” she said. “Teachers’ strike.”
“What? Then where the hell have you been?”
“At the office,” she said. “Where most of the time you don’t see me. You don’t react or respond. It’s like you’re living in a…” She sighed. “It’s like you’re back in Limbo.”
“No,” I protested. “That’s bullshit. I know I am back. I know this is real.”
She looked at me. “That night, Erik, why were your hands covered in blood?”
Blood.
I remembered blood. I remembered it on my body, on my hands and arms, on Djinn, on my face. I remembered it all, but I had no context.
“Abi reported these incidents to me,” Gil was saying. “As did Amaymon.”
I looked up at her.
No. Not Amaymon, too.
“He was the first to notice,” she went on. “Slowly, we all began seeing hard evidence that something inside you was broken.”
The same words Amaymon had said in the forest. Something is broken inside of you. And you better fix it before it destroys the person we fought so hard to bring back from the dead.
“You disappeared again the night after we came from the bar,” Abi said.
No. No. This could not be happening.
No.
This was bullshit.
This was a lie, a trick, maybe a test.
It had to be.
“We compared blood samples, Erik,” Gil said. “Vega, the people killed at the bar, even the thug you called Ice—all their DNA was found on you.”
Please no.
Please someone wake me up from this nightmare.
“I started investigating,” Abi said. “On my own. And last night, with Detective Diaz…”
Gil slid a photo in front of me. “This was taken from a security camera in her loft.”
I saw the dark creature known as the Knightmare standing in front of Diaz, his body a blur. Diaz was on the ground. The picture was hazy but she looked wounded. Her gun was in her hands.
The next picture saw the Knightmare over Diaz, who was now dead. Something caught my eye. Something on the creature’s oversized weapon.
A speck of color shining through like a beacon from beneath all that black armor and metal.
Blue.
No. Azure, burning bright with magic and power.
Djinn.
I’d recognize it anywhere.
“She fired at you to protect herself,” Gil said. “The bul
lets ricocheted off the sword, exposing Djinn beneath. Do you see it now, Erik? Do you see the truth?”
I looked at both of them.
“No,” I said. My voice was distant. “No, this… this can’t be true. This is some kind of trick. Photoshop. A frame-up.” I started breathing heavily. “No. Come on, Abi. Gil. You know me. You know I would never kill someone like this.”
Surprisingly enough, it was my sister who looked away first.
“We know,” Abi said. “But all the evidence says so. Even that black ichor you collected. The blood was yours, Erik.” She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and looked at me again.
“I don’t know how,” she said. “Maybe Greede had something to do with it, or maybe we’re looking at an independent agent. But the truth has finally come out.”
No. No, please don’t say it.
“Erik. You are the Knightmare.”
I have very little recollection of the next couple of hours. I sat there in shock, replaying events in my head over and over again, looking for gaps and holes.
And I found them. Poke in your brain long enough and you’ll believe anything. People have the ability to twist facts and interpret pretty much anything. So when I went to look for inconsistencies I found plenty.
Some were real, some were false, and by that point I had lost the ability to discern which was which.
As far as I knew, everything was false. The only thing I knew for sure was that I was locked up, with no allies, no friends, and if Gil was to be believed—and she was—a shitload of her ninja soldiers disguised as police officers at the station, waiting to subdue me if I made any attempt at escaping.
She even told me that Amaymon had offered to track me down if I broke loose.
So I sat there, in that cell, watching as the sun slowly set through the window on the opposite end of the room.
The door opened and the last person I expected to see walked in.
“Erik.”
I stood up, the surprise a nice change from the despair flooding my system.
“Doctor Tompkins,” I said. “Annalise,” I added, remembering she asked me to address her by her first name.
