by Ryan Attard
“Yes.”
I had barely finished the sentence and she was already slamming the door behind her.
“Was it somethin’ I said?” asked Amaymon.
“Why do I keep you around again?” I asked.
He shrugged. “I kick ass and have more than ten thousand years’ worth of knowledge in here,” he said, pointing at his head.
I rolled my eyes. “So, use that head of yours and tell me why she’s still walking.”
“I dunno – maybe cause she got a great ass.”
“Amaymon!”
He held his hands up. “Relax. Oh, here’s what I think. When he attacked cutie back there, he didn’t have the storage for the Core. Maybe the idea of stealing magic ain’t even occurred to ‘im yet.”
“So, what the hell is he planning?” I asked. Frustration was steadily building up.
“He’s collecting all those Cores, but why?”
Think, Erik, think.
He began druid practices, then moved onto the mental stuff. Somehow, he found a way to shut down souls and steal Cores using phantoms.
Phantoms. Ghosts.
“Oh, fuck.”
Apparently I said that aloud because both kid and demon stared at me.
“He’s planning a Hallow spell,” I said with sudden realization. “Think about it. He started off as a druid. You guys take the movement of the sun and equinoxes and all those dates seriously, right?”
Francis nodded. “Yes. Those events are all part of nature’s cycle.”
“And what important event is coming up?” I continued.
“Halloween,” groaned Amaymon. “That would explain a lot. It’s the perfect condition for someone with ‘is powers.”
“Excuse me,” interjected Francis “but what happens during Halloween? As I understand, it’s a made-up holiday.”
“No way, man,” I said. “The holiday is a cover-up for the real thing. It’s a period where the spirit or ethereal dimensions resonate with this plane. For a short amount of time, their frequencies match up, making it easier to cross that border.”
“Oh,” he said.
“And that’s not the best part,” I continued. “All ethereal spells, like the ones Tobias uses – they all multiply in power.”
“Which explains why a kid like ‘im can access the soul when even the highest level wizards are hard pressed for something like that,” added Amaymon.
“A Hallow spell is any ethereal spell powered by the forces of . . . well . . . Halloween,” I said.
I scratched my head and frowned. “That sounds like the stupidest thing I ever said.”
“Yeah, close enough,” sniped my familiar. “But you ain’t wrong. Though you still don’t know what he wants.”
I scoffed. “That’s easy. He wants what every powerful person wants − more power. He’s been exposed to all this magic but lacks the juice for it. He wants to steal as much magic and as many Cores as he can.”
I gazed out the window, towards a cluster of lights and scattered Jack O’ Lanterns.
“And I know exactly where he can do that.”
*****
I already said I don’t like Halloween.
And, no, it’s not that I hate holidays or a reason to eat candy whilst in zombie costume. That’s cool. But I know what that holiday represents, being a wizard and all. The reason I hate it is all that commercialism − no one needs fifteen Jack O’Lanterns.
At least hand-carve them and have some fun with it. Don’t just buy a silly-faced one from the store. And I have no problem with the costumes and masquerades. To me, who has seen actual, real monsters, it’s just funny. But at least have proper costumes – zombies, vampires, werewolves, creatures of the undead. There are thousands of them.
But I can assure you that I have never met Batman, a medieval pink princess, or a slutty nurse during my career.
Maybe that’s just my luck.
This year, some official decided to get creative and organize a party in the town square. There were lights, fun-fares, and people in costumes, some of them right off a Bondage set, and a whole bunch of other stuff.
At the center of it all was a stage where live bands were supposed to set up and entertain. Except there wasn’t that merry, devil may care feeling to the whole gig. It felt dead, morose, and somber.
As if someone literally sucked all the life out of the party.
Tobias, or Dreadnite, made his way through the crowd. His walk was exactly like that of a bully on a playground – clearly trying too hard to be tough. He was surrounded by dozens of people. I saw phantoms twisted around them, controlling their movements like puppeteers.
I couldn’t get a good look at him until he got on stage and surveyed his kingdom of comatose subjects. He looked completely ridiculous wearing only a vest of black leather and pants, like some wannabe rock star. But that wasn’t even the worst part – the guy had drawn symbols all over his body in glow-in-the-dark magic marker. He looked like a walking rave, though I suppose that was the intention. He must have looked really freaky to those trapped under his fear influence.
“Kneel before me,” he said in a raspy voice.
He splayed his arms and phantoms scattered, seeking fresh victims.
“Stay back and set up that barrier like I instructed.”
Francis nodded at me. The rest of the druids scattered, each of them following the orders I had given them before coming here.
A small cluster of phantoms raced towards us. One of them butchered onto Amaymon. As soon as the ghost touched the demon, it let out a shrill scream and exploded, as did the other two in the vicinity.
These phantoms were supposed to be the embodiment of fear – and that meant that whatever scared Amaymon was so powerful, it made them blow up. I wasn’t even sure the demon feared anything. What can scare an embodiment of chaos itself?
A phantom latched onto me and I felt a tendril of darkness seep into the deepest corners of my brain. That was the phantom’s role purpose – to make me relive the scariest moments of my life.
I was back at the mansion I grew up in, looking at a coffin. My mother’s remains – mummified by the foulest of magic − kept for the purpose of bloodline magic.
I faced my own father, deranged and on more magical drugs than anyone alive, fending for my life as he tried to kill me and my twin sister. I recalled the fear of him about to strike me dead when my sealed powers flared. I lost myself and woke up later, with my father dead and the place in ruins.
I remembered losing my magic and the despair I felt. I remembered looking at that wraith as I willed it to kill me. I remembered facing the man who killed my mother and partnered with my father to kill us. I remember his killing the only man in my life I could even call ‘Dad’ − my mentor, the man who shaped my life and morals.
I remembered conversing with him – Dark Erik, I call him. My subconscious, my sealed power. A figure clad in shadows, claiming to be my legacy. My potential.
And that guy frightened me. But I suppose all of that meant I was aware of just how much fear I lived with every day. It meant I had accepted it into my daily life. It meant I knew how to deal with it.
I focused on the phantom latched onto me. It was designated to feed on fear and enhance it. But most folks just have a couple of repressed traumas and that’s it. I felt it wavering, as if on the brink of letting go. Slowly, it began withering – this fear phantom wasn’t nearly powerful enough to deal with the shit I had going on inside my head.
“Fuck off!” I yelled as I ripped it away from me. It dissolved into shreds and evaporated.
The rest of Dreadnite’s victims weren’t so lucky. Some struggled, others screamed, but they all ended up frozen on the spot as the phantoms shut them down and took control over their limbs. I saw a young boy in a superman costume going towards the glowing, tattooed freak.
Dreadnite grabbed the phantom possessing the boy and I felt his magic flare. Something inside the boy fought and withered – his soul. Instinct
ively, I rushed towards the boy, desperate to save him. I took a first step and found that my feet were buried in the asphalt.
“What are you doing?” I yelled at Amaymon.
He pointed. “Watch,” he said. “Watch where the container is.”
Demons – willing to sacrifice anything so long as it suited their needs. He wasn’t completely wrong, though. We needed to figure out where Tobias was keeping all the Cores he stole.
So, I focused on the boy’s Core. I saw his magic, or potential for it, being ripped out of his body. The lump in my throat kept getting bigger and bigger and I was vaguely aware of the pain in my hand as my fingers compressed themselves into a tight, white-knuckled fist.
But I saw it – a glow of metal underneath his vest. It looked like a loop, intertwined into another loop. In fact, it looked a lot like a...
“Dream catcher,” I said. “It’s that metal dream catcher.”
The trinket glowed white hot. I realized it was attached to a bolt that pierced Tobias’s side like a really grotesque earring.
“That’s one crazy son of a bitch,” muttered Amaymon.
“Well, now that we know what it is, all that’s left to do is kick his ass,” he said with a grin.
I glanced over to where Francis was. He gave me a brief nod – the barrier was set.
I nodded back.
“Now.” His shrill voice echoed all over the piazza.
I felt magic take effect. The area around us was encircled in a magical barrier, preventing anyone from entering or leaving. Usually, it took quite some power to set up a thing like this, but the kids were many and the barrier was ethereal in nature.
Tobias wasn’t the only one who could use Hallow spells.
The kid noticed immediately when we trapped him.
“What is this?” He turned his deranged face towards me.
“Who the fuck are you?”
“Erik Ashendale,” I replied.
He bared his teeth. “You’re that faker everyone keeps talking about. We’ll see how long you’ll keep that act after I am done with you.”
Phantoms rushed at me.
This time, I was ready for them. I grabbed at them and clawed through them. The magic inside my body dissolved the apparitions.
“I’m no faker, kid,” I said. “Now, get off the stage and turn yourself in before anyone gets hurt.”
Dreadnite extended his middle fingers. “Like hell. Let’s see you try to hurt innocent people then.”
One by one, the possessed comatose people rose up and awkwardly began moving towards me, like a horde of zombies.
“You remember the plan?” I asked Amaymon.
The demon smirked gleefully. “You strike, I sweep.”
I nodded and bolted into the mass of people.
My fist met a guy’s face and he initially crumpled down. The phantom disappeared and the ground softened beneath his limp body until the earth swallowed him.
Amaymon was to transporting them beneath the barrier and outside, far away from the battle. All it took was one hit – a kick, a punch, an elbow. The possessed bodies crumpled immediately, without so much as an attempt at retaliation. Those phantoms were not made for control – they could only hold a body and force it into basic movement.
Certainly not suited for high-speed combat.
I also noticed that only around twenty bodies or so could be controlled at a time. As I knocked them down, the number of replacements dwindled until the last of the people were spat out far off from there.
All that remained was us – Amaymon, me and Dreadnite. The kid panted heavily. Sweat ran down his body, smudging the magic marker symbols.
“It’s over, kid,” I yelled. “Just us left, now. It’s over.”
“It’s not over,” he replied. “It’s not over until you all bow down and acknowledge my power. It’s not over until I say it is.”
A wave of phantoms came howling towards me.
Alright, kid. Don’t bitch when you get hurt, I thought as I extracted my sword.
Djinn exploded in a burst of blue light. The blade doubled in length and I swung it around in a wide arc. The phantoms were like putty, instantly disintegrating. Amaymon stomped his foot and a series of tall spikes jutted from the ground and into the phantoms. But they weren’t corporeal, so they could simply pass through the earth.
“Tsk,” he tutted in annoyance. “Have it your way.” He kicked at the spikes, sending them straight at Dreadnite. The kid was light on his feet – he dove from the stage, which exploded into a shower of stone and wood splinters. Not the most direct of attacks but it worked – the phantoms disappeared as Dreadnite’s concentration wavered.
“It’s over,” I said again, glaring at the slayed kid. “We win.”
*****
You know that feeling when you know you jinxed something but your mouth won’t stop? I was having that feeling.
As soon as I said that, the clock struck midnight with a loud dong and I felt Dreadnite’s energies shift.
“Yes, it is over,” he rasped. “But no − I win.”
His power flared outward against the barrier and shattered it. Thousands, tens of thousands, of phantoms swirled around him like bats – covering the sky like a cloud.
“Mr. Ashendale.” Francis was on his hands and knees behind at tree. His glasses were shattered. “It’s time. Do not let him complete the ritual.”
Dreadnite’s deranged eyes locked onto the young druid’s. “You,” he spat. “I’ll make you pay. All of you. You will pay.”
The phantoms multiplied and shot outwards. They latched onto every person, comatose or not, and began dragging out their Cores.
“Mr. Ashendale,” screamed Francis as a trio of phantoms assaulted him. “Stop him!”
A mass of phantoms enveloped me. Djinn made short work of them, but I sensed that their purpose was not to attack, but to stall. Dreadnite could only take one Core at a time and he needed time. I swiped at the phantoms, clearing my field of vision.
Damn kid.
You see what happens when you mix teenagers and power? And for what?
This idiot just wanted to get on with a pretty girl and be accepted by a group. This was certainly not a healthy way to handle rejection. And now look at him – coming up with dumb ass names and delving into the darkest corners of magic.
Hang on a second.
I stopped fighting and just looked at Tobias. He had both arms outstretched, that ridiculous dream catcher pierced into his side and was laughing like a maniac. Phantom amassed around him, creating a link between him and his victims.
I just looked at him, as if I were looking at him for the first time ever.
Then, calmly, I walked over to one of the stalls. I stabbed Djinn into the wooden counter and leaned casually against a stand.
“Erik, what the hell?” blurted Amaymon.
“Let him do it,” I said. “Just let him finish.”
I gave the demon a meaningful look, and he got it. With a nod he just tapped his foot, and boulders shot up from the ground. He sat there, clicking his claws against each other.
Dreadnite smiled maniacally.
“Finally acknowledged my power, have you? No matter, I will not spare you.”
“There are over two thousand people here, Tobias,” I called out. “You sure you can do it?”
“My name is Dreadnite,” yelled the kid.
His power flared, and I felt him connect to the ethereal energy seeping into the earthly realm. His laugh echoed as he began using his powers. A mass extraction of souls – he had the power for it now, and I was just sitting there, waiting.
Anytime now.
And nothing happened.
Tobias brought his hands down and reached for the dream catcher. He found nothing but skin flapping and blood oozing.
“What . . . how? His hands pressed on the wound, and blood oozed in between his digits.
Amaymon appeared next to me again, his movements a blur. He dangled the dream catche
r before crushing it. My ears popped as sheer power over a number of magical Cores escaping messed with the atmospheric pressure.
“You sure the Cores will go back to their owners?” I asked the demon.
“Yeah,” he said. “Those guys should be wakin’ up anytime.” He sniffed the crushed trinket. “This looks tasty.” He threw the dream catcher into his maw and chomped down hard. “Hmm,” he said in between bites. “The kid actually had some talent, to make such a powerful toy. He coulda made a good adept, maybe even a wizard. Ah, well – fuck it.”
“Why?” Tobias looked a mess. A single phantom rose from his body and latched onto his arms.
I snatched Djinn from its post and channelled magic through it. They were too far to hit with a melee weapon, but I swung anyhow.
A crescent beam of azure energy streaked towards them, disintegrating the phantoms and knocking Tobias backwards, into the disintegrated stage.
I sheathed the short sword and began walking towards the boy. “That spell is pure evil. It’s not just enough to have power or the right timing,” I explained. “You need to be evil – pure evil. The kind that normal folks aren’t capable of. You’re just a scorned kid who couldn’t get laid.”
“I want that power,” he rasped. “So, I’ll just take yours.”
He lunged at me. I knocked his hand away and drove my fist into his face. Blood gushed from his broken nose.
“And I want a cat that doesn’t get on my ass and clients who aren’t complete douche-bags,” I replied. “Life’s a bitch − deal with it.”
I walked away, leaving Tobias moaning on the ground.
“You gonna leave ‘im like that?” asked Amaymon.
“Roland should be here in ten.” I shot Tobias a quick glance. He was sobbing now.
“Yeah, but that means we got ten minutes to spare.” He dug his hand into the ground and extracted a bag full of eggs.
“It’s Halloween,” he said with a smirk. He pulled out an egg and tossed it at Tobias. The kid sobbed harder as he wiped yolk from his trousers.
Normally, I’d feel bad for the kid.
But you know what? This asshole deserved it.
So, I grabbed an egg and joined Amaymon. The druids soon joined us, and together we pelted the would-be villain until the cop showed up.
