Demontouched: The Demontouched Saga (Book 1)

by Wayne, Douglas

  I’m freaking out. That shit always works.

  “You don’t know who you are dealing with, do you holy man?” I hear from behind.

  I turn around and see the guy from the parking lot, blood streaming from the wound on the top of his head. Bits of brain visible behind his hair.

  “Well, you aren’t the normal class of asshole that I’m used to.” Its not every day you get to stare down a demon, full on. To be honest, most of the time you wouldn’t know it if you were. This asshole, however, is showcasing the trademark smoking eyes. Probably because he is using his powers to heal his host. From every thing I have read about demons, this is something they only used in case of emergency. It was usually faster to find another host than it was to heal it.

  With a lack of warm bodies, they probably do this more often now.

  “Drop the bag and knife.”

  I throw down the knife and pull off my pack.

  “I’ll take this.” He reaches over and pull the sword off of my hip and starts to examine it. “This is a very nice blade,” he says. “What I want to know is how a priest like you managed to get his hands on an angel blade.”

  “Hand-me-down.” I shrug my shoulders. “Poor family.”

  “Get on your knees, holy man. Say a little prayer for me,” he gives me a toothy grin.

  The last thing I feel is the butt of his gun on the back of my head before things go black.

  -9-

  I wake up without a clue to where exactly the fuck they took me. My eyes are blindfolded, and my mouth is gagged. To my right I hear a chair shifting on the ground and the sound of a muffled voice. Almost sounds like whoever it is is screaming into a gag.

  I’d put everything on it being Sara. I hate knowing I put her at risk. I know she wanted to help more than on the information front, but she isn’t built for this line of work. I admire her ambition, but this is why I try work alone. It is hard enough to keep myself alive sometimes.

  I hear the sound of a creaking hinge followed by a clicking noise. Unless I’m mistaken, someone just came in.

  When they pull off my blindfold, I open my eyes and see Sara sitting in a chair across from me. Her shirt is unbuttoned exposing her chest with her hands tied above her head and attached to a pulley in the ceiling. Her wrists are raw and bloodied like she has been trying to escape.

  Beard walks over to her, pulls back his hand and slaps her across her cheek. I notice her jawbone quivering beneath her gag, her muffled screaming turns into a cry.

  When I get out of this, I am going to find a nice slow way for this fucker to die.

  He turns around and faces me, his eyes no longer smoking. He pulls up a chair, sits down facing me, and pulls the gag from my mouth. “The boss doesn’t like when someone steals his girls.”

  “Funny. That’s my line.”

  Beard laughs before rewarding me with a backhand. It doesn’t take long before, I taste blood in my mouth. This guy really knows how to get on my good side.

  “I would love to stay and chat, but my boss has special plans for her.” He walks over, unties her, and throws her over his shoulder. “Have fun with the boys.”

  The hipster kid walks over to a table in the corner of the room and brings it over in front of my chair. He walks to the door and opens it, grabbing my bag from someone on the other side.

  “Think you are some sort of hunter?” He pours the contents of my pack on the table.

  “When the time calls for it.”

  “You hunt us, yet you bond with one of us.” I must give him a look of surprise because he just smiles back. “Don’t you worry, we’re going to fix that.”

  He grabs my knife and cuts off my shirt and jacket. He sets the knife on the table and grabs one of the vials of holy water. “Can’t forget these!” He grabs my gloves and puts them on his hands before popping the lid off of one of the bottles.

  He tips it over, pouring a bit on my hand. I try to muffle the screams, but they just come out in full force. My hand feels like it is being dunked into a pot of boiling water. I look down and notice the skin on my hand is starting to smoke and bubble. It is taking everything I have to keep from passing out.

  Even more odd is that Eunie is seemingly MIA. Struggled to keep the fucker quiet yesterday just to have him go in vacation today. If I get a chance to talk to him again, we are going to have to work out a few more things.

  “Shit isn’t so fun, is it priestie?”

  I shake my head, trying to keep my lower lip from quivering. The last thing I want to do now is start crying like a little bitch.

  “Then you are going to love this.” He sets down the vial and picks up one of the crosses.

  If the holy water felt like that, I can only imagine what this is going to feel like. I close my eyes and prepare for whatever is coming.

  Suddenly the door slams open. I hear a something whiz by my ear, opening my eyes in time to see a flash of white light hit Hipster dude right in the face. He lets out a scream as his body is enveloped in a white flame. I look back at the door and notice a young man with white hair holding a bow in his hands. He rushes over and cuts my hands free.

  “Get your stuff. We have to get out of here fast.”

  “And who the hell are you?”

  “Zeke. Now, go.” He offers his hand to help me up. “You did good, the girls are out.”

  I reach down and pick up my shit and put it back in my bag. Then I do the only sensible thing I can think of.

  Run off with this dude that just saved my life.

  -10-

  “Why did you save me?” I ask Zeke as he drives away from the hotel.

  “For some reason Uriel has a lot of faith in you. I was fine with leaving you in there for them to play with,” he says. “I was trying to save the girl. I wasn’t willing to leave her to that fate.”

  Saving her I can understand. She may be acting strong, but they’ll break her. Once broken it would just be a matter of summoning up another demon to inhabit her body.

  “We are already losing the war here on earth. The last thing I want to do is leave one of the good ones for them to corrupt.”

  “Thanks for that,” I say. “What’s next?”

  “We finish what you started. We take down Duncan Stansbury.”

  “How do you know about that? The only people that know are Sara and…”

  “Roman Nalar, yes.”

  “Nal doesn’t seem like the type of person you would associate yourselves with.”

  “He isn’t. If it were up to me, we would kill him before the demons realize how easily they could get in.” He hands me a piece of paper with some strange drawing on it. “Uriel has been using his body to relay information to you.”

  “That doesn’t make sense. Why would an angel send me out to kill others. Especially knowing that Einuir would have to show his face from time to time.”

  “We are too spread out, this has always been the case. We have used people to achieve our goals since the beginning.”

  “Beginning?”

  “Eve. Cain. Need more?”

  “That still doesn’t make sense. I always hit targets that were a threat to Nal’s territory. Why would you care about that?”

  “We used his mind to come up with targets that you wouldn’t question. Like the Sheriff.” He stopped the car and looked over at me. “Do you think we would let a human like Nal have an angel blade?”

  I never thought about that. It really didn’t make sense for Nal to have a crew at the riverfront. It was well out of what he considered to be his territory, not to mention a wasteland.

  “So the journal…?”

  “Uriel believes that we may be able to save you. If you can find a way to control him, we may be able to find a way to expel him without killing you.”

  “Then why not just give me the journal?”

  “We had to make sure that you would be able to help us. Duncan is a fairly high ranking demon, the type that we need to start hitting hard if we want to turn this war
around.”

  “What if I just want to be left alone? What if I don’t want to help the losing side?”

  “Because we know that you want to be with Linda and Jack again.”

  I look over at him, shocked. “How do you know about that?”

  “Self sacrifice is the one trait we admire most in humanity. Some of your kind are willing to give up everything in order to save those around you. We knew about Linda’s cancer. We know you made the pact to help cure her.”

  “Then why would you let me do it if you were going to take her from me anyways?”

  “You had her another two years of life without pain. She loves you for that.”

  I ball my hand into a fist and shatter the passenger window. “And you took her from me anyway. I gave up my life, my soul, to keep her alive.” I can’t stop the flood of tears at this point. She was everything to me. Even knowing what I know now, I doubt I would have done things different. It doesn’t make things any easier. “Then why not take me?”

  Zeke reaches over and touched my sternum. “Einuir tainted your soul enough that we were not able to find you.” He looks over at me. “You are one of the good ones Mitch. There aren’t many of you left. Help us end this and you will be with her for eternity.”

  “So, tell me about Duncan.”

  “Duncan is here to finish what Astar started.”

  “The portal?”

  “Yes. He has been spending his time in Memphis building his own army to protect the rift. With Michael now occupied in Chicago, he believes that now is the time to open it.”

  “But the arch was destroyed.”

  “He has had a crew downtown repairing it. They should have it repaired within the next few weeks, thats why we need to end this now.”

  We pull up to an abandoned YMCA building and make our way to the pool area in the back.

  “We need to get you up to speed with that blade, and fast.”

  “What did you have in mind?”

  He pulls his blade off of his belt and comes at me.

  * * *

  “That mark on the ground, if drawn properly, will prevent a demon from leaving. This won’t work on the more powerful ones, but it may work on Duncan.”

  I look at the drawing closely. It would take some time to draw one, but it didn’t look that difficult. “What if I run into one of those?”

  He hands me a dagger. On the hilt I notice some sort of ancient writing that I can’t make out. “Then you can use this. The angel blade is not made out of metal, so your powers will not work on it. The dagger is made out of iron, so you can move it around. It was enchanted with these runes which gives it the ability to kill a demon instantly, just like the sword.”

  “What if Eunie decides he doesn’t want to help again? Like where you rescued me from.”

  “Did you look around that room? They had markings all over the wall that suppressed your powers.”

  “They wouldn’t do that, it would have suppressed their powers too.”

  “It did. But your demon friend was still there. That’s why the water still burned your hand.”

  “Why would they willingly go into that place like that?”

  “They wanted to kill you, but they knew they couldn’t as long as your demon friend was around to play. They could overpower a human pretty easily, but you are a different story.”

  “Why would they kill a live host though? We aren’t exactly an abundant resource anymore.”

  “Your bond is not pure. When you gave up part of your soul to save your wife it kept us from finding you years ago. It also keeps him from being able to completely take over. They are trying to free him so he can find a more suitable host.”

  “Sara?”

  Zeke nods. “They would have broken her spirit. Once that was done they would have finally killed you letting Einuir out.”

  “And right into her body.”

  “That’s why Uriel sent me. She knew that you wouldn’t make it out of there any other way.”

  “So. Are you going to give me a hand with Duncan?”

  “That is your fight.” He puts his sword back on his hip. “But, I can keep his minions at bay while you take care of him.”

  “So, what’s the plan?”

  -11-

  After sword practice, we park the car at the top of a hill facing the warehouse. The building houses nearly eighty percent of Nal’s drug manufacturing operations in the area. We figure Duncan has control of this building too, since this operation is far more valuable than the girls.

  I lie down on the ground, reach my arm under the car and poke a hole in the gas tank. I get up and watch Zeke put the car into neutral, allowing the car to slowly roll down the hill towards the building. We watch the car as it smashes into the glass windows on the front of the building. I light my lighter and drop it on the trail of gas. The gas ignites and the flame follows the trail, right into the tank of gas.

  The car explodes, sending flaming debris through the parking lot and igniting the front of the building.

  “Ready for this?” Zeke asks, pulling out his bow.

  I nod and we make our way to the building.

  People start exiting the surrounding buildings. Probably trying to see what the commotion is. I pull out my new knife with one hand and the angel blade with the other. I wish I actually kept a gun around for situations just like this.

  As we enter the parking lot we draw the attention of the people out front.

  “Assume they are all possessed. The people that work for Nal are the types the demons look for. The few that aren’t.” He glances over at me. “We can sort after Duncan is dead.”

  Zeke levels his bow and shoots at some of the onlookers. I walk ahead towards the crowd.

  Three guys break off and charge my way. I raise the knife in the air and twist it above my palm. I thrust my hand forward, flinging the knife into the chest of the guy in the middle.

  I pull my hand back, trying to free the knife. His chest raises, but the knife doesn’t budge.

  I guess I’m going to have to do this the hard way. I put both hands on the angel blade and prepare to defend myself.

  The guy on the right tries to hit me with a hay maker, but I duck down, dodging his swing. The other guy wraps his arms around me and brings me to the ground knocking my sword free. I flip around, putting my hands up to protect my face. He reaches back to hit me with a nasty right hook just as I notice one of Zeke’s arrows jutting out of his chest. I push the body off me and get to my feet, squaring up to the last guy.

  He reaches into his coat and pulls out a large hunting knife.

  “Wrong choice, dumb ass.” I reach out and focus on the knife. I pull and twist my hand trying to take the blade from him, but he has a very firm grip on it. I look down and notice he is bearing down on his back foot so I put everything I have into a push, embedding the blade in his chest. He lets out a yell and falls to the ground. Blood starts to pool on the pavement.

  I walk over, pick up my sword, and stick it through his heart. The wound starts to smoke and bubble and his eyes go black before turning completely white.

  One demon evicted.

  I retrieve my new knife and clean it off on the guy’s shirt. I look at the guy’s eyes and see his eyes were also pure white.

  “There should be another entrance on the side. Go find Duncan, I’ll watch the outside,” Zeke says.

  I jog around the side and notice the entrance a few hundred feet away, and then notice the door open. A head pokes out and looks at my direction, then I see a hand reach out and grab the handle to shut the door. I thrust my hand out and focus on the door, hoping it is metal. I push forward and the door flings back, throwing the man holding it on the ground.

  I throw the knife towards the guy on the ground and direct it towards him using my power. He sits up, holds his hands in front of him, and closes his eyes. I stop the knife moments from his face. I have to get some answers.

  “Where the hell is Duncan, asshole?”
<
br />   “Duncan? Did they kidnap him too?” His voice is wavering, tears streaming down his face.

  “Kidnap? You don’t work here?”

  “Hell no, man. They are killing us in there.”

  Something is telling me that Duncan isn’t into the drug ops anymore. I start to wonder what I am going to face inside.

  I reach into my pocket and pull out a bottle of holy water. I uncork the top and hand it to the man. “Drink it.”

  “What? What is it?”

  “It’s either your salvation or your damnation. You drink it or I’m going to get creative with my knife.”

  He tilts his head back and drinks the vial. I wait for a few moments.

  He doesn’t start screaming. He is clean. I pull the knife back to my hand.

  “Here is what you are going to do. You are going to turn around and run down the alleyway. Don’t stop until you are well out of this side of town.”

  He turns around and takes off at a full on sprint and I walk into the building.

  The first thing that draws my attention is the screaming. It grows louder as I work my way inside. I turn around the last corner and I see hundreds of cages filling the main warehouse. Most of the cages are occupied with people in various states. All begging me for release.

  I look to my right and notice the fire working its way back towards the people. Duncan was going to have to wait. I walk up to the first cage and inspect it.

  “Get me out of here. Please. My family is here. I need to save them.”

  “Where are the keys?”

  He pointed up front. Towards the fire. The car explosion doesn’t seem like such a great idea anymore. I sigh and head towards the flames.

  The heat grows more intense as I get closer to the front. The screams are also growing more intense the closer I get. I have to make this quick, but I don’t know where to start.

  I walk to the nearest doorway and look inside. I see two desks on opposite sides of the room. I open the drawers on the desk to the left and dump out the contents. I don’t see any keys so I go through the other desk. I reach down, pull out the bottom drawer and I spot a key chain. I grab the keys and turn around towards the back. In the doorway I notice a tall man with short black hair leveling a gun at me.