Evolution (Demon's Grail Book 2)

by Amy Cross

  “Help me!” I scream, crawling forward and reaching out toward him with a trembling hand, as tears stream down my face. “Father, they've destroyed our home!”

  “Karakh has fallen,” he replies. “The army of spiders is no more.”

  “We've been tricked,” I continue, forcing my way through the pain as I crawl on my hands and knees toward the center of the hall. For a moment, I feel as if I'm about to pass out; finally, however, I manage to look up and open my eyes, just as my father steps out of the void and towers above me. I blink a couple of times, trying to make out his face, and after a moment I reach up to him with a bloodied hand. “Father, please,” I gasp. “You can't trust these creatures. They've been using us!”

  “The demon race existed long before the spiders and the vampires,” he replies, staring down at me with a face similar to Skellig's, “and Emilia... I am not your father.”

  “It was necessary to lie to you,” Skellig explains, standing nearby. “We had to resurrect the last dead demon, the last of the holy twelve. Since you never met your father, it was easy to fool you. Easier, even, than any of us anticipated.”

  “No,” I stammer, “it was my father, I heard his voice, he spoke to me from the void and he told me -”

  “Your father is long dead,” the figure above me says firmly. “He died along with your miserable spider empire. You heard my voice.”

  “No,” I whisper, “that can't be true. Keller -”

  “Keller was a fool,” Skellig says, interrupting me. “He'd actually met your father many years ago, and even he allowed hope to cloud his judgment. Like you, he believed he was serving your father once again. Like you, he was so desperate to see the spider empire rise again, he didn't stop to think that perhaps he was mistaken.”

  “No!” I scream, trying to get to my feet but feeling burning hands pressing down on my shoulders, forcing me to the ground. “My father's alive!” I sob. “He's waiting in the void! He's coming back!”

  “Your father is long dead,” Skellig sneers.

  “No,” I stammer, “he's not. He's coming back, he's in the void...”

  “Everything worked as planned,” Skellig continues, stepping closer to me. “The vampires were destroyed at Gothos and the spiders have now fallen too. The werewolves, meanwhile, are no threat whatsoever. The original three upstart species have been destroyed, and now we can return to our rightful place. The palace of the demons can rise now from beneath the ruins of Karakh.”

  “And the thirteenth demon shall be called forth,” adds the creature that I once believed was my father. “Remember, that is why we are here. Our glorious task has only begun.”

  Turning, I look around and see that I'm surrounded now, with twelve of these demonic creatures standing in a circle. One by one, they slip their hoods away to reveal burning bodies filled with energy that seems to be bursting out, and the pain in my head is so intense now, I can barely even think.

  “We are mentioned in the myths of every species,” Skellig explains, tilting his head slightly as he smiles. “Now it is time for those species to realize that we are not a myth at all. Our grail is here beneath Karakh, and now there is nothing that can prevent us from rising again. The demon empire has returned.”

  With that, he reaches down and places a hand on the side of my face, instantly filling my body with a wall of pain that burns through my soul and leaves me screaming as more hands cover my face and I collapse into darkness.

  Epilogue

  Jonathan

  Three months later

  It's almost midnight when the boat finally docks, bumping against the harbor wall with the lights of Manhattan towering above us. Several deckhands immediately start securing the ropes, and I feel a sense of relief as I realize that our long journey back to the human world is finally over.

  In the distance, there's music pumping out of a nightclub, and the familiar roar of the city actually feels welcoming for once. I'm back, after all the insanity of Jagadoon and the journey to Gothos and the battle with the spiders, except...

  Except something feels wrong this time. My sense of relief feels false, almost as if I'm trying to fool myself. New York, the human world, suddenly feels very alien and unwelcoming, as if I don't belong here.

  “We're home,” I mutter, joining Abby at the front of the boat. “I mean... I guess...”

  Without replying, she steps forward and starts climbing up the rusty ladder. We've spent almost a month at sea on the ferry, and in that time she's barely said two words to me. Instead she's been locked in her own thoughts, and I haven't felt as if it's my place to disturb her. I know she's thinking about Absalom and about everything we've lost now Gothos is gone, and about the spiders having won the day. The few times she's spoken, it has been about the spiders being out there somewhere, and about the need to stop them, and about a race of demons.

  And Karakh.

  She's thinking about the journey to Karakh, the place where she's fated to die.

  When I get to the top of the ladder, I turn and look down at the boat. The silent ferryman, whose rotten face I glimpsed once or twice during the journey, has already begun to turn his vessel around. I know enough by now to not ask too many questions, but I can't help wondering who the ferryman is and how Abby was able to contact him for this journey. Still, when I turn back to my sister, I see that she's staring up at the brightly-lit buildings of the city's night-scape. I want to tell her that everything is going to be okay, but I know those words would seem so hollow.

  Finally she turns to me.

  “This is goodbye,” she says calmly.

  I pause, shocked by those words. “Goodbye?” I ask after a few seconds. “What are you talking about?”

  “I brought you home,” she continues. “That's the most I can do right now. I'm sorry. Just try to forget that you ever met me.”

  “We're going to Karakh,” I reply, stepping toward her. “You said it several times since we left Gothos, we have to go to Karakh and find a way to stop the spiders and those... Whatever those things are that Absalom mentioned. You said it yourself, they can't be allowed to continue.”

  “I have to go to Karakh,” she explains, with a hint of fear in her eyes, “and I have to face Emilia and the demons and whatever else I find there, but you don't have to come with me. I know you feel like you don't fit in with everything that's happened, Jonathan, so this is your jumping off point.” She holds a hand out for me to shake. “No bad feelings, no resentment, just...”

  I stare at her hand. Before the battle at Gothos, I wouldn't have hesitated to accept this offer, but now I'm not so sure.

  “We don't work very well together,” she continues. “It's no-one's fault, it's just the truth. There's a savage side of being a vampire, a side that you clearly find too shocking. I can't hide that part of myself, and if I'm going to Karakh, I can't allow myself to get distracted. I think it's better if you go back to your old life, the way you wanted. You haven't been around me very much, so maybe you can suppress certain parts of your personality. I'm not saying your life will be easy, but I think it's worth a shot.”

  I pause for a moment, before realizing what I have to do. “I'm coming with you,” I tell her finally.

  “Jonathan -”

  “I'm coming with you,” I say again, feeling more certain now, “because after what happened at Gothos, I can feel something changing in my soul. When I fought those spiders, I experienced a hint of the savagery you mentioned, I felt for the first time that I wasn't entirely human.” I take a deep breath, shocked that these words are coming from my mouth but, at the same time, relieved that I've made a decision. “I'm coming with you because I don't belong in the human world anymore, not properly...” I pause for a moment. “And I'm coming with you because you're my sister, and because I can't let you go alone.”

  “There's a prophecy,” she replies. “It says that when I go to Karakh, I'll...” Her voice trails off for a moment.

  “I know,” I continue. “Maybe
it doesn't have to come true, though. You can fight a prophecy, can't you?”

  She shakes her head. “Our father tried, and look how that turned out. I'm going to Karakh, Jonathan, and I won't make it back. All I can hope is that before I die there, I'm able to stop whatever's happening. They've had a head-start already, I can't afford to wait any longer.”

  “I'm still coming with you,” I tell her. “There's just one thing I have to do in the human world first. I have to find 411 Maple Crescent Drive. I don't even know what city it's in.”

  “What are you talking about?” she asks. “Who lives at Maple Crescent Drive?”

  “David and Rose Watson.” I take a deep breath, feeling a shiver in my chest. “Ash's parents. I don't know what I'm going to tell them, but I have to tell them something. I have to tell them that their daughter...” My voice trails off. “Well, I guess I'll think of something on the way. And then once that's done, we'll go find Karakh. You don't have to come to see the Watsons, though. I can do it alone.”

  She pauses, before shaking her head. “I'll come,” she tells me. “I don't know what I'll say to them, but I'll come.” She turns and looks toward the city. “It's cold. We should go to my apartment. Hopefully the power's still running.”

  With that we set off on foot, making our way into the bright lights and deep, swooping shadows of the city. Even at 3am, there are people everywhere, but we pass among them without drawing any attention. They have no idea who we are or, more importantly, what we are. If they notice us at all, they probably just think that we're like them, that we're humans. They can't even begin to understand the truth, and perhaps it's better that way. If they knew what we'd been though, and if they knew about the spiders and demons massing at Karakh, waiting to launch an assault against all the other worlds, including the human world we're in right now, there'd be mass panic. It's better to let them stay happy for now, unaware of the darkness that's coming this way, and of the truth about Abby. And about me.

  We're vampires. Both of us.

  NEXT

  The 13th Demon

  (Demon's Grail book 3)

  With the war over, a race of ancient demons has finally taken control of Karakh. Determined to cast aside all other species that have risen during their absence, the demons – led by a ruler who has spent thousands of years trapped in the void beyond worlds – implements a plan that will lead to the extinction of not only vampires, but all living creatures.

  For Abby Hart, the moment of destiny arrived. With only her brother to help, she sets out on the journey to Karakh, despite knowing of a prophecy that states she will die in the palace of the spiders. Along the way, she strikes up an unlikely alliance and gains an even more unlikely follower, before finally entering the one place in all the eight worlds where she should never set foot. Like her father before her, Abby must face the unbending will of the fates themselves.

  The 13th Demon is the third book in the Demon's Grail trilogy, continuing the story that began in Ascension and Evolution.

  OTHER BOOKS

  BY AMY CROSS INCLUDE

  Horror

  The Farm

  Annie's Room

  The Priest Hole

  Eli's Town

  3AM

  Asylum

  Meds (Asylum 2)

  Tenderling

  The Girl Clay

  The Prison

  American Coven

  The Night Girl

  Devil's Briar

  Ward Z

  Ward Z: Revelation

  The Devil's Photographer

  Take Me to Church

  Fantasy / Horror

  Dark Season series 1, 2 & 3

  Ascension (Demon's Grail book 1)

  Dead Souls Volumes 1 to 4

  Lupine Howl series 1 to 4

  Grave Girl

  Graver Girl (Grave Girl 2)

  Ghosts

  The Library

  Journey to the Library (The Library Saga 2)

  The Ghosts of London

  The Vampire's Grave

  The Werewolf's Curse

  Thriller

  Ophelia

  The Dead City (Ophelia 2)

  Fallen Heroes (Ophelia 3)

  The Girl Who Never Came Back

  The Dead and the Dying (Joanna Mason 1)

  The House of Broken Backs (Joanna Mason 2)

  The Pornographer's Wife

  Other People's Bodies

  Dystopia / Science Fiction

  The Shades

  Finality series 1

  Mass Extinction Event series 1 to 4

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Part One

  Jagadoon

  Part Two

  Storm Warning

  Part Three

  The Mistake

  Part Four

  A Gathering of Spiders

  Part Five

  The Enemy Within

  Part Six

  The Fall of the House of Gothos I

  Part Seven

  The Fall of the House of Gothos II

  Epilogue

  Also by Amy Cross

  THE FARM

  No-one ever remembers what happens to them when they go into the barn at Bondalen farm. Some never come out again, and the rest... Something about them is different.

  In 1979, the farm is home to three young girls. As winter fades to spring, Elizabeth, Kari and Sara each come to face the secrets of the barn, and they each emerge with their own injuries. But someone else is lurking nearby, a man who claims to be Death incarnate, and for these three girls the spring of 1979 is set to end in tragedy.

  In the modern day, meanwhile, Bondalen farm has finally been sold to a new family. Dragged from London by her widowed father, Paula Ridley hates the idea of rural life. Soon, however, she starts to realize that her new home retains hints of its horrific past, while the darkness of the barn still awaits anyone who dares venture inside.

  Set over the course of several decades, The Farm is a horror novel about people who live with no idea of the terror in their midst, and about a girl who finally has a chance to confront a source of great evil that has been feeding on the farm for generations.

  Also by Amy Cross

  ALICE ISN'T WELL

  (DEATH HERSELF BOOK 1)

  “There are lots of demons in the sky above London. The problem is, this one came crashing down to earth.”

  Ten years ago, Alice Warner was attacked and disfigured by an attacker in her own home. She remembers nothing of the attack, and she has been in a psychiatric hospital ever since. When she's finally released, however, she starts working as a security guard at an abandoned shopping mall. And that's when she starts to realize that something is haunting her, keeping just one step out of sight at all times...

  Meanwhile, seventy years earlier, a little girl named Wendy is left orphaned after a World War 2 fighter plane crashes onto her house. Taken to a monastery, Wendy is quickly singled out by the nuns for special attention. They say she has been possessed by a demon, and that there's only one way to save her soul. Fortunately for Wendy, however, there's someone else who seems to know far more about the situation.

  What is the shocking connection between Alice and Wendy, reaching out across the years? Does a demon really lurk in the girl's soul? And who is Hannah, the mysterious figure who tries to help Wendy, and who seventy years later begins to make her influence felt in Alice's life too?

  Alice Isn't Well is the first book in the Death Herself series, about a dark figure who arrives in the night, promising to help deal with the forces of evil whenever they appear.

  Also by Amy Cross

  MEDS

  (THE ASYLUM TRILOGY BOOK 2)

  “Welcome to the Overflow. And remember, all roads lead back to Lakehurst.”

  At the edge of a ruined town, a burned-out hospital houses one final, functional ward. There, a small group of doctors and nurses tend to patients who have been consigned to the Overflow. Unloved, forgotten by the people wh
o knew them, these are the patients who will never receive visitors. If something happens to them, no-one will ask questions.

  When she starts work at Middleford Cross, Nurse Elly Blackstock thinks she's getting a second chance. She soon discovers, however, that this particular hospital is unlike any other. In one of the beds, an old man grapples with the horrors of his past, while in another there's a woman condemned to a life of darkness and silence. Ghosts stalk the corridors, and more ghosts are on the way. And watching over all of this is the hospital's administrator, Nurse Kirsten Winter, a woman who is desperately searching for someone named Annie Radford...

  Asylum: Meds is a dark horror novel about the lengths one woman will go to as she searches for the truth about the voices in her head.