Warlocks of the Sigil (The Sigil Series Book 1)

by Peri Akman

  Quinn slammed open the door to find a half-drugged demon, no longer tied up, attempting to murder Doctor Travitz yet again.

  Kole responded to this by hitting the demon with her stick rather hard a few times, almost casually, and the two older women were able to force the demon down. Quinn watched silently, sheepish at his own mistake, amidst the partially destroyed apartment.

  Travitz was wounded again, this time a nice long gash from her face to her shoulder, and Kole set to healing her as the demon lay bleeding to death on the floor.

  Quinn stared at his hand, sure that Kole could handle the situation. Could he summon… anything?

  Summon a diamond. Could he summon a diamond? He’d never seen a diamond, but he’d seen drawings of them…

  Pop!

  A two-dimensional diamond floated softly onto his hand.

  Well then. No sooner did it touch his fingers than it began to disintegrate into dust before disappearing entirely.

  Huh. He tried again, and tried to picture the diamond whole; a cardboard diamond-shaped and pastel blue colored box landed on his hand. It rolled around before disintegrating. How had his accidental summoning been way more successful than this?

  Magic was weird. Far too weird for him to understand it.

  Quinn’s focus was broken by Doctor Travitz leaving the room, crying.

  He blinked. Had he missed something? He couldn’t have been so focused that he missed a fight or something.

  Kole must have noticed his confusion, because she motioned for him to come towards her and the demon, who was currently pinned under her walking stick, much like Asim of Trell had been.

  “Is Doctor Travitz okay?” Quinn whispered.

  “Yeah. Sorta. As it turns out, clobbering an apprentice look-alike for a long period of time is draining on the soul. She’ll be fine,” Kole explained.

  “But… that’s not Sennta,” Quinn said. “It doesn’t even look like him anymore.”

  “You’ve known the kid for two weeks at most,” Kole snapped. “They’ve known each other for nearly a decade. Don’t you think she’s entitled to her emotions?”

  Quinn felt his temperature rise, like Kole had just gravely insulted him. He wanted to snap, yell, tell her she was an idiot. This emotion unsettled him, and he instead just kind of shrank.

  Apparently this resulted in him making several weird faces, since Kole reacted rather aggressively.

  “Do you disagree with that, Quinn?” she asked, practically spitting out the words.

  “You were the one calling her a terrible woman who didn’t care about him, not me,” Quinn muttered.

  Kole gave a cold laugh. “I said nothing of the sort and you know it. If that’s what you got from my rant, you need to pay attention. Now I can either rehash it and re-explain the nuances of humanity, or I can teach you how to interrogate a demon; which would you prefer?”

  Quinn’s face was still hot. He didn’t like feeling like this, so he just nodded silently.

  “Good,” Kole said. “Fetch me a knife.”

  Quinn looked down at the table, saw a knife, and went to pick it up.

  “Try to find a knife that you didn’t just summon out of thin air, Quinn,” Kole ordered.

  Sure enough, the second Kole finished the statement, the knife disintegrated.

  He really is a useless one, isn’t he?

  Quinn froze. The speech was inhuman, yet he understood it all the same.

  Sennta was speaking. Grinning, bleeding, and slowly becoming more and more mobile.

  Kole was not particularly fazed. “Ah shaddap, demon. No one cares about your mind tricks.”

  He does. You should have seen his face, Demon=Sennta sneered. Quinn felt his blood run cold. Suddenly Doctor Travitz needing to leave made a lot more sense. There was something wrong, seeing a friend’s face like that, filled with contempt and superiority and bile and hate and just everything that shouldn’t be there.

  Kole rolled her eyes. “Quinn, ignore the demon. He’s going to do a few cold reads and act like he’s the evil supreme. Just like every other demon.”

  Quinn went to the boxes and tried really hard to not conveniently find a knife that just so happened to be lying exactly where he was looking, but instead to find an actual knife that was exactly where it was supposed to be.

  The demon continued its tauntings.

  Oh, he wasn’t ignoring me before! Got all excited before he figured out. Probably because he thought someone actually cared for him, adorably pathetic. Where’s your stupid gift anyway? Probably broken on that roof. Don’t you even care where I found the mute little brat in the first place? He was out trying to talk to some gir--OW!

  Quinn turned around to see Kole kicking it in the stomach.

  He held a very real knife in his hand, and gave it to Kole, shaking. Demon-Sennta was unsettling.

  “Are… are you going to torture it?” Quinn nearly whimpered. The idea of cold-blooded torture made him want to vomit.

  Yes. Go ahead. Torture me. We’ll see how that weighs on your conscience.

  Kole groaned. “Really, Quinn? Just give it more ammo, why don’tcha?”

  Quinn frowned. To be honest, he was mostly relieved the demon wasn’t talking to him anymore.

  Kole raised the knife—and took a deep cut to her own hand.

  And pressed the gushing wound right into the demon’s mouth. It practically gargled as it flailed, trying to spit it out.

  Kole struggled to hold the demon down by herself. Quinn knelt down, and pressed his weight down on the demon’s waist. A bright idea occurred to him. Maybe he could summon weights?

  A solid chunk of iron dropped onto Demon-Sennta’s foot, denting the wood. It was too small to stay on top of the foot, however, and toppled over. Quinn frowned. He had tried to make it bigger, but apparently that was harder than it looked.

  After what had to be a good few minutes, Kole wrenched her arm away and healed the wound, her bandages practically soaked in blood.

  Wowwwwooooo you’rra…pretty lady, Demon-Sennta slurred, smiling goofily. Can we like… kill things together in the name of the Dark Queen? That’d be stellarr…

  “What… what did you?” Quinn stared blankly.

  “Got him drunk,” Kole said, shrugging. “They feed off our magic. What’s coursing through our veins? Magic.” She went to stand up and immediately fell over from blood loss.

  Demon-Sennta didn’t bother to take this opportunity to escape. Instead he crawled near Kole and began licking the only exposed skin she had. You taste… verrrry nice. Good magic. You are good warlock. Be verrrrry proud.

  “Argh. Idiot demon, get off of me!” Kole snarled, gripping her walking stick and slamming it into it. This did not deter the demon, who now seemed far more resistant. Instead, the demon gave a pathetic whine and slapped Kole across the face. Kole’s head jerked at the force, a slight groan elicited through gritted teeth in reaction, but she held fast.

  Argh. Idiot human, get off of me! Demon-Sennta said in a mocking voice.

  “Stop mimicking me!” Kole hissed.

  Stop mimicking me! Demon-Sennta countered.

  It would almost be hilarious if there wasn’t a fourteen-year-old guy most likely being drained to death somewhere.

  Kole raised the knife, the edge still coated in blood. “Hey, hey demon. You want this, right? Tasty magic juice, right?”

  The demon watched the knife in awe, and tried to reach for it, but Kole slapped the hand away.

  “Now, tell me, where is the real Sennta?” Kole asked.

  The demon whimpered, and shook its head. No. You’ll kill me afterwards.

  It was practically whining. Quinn found his jaw dropping in shock. This was all it took? Overfeed the buggers and they were compliant? This was what the Academy had said were more dangerous than monsters?

  The three-foot monsters from Haldon seemed way more sinister.

  “No I won’t. I trust you. Why else would I feed you all that magic?” Kole asked. She seem
ed nearly… bored. She placed the knife right underneath the demon’s nose.

  The demon bit down on the knife and began to suck, smiling pleasantly. Through its teeth, it managed to get out, We dropped the brat in a cave a pace or so from here, so the rest could eat while I got more food.

  Kole nodded. “Interesting. Anything by the cave to make it stick out?”

  The demon took out the knife and stared at it. Uhhh…

  Kole gently took the knife, and this time drew blood from her leg, coating the knife in it before healing herself. She dangled it appetizingly in front of the demon.

  There’s a garden. Big one. I stole carrots from it. It’s to the east north. Gimme gimme gimme.

  The demon seemed liked it was about to lunge, but Kole relented and tossed the knife. The demon bit down, cleaving through the steel like it was made of paper. It proceeded to shove the rest of the knife down its throat, and swallow.

  It grinned. More, it hissed, and it lunged towards Kole.

  Quinn was waiting and ready, and slammed into Demon-Sennta with a bat.

  Clang.

  The bat shattered off the demon, not even slowing it down.

  Kole lifted up her lame foot and tried to push the demon off, and the demon responded by biting down and chomping it clean off, bandages and all.

  Kole gave a scream of pain, and Quinn paled. The door slammed open, and Doctor Travitz stood over, bleary eyes wide.

  Demon-Sennta stood up smugly. You’re stuuuuuupid. I double crosssssed you. HahahahahahahHAHA!

  The demon did not actually laugh, but instead enunciated each verbal ‘ha’ with glee.

  The demon turned to Quinn, stepping into another lunge.

  Travitz gave a screech, but she was too far away.

  Two things happened at once. The first was that Quinn found himself holding a rather large shield, and the second rendered that fact irrelevant as the demon stopped in its tracks mid-lunge.

  Its skin was beginning to peel off. Large Sennta-esque chunks began to disintegrate.

  The demon’s eyes went wide.

  Ohhhhhhh. You double mega crossed me first. Verrry clever…

  The face melted away, and any trace of Sennta was completely gone. Instead there was just some sort of humanoid murky shadow creature, with black eyes larger than any eyes Quinn had ever seen.

  The true form of the demon lasted only for a few moments, however, before it began to melt away.

  Quinn looked down at the shield. He was surprised he had been able to summon it so efficiently, considering how using a shield hadn’t even occurred to him. There was a large fancy H engraved on it, and it seemed to be made of very good metal, unlike the bat. At least he was able to summon something right.

  Doctor Travitz was now by Kole’s side, examining her lack of leg.

  Quinn inched near them, afraid of accidentally summoning a leg.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, biting his lip slightly.

  “No, but otherwise that turned out pretty well!” Kole answered chipperly.

  “You idiot!” Doctor Travitz scolded. “I thought you were going to torture the demon. Not drug it up!”

  “Drugged demons comply better. Pain does nothing. It would have been a long shot,” Kole responded, clearly a bit annoyed at being chided. “Besides, I took the necessary precautions. It’s dead, isn’t it?”

  “And by doing so risked all of our lives!” Doctor Travitz snarled. “One errant slap and you could have had your head blown clean off.”

  Kole rolled her eyes. “You have two options. Yell at me, or go save your kid. I can heal my leg. You and Quinn head northeast of here. I’ll catch up once I can walk.”

  Doctor Travitz’s face contorted, and it seemed like tears were running down her face again, but she nodded.

  “C’mon Quinn,” she said, her voice quivering.

  Quinn nodded and followed Doctor Travitz through the door.

  “Doctor Travitz, are you going to be okay? You’re crying…” Quinn swallowed and frowned.

  “And you’ve done nothing but freeze like a bunny rabbit,” she snapped coldly. “I will continue crying until this is all done with. So let’s go already.”

  Quinn shrank a bit, but nodded.

  They hurried down the stairs, and no sooner did they make it out that Travitz started looking around.

  “How far away did the demon say?” Travitz asked.

  “A pace,” Quinn relayed.

  Travitz frowned. “Sennta is three feet away from us?”

  “Uh… maybe it was reverse hyperbolizing?” Quinn tried to helpfully supply. Maybe he could just… summon up a map of Shorne.

  A paper appeared.

  It said "SHORNE" in giant letters.

  And it had a small arrow pointing to the “O” of Shorne, captioned ‘you are here.’

  Yeah, that went about as well as he expected.

  “Stop fooling around!” Travitz snapped. “What do we need to find?”

  “A garden. The demon said a cave near a garden, northeast,” Quinn repeated.

  “Did it mean the greenhouses?” Travitz asked, furrowing her brow, wiping away the wetness that had accumulated on her face.

  “I… I don’t know,” Quinn confessed. “I was distracted… by everything else.”

  Doctor Travitz sighed, and sniffled slightly.

  “We’ll find it. I’ve lived in this city for long enough, I can find some stupid cave,” Travitz muttered under her breath, every step seeming to scream exhaustion.

  Quinn frowned. It was quite possible that Travitz hadn’t slept in a long time, considering her ridiculous work schedule.

  Regardless, the two set out in search of the cave, with Kole following rather far behind.

  Chapter Twelve

  By the time Quinn and Travitz were on the right track to the greenhouse, Kole had caught up with them. She actually showed up faster than expected, and when Quinn asked if she had indeed just jumped out of the window, Kole shook her head mischievously, and informed Quinn she had used his new shield-summoning ability to sled down the stairs.

  Doctor Travitz was right—the demon was referring to the greenhouse, which sported a few lovely holes in its broken… glass?

  Was it glass? Or plastic? Quinn couldn’t tell from this angle. Either way, it was broken and ravaged.

  Travitz and Kole discussed plans while Quinn tried to focus. He would need a weapon. A good weapon. Something to at least defend himself. His reaction time was terrible, so maybe he should just stick with that shield he had summoned before. It seemed like it was made of tougher stuff.

  The group continued their trek past the greenhouse, traveling further and further away from city limits. Buildings became sparser, with grass defiantly growing taller through the unmaintained cracks in the paved roads. Finally, they hit a fence, tall and covered in barbed wire.

  Quinn squinted at the gaps. He might be able to squeeze through it if he lost about half of his weight… and his head.

  Travitz squatted down, gesturing to one of the bigger gaps in the barbed wire. “I think we found the demon’s entrance.”

  “Short little buggers,” Kole replied. She turned to Quinn. “Hey, Quinn, summon your bat.”

  Quinn nodded, and a few seconds later, the metal bat was in hand. Kole summoned two of her own, and tossed one to Quinn to hold. It felt absolutely mundane and not at all strange, which naturally made it feel very strange.

  Kole rested her weight on her walking stick, and used the bat she was holding to start prying the barbed wire back. Quinn quickly realized what he was supposed to do, and began to work on the other edges. As it turned out, barbed wire was much heavier than it looked, and exactly as sharp as it looked. Plus, it had been twisted and tied into braids, making it far more sturdy.

  After a bit of struggling and quite a few nicks along Quinn’s wrist and arm, the premade hole was extended to something humans could crawl through. Travitz and Kole made it through with no problem, but Quinn had to press his st
omach flat on the ground to make it. It was not exactly the adrenaline-inducing rescue mission he was expecting.

  Kole clapped him on the back in thanks and support, and, with that, they returned to travelling the ground, now objectively outside of city limits. While before it had been more of a group effort between Travitz and Kole, past the fence, Kole began to take the lead.

  No sooner than a minute later, in the middle of a small field, Kole halted them.

  “I see it,” Kole muttered. “It’s a bit hidden, but thanks to Sennta I can see it. Bunch of demons are sunbathing.”

  Travitz paled. “They’re what.”

  “Sunbathing. Probably because they’ve been overfed,” Kole said slowly.

  Sennta…

  Quinn swallowed and grimaced. “Does that mean he’s dead?”

  “No,” Travitz muttered. “Warlocks can last for days. They usually die of starvation first.”

  “Oh…” Quinn replied, unsure of what to say. The weight of the situation was beginning to tear him down. His breathing quickened.

  This was too dangerous. What would they do, heal the demons to death?

  Wait, no. He could summon.

  Oh dear gods. He was the offensive power here! Him and Kole by proxy! Was this their plan? Did they have a plan? Why did Kole seem so relaxed about this? And Travitz was just going along with it!

  “Shouldn’t we uh…” Quinn nearly squeaked.

  The two older women turned to look at him expectantly.

  Put on the spot, Quinn found himself at a loss of words. He gasped for air a bit as the thoughts formed. “Shouldn’t we contact the city law? The guards? Anyone else?”

  Travitz’s frown deepened. They exchanged glances, like there was something they weren’t getting into. No, not weren’t, didn’t want to. It was that weird look teachers got. The “this child is asking questions too complicated for life” look.

  “I can explain the corruption in the guards and the problems with warlocks and demons going back several centuries,” Kole finally responded. “But for now, can you just trust us?”

  Quinn nodded. This was fair. He did trust her. Every mistake she’d made seemed to work out, in its own odd way.