by LW Herndon
“How do we get her out?”
“We let them out.” Bart pressed a switch on a remote in his hand. The panel slid back in the ceiling above the platform and crane. A trap door used to position props and stage material during productions. The mist rose through the ceiling, each demon vying for freedom. The hard clink of metal slid shut behind them.
“Take them now.”
Rough hands grabbed my shirt and hauled me across the concrete floor to a small wooden pallet. Aisha slammed to the pallet next to me with her new captor behind her. The whole platform started to rise, hoisted from above to the next level. A section of the ceiling slid closed behind us as we reached the floor of the orchestra pit.
Pulling us up by our shoulders, the guards shoved us to the stage and then separated us.
The section Bart had opened for the demons emptied into a cylindrical cage, crisscrossed with silver bars from floor to ceiling, and charged with electrical energy. The demons had risen to escape and been trapped within an energy field on the stage. They could neither leave nor return to their corporeal form. The energy grid covered the floor and ceiling as well as the sides of their new prison, leaving demon mist swirling to avoid contact.
Caged and trapped in their shapeless form, the demons whipped in a frenzy. The rage from the collective rebounded within their trap. The bars vibrated with their attempts to flee. Their screeches and whispers filled my mind as their colors pulsed in mad streaks of red, orange, and purple.
The clan was definitely pissed.
The guard had lifted Aisha, carried her to the table by the back wall of the stage, and secured her wrists and ankles with leather straps affixed to each table leg. Her fists clenched with her struggle, but her knees couldn’t bend because of the awkward angle. Fear and horror reflected in her eyes as Marco advanced toward her, athame in hand.
A glazed sheen of ecstasy contorted his face into something wizened and ugly. A sweaty film covered his flesh and a bright feverish gleam spilled from his eyes. Not Marco’s eyes. Those young fragile eyes had been hazel like his sister’s.
Perry’s black eyes glistened from Marco’s face, a freakish possession of the skin and bone that was Marco but no longer the soul that had been Aisha’s brother.
She gave a desperate sob and twisted on the table, but there was nowhere for her to go.
I jerked at my restraints. The guards had slapped cuffs on me before the pallet had cleared the stage floor. I could flex my hands, but it was little help as they shackled me to a support post at the far end of the stage. I stood bound, ten feet from the cage that contained Shalim and his clan, the demon soup still swimming in the air to avoid the electrical field.
Langston appeared behind Bart. Neither reacted to the demon furor. Perhaps the raucous sound was loud only to me from my connection with the clan and my guilt. From their perspective, I was free and they held me responsible. From my perspective, I hadn’t found a way to circumvent this offensive.
The female demon lord Perry had bound to him lay curled in a ball on the far side of the electronic cage. The excited anger of my clan didn’t intrude on her misery either. I’d remembered her skin as a dynamic display of black-and-white tiger stripes. The black striping had widened, the crystal white dimmed to gray. Evidently, Perry/Marco intended to keep her weak given the number of unhealed cuts and wounds on her body.
One empty hexagram within a vacant summoning circle resided at the far edge of Aisha’s table, completing an awkward pattern to our confinement. Lines across the floor linked the cage, the circle, the demoness’s position, Aisha, and me as tips to a star, to another hexagram. Each of us, a target for parts in the sorcerers’ script and the empty circle obviously destined for yet another demon, one powerful enough to warrant so many victims. Yet while we were all captive, we still presented potential threat.
I pulled at my wrists. The metal restraints didn’t give. The guards hadn’t risked using rope that I might have been able to work free. This would be a righteously good time to lose control and see what a glow could produce, but I couldn’t funnel the sensation inside me. I was angry, but the glow bounced at the edge of my consciousness and avoided my grasp.
Images flooded my mind. I fought to maintain sanity and consciousness while pictures in a fast film clip pummeled my senses: Moloch, Zepar, and Brazko returned from the earlier fight. Brazko injured and mutated, his anguish let loose on the clan in violence and fury. Shalim’s tragic intervention to avoid further destruction.
I understood what had happened. I suspected I knew who projected the images. I focused to shut them off, to stop the transmission, to construct large iron doors and swing them shut, padlocking off more contact, locking Chaz from my mind. He most likely intended some knowledge transfer but I knew more than I could deal with for the present. After several moments, the quiet returned to my head, but an ache behind my eyes torqued in time with my pulse.
Brazko’s infection had occurred like mine, in the battle. He then brought the organism back to the clan, where the Consortium, or specifically Langston, intended him to infect the group and target the clan lord for summoning. The parasites couldn’t have infected the demons in their translucent form; the other clan members in the battle were aware of that restriction. But Brazko had fought in solid form, being a young demon and full of unfocused energy, ego, and pride. He’d considered himself only injured and not realized the full extent of his risk to the clan.
Chaz and Abraxas had not returned and neither had I. The explanation of betrayal was simple from Shalim’s standpoint. Destruction of Brazko had been for the good of the whole, but it depleted the clan’s energy and capped off the tragedy.
Regardless of the fact that I couldn’t have saved Brazko, I had chosen to help Aisha and Marco before reporting to Shalim. Once all the details were clear, that would still be an infraction of the first order.
A low-pitched whine escaped Aisha’s lips as Marco’s knife slid into her skin, at first along her wrist and then at an ankle. She struggled with no success, her blood dripping into stone bowls on the floor around the table.
I watched the demoness writhe in her ball as she caught the scent of fresh blood in the air. Marco glanced her way and smirked. He wouldn’t allow her to feed, but her presence would serve to fill the summons and torture her.
Bart pulled a crystal amulet from around his neck and began an incantation as he poured the blood from one of the stone bowls into a silver chalice in preparation for the rite. Langston leaned on a table at the far side of the stage and observed. His concentration on the steps of Bart’s spell seemed one of mutual involvement—not that of a distanced teacher. I realized Langston aided Bart in this conjuring, and it was taking both of them to execute the plan.
Perhaps I had allowed appearance to impair my judgment. I’d assumed Perry to be the lead merely because he originally looked the oldest. Based on the coordinated order in front of me, it seemed more likely that Langston had orchestrated the whole shebang.
Bart stopped and inhaled, surprise and satisfaction in his expression. “She’ll work even better.”
Langston walked to the table and reached a finger to catch a drop of blood from Aisha’s wrist, tasted it, and then looked from her to me.
“And you knew? The irony, her blood is the ultimate ingredient for another tool. A shame we didn’t know in time to save her for a vessel.” He closed his eyes for a minute, savored Aisha’s blood, and then frowned. “Though perhaps not powerful enough.” His speech was slow and exacting, whether from Aisha’s blood or from the power it took for him to sustain the spell that Bart was working, I couldn’t tell. What was obvious was that he could taste the wizard in Aisha, and he had no compunction about ending the life of a female, wizard or not.
It was also apparent that he didn’t seem to care what demon he summoned. One tool would work as well as the next. It also implied that my clan was a means to an end and not his specific.
Aisha looked toward me and blinked, her face pal
e and her breathing more labored. With the wounds Marco had inflicted, she would bleed out in an hour. I turned my head from Langston and Bart in disgust, battling with rage and desperation as I caught a glimpse of movement from the rear of the stage.
The sorcerers had a thug army of a dozen mercenaries. Some were at the edge of the stage. Several remained below the stage. Two were on either side of Marco, and two maintained backup behind the demon cage. Which was ludicrous given they wouldn’t stand a chance if Shalim’s clan escaped their bondage.
Scouts lined the back wall of the theater like ushers waiting for intermission.
But no one was backstage. At least not anyone positioned by either Langston or Bart. All their little minions had been assigned duties and other locations at the start of this macabre display.
Yet, I could discern an occasional flicker behind the tatter of curtains pulled to the stage’s edge. Not one of the Consortium thugs. Not one of Shalim’s crew, and it had better not be Jez. Whoever was by the backstage door shimmered in and out. There, but not.
“Too much for you to stomach? You poor miserable human wretch. Made a bad choice with the demons. Did you think they would give you some standing?” Langston grabbed my chin and forced me to look up at him as he swiped my cheek with Aisha’s blood. I forced myself to flinch from his touch and jerked my head back. He didn’t scare me, but he didn’t need to know that.
“Pathetic coward.” He pushed my head back into the post with enough force that I saw stars, then he walked back to his disciples. I feigned pain and hung my head. Now able to keep a discreet eye on what was backstage, I would refrain from engaging the sorcerers until I was ready.
Then my suspicion proved true. I focused in time to see Decibel shift in and then out again. The next time I was able to see the blade she carried, her focus centered on Marco and Aisha. I had one flicker of doubt and almost gave in to the knee-jerk reaction to stifle it, but I was out of time.
As the heat started to rise in my body, I flashed back to Decibel’s angry comments in Anne’s house and my power’s response. Forcing rage, I fed every image through my mind that I could remember—her promise to destroy all the threats in her path; Shalim’s vow to destroy Jez. The heat swelled inside me. I pushed deeper and faster. Chaz captive as a serpent and spider appetizer. Perry’s eyes reflected from within Marco’s body as he infused Aisha with a permanent nightmare of her brother’s loss and betrayal.
Decibel winked back in behind the stage for a second, and her eyes met mine. The connection, her power focusing my memory as my mind flashed to the awakening of my marks, fresh and vivid.
A cleansing pain washed through me.
Bart had finished his chant and moved to add the blood from the bowls around Aisha’s ankles to his chalice. The smell of burned tar and brimstone saturated the air. The demon mist pixilated from vibrant colors to black and back to molten orange. Theirs would be a forced incineration in molten ether.
Bart’s spell was activating, and they were all going to die, the clan and Aisha. With the Consortium free, the Irin would be eliminated and the wizard progeny with them.
I watched Decibel pull her arm back to take aim as she headed for Marco and Bart. She had picked her target, and I needed to save mine.
I lunged—shackles, bolts, and all. Fire burned through my flesh. Rage painted a red veil before my eyes as energy surged around me like a python sliding from the marks at my side. It entwined around my chest and slithered up my arms and out of my hands. The fabric of my shirt toasted to ash as I dragged on my wrists until either the metal gave way or my limbs would be free of my hands.
A noise. A roar. An immense cry of rage I didn’t recognize reverberated through the theater. I twisted and pushed from deep within my soul to shoot a physical bolt of flame toward the contortion of Decibel, Marco, and Bart writhing in struggle.
Bart gave a frantic cry and turned to me. The hesitation was his undoing for now he was cornered. The bowl crashed to the floor with the remnants of the spell’s props swept across the stage, dispersing the incineration spell on the demons in the cage. He didn’t pay attention to the repercussions.
I did.
Shards of stone and Aisha’s blood landed on the guard behind the demon cage. It startled the man into dropping the remote for the electronic field. I pushed a wave at the remote. White fire roiled from my palms, engulfed the guard, and whipped him into the audience seating. The remote sparked and exploded from the fire’s contact.
With the electrical field extinguished, the silver bars receded into the floor, and the demon mist poured onstage, forming strong demon bodies with muscle, bone, and claws. All headed for any victim in their path.
I aimed for Bart, heat and light still spreading in my path and covering my vision. He cringed from me and put himself behind Marco. Decibel had already delivered her final blow to Marco, the blade still embedded in the boy’s chest.
I added a final strike to her attack with one of my own. Pure white flame engulfed Marco. Instead of burning his flesh, he became an opaque mass of white-hot light. Then his body, Perry’s last vessel, exploded in fire. Oil and water collided in the heat with a pop and then sank to a slick pool of crude on the floor.
The altercation left Bart with no place to hide.
I didn’t have to bother with finishing him.
The female demon lord, released from Perry’s binding by Marco’s death, lunged at Bart, the nearest food source. He wailed like a child. It evoked no sympathy in me. He and his kind had killed innocent people with malicious joy in their greed to become gods.
My need for justice sanctified the demoness’s attack as her fangs sank deep into Bart. Holding his chest to her mouth, she looked at me over his body, her fangs moving, her eyes red and crazed from her suffering. Bloodlust barely satiated, the demoness glanced toward Aisha while finishing Bart.
Her moment of indecision allowed me to shove one of the buckets of Aisha’s blood her way and shield the girl. With a harsh glare, I kept my stance between them.
She owed me a boon. I had released one of her clan in the last battle. I allowed her respite and freedom now, though Decibel had planted the fatal wound on Marco.
A sluggish haze of reason filtered into her red eyes. With shaky hands, she dropped Bart’s body and then drained the bucket of blood. She glanced toward Shalim’s clan raging havoc, gave me a terse nod of thanks, and disappeared.
I squatted and ran my fingertips across the goo spot that had been Marco. My fingers came away clean. Nothing remained. The fire had wiped away every trace of him. No, not quite true.
Marco’s soul had left his body before I had ever reached the theater this evening. It was now free of the Consortium, for what little peace that would provide Aisha. It provided very little for me.
Langston had probably enabled the possession when he summoned Marco and commanded he lure Aisha to leave Caulder’s house.
I was determined to believe that. Otherwise Perry would have capped the final blow to Marco’s spirit with Aisha’s betrayal. Because as damaged as Marco’s psyche had been before the Consortium had targeted him, the ruin of the only person on earth who’d cared if he lived or died would have destroyed him. I couldn’t accept that outcome. For Aisha’s sake, I refused to. Decibel’s knife had merely given Marco’s spirit release and Perry’s spirit the damnation it deserved.
I glanced around the theater. Langston was nowhere to be seen, and the demons were making headway with the scouts and guards, though the number of both had tripled.
Whether from loss of blood or from seeing her brother destroyed before her eyes, Aisha remained unconscious. I slit her bonds and sliced strips from her shirt to tie her wounds. I gingerly picked her up and turned to find Decibel behind the stage curtains with her arms out.
“I can take her to safety as you cannot.”
I took a deep breath but held tight to Aisha. Decibel had killed Marco, but Marco had been beyond help.
“I will safeguard her for y
ou. And this will be your debt to me.”
I still hesitated, but I could hear the battle behind me. The clan still needed help, and Decibel was correct. I couldn’t get Aisha to safety fast enough to counteract the blood loss.
“Your oath.”
Decibel gave me a tight-lipped look. “My word, child of angels.”
“Fallen angels don’t count as the real thing.” But I handed her Aisha anyway and they disappeared.
I turned to the mayhem behind me. Langston appeared at the edge of the stage, his gun prepared and aimed toward Shalim.
The clan had covered Langston’s army, circled them in a tightening sphere. They crushed and strangled each man, then closed in on Langston, even though he seemed protected in his narrow space.
I moved closer, fingers burning, prepared to end the fight. I just wasn’t certain how accurate my aim would be. It wasn’t going to stop me.
Langston looked briefly at me, as if he suddenly realized his risk. “Demon spawn is beneath our contempt. Surely you won’t lower yourself to help their kind?”
A transparent fog encased his body. He had planned a back exit, and suddenly I didn’t care. If he left here without infecting any more of my clan, I’d consider it a win. I would find him one day. The world was just too small.
“They’re rejects, forced beneath the earth—the contempt of every great predator on earth,” he said.
Shalim had paused in his attacks; the neck of a guard hung from each of his fists. He and the clan slowed to watch for Langston’s purpose.
I gritted my teeth in disgust. “Demons, like lions, are the kings of their domains. As with all great beasts, they do not take more than they need. Nature in balance.”
“We still have more to offer you.” Langston narrowed his eyes as he looked at my body. I knew that my fire had left my skin covered in white dust and my clothes in tatters, with my sigil exposed. I could feel it move on my skin, the heat reflecting a glow around me.
