by Duncan, Lex
- Max
The subsequent comments ranged from panicked to grotesquely curious. I hovered somewhere in the middle. I was freaked out, yeah, but I had plenty of questions. Who was The Boss? Why was this killer so dangerous? What did this mysterious symbol look like? Should I really go hunting tonight?
All I had to do was take a gander at the mounting pile of unpaid bills on my kitchen table to find the answer to the last question. The others I could merely speculate about.
In an effort to avoid any more bad news, I closed my laptop and directed my energies toward the task at hand. I had everything I needed for a hunt spread out on the floor in front of me. Gun, bullets, chalk, dagger, a diagram of the banishing seal―the symbol used to purge a demon's spirit from its physical body―and a list I printed out from the government's Department of Demonology website detailing the ways to identify a possessed animal. I probably wouldn’t need the diagram, seeing as we spent an entire week in third grade learning how to draw the seal as part of Possession Prevention Week, but I wanted to bring it just in case my brain shorted out like it often did under pressure.
No one knew exactly where demons came from. A lot of people used them to prove the existence of Hell while others believed they hailed from a parallel universe. I didn't care one way or the other. They were here and they weren't showing any signs of wanting to leave.
What we did know, however, was that a demon couldn't survive long without a host, hence possession. They were parasites, feeding on whatever living thing they could sink their nasty claws into. According to demonologists, animals were easier to possess because they lacked the free will humans had. They couldn't fight back. Humans were trickier but the payoff was enormous. Possessed humans were stronger, faster, smarter, meaner. Capable of anything.
I had to be careful. One false move and I'd end up in the sanatorium with Rosie.
The rest of my preparations weren’t as exciting. Shower, shave, find some hunting-appropriate clothes. The majority of my wardrobe was comprised of school uniforms, tattered jeans, old Converse, and one color: Black. Black shirts, black pants, black shoes, black fishnets I'd worn to last year's screening of Rocky Horror Picture Show. Black was easy. Safe. Unassuming. And it matched with everything.
I settled on a tanktop, a zip-up hoodie with a faded imprint of the Batman logo on the front, a pair of jeans that had seen better days, and my trusty combat boots. Good enough, I guessed. I completed my look with a braid, crudely done and slightly crooked, then went to go check myself out in my cracked bathroom mirror. What I saw startled me. Just as the wicked girl at the sanatorium wasn't Rosie, the girl in my mirror wasn't me. Her red hair was dull and shabby and in desperate need of a trim, her blue eyes ringed with the shadows of unrest and weighed down with more baggage than an airport terminal. Her skin was too pale—a side effect of pretty severe anemia she never had time to worry about. She had too many freckles. Looked far too much like her dead mother.
“You look like shit,” I told her. “Invest in some makeup the next time you're at the store.”
Turning away from my corpse-like reflection, I went to grab my backpack, dumping the school stuff out and packing the hunting stuff in. A queasy brew of adrenaline and anxiety burned hot through my veins. Tonight was either going to be a miserable failure resulting in my grisly death or a spectacular success that would earn me loads of cash and my own TV series.
Beatrice the Demon Hunter. Had a nice ring to it.
***
The fun began when the clock struck twelve. I left my apartment and crept down dimly lit streets and crooked alleyways, not entirely sure where to go or how to start. I knew demons preferred dark, dirty places. Places where sin could thrive unabated, and in Stone Chapel, that could've been anywhere.
But the Old Quarter was particularly vulnerable.
A short stroll from my apartment building, the Old Quarter was the diseased heart of the city, infected by crumbling infrastructure and haunted by poverty. The decrepit mansions hidden here between the gnarled pines offered brief glimpses of centuries past, of magnificence stolen by time and indifference. I often wondered what it was like before the demon infestation got so out of control. Who lived in these giant houses? Did they worry about possession? Did they, in the back of their minds, fear walking out their door every day?
It was hard for me to imagine not having to deal with demons. They were an integral part of billions of lives the world over. We’d all become accustomed to them. Accustomed to fear. I never felt truly safe. Not even with my gun on my hip.
I wandered aimlessly around the decayed neighborhood for what felt like an eternity, the quiet making my skin prickle. Trees swayed listlessly in the chilly wind and I thought I heard an owl hoot somewhere among them, but other than that, silence prevailed. Creepy, dead silence.
I had to remind myself that this wasn't a horror movie as mansions faded to boarded-up storefronts. Those storefronts then evolved to one tall and jagged and unforgettable silhouette, shooting into the night sky like a syringe.
The church was the Old Quarter's single saving grace. Here in about nine hours, these same streets I crept along would be filled with cars and the empty pews inside would be brimming with worshippers. The bells would toll and the sermon would begin and the wretchedness we all were drowning in would be forgotten until it was time to leave.
But, for now, it was a midnight landmark. A sprawling feat of neo-Gothic architecture complete with a graveyard in the back and a pair of gargoyles out front. Not that it played into clichés or anything.
The closer I got to the massive church, the greater my paranoia became. I wanted to cling to the naïve notion that demons couldn't enter hallowed ground, but I knew better. The power of Christ didn't compel them. The cross didn't hurt them. A passage from the Bible bored them. I was as screwed out here as I was in there.
So why, then―paranoia and all―did I feel drawn to it? Pulled toward it like a moth to a flame, an apostle to a martyr?
It didn't make sense, but the compulsion was too strong to resist. I needed to get to the church. No matter what.
I shambled across the street, boots scraping the rain soaked asphalt. A car honked as it sped by. I must have walked in front of it, but I couldn't bring myself to care. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but the church.
My thoughts faded to a static that intensified as I approached the main entrance. By the time I allowed myself to stop moving, I wasn't thinking at all.
…And yet, I was content. I didn't try fighting it, this feeling that I wasn't completely myself. On the contrary, I welcomed it. It helped me realize that everything Demon-Rosie said was true. I was a miserable screw-up. My parents were dead because of me. I couldn't pay my bills because I was lazy. Selfish. I didn't believe in God. I cheated on last week's math test. I pushed anyone who tried getting close to me away. I was going to die alone.
This church was my salvation. I had to atone for my sins, beg forgiveness for leading a life of ill repute. I had to go inside, collapse at the altar, draw my blade across my throat. A sacrifice in blood. A small price to pay for an eternity in paradise, and all I had to do was―
Boom!
A scream curdled in my throat. I spun around on the heels of my boots, heart pounding rapidly against my ribcage. The static in my skull fizzled to nothingness as I squinted into the shadows. Whatever terrible presence that had somehow wormed its way inside of me was gone. I felt like Beatrice Todd again. Mostly.
“What the hell?” I sucked in as much of the damp September air as I could. A thin layer of sweat beaded on my forehead and dizziness rocked me in its disorienting grip. I’d need to check with Rosie, but I was pretty sure the church just tried to possess me. Or something like it.
I stumbled away from the doors on trembling legs, too terrified of what I'd see if I looked back. This was a horrible idea. What was I thinking? Demon hunting?! I barely even knew how to use my gun. I was an idiot. A stupid, stupid idiot.
An
other loud clap exploded from above, followed immediately by a crackle of lightning. That explained where the first boom came from. I'd never been so grateful for a storm in my life. If it hadn’t thundered…
God, I didn't want to think about it. I wanted to go home, take these stupid boots off, and go to sleep.
Unfortunately, the road to hell was paved with good intentions and the best laid plans never went without a hitch. Especially if said plans were made by me.
I didn't even make it out of the churchyard when I heard it. A snarl that rumbled through the electric atmosphere, a killer noise that sent a jolt of fear down my spine. That fear spiked to blind terror as the source of the growling stepped forward. First the church tried possessing me and now a demon dog was going to maul me.
Tonight was really not my night.
Four
When I was eight and living at the orphanage, I begged Mother Arden for a dog. She let me down gently, saying we didn’t have room for a one, but like any proper eight year old, I wouldn’t take no for an answer. I got mad. Threw tantrums, refused to eat my vegetables. If that Annie girl could have a dog, why couldn't I?
My underdeveloped brain saw her rejection as deprivation. Ten years later, I more than understood Mother Arden's decision. Not only was there no room in the cramped orphanage for a dog, the risk was simply too high.
Possessed, a dog wasn't a dog.
It was a monster.
A monster standing four feet tall with bundles of hard muscle rippling underneath its glossy black coat, with matching rows of yellowing fangs and paws the size of my head. As if that wasn't bad enough, it occurred to me as it prowled closer that something was missing. Eyes. This dog didn't have any eyes. In their place were bloodied stitches, empty sockets sewn shut.
My stomach flipped. I was going to have nightmares for weeks.
“Nice doggie,” I said, trying to avoid looking at its disfigured face. My voice shook. “Good doggie.”
Unfazed by my placation, the dog snapped its jaws, long strings of drool dripping onto the grass. Lightning forked across the sky, briefly illuminating my dark world in a flash of brilliant purple. The dog's gargantuan head swung to the side, distracted by something neither of us could see.
This was the opening I needed. It was now or never. Withdrawing my gun, I aimed and prepared myself to fire when another shot rang out. The dog fell to the ground with an unceremonious thud. Blood pooled in the grass from a perfect entry wound on the side of its skull.
My jaw dropped.
“Who's there?” I demanded into the dark, hoping I sounded more confident than I felt.
“Put the gun down, darling,” my intruder/savior answered from somewhere to the left. “You're going to hurt yourself.”
This lady obviously hadn't gotten the memo. Telling me to do something would make me want to do the exact opposite. I wasn't putting my gun down. No way.
The voice, prim and very British, sighed. “Please don't do this. Put the gun down and we'll talk. You owe me a favor, don't you? Since I saved your life and all.”
Ugh. She was one of those people. Turning in the direction of her sigh, I lowered my gun. Just a fraction. Easily remedied if she decided she didn't want to play hero anymore. “I'll put it down if you come out.”
She scoffed. “Come out? Darling, I came out in 1986.”
“Ha ha.” I might have thought it funnier had the circumstances been different, but considering everything that happened within the past fifteen minutes, I couldn't help but be wary of the gun toting British woman hiding in the dark like a narrator in a Jane Austen movie.
“I know, I’m hilarious.”
Her voice wasn't disembodied anymore. It was right behind me, so close that I could feel her breath on my neck. Stifling a yelp, I whipped around, nearly smacking her in the face with my pistol. Oops.
Her brow furrowed and within the space of a second or two, she seized my gun, unloaded all the bullets, and tucked everything away in her coat. “You won't be needing this old thing.”
“Hey!” I said. “That’s my property, I paid for that!”
She skipped the apology part and went straight to the interrogation. “What is your name?”
I crossed my arms over the logo on my chest. “Who wants to know?”
“Are you always this rude?” She asked.
“How do I know you're not a cop or something?”
She didn't look like a cop, more like a model straight off the catwalk. Her beauty was the dangerous sort, the epitome of femme-fatale wrapped in a black dress, a leather jacket, and a pair of knee-high boots. She had that statuesque figure a malnourished twig like me could never achieve, a tangle of ink colored hair, dark skin, and cheekbones sharper than a butcher's knife.
Eat your heart out, Brigid O’Shaughnessy.
“Because you and I have similar goals,” she said. Her gaze dropped to the dead dog at our feet. “You were attempting to hunt this creature, I assume?”
Attempting. Failing. Same thing. “Yeah, I―”
“You're aware such things are illegal?”
“What do you care?”
“I don't.” She crouched down, long fingers brushing the dog's eye-stitches. “Help me move this to the street.”
“What?”
“Have you gone deaf? Help me move this to the street.”
Knowing she'd pull the I Saved Your Life card if I refused, I braced one end of the dog while she braced the other and we did an awkward crabwalk over to the road, putting the dog underneath the yellow glow of a streetlight.
“We'll need to finish the cleansing process before it rains,” the woman mused, casting an upward glance at the sky. “You have chalk in that backpack of yours?”
“Yeah,” I unzipped the front pocket and retrieved an entire box of the stuff. I meant to toss it to her, but she gave me a look that made me rethink my decision.
“No, no, darling,” she said. “You do it.”
“You're kidding, right? I've never done this before. I'll screw it up.”
She raised a single perfectly manicured brow. “Now is your chance to learn, then.”
Another good point. I had to start somewhere. Especially if I wanted this hunting thing to pay my bills. Putting my backpack down, I plucked a fresh piece of chalk from the box and reached for the diagram of the banishing seal in my pocket. Drawing it wasn’t hard. I wasted many a math class practicing. The main design was simple: A triquetra enclosed within a circle, which was then enclosed in an inverted triangle, followed by yet another circle, then completed with a slick of the banisher's blood in the middle. Place the demon in the center, mumble a string of Latin words, and bing, bang, boom, no more evil spirit. Easy as pie.
Bolstered by newfound confidence, I put my chalk to the asphalt and began drawing. I’d gotten half a triangle done when Gun Toting British Woman intervened.
“What are you doing?” She asked.
Was that a serious question?
“What you told me to,” I said, affecting her haughty accent. “Have you gone deaf?”
She placed a hand on her hip. “Are you trying to summon another demon or banish this one?”
“What?” I asked, unable to think of a wittier response.
Her perfect posture slackened, her amused expression turning exasperated. “Are you daft, girl? You wanted to play hunter and you don’t know the proper way to draw the seal?”
“You didn’t let me finish!”
“Because you’re drawing it the wrong way.”
“I barely drew anything!”
“Counterclockwise,” the woman demonstrated as such with a twirl of her finger. “You must draw the seal in a counterclockwise manner to banish a demon. Drawing it clockwise would be pointless because clockwise is for summoning, yes? Surely they teach you these things.”
Oh. Right. Counterclockwise. I knew that.
Ashamed of my rookie mistake, I erased my half-triangle with my sleeve and started again. The seal had to be big enou
gh to hold the demon in its entirety and since the dog was roughly the size of a small horse, the finished product took up half the road.
“Not too bad,” I said, taking a step back to admire my work. It wasn’t perfect. The circle was shaky and the triquetra was a bit crooked, but it’d get the job done.
My partner in crime wasn’t as impressed. “You need to work on your technique.”
Whatever. I thought it was good. Time for phase two. Withdrawing my knife, I stared down at my unblemished palm. This was going to hurt.
“Well?” The woman said.
“Give me a minute―”
“We don’t have a minute,” she seized my wrist and pressed the blade into my skin. Blood and a sharp sting of pain welled to the surface.
“Ow!” I yelped, wrenching my arm away. “What the hell?”
“You were being slow,” she said flatly.
Running my thumb along the thin wound, I smeared the blood onto the middle of the seal. “At least tell a girl your name before you assault her with a dagger.”
She gestured to the dog. “I’ll tell you my name after you banish this demon.”
Fair enough.
Once we moved the body safely within the seal, I got to my knees before it and pressed my hands to the asphalt. Thunder rolled in the distance, the chilly air charged with electricity. The hair on the back of my neck stood on end.
“You know the words, don’t you?” The woman asked from the sidelines.
I nodded. The banishing incantation was as almost simple as the seal. I guess whoever made them wanted them to be as accessible to as many people as possible. Good thing, too, or else I’d have been screwed. Drawing was Rosie’s thing and I barely passed my Intro to Latin class freshman year.
Breathing deeply, I closed my eyes and focused like Max told me to in one of his messages. I needed to believe that I could do this. I needed to envision myself overpowering the demon, forcing it out of its physical body and back down into whatever hell it crawled out of. Banishing required absolute concentration. If I lost that concentration, the demon could very well choose me as its next target.
