The Reaping: Language of the Liar

by Angella Graff

  Alone and more scared than ever, Dorian clutched her hand around the bracelet and felt the profound sense that no matter what path she chose, it wouldn’t be over quickly or easily. She knew Nic wouldn’t give up without a fight, and even if she chose death, he’d be waiting on the other side, waiting to welcome her with open arms.

  ***

  The guys got done “calling the lads” half an hour after they got in, and they came out showered and refreshed. They each had more of a bounce in their step, which made the mood lighter, and Dorian felt a little better. She still had a decent buzz going from the liquor, something Dash found hilarious and Lennox found annoying, but she was less bothered about the whole thing without a sober mind.

  “So, Briar said we’ve got another exorcism tonight,” she said as she leaned against the kitchen wall. Dash was frying up some meat for tacos, determined to feed everyone before they had to head out again.

  “Yeah, we got a hit on someone who escaped from a hospital a few days ago. Some kid in his twenties. Seekers said he’s been possessed going on six years now. This is one of the iffy ones.”

  “Like where he might die?” Dorian clarified. “Is it dangerous? For you two, I mean?”

  “Can be,” Lennox cut in. He was at the table getting their bags organized with far more tools, potions, and to Dorian’s surprise, a long row of silver chains. “Briar will be with us, of course. We usually try for at least a four-man exorcism with someone who’s been gone this long, but everyone’s out of town and we can’t waste time. The longer he’s out on the streets, the bigger the chance he gets banged back into hospital.”

  “Isn’t that a good thing, though? I mean, so the demon isn’t out hurting people?”

  Dash shook his head. “In hospital we can’t get to them. They’re pumped full of drugs, heads all murky, and it’s harder to reach the doorway. He’s pretty detoxed now, so it shouldn’t take long. Open and shut case.”

  “And what if he dies? Briar said there’s a good chance he’ll die.” Dorian looked between Lennox and Dash, both hesitant to answer her. “You just leave him there or what?”

  “Generally. We have a team who does exorcism site clean-up. Erases the evidence we were there. They’re usually listed as suicides.” Lennox looked at least a little ashamed of this, which Dorian could appreciate.

  “How many die?” This question was important, because she wanted to know her odds. They’d made it clear the exorcisms of those who hadn’t been possessed were usually successful, but these? She hadn’t been given straight answers, and the whole thing was too muddy for her liking.

  “About one percent survive,” came Briar’s voice from around the corner. She stepped into the kitchen wearing tight, stretchy jeans and a black tank-top. Her hair was pulled back again, and she wore several amulets around her neck and arms. Strapped to her side was a massive knife in a holster, the handle covered in intricate carvings. “Like I said, it’s really only the strong ones who survive.”

  Letting out a frustrated laugh, Dorian shook her head. “You’re telling me I have a ninety-nine percent chance of dying?”

  “Technically,” Dash cut in. “But your case is unique. You’ve been able to mentally withstand a possession nearly your entire life by a very strong entity. We suspect he’s a leader of one of his dimensions, meaning he’s unfathomably old, and his power is wholly terrifying. You should be a catatonic mess right now, but here you are talking to us and fighting him off with the help of some paltry amulet.”

  She glanced down at her wrist and frowned. “The help of the amulet?”

  “Trinkets, love. These are nothing more than trinkets. Yes, they hold some symbolism and power, but,” Dash paused and flicked his necklace with the tip of his finger, “they’re nothing compared to the power you hold.”

  “So my odds are better than this poor fool we’re going to see tonight, is what you’re saying?”

  Lennox nodded as he zipped up the bags and set them on the floor. “That’s exactly what we’re saying. If you were worse off, if you had no actual chance, we wouldn’t be here right now trying to show you your options. We’d have either exorcised you, or taken you out the day we met you.”

  That hit her hard, and she reached out blindly for a chair. Sinking down, she saw Briar take a seat to her left, but no one said anything for some time. “So tonight you’re going to show me what I have to go through.”

  “Aye.” Lennox pulled down a few plates from the cabinet and helped Dash assemble a handful of tacos. “As I said, it won’t be pretty, but you’re strong.”

  “Basically he’s saying you’ve got this. And normally I don’t agree but this time, I do.” Briar sounded serious, and for whatever reason, it put Dorian at ease.

  “Okay.” When the entire table looked at her in surprise, she gave a shrug and reached for the plate of tacos. “What choice do I have? I mean, it’s not really a choice, is it? So fuck it. Let’s just do it and get it over with.”

  The stunned silence continued until Briar laughed and pointed her fork at Dorian. “I knew I was going to like this girl. Didn’t I tell you I was going to like her?”

  Chapter Thirteen

  They chose midnight to demon hunt. Based on legend, Dorian thought it would be the demon’s most active time, but she was informed the demon would be sleeping and gathering its energy for the next day.

  “They feed off human energy, and there’s very little of that going around when most of the city is asleep,” Briar explained in the back seat as they tore down the street. Dash was behind the wheel again, Lennox on the line with a Seeker—something Dorian hadn’t figured out yet—and they were being given directions based on some spell to locate the demon. “Usually we can get the jump on them since they’re not fully possessing the human at the time. We use spelled chains to hold them in place, and once these two begin the ritual, he shouldn’t be able to move.”

  “Shouldn’t.”

  Briar winked. “Caught that, did you? Yeah, sometimes they get a burst of power and they can break the ritual. You know that weird gold glowing thing you saw earlier?”

  Dorian nodded. “It was really hot.”

  “Like an electric current,” Briar said, and Dorian nodded. “That should keep him in place until these two can get into his head. Once they’re in, I use this,” she patted her knife, “to draw blood, which I can use to control the demon. Give it a great big shove backward through the door, and they shut it.”

  “Is it dangerous for you?”

  Briar let out a small sigh. “Kid, I realize you’re new at this, but one thing you should understand right from the beginning, we’re always in danger. Every time we set foot out of our warded apartment. We’re great big walking targets to those demons. They take us out any time they get the chance. It’s why we stick together. Exorcists work in teams, who have resident Reapers. Seekers work from the home base playing around with their spells or whatever, but if we’re out alone, we’re vulnerable.”

  Dorian let out a trembling breath, then nodded. “Okay. I mean, it’s not okay. This is all pretty fucked up, but…”

  “What choice have you got?” Briar asked, repeating Dorian’s words from earlier. “Not much. But don’t worry. If you make it through, you’ll train under me, and I’m one of the best.”

  “She’s not lying,” Dash called from the front, and Lennox immediately hushed him.

  “Left here, fourth building on the right.” Lennox’s voice was tense, snappy, and it reminded Dorian that what they were about to do was serious. There was a good chance this man wasn’t going to be saved at all. He was probably going to die.

  They arrived at the building moments later, but instead of pulling up beside it, Dash drove around the block and parked under a couple trees with low hanging branches. “Len and I will go scope everything out. Bring Dorian after you see the signal.”

  Dorian wanted to argue, shaken by Briar’s warning that apart they were vulnerable, but it was obvious this was protocol. Lennox
and Dash climbed out of the car, grabbed the bags from the trunk, and hurried down the street.

  Turning to watch them out of the back window, she was impressed by how lithe and quick their movements were. They kept to the shadows, their clothing of browns and deep reds blending in perfectly with the shadows cast by the heavy, yellow street lamps. They turned the corner and were gone, and Dorian sat back down, trying not to let her nerves get the best of her.

  “Here.” Briar held out a silver flask and shook it at her. “Just a shot. It’ll take the edge off.”

  Curling her hand around the cool metal, Dorian slugged back a mouthful and grimaced. It was gin, bitter and strong, and she swiped her hand across her mouth. “The kind of job which could turn even a nice church girl into an alcoholic.”

  Briar snorted a laugh. “Oh, I know you’re not a church girl. You might be a virgin, wholly terrified, and with abandonment issues not even Oprah could cure, but you’re no angel.”

  Dorian’s cheeks pinked and she looked out the window. “I might have seen some stuff.”

  “Girl, I know you have.” Briar capped her flask after taking another shot, and slipped it back into her pocket. “Everyone like us, girls out of the system, have seen some stuff.”

  She had on a thick leather jacket which Dorian scoffed at until Briar pointed out it was good protection from flying objects. Which, it turned out, was a common occurrence during post-possession exorcisms. Now Dorian felt naked and exposed, but planned on keeping to the sidelines until she was either dead, or in possession of her own Reaper powers.

  After a few minutes, just when Dorian was starting to worry, there was a small spark which exploded in the back window looking a little like a Roman candle. Dorian was startled, but Briar grabbed her arm and shoved a sheathed knife in her hand.

  “Do I really need this?” Dorian twisted it, trying to get a look at the hilt, but it was too dark.

  “Hopefully not, but you can’t be too careful. Don’t want to lose you before I get you.” With that, the girls were out of the car and hurrying down the street. While Briar moved much like the guys, trained and expert, Dorian felt like a clumsy giant, tripping over her feet and unable to make her footfalls silent.

  Briar didn’t seem to mind, however, and beckoned her along until they were at the door. It was an old, abandoned building, the door frame warped and cracked, and the door was sitting half open. Going first, Briar pushed it open with her foot and peered inside before nodding back to Dorian that the coast was clear.

  As the girls stepped into the empty front room, they heard a thump overhead, and Briar sighed. “Sounds like they got the chains out.”

  “Should we run up there and help them? Just in case?”

  “Hell no, I’m not wasting my energy running up the stairs. These boys do this daily. They need help, they’ll scream for it.”

  Dorian remained unconvinced, but she mirrored Briar’s unhurried steps as they walked through the front room, looking for the stairs. “What was that spark?”

  “Just an alert spell. These boys have a lot parlor tricks. They tell you they were brought up in this life?”

  “Lennox said he was exorcised as a baby, that his parents raised him in the Community.” They crept around a corner, but found nothing beyond more empty rooms.

  Briar seemed a little too casual as she turned on her heel and walked in the opposite direction to scout out the area. “Dash grew up the same. Back then the Exorcists and Seekers were called warlocks and witches. All big black cauldrons and eyes of newt. Dash apprenticed under Lennox.”

  “Whoa. So he fell for his teacher?”

  Briar laughed. “Dirty, right? They get really pissed if you start giving them shit about it. Keep it as ammo, trust me. You’ll need it.”

  For whatever reason, the familiarity between Briar and the Exorcists left Dorian with a sense of warm fuzzies. The life was hard, and it was dangerous, but they were like family. It offered her a chance, should she survive, to belong somewhere. To people who cared about her well-being. As much as Briar made fun of the boys, it was always with an undercurrent of affection, and Dorian had been lacking that her entire life.

  “We’re good to go.” Briar’s head nodded toward a rickety, rotted set of stairs leading up. They creaked under foot, and at one point, just near the top landing, the entire thing swayed. But they got to the top with neither falling to their death, and Dorian followed Briar down the hall to a far room where she could see the glow of candles under the door.

  Stepping in, Dorian’s eyes went wide. The boys had maybe ten minutes on them, if that, but the entire place was transformed from a gutted, empty room. Massive symbols were painted on the walls and windows, and a giant, inverted pentagram with what looked like Semitic writing was smeared across the floor. In the center was a man in his twenties, sallow skin, sunken eyes, and greasy black hair. He was writhing under the chains, spitting and hissing, but there was a red symbol painted across his mouth which appeared to be preventing him from speaking.

  The guys were lighting the last of the candles, some of which were floating in midair and Dorian tried not to focus on that right then. It was all a bit much, and her body threatened to go into shock if she wasn’t careful. She clasped at the amulet on her wrist and remembered what they told her earlier. She was the one holding Nic at bay. She was the one in control. Mostly.

  “Okay lass, you have a seat. Away from the window if you don’t mind,” Lennox ordered, pointing to a dusty corner across the room. “Whatever you do, try not to make a sound. We can’t lose concentration, and this could take a while. If you see anything or hear anything come up those stairs…” He dug into his pocket and tossed her the cell phone he’d taken from her that morning. “There’s a number in there, programed as Markus. You dial that. Got it?”

  Dorian gave a mock salute as she hunkered down, trying to ignore the dust and massive cobwebs. She held her knees to her chest, back pressed to the wall, and fixed her eyes on a single flame on one of the floating candles. Though the air in the room was completely still, heavy and hot with the spell the Exorcists were working, the candles floated through the air, wavering back and forth making the light flickering on the walls more eerie.

  With her thumbnail wedged between her teeth, Dorian leaned forward as the ritual began. Lennox and Dash began to chant in the strange language again, the room growing hot and the air even thicker. The bracelet around Dorian’s wrist began to vibrate and she could feel pressure in her temples mounting.

  “Stop,” she whispered. “You can’t come in.”

  She heard the sounds of laughter far off, and clamping her eyes shut, she used what little strength she had beyond her fear to shut it out. She could see Nic’s shadowy teeth in her mind, but after a moment of controlling her breath, the noise died down and she returned to the present.

  Briar was on edge as Lennox and Dash worked. She was circling the demon-possessed man like a tiger watching its prey. She had the knife in her hand now, and she seemed unaware of anything except the yellow eyes.

  The man on the ground writhed beyond the glowing orb surrounding the two men working the spell. He was hissing, spitting through his partially open lips. His jaw was working, and Dorian could hear muffled sounds, words similar to the ones Lennox and Dash were chanting. At one point, a hand broke free of the chains and slashed out, catching Briar on the arm and leaving a bloody trail in its wake.

  She hissed, pulling back, but her eyes remained focused. She stood on the opposite side of the Exorcists now, knife poised just above the exposed arm of the man, and her hands were shaking. Dorian could feel the power in the ritual mounting. She was leaning forward, unable to stop herself, and a voice in the back of her head whispered, “This is what they’ll do to you. This is your fate. Do you really want that?”

  “Shut up!” she cried.

  Lennox gave a start, glancing back, and Dorian could feel something break. The demon on the floor let out a laugh as he sat up, and he locked gazes w
ith Dorian. She was pulled in, down into the vast tunnel full of open doors, and this time she could hear them screaming. There was a battle waging, and so much blood and death. She couldn’t see it, but she could smell it. And from behind her, strong arms had her, closing around her waist and a hand around her throat.

  Panicked and blind, she shoved back with everything she had, and suddenly she was on the floor, her head laying on the hard wood, aching from where she hit it. Peering one eye open, she saw Briar holding the demon down with her foot on his throat, her knife sunk halfway into his arm. Lennox and Dash were whispering fast and harsh, rocking back and forth, both of them bleeding from the nose and mouth.

  She scrambled to her hands and knees, but as she crept forward, one of Lennox’s hands shot out and she felt herself flung backward by an invisible power. He didn’t break contact with the demon though, and as the chanting got louder, Dorian could feel the power, see the power pulsing from Briar as she used what she had to drive the demon back.

  “He’s coming for you, beautiful. You can’t stop him.” The demon choked out his final words before the final surge of magic, and everything went still.

  As the Exorcists collapsed forward, the candles dropped to the floor, the lights winking out. The only thing left was an ugly glow from the streetlamp coming through the high, dusty window.

  Dorian remained crouched on all fours, her eyes trying to adjust to the lack of light. Her throat was burning from where she’d been grabbed by the creature, and there was a stinging on the skin of her wrist where the bracelet had gone white-hot. Her fingers pushed the metal back and she could feel raised skin where a blister was forming.

  After a moment, Briar broke the silence, letting out a cough, and she moved away from the body. She grappled through the stuff until she found the camping lanterns, and she put them down on the floor with a loud clink. She lit them with a soft hiss, and the room was flooded with an unnatural white light. Briar looked sallow under the glow, her arm bleeding freely, and Dorian felt her heart sink into her stomach.