Lennox visibly tensed, and it confused her. Dorian had only met Matias around her exorcism, she found him far more pleasant than his brother. But there was obviously tension between the group, and it wasn’t her place to ask. Not now, anyway.
“So, you want to fill us in, or are we just here for spells?” Briar asked, her gaze fixed on Markus.
Dorian watched a non-verbal exchange between the two, and she forced herself to look away after a moment. It was too intimate, and she felt uncomfortable being in the know about them. Their personal business usually remained far away from supernatural business, but Briar was toeing the line now.
“I’ll explain everything when my brother gets down. For now, the wards are fine, but whatever’s got him is strong. I haven’t seen the likes of anything like this since…”
“Me,” Dorian offered, and Markus gave a slow nod. “Do you think it’s him? Nic?”
“I know it’s not. We’ve been able to ID the demon, but I think he’s on par with your friend.”
Dorian winced when Markus referred to Nic as her friend. It felt like a dig, and a cruel one at that. But again, now was not the time. Markus was stressed and she remembered Briar mentioned this possession was probably personal. Maybe family.
“Ah look what the cat dragged in,” came a voice from around the corner, interrupting the tense mood. Matias walked in the room, a jovial smile on his face. His gaze flickered past Lennox, then Briar, but lingered on Dorian. “I’m so pleased you were able to make it.”
Dorian felt her face go a little red, and her head ducked. “No problem.”
“My brother’s filled me in on how your powers are developing and I have to say, I’m impressed. I can’t wait to see them at work.”
Again Dorian felt like a specimen in some clear, plastic cage, and she found she couldn’t meet his gaze with her own.
Before things could get worse, Lennox spoke up. “So what’s the deal?”
“It’s Grant.” Markus’ voice was low, troubled, and although it meant nothing to Dorian, both Lennox and Briar went rigid. “I don’t know how long it’s been going on. He says he can’t remember when the blackouts started. And there’s a good chance it was happening for years and no one noticed. That’s how strong this thing is.”
“Jesus,” Lennox breathed, drawing his hand down his face. “So you think he’s the leak?”
“It’s possible,” Markus replied.
Matias leaned on the counter, his arms crossed. “We’ve had Adelaide in his head, but the thing was able to put up walls. She can’t get in far enough to assess the damage.”
“I’m lost,” Dorian muttered, and blushed when she realized she said it aloud. Everyone stared at her, and she let out a breath. “Sorry, I just have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Markus looked annoyed, but Matias gave her a cautious smile. “Sometimes, if the demon is weak, or if the possession is new, a Seeker can slip into a person’s head. They can assess the damage the demon’s done to their subconscious. It gives a better understanding of whether or not a person will survive an exorcism. Sometimes there are echoes left behind which helps us identify the demon. We’ve been able to ID this creature, as best we can according to our codex, but the demon is strong. It’s managed to shield most of Grant’s mind from us.”
“Meaning they can’t tell whether or not he’s a candidate to survive,” Lennox said.
Dorian nodded. “But… doesn’t that happen all the time? I mean, you said yourself only one percent survive. So is it really that important to know?”
“Yes, God damn it!” Markus spat.
Dorian flinched, and Lennox half-rose in his chair, giving Markus a threatening stare. “Sorry I just…”
“Grant is his son,” Matias filled in. When Markus turned his icy stare on his brother, Matias shrugged. “What does it matter if she knows? You want her help, her powers are strong, and a little personal motivation might go a long way.”
Markus muttered something under his breath in a language Dorian didn’t understand, then stormed out of the room. Her cheeks went red again and she shrank back in her seat. “I didn’t mean…”
“We might be numb to a lot of this tragedy,” Lennox said, “but there are times we feel the pain. This is one of them. Markus has a troubled relationship with his son.”
Dorian nodded and took a few breaths. “Fair enough. I’m not taking it personal.”
“Nor should you.” Matias clapped his hands together, rubbing them as he started to pace. “Lennox, we need some stronger spells around here. Markus just set this safe house up, so we’re low on supplies. Do you have anything with you?”
“Always.” Lennox jumped up from his seat. “Give me ten minutes, I’ll get some stuff put together.”
“I’ll help,” Briar said. She rose, but stopped next to Dorian and grabbed her shoulder. “You need to meditate. Focus your mind on your power and controlling it. Right now, we really need your help.”
“But no pressure?” Dorian half-joked, and ignored the scoff Briar gave her as she followed Lennox out of the room.
“You know they mean well, right?” Matias slid onto one of the bar stools positioned on the other side of the counter, and he clasped his hands. “Lennox and Briar. Even my brother means well.”
Dorian fought back a sardonic laugh. “Your brother is only interested in dissecting me. First I was the girl with the long-term, high level possession. Now I’m the Reaper with the uncontrollable powers. I get it, but don’t tell me he means well.”
Matias’ tongue darted out to wet his lips, and he blew out a sigh. “My brother’s…” He trailed off, his eyes rolling toward the ceiling and he stared up for a moment. “Things are complicated. As I’m sure you can imagine.” He smiled, revealing white teeth, slightly turned sideways at the canines. “Growing up around this life wasn’t easy. It makes one harder than a person should be. While we’re seen as lacking empathy, really we’re just afraid all the time. We know loss better than anyone, and it changes you.”
“Yeah,” Dorian said from behind a breath. “I get it.”
“Now with his son possessed, he’s forced to deal with a potential loss in his own home.”
“Can I ask how the hell that happened?” Dorian asked, her brow furrowed. “I mean, isn’t it protocol or whatever to make sure your kids are all given an exorcism?”
“Only when it’s necessary. Both Reapers and Seekers have ways of telling whether or not a person is a doorway, and when Grant went through the process, it was determined he had no doorway.” His lips thinned, then he said, “It’s my fault, though.”
Dorian’s eyebrows shot up. “Your fault?”
Matias nodded, his face threatening to crumble, and he took in a shaking breath. “I was his Seeker. I cleared the boy. But believe me, there wasn’t a hint of power inside him. No trace of an open doorway. No demon could touch him. I was so sure of it.”
It didn’t make sense, but Dorian had the feeling a lot of things were changing now, and she didn’t have to be in the Community long to know it had started with her. She bowed her head, feeling that familiar pit of guilt flare to life again and she wondered if she was ever going to escape it.
“Now because of how strong this thing is, we can’t tell if Grant will even survive the exorcism and Markus is…” He hesitated.
“Not taking it well?” Dorian offered.
Mat barked out a laugh. “That’s putting it mildly. His relationship with his son has always been complicated. His mother was a school-age girlfriend when we were kids. Markus and I were studying abroad in California for a year when they met. They had a whirlwind romance and she came back to Sweden with us when she got pregnant. She stayed back in Stockholm after Markus and I were transferred to London, but by the time we came back, she had disappeared. We managed to locate her a few years later. It wasn’t top priority, but it was important we find the boy to have him cleared. She’d come back to California and had been living in her mother’s home.�
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“Did she say why she took off? I mean, was Markus upset that she just up and took the baby?
Mat smiled, shaking his head back and forth. “Our lives are complicated. Nomadic. My brother and I are sent from city to city and perhaps my brother wanted a home and a family, but it’s no life for a child.”
Dorian thought about Lennox, about growing up the way he did. Losing his siblings, his brother’s injury, all the death he’d seen. She couldn’t imagine trying to bring a baby into this life. “Makes sense, I guess.”
Mat shrugged one shoulder up and down. “She fought us for a few weeks, insisting we stay far away from her and her son, but eventually we were able to convince her it was necessary. She allowed us to come in and examine the boy, but made it very clear he wasn’t to know who or what we were.”
“And that’s when you cleared him?”
Matias nodded. “He was three. It was difficult, but he seemed just fine. His mother on the other hand, she was suffering. She wouldn’t say, but I believe she saw something while my brother and I were gone, and it terrified her. Markus and I attempted to keep tabs on them, but six months later, she fell off the map and we didn’t hear from her again. Markus put a couple men on the job, but since neither she nor Grant were attached to the demon realms, we couldn’t track them.”
Dorian let out a puff of air. “Christ. So what happened? How the hell did he end up here like this?”
“Well, for fourteen years nothing. Then out of the blue, we got a tip that a teenager was dabbling in magic. A rogue, not cleared or associated with the Community. We sent a few men in, and they found him buying exorcism supplies from a local Wiccan shop. They tracked him to an orphanage where they were able to get his file and when Markus got the information, we realized who he was.”
“Did he know? I mean, when Markus came to get him?”
Mat laughed a little. “He knew. Apparently his mother had given him the information on the Community when he got a little older. He’d been in state care for a few years after he came home one evening and found his mother murdered in their home.”
Rubbing her hand down her face, Dorian shook her head. “God, that’s horrible. That poor kid. No wonder Markus is freaking out.” She let out a puff of air. “So what about his mom, though? Was her death demon related?”
“We could never confirm, but we suspected it. And now that Grant’s suffering this type of possession, we’re almost sure of it.”
Dorian started to ask another question, but the door banged open and Lennox walked in with Briar at his heels, both of them loaded down with spells and supplies. Lennox tossed a spell bag at Dorian who plucked it out of the air and jumped up off the barstool.
“You ready, lass? Got yourself all calm?” Lennox shifted some of the supplies in his hands, and glanced up the stairs.
Dorian felt her nerves firing up again, but she nodded. “Yeah.” She was tense and afraid of what she might do, but she owed it to this poor bastard to try. A kid whose luck seemed almost as terrible as her own, and now he was suffering the way she had. A powerful, high-level demon using his body as a meat-puppet for its own agenda. No control, no free-will.
Head still in a daze, she followed Briar and Lennox up the stairs. On the landing, Lennox motioned for the two of them to wait as he went into the room to prep everything. Dorian leaned against the wall, and let out a small sigh of relief when Briar put a comforting arm around her.
“You’re going to be fine, girl. I promise.”
Dorian’s head shook. “I know you think the best of me, which God only knows why since I’ve never been anything but a mess, but I don’t feel like it’s going to be fine.”
Briar reached behind her back, and Dorian heard the sound of leather scraping on cloth. A second later, there was a knife sheathed in a brown case dangling from the Reaper’s fingers. “Lennox’s mom gave this to me right after my first exorcism.”
“The one that…?”
“Yeah.” Her eyes went dark for a second, and her breath was shaky. “It’s spelled, warded, and she insisted the magic protects not only the person you’re trying to save, but the Reaper too.”
“Don’t you…”
“No,” Briar said, cutting Dorian off. “I don’t. You do. One day when you get your shit all figured out and you’re training your own Reaper, you can pass it on. It wasn’t supposed to be mine forever, anyway.” With that, Briar pulled her away from the wall and fastened the leather strap around a belt hole in her jeans.
“Thanks.” The word came out breathy and small, but Briar smiled and pulled her in to a one-armed hug.
“Like I said, you’ve got this. You know me. You know I tell it like it is, and if I didn’t think you had it in you, I’d say so.”
Dorian took comfort in that, because it was true. Briar didn’t give her time or loyalty easily. They didn’t have a lot of time to contemplate, though, because a moment later, the door opened and Markus walked out with Lennox close at his heels.
“Everything’s prepped. Meet me downstairs when you’re finished.” Markus didn’t meet anyone’s eye as he turned and took the stairs down two at a time.
With a frown, Dorian turned to Lennox. “He’s not helping?”
“He’s too close to the situation to be effective.” Lennox adjusted one of his amulets, then looked at the door. “He’s drugged right now, but the demon could pop up at any minute. The wards on his chains are strong, but we saw what Dorian’s creature was capable of, so I don’t want to take any chances. We get in, set the wards, and get the hell out.”
The warning was ominous, which did nothing for Dorian’s state of mind, but she squared her shoulders and nodded. Briar shuffled through her things, handing Dorian the paper with the spells printed on them, and she clutched them tight to her chest.
“Just read the words. Your magic will do the rest.”
Dorian nodded and she readied herself. This was it. It was now or never, and she had a feeling if she failed here, if she messed everything up, the Community would be done with her for good.
Lennox opened the door and stepped in, Briar after, and Dorian last. In the doorway, she could feel the spells. It put a strange, almost metallic taste in her mouth, and she realized she knew it. Blood. The air in the room tasted like blood.
It was all dark, save for a small lamp in the corner on the opposite side from the bed, where the unconscious figure was laying under a pile of blankets. Dorian could make out the faint glimmer of metal attached to a few hooks in the floor where the chains were secured. The walls, like in any Community house, were painted from end to end with warding spells.
Other than that, it was bare. It was like a prison cell, and it set her on edge. How was this person supposed to have faith he would come out of it like this? Bleak and terrifying, he probably felt like he was about to die.
A sharp laugh sounded through the room, making Dorian jump. The figure on the bed began to move, the sound of chains clinking moved up her spine, and the blanket fell back to reveal a shock of curly hair.
“He is going to die.” The voice was raspy and sore, but strong and it set the entire room on edge. “You’re only delaying the inevitable.”
When Dorian’s eyes went wide, Lennox caught her gaze and shook his head. “Don’t engage it.” He began to place spell bags throughout the room as Briar began to place candles along the floor in a pattern. Dorian stepped back to allow them space, and her hands clutched tighter to the sheets of spell paper.
She could sense the demon in him. She could see a glow of power just under the skin, locked there by the spelled chains, and her heart began to pump hard in her ears.
“Is she here? Nic’s bitch?”
Her face went cold and Lennox’s head snapped up just as the thing on the bed turned. Where a human face should have been, Dorian saw the demon. It was just like Nic. Slender, angry, cat-like eyes and violently bright, though the glow didn’t extend into the shadows of the room. When it smiled, she could see a row
of fangs, and claws lifted up against the chains to draw the blankets back.
“God,” she breathed.
“Can you see it inside him?” Lennox asked, coming up to her elbow. He put his hand on her shoulder, giving it a squeeze.
“That’s all I can see.” Her voice came out stronger than she felt, and she took in a breath. “Fangs and claws.”
The thing on the bed laughed, its eyes glowing violently in the poor human’s skull. “Fangs and claws. I like that. Nic never mentioned you were so poetic. He did mention your beauty, however. How right he was.”
Bile rose in her throat and she turned away. “Can you shut him up?”
“He’s not saying anything,” Lennox said, his brow furrowed.
Dorian’s gaze snapped over. “You can’t hear that?”
“I’m not hearing anything either,” Briar said, sounding alarmed.
Dorian’s head shook back and forth. “He’s…” Her voice trailed off as the demon on the bed erupted into laughter. “He’s laughing at me.”
“They can’t hear me, beautiful. Only you.”
“Why?” Dorian abandoned all pretenses and took a step toward the bed. Lennox’s arm stopped her, but she pulled against him. “Why only me? What the hell do you creatures want from me!”
“Your power. Your gifts. Your loyalty.”
Dorian felt her knees go weak, and it was by Lennox’s grip alone that she didn’t fall. “I don’t belong to you.” Her voice came out a whisper, but it was strong.
Straining against the chains, the demon’s eyes narrowed at her. “No. You don’t. But you will. You will belong to us and it’ll only be a matter of time before your powers consume you and your doorway rips back open. When that happens, little bitch… when you finally give in…you’ll have an army inside you. Tearing. You. To. Pieces.”
“No!” Dorian ripped herself from Lennox’s grip, falling to her knees as fear, anger, and power poured out of her body. The candles on the floor erupted into flames, flinging themselves into the air. Her hands gripping the sides of her head shook as she gasped for breath, and she only came back to herself when she felt Briar’s hand on her back.
The Reaping: Language of the Liar Page 22
