by N. P. Martin
HUNTER’S LEGACY (NEPHILIM RISING BOOK 1)
N. P. MARTIN
DARK WORLD PRESS
Contents
Rights
Mailing List
Epigraph
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Mailing List
Before You Go…
Sorcerer’s Creed Series
Books By N. P. Martin
About The Author
Copyright © 2018 by N.P. Martin
All rights reserved.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Neal Martin
Visit my website at www.npmartin.com
Editing: Damian Southam
Cover design: Rebecca Frank
This a completely revised and rewritten version of the previously published book, Hell Is Coming (Watchers Book 1).
Be sure to sign up to my Reader Group and be the first to hear about new releases, cover reveals and special promos. Plus get access to my private fans-only Facebook group.
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"Hell is empty and all the devils are here."
William Shakespeare
1
It was dark outside when we stumbled out of the abandoned factory building, which had been the last stop on our three day binge. My mind and body could only take so much, so now it was time to head back to Kasey’s squat for some much needed down time. As we emerged from the rundown building, the music still blaring behind us, I wasn’t sure if it was late at night or the early hours of the morning. Not that it mattered: the demons were around twenty-four seven anyway.
"You don’t usually get this fucked up," Kasey said as we walked up an alley that would take us to another; and then back street after back street, until we reached the empty apartment building that Kasey called home. Despite being the most streetwise person I knew, Kasey often insisted that we navigate the backstreets instead of sticking to the main ones, even though she knew there was more chance of meeting predators that way; and all because she wanted home quicker. Normally I would try to steer us back onto the main streets, but I was too fucked up to care this time.
"Don’t I?" I said, taking in large gulps of air once I realized it was helping to clear my head a little. Though, I knew it would take more than air to clear it fully.
"No. There’s something going on with you, Leia. Why won’t you tell me? I thought we were friends."
"Jesus, not now, Kase…" I moaned.
Kasey shook her head. "That’s been your response every time I’ve put you on the spot about this. It’s like you don’t want to tell me…"
She was right; I didn’t want to tell her. Was I really supposed to say that I’d been seeing demons everywhere I went for the last six months? Since right around my eighteenth birthday? Or that weird things were going on in my body; stuff that had nothing to do with normal growing pains? Hell, I didn’t understand myself what was going on, so how could I explain things to anyone else? Kasey would think I was losing my mind, and she would probably be right.
"Look," I said, as we stumbled down another dark alley. "I’ve just been stressed lately, you know, with trying to find an apartment for me and Josh, and—"
Kasey snorted. "I still can’t believe you’re going to live with your brother. You could live with me instead. The things we could do, the fun we could have…it would be awesome."
"No offense, Kase…but you live in a squat."
"Of course, yeah, I forgot. Princess is too fucking good for a place like that."
I sighed and shook my head, totally not in the mood for one of Kasey’s strops. It annoyed her that I didn’t live alongside her in whatever squat she managed to find, and that I instead chose to live along with my brother in foster care. Shit, life was hard enough without having to live on the streets as well; though try telling Kasey that. She had long ago convinced herself that the streets were the only place for her.
"Fuck you," I said without much conviction. "You know that’s not—"
Kasey stopped dead in front of me, and I walked right into her. "Stop," she said in a low, urgent voice.
"I just fucking did," I said whilst rubbing my nose. "What’s wrong?"
Kasey raised her chin. "There’s someone standing there."
"What?" I looked up to see a tall, dark figure standing half-way up the narrow alley, in line with a row of dumpsters. One of the dumpsters was open and the figure looked to be pushing something down into the trash. The figure, which looked like a man in a dark overcoat, stopped what he was doing to stare at us. Even though it was dark and I could hardly see the man’s face, I somehow knew immediately that there was something off about it. It wasn’t just that we had obviously caught the man in the act of doing something illicit, like dumping a body in the dumpster. There was also a weird vibe coming off the guy that promptly chilled my blood.
Then, to make my drug-addled mind even worse, something very strange happened: things began to fall from the sky; dark lumps about the size of a baby’s fist, some of which shattered when they hit the ground. For a moment, I thought I was tripping, until one of the balls hit me on the head and I yelped in pain.
What the fuck?
Looking harder, I saw it was actually hailstones falling, which seemed odd, to say the least, given the sky was completely clear. Not only that, the hailstones were also a dark red in color. Nearly forgetting about the scary dude still standing in the alley watching us, I picked up one of the hailstones and examined it, quickly dropping it again when I realized with horror that the ice was mixed with blood.
"Jesus," Kasey said as she saw the blood run over my hand. "What is going on?"
I shook my head as I wiped my hand across my top. We both stood close to the wall for another moment, until the hail shower had finished and the ground was now covered in lumps of blood-ice. "This night can’t get any stranger…"
"Yes, it can," Kasey whispered, pointing to the man in the middle of the alley. "What’s he doing just standing there?"
I shook my head. "Nothing good probably," I whispered back. "Do you feel that?"
"Feel what?"
"It’s like…bad intent…"
Kasey shook her head as she grabbed my arm. "You’re tripping, girl. Let’s go…leave this creep to his business."
We turned around to go back down the alley. Two steps was all we took befo
re the stranger impossibly appeared in front of us, causing us both to scream involuntarily. We turned quickly and went to run the other way, but again we were blocked by the same man.
"No," Kasey said. "I must be fucking tripping as well, because there’s no fucking way…" She trailed off when the man let out a slow laugh.
I could only stand there staring at him as Kasey gripped my arm tight. Then his face changed suddenly, and it was like dozens of black, writhing tentacles had sprouted from it in an instant, out of which shone two bright yellowish eyes.
Not so long ago, I would’ve thought I was indeed tripping, as now I wished it were as simple. In the last few months, I’d seen far worse than this one, and on an insanely regular basis. The constancy of it had established that it wasn't restricted to any tripping brought on by my recently developed habit; a cocktail of narcotics and booze aimed at dealing with both the stress of seeing these monsters, and of the feelings and paranoia brought about by their presence. I'd seriously begun having doubts about my sanity, and thus my habitually altered state of mind had become paradoxical. On the one hand, it was in the hope I wouldn't see them anymore; and on the other, it was aimed at the hope I'd have the means by which to handle seeing them, these normal human faces that would suddenly change into something monstrous. These horrific transformations would normally only last for a second or two at a time, often for less than that, but long enough for me to know what I was looking at:
A demon; if such a word can be used to describe anything that is found outside the pages of some paranormal fantasy novel.
A demon just like the one who had killed my parents, which until recently, was the first and only time I had seen one. I spent years wondering about that fateful night, about the kind of creature that had slaughtered my father and dragged my mother away. Now suddenly the fuckers were everywhere, though rarely as close—or as blatant—as the one standing in front of me and Kasey. As always when I encountered one of these demons, I couldn’t help thinking: Why now after all these years? What do they want?
When I glanced at Kasey, I saw no indication in her face that she was seeing what I was. Sure, she looked fearful underneath her normal tough guy facade, but she didn’t look horrified, as anyone should if they were looking at the same thing.
"Hello, girls…" the stranger said casually, as if he were just out for a late night stroll. He bent down and picked up one of the large hailstones, blood oozing over his hand, which he then tasted, raising his eyebrows as if in some kind of approval. "Mighty strange weather we’ve been having lately, wouldn’t you agree?"
Kasey reached inside her tattered leather jacket and pulled out a switchblade. "You better fuck off, Mister!" she said in a trembling voice as she extended the blade of her knife. She liked to tell people that she had used the knife on a number of occasions, but I knew she never had. The knife was just to scare people, though something told me few things would scare him.
The demon’s face disappeared, replaced by the face of the man again; a man in his thirties maybe, with dark hair and a sneering smile that told me all I needed to know about his intentions toward us. "Now what are you two little street rats doing here at this time of night?" he said, completely unconcerned by the knife in Kasey’s hand. "Shouldn’t you be sleeping in whatever hovel you nest in?"
"Fuck you!" Kasey said. "Move or I’ll—"
The demon moved with shocking speed as he closed in on Kasey like the predator he was, disarming her of the knife and picking her up by the throat in the space of a split second. Though to me he seemed to move in slow motion, which somehow made the whole situation more tense, as the horror of it was drawn out as though it weren’t already enough. I couldn’t help but scream as I staggered back away from him, my heart pounding so hard I thought I was going to have a heart attack right then and there. I could only look on in horror as the demon seemed to examine Kasey for a moment, turning her head to each side in appraisal, as her eyes bulged with fear, her mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water, no sounds emitting from the effort she made, other than the gurgle of trying to breath.
"I know someone who would pay a pretty penny for two little skanks like you," the man said, his eyes now glowing yellow. He then touched Kasey’s forehead with his free hand, and Kasey immediately went limp, as if the demon had switched off her brain. Then he let her drop to the ground, where she lay unconscious.
"What did you…do to her?" I said backing away, the overwhelming fear making it difficult to even breath.
"The same thing I’m going to do to you," the demon said smiling. "I’d prefer it if you didn’t fight me. Damaged goods are harder sell."
I kept backing away as the demon came forward, until I eventually backed into a wall. The demon’s hand shot out and grabbed me by the throat, lifting me clean off my feet, putting my face right in front of his, as his yellow eyes bored into mine.
For a few seconds, I felt as helpless as Kasey likely had. But then something happened that I couldn’t explain. It was like something came to life inside me. A fire in the pit of my belly that was jarring to say the least. The shock of its combustion took my breath away, and my body tensed against the sudden power that was now slowly spreading through me.
When I next looked into the demon’s eyes, his expression had changed, as if he now saw something in me that at once frightened and excited him. "Well, well," he said. "Look at what I just caught. I’m going to get a lot more for you…a lot more."
I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about, neither did I care. The feeling of power that had suddenly ignited in me had by now spread throughout my whole body, bringing with it a feeling of pure calm that all but displaced the fear that had previously threatened to consume me. My every nerve ending felt electrified, my every muscle primed and ready for whatever action I chose to take next. I felt lighter in every sense of the word.
The demon’s eyes betrayed his growing fear and concern, and his hand started to come up. "Time for you to go night-night, little—"
That was as far as he got before a sudden instinct told me to punch him, which I did, my fist traveling at a speed that shocked me as it slammed into the demon’s chest. His grip on my neck was released as he went staggering back, and I landed on my feet with a cat-like balance, my eyes never leaving the demon in front of me. At that moment, I felt no need to question any of what was happening. A light seemed to emanate from me, and it powered my every move, keeping me focused squarely in the present moment. More importantly, it kept me focused on the threat at hand.
The demon’s sneering smile returned as he regained his balance. "So it’s like that, is it?" he said. "I’ve never killed one of your kind before, but I’m going to enjoy killing you, little one."
I couldn’t get past what he said. "My kind?"
The demon’s smile widened for a moment, until he eventually started laughing like he’d just realized something funny. "This just keeps getting better. You don’t even know what you are." He laughed again, then his yellow eyes glared at me seriously once more. "I know someone who is going to be very happy when I deliver you. What a fortunate encounter this has turned out to be."
I remained crouched as I frowned at him, having no clue what the fuck he was talking about. I wanted to know, but the guiding light within me wouldn’t allow for any questioning or shift of focus from the threat at hand. The demon was getting ready to pounce. Reeling in shock at this whole crazy experience would have to wait until later.
When the demon made his move, he charged toward me with his fist drawn back, clearly ready to lay me out in a brutal fashion.
Luckily for me, my newfound instincts kicked in again, otherwise I would have remained where I was, frozen in fear as a demon came charging at me. The timing of my reaction couldn’t have been any better. As the demon came forward at preternatural speed, I sprang forward from my crouched position. The demon’s fist skimmed over the top of my head just as I slammed my palm on his chest. The blow itself surprised me, thou
gh not as much as the powerful energy that came from somewhere inside me, traveling down my arm at the speed of electricity, before exploding out of my hand in a flash of blinding white light. I almost couldn’t believe it when the demon, who had to weigh at least two-hundred and fifty pounds, was lifted off his feet by the force of the impact, and was sent sailing back several feet, until he landed with a heavy thump on the ground. There, he remained unmoving.
For several long seconds, I stood staring over at the unconscious demon, in shock at what I had just done, and wondering if the demon was going to get back up. When he didn’t, I then wondered if I had killed him. If I had, I wouldn’t have minded, and that was the truth. He tried to kill me after all.
When it became clear that the demon wouldn’t be getting up anytime soon, I turned my attention to Kasey. She was still lying on the ground, unconscious from whatever the demon had done to her. I ran over and crouched down beside her. "Kasey?" I said, gently shaking her.
When she didn’t respond, I instinctively put a hand on her chest, and was again surprised and thrilled at the power that coursed through me. That same white light, a light like nothing I had ever seen before, appeared around my hand for a second before gradually fading. Then Kasey’s eyes opened a moment later, and she sat up, causing me to smile in relief, and also in amazement at what I had just done.
