“My dad said that the only way a demon can possess a body is by developing a claim on the human soul. Like what I have with Aaron,” I said, hurrying to keep up with Nick.
He stopped suddenly and turned to me. “What you have with Aaron is nothing like the claim this demon has on your teacher. You do not thirst for Aaron’s soul. In fact, you are waiting for him to break your claim so that you can set his soul free. This demon hijacked your teacher’s body. I have a feeling no claim was necessary.”
“So what you’re saying is that her body was taken over. But she didn’t seem to remember anything after I collapsed.” I had assumed this, of course. For all I knew she had been perfectly lucid during the whole thing and only pretended not to remember once the demon backed off.
“She wouldn’t,” Nick explained. “The demon takes over for the time it needs. Once it’s done it lets go and she’s unaware of anything having happened.” He grabbed my shoulders. “What is your teacher’s name?”
“Miss Masters,” I replied, looking at him with fear in my eyes. “What are you going to do?”
“I am going to find Miss Masters and we are going to get that demon out of her before it drains her life source completely.”
“That’s all fine and dandy,” Helen chimed in, her hands on her hips. “However, we have to face the simple fact we have no idea who this queen is that Dawn mentioned.”
“What queen?”
“The hybrid queen,” I reminded him, looking at Helen. “I’ve been told now by two beings that the queen will have my core.”
“I had a run-in with a creature at my apartment,” Helen confided quietly. “It told me that the hybrid queen would have mine as well.”
“And neither of you thought this was something I needed to know?” Nick boomed.
“You just got here yesterday and with all that crap with my mom the thought never crossed my mind,” I defended myself. “And in Helen’s defense, she’s been here for a whole hour!” I yelled back at him.
Nick’s hands went to his head in dismay. “She’s found you, then. Both of you! She knows we will raise Krista and find the fourth. She’s playing with us!”
“She’s known where I was all along, Nick,” I cried out, exasperated. “Let’s not forget that she ran off with my boyfriend!”
“Miranda is not the hybrid queen!” he bellowed.
“What?” I asked meekly.
“Miranda is not the hybrid queen,” he repeated, his voice lower.
“Then who is?” Helen asked, bewildered.
“Her mother,” said Nick, looking at us both.
“Her mother was killed a century ago,” I argued. “Mara told me that when I met her.”
“Who’s Mara?” Helen asked, frowning.
“She’s a nightmare demon, and a friend of my father’s.”
“Well, Mara is misinformed,” said Nick. “So is the whole underworld, apparently. The story states that Lilliana’s mother was a vampire. Not just any vampire but an ancient one. Did you really think that she was going to go down easily?” He eyed us. “There has been a lot of talk about the rise of this hybrid queen. Her name came up in one conversation and a prophet was found gutted in his home the next day.”
“So if Miranda’s mother is the one who is causing all of this, then what is Miranda’s role?” I pressed.
“Right now that is the least of our worries. I am more concerned about your teacher than I am about the queen. As long as the demon is within her body the queen can control everything here. She knows who you talk to, who your friends are, what you had for lunch…” He turned back toward the driveway. “We have to get in one of these cars and save that woman before her soul is damned for eternity.”
“I’ll drive,” Helen said, running to her car with the two of us close behind her.
I stopped abruptly when my mother’s voice rang from the house.
“I’m coming with you,” she yelled, racing out the door with her eyes already white.
She was getting good with the hearing.
“How much did you hear of that?” Nick asked my mother as she slid into the backseat next to me.
“I am Puriel, Nicky. I can force the truth and punish wrongdoing. You are going to need a pureblood on your side for this one.” She looked at me and I saw that her eyes had changed back to their normal shade of blue.
“I hate it when you’re right,” Nick grumbled motioning for Helen to get moving.
***
I forget how I knew where Miss Masters’ house was in the city. She lived nowhere near Midvale. Hers was a tiny house with blue shutters and a beautiful garden. It didn’t look like the sort of place a demon would choose to reside in. This, of course, caused me some concern.
“Dawn, you and your mother need to go to the door. Helen and I will follow,” said Nick as we prepared to get out of the car. “There is a good chance the demon will appear the moment that your mother sets foot on the threshold. Like she said, she has the ability to pull the truth from anyone.”
Getting out of the car we exchanged anxious glances. Helen and I had no idea what was going to happen. Nick and my mother, on the other hand, looked like this was something that they had done many times before.
My mother and I walked to the door and knocked. Miss Masters answered with an uncertain smile on her face.
“Dawn.” She looked at my mother. “How did you find my house?”
“I Googled your name,” I lied. “I wanted to thank you for your help today in class.” I had no idea what I was doing. I was running on pure instinct, quite unsure about how things might develop.
“My daughter mentioned that she had an episode at school,” my mother interrupted. “I wanted to thank you for taking it upon yourself to take care of her.”
“Oh, you must be Mrs. Weathers. It was nothing. Dawn just took the death of her fellow-student very hard.” Miss Masters smiled back at my mother, but there was a note of cruelty in her smile and I knew we weren’t talking to my teacher anymore. We were talking to the demon.
Filth! Angel! Punishment! Judgment! Puriel!
I flinched at the voices I heard flowing from my teacher’s brain.
“It’s not her,” I whispered to my mother.
The look on my mother’s face was frightening.
“Who are you, demon?” she demanded coldly.
Nick and Helen ran up behind us.
“Oh, goody!” the demon said to us through my teacher’s lips. “Two half-breeds, a prophet and a pureblood. She will be pleased, oh, she will be so pleased!” The creature clapped its hands together like a child.
“Who will be pleased?” Nick demanded.
“I don’t have to tell you shit!” the Demon spat at him.
“Maybe you don’t, but you have to tell me,” my mother broke in.
Her eyes turned white and I felt the prickle of ice in my fingertips. I was on the verge of combustion.
“I have no name, angel,” said the demon.
Something in me flipped. I felt the fire surging and realized I was unable to keep it contained. My mother reached back to touch me but instead ignited the flame within me as she had before. Before I knew it I was standing in front of the creature engulfed in soft white flame. My mother followed suit and we stood there together, burning brilliantly.
Helen raised her hands to the sky and I felt the earth shake beneath my feet. The creature stared at us with fear in its eyes. Nick stepped forward, taking the cross from around his neck and pushing it against my teacher’s forehead as he shouted words in Latin. The body of Miss Masters twitched and writhed. The demon screamed profanities but refused to let go of her. We needed to make it more afraid. I felt my eyes changing. Then my feet rose from the ground and I was again welcomed into the air like an old friend. A breeze cooled my flesh through the fire. I felt Helen beside me and turned to look at her. The wings that extended behind her were as white as my mother’s.
�
��She will have your cores!” the demon screeched at us as the body it had occupied continued to writhe. “She has the Neutralizer! She has the Harbinger! Now she searches for the Priestess!”
“The Priestess?” my mother demanded.
“Yes, the final acquisition in the trinity, the being who can destroy the pureblood.” The Demon laughed through its pain.
I felt the need take over like it did before. I wanted the soul of the Demon. I wanted the soul of my teacher. The power consumed me. But before I felt any further change my teacher’s body crumpled to the ground. Nick knelt quickly in prayer over her.
“The demon is gone,” he said after a moment, pulling himself up to his feet. “Can someone help me get her to bed? She won’t remember any of this, but I don’t want her coming to and finding four people standing over her.”
My mother looked down at the stricken woman. “I know her from church,” she said slowly. “She quit coming about two months ago. That must have been when the possession began.”
“She will be returning this Sunday, I’m sure, when she realizes that her soul is unclean,” Nick said, picking Miss Masters up with ease and carrying her into the house.
He tucked her into her double bed and turned on the TV. Then he let her dogs out to go to the bathroom before ushering us out. My mother cleaned up the scorch marks on the front porch that had been made by my fire and fixed the ground where Helen had split it, without meaning to of course. We left the house as if we had never been there. If Miss Masters remembered anything it would be nothing more than the memory of a messed-up dream.
I felt weak and lost. My mind was swimming and my brain was mush. I couldn’t think a single thought that made sense. The power still circulating in me caused my body to retaliate against everything I was telling it to do. I was dimly aware of my mother helping me into the car. After that I felt nothing but blackness and I fell. I fell and fell until I thought I was never going to stop falling. I smiled at the darkness that surrounded me. I welcomed the silence and the peace, and just when I thought my life was over I hit the ground with a thud.
***
It took me a few moments to figure out where I was. I knew this house. I had been there before. This was the house that I had been in when I took my adventure through Krista’s eyes. I remembered the red couch in the sitting room, but this was another room altogether. There was a huge fireplace on the right wall and two very old, yet beautiful, chairs in the center of the room separated by a table upon which stood a gorgeous lamp with a stained glass shade.
“Where am I?” I breathed.
This is what I got for knowing what I am. I was really getting tired of constantly being abducted. Why couldn’t someone just ask me if I wanted to go somewhere to talk?
“You should know this place,” said a man sitting on one of the chairs. I did a double-take. I was sure he hadn’t been there a moment before.
“I remember it, yes, but where is it?” I asked, still trying to recall if this man had been there when I arrived.
“No need to worry about that. It’s really nothing more than empty space. However, it is quite beautiful, don’t you think?”
He stood slowly. He was tall, with dark brown hair and black eyes. He was wearing a well-tailored suit like the ones that my father wore, not a cheap imitation. Appearance-wise he looked young, maybe mid-thirties, but from my recent experiences I had learned that appearances weren’t everything.
“Yeah, I suppose. If you’re Dracula,” I joked dryly.
He didn’t look amused. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Dawn,” he said smoothly, coming toward me and standing very close.
“I would say likewise, only I have no idea who you are,” I said slowly, feeling like my bubble had been invaded.
“Introductions are not important; just realize that I am someone rather essential in your little predicament.”
He reached up to my head and ran his fingers down a strand of loose hair. I felt a twinge of anger but stifled it.
“I find introductions to be rather important when it comes to the people I’m talking to,” I said curtly, pushing his hand away. “So cut to the chase. What do you want?”
“I want your inner core,” he whispered. His eyes glowed red for a few seconds. I could see the fires of Hell wanting to escape his body.
I groaned. “Why?”
“Oh, sweet princess.” He shook his head at me. “You have no idea about the fire inside your heart, how easily you could end all existence.”
“I–I don’t understand,” I stammered.
His eyes were terrifying, yet thrilling at the same time. I couldn’t look at them long without being drawn irresistibly to him.
“Of course not. Everyone kept you cooped up, trying to hide you from what you are. They’ve told you lie after lie to keep you from following your destiny.”
He smiled viciously and ran his fingers along the mantel over the fireplace. I looked around, confused. Just a second before he had been standing right in front of me, just inches from my face.
“You act like you know me better than they do,” I ventured, grimacing at the way he moved. It was too fluid, too… unnatural.
“Well, why wouldn’t I? Think about it, princess. I am the reason the fire is in your veins. I put it there! Neither your beautiful father nor even your saint of a mother could give you what I did.” His eyes blazed fire. “Come with me and I will make you my queen. Let Lilly have this sorry world. You can rule the dead in mine. I know you can feel the flames pulsating and throbbing in your veins.” Suddenly he was pressing his cold lips to mine.
“Never!” I screamed, recoiling from him. “If I go with you Heaven’s flame will become yours, and I will not break the balance! I won’t be your queen of anything!” I threw my arms out as hot fire surged through my veins. “The fire is mine to protect. Lucifer himself will have your heart for this.” I raised my hands, willing it to release.
He sighed. “You are always so eager to jump to the fighting. You don’t think or size up your enemy. You just assume that everything will go up in flames. But not everyone burns, Dawn.”
I stared at him, dumbfounded. “You don’t know me!”
“I know you better than you know yourself. Good lord, you really are a hard-headed vixen, aren’t you?”
He touched my face and my skin crawled. How did he move so fast?
“You are merely the Warden; you are not the Creator,” he went on. “You hold no alliance to either side of the spectrum. You are a big girl, now: make your own choices.”
“Why bring me here? Why show me this so-called Kingdom of the Dead?” I demanded angrily.
“Well, I couldn’t exactly knock on your door and ask to speak to you, could I?”
I sensed he was losing patience with me, while I was fighting the itch to set him on fire.
“This is only a taste of the kingdom I rule,” he informed me. “You will rule by my side once you relinquish both flames to me.”
“They are not my flames to give!” I boomed. Fire erupted all around me and, to my satisfaction, he looked afraid for the first time.
“Just think about it then,” he said, licking his lips. “I can give you a few days to make up your mind.” He backed away, then turned on his heel and disappeared into black nothingness.
There was a flash and the room disappeared. When I was able to focus on my surroundings once more I found I was standing on my own on the curb outside Adam’s house. I was confused and disoriented. Then the heavens burst open and rain pelted down. Steam rose from my body as the rain cooled my hot flesh. I groaned as I pulled my hoodie up and over my head.
There was really nowhere else to go. I didn’t have my phone, so I couldn’t call my mother, and it was too far to walk home. My only option was to trudge up to Adam’s door and create an excuse for why I was standing out there in the rain without my car and with no phone.
Chapter Ten: Gunk
Adam answ
ered the door in his pajama bottoms, rubbing the sleep from his eyes as he looked at me in disbelief. I gave him a weak smile.
“Dawn, it’s three in the morning. What are you doing here?” he asked me sleepily.
“It’s a long story.”
“Well, get in here before you catch your death.” He held the door open for me and then closed it behind me.
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” I said, staring at him.
I had never seen him without his shirt on. There wasn’t an ounce of fat on the boy and his chest was smooth and free of any blemish.
“No, it’s fine. Does your mom know where you are?” he asked, running his hand through his brown hair.
“No. May I use your phone?”
“Yeah, come with me. You can use my cell. It’s in my room.”
He led me upstairs and into his bedroom. I took a seat on his bed and he handed me his phone. As I started dialing my mother’s cell number he collapsed next to me and laid his head on my damp lap.
“You smell like rain,” he observed, getting comfortable.
The phone rang only once before I heard my mother’s frantic voice at the other end.
“Adam!” she exclaimed. “Have you seen my daughter?”
I groaned. “Mom, it’s me. Dawn.”
“Oh, thank goodness.” She sounded relieved. “How did you wind up there?”
I looked down at Adam. His eyes were closed and he was breathing softly. I had never suspected how adorable he was when he slept. Then again, all the times I had been present he had been vibrantly awake.
“Mr. No Name dropped me off outside in the rain about ten minutes ago,” I told her sourly while fighting the urge to stroke Adam’s hair.
“Who’s Mr. No Name? Where did he take you?”
“To Count Dracula’s castle,” I said, rolling my eyes.
“Honey, I can be there in twenty minutes.”
“Tell your mom I’ll bring you home in the morning,” Adam murmured. He wasn’t asleep yet, then. “There’s no need for her to drive all the way out here in this weather.” He yawned.
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