Demon Snare (These Immortal Vows Book 1)

by Kestra Pingree

  I help another customer and manage to drive off the tears for a moment longer.

  I’m fine while we’re busy, but when things start to slow down, my mind starts to wander all over again, and I feel like crying. I haven’t shed a tear this whole time, but I’ll make up for that by shedding plenty of them into my pillow once I get home tonight.

  I’m pathetic.

  “Thanks for your help as always, Tasia,” Gina says as we close the store together.

  I nod instead of acknowledging her with words.

  “Hurry up and go already! It’s a school night.”

  We haven’t even finished closing up, but Gina gives me this look that says “don’t argue with me,” so I don’t. I clock-out and make my way to my car. Honestly, I’m relieved she kicked me out a little early. I’m tired of barely holding myself together. But I have to do it for a little while longer. I can’t cry until I’m alone in my room. I don’t want my parents to ask what happened. I don’t want anyone to know why I’m so upset.

  It’s dark outside now, and the air is so cold. I wouldn’t be surprised if we get snow soon. I tighten the scarf around my neck and pull on a pair of gloves as I walk to my car in the nearly empty parking lot. Once I’m inside, I start the engine to get the heat going, and then I check my phone out of habit. I have a new text message from Rynne.

  We’ll make up for it tomorrow.

  That’s it. I can’t hold it in anymore. The tears pour out of my eyes and I hunch over to rest my arms at the top of my steering wheel, and then I set my forehead down on top of them. I have no right to cry like this. I keep telling myself that, but I’m doing it anyway. And I hate it. I hate it so much. Rynne isn’t even my boyfriend. I have no right to cry.

  “You’re such a child, Tasia,” I tell myself.

  Eventually, I make my way home—after I’ve stopped crying and I’ve made sure my eyes don’t look too red or puffy. My parents would totally ask questions if I came home looking like that, and I don’t want them to. I just want to go home, get into my bed, and sleep.

  When I get home, I park my car in our gravel driveway and walk up the porch steps. I’m greeted by a familiar ring of garlic always pinned to our front door. I brush my fingers across it and ask it to banish the negativity surrounding me. I know the gesture is in vain. If my black diamond can’t even lighten my thoughts right now, I doubt a ring of garlic could.

  “I’m home,” I announce as I close the door behind me.

  No one answers me. The living room is dark. If a burglar tried to get in, he’d probably trip over something, but I know my way around the herbs, the gemstones, the rosaries, the incense… I pause when I hear voices and see flashes of light coming from the kitchen. My parents must be watching TV.

  I navigate my way through the living room and into the kitchen, where I see my parents literally glued to the TV. I place my hand on the back of the only empty kitchen chair and glance at the TV to see what they’re watching. It’s the local news.

  “The Guardian Angel was desecrated after someone broke into Reverie Park and turned on the power; some of you might have seen the sight from your houses.

  “The Guardian Angel’s wings have been detached somehow. We currently suspect the use of a sledgehammer or something similar. The Guardian Angel was also splattered with a tube of fake blood. The police are looking into it as I speak.

  “The mayor wishes to send a message out to all of Reverie’s citizens. He says whatever the motive, it is unacceptable. Our Guardian Angel is to be respected. It is the town’s oldest memory, and it will undergo restoration as soon as possible…”

  “How awful,” I whisper.

  Mom says, “Don’t go to that Halloween party.”

  “You’ve already told me not to, and I wasn’t planning on it.”

  “Before, your father and I were just telling you how we feel about the whole thing, but if you go now, you’ll be grounded.”

  I reply with more bite in my voice than I intend, “There are so many people excited about the Halloween party. Whoever did this was probably someone who doesn’t want anyone in town to celebrate Halloween. This is a scare tactic. Why is everyone making such a big deal out of Halloween that someone would go and do something like this? The rest of Pennsylvania celebrates Halloween every year and they get through just fine.”

  “You don’t know that,” Dad says. “It’s a step toward evil.”

  Mom glances behind her to look at me. “Trust us, Tasia. We have a bad feeling.”

  I shake my head, too tired to fight. I’m not hungry either, so there’s no point trying to make myself eat something for dinner. I excuse myself and go to my room.

  I close my door and bury my face into my pillow and cry again. I can’t believe I saw Rynne kissing some girl—today of all days. He’s never kissed anyone. With the way gossip works in Reverie, everyone would have talked about it. And now the town’s going crazy over the Guardian Angel.

  Who would do such a thing? I’m almost positive whoever did this to the Guardian Angel isn’t anyone who’s excited about Halloween. I know everyone going to the Conways’ party, and they’d never do anything like this. I know plenty of older people who would do this to stop the Halloween party from happening though, and all consequential Halloween celebrations. Those old people who are angry about life just to be angry about it would do this. They wouldn’t think twice about desecrating the statue if they could scare people away from celebrating Halloween. They’re all stuck in the old ways, the ways of the past. I think even Jazmin would do something like this. She’d see it as the lesser of two evils.

  I laugh even though tears are still spilling out of my eyes. I can’t believe I’m thinking like that. Now I’m just assigning blame without any proof. But now I want to know. I want to know why my parents and the elders think Halloween will ruin Reverie and why someone would go so far to stop any form of celebration for it. They say it’s a step toward evil, but is it really? And what about what happened to the angel? That’s a step toward evil.

  I know the mayor. I know the people going to the Halloween party. They want to start Halloween with that party. This whole month people have been preparing to celebrate Halloween early with the idea of carrying that celebration on to Halloween night itself. None of them are doing it with any bad intentions. They’re doing it with good intentions. They want to bring the town together and have some fun. They want to embrace the world around us.

  I think I will go after all. I know Didi and Connor are going. I doubt Rynne is, but it doesn’t matter. Either way, I’ll deal with it. I can’t keep crying over him like this. I don’t want to stay trapped. I don’t want to hide from everything my whole life. I don’t think I even want to stay in this small town forever. There’s a whole world out there, full of people and places I’ve never seen, and all I’ve ever known is Reverie. My parents have taught me a lot. Jazmin gave me this black diamond to fight off evil and the spirits that bombarded me. I know there’s truth in their words and choices, but I’m also sure they don’t know everything. I’ll go to this Halloween party to prove them wrong.

  CHAPTER 6

  Arsen

  THERE’S A SLIGHT UPSET in the town, but that’s it. I’m disappointed.

  I stay hidden in an oak tree that has barely lost any of its leaves as I squint at the dying rays of sunlight, using my hand to help shade my eyes. Usually, I wouldn’t bother coming outside until the sun has completely gone down, but I wanted to see for myself what’s been going on.

  At first, I wondered if the humans here were really that incompetent or fearful that they’d hide my murder from the rest of the town. There’s no other reason for such a quiet response to what I did last night. Now that I’m here, I see someone did, in fact, cover up my murder.

  The human body I left behind has been cleaned up without a trace. The human blood I placed on the statue has also been erased, and the one responsible used a tube of fake blood and sprayed it on the statue instead. It’s very pecu
liar. It seems I was right about something going on in this town, but it looks like it might be much deeper than I thought. Would an angel do something like this? It seems like a long shot, but I can’t picture a human doing this. Maybe a demon… but that seems like even more of a long shot.

  The humans clean the blood off the marble statue, and then they put cautionary tape around it as a deterrent, but they don’t do anything more than that. I suppose they’ll fix it at some point, but for now, this is apparently good enough. Night sets in and the park stays silent.

  As cute as this all is, it’s not enough to keep the rage from boiling in my veins. Where the hell are the angels? This place was saturated in their scent when I first arrived, but the air has shifted since then. It’s darker. Heavier.

  The large branch I’m standing on shifts ever so slightly. I knew Yuki was coming to join me. I’m constantly aware of her presence because we’re rarely separated by a great enough distance for me not to be. Ever since the day she invited me to look inside of her soul, to the very essence that makes her up, I’ve been stuck with the knowledge of her presence. I can pick her out among every other darkness because I know the uniqueness of her soul. Some make it a habit to mark souls, to keep their pawns in place. That sounds overly ambitious and like a headache to me. I’ve only ever known one other soul the way I know Yuki’s. No. I knew that soul even better than Yuki’s.

  “What are you doing?” Yuki asks as she comes up from behind me. She puts her arms around my waist and rests her cheek on my back.

  “I’m hunting.”

  “When aren’t you hunting?”

  She stands on her tiptoes and kisses the back of my neck, stirring the beast inside of me—but I don’t have time for that right now.

  The humans have left, and the angels ran away. Something else is going on…

  My logician can’t concentrate when my beast feels only Yuki. I twist around in her hold so I’m facing her. Perfect red lips, skin like an orchid… I reach down, about to plant my lips on hers, when I hear footsteps. I glance behind me at the red-rock trail leading to the Guardian Angel as my logician takes control.

  Humans.

  Yuki lets go of me without me having to say anything. I glance down from the tree we’re in to see a pair of humans with flashlights. These two weren’t here earlier. They aren’t part of the police. They aren’t part of the local reporting team either. They’re something much more. The fact that they smell like poison tells me they’re probably something a little more dangerous.

  “Hunters? Do they live here? Or did they somehow catch wind of us?” Yuki whispers.

  I give her a hard glare. “Stay here.” She stops talking and she casts her eyes down to the ground, showing complete and utter submission to me. She won’t make a move unless I tell her to.

  I drop out of the oak tree, landing on the grass below with hardly a sound. Keeping out of sight will be easy with all these trees and fairytale sculptures. I move from one blind spot to the next, until I have a clear view of the couple that is now bypassing the tape the police lamely placed around the Guardian Angel earlier.

  “This doesn’t seem right, Yvonne,” a man says. “You can feel it, too. Can’t you? I know we aren’t aura readers, or psychics in any sense of the word, but we know this feeling.”

  He looks weary, like he’s seen this sort of thing too many times before and wishes he didn’t have to see it again. He doesn’t particularly look like a hunter. It’s not that he doesn’t have potential, but it’s all too obvious to me that his body is very out of practice. Perhaps he is retired. He is wearing a silver cross around his neck, but that isn’t too surprising considering most of the people in this town seem to wear or keep trinkets like it. It’s the vervain running through his veins that makes me think he might be different than most of the people living here. He must drink it daily. Religiously.

  He brings his right hand to the dark stubble on his face and closes his eyes. Then he rubs the bags underneath his eyes.

  “Yes, but then what does this mean?” a woman, Yvonne, replies. “If some supernatural entity is behind this, why play such a lame prank?”

  She looks just as weary as the man. She folds her arms in front of her chest and shivers slightly in the cold, covering up her matching silver cross. Her physical state isn’t any better than the man’s. There’s no way they could be active hunters—if they’re hunters at all. However, they’ve clearly been tainting their blood with vervain.

  “I don’t know.” The man sighs and drops his hand back to his side. “Do you think it's still here?”

  “Judging by the oppression in the air? Yes.”

  I raise an eyebrow, intrigued by their conversation. They aren’t amateurs, and I’m almost certain they at least have background with hunters. They drink vervain tea, wear crosses… they’re probably packing holy water and who knows what else. All I know is their very presence is foul. They could be a nuisance, but they won’t be any more than that. Hunters aren’t equipped to take down natural demons, and we’re far too lazy or clever—take your pick—to usually bother with them.

  “What do you think we’re dealing with? Should we call Blade?” the man asks.

  Yvonne shakes her head. “You’re right, Henry. We should call Blade. We should call the Johnsons, too. If we’re wrong, there won’t be any problems. If we’re not… Well, let’s hope we’re wrong.”

  I glance up at the clear and starry sky. Hunters. Angels. Demons. The essence of this town feels like it’s growing dark, like some other darkness besides Yuki and I has arrived. It seems I need to do some digging of my own.

  I jerk my head away from the sky above and spit on the ground in front of me. Angels pretend to have good intentions. They pretend that they care about the welfare of humans, and here they are leaving this town to demons like myself. They’re nothing but cowards and hypocrites.

  My vision burns red. I want to kill something. I need some kind of release. I let a challenging howl rip from my throat. Hear me, angels. Answer my call and protect the fragile humans you so graciously forced your good will on. Answer me.

  The angels don’t come. Demons don’t come either, but the hunter duo does. They heard my call loud and clear and they’re running toward me. I applaud their brave stupidity, but I have no interest in fighting them. They’re not strong enough to satisfy me, and I have bigger things to worry about right now.

  I slip away long before they ever reach the place I was hiding. I meet Yuki back in the oak tree.

  “Come with me,” I tell her.

  She does so without question, and she doesn’t say a word as we slip through the town unnoticed. Since every damn building in Reverie is practically drowning in charms, Yuki and I have been staying just outside in a secluded forest. When we’ve reached an area where I feel satisfied that we won’t be bothered by any inquisitive humans, I stop.

  Yuki stays silent, but she looks at me with her bright eyes, filled with years upon years of life essence.

  “We’re staying in this town a little longer. I want to know who covered up my murder and why.”

  She nods. “Nothing like this has ever happened before. Do you think the angels are behind it?”

  “That’s what we’re going to find out,” I growl.

  CHAPTER 7

  Tasia

  I EAT BREAKFAST AND drink my family’s ritualistic vervain tea alone again. My parents are sleeping in—something they never do. To be honest, I’m glad I don’t have to talk to them. I’ve never rebelled in my life… not outright, not anything worse than watching The Nightmare Before Christmas at Didi and Connor’s house. If I go to the Halloween party, I’ll be going directly against my parents’ words. They told me I’d be grounded if I go. I can’t believe they said they’d ground me for it.

  Frowning, I manage to force down another spoonful of the whole-grain cereal I decided to eat for breakfast. I wish I could stop thinking about Rynne.

  Rynne…

  “Pull yourself to
gether,” I exhort myself.

  Taking the keys to my white Toyota Camry, my phone, and my backpack, I leave the house and drive to school. I get there early again. I do my best to keep my emotions in check and find a bench in the commons. I do one last read-through for my essay on the history of Reverie. Once I’m satisfied, I use the school’s WiFi to sign into the school portal and send my essay off to my English teacher.

  When I shut my laptop, I see Wyatt Conway making his way toward me. Looks like I finished just in time.

  “Good morning, Tasia.”

  “Good morning, Wyatt,” I reply as I shove my laptop into my backpack.

  “So, you’re staying home tonight, right?” he asks. The usual energy in his voice is absent.

  I study his face, his hair, his clothes. Nothing seems out of place… Wait. Something is out of place. His smile is off somehow.

  I reply, “Actually, I’ve been thinking about the Halloween party and I’d like to come after all if that’s okay.”

  “R-really? But it’s tonight, you know?” He trips over his words in a completely uncharacteristic sort of way.

  “Am I uninvited?” I ask carefully.

  “N-no of course not.” He runs his right hand through his hair, ruining his always perfect pompadour. “I’ll see you there.”

  Then the bell rings and Wyatt makes a mad dash out of the commons like he can’t wait to get to class. I frown after him for a moment, trying to figure out what that was all about. He seemed nervous about something. Stressed? Maybe he’s just stressed. He probably has a really important assignment in one of his classes and he’s behind. Yeah, that’s it.

  Shaking my head, I grab my backpack and merge with the rest of the students on their way to their classes. The closer I get to class, the more nervous I become. I thought I was going to be fine, but now that I’m going to actually see Rynne, I feel like I’m going to fall apart. I would try to avoid him, but I can’t really do that when we have the same first class…