Had they all known the truth that demons had infested their community, things would have been more difficult to accept.
That was not the case for Journeyman Joey Mosely, who probably knew too much about demons and the supernatural, at least far more than any average person would want, or be able to, handle.
He’d been snatched away by the leader of the Noctis some days ago, though it was hard to determine exactly how much time had passed due to the perpetually dark surroundings and the dizzying amount of pain continued to be given to him. Recently, they’d moved him to the stinking cesspool that was the torture house and although he had been blindfolded from departure to arrival, the stench and sounds were a very good indication of where he was.
This particular evening, Joey had been brought into the kitchen, though larger than average something about it was foreboding and tight like a straightjacket. Perhaps it was because he was bound himself, or there were gleaming utensils out on full display atop the countertops, but that feeling stayed with him the rest of his time there, steadfast. Everything from the appliances to the decor had a modern feel, yet was countered by grime from extended use and improper cleaning. Even the stainless steel of the fridge had somehow been tarnished irreparably.
“Sit!” came a gruff voice from behind, along with a hard slap to his shoulder.
Joey took a weak and wobbly step toward a small wooden chair sitting in front of two long, wooden tables. He wasn’t moving fast enough.
“I said SIT!”
Another punch came and Joey stumbled the rest of the way, running right into the chair. Righting himself, he pulled it out with his bound hands and sat down.
The demon that was behind him quickly marched up, grabbing Joey by his long hair He yanked his face upward, staring at the human with his glinting red eyes.
“Took you long enough to do as you were told. One day you humans will learn your rightful place,” the demon provoked, noting Joey was curling his lip in disgust. “Go on, say something. I beg you!”
“Sorry,” Joey replied feebly, “but it’s your breath… it’s disgusting.”
The demon pulled up hard, tearing away some of Joey’s hairs before pushing him back into the chair. It slid a few inches back as the demon marched over to the bank of utensils, whistling calmly while he decided what he was going to do.
Just then, the sounds of crying leached in from the other room, transitioning to desperate pleading before rising into a blood curdling scream. Silence followed as a second door to the kitchen flung open and another demon stormed into the room. He was dressed similarly to the demon at the counter – in simple country clothing – carrying a severed arm as he made his way for the refrigerator. Opening the door, he tossed the limb inside, fetching out another bigger one before striding over to a shadowy corner.
Joey craned his neck to get a better view of the new arrival, spotting a knob of bone jutting out of one end, so white it had to have been licked clean. That’s when it disappeared close to the demon’s face and the sounds of slurping and chewing took over. If Joey wasn’t already so dehydrated, he would have puked.
“Dagon!” shouted the demon at the counter. “Could you eat a little quieter? I’m trying to decide on what tool to familiarize our friend over there with. Speaking of, where’s the butcher knife!”
“In the living room,” Dagon replied. “Was using it on the bitch in there. She was a bit loud wasn’t she, Phenex?”
“Was?” Phenex asked.
“Yeah well you know how these things are,” Dagon replied. “Got a bit carried away and well… ‘accidentally offed her didn’t I?”
Phenex was furious, throwing a knife across the room into Dagon’s shoulder.
“What’d you go and do that for?” Dagon said, pulling out the blade and giving it a lick.
“Be glad it wasn’t demon spike, ass!” Phenex remained livid. “You can’t go killing off the cattle. You’re already in a shit ton of trouble losing the Overseer’s pet.”
“It’s somewhere in the house,” Dagon said casually. “Thing’s got no legs so it can’t be all that hard to find.”
“I’ll leave that to you then,” Phenex said, “in the meantime finish your snack and bring that knife with you. I want you to come help me chat with our new boy toy; if you’re good enough I may even let you have a go at him, after I’m all done.”
Without any emotion, except for the smallest hint of delight, the two demons came around and stood menacingly in front of Joey’s chair, looking down at him like a they were about to kill their prey.
Joey knew he was in a world of trouble, fighting the urge to show any fear outwardly. Demons did not have any need or drive to eat, yet Dagon seemed to enjoy it and he was looking at his body nonstop.
“Our poor friend here seems afraid,” said Phenex. Taking the knife off of Dagon he began flicking it around intimidatingly, making sure to pass it really close to Joey’s face. “Doesn’t he?”
“Yeah,” Dagon agreed. “I’d feel that way too if you abandoned me.”
“Demons don’t abandon each other,” said Phenex, “that’s the difference between us and them.”
Joey dropped his head down, looking to the floor while trying to think of happy places and sounds; anything but these two demons and their threats.
“Is he crying?” asked Dagon. “I can’t see.”
Phenex stepped up and grabbed Joey by the hair, once again pulling his head up; there were no tears. “Nothing yet,” Phenex said threateningly, taking the knife and swiping it across a large section of Joey’s hair.
His head fell back down and he watched as a huge pile of hair cascaded to the floor.
“Let’s see if we can get anything out of him,” said Dagon, kicking the chair into one of the tables. He pulled out a cigarette from his pants pocket and lit it with a lighter from the other.
The two demons lifted one of the rectangular tables and placed it perpendicularly over the other one, sliding it closer to one end in the shape of an inverted cross. There they bound Joey with ropes, enchanted to burn his skin as they were drawn tight over his wrists and feet. Pulling them brutally taunt, his body felt like it would tear apart at the joints. Now secured, the demons stepped back from Joey and removed their belts, their oversized pants sliding down slightly to reveal their hairy lower bodies.
Joey was unsure what was about to happen, his mind racing through all sorts of scenarios, none of them good. That’s when the first stinging kiss of leather whipping against skin struck him across his chest. It was followed by another lick, then another, and before long there was an orgy of pain dancing across his entire front.
Joey tried his hardest to pull his arms or legs free from their bonds, but the more he struggled the more they burned and the tighter the bonds seemed to become. Succumbing to numbness, he didn’t cry as the belts kept on battering him across his chest and stomach, while his wrists felt as though they were about to be severed from his body. As the feeling grew, he could only imagine that at least then he would be free to move, free to try and stop them hurting him. The red of his skin gave way to blisters, which in turn yielded blood.
As the belts continued to sting him like whips, casting splatters of crimson over his body Joey shut his eyes, imagining he was far away in the familiar and safe surroundings of the Lodge and the Odyssey.
“Oh no,” Dagon croaked, “that won’t do at all.”
The next thing Joey knew, his right eye was being pried open with Dagon’s thick fingers, the bite of cigarette ashes arriving moments later when, at last, he screamed…
JOEY CAME TO sometime later with a pounding headache, probably the best feeling part of his body at that moment. His eyes were wide open despite the aching he wished he could shut out, his abdomen now throbbing with heat and soreness. Still restrained from earlier, he was unable to alleviate the itching that seemed to be spreading alongside the anguish.
The door creaked open and a single set of footsteps strode through the darkness,
Phenex’s sharp features visible when he opened the refrigerator door. A moment later he slammed it shut, noticing Joey was awake.
“Ah, our dear guest is awake,” the demon said. “Well rested from our little bout of fun earlier? A shame you were unconscious for the best parts of it.”
Joey grimaced, a combination of disgust for Phenex plus a sharp pain that coursed through his legs.
“The only thing I regret,” Phenex continued, “was that fool Dagon was the one who got a scream out of you. I thought that you and I were closer than that, Mr. Mosely.”
Joey continued to sit sat in silence, finding what little strength he had in ignoring the demon’s words – he knew he would punish him regardless. Looking up at the dank ceiling, stained with fluids seeping into it from the upstairs bedrooms, Joey sighed.
Phenex brought his face right up to the side of Joey’s where his hot and stinking breath was unavoidable. “No? Do you not have one for me inside?”
Phenex tried to elicit some kind of response, taking his tongue and sloppily licking Joey’s ear. Nothing came out of it and his anger quickly boiled over.
Leaping up he thundered over toward the countertops, shouting demoniacally.
None of the things that had been laid out interested him at the time, so he made his way for the drawers, yanking one after another open. All he saw was more shit, until something glinted at him in the dim light. Phenex snatched it up, a potato peeler tight in his grip.
“This'll do!”
Maniacally, the demon looked over his shoulder to Joey with his piercing red eyes, sending the tortured man before him into a fit of erratic breathing.
“Somehow I plan to get it out of you, be it this blade or my fucking dick!”
Phenex bolted toward Joey, wasting no time when he arrived swiping the peeler up from joey’s wrist along his forearm. The top layer of skin rolled up and over the blade, blood gushing from the missing strip of flesh.
The initial feeling was the coolness of the metal, followed by a merciless burning that filled his arm.
Joey had little choice and cried out across his parched lips.
“That’s it!” the demon reveled. “I need MORE!”
Phenex took two more swipes across Joey’s forearm before he collapsed as if he climaxed, more than satisfied with the cries he had taken. Standing, the demon whistled a happy little tune as he set the bloody peeler down on the laminate countertop and departed for the living room.
Joey looked over his flayed arm with tears streaming down his face, continuing to wish he was home until he faded back into unconsciousness.
SURELY THIS NIGHT of terrors would soon be over, the activity definitely quieter during the daylight hours.
Joey longed for Marcus’ embrace, recalling their night in Ireland at the bed and breakfast, likely the most intimate they had been to date. He prayed that there would be many more opportunities for such fun in their future, if and when he made it out of that wretched place.
He looked once more across his forearm, the strips that had been scraped off already starting to scab over.
The door creaked open once more, and Joey expected to hear the now familiar sounds of footsteps approaching in the dark, a prelude to more torture.
Instead, there was no sound at first but then came a sound like something big yet soft – like a body – slumping over. Joey looked toward the door but couldn’t see a thing.
A gross squishing noise started, like wet flip flops across the tile floor. Something was approaching him slowly in the darkness but no matter what he did, which way he turned his head, Joey couldn’t see what it was.
He then saw something out of the corner of his singed eye, blurry but definitely there. A pink mass was approaching, its heavy and bloated body undulating as fluids pooled on the kitchen floor leaving a thick, slimy wake.
The thing resembled an overgrown slug, its front end puckered up like some quivering prolapsed anus. As it got closer to Joey’s helpless body, its mouth bloomed into an array of sharp teeth.
“You've got to be joking…” Joey whispered, knowing full well this nightmare was real.
Expecting it to go for his head or face, the thing slithered around to his right side and like some hound sniffing out its dinner, honed in on his right hand.
“No, no, no…” Joey pleaded as he felt his ring finger slide into the warm hole.
The sides of its silky throat caressed the entire length, contracting in waves as it started sucking. Then came an incredible pressure, focused just past the first knuckle, and loud crunch as the thing withdrew, chewing.
The lingering sting was so intense that it drove Joey to the brink of madness. He could feel something vile coursing through his body, taking over right before all went black for the last time.
MY… LORD… CAME a voice out of the pitch black.
It was distant, minuscule, and weak – just like Dajjal who could not see a thing in the blackness that had overcome him.
My Lord? the voice came again, much closer and stronger than before.
The great demon had drifted so close to the brink and was now teetering over the edge of the abyss, his broken body broken beyond repair. Yet, as the voice repeated itself for a third time, he was able to smell something that may be able to help before he toppled over. He could taste it with his parched and cracked lips – unbridled fear that could only be described as… delicious. Something was triggered in him and the darkness began to recede, replaced with blotches of color then a view of the cracked ceiling of Bennett Peak.
Instead of the single, glowing pillar that had streamed into the dingy room for so many years, the chamber was now filled with light, spilling in from all angles well above the jagged, towering walls.
“My Lord!” a lesser demon exclaimed as he saw Dajjal's eyes moving. Dressed in an ill-fitted suit, he peered over his master’s motionless body. “Are you alright? My Lord…”
The lesser had entered the destroyed Chamber of Light to investigate Dajjal's failure to appear at a meeting back in Warminster. He was joined by two others in similar attire, another male and a female, however the both of them hung back – way back – cautious.
It was a good thing they had done so because without warning, Dajjal's arm quickly lashed out, grabbing the elated lesser by the neck.
The unsuspecting demon gasped, his eyes widening as they shifted from joy to full on fright. Dajjal wanted more, needing it badly, and tightened his already strong hold which now threatened to crush the vessel’s throat.
“That's it…” Dajjal croaked wantonly, gathering the strength to crunch forward. “Surrender yourself to me and to your fear…”
The two lessers turned and attempted to flee, but as they started to run an intense pain seared the backs of their knees; they both stumbled to the stone floor. Moments later, Dajjal's razor skipped across the ground toward his free hand, a thin line of blood trailing behind it.
Dajjal continued to rise, pulling energy right out of the lesser’s skin. He now stood eye to eye with his fearful captive as the lesser’s eyes melted away to their original colors; the skin beneath Dajjal's grip growing cold, crinkled, and rough like sandpaper.
“At last,” Dajjal said with relief. He could feel his strength returning little by little, body parts mending themselves as he drew in more from the lesser. “I am about to take all I can from your vessel, but thank you for your sacrifice in keeping your Lord well fed.” His head shifted slightly to the right and he saw the other two demon’s crawling helplessly on the floor. “You two as well,” he muttered with lips stretched grotesquely wide.
The captive tried to scream as Dajjal's maw opened, but he couldn't as the air grazed his throat like glass. All he could see before him was death. His skin grew tighter and drier, before long his entire body drawn up like a shriveled leaf. The demon within was forced to exit, his smoky form loose and unshapely.
Dajjal’s eyes closed as he breathed the demon in, wisps of dark vapor floating into his mouth
and up his nostrils to become a part of him.
Oh the taste… it was divine and Dajjal had to have more. Now.
Quickly extending his arm, the razor lashed out across the throats of the two demons on the floor and they were ended. Their bodies flung themselves through the air towards him where, like moths to a flame, the three lessers hung in mid air.
There he fed on them all at once, consuming every ounce of life force from their vessels before devouring their hellish forms as well. His eyes drifted back pleasurably into his head, Dajjal’s body brought to the brink of an orgasm before spilling over.
He shuddered, having relieved himself in the sickest of ways yet he had also freed himself of the pain that had so crippled him earlier.
THE AFTERNOON SUN beat down on the desert as a cool wind blew across the plains. Vultures circled over roadkill in the middle of the highway, its long stretch of drab gray running to the south and the north, further than any eye could see.
Still lucid, Dajjal appeared in a flash of lightning and booming thunder. He was shirtless, wearing only a pair of grimy jeans and boots. Most of his wounds had healed up though a few were straggling. Looking down to a gash across his left ribs, he noticed the charred body of a coyote beneath his feet. Stepping off, it crunched as he moved toward the shoulder, the vultures soon falling from the sky like rocks themselves, also burned to an unrecognizable crisp.
Dajjal’s mind was racing, touching on the battle with Fenrir – that he lost – and that bastard Botis not only coming in to save the day, but also sealing the Door to the Mountain behind him. Dajjal was currently at a loss, with no idea what to do to get that fucker open again.
Given all that had happened, a little fresh air was needed – the sight of Bennett Peak’s claustrophobic interior and even the lavish surrounds of Warminster were doing nothing but limiting his perspective. So he took to the open road in the hopes that it would offer a fresh one.
He had transported himself a few miles away from Bennett Peak, leaving his host’s custom bobber behind. He didn't yet feel stable enough to ride a motorcycle but he also didn't want any reminders of his past to taint his decision making for the future.
The Devil's Highway (Journeyman Book 4) Page 5