“I know Adam said this was a low-level nothing job, but we need to treat it like any other assignment we received. If we go in there in a hurry, one of us could get hurt.”
“I just want to get there fast. As soon as we step out of the car, I’ll be all business.”
“Good, cause when Jackson gets back, I don’t want to have to explain to him how I let his best friend die.”
“Well, when you say it like that, it sounds kind of sweet.” The corner of his mouth upturned into a smirk.
“Damn it, Marcus. Just be ready for anything, ok?”
“You got it, boss.”
We moved through the outskirts of Vegas at breakneck speeds until we turned off onto a dirt road. Well, there was no way whoever was in the house wouldn’t see us coming. The cloud of dust behind our car was the only thing to look at for miles around. I grabbed my bag out of the back seat and pulled out my swords. As soon as the door opened, I wanted to be ready.
Marcus gave me a wink as we rolled through the open gate and onto the property. A few hundred feet later, we pulled up to a series of four trailers and one house. The house was nothing special to look at, and the trailers had seen better days. Most of them were on blocks now. This was just the kind of shithole you never wanted to come to. The kind of place our creepy hotel attendant would live.
Marcus put the car in park, and we both got out. I gave my swords a quick twirl to loosen my wrists. Marcus had his staff. We had to be careful. For all we knew, demons were sharing this property with humans. If that was the case, we couldn’t just kill anything that moved. We stalked slowly forward toward the house. Everything was deadly quiet. Either this place was abandoned or we were in store for a nasty surprise.
One of the trailers groaned as someone shifted their weight inside. So the place wasn’t deserted. Another sound came from my left, closer to Marcus. As soon as I looked in his direction, I saw it. A demon was crawling on top of the trailer. I started to shout a warning, and then the trailer next to me made a noise.
I brought my swords up reflexively, expecting the attack from above. The demon in the meat suit landed on top of me. My blades ripped through his flesh, sending us both crashing to the ground. I rolled, dragging my swords free from his corpse as I stood up. Then I was hit from behind by another demon.
This one was a big bastard. He had me pinned to the ground, and no matter what I did, I couldn’t break free. I called on my gift and started to burn the demon, but it still didn’t let go. The sounds of his screams filled my ears, and the scent of his burning flesh wafted across my nose. If I wasn’t careful, I’d go up in flames with the bastard. Finally his hand slipped, and I broke free. I slammed an elbow into his head and felt his nose break with a sickening crunch. The demon howled, and I broke completely free from his grasp.
With a swift slash of my blades, I set his head free from his shoulders. I scanned the rest of the area, but it remained demon free. Marcus had four piles of ash around his feet. When he noticed me looking, he gave me a curt nod. He had been full of jokes earlier, but the amount of demons here had snapped him out of it. Both of us were on high alert now. Nothing outside of the house stood out, and no more demons came rushing toward us. That meant we had to go inside.
The porch stairs creaked as we walked up them. I motioned for Marcus to get the door. He looked at me and mouthed. “Loud or quiet?”
“Let ’em have it.” Screw it. I was done playing nice with these monsters. I hated that the second demon had been able to get the drop on me. I was out of practice, and it showed. I was going to kill everyone I found in that house. There was no reason to be subtle now. They knew we were here.
Marcus placed his hand against the door, and a second later, it exploded off its hinges, crashing into the house. Someone screamed, and then I was moving through the door, blades drawn. The next three steps into the living room brought me in contact with three demons. I dropped all of them to the ground in less than a minute. Marcus ashed their corpses, along with the one half crushed behind the door.
The rest of the first floor was empty, and so was the second floor. We started moving back through the house and noticed a door off the center of the house. Could this place actually have a basement? They weren’t common in the southwest, but that didn’t mean there couldn’t be one. Opening the door revealed a set of stairs leading down. I gave Marcus a quick glance over my shoulder. He nodded. That was all I needed to move forward. I knew he would be right behind me.
The light switch didn’t work, so I cast a light down into the space. The basement wasn’t finished. In fact, calling it a basement might have been a stretch. The earthen walls I could see made it seem more like a random hole dug under the house. I double checked to make sure Marcus was still following me, and he just winked and made a “go on” gesture with his hand.
I made it to the bottom of the stairs and turned around to face the open space. I sent my light out into the middle of the room, and the horror that greeted me there almost made me retch. The demons had been using this as a feeding room. The people I was seeing had to have been the original occupants of the home.
Marcus let out a little gasp behind me, and I knew that we felt the same way. What happened here had been horrible. I started to wonder if we hadn’t stopped for the night if we could have stopped it, but most of the blood had already dried. Almost all of the carnage that had taken place down here wasn’t fresh.
Limbs had been ripped from some of the corpses. You could see teeth marks in their flesh. I didn’t even want to think about what had happened to these people before they became dinner. Demons weren’t known to be kind. These people had suffered and died in the most horrific way possible.
A small gasp issued from what I thought was only a pile of skin. The pile shifted, and a head broke free. I rushed forward and fell to my knees by the girl. She had one arm missing, and bite marks littered her naked torso. She gasped and rolled onto her back. “Don’t worry, you’re safe. We got them.”
“More will be back soon,” she gasped. “Please kill me.”
She had been through something that I couldn’t even imagine, and I understood. I wasn’t sure that I would want to live if I had suffered and watched what the demons had done to the rest of my family. Sometimes being the sole survivor wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. At the same time, I had to try and find out as much as I could. I sent a small wave of healing energy through her, just enough to keep her conscious. I felt how weak her body was. She didn’t have long to live. “Can you tell me anything else about them?”
“They will be back soon, and you will find out. There are more of them, always more.”
She rolled over, and her breathing grew heavy and labored. I shared a look with Marcus, and he nodded. I stood up and started to walk away.
“Please kill me,” she mumbled between rattled breaths.
With a snap of my fingers, I granted her wish. I had been merciful, but it still stung. Even if we could have healed her of her injuries, the mental scars would have been horrible. The only thing that would make me feel better was making the demons that did this to her and her family pay. We had done that for the most part, but now I wanted to see who was going to show up next.
“Looks like we won’t be leaving just yet.”
Marcus nodded and started to head for the stairs. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
He didn’t show a lot of emotion when he slipped into a rage. I had known him long enough to tell that the first demon he saw didn’t stand a chance. The scene below that house had been worse than something from a horror movie. Now we had the chance to make it right. Well, as right as we could.
Both of us took a seat on the front patio and waited in silence. Each of us was wrapped up in our own thoughts about what we had seen. I’d be able to put it behind me after I made these bastards pay for what they did. There was a bigger question to be answered, though. What had made them so bold? Demons normally wouldn’t set up shop on someone’s pro
perty and kill an entire family. It would draw too much attention. In today’s age, it wasn’t as easy to cover things up as it used to be. Friends and family were only a Facebook post away, and if all of them stopped sending messages, you could bet the cops would have been out here. That begged the question, why hadn’t they been?
That meant the demons either felt extremely comfortable in this area, or there were more demons around then just this one group. Either way, we had a bigger problem on our hands then just the deaths of one family.
CHAPTER 16
JACKSON
“I’m not sure what they have planned, but the whole castle is buzzing about something,” John said, his eyes brimming with concern.
“Whatever it is, I’ll find a way to win. After this last battle, you’re free.” I’d proven myself in the crucible already. I knew this time Adramelech wouldn’t be holding anything back. This was it. If I won, we were free. I was ready to get back home and hold the woman I loved.
“Whatever happens, I want to thank you for coming for me.”
“Don’t talk like that, Dad. This isn’t over yet.” There was no reason for him to be worried. We were so close to going home I could taste it. No matter what the demon had planned for me, I would face it and win. Thoughts of April swirled through my head. As much as I loved to think about her and the way her lips always tasted like strawberries, those thoughts wouldn’t help me now. I needed to be focused on the battle ahead. When I won, I was going to pick her up and tell her just how much I loved her.
“I’m sorry. Almost twenty years in hell has a way of shaping your perspective.”
I knew exactly what he meant. I’d only been here three weeks, and already I felt this place wearing me down. It was being constantly stuck in fight or flight. After a while, it started to drain you to the point you were always stuck on fight. Every noise, every footfall, had me jumping and ready to lash out. We weren’t made to live in a constant state of panic. Every time someone knocked at the door or spoke to me, I was ready to fight for my life. It felt crazy, but that was just how life was here.
It was no wonder the demons were so aggressive. Their entire society functioned around the strong taking what they wanted. At least in our world the strong and the rich pretended that they played by the same rules as the rest of us. Here everything was a challenge, a constant struggle to survive. The demons wanted to expand. Not because they needed to, but because they were driven to take more.
A knock sounded at the door. A burst of electricity flowed around my hand. My dad gave me a cautious glance and moved toward the door. With some effort, I made the blue arcs of electricity fade away. I was ready for a fight. Anything was better than waiting to find out who was going to try and kill me next.
My dad opened the door, and Salina strutted in. Did she not have any other kind of walk? Her constant preening was starting to get on my nerves. I didn’t even see her flawless beauty anymore. All I wanted was for her to leave or to take me to the crucible. Enough of the games. I was ready to fight for my chance at freedom.
She walked toward me and trailed one finger from my cheek down to my chest. I resisted the urge to push her away. This demon obviously held an important place in Adramelech’s court, and the last thing I wanted to do was anger him when I was so close to leaving. She tapped her nail against my chest and licked her lips.
“It seems like such a waste for you to stay true to a woman you will never see again.” She trailed her hand down lower. “We could have so much fun together.”
I slapped her hand to the side before it could get any lower than my stomach. “Why are you here, Salina?” She pouted her lips and did her best to give me a smoldering look. As if I could have actually hurt her feelings. Then she turned and started walking toward the door. Even seeing her walk away didn’t have the same effect on me anymore. Her beauty wouldn’t win her any favors with me.
She looked over her shoulder. “The crucible awaits.” When I started to follow her, she stopped again. “Bring your swords.”
“I thought we weren’t allowed to have weapons inside of the crucible?”
“This contest is different.” She started to walk again. “Bring your blades and don’t dawdle.” She wagged a finger over her shoulder just to irritate me further.
John tossed me my harness and sheathed blades. I gave him a look, and he just shrugged his shoulders. I wondered just what in the hell was going on. My weapons hadn’t been allowed in the crucible in any of the other rounds, and John had told me they weren’t allowed at all. So now that I was being told to bring them, I had to wonder just what was in store for me.
“Good luck.”
“You’ve never wished me luck before.”
“You’ve never needed it before.”
He gave me a smile that let me know he was just screwing around. It made me feel better and helped me find a little bit of the balance I had lost when Salina told me to grab my swords. It was the kind of humor one warrior would share with another when they were stationed along the front lines together. You never knew when the end was coming. After a while, all you could do was joke about it to stay loose.
“Plus I’m looking forward to going home,” John said, still smiling, but his eyes burned with a fierce sense of desire that I hadn’t seen before. I couldn’t imagine being away from April for twenty years. I couldn’t imagine how much that feeling would intensify once we had been together for over a century.
“You and me both, Dad.”
Salina hadn’t waited for me, so I had to jog to catch up with her. I strapped my harness on as I ran. It felt good to have my swords tucked against my back. I had missed having them with me. Since I started using the weapons, they almost felt like they were a part of me. It was still a bit concerning that Salina had asked me to bring them, but unless whomever I was facing was a master, I would be ok.
“So are you going to fill me in on what is different about today?”
Salina smirked. “Ah, so now you want something from me. Tell me, son of John, how would you be willing to pay for that information?”
“Forget I asked.”
She laughed, and it sounded like the tinkle of wind chimes. It was beautiful and cruel at the same time. All of her facial features spoke of trust and desire, but her eyes held a darker message. “You’re not very much fun, are you?”
She hit me with her best pouty face. If April had hit me with that same look, I would have moved the sun and stars for her. When Salina did it, all I saw was a demon playing at having emotions. Even then, I wondered, could she really mimic something that well if she had never felt it in the first place?
She ran her hands down the sides of her chest and onto her thighs and then back up. It had the simple effect of dragging my gaze across her entire body. It was flawless, and yet it held no sway over me. It took more than a sexy body to win me over. When she spoke next, her words were laced with desire.
“Believe me when I tell you that you have no idea what you missed out on. Sadly I fear our time together is at an end after today.”
“Why do you stay?” I wasn’t sure why I said it. It just slipped out. Once the words had left my mouth, there was no way to recall them.
Salina stopped walking, and her whole body stiffened. “What do you mean?”
I had already asked, so there was no reason to be shy now. “You can create a portal to our world, and with your considerable charms, you could stay there and be happy. You could escape this life, this place.”
Salina looked up and down the corridor before facing me again. “There was a time, son of John, that I would have considered that. Sadly, that time has passed on. This is the only life I have ever known. How could I leave it?” She seemed to focus for a moment, and then a sad smile moved across her face. “This is my home.”
I didn’t know if this was just another game she was playing, trying to draw me in closer by playing on my emotions. I felt for her. I really did. There was a time when I had felt all alone and did
n’t know what to do. I had isolated myself. Salina was doing the same. I reached out and touched her arm. I was very conscious of the fact this was the first time I had touched her. “Let’s go.”
She nodded once, and within three steps, her normal swagger had returned. We entered the carriage and sat down. As the carriage started to roll away, I caught Salina looking at me out of the corner of her eye. For the first time, it wasn’t lust that I saw there, but sadness. Maybe the demons weren’t as different from us as I wanted them to be.
THE CARRIAGE ROLLED TO A STOP, and the door opened. I climbed out into the iron cage and walked until I reached the inner gate. All I could do now was wait for them to announce the game, and then do my best to stay alive. The crucible looked to be smaller than the previous versions I had been in. The floor was made out of stone. At least I wouldn’t have to worry about scorpions again. I still had dreams about gigantic scorpions bursting from the ground and trying to eat me for dinner.
Adramelech’s voice boomed from above. “Today we have a special battle for you. Gifted versus Gifted. Only one of them will be allowed to leave the crucible alive.”
I wondered who they had captured to fight against me. If it was my father, then we couldn’t fight and would have to find a way out of here together. If it was April or Marcus, the same rules applied. I wouldn’t fight against one of my friends. Pairing me against my father seemed like the more likely explanation. The demons had no souls. They would enjoy watching a father battle a son, especially if it meant keeping one of them in hell forever. I didn’t come here to kill my dad, so if he was in here with me, there was going to be hell to pay.
Adramelech’s voice screamed out over the crucible. “Begin!”
The iron door slid away, and I walked out into the arena, unsure of what to expect. Slowly I made my way toward the center of the crucible. Who was going to meet me there? When I reached the center, I found what appeared to be a ring of stone. It looked like the perfect place to hold a duel, a one-on-one death match. I was sure that was exactly what they were expecting. I waited on the edge of the ring, scanning the crucible for my opponent.
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