“I’m not going to kill him.” Elliot shouted just as First spat Mark out onto the road.
This time Mark fell deadly silent and still across the road like road kill. Was he dead? Had Elliot just killed my best friend? What have I done?
As Mark’s body went still the shadow spirit shot upwards from his chest, covered in thick grey chains and within the centre of a vaporing dark cloud. The chains were held in his hands like reins where the other end bound themselves onto both of Mark’s wrists and around his neck. The spirit fired a black missile that knocked First backwards, the hot torpedo having enough power that even a creature like Goons were tossed like twigs. I flinched and took cover behind a parked car, able to feel the fierce energy fly towards us with each swing from the spirit. There was a thick, cloud that was evaporating around both Mark and this ghost, the smoke seemingly to be draining out of Mark’s body in a heavy stream.
The spirit was insane. Furious and strong. He was able to push First back without any struggle, draining Mark and transforming the smoke into hot pockets of power. I had to leap to the side to avoid a wild missile skimming past my shoulders. First was fast as well, blinking to and fro between each fire that the spirit tried to shoot him down with. The black magic skimmed over the Goon’s back, causing him to wince but he didn’t slow for a moment.
“Trust me” Elliot said but I couldn’t stop myself from cringing at the sight of him.
As the spirit slithered into the sunlight there was a white flickering dust spiralling down from the wind; abruptly revealing the Hunter. It was a different Hunter this time, an older male as he stepped forwards towards the dark Ghost in a speed that far past them all.
Within the chaos the Hunter managed to take the chains with his hands that connected the ghost to Mark’s unconscious body. The shadow spirit turned his attention onto the Hunter, panic consumed every muscle in his face but despite his best attempts he just couldn’t keep the Hunter away. With his bare hands the Hunter took the chains and snapped them in two. Suddenly free again, the black smoke gushing out of Mark’s pores completely stopped as if it were a valve the Hunter just switched closed. With doing so it removed the spirit from being able to inhale any more smoke and cast the energy into bullets. First took the man into his jaws without a second to waste, not letting the soul escape again and attempt to attach to another human.
Without addressing us, the Hunter approached Mark before gliding his palm across his forehead. Then, once satisfied, he stepped back into the light and disappeared.
“That was a close call.” Elliot exhaled.
“What on earth was that spirit? Why did he attack us?”
“That spirit is a Banished. They are the worst type of spirit you could come across. I didn’t expect that you would have to deal with one on your first day alone.”
“What about Mark? Is he okay?”
“He is now. Banished are just like tics where they latch onto other living souls and drain them of their life source. If it had gotten away with Mark we may never be able to catch him as they host jump, making it impossible to track. These banished will fight you from the very beginning, so whenever you smell a Banished Spirit always try and get back up. If they get away, try and follow them and lead them to the sunlight. They will protect their hosts at all costs, so if you threaten the host they will show themselves. The Hunters can only sense them once they are in the sunlight you see, that’s why we have to drive the ghosts into the sun. But they are mostly a Hunter problem, if you accidently lose one just… don’t tell anyone.”
“Mark didn’t even react to the ghost-”
“He wouldn’t be able to see him. Banished can choose to reveal themselves to their Hosts or not, most don’t. Most Hosts don’t even know what happened till it’s too late.”
Elliot approached First who seemed to be having problems keeping the spirit in his mouth. He was dry retching trying not to vomit.
“Come, I think it’s time I show you where this type of spirit belongs. Don’t worry about Mark; he’ll wake up soon without any memory of this.”
I followed Elliot into the darkness that swept us downwards, but, instead of taking the banished to the drop off we wound up within another strange realm. It was eerily quiet. A world of slumber where no other creatures be it insects or man walked these lands. There were crooked black trees that stuck out of the earth and a soft water stream moving downwards across the level floor. It was foggy and vague like stepping into a cloudy dream.
Elliot cleared his throat before summoning the demon of the waste, “Mother.”
Chapter Nine:
A soft movement stirred the mist that surrounded us. There was a soft ripple tearing through the fog followed closely by a moving darkness that crawled across the space like a sheet of paper. There was an awful cracking of breaking bones as the darkness came to a stop in front of us. Building itself up from the shadows, the creature pulled and fought against the sac that carried it. A head of black long hair sprouted upwards, attached to a slender neck that curved into the torso of a snaked scaled woman. Her waist opened like a spoon, legs replaced with a long thick tail of an eel that looped around the base of its body. The woman’s face was covered completely by the moving black hair that slowly dripped from her face and fell to the ground.
From her sides grew long, thin limbs of seven arms that stretched out behind her and towered over us like spears. Each hand held a dark wooden mask; seven arms for seven masks. The creature purred in series of clicks.
“Jordon… this is Mother. She is the gate keeper to the temptations, the doorway to the sins.”
Mother clicked at them with her distorted rumble, her voice lost behind the folds of seeping black goo. At her appearance Raix crept out of the darkness as well. He looked up at the serpent woman, intrigued with her before whimpering behind me.
“Nice of you to finally show up.” I bickered where Raix snorted in reply.
Elliot motioned to First who stepped upwards and spat the spirit out at Mother’s tail. The shadow ghost rolled onto his back, breathless and scared out of his wits. Before he even had the chance to run, Mother’s tail lashed out and coiled around his torso, securing him down. She sniffed the air around the spirit, passing judgement on him before one of her arms shifted downwards bringing the mask to her face. With a snapping reflex, the mask was slapped into the curve of her face and swallowed into the black soup of her hair. The banished ghost was inhaled through a line of smoke into the mouth and eyes of the mask before he completely disappeared. Mother let her tail unfold before she moved her hand back to the mask, prying it off her skin.
“You send banished spirits here, to Mother.”
“Where did she take him?” I asked.
“To be destroyed. They are sent here to be broken down, and once they are nothing but waste they are returned to the spirit world to be recreated into something new.”
“You recycle them?”
“Sometimes, sometimes they are stored for power.”
“Why seven masks?” I inquired.
“Seven masks to fit the seven sins. Lust, Greed, Gluttony, Wrath, Sloth, Vanity and Envy. Each banished is marked with the taint of a sin, which makes them stand out from the rest of the spirits. But they are strong as well; you can’t take on a banished alone, especially if it’s attached to a human host. Using the person’s soul it can conjure up black magic and defeat you, it’s only when Hunters are around that Banished become weakened. You need to break the chains, no host means no power. Still, best to get back up when you verse them. Just remember, banished come to Mother. Other spirits go to the drop off.”
“Got it. Banished are to be destroyed. Don’t worry; I won’t let it loose next time.”
“Good.”
Now finished with the spirit, Mother broke apart in the same manner as she was built, her bones breaking and snapping in half, folding herself back into the darkness that carried her. And then she was gone.
“This is where they took Christop
he… isn’t it?”
Elliot lowered his head bitterly, “It’s where they take all Reapers who misbehave. If not to destroy us, then to torture us into submission. Anyone can call upon Mother, human or spirit, but I don’t know why anyone would want to. That is, unless they are trying to save someone from the Sin World. Even then they are just as likely to get caught themselves. And don’t try calling her on the surface through the day, she hates the sunlight so you can only call her at night, otherwise she won’t appear.”
“How do you know how to find Mother?”
“In the spirit realm just call her name, she’ll come. On the surface there is a special chant that’ll get her to visit you. Binding seven, Mother of us all, move through darkness and reveal my truths. Reveal to me your curse of sins; show me my nature at the hands of demons.”
***
On our return, Elliot and I went our separate ways. Elliot went back into the spirit world, or just merely disappeared among the shadows. Where he spent all his time I wasn’t sure, maybe he never stopped working. I went back to the same street in search of Mark but to have found him gone. When I went to visit by his place, his father greeted me with a stern frown.
“Jordon, I’m sorry but Mark isn’t up to visitors today.”
“Is he alright? Can I see him for a moment?” I tried to steer my head around the corner, but Mark’s dad kept it close to his body, shielding the house inside.
“Not today. He is not well.”
He then closed the door, meaning that was that. Unable to stop the anxiety from swelling inside of me I stepped around the corner and pulled the reaper cloak over myself. The material shimmered against the darkness, drawing in the shade and tossing it over my body like a fabric mirror. I went back to the door and walked through the wooden frame. Though I didn’t need to, I still step around the furniture and tried to hold my breath when Mark’s family walked too close. They were talking to each other in a foreign language, something that was obviously very concerning by the way their lips dropped into frowns. I quickly made my way up to Mark’s bedroom and let myself in. His mother was there, dipping a damp cloth into a shallow bowl of water before ringing the towel and placing it over Mark’s forehead. He was sweating terribly, a hot fever painted pink across his cheeks and rained sweat along his black hair. Sadden, his mum picked up the bowl and made her way down stairs.
I stepped up to Mark and looked over his body, able to feel the sickness within him fume upwards through his pores. Had the banished caused this? I stood there for a few moments, studying every struggled breath but the smell of disease was almost unbearable. Unable to watch, I quickly turned to make my way down the stairs. I had just reached the bottom step when something shifted within the room and caused my head to turn. It was soundless; just something unnatural that picked at my skin. I went back to Mark, just wanting to calm my nerves, when I saw the tail cloak of a Reaper and their pet step into his room.
“No! No wait!” I shouted and bolted back in after them. When I got to Mark’s bedside there was no one else there. Mark was still asleep, mumbling as I searched around myself, trying to catch where the Reaper was hiding. “Not him.” I warned into the silent room, “Not him, this one is mine.”
Out of the corner a Hunter stepped forward, followed closely by Teresa and her Goon. “Reaper?” It was the female Hunter from earlier, the one who took Christophe away and locked him up with that seven armed demon.
“You… you are the Hunter…”
“Hunter Gale… wait I remember you.” She stepped up to me and lifted my chin again with her fingers, reading deeply into my right eye. “What are you doing here?”
“Umm…” I felt myself nervously glance about the room, unable to look past Gale’s tanned face and walnut eyes as she lent forwards closer into me.
“This is the boy that saw you, wasn’t it?” She then asked.
“Yes.” I answered automatically.
“And you’ve come to clean up your mess. Well, there’s no need.” She let me go and made her way around Mark’s bed. He remained sleeping on his back, face tilted to the side lightly and his black hair pulled back by the damp cloth across his forehead. His eyebrows kept twitching like he was having a nightmare.
“What do you mean?”
“It appears that that Banished Spirit has put a taint inside him. A disease. It’ll start off as a fever, but it’ll grow and become something far more fatal.” Her hands went to Mark’s cheek and gently soothed her index finger along his face, causing him to stir. “But I’m afraid it’s not fast enough.”
“Do you mean to stop it?” I asked, glancing over at Teresa who was clenching her jaw tightly with a churning rage. I looked away from her quickly.
“Save him? Of course not. He has seen too much, I’m afraid that once he wakes he may try to tell everyone about what he saw. Right now they just think he collapsed while he was out walking…”
“No, wait he doesn’t know anything. He didn’t see the Banished spirit, and it’s gone now. We took it to Mother and she.”
“The Banished? That little worm isn’t what I’m talking about, Reaper you touched him while you were in your other form. Now he can see behind your mask-”
I cringed back alarmed.
“Did Elliot not tell you? When you touch a person in your Reaping state you’ve just allowed them to see past all our tricks. If we let this human live, he’ll forever be able to see Reapers where they walk and in their true form. It’s not something that you can just… take away. It is a terrible burden you’ve put upon him. I’m sparing him a life of torment.”
“What? And his life is something you can just take?”
The Hunter just sighed heavily and clasped her hands together in front of her chest, staring directly at me. I could feel my eyes were tightening, anger tears building trying to spill. “It’s ours to take.”
“Can’t you force him to forget, to erase his memory? -”
“That is fair too much work for me… Jordon right? You know this boy don’t you?” Teresa pushed her back off from the wall, rounding the corner from behind me. I watched her prowling along the walls of the room, one hand lifted against the plaster as she let her nails drag.
“He’s a kid from my school-” I replied.
“Don’t lie to us; they are best friends, Hunter.” Teresa interrupted, “Jordon still interacts with the living. He stays at home with his family.”
Gale’s soft face went rigid. Her eyes dilated and her nostrils flared, lips tightened to a thin line. “You still… communicate with them?”
“I… They are my family, it’s where I live.”
“Have you told them anything? Have you made contact with them while as a Reaper?”
“No, no I swear I haven’t.”
“Elliot did not tell me this.” She then quickly glanced at Teresa, “Teresa, take him.”
The shadow vulture uncurled itself from the darkness and dangled upside down from the rooftop. The large bird craned its neck downwards, hovering mere inches from Mark’s forehead. Its beak was curved like a hook, and where it opened its jaw a steam of electric green ash rose like smoke. Mark started panting, burning underneath his fever.
“Hunter, no wait, I can fix this. Let me fix this” I leapt forward, trying to take a hold of Teresa’s clothes but I was thrown from my feet.
“You leave, Reaper Jordon. And you leave, tonight and never come back here.” Without a word more, the hunter dismissed me with a tilt of her head, hurling me downwards into a vacuuming void so thick and heavy I thought I would never see the crack of daylight again.
Chapter Ten:
When I woke, finally, I was on my back with a pulsating pain that kept my legs numb and my head taut. I could feel myself sprawled out with my arms pulled to the side of me and my legs stretched forward. A type of poison was moving through my bloodstream, keeping me pinned. My bones were thick, heavy like metal pipes and my skull was a giant boulder that pulsated with deep ache. Where did she send me
? My eyes were open, I was sure of it, as every blink I could feel the tips of my eyelashes brush my skin. There was nothing beyond me. Nothing but more stretch of stillness masked over by black.
I tried to call out but my lips moved mutely on their own, unable to spit out any noise for help. I prayed that she hadn’t sent me to Mother. There was a movement in the back corner of the room but I couldn’t lift my head or strain my neck far enough to see what was going on. There were footsteps as they made their way around the base of my feet. I started to squirm underneath my restraints, suddenly becoming overwhelmed with the images of every horror movie I’ve seen flooding into my mind.
I can’t move! I have to get out of here. I have to save Mark!
I kicked against the straps that bound me a little harder, suddenly remembering the vulture Goon lower its beak down to Mark, opening its mouth to inhale his spirit from his body. I struggled again when a voice called out to me.
“Stay calm, it’ll all be over soon.” Christophe stepped up away from the thick shadows bringing with him an orange flame that breath light into the dense space. I was in a room or a type of shed.
“Christophe? You’re alright! I’m so glad to see you.” I crowed in relief. Unresponsive to me, Christophe’s face did not break a smile nor did he lift his head from staring at his feet. He carried his body like he had been tortured. I swallowed loudly, tasting the build-up of guilt.
“Can you please help me? I’m stuck; you gotta help me out here.” I motioned to my bound hands but Christophe shook his head.
“It’ll be over soon.” His old face had age terribly since being sent into the realm with Mother. Whatever Sin she took him too, and locked him in for two weeks had sucked the joy and happiness right out of his body.
My Demonic Ghost Book two (The Reapers 2) Page 9