Before she could finish her sentence a strong draft pushed against us and scattered the leaves by our feet. One thing I remembered for certain there were never any sense of breeze or wind in this realm. We all held our breaths not sure who to expect to approach us. When usually a silent sheet of black would carry her Mother moved through the trees with slump shoulders and at a slow pace. She seemed exhausted or perhaps wounded. When the Goons attacked her Mother barely hesitated when retaliating so I know she doesn’t wound easily. Something else was wrong.
Once she approached us, Mother looked down through her weeping hair and spoke to us in a series of ticks. Of course, none of us understood what she wanted and could only watch suspiciously. She then lifted a mask and fitted to her to face. Before we could react the vacuum sensation hurled us all forward into the mask. The alcohol definitely was not helping with the nauseating clench of spiralling through darkness. Once we landed we found ourselves nestled in musky holes of shadows. Just by inhaling the dust I could feel my muscles tightening and my joints ache. It must’ve had something to do with spending nearly two years in this place that left a permanent mark on me, I don’t think I’ll ever be alright returning to this prison.
The other two Reapers were able to lead the way out of the pocket cave we fell into, seemingly a detachment from the rest of the realm. Inside was exactly as I remembered it, horrible. The webs that carried the imprisoned were scattered across the cave like landmines. Instantly I became woozy and had to catch myself against the rock wall to stop from fainting. Teresa helped me gain my balance by holding onto my shoulders. There was a strange smell that lingered though; it wasn’t something that I had ever smelt while in my confinement here.
“Look…” Kevin motioned to one of the sacs that had been gutted.
“And over here too” Steve had reached another sac that also had been mysteriously forced opened, the cut along the web rough probably by blade or a saw. No normal knife could’ve cut through a web like that; it had felt as strong as pipe steel and sticky.
“What on earth could have done that?” Teresa muttered when a gurgling sound startled her. She glanced over at one of the back corners and gasped. A boulder of brown fur matted with blood and dirt had collapsed against the rocks. A pool of blood was filling underneath the spiders wound, its legs curled in and her head rested against her shoulder. Every now and again her muscle would convulse or the fangs overlapping her mouth would twitch.
“Is that Greed?” We all rushed over to inspect the giant sin, and sure enough, it was unmistakably Greed the spider demon. A wound the size of a pothole had been pierced through her abdomen and was bleeding heavily into the dirt.
“Hunters… it must be.” Teresa crouched into a whisper, throwing two fleeting looks over her shoulders. “Nothing can hurt these demons, only holy weapons. They must be searching for the Blue Spirit.”
“The sacs that are open… there are only two. Does that mean they found her?” Kevin asked. I ran my hands through my hair, this was a disaster. If they found the Blue Spirit, everything that we were trying to achieve would be destroyed. They can’t have found her. They can’t.
“H-Help me…” A raspy voice called out from behind us, an old man as frail as tissue paper was reaching out his arm. His eyes blinked with the golden taint of Greed, and by the stench of him he had been held in these cacoons for a very long time.
“It’s a banished spirit.” I quickly raced over before kneeling down to his eye level. His eyes were rolling around in his head; this man’s sanity has long been dripped free from his body.
“T-take me wi-wi-with you.”
“Okay, okay I will just hold on-”
“Wolf Reaper?” Kevin protested but I shouted over my shoulder.
“We are taking him; I know what it is like to stay here. He comes with us.”
I scooped him up carefully as to not break any of his bones, “T-T-Thank you.”
“Wait maybe he can help us. Banished, did you see anything?” Teresa walked over. He lolled his neck into the nook of my shoulder, unable to keep himself in a stand. I even questioned the liability of him able to survive out on the surface long enough to attach to a host. The thought bubbled on the surface again, about how I was condemning another person to the death of a host but I didn’t let the image linger.
“Banished? Answer me!”
“He can’t understand you Teresa-” I muttered just as the old man gurgled on his tongue.
“Y-Yes. H-Hunters, Hunters.” We all exchanged quick wide eyed glances.
“Did they find the Blue Spirit?” I asked as Teresa spoke over me.
“They wouldn’t know what the Blue Spirit is; did they find a girl here? A girl in a blue cloak?”
The man looked between us, his lower jaw slack that opened his mouth into a gaping hole. He nodded viciously as we all tightened our muscles. The hunters have gotten her. Hunters now held onto the most crucial puzzle piece holding our plan together. Before panic over took us the Banished then started to shake his head no.
“No-No-No-No.” He mumbled incoherently, “A spirit… a b-b-ban….”
“A banished?” I questioned as all of us slumped relieved.
“A b-boy and a g-g-girl.” He then pointed to his heart with a crippled, trembling finger, “L-L-Living.”
“Living?” Teresa repeated.
“A host…” I swivelled on the ball of my heel to face the others. Maybe I was letting my hopes get too high, but I couldn’t stop my smile from lifting upwards. “A banished and a host! It could be Evan!”
“Why would Evan be in the Sin Realm by choice?”
“Exactly why we’re here, looking for the blue spirit. Betrayal must have been searching with him in the realms, they must’ve known -”
“Impossible, no one knew that we had taken the Blue Spirit to Greed, only the Reapers. It must have been a mistake-” Teresa paced trying to wrap the idea around her head.
“Free-dom. Spirit was set f-free; boy and host ran off w-when hunters a-a-a-arrived.”
“So the Blue Spirit just disappeared?” Steve spoke up from behind.
“We’ll find her; she’s free from Greed at least and on her own. She said to me that once she was free she’ll do her rightful job, we’ll find her.” I grinned before nodding at Teresa, “Let’s get out of here.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight:
We teleported out into the open space on the living plane and almost immediately the Banished Spirit wrestled out of my grasp and fled the scene, no doubt searching for a host. We had arrived in the middle of a park, somewhere heavily filled with large trees and shrubs. It had almost looked like a nature reserve where street lights were scattered every few meters to help keep the footpath illuminated for late night walkers.
“Why did you teleport us here?” I asked Teresa but she shook her head.
“I didn’t I thought you did. Steve? Kevin?” Both Reapers shook their heads no.
“That’s weird, let’s just le-” I started to walk forward when more Reapers suddenly teleported in front of us. We quickly shuffled backwards expecting them to be hostile, but they merely glanced around baffled.
“What are you doing here?” I asked. There were three of them in their group but they were just as confused as we were. They all scrunched their faces up.
“I didn’t want to teleport here! I was going back to the main hall-”
“I didn’t do this, where are we?”
“Is this a joke?” They started to turn to each other in dispute just as four more Reapers appeared; followed by at least another three groups of five. They were popping up from everywhere, and every single one of them stumbled around confused as if they were plucked from their beds. Soon the whole pathway was taken up by dark cloaked spirits.
“Who’s doing this? What’s going on?”
“They’re grouping us together like cattle!” One of the Reapers shouted as another hysterical voice lifted above the group.
“I can’t leave. We ca
n’t teleport!” A wave of frightened voices grew louder.
“Wait, let’s just stay calm for a moment-” I tried to yell when a strange chill crawled across my skin and entire body. Every Reaper suddenly stopped panicking to rub down their arms. It was more than just a chill or a shiver; it felt so much heavier than that; heavier enough to stop me midsentence and to glue all of us to our spots.
“Do you all feel that?” Teresa asked.
The air was stale and heavy. It was so quiet. Too quiet, not even our exhaling breaths reached our ear drums. I looked further into the bush, unable to shake that feeling that we were being watched. Teresa was glancing upwards into the skies, as if she could feel something pressing their hands down onto her shoulders. It was a cloudless night sky; the stars a freckled face of white against a deep black. When the tree leaves brushed together it was like a pen being dropped in a silent classroom; a tiny bird perched itself on the branch and startled us into taking a step back. It was grooming its peak into the pillow of its chest before it swept down onto the ground. Every flutter of its feathers was being amplified across the entire forest. First it was just one bird, then another bird, a black crow this time also landed on the ground next to it. If that wasn’t strange enough a lone white rabbit moved out from underneath bushes, stopping once joining the two birds.
I pushed my way to the front of the pack to get a better look. For a moment they just sat there unfazed by the huge mass of Reapers formed in front of them. Even the Reapers let their breaths go; relieved it was just mere animals. It wasn’t until a familiar teal butterfly landed on a low branch of a tree that my concerns became real.
As they started to morph the once steady sound of my heartbeat charged against my ear drums. Within moments, creatures the size of human children stretched out from the bodies of the animals before standing within the wash light of the street lamp. The yellow light was bright as it lit up their alien eyes and faces. The sudden change quickly caught all of the Reapers’ attention as they glanced over in stunned silence. Once they morphed they just stood there facing us.
“Do you know what they are?” Teresa asked through tight lips.
I gulped and nodded, “Creators.”
“Creators?! But… they shouldn’t be down here. What are they doing down here?”
My eyes strained as the Creator Spirits started glancing to each other, communicating through swift facial changes. Like hot gossip the Reapers were turning to one another, whispering the word Creator down the pack line. Creators were known and feared, but no one had ever seen one before. In a high pitched whistle, the crow Creator arched it back and hissed menacingly at us. I don’t know why, but at the moment Gargoyle’s warning suddenly popped back into my head, she’ll be coming for you.
“Miira sent them…. Run! Run!” I snatched Teresa by her sleeve and pushed her in the other direction. We were like ants under the foot of a human shoe. As we scattered blindly the Creators were knocking us down like a sniper above the cliffs. Most of the Reapers summoned their Goons but the demonic beasts were just as confused and frightened as we were.
It was horrible, the deafening cloud of screaming was enough to trip my feet. Without lifting a finger Reapers were forced into the ground then dragged across the dirt. With a mere nod of the head the Creators were able to squeeze the Reapers until their literally burst into flames. Even as they tried to sprint away the Creators were ringing ropes around their ankles and hauling them in like fish on hooks. We were falling in groups of ten. Just bang, bang, bang they went down. Reapers were popping like landmines that disappeared into air. Almost like a game the Creators were teleporting from spot to spot, appearing in front of us to watch us skid and bolt in the other direction only to jump back into our paths again.
Disorientated I was turning around in circles, trying to keep track of the erratic movements of the Butterfly Creator in particular. Everyone around me were being tied in, dragged across the ground and exploded. I had catch sight of Teresa but she had managed to slip free behind the ruckus. Out of the shadows Raix leapt forward and started to circle me. He had his ears pinned to his head and tail tucked between his hind legs. I had never seen him this spooked before, but even so he kept a protectively stance in front of me, trying to use his body like a shield.
“Raix, you have to hide!” I kept trying to pull Raix to the side but he was persistent. The combination of shouting Reapers and snarling Goons filled the skies like a storm. The urge to stand to fight demolished within me as everyone kept hitting the ground either paralysed or as piles of ash.
“Let’s go!” Using the cover of the fleeing Reapers I was able to run down the shallow slope and out of the mass with Raix by my side. Without glancing back I ran forward. The forest was dark enough that I couldn’t see a meter in front of my steps, causing me to continuously hit low hanging branches and trip over rocks and roots. I ran at full speed until the sound of a piercing whistle slowed our steps. Raix lowered into a crouch as I looked over my shoulder to see if we were being followed. The whistle was so loud; it must be close to us.
Snapping branches and crunching leaves started moving at an alarming rate towards us. Just as I turned again to run a pair of eyes moved across me like a heated spot light. Raix again started baring his teeth and peeling his lips back snarling. In the dense shrub the white rabbit Creator poked its head up as Raix attempted lunge at it, only stopping as I grab him around the neck and steered him away.
“No Raix! Don’t fight it! Just run!”
Raix kicked off into a run with such speed that my feet dragged across the ground. I kicked upwards, mounting onto Raix’s back before ringing my arms around his board neckline to stop myself from bouncing off. The colours of the forest flashed past us in smudged, disjointed blurs and the wind lashed past my ears like hollowed echoes. Regardless of how far or fast Raix ran the Creator was still hot on our trail. Each heavy pant was loud against my ear as I held it pressed into his neck. A few times a flicker of black swept over us as Raix attempted to teleport but it was useless, we were trapped to the ground. He couldn’t teleport which meant we couldn’t escape. I bounced on Raix’s back with every stride; he was so strong and powerful that his body could ram through concrete walls.
Until suddenly we hit something on the ground that took out Raix’s legs, flipping us over. Thick tree roots, rocks and branches punched into my back as I landed heavily before skidding to a stop across the forest floor. Raix scrambled back onto his feet, panting hard before rushing over to me. He was biting my clothes, trying to haul me back up but the pain was so intense I could only groan and curl into myself. The tears blinded me momentarily as I heard the footsteps of the Creator stop within a few meters from us. Raix was whimpering and hopping from paw to paw as if the ground was too hot to stand on. I couldn’t move regardless of how desperately Raix tried to roll me over. The insects of the forest were chirping in their loud song till everything went quiet. I even felt my chest clench mid breath. It was here.
Raix glanced between me and the Creator, whimpering, pacing before pinning his ears back and let out a series of threatened barks. He was growling nonstop, trying to frighten the Creator away. I could feel his panic surge through me in every one of my heart beats. A soft whistle came from the Creator’s direction which only stirred Raix up more. He stalked closer to the spirit baited. I sat myself up while Raix was bouncing on the tip of his paws, viciously snapping the air ready to strike.
“Raix-” I groaned, clenched my eyes for just a moment and as I glanced back up I saw just a glimpse of Raix’s tail disappearing into the woods.
“Raix... Raix?”
Panicked energy sprung my legs upwards from the ground. I could feel my stomach squeeze like I was going to be sick, but I kept going trying to ignore the pain knotting the muscles in my back. Desperately I flung myself forward in a loud shout, “Raix? Get back here, come back!”
He was barking and barking until a painful yelp hit the skies before a sound of snapping bone abrup
tly halted me. “Raix…?”
My knees buckled as if something suddenly had taken out my legs. Before I could land heart ache tore through my chest, hollowing me out like a gutted fish. My mind froze over, my entire body went numb and I collapsed to the ground as if my skeleton had been removed. Before I could understand why, I was wailing. A strong primitive sensation was twisting at my chest, choking me and arching my spine in my distraught screaming. It hurt. It hurt so much and I couldn’t understand what was happening. It was pure torture. It was more than just a broken leg or bodily wound; it felt sickening like my very existence was snapped in two. It was moving through me as an unsettled current of despair, filling every vein in my body. With eyes clouded I watched the Creator step around the trees and into view. It approached me, crouched down and tried to speak to me in its alien clicking. My body was damaged and my mind was scattering like fine dust. I couldn’t even blink.
It then reached over and touched my forehead. At its contact a wave of heat and power sparked life back into my body but it felt like it didn’t belong to me. If I could I would’ve spat the power back out.
Where is she? A voice of muffled English boomed inside my head. I lurched forward in a gasp not expecting the invasion of fingertips poke into my mind. Teal coloured eyes bore down into me, its head tilting left and right, burrowing into my memories in search of the Blue Spirit. The pattern of the butterfly was pressed to its skin, catching the faint moonlight that made it glow beautifully.
When I couldn’t answer the Creator merely stepped over me and vanished. To stop my dinner from coming back up I lifted my hand to my mouth and clenched my teeth together. Like a fist my heart was hammering inside my chest. The blood pumping around my body was like thick custard, heavy and slow.
I dared to turn my head but the blades of grass were blocking my view. The insects started to chirp again as the weighted invisible sheet was lifted away. I turned onto my stomach and crawled across the plains. I was trembling so badly I was surprised my weakened arms could even keep me above the dirt. Craning my neck over the mound I caught sight of a stiff black corpse, hollowed out with skin as dry as desert lake beds. Before I could register what I was looking at a pair of arms grabbed onto my shoulders and turned my head away.
My Demonic Ghost Book two (The Reapers 2) Page 26