Howler's Night

by Marie Hall

  “Hannah. Level ten witch, yeah.” He scratched his jaw. “She had to be powerful enough to attract their attention. She was good people.”

  My eyes narrowed as my blood ran cold. I was a killer; death didn’t turn me squeamish, but I’d never talked about it in such blasé terms either. “You sent her there knowing she’d die?”

  “Yeah.” He sighed. “It was either her or her brother. I will never understand the vagaries of love. She could have opted out, but instead she chose to take his place. Whatever.” Dean shook his head slowly, and finally I could see the cold-hearted killer beneath the mask. Death meant nothing to him. “The plan was the same. Give her the journal, so that she could remember.”

  “Remember what?”

  “The truth. Your demon’s been brainwashed to within an inch of her life. The Triad wants you dead, boy, and they figured the easiest way to ensure it happened was to make your little spitfire the one to pull the trigger.”

  I didn’t look at anything in particular as I tapped my fingers absentmindedly on the countertop. The only person in the world I would ever let my guard down with is Pandora. “Why do they want me dead?”

  The list of reasons was long, I was sure. My soul was still not my own, I was a rogue Priest, I was in bed with the enemy… far too many reasons. But if he could help me narrow it down, it would help.

  “Cause you picked your side, King, and it wasn’t theirs.”

  “So the Triad is part of the Order, an enterprise built to defend humankind, and yet they’re actively trying to bring about the end of the world. Why?”

  I knew the answer to that question, what I wanted to know was if he knew the answer to that question. Just how much could I trust him?

  His smile was secretive. “Not gonna make it that easy on you, bub. Trust me, or don’t. But I’m only here to take a couple pawns off the board, nothing more.”

  “Then tell me something you can say.”

  His grin grew wide. “Ask me about her book.”

  “Where’s her book?”

  Dean punched me on the shoulder; I glanced down at the spot and shook my head. This guy had been among humans too long. He was completely off his rocker, but there was something about him I liked even though I knew he was about as docile and tame as a high caste demon lord.

  “Where she needs it most.”

  “And that is?”

  “Her cage, of course. You see, I just reset the game board, Priest. Checkmate.”

  ~*~

  Pandora

  I slowly came to myself, feeling as though I’d just had another black out. But this time, instead of the haze of half-remembered memories, I saw a picture in my mind of the man with brown eyes.

  My heart rate ratcheted up as I thought of him, and I grabbed my chest. The memory of it broke me out in a wash of need even while I felt a smothering sense of murderous rage.

  I bit down on my lip and covered my ears with my hands, trying to shake the strange images loose. Then I noticed a book. I stared at it, feeling as though I’d seen it before.

  It was a buff suede color, and some stenciling adorned the front. When I reached out to grab it, a miniature spark of lightning jumped from the stenciled words into the palm of my hand.

  Hissing, I yanked my hand back and hugged it tight to my chest. I turned my face aside, but after a minute I caught myself looking back at it.

  There was a compulsion burning inside me to open it.

  I rocked on my butt and stared at it, growing more and more mesmerized with each second that ticked by.

  Finally the curiosity was too much to bear, and I snatched it up, fully expecting to be shocked once again, but I wasn’t. With fingers that couldn’t seem to stop shaking, I cracked it open to the first page and started reading.

  All accounts in this story are true. I didn’t have much time to get it all down. They’re coming for me. Tonight it’s going to be electroshock therapy, and I’m not sure I can handle another session. I’m breaking, Luc, they’re breaking me…

  I know this is a long shot, the hope that maybe someone might actually find this journal, but the witch across from my cell said this journal will go to the one who needs it most, so I have to assume it’s you. Because the truth of what’s going to happen to our people after they kill me is something you’ll need to know. You need to warn the others what the Triad has planned…

  My God, I can’t believe this has really happened. I fought so hard, I thought I had time… thought we had time. I thought we’d figured it all out. But we were fooled, right to the very end.

  All I can say is I love Asher. I know why he did what he did when he stabbed me, and I forgive him. Luc, if you’re reading this, you have to tell him that because I know they will wipe all of this from my mind. I’ve seen them do it to others. Soon I’m going to be nothing but a shell, a vessel they will use to try and destroy everything I love. Forgive the Priest, Luc, you have to, you have no choice. Without him by our side we can never succeed.

  My God… I know it all now. It’s so much worse than what we thought, the truth of it all… it’s so much worse.

  My pulse was pounding so hard by the time I finished reading that I had to slam the book shut. I’d barely even begun, but already I felt something dark and malevolent slink through me. Something foreign and unpleasant, and deep down I knew all the answers were in that book.

  A book written by my hand.

  A journal I couldn’t remember ever penning.

  I gazed on in horror at it sitting undisturbed by my foot, staring at it like it was a wild animal ready to snatch me up in its deadly jaws and devour me whole.

  I knew I wasn’t going to like what I read inside, and that night I just didn’t have the energy to try.

  Chapter 7

  Asher

  She was asleep, tossing and turning and crying out in her dreams, flinging her arms wide, and begging them to stop.

  I sat on the cot and watched her with my heart trapped in my throat. I knew I couldn’t go to her. I’d tried earlier in the night, and the moment I’d opened the cage, she’d very nearly ripped my throat out with her claws.

  Pandora was damaged, and I couldn’t help but remember Luc’s words. Even though she was right here with me, it felt like she was dead because this woman before me was nothing like the one I’d known all my life.

  Dean had poked his head into the room hours earlier motioning for me and saying that maybe being back here with her was only making it worse, but I couldn’t leave. I still didn’t really trust him.

  It seemed no matter where I turned everyone wanted a piece of Pandora. Dean could be on our side for now, but who could say what would happen tomorrow, or the next day, or the day after that, when a new player entered the game, changing the rules all over again and turning a temporary ally into a merciless enemy?

  So I stayed back there with her, watching helplessly from the sidelines as she convulsed and screamed for them to stop cutting.

  At one point she’d jerked so hard she’d exposed an angry and deep scar in her thigh, and it’d been all I could do not to demand Dean tell me where Creatus was so that I could kill every single bastard in there.

  Not only had she not healed from the wounds, but she was covered in more scars than even I was. Scrubbing my jaw, I squeezed my eyes shut and laid back down on the bed. If she had to suffer, so would I.

  “You will never be alone again, little demon. Never again.”

  My whispered words seemed to enflame her rage as she slammed her body against the spelled cage over and over, reaching her arms out, desperately trying to get at me.

  The only good thing that’d happened when I’d entered the cage earlier was that I’d managed to swipe up her journal before being forced to lock her up again.

  Grabbing the book off the floor, I tugged on the chain attached to the dangling light bulb overhead. The power of strong magic rippled off the journal. It was benign magic, not meant to harm. There was a compulsion to read the book laced wi
thin its spell, which was probably Dean’s purpose in sending Hannah in there to begin with.

  I spent the rest of the night reading through the massive book. It was her story, but it was also our story. I blinked the heat from my eyes as I read her words to me, how she loved me, how she would never give me up, and that no matter how many times they cut her open she would fight like hell to protect my whereabouts.

  Then came the day when her demons were stripped from her and she rejoiced at the loss of Pestilence but losing Lust made her cry for days on end. How everyday they would pump her name through her cell—Ya-el, Ya-el, Ya-el—until she was sure that Pandora was gone, transposed by the demon within.

  Soon she began to speak of Wrath and how he must be saved from the tortures of Hell, how they must all be saved and bring the world into a new order of enlightment.

  It wasn’t easy reading her words, feeling the desperation in them, watching her letters become more and more paranoid as time went on. Reading how she was unable, at one point, to remember whether I was real, or if I was some double agent sent to kill her when her guard was down.

  Slowly but surely, her faith in me began to waver. Their indoctrination had completely taken hold, and by the end, the only words she could write were “Kill Asher” over and over. She cried out for Luc because he was the only true constant in her life, and the heart-shaped scar was the only thing saving the last of her sanity.

  Taking a small break, I glanced over at her. She was finally sleeping soundly, with a fist pressed up beneath her cheek, reminding me of a tortured angel.

  I knew this book would save her, but it could also hurt her. By the end of the journal, her brainwashing was so absolute that I feared reading these words would send her spiraling back into the lies.

  Flipping back through the book, I looked for the spot where their lies began to supplant her true memories and attempted to rip those pages out, but they wouldn’t budge.

  I couldn’t let her read those words; they were dangerous lies. Calling shadow to my palm, I tried to hide the final pages in impenetrable darkness, but the book’s spell was powerful and dumped the shadow off.

  It’d been years since I’d spell cast. I’d learned the art centuries ago when I’d hunted down a rogue neph who’d dabbled in it. Walking back into the bar, I nodded at Dean, who was sitting by the door chatting with a were-panther who had half his face tattooed with tribal bands.

  I still couldn’t fathom why Death would give us safe harbor, but I was also not fool enough to consider taking Pandora out of there as she was. Whatever cage Death had placed her in was powerful enough to withstand her attacks on it. At least in there I only had a handful of creatures to keep an eye on; on the outside I’d have a world to contend with.

  Grabbing a pen and pad of paper, I turned without acknowledging him and headed once again to the pantry. Sitting back down on the cot, I closed my eyes and attempted to recall the spell.

  I didn’t want to crack Hannah’s wards. It was a good spell that would eventually help Pandora weed through the lies in her head. What I wanted to do was force Hannah’s spell to recognize mine as friendly so that it would accept my shadow and not fight it.

  It took me an hour of penning the words until I created one that I felt would be strong enough to slip through the ward.

  Setting the pen aside, I brought the closed book to my lap, set my palm upon it, and took a calming breath, forcing all my fears, all my questions and anger, out. Spell casting was best done when the soul was at ease and the spirit calm.

  “Amicus sum, non hostem umbra tuas accipere.” I spoke the Latin words with power, pushing all my will and desire into them. The palm of my hand heated with a gentle warmth that flowed through me.

  Shoulders slumping with relief that the spell had opened itself to me, I smiled.

  “Damned impressive there, Priest.”

  I glanced up to note Dean standing just in front of me. It bothered me that I hadn’t heard him enter.

  “Hannah was as powerful a witch as they came.”

  Sighing, I leaned my head against the wall. “She was also human with human years. I’ve learned things in my life.”

  Snorting, he crossed his arms and turned toward Dora. “You think hiding those words from her is the right answer?”

  “What would you have me do? Feed her more of these lies?”

  His lips twisted. “Just curious, I guess.”

  “And if I hand her the lies, what happens?”

  He shrugged. “Don’t know. Ball is still in her court. In the end the decision is hers.”

  “So how am I supposed to get through to her?” I hated asking a stranger for advice, but in a case such as this, I didn’t have a clue what to do. My desperation to get her back as she’d been consumed me. Always a patient sort before, I found myself now at a crossroads emotionally.

  “You asking what I would do?”

  I flipped my hand out, silently acknowledging that I was.

  “Give her the book. All of it. Trust her instincts. She came here after all.”

  Snorting, I raised my brows.

  He nodded. “She was told to go east, Priest. She came west. Deep down that girl is fighting. She may not know it, but she is. How well do you think you know her?”

  “She’s the other half of my soul.”

  “Then make her remember that.”

  ~*~

  Pandora

  My Re-indoctrination

  Day 1

  I woke up to find the brown-eyed man staring at me, and instantly I was triggered. Roaring, I jumped to my feet and slammed into the bars.

  “Kill!” the demons inside me roared.

  But no matter how hard I hit the bars, they did not yield, and the man just stood there, looking at me.

  I slammed into the door. Over and over. I didn’t know how long I hit it, but I kept going, because I was compelled to grab him. To hurt him. To kill him.

  My mind was nothing but violence and chaos. The demons inside my head chanted, Maim. Torture. Kill. Maim. Torture. Kill.

  I reached through the bars, curling my claws at him, tasting my blood on my tongue from where I’d bitten down too hard.

  He never moved.

  I think I must have been going at it for hours before I finally exhausted myself. I slumped to my knees even as I continued to feebly reach out for him.

  “What’s your name?” he asked in a calm voice.

  I snarled, even though my energy was spent.

  “Your name!” he demanded, louder.

  “Ya-el.” I snapped my fangs at him.

  “What is your purpose?”

  “To kill. To maim. To hurt. To rage. To—”

  “No!” He grabbed the bars and rattled them. “Your name is Pandora.”

  “No.” I shook my head, wondering if I had the energy to rush and grab his fingers so that I could snap them off. My fingers curled into my knees.

  “Yes.” He shook his head.

  I’ve heard his voice before. It was dark and deep and seductive, and I wanted to hurt him, I wanted to kill him, I wanted to…touch him?

  I grabbed my chest.

  “Pandora. Say your name.”

  “No,” I growled.

  “Say your name!”

  “Ya-el.”

  “No. Pandora. Pandora. Pandora. That is your name.”

  “Liar.” I shook my head, clamping my hands over my ears. “Ya-el.”

  “Pandora.”

  “Ya-el.”

  “No.”

  We went back and forth for hours. Twice I rushed him, and twice he stepped just out of reach. As the room darkened and the sun set outside, I wrapped my arms around my legs.

  “My name is…Ya-el.”

  I expected to hear him yell out Pandora again, but instead something heavy dropped loudly by my foot. It was my journal; he’d slipped it into the cage.

  “Read your book.” Then he turned his back and walked out the door, and I screamed because he was gone and I co
uldn’t kill him.

  ~*~

  Day 7

  “What’s your name?” He was back again, and this time he held a plate of food and a cup.

  I wasn’t hungry. But I was thirsty. My throat was raw from screaming, my hair matted, my dress stained with dirt and blood.

  I coughed weakly. The fire of my hate still burned, but it grew weaker everyday.

  “Wat…er.” I coughed again.

  The brown-eyed man set the plate of fruit down on a box beside my cage and handed me the cup. I snatched it with desperate hands and drank it through the bars, dribbling most of it down the front of my dress. But it was cool, and it felt like healing waters on my abraded throat. He took the cup from my hand, and when his fingers grazed mine I made a weak swipe at him that he easily batted away.

  “What is your name?” he asked again.

  I was tired. My nights had been hounded by visions of death, of torture. Of me on a steel bed being ripped apart by evil hands, of fire flowing through my veins, and whispered words telling me dark and terrible secrets.

  I clenched the bars. “Ya-el. My name is Ya-el.”

  He reached out his hand toward me, as if he meant to touch me. I hissed and pulled back. He curled his hand by his thigh.

  The brown-eyed man said nothing, but I could see the sadness that lingered tight around his eyes. Shaking his head, he turned to leave.

  He was just about to walk out the door when a strange compulsion took me. “What is your name?” I asked him.

  His look was shocked when he turned to me. He didn’t come back to my side, but he slowly whispered, “Asher. My name is Asher.”

  ~*~

  Day 21

  I’m laying on my back staring up at the fog-filled sky of a freezing South Dakota afternoon and watching as the first snowflake of the season slides gracefully through the breeze, landing on the palm of my hand. I stare at it with impossible hope. Every snowflake is different, every one unique. If someone went out of their way to create a once-in-a-lifetime masterpiece of ice, then maybe I mattered too…

  ~*~