Damnation's Door: A Cursed Book

by Amy Braun

  I did as she said, stifling a laugh.

  “Guess you found the food and clothes and cleaned yourself up?”

  “Yeah,” I replied. When I left the back room to use the bathroom, there had been a collection of protein bars, a bottle of water, and a pile of clothes on top of the sink. I almost choked on the protein bars, I inhaled them so fast.

  I plucked at the hem of the black, form-fitting V-neck shirt, glancing down at the skinny black pants and dark grey, lace up boots that went to my knees. I was also wearing a slate grey leather moto jacket. It looked sleeker than my tattered lucky jacket, but it was tighter in the shoulders and would have to be cut so I could fight in it. I had liked my lucky jacket because it was bigger, and gave me more flexibility and movement.

  Stupid that I missed something so small, but that jacket had seen me through some wretched times. Given how most of my clothes ended up, I doubted this one would be able to withstand the damage I’d be bringing it.

  Before dressing, I’d taken a quick shower to wash off all the blood and dirt from my fights. Dro had healed me while I was asleep/unconscious, so the only mark that remained on my body was the scar on my abdomen where the fragment had gone in. My weapons had been recovered and were back on my body– four knives sheathed to a harness at my ribs, two in my boots, and my hatchet on my hip. It felt good to be clean, dressed, healed, and armed again.

  “Thanks,” I added.

  Maria nodded, but still didn’t look at me. “They belonged to my daughter. She was about the same size as you.”

  The hint of sadness in her voice reminded me of the way she’d sounded on her doorstep, when she learned I had the fragment in my stomach. I couldn’t help but wonder if her daughter was the reason she knew so much about the fragments.

  Then again, maybe her daughter was the person I tossed into a murderous crowd. I knew better than to ask.

  “Pretty neat shop you have,” I said, glancing around it again. “Where did you get all this stuff?”

  “My family has dealt with the supernatural since before you were born,” she told me, sliding books onto the shelf over her head. “This shop belonged to them.”

  “Were they demon slayers?” Warrick and Carver’s slayer team was the only ones I knew of, but there had to be more.

  “Some of my uncles were,” she said. “Most of the women in my family focused on learning and the spiritual aspects of it all.” Maria placed the last book on the shelf then turned to look at me. “But we both know you didn’t come out here to talk about my family history, so why don’t you get to the point?”

  I raised my eyebrows at her, not sure what switch I flicked to make her so snarly. Maria put her hands on her hips and gave me a curt look.

  “While you were passed out, your friends filled me in on what was happening. I know all about you and your situation.” Her eyes were stormy. “I know what your sister is running from.”

  My blood went cold. I was going to have a serious talk with whoever spilled our secrets to this stranger.

  “Fine,” I said, folding my arms over my chest. “Tell me everything you know about the fragments, and how to destroy them.”

  Maria’s dark eyes held mine as if to judge how serious I was. Then she turned to the shelf and picked out a notebook from it. She flipped through the pages until she found what she was looking for, then rested it on the counter facing me.

  I took a step closer and looked at a picture sketched on the lined paper. A quick spike of fear went down my spine as I stared at the drawing. The text on the page was scratchy and hard to read, but I was too focused on the drawing anyway. It was all of the fragments, each spread out along the page. Even though they were separated from each other, I could make out the image of them fitting together to become a skeleton key. Each piece was the same pitch-black stone with bright red veins scattered around it like lightning.

  I recognized the one that had been shoved inside my belly to burn me alive.

  Even now I could feel the blistering pain pulsing through me like an electric shock, and I was just looking at a fucking sketch. I kept my face blank and looked at the other shards. The other five pieces were different– three were the curves from the top of the key, two were splinters of the blade and the cuts, and the final one was a sharp, triangular tip.

  There are five more of these things out there, each one inside of a person. How the hell are we supposed to find them all?

  “I take it you know what the fragments make a person do,” Maria said.

  Images flashed through my mind. Mind-numbing agony, sharp stares, blood flying in every direction. Three people dying because of me.

  “It kind of possesses you,” I said. “It acts like a trigger for your darkest emotions and desires. The worse the desire, the more likely you are to do it. You want to, and it draws other people to do the same.”

  Maria nodded. “The fragments taint your soul. Human eyes can’t see it, but it draws people in like a drug. The closer they are to you, the more corrupted their minds become until the smallest trigger sets them off. Think of it like a poison gas with a sweet scent. You love the smell and wander toward it, only realizing too late that it’s killing you.”

  “Yeah. That sounds about right.” I tore my eyes away from the page. “So how do we destroy them?”

  “I don’t know.”

  I blinked, confused. “But the one Dro took from me turned to ash,” I reminded her. “I saw it. What happened to the ash?”

  Maria pulled a key from the chain around her neck and used it to open the drawer beside her. She lifted up a hidden compartment, took out a clear vial no bigger than my pinky finger and placed it on the counter. It was filled with mostly black ash, though there were a few specks that glowed bright red behind the glass.

  “That was all I could recover,” she said. “I don’t know how it was destroyed. If you’re going after the fragments like your friend Max said you planned to, then you’re going to have to find another way to get them out of the carriers.”

  Damn it, Max. “Finding them might not be too hard since they’re so interested in causing trouble,” I grumbled. “But why would we need to find another way? You got this one out of me easy enough.” Though it was excruciatingly painful.

  “Because the fragment was still intact. Most people would refuse to resist the fragment’s influence, whether they couldn’t tolerate the pain, or because they didn’t want to. You’re the only exception I’ve ever heard of, and so when the fragment was inside you, it was taking its revenge by brutalizing you. For people who embrace the fragment’s influence, they feel nothing when it splits apart. Once it breaks down into their bloodstream, you have no hope of getting it out. The only way to destroy the fragment is to destroy the person.”

  “Then how does it move around? These attacks have never been in one place.”

  “I seriously doubt the fragments are moving from person to person. Whoever is holding them is probably keeping them, and escaping the chaos while everyone else kills each other.” Maria’s face was disturbingly serious. “The carriers are probably sided with the demons.”

  No matter how many times I heard that, it still hit me like a punch to the gut. Drake and Mateo were unquestionably allied with Lucifer and obviously had a couple of fragments, but what about the slayers? Had they become carriers by accident? I didn’t think Carver would go that far into deception, but the man was a fanatic hell-bent on stopping the demons, no matter what he had to do to himself or his colleagues. The thought of Jackson having a fragment in him made me sick. He didn’t deserve that kind of pain.

  We had to find them again and get our answers more aggressively.

  “You’re thinking about trying to save someone,” Maria said. “Don’t. You can’t. If someone wants the fragment inside of them, they’ll keep it there, and there is nothing you can do to help them.”

  I listened to her voice rise in pitch, watched the tears grow in her eyes. When her rant was finally over, I saw how deep he
r sorrow was. I looked down at my clothes guiltily. Did I look like her daughter?

  Maria took a deep breath. “The people with the fragments can’t be saved. Your best bet is to survive.”

  “And let Lucifer and his minions ruin everyone in the world? I don’t think so. He’s hunting us, and we need to find a way to stop him.”

  Her pain turned into anger. “I bet you’ve told that to yourself before, haven’t you? How many more times are you going to say it before you realize you can’t stop Lucifer? He’s going to take whatever he wants from you in a way you’ll never know about. He’s the Lord of Deception and Lies. He can take any shape he wants, whenever he wants.”

  She looked away, weariness wrapping around her like a smothering blanket. “I’ve been here since the beginning, since the fragments started doing their worst damage. I watched my daughter succumb to their influence and be torn apart by it before I could save her. I scoured every inch of this damned city looking for a way to stop him, and do you know what I found?”

  Maria’s eyes were as sharp as knives.

  “Nothing.”

  I didn’t dare speak. Had I ever thought that stopping Lucifer was impossible? Yes. Did that mean I was going to give up? No. Not with Dro’s life in the balance. As long as Lucifer thought he was King of the Universe, he was going to try and bring her under his wing. I refused to let that happen.

  It must have showed on my face, because Maria stepped closer to me.

  “I know what your sister is,” she whispered. “I know who she was born from, and I’m telling you that you can’t save her from him. If he wants her, he’ll find a way to take her. You need to be ready to deal with that when it happens.”

  I tightened my arms around my chest. “You better not be telling me to abandon my sister,” I warned.

  “I’m telling you that she threatened me. I’m telling you that I could see the power she used from my front window. I’m telling you that she’s going to be the death of you.”

  My first impulse was to slap her. Maria wasn’t “telling me” anything I didn’t already know. She wasn’t preparing me for something I didn’t wasn’t ready to deal with. She was just saying things I didn’t want to hear, because I wasn’t going to let them come true. Dro had made some mistakes, just as bad as the ones I had made, but she was still herself.

  I can’t fight this anymore, Connie.

  You have lost her.

  I inhaled slowly, soothing the storm building in my chest. I didn’t need to talk to Maria. I needed to talk to my sister.

  “Thanks for the operation, the food, the clothes, and the advice,” I said, biting out the last word. “We’ll leave right away.”

  I turned and walked away, shoving the curtains aside. Warrick came out of the bathroom, shaking a hand through his wet hair. He looked clean even in his dirty clothes, but his eyes were still tired. He smiled at me, though it quickly faded when he saw the look on my face.

  “Hey, are you okay?”

  “Fine,” I answered sharply. “We’re leaving. Where’s everybody else?”

  Warrick didn’t ask what had set me off. Maybe he was getting used to my moodiness. “There’s an apartment upstairs with two spare rooms. Maria let Dro and Max borrow one, and Sephiel took the other.”

  “Pack up whatever you can,” I told him. “I’ll get everybody up.”

  I started walking for the stairs on the left, then stopped. I turned around and grabbed Warrick’s hand. When he twisted to face me, I kissed him. He seemed surprised, but melted into the kiss easily. I reluctantly pulled away and touched his face.

  “Thank you.” I didn’t need to say what for.

  Warrick smiled. “Any time, beautiful. I’ll be down here when you’re ready.”

  I gave him a small nod and an even smaller smile before turning and jogging up the stairs. There weren’t many, so I was on the second level in no time. It was narrow and wooden with one door for a kitchen and two for the spare rooms. I turned to the one on my right and knocked on it.

  Sephiel opened the door. He wasn’t wearing his white trench coat for once, and his white dress shirt had been replaced with a new, clean one that was shorter around the cuffs. With the jeans and sleep-tousled hair, Sephiel looked like a rushed businessman who fell asleep at the office.

  “Hey, how’s your side?” I asked.

  Sephiel turned and prodded the spot where he’d been stabbed. “Andromenda healed it after caring for you. I am no longer in pain, but…” He stared at his side. “It is strange to feel such a small amount of pain for so long.”

  I set my jaw, not wanting to say anything that might suggest I thought of him as a weak human. He was far from weak. Hell, he was one of the strongest men I knew.

  Before I could tell him that, Sephiel turned his head up to me. “You look well,” he told me with a smile.

  “Thanks. I feel better. Which means it’s time to go.”

  His smile dropped like a rock. “Is everything all right?”

  “Well, no one’s tried to kill us yet, but we need to get those fragments. Now that we know exactly what they can do to someone…” I shook my head. “We can’t let anyone else near them.”

  Sephiel nodded slowly. The door behind me opened, and I spun around to see Max rubbing his eyes in the doorway of the second room.

  “I slept like a rock,” he mumbled, “and I still don’t think it was enough.”

  “I’ll let you have a nap when we find another safe-house.” I started moving for the staircase. “Tell Dro to get her stuff ready and come downstairs.”

  “She’s already downstairs.”

  I halted in mid step, then turned on my heel. “What?”

  “Dro’s already downstairs,” Max repeated. “She told me she was having trouble sleeping, so she was going down to talk to Maria. Why?”

  I didn’t answer him. I rushed down the steps and swung around the doorframe into the middle of the shop. Warrick was there, waiting by the door with backpacks in his hand. He straightened up and looked at me anxiously. Maria stared at me from behind the counter with a curious expression. I walked straight to her.

  “Did you see her?” I demanded. My heart was in my throat.

  Maria nodded slowly, as if she was having trouble understanding the problem. “She came down about an hour ago said she was going to get some air.”

  My nails dug into the counter. I could feel my body beginning to tremble.

  “Constance? What’s wrong?”

  I barely heard Warrick’s voice. All I could hear was two people repeating two phrases in my head.

  I can’t fight this anymore, Connie.

  You have lost her.

  “Constance? What happened?”

  I didn’t have the heart to look at Max when I heard him call my name. I closed my eyes and hid my tears, forcing the words out.

  “It’s Dro. She’s gone.”

  Chapter 16

  It wasn’t the first time Dro had left me. It wasn’t the first time I had lost her.

  But this was worse than all the other times, even when I was certain she had left and would never return…

  For nearly three days, I did nothing but search. I barely ate. I barely slept. I started at bus stations and cab corners, keeping my head down and quickly asking if anyone had seen a pale girl with white hair and bright blue eyes. Nobody had, and the moment they eyed me suspiciously was the same moment I left. They probably thought I was crazy.

  I hadn’t gotten to the crazy phase yet, but I was desperate, so I was coming close. I went to the homeless shelter and talked to them as calmly as possible, but they could offer me nothing but pity and free food.

  My next stop was hotels and bed and breakfasts. Dro didn’t have a lot of money, but she would appeal to the goodness in people with the hopes that they’d help her. I was less optimistic, and much more aggressive. I made the owners talk, but they hadn’t seen her either.

  It wasn’t long before I hit the alleys and the dark streets. Dro and
I had been homeless before, so living under cardboard and dirty blankets wouldn’t be new to her. I grilled every sickly addict, threatened every hooker, punched every thief, and came up with nothing.

  Fucking, goddamn nothing.

  That meant she didn’t want to be found. Not even by me.

  I cursed myself for protecting us the way I did. She would know how to stay hidden and how to survive on her own. She would know how to disappear completely.

  The rain was soaking through my hoodie, the cloth over my head dampening the greasy hair beneath. My hands were tucked under my armpits for warmth, but it didn’t help. I was freezing, walking on a road that would lead to somewhere. I could only hope that it would take me to my sister.