Too late.
As if on cue, a deep guttural sound rumbled from within Hemming’s chest. His glowering gaze sized up Jenae and me.
His bones snapped and popped as Hemming howled in pain. His body shifted into inhuman shapes, making his clothes rip and fall off. The pink of Hemming’s skin darkened, turning a sickly grey. Hair sprouted, forming small patches of dense fur. His bare feet elongated, and toenails thickened into giant claws. His hands contracted and shook as claws burst out of the first knuckle. Blood dripped from his wounds.
“Jenae, get behind me, now,” I said quietly. The girl’s attention was fixed on Hemming, watching him change. I grabbed her arm and pulled her behind me.
Hemming jerked his head back. His skull flattened, his ears grew furry and pointed, and the muzzle pushed forward. The noise of the bones reshaping disturbed me, despite the fact I had seen this before. Human teeth fell out of Hemming’s mouth, and in their place, sharp fangs ripped through his exposed blood-red gums.
Hemming wasn’t there anymore. In his place stood a demon wolf.
The wolf was terrifying.
Saliva oozed out in strings from between the teeth and pooled onto the condo floor. It growled at the two of us and crept its way forward.
I backed up and edged off to the side, trying to put myself and Jenae into the kitchen area, where we might have a chance to get down the hallway and into a bedroom. A closed door wouldn’t keep Hemming’s wolf out for long, but it would buy us some time. I grabbed Jenae who, despite my stink, was directly behind me and standing very, very close. I shuffled slowly, one step at a time.
The wolf watched us and took a few more steps forward. His yellow eyes seemed to fill the room, along with the snarls and guttural growls.
And then the wolf slinked its way towards the two pods that lay just within the apartment’s entranceway.
We kept our movements slow and steady towards the kitchen.
Hemming the wolf sniffed the pods, glanced back at us, and then swung its head towards the closed door. It uttered a low growl that reverberated throughout the room.
From behind me, a wide-eyed and unbelievably quiet Jenae finally broke her silence and whispered, “Dati, I think the dog wants out.”
She was right. The demon wolf pawed at the door a couple of times, leaving long claw marks on it.
I cautiously made my way over to the door. I was stupid to put myself so close to the wolf, but I believed Jenae was right. Hemming wanted out, and before the two of us ended up shredded by wolf teeth, I thought it best to give the dog what it wanted.
I slid my hand over to the doorknob and slowly turned, releasing the locking mechanism and allowing the door to open a crack.
The wolf barked at me. Its lips curled back, exposing its teeth. I edged the door open a little more.
Without warning, the wolf lunged at me, knocking me down. The weight of the creature hitting me was like I’d been hit with a sledgehammer.
Jenae screamed. The wolf’s claws pierced the skin on each of my shoulders, and its jaws snapped inches away from my face. Drool splattered as the low throaty rumble continued.
It backed off of me, then sauntered its way out the open door and disappeared down the hallway.
“What do we do now?” Jenae whispered.
“We don’t move until we are sure he is gone,” I whispered back.
“Then what?”
“We wait for Hemming, not the wolf, to come back.”
We waited for several minutes, listening carefully for any indication that the wolf was in the hallway, waiting for us. But there was nothing: no movement, no wolf growl, no snarling, no yellow eyes.
Hemming had gone.
Jenae breathed a deep breath. “Jesus fuckin’ Christ!” She clutched her ruffled shirt in her tiny hands.
She spun round and glared at me. “And oh my god, you stink!”
Release
JENAE
“I can’t do this,” I said, standing behind Dati after hours of waiting for something, anything to happen to the pods that were scattered around the apartment. Hemming’s hairy shells were totally creeping me out with all their scratching, moaning, and whining.
“Can’t do what?” Dati’s gaze stayed fixed on his cocoon.
“I can’t sit here any longer and just wait. It’s been two days. I’m bored out of my mind.” I crossed my arms.
I had no television, and I had read my grimoire cover to cover more than once—well, read what I could. So much of it was in other languages.
Hemming was still playing hooky, so of course I ended up egg-sitting. I had no idea when his velvety cocoons were going to split open, but if one of them so much as cracked even a smidgen, I was done, gone—out. There was no way I’d stick around to watch another Shape-Shifting mess. Gross.
The zombie bitches floated around Dati and hovered near the cocoon. The dead neighbour was staring Dati directly in his face. Dati didn’t flinch a bit.
They were now whispering things to me, things I was sure were other people’s thoughts. As they circled Dati and the cocoon they said together in quiet hushes; “He wants him. He needs him. He only thinks of him.”
Their voices felt like tiny mouse paws running across my skin: dry, scratchy, and barely there.
Dati seemed completely obsessed with Alyx. Obsessed, I wondered, or in love? Could a demon love?
“What are you even doing?” I flung my arms up into the air in frustration.
“Watching,” Dati finally said, not breaking his gaze from the pod. I thought he was peering through the black crystals, trying to see what happened on the inside.
“What’s to watch? It hasn’t moved or grown or done anything since it formed!”
Dati said nothing. He just stared at Alyx.
“Ugh, you’re impossible. I have to go out. I can’t be here anymore.”
“Do not get into trouble,” Dati replied without moving or glancing in my direction.
Maybe I would leave and just never come back.
“Fine.” I spun around and left him alone with Alyx.
“Fine,” Dati said.
But it wasn’t fine.
And I was sure nothing would be fine ever again.
I filled the borrowed backpack with the grimoire and other items from Mirabelle’s closet, including the little dragon statue, the wand, a ring, and the necklace with the big chunk of darkened amber. If I wasn’t coming back, there was no way in Hell I was going to leave all this cool stuff just lying around Dati’s apartment.
I caressed the stone and decided that it would be better hanging around my neck, not stuffed away. It was rough and raw, sort of burnt orange in colour until the light hit it, then it would glow an ominous yellow. The wire wrapping around it had spirals and other shapes that reminded me of the runes I had seen in the grimoire. I recognized the symbol in the center of the stone. It meant fire.
“Do this, don’t do that…” I muttered to myself while shoving a worn but soft leather jacket into the knapsack. It was getting pretty full.
The whole situation at Dati’s was awkward. I felt like I constantly intruded, as if I was walking in on Dati and Alyx in the middle of something.
“I can’t believe he’s even letting me leave. Probably doesn’t care about me anyways. Nobody else does. Why should he?” I zippered up the sack and slung it over my shoulder.
I stopped and peered around the scarred and blackened apartment. Damage I had done.
I sort of felt bad for wrecking the place. Dati could have retaliated, but he hadn’t. He could have ripped me apart if he had done it quickly enough. But Dati had never laid a single hand on me—unlike all the other adults: Sis, Mom, and the never-ending stream of Mom’s boyfriends—they had all smacked me around or done worse things.
The backpack was heavy. I let it slide off my arm and onto the couch.
I took out several items of clothes to lighten the load and left them in a pile on the living room floor.
“I’ll
come get them later if I find somewhere else to stay.”
I wanted to go back to school. Actually, I wanted to go to my locker and retrieve my iPod that had all my music on it. Dati had warned me—again more orders—to stay as far away from other people as possible.
I left the apartment in more borrowed clothes from dead Mirabelle’s closet. I liked them. Most of the items were black, some trimmed in lace, and the whole collection was disturbingly pretty. The bodices were tight, and I liked the feeling of being strapped in. It made me feel secure, like having the Shishi constantly guarding me. They were just so damn cute, despite the slobber that drooled out from between their rows of sharp fangs. As soon as I walked to the front door, they wanted to follow me out.
I had to promise them more treats when I returned.
AS THE BUS drove away, students scattered all around, most loitering around the doors of my old school.
The smokers were hanging about the fire hydrant, which was off of school grounds.
“Well, look who decided to finally come to school? It’s shit-face,” a female voice said from the group of smokers.
I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth.
It was Meaghan, a bully who had made my existence at school a living Hell.
She had arrived at my school in grade four. Isa, Lori, and I had always hung out together, and we were excited to see someone new. But within days, Meaghan had turned both Isa and Lori against me. The three of them were tight from that day forward and not far from each other. I was never part of their group, and neither was anyone else.
Meaghan had force-fed me dog shit in grade six—hence the nickname. All of them publicly humiliated me on the playground in grade eight by ripping the front of my shirt off, exposing my newly purchased training bra. Meaghan had snatched off my bra too, exposing my rather small breasts to the entire school.
Meaghan’s torment was a daily routine. I had been tortured, slapped, beaten up, and humiliated.
Meaghan had no idea how much I had changed.
The taunt from Meaghan and her posse fueled a fire in my chest. For once, I was actually angry at them, instead of terrified of them. The thought of my grimoire, safely tucked away in my backpack, helped me conjure up evil possibilities. I could finally ruin Meaghan forever if I wanted, and oh my god was that tempting.
The trio of dead women silently huddled in close to me. Their vacant expressions changed as they focused their attention on Meaghan. Their mouths moved as they whispered more decaying words of poison into my ears. “Kill her. Eat her. Destroy her.”
“Fuck off, Meaghan,” I said quietly, unsure whether she could hear or not.
I turned and started to walk away from Meaghan, Isa, and Lori. The last two sported the same haircut and similar outfits to their leader.
My locker was closer to the rear of the school, a long walk across a half-empty parking lot. Scared that Meaghan might have actually heard me, I could feel a thin layer of sweat begin to bead across my back.
I wanted to distance myself from this bitch, get my stuff, and then get away from the school.
My hands shook as Meaghan gasped. “Did you just hear that? Did she really just tell me to fuck off?”
Oh Christ, she heard me.
I continued towards the parking lot. Not quite in a run, but it was definitely a quickened walk.
My heart beat loudly in my chest.
“Kill her, eat her, destroy her,” the zombie chorus repeated over and over.
I could feel the words in the grimoire running over my tongue and slipping out my lips. Murmurs of such devilish words started a swell of power in my chest.
Which words, which symbols, how can I turn this around?
Should I give into temptation?
I glanced behind me.
Meaghan and crew were catching up. They were coming up behind me in a fast trot. There was no way Meaghan was going to be told to fuck off and let it go without a fight.
She reached out her hand, caught the edge of my Victorian lace collar, and pulled me quickly around, then pushed me to the ground.
I hit the grass hard, scraping my knees.
The fall pissed me off. My cheeks flushed hot with embarrassment and anger.
Everything Meaghan did was to piss me off. Anger and hate coursed through me as I spat, “You shouldn’t have done that.”
Meaghan laughed hysterically. Her hand flew towards me fast, slapping me across my face.
I didn’t flinch.
“And what the Hell are you going to do about it, shit-face?”
I wasn’t exactly sure which happened first.
I could feel the rock around my neck start to pulse. It was warm.
Licks of heat ran across my chest.
Then I felt the sharp spines of one of the parasitic minions inside my belly start to poke through my skin.
Oh no, no way in Hell.
There was no way I would let this bitch be my first morph. I wasn’t going to transform Meaghan and have to be responsible for her, not a chance in Hell.
So I did the only thing I could think of.
I closed my eyes, let my mind go completely blank, just as it had said in the grimoire.
Raising my right hand, I drew the symbol for fire in Meaghan’s direction.
“Ustrina.”
As I said the word, I imagined Meaghan engulfed in a large ball of fire, melting, skin falling off the bones, eyes bursting from heat.
The copper wire that formed the fire symbol on the amber stone hanging around my neck glowed red hot.
Meaghan and her two friends stared at each other and started to laugh, a lot.
What is going on? Why isn’t this working?
Another sharp pain in my gut made me grab my stomach and double over.
No, no, this can’t be happening, not like this.
I gathered all the rage inside of me, the heat from my cheeks and all the years of feeling belittled and humiliated.
“Ustrina!”
The word fell out of me, but I didn’t recognize my own voice. It had changed. It sounded deeper, more confident, and the word felt like it filled the air between us.
Fire erupted from the stone around my neck and wrapped around my waist.
The sharp spines of the minions retreated.
The dead bitches chanted in unison, “Ustrina, ustrina, ustrina….”
Meaghan’s shirt edge burst into flames.
Meaghan stopped laughing.
She patted the little flames, trying to put them out. Her two friends frantically tried to help.
None of them were paying attention to me, but I wasn’t completely there anymore. It took me a moment to realize I no longer stood on the grass.
I hovered an inch off the ground, and my hair billowed out behind me. My vision blurred as if I looked at the world through old warped glass. My lips kept forming the word against my will, and the voice coming out of me, which I didn’t recognize, kept repeating “Ustrina.”
Flames erupted everywhere. Fire spun in circles in the grass. On the hood of one of the nearby cars, heat melted and singed the paint. The ends of Meaghan’s hair curled and disappeared in the heat. The air around us became unbearably hot, and crackling sounds popped like dry wood spitting sparks from a campfire.
Isa and Lori, unable to stand the heat, backed away and watched me as I hovered above the ground. They stood there for about half a second and then fled, terrified, running at a full pace towards the school.
The edge of my vision blackened. I was about to pass out again.
Fire burned intensely across the parking lot. Everywhere I could see there were scorch marks.
Meaghan shrieked like a little girl. She sunk to her knees on the grass.
I floated over towards her, bent over, and leered into Meaghan’s eyes, which were locked on me in terror.
The last thing I remember was pointing directly at Meaghan’s face, and saying, “Ustrina.”
Then everything went black.
I FLOATED OVER the burnt and smoking body. The fires around me all at once burned out as I punched a fist through the smoldering corpse’s chest.
I was so hungry.
Meaghan’s singed and smoldering form appeared suddenly to join the dead chorus. Her face was pasty and vacant just like the others.
Death Date
DATI
The door slammed, causing the apartment to shudder. I glanced at the clock and realized only a couple of hours had gone by. Sounded like Jenae had returned from wherever she had gone.
She had been right. Nothing was happening, and I was starting to have doubts that Alyx would ever emerge.
I left Alyx’s cocoon and crashed into Jenae, who was running down the hallway towards me. Scorch marks were smudged all over her, and she smelled like singed hair.
“What the Hell happened to you?”
“Nothing!” she screamed at me, tears welling up in her eyes. Before I could stop her, she had wrapped herself around me and sobbed uncontrollably.
I had no idea what to do.
I held my hands outwards, a little revolted at the uninvited human contact. “Ah, okay, Jenae, what’s going on?”
“I went back to school to get stuff from my locker, but instead I ended up setting Meaghan on fire, and I think I ate her, and the zombie bitches made me do it, and now she’s one of them. I hate this! I hate her! I don’t want her following me around like the others.”
Just as I was about to ask for clarification, which I already knew would be the wrong thing to do, the front door of the apartment swung open with a bang. Somebody was walking into the condo.
“What the Hell now?” I peeled Jenae’s arms off of my midsection. She stood there, slump-shouldered in front of me, obviously very upset. I had to move her off to one side so that I could squeeze past her.
As I entered the living room, I was surprised to see the Kasadya demon from the summoning in my house, where he had just deposited, rather roughly, an unconscious Hemming. Hemming was filthy and naked.
“I brought him here as I believe he belongs to you?” the Watcher said with a crooked eyebrow.
The Watcher demon’s head dropped, and the arched brow shifted to a furrowed stare. “And we are all about to die.”
Daimonion (The Apocalypse Book 1) Page 14