by Holly Hook
Table of Contents
Title Page
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
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DEMON Magic
Abnormals Underground #5
By Holly Hook
Copyright 2017 by Holly Hook
Chapter One
The world burned.
The sky. The buildings. The landscape. Everything.
Flames lashed at the heavens, jutting from blackened, skeletal remains of buildings. The streets below had jammed with broken cars and shattered glass. Cumberland was an apocalypse. With my supernatural hearing, I could detect things no one should ever experience. A man begged for his life. A werewolf growled in response. The guttural voices of demons, speaking in tongues older than history, permeated the air. Few Normals down there would survive for long. Those who survived would endure a life of misery.
I looked straight down. I wasn't on the hill I expected, but the top balcony of the ATC building. It was the very same one from where Xavier and I had jumped a lifetime ago. Blackish-green clouds that reminded me of Death's underworld rolled overhead. A dark form drifted through the clouds in the vague shape of a dragon. A warning siren wailed, one of the few things that were still working.
And through the clouds, the sky was the color of bricks.
It was the color of the Infernal Dimension.
The worlds had become one.
“Alyssa,” he said next to me. “You have done well.”
I looked to the side.
Thoreau rocked on his feet next to me, his hands behind his back, his black suit untouched in the chaos. The mayor stood in full demon form, his true form, with red skin, black claws, and inky eyes filled with angry flames. His black wings remained folded, and he studied his new domain like a king made of hardened lava. A pair of short horns protruded from his forehead.
This world belonged to the Dark Council now.
To him.
The mayor smiled at me. “Thank you, Alyssa, for making this possible.” He was saying this to torture me. He knew that the fact that he'd won was causing me pain.
The source of my anguish was him.
He could be...he could be my...
“Where's Xavier?” I asked. He had to be alive. I turned away from Thoreau to avoid looking at him, to prevent my horrible thought from finishing itself. I entered the ATC building and ran into the room with the portal. The water had evaporated. There was no need for portals anymore, not with the worlds now one.
Xavier stood against the wall, arms chained above his head. He hung between two of the demon face pillars. Torch light cast horrible shadows on his face, and dark bruises formed rings around his eyes. He hung not far from the wooden double doors that lead to Thoreau's office. I didn't understand. Xavier should have been able to Transpose out of there. We were both strong enough now.
My battle partner looked at me and cast his gaze down again.
“Xavier!” I raced to him and away from the horrific scene outside. “What's he done to you?”
But he wouldn't look at me. He just told me that he loved me.
Now he wouldn't face me.
“He's too strong,” Xavier managed. His voice was hoarse. “We're his slaves. All of us War Mages are nothing but his sparks.”
The chains binding his wrists to the wall were bright magenta. War Magic. Why was it betraying him?
“Let me get those off,” I said, reaching up for the shackles.
I stopped, arm in midair, while Thoreau walked inside the building.
My skin was red, the same shade as Thoreau's, and my fingernails were just as black and deadly sharp.
“No!”
I opened my eyes, and the stars winked overhead through tree branches and thin, wispy clouds. A waxing moon shined overhead, casting silvery light on the leaves and the lake that spread out beyond the beach. I kicked something dark off of me, something with white runes sewn along with edges. Mack's altar cloth, which Xavier had used to cover me from the sun, flew to the sand.
“Alyssa!”
Xavier sat up next to me. He grabbed onto my arms to steady me.
I blinked again.
A nightmare.
“What's wrong?” Xavier asked, blinking sleep out of his eyes. His leather jacket squeaked as he shifted and checked the beach for any potential threats as if he could see that well with his human eyes.
I let out a breath and relaxed a little. “Let's just say that I'm glad I don't have to sleep that much. I'm sorry I woke you up.” We had fallen asleep late in the day underneath this tree. Mack had driven our two captive ATC agents to his junkyard and suggested that we stay here for a bit to hide out from the ATC. I was still the most wanted Abnormal in all of Cumberland.
“I'd be shocked if you didn't have them,” Xavier said. I could tell that he was telling the truth. Ever since I had bitten him, I had a much better sense of his emotions, even though I could detect them before. “I wish there was something I could do. A Seer Mage might be able to help with your dreams, but you know I'm only good at fighting, and maybe not even that.”
“I think we did pretty good at the bunker,” I said.
“We should have killed Thoreau,” Xavier said. His eyes were sad and full of regret. Even after all this time, he still didn't have his honor, but the guilt of indirectly killing his grandfather was dissolving. I could sense that, too.
“Yes,” I said, getting up. “We should have." Now that it was full night—maybe only ten or so, judging from the position of the moon—I no longer had to hide. "We should get out of here."
"I agree," Xavier said. "This might be someone's property. Mack's supposed to be back in a bit. We need to meet him by the road."
He didn't want to talk about the obvious. I was one more step from becoming the Dark Pentagram, the being who would help Thoreau merge the worlds. I got up and looked away, pretending to eye the road.
“Alyssa,” Xavier said from behind me.
“Leave me alone,” I said. “I need to go into the lake and scrub myself off.”
“You don't have to do that,” he said, even though I could sense his excitement at the thought. I knew how he felt about me now that I had bitten him. But how long would that last?
“You didn't just have the worst demon baron of all time say that he's your grandfather," I said.
Xavier was silent. We walked towards the road. Staying on this beach wouldn't help us.
“I'd want to do the same thing,” he said. “I know what it's like to look at your grandfather and feel disgusted. I mean, no, I take that back.” He face-palmed. “Leon doesn't hold a candle to Thoreau. No, wait, I take that back too, only I don't.” Xavier sighed and lifted his face from his hand. “What I mean is, we don't even know if Thoreau even is your grandfather. He could have said that just to back you into a corner. You know, to get you to bite me.”
"He could have," I said. "There's no way to know for sure. Or maybe there is." I made it to the dirt road and looked down it. No one. "I wonder if my grandmother is still alive."
"She might be worth asking," Xavier said. "We
need to know for sure. Whether or not you can ever afford to go into the Infernal Dimension to get your father depends on it."
"I know," I said, pulling out the phone Janine had let me borrow. Thoreau had told me that I would change if I went there. In what way, he didn't mention.
But it couldn't be good.
"What are you doing?" Xavier asked.
I scrolled through the phone. "I need to see if my grandmother is still alive and if we can visit her. She'll be able to tell us the truth if we press her enough."
"You might not want to know the answer," Xavier said, rubbing my back.
“So you think Thoreau was right,” I said, facing him. He didn't release my hand, my pale hand that was free of black claws and red skin. I could feel that he feared that. “If I'm some quarter-demon--”
“You are not a demon,” Xavier said, gripping my other hand. “The Infernal thing is true. Even if Thoreau is right, it does take the Infernal Dimension to awaken any demon inside of you.”
"I still have to know for sure," I said, eyeing the phone. "I think I remember my grandmother's name."
I was potentially a worse monster than I had ever imagined.
I already had the touch of Death and the fire of a dragon. I could use War Magic, and above all, I had to drink blood to survive. It was a nice, fuzzy, warm combination. It was no wonder I had no family that wanted me for any good reason.
"Okay," Xavier said. "As soon as Mack gets here, we tell him the deal. I'm with you every step of the way."
He kissed me on my cheek.
For a moment, I thought everything would be all right.
* * * * *
Mack picked us up in his old beater a few minutes later. He had taken the captured agents to his junkyard, where they waited. The search for us had calmed down, according to him. We were safe to go back if we didn't make a scene.
Maybe.
Biting Xavier was keeping me sated, even though I had done it yesterday. No trace of thirst rose inside of me yet. It was as if something in his blood had calmed down the monster inside. I felt less tormented, at least in that way.
In other ways, no.
"So you want to visit your grandmother?" Mack asked as we merged onto the expressway. He sounded more disgruntled than I'd ever heard him.
"I have to find her first," I said, scrolling through my phone. "I think her last name is Silas. Her first name started with an E. I think."
"You don't know your grandmother's name for sure?" Mack asked.
That sure made me feel better. Not. "My family is screwed up, okay?"
"She doesn't want to talk about it," Xavier said. "Have there been any news reports about the missing ATC agents? You know, the ones Bathory murdered?"
"No," Mack said. "I think the mayor controls the media, myself."
“I'm not shocked,” Xavier said.
I was glad he'd changed the subject. Xavier and I had told no one about the great news I got.
I shuddered. There was no comfort here. I thought of Thoreau, first in his human form and then in his demon form, with a voice that sounded like it echoed from some infinitely deep pit. Even in his human form, he had black eyes with flames dancing inside. It was why he wore sunglasses.
My grandmother must have been blind.
Her husband must have been clueless.
My mother must have nearly died from the shock and horror when Thoreau introduced himself to her if Thoreau's story was right.
I used the phone to look up Silas. I found an Emily Silas, but she was too young, but then, after about half an hour of using a people search site, I came across an Emmy Silas, age eighty-five.
The name rang a bell. I had seen it before.
“I think I found her,” I said, holding up the phone. “Her first name is Emmy. I remember now.”
“It's funny how those childhood memories come back,” Xavier said.
“She's still living alone,” I said. I saw the address for a town about twenty miles to the west of Cumberland. Oaktown. “I think her husband's dead by now. I don't see him listed here.”
“Well, she is eighty-five,” Xavier said. “I'm curious to meet her. You've never introduced me to anyone in your family."
I tensed at the thought. I wasn't sure how it was going to go. Would Grandma even recognize me after all these years? Did she even know that I Turned in the first place? I wondered if Mom had told her any lies or if Grandma only thought we vanished when I was two. I couldn't remember if Mom even spoke to her much or not. I imagined that she had and just left Dad and me out of the equation.
If she was an ATC supporter, she might not take to my showing up on her doorstep very well. Mom always said her family was descended from nobility and into the whole image thing—just not in those words.
Mack was impatient. “I can't be driving you out to your grandmother's house for a picnic,” he said. “Why do you need to see her right now, anyway?”
“Because I have an important question that might affect whether or not we can rescue our people,” I said. “Only she can answer it for us. If you don't want to drive us, we can always Transpose, but I have to warn you that we're still not very precise.”
“I could get us there,” Xavier whispered in my ear. “You still need me to Transpose, by the way. You can't do it by yourself.”
“Makes sense,” I said, even though it didn't. I had joined Xavier in throwing War Magic charges and summoning the killing fire. Why couldn't I Transpose? It didn't seem fair. “I guess getting to hug you every time is a plus.”
Xavier grinned. For the first time in the last twelve hours, I didn't feel disgusting. Things were looking up in that department. I had to make sure they stayed that way.
“Good. Why don't you Transpose?” Mack asked, pulling onto the side of the freeway. He put his hazard lights on. “It would be faster.”
“Because I don't know what the house looks like,” Xavier asked. “I do have limits as to what I can do. And can't you Transpose, too?”
“With a rite, I can,” Mack said. “It's different with Dark Mages. We're not about the flashy magic.”
Xavier flushed. “We're not all a bunch of peacocks, you know.”
“Leave him alone,” I said. Mack was developing an attitude. “It's no wonder you have to live in a junkyard.”
“This is why you need to ask Death to make me a Normal,” Mack said, glaring back at me. “I get like this. I'm not a nice person, as you're finding out.”
“None of us are under this kind of stress,” Xavier said. “We'll get out, and we'll Transpose to Oaktown. I've never been there, but I'm sure we can find a picture of the downtown area on the Internet and go from there.” I could tell that he just wanted to be away from Mack and so did I. Time was running out to ask Death to get rid of his Dark Magic and if the world ended, that probably wasn't going to happen at all.
We got out of the back of the car. “What are you going to do to the ATC agents?” I asked. For the first time, I was concerned about them.
“I'm not sure,” Mack said. The black specks in his eyes were darker than ever as if the Dark Magic inside of him wanted to break free. He wanted to do something evil. “I have them in my shack for now. I'll think of something.”
I didn't like the sounds of that. We had kept the agents to glamour as them, but now that they didn't serve that use anymore, there was no telling what might happen. I imagined them both tied up in that junkyard shack, unable to cry for help. They must be fearing what had happened to their colleagues at the bunker. They were right to be afraid, but not for the reasons that they thought.
Thoreau had killed them, not us. He no longer cared about his own employees. The ATC was expendable now, just like everyone else.
Mack drove off before I could drill him anymore. The passenger doors in the back both remained open like he couldn't wait to get away from us. Then Mack stopped, got out of the car, and slammed both doors. Mack didn't look back at us as he drove off.
"He's sick of be
ing our chauffeur,” Xavier said.
“I think he's sick of waiting for me to cure him,” I said. “It's how I'm tired of discovering worse branches in my family tree.”
“Well,” Xavier said. “You're not related to whoever started War Magic in the first place. You got that from me.”
“I'm related to three out of five Dark Council members and linked to the two others,” I said. “I don't think my record's very good.”
“We still don't know just how truthful Thoreau was,” Xavier said.
A semi drove past, ignoring us.
“That's what we're going to find out,” I said with a gulp. “Ready to meet my grandmother?”
He gulped, too. He had seen enough of my family, and a Normal member wasn't any less terrifying. To him, and to me.
“Well,” he said, opening his arms. “Let's get this done. I'm with you on this.”
We embraced and fell through violet magic.
Chapter Two
Oaktown wasn't that far from Cumberland. Even in the dark, I could see the distant towers of downtown, rising above the landscape. Oaktown hadn't seen great times. There were subtle marks on the road and on the curbs where water had flowed. Even some of the old downtown buildings had faint water marks on their sides, left over from a flood. The stores were old and all made of brick. I was willing to bet that none of these places had dared to put in carpet, but they all smelled of new insulation and fresh paint.
Distant Cumberland shined in the night. I could see the faint lights of the skyscrapers in the distance. Compared to the city, my grandmother's town was quaint.
“So this is Oaktown,” Xavier said. “Have you been here before?”
“Something about it looks familiar,” I said. “If my grandmother never moved, then I've visited this town before I got bit. I think this might be the town my family was driving home from when Russell Fox did his worst to all of us.”
“Well, you got revenge on him,” Xavier said.
“Fox sought me out on purpose to bite me,” I said. “Thoreau knew where my grandmother lived, then. He would have needed to if he sent Russell after me like that. That doesn't bode well for what he told me.”