These are the grayish ones, of ashen pallor, such is their flesh somewhat mottled. Their narrow, elongated heads are hairless, slightly ridged, their pupil-less eyes like shiny red pools inviting insanity into their depths. They wield deadly talons on their hands and feet, their overly-wide maws crowded with pointed teeth, and from what she has been told, these are more of the ‘lesser’ kind. She saw something similar in the warehouse back in the City when she first learned of the existence of such things, and she is told these are more easily killed.
She does not necessarily find it so, but there is a lull as she empties the magazine, having jerked her Glock free, firing off a few rounds from her sidearm, moving the pistol about, looking for more targets. She re-holsters, then reloads the submachine gun, glancing at Skot, her breath heavier than she had realized, and she sees him pouring a thick substance over his cousin, as though anointing him with the contents of the glass phial.
“What are you-?” she tries, but he speaks.
“Step back,” he says, firmly, holding out his left hand, and she does, keeping an eye and ear on the avenue of approach, knowing another attack is imminent.
He murmurs something, something in that language she has heard before, the one that seems as though it may be similar to Latin, but it is not that same tongue. She realizes it must be a prayer of some kind, a benediction, and just then the body lights up, an eldritch blue to the dancing flames, lending more obvious sign to the supernatural origins of the fire.
“What are you doing? He’s alive.”
“Not anymore,” Skot says, then he glances at her, noting the bewilderment, “He has been dead for a while. He was artificially, magickally, infused with a bit of life. He’s bait.”
She wants to ask more, but she sees him pull out his pistol, aiming into the hallway. She turns in that instant, seeing as more of the demons round the corner, and they both unload their charged bullets, occasional glimpses of amber flaring forth as though of tracer rounds, though the actual cause is more akin to that which gives life to the blue fire that thoroughly consumes his cousin’s corpse.
“We need to get out of here,” Lilja says when this attack is repelled, “Are we done down here?”
“Yes,” Skot utters, and she sees a shadow pass over his features.
Though she again wishes to know more, such can wait, so she nods once in response to him, both of them reloading, both low on ammunition, and she leads the way out.
*****
“It was a trap, you know?”
They both look at Nicole, both having been given time to clean up, change, and now they sit in this expansive room in the manor, sipping of calming tea. Lilja recalls meeting Skot’s sister, Nicole-Angeline Felcraft, and being taken not only by her beauty but also her aspect. The woman, slender of form, tall, seems as though she almost floats and speaks through wind rather than being a normal part of this physical world. Even when she does show expression, a smile or a movement of brow, it proves subtle, as if a continued attempt to speak in a foreign language merely for the benefit of the natives.
She is married, happily so now for a little over fifteen years, mother of three children of her own, but she does not even have a hyphenated surname. Regardless of marriage or gender, the family name always remains.
“And yet we still went,” Skot replies, coloring his words with enough sarcasm that they all pick up on it.
Jericho stands to the side of the main area, thick, tattooed arms crossed. He furrows his brow at these words but remains silent. The Matriarch, Joanne Felcraft, looks about to speak, but her daughter intercedes.
“It was an acceptable risk, and you know that. Otherwise, why did you go? There are any number of resources from which to choose.”
Her hair is a rich brown, not quite as dark as her mother’s had once been, and it falls down in thick, straight locks to nearly the middle of her back. She wears a dress, also her usual attire, the coloring and accenting pattern elegant, adding to her almost sublime appearance. Her tone, even now when under some stress, always calm. Skot cannot shake the feeling that the more she delves into her power, the less she is of this world.
“Nicole!” and all eyes turn to the mother, “You risked your brother’s and Lilja’s lives?”
“Mom,” Skot begins, but he is spoken over.
“My brother is the Head of the Family, and he is well aware of the risks.”
“She’s right,” he continues, “No one made me go.”
“Then what about Lilja?” Joanne persists, gesturing with one hand to the woman, seeming quite protective of her, “She’s had very little training. Why take her?”
“She protected me, Mom,” Skot says, “and she had many more kills than I did. She may be new to … this, but she is not new to this sort of danger in general.”
Joanne smiles warmly, then rises, walking over, giving Lilja a hug, one which is accepted somewhat awkwardly, judging from the young lady’s reaction.
“Thank you, dear, thank you for saving my son’s life.”
“I … uhm.” Lilja licks her lips, her pale flesh flushing.
The elder woman rises up from the embrace, giving a pointed glance to her children before moving back to the soft cushion of her chair, taking the nearby crystal glass in hand and having a sip of the Montresor Recioto della Valpolicella wine. Skot glances at Lilja, and when her eyes meet his, he gives her a very sincere smile. She returns it, her bashfulness still evident. He leans forward the short distance to the coffee table, setting his saucer and cup atop it, then slips his right arm about Lilja’s shoulders, pulling gently. She leans into him.
“They wanted us to find the body,” Nicole intones, her slender, tapering fingers held entwined before her, very loose, almost as if not quite touching, the interlacing pattern more an affectation, “The skin wearer was not there.”
“Skin wearer?” Lilja asks, confusion taking her face as she looks up at Skot, whispering the question.
He nods, eyes back to her. “Some of the more powerful demons are able to … shapeshift, for lack of a better term, taking on the guise of a human. It is not possession of a human host. They change their appearance.”
“We rarely see it,” Nicole adds, “As Skothiam says, only the most powerful are able to do it.”
Lilja looks about, noting the heavy expressions writ on everyone present, though they all show it in their own ways.
“Uhm, so something allowed this powerful … demon,” she says, obviously still not comfortable with the terminology, “to get through to our world?”
Skot nods. “Yes, and though we are concerned with that-”
“We need to know where he now is. We have to find him,” Nicole finishes.
“So, your cousin,” Lilja continues, speaking slowly, carefully, “was ... bait? Why bring us down there? Was that to throw us off the other’s trail?”
It takes her a moment to realize that all eyes are now on Skot. She blinks, looking about and back, and he sighs, heavily, an act which does nothing to answer her query or allay concerns.
“Those are very good questions, Lily,” he finally speaks, and she wonders if that is all he wanted to say, “We’re still looking into that, but it would not be the first time they have laid traps or such plans.”
“They’re a manipulative lot, the Infernal,” his mother comments.
“We should inform the Malkuths.”
Joanne’s top lip sneers just the barest bit at her son’s words, then she covers it with a healthy sip of her dessert wine.
“Prudence seems to dictate that we give them some information regarding the skin wearer,” Nicole begins, “It would be helpful to have them also hunting such a demon, and it would serve as a gesture that we’d expect the same from them if they were to learn of such a creature here on earth.”
“Hmph.”
All eyes turn momentarily to the matriarch, but she merely goes about to sipping more of her wine, choosing to not notice the attention. Once a brief moment has passed
, Nicole looks expectantly at her older brother.
“We’ll do that. Let them know of the Demon and what it has done. They may even be told it took one of ours, but no more detail than that.”
A heavy sigh draws them back to Joanne.
“I’ll call Marcella tomorrow, maybe tonight,” she says, mentioning Charles’ mother, then she sets her eyes back on Skot, “Arrangements will need to be made for the memorial service.”
He nods.
“I wish we had the body and could have handled it differently,” she continues, looking away, forlorn, which she punctuates with another sip of the wine.
Lilja looks at the woman, suddenly taken with thoughts of all she must have seen in her seven decades. What was it like for her to come into a family like this? Skot has told Lilja more of his brethren in the ensuing months, and she knows that his mother was no Hunter. She married into it, embracing fully the revelations made to her as well as the responsibility and stress, yes, the very deep, real stress. Joanne had lost her firstborn before losing her husband, one to battle, the other to a lingering, debilitating illness that continued to baffle and stymie the doctors throughout.
Skot had explained something of how they forge unions in this family, how there is that rarity in the genes that not only grants some of them the potential of their supernatural abilities but also works on a deeper, more underlying level to bring them together. There are few of them, so very few, and if they remain apart, they might well lose this war, but when they create bonds, love, progeny, they stand a better chance. It is not lost on her what this may mean of the deep attraction the two of them share for one another.
Lilja further studies the elder woman, watching her, knowing that such arrangements as are about to be made are more commonplace in this family than they would like. Do the feelings mingle with the sense of responsibility, or do they become eclipsed by it, she wonders. She understands this, what it may mean, and she experiences a type of fear deep within herself as her musings run their course.
“We would have brought the body back if we could,” Skot says, breaking Lilja’s train of thought, and she turns her eyes up to him. “If the situation had been less hostile, we would have stayed until a larger team could come for retrieval.”
His mother nods, slowly, the tone of his statement not one of defense or explanation but merely conveying an unfortunate circumstance.
“The condition of Charles’s corpse,” Nicole says, her tone slow, soothing, and all attention is turned to her, “He was not just bait. He was a message.”
*****
The two of them sit in the sumptuous chamber, the lighting an elegant accentuation, adding much without drawing undue attention to itself. Artwork is glimpsed in these writhing shadows, bold, some quite evidently erotic. One of the tall walls bears floor-to-ceiling shelves, the topmost holding three statuettes. The rest are crowded with books, and if one were adept at the evaluation of such things, a fortune would be known to reside there.
Three books in particular, though, are missing from that private collection.
He sits, a glass of very fine red wine before him. He sips from it on occasion, keeping his fingertips on the stem. He wears what he considers casual clothes, though most might find them to be rather elegant, perhaps even uncomfortable for more intimate, unguarded moments. But then, rarely is any moment in his life unguarded, and assuredly this one is not.
The other person sitting here, a woman, also mingles some sense of refinement along with relaxation. Her dark hair is long, straight, fine. She wears it parted in the middle, the style almost archaic in its manipulation of simplicity. Her face is well-fleshed, rounded, the body beneath her dressing also alluring of curve. Her genes favor her, and along with many other benefits, she exhibits little effort to maintain her attractive figure.
A similar glass of wine sits on an elegant end table near the equally exquisite chair. As with the overall décor in this room, none of it is ornate, ostentatious, but all of it shows a deep quality for those of a mind to know of these things. She quietly scans over a digital notepad, reading some information, occasionally reaching toward the crystal glass, having a gentle sip, eyes rarely straying from the device. He waits, patiently, having been summoned here. She gave him the barest of acknowledgements when he arrived, merely looking at him with those dark, intoxicating eyes of hers, then silently inviting him to sit. No one had asked if he wanted to join her with a serving of wine, no, it had just been brought.
“It seems a very powerful demon has entered our world,” she finally speaks, reaching again for the drink, her eyes finally moving to him as the glass comes to her lips.
He blinks, letting the barest hint of perplexity take his features.
“How powerful?” he finally speaks into the drilling silence of her gaze.
“It wears the guise of a human.”
A split second passes, and she senses a touch of fear there, like a gossamer whisper from shadow.
“Where is it?”
“That is not precisely known,” she answers, her voice smooth.
“How did we come by this information?”
A curl touches her lips, and in that moment, he knows he will not like the answer, and she gains some sadistic satisfaction from this.
“We received a very thoughtful and astutely political missive from the Felcrafts.”
And just as a curl had briefly danced over her lips, giving them a short up-curve, something similarly fleeting also takes his, though in the opposite direction.
“I suppose they want us to also hunt it.”
“Come now, Denman, don’t sound petulant. It doesn’t benefit you.”
He stiffens for a moment, one shorter than the fear, the frown, but she still catches it. She is keen to such things, almost as though a hunter of negative emotions, especially ones she may cause, directly or indirectly, and she senses them, as though somehow snatching them up for a dark consumption.
“Of course, they want us to also hunt it,” she resumes when he has calmed, “Why would they not? We would do the same if one as rare and powerful as this had been discovered by us. It must be found and exorcised.”
He nods once after she spends a time just staring sat him. She continues staring.
“Do you wish me to hunt it?”
She expends some more small instances watching, and she is pleased that she senses no more of the fear, no incredulity.
“I am not yet sure of the course of action. I have just recently received the message.”
He doubts that, believing she has invited him here to make this informing to him. He watches his cousin as she goes back to looking over the datapad. She is a few years his junior, but her abilities far outstrip his own, thus is she the Head of the Family Malkuth.
“Mayhap this could be a way for you to make up for your failure regarding the book.”
He controls himself, not reacting to this barb. She loves to fling out these stingers, though sometimes, within them, is a sincere way to do some good work. One excels in this family by developing a resistance to the venom, not succumbing to it.
“I would gladly undertake this hunt, if that is your wish.” He dips his head once at the end of this declaration.
“We require more information. I’ll not send you blindly and alone to take on such a creature.”
He moves his head again, another single nod.
“Of course, you were not exactly alone when you went to acquire the book, were you?”
He feels another stab.
“I was not,” he admits what is already known to them both.
“We knew the Infernal were active there. We even let you use one of our most powerful dowsers, which you also lost, but in the end, you did not realize how much you were not alone.”
He knows she is referring to the Head of the Felcrafts, Skothiam, being there. He also knows she is well aware of his inability to detect such a man, should he so choose to remain hidden. If anything, it shows the lengths to which the
ir rivals were willing to go to acquire the book, efforts not matched by the Malkuths. The book still resides in the university’s rare book collection, but it is decidedly under the custodianship of their rivals. A move against it now would be too much an open declaration of war, and they cannot afford to so fight one another, not when a greater threat looms.
“Is it not acceptable that the book remains out of their hands?”
She lets a moment linger betwixt them.
“It is,” she begrudgingly gives him, “and this way, we may even keep surreptitious watch over it. It is quite an eloquent solution.”
He lets a smirk barely touch his lips.
“Did you resign your position there?” she asks, angling more at him, her language evident to one such as him, “or will you be returning this session to … teach?”
And her smirk is more open, ending only when the glass again reaches her lips, and another sip of the fine wine is taken.
“I took a leave of absence,” he finally says, trying not to give in to her efforts, adjusting himself as though becoming more comfortable.
“What a pity. I am sure many young minds will suffer without your guidance.”
“Yes … a pity.”
He merely looks at her. She and the family engage in many forms of philanthropy, and all of it is part of their continued effort to help humanity from its lost ways. She sometimes even seems to show sincere sympathy, which confuses him. He supposes it is part of her emotional perversion.
“There are still the other books,” she leads, and he wonders why she states the obvious, and just as he is about to speak into another lengthening silence, she resumes, “We have people working on that, but I am curious about this new demon. How, why, where, and who. I’d like to know the true extent of its power.”
He again gives a single nod, feeling as though he is more concerned with its purpose.
“I’ll send a reply, letting them know we shall also work to locate it,” she concludes, then she fixes him with another look, and he almost squirms under it, “You and Skot worked so well together last year, maybe I ought to just lend you out to him to find this one, hmmm?”
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