Cards of Death Box Set

by Tamara Geraeds

  Vicky doesn’t agree. She wants to come with us, for protection. I hate to do so, but eventually I end the hushed discussion by telling her it’s an order.

  Instead of driving home, I take Mom to the Smokehouse, a barbecue restaurant she used to love. We haven’t gone out to dinner in ages, because Mom was always afraid she’d get a fit there. When I park Phoenix and walk Mom towards the restaurant, her face lights up.

  We have a great time and for an hour and a half, I even forget about demons and saving the world. We chat and laugh like we did before Mom’s fits started.

  When we get home, Mom kisses me on the cheek. “Thank you so much for this lovely day.”

  “You’re welcome. I had fun.”

  She puts her bag on the table. “I prepared something for dinner this morning, just in case, so I’ll put that in the fridge for tomorrow. Are you going to bed?”

  “Yes, sorry. I’m no fun.” It’s still early, but I want to add Trevor to my Book of Spells. “I’m going to read for a bit and then get some rest.”

  Despite my fatigue, I energetically climb the stairs. I was dreading today so much, but it turned out to be the greatest day in years. I spent it with two of the people I care about most. Even though I couldn’t speak to both of them at the same time, I felt at ease and even happy.

  I take off my clothes and put on a shirt. My book is still in the bottom drawer. I turn on some music and jump onto my bed.

  I’ve just drawn the outline of Trevor’s stone face when I hear it. A rustle at my window. A cold wave goes through me, and when I turn my head, I stare into two black eyes. I recognize them from my premonition.

  My breath catches in my throat. I didn’t prevent it.

  But it can’t get in. I protected the house. And Mom isn’t vacuuming and making dinner, as she was in my premonition.

  The demon opens its mouth. Its tongue slithers across the window, leaving a trail of dark smudge.

  It can’t get in. Just ignore it.

  But I can’t avert my eyes. They are pulled to the endless black in its sockets. It grins at me, pulls its head backwards and slams it against the glass. Shards fly everywhere and I duck.

  I remember this demon tearing me apart in my premonition and reach desperately for the spark within me. A bolt of lightning shoots from my hand, but misses the hulking spider body. The monster’s tail smolders, but it doesn’t slow down. It’s not coming for me like it did in my premonition. It’s hurrying into the hallway, going straight for another target.

  “No!” I yell, jumping from my bed and diving after it.

  It’s already treading down the stairs. Tar drips from its paws. It burns my feet, but I keep running.

  “Mom! Get out of the house!” I scream.

  When I reach the top of the stairs, the spider demon is crouching behind the banister. Mom appears in the doorway to the kitchen. “What are you yelling about?”

  I raise my hand to hit the demon with another bolt of lightning, but I’m too tired. I try to freeze it. Nothing happens.

  Mom takes a step closer. “What’s wrong, honey?”

  “Don’t come closer!” I yell. “Go back into the kitchen. Crawl out of the window and go to Mona’s.”

  Her head flinches back slightly. “Why?”

  The spider demon moves its front legs. A web of smoldering tar shoots from it and burns a hole in the ground.

  Mom shrieks and jumps back, pointing at the black gap. “What’s that?”

  “It’s a demon. Run Mom, please!”

  She doesn’t move. “A what?”

  The monster slowly creeps forward, weaving another web. I have nothing to attack it with but my fists, so I dive down the stairs and jump on its back.

  Or that’s what I want to do, but the thing just steps aside and jams a sharp leg down. It misses my foot by inches. I crawl back and almost fall into the hole it created. It is endless and smells of excrement.

  Mom still doesn’t see the demon. She stands there with a dazed look on her face. “What are you doing? Is this some kind of game?”

  The spider demon is already moving towards her again.

  “Please run,” I pant. I close my eyes, reach for the power inside me and stretch my arms in front of me.

  A giant bolt of lightning escapes from my fingertips. It scrapes the demon’s head and it howls. Specks of black fly in every direction. One of the kitchen cupboards splits in half when the bolt hits it.

  Mom’s eyes grow wide and her mouth falls open. Finally, she turns and starts running.

  But the monster won’t be distracted. It has come with a clear purpose and it’s not willing to fail.

  While I’m reaching for more power, the demon shoots a web covered in tar. It wraps around Mom’s legs and pulls her off her feet.

  She yells and tries to grab one of the kitchen cupboards. But the demon is already hauling her in. Its ugly head, with the piercing black eyes turns to me. It hisses and spits hot pitch at my face. I roll aside, looking for something to hit it with. But before I can even get up, it takes a giant leap straight into the hole. Mom is dragged along the floor, her eyes wide with fear. She reaches out to me, and I try to grab her hand.

  “Dante!” Her fingers slip through mine.

  “Hold onto something!”

  I pull a lamp from the sideboard and leap towards the hole. I slam it down onto the web, just before Mom is dragged down.

  “Pull yourself up!” I shout.

  Her hand reaches for the chair close to her. She gets a hold of it, but another web shoots out and seizes her arm.

  “No!” I yell when she starts sliding towards the hole face first.

  I struggle forward, drops of tar burning my knees. I hardly feel it. My eyes are fixed on the web wrapped around Mom’s arm. I bring down the lamp upon it, but it doesn’t break. I hold on to it, try to slow it down, but the pitch burns my hands and the web slides through my fingers.

  Panicked tears run down Mom’s cheeks.

  “Don’t give up,” I urge her. “Keep fighting.”

  I try to conjure another lightning bolt, but I’m out of energy.

  Quinn! He can help.

  I shout out his name, meanwhile reaching for Mom’s foot. “I’ve got you. Hold on.”

  A roar rises from the hole and the demon shows its face again. It looks livid, the pitch on its body steaming. It gurgles and spits a ball of black at me. The hot liquid hits me square in the chest and I fly backwards.

  With a satisfied growl, the demon jumps back into the hole and pulls Mom after him.

  The pitch burns straight through my shirt. I wriggle to take it off, meanwhile trying to get back onto my feet.

  Quinn emerges at the foot of the stairs. “What’s going on?”

  I leap back to the hole that’s closing rapidly. “Mom!”

  There’s no answer.

  I want to jump after her, but Quinn grabs my arm. “Watch out. You don’t want to be trapped in there when it closes.”

  “A demon took my mom. I have to get her back.”

  “Not through here.”

  I try to pull myself from his grip. “What if she’s stuck?”

  “It probably dragged her out on the other side.”

  “Or it killed her!”

  He shakes his head. “If it wanted to kill her, it would have done so already.”

  The hole closes completely and Quinn lets go of me.

  I drop to my knees and bang my fists against the floor. “This can’t be happening.” Tears break up the black goo below me. “Where did it take her? How is this even possible?” Anger takes over and I grit my teeth. “We protected the house. We should’ve been safe.”

  Quinn taps his chin with his finger. “Yes, that’s strange, even on Friday the thirteenth.”

  I stand up. “That’s strange? Is that all you can say?” I put both hands against his chest and push him. “How can you be so calm? My mother was just taken by a de
mon!”

  He puts a hand on my arm. “Take a deep breath.”

  A peaceful feeling runs through me. I’m afraid to move, because I don’t want to disrupt it. So I watch him from the corner of my eye. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m easing your pain. You need a clear head.”

  I breathe in and out slowly and my heart rate drops.

  When Quinn pulls back his arm, I feel a lot better. The burns on my feet and hands are also gone. “Thanks.”

  “That man in the bird park,” he says, “did he touch your mother?”

  “That Trevor guy?” I think back, try to picture them in my head. “Yes, he hugged her.”

  Quinn gets two wet towels from the kitchen and hands me one. “He must have planted something on her.” He wipes the pitch from the floor. “Something that made it possible for the demon to get to her.”

  I start cleaning the stairs. “What’s the point of a protection spell if it doesn’t protect anything?”

  He rinses out the towel before answering. “The spell keeps most evil out, but there are a few ways around it. Especially if you have help from different kinds of magic.”

  I look up from the top of the stairs. “You’re saying Trevor had help?”

  “Probably from an air elemental.”

  I lower my towel and grit my teeth. “Simon.”

  Quinn gestures for me to throw him the dirty towel so he can rinse it. “Let’s not jump to conclusions too fast. Air elementals aren’t that rare. And they often hang out with earth elementals, like Trevor.”

  “And Paul.”

  When he comes back and throws me the towel, I ask, “So how can I protect the house better? I mean, in case…” I swallow my tears back, “in case I find Mom and bring her back alive.”

  “You’ll have to use salt, like you did at Darkwood Manor. Which I put back in place by the way.” He wipes up the last of the tar downstairs. “It got a bit scattered.”

  “Thanks. I guess I can use salt now that Mom knows demons exist.”

  She must be so scared. If she’s even still alive.

  “What do you suppose they want with her?”

  “It’s probably just a warning for you to stay out of it.”

  “So she’ll be alright?” I shoot him a pleading look.

  Please, just lie to me if you have to.

  “We’ll get her back in one piece.”

  CHAPTER 20

  There’s no way I can sleep right now, so I invite Quinn to stay for a while. We sit down at the kitchen table and I pour us some vodka from the bottle that Mom must have bought recently. “How was everything at Darkwood Manor?”

  “Quiet. We fixed some broken floorboards and painted the front of the house.”

  “Did you find out who that woman with the hair bun was?”

  He empties his glass and I follow his example.

  “Her name is Myah Pullus. She works as an IT-specialist at the Idaho Police Department.”

  “The M, the star and the screen. It’s definitely her.” I rub my forehead. “So now we have to find out who wants to kill her.”

  Quinn refills the glasses. “It could be a criminal she caught.”

  For once, I enjoy thinking about this puzzle. It keeps my thoughts from going over every possible situation Mom can be in right now. “We should search her house and office and put spy cams in. When someone comes to plant explosives, we can remove them.”

  Quinn raises his glass and I tap it.

  “Rodney’s has some spy cams we can use. I’ll go get some tomorrow.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  We finish another drink and just sit quietly for a moment. Then I ask the inevitable. “How are we going to find my mother?”

  Quinn reaches for the bottle again. “I can try to trace her. And you could cast a tracing spell.”

  Although his tone says it all, I still ask, “But you don’t think we’ll find her.”

  He shakes his head. “I think they’ll return her when they’re done.”

  I almost choke on my drink. Vodka flies everywhere. “When they’re done? Done doing what?”

  He grabs the bottle again. “I don’t know. But you have to prepare yourself for something ugly, Dante.”

  So that’s why he’s been feeding me all this alcohol. I push my chair back and stand up, slamming my glass on the table. “If you think you can keep me here …” I sway on my feet and grab the sides of the table, “you’re absolutely right.”

  He rises from his chair and walks to me as steadily as always. “I’m sorry, but I don’t want you to do something foolish. That’s exactly what Lucifer wants.”

  I try to focus on his dark frame. “You’re calling him by his real name now?”

  He smiles sadly. “He is still my brother.”

  My hand reaches for the glass, but misses. “How come you’re still so sober?”

  He pushes me slowly towards the couch, supporting me so I don’t keel over. “I’m an angel, Dante, I don’t get drunk. Didn’t you notice before?”

  I remember the last time we were all together. Me, Quinn, Charlie, Paul and Simon. We all had a bit too much to drink, but Quinn didn’t seem affected. I can’t believe that was just a couple of days ago.

  I nod, and the whole room spins around me.

  “Just lie down. You’ll be fine.” He places a pillow under my head and lifts my feet onto the couch.

  I close my eyes, no longer fighting the heavy pull of sleep.

  Then a thought flashes through my mind. “Oh no, the prophecy.”

  A sacrifice has to be made.

  My hand shoots up and grabs Quinn’s wrist. “Tell me it’s not her. Please.”

  “I don’t know, Dante. I don’t know.” His sad expression is the last thing I see before I pass out.

  I wake up alone and with a thundering headache.

  When I remember the attack, I squeeze my eyes shut. This can’t be real.

  I get up, swallow my nausea and walk through the house. Of course, there’s no sign of Mom. She’s really gone. Taken by the spider demon from my premonition. The head demon probably.

  I shake the images from my head. What did Quinn say? Something about a spell.

  The banging inside my head blocks my thoughts. I drag myself into the kitchen and drink a glass of water and some orange juice.

  Feeling a bit better, I slowly get dressed and splash some water into my face.

  So, a spell. A tracing spell.

  I retrieve Dad’s notebook and leaf through it. I’ve seen most of it by now, although I haven’t read it all. I still find it difficult to look at the angry scribbling. I know I’ll have to eventually, if I ever want to find out what happened to my father, but not right now. The living worry me enough as it is. If I can still count Mom among those.

  I swallow the bile rising in my throat. Don’t think like that.

  I turn some more pages in an attempt to distract my thoughts.

  Then my hand freezes halfway. It hovers over a page that wasn’t here before. I saw this spell in my premonition about the spider demon, but when I woke up, the page wasn’t there. How can it be here now?

  I compare the handwriting with that on the other pages. It’s all the same. This was definitely written by my father.

  Why did this suddenly appear?

  I jump up, put both notebooks behind my waistband and race downstairs. I almost shout my goodbyes to Mom, but remember just in time that she’s not here.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll find you,” I say before opening the front door.

  Phoenix starts without trouble and I take the magical roads to Darkwood Manor.

  When I step into the kitchen, sad faces greet me.

  Vicky puts her arms around me and kisses my cheek. “I’m so sorry about your mother. We’ll do everything we can to help you get her back.”

  The others mumble their agreement and I give them a shadow of a smile.
/>   “How did you know?” I ask when Vicky lets go of me.

  “Quinn stopped by to tell us. He wanted to make sure we were on guard.”

  Nausea creeps up from my stomach. “Was he expecting an attack on the mansion, too?”

  She shrugs. “You never know.”

  I sit down and take out Dad’s notebook. “Quinn told me a tracing spell might help us find Mom, so I was flipping through Dad’s book.”

  Vicky combs her fingers through her hair. “Did you find one? Otherwise, I can help.”

  “That’s what I thought already. I didn’t find a tracing spell, but I did find something else.”

  I open the book on the newly filled page and hold it up for the whole Shield to see.

  Jeep is balancing his hat on his finger and drops it when he reads the first line. “That’s the spell from your premonition, isn’t it?”

  “Exactly. The spell that wasn’t in the book.”

  Taylar leans closer to take a better look. “But it is now. Did you write it in?”

  “No, it was just there.”

  D’Maeo taps a finger against his lips. “He must have protected some of the pages with an invisibility spell.”

  I put down the book and look down at the words. “But why?”

  Jeep picks up his hat. “Maybe because they’re dangerous in the wrong hands.”

  Maël, who has been even more quiet than usual, moves her golden headpiece a bit higher, before saying, “It must be an apprentice book. Written to make sure his knowledge wouldn’t be lost.”

  I flip through the pages. “Written for who?”

  “For someone he wanted to teach his magic to.” She smiles gently. “Usually someone the owner of the book wrote about on the first pages.”

  The lump that rises in my throat makes my voice hoarse. “So he wrote this for me?”

  “Yes, he did,” Maël says, and Vicky strokes my arm.

  “See,” I whisper, “he wasn’t a bad man.”

  No one objects, although I’m sure some of the ghosts don’t agree. But I’ll prove them wrong. The prophecy even says he had to fight the Devil. How can he have been bad then?

  “But why do I only see part of what he’s written?”