“You heard it, too?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she said, reaching down to unsnap her holster and remove her gun.
They both stood perfectly still, the thick gray mist blowing around them on a silent wind.
“There,” Agent Isabel said, now moving toward the building.
He’d heard it as well, and there was no mistaking what it was. John followed closely behind her, the two of them drawn toward the almost ghostly sound of multiple children.
All of them crying.
Theo did not wait for the others.
The entities inside her were wild, compelling her to run from the passage toward the mist-enshrouded building.
She could feel them inside her, pumping her heart, flowing through her blood, engorging her muscles, attempting to change her in such a way as to deal with what she would find in this tiny pocket of reality. “No,” she grunted aloud, forcing herself to stop—to take control. They fought her, but to no avail; she was stronger than them, the magic inscribed upon her flesh making her superior.
The demons protested, but she was capable of suppressing them for now, giving her a chance to check out where she was. Theo was at a back entrance to the building, a rusted chain and lock woven through the door handles to prevent anyone from coming, or going. She approached the door, touching the chain with the tips of her fingers, knowing that she needed to be inside.
Any volunteers want to help me get in? She put the question out there to the demons, feeling a multitude of stirrings. Grabbing the chain in both hands, she waited to see if any would volunteer, opening up the dam of her control just a little to allow one of the demonic beasts to come through long enough to assist her. There was a sudden, painful surge of power down her arms, and she felt her skin stretching to accommodate the powerful musculature that had begun to manifest. Her fingers grew thicker, the skin like rock, as she took the chain and both hands and pulled in opposite directions.
The center links came apart with ease, falling to the ground in front of the door, allowing her to remove the chain. The demon that had lent her its strength wanted to stay a bit longer, desperate to tear the doors from its hinges, and rampage through the structure mangling anything that dared get in their way, but Theo promptly informed the entity that it was done, pushing it back down where the others of its ilk congregated.
In control again, she grabbed hold of one of the door handles and pulled it open to reveal a figure in filthy, tattered clothing standing there to greet her.
“One needs the proper authorization to enter this building,” the man said, winding back and punching her square in the face.
Theo flew backward, landing hard upon her butt, rolling backward to the ground, stunned by the strength of the blow.
“Do you have the proper authorization?” she heard the man ask as he left the building walking over to where she lay. “I don’t believe that you do.”
Theo tried to react, to recover enough to get up from the ground before more harm could be done, but she couldn’t escape the darkness as it closed in all around her, putting her back with the inside her.
“He’s likely going to kill me,” she informed the gathering of demons that encircled her.
Billy Sharp, or the demon wearing the benign shape of the little boy, pushed through the crowd to speak to her.
“Do you recall what was promised us?” he asked in his high-pitched child’s voice.
“He’ll kill me, and you will all die. You’re bound to me in such a way now that if I die, you die with me,” she told them all. “So it would benefit you to—”
“Do you recall?” Billy insisted.
She didn’t want to remember what she had done to acquire the information that they’d needed, what she had agreed to.
“Yes,” she said. “I remember.”
“And you will give us this?” he asked her.
She didn’t answer, feeling a terrible constriction about her throat. She could only imagine what the man was doing to her.
“Yes,” she finally agreed. “You’ll get what you want . . . what I told you I would do.”
The demon child studied her with dark, cautious eyes.
“Yes,” she finally screamed at him. “I swear.”
The boy smiled, happy with her response. “Okay, then,” he said. “Would you like a little help?”
Theo opened her eyes, looking into the face of the man who was attempting to kill her. This close, he looked like a walking corpse, and he held her by the throat, before his horrible face, studying her.
“Who are you?” he asked, realizing that she was awake. “And how on earth did you get here?”
She couldn’t breathe, the pressure on her neck excruciating. It was only a matter of seconds before fragile workings within her throat collapsed and she was as good as dead.
The demons waited just long enough, almost as if wanting to show her how needed they now were.
How valuable they could be.
Theo experienced the physical changes almost immediately, the muscles, cartilage, and bone around her neck and throat thickening in such a way as to prevent any damage.
She could breathe again, taking in the foul stench of her enemy.
The man smelled of rot, as if the flesh on his body had begun to decay. The stink of him was obscene, and she wanted nothing more than to be free of his clutches.
The disciple was squeezing with all his might, waiting for the inevitable collapse of her trachea beneath his powerful grip, but the new makeup of her throat wasn’t about to let that occur.
She looked into his dull, film-covered eyes and saw a moment of realization there, the idea that something had happened to steal away the murder he was about to perpetrate.
That maybe he should have been more careful.
Her body had morphed as well, the muscles in her legs having grown thicker, and more powerful, the feet inside her shoes growing so large—the nails on her toes so sharp—that they shredded through the sneakers on her feet. Theo pulled her legs up, the remains of her footwear dropping like discarded skin as she dug her new talon-like toes into the front of the man, raking down the front of him, tearing away clothing as well as the foul skin beneath.
The man cried out, releasing his grip on her neck as he stumbled back.
Theo crouched upon the ground, watching the man as he looked down upon the damage she had wrought. The gray flesh of his stomach was lacerated and weeping a milky substitute for blood.
“That wasn’t very nice,” the disciple of Damakus said as she watched his belly push outward, the skin letting go with a disgusting, tearing sound, his insides uncoiling and spilling out to the ground.
The demons inside her went wild with the disgusting sight, enjoying the obscenity of it all with such intensity that she actually found herself smiling with them at their victory.
Which might have been a bit premature.
The man was on his knees, his internal workings displayed before him. She could hear him muttering to himself as he reached down to the rubbery innards, picking them up in his hands and shoving them back inside the open stomach cavity.
The demons were suddenly impressed, showing their approval with screams and laughter.
The organs stayed where the man had shoved them, his sickly flesh rapidly healing around the open wounds.
“Now, then,” the man then said as he rose. “Where were we?”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Brenna moved down the schoolhouse corridor, gun ready to fire if required.
“Stay close,” she said as she walked, eyes darting to patches of shadow just in case.
The crying was louder the closer they got to the open doorway at the end of the short hall. Her heart was being torn apart by the hopelessness of the sound, but she curbed the urge to run blindly into the room.
In a situation such as this, she needed to be careful.
She thought of her son as she cautiously moved toward the doorway, thinking of how she wished that he h
ad cried out, had given her some kind of chance to save him. But whatever had taken him—SID, crib death—whatever name was given to the crippling phenomena, it had struck with terrible efficiency.
From somewhere in the building they heard a loud, banging sound as if heavy, emergency doors had been thrown open. They stopped, listening for what might follow.
This just spurred them on to move all the faster, Brenna making eye contact with her partner at the open doorway.
“Ready?” she asked, and he quickly nodded as she came around the corner into the room, her gun aimed for business. Her eyes scanned the location, taking in the rows of old-fashioned desks and the five children sitting there.
“We’ve come to get you out of here,” she told them, attempting to stifle the flow of powerful emotion that she could hear in her own voice.
John had already moved to the first desk, a boy she recognized as Christopher Waugh watching cautiously as he squatted down beside him.
“They’re chained,” John announced, already looking around for a possible solution. “We need a key, or something to break the chain with.”
She holstered her weapon, going to the heavy wooden desk at the front of the room.
“Look at the lock,” she instructed. “What does it look like?”
“Simple manacle,” John answered. “Nothing fancy.”
She moved around to the front of the desk, pulling open side drawers, top and bottom, which were empty. She then tried the center drawer, which was pretty much the same except for dirt, an old pencil, and . . .
Bingo! There were two paper clips inside amongst the filth and she snatched them up as if they were the most precious of rare jewels.
“Check on the condition of the others,” she said, coming down the aisle toward where Christopher sat, bending the paper clips into the appropriate shape for what she was going to try.
“It’s been years since I’ve done this,” she said to anyone who was listening.
“What—” the little boy started, his voice a terrible dry croak.
“I’m going to try and pick this lock,” she said, getting down on the floor. She went to work on the boy’s chains but not before she noticed the dried blood covering his foot.
“This one,” she heard John say. Brenna looked over to see what he was doing. In the next row, John was squatting down next to a little girl, who appeared to be sleeping.
“Is she . . . ?” Brenna asked, afraid for the answer.
“She’s alive,” John said, laying a gentle hand upon her back. “But she’s in rough shape. All these kids need medical attention as soon as possible.
“He’s going to kill us,” the boy, Christopher, croaked. “He’s going to feed us to . . .” The boy turned his head, and Brenna followed his gaze to a tank at the back of the room, something swimming around in the filthy water.
She could see that the boy was on the verge of complete emotional collapse, his lips quivering and his face twisting up with sorrow.
“Let’s get you kids out of here,” she said, looking away before she, too, was breaking down.
She slipped the thin ends of the paper clips into the lock of the manacle around Christopher’s ankle, trying desperately to remember her college days and how she’d taught herself to lock-pick out of necessity because she was always locking herself out of her dorm room.
The lock was clogged with dirt, but she was still able to get in, manipulating the simple mechanism to release the clasp and set the boy free.
“There you go,” she said, looking at him. He’d gotten control of himself, but she could still see that vacant look of shock in his eyes. “You just sit there while we help the others,” she told him.
He agreed with a slow nod.
She then turned to the little girl across from him. “You’re Rebecca, aren’t you?”
The child attempted a smile, and Brenna felt her rage inflame. The monster who had abducted her had taken her teeth. In a way, she had been the one to lead them here, the horrible act committed against her actually contributing to them getting here. Brenna reached out, laying a gentle hand upon the little girl’s hair, and spoke softly to her.
“We’re going to get you home.” She then proceeded to pick the lock on the child’s manacles, freeing her in less time than it had taken with Christopher’s restraints. It was all coming back to her.
Brenna turned to Christopher. “Can you keep an eye on Rebecca while we free the others?”
He said that that he would, and she reached out, giving his shoulder a gentle squeeze, and was horrified by the touch. She remembered the photo of the husky boy, in his Pop Warner football uniform; now he was nearly skin and bones.
“This is Cindy,” John said as Brenna joined him, leaning down beside another little girl who could barely keep her eyes open.
“Hello, Cindy,” Brenna said, squatting down beneath the desk. “Let’s get those chains off you.”
She did that two more times, each child grateful, but not having the strength to do much of anything else other than sit there and . . .
“What’s he up to?” John asked.
Brenna looked to where he was looking and saw that the boy, Christopher, had hobbled to the back of the room and now stood before a filthy fish tank, looking at it with hateful eyes.
“Chris, what’s up?” Brenna asked, standing up from where she’d been squatting, working on the last of the locks.
“It’s being quiet,” the boy said, swaying because of his injured foot. “It doesn’t want you to know it’s here.”
There was sudden movement within the tank, the filthy water splashing.
John moved down the aisle. “Christopher, I think you might want to—”
“It’s because of him,” the boy said, reaching out to grab hold of the edge of the tank.
“Who, Christopher?” John asked, almost to the boy. “Damakus,” the boy said, almost as if spitting something poisonous from his mouth. And as the name was said, he pulled upon the tank’s edge, using all his strength to tip it from where it rested on the two desks.
The tank fell from the desks, shattering upon impact, spilling its foul-smelling water, and something else, onto the classroom floor.
John ran toward where the boy was standing, staring with rapt attention at the hideous monstrosity that now flopped and writhed upon the wet, glass-covered floor. He grabbed the boy, yanking him back away from the thing as it immediately lashed out at where the child had been standing, one if its tentacle-like appendages snapping the air like a whip.
“What the hell is that?” she asked.
“That, I believe, is the demon lord, Damakus,” John said, watching the thing as it thrashed about.
“Good to know,” Brenna said, walking a few steps closer, aiming her gun, and firing multiple shots into its fleshy, undulating mass.
She let the demons’ attributes flow, allowing her body to shift and change, to manifest their various traits.
This would be needed if she were to survive.
The disciple of Damakus was fast, evading her claws with ease while pounding her with fists like rock.
Theo lay on the ground, shaking the fog from her mind. She attempted to evade him, to spring away from his reach, but he again proved too fast. One of the disciple’s hands grabbed a handful of her thick black hair, yanking her back to him.
“What are you exactly?” the man asked inquisitively. “I’ve never seen the likes of something like you before.”
She struggled in his grasp, and then felt her hair let go.
Theo was suddenly free, scrabbling away from her foe, who was left holding only a large handful of her hair.
She ran a clawed hand over a newly smooth scalp. One of the demons had caused her hair to fall away, leaving her now bald, and quite angry at the change. Theo loved her hair, and hoped—for the sake of whatever demon had been responsible—that they would somehow return it to its fullness and luster as soon as this matter was settled.
But unt
il then she would use the anger of its loss to her advantage, springing off from the ground in a terrific leap, landing upon her foe’s chest and driving him back to the ground.
“You want to know what I am?” she asked, perched on the disciples chest. She could feel the inner workings of her mouth changing, her teeth reforming in her gums, growing sharper—longer. “I’m the thing put out there in the world to make something like you afraid.”
The man fought to throw her off, but she held fast, the claws of her toes and hands sinking into the putrefying flesh to hold on as she drove her head and mouth forward, to sink her teeth into the skin of his throat.
Theo should have been revolted by the act, but she wasn’t—the demon that was giving her the strength and rage to fight her foe dismissing the disgust and replacing it with something akin to hunger.
The man tried to scream, but his damaged throat was filled with blood, or whatever foul juices coursed through his disgusting body. Theo bit down harder and yanked back, tearing away a large chunk of neck. Part of her wanted to consume the prize, but her humanity won out, and she spat the piece away. Caught unawares, the disciple bucked wildly, and she was thrown from her perch on him.
One hand pressed to his damaged throat, he climbed to his feet. Theo waited, in a tensed crouch, growling like something fresh from the jungle.
The disciple pulled his hand away from the nasty bite, and she watched in horror as it healed before her eyes.
“That was nasty,” the man said, his voice at first a strained whisper, but suddenly stronger. “But I can be nasty, too.”
He charged at her, grabbing her around the waist and tackling her to the ground.
The demons inside Theo all cried out, each and every one of the thousand trying to come forward. It was more than she could handle as her psyche was deluged with the demonic, giving her adversary the upper hand.
The disciple was wild with rage, his fists raining down upon her ripping flesh, and shattering bone with his blows. Theo attempted to fight back to the best of her ability, but she was easily swatted aside, one of her limbs grabbed, twisted, and broken with such savagery that she found her mind going completely numb to the onslaught.