A Demon's Wrath: Part II (Peachville High Demons) Read online

  “Where are you headed in such a rush? And at this hour?” she asked.

  “I’m meeting a friend.”

  “It’s nearly nightfall,” she said, her face wrinkled.

  I didn’t offer any more information and she didn’t ask again. Over the past few years, I’d learned it was better to be vague and give very few details about my life. I already knew she didn’t approve of the way I’d continued to search for answers.

  In the early days after Aerden had disappeared, I went to my parents with every single tiny shred of evidence about who might have wanted to hurt him. Even the tiniest clue was something I wanted to discuss with them. I wanted to hear their feedback and see what they had to say or if they’d heard anything. I didn’t understand why they weren’t out there searching with me. Why didn’t they need answers like I did?

  After a few years, it started to sink in that my parents had no interest in finding out the truth.

  In fact, they began to get upset with me for continuing to ask questions.

  “Let him go,” they’d said a thousand times. “Your life is with Lea now.”

  Their words burned me to the core. How could they ask me to let him go? And how could they forget him so easily?

  Any time I tried to question my father’s lack of emotion over losing his son, he said he only wanted to be strong for my mother. He said that she had been unable to grieve and move on because of my constant questions. He’d said we all needed to let Aerden live on in our hearts and memory but to move on with our lives. He told me that’s what Aerden would have wanted.

  But instead of quieting my search and letting my brother’s memory rest, my father’s blindness only made me angry.

  He should have been by my side searching for the demon who had killed Aerden. They both should have.

  It had always bothered me that my parents kept pushing me to put Aerden’s disappearance behind us.

  But after hearing what Andros had to say, I wondered how I could have been so blind all this time.

  The reason they weren’t searching for the truth was that they already knew the truth.

  Their questions and anger had nothing to do with my mother’s ability to grieve and everything to do with the fact that they did not want me to find the real truth. There was something important they didn’t want me to know, and they would stop at nothing to make sure I never found out.

  “Who are you meeting?” she asked.

  “Lea,” I said, which was true.

  Her eyes narrowed into dark slits. “And who else?”

  I swallowed. “Why do you need to know?

  I was tired of her questions. Her constant lies. I would never forgive her if I discovered Aerden was still alive and she knew about it. My anger would know no limits. I could feel it growing inside me even now.

  “Denaer, there are those out there who would see you fall into madness,” she said. She moved toward me and put her hand on my cheek. I pulled away and she frowned. “Be careful of the lies those people would tell in order to manipulate you, son. You are the future ruler of this kingdom. That comes with a great deal of responsibility. I hope you understand that. There are dangers out there you can’t possibly understand.”

  I gave no answer, but I understood. Yes, there were those who would use me for their own personal gain, not the least of whom was standing right in front of me.

  “Will you be back before nightfall?” she asked.

  I gave her a quick bow. “Not likely,” I said, then turned and shifted into black smoke. I didn’t give her the chance to ask anything more of me, and by the time night did fall, I was nowhere near the castle walls.

  The Deepest Kind of Darkness

  Andros was waiting for us by the roses.

  He didn’t see us at first, so I stood there for a moment watching him through the darkness.

  He leaned down at the edge of a small patch of flowers and closed his eyes. He lifted his hand over the flowers and mumbled something I couldn’t quite make out.

  A bluish black mist of energy rose up from the flowers like a fog, flowing into the demon’s hand. Then, Andros cried out and yanked his hand backward, falling onto his back.

  I rushed over toward him.

  “Are you okay?” I asked.

  He cradled his hand close to his chest. “I’m fine,” he said, laughing. “Just one of the dangers of experimentation, I guess.”

  “What were you trying to do?” Lea asked.

  “Honestly?”

  I nodded.

  He shook his head and laughed. “I have no idea.”

  “What was the black fog that rose up from them?” Lea asked. “Where did it come from?”

  “I haven’t completely figured it out yet, but these roses have some kind of property that allows them to pull energy from the magic around them,” he said. He lifted his hand over the cluster of the black roses and moved it in a circle. I could instantly feel the energy of his magic as it entered the air, and within a few seconds, I could physically see it too. “Watch this.”

  I watched as the energy field of his magic transferred from his hands to the tips of the roses. It was as if the roses were a magnet, drawing the energy toward them.

  The dark black smoke of his power drifted toward the roses and hovered above it.

  “Now what?” I asked. “Does the magic get absorbed into the flowers?”

  Andros shook his head and moved his hand away from the roses. The smoke hovered for a moment, then gradually faded altogether.

  “It doesn’t seem to actually soak in,” he said. “The roses attract the power, but they don’t seem to have a way to store it. They appear to be more of a conductor of energy. It’s hard to understand, but that’s why I started growing them here. I want to understand them. I think they’re important.”

  “I’ve seen these roses before,” I said, looking out over the darkened field. The light of the moons was dim tonight, but I had always been able to see very clearly in the dark. It was one of my gifts. “The day my brother disappeared, I got a very strong vision of him. He was kneeling in a circle of these roses, bleeding and crying out. There was a bright light shining inside the circle.”

  I struggled with the memory. It was difficult to talk about it, even now.

  “Tonight may prove to be a very emotional one for you, my friend, but I think you are on the verge of finding answers to questions you have held for a very long time,” he said.

  “Where are you taking us?” Lea asked.

  She was still unsure about us being here, and I knew it was a lot to ask of her. If the king found out we were meeting with rebels, he would be very unhappy. I knew she was only here out of loyalty to me, which only deepened my guilt.

  “You’ll see very soon,” Andros said.

  “What do the roses have to do with what happened to my brother?” I asked. “I know the two things are tied together. It’s the only real clue I’ve had to follow.”

  Andros looked across the field of black, his eyes growing darker and more distant, as if he were remembering some great pain. “That’s where information get complicated,” he said. “And privileged. I’m taking a very big risk showing you these things.”

  “I need to know.”

  “Once you’ve seen what I’m about to show you, you’ll never be able to go back to life the way it was before,” Andros said. He looked from me to Lea, meeting our eyes. “It will change everything. Are you sure you’re ready for this kind of truth?”

  “My world has already been changed forever,” I said. “The moment my twin brother was torn from me, it was like I went over some kind of cliff. I fell into the deepest kind of darkness. How could my life ever be the same after that?” I shook my head and ran a hand through my hair. “I’m going to follow this path as far as it goes, and believe me when I say that whoever is responsible for this is going to pay for what they’ve done. It’s the one thing I can say with complete confidence. I won’t rest until they’ve paid for this with their lif
e.”

  Andros lifted and eyebrow and laughed. “You sound like one of us.”

  “Who’s us?” Lea asked.

  He ran a hand across his cheek, studying her. “The Resistance,” he said. “It’s a small group for now, but it’s growing.”

  “What are you resisting, exactly?” she asked. Her tone was biting. Untrusting.

  “You really are sheltered, aren’t you?”

  Andros walked toward a black bag laying on the ground. He picked it up and slung it over his shoulder, a look of amusement on his face.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I mean, how is it possible you’ve never heard of The Resistance?” he said. “Only someone who’d been sheltered deep within the castle walls could be so blind to what’s been going on in the outerlands.”

  A hollow feeling took over in my stomach. “Yes, we’ve been sheltered,” I said. “But I’m here to find out the truth.”

  Andros paused and turned around. “And what about you, Princess?” he asked. “Are you ready to find out the truth? Even if it means finding out that your father is not as honorable as you think he is?”

  Lea’s jaw tensed and her hands clenched into tight fists at her side. “I’m here to take a look at the facts with open eyes and make up my own mind about what’s real and what isn’t,” she said.

  Andros made a face. “Inviting you into my world and sharing my knowledge with you is either the smartest thing I’ve ever done,” he said. “Or the dumbest. But if the two of you are to be our leaders someday, I think you have a right to know what’s going on. I think you have a right to see what your king has worked so hard to keep hidden from you and the rest of the citizens inside his precious gated city of gold.”

  His voice trailed off and he looked out across the roses again.

  Finally, he squinted up at the moons shining above.

  “Come,” he said. “It’s time.”

  Dark Purpose

  Andros shifted to pure black smoke and I knew the time for questions was gone. It was now or never.

  I looked to Lea, making sure she was truly ready to follow where this would lead. She gave me a sad smile, then shifted and followed the trail of smoke Andros had left behind.

  I followed them through the dark forest, then out across a field of firegrass that sparked across the backdrop of the night sky. We came across a worn path and followed it for a long while, then suddenly split off from the road and cut through another dark forest full of thorned trees and nightwhispers.

  I could barely keep up with them. Without my night vision, they would have lost me miles ago. I had no idea how Lea was following him with such ease, but I was impressed. And jealous.

  When we broke through the trees, the Sea of Glass stared back at us, the moons’ glow dancing on the black surface of the water. True to its name tonight, it was as still and motionless as glass.

  We followed the shoreline toward a cluster of lights in the distance.

  Klashok. I recognized this village.

  I had been here once when my father took Aerden and I fishing as children. We had hired a guide who took us on his boat across the sea. We’d spent the day casting nets out into the clear water. Aerden had caught a large spiderfish and I had caught a whestler. It had been a very good day.

  Even from this distance, I could tell the town had changed. The homes on the outskirts were practically in ruins. Abandoned by the looks of it.

  There used to be a large, sturdy pier leading out into the water nearly a mile with boats lined up as far as the eye could see, but part of it had collapsed into the sea.

  “What happened here?” I whispered when we stopped just outside the village.

  A young girl appeared beside me out of nowhere. “This is what’s happening all around,” she said, her voice so low I almost couldn’t hear her at all. “The villages that have been hit the hardest are falling into such horrible poverty they can’t afford to replace and repair the older buildings and structures that have stood for centuries. Many of the elders have been taken, leaving no one to pass their power on to the village. It’s devastating.”

  I wanted to ask her more and find out who she was and where she had come from, but Andros motioned for us to be quiet.

  He crouched low and shifted, his smoke slithering inland, away from the shore and out into a large field of firegrass on the other side of the village.

  We followed quietly. I noticed several others had joined our small group. Members of The Resistance, I’d guessed.

  My pulse raced as we moved into the grass. What would we find here? What exactly was he going to show me?

  The girl had said elders had been taken. Did that mean they were taken by the same people who took my brother? I was anxious for answers, but afraid of what truth lay beyond this moment.

  Firegrass can grow very tall if left untended and this particular field was almost tall enough to hide us completely, even if we had been standing. The tips of the dark grass glowed a very dim orange, sparks erupting from them every few seconds like miniature explosions.

  We inched our way farther from the lights of the city and deeper into the grass.

  That’s when I saw it.

  A clearing in the grass. We stopped as we reached the edge of the it.

  The grass had been burned from the looks of it, the ground charred and dead. But there in the center was a perfect ring of black roses.

  Fear gripped my chest. What did this mean? What had he brought us here to see?

  It was much too quiet for me to speak without being heard, so I kept my mouth closed despite my fears. As a group, we hid in the shadows, watching.

  After a while, a dark figure cloaked in rags floated into the clearing and hovered near the circle of roses. I held back a scream as she turned her head just enough for me to make out her hideous, decaying face.

  This was not a demon. I had no idea what this creature was, but she was unnatural. Dark.

  Evil.

  I covered my mouth and looked away, but in the next instant, my eyes were drawn again to the sight of the creature as she began to cast a spell.

  Her arms moved around in a circular motion and a low growling sound hummed in her chest. She threw her head back and laughed as a large cloud of grey and black smoke rose up from the center of the roses. She stepped inside and waited.

  From somewhere inside the smoke, voices began to chant. The sound chilled me to my core and I flinched, pulling back. Being here felt wrong. Dangerous.

  I wanted to leave and go back to the safety of the castle walls and a life of ignorance.

  But at the same time, I knew I was exactly where I was meant to be. This is where my destiny had been leading me ever since the day my brother disappeared. Andros was right. Life would never be the same after tonight.

  “Maleia, faithful servant of the Order of Shadows, we invite thee. Wise one, Seeress, Join us now.”

  A single voice echoed across the clearing and my heart stopped. I watched in horror, knowing that something like this had happened to my brother. Someone from beyond this world had commanded one of these abominations to steal Aerden from me.

  Rage boiled inside of me, alongside my fear.

  “Prima.” The hunter bowed toward the cloud of smoke and for a moment, I caught sight of a shadowed figure on the other side.

  I nearly jumped back, unable to control my shock. The girl beside me grabbed my arm, her eyes flashing with fear. She shook her head and I forced stillness upon myself.

  “I am your humble servant, now and forever,” the creature said.

  “Maleia, give us the name of the demon you have chosen for us.”

  My stomach turned. A name. Another victim like my brother.

  “Shyla.”

  The name rolled off the tongue of the hunter like honey, as if the taste of it were sweet.

  “Thank you,” the woman in the shadows said. “Your service to this coven is done for now. Set the summoning stone in the roses and depa
rt from us until you are called again.”

  The huntress bowed low, then floated off into the night. I could no longer see her, but I sensed she had not gone far.

  Inside the circle, the voices began chanting again. I couldn’t understand what they were saying, but I knew now what Andros had brought us here to see.

  He had brought us to a portal like the one I saw in my vision the day Aerden was taken. He was showing us proof that what he’d said was true. A group from the other side—another world—was pulling demons through against their will.

  He’d said they didn’t know why, but the energy of this ritual was not one of beauty and light. No, these beings served a very dark purpose.

  And now they had a name for their next victim.

  Shyla.

  I glanced toward the village, looking for any sign of a demon girl being brought toward us in shackles like the ones Aerden wore, but the town was completely quiet. Most likely everyone was asleep in their homes.

  My attention snapped back to the portal as a bright green light pooled like water inside the circle of roses. The chanting of the voices grew louder and with each repetition, the emerald pool grew larger and brighter.

  A terrified scream rang out across the darkness. A girl, but not a demon. No, this voice was different. More fragile somehow. It was coming from someone deep inside the light. Someone on the other side of the portal.

  I didn’t understand it and even though I strained my eyes toward the light, I couldn’t make out what was going on deep inside. I could only see the dark figure I’d seen before. She was wearing a hooded green cloak. A cloak identical to the one the shadowed figure had worn in my vision just before Aerden was ripped from my life.

  My stomach twisted.

  After more screams, the cloaked figure raised her hands and spoke again. The screams were silenced.

  “Shyla, demon of the Shadow World, we call to you. Enter into this sacred place. We demand your presence.”

  The chorus of voices began a new chant and this time, the emerald light rose up from the ground like an orb.

  No. Like a doorway.