“Let’s get her out of here,” Reilly shouted, already reaching down to grab Mary-Beth under the shoulders.
Troy shook his head and looked down. Her eyes were closed and her lips were curved into a small smile. He’d felt her slip away when Laney’s chill had hit. She was gone. Poor girl.
Laney’s voice rose and he realized she was chanting. Had been all along. The demon screamed again, the sound rising until, with a pop, it disappeared completely, leaving the three of them alone in a charred room with three bodies.
Talk about a smoking gun.
Chapter 5
The hellfire snapped off, and I blinked the bright spots from my vision. It took me a few seconds to realize the demon had teleported out. Well, crap. They weren’t supposed to do that.
I looked around the room, noting the charred wallpaper and the fact that no amount of shampooing was going to rescue the carpet on the other side of the room. Hissing between my teeth, I pulled the Grimm back within. The “promotion” to Special Operations had brought a boatload of knowledge, all of it exploding through my brain at the same time I battled with the demon. Perfect timing. I’m trying not to get my ass kicked into next week while stopping the demon from toasting Troy and Reilly, and the Grimm decides to damn-well info-dump me.
Everything from how to bewitch a Fae through the best way to kill a dragon (there’s a soft spot behind the ear, if you’re interested…) wanted equal billing in my head. Only years of practice focusing on lifelines had allowed me to block most of it and access just the part I needed.
Like how to cast a holding spell to trap a demon so I could slice its freaking head off. Demons are tricky fuckers. Unlike other creatures, even the weird and wonderful ones, demons have no soul to reap, as I’d naively thought. Oh no, they don’t make it that easy. Unless you’re the Grim Reaper himself, they have to be pinned down with magic, a holding spell or a demon trap, until you take the head. End of. Do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars, go right to the pit of hell. Express elevator.
Yeah, yeah... I know all the paranormal-type shows have exorcisms and the possessed body being returned to the original owner. No harm, no foul. It’s all bullshit. My knowledge “upgrade” laid it all out for me in neat little lines. Possession by a demon is permanent and nearly always fatal. The presence of something so black within a human body eats at the soul and destroys it utterly.
“Crap. That was intense,” Troy muttered behind me as he and Reilly got to their feet. The girl they’d been trying to protect was dead. I could’ve told them that before we got in here. Turning, I slid my blades, back to normal sized now, into their sheaths with a small snick.
“Yeah, you could say that,” I commented, a quick flick of my vision to the Shade showing the souls waiting to be dispatched.
Two were huddled into small balls, their arms wrapped around them as they rocked back and forth. Shock. Trauma. Call it what you will. Reapers call it death-shock, when a soul can’t cope with the transition from life to death. Happens often with violent deaths. I stepped into the Shade to deal with them quickly. The longer they’re like that, the harder it is on the soul.
The third though, was going to take a little more work. She lay on her back, in the same position as the body, even down to the intestines spilling out of her shredded abdomen. Black lines of corruption wormed through the soul construct.
Grimacing, I searched through my new knowledge. I was sure it had to do with the demon. Within a few seconds I’d found what I needed. I was right. The touch of the demon had shattered her soul, the black lines like acid from its touch.
Her heart would be gone as well, even though at first glance there was no way to tell in the bloody mess of her stomach. First stage to possession was taking the heart and eating it, another reason possession was always fatal. Nothing natural functions well without a heart. I checked the other two, but both souls were intact. The demon hadn’t gotten that far.
My frown deepened as I moved closer. I’d never seen anything like this before. The demon must have been new to this realm. They didn’t need to claw their way through the abdomen to get anyone’s heart, they could simply pluck it from the chest through the ribs if they could get close enough. I knew that without the advantage of my “upgrade.”
“What happened?” Reilly looked at me with expectation, not bothering to look at the scene.
Was he serious? I gave him my best blank look. “Killer clowns. From outer space.”
Troy snorted and then rapidly turned it into a cough. “Sorry, sir. Should have mentioned she’s got a unique sense of humor.”
I rolled my eyes.
“No, I was insulting him. What do you think happened?” That was leveled at Troy’s boss, along with my best stare. The one that’ll give a mirror a headache. Let’s just say nothing, not even a rattlesnake, wants to get into a staring contest with me. Some punk kid a few cities back had tried it, trying to psych me out in a bar. I’d let him stare right into the Grimm behind my eyes. I don’t think he stopped running until he reached the city limits. Three states over.
Reilly put the Glock away as his pale gaze swept the room. I didn’t miss the ease in the movement. The guy absolutely slept with it under his pillow.
“No signs of forced entry and they didn’t have time to run.” He walked between the bodies, not flinching from the sight, even when he knelt next to the girl without a face. It didn’t bother me that much what the body looked like. After all, it was only a vessel for the soul. By the time I got involved, there’s really no need for it. But normal humans could get a little squeamish.
Not this one. He looked right at the damage, not seeing the soul of the girl curled up in a little ball next to the body. He moved her hand, opening the fingers to reveal something hidden within. Picking it up, he held it out. Some sort of charm. I narrowed my eyes. The symbols on it seemed familiar.
“Looks like some sort of ritual. Here...” Troy eased the body of the last girl to die to the side. There, under the blood was something. “Looks like salt in some sort of design.”
“It was a summoning.” I stepped over the nearest body and looked around. The Grimm picked up what was left of the salt and overlaid possible designs in my vision, one after the other until we found something that nearly matched. “Crap. This is serious stuff. They were trying to reach the third hell. Some real nasty fuckers in there.”
“Third hell?” Troy’s expression was all sorts of curious. “What do you mean third hell?”
I walked around the edges of the design. “Just that. They were trying to call something from the third hell. There are seven but the third is like...Alcatraz. That’s where they put the ones even the king can’t control.”
“King...” Troy sat back on his heels. “They have a damn king?”
“Seven hells, one king.” I nodded, for once not inclined to poke fun. To say they were being brought up to speed rapidly was an understatement. “Nasty piece of work from what I hear.”
“Got something else here.” Reilly held up a book. Small and nondescript, bad vibes rolled off it in waves. My lips curled back.
“Yeah, spell book. Doesn’t surprise me. Three high-schoolers stumbling across a way to summon something from a hell-prison? Not happening. Someone put them up to this. And,” I nodded toward the book, “I’d hazard a guess that isn’t the only copy around. I suggest we find the others before someone manages to organize a full-scale breakout.”