Destroyer of Worlds Read online

  Which left John feeling even more like shit than he already did. He just wanted to go home, get drunk, and forget everything for a while. But Caleb and Gray depended on him, so instead he planned on spending a long night hunched over scans of Brimm’s books and praying for a miracle.

  When he finally headed for his car, he spotted Sean a little way ahead of him, talking on the phone. “Sean! Wait up!”

  Sean ended the call abruptly and turned around. The parking garage lights painted his skin an unhealthy shade of mustard. “What is it?”

  He seemed tired, John thought as he approached. The smell of cigarettes around Sean was even more noticeable than usual. It reminded John of sneaking smokes out back at school, when they’d both been seventeen and stupid.

  “I just wanted to thank you again for the save earlier,” John said, stopping a few feet away.

  Sean pulled out his pack of cigarettes and took one out. “I shouldn’t have had to save you. Not from a fucking ghoul. Your head’s not in the game.”

  “I know.” No sense in denying it.

  “Is this about Caleb?” Sean asked bluntly. “Because if it is, maybe you should just take the next few days off.”

  “I’m worried about him,” John admitted. And Gray. But he couldn’t admit that, even to Sean.

  “Why?” Sean flung his arms out in exasperation. “Christ, he’ll be back Sunday. Forsyth told you so himself, right?”

  “Not technically.”

  “But he said they’ve got an exorcism lined up. Why are you freaking out?”

  The words hovered on his tongue. Because the whole situation at RD stinks, and Caleb’s in the middle of it, and I can’t do anything but stare at books until the wee hours of the morning.

  Because I’m in love with Gray and I can’t let him die.

  He couldn’t. Couldn’t say it out loud and see Sean’s shock, because who would ever understand? Even if he only told Sean the first part, his friend would want to know how he knew anything sinister was up at RD.

  And he trusted Sean, he did. But Caleb had asked him not to tell anyone he’d been in communication. John had already broken one promise to Caleb; he couldn’t bring himself to break another.

  “I just miss him,” John said. It sounded lame as hell, even to him.

  Sean eyed him for a long moment, but when John didn’t elaborate, he sighed. “You really do have it bad, don’t you?”

  “Yeah. I really do.”

  “A shame you couldn’t have met under other circumstances. If he’d come down to visit his brother instead of for a funeral, and you’d met in a bar or something…” Sean put his cigarette to his lips, realized he’d never lit it, and fumbled for his lighter.

  “I guess.” Except then John wouldn’t have met Gray…and hell if he’d ever had a more selfish thought in his entire life. “You’re right. I don’t have my head together.”

  Sean took a long drag off the cigarette, its tip glowing cherry red. “At least you admit it. Look, if you’re determined to keep at this, just stick with me tomorrow, all right? Tiffany can handle herself.”

  He didn’t like letting Sean babysit him, but getting killed by a ghoul wouldn’t help Caleb or Gray. “Okay.”

  “Glad you’re being reasonable. For once.”

  Sean started to turn away, but John stopped him with a hand to his shoulder. Pulling his friend in close, he embraced Sean, clapping him on the back. “Thanks, man. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

  “Get your face eaten off by ghouls,” Sean groused. But he returned the hug. “Go home and get some sleep.”

  “I will,” John lied. But as they headed to their separate cars, his heart lightened slightly. He might not be able to confess his feelings for Gray, but he knew without question Sean would always be there for him.

  * * *

  Caleb poked at his dinner and reflected at least he couldn’t complain about the food. He’d figured he’d be lucky if he got anything edible, or would have to put up with cheese burritos, or salads of nothing but iceberg lettuce and a slice of tomato. Even Jell-O because the cook didn’t realize they made it out of boiled-down pig skins.

  Instead, every meal had been, if not gourmet fare, pretty damned edible. No doubt part of Forsyth’s plan to keep him compliant—a trap baited with stir-fried tofu instead of honey.

  And a trap it was. The more “tests” he performed as the week went on, the more convinced of it he became.

  “I agree.”

  Taken apart from each other, the tests didn’t seem particularly menacing. How hard he could punch a steel slab. Whether or not he could break cables of a certain thickness. Just to measure his strength, they told him, nothing more. Just meant to rank a drakul in comparison to other NHEs. Harmless.

  Except, combined with the tests on spirit wards and a few other things, it didn’t seem harmless at all. More like Forsyth was trying to figure out how to restrain Gray once the possession became irreversible.

  Caleb pretended to cooperate, but held back every time. If no exorcism light waited at the end of this tunnel, he had no intention of becoming a permanent guest of RD. At least there didn’t seem to be any empaths here. Why, Caleb didn’t know, but he would have been fucked on day one if there were.

  He wanted to leave. Every day they stayed ran the risk it would be the last, if Forsyth decided he had enough data and tried to trap them. Not knowing exactly what the man had in mind, Caleb couldn’t be sure a trap wouldn’t hold them, even given his deceptions.

  “We have not yet found the demons.”

  I know. Caleb took a bite of tofu and kale, the simple flavors bursting on his tongue. Eating wouldn’t be the same without Gray. Although at least he’d have garlic again. Believe me, it’s the only reason I’m not heading for the hills right now.

  “There are no hills in this area.”

  Yeah, thanks for the update, Captain Literal.

  “If you mortals would simply say what you mean, I would not need to correct you.”

  Caleb rolled his eyes. Just a little while longer and you won’t have to deal with my mortal nonsense anymore.

  Gray stilled. “No,” he agreed, small and quiet. “No, I will not.”

  Chapter 5

  John stared at the screen of his tablet, willing his hands not to shake. The scanned page it displayed came from one of Brimm’s books, an old, crumbling volume written in medieval Latin, which itself seemed to be a translation from some other work.

  The study of paranormal entities and how to deal with them barely qualified as science even now, and the old texts were as full of wild ranting and religious mania as anything useful. More, sometimes, and sorting out reality from superstition could be nearly impossible.

  The tome’s title, Dealings With Angels and Other Higher Beings, hadn’t seemed remotely promising. John left it until nearly last, certain he’d find only the personal philosophy of some heretical monk or alchemist inside. But almost as soon as he opened it, he came across a diagram of a circle startling in its familiarity.

  It was the circle Brimm had trapped Gray in, the only thing John had yet seen which successfully contained the drakul. And if that was legitimate, something else in the book might be as well.

  The tome had no index, of course, or table of contents, forcing him to go page by page, translating slowly and making notes. The unknown author mixed a great deal of wild talk in with the rituals, mainly speculations on the nature of NHEs. Which, as the text dated from medieval Europe, cast them as angels and devils. He had the feeling Gray would find the whole thing absurd.

  Several different exorcism rituals were scattered throughout, most no different than a dozen others he’d encountered. But one caught his attention.

  “For the exorcism of higher orders of demons, two or more exorcists must work together,” he read aloud. “One must fuel the circle with his blood as described.”

  Blood. Drakul were blood-drinkers. And two exorcists…

  He read through the ritual c
arefully several times. Yes. This was it. This was what he’d been looking for all along.

  He knew how to exorcise Gray.

  * * *

  Friday morning, and Caleb had hoped like hell to be on his way out of here by now. Instead, he walked with his guards into an area he hadn’t seen before, down a sharply angled corridor, which seemed to lead deep underground. The dank concrete walls echoed with their footsteps, and the sodium lights painted everything an ugly shade of piss yellow.

  Utilitarian, even for this place.

  A heavy door barred the end of the hall, the kind used on bank vaults, eight inches of solid steel and probably alarmed to hell and back. The hair on Caleb’s neck prickled as the guards led him through. What are they hiding down here that needs to be guarded like Fort Knox?

  The air beyond the door swam with demonic miasma: rot and corruption, roses gone to slime, even the freezer-burned meat smell of a wendigo. The door wasn’t for keeping anyone out. It was to keep things in.

  Caleb’s stomach cramped with hunger, and Gray hovered just beneath the surface, ready to manifest at any minute. Ready to hunt.

  No! His heart thundered—from panic or elation? We can’t—I mean, you can’t! Don’t give Forsyth a reason to toss us in a new cell. Or trap us here. Now the tests punching the fucking steel plate made sense, after seeing the door.

  His teeth burned, and the tips of his fingers tingled, fangs and claws aching to slide free. “They are here all around us! We must hunt.”

  If you do this now, there won’t be any more hunting, not ever, because Forsyth will decide we’re too dangerous to keep around. Or he’ll throw us down here with…these others.

  Gray didn’t like it, but he subsided a bit, enough for Caleb to focus on something besides hunger. Other smaller halls cut off to either side of the main corridor, all of them with security cameras and guards. Caleb peered down one casually. Heavy doors opened to either side, each with a hatch set into it. For feeding?

  Was Forsyth out of his goddamned mind? There were dozens of demons down here. Maybe hundreds. These people should have been exorcised, or given the release of death if it was too late. Who would keep them like this, trapped in cells, meat puppets for the demons within? And hell, what about the demons yearning for all the tasty human flesh just on the other side of their cell doors? If something went wrong and they got loose somehow, RD would find itself overwhelmed by a small army of monsters.

  An army.

  Christ. Was Forsyth building an army? Just like Brimm, on a larger scale?

  But why? Against what enemy? Forsyth wasn’t Brimm, locked away in a moldering house, slowly going insane in the middle of his pet ghouls. A huge operation like this would take government funding on a massive scale. Someone else must know about this.

  Brimm. What had he said? “SPECTR isn’t what you think.” It had worried Caleb at the time, but he’d listened to John’s reassurances.

  John. No way did he know about this. He’d never go along with locking up NHEs, still inside the humans they’d possessed. Such cruelty went against everything he believed in, everything he stood for. If he found out…

  It would break him.

  They came to a halt in front of another door. The guards opened it and motioned Caleb through. Apparently, they weren’t coming with him.

  Not reassuring, actually.

  “Do they mean us harm?”

  They all mean us harm. The only question is if it’s immediate or not.

  Caleb stepped through, and found himself in a large, round room, somewhat like the sunken floor of an amphitheater. Smooth concrete walls, twelve feet high, enclosed the area he stood in. Above them stretched a thick glass barrier, beyond which were a couple of rows of seats.

  Caleb walked slowly to the center of the pit-like area, staring up at the watchers behind the glass. Forsyth was there, of course; he gave Caleb a smile and pressed an intercom button. His voice came out of a speaker mounted on the pit’s wall.

  “Good morning, Mr. Jansen!” he said cheerfully. “This will be your final test before your exorcism tomorrow.”

  Caleb managed a feeble smile. “Um, great.” No way a test in a place like this would be anything but awful. “What do I need to do?”

  “I’ve had the pleasure of seeing the drakul in action, but we’d like to make observations in a more controlled setting.”

  Gray perked up. “We will feed?”

  Unease roiled Caleb’s gut. Sounds like.

  “What do you mean?” he asked aloud.

  The door behind him opened again, and he quickly stepped away and turned to face whatever came through.

  To all appearances, only a man joined him. Early twenties, brawny, dressed in fatigues and with a military-style buzz cut. But he stank of rancid fur and spoiled musk. Like a demon.

  Like food.

  The man—soldier? SPECTR agent?—flinched back at the sight of Caleb, and some of the color left his skin. But the door behind him had already shut.

  Seeming to realize no escape existed, he straightened and forced a sneer onto his square features. “What the fuck is this thing?”

  His demon must have been able to smell Gray. No wonder he’d flinched—it must recognize Gray as a predator and want to get the hell away. And of course this douche decided he had to mask his fear with aggression.

  “Your opponent,” Forsyth replied simply.

  Shit. Not good.

  The possessed agent smiled, although it looked more like a forced grimace. “I’ll rip his fucking head off. Hear me, monster? You’re going to die.”

  “Monster? I am no monster.”

  Caleb wasn’t about to debate semantics. Even as his heart started to pound and his teeth ache, he backed up, hands held before him. “Die? I’m not fighting you. Forsyth, this guy is still human! He can still be exorcised!”

  With a low, animal growl, the man charged.

  * * *

  The mortal alters as he charges. His teeth overfill his mouth, his eyes darken from blue to dirty black, and his nails become claws. Not a full shift to werebear, not yet, but he is close to the end of his time. The demon’s scent intensifies, and every instinct tells Gray he should leap upon the creature, sink his teeth deep, and drink up the energy carried on the mortal’s blood.

  But he has learned a few things in his time with Caleb. Perhaps it is all mortal foolishness, but there are complexities to the world, to his decisions, he did not understand before. One of these, one of the first he learned from John, was not to kill the possessed if they could still be saved.

  He darts to the side, his reflexes faster than the werebear’s, at least as long as it doesn’t have complete control of its host. It lumbers through the spot he had occupied, turning with a snarl, the mortal’s face something less than human but not utterly monstrous.

  “Desist,” Gray orders. “I will not kill you, but you must stop this foolishness.”

  Instead of listening, it rushes him again.

  “Let me”

  Caleb’s telekinetic power shoves the werebear back hard, sending it sprawling across the concrete.

  This display is absurd. What does this Forsyth wish to prove?

  “Hell if I know.” Caleb’s unease bleeds through them both. This cannot be anything good.

  The werebear snaps up, berserker rage clouding its eyes. One hand darts to its belt, and it draws out a gun.

  “Oh, that’s not fucking fair.”

  Without the kevlar-lined coat, nothing slows the punch of bullets through their legs and torso. Bone splinters, shredded muscle screaming in agony, and they collapse to the merciless concrete.

  Gray is becoming annoyed.

  Bone is still snapping back into place when the werebear plows into him, claws mauling his chest. Its rank breath gusts into his face, and hunger spikes, because healing this living body takes energy. They must feed.

  His fist connects with its face before it can bite. Its grip loosens. He uses the single leg which works at t
he moment to kick it hard in the gut, shoving it away. He rolls over, veins knitting, muscle reconnecting, until he’s back on his feet.

  “Christ, let’s not do that again.”

  Agreed.

  He takes the fight to the werebear, not giving it a chance to gather itself. Grabbing one arm, he wrenches it back violently, dislocating at least two joints. The werebear roars in agony, but its lust for death is greater than its pain, and it swipes at him with the other arm.

  He catches its clawing hand and snaps the wrist.

  It bites at him in its frenzy, but it is no threat now. He seizes it by the hair, dragging its head back. The pulse beats enticingly in its throat.

  “Go ahead.” Forsyth’s voice is tinny over the loudspeaker. “Feed.”

  Careful not to exert too much force, Gray raps the werebear’s skull against the concrete floor, hard enough to stun but not to kill.

  It goes limp, eyes glazed. Satisfied it is no longer a threat, he lets go of its hair and steps away. Lifting his gaze, he stares up at Forsyth through the thick glass.

  “I do not kill those who can be saved,” he says. He folds back into Caleb, and leaves the mortals to their confusion.

  * * *

  Caleb’s heart still pounded overly fast when the guards left him inside his apartment-prison.

  What the hell was Forsyth’s game? It almost seemed as if he’d wanted to see how far he could push Gray. And the hyper-masculine jerk who’d be lucky if he regained use of both arms…had he been a volunteer? He’d obviously thought the test was of his speed and skill, his chance to show off. Had no one actually told him what he’d be facing? Or had he just thought he’d be good enough to kill Gray first?

  Would they exorcise the man now? Or leave the demon inside, and put him in with all the others?

  We have to get out of here.

  Gray stirred. He’d been grumpy and out-of-sorts since the confrontation, not that Caleb could blame him. Gray was hungry, and angry, and…

  And he wanted to go home.

  Except there was no “home” for him to go to. The condo and John were Caleb’s home, not his.