Authors: Julie Kenner

Demon 04 - Deja Demon (38 page)

BOOK: Demon 04 - Deja Demon

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His brow furrowed as he considered me. “You’re serious?”

I nodded, tears in my eyes. “Could a demon have come in with Eric’s soul? After I used the Lazarus Bones?”

“I don’t know the answer to that, but what has he done to make you think this?”

I sank down in my chair, my fears seeming vague and abstract. “His temper, for one. It’s on edge. And it’s violent, too. And everything with Allie,” I added, taking a quick detour to explain everything that had happened recently. “Not only did he flat-out break a promise to me, he deliberately put her in harm’s way. He could have gotten her killed.”

“Anything else?”

“He’s spending a lot of time away,” I said, my voice small. “And then there’s all that stuff about the blackness within that the old lady from the carnival spouted.” I pulled my knees up to my chest and hugged them, wishing I’d grilled the woman more in the beginning. Now I would never have the chance.

“That’s pretty much everything, and I know you’re going to say I’m paranoid, but Father, I really think there’s something there.”

“I do, too,” he said, gently.

I looked up, surprised. “You do?”

“Guilt. Fear. A lot of emotions that make up a curtain through which you’re viewing David now.”

I tilted my head to the side, silently looking at him.

“I’ve met David, Kate,” Father Ben said. “Before and after you used the Lazarus Bones. He’s a good man. He comes to mass, helps out at the church.”

“Yes, but—”

“Kate, there’s nothing you’ve told me that’s not completely understandable. David—
Eric
—has been through a lot. And while we all strive to be calm and rationale, we are at the same time human. And humans can only bear so much.”

“His temper,” I said.

Father Ben inclined his head. “Under the circumstances, I don’t think a bit of temper is unusual. In fact, it’s probably to be expected.”

“But Allie—”

“He’s her father, and he’s been usurped from an authoritarian role. Even more than that, he has no real idea how to parent a teenager. His only point of reference is his youth. Your youth, too. So tell me, Kate. Are the things he has done with Allie so different from his experience as a teenager?”

“No, but—”

“I don’t think this is a demon issue, Kate. I think it’s a marital one.”

“Marital?”

He lifted his hands. “Granted, not the typical marriage, but some of the underlying issues are the same. Parenting. Boundaries.” He regarded me seriously. “Perhaps I can assist not as your
alimentatore
, but as your priest and counselor.”

Okay, this was really not the response I’d expected. “You’re talking
marriage
counseling? With David?”

“We could even start informally today. He left only a few minutes before you arrived. If we call him, I’m sure he’d be happy to turn around and come back.”

“He was here? Why?”

“Research,” Father Ben said. “He’s been spending some time in the archives lately.”

That was news to me, and despite Father’s attempts to soothe me, David’s surreptitious research and trips to Los Angeles were simply making me more nervous.

“Should I call him back?”

“No,” I said, standing up, and forcing myself to give due weight to Father Ben’s theory. “I’m overreacting.”

He looked at me, as if he weren’t quite sure he believed me. I wasn’t sure I believed me, either. Part of me wanted desperately to take Father Ben’s words to heart. Another part of me feared the worst.

“I have one more idea,” he said. “May I discuss this with Father Corletti? Perhaps he can reassure you in ways that I cannot.”

“Of course,” I said, pausing in the doorway. “I’m glad you’re here, you know. You’re a great
alimentatore
and a terrific priest,” I said. “Most of all, you’re a wonderful friend.”

I could see his answering smile in his eyes. “Thank you, Kate. That means a lot.”

“So you really don’t think my soul is in jeopardy?”

“For using the bones to raise David?”

I nodded, lips pressed tight together.

“As many times as you have saved us from Satan’s work, I tend to think that God will grant you at least one free pass. Okay?”

“Sure. Thanks.” I drew in a breath and stepped out of his office. I knew he was trying to make me feel better, but the fact that I needed God’s pass meant that I’d been right all along.

Someone was following me.

I’d left Father Ben’s office, then cut through the courtyard between the bishop’s hall and the cathedral. I’d been all alone. Now I heard footsteps behind me, and I whipped around, my hand in my purse, my fingers tight around the hilt of my knife.

Behind me, Dukkar raised his hands, a huge duffel bag hanging from one shoulder, his eyes wide. “Please, I do not mean to startle you.”

“What the hell do you want?”

“I give you this,” he said, dropping the duffel. He unzipped it, then reached in and pulled out a mass of filthy cloth, which he proceeded to unroll in the shadow of the Virgin Mary’s statue.

“The Sword of Caelum,” he said, his head inclined as he backed away. I looked down, then let out a little gasp of awe as I saw the beautifully forged blade and intricately jeweled hilt.

“It’s amazing. This is really it?”

“It is,” he said. “And it is to be wielded only by you.
The Hunter whose body and soul shall nurture and give life to the generation to come. That Hunter shall wield the sword and strike down the Decimator, sending him to hell and death for all eternity.
There is more,” he continued. “A mathematical component of which I do not know the details, but which our people have discerned to be this place. This town.”

He took a step back, waving his hand to encompass the duffel and the sword. “That,” he said, “is the nature of the prophecy. That,” he said, nodding toward the sword, “is for you.”

“The Decimator?” I repeated. “Goramesh? That’s who the sword will kill?”

“That is the demon for whom it was forged, yes.”

“Not Abaddon?”

He looked curiously at me. “No. Not Abaddon.”

I licked my lips, trying to make sense of this shift in information. “The old lady said she didn’t know anything about a prophecy or about a sword.”

“She hesitated to trust you,” he said. “I hesitate, too.”

“Why?”

“Because of
him.
He has the demon within.”

I trembled, not liking the sound of that. “And me?”

“You? You are not unmarked. But you are clean.”

Didn’t
that
sound great? “So you trust me with this?”

He hesitated, then nodded. “If the demon is to die, it would seem we have no choice.” He took a step back, inclining his head a bit as if I were newfound royalty. “I do not know that you are our best hope. But you are most assuredly our only hope.”

I cringed. Not exactly a rousing vote of confidence. But apparently the most that I could hope for.

Twenty

The Hunter whose body and soul
shall nurture and give life to the generation to come.

Pretty damn clear, all things considered. If Dukkar was right and the mathematical portion of the prophecy really did point to a geographical location in San Diablo, then I was the only Hunter here giving birth to anyone. Which meant two things—I was destined to strike down Goramesh with this sword, or die trying. And my daughter truly was the next generation of Hunter.

“Or Timmy,” Laura said, when I ran my reasoning past her.

We were sitting on the back porch, and now I looked sideways at her and scowled, not because her comment was foolish, but because she was right. Timmy didn’t have the genes of two Hunters, but that was hardly a strike against him. Most Hunters were recruited from normal families. Orphans like me who were trained by
Forza.

“And the wheel keeps on spinning,” I said. “First I lose my daughter, and then I’m going to lose my son.”

“You haven’t lost Allie,” she said. “A long way from it, I’m betting.”

“I haven’t seen her since last night,” I retorted. “She’s locked in her bedroom, pissed at me for grounding her—”

“And pissed at herself for deserving it,” Laura finished.

“Do you really think so?”

“Kate, she saw a bloodbath. And she’s not a stupid girl. She has to know your rules were to protect her. She blew it. She almost got killed. Yeah, I think she’s hiding in her room licking her wounds. It’s not you she’s mad at, it’s herself. And maybe David, too.”

“That makes two of us,” I said.

“Go tell her what you’ve learned. I mean, this Goramesh thing is huge, right? Abaddon is all over the place, but the prophecy applies to Goramesh. Do demons work together a lot?”

“No,” I said. “They don’t. That’s what has me worried.”

“So let her help. Tell her what Dukkar told you. Show her the sword. Let her be involved the way you want her to be. With books and the computer and weapons training until she really is ready.”

“You’re a good friend, you know?”

“Hell, yes.”

I laughed. “And modest, too.”

She cocked her head toward the back door. “Go ahead. I’ll go home and do the same. Maybe this is the break we need. An intersection between Abaddon and Goramesh. I can’t imagine what, but maybe something will spring out if we all start looking for it.”

She was right, of course, and as she headed back to her house, I headed inside to talk to my daughter.

I was sidetracked by the ringing phone. I considered ignoring it, but when I checked the Caller ID and saw that the call originated in Italy, I answered.

“Father Ben must have called you,” I said, after Father Corletti and I went through the usual greetings.

“He is worried about you,” Father said. “As am I. My child, why did you not confide in me?”

I sank down onto the couch and hugged a pillow, feeling all of seven years old again. “I was ashamed, I guess. I didn’t want you to know I was so weak. I mean, he was dead. And by every law of nature, he should have stayed that way.”

“You were weak, Katherine, I will not deny that. But that weakness does not stain you any more than being human does.”

“Really?”

“I promise I speak the truth.”

“But what about Eric? I didn’t harm myself, but what about him? I opened the same door the demons use, and—”

“And he used the same portal. It is not common, I will grant you that, but it is not unheard of, either. Eric himself had done it before, yes? Moving into David’s body?”

“Yeah,” I said, hesitantly.

“You simply opened a portal to allow that to happen again. And because it was the Lazarus Bones, the injuries to the body healed. But Katherine, the key is that you
allowed
it. You did not force it. Whether he remembers it or not, Eric ultimately made the choice to come back. And he returned for the same reason you used the bones.”

“Love.”

“It is a powerful magic in and of itself, is it not?”

I nodded, unable to speak.

“Eric is no different than he was before. If anything, he is stronger for having your love to lift him up. Do not take that away from him. If anything, he will need your strength now more than ever.”

“What do you mean?”

He paused, but I pressed. “Father, what do you mean?”

“Only that there are difficult times ahead for Eric. For David. He is the same man, and yet he is also different. He must learn who he is, and to do that, he will need a rock to hold him in place. You’ve always been that rock, Katherine. Can you still be there for him?”

“I think so.” I ran Father’s words back through my head.

“So Father Ben was right? Eric’s temper and the risks he’s taken with Allie—those are just him trying to work it all out? To deal with what’s happened to him and to figure out how to be the father to a Hunter-in-training?”

“You didn’t harm Eric, Kate. Trust yourself. For that matter, trust your instincts.”

I smiled, because now he sounded like he was giving me a
Forza
101 lecture. But my instincts were still tingling.

“Fair enough, but my instincts say you’re not telling me something.”

“There is one other thing,” Father Corletti admitted. “With the Lazarus Bones, the strength of the raiser imbues the raised, and they are forevermore connected, both in spirit and in some ways in body.”

“Which means?”

“Katherine, it means that David’s fate is now tied to your own. If you die, then David dies, too.”

“Dear God,” I murmured.

BOOK: Demon 04 - Deja Demon

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