Demonized (13 page)

“There, see? No poison,” she said lightly. “Now, is your dog going to behave himself if we leave him up here alone?”

I glanced at Mutt. He glanced back forlornly, and I couldn’t help but think that if he could talk, he’d be warning me just like the Voice. Well, no, not just like the Voice. Mutt would say something like, “Well, Ethan, this is another fine mess you’ve gotten us into.”

“He’ll be fine,” I told Tamsin. “He’s fully house-trained.” He’d never pissed on my carpets, anyway.

She cast Mutt a warning frown and beckoned me into the kitchen. Next to the fridge-freezer was a sturdy-looking wooden door that I guessed led down to the basement. My unease returned as I remembered the last basement I’d been in. Back in Shoregrave, chasing down a child-killer, I’d wound up locked in a basement with a hungry ghoul. The whole experience had been pretty traumatizing. So I hesitated before following Tamsin down the stairs.

“Ethan? You okay?” She paused in the doorway, one hand on her hip. It was a seductive pose, especially combined with those soft lips and dark lashes. Some of my tension lifted. Really, it wasn’t like going down to a basement with a hot chick was going to end badly, right? I had my gun. I’d be fine.

“
You’re an idiot. You deserve to die.”

The Voice sounded fainter than usual, pushed to the back of my head. A result of Tamsin’s tincture? I did feel kinda…looser, calmer. “I’m peachy,” I assured her as I followed her down the stairs.

The basement was a bit witchier, a bit more clichéd. A red light bulb swung from the ceiling, casting a bloody light around the room. The walls were painted black, with silver pentagrams and crescent moons. I saw a few shelves on the walls, lined with jars of various sizes. In the red light, it was hard to tell what was in the jars–they were just weird shapes. There was a chalk circle on the pale stone floor. The circle had a pentagram in it too, with a candle at each of the five points of the star. One red, one blue, one green, one yellow, and one white. It looked a little fluffy-Wiccan to me, but the energy of the place felt real.

It thrummed in the warm air, dark and wicked. The red bulb made the small basement feel smaller, claustrophobic and sticky. I could imagine people dying down here, sacrificed and chopped up. The Voice stirred, telling me again to run, but it sounded far away and felt sluggish. That was quite nice, actually. I could almost remember what it was like not to have the demon in me at all. I didn’t like the heavy drowsiness settling over me, though, turning my body to lead. “What was in that tincture again?” I asked Tamsin as she set about lighting the candles.

“Fruit and herbs, mostly. Stand in the circle, please. Don’t smudge the chalk.”

To my surprise, I stepped into the circle without debating it. The air snapped around me, like a door slamming. I was vaguely aware that I didn’t like that, but I couldn’t decide what, if anything to do about it.

Tamsin smiled at me, that predatory, calculating look back on her pretty face. “Give me your gun,” she ordered.

I handed it over without a thought. Even as I did, I knew I shouldn’t, knew I’d regret it, but I couldn’t have refused. The instinct to obey her was as natural as breathing. I was in big trouble. I knew I shouldn’t have drunk her home-brew shit.

“And your phone,” she added, and I handed that over just as meekly.

I’d always had this idea that I’d know if I was being hypnotized. That it would be like a hand reaching into my skull, or a pressure behind my eyes, warning me someone was invading my mind, but I didn’t feel a thing except the desire to do as I was told. Maybe I was just used to not being alone in my head, so I didn’t notice Tamsin’s magic tincture taking effect. The only real clue I had was that the Voice fell utterly silent.

I figured the fact that that scared me meant I was totally fucked.

Tamsin placed the gun and phone on an empty bookshelf, and paced around me, studying me with sharp eyes. I moved with her, not sure if that was my choice or hers. We did a full circle before she spoke again.

“Demon-infused blood, demon-infused bones and organs...I can’t believe you just walked through my door!” she laughed.

I tried to speak, tried to say something pithy and witty, but she snapped her fingers and shook her head. I couldn’t open my mouth.
Crap
.

“Take off your coat and shirt,” she ordered. I obeyed mindlessly, wondering if this was where all the zombie myths of Haiti came from. I felt like a zombie, dead-limbed and doped-up. I dropped my coat and shirt on the floor, and she hissed at me.

“Watch the chalk!” She snatched the garments up and tossed them aside. Then she reached out to lift my arm up, running her nails up and down my skin. “Traditionally a Hand of Glory came from a hanged man,” she told me, “but a demon-infused Hand of Glory should be more than adequate.”

I found myself staring at the jars on the shelves again. My eyes had adjusted to the weird light down here, and it was now impossible to mistake the contents for anything other than what they were.

Organs.

I couldn’t put a name to them all—I flunked biology after an argument with my teacher over who the biggest cock-sucking moron really was—but I felt pretty sure I stared at kidneys and hearts mostly. My stomach lurched and with a massive effort, I forced a single word from my stiff lips.

“Rhian.”

Tamsin smiled sadly. “Poor thing. She was so miserable, so messed up. It was a mercy killing really.” She let my arm fall and scooped up my jacket to rummage through my pockets. She pulled out my wallet and laughed when she saw my PI license. “I should have known. I heard Baxter ranting about hiring an investigator, but I figured he’d drop it.”

I was dimly aware of Mutt barking at the basement door. Tamsin glanced that way too, frowning. “We’ll have to deal with that mongrel too, I guess.”

I felt a little stirring from the Voice then, moved by the threat of violence. Funny that Tamsin muttering about chopping off my arm didn’t get the demon excited, but the thought of her butchering my dog did.
Bastard demon
.

Tamsin went to one of her shelves and plucked a fuck-off huge knife from next to a jar of what I really hoped weren’t eyeballs. She grabbed a piece of black velvet too, and wiped the blade down before returning to me. She acted so fucking calm and cool, it chilled me. She’d done this before, plenty of times. Not just Rhian, but the other girls Anna and her team had found. I guess I could take some comfort in knowing I was going to be chopped up by an expert.

She trailed the point of the knife down my chest lazily, smiling at me. “I should siphon off some blood first, I guess. Demon-infused blood will give my potions a real kick.”

I tried to say something else, but she shook her head and my tongue froze in my mouth. My gaze fixed on the blade, and it was all too easy to imagine it dripping with my blood. My stomach twisted and the Voice stirred again, like an echo down an alleyway. It gave me a weird flush of hope. I’d learned in Shoregrave that the demon let me take a hell of a lot more punishment than I could handle on my own. If I could find a way to shake off Tamsin’s compulsion, I might stand a chance of escaping here with all my organs intact.

Of course, I had no idea how the hell to shake off the compulsion, and I wanted to figure it out before she started hacking pieces off me.

With a swift motion, she slashed the blade down my chest. Blood welled at the cut. I wanted to swear in pain, but silence still locked me in. The pain sent a jolt of life through me to the Voice, bringing the demon closer to me, like it moved through my head to stare out through my eyes at what Tamsin was doing.

What she was doing, I realized was carving a pentagram on my chest with slow, deep cuts. The pain turned to agony, and all my nerves burned. The Voice found the sight of my blood sliding down my skin pretty enticing though.

“
Luscious. Like sweets.”

The Voice sounded foggy. I guessed as messed up by the compulsion tincture as I was in its way. I felt a sudden kinship with the demon. Probably a sign I was about to die a violent death.

“I can feel the demon in you,” Tamsin told me as she carved her symbol. “I can’t decide if it’s for or against this though.” She took a step back to look me in the eye. “I’ve never done this before,” she added.

I wanted to ask which part, but it was obvious what she meant. It struck me that she was a little scared. Under that calm surface, beneath that happy slasher exterior, Tamsin didn’t really know what to do with me, didn’t know what to do with the demon.

I tried to think of a way I could use that to my advantage. I hadn’t thought of anything by the time Tamsin shrugged off her doubts and started slicing me up again.

Upstairs, Mutt now dug at the door. His claws raked at the stone floor, and his frantic barks echoed through the wood. Maybe he’d do a Lassie and run for help, or crash through the door to rip Tamsin’s throat out.

Tamsin finished carving her pentagram and swore as Mutt began howling. “He’ll have the whole neighborhood knocking the door down,” she muttered. “This is a no pet rental.”

So pets were bad but human sacrifice was okay
? I made a mental note to avoid this neighborhood when my own lease was up.

Tamsin poked me in the chest, at the center of the pentagram, twisting the tip of the blade in. A driving pain shot through my heart. I gasped for air, wavering on my feet and wishing like hell I could punch the bitch in the face. She smiled at me and snapped her fingers. “Lie down. I’m going to take care of your damn dog.”

I collapsed to my knees, pain racking through my body like a heart attack. Once I was on my knees, it was easier to keep going than stop, so I ended up in a fetal position on the floor. I wrapped my arms around myself as if I could suppress the pain that way.

I watched Tamsin stride to the stairs. Her pointy heels clacked on the stone. I was scant inches away from the edges of her precious chalk circle. Agony washed through me in waves, making it hard for me to concentrate on what I knew should be obvious. I gritted my teeth, listening to her climb the stairs. I had seconds to do something and I didn’t know what to do.

“
Break the circle,”
the Voice ordered me, still sounding drifty and distant, but getting stronger, looking for control. “
Break the circle and we can break her neck for daring to try and control us.”

Oh, so it’s “us” now, is it
? I tried to unfold myself, but I felt like cement coated me, my limbs heavy and my head fuzzy. It felt like a hangover, but without the fun of getting pissed and humiliating yourself. Normally I’d deal with a hangover by eating a lot of cold pizza and watching a lot of bad movies, but I needed a quicker fix here.

Tamsin was halfway up the stairs. I wanted to weep with pain, but I didn’t. I let the Voice take over.

It felt like setting my brain on fire. Like at the church, I saw flames and shadows rise at edge of my sight, and felt heat lick at my body. The Voice pushed me to the back of my head, and I felt the alien force of the demon slide in and take over. The Voice laughed through my mouth, the sound ugly and hoarse. It stopped Tamsin in her tracks. She turned back to look at me with shock on her face.

“What the fuck...”

The Voice laughed again, and I felt some of the heaviness lift from my arms. I flexed my fingers, as relief rushed through me. I could move. Okay. If I could move, I could get out here. I’d save the niggling issue of whether I could take over from the Voice again until after my daring escape.

Tamsin rushed down the stairs toward me, but was too late to stop the Voice from reaching out and smudging the chalk circle.

I heard a crack like distant thunder, and all those shadowy figures rushed in to crowd around me. Hellish howls and moans filled the room, and I swear I heard a faint rattle of chains. The Voice laughed again, full of wicked delight as Tamsin stopped short to gaze at me in horror.

“What have you done?” she cried.

“You think you can cut me up like your hookers and whores and steal my organs?” the Voice snarled at her, pulling my body up to its knees. “You think you can drain my blood for your spells and potions, witch? Try me.”

On my feet now, I lunged at Tamsin. My hands curled into claws to rip her apart. I caught a handful of hair as she shrieked and tried to shove me off. Her eyes darted to her shelf of horrors, and the Voice and I both knew instinctively we had to keep her away from it. Who knew what magic she could fling at us with the right jar of pickled eyeballs in hand?

She raked her nails down my chest, drawing fresh blood from the oozing knife wounds. I flinched, but the Voice simply soaked up my pain and her desperate rage, drinking it down like the best malt whiskey.

“Fight me,” the Voice mocked, pulling her in close to wrap my hands around her throat. “I dare you.”

To her credit, she did. She kicked and spat and clawed, trying to free herself, while we choked her. She had no chance. Even without the Voice, I would have been physically stronger than her. With the Voice breaking down all those pesky inhibitions I had about hitting women, Tamsin was helpless, as long as we kept her from her magic tools. Those might even the playing field.

Out of the corner of my eye, I watched the shadowy demons creep in closer. Tamsin’s frantic gasps luring them in. With the Voice riding me like a seaside donkey, I had more access to its thoughts and memories, and I picked up that these creatures were more cacodaemons, called from the Netherworld by the promise of pain and misery. Fright flickered through me, quickly stamped out by the Voice.

“
Death. Torture. Her blood spilling over our hands. That’s all we want,”
it snapped at me, distracted from Tamsin for a split second.

That split second of distraction was all she needed to knee me hard in the groin. I winced, and even the Voice didn’t like
that
pain. Our grip on her bruised throat slackened, and she shoved me away hard, sending me stumbling into the crowd of cacodaemons. They clawed at me with hot hands, pulling me to the floor so they could crawl over me like cockroaches. I shrieked and tried to bat them off, but there were too many, a black, boiling swarm. I flashed back to when the Voice first possessed me, that sickening jolt where my whole world fucked itself, and wondered if any more demons could find room inside me.