Raven's Peak (15 page)

“We have been watching him and several others for months now. The last time he lived in Arizona, he had two Council guards watching over him to keep him safe. This time, he didn’t.”

It made sense because aside from Delaphene’s cell she hadn’t noticed anyone keeping tabs on Haatim. There hadn’t been anyone from the Council in the city aside from herself, as far as she knew.

“The only thing we didn’t account for was
you
,” Delaphene added. “Abaddon knew you were about to execute him, so he didn’t want to risk taking Haatim as a vessel right away. He thought he could keep Haatim close and use him to get you off the streets.”

“All Haatim had to do was take the bait.”

“And he did,” Delaphene said. “Yet he hesitated when he was supposed to turn the evidence over. I suppose his conscience got the better of him.”

“Lucky for him,” Abigail said. “I might have killed him myself if he went through with your plan.”

Delaphene shrugged. “Little loss there. We underestimated just how resourceful you could be. Arthur trained you well, it seems.”

Abigail frowned.

“Oh, a sensitive subject? And why wouldn’t it be, with Arthur languishing in hell—”

“What business is Abaddon on?”

Delaphene stared at her. “I can’t say.”

“Who sent him on it?”

“You
know
I can’t say, Abi. And even if I could, I wouldn’t.”

“Don’t say it’s because they’ll do worse to you than I will,” Abigail said softly.

Delaphene laughed. “Not worse, just for a
hell
of a lot longer. Is that all of your questions?”

Abigail hesitated. “Where is Arthur?”

“Ah,” Delaphene whispered, smiling. “I wondered how long it would take to get to that.”

“I know you don’t like him—”

“Like him?” Delaphene interrupted. “He destroyed
everything
I built. He brought my entire organization crashing down. And, worst of all, he stole
you
from me.”

“I was never yours.”

“You will
always
be mine,” Delaphene replied, and the conviction in her voice sent a shiver down Abigail’s spine. “It will just take some time for you to realize it.”

Abigail remembered being a little girl who was terrified of Delaphene and the others. She remembered the horrors and devastation that had been her life: they kept her locked in the closet when they weren’t abusing her…

When they weren’t corrupting her.

But she wasn’t that girl anymore. She’d been freed and shown a better way, and now her life was dedicated to sparing other people from that same fate. She’d come to terms with her past, and she was not going to be ruled by fear.

Abigail stood calmly and slid a knife free from her belt. She walked to Delaphene’s chair and knelt in front of it. The nurse had a concerned expression on her face now. She rocked the chair, trying to move it away, but it didn’t budge.

Abigail slid the knife forward and drew a small cut on the demon’s arm, a little over two inches long. Then she snapped off a few of the dry flower petals from the dried Verbena and began grinding them between her fingers. She chanted softly, closing her eyes.

“No,” Delaphene muttered, trying to rock the chair again. “No, don’t, please. It was just a joke. Please.”

Abigail reached forward, scattering the crumbled flower into the wound. The effect was instantaneous, a sizzling bubbling from the cut as though she’d hit the skin with a blow torch.

Delaphene screamed in pain, thrashing so hard veins popped out on her neck. She rocked in the chair, trying to rip her arm loose.

Abigail waited about ten seconds before walking to the table, grabbing a towel, and wiping the petals off the demon’s arm. It took a few seconds before the sizzling sound subsided and the demon stopped screaming. The nurse sat in the chair panting, head hung low and hair matted against her face.

“It doesn’t hurt the human,” Abigail said, holding up the remainder of the plant. “But I can’t say the same for the parasite inside.”

“They said you had changed,” Delaphene mumbled. Her eyes were bloodshot from popped blood vessels.

“They were right. Tell me where Arthur is.”

“I’ll tell you the same thing I told the last person who asked me that,” Delaphene mumbled. “I
don’t
know.”

Abigail froze, the knife shaking in her hand. The demon looked up at her slowly, realizing its mistake.

Abigail mumbled: “The last one?”

“Who was it?” Abigail asked, stepping forward. “Don’t lie to me.”

“I don’t know,” Delaphene replied.

“Was it Frieda?”

“No.”

“Greathouse?”

“No,” Delaphene said. “It wasn’t someone I know, which means you sure as hell don’t know who it is.”

“What did the person look like?”

“I never saw clearly,” the demon said.

“But they
were
asking about Arthur?”

“Yes,” Delaphene said in exasperation. “She wanted to know where Arthur had been taken. I told her that I don’t know because it’s somewhere we don’t go. It’s somewhere…outside. Beneath. I don’t know exactly how to describe it. The things down there are
our
demons.”

“Does Abaddon know who it was?”

“No,” Delaphene said. “But it is something which concerns him. The things down there…they don’t wake up very often, and they certainly don’t come up for air. Whatever is going on…it’s big, and it’s only going to get worse.”

“If you’re lying to me…”

“I’m not,” Delaphene replied quickly. “Look, for what it’s worth, I don’t think this other woman is trying to find Arthur to rescue him. I’m pretty sure she has something else in mind.”

“Like what?”

“Like finding out what took him to make a deal with them.”

Abigail was silent for a long minute, thinking about the possibilities of that statement. She remembered the creature that had been inside her all those months ago, the way it had utterly dominated her. The sort of power it could grant to a human being was…

Unthinkable.

“Does the Council know?”

“I don’t speak to the Council,” Delaphene said. “Maybe you should ask them.”

“I can’t,” Abigail said.

“Of course, you can’t,” the demon said. “Because nothing you’re doing right now is sanctioned, is it? They don’t know you’re looking into this, and they definitely don’t know you’re talking to me, right? They think you’re a good little soldier, behaving orders like you are supposed to. They don’t understand you, Abi.”

“Oh, and you do?”

“Most assuredly, I do,” Delaphene said. “I chose you for a reason. I saw your potential when you were a little girl. I knew what you could become. I had great plans for you, Abi, before Arthur stole you from me.”

“I’m nothing like you.”

“You’re
exactly
like me,” Delaphene countered. “Look around us. Look where we are. This is Arthur’s home. His sanctuary. And you are using it to treat with a demon. The foremost tenet of your Order is that you will
not
deal with demons, and yet here we are.”

“Be quiet.”

“You dishonor him—”

“Shut up,” Abigail said angrily, but Delaphene was ignoring her.

“You are betraying
everything
Arthur stood for in your pursuit to rescue him—”

“I said
shut up
!” Abigail said, stepping forward and backhanding Delaphene across the face.

She’d known it was a bad idea to bring Delaphene out here. She had too much history with this demon; never mind how connected Delaphene was to the underworld and what kind of information she had access to, she was dangerous. The problem was: Delaphene knew just how to push her buttons.

The demon stared at her, a red handprint on her left cheek.

“That anger,” Delaphene said, smiling knowingly. “That’s the part I miss the most.”

“Answer my questions, and nothing else,” Abigail said, forcing herself to calm down and take deep breaths.

“I did,” Delaphene said. “I told you everything that I know.”

“You are withholding something,” Abigail said. “You think you know me? Well, I definitely know you, too. I know when you’re holding out.”

“I’m not.”

Abigail held up the leaf. “The last time I left it only for a few seconds. This time, I’ll leave it for an hour.”

Delaphene hesitated. “That would kill me.”

“Little loss there.”

“Bravo,” Delaphene muttered finally. “I suppose there is
one
other thing you could try. It’s a trick I heard about long ago, and I’ve been wondering if it might help track Arthur down: intersect the link.”

“The link?”

“The one Arthur created with the girls. Their scars never faded, did they?”

Abigail shook her head. “No, they didn’t.”

Normally, the scars of a claiming wouldn’t last more than a day. Two at the most. But the scars on the three little girls had lasted through all of the months since Arthur first claimed them in the Church. Various doctors had tried to heal the sores, but they stayed open, uninfected but ugly marks on their foreheads.

“The link is still open,” Delaphene said.

“What good does that do me?”

“There is a way to bridge the connection. I can show you how to do it. You
might
be able to see where his soul has gone, and, who knows, you might even be able to bring him back.”

Abigail thought about it for a second. “Show me.”

“Only if you agree to tell me where he is if you find him.”

“Not a chance,” Abigail said. “But, I will let you keep this body for a while longer if you help me.”

“Deal,” Delaphene said. She rocked a little in the chair. “Do you want to remove these bindings so we can shake on it?”

By the time Haatim returned to the cabin Abigail was on the porch waiting for him. He had turned his phone on, but there was no signal out here, so he’d just turned it back off and slipped it into his pocket. They were in the middle of nowhere, so he hadn’t been expecting much.

Abigail looked unhappy and exhausted, leaning against the railing of the porch and staring out into the wilderness. She didn’t react to his approach.

“Is it…?” he started to say. “Should I walk some more?”

“No,” she said, “it’s taken care of.”

“Did you…?”

Abigail looked at him. “No, I didn’t kill her. Like you said, the human is innocent,” she said. Then she shrugged. “Mostly, and with a loose definition of innocent.”

“Then what did you do?”

“I found out some interesting things, and we have one more stop to make before we leave Colorado.”

“To do what?”

She walked over to the car and gestured for him to get in. He followed her over and then glanced back at the cabin.

“What about the…?”

“The demon?” she finished.

“Yeah.”

“I promised her I would let her stay in that body for a while longer. I never said I would let her leave the cabin. I locked her in one of the cages, and I’ll let her go when we get back.”

“Cages?”

“Prison cells,” she explained. “There are three down in the basement. Don’t worry, she has plenty of food and water.”

Haatim climbed into the passenger seat. Abigail turned it on and started rolling back down the dirt road. “Why are prison cells in your cabin?”

“For situations like this.”

“Does this happen often?”

“More often than you’d expect,” she replied. She started the car and drove out onto the dirt road. It was slow going with all of the potholes and uneven sections.

Haatim glanced over at Abigail.

“What?” Abigail asked.

Haatim hesitated. “Is she really a demon?”

“You saw what she is,” she replied. “Your own senses are your best judge, not me.”

“I don’t know what I saw,” Haatim argued, shaking his head. “But, I mean, seeing something strange that I can’t explain and seeing a
demon
are entirely different things.”

“True.”

“So why do you call it a demon?”

Abigail shrugged. “Habit,” she said.

“What do you mean?”

“What people call it depends on how they grew up. Different religions call them different things. Some people just consider them evil creatures and refuse to associate them with any religion. Some even worship them. I personally just think of them as demons.”

“Like hellspawn?”

“You could call them that,” she agreed. “Except not hell in any religious sense. Hell is an idea. The reality is ambiguous.”

“So, you call them demons because you are Catholic?”

“Not me,” she said. “My mentor was. The man who taught me about all of this stuff. He considered them demons, and it stuck with me.”

“So it’s the lens through which you view the world,” Haatim mused.

Abigail shrugged. “Sure.”

“How are things like that real?”

“No one thinks they are until they know better,” she said. “People are naturally ingrained to disbelieve in things like that.”

“Are vampires real?”

“In a sense,” Abigail said. “But we haven’t seen one in a long time. Same thing with werewolves and other creatures. Most of them have some basis in reality, but their stories have been blown out of proportion.”

“With social media things like this should be impossible keep hidden.”

“It’s actually easier,” Abigail said. “Doctored footage and trending topics mean people will believe anything they are told. It’s never been easier to spread propaganda.”

Haatim fell silent, wondering about that. On the one hand, it was hard to believe that demons and supernatural creatures could remain hidden, but, on the other hand, it did sound plausible. Just looking at world politics made it easy to believe that people could be tricked.

“Where are we going now?” he asked.

“You’ll see when we get there,” she replied. “It isn’t too far away and should only take a couple of minutes.”

“To do what?”

“Nothing too major,” Abigail said, glancing over at him. “On a side note: how do you feel about kidnapping?”

The car came to a stop next to the curb, idling just outside the playground on Miller Street. Haatim glanced out the window at all of the gathered children, running around and playing on the swings and climbing objects scattered throughout.