Unbreakable (5 page)

Lukas watched me from across the table, measuring my reactions. “The demon isn’t sending them after just anyone. He wants them to kill specific people. And you’re one of them.”

It didn’t make any sense. “Why me?”

Jared had been pacing the room like a caged animal since we came inside. He stopped and turned to his brother, a silent question passing between them. Lukas nodded, and Jared took something out of his pocket. A tattered sheet of yellowed parchment, the creases so deep it practically fell apart when he unfolded it.

Jared slid the paper across the table. “Have you ever seen this?”

A hand-drawn symbol filled the center of the page. It reminded me of a music stand with two lines curving upward, each capped with a triangle like the devil’s tail. “No.”

“Are you sure?” Jared’s eyes drilled into me.

Of course I was. A basic image composed of three continuous lines wasn’t a stretch with a memory like mine. Not that I was admitting that to them.

I studied the symbol for their benefit. “I’d remember something like that. Are you going to tell me what it is?”

“It’s a seal.” Lukas took the silver coin he’d been toying with earlier out of his pocket. It looked like a quarter, but
the image was different. His fingers rose and fell in a steady rhythm as the coin rolled over them and back again. “Every demon has a unique seal, like a signature. It’s used to summon and command the demon. This one belongs to Andras.”

Now the demon has a name?

Jared reached for the page, and his hand grazed mine. He yanked it away like he was allergic to human contact, and shoved his hands in his pockets.

“Ever heard of the Illuminati?” Lukas asked.

The name was familiar. They were one of those conspiracy groups featured on the History Channel all the time. “Like the Knights Templar?”

“They were both secret societies, but the Templars fought
for
the Catholic Church, and the Illuminati wanted to destroy it.”

I paused before asking the next question, testing out the words in my mind. There was no way to make them sound right. “What do they have to do with the demon?”

The one I don’t know if I believe in? The one that’s trying to kill me?

“I’ll give you the short version, but it won’t make sense unless I start at the beginning.”

I stayed quiet, encouraging Lukas to continue.

“In 1776, five guys in Bavaria formed the Illuminati. They wanted to take down the governments and churches so they could create some kind of new world order. They
targeted the Catholic Church and decided that killing the pope would be a good place to start.”

“So they were insane?”

“Pretty much.” Lukas leaned forward, resting his arms on the table. “The church formed a secret society of its own—the Legion of the Black Dove. Five excommunicated priests with orders to destroy the Illuminati.”

I wondered if Lukas had seen too many of those documentaries. “Why were they excommunicated?”

“Different reasons.” He gave me an awkward half-smile. “Let’s just say none of them played by the rules.”

“Five people doesn’t sound like much of a legion.”

Jared stopped pacing. “It’s a reference from the Bible. Jesus met a man who was possessed, and he commanded the demon to tell him its name. The demon said, ‘My name is Legion: for we are many.’ ” Jared’s deep voice grew quieter. “The ex-priests called themselves the Legion to remind them of what they were fighting. And of what they had to become in order to win.”

I didn’t know where they were going with this.

“But there was a problem,” Lukas said. “Since no one knew the identities of the Illuminati members, they were impossible to stop. So the Legion turned to a grimoire.”

“A what?”

He watched me for a moment before answering. “Grimoires are texts that provide instructions for communicating
with angels… or summoning and commanding demons. The Legion used one to call Andras.”

Angels? Summoning demons?

I stared back at him, speechless.

Lukas walked over to the empty cabinets and rummaged around, unearthing a forgotten coffee mug. He filled it with water from the faucet and handed it to me. “I know all this might sound unbelievable—”

“You think it
might
sound unbelievable?” I stood up and leaned against the refrigerator behind me, the bite of cold metal spreading up my back. “Which part? The fact that demons exist or that one’s trying to kill me?”

“When you say it like that, it does sound kind of stupid,” Lukas said. “But it’s still true.”

Before I had a chance to respond, the radio on the counter switched on. The dial turned and the needle moved across the stations, snippets of voices and songs distorting into a single progression.

“There’s a storm warning—”

“—electrical storms tearing across the sky—”

“—three deaths reported—”

“—killed tragically—”

“—looking for salvation—”

Finally, it stopped on an Alice in Chains track, a single line repeating slowly over the crackle of static.

“Ain’t found a way to kill me yet—”

The cord dangled from the counter.

Unplugged.

“Ain’t found a way to kill me yet—”

Lukas reached out his hand, urging me toward him. “Kennedy—”

The wooden cabinets began to rattle, and the faucet turned itself on full blast. Steam rose from the sink. Jared shouted something, but I couldn’t hear anything except the ominous message repeating over and over.

“Ain’t found a way to kill me yet—”

Something metallic glinted in my peripheral vision. A knife block sat next to the stove, directly across from the kitchen doorway. I hadn’t bothered to pack it because it weighed a ton.

The black handles of the knives were still secure in their slots. Except for one.

A steak knife hovered above the counter. It turned slowly until the blade faced Lukas. For a moment, it didn’t move.

“Ain’t found a way to kill me yet—”

The knife tore through the air.

“Lukas!” I screamed.

He pivoted as the blade hit the doorframe, catching the edge of his jacket.

Another knife slid out, the serrated edge skimming the wood as it pulled free.

Jared ran toward me. “Move!”

“Ain’t found a way to kill me yet—”

The garbage disposal whirred to life, spraying hot water
from the sink all over the room. I shielded my face with one arm and reached out for Jared blindly with the other.

The second knife landed next to me, with the clipped sound of metal against metal as it hit the fridge.

Someone grabbed me around the waist and hauled me out of the kitchen. I wiped my eyes, hot water trailing down my neck. I caught a glimpse of his army jacket and realized it was Jared. He was soaked, water running down his face, a single-minded focus propelling him forward. Jared’s hand locked on my hip, his fingers pressed against me, as if nothing could break that hold.

Lukas was at the front door, yanking on the handle. “It won’t open.”

I glanced through the kitchen doorway. The remaining ten knives drew themselves from the block one by one and lined up in the air.

There was no way we could dodge that many.

“Get out of the way.” Jared released me and pushed his brother aside. He pulled the duct tape-covered gun out of his jacket and fired three shots at the base of the door. Steam poured from holes where the salt rounds gouged the wood.

He looked at Lukas, who was already backing up. “We have to break it down.”

Jared and Lukas charged the door. Their shoulders slammed into it simultaneously, but the hinges only groaned. They backed up again.

This time, I threw my body against the door alongside theirs. I heard the wood crack and felt myself falling.…

I skidded across the front walk, my hands burning as they scraped the pavement. I waited for the world around me to stop swaying before I turned back to my house.

Lights flashed on and off inside like an insidious form of Morse code.

“Kennedy.” Fear and panic warred in Jared’s eyes. He grabbed my hand and pulled me up. “We have to get to the van.”

Lukas was already halfway there.

I couldn’t take my eyes off the house as I ran. It was alive—breathing, consuming, destroying. The kitchen windows exploded, spraying glass all over the sidewalk.

Jared yanked the van door open and shoved me across the bench seat toward Lukas. The air in front of the house started to move like the tide pulling back from the shore—sucking broken glass, splintered wood, and potted plants up the sidewalk and into its jaws, as the house took one long, devastating breath.

“Look what it’s doing.” Lukas’ eyes widened.

The supernatural force pulling everything inside suddenly stopped. The air in the front hall started to churn like a tiny cyclone, our welcome mat and one of my sneakers caught in the brown whirlwind.

Inside, the lights flickered faster and faster.

Lukas glanced from Jared to the house. “Hurry up.”

Jared fumbled to get the keys in the ignition.

“What’s happening?”

A surge of air burst from the hallway like a bomb exploding, tearing what was left of the front door right off its hinges and expelling everything the house had sucked in.

The van pulled away from the curb. I stared out the back window watching as other doors along my street opened, my house growing smaller and smaller.

Was I really leaving with them?

It wasn’t a question anymore.

I had made my decision when I became more than just a girl with a dead mother—somewhere between the girl in the white nightgown, the knives flying, and the cyclone in the hallway. I was a girl whose mother was taken from her by something supernatural.

And something evil.

T
hat was the nastiest poltergeist I’ve ever seen.” Lukas looked out the window one last time like he hoped to catch another glimpse.

“It’s the only one you’ve ever seen.” Jared kept his eyes on the road, his expression tense.

“Whatever. That was some serious energy.”

They were talking about it like a hurricane or a tornado, but it wasn’t some uncontrollable natural disaster. It was completely
unnatural
, controlled in a way I didn’t understand. And judging from Jared’s comment, they weren’t experts either.

I wrapped my arms around myself.

“Are you cold?” Lukas started to take off his jacket.

“I’m fine,” I said.

We both knew I was lying. It was December, and I was wearing my standard uniform, skinny black jeans and a thin gray T-shirt. I would’ve killed for a coat, but I didn’t want them to see how far from fine I really was. Lukas didn’t push.

Maybe he sensed how lost I felt. Lukas and Jared had at least some of the answers, and I didn’t even know the questions. But after the last few hours, I was too exhausted to try to figure them out.

I leaned heavily on one arm, and my hand slid across the seat and bumped into Jared’s. Our fingertips touched for a second. He glanced down at them before I pulled away, folding my hands awkwardly in my lap.

“So what happened back there?” I asked.

“A poltergeist,” Lukas said.

“Like the movie?”

“Did it feel like a movie?” A reassuring smile played across Lukas’ lips. Jared never seemed to smile. Aside from their clothes and Jared’s scar, it was one of the few ways I could tell them apart.

“Not one I’d want to see again.” I tried to relax, but it was impossible with my body wedged between them.

“That movie was actually pretty accurate. Poltergeists are paranormal entities that feed off energy—electrical, mechanical, even human—and use it to move objects and cause some serious damage. No one knows exactly what they are, but they’re not spirits.” It sounded like Lukas was repeating something he read on one of those paranormal websites.

“I still don’t understand what one was doing in my house.”

They both looked away.

“You guys showed up in my bedroom out of nowhere, shot my cat with a gun that looked like something from a video game, and told me that a demon’s trying to kill me. Want to explain how you could possibly know that?”

Jared looked over at me. “Because our family has been fighting his army for over two hundred years.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Andras can influence vengeance spirits, and he uses them to do what he can’t—hurt and kill the living,” Lukas said. “The Legion vowed to protect the world from those attacks.”

“You mean like those ghost hunters on TV?”

Jared frowned. “More like exorcists.”

“I thought exorcists help people who are possessed by demons… or whatever.” I wasn’t ready to start talking about the devil. I sounded insane enough already.

“Anything can be possessed—places, animals, even objects,” Jared explained. “And demons don’t have the market cornered. Spirits possess things all the time, like your cat.”

I didn’t want to think about it. I hoped that Elvis was curled up in front of the fireplace in one of my neighbors’ houses.

Lukas squeezed my shoulder gently. “Exorcists are like supernatural exterminators. If something is hanging around
that isn’t supposed to be there, they get rid of it. For the Legion, that’s a full-time job.”