Chapter 17
CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN
SAMANTHA
I screamed as something slammed into me hard, tackling me to the ground. I didn’t feel pain—well, any more pain than the feeling of my body being slammed into the sidewalk—but my head didn’t hit the pavement. Something was under it.
There was the sound of a fight next to us, and then a wave of power hit me with enough force that it made my teeth tingle.
“Submit!” Dastien yelled, and there was a wolfish whimper.
I took that to mean Dastien had control of the rogue wolf. The weight on me lightened, and I looked up to see Phoenix raising up on one of his forearms. His hand slid out from under my head.
He’d saved me from being attacked. I honestly couldn’t believe it.
Phoenix tugged the other earbud from my ear. “Hi.”
“Hey.”
“You okay?” He studied my eyes, as if searching to see if I would tell the truth.
“I think so.” I took stock, but nothing really hurt. I might be bruised, but I’d take that over having my throat ripped out. “Yeah. I’m fine. Is your hand okay?” It’d cushioned my head.
“Totally fine. Maybe a little scrape, but worth it. I just didn’t want you to get a concussion.”
“Let me see.”
He held up the back of his hand. There was a small scrape, just a little blood. But it could’ve been so much worse. I gave it a kiss. “Better now?”
The dimple I loved so much peeked out at me. “For sure.”
“Looks like you’re good at more than just pulling me out of portals.”
He huffed a little laugh, brushing my hair away from my forehead. “I didn’t see that one coming though. Not from one of our group. Rookie move.” He hopped up and reached a hand down to me, pulling me to stand.
I glanced at our joined hands, and my eyes widened. “Oh, no.”
He shook his head. “It’s totally fine. I’m okay. I got your sight as soon as I tackled you, but remember that this isn’t my?—”
“First time. I know.” But why did I keep doing this to him? Although, to be fair, I didn’t know he was going to tackle me.
And he never seemed to mind. So, maybe it was okay. Maybe this was one thing I didn’t have to worry about anymore.
Tessa moved to stand in front of me. “Are you okay? I can smell a little blood, but?—”
“It’s mine,” Phoenix said. “My hand got scratched. No big.”
Tessa winced. “I’m sorry. That shouldn’t have happened.”
“We’re okay.” If I hadn’t been so open to the spiritual realm, I would’ve given her a reassuring hug. Instead, I gave her a smile. “He didn’t get me, and Phoenix is okay.” I scanned the group around me. “But we have a problem.”
“Yeah, no shit,” Garrett said. “What the hell is happening?”
He was right to be freaked out and angry. I wasn’t because I was used to dealing with evil things like this. But I had to fix this before I dealt with the portal.
“Who here is having negative thoughts?” I asked as I scanned the wolves. “Thinking I’m crazy or wasting your time or things like that? Anyone feel a heavy weight on their heart making it seem like this is useless or that you’re useless or anything like that?”
“Come on, Sam.” Tessa crossed her arms and shook her head at me as if I was crazy for mentioning it. “No one is thinking that. We know how this goes.”
“I mean, maybe you’re right? But if that’s the case, then what do you make of him?” I pointed to the wolf that Dastien had pinned to the ground.
One of the werewolves cleared his throat. “I am feeling all those things. What the hell are we even doing right now? We’ve been wandering around in circles for hours. We’re running out of daylight, and when that happens, we’re going to start dying. And you’re doing nothing . You have to hurry the fuck up.” The last word was more of a growl than anything.
Tessa started to argue with him, but then a few more chimed in.
It turned into a total pile-on with everyone except Dastien, Tessa, and Phoenix angry at me.
It was a good thing I didn’t get offended easily. I’d learned the hard way that people could only hurt you if you gave them that power. These wolves didn’t make the cut for that, and I could see what was wrong with them.
This wasn’t them. Being in an anxious rush? That was Satan’s work.
In a second, they’d realize that these weren’t their thoughts, and when they apologized later, I would accept and tell them to move on.
I pointed to the wolf on the floor. “He’s demon ridden, and the rest of you have ones whispering in your ears, telling you things, guiding your thoughts and emotions. I wasn’t wasting time. I was finding this place.” I pointed to the house. “You track things with scent. I do it through the spiritual realm. It’s trickier. But I’m here, and I’m helping you all. So, now you’re going to line up, and I’m going to clear you of demons.”
“You’re not going to hurt any of my wolves, right?” Max asked, and I wanted to be insulted. But I knew he’d lost wolves, so he was getting a pass.
“I’d never hurt anyone. You know that. We’ve worked together how many times?”
He started to say something and then stopped. His brow creased, and I knew that there was a war waging inside him—facts against emotions. Demons could twist things and lie, but they couldn’t change the truth.
Max had been acting weird since I saw him, and I wished that I could blame it on a demon, but I couldn’t. I had to assume he wasn’t himself because he’d lost some of his people. As the most alpha wolf here—aside from Tessa and Dastien—he must’ve been taking the responsibility of the deaths on himself.
When I was sure he wasn’t going to argue with me, I continued on. “Once I make sure all the wolves here are okay, I’m going to go knock on the door of that house.” I pointed behind me.
“That’s the house with the portal?” Dastien asked.
I turned back to make sure I hadn’t imagined it, and no. I hadn’t.
“Yeah.” This was it. I knew it.
The house didn’t have as many demons hanging around outside of it as some of the other ones in the neighborhood, but there were demons crawling out of the second story window over the garage. I’d seen demons coming from other houses in the area, but only a few here and there.
None of them were going into this house. All of them were leaving. All of them. Even if they were waiting for me to leave, they all wanted to get as far from that portal as possible. It fed them power, so it would be a source of fuel for newly released demons—and it could attract other entities that were waning in power for the same reason—but once they were ready, they’d leave. They wouldn’t risk sticking around and getting sucked back through it whenever it closed. Because all portals would close eventually. Even this one.
The portal was in there. I didn’t need to see it to know it.
“It’s not in the middle of the zone we identified,” one of the werewolves with a demon attached said. “You sure you have the right place?”
Yeah, I was pretty much absolutely sure. “I don’t know anything about zones.” It wasn’t like they’d shown me any maps. “But there’s an open portal in this house.”
“I’m going to find out who lives here.” Dastien stepped away, pulling out his phone to make a call.
“Great.” I didn’t care about that. It didn’t matter who it was. I’d clear the house one way or another.
First things first. I couldn’t have a bunch of werewolves affected by demons. That would work against me, as that other guy had shown. He was still in wolf form. Still on the ground. He snarled at me, but a wave of power came from Dastien, and he whimpered.
This wasn’t ideal, but it was fixable.
I had to have a unified front when I went into that house. I could go in there alone—that wasn’t the problem—but the werewolves wouldn’t let me. Not Max. Definitely not Tessa or Dastien.
Phoenix wouldn’t let me, either.
But I couldn’t fight against a bunch of unknowns and have wolves working against me all while trying to close a strong portal. Anyone with an attachment was a danger in this kind of situation.
I unzipped my belt bag. Time to fix this.
The werewolves were going to hate this next part, but I wasn’t messing around. Not when I wasn’t fully back to one hundred percent. I pulled out the vial of holy oil. “Everyone line up here.” I unscrewed the bottle.
“No way. That’s going to fuck with my sense of smell,” one of them said. “I can’t hunt if I can’t smell.”
“Good thing everything we’re hunting right now is on the spiritual realm, then. Right? Nothing for you to smell.” I gave him a smile and didn’t even care that I was meeting his gaze.
Werewolves had a thing with meeting gazes. Sometimes it started a challenge for dominance. I usually avoided it with any wolves that I didn’t know really well.
“Hang on,” Dastien said to whoever he was talking to on the phone, and he lowered it. “You want in on this, you do it her way. She came here to help us, and whether you know it or not, you’re about to make her job harder. That’s unacceptable.” Dastien stood before me and bent down so that I could reach his forehead. “Do what I’m doing.” I felt the power in his command to the other werewolves. He’d shoved it through the pack bonds that wove in and around all of the werewolves, tying them together. Some of them thicker, some thinner than spider silk, but all of them visible to me. And none of them immune to Dastien’s power.
I hated that he had to do it, but I was thankful for his help. I needed to get this done. And fast. Because they were right. It was getting later, and I wanted the portal closed before sunset.
I used the tip of the dropper to draw a cross on Dastien’s forehead. “For protection against all evil and spiritual guidance to lead them where they need to be. Let your Spirit speak to them, and send the enemy away. Amen.” Tessa was next. Then, Phoenix. I went down the line, repeating the actions on the other nine werewolves with us. I hadn’t studied all the werewolves that were there to pick me up, but I was pretty sure none of them had anything demonic around them until we started walking around, trying to find the portal.
The first six were easy—oil anointed and poof, the demon ran for the hills. The two that were being influenced fought harder, but an extra line of prayer had them running. But the one that was still on the ground, still in wolf form, was the one who had an attachment.
Garrett caught my eye, and I noticed he hadn’t moved since I anointed him. “You okay?”
“Yeah. This is maybe one of the weirdest things to ever happen to me. I just kept getting this feeling as we were patrolling around that we were wasting time. It was getting worse, but I felt…low, drained, and kind of helpless.” He shook his head. “You did your thing, and now that’s gone. I feel better, but I didn’t even realize I was feeling bad, let alone that a demon was messing with my head.”
“Demons are tricky, but I’m glad you’re feeling better. Now you know what you’re facing, and you’ll be stronger. Those are really good things.” I emphasized the positive, hoping that he’d focus on it instead of how creepy it was to know something was actively highjacking your thoughts.
I turned to the last guy. He was going to be a problem.
“Can you make him shift back?” I asked Dastien. “I really don’t want to fight anything with claws and fangs.”
“Sure. Someone go grab a set of clothes from one of the SUVs,” Dastien said as he tugged off his shirt. He held out a hand toward the wolf, and I saw power ripple through the pack bonds. The bond connecting this guy and Dastien was thinner than any of the others, likely because they weren’t in the same pack. Maybe Max would be mad I hadn’t asked him to do it, but I knew Dastien better and I knew he could do it.
The bond flashed bright and then pulsed. A second later the wolf shifted. It was slower than the normal shift. Usually it was so quick I couldn’t track it. But this time, it looked painful.
I had to look away, and by the time he was human again, he was panting and moaning.
Dastien tossed his shirt on the guy so he was at least covered.
I noticed Phoenix watching me and I raised my brows in question.
“I’m cool, but that was a lot.”
I shrugged. “Werewolves are drama.”
“Hey!” Tessa said. “Not all of us.”
I gave her a wink. “Eh. We’re all drama sometimes.” I found a shady spot under a tree—with no demons in the shadows—and sat. I leaned back against the trunk and closed my eyes. “Let me know when he’s decent.” I was going to take this moment to prepare, pray, and breathe.
Inside that house was something really, truly bad. Whatever killed the wolves wouldn’t be here—I didn’t think—but the portal itself was bad. By definition, any portal to Hell was bad.
A long time ago, I’d faced a similarly sized portal. It was what had caused Hunter to freak out and say some awful things to me. I know now that he’d been afraid, and I was the easy target for all the fear that turned into anger and hatred. I was sure the anger and hatred probably died off after a bit, but the fear that experience instilled in him likely stuck around for a while.
It stuck with me, too. But I didn’t get to run away. It was a necessary part of my job to go in and close the portal, even when I was scared.
I just had to do it right this time. No collapsing buildings.
A few minutes later, I heard the sound of running feet. “Here. I got the clothes.”
Another minute and someone tapped on my shoulder. I opened my eyes to see Phoenix squatting in front of me. “He’s ready.” He studied my face for a moment. “You okay to do this?”
I nodded. “Yep. It’s what I do.” Phoenix rose and took a step back so that I could get up from the ground.
As soon as I took a step forward, the werewolf started writhing. The only thing that stopped him from attacking me were Dastien and Max’s hands pinning him to the ground.
I studied him for a moment. I’d been so focused on finding the portal and taking care of evil that I hadn’t really looked at anyone of the pack while I worked. But now it was so obvious I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed it.
If I let something like this slip by me, then saving Van had really taken more out of me than I’d realized. That was a little terrifying. Not to mention dangerous.
I was going to have to do better.
I looked at Tessa and tapped my hand—our signal to watch the demon-ridden wolf—because I had a feeling he might need more than just Dastien and Max restraining him.
Her bond with Dastien lit up, and I trusted them to take care of the rest.
I moved to stand to the side of the pinned werewolf. I didn’t want to kneel in front of him yet—not until I had to—because werewolves moved really fast. If I got too caught up in what I was doing, I might forget what this man was capable of, which could get me into trouble.
He was tall, muscular—because all werewolves were beefy—and blond, but I didn’t think he was one of Meredith’s brothers. His hair wasn’t quite white-blond enough to be one of the Molloney guys. His eyes stared at me with anger. Anger that hadn’t been there a second ago. Then, they flashed from a bright blue to amber. Usually werewolves eyes just brightened with spiritual light when the wolf got close. It was the first time I’d seen the color actually change like that. I wanted to ask questions, but now wasn’t the time.
I held my hand over him, feeling for a tie between him and the demon because I couldn’t see any red strings. But honestly, there were so many pack ties when dealing with their kind that it was like trying to find one specific noodle in a vat of spaghetti soup.
After a minute of searching, I found it. “Ah-ha. Got you.” The demon tie was fresh. New. And I needed to cut it before it rooted deep into his soul. I held the tie tightly in my fist. “What’s your name?”
“Stephen,” he half-growled his name.
Fun times.
Dastien pressed fully with his hands, making sure that Stephen stayed down. He gave me a nod. He wasn’t going to let anything happen to me, and I trusted him to keep his word.
I nodded thanks, then focused back on Stephen. “Full name, please.” I tried not to sound annoyed, but I kind of was. I needed to let that go.
“Stephen Alexander Davidson.” His leg kicked out, and I jumped away.
“Garrett,” Dastien said, and Garrett moved in, grabbing his legs.
Another wolf came to help Garrett. He looked up at me, and I would’ve bet that he was wondering what the heck was going on. If I were him, I’d be wondering the same thing.
“Can I see what you’re doing?” Tessa asked. “Because Phoenix already can, right?”
I nearly jumped at how close she was. “What?” She wanted to see . Right now ?
Stephen started growling, but not like a wolf’s growl. It was a demon growl.
“Dastien did fine with it, and it’s not like I’m new to seeing strange things,” Tessa continued.
“I’m kind of in the middle of something right now.”
“Please.”
I thought quickly. Tessa was used to having visions. She saw things from the past and future, but she’d never seen the spiritual realm.
Tessa was a werewolf, a hereditary witch, and her mate had done okay with it. The chance that she’d lose it was slim to nil, and Dastien would help her on the off chance that she didn’t react well to it.
“Fine.” I closed my eyes, resigned to the fact that this could mess everything up. I held out my arm. “Touch my skin and you’ll see what I see for about the next thirty minutes. Maybe couple hours. That depends on you.” I felt her touch my arm, and then gasp, but I was focused on the demon.
The evil thing was tucked mostly under Stephen’s back, with its long, thin fingers wrapped around his head and its chin dug into the crook of Stephen’s neck, hiding its face.
Stephen might think he didn’t want my help, but yeah, he needed it.
I gave the demon a smile. “In the name of Jesus, I withdraw your hold over His servant, Stephen Alexander Davidson.”
He roared.
“You have no power in this realm.” I shoved my own power into the thin, red, glowing tie that snaked from the demon on Stephen’s back and wrapped around him until it disappeared inside his heart. I watched tie turned from red to pink.
“In the name of Jesus, I cast you out.” I yanked hard, then shoved a little more power down it, burning the tie to ash.
The demon launched itself at me, but I was ready, my feet braced.
Phoenix was yelling something, but I dropped to the ground and the demon flew over my head. I sprang up, running after it, tackling it to the ground. Pinning it with my knee on its chest.
“You have no power here.” The demon’s spindly arms and legs tried to shove me away, but in this position, the demon was weak. “You are weak, worthless, mortal.”
“Goes to show what you know,” I answered him in demonic. I regretted it instantly.
“It’s you !”
“Oh for fox sake.” I was tired. That was my only defense for doing something so stupid.
I punched it in the face. “ Aperta! ” I opened a portal next to us and rolled off the demon, kicking its side.
I screamed, “ Claudere! ” But as the portal closed, I heard the demon screaming the name I didn’t want it to scream.
“Astaroth!”
I sat on the ground for a second. “ Shitaki mushrooms . I’m a forking idiot .” Responding in demonic. What was I? New?
Sorry, God. I know those technically weren’t curses, but they felt like them. I could use a little help.
I popped up and ran to the door of the house and started pounding on it. “Hello! I need to talk to somone right now!”
“What just happened?” Dastien asked, but I didn’t have time to answer. I could feel them pacing the lawn behind me, but I was too angry at myself to look back.
Tessa was trying to tell him, but she wasn’t sure.
“Sam. Talk to me. What happened?” Dastien yelled from behind me.
“I gave away my hand. The demon called my father as I pushed it through the portal.” I banged on the door again. “I need inside. I have to close the portal before my father gets here.” I banged again. “Hello! Open up!”
“Move,” Dastien said.
I wasn’t sure when he’d gotten to the front door—it was like he wasn’t there one second, and the next, he was picking me up and moving me away from the door.
Dastien kicked the flat of his foot into the door.
Bang.
The door flew off its hinges, crashing into the wall beyond.
Dastien turned to me. “Do your thing, but use words.” He motioned to the doorway. “You have to communicate so that I can help.”
“Right. I’ll try.”
The house was dark and it reeked of mold and dirt and death. I took a few steps inside, and to my left, spotted a living room. There were children’s toys strewn over the carpet and?—
Wait. Toys ?
Toys meant kids .
That just blew all. I hated it when kids were involved.
Demons messing with kids was so much worse than when they messed with adults. They did so much damage to the innocent. Demons didn’t care about things in the mortal realm—like sleeping, bathing, or eating. Kids weakened really fast when they didn’t eat. From what I heard about how long this had been going on, I was scared about what kind of state a child who lived in this would be in.
And that meant I needed to speed this up. I had no idea where the people who lived here were, but there was a solid chance that they were in big trouble.
If they were still alive.
I hoped they were still alive.
“I’m heading to the room over the garage.” That was where I’d seen the most demons leaving. “Search the rest of the house. Restrain any mortals. Don’t engage. Don’t hurt them. No matter what they say or do. Just restrain. I’ll need to see them when I’m done with the portal.”
I turned to scan the werewolves, and they all nodded. From my quick count, we were already down two—the guy who I’d just helped, plus probably someone who’d stayed back to help him while he recovered.
Fine. It was still way more backup than I was used to having. Even when I was with the pack.
“Phoenix, Tessa, and Dastien can stay with me. The rest can search the house. I need a little space to do my thing.” I walked past the living room to the back of the house. I didn’t mind an audience exactly, but I didn’t really want a big one either.
I ignored everything that I was seeing—the demons, the ghosts, the mess and trash and gore on the floor in one of the hallways—and headed to the right.
Formal dining room. The table was turned on its side. The chairs were toppled over, two of them smashed to bits. Another was missing a leg. There was food and trash and rotting things everywhere. And something written on the walls.
I wasn’t going to look too closely at that. It was fully creeping me out.
“Man, this reminds me of that apartment,” Phoenix said. “The smell…”
“Yeah,” I said. “But this one is worse.”
“Yeah, because I can see everything from the start.”
“Actually, there were more demons that time, I think.” I wasn’t sure on that. Maybe it just felt like more because the apartment was smaller. “But this one feels darker. It’s the portal. From everything I’m feeling and seeing, it’s probably been open for a while.” I turned and found the kitchen.
The pressure was getting thicker with every step I took. This was the side of the house with the garage, which made sense. There had to be a stairwell that led to the room over the garage somewhere…
Sure enough, just past a little built-in dining nook, I found a back set of stairs.
As soon as my foot hit the bottom stair, I heard the screams. The demonic tongue. Felt the heat. Smelled the sulfur.
It seeped dark and heavy and helpless emotions, and I knew what I was walking into.
I really, really didn’t want to fall through that portal.
God. Give me strength.
I started up the stairs.