Playing With Fire (24 page)

I backed up to the pantry entrance, Sylvia behind me. Tommy stood at the scullery door and raised the knife.

Footsteps pounded along the floorboards. They grew louder.

Closer.

Ham rushed in, swatting Tommy aside as if he were a fly. Sylvia screamed. Ham came at me. I slashed out, striking him in the chest, but it didn't slow him down. He picked me up and threw me over his shoulder.

Sylvia screamed again. I screamed too and beat the brute with my fists. I clawed at his neck, pulled his hair. If it hurt, he gave no indication. He ran for the door.

Tommy launched himself at Ham's legs as we passed, but the demon kicked him away. Tommy landed awkwardly on his injured arm, face down on the flagstone floor, unconscious.

"Sylvia!" I cried. But it was useless. What could she do? What could any of them do? Jack was gone and the amulet with him. There was no one and nothing to stop the demon.

Sylvia's screams followed me all the way down the hall and out the door.

CHAPTER 14

Ham ran down the steps with me slung over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. It was an awkward, uncomfortable position. My ribs hurt, my head too as blood rushed to it. I shouted and hammered at his back, but nothing slowed him down. It was hopeless. He was taking me away, and there wasn't a soul who could stop him.

A gunshot fired. I felt Ham flinch, and I thought he'd been struck, but he kept running with me clamped over his shoulder. I looked around, but saw no one. Who'd fired the gun?

Another shot rang out and I glanced up in the direction it had come from—back at the house. Langley was at one of the upstairs windows, a shotgun pointed at the sky. He wasn't firing at us, thank goodness. I was as much a target as the demon.

Why was he firing at all?

I got my answer in the form of Jack and Samuel running out of the woods, Bollard loping behind. Langley had used the gunfire as a signal. Ingenious.

Jack was so fast he reached us well before the others. He punched Ham in the jaw and Ham stumbled, dropping me. Jack caught me, but quickly let go before the touch became one of desire instead of rescue.

"Run, Hannah!" He ordered as he threw another punch at Ham.

I did, only to stop in my tracks. Reuben Tate came toward me. He wasn't running. Indeed, his steps were labored, as if every one were an effort.

No one else had seen him. Bollard and Samuel had joined in the fight against Ham and were occupied. The demon was strong and every punch inflicted an injury. Tate suddenly stopped walking and looked at the house. At Langley.

Langley stared back. Raised the gun. Aimed.

Tate's Adam's apple bobbed, but he didn't move. He wore no hat and wisps of his white hair waved in the breeze. I held my breath and tensed, waiting for the crack of the gunshot.

None came.

Langley could have shot him if he were accurate enough. Yet he didn't, and I couldn't blame him for that. They'd been friends once. It would take a truly heartless man to kill someone, let alone someone he knew well.

Then I realized he was no longer looking at us, but at the woods. I turned. A scream caught in my throat. The other demon ran toward us at a rapid pace. Langley did fire then, but if the bullet hit the demon, it had no effect. It kept coming.

Tate moved again, faster than before, his face a picture of horror and revulsion. He stumbled twice, falling to his knees. He awkwardly pushed himself up each time with his one hand.

"Jack!" I shouted. "Jack, the other demon!"

"Demon?" Panic pitched Tate's voice high. "Ham! Here! Now!"

Ham obeyed, simply walking away from his opponents. They didn't go after him. All eyes focused on the other demon.

Langley fired again, but it didn't deter the creature. It wasn't afraid of the noise or of being hit. If any bullets did get their target, it made no difference. The demon kept coming. And coming.

It went for Tate first. He was the closest and the weakest, his missing arm making him more vulnerable. Tate squatted and folded in on himself in an attempt to be as small as possible. "Kill it!" he shouted at Ham.

Ham reached the demon before it got to his master. Then, for some reason, the demon backed away from him. Perhaps it recognized another of the same species and didn't want to fight. Ham was, after all, much bigger, although I doubted he was stronger.

The demon's small eyes settled on me. Unlike Ham, there was no resemblance to anything human in them. They were yellow and small, set wide apart. I saw no trace of the spirits of the children.

Fear turned my legs to jelly. My heart flapped wildly. I stumbled back, put my arms up to defend myself.

"Hannah!" Jack shouted.

Heat and fire roared past me. A fireball slammed into the demon, but had little impact. Unlike the first few times, it didn't scurry away. It had learned that fire couldn't hurt it.

"Hannah!" The shout came from Tate this time.

Jack grasped the amulet hanging from his neck and began the chant. The demon's eyes widened. It turned on him. Ran. Jack spoke faster.

The demon swiped at him, sending him to the ground.

"Jack!" I screamed.

He pushed himself up, stumbled and fell again with a grunt. "Amulet," he said on a groan.

It lay a few feet away in the mud. Samuel dove for it and began the chant anew. The demon raced at him and Samuel threw the amulet at Bollard. He caught it, but Samuel continued the chant.

The demon seemed confused at first, then must have decided Bollard was the weakest. It smashed a first into his face and Bollard crumpled to the ground. The amulet tumbled out of his grip.

Jack scrambled for it, but again the demon attacked. It pounced on him. Jack rolled and kicked out, striking it in its middle. Samuel continued to chant.

A muscular arm snaked around my waist and hefted me up. Ham!

Jack hadn't noticed. He and Samuel were busy fending off the demon and trying to send it back. I swallowed my scream. I didn't dare distract them.

"Get her away," Tate snarled at Ham.

I hadn't seen him up close in weeks, and the change in him was profound. Sweat made the hair at his temples damp. Dark shadows circled sunken eyes amid his pale face. He looked deathly. I wondered how long he had left.

How long I had.

I struggled against Ham, even though I knew it was useless. He was too strong. I kicked and scratched anyway and would have bitten him if he didn't hold me from behind.

"Come with me willingly," Tate suddenly said. "With your help, I might find a cure in time."

I stopped fighting and stared back at him. "Why did you do this to me? To yourself?" I wanted to scream at him that I'd been only a baby, but there was no point now. It was done, and I needed to save my energy.

"Many reasons." He glanced past me to Jack and the others. I dared not look. The demon's snarling and Samuel's chanting told me it wasn't yet over. "Come with me, Miss Smith."

My breaths came in short, sharp bursts. Ham held me tight, but didn't squeeze. I didn't feel tired, but I did feel weak. Useless. I hated it. "What will happen if I do?"

He glanced past me again. We both knew now was not the time for this discussion. "Just come with me!" he snapped. "Ham, go."

"No!" Jack cried out in anguish from behind me.

I turned, thinking he was watching Ham drag me away, but his attention was entirely on the other demon. It held the amulet between its claw-like hands and snapped it in half. Samuel finished the chant.

Nothing happened.

The demon's mouth split into what could have been a grin, but was little more than a stretch of the slit in its face. It tossed the pieces of the amulet away.

Oh God. What now?

Nobody moved. We were all too stunned. Our one chance lay broken and useless in the mud. The demon knew it too. It went for Jack.

I screamed.

"We have to get away," Tate said to Ham.

Ham dragged me off. I dug my heels into the ground, but my attempts were pathetic.

I watched as Jack managed to punch the demon over and over, but it had little effect and he was tiring quickly. I could see it in the way he stood, his shoulders not quite so square, his chest rising and falling with his hard breathing.

Bollard joined him, but he wasn't as fast or capable as Jack and the demon easily swatted him away.

Then Samuel spoke. "Look at me." His voice was compelling, smooth as silk.

I looked away, tried to break the compulsion to sink into his voice and do as he said. It wasn't easy, but I managed.

"Look into my eyes and listen to my voice," Samuel intoned.

The demon looked. Then it smashed its fist into the side of Samuel's face. His eyes rolled up, his lids fluttered closed, and he fell to the ground.

The demon turned on Jack. It swung at him. Jack ducked and spun so sharply that the contents of his pocket emptied into the mud. He got up and threw a punch at the demon, but he wasn't moving as fast as usual. He was exhausted. It was only a matter of time now. The demon would win. We had nothing to defeat it.

Oh Jack. God no. Please, please no.

Ham, Tate and I reached the edge of the lawn. I resisted all the way so our progress wasn't as fast as Tate would have liked. He urged Ham to run. The brute still held me around the waist, leaving my legs loose so that I was able to trip him. We tumbled to the ground, and he let me go. But only for a moment and not long enough for me to escape. He picked me up and swung me over his shoulder again.

I hung upside down. My cap had fallen off back in the scullery and my long hair skimmed the brute's thighs. I twisted and fought him, but it was no good. I began to cry, great wracking sobs that I couldn't control. Jack was going to die, and I was going to become another test for a madman.

"Bollard!" Jack shouted. "The knife!"

I looked up to see Jack catch the small knife he'd been carrying lately. It must have fallen out of his pocket. It wouldn't kill the demon, but perhaps it would slow it down.

The demon barreled toward him. Bollard jumped on it and Samuel too from the other side. But the demon kept going, on and on toward Jack. Just as it reached him, Jack stepped neatly aside and thrust the knife into its chest.

It stumbled and fell, taking Bollard and Samuel down with it. They scrambled up. The demon did not.

Then it did the most peculiar thing. It let out a piercing cry and began to disintegrate. It was like watching a pile of sawdust blow away in the wind. Within seconds, there was nothing left.

I gasped out a cry of relief.

Jack, still breathing hard, turned to us and ran. We had stopped to watch the demon dying, the sight mesmerizing everyone, but the sight of Jack approaching at speed set Ham going again. Tate too.

Jack was fast. I renewed my own efforts to release myself, kicking and hitting Ham to try to slow him down. It was working too. It worked so well that when Ham looked back, he stumbled and fell.

I landed on my hands and knees, mostly unharmed. I scurried out of his reach, but it didn't matter. He didn't try to grab me. He'd already got up and was facing down Jack.

Ham was clearly the stronger, and Jack was obviously weary, yet his supreme speed meant he dodged several of Ham's punches. It also meant he could duck and drive the knife into his opponent's body.

Ham's eyes widened. He began to disintegrate into dust, just as the other demon had done. It was all over in a moment. Ham was gone.

Tate too. He must have slipped into the woods while we were occupied.

Jack knelt in the mud beside me. "Hannah," he gasped out. "Hannah…are you all right?"

I nodded and dragged in deep breaths. I may not have worked hard, but my chest hurt from lack of air.

He pressed his lips together and clasped and unclasped the knife in his fist as if he were undecided about something. Then he pulled me into a brief, powerful embrace. Heat blasted me from the inside. Fire shot from my hands and Jack's too, only to extinguish in the damp grass and mud.

We sprang apart. I breathed heavily, trying to regain my composure. He swore and punched the ground with his fist.

"Jack," I said. "You did it. You killed both demons."

Samuel and Bollard came up to us. They looked as terrible as Jack. Hair messy, covered in mud, and bruises and cuts on their faces and knuckles. They both bent over and sucked air into their lungs.

"Wait here," Jack said, standing. "I'm going after Tate."

"Be careful," I called out to him as he ran off. "He may have a gun."

"He would have used it on us if he did," Samuel said, following Jack. Only Bollard remained with me, and I was grateful not to be left entirely on my own.

I couldn't take my eyes off the woods. I scanned the trees, looking for danger. My ears strained for any sounds, but the woods were silent. Bollard and I stood side by side, watching and waiting. I expected him to return to the house, but he didn't.

Eventually, after what seemed an eternity, Jack and Samuel returned. Without Tate.

"He's gone," Samuel said when he reached us. "We found hoof prints in the soil. He must have ridden away."

"Bloody hell," Jack bit off. He kicked the ground, gouging out a clump of muddy grass.

"At least Ham is gone," I said. "Tate won't have anyone to help him now. If that amulet belonged to him, it's useless." Yet I doubted that Tate had summoned the second demon. He seemed surprised to see it, nor could he control it the way he could control Ham. "Do you think it was Tate's doing?"

"We may never know," Jack said darkly.

Samuel cast a resigned look in the direction in which Tate had run off. "Going by his reaction, I wonder if he's innocent on that score."

"That means someone else summoned it," I said. "Who? And why?"

Nobody had an answer to that. The dreadfulness of the thought threatened to overshadow our victories, so I changed the subject. "How could that little knife kill those things?"

"I was wondering the same thing," Samuel said.

We didn't get an opportunity to discuss it. "Hannah!" Sylvia shouted from one of the windows. "Hannah, Jack, come back inside."