C. Murphy - Demon Hunts

No. I was wary, in this situation. I’d never been scared. The fear was Laurie, who had neither my height nor my strength, and who was much, much prettier than I was. Her anxiety pervaded the scene, though beneath it there was anger, too. Anger that she was afraid, anger that there was reason to be, and anger, I suspected, at knowing what happened next. Anger at being unable to stop it. I glanced at her, and she said, tightly, “This is where I don’t like to go.” Her neck was stiff with strain, like she was resolutely refusing to look over her shoulder.

I looked.

What I saw was the wendigo, talons between her fingers like I held my keys. What I saw was the beast’s loping form, her raging eyes, her starving soul now determined to hold on to the body it had taken. The unwilling dead were so greedy for life it hurt me, like a blade in the heart. The handful of people I’d met who had died well, or who had understood their fate, had slipped away comfortably enough, but those who had gone down fighting or in fear would do anything to reclaim what they’d lost. It was a terrible thing, that we lived in a world that made such unhappy souls. I took a step forward, half intending to intercept the miserable creature, but Laurie spun around, fear and frustration making her aura sour.

“David, leave me alone! How many times do I have to say it’s over? You can’t follow me like this. It freaks me out!”

I never heard what David said in return. The wendigo rushed her, so abrupt even Corvallis was surprised, which suggested that this wasn’t in keeping with her memories of what had happened with David. She shrieked, an aborted little sound, and her head cracked against the pavement with a noise like a plastic bowl landing cup-side-down.

For the second time in a matter of minutes, the wendigo sank into Corvallis’s body, leaving nothing of itself behind.

I fell back, horrified. In the Middle World, the possession had been bad, but it had suggested Laurie’s soul was out for lunch, leaving the body empty to be occupied. Here, in Corvallis’s garden, there was nothing but her soul to replace. The landscape started to shift, mountains and cedar trees ripping up from beneath the pavement. I staggered, using the spear for balance, and my eyes were drawn to it as an unpleasant reality hit.

I was actually going to have to kill her.

She folded her arms up to put her hands palm-down on either side of her head, and did a full body surge that drove her to her feet. I’d only ever seen anybody do that in movies, and thought it looked just as inefficient in real life as on film. Also, it meant she came at me ribs-first, body arched forward to get the momentum she needed to gain her feet.

I kicked her in the sternum.

I didn’t know why nobody ever did that in movies. Corvallis slammed right back to the ground, hitting so hard I went breathless. But whether it was the wendigo in control or simply that it was Corvallis’s garden, she didn’t stay down. I’d never seen a more classic stop, drop and roll, in fact, overlooking the fact that the stop and drop had been initiated by a boot to the ribs rather than being on fire. Look, it had been a good analogy. It didn’t need close examination.

She rolled to her feet a few yards away, which was a much better way of getting up. I went after her, bellowing, “Damn it, Corvallis, I don’t want to kill you, but I will if I have to!” I sounded like a parent threatening a child for its own good. I had yet to meet a kid who believed that. Either way, I brandished the spear, hoping it would cow her.

She grabbed it just beyond the head and yanked it toward her to capture the haft between her arm and ribs. I very nearly let go from surprise, then grunted and set my weight. I had at least forty pounds on her, and it should have been easy to knock her off her feet using the spear as leverage.

The bitch didn’t so much as tilt. I did a credible wendigo-sounding growl and shoved forward, managing to slide the spear and get myself a couple feet closer to her. I had no plan after that, but the Corvallis-wendigo did: she bared fingers whose nails had gone very claw-y, and slashed at my face. I dodged back, then kicked her in the ribs again, booted foot connecting solidly. She wheezed and her grip on the spear loosened. I yanked it away and backed up, ready for her when she pounced.

I had to give the wendigo this much: it wasn’t an original fighter. Even with me armed with a spear, its inclination was to come from on high and bear down its victim by weight. That was more effective when it was three hundred pounds, not a hundred and fifteen. I took a chance and swung the spear aside so it wouldn’t impale her, and straight-armed her in the xyphoid process instead.

Honestly, I couldn’t have done better if I were a professional wrestler. The heel of my hand caught her just above the gut and I let go the spear to grab her with my other hand and body-slam her to the earth. It would’ve been hugely more effective if we were still in the parking lot Corvallis had imagined up instead of in the wendigo’s preferred forest, but even so, it wasn’t half-bad. The blood rage faded from Corvallis’s eyes, and for a bewildered instant she blinked at me through a spray of snow.

“Corvallis! Is that you?” Fighting the wendigo was one thing, but I had Laurie’s weight pinned, and confidence, if necessary, in my own ability as a brawler over her barracuda-girl attitude.

I hadn’t counted on the possibility she knew how to fight.

She brought her feet up, caught me in the belly, and threw me over her head. I flew spectacularly until freshly-grown trees stopped me, and I slithered down them under a rain of snow and pine needles.

Corvallis was on her feet again by the time I looked up, pretty features all snarly. “I told you, David. It’s over. Don’t make me hurt you.”

Unwelcome comprehension unfolded a clear path before me. I had no idea at all what had happened with Corvallis and this David person, but everything about the scene had suggested something bad. That left me between a rock and a hard place, shamanically speaking, because if I kicked her ass now, whatever trauma she had to face might never get resolved. On the other hand, if it turned out she’d actually kicked his ass then, while reliving the victory would no doubt be good for her, it would be considerably less good for me.

And the truth was, there wasn’t really much of a choice. Power fluttered behind my breastbone, eager to help. If Laurie herself had an incident in her past she needed to deal with, I pretty much literally couldn’t refuse. I just hoped like hell that it was Corvallis, and not the wendigo, in charge of this particular boxing round.

That was all the time I had to think. She left the spear behind, for which I was grateful, but she delivered a roundhouse kick to my head when I pushed up from the trees. I was considerably less grateful for that, as I spun around to eat snow a second time.

Corvallis jumped on my spine, a hand fisted in my hair. I could have shoved her off, but I thought-hoped-she wasn’t going to kill me. Or David, whichever of us she saw. She leaned down and put her mouth by my ear. “I’m not the same girl I was back then, David. I’m tougher now. I learned how to protect myself. If you want to hit somebody, you don’t need to look for somebody your own size anymore. I’m willing to fight.” Then she lifted my head by the hair and slammed my face forward into the snow. I hit a tree root and saw stars, but her weight came off my back and when I rolled over, dizzily, it was to see her standing above me in triumph.

Her expression fell into confusion, though, as I worked my way toward sitting up. “Detective? What are you-” She looked around, clearly only seeing her surroundings for the first time. “Where are-?”