Diana Rowland - Fury of the Demon

“How could you not know?” I asked, keeping my question nice and vague.

“They didn’t bring the poor child in until after we summoned Isumo.” Grief clouded with anger touched her voice. “I agreed to assist Aaron and the others with the summoning, not with what they did after .”

Something I needed to be warned about? An act related to me she wanted to stop, but couldn’t? The poor child . . . Isumo . . . I stared in numb shock as the disjointed fragments lit a spark to illuminate a hideous picture. The rakkuhr trap in the semi-trailer. Isumo Katashi. And Idris’s murdered sister, Amber. It had to be.

Mzatal’s already-heavy aura rose in a choking wave, backed by an ominous growl unlike anything I’d ever heard from him before. Rasha paled and clutched weakly at the counter as she swayed. I caught her arm, then shot Mzatal a warning glare. Stop! She’s about to fucking drop dead!

With seething anger barely contained, Mzatal turned and strode away down the hall. I felt his deep turmoil and knew he distanced himself from her now for her benefit as well as his own. Extending, I touched him with what little reassurance I could offer. He’d read something terrible from her, but I’d find out soon enough what that was. For now I returned my attention to the shaking woman beside me.

She inhaled, and her trembling eased. I felt the flicker of calm like a soothing touch and realized she’d pygahed.

“Rasha, tell me who Aaron is.”

Her fear evaporated into anger. “Aaron Asher.” She spoke his name with such contempt that I half-expected her to spit on the floor. “An arrogant, disrespectful son of a bitch. Once a colleague and student of mine.”

My eyes narrowed. “Brown hair pulled back in a ponytail? Dresses in stupid flowy poet shirts?”

At her nod, more of the terrible picture lit up. Aaron Asher was Mystery Man Twenty-two, who at times brought Rasha’s granddaughter, Jade, along with him to Farouche’s plantation. Moreover, we’d seen him with Idris in the video clip from the airport near Amarillo.

I reviewed Rasha’s words and filled in the gaps. Rasha had assisted Asher and “others” with the summoning of Katashi, after which Amber had been brutalized and murdered and rigged with the rakkuhr trap. Which meant Katashi had to have brought the rakkuhr with him, direct from the Mraztur, prepped and ready to place on the young woman as a trap for me.

“When did Asher come here?” I asked. “When did you help him summon Katashi?”

“Almost a week ago,” she told me. “Monday. Yes, it was Monday, mid-afternoon.”

Only a few hours before I arrived on Earth, and within the same time frame as the disruption in the flows that Mzatal had pinpointed—a disruption based in Austin and with hints of Idris’s signature. “Who else was with Asher?” I asked, well aware that my voice had gone hard. “Who else helped you summon Katashi?”

Fear shone in her eyes again, but it wasn’t the perfectly natural fear of imminent destruction by a demonic lord. This was a more subtle, more insidious fear, and one with which I was all too familiar.

Son of a bitch. Farouche . Like a “getting warmer” clue in the game of Hot or Cold, the fear in her eyes told me my question prodded uncomfortably at Farouche’s interests.

I leaned close. “Was the other summoner a young man with curly blond hair?”

She trembled in my grasp and swayed again. Hot, blazing hot! Nailed it first try. She opened her mouth and fought to answer, but her trembling only increased.

“It’s all right,” I said, voice softening. “You don’t have to tell me.” Her reaction told me all I needed to know. Idris had indeed been here with the others.

Her shaking subsided, but cold sweat dotted her upper lip. I glanced back at the two silent and watchful men.

“Could y’all please take Rasha to the living room so she can get off her feet?” I asked, then gave the woman a smile as Bryce and Paul came forward and gently took her in hand. “I’ll be back in a few minutes,” I told her. “Everything’s going to be all right.”

It wasn’t until they left the kitchen with Rasha that I allowed myself to look upon the full horror of all that happened here.

My chest tightened, and I had to remind myself to breathe. Amber Palatino Gavin had been murdered here in this house, with her brother, Idris, present.

I went in search of Mzatal and found him in the room at the end of the hall—Rasha’s summoning chamber. A permanent base diagram had been beautifully etched in the clay tile of the floor, and Mzatal stood atop it now, head lowered, hands in fists at his sides, and black fury roiling through his aura.

“Did he see it?” I asked, had to ask, though my voice quavered. “Did Idris have to watch his sister’s rape and murder?”

Teeth clenched, Mzatal lifted his head. His eyes met mine, and within the rage and pain and guilt that burned in them lay my answer.

“Show me,” I whispered hoarsely. He looked away, and I moved to him, seized his hand. “Boss, show me. I need to know what you read from her.”

He didn’t move for another several heartbeats, then finally laid his fingers against my temple.

Images and impressions from Rasha’s memories tumbled through my mind, and I fought the urge to pull back from the disorienting wave. A heartbeat later I felt him focus, and the influx eased and resolved.

My hand remained clenched on his as I processed the flood of visions and sounds and emotions, slipped into the flow of the woman’s memories.

Idris leads us in the summoning ritual. Tsuneo and Aaron assist while I anchor. It is kind of the boy to leave that aspect to me. So very difficult to work the potency strands with hands stiff with pain. Talented and adept as well as kind. The summoning is smooth and perfect . . .

Isumo arrives, his face contorted in agony. He carries a sigil like nothing I’ve ever seen. Red and chaotic and twisted. It feels wrong, but my questions and protests are ignored. Isumo calls for “the girl,” and my confusion rises as two men enter with a bound and gagged young woman . . .

Idris is horrified. Amber , he shouts, and while Isumo and Aaron place the girl within the diagram, Idris struggles wildly against the men who brought her. Now I learn it is a death ritual, to be used to entrap one called Kara Gillian. I protest and refuse to assist, beg Isumo to reconsider. I do not understand why he would follow such a terrible path, yet he orders me removed from the chamber— my chamber. Tsuneo and Aaron take me out, and I see one of the other men look toward the girl with an ugly smile. He straightens and unfastens his belt . . .

I sit in the living room. Isumo calls for the sigil to be placed in her . Rakkuhr, he calls it, and even the word feels unclean. I hear her weep and Idris beg mercy for her. Then cries and screams punctuated by sadistic grunts of pleasure. Then there are only screams and whimpers. For hours I listen and despise myself for not interfering, for doing nothing while they abuse her . . .

Finally, silence, save for a low murmur of voices. After a few minutes the door to my chamber opens, and Tsuneo and the one with the ugly smile come out carrying a black body bag . . .

What can I do? Terror fills me at the mere thought of calling the police. I am a foolish and useless old woman, and the girl’s blood lies on my hands as heavily as any of them. The men leave through the garage with the body bag and do not return . . .

Idris is led out, shoved forward to sit on the couch. He does so, numbly, as if he has no fight left. “We were following node emissions,” he murmurs, stricken. “I was cooperating. They didn’t have to do that.” His voice is so hollow and lost, yet I think perhaps he has much fight yet within him, more than they can imagine. Isumo and Aaron finish in my summoning chamber, and then they all leave . . .