Bryan Smith - Soultaker

The boys traded a single quick glance, then surged through the narrowing space between doorjamb and door. Jake cursed and pushed back against them. His feet slid on the hardwood floor. He was older and stronger than either of them, but it was two against one and a losing battle. He threw all the strength of his upper body into the effort, but his feet continued to slide backward. Then the girl who looked so much like him joined them and the battle was lost. Jake let go of the door and staggered backward as the three intruders came stumbling into the house. The girl threw the door shut and turned the lock.

Jake struggled to catch his breath. He looked at Kristen. “Go…out the…back. Run to the nearest…neighbor. Call the cops.”

But Kristen just stood there. Her eyes pleaded with him. Rescue me, they said. Please make this go away. He’d been angry before, but now he was shaking with barely checked fury. He burned with the need to beat the shit out of these little snots for putting her through this so soon after the trauma of losing her brother.

The taller boy recognized the promise of violence in his eyes and held up his hands. “Whoa, whoa. Hold on. Just listen to me for one goddamn minute, okay? If you still want us to leave after I’ve had my say, we’ll get out of here and figure something else out.” The boy had been panting, too. He paused to catch his breath before continuing. “That fair enough?”

Jake held his breath and counted to ten. He unclenched his fists. “No. I’d rather take those popguns and shove ’em up your fucking asses. But I just want you gone, so I’ll take you at your word. Have your say and get the fuck out.”

The tall one tucked his gun in the waistband of his pants. He looked Jake in the eye and said, “This has to do with your brother, our friend Trey, and his demon girlfriend.”

The other boy said, “He means that, by the way. Literally.”

“Excuse me?”

The tall one said, “Trey’s girlfriend is a demon. A for-real demon. She feeds on the souls of young people, and later this afternoon she’ll pig out on the students of Rockville High.”

“The Harvest of Souls.” The girl stepped closer. The eyes that so resembled his own shone with a startling intensity. “I only learned about it last night. They’re telling the truth. I wouldn’t have believed it myself, but last night some things happened. Incredible, horrible things. And now I know. Demons are real. I’m half demon myself, you see.”

Jake blinked slowly before his eyes went wide.

He felt as if he’d been slapped.

He surprised himself with a laugh. “Is this a joke?”

The girl and the boys exchanged glances. They fidgeted a little. Jake tried to find some meaning in the silent communications passing between them. Some instinct told him they were far too earnest to be lying. They knew their story would sound absurd to other ears, but they believed what they were saying. Maybe they were on drugs. No. Jake knew drugs, was very familiar with the effects of all major narcotics and hallucinogens. Dope wasn’t the culprit here. A simple solution occurred to him and it made him groan inwardly. These were just kids, after all. And perhaps very gullible or suggestible ones.

“If this isn’t some kind of stupid prank or joke-”

“It isn’t!” the girl snapped.

Jake held up a hand to head off any further outbursts. “Chill a sec, okay? I take it you’re all aware of what I do for a living?”

The girl blew out a breath. Her features conveyed disdain. “What? Are you supposed to be somebody important? I never fucking heard of you before today.”

One of the boys said, “You write horror novels. I’ve read them. I liked the first one.”

His friend said, “I have them, but haven’t read them.”

Jake smiled. “Okay then.” He directed his next comments at the girl. She was the most volatile of the three and he figured he should establish a more intimate rapport with her. “And no, I’m not important. I’m nobody. You haven’t heard of me? Guess what? Hardly anyone has. My books are supermarket paperbacks. They’re on the racks for a few weeks and then gone forever. I’m not complaining, mind you. I like what I do. But in my chosen genre there are some stock cliches, things that have been done a million times. One of the most hackneyed is the plot involving a writer, often a horror writer, who returns to the small town of his youth only to wind up battling a real supernatural evil. So…think about it. What you’re telling me is I’m living the cliche.” Another of those unexpected laughs came. It was followed by another. He choked back yet another.

He wouldn’t let the laughter take him again. For Kristen’s sake, it was time to wrap up this farce. He coughed and sat up straighter. “I’m sorry.” He strove for a more sober tone and almost made it. “Really I am.” He heaved another big breath and this time successfully killed off the last of the hysteria that had been bubbling inside him. He looked the scowling girl in the eye and said, “Trust me on this, okay? Whatever you think is going on…there’s a logical explanation for it. You’ve maybe let your imaginations run wild and-”

The girl said, “It’s all true and I can prove it. Right now.”

Jake stared at her with his mouth hanging open for a long moment, his mind still stuck on his interrupted sentence. Then he did another slow blink and shook his head. “Come again?”

The girl’s scowl vanished. A small, almost imperceptible smile crimped the edges of her mouth. “I told you. I’m half demon. I can do things. I’ll show you. Then you’ll believe.”

Jake stared at her a moment before saying, “Uh-huh. Okay.” He looked at Kristen, who was staring at the girl with a rapt expression, hanging on her every word. There was no evidence of the anger he’d expected to see there. He looked at the girl again and smiled. Okay. Whatever. As long as Kristen wasn’t freaking out, he could play this game, too. See it through to its logical-and quite likely anticlimactic-conclusion. “Fine. You’re a demon and you can prove it. What are we really talking about here? Magic tricks?”

The girl’s inscrutable smile remained in place as she shook her head. “A kind of magic, yes. But real magic. There won’t be any trickery involved.”

Jake grinned. “Cool. Awesome.” He rubbed his hands together and clapped them once. He shot a wink Kristen’s way. “Hit me with the smoke-and-mirrors routine, girl.”

“The name’s Jordan.” A corner of her mouth twitched, a near smirk. “And I’m about to wipe that smug grin off your face. I told you. No trickery. No smoke and mirrors. Just real-deal magic.”

Jake shrugged. “Okay, okay. Show us your stuff, Jordan. I’m expecting some serious razzle-dazzle here.”

Jordan moved to the center of the room. The rest of them backed away from her, instinctively giving her space to do her thing. Space for what, Jake couldn’t imagine. Jordan closed her eyes and bowed her head. She held her hands in front of her, splayed fingers pointed at the floor. The pose made her look as if she were praying. She moved her lips and sounds emerged, but nothing intelligible. Jake scanned the faces of the others. The attention of all was focused solely on Jordan. They were absolutely spellbound. It was absurd. Nothing was happening. Why-

And then he felt it.

A sudden shift in the atmosphere. The fine hairs at the back of his neck stood on end. His heart began to speed up and he felt a strange kind of crackling in his fillings. A strange warmth suffused the air, displacing the air-conditioned chill in the space of maybe a second. He glanced at the others again, saw they were all feeling the same things. Kristen’s hands were clenched in tight fists at her sides. Her knuckles were a stark white. Her cheeks looked gaunt, the flesh stretched taut. It was then that Jake began to experience true terror. A terror of the unknown. He had written of this feeling in his books, but he knew now he’d gotten it all wrong. He had never fully conveyed how it could strip a man of his defenses and lay him bare. He was in the presence of something unnatural and dangerous. Something supernatural. Accepting the truth of this in his gut made him feel exquisitely vulnerable. Like he knew nothing and understood nothing. He hadn’t felt anything remotely like this since those childhood nights of crouching in a dark closet while his drunken parents screamed and threw things at each other. And even that had been a mere shadow of what he was feeling now.