Page 121 of A Summoned Husband

His horns were as red as his flesh and completely on fire as he took a threatening step toward her.

“The last one,” he said, his voice grating against my ears. “Come now, time to pay for your sins.”

I whirled. “Alicia! Run!”

She couldn’t hear me though. No one could.

* * *

I billowed into smoke, disappearing through Alicia and appearing somewhere dark where screams echoed.

“Diric!” Imani bent at the waist, screaming from her core. Her voice was hoarse, like she’d been at this a while. I looked around the derelict building with its boarded windows and concrete floors. There was a metal trashcan on fire in the corner, the bright light illuminating her face in a warm glow.

The smell was vile.

Filth and urine.

It was disorienting being ripped from one scene to another. It happened quicker now. A mere blink tore me from my scene with Alicia to this one. My heart hammered, the taste of bile coating my tongue as she cried for one of her babies.

I couldn’t be here. No.

“Fahmo! Hani!” She screamed.

All the fear, all the heartache, it was nothing compared to what slammed into me now. My eyes widened as desperation moved through me and I started to run through the space. Her babies were here and auntie Ede needed to find them. I needed to get to them before that witch touched them with her wicked hands.

“Diric! Fahmo! Hani!” I screamed.

No, no, no. Not the kids. Anything but the kids.

My heart felt two sizes too big for my chest as I anxiously began my search.

“Hani!” Imani cried.

“Stop it!” I screamed as I entered another empty room. There was a dirty mattress on the floor, piled with soiled clothes. Pigeons walked along the floor, gently cooing. My breath fogged in front of my face.

This had to be the witch.

“Stop it!” I screamed again. I couldn’t take this anymore. Couldn’t keep jumping from distressing scene to distressing scene watching as all the people I loved came face to face with their worst fears.

The kids? This was too much.

If this was the witch, I knew one thing for sure, I would stop at nothing until she was dead. I would destroy her.

A scream sounded behind me as Imani ran past. A demon similar to the one who had stared down Alicia and challenged her to confront her sins chased Imani down the hallway behind me.

“Diric!” she cried. “Where are you guys!” She ran both in search of them and to escape the demon at her back.

This was a nightmare.

I gave one more quick glance around the empty room to make sure nothing and no one hid there before I took off down the hall after them. “Stop it! Leave her alone!”

A sob inflated my chest as I turned down the end of the dark hall and stalled. There was no one there. Nothing. The windows were ripped open giving me eerie views of the night and trash was scattered around the edges of the large room. It must have been an office building at one point because there were a few metal desks on their sides. Some chairs were strewn about.

“Imani,” I huffed.

More tears came.

All of this was because of me and that was the hardest pill to swallow. I had done this to them. Whether it was real or not — and I wished with everything I was that it wasn’t — I had put them all here. Trapped them in nightmares fuelled by a witch who would stop at nothing until she got her hands on my husband.