Page 5 of Dark Hope (Dark Carpathians #38)

Chapter 5

The moment Tora stepped inside the home of Raik Bootsma, the seaman’s level of agitation rose sharply. He began to clench and unclench his fists. Underneath the swelling on his arm, the dark shade of purple pushed against his skin as if seeking a way out. His eyes instantly became bloodshot. His breath came in short bursts while his chest rose and fell fast.

“You have to leave,” he told Tora, leaping from his chair, nearly knocking Silke over. “Get out now. Get out of my house.”

Imka rushed into the room, followed by Julia. The two of them skidded to a halt when Silke calmly held up her hand and then indicated for them to go back out. At the movement, Raik swung around to face his wife and daughter, his face a mask of near evil.

“Why are you inviting the enemy into my home, Imka? What kind of wife are you to betray me in such a manner?” He took an aggressive step toward her.

With complete confidence, Silke glided in between him and Imka and Julia. Facing Raik, she indicated behind her back for his wife and daughter to retreat from the room. Raik swung at Silke with a clenched fist, the one that was swollen. The purple streak pulsed with rage beneath the skin. Silke easily slipped the punch as she drew her crystal sword from her backpack. She stepped to one side, forcing Raik to face her.

Behind them, Tora lifted her arms to weave a protection and caging spell, making it impossible for Raik to leave the room—or if Silke managed to draw out the demon, holding the demon in place.

“Don’t hurt him,” Imka cried out. She could see Silke drawing the crystal sword and the sacred water she always carried with her. “This isn’t his fault. Don’t, Silke.”

So Imka knew. Silke snapped her one emotion-laden look. “You should have sent for me.”

“I don’t want him hurt.” Imka burst into tears. Julia followed suit.

The display only agitated Raik more. He bared his teeth and actually growled at his wife and daughter and then threw another punch at Silke.

Imka screamed. “Raik, stop. Silke, you and Tora need to leave. We don’t want you here.”

“Imka, go into the other room. No one is going to hurt Raik. We’re going to help him. You’re making things worse.”

Silke flicked a quick glance to Tora, indicating she needed to keep Imka and Julia from interfering. It would be best if they couldn’t see what was happening. Dealing with demons was never easy, and she couldn’t afford to be distracted.

Tora sent a command to Imka and her daughter. The two locked hands and left the room. Immediately, Tora safeguarded the room, closing the door and sealing every crack and point of entry or exit. At the same time, she safeguarded the windows in the event Raik or the demon tried to break out using that means.

Silke let Raik’s intended punch slide just past her head as she tossed the bottle containing the sacred water into the air. The tube spun and upended, spraying droplets of the water into the air to disperse throughout the room. She raised her crystal sword and colors burst through the room onto the ceiling and walls.

Raik growled and rushed her, lowering his shoulder with the intention of hitting her square in her stomach to knock her off her feet. Silke was ready for the move, gliding aside as she began to chant in a soft, compelling voice. The water spilled over Raik and the pastel colors. The light from the sword mingled with the water, turning the colors into soft watercolors.

Is it possible for you to get inside Raik’s memories and then describe the creature that bit him to me? Silke asked Tora.

No problem.

As always, Tora sounded confident. Silke appreciated her composure, no matter the circumstances, and had worked to emulate that trait.

Silke circled around Raik, keeping him moving, keeping his attention on her as he was forced to keep turning to face her. Each time he looked as if he might attack, the crystals in the sword brightened, blasting toward his face to momentarily take his vision.

Sending you the image, Tora said. Sea serpent? But large, like the Loch Ness monster is reputed to be. Dinosaur-looking creature. Savage teeth.

Silke continued to move around Raik, forcing him to face her. The purple stripe going up his arm was reactive to her presence and that of the pale colors in the sword. Beneath Raik’s skin on his wrist and going up his forearm, something moved, raising the skin. As it slithered, climbing toward his shoulder, she saw a darker, mottled purple rise with alarming force, shoving up beneath the skin so it was outlined. A scaly head with horns and distinctive curved teeth trying to keep track of her, although it was inside Raik, protected by his human form.

Raik howled in pain, his face a mask of agony as the large head swiveled back and forth, the teeth slicing at muscle and bone.

This one is classic but in the sea. I had no idea it could insert itself into a human, Silke told Tora. It’s a little alarming. There is no record of a sea monster embedding itself into a human being.

That is worrisome, Tora agreed. Will you be able to get it out of Raik without killing him?

That thing has teeth and isn’t opposed to attacking Raik. I’ll get it out, but hopefully it doesn’t try to kill Raik while I’m forcing it out of its host.

Silke took a deep breath and let it out. She had a bad feeling about the sea monster. It seemed willing to sacrifice its host to get to her, rather than seeking to protect itself from her as most demons did. That meant that the demon would come out fighting. She worried it would chew its way through Raik’s muscle and skin.

Raik lumbered toward her awkwardly as she reached for the demon, treating it as if it were an actual sea creature she could connect with. She had to approach the serpent slowly, so it was unable to detect her as she invaded. The mind of the monster was chaotic, raging, in a frenzy of hatred directed specifically at her.

She stayed very quiet, trying to observe the demon’s memories so she could find its original orders. The frenzy to kill was directed at her only because she wielded the crystal sword. If Tora had the sword in her possession, the serpent would have fixated on her. That told Silke for all the spies sent to Nachtbloem, Lilith still wasn’t aware who the demon slayer was. Between Tora and Silke, they had managed to keep that information from getting to their relentless enemy. Lilith wanted the slayer dead before she struck at Nachtbloem.

That made sense since the slayer in Dellys had managed to completely shut down her generals and hellhounds. Lilith was learning from her mistakes. This time, she was determined that the slayer would be taken out of the equation before she launched her war. That strategy was in their favor. It gave Tora and Silke more time to prepare. It also, hopefully, would allow the Carpathian ancients, the ones they needed so desperately, to arrive and get to know everyone before Lilith sent her army to slay them all. They would need to be able to work smoothly with one another, trust one another and strategize. Silke had her misgivings, but she was intelligent enough to keep them to herself and wait to form judgment.

Silke matched her rhythm and energy to that of the sea monster lurking beneath Raik’s skin. She had to do so delicately, keeping her touch light and energy low enough that the demon wouldn’t become aware of her as she flowed into its mind. This demon was powerful. Once she connected, she had to carefully sift through the creature’s memories to find out how Lilith had created the mutant and what orders she gave all the others lurking in the sea. Hopefully, she could find the actual number of sea creatures let loose in the sea on unsuspecting fishermen.

All the while she worked at very delicately merging with the monster, she had to avoid Raik’s attacks on her. She also needed to keep his attention solely on her. Tora had to be the one to keep Raik safe. She could fade into the background, preventing Raik and the sea demon from remembering she was in the room.

Do you feel the presence of evil? Silke asked Tora. She was sharing all information with her. If anything went wrong, the other slayers would need to know whatever she could find out about this demon as well as whether Lilith was looking at the slayer through the demon’s eyes. Although she was surrounded by evil while she was sifting through the demon’s memories, she didn’t feel as if Lilith was lurking.

Tora took her time, examining the demon through Silke. She was Carpathian, and just her presence, if detected, could tip off their enemies. Tora was ancient. She was extremely good at hiding herself from vampires and demons. She’d taught Silke so much. Her composure during every battle with the undead was shocking and something Silke aspired to.

Fighting a demon was always tricky. Very difficult. Fighting the undead was horrifying. Scary beyond imagining. Vampires did their best to get into one’s mind. They commanded victims to come to them and most did. They were the worst as far as Silke was concerned, although when Tora was forced to fight them when they came too close to the village, Silke always backed her. She had the scars to prove it.

I do not feel her presence, not like she is in him currently. More, it is his memories where the evil emanates from mainly. And him. There is no saving this creature, Tora added in warning.

Silke was aware the mutated demon was too far gone. That didn’t mean she couldn’t feel compassion for him. He had been mutated by Lilith and her army of mages and vampires dwelling in the underworld with her. She seemed to always be able to convince the worst of them to work for her, promising them she would free them if they pleased her. As far as Silke was aware, no one had ever been freed from Lilith’s service, but those in the underworld believed her empty promises. They were that desperate to escape their fate.

Lilith can enter and see through his eyes, Silke cautioned. She is notorious for leaving herself that door. When I draw him out, we’ll need a veil so he can’t send back to his maker what we look like. She may get a feel for us, but our scent, and hopefully our identities, will still be a mystery to her.

She kept Raik’s attention centered on her the entire time she studied the demon. At times she could take over a demon, draw him away from Lilith, but this one was beyond that. She would have to draw him out of Raik’s body. This one was savage and relentless, programmed to kill the wielder of the crystal sword. As she studied the demon’s memories to find the answers they needed, she still had to avoid Raik’s attacks. He was becoming more animalistic. Much more aggressive and vicious as the demon reacted to the lights of the sword.

Be ready, Tora, she cautioned. I’m going to draw him out. Raik will fight it. The demon very well could tear through his body to get free and come at me. If that happens, see to Raik first. Don’t let him die if there is a way to save him.

I’m ready, Tora confirmed. But know this, sisarke, if it is between you and Raik, I will save you every time, and it isn’t because you’re the demon slayer.

Silke allowed that declaration to warm her. She had Fenja, but Silke had been taking care of her adoptive mother since it became apparent that she was the demon slayer. Somehow, over the years, there had been a reversal of roles. Silke became the teacher and Fenja listened to her, drawing on her vast knowledge of plants and shrubs to aid the villagers when they were ill.

Fenja’s eyesight had deteriorated over the years. Her arthritis had curled her fingers into claws. Tora had healed her several times, but the condition always returned quickly. She had already been a mature woman, far past childbearing years, when she had taken Silke, a newborn baby, home with her. Tora treated Silke as a sibling. She wasn’t the most demonstrative of women, but she always made Silke feel loved. That brief statement Tora had made gave Silke the knowledge that she mattered to at least one person other than Fenja.

Once more she shifted the crystal sword, making direct contact with Raik. At once the sea monster reacted, thrashing and biting, moving toward the piercing colors, not away.

Something is wrong, she whispered into Tora’s mind. Demons don’t race toward the energy of the sword. They run from it. Or try to hide. This demon is doing neither. It’s as though the sword is feeding the creature more energy.

Anything out of the usual and Silke knew she needed to be concerned. She shifted the pulsing lights to the ceiling and took a moment to be a calming influence in the mind of the sea serpent. It was nearly impossible to see beyond the creature’s need to kill. It felt to Silke as if the sea monster were in a frenzied thrall, hypnotized, under a spell to self-destruct if the end goal of killing her was met.

How had Lilith pulled it off that one of her demons would become stronger when faced with the crystal sword? Raik was far more aggressive, feeding off the frenzy of the demon directing him to try to kill Silke. He could no longer see her as a friend. She was the enemy that had to be destroyed for Raik to live.

Silke concentrated on delving deeper into the sea serpent’s memories. There had to be a clue. It was becoming more difficult to escape Raik’s wildly swinging punches with his hamlike fists as he growled and snarled at her. Each time she had to make an evasive maneuver, the chances of the serpent realizing she was examining its memories doubled.

She persisted, moving farther and farther back, sifting as quickly as possible through the sea serpent’s memories until she found the moment when Lilith and two mages brought the newly formed demon out of the trough where it had been conceived. There it was. The answer—and not a good one.

They conceived these serpents in vats surrounded by crystal lights. Somehow, they were able to construct a crystal sword, and they used the energy from the sword and the colors to enhance the power of the demon.

That was bad. Very, very bad. If they could mutate one demon, making him immune to the slayer’s weapons, they could mutate many others. She watched the infant serpent as it was exposed to the pulsing crystal colors that were directed at the creature night and day. Many of the serpent babies died. Many went mad and were destroyed. Only the strongest survived. The hatred of those pulsing colors and anyone who wielded them was embedded deep into their brains.

Silke took a deep breath, avoiding another attack by Raik as she meticulously examined the way the lights played over the vat. Were the serpents completely immune? She didn’t think so. The lights caused extreme distress. There was a pattern to the way the wielder of the crystal sword used the colors.

Mage, she identified. Lilith enlisted the help of mages to create these creatures. They’re falling back on the same spells, the ones they know have worked for centuries.

She didn’t use any of those same weaves because it had been Tora who aided her in constructing her weapons. Tora had never gone to a mage school. She had developed her own weaves of protection through trial and error. She didn’t even have parents to help her. Over the centuries, she had perfected each intertwining strand. In the end, she was able to protect the forest where she had aided the people in defeating the Romans centuries earlier. Not just the forest; she also was able to secure some of the buildings in the village. The sea was too vast, so Silke and Tora had made their priority the forest and village.

Watch yourself, Raik is becoming more agitated, Tora warned.

That horrid demon is chewing through his skin, Silke said. I was afraid it would do something like that.

Once again, she pointed the crystal sword directly toward the arm where the demon thrashed and bit beneath Raik’s skin. This time she darkened the colors from pastel to deep-hued watercolors. The moment the rays of color hit Raik’s arm he bellowed, growling like an animal and lunging at her over and over.

She continued to circle him, keeping the vivid lights pulsing directly over the sea serpent’s head, where it was raised, battering and biting at Raik’s bone, muscle and skin. The moment the new colors struck, the demon went berserk, adding a high-pitched scream to Raik’s maddening vocalizations.

Silke chanted softly, keeping her tone pure and melodic. She was careful never to raise her voice or her level of energy. She didn’t want to tip off Lilith to who she was, should the serpent’s agitation draw her out. Energy and power had a footprint. Once she was able to read that print, Silke could identify the creature anytime she ran across it.

“Demon from the sea.” She knew the mages called him Snaggle from her foray into his memories. “Sent by Lilith, named Snaggle, to create chaos and hatred. I command your attention.”

At once, beneath Raik’s skin, the sea serpent lifted its head, shaking it back and forth in agitation. The screaming was high-pitched, piercing, one of the worst sounds Silke had heard any demon produce. She realized instantly the sound was part of the serpent’s weapons system.

Make certain Imka and Julia can’t hear this demon, she cautioned Tora.

They are unaware of anything happening in this room, Tora assured her. You watch out for yourself. This is new and unlike anything you’ve ever dealt with.

I’m going slow.

Too slow. Raik is becoming problematic in his attacks on you. I could stop him…

No. I don’t want Lilith to get the feel of a Carpathian. It may draw her to aid her demon.

He may be calling to her, Tora pointed out.

Silke didn’t need Tora to caution her. It was the biggest concern she had. If Lilith threw her power behind the serpent, an unknown demon to the slayer, there was a chance Silke could be in trouble.

Patience and discipline were her best friends. Her brain was her greatest weapon. She repeated those things over and over in her mind. Her mantra. She might have begun her training from the time she was two as well as having the knowledge of how to fight demons imprinted on her before she was born, but knowledge and training meant nothing if one couldn’t stay calm and thinking the entire time.

I will know if she joins with him. Please watch over Raik. Silke didn’t want to lose the man. He was one of the men she most admired in the village. He’d always taken good care of his family and seemed to love his wife and daughter. She found it interesting that he was the man bitten by the sea monster and injected with a demon. Was that coincidence? Or planned?

She went back to drawing out the demon. “Snaggle, I command you to show yourself to me. Leave the body you have taken over. I am in command. Do you feel my presence?”

The demon shrieked again in his high-pitched tone, thrashing and fighting the relentless compulsion to obey her. At her insistent command, Snaggle stopped attempting to chew his way through skin and muscle to get out through Raik’s arm. Instead, he swam fast toward the man’s heart.

“You will not harm this host.” The demon was powerful and fighting her every inch of the way. “Exit through his mouth.”

Silke felt the instant elation sweeping through the serpent. The demon obeyed, but at the same time, rushed to block Raik’s airway, swelling until he was a bloated mass choking the fisherman.

She took a deep breath, let it out and allowed the demon to realize she was in him, directing his movements away, first from Raik’s heart and now his throat. She was commanding him not only from outside his body but also from inside his mind.

Raik choked, his face bright red, his eyes bulging, both hands going to his throat. He began to cough violently. He took two more steps toward Silke, staggered and went to his knees. Silke refused to be distracted. She didn’t look at Raik’s purple, mottled face. She kept the relentless compulsion on the demon.

“I command you to leave that host. Obey me now .” For a brief moment, she turned the crystal sword toward the ceiling and allowed the colors to change from the vibrant watercolors to the pale pastels. She even managed to make her hand tremble just enough that the colors shimmered along the walls and ceilings. As she did, she took a firmer grip on the mind of the serpent, urging it to surface while pouring doubt and uncertainty into its head, so that the creature became confused.

The sea serpent was programmed to attack the slayer. She knew it had been bred for just that purpose. With her own seeming uncertainty adding to the chaos and indecision in the mind of the sea monster, the creature let out a hideous scream and burst from Raik’s open mouth straight at her. Savage teeth, curved and pointed, filled Snaggle’s gaping mouth. What appeared to be venom hung in strands. She swung her sword straight at the attacking demon, the colors changing from pale to vibrant as she extended the tip right at the cavernous mouth.

In midair, the demon managed to fold in on itself with astonishing speed, whipping around to fling itself at Raik. It hit the invisible barrier Tora had hastily woven around the fisherman. One of the brighter blue colors pierced the thick scales, causing more of the venom to leak out.

In the venom, Silke warned, realizing tiny little tadpole-like creatures wiggled and moved in the strings of dripping slime. The greenish- yellow threads began to slither across the floor, coming from every direction the serpent had sent the venom flying in when it had shaken its head. Stay off the floor. Protect Raik, they’re heading straight for him.

Because she was entrenched in the serpent’s mind, she saw that he was directing his offspring to enter Raik’s body, where they could feed and grow.

I’ve got him safe. You can destroy the little demons.

Silke was forced to take her gaze from Snaggle as she swept the crystal sword around the room in a meticulous grid to pierce each of the slithering tadpoles as they rushed at Raik. Raik suddenly surged to his feet, almost as if he were a puppet, a marionette, directed by another being. He swung his fists wildly as he lumbered straight at her.

Silke tried to dodge Raik as he hobbled toward her. His movements were jerky and very awkward as if he didn’t have control of his own body. She timed her evasion to avoid his wildly swinging fists. For all his awkward motion, Raik was astonishingly fast with his hamlike fists. One managed to graze her head as she ducked back, still targeting the sea serpent’s offspring as they raced to find a host.

The slight contact with Raik sent alarm skittering down her spine. He felt off. She had been certain she had managed to draw the serpent from his body, yet he still had the taint of demon. Why? That made no sense. It was one more division of her mind while she was attempting to destroy the many tadpoles, evade Raik and protect herself from the demon in the form of the sea creature as it took advantage of Raik’s attack to rush her with blinding speed.

I have placed a protection barrier between you and Raik, Tora informed her. It isn’t strong. I didn’t want to weave something Lilith might recognize as mine later, should she be drawn here by this battle.

Silke shot the dazzling vivid colors straight at the demon as it flung itself through the air straight at her throat. She was lucky the serpent had chosen to come at her so high. That allowed her to continue her sweep down to the floor as the sea creature dropped, shrieking, trying to protect itself from the vibrant crystals. Several holes appeared in the thick, round body, piercing through the armored scales. No more spawn burst from the many holes. Instead, orange and red embers flickered from inside the serpent. It shrieked and screamed continuously, the sound horrendous, playing on every nerve in her body.

Silke took the opportunity to finish destroying the last of the remaining tadpoles, burning them with the crystal lights. It took several more precious seconds to do a thorough job, giving the sea demon enough recovery time to launch another attack on her. He was shockingly fast. She was forced into an evasive maneuver as she tried to quickly analyze how the demon was becoming faster. He had been created specifically to draw energy from the softer crystal colors. The more vivid, stronger tones pierced through his armor, clearly presenting a danger to the creature’s life. Yet he was becoming faster.

Was he evolving? Becoming resistant to the crystal sword? His offspring had burned within moments of being exposed to the sword’s powerful energy. They hadn’t been born resistant. That meant the original sea monster, bred in a vat, was the most dangerous. Perhaps in time, the emerging offspring would develop a resistance, but when they first emerged, they had none.

Her brain processed information at high speed, analyzing and discarding the various possibilities. She had to conclude that the serpent adapted quickly to the crystal sword’s lights. If he began to absorb the energy, she could be in real trouble. Not just from the serpent but from any other demons Lilith and her mages created.

The serpent stayed low, not repeating the mistake he’d made in his previous attack. That also told her he evolved quickly. He learned as he went. She took a better grip on his mind, watching for the moment he decided to make his next move. Merged with him, she forced a hesitation, a doubt, giving her a split second to slice through the serpent’s long, thick body. Just in the short time it had been outside the host, the scales had thickened, giving it the appearance of the sea monsters depicted in the drawings from a hundred years previous. The teeth were longer and came to a wicked point.

She swung the crystal sword, the blue blade slicing off the head of the serpent as it rushed her. At the same time, she poured an entire tube of sacred water all along the body and severed head. At once, smoke rose. Holes appeared throughout the long body and head. She swept the colors of the sword at the shrieking creature. Instantly, fires sprang up, roaring through the holes from the inside out. The stench was horrific. Even with the head cut off, the demon shrieked for what seemed hours before the fire consumed it entirely. She had to ensure that not one of the ashes remained.

Silke sank to the floor and put her pounding head in her hands. She felt sick. She always did after a particularly difficult battle with a demon. Part of her reaction was because she often shared their mind, felt the pain they suffered with no letup from the hideous experiments Lilith conducted on them. Lilith thought nothing of sentencing them to gruesome punishments and then forgot where they were for months or years on end. Silke couldn’t help the compassion she felt for the creatures, even though they were wholly evil and she had no choice but to destroy them. That didn’t mean she didn’t feel empathy.

“Are you going to be all right? I want to heal Raik as soon as possible. We’re going to lose the night if I don’t move on this,” Tora cautioned.

Silke lifted her head. “I’m good. Be careful.”

“I always am.” Tora shed her ego, let go of all sense of self to become pure light and energy in the way of her people. It was how they healed wounds from the inside out. She entered Raik’s body and began her slow, careful inspection.

Silke guarded Tora’s body. With her spirit absent, Tora’s body was vulnerable to attack. For some reason, when she should have felt satisfied and relieved, anxiety gripped Silke. The ominous foreshadowing remained in her mind.

Tora had wrapped the room in weaves of protection. Silke had known Tora her entire life. She knew Tora was a powerful, dangerous woman and very skilled in her protections as well as fighting ability. She’d had to become proficient, as no other Carpathians were near them. If a vampire stumbled across their village, there was only Tora to protect them. Eventually, Silke learned to aid her.

She glanced out the window into the dark sky. Clouds drifted across the moon, but they seemed natural to her. No spies looking down in an effort to find the two of them—slayer and guardian of the gate. She turned back to face the room. Whatever was making her uneasy was close. Had she missed one of the serpent’s offspring? Was it hiding? Waiting for an unwary host?

Silke went very still, allowing her mind to expand, to seek the taint of demon. She inspected every corner of the room, the ceiling, the floor, the furniture, the fireplace. Nothing. Still, she knew she was right, she had missed something. Her attention returned time and again to Raik. Tora was pure spirit. Silke didn’t know enough about how she survived as light and energy when inside another being. She’d been healed by Tora on many occasions. She’d felt her moving inside her, the heat, the soothing relief as Tora closed wounds she’d endured during battle or pushed wiggling parasites from her bloodstream that a vampire had injected into her when his teeth had torn her open.

Frowning, she paced, walking off the nervous energy while she waited. She hadn’t asked Tora what kind of danger she could be in if another being such as the demon was still in a host while Tora healed the man. She should have asked. She couldn’t reach out to Tora and distract her.

Tora finally emerged, pale and exhausted. Without hesitation, Silke extended her wrist to her friend. She knew Tora needed blood to recover, and she’d given her blood so many times she didn’t think anything of it.

The uneasiness in her magnified, not lessened. Something was terribly wrong. Raik is still tainted. Silke was certain. I missed something.

Tora’s frown was in her mind, as she took the blood she needed for her recovery. Once she was stronger, she walked carefully around the fisherman. He sat on the floor, hands pressed to his head, rocking back and forth and moaning.

“You drove the demon from him,” Tora said. “Could there have been a second one we missed? I went through his body to heal him from the inside out. I was very meticulous, worried that one of the serpent’s offspring had gone unnoticed. I found nothing.”

Silke couldn’t imagine Tora missing anything when she was healing someone. This was too important. She had taken her time, careful to inspect every muscle and organ, his blood and bones.

“I do not feel the threat,” Tora admitted. “Just your uneasiness. You have never been wrong when it comes to demons. The merest trace does not escape you. If you are feeling taint, there must still be a demon close.”

Close. Silke turned the word over and over in her mind. From the time she was a child, she had been very sensitive to the slightest taint of demon. She trusted her instincts. She trusted her radar. Her warning system blared at her. She once again searched the room. There were many tiny cracks where a tadpole might be hidden, but she reexamined the walls and furniture, the fireplace and floor, even the ceiling, inch by inch. It took her a long time, but she didn’t rush her inspection, no matter that she was losing the night. Tora and Silke wanted to be gone before villagers might see them. And Tora always left before dawn.

Silke’s ability to ferret out demons was intuitive. She had such an instinctive expertise, she knew that ability had been given to her prior to her birth. She was born with the knowledge of her ancestors—demon slayers—each adding their experience. At her birth, she was already a walking encyclopedia of demons, the hierarchy and how to kill each one. But now, demons were evolving, growing stronger and faster and resistant to the crystal sword the slayers had always used to defeat them.

Silke came back to the center of the room, staring down at Raik as he rocked back and forth, moaning. Tora kept him in a state of unawareness, yet he was still feeling pain. She had healed him, yet he was moaning and rocking. The most condemning evidence was the strong feeling of demon taint emanating from him.

“He is still unclean,” she stated, certain she was right. There was still a demon hiding itself within the host. Somehow the creature managed to stay hidden from Tora. That was another new development.

“I’ll look again, Silke, but I was very thorough. I believe the demon is there; I can see Raik is still miserable and he shouldn’t be. I just don’t…” She trailed off, shaking her head, clearly frustrated. “I’m inspecting him again. Stay merged in my mind. You may be able to direct me.”

“Is it dangerous to leave you so unprotected?” Silke didn’t like her attention divided, not when Tora was at risk.

“I’ve safeguarded the home and this room, even Raik. The women in the house are unaware of what is taking place, and before we leave, I’ll remove all memories and replace them with something that makes sense to them. That we healed Raik when he was so ill.”

Once more, Silke guarded Tora’s body as she entered Raik in her purest form. This time, Silke stayed merged with Tora as she inspected the man. When they were in his body, the energy from the demon actually lessened, as if he knew they were hunting him, and he remained quiet and inactive. Raik calmed, ceasing his moaning and rocking.

Silke felt more uneasy than ever before. She knew evil crouched somewhere in Raik. He was a good man. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he realized how much he was abusing his wife and daughter.

She took a deep breath, relaxed and shut down all thoughts of Raik and Tora and the repercussions of leaving behind a demon in the fisherman. She allowed her senses to reach out, to travel through Raik’s body with Tora leading the way. She didn’t try to search for the demon with Tora’s vision. She stayed inward, letting her instincts guide her.

Not in the trunk area, legs or feet. Go higher. His chest, his heart. Search there.

The trail was far too faint for the demon to be hidden anywhere in Raik below the waist. As Tora moved upward toward the heart, examining ribs, bones, muscle and organs as she went, Silke kept her vision her own. She trusted that Tora had locked them safely in the room, and she could turn all her senses to tracking that very faint footprint.

Tora was meticulous in her search, fearing the demon might attempt to give Raik a heart attack if he was found. Silke detected a stronger taint, but she was certain the demon was above the heart.

Raik continues to rock back and forth and hold his head. The demon is concealing itself above the heart. It is probable that he is somewhere in the brain.

It’s so difficult to find in all the shadows and creases. I went over Raik’s brain numerous times and didn’t find anything.

Silke knew they were both exhausted. It was far too close to dawn. Tora had to get to ground. She knew it was coming and dreaded Tora’s report.

I can’t find any shadowing. I’m sorry.

Silke knew the demon was hidden in Raik’s brain. She could feel him. The energy might be low, but she felt it pressing in on her, weighing her down. She knew, but she couldn’t pinpoint him. He was clever enough to disperse the energy throughout the entire brain.

Tora’s spirit connected with her body, and she slumped back on the floor. Silke immediately provided her wrist again.

I must go to ground. I’m so tired I feel as if I’m already going into paralysis.

“Do you need me to carry you to safety?” Silke asked. “I’m sorry I pushed you to try again. I should have known we were getting too close to dawn. You expend so much energy when you’re healing.”

I can make it. Let me put Raik into his bed. I’ll keep him in a coma. The story is he has a very contagious virus and must sleep for several risings. We’ve given him a sleeping aid to keep him under, so his body has time to heal.

“Can you make the weave strong enough that the demon will succumb as well?”

I hope so.