Page 13 of Helsing: Demon Slayer
Not a single body remained.
The cabin door slammed shut on its own. Almost instantly her captor swung Dianne back and forth between the closed wood door of the closet and the metal hull like a dog shaking a prey held in its jaws. She hit her head against the closet door and then her left shoulder.
A moment later a massiveboomrocked the cabin door as if under assault by a battering ram.
The stranger began to laugh, an unnatural, high-pitched sound that broke unevenly and ended in a gurgle. “Someone wants to take you back, little girl. Wonder if he’s willing to play tug-of-war?”
The door opened abruptly, and Ryan fell into the cabin and into Dianne, who crumpled to the floor with the force of his impact. She managed to get her left hand out to break her fall, but her face still kissed the industrial-weave carpet.
It took her a moment to realize that Ryan stood above her, straddling her shoulders as he faced the stranger.
“Not today,daemon,” he said. The authority in his voice sent shivers down Dianne’s back.
She started to push herself up to see to whom Ryan spoke, but her left wrist screamed at her, and she collapsed on the floor again. When she whimpered involuntarily, Ryan shifted. An instant later, Dianne slid across the floor and smashed into the foot of the bed, hitting the top of her head. She sagged into the floor, struggling to remain conscious. She turned her face where it rested on the scratchy fibers and lifted her gaze.
In front of her stood the woman who’d watched them walking through the passageway earlier. Instead of a fearful expression, she now wore a sly smile. She took a step.
“Stop! I command you in the name ofElohim, the Creator of Heaven and Earth,” said Ryan as he advanced again to stand over Dianne.
“Please,” said the woman, her oddly modulated voice wheedling. She eased another foot in front of her. “I meant no harm, paladin.” The last word grated like a fork caught in a running garbage disposal.
The temperature in the cabin dropped. Dianne quaked. When she breathed out, she saw a frosty cloud.
“Stay back.” The Beast had returned in a growl. He lifted Dianne in his arms. She shrank against him, trying to burrow into his warmth and away from their sinister antagonist.
“Or what?” asked the woman. “You won’t harm a woman, will you?” She opened her mouth and exhaled. A miasma of decay enveloped Dianne, who began gagging.
The low light in the cabin extinguished.
Bodiless voices laughed around them in an icy whirlwind, tearing at Dianne’s hair and pulling her scalp. She shrieked, but the foul breeze swallowed the sound and grew in strength.
Ryan clutched Dianne to him, straightened his shoulders, and lifted his chin. Then he began chanting, his rich, husky baritone vibrating his chest and instantly allaying Dianne’s terror. “Crux sacra sit mihi lux.Non draco sit mihi dux. Vade retro Satana.”
As he sang, light emanated from a pendant on his chest that Dianne hadn’t noticed before.
Thedaemonhissed and sprang ten feet into the farthest corner of the cabin, its black hair wild and limbs splayed. Ryan continued singing in unfamiliar, yet somehow soothing, Latin. The blue light expanded, glowing softly until it created an ethereal cocoon around Dianne and him. Shadows played on the possessed woman’s face as if a legion of dark spirits tormented her.
The cabin shook violently as if the ship was being tossed in a hurricane. A thousand tormented voices rose in mind-numbing babble.
But Ryan’s gaze held Dianne’s. It promised safety. It promised victory.
Without warning, the window in the cabin exploded outward, and the mineral scent of the sea rushed in. The unholy cataclysm quieted.
After Ryan’s chant ended, the only sound to be heard in the strangely quiet room was the woman’s sobbing. The celestial glow remained around them, if dimmer.
In the otherworldly light, Ryan’s gaze had turned inscrutable. “Let’s go. We won’t have any more trouble before we dock in Split.”
He slipped his hand into hers and turned to leave. Dianne looked back toward the woman, who sat in the far corner of the cabin with her arms around her knees, rocking back and forth and muttering between sobs.
“What about her?” she asked.
Ryan glanced at the woman. His gaze, already inscrutable, shuttered. “There’s nothing I can do for her. If I had a harmonics modulator keyed for humans .…” He squared his shoulders. “But I don’t.”
He tugged Dianne toward the door, leading her back along the corridor toward the stairs. In the dim emergency lighting, the faint glow surrounding them threw odd shadows on the walls and closed doors. Many doors had been thrown open, the contents inside the cabins tossed around. But they appeared empty. Shivering, Dianne leaned closer to Ryan, whose stride matched her hobbling one.
They made it to the stairs without being accosted. They’d gone halfway down to Deck Four when a crew member wearing a sidearm appeared on the deck below. He stopped when he saw them, his hand coming to rest on the weapon at his waist. Even in the gloom, she saw that his gaze took them in.
“Where is your cabin?” he asked. “I will escort you.”
