Page 74 of Filthy Little Witch
I wouldn’t accept this. I wouldn’t allow this. He was coming home with me, with us, no matter what fucking deal he made with a demon.
As smoke, they were omnipotent. They could be everywhere and nowhere. They could invade the tiniest cracks in a ward, just as this bastard had done at the estate. But once they took a mortal, once they became corporeal, they were easier to trap. More powerful, of course. They could siphon the energy from the mortal, drain that person’s soul dry, which was why so many of them longed to possess a person. As Wes, the demon could eat and fuck and experience the utter joy of killing, instead of simply influencing. But as Wes, I could contain him.
I aimed my gun at the demon’s head, but he shook his head and tsked his teeth. “Don’t do that, little witch. Could you really watch Wesson’s brains paint the woods? There’s no undoing that damage, not even after I’m done playing with him.”
“Just like a demon,” I said. “Making a deal you had no intention of keeping. Is he even still in there?”
“Oh, I very much intend on keeping my side of the bargain,” he said. “After all, it’s your God that demands blind faith with no promise of rewards. My side always does what it says it’s going to do.”
Demons lie, I reminded myself. He’s lying. Don’t listen to him.
“However, just because I said I would let you go doesn’t mean I won’t have a little fun first.”
He’d barely gotten the words out before he flicked his hand at me, and I flew sideways, smashing into the side of the church. The impact made me lose my gun and knocked the air out of my body, crushing my lungs, collapsing my stomach. I grunted and forced myself upright, reaching for my satchel. But the demon used its magic to hold my hands out to either side, pinning them in place so I couldn’t grab my tools.
“Demon of hell,” I chanted in Latin. “I condemn you. By the magic in my veins, by the power in my blood?—”
He tilted his head, and my mouth sealed shut, my lips glued together. Fury raged in my gut, the anger of two months of isolation and generations of pissed-off witches exploding from my torso in a blinding white light. It knocked Wes backward, but I got off the wall, and my mouth finally opened. I held my hands up to project energy toward him, keeping it as steady as I could.
Wes easily got to his feet and mirrored my movement, holding his hands up as that dark smoke erupted from his palms, colliding with my force. They smacked together like a lightning strike, deafening, shattering the surrounding trees. I quickly realized that I wouldn’t be able to hold him off for very long. Wes still had his connection to Atlas and me, and he pulled on it, draining me, tugging on my magic and the vibrance coming from my other warrior.
I tried my chant again.
“Demon of hell, I condemn you. By the magic in my veins, by the power in my blood, I demand you vacate the mortal called Wesson Colt.” I wrenched the words from my lips, sputtering the syllables with every ounce of power I had left.
He twitched his head and cracked his neck, but only retaliated harder. The metallic taste of copper trickled over my lips, and I didn’t know if that was because my nose was bleeding from the exertion or if I’d cut my head when it launched me at the church.
“Give up, witch,” he roared. “It’s done. It’s over. I have you now.”
“No!” I screamed, yanking on Atlas’s energy, sensing him closer. And just when I thought I didn’t have anything else to give, just when I was scraping at the bottom of the barrel for strength, a flash of silver somersaulted through the air, smashing into the demon.
Wes’s head flipped back. The black smoke dissipated. And then his body lay limp on the ground.
I glanced at the church, where Atlas slumped up against the doorway, panting in deep breaths. I limped over to Wes and knelt by his body, where a giant silver crucifix lay next to his prone form. Obsidian blood oozed from the wound on his forehead, but he’d been effectively knocked out.
“Fucking hell,” I said, pushing to my feet. “Incredible aim.”
Atlas nodded and lumbered down to the grass. “Is he out?”
“Yeah, but we don’t have much time,” I said. “He’s possessed. He made a deal with the demon, our safe exit in exchange for him.”
“Stupid martyr son of…Help me get his legs.”
I grabbed one ankle, and Atlas did his best with the other. Together, we hauled 220 pounds of Wes into the church. We dragged him up to the head of the sanctuary and laid him at the bottom of the giant representation of Jesus on the cross.
“We need to draw a demon trap,” I said. “Quickly.”
Atlas glanced around for something to use, and I ran into the back room, ransacking the father’s office until I found a thick black marker. When I came out, Atlas was digging through the pews.
“Here.” I ripped off the cap with my teeth and handed it to him. “You draw it out. I’ll get the salt and the candles.”
He dropped to his knees and started etching the ancient symbol on the crimson rug, and I winced when I thought about desecrating the church’s furniture, but nothing was real in the liminal, right? The real church in the real world was carrying on with its real life, and nothing we did really mattered.
Then I raced around the building to gather the things I’d need. Holy water and blessed wine were easy to find, as were a plethora of incense made explicitly for this purpose. I grabbed rope and a knife and anything else I thought we could use. I returned less than ten minutes later, where Atlas had finished the sigil and was now trying to drag Wes into the center of it. His ribs were still bruised, and his ankles looked like minced meat, but he managed well on his own. I grabbed one of Wes’s legs and tugged.
Once he was inside, I doused the rope in holy water and handed it to Atlas so he could tie Wes’s hands together. We did the same with his feet.
It must have burned the demon inside him because he groaned and blinked his eyes, turning his head from one side to the other as he came back to consciousness.
