Mind Games

  Mind Games

  A Demon Trappers Novel

  by Jana Oliver

  Nevermore Books

  “The marks humans leave are too often scars.”

  — John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

  “All men make mistakes, but a good man yields when he knows his course is wrong, and repairs the evil. The only crime is pride.”

  — Sophocles, Antigone

  Chapter One

  December 2018

  Atlanta, Georgia

  Riley Blackthorne’s two apprentices were having too much fun, laughing and playing in the unusual Atlanta snowfall. It’d grown increasingly cold throughout the day, and at dusk the white stuff began to accumulate. This being the South, traffic had immediately snarled in the grip of a “snowstorm” that promised three inches tops.

  Riley chose to ignore it. Though it was pretty in a fairytale sort of way, it was a distraction. When you trapped demons for a living, distractions could be fatal. Or at least earn you a lot of time clawed up and healing.

  “Guys, let’s focus here,” she said, sounding at least two decades older than her eighteen years. It all came down to what life had thrown at her, most of it bad, and almost all of it during this last year.

  “But the snow’s so cool,” Richard said, proving he was a true Southerner. Someone from up north would have shrugged and moved on.

  Richard Bonafont was thirty-something, a former radio DJ, now on his second marriage. He wore wire-rim glasses and had a ready smile. He and Kurt Pelligrino had been with her since the summer, and were partway through their training. The third apprentice, Jaye Lynn, was out on family leave at the moment, but Riley expected her back in the trenches soon.

  “Yeah, but how often does it snow down here?” Kurt asked. Just into his twenties, he was single, tall, and sporting some serious muscles.

  As apprentices went, these guys were sharp, not like some who were hotheaded or downright stupid—traits that did not promise a lengthy career in the Atlanta Demon Trappers Guild.

  At least a hothead could change. Denver Beck, Riley’s fiancé, had. Being stupid, on the other hand, was a lifespan-limiting issue, especially when you were dealing with Hellspawn.

  “Here’s a hint: We are in Demon Central,” Riley said in what she called her “teacher’s voice.” She came by it honestly; both her parents had been educators and her father, one of the best demon trappers in the country.

  “Demons should like snow too,” Richard said. “They never get to see it in Hell. I wonder if they’d build a snowman if they had a chance.”

  “Probably make it look like Lucifer or something,” Kurt chimed in. “Though I bet they wouldn’t have the balls to give him a carrot for a nose.”

  “No snow in Hell.” Riley knew that for sure, and exactly what the Prince of Darkness looked like. There were no carrots involved. “If you don’t pay attention, this pretty, white, fluffy stuff could be the last thing you see.”

  “You know, you can be a real bummer,” Richard said, shaking his head.

  “Better a bummer than a corpse,” she shot back. Then immediately felt bad.

  In their own way, these guys were telling her to chill out. She’d been too serious since her trip to Scotland in late October. Nearly being killed by an Archfiend and a rogue necromancer would do that to you.

  “Okay, message received,” she said. “I’m far too grim tonight. Sorry.”

  Riley looked up, caught a snowflake on her tongue, and tried to lighten up. It wasn’t like they were going to do anything before another demon trapper arrived. It was standard procedure now: The first time an apprentice trapped a Grade Three fiend, a pair of experienced backups were required. Tonight, those parts would be played by herself and Journeyman Trapper Lex Reynolds.

  As they continued to wait for Reynolds, her apprentices horsed around in the snow while Riley executed a slow three-sixty to scope out their surroundings. Demon Central, as the trappers called it, was located just south of downtown Atlanta. With the depressed economy, it’d been a dumping ground for garbage by those trying to avoid paying the high trash-collection fees. Now, with the economy finally improving, it looked cleaner. The occasional deep holes in the pavement, a remnant of Civil War Atlanta, remained.

  “‘In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit,’” she murmured. Maybe in Tolkien’s Shire, but in this part of the city, holes meant Hellspawn. Grade Three demons loved them. Since their usual home was Hell, a hole in the middle of a major city had to be an improvement.

  The guys behind her were too quiet. Riley turned to find that they had fashioned snowballs and were eyeing her as a potential target.

  She grinned. “Remind yourselves that I assign who cleans the demon crap from under the holding cages at Master Harper’s place. And I’ll be doing that for the rest of your apprenticeships.”

  The snowballs hit the ground simultaneously. No one liked that task. At least she let them wear gloves and use a shovel, unlike when she’d had the job.

  “So who can give me a rundown on the type of Hellspawn you’re trapping tonight?”

  The two looked at each other, and it was Kurt who answered.

  “A Grade Three demon, also known as a Gastro-Fiend, is an all-purpose omnivore. It’ll eat anything. They usually stand about four feet tall, have six claws on each paw, and one or two sets of razor-sharp teeth, depending on the fiend’s age.”

  She nodded. “Why do they live here?”

  “The holes,” Richard replied. “They seem to like them. And all the garbage down here.”

  “At least until recently,” Riley said. “The city is cleaning up this area of town. Why is that a problem for us trappers?”

  That stumped the two apprentices.

  “What happens when you alter a predator’s natural habitat?” she nudged.

  Richard nodded his understanding. “It finds another place to hunt.”

  “Exactly. The Threes have been branching out. They’ve always been pretty mobile, but clustered down here for the most part. Now they’re regularly seen as far north as Midtown and Buckhead, and as far south as the airport. Though why they’d go down there is anyone’s guess.”

  “This change of territory doesn’t sound good,” Kurt said.

  “No, it’s not. The Guild warned the city about what might happen if they messed with this area, but they’re eager to develop the land after the casino went bust. The demons expanding their hunting range is a prime example of what my dad used to call ‘unintended consequences.’”

  Before either of them could respond, something crawled across Riley’s skin, like the sharp skitter of thousands of clawed feet. A quick glance at the other two proved they’d felt it as well.

  “What was that?” Kurt asked, his eyes widening.

  “That would be magic.”

  “Really? How cool is that?” Richard said.

  “Not at all cool. Not down here.”

  Another crackle of magical energy lit up the night, appearing farther south, near Alabama Street.

  “Not our problem, right?” Kurt asked, his voice thinner now. “I mean, Grade Three demons aren’t going to care if someone can sling spells around.”

  He was correct. A Gastro-Fiend wouldn’t care—a necromancer would make just as tasty a meal as a demon trapper if he or she wasn’t careful. Most of the magic users were brighter than that.

  “It’s not just Threes down here,” she said. “That’s the danger.”

  With each increase in grade on the demonic rating scale came a corresponding increase in lethality and smarts. Playing with magic in Demon Central was like laying a juicy steak
in front of a hungry mongrel. Some of the demons would ignore it, but not all. Not the really badass ones. They’d love nothing more than to grab onto the soul of some clueless necromancer. If you delivered a summoner’s soul to the Prince? That’d earn you special brownie points.

  Hell was all about one-upping your fellow fiends, the ultimate corporate hierarchy. Mortal institutions were only pale imitations.

  When the ground rumbled beneath her feet, Riley knew the magical bait had been taken. “Damn!” she said, pulling out her cell phone.

  “What was that?” Richard asked.

  “Big trouble.” Riley sent a text, one that automatically went to all the demon trappers on duty tonight. One that meant they should drop whatever they were doing and get here as fast as possible.

  FIVE IN DEMON CTRL

  No other directions would be needed—a Geo-Fiend, or Grade Five demon, stood at least seven feet tall. No way you could miss it. All the trappers had to do was follow the lightning and the raging windstorm.

  Once she finished the text, Riley looked over at her apprentices. Richard’s and Kurt’s faces had paled now. They knew what a Five was, and they knew they were nowhere near ready to confront this level of demon. It would be suicide.

  She needed to reinforce that thinking, so they didn’t try some of the crazy stuff that she had when she was an apprentice.

  “Guys, this thing is above your pay grade. You stay here. Do not get in the middle of this.”

  “But—” Kurt began.

  “No! This fiend will tear you apart.” Riley paused. “This is the kind of demon that killed my dad. You know, Paul Blackthorne, Master Demon Trapper?”

  “But you need backup,” Richard insisted.

  Her newbies had guts, that was for sure. But guts with no training would get them just as dead.

  “Backup will be here shortly. What you can do is keep the civilians away. There are bound to be some nosy ones around,” she said, pulling a blue grounding sphere out of her backpack. “Stay safe, okay?”

  They both nodded, still in shock. There was a point in every trapper’s career when the job bitch-slapped them, and she suspected that moment had just arrived. This was usually when the decision was made: Continue with the training or walk away? Riley would tackle that issue later.

  Right now, she had a demon to trap.

  Chapter Two

  Riley took off at a trot. One street away, she found herself facing increasing gusts of wind and lightning bolts that slammed into the buildings nearby, causing debris to break loose.

  As she drew closer, she found the source of the trouble: A man in a dark-blue robe stood in the middle of the street, magic arcing around him. Didn’t he realize that he had attracted one of Hell’s most lethal killers?

  “What a total idiot,” Riley said, picking up speed. If she could hold the Geo-Fiend in place until the other trappers arrived, they could ground the monster and send it back to Hell. If not, there would be more earthquakes, high winds, and casualties.

  One of which might be her.

  Riley had nearly reached the necromancer when he turned in her direction. He didn’t look familiar, but then, she knew only a few of the corpse summoners. On the whole, she tried to avoid them. The necro smiled at her, pulled up the hood of his cloak, then vanished in a ball of bright-blue light.

  “What the . . . oh no.”

  Had she just been set up?

  The Geo-Fiend rose out of the boiling asphalt, its bull-shaped head resting on a pair of massive shoulders that would make any steroid-stoked bodybuilder proud. Horns curved out of its skull, and it had two massive canines. Coal-black skin contrasted with the blazing-red eyes, which homed in on her immediately. That wasn’t surprising. If this behemoth could kill her, or obtain her soul, it would be given the biggest celebratory party Hell had ever seen.

  “Blackthorne’s daughter!” the fiend bellowed.

  It hovered above the ground now, wind swirling around it, picking up snow and debris. The mini earthquakes were bad enough, but the debris could be lethal. She’d lost her father that way.

  Riley ground to a halt about forty feet from the monster, needing to buy time for the others to arrive. Her heart hammered and her palms sweat, making it hard to keep hold of the grounding sphere.

  She thought of the man she loved, how Beck would handle this. And then she knew the best way to play it.

  “Hey, dumbass!” she called out, channeling her fiancé’s mouthy attitude. “Yeah, you! What are you doing here? Don’t you know Atlanta is a no-go zone for you losers?”

  “Your soul will be mine!” it called back.

  One-track mind. “Not happening,” she replied, sweat now rolling down her back despite the chilly night. “How’s old Lucifer nowadays? Still cracking heads like a good tyrant?”

  The demon snarled at the mention of his lord. The fiends might serve the Fallen angel, but that didn’t mean they liked to be reminded. The lesser demons would cringe at his name. This one just winced.

  Without any warning, the ground in front of Riley cracked, heaving open. Heat and the stench of rot rose in a steady cloud.

  “That again? Really? Don’t you guys learn any new tricks?”

  Where is my backup?

  If a Five came to the city, every demon trapper on duty had only one response: They came to the battle.

  Yet here she was, alone.

  They wouldn’t let me die like this.

  Or maybe they would. At least some of them.

  The demon laughed in amusement, knowing she was in trouble. “Pledge your soul to me and I will let you live,” it offered.

  “Yeah right.” Riley smirked, trying to cover the fear that had wound itself around her middle and squeezed like an anaconda.

  “Let me guess, that deluxe “Sell Your Soul to Me” package comes with a one-way trip to Hell, a personal welcome by the Prince himself, and an eternity of torment. Am I right?”

  The fire in the demon’s eyes grew brighter now. “Of course not.”

  “Liar. You forget, I’ve been down there. I know what it’s like.”

  And no matter what it took, she would never go there again.

  The demon flicked its hand, and a mini tornado formed on its palm. That was this kind’s strength—the ability to command the weather and generate earthquakes. It dropped the funnel to the ground, and it immediately grew in size, spinning the snow as though she and the fiend were inside a hellish snow globe.

  Usually Demon Central was littered with scraggly metal fencing, left in place because most people weren’t brave enough to try to salvage it in an area full of monsters. The grounding spheres worked best by connecting with the metal and—if you were lucky—enclosing the Five in a circle of magic. Once the fiend touched ground, it would return to Hell. A quick check proved that the city’s ambitious cleanup plan had robbed her of that option, at least when it came to the fencing.

  “Thanks a bunch, guys,” Riley muttered. Now she would have to lob the magically charged sphere underneath the fiend. If the sphere hit in just the right place, it’d work. Most times, it didn’t.

  Just as she was about to throw the sphere, a voice called out. A quick glance over her shoulder revealed Lex Reynolds running toward her at top speed. The bad news was that he was the only one.

  He skidded to a halt by her side and, breath heaving, asked the same question she’d been thinking. “Where is everyone?”

  “Polishing their nails, apparently.”

  He met her eyes and the message was passed: They were on their own. At least until someone grew a conscience. Or a pair.

  The earth rumbled again and they dodged right to avoid another sinkhole, debris swirling around them. When Riley looked back, the demon had shifted closer. Too close.

  “Stay or take off?” she called to Reynolds. Not that she wanted to run, but t
hey were in deep trouble.

  “Stay,” he said. “Let’s send this thing home.”

  “Then we’ll kick some people’s asses.”

  “You got a deal.”

  They flanked the Five, carefully avoiding the steaming pits that continued to open around them. It was harder to avoid the crap whirling in the air.

  A low groan from Riley’s left indicated that one of the derelict buildings wasn’t tolerating the wind. “Reynolds!” she called out in warning.

  He sprinted out of the way as a jumble of bricks cascaded to the ground, adding even more fuel to the demon’s windstorm. A crackle of lightning made Riley look up just in time to avoid being speared by a sizzling white bolt before it slammed into the ground, scorching the pavement in a five-foot circle. Car alarms blared in the distance.

  Reynolds’s blistering expletive and “Hell no, you bastard!” told her that the Five had just made the same “Sell Your Soul” offer to him. So much for being special.

  Her fellow trapper’s grounding sphere fell short. As the demon roared in anger at the futile attempt, Riley took her best shot. Her sphere landed closer to its mark, which only infuriated the Five more. As the magic took hold, grabbing onto the fiend, her companion sent another grounding sphere under its clawed feet.

  When the Five went ballistic, fighting against the magic, they broke open their shield spheres, forming a protective envelope of magic around each of them.

  Riley’s heart raced and her breath grew short as the storm roared around them. Another sphere arced near the demon, a long lob from somewhere behind them. That sphere caught as well, and with a final deafening roar, the Five sank into the ground, leaving behind one last, sharp shake that sent Riley tumbling to her knees.

  As the debris pattered around them like rain, she covered her head, praying the shield spheres held a bit longer. Finally the fallout ended, and she regained her feet.

  Reynolds raised his head. “You okay?” he called out.

  “Yeah. You?”

  “In one piece.” A trickle of blood ran down the side of his face. “Jackson, you good?”