The Hunt
Earlier...
Nine-fifteen pm.
Somewhere in Beacon Hill, where the full moon shone over rows of houses intersected by sloping streets, a figure ran past a dark alley; hard breathing with light, fast-paced steps on pebbled ground. It was nine pm on the clock and something followed the figure behind. It flashed past as if its feet weren't even touching the earth. In a minute, this race would be over. The shadow would win.
Empty houses up for sale filled the present area. Life was on the other side of the block, down the next winding street. Screaming for help wouldn't have helped the victim, and before long, a dead end surfaced. The figure in front pulled to a sharp stop, adrenaline palpable like ocean currents.
Looking back, Lisa Cahill could vividly remember walking into an opera house close by that evening. She had put on a red, cape-necked lace dress that dropped till the top of her knees, not loose but not too tight either. Her bare toes peeked up at her now, skin pale as dough in contrast to the dark. She had liked those black ankle-strap stilettos; they were her favourites.
Lisa faced the creature. Edging closer to the wall, her sterling grey eyes held a certainty that caught the fiend before her off guard. This was her end. She should have been convulsing with fear and not wearing that confident ghost of a smile on her face. The shadow then took the form of a half human. Its preference was a man this time, and his eyes glowed a powerful shade of red.
"Any last words, milady?" The exaggerated accent triggered an eye roll.
She had fought the scoff that came next, but it came out louder. "Is this a joke or did you fall out from nineteenth century England?"
"I've been here and there for a while."
"And you've escaped our traps for so long, huh?" She crossed her arms and grinned. "Demon, it would be my pleasure to get rid of you."
"Look around, my gyves are already upon you." He opened his arms.
His varying manner of speech irked her. It was an obvious facade. Lisa snorted at his weird way of saying fetters. She wanted to shove that annoying smirk on his face up his ass and she was going to do it.
In the next second, the sound of tires screeching to a halt at the other end of the route distracted the demon-man. He had looked away for a split second, and Lisa charged.
She made a perfect aim and the ropes of the bolas captured his ankles and wrists at one go. An ancient spell sired by a mage laced the weights at its end.
They called it the red market, and it remained the meeting point. A wizard would enchant ordinary weapons to receive a rare crystal from the few aware of their existence. As far as Lisa knew, witches weren't to be hunted. They existed in secret for a greater good.
The spell could weaken demons and expel ghosts. The demon-man struggled and tried defending himself by releasing clouds of a noxious ashen substance from his mouth.
It didn't harm a single hair on her head.
The onyx necklet she wore absorbed the black magic immediately and the demon-man knew he was finished.
Meanwhile, a huge bear of a man approached. He walked with ease through the darkness, like he had spent more than enough time within it.
"Baby sister, I didn't mean to be late...I swear," he said, pressing a palm to his chest in mock apology.
She gazed away and crossed her arms. Practicing her breathing, she aimed to put her anger in reins.
It didn't work.
"For once in your lifetime, can you stick to the goddamn plan, Damien!" Lisa whisper-yelled, glowering.
"Whoa, whoa. Someone's clearly not in the mood." He tried a lopsided smile.
The demon-man stayed bound between them on the ground. Lisa released a sigh and ignored her step brother's attempt to annoy her. She raised the hem of her dress up her thighs, exposing a thigh holster. Lisa had pulled out a silver dagger that caught the moon's reflection like a magnet, and Damien dropped a low whistle.
"Oh my god, you're disgusting." She made a face as if she would puke and eyed him.
"Come on, Lisa. Don't act prissy. I was only pulling your legs..." He paused, only to speak faster, lifting his brows. "But damn, they're some fine legs."
Damien had angled away on instinct, knowing fully well that she was going to aim for a hit on his head or shoulders. She had shoved the air, and he doubled over, laughing his heart out.
He lived for the sake of getting on Lisa Cahill's nerves.
Jabbing the dagger's end against his chest, she glared. "Finish this off and the others in hiding or else I will tell our father that you jeopardised a hunt just to get in the pants of that opera singer."
She picked his keys from his left pocket and pulled his leather jacket off of him to clothe herself from the biting night chill. A strong, masculine scent enveloped her. It had made her feel safe. She hugged the jacket closer.
Damien held the weapon hesitantly as he registered with her words. His eyes started swivelling around and scouring through the darkness with haste. Lisa was already on her way down the steps when he asked in a tense tone; thick brows furrowed.
"Wait! Lisa, I don't understand. What do you mean by the others?"
She didn't answer. She kept her strides normal and as graceful as always, never looking back; even though she knew she had his onyx necklet sitting inside her thigh holster.
On reaching the black beamer he had showed up with, she turned her neck the fraction of an inch and smiled with mischief written all over.
Damien felt his heart jump.
A chill spread in his spine and throughout. He wanted to call out again. Actually, he wanted to rain curses and scream at his sister. He moved to cup his neck with a hand and when he felt it bare, his mouth worked mutely. He couldn't utter a sound.
Those others were behind him, and he could feel that there were many of them.
Damien had pressed his lids together for a short while and spun around, slashing the weapon across.
___
When Lisa cut into a two-lane street, she couldn't have expected the life-changing moment that came next. She had left her step brother to face off a gang of angry-looking demons alone, but if anyone could survive that, it would be Damien Cahill. He was strong, and she admired and hated that about him.
It was what they did on the other side of every normal day. Lisa worked as a highschool teacher during the day and at night, she would carry on her family's legacy. An endless lineage of bounty hunters who rid the streets of Boston from the attacks of ghosts and demons in return for an unknown wire transfer of thousands of dollars on a daily. All she had wanted to do was teach him a lesson.
Damien Cahill didn't enjoy his life, and Lisa could see that. She watched his hunger to live a normal one grow each passing day. He was fit enough and extremely skilled in hunting, but that thrill gained when shuffling from one paranormal investigation to another didn't exist for Damien. If their father Marcus were to learn of this even in the slightest bit, Lisa knew he would spend at least a month inside the wall. To the Cahill kids, that was purgatory in the land of the living.
Eyes trained on the idle road, she couldn't stop her wandering thoughts. His onyx burned her thighs. It could have been the work of her guilt, but she thought of the worst at that moment. Damien could be dying. He hadn't worn boots; he didn't have his sword with him. A silver dagger against an army of evil. She feared she had gone too far with her revenge.
Lisa chanced a wistful glance at her side-view mirror, as if she could see the alley far behind inside it. She wasted her time. There was nothing in her tracks. The lamp-lit street ran empty from behind, but then, in her front, that wasn't the case. She returned her gaze, and it began at a shot; those life-changing seconds.
An elderly woman appeared in the middle of the road, right in front, just there, looking like an ambassador for the underworld. Bluish-grey skin dripped water. This woman wore a black royal mantle and possessed a lifeless and rumpled face. She held a golden staff in her right hand.
Lisa suspected she had come face to face with someone akin to death.
She swerved dangerously to the left on impulse. It couldn't have been possible to stop without hitting what stood in her way.
The blaring screech cut through the silence of night and the beamer ran into one of the gigantic trees that lined the quiet street. The air bag had protected her from a fatal collision with the steering wheel, but Lisa still bumped her head against the car door. She had skipped the seatbelt last minute.
Her breaths came in quick falls and her fingertips felt numb. She climbed out of the car, desperately searching and, like a nightmare, she had found the road blank. If she narrated the story in her head to anyone, they would think she had lost it.
Damien's car was in terrible shape. Its bumper and hood had compressed into a mess, but her only luck was that the engine didn't smoke. If she hadn't sent him to his death—hopefully—he would kill her for this instead.
Lisa had reached into the front seat for her phone when a sharp, impossible pain burst through the area of her collarbone. The force of it had pulled her to the ground, and she groaned aloud in agony.
Her screams could echo. It felt as though inextinguishable flames came in contact with that point on her skin. Her feet dragged through the dirt on the ground and her hands clutched the earth as tears streamed down her face. Sweat trails broke out on her neck and forehead; the pangs of torment caused her to feel her end without achieving it. Lisa had no explanation for the hell she currently experienced.
Again, the mysterious woman showed herself. Through teary eyes, Lisa watched a form tower over her. An extended hand placed itself on the spot below her collarbone. Rested against the body of the beamer, it all seemed like she had fallen into some kind of trance.
She wasn't a ghost or a demon. The onyx should have fought in Lisa's place already, but it chose not to. This woman was either an unbelievably powerful creature, or she was just something...necessary.
The impossible pain had vanished after her touch, but so had the woman. When Lisa's vision cleared, her throat felt cracked from wailing so much. She tried gulping spit, but to no avail. Quick, amidst the pounding in her head, she tugged at the neckline of her dress and pulled it apart with all the strength she had left. The tearing created was enough to see what the woman had left behind.
A golden mark.
It appeared like the strokes of a razor, scrawled, 1-0-0.