The Demon Mage Pt. 02

"Snap out of it. Calm down, you're experiencing an Incubus' feeding instincts for the first time. Deep breaths, close your mind to it, look into my eyes."

I attempt to let out shaky breaths, bringing in the musty city air in through my nose.

Suddenly her eyes were no longer a light brown. The eyes that bore up to mine were a glinting metallic silver. Something in the back of my mind recognized those eyes.

The demon was no longer standing beside me. I felt my transformation fading, my claws and horns sinking away.

I was now aware that my half-hard cock was pressed against Morgana's lower stomach.

She stepped away.

"You're going to want to..."

She stumbled slightly with her words.

"Get a hold of yourself, so you don't walk around like that in public."

She turns to walk down the alley to give me space, but as she did so, I thought I could see a flustered and pinkish expression, unless I imagined it.

The rest of the way, as a precaution of my demonic side flaring up again, we stuck to back alleys and non-busy roads, which only made the walk to my childhood home much longer. After almost an hour of walking, we were finally in the slum outskirts of the city, where the poor and farmers dwelled.

The sun was now high in the early afternoon sky, pressing warm light into the grotty shacks and cottages. Children adorn with rags and grime on their knees and hands pranced over the dirt roads, singing and laughing. Men and women bent over gardens, or sat in front of their houses, watching the children at play.

I feel the familiar swell of nostalgia for the neighborhood I grew up in, looking over the houses and people who worked endlessly to make ends meet.

As Morgana and I walked the dirt path, adults looked to our Vermont School robes with surprised expressions. I attempted to avoid their gazes, which called out to us:

Why are these high-class mages in a place like this? You don't belong here.

After minutes of walking, my mother's cottage is visible, its shabby wooden roof and walls at home amongst the other degraded buildings. The garden in the back, strangely, was not as colorful and lively as I remembered it, the green of the spinach, radishes, and broccoli she sells to the market looking faded and wilting. It has been years since seeing it, and I feel my life here with my mother floating in the back of my mind, a younger me running ahead of me up the cobblestone steps to the front door.

Lost in memory, I don't realize that I'm standing before the front door. It looked foreign and intimidating nonetheless of the child covered in dirt who once threw this same door open to greet my mother at the kitchen table.

"Anything wrong, Laizen?"

Morgana asked, at my side.

I looked over to her, startled, almost forgetting that she had accompanied me here.

"I-I-"

I couldn't find the words that could express the fear and shame of seeing my mother again after all these years, after finally seeing this neighborhood from years of living in luxury in a castle.

While I studied magic, she remained here.

Suddenly Morgana's hand was on my shoulder, and the warm gesture surprised me.

"All there is to do now, is knock."

After swallowing deeply, that's what I did.

The frail wood felt hollow to the touch. Footsteps clamored lightly from the inside of the house, and suddenly, the door was open, and my mom stood before me, her eyes widening.

"Hi, mom."

...

I was wrapped in my mother's embrace. She was on the tips of her toes, holding me.

"Oh my God, Laizen, my boy."

She said into my shoulder.

I squeezed my mother, feeling the hot press of tears in my eyes, but I coaxed them down, as my mother took a step away.

She looks up to me, her green eyes glinting with tears, her cheeks damp and pink. Her curly brown hair lay over her shoulders, wispy and greying.

"What are you doing here son?"

Her hand was on my chest.

"You've gotten... Tall- and- dear lord what physical exercises are they putting you through at that school? You've really grown."

I chuckled, swiftly ignoring her, wanting to push the subject elsewhere.

"I- wanted to talk to you..."

I said quickly.

Her eyes shifted from looking her son up and down, to Morgana, who still stood in the doorway.

A smile is splaying over her face, and her eyes perk knowingly up to me.

"I'll brew you and your girlfriend over there a pot of tea."

I felt my face numb, and Morgana giggled from behind me. It was the most feminine thing I've heard from her mouth. My mother walks towards the kitchen counter to get a tea kettle. I notice an unmistakable limp to her walk.

"Mother, are you okay?"

She turns towards me with a flip of her brown hair, grabbing the pot, and walking over to the fire that burned steadily in the fireplace.

'Oh-"

She smoothed her hand down her back.

"Just my back and legs giving your old mother a hard time."

She said nonchalantly.

I watch worriedly as she hangs the pot over the flames.

That's why the garden didn't look the same. She's hurting.

I remember sitting at the table with my mother years ago, contemplating attending Vermont when I received my test scores.

"I can stay here with you, help you and the garden, I don't have to go."

I told my mother, looking over the parchment that had my high scores printed in black ink, and seeing her saddened expression.

To this, she smiles, placing a warm and slender hand over mine.

"I can handle things here. You need to be able to choose whatever path opens to you in life. You can provide for both of us when you're a mage, son."

She said with a laugh that brought me back to warm Summer afternoons in the gardens with her.

I took her words and went after that dream of being a Mage, of helping the world.

While my mother worked herself to death.

I felt guilt pulse nauseatingly in my chest.

I notice my mother looking over me curiously.

We meet eyes, and when she realizes I had noticed her lingering eyes, she chuckles, straightening herself from her slouched position over the fire.

"I'm sorry- it's just now... You really look like..."

She trailed off, her eyes averting from mine quickly, walking over to the table in the kitchen, gesturing to the two empty chairs.

"Why don't you kids have a seat."

Morgana and I exchanged glances and took a seat at the table, as my mother prepared bread at the kitchen counter.

I watch her work, slicing the crusty bread with a knife and placing it on a wooden plate.

"Who is my father?"

I ask.

Her knife pauses, and my mother was still, her stature almost lifeless.

After moments of silence, she spoke.

"Son, we've spoken about the subject of your father. It is something that I do not want to tread."

She said, and the sternness of her voice was unrecognizable. It wasn't the voice with which she scolded me as a child. This voice was a different person.

I take a breath, and press further, nonetheless of my mind telling me to stop.

"Why can't I know? Who is he?"

She continued slicing the bread, but her cuts were jagged and unfocused.

"That man is not associated in any part with you life-"

I cut in.

"Why is it being kept from me, is there something that you are not telling me-"

"I have told you my position with this subject and I will NOT-"

"All my life I've gone without a father, it's just a-"

"Laizen-"

"question, I need to know- please-"

"Laizen-"

"It's all that I will ever ask of you-"

"THAT'S ENOUGH!"

Suddenly blood is pooling over the kitchen counter. The knife that had been cutting bread is buried deeply in my mother's thumb.

Morgana and I clamor from our chairs, but suddenly my mother raises the hand with the knife gripped in it towards us.

"I'm alright."

She said softly. Her voice was thin, it sounded weary.

Nothing but the cackling of the fire was heard in the room, sounding like snickering children in the small cottage.

Her knife drooled with her blood like an animal's teeth, wavering in an unsteady motion in the air. It dripped wicked liquid to the rotting wood floors, a faint pitter patter with each drop.

I was posed to assist my mother, but something within me caused me to remain standing at the table.

My words broke into the ominous silence.

"Someone has turned me into a demon."

My mother's eyes were glassy as she looked at me, unrecognizable. Those green eyes once gleamed at me from her spot in the garden as I played, as we ate together at this very table.

These eyes possess none of that warmth. They were glazed with fear, looking at me as if I were someone else entirely.

She lowers her knife to her side shakily. She was shaking her head at me, feebly.

I continue, my voice thin.

"Someone- something, is in control of me and everything I love."

Suddenly the knife hits the wood floor with a hollow thud.

She staggers, losing her footing entirely and nearly falls, but she grips the counter, steadying herself. Her body was trembling. I am at my mother's side, my hands out to assist her.

"Mom- what's wrong- are you okay?"

I press my hands into her shoulders. Her body felt frail in my hands.

"He- he planned to awaken- to awaken your-"

She was speaking frantically. Her face was colorless, a shade of icy grey.

"I told him no- I told him I wouldn't allow it- and he-he..."

She suddenly stops, as if something were caught in her throat, choking.

She raises her trembling wounded hand to my face, pressing her wrinkled and bloodied skin into my own.

But the greyen eyes of my mother were not hers, they were the eyes of a corpse.

She was struggling to say something- her breath was wheezing weakley from her throat.

I strained to hear her, feeling numb, the world around me empty and black.

Suddenly I hear Morgana's voice behind me:

"Laizen get away from your mother- NOW-"

My mother's words fell from her chapped lips to the cold, silent air.

"I love you."

My mother's face erupts outwards in an explosion of blood and something hard slams into my chest.

I'm thrown off my feet, my body crashing into the dining table. It's legs buckled under my weight and fell to the ground.

Standing before me, my mother's body bucks, insect appendages tearing from her body, the scabbed face of a demon pulling itself from my mother's ruined face, its slitted eyes corusating a green glow, pincers snapping over a jagged fanged mouth, drooling a viscid black venom.

The corpse of my mother lay in a strewn mess of blood and organs at the legs of the demon. A mix of human and spider appendages extend from the demon's absurd body, writhing unnaturally over its slimy exoskeleton.

The monster's scream tears through the house and my ears. My body was numb. All I could feel was the drip of my mother's blood over my face and arms. All I could see was my mother's grey face.

The demon's voice, sounding like cracking glass screamed at me:

"YOU WILL MEET THE MASTER EVEN IF YOU'RE BARELY ALIVE."

The beast pounces at me.

Muscle memory takes control of my numbed limbs and I kick at the demon's flailing limbed body, sending it scraping across the wood floor and into the opposing kitchen counter.

I attempt to scramble to my feet, crawling desperately away from the demon, gripping an edge of the kitchen counter and pulling my convulsing body upwards and on my feet. I felt like my lungs were taking in no oxygen, I gasped for air, my heart and the ringing in my ears blaring in a morbid harmony.

The demon staggers to its feet, the spider like legs scraping over the floor with a frantic clicking.

It charged at me.

I raise my hand, attempting to slow my breathing.

"Hastar- ext- norime mustarcarus-fiern!"

The demon repulsion curse rippled the air before me, but faded away, the swirling light disappearing feebly.

I have to steady my mind- I have to concentrate.

But my mother's face and her last words were all there was.

I grab the spider appendage as it swipes at me, but not soon enough that it slices over my shoulder. Another swipe, this time a human arm, and I grab it with my free hand.

My body is pushed into the counter, my arms strain and shake against the weight of the demon. The pincers snap at my face, but I keep it away, pushing with everything I had. I could feel the strength leaving my arms.

Suddenly the demon turns and screeches.

"Morgana! Help! Take the asset!"

I turn over to see Morgana standing feet away, staring at the struggle before her, her expression frozen. She seemed to be trembling, and no words left her mouth.

"YOU MUST DO AS THE MASTER COMMANDS!"

The demon snapped, black venom flicking grotesquely from its mouth.

Something crosses over Morgana's face, and she lunges towards us.

I close my eyes.

A horrific squelching noise erupts in front of me, and a blood curdling scream ripples through the cottage.

I open my eyes to find my mother's knife skewered through the monster's face. Black demon blood gurgles from the puncture that tore through its eye and deformed its features.

I pushed the dead body away from me, and it rolled onto the floor.

It's limbs continued to flail and buck.

I slide onto the floor, my body trembling, finding myself finally capable of breathing. I take in the shaky breaths, feebly filling my lungs in and out. Hot tears were spilling down my cheeks, a dark reddish black from my mother's and the demon's blood.

Morgana stood silently, looking over the corpse of the demon, her cream eyes glassy.

"A Sleeper Demon..."

She muttered, closing her eyes as if to be fighting off a headache.

A high pitched whistling noise fills the cottage.

It was the water from the kettle that had finally come to a boil over the fire.

I close my eyes at the noise, as it drifts over the ruined house painted with blood.

...

My mother's house was set aflame.

We walked from the collapsing house, devolving under the flame, smoke and embers that danced over the sky like leaves in the autumn wind.

The walk was silent. Morgana was at my side, quietly following me as we walked through the main streets. The crowds in the street and market were unsettled, hurrying here and there for some uncertain reason, but smothered under the swell of my thoughts, I barely noticed.

A Sleeper Demon.

I wipe blood from my face and arms, desperate to get it off.

I remember sitting in Demon Analysis courses, seeing the spider like demons from the safety of a textbook illustration years ago.

The ability to possess and live as a parasite inside of a human while it lives its life. The longer they stay in, the more bodily problems the host gains, and if they leave the body, the host is killed.

My mother flickers over my eyes, and I close them in an attempt to block the images out.

She was limping. It wasn't from gardening, it was from...

I clench my hands, not wanting to provoke my body to start trembling again.

I hadn't realized we were now on the dirt path, leading up to the school, it lay in late afternoon shadow, the sun sinking behind its broad stone walls and pillars.

I find myself speaking finally.

"You knew my mother was going to die. It's why you came."

There was nothing but the wind and faint rustling of shrubs as we made our way up the slope.

All that Morgana's soft voice said:

"Yes."

I turn back to see Morgana's form silhouetted and dark against the shadows sinking around us.

The clatter of a bell breaks through the field of grass, reverating deeply from the school.

A similar one begins a violent and distant pounding from the king's castle in the city.

"Laizen what is that?"

Morgana asks, her voice quiet and foreboding.

I look back to the school before us, and find my body sprinting.

"An emergency signal-"

I yell breathlessly, not feeling my limbs as I run towards the school.

"The city is under attack."

...

Morgana and I push open the oak wood doors of the school, revealing a courtyard filled to the brim of the bustling cloaks of mages.

I push through the panicked mages in training, glaring over the crowds when suddenly I hear a familiar voice calling.

"GARRISON! There you are, where the fuck have you-"

My classmate, Gregor, stops in his tracks at the stained black and red blood covering my arms and under his shirt. He seemed to push his curiosity to the side out of panic.

"You are with Captain Reckner's squad, the attack must be big- they are even requiring mages in training to be a line of defense for the inner city."

I simply stare at him, my heart raging over the sounds of the crowds of grouping squads.

Gregor, frustrated, takes me by the shoulder and pulls me.

"Wake the fuck up Laizen. We need to GO."

Gregor pulled me through the thicket of crowds, Morgana right on our tails, I heard students crying, screaming, and I felt the world I knew collapsing right before my eyes.

In a small clearing between the crowds of instructors and students, I see my class, with Reckner standing at the helm.

We meet eyes, and I feel my pulse jolt in my throat, and I quickly avert my eyes ashamedly.

Reckner scans the rest of the class, by his concentrated look, taking a head count.

"The city is under demonic invasion, parties of them appearing from the south of the city."

He screams over his students and the roar of the courtyard around us. Suddenly, the crowds start filing in muddled lines out of the doors of the school grounds. Reckner in the lead, we follow the flow of people, while Reckner continues to shout instruction to us.

"We have been assigned inner-city defense. All of you will more than likely not encounter any conflict if our front lines in the outskirts of the city fare against the invasion. Nonetheless, I need you to treat this with utmost seriousness, be on your guard, and be wary of your fellow classmates. Do you understand?"

He shouted, and the students behind him shouted their agreement.

The crowds of mages were pouring out into the field leading to the inner city, all jogging in a mass of black cloaks against the dimming light of the day.

We entered the inner districts of the city, heading towards town center, and the market. Different squads disperse from us, thinning the crowd, heading towards the outer districts of the town in preparation to be the second line of defense if the first line fell.

We pass through narrow streets, watching as more and more squads disperse, heading towards their assigned area.

The entire outer and inner city has some sort of defense, the demons can't fight through three lines of mages and soldiers.

I turn to Gregor and Morgana, giving them a look that said:

We stay together.

They both nodded their agreement. Suddenly Reckner is hollering ahead of us:

"The line is halting!"

He snapped at the students, who slowed subtly to a stop. Confused muttering consumes the crowd, among the whimpers of scared students.

I strain my hearing to hear the conversation, to even get a brief idea as to what's happening.

"What the hell is going on?"

A student who looked weary and perturbed whispered to his companion, who looked equally uneasy.

"I'm scared. I want to go back to my dorm."

A young underclassmen.

"Council members believe there's a demonic presence straight ahead, just overheard Reckner talking to another teacher."

Someone shouted breathlessly. He seemed to have been farther up by Reckner and was spreading the message.

I swallow hard, suddenly feeling that lingering specter of aura drifting over the crowds.

Where is it coming from? How could there possibly be demons here?

I looked over to Morgana, who's fearful expression confirmed that she could sense it too. I peer over the heads of students, craning to see further down, looking frantically looking around the students that surrounded me.