Demon Day Read Online Free Page A

“That’s not possible. It’s
a legend told by Vodoun to scare witches and other
demons.”
    “ Yet that is what you tried
to do to as she lay awash in blood at the altar. I felt it in the
air. You called on the Loa, Rae, and they were answering you. You
defied natural order and that is not your purpose.”
    I bit my lip, hard. “It was you? You
stopped me?”
    “ If you had truly wanted to
tie her to such a repugnant fate I would have let you finish.” He
held up his palm to stop me from speaking. “But I think I stopped
you in time.”
    I grabbed his hand. “You think? I saw
her twitch, but I thought it was her body being zapped with magic.”
I looked back to the body and thought of the energy I could feel
within her. Was it possible? Was there a way to bring her back to
me?
    A shadow of a nameless emotion passed
his face, like clouds over the sun, but it was gone in an instant,
smothered by that expressionless mask he hid behind. “To complete
the resurrection you needed to lock her soul in her body. She did
not awaken, she was set free.”
    My excitement died and I
loosened my grip on his hand. Tears welled in my eyes to run down
my face. “I miss her,” I confessed and scrubbed at my cheeks.
“She’s only been gone a few hours and I– I’m struggling to accept
it. She doesn’t feel gone to me.” I tried to make him understand
that her loss was not something I could rationalize. “She should
never have been dragged into this. She suffered. They humiliated
her and abused her body. I want … wanted to give her something
back.”
    “ You tried to give her life
but it was not for her wellbeing.”
    I jerked like he had backhanded me and
stared at him. “How could you say that to me?”
    “ You tried to reanimate her
for yourself. No one would want to live such a wretched existence,
least of all someone as vibrant as I sensed your friend to be. She
would have become a killer, Rae, and consumed with thoughts of
flesh and pain. A slave to the urges and whims of the dark magic
she was reborn from. Her flesh would be cold and dead. She would
never change or grow. You would have given her life, but lost the
friend you knew.”
    “ You don’t know her. She
would have been fine. I would have helped her, zapped her with good
energy or something.”
    I looked inward, seeking answers to my
own questions and complicated thoughts. In truth, I’d not thought
of the repercussions when I had tried to reanimate Lex. How would
she have felt becoming a zombie? Created and kept alive by dark
magic pumping through her body. The knowledge of how to create
zombies had supposedly died out alongside the Vodoun; Bokors and
Mambos who practiced voodoo a decade before. Lex’s own mother was
the last known voodoo sorceress known to humankind – hunted down by
the Clerics and executed. Her mother’s power was the reason why I
thought calling on the voodoo deity would save her from death. But
would Lex have forgiven me? Could she have ever been
happy?
    “ It was selfish,” I
admitted and my shoulders slumped. “But it doesn’t matter. It
didn’t work. I swear to never try it again.”
    As I said the words magic crackled,
and a heavy constraint wrapped around my neck and settled. Then the
collar of air disappeared. I blinked, placing my hands around my
neck.
    “ Uh, what
happened?”
    Breandan stared at me like I was mad.
“You made an oath.”
    I rubbed my neck. “By saying I
swear?”
    “ Our words are bound by
magic. If you swear to do something, you must keep the promise.” He
pulled my rubbing hands down from my throat and placed them at my
sides.
    I shifted, fidgety. I plucked at my
bottom lip instead, knowing yanking on my hair, or rubbing my nose
would be too big a giveaway to how uncomfortable I was feeling.
“This goes hand in hand with the whole speaking the truth thing,
right?” He nodded. “So if I break an oath–”
    “ You die.”
    I gaped at him then
spluttered; “You didn’t think to tell me