JOHN EVERSON: Redemption

EXCERPT of REDEMPTION

John everson

Copyright © 2017 by John Everson

SIX FINGERS CURLED around Alex’s neck and shoved her hard against a rock wall. At least, she supposed there were six fingers because that’s how many that there were on the hand that pinned Ariana to the wall across from her. The realization chilled her when she absentmindedly counted the fingers around Ariana’s neck… and then counted them again to be sure.

They were long, dark, gnarled. The demon itself – well, at least Alex assumed it was a demon – leered at her with teeth that seemed too large for its heavy jaw. They glistened in the dim room.

“Were you looking for something?” it asked. The voice was a low growl; like a chain dragged across an iron bucket.

Ariana answered, from the opposite wall.

“We were looking for you,” she said. Her voice was artificially sultry. Alex wanted to barf. The woman was smooth as plastic, and just as real.

The demon didn’t buy it.

“Yeah, and I was looking for dinner. Thanks for coming when I called.”

He leaned in and bared dark teeth. It looked as if he were going to chew out Ariana’s neck.

But then she dropped the act.

“Wait!” she demanded. Her voice was cold. Hard.

The demon stopped. It raised an eyebrow. Or, at least, the ridge where a human eyebrow would be. This creature didn’t seem to have any hair. It resembled a human close enough, but obviously differed too. Its eyes were longer, as if someone had grabbed it by the corners and pulled. It wore no clothes, and its chest and belly were scarred with the dark lines of past wounds. Its sex looked heavy, and dangerous. Alex thought there might be spines at its end. She didn’t lust to become the object of its “affections.” It might be a tryst she wouldn’t survive.

“I can help you,” Ariana said.

Alex raised an eyebrow. She couldn’t wait to hear where this was going.

“No place good,” Malachai whispered in her head.

The demon laughed. “I wasn’t looking for any help,” he said. “I’m perfectly capable of ripping the two of you limb from limb by myself. And I don’t think you’d want to help me with that anyway. What are you going to do to help me?”

“I can help you open the door between worlds,” Ariana said quietly.

The demon paused. It looked at her more closely. Considered.

“And why would I believe that?” it asked.

“We’re here, aren’t we?” Ariana said. “How do you think that happened?”

“How do I know you are the one who found your way through? There are many of us who have reached through the walls between worlds and brought back a toy. I’d guess that you are the toys of someone else. Someone who will probably be looking for you. Them, perhaps?”

The demon gestured back in the direction they’d come from. There was noise at the entrance of the hall.

Voices. Feet.

“If you don’t get us to someplace safe quickly, I won’t be able to prove anything to you,” Ariana warned. “You know they will torture and play with us until we are dead.”

The demon nodded. “As will I.”

“If you don’t get us out of here in about ten seconds, you’ll never know what you had.”

The hand tightened around Alex’s neck until she choked.

“If you are not serious, I will make sure that your death is far slower and more painful than you would have received at the hands and feet of the mob,” the demon said.

It yanked them from the wall, and pushed them in front of its legs, already in motion, forcing them to a staggering run. After they rounded a corner, it stopped, and slipped one arm around each of their waists.

Alex felt her feet lift the ground and her head tilt forward. And then the demon was carrying them, and they were flying through the dark. Twisting through silent corridors and vaulting up winding stairwells. The air grew warmer, and smelled of something heavy and bitter.

The sounds of the other demons disappeared behind them, and eventually, their captor slowed his pace. Alex’s feet touched the ground but she wasn’t free. The demon’s long fingers crushed around her arm, and dragged her into an alcove in the black rock of the corridor. She was pushed ahead, and Ariana’s bare skin suddenly plastered itself against hers. The demon held both of them with one arm, as it opened the door ahead.

“Welcome home,” it growled, pushing them into the dark room beyond.

A flame guttered into existence on the wall ahead and suddenly Alex could actually see the room. The fire flickered and grew on its sconce. There was nothing else on that wall, but there was a collection of trophies displayed on the far one. A human skull decorated the center, but around it was a mélange of bones and other skulls; she saw what looked to be a ram’s head, with curled horns hanging from the wall, but most of the bones were from creatures that Alex couldn’t identify.

She didn’t have time to try; the demon hustled them through the room and opened another door. Without warning, a heavy hand shoved her in the back and Alex fell forward. Her feet left the ground and she landed on her shoulder, rolling down a short ramp to crack her head against the ground at the bottom. Ariana’s hip smashed into her face. She cried out from shock and pain. From above, the demon laughed.

“Make yourselves comfortable. When I come back… we’ll have much to talk about.”

With that, the door at the top of the incline closed, and Alex and Ariana were left in absolute darkness.

GIVEAWAY

Yeah, baby!!!! The night before Halloween and you had to have known John would make this special!!! He’s giving away FIVE ECOPIES OF HIS BRAND NEW STONE-COLD CHILLER REDEMPTION!!!!  So hurry and click on back to tonight’s post featuring John Everson and comment I WANT TO WIN!!!! Five lucky winners will!!!

What if you woke up in hell?

Alex hadn’t really thought of what would happen after she dragged Ariana through the portal to close the gate between worlds. She hadn’t given sacrificing herself a thought, she’d just wanted to end the demonic summoning before it was too late.

But when Alex wakes up on the other side, in the world of the Curburide, she has to think fast if she ever wants to see Joe Kieran, or Earth, again. Her only ally is an occult serial killer. Demons are searching for both of them, and there’s nothing demons love more than human fear and pain. They feed on it. In the world of the Curburide, demons are everywhere.

And they’re hungry...

The stunning conclusion to the story that began in Covenant and Sacrifice!

AUTHOR BIO

John Everson is the Bram Stoker Award-winning author of nine novels of erotic horror and the macabre, including his latest, REDEMPTION, the conclusion to his demonic Curburide Chronicles trilogy. Other novels include the Fountain of Youth erotic thriller THE FAMILY TREE, the Bram Stoker Award-nominated tour de force NIGHTWHERE, the Bram Stoker Award-winner COVENANT, its sequel SACRIFICE and the standalone novels THE 13TH, SIREN, THE PUMPKIN MAN, and VIOLET EYES. He also is the author of four collections of short horror fiction, including his latest, SACRIFICING VIRGINS.

John shares a deep purple den in Naperville, Illinois with a cockatoo and cockatiel, a disparate collection of fake skulls, twisted skeletal fairies, Alan Clark illustrations and a large stuffed Eeyore. There's also a mounted Chinese fowling spider named Stoker, an ever-growing shelf of custom mix CDs and an acoustic guitar that he can't really play but that his son likes to hear him beat on anyway. Sometimes his wife is surprised to find him shuffling through more public areas of the house, but it's usually only to brew another cup of coffee. In order to avoid the onerous task of writing, he occasionally records pop-rock songs in a hidden home studio, experiments with the insatiable culinary joys of the jalapeno, designs book covers for a variety of small presses, loses hours in expanding an array of gardens and chases frequent excursions into the bizarre visual headspace of '70s euro-horror DVDs with a shot of Makers Mark and a tall glass of Revolution Brewing's Anti-Hero IPA.

Learn more about John on his site, www.johneverson.com, where you can sign up for a direct-from-the-author monthly e-newsletter with information on new books, contests and occasionally, free fiction.

Want to connect? Follow John on Twitter @johneverson, or find him on Facebook at www.facebook.com/johneverson.