Page 17 of Dark Rapture
“What the hell?” I rub at my upper arms a little faster in an attempt to generate some warmth. I really need to stop leaving my house without the proper clothing, especially considering what season we’re currently in.
Ideally, things need to stop scaring me and triggering my fight or flight response in the middle of the damn night.
The temperature fluctuation must have been a warning of what was coming, because the flames of all the candles in the church suddenly triple in size.
I gasp, staggering backwards until my lower back collides with the edge of the hefty wooden altar.
I may be a slow learner, but I do eventually learn. Gone are the days of an uneventful life. Now, my existence seems to be marked by terrifying paranormal events. One after another, haunting me relentlessly.
“Who’s there?” I call out, trying to feign bravery in the face of whatever has entered this sacred place. My voice doesn’t tremble, for that I am grateful, but the rest of me is shaking like a leaf.
The shadows shift before me, the double doors that lead out of this place swallowed by a great black chasm. Darkness like thick, impenetrable black smoke falls from the elegant ceiling into the void below.
I watch in rapt horror as a figure descends from the ceiling, its form comprised of the thickest of shadows, like the pitch black smoke of a deadly fire. The inky darkness is being pulled inwards, like the entity is a black hole swallowing every photon of light on these blessed grounds.
Massive wings made of billowing black, the shape of a great owl’s, spread so wide they fill the entire width of the church. Once the entity’s massive body lands both of its feet on the ground, those wings fold to rest behind its broad back.
I cannot make out any details, only vague shapes. It is a shadow figure, devoid of all light, but there are a few things I can distinguish among the darkness.
A massive set of horns sits atop its head, holding what appears to be a dark, polished crown. The lengthy spires curl up and out from where I imagine its forehead is intended to be, with two other sets of spires along the outline of its skull. Though distinctly demonic, they are also awe-inspiring in their size and shape. Like the entity’s horns are a crown all on their own, even without the visual aid of the unholy adornment they hold in place.
This entity is humanoid, but colossal, with spikes protruding from various points around its dark silhouette of a body.
The scream that threatens to explode from my chest is lodged inside of me, my breath caught like a mouse in the trap of my throat. I can’t breathe through the horror of witnessing the being that stands before me.
I’ve lost my fucking mind. At some point between leaving home and arriving here, I’ve slipped into a frenzied psychosis. That is the only way to explain the shadow of a demon standing at the other end of the church.
Tears pool at the corners of my eyes as I stand with my back to the altar, my body trembling so violently I think I may pass out.
The shadows move again, flickering and shifting, until the vision of the great demon turns to a static image my mind just cannot comprehend.
Reality bends, and in the monster’s place, a man stands. Though he is still shrouded in heavy darkness, the man’s body looks far more real than the demon that preceded it.
“Little witch.”
It’shim. The demon from my altar room.
His haunting, disembodied voice fills the church, and if the man is speaking I cannot see his lips moving. It’s still far too dark where he stands for me to make sense of him at all.
The image of him is flickering in and out of existence, one moment he is a man, and the next that monumental demon stands in his place. My mind is fracturing, I cannot understand what I am seeing. Man, demon, both.
“What do you want with me?” I call out as my body presses back against the altar, desperate to escape, with nowhere to go. This entity stands between me and the only known exit.
His voice echoes through the church again, deep and soothing, but still clearly inhuman.
“It isyouthat calls tome.”
I shake my head, terror gripping me. “I didn’t… I…” I whimper, the words dying on my tongue. “Protection spell.” I force myself to speak to the entity, desperate to convince him I didn’t want any of this.
My trembling hands reach out behind me as I try to shimmy slowly along the front of the altar, my instincts screaming at me to run.
“You wear the sigil of my great name upon your soul,” the voice growls deep and low, his presence filling the entire church with an oppressive, dark energy.
Again, I shake my head in response. My head moves so violently that strands of hair slip out of my braid, falling in messy pieces around my face. “P-lease. Let me l-leave.”
“There is nowhere you can run that I won’t find you, little witch. You belong to me,” the incorporeal voice booms around me, and instead of running like I originally intended, I drop down to my knees like every ounce of strength has been ripped from me.
I lift my head, staring wide-eyed at the entity as it takes a step towards me. It flickers again, a man in its place for just a moment, until the demon returns to fill my vision.
