Hunted in Light Read online

  Hunted in Light

  J S Bright

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  About the Author

  Also by Julia Bright

  Hunted in Light © Copyright 2019 Julia Bright

  Hunted in Light Copyright notice: All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Warning: the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.

  Created with Vellum

  1

  River

  Demons exist. I’d spent my life ignoring the obvious, but after battling Costel and almost losing everything, I couldn’t ignore the truth. This world was full of magic and I now was a part of that magic.

  Working in the psych ward, or even in my private practice would be impossible now. I wanted to help people, but there was no way I’d be able to keep my psychiatric practice if I acknowledged demons. Someone would turn on me, and I’d lose my license.

  I glanced up and rolled my eyes as George stepped in, his heavy boots clunking on the hardwood floor.

  He paused, our gazes met and his eyes narrowed as his lips thinned. We hadn’t done more than kiss, but that didn’t stop me from thinking about doing more.

  He stepped closer to the table and crossed his arms over his chest. “What?”

  I lowered the book and groaned. “Nothing. I just—this is hard.”

  His deep chuckle warmed me. “It takes years to learn and even then, it won’t be everything.”

  “Don’t tell me that.” I didn’t want to be an apprentice. As a doctor, I’d had my own practice. But now, I was the junior member on this team, and it felt odd, like I had to ask permission to do the simplest of tasks. “I’ll never learn it all.”

  George chuckled. “Nope, you never will.”

  I slammed the book shut and stood, heading to the kitchen. “How long did it take you?”

  My steps ground to a halt as I waited. I glanced over my shoulder, watching George’s face go blank. He shook his head and a smile I didn’t really buy stretched his lips wide as he stared at me.

  “Don’t worry about it. It will all work out.”

  Georges words did little to reassure me. But George moved fast, his lips descending over mine. I closed my eyes and leaned in, drinking in the passion. I felt good in his arms. This was where I belonged.

  It had been two weeks since I’d moved in. I’d wanted to take things further, but George was into taking things slow.

  George’s muscles stiffened and he stood tall, disengaging before he took a step back. “There are a couple of students at the school nearby dabbling in the dark arts. I need to check it out. Would you care to join me?”

  I looked at my hands, then back up to meet George’s gaze. I would never get used to looking into his ever-changing eyes. He’d seen so much, and that knowledge shown through. I hadn’t gotten a straight answer out of him about his age, but he was older than me; I just wasn’t sure by how many years.

  “Sure. That sounds like fun.”

  “Okay, we’re leaving in two hours. It’s close, but we’ll drive over.”

  “Sounds good. I’ll clean up my books, then get dressed. Do I need to bring anything?”

  “No.” His voice had gone flat, but then two seconds later his smile was back in place. “This shouldn’t be difficult.”

  “Awesome.”

  George left the main room of our apartment and headed to his private bedroom. There’d been so many nights I’d wanted to sneak in there and curl up with him, but fear had held me back. My heart rate picked up because soon, I’d take the next step.

  We arrived close to nine that evening, parking in the school lot. A full moon shone, illuminating the ground and casting shadows. The wind whispered through the trees, causing creeks and groans. Goosebumps broke out over my arms.

  “Spooky,” George whispered.

  “It is when you know there is bad stuff out there,” I said.

  “True, but we’re relatively safe.”

  “It’s all relative, isn’t it?” I chuckled as I grabbed a bag and slung it across my body then tightened that strap.

  “From what I understand the three teenagers are in the woods over there,” George pointed to the trees draped in shadows. The wind picked up and they swayed, a loud groan, almost like a human, came from the area.

  “That was the trees, right?” I glanced to George, hoping he could affirm my hypothesis.

  “Yes, that was the trees.”

  “So Ouija boards, are they really that dangerous? I mean those boards are sold everywhere, even Walmart.”

  George glanced around and shrugged. “Yes and no. There is a cemetery close by. The teens could conjure up something they don’t want.” He took off walking then paused and looked back at me. “The reason we’re here is a few weeks ago they did conjure something, but it didn’t amount to much. There was a police report filed after a fire erupted nearby. Then we were made aware of the suspicious activity.”

  I nodded and we took off walking again. There was so much about the agency I didn’t understand. Like why we were out here confronting these kids when we could have been doing something more important. Maybe the students were getting into deeper trouble than I could imagine.

  “If you head to the left, I’ll go to the right,” George said. “We’ll circle around to meet up. If they run, we have a chance of stopping them.”

  “What about the other way.” I pointed to the wooded lot. “Like behind them?”

  “The cemetery fence should block them.”

  “Sounds good. I’ll see you in a few.”

  The trees were thick near the lot but thinned out the deeper I went. The teens had set up behind a small outcropping of cedar trees, blocking them from my view. George had shown me how to create a low light that hovered close to the ground about five feet in front of me. It gave off just the right amount of light, illuminating the path but not much else.

  The deeper I went into the trees, the darker the area became, almost like the trees were eating the light. A shiver snaked down my spine, and I felt like something was watching me. I paused, but heard nothing.

  About twenty yards in, I could see the fire the teens had built. The circle of light it gave off was small. There was no way the teens would see me.

  The hair on the back of my neck prickled. I paused again and glanced over my shoulder, finding nothing. The skin on my arms still stood on ends. I brushed it off and tried to take another step, but I felt like something had me around the neck. My hand flew to my throat as panic rose. I didn’t feel anything grabbing me, but the sensation of being choked grew.

  George had cast a protection spell on me, and Costel shouldn’t have been able to find me. But what if he had? Th
e grip tightened, and suddenly the form became solid. It was big, his lips wide and thick. His eyes didn’t look normal, more like a snake’s eyes. His breath was hot and smelled of burning wood.

  Fear spread and my heart raced. I tried to grasp onto his arm, but my grip failed me.

  “River,” George called out.

  I opened my mouth, but the crushing grip cut off my voice. At least George knew I was in danger.

  A chuckle from the thing holding me vibrated through my bones, making me shake all over.

  “We’re going to have fun with you.” Its voice was sharp as steel, cutting right through me.

  A sizzle started at the base of my spine, then raced down my legs and up my back. I felt on fire and tried screaming. Then a deafening pop stole my breath. I dropped to the ground, gasping for air.

  I blinked against a bright light, trying to focus. Fear still had me, and my hands shook as I blocked the light with my raised arm. But it wasn’t just any light, it was the sun. Not normal though—no, this glowing light was tinged orange, very orange. Everything looked off-kilter. The smells were different too, like something fundamental had changed with the earth.

  I drew in another breath of air and coughed. My brain felt fried as I stared up at the man who had taken me. His cheekbones were pronounced, and his eyes were sunken deep into the sockets. His smile looked ghoulish. Fear took over and I tried moving away, but a rough wall prevented me from getting too far.

  “Welcome to my world, darling. Now you’ll have to choose which side you really want to be on,” the man said before he snapped his fingers and disappeared.

  I dropped to my knees, a scream filling my ears.

  This place was wrong. Everything was off.

  I forced myself to stop screaming and stood. I was utterly alone. Would George be able to find me in this world of light? And if he did, could he get me out of here? I didn’t know where I was, but it was no place on earth, at least not the Earth I knew.

  2

  George

  A bright flash then loud pop knocked me to my butt. The girls I’d been investigating shrieked and then shrieked again. They ran straight at me. I increased the light from the orb I’d lit with magic earlier. At the last second they veered away, fear shining in their eyes.

  “River?” My voice warbled and stuck on the final syllable, dropping too low to be heard. I called out again, this time louder. “River.”

  The pop and flash of light had happened close to where she’d been. Dammit. What the hell had those girls conjured?

  I raced over, slowing when I came upon the candles set up inside a circle. The girls had set the candles up inside the pentagram. Jesus, why the hell had they done that? Why did stupid people do this kind of thing? They knew enough to cause problems but not enough to fix them.

  I didn’t have time to investigate what precautions they’d taken against summoning a demon, based on the pop and flashes of light, I suspected they’d done nothing.

  “River, where are you?” I called out. “I’m starting to worry.”

  No response.

  My blood chilled. “River!”

  My last scream wasn’t necessary. There, on the ground close to where she probably stood, a bush was burning with a purple flame. I turned, noticing the light I’d created wasn’t enough. I flipped on the flashlight on my phone, shining it on the devastation surrounding me. Limbs were broken, and the dirt had a covering of white ash.

  A demon from another realm had been conjured. There was no other explanation.

  My shoulders slumped in defeat. “Shit.”

  Figuring out which demon they’d conjured would take time and I didn’t have any. River was at the mercy of a demon who would probably kill her. She needed help. She wasn’t strong enough to survive being taken to the demon realm.

  There was no way to speed this process along. I had to work the evidence and figure out who had come to take her. After I blew out a sigh and allowed my shoulders to slump in defeat, I pushed away the poor me attitude and stood tall. The desire to find River ripped through me, burning away the sadness, replacing it with anger and determination.

  The demon had come here to destroy something good, but I wouldn’t allow it to win. I’d fight back and prevent him from entering this world forever.

  I bent, almost gagging at the smell of the ashes on the ground. After securing a cloth over the lower half of my face, I gathered ashes and then took clippings from the burning bush before I moved to the circle of candles. There were too many resources on the internet. These girls had gotten too much right. Before there was an easy to find set of instructions for invoking demons, teens had to search libraries for books that weren’t always accurate in depicting how to invoke something. Now at the touch of their fingertips, young people all over the globe could be incredibly stupid at the push of a button.

  These girls had planned well, or at least one of them had. I lifted the cloth from my nose and drew in a deep breath, catching the whiff of burned flesh.

  What had they sacrificed?

  The beam of my flashlight wasn’t enough to make out the exact creature since it was charred and shriveled, but I bagged it for evidence. I looked around, seeing no salt anywhere close. Amateurs. The scent of sage was also missing as a protective measure. These teens had made a huge mistake.

  I blew out the candles and then began reciting a protection spell as I scuffed my foot over the pentagram and writings. The line was broken, the summoning ended. I wanted to trace where the demon had taken River, but I’d have to do that at home where I could figure out what type of ash had been used, what animal had been sacrificed, and I had to figure out what chant they were using. That would mean I’d have to ask someone to break into their emails.

  Before leaving the area, I said a little prayer, hoping against hope River would be okay. She wasn’t prepared to travel to another realm or do war with a demon in that space. It wasn’t our world, and our rules didn’t apply. Depending on where she went, the principles of physics would be vastly different than ours. She could think she had what she needed to defeat the monster who took her there, but she could easily overestimate her abilities and fail.

  Worry pushed me to drive faster as I headed to our apartment. Though I hadn’t cemented our relationship with sex, I was attached to River. She wasn’t just going to be someone I slept with and left, I wanted her with me for as long as she was willing to stay.

  It would be difficult building a solid relationship with her. We had different perspectives of what life should be like. I could tell in the little things. The years on this earth had changed me, but there were certain perceptions I had that were stiff where her life flowed easily. She didn’t have difficulty going from working to flirting with me, whereas it threw me every time she did that.

  Before, when it hadn’t meant anything to me other than lust, I’d let my desire for her flow, but now with the thought of spending a lifetime with her, I was having trouble reconciling my feelings, my past, and her future.

  Did I want her? Yes! But being with me would mean danger, like this. And what if my past was too much for her to get over?

  By the time I arrived home my thoughts were tumbling over everything. I would be lucky if I found her alive.

  I couldn’t predict the future and I couldn’t make River love me, but I could search for her. She needed my help. It would take time, but somehow, I would track her down.

  Long ago I’d read a story of someone being pulled into another realm. The spell to find them was detailed and complex. This didn’t happen often, actually it happened rarely, so the spells weren’t wide spread, and the books holding the spells were highly guarded.

  I’d have to go to the command center. I paused, not wanting to face the place without Steel Skylar there. The poor guy was in solitary confinement after everything that had happened. Central wasn’t sure if Steel had welcomed the demon or if he’d been infected. But I knew Steel wouldn’t turn on us. He was solid.

  I p
acked a bag and arranged for a flight. If I had any hope of finding River, I’d have to buck up and deal with my feelings. If I could trust the people running Central right now, I would have asked for them to do the research, but I needed to keep a tight rein on who knew River was in another dimension.

  The flight wasn’t for hours, so I began researching on my own, reading everything I could find. My head ached and my heart felt swollen with loss. I didn’t want her to be gone forever.

  Eighteen hours later, I stepped into the offices that housed Central. The place felt the same; plain from the outside, the inside teeming with activity. Twenty people worked here full time, and then there were people here to study. Witches and warlocks spent an excessive amount of time reading the pages of forgotten scrolls when they were avoiding real life. I’d overstayed my welcome at Central a few times. Then there were the understudies who were learning, and the rest of the misfits who had no place to go.

  “George, what are you doing back?” an older witch asked.

  “I’m researching.”

  “Not the same with Skylar gone,” the witch said as she headed off the other way.

  Four more people said hello but didn’t stop. Then there was Lewis. The second he saw me, his face lit up. I’d been trying to discourage Lewis for years. He was a nice enough warlock, but I didn’t want anything other than friendship from him.

  “George, it’s good to see you.” Lewis’s arms wrapped around my back, his hands drew me closer.

  Hugging Lewis made my heart ache. I’d known Lewis for decades. Though I hadn’t trained with him, he’d stayed with me for years a decade or so ago. I knew I shouldn’t encourage his attraction but holding him after losing River was balm to my soul.