Demon Thief (The Demonata 2)

The thing looks at the rest of us. Spreads its arms and hisses. And thirty-four kids scream as one and crap their pants.

KIDNAP

CHAOS. Everyone’s running, crashing into each other, falling, screaming. I’m part of the madness. Clutching Art in my arms. Fleeing blindly. Away from the grey light and the four-armed monster. Trying to stay on my feet. Weeping, partly because Logan has been killed, mostly because I’m terrified.

A girl smashes into me and knocks me to the ground. I manage to fall with Art on top of me, so he isn’t injured. He’s laughing — he thinks this is a game. I start to yell at the girl, but then I see blood gushing from her throat, her arms thrashing. She topples over. Flops about, then goes very still.

I look away before I can focus on her face. I don’t want to know who she is. Right now I want to concentrate on the one thing that matters more than anything else — getting out of here before the monster kills me.

I push myself to my feet, chest heaving. Look for the best way out.

It’s hard to tell. I’m surrounded on all sides by panic. I count two, three, four dead children — then stop. I don’t want to know the numbers.

The monster’s on top of a boy — Dave English, who was so afraid of death. The beast’s fingers are buried in Dave’s stomach. It’s gazing around, white eyes darting from one child to another. Like it’s choosing its next victim. Or looking for someone in particular.

I’m getting ready to run again when I spot movement in the panel of grey light. A man steps through. Behind him is a blonde woman. Another woman after her, Indian, wearing a sari. Then a second, dark-skinned man.

The Indian woman curses when she sees the corpses. Starts after the monster, her hands coming up, murder in her eyes.

“Sharmila! No!” barks the first man. He’s old. He has a short beard and messy dark hair. A shabby suit.

“We must stop this!” the Indian woman shouts.

“No,” the man repeats, and I can tell by his tone that he’s accustomed to being obeyed.

“Master . . .” the second man says uncertainly. He has the darkest skin I’ve ever seen, as if his mother was the night.

“I know, Raz,” the first man snaps. “But we mustn’t kill him.”

“The children,” the Indian woman snarls. “I will not stand by and let that demon murder all these children. That would be monstrous.”

“She is right, master,” the black man says.

“Oh, very well,” the man in the shabby suit grumbles. “We’ll save as many of the young as we can. We don’t want to be considered barbarians.” He laughs, then makes a signal for the others to spread out. “Work Cadaver back to the window and force him through. We’ll track him down again later.”

This sudden appearance and surreal conversation have astonished me so much, I’m standing still instead of fleeing for safety. The monster — a demon, the woman said — has moved on from Dave English and is lolloping after a girl. She’s racing from it like an Olympic sprinter, but the monster’s legs are longer and it catches up with her in a couple of seconds. Reaches out with its long, hairy fingers . . . then recoils when the ground at its feet explodes upwards.

The demon makes a high whistling sound, its head snapping around. It spots the four humans who came through the panel (or window, as the man called it). It glares at them, white eyes filled with fury and hate. They’re closing in on it from both sides, leaving a path to the window free. Pale blue light crackles from the black man’s fingertips — I guess he made the ground explode, distracting the monster and saving the girl.

Art bites my right arm, hard. It’s the first time he’s ever bitten me. I get such a shock, I drop him and collapse on my butt. He lands with a heavy thud, rolls over, then crawls towards the demon, gurgling happily. He must think it’s some giant toy. He’s so anxious to play with it, he bit me so I’d release him.

“Art!” I yell. “Come back! It’s . . .”

The demon spots me. Its white eyes roll down and fix on Art. It gives a loud, high-pitched whistle. And then it’s running towards us, impossibly long steps. I barely have time to register fear — then it’s on us. It stoops, picks Art up with one hand, hisses like a nest of snakes.

“No!” I cry, leaping at the demon, forgetting my fear, caring only about Art. I land on the monster’s left side. From a distance I thought its skin was leathery, but now I realize it’s more like an insect’s brittle shell. My fists crunch into it, knocking crinkly flakes loose. I’m yelling wildly, the way I always do when I get into a fight.

I tug at its hairy arms — they feel like strands of seaweed — desperately reaching for Art. The demon hisses again, then knocks me aside. I land hard on my right arm. It twists beneath me and snaps. I roar with pain, but roll over and force myself back to my feet, woozy but determined to rescue Art.

But the demon isn’t there. It’s racing towards the grey window, Art cradled in its arms, head down, legs a whirl of motion.

“Beranabus!” the Indian woman shouts.

“Let him go,” the leader of the quartet says.

“But the child . . .”

“Not our problem.”