The Haunting (Immortals) (23 page)

When she finished, she shut off the water and reached out for a towel to dry off with. Pulling back the curtain, she glanced at the mirror—and sighed. It was steamed over, but there was nothing unusual there.

Feeling relieved, she stepped out onto the bath mat and wrapped the towel around her. She’d just tucked in the end when a squeaky noise made her jerk up her head.

The sound came from the mirror. As Mai watched, a streak appeared through the steam on the surface. It ran vertically for about two inches and then stopped. A second
line formed beside it, much shorter than the first. Then another started at the bottom beside the first and rose to about half the height before looping down, up and down again.

Mai’s pulse raced as she stood spellbound, watching as more streaks appeared. They were forming more quickly now, spelling out words.

When they finally stopped, Mai stared at the message in horror as a cold chill raced up her spine.

I’m watching you
.

A sickening sense of déjà vu gripped Mai as she stared at the words in the mirror. After the face in the mirror and Sarah’s disappearance, Mai was no longer convinced this was another hallucination. It might have been better if it had been. At least, then, she’d know what she was up against.

This was something she didn’t know how to fight and it scared her to death.

For half a second, she debated whether it was better to race from the apartment or to move slowly, making no sudden moves.

To hell with it.

Yanking open the bathroom door, she ran down the hallway. She’d almost reached the front door when suddenly a creature appeared, blocking it. Standing on two large hind legs, it was tall with scaly gray skin, four clawed arms and flashing green eyes. When it opened its mouth and roared, Mai saw rows of deadly sharp teeth.

She stumbled back, narrowly escaping the claw that sliced through the air where she’d just been. Dashing through the kitchen, she grabbed a knife from the cutlery block and held it in front of her, ready to defend herself. But the creature vanished.

Mai stopped and looked around, her every sense alert and wary. Where had it gone? She turned, afraid it might suddenly appear behind her, but it was gone.

Not about to be lulled into believing she was now safe, Mai made another dash for the front door. This time, she reached it and flipped open the lock. Grabbing the handle, she tugged on the door—but it wouldn’t open. Thinking that in her confusion, she’d locked the door instead of unlocking it, she flipped the lock the other way. Still the door wouldn’t open. She banged on it as the truth hit her. It wasn’t stuck. Magic was keeping it closed. The same magic that had a monster stalking her in her own apartment.

When the creature suddenly appeared behind her, she turned and drove her knife into it—and hit thin air as it vanished yet again.

She looked around, anger replacing some of her earlier fear. When she felt the hairs on the back of her neck prickle, she whirled around. The creature was there, all four claws swiping the air. She dropped to the floor as it reached for her, and scrambled out of its path. She didn’t move fast enough and a claw sliced the lower part of her leg. The pain she felt was real enough, as was the blood running down her leg.

She managed to put some distance between them, enough to let her get to her feet.

“Maaaiiii. Geeetttt oouuuttt.”

Mai jumped at the sound of the wailing and saw the creature closing in. Frustrated, she raced through the kitchen, thinking if she could reach her bedroom, she could put a locked door between her and the monster. She hadn’t taken more than a couple of steps when the creature suddenly appeared down the hallway, blocking her path.

Mai ran back to the living room, straight toward the picture window. She stopped short of opening it. Was she
prepared to jump to her death to avoid the creature? What if it wasn’t even real?

The cut on her leg said otherwise, but she didn’t open the window. Instead, she climbed onto the chair in the corner, where she had the strategic advantage of being able to see the entire room. If she was going to die, then she would die fighting for her life.

Of course, she would have had better odds if she still had the knife.

She looked around for the creature, but it had disappeared again.

“Maaaiiii. Geeetttt oouuuttt.”

The voice came from the mirror and wasn’t helping her nerves any. No clothes, no weapons, and no help—

The cordless phone was mounted on its base on the kitchen counter. Maybe she could race across the room and grab it.

Mai waited, calculating her move, and then jumped from her spot. As soon as her hand fell on the phone, a man appeared, dressed all in black. It was the man who’d attacked her in her old apartment.

“I tried to warn you,” he said sadly. “But you wouldn’t listen.” He was gone before Mai could think to pull off the necklace. She looked around the room trying to guess where he’d disappeared to.

The wailing from the mirror grew louder, less human in sound, raising the hairs along her arm and the back of her neck. The lights in the apartment started flickering on and off like in a cheap horror movie.

“Is that all you’ve got?” Mai screamed, sounding braver than she felt.

Then her apartment vanished around her and she was suddenly standing in Central Park before the Obelisk. Hearing footsteps along the path, she turned toward the
sound. A woman with long straight black hair was walking toward her. As she drew closer, Mai recognized herself.

“You’re late.” The words came out of her mouth, but it was Lenny’s voice she heard speaking. With the same kind of detachment one feels in dreams, she raised her hands before her and saw they weren’t hers. These hands belonged to a man.

It didn’t take her long to realize what was happening. The Keltok demon orchestrating this nightmare had cast her in Lenny’s role and given how bad the gash in her leg hurt, compliments of the last nightmare, the bullet about to rip through Lenny’s head would feel just as real. Only it wouldn’t be Lenny’s head this time. It’d be hers.

Mai tried to run, but her body wouldn’t budge. She looked around for help and saw only the image of herself on the path, drawing nearer. Her heart leaped with excitement because maybe help was already here.

“Nick, is that you? We’ve got to get out of here.” She heard the words in her head, but that’s not what came out. “Try to hang on to it this time.” She reached into her pocket and felt the folded piece of paper. She had just pulled it out when pain ripped through her head.

She fell to the ground, unwilling to accept that this was the end for her. It wasn’t real, no matter how it might feel. It was like the first hallucination. She told herself that over and over, until the pain finally subsided.

When she opened her eyes, she was back in her living room, lying on the floor. The cordless phone she’d been holding in her hand lay beside her, now only a mangled piece of plastic and metal.

It was a stark reminder that not everything happening here was an illusion.

Taking stock of her surroundings, Mai shot up off the floor and raced for the door. A blast of power hit her with
such force she was thrown onto her back half a room away. She lay there, stunned, trying to catch her breath.

Heat licked her ankle, scorching it. She looked down to see the cause and found her floor was on fire. She jerked her knees to her chest and looked around. The fire was spreading and already, bits and pieces of the floor, consumed by the flames, were disintegrating. Smoke formed a cloud just below the ceiling that grew larger every passing second.

Mai scooted back toward the chair since the floor behind her was more solid than the floor between her and the door. When her hands touched the edge of the chair, she levered herself into it right as the floor where she’d just been fell away. Beneath it loomed a seemingly endless well at the bottom of which ran a river of molten lava. Hell.

Even as she tried to figure out what to do, the rest of the floor gave way, crumbling in chunks until only the floor beneath the chair remained.

Burning heat emanated from the lava and Mai wrapped her arms around her bent legs to keep her feet from slipping off the chair; to keep her balance; to keep from falling.

She closed her eyes and kept telling herself it was just another dream.

She considered summoning Darius, but didn’t want to waste her one shot. When she threw that lightning bolt, she wanted the demon to be on the receiving end of it. So she watched and waited, determined that in this battle of wills, she would be the winner.

Mai had no idea how long she sat there. The molten lava illusion continued to play, keeping her rooted to her spot. She became aware of a new danger after several hours as fatigue set in. Her eyes grew heavy and, more than once, she found herself jerking awake.

Mai realized that the creature—or bogeyman—wanted her to fall asleep. If she did, then she’d be easy prey. She needed to stay awake.

The day wore on. Outside, the setting sun made everything seem so calm and peaceful. Completely at odds with the hellish conditions inside.

The wailing in the mirror had continued at such an ear-splitting pitch that Mai had wondered why none of the tenants on the other floors had complained—unless, as she surmised, it was just another part of the illusion.

When the pounding on the door sounded, she didn’t at first notice it. Thinking it was just the demon’s next trick, she pulled the lightning bolt off the chain and held it in her hand. It would be like the demon to trick her into doing something foolish, like rush to the door thinking she’d found help only to find his creature waiting there for her.

The pounding on the door grew insistent and then there was a loud splintering crash as it burst open.

Mai threw the bolt of lightning.

Time froze for Nick. When Mai hadn’t answered his phone calls, he’d been worried enough to go see her in person. When she hadn’t answered the door, he’d gone into the spirit realm to check on her. He’d known right away there were problems. The energy patterns inside the apartment were all wrong. That’s when he made the decision to kick in the door.

In the seconds that followed, he’d registered Mai perched on the chair, her arm outstretched toward him. The expression on her face was that of a fierce warrior. The instant she saw him, though, her expression changed to one of surprise and horror. He knew then that the brilliant flash of light sailing toward him hadn’t been meant for him—and it wasn’t going to be good when it hit.

If he’d been human, he might not have been able to get
out of the way in time. As it was, he narrowly dodged the light before it struck the wall.

There was a flash followed by two loud claps of thunder. The accompanying blast of power knocked him to the floor and left him dazed.

When his vision cleared, there was a savage-looking man in tattoos and a black duster holding a sword to his throat. By his side, a gray wolf snarled and bared its teeth.

A lesser man would have conceded defeat, but Nick was not such a man.

Tapping his own magic, he lurched to his feet, shifting to the form of a grizzly bear, knocking the sword aside with a powerful sweep of his paw. He’d made the transformation in the blink of an eye, but his opponents seemed unfazed.

Moving with lightning speed, the man was on him. Nick barely avoided the sword the second time it came at him and it cut a gash in his upper arm.

The wolf, perhaps sensing it didn’t stand a chance against a bear, had shifted into a beautiful dark-haired woman who promptly hurled a ball of fire at his head.

Nick dodged the fireball, but knew that in a battle of strength, he’d not defeat these two. His only hope of surviving—and protecting Mai—lay in the element of surprise.

As the warrior closed in on him, his sword readied, Nick shifted again. The warrior hesitated. As Nick had hoped, the warrior had some affection for the female with him and when faced with her nude image, he’d known a moment of doubt. It wouldn’t last, but a moment was all Nick needed. He started shifting forms at random and in such rapid succession, he appeared little more than a shadow as he slipped past the warrior to reach Mai. Such use of magic taxed his energy and left him drained so that when he finally reached Mai, he had only enough energy to assume his natural form.

Upon seeing him, Mai jumped from the chair. “Nick.”

“Get behind me, Mai,” Nick growled, pushing her behind him so he could face their attackers. Once again, the warrior held a sword to his throat and Nick wasn’t sure how he was going to fight him, but he would find the strength somehow. Mai’s life depended on it.

“Friend or foe, Mai?” the warrior growled.

“Friend,” Mai said from behind Nick.

The shape-shifting woman took a step closer, holding another ball of flame in her hand and clearly not happy with Mai’s answer. “Then why did you try to kill him with the lightning bolt?”

“I’d kind of like to know the answer to that myself,” Nick said, not taking his eyes off the couple before him but talking to Mai. “If it’s about last night…”

“It’s not,” Mai said quickly, but not before the other two cocked their eyebrows in curiosity.

“Last night?” the woman asked.

“Oh, for goddess’ sake, everybody please relax.” Mai tried to push her way past Nick, but he refused to let her into harm’s way.

Behind him, he heard her huff.

“Nick, meet my good friends Lexi and Darius, an Immortal. Lexi and Darius, this is…Nick. We’ve sort of been working together on a missing person’s case.”

Just because Mai had made the introductions didn’t mean that everyone immediately relaxed their stance. It happened in stages until finally the three were standing, staring at each other awkwardly. At least the warrior had lowered his sword even if he hadn’t yet put it away.

“Do you think the three of you could not kill each other for a few minutes while I go into the bedroom?” Mai said. “I’ll be right back.”

“I’ll go with you,” Lexi said, giving Nick a final look before following Mai out of the room.