Chapter 28

Iwoke up, immediately sensing that something wasn’t right. The room smelled like wax and something burning, bringing back memories I did my best to keep buried. I tried to roll out of bed but was pulled to a stop before I could move even an inch. I frantically darted my eyes around, seeing my wrists tied to the headboard. Dozens of candles were lit, sitting on every available surface of my furniture.

My gaze stopped on my mother before continuing over to see the man who had haunted my nightmares for ten years. Father Butler stood at the foot of my bed, looking smug as he stared down at me. His robes hadn’t changed. Nothing about him had.

I chose to ignore his presence, knowing that his only goal was to hurt me. There would be no pleading with the priest. Instead, I looked back over at my mother, who stood further away by the door. She had her arms crossed over her chest, and her chin was jutted out.

“Mother, please don’t do this.” It was the only plea she would hear from my lips. If she ignored me the way she’d done all those other times, she would kill the last thread of familial bond I’d held for her.

“I saw you last night.” She swallowed, then shored up her confidence with the squaring of her shoulders. “There is a demon inside of you. I tried to help you… before. It didn’t work.” She looked over at the priest, who was still staring down at me with a maniacal gleam in his beady eyes. “Father Butler has assured me that he can rid you of the demon once and for all.” She swallowed thickly. “It might hurt a bit.”

I laughed bitterly. I didn’t know what he had planned, but if it was worse than the lashings he’d given me as a child, I knew I should be afraid. “The only demon inside of me is me, Mother.”

Her eyes widened, and she let her arms drop to her sides as she took a step back. Her hand waved behind her back as she searched blindly for the doorknob. Once she found it, she quickly opened the door.

“Just let me know once it’s done, Father.” And then she was gone, the door closing with a bang as she slammed it closed.

I took my disbelieving gaze from the door, actually surprised that she had taken the coward’s way out. I wasn’t sure if she was more scared of me or what the priest had planned. I looked back at Father Butler.

“You’re no priest.” My words were sure and steady as I eyed him from my vulnerable position.

“We are what we believe we are.” He grinned, looking as if he won the lottery as he took me in. “You believe that you are a demon?” He tilted his head. “That’s interesting.”

I gritted my teeth. “Why is that interesting?”

He walked around the bed to stand at my side. He loomed over me and caused the fear I had been trying so hard to hold back to rush in like a tsunami. “Because I know that I am.”

I stared in disbelief. He looked human, but then, so did Valen until he changed forms. Something told me I did not want to see this man’s demon. “Are you serious?” I whispered while trying to inch away as he leaned in even closer. There was something disturbing about his eyes that made my skin crawl.

He chuckled. “Oh, sweet child. I don’t lie about that. I am, after all, a man of the cloth.”

“A priest wouldn’t be a demon.”

He pouted as if I were ruining his fun. “Well, I suppose you’re right.” His expression brightened again. “But there’s no rules against demons being priests!”

“I’m pretty sure there is somewhere,” I muttered, trying to turn away but finding it difficult to look away from his eyes for long. Then it finally hit me. “My reflection is upside down!” I gasped.

“Oh, yes. It’s one of the only things I can’t hide from humans, even when I am in this form. Have you ever heard of an Aswang?” He seemed to be eager to share with me, and I got the feeling he didn’t often get to speak with his victims before he killed them. And there was no doubt in my mind that was where we were headed if I didn’t get myself together and get on with saving the day.

I glanced around the room, trying to figure out how my ability to make the floors and walls break would get me untied from this bed. “Umm, it sounds vaguely familiar?”

He let out a throaty hum and stepped back. I watched as he walked around the room blowing out candles. “We don’t want to cause a house fire, do we?” When he started walking back toward the bed as smoke rose from the extinguished candles, he reached down. With horror, I realized that he was removing his robe.

“That’s really disappointing. The lore doesn’t have it completely right, of course, but to know that my favorite victim doesn’t even know what I am capable of?” He tsked at me as he folded the robe carefully and placed it in the chair by the window. “Do you want to know?” He paused with an eager expression.

If he were talking, then he wouldn’t be killing me, right? I should be able to figure out what to do. “Um, sure. I’d love to know all about your Assgang.” Why can’t I break the headboard if I can break walls?

“Aswang,” he snapped, “It doesn’t even sound anything like... you know what? Forget it.” He sounded seriously irritated as he spoke between clenched teeth and pinched the bridge of his nose. He dropped his hand and stepped close to the bed again. He leaned over until his angry face was an inch away from mine. He gripped my chin, his fingernails digging deep enough into my cheeks to sting. “Listen closely.” He pulled his hand away roughly, scoring those fingernails across my face.

“My kind smell our victims,” he began speaking as his hands moved to his white dress shirt, undoing the buttons slowly and methodically. “When we get the scent in our minds, it’s almost impossible to ignore. I scented you at church. You probably don’t remember that day. We shook hands.” He paused to get my reaction. I shook my head helplessly. I honestly didn’t remember meeting him until the day he showed up at my house to perform the first of many exorcisms.

“Yes, well, I figured you wouldn’t. You were a very quiet child, barely speaking and rarely looking up from your lap. Always polite, though.” I was incredibly disturbed by how much he seemed to have watched me. “Anyway, I have an incredible sense of smell, and I knew when I caught your scent that there was more to you than it appeared.”

He shrugged the shirt off and placed it in the chair on top of the robe. “My nose brought me to your house later that night, and I had full intentions of eating you then and there, but I saw you sitting in the middle of the bed, staring at your closet door. There was something about your expression that intrigued me. It was as if you longed to be in there yet were terrified of opening the door at the same time. After that, I had to get closer to you. The phone call from your mother gave me the perfect opportunity.”

I kept my eyes away from him as he removed his pants, not caring to see anything that he would reveal. Honestly, the whole stripping thing was weird and couldn’t mean anything good. Instead, I focused my eyes on the footboard and concentrated on getting the wood to crack or split enough to pull my legs free. As I focused, I felt the bed underneath me tremble the tiniest bit.

“You played with your food,” I pointed out dryly, glancing at him from the corner of my eye to see he had folded his slacks and was placing them on the stack of clothing. I needed to move a whole lot quicker because I was sure the main event was about to begin.

He paused, then barked out a laugh. “I suppose I did. I was curious how you would react, plus it gave me time to get to know you better. I had never done that before. It was… refreshing.”

I was so shocked by what he’d said I forgot that I didn’t want to see his junk and jerked my head in his direction. Luckily, he was covered by a pair of tighty-whities. “Get to know me better? You beat me with a rope for hours!”

He rolled his eyes and huffed. “It was a silk rope we used to tie back the curtains for the baptism pool. It was soft and hardly left a mark.”

I looked up at the ceiling. “I can’t believe I’m arguing with a demon over getting the hell beat out of me.”

“It’s funny you say that. I actually used those words when I explained what I planned on doing to you.”

“Beat the hell out of me? Because you’re a punny guy, right?”

“I do try. Just so you know, she didn’t hesitate for even a minute at my intended methods. You should really find a new mother, the one you have is pretty shitty.”

“Thanks, I hadn’t noticed,” I responded dryly and had to hold back a smile of triumph when the footboard split with hardly a sound. It still needed a way to go before I’d be able to free my feet, but it was working.

“You became my favorite toy, and I enjoyed playing with you. But, I am sad to say it must come to an end. Thank you for returning so I can say my goodbyes properly.”

His words pissed me off. “I didn’t come back for—” I choked on my words when I turned my head to glare at Father Butler to see he had changed his appearance. It was so unexpectedly horrifying that my tight hold over my ability slipped, and the room began to shake. With great effort, I managed to reign it in before any damage could be done. I needed to escape from this monster, not end up buried under ten feet of rubble.

His demon was truly terrifying as he dropped to all fours. His arms and legs grew to twice their original length, growing into thin, bony limbs that bent backward, closely resembling spider legs. His fingers and toenails lengthened into long, sharp claws that made me swallow back my bile when I saw them. But it was his tongue that made me start to yank frantically on my bindings.

I suddenly remembered what little I knew about the Aswang from our short lesson about mythical creatures back in tenth grade. It was said to be a creature from the Philippines that hunted children and pregnant women so they could eat the unborn baby. That long tongue with the pointy, razor-sharp forked end, the one that just whipped around the room as if he were tasting the air, is what they use to eat their victims.

“Holy shit. This can’t be happening right now.” I kept rambling to myself as I pulled on the ropes until my arms began to burn from the friction. The pain was enough to center me and helped to bring my focus back to escaping. I took a deep breath and concentrated hard on the footboard, knowing I didn’t have time to be slow and stealthy. The time for stealth was long over. It was time to get the hell out of here.