Demon Singer Read online

  Demon

  Singer

  BENJAMIN J NICHOLS

  Copyright © 2014 BENJAMIN J NICHOLS

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN-13: 978-1497530041

  DEDICATION

  For Emily

  CONTENTS

  Acknowledgments

  i

  1

  Demon Ties

  4

  2

  What to Do?

  8

  3

  So Much for "Family"

  13

  4

  From the Top

  21

  5

  Mysterioso

  31

  6

  Where is Everyone?

  38

  7

  Where is the Prophet Man?

  50

  8

  Seriously, Where's the Prophet Man?

  62

  9

  The Stranger

  69

  10

  Welcome to Sta Catoe, - Now Go Away

  85

  11

  Dammit

  94

  12

  Seven Easy Payments

  100

  13

  The Prophet Man

  107

  14

  Of Course

  118

  15

  Errol's New Digs

  129

  16

  Ouch!

  137

  17

  The Gray Angel

  152

  18

  Weres

  164

  19

  Mute

  168

  20

  The False Prophet

  177

  21

  Rondeaux

  186

  22

  Whammied

  196

  23

  Discernment

  208

  24

  Freakin' Fairies

  214

  25

  Fallen

  222

  26

  Reunited

  232

  27

  Markhato

  239

  28

  Fugue and Ceylan

  248

  29

  War

  253

  30

  Alofth Hing’ed Thew

  266

  31

  Surprise

  273

  32

  Revelation

  278

  33

  Traitor

  285

  34

  Too Late

  295

  35

  The Eighth Measure

  300

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thank you to Vanessa, my first reader.

  Acknowledgments tend to be boring, so allow me to offer you some special little known details about some key people involved in the awesomeness of this book:

  Ronald O'Rourke (who will be playing Lyric in the upcoming Demon Singer trailer) is a giant of a man. He hates brick walls and regularly crushes them into dust... with his pinky toe.

  Red Sand Beach on Kaihalulu Bay in Hawaii used to be white. It's red now because that's where Ron has all the brick dust shipped. We expect that soon Red Beach will become known as Red Sand Dunes.

  Eventually Ron will have crushed enough bricks to build an enormous castle for his children. No one has yet been brave enough to point out to Ron that that will likely require all his red dust be formed into bricks.

  Ron also single handedly trained 106 mustangs to travel only in configurations that spell out his initials. If you wonder if those are cars or horses the answer is yes

  Laura Fortman (who will be playing Acheron in the upcoming Demon Singer trailer) manages to find light in the darkest places. A foolish king once bet her she couldn't find a spark at the bottom of a bottomless well. Laura dove in head first and searched for over a year. It seemed to the kingdom that she would fail her challenge when Laura decided to shoot the laws of physics the bird and begin glowing.

  Her glow grew into a pillar of fire so bright it forcibly evicted every shadow in the bottomless well. Those shadows fled so fast that they actually traveled backward in time and told her story. That is why today we have the legend of the Phoenix.

  Laura has also won by popular election the mayorship of Strawberryville. She is now responsible for all the legislation and community health of every strawberry on the planet.

  Maijel Chisolm (who will be playing Cadence in the upcoming Demon Singer trailer) has led the charge to ban mermaid fishing for the last 13 seconds.

  She also organized a 600 piece orchestra of kangaroos to beat out the Canadian national anthem on the world's largest xylophones. Even though she isn't Canadian... as far as we know. To make it a challenge for herself she wouldn't allow the 'roos to use their arms or feet. They had to use their ears.

  Maijel is also the first human to master the mystical power of ostrich running. Not to be confused with ostrich racing, ostrich running involves running like an ostrich. Forever dissatisfied with mediocre, Ms. Chisolm runs like a cracked out ostrich trying to escape a herd of butterflies. Why? Because butterflies are scary.

  Cathy Phillips (who will be playing Lisian in the upcoming Demon Singer trailer) once told a blue whale she could beat him in a swim race. The whale, whose name was Sven, scoffed at her claim and promised to run for president if she could.

  Cathy began training that very day, participating in every single marathon, triathlon, tough mudder, hopscotch competition and bake-off she could find. She would win the competitions secretly and donate her awards and acclaim to various other individuals.

  The time came to race and Cathy passed Sven eight times in their 3 lap race.

  Eventually, she grew fatigued and stopped to squelch a fight between Ursula the sea witch and king Triton, because resolving the differences between giant fictional sea characters relaxes her.

  Sven is expected to announce his candidacy later this year.

  1 demon ties

  The woman at the center of the blast zone gave him a briefly interested up and down before her light violet eyes dismissed him and flicked to the other occupants of the room. Her gaze fell on Master Lomong, a mountainous man sitting on the floor against a pillar carved with ancient symbols forgotten by all but a handful of people on the planet. Delicate nostrils flared slightly, she headed straight for him, back erect, hips swaying and curves wondrously immune to the surly demands of gravity.

  The only man standing - the same one she had dismissed as unimportant - came to his senses. He sang a low soothing note, and instantly she was back in front of him, nose to nose, staring intently into his eyes. His lower back spasmed into a knot at the proximity of her lips to his.

  “It was you who brought me here. Who are you?”

  “My name is Lyric.”

  “That's a stupid name. What are you, Lyric?” She seemed to stare at him, but her gaze did not quite focus on his face. It was as though she looked into him. “There’s something different about you.”

  “I’m a soul singer, a protector of the Score of Creation.” Lyric met her gaze calmly, even though her nearness made him feel anything but calm.

  The woman cocked her head thoughtfully to the side, staring at Lyric through those dazzling eyes.

  "So, really, you have no idea either."

  Master Lomong slowly picked himself up from the floor.

  “And what is your name Verger?”

  “Verger?” As she turned to look at Lyric's voice instructor, her tinkling laugh made every Y chromosome in the room smile happily. “Don't insult me.” Turning back to Lyric a delicate hand reached for his neck.

>   Move you idiot! His brain screamed at his frozen body. He could not account for his certainty, but he had no doubt that this creature was far more deadly than any Verger he had heard of. Furthermore, he was certain that if she decided to kill everyone in the room he would not be able to stop her, even though he was responsible for her presence. She smiled knowingly, as though amused by his secret thoughts, and the knot in his back pulsed. To his surprise, she did not attack. Instead, she hooked a finger in the silver chain that encircled his neck and pulled the soul singer pendant out of his shirt. Almost lovingly, she caressed it with her thumb. “You wanted power sweetie, you got it." Her eyes moved from the pendant back to his, she leaned in close enough for him to feel her hot breath on his skin. "You overshot your mark... by a lot. My name is Acheron. But I’m no Verger." Icy fear filled Lyric's stomach. The room stopped breathing in shock.

  “You’re a demon?” again, Lomong regained his composure first and spoke.

  “Demoness,” she corrected absently, tucking the pendant back in Lyric’s shirt. She patted his chest, electricity shot through him at her touch. She slithered around the perimeter of the blast zone, looking curiously at the carvings on the columns and the walls. “And it looks to me like this is the fabled Soul Singers Guild. One of the few sanctuary’s of the Composer that no hellion has been able to penetrate. Aren't I the lucky girl?" She gestured casually at one of the glyphs, "That one’s wrong by the way."

  She spun on a booted heel to face Lomong.

  "Funny how anyone who’s even heard of you thinks you’re a myth.” Looking back at the pillar, she reached out a single finger to touch a symbol in recognition. The demoness jumped back as her finger came within an inch of it and blue sparks flared up, accompanied by the smell of ozone. She stuck her burnt finger between her pouting lips her eyes narrowed as she looked back at Lyric.

  “Really, Lover? You have me shielded? Let’s drop this little barrier you’ve got your girl trapped behind, huh? I’m completely at your disposal and solemnly swear,” she crossed her heart, that is if she had a heart... and if it was located directly behind her left breast. “No harm will come to you...

  “from me...

  “today...

  “Or are you into the bondage thing? ‘Cause I could teach you some fun...”

  Lyric’s voice sounded again, a strange phrase that silenced her. Acheron shivered in a fascinating manner and smiled lasciviously.

  “How’s about a warning next time stud? You can’t just compel a girl to obey you. It’s bad manners you know, besides, I already told you, you’re in no danger from me.”

  Lyric remained silent, letting that serve as his answer. Acheron sighed resignedly.

  "Fine, be a douche."

  Lyric was finally able to tear his eyes away from the sultry demoness and survey the damage to the Casting Chamber. One of the ornate columns sported a large crack. Blood smears marked the blackened floor and walls, a result of the demoness' arrival hurling the Guild Masters into them at speeds that they were all likely to agree were unreasonable. Several of the tapestries were either burnt, burning or already ash. Acolytes were carrying unconscious Singers from the room, while the remaining Masters vigorously discussed something in a tight circle. Whatever they were saying, it involved a great deal of dramatic gesturing. Master Singer Lomong held himself apart, as usual, and watched his student and the demoness with an inscrutable expression on his face.

  “They have no clue what to do with you and me, and it scares them somethin’ awful...” Her voice in his ear nearly ejected Lyric from his skin.

  “Please don’t sneak up on a fella,” he said, “it’s bad manners you know.”

  She laughed again. The sound was intoxicating.

  “Uh-oh, someone’s being unfriendly,” the demoness sing-songed.

  Hairs stood up on the back of Lyric’s neck. The song quietly filling the air was familiar; it had taken him over a year to memorize it. The Masters were singing a complicated and powerful banishing song, one written to send even the strongest demons back to Hell. Panic gripped his chest as he realized they were preparing to banish the only demon in the room, the one that happened to be tied to his soul for life. If they sent her back to hell what would happen to him? Vergers and Singers share their fates, if one dies the other dies. If the masters banished her while tied to him, it stood to reason he would be dragged to hell along with her.

  Lyric began singing the first song he could think of, a drinking song he and his classmates used to prank one another in the Guild. Remembering Master Lomong's exhortation not to hold back, he let it fly, throwing everything he had into it. Much to his surprise, Lyric watched the Masters of his order - dignified and austere men - slur their words and wobble unsteadily on their feet. Within seconds, every Singer in the room passed out on the cold stone floor in a drunken stupor, leaving Lyric standing alone with the demoness.

  Looking around at the softly snoring soul singers the demoness burst out in laughter.

  “That’s damn impressive; this might be fun after all!”

  2 WHAT TO DO?

  The High Master of the Soul Singers Guild listened in cold silence as the other Masters discussed the issue of young Lyric tying to a demon, then rendering a room full of the most powerful soul singers in the world unconscious with a drinking song used by Singers in their fifth measure. He smiled grimly as he wondered how effective this meeting would be with one of his advisors absent in a coma and the rest nursing hangovers.

  "There is no way it can be allowed to stand." Keith Normvy was purple in the face as he pounded the table to emphasize his point yet again. Bailey Storn rubbed his temples as his cell phone jumped to the rhythm of Normvy’s tantrum and tried to ignore the line of spit that showed up between Keith's lips every time he got angry.

  "For the hundredth time, Keith, no one is disputing that. Can you please stop being so loud? Seriously, how can you not have a headache? The problem we face isn't reaching consensus on whether to allow this, but what do we do about it? There is no precedent to guide us here."

  "No one has mentioned the obvious solution, distasteful though it is." Johnson Chab studied his spot at the table carefully as he spoke, as though seeking answers there. Lomong regarded him with disgust. It was no secret Lomong considered Chab to be a spineless weasel. His diminutive stature coupled with an apparent lack of a neck made him a comical figure at best.

  Nevertheless, he did not earn his place at this table easily. None of them had. Of course, that did little to temper Lomong's low opinion of the man.

  "No one has mentioned it," growled the Voice Master from his seat near the head of the table, "because it is unmentionable. soul singers do not murder. I, for one, am glad the boy thought so quickly, before you sent him alive into hell. One of our founding principles is the sanctity and protection of life. Disregard that and you may excuse yourself from this table, this room and this guild." The large voice master fixed his intimidating scowl on Chab.

  "Lomong is correct," the Guild Master interjected. "We will not murder an innocent man. I refuse to allow that to be an option. I’m still very interested in knowing who began the banishment song." The High Master of the Soul Singers Guild's normally smiling eyes fixed his companions with steel this morning. He tried to be present at all castings, but pressing matters out west had him away from the guild. A crazy woman was stirring up trouble in the supernatural community and had become a serious problem, the likes of which humanity had not faced in centuries. The Four Kings requested he be part of the advisory council to determine how best to deal with her; three solid weeks of meetings, debates, defense plans, and the bane of his existence, politics. The four kings had grown complacent and all the royalty were more concerned with maintaining the appearance of control than actually facing the problem. On top of that, he had to deal with the disappointing performance of three of his active Singer's in Markhato. With the last few weeks behind him, this debacle was not what he wanted to come home to. The table remain
ed silent, waiting for their leader to continue. He let the quiet stretch out.

  “It appears a reminder of this Guild’s purpose would be valuable,” he began quoting from the first page of the first Measure.

  “ ‘One of the principal functions of the Soul Singers Guild is to defend humanity from all malignant supernatural creatures, but our chief enemies by far are the Fallen Ones; demons.’ “

  He paused to interject, “to have a soul singer tied to a demon is worse than unheard of, it is almost blasphemous.” He continued with his quote,

  “ ‘We hold high the sanctity of life and the idea of killing an innocent is an affront to the Composer, in Whose likeness all humans were made, as well as a betrayal of those we seek to protect.’

  “I need you to understand these basic truths of our order before you make hasty decisions, like banishing young Singers to hell.”

  There was another long, uncomfortable silence before Lomong spoke up again.

  "The boy is in my employ and I feel a certain amount of responsibility for him. He cannot remain tied to a demon and stay here; there are too many possible repercussions. What if we exiled him from the Guild with instructions to find a way to sever the tie?"

  "Ridiculous," Normvy scoffed, "might as well go ahead and kill the boy now and spare him suffering. Besides, who knows what kind of havoc that creature will wreak if you let them loose on the world?"

  Bailey Storn smiled sardonically