The Demon Senders Read Online Free Page B

fear he felt for them to smuggle in some hatred. And he had no proof the tearing and drowning pain he had endured for three “rounds,” as Henry called them, were delivered by anyone.
    Then on whom or where could he place his hatred?
    As he felt the damp air around him begin to cool and shift in unpredictable currents, Phillip understood his delay had cost him. There would be another round. Another burning. He felt no hands on his body but could feel an already too familiar pulling of his skin. As if whatever was outside of him needed to stretch skin to work its way inside where it (they?) called their work office. A thought raced through Phillip’s mind, offering the briefest of reprieve. “These sons of bitches are talented at their job. Better than I ever was at anything.”
    It was then he knew. As the fog grew to within a single degree away from being pure, drowning water and the pain began to erupt, Phillip’s hatred found its mark.  
    The sound which was always in the background became the only sound he could hear. When he first woke on this side, the sound was nothing but a single instrument in a massive orchestra. It was unidentifiable and impossible to distinguish as being at all unique from the myriad of other sounds. But as he lay, his torturers pulling away and leaving their completed work alone, that one sound revealed itself.
    Phillip pulled himself up and stood on legs so weak he feared they would collapse and send him crashing to the unforgiving ground. Thankful for their hold, he rubbed his thighs and brushed off the decay and muck that had gathered on them. He then stood and listened to the screaming laughter. It was so distant and came from no specific direction. Its echoes gone, he understood there was not an orchestra of sounds but just this one. Laughter or something driven by a different emotion, Phillip was unsure. But whatever it was and whoever was causing it was all he could hear.
    He imagined the sound to be either the twisted laughter of a man whose mind had long since departed from sanity or the horrible screams of a soul too familiar with terrifying pain. He chose to believe the sound was laughter as believing it to be anything else was too horrific for Phillip to consider.
    He risked movement and found that his strength had fully returned, allowing him to step as quickly and as confidently as he had on the other side. And though most steps ended with the pain of a foot banging against a rock or finding their landing covered with broken pieces from long since dead thorny branches, Phillip moved towards a somehow known destination.
    He slowed his pace, not to reward himself a less painful trek but only to reserve his strength. It would be needed.

CHAPTER FIVE

    It took me a few days before things started to make sense. I tried to forget about the old man, the feather and it’s magical ways of relocating itself. Things were going well for me and I wanted to get back to doing what I could to keep my streak of good luck chugging along. I chalked the whole incident up to either a freakish reality or a drug induced hallucination. Not that I ever had problems at Shorty’s, but I figured it was just as reasonable to believe some asshole slipped something into my beer as it was to believe that what happened, really had happened.
    By the middle of the week, I forced myself to burn the feather, bury the ashes and to get on getting on. As soon as the feather was gone, I started hitting local bars and taverns, looking for paying gigs. My success at Shorty’s gave me a whole lot of inspiration and me worrying about some strange old man —who probably wasn’t even real—was nothing more than me wasting that inspiration.
    But the feather was real. I couldn’t deny or explain that away too easily. It was real when I saw it sitting on the seat in my van next to me and it was real when I put a flame to it. I figured if I was drugged at Shorty’s, I could have forgotten having picked up the feather