Free Dark City (The Order of Shadows Book 1) by Kit Hallows Page A

asphalt.
    "Who sent-" I didn't get a chance to finish before its barbed leather fist caught me under the chin. My head lurched back and my ears were filled with a riot of pain and noise.
    It drew its fist back to strike me again. I dodged and its claws whistled through empty air. I grabbed its forearm and fired my gun point blank into its wrist.
    The demon howled, the din stinging my ears. My nostrils flared with the sickening stench of burnt flesh and brimstone as the demon kicked out and its boot caught me in the midriff. I buckled over and the breath rushed from my lungs. I stumbled back as the creature drew its fist into the air to punch me again.
    I watched as it sailed down towards me, then I grabbed it in my hand and twisted it hard. The demon howled again. I tackled it to the ground. It tried to squirm free, but I pinned it down and sat astride its chest.
    I dug the hot end of the gun into the wound in its wrist. It screamed. "Hurts, does it?" I growled.
    It gurgled in its alien tongue.
    "Who sent you?" I pushed the gun further into the smoking hole in its wrist. Black ichor seeped from the wound and it was all I could do not to gag.
    The demon shook its head as I wrenched off its mask and threw it aside, revealing an oval of silver scales. I looked into its blazing green eyes. "I asked you a question."
    It growled and muttered twisted, unintelligible words.
    "In English." I placed the end of the gun against its forehead. "Tell me who sent you."
    Its eyes grew bright. "Go to hell!"
    It spat. The gob singed the side of my face. I pushed the gun harder to its skull. "I'll keep you here. You can thrash around in agony until the sun comes up and finishes you off. Is that what you want?"
    "Release me." It muttered a series of words I couldn't understand.
    A stabbing pain hit me with the force of a hurricane. It started in the center of my skull, as wicked as the mother of all migraines and felt as if it was singeing every one of my nerves. Most people would have caved and released the creature, but I'm not most people.
    I dug into my bag with my free hand, looking for something to break the curse. A mistake. The demon seized the moment and uttered a string of sing-song words.
    An invocation.
    I grabbed its jaw but the flesh turned to smoke and ran through my fingers.
    There was nothing I could do but watch as the demon began to dissolve. Its face rippled and blackened and my hands passed through its chest and struck the ground as the fumes filled my mouth and nostrils.
    The last thing I saw was its wolfish grin, then its smoky remains snaked away on the breeze.
    It seemed fitting. Of late, my whole life felt like chasing smoke.
    I climbed to my feet and walked away, empty handed, bruised and broken.

    * * *
    I grabbed a bottle of bourbon on the way home, the perfect companion on a slow steady one-way trip into the painless comfort of unconsciousness. I was done. No more demons, assassins or vampires. For now at least.
    Storm was the only one cat in my apartment that night. I found him perched on the cabinet next to Willow's picture. Unlike the others, who only used my place as a second home, Storm was feral and lean. His shoulders were broad and hard as stone, the map of scars covering his face marked old wounds from countless battles. He'd appeared one night late last autumn as lightning raged across the sky, hence his name.
    I nodded to him, lit some candles and poured myself a drink. He blinked slowly back, before looking away.
    The bourbon went down fast. I lay back on the sofa and gazed at the flickering flames. It had been a strange, painful day and I had almost as little to go on now, as I'd had when I'd started.
    I checked my phone for updates from Haskins, but the screen was empty, so I refilled my glass, sipped it slowly and made my way to bed.
    My dreams plunged me into the forest I'd seen beyond the portal. I wandered, lost among the towering, twisted trees and awoke hours later to a burning sensation on the