Free Darkening Dawn (The Lockman Chronicles Book 5) by Rob Cornell

its color. No. He knew he had landed in the presence of demons. A secret place between all planes of existence. The place where lost souls came to wander in nothingness, for eternity.
    He staggered backward, gazing up and around like a tourist in New York City admiring the skyscrapers surrounding him. So much of nothing. It didn’t seem possible.
    Something slithered between his thighs and wrapped itself from crotch to kneecap. But when he looked down, he saw nothing. Still, a slimy chill spread from his groin, through his stomach, and straight into his heart.
    He shivered.
    Who’s there?
    A snicker rose from below him. I am.
    Who are you?
    Another snicker, a little deeper, thicker, with a liquid edge. A fellow traveler.
    Hell no, if this thing thought Earl belonged here like the other souls. He had a tether to the living world, but he didn’t dare share that tidbit. Motherfucking thing might try to hitch a ride back with him.
    Let go, Earl said.
    But you’re so warm. So very warm. The thing wrapped tighter around his leg like a python suffocating its prey. Pain pushed down to his bone.
    Earl took a deep breath, simulating the meditative state, and let the pain exist outside his perception. Whatever kind of demonic soul had him, Earl didn’t know how to get rid of it. He should have been more prepared, but after failing to destroy the Chosen One, he hadn’t had time to learn how to fight demon souls. He needed to speak with his master before they lost their trace on the girl.
    Should he ignore the creature? No matter how well practiced Earl was with the meditative state, if the soul squeezed any tighter, the pain would be impossible to ignore.
    Could he reason with the fucker?
    What do you want with me?
    The cold rolling off the thing burrowed its way up to Earl’s neck. Knowing that it wasn’t his physical neck, just a mental construct of his soul, did nothing to comfort him. The demon, physical or not, could kill his soul as easily as a burst of rounds from Earl’s rifle through his brain.
    I told you. Your warmth.
    The thing sensed Earl’s difference, the life that still lit his soul. It might not understand what it felt, but even demons had instincts. Somehow Earl had to convince the thing it didn’t really want what Earl had, or trick it into thinking Earl’s warmth had faded.
    Remember what your mind can control, Earl recalled his master telling him in a dream once. Your mind dominates you. Tap into that dominance and it will set you free.
    Which was what Earl did in the meditative state. Not as fully as his master suggested—not yet. Still, he had to try something.
    Just like he was doing with his physical body, Earl sat down and tucked his legs in akimbo. He sat on pure white, nothingness. He felt like he should still be falling. Something held him up in the middle of this oblivion, though.
    The demon hugged Earl’s leg tighter, cutting circulation to almost nothing.
    There is no such thing as circulation in this place , Earl told himself. That didn’t make it feel any less real.
    Why does it sit? the demon hissed, snakelike.
    Earl ignored the question. The cold oozed through his entire spectral body now. He shivered, feeling naked in a winter storm, even though this place had no seasons and no requirement for clothes. It was just the way Earl translated sensations in the Inbetween. His mortal soul mimicked what it had learned from forty years of existence on a physical plane.
    He closed his eyes.
    What does it do?
    Earl could sense panic in the thing. It didn’t understand Earl’s actions because it had spent too much time wandering in oblivion. For all Earl knew, the demon could have been here for centuries. Plenty of time to forget the meaning or use of physical activity.
    A smirk tugged at the corner of Earl’s mouth. From somewhere came the scent of roses—the scent of the candles burning in the open skeletal palms on either side of the altar. Earl pictured the smiling skull situated at the top