Age of Demons

Chapter 44 - Emery

Emery dreamed of fleeing their safe house again.

White flakes fell in perfect syncopation. Hyperventilating voices split the soft air, and death cries followed.

Emery marched through the snow, passing by plummeting bodies, stepping through black clouds haunting the ground. She walked as if in a trance, declining to give a passing glance to those that were devoured by the spirits.

When she passed it all, standing at the back road that was a couple yards away from the safe house, she stared into the tree line.

Shadows caressed the wooden trunks as snow buried branches beneath its crushing weight.

The longer she gazed into the forest, the more the shadows seemed to move, like droplets of ink in water. Slowly, they morphed into shapes. Images of people flitted about the trees, and something dark loomed in the background.

Quietly, like the whispering of the wind, a voice floated just out of reach. Emery strained to hear the words, but she couldn't quite make them out.

She took a step closer to the tree line, leaning forward, trying to hear what the voice was saying.

She took another step forward.

Just barely, she caught the words, and they floated around her head in a dizzying message:

The Portal lies in the East.

Em rested a hand on a tree, its hard exterior biting into her palm. She bent forward, transfixed by the dancing shadows.

The Portal lies in the East.

The voice was growing louder, and soon it was all she could hear. She leaned even more, holding on to the tree for balance.

A powerful gust of wind howled from the forest, shaking tree branches in its wake, snow falling like confetti—before it slammed into her.

She slipped, her feet sliding in the snow, and as her back hit the ground, the voice screamed:

She has awakened!

Emery blinked against the soft light.

She lay on her back. She propped her elbows underneath and took in her surroundings.

The lake stretched out before her like a rippling ribbon of green and midnight blue. It roared quietly, as if wanting the world to know it still existed but keeping its tone respectful.

Grains of sand prickled her elbows, and she pushed herself up into a sitting position, rubbing the sand off her arms.

"Morning'," Felix called, and Em turned toward him.

Her brother sat on one of the boulders they'd taken camp by. He held a compound bow in his grasp, adjusting its weight and running his hands along the cords.

"Morning," she mumbled, rubbing at her eyes.

"Oh." Felix reached down and unzipped the teal backpack at his feet. It bulged with the cans of food they'd been able to claim from their raid. Felix had even found a pan so they could actually cook more than just putting meat on a stick. "I found this, and... You know I don't agree with it, but I thought it might make you happy." Felix pulled out a black leather book. A red ribbon curled inside the pages, its end sticking out the bottom like a snake's tongue.