The Demon's Storm by Hope A. Breedlove (read dune TXT) 📕

It was raining that day. All day long in fact. A torrential down poor that shivered everyone to the bone. A memorable day indeed.
Auburn haired, sixteen year old Emmery Ward walked briskly to the cafeteria, determined, ignoring any odd looks as she practically tripped over her own soaked feet down the hallway. All of her thoughts were focussed on a particularly peculiar blond named Allen Hale and another young man, Jeff Cooper. Both vying for her heart’s attentions in completely different ways.
She wished for answers from one and love from the other.
She turned the corner and--Ran headlong into Tony Noventa. She backed up, slightly dazed. Nic, his younger brother, was with him as well. Tony put a steadying hand on her shoulder.
“You okay Emmery?” he asked, looking at her with his deep brown eyes. She nodded hesitantly and she saw Nic roll his eyes out of her peripherals.
“Can we talk to you for a minute?” Tony asked, ignoring his younger brother. They both smiled at her, their perfect white teeth contrasting harshly against their olive skin.
“Uh, sure,” she mumbled, trying to regain her thoughts. She had been so focussed on where she was going and now her mind seemed to have gotten bumped into as well.
Nic headed off down the hallway without a backwards glance. His blase demeanor was getting on Emmery’s nerves. She was about to protest, but Tony grabbed her hand and pulled her after his brother.
“Hey, what’s the big idea?” she asked as they walked rapidly down a corridor that was remotely desolate. Tony looked back at her, a glint in his eyes. She tried to pull her hand free but he kept a vice grip on her.
“You guys,” Emmery huffed, “What’s going on?”
Nic stopped abruptly, as did Tony, and she nearly ran into them. Tony turned around finally letting her hand go free. “We need to talk.”
The younger Noventa leaned against the white wall next to them, looking at Emmery with little concern. However Tony’s face showed a great deal of worry.
“Alright.” Emmery folded her arms across her chest, “What do we need to talk about?”
“We’re just looking out for you Emmery,” Tony said, his voice steady. He glanced at Nic who nodded in agreement.
“Looking out for me? What do you mean?” she asked the Noventas, starting to feel a little uneasy. Nic looked down at the floor. Suddenly the toes of his shoes seemed to be extremely fascinating to him.
Tony looked at her anxiously, he opened his mouth a couple of times, but never said anything, as if he couldn’t quite find the right words. After a moment he reached into his pocket and pulled something out. He held it up in the light for Emmery to see.
It was a thin, silver chain that sparkled lightly in the florescent lights above their heads. But what caught her eye was what was hanging from it.
A silver cross.
Emmery studied the pendant carefully, her eyes narrowing in confusion. It was small with intricate carvings on the two transverse posts.
She looked at Tony, her face marred with uncertainty that seemed to reflect his own. He held the necklace out to her, the small crucifix swinging like a pendulum on its chain.
“A gift from our father.” His voice was rich, unwavering. Her eyes darted to Nic, he looked past her at the cross, his eyes filled with thoughtfulness, respect.
Turning her attention back to Tony Emmery took a deep breath. “What do you mean?” It came out slowly, almost a whisper, but in a deeper voice than she was used to hearing from herself.
“He wishes for you to wear it. For protection,” Tony explained, keeping his eyes leveled on the necklace rather than the young woman before him.
“But, I’ve never met your father,” Emmery told him, her voice rising slightly with panic, “What could I possibly need protection from anyways.” She let out a nervous laugh.
“Emmery.” Nic spoke for the first time during this strange exchange, ”Our father, Minister Noventa, he is worried about the evil you have been lingering around.”
Nic’s voice was soft, intelligent, meditative. Nothing like his usual jovial tone. Emmery looked from Tony to Nic, her eyebrows forming a ‘v’ above her blue eyes.
“What are you talking about?” Emmery bit out, holding her anger in, attempting to block it with confusion. She felt her fists clench, the skin stretch over them tightly because of the tension.
“Emmery, please stay calm. We are only following our father’s wishes,” Tony breathed smoothly. Still clutching the chain with one hand, he let his other hand rise to her shoulder in an attempt to conciliate her growing annoyance.
Emmery looked at him, letting her fingers uncurl. His composure seemed to rub off on her. “I-I don’t understand.” At this point she was past her irritation and had moved onto wary incertitude. “What ‘evil’ is your father talking about?”
The Noventa’s exchanged a knowing glance. Emmery stared at them, feeling a quiver of perplexity run up her spine. Tony took her hand and placed the cross in it, folding her fingers over the cool silver gently.
The elder Noventa let out a deep sigh, as if preparing for a long and difficult speech. She watched him closely, ready to hear it. He looked down at the floor.
“Emmery, our father, being that he is the epitome of a holy man, a priest, a tepid parent,” he smiled to himself, but then looked at her with a hard gaze, “He believes that Allen Hale is not a pure being.”
She opened her mouth to say something, but all that came out was a timid gasp. Tony ignored it and kept speaking, his demeanor remaining calm and intelligent, stealing glances at his brother when necessary.
“As you know, Allen’s parents died in a house fire when Allen was a young boy. But what you don’t realize is that he was on the second floor of the building, that is where his body was found. He was trapped under a ceiling beam,” Tony paused and stared Emmery straight in the eyes, “When the paramedics examined him, though there was not a scratch on his entire body, they couldn’t find a heartbeat. But Allen was breathing.”
She stared at Tony unbelievingly. Nic was still leaning against the wall, his eyes closed now, listening.
“The doctors were astonished. He was such a small, frail child. How could he have survived such an ordeal?” Tony’s voice was rising, as if he was reaching the climax of some great tale of excitement, “But he did survive. Though he is absent from school more often than anyone else due to illness, he is still alive.”
Emmery was fed up with the story he was weaving in her brain. It wasn’t making any sense. “But what does this have to do with me? Allen survived, it was an act of God, a miracle, right? Isn’t that what your father would say?”
“No,” Tony grabbed her arm, “It wasn’t an act of God. Don’t you see? My father believes him to be the devil. Possessed by some other worldly being filled with evil and deadly power!” Nic’s eyes opened, his mouth in a pensive scowl. He looked at her, his expression intensely serious.
“Surely you don’t really believe that insane accusation?” Emmery shot back at Tony, ripping her arm away, yet keeping a firm grip on the cross in her hand, the chain dangling between her fingers.
“According to our father, it’s the Godforsaken truth,” Nic stated.
“It’s crap that’s what it is,” Emmery hissed pushing her way past Tony, but he grabbed her again.
“If you have any common sense you’ll listen to us,” he said, his eyes burning a new shade of brown. He looked at her, clearly realizing that she had no intension of doing so. “At least wear the necklace. Please.”
Emmery wrenched her arm away again and with a final glare masking her features she turned and stormed down the hallway, heading away from the cafeteria. Suddenly she didn’t feel like seeing Allen anymore.

***

After school Emmery walked down the bustling hallway, taking her time, her mind a rush of questions. The Noventas had filled her head with doubts and her view of Allen Hale was now fogged by those words.
“Allen Hale is not a pure being.”
Not a pure being. What did that mean? That he wasn’t human? It just didn’t make any sense.
Emmery fingered the cross at her neck. She had reluctantly fastened the clasp and allowed it to rest against her collar bone, if only to appease Tony and Nic.
Taking out her cell phone she shakily sent a text off into the void of space hoping it would reach her brother, Jerry, before he started to worry. She wouldn’t be riding home with him today. She had something important to take care of.

***

Emmery was amazed that she was actually capable of finding the nearest bookstore to Edgewood High, especially considering she was devoid of any type of transportation.
But there it stood in front of her. An older building with a paint peeling door constituting as the entrance and exit. In the small window hung an ‘open’ sign. As she entered the used bookstore a small ping of a bell rung in her ears.
Inside Emmery noticed a piece of trodden plywood lying between the level of floor she was standing on and the actual store, which was about three inches up. The board, which creaked as she walked up it’s slight slope, was the equivalent of a makeshift ramp. She noted it as odd, but shrugged and walked further into the establishment. She noted many things as odd as of late.
To the left and right of her, amid the intoxicating aroma of aged spines and pages, were shelves and aisles full of books. Books that if Emmery wasn’t careful would distract her from reality and pull her into their fanciful worlds of unbelievable characters and beautifully written landscapes.
She trudged on past the children’s section, the mysteries, the autobiographies, the thrillers, and the romances. She wasn’t thinking as clearly as she had been when her nostrils were absent of the wonderful musty smell of hundreds of novels.
The cashier stared at Emmery, her pink frames sliding down her nose as the young red-headed woman rushed past without a sideways glance. Emmery only passed one other person in the whole store, an older man who was reading heavily into an old paperback.
She passed him by and headed to the section she never thought she’d ever end up in. Spirituality.
Spirituality. What the hell did the word even truly mean? She glanced at the cross around her neck. Certainly not a minister filling his sons' heads with crazy tales of the devil and his minions. But then again that didn’t really answer her question.
Emmery looked around at the books, nothing catching her eye. All tales of the bible, angels, religion. But as if out of nowhere a small book, bound in black, with the silver words DEMON printed on it’s cover in scrolling letters fell haphazardly from a dilapidated bookshelf right in front of her.
Thinking that fate had grasped her in it’s clutches, she ignored the bubbling fear in the knots of her stomach, and camped out in the center of the aisle, cross legged. Slowly, carefully, Emmery picked up the book. It felt like