Heaven and Hell

Azriel knelt to the ground, feeling the soft dirt beneath his fingertips. Next to him was the buried body of the feral demon that he had killed the previous night when he had saved the so called warriors of the Order of the Holy Light. Their incompetence had caused him to lose his quarry, which angered him. He lost track of the witch and had to call it a night. He hoped tonight he could find her and complete his assignment and get some much needed rest.

He found a pair of footprints a few yards from the site where he had buried the beast. They were fresh. Beneath his mask a smile appeared upon his face. He knew she had been her only moments ago. This meant that she couldn’t have gotten too far away, he could still complete his mission. He followed the tracks along the path, his heart racing in anticipation of finding his quarry. The smell of smoke caused him to pause in his tracks. Ahead he could see smoke rising into the air. A chilly breeze blew passed him, with it carried a voice, but it was too indistinct to make out the words.

He drew a pair of shuriken and leapt into a nearby tree. He then leapt from that tree to the next and the next, following the sounds carried by the unnaturally cold breeze.

Finally, he arrived overlooking a small clearing where two figures stood by a bonfire. One was a man on his knees with his arms behind his back as though tied together, but nothing was around his wrists. He was also shirtless and shaking, though whether from the cold breeze or fear Azriel did not know, perhaps both. The other figure was that of a young girl who looked to be about seven or eight years old. Azriel noticed that the girl was dressed in a white dress.

“Don’t worry, this will all be over soon Jared.” the girl said in a high pitched voice, her hand stroking the man’s cheek. He tried to turn away from her, but he could not. The girl giggled.

“You should feel honoured, you are to be a sacrifice to the Great Demon Alvora,” she began stroking his hair.

“You’re insane!” the man known as Jared spat. The girl slapped him across the face.

“You should respect your elders!” she replied, her voice sounding more like that of an adult woman than that of a child. She placed her hand around his throat. “I could kill you now, so very easily. Lucky for you, it seems fate has a different plan in store for you,” her voice had returned to that of a child. She giggled again and skipped over to the fire. She bent over a bucket and grabbed a fistful of something that looked like powder and tossed it into the fire. It instantly grew several feet, the heat becoming so intense that Azriel could feel it as though he was sitting next to it. The Witch began to chant, her voice once again sounding like that of a woman.

“Great Alvora I call thy name, hear my cry and come to me! I call upon thee from the depths of Hell to rise, rise, rise!” she repeated the chant several times, her voice and the bonfire growing in intensity.

Azriel knew he had to stop her from completing her ritual but he found himself mesmerized by it. It was as though something was holding him back, but he did not know what. He couldn’t move a muscle, only stare helplessly. A jet of flame parted from the rest of the fire. It encircled the bonfire spiralling upwards, high above it.

“Great Alvora accept this offering I bring to thee. A virgin with the crescent shaped mark upon his chest.” In that instant the jet of fire shot right through Jared, before he could even scream he was dead as the fire pierced his chest. The bonfire died out, leaving only darkness and silence. As Azriel’s eyes adjusted he could hear a whisper in his ear.

“You have done well Witch,” the voice said. “In three days time the moon will be full. You must bring me the last sacrifice, a virgin woman of great beauty and strong mind. She must be a woman of God, Witch. Bring me this kind of woman and I will be yours to do as you wish.” the voice faded away into the night, once again leaving nothing but silence.

Before Azriel could move, the branch he stood on broke and he fell to the ground below with a thud! The Witch stood over him, giggling.

“Looks like I found the one who killed my pet!” she said in her child voice. “I’m going to make you pay dearly!” Fire appeared in the palm of her hand and she threw it at him. Azriel managed to roll out of harms way. She threw two more at him as he rolled, each one missing him. He then sprang to his feet and threw the two shuriken at her. With a wave of her hand they were cast aside into a nearby tree. The distraction gave him enough time to draw his Kusarigama, an ancient weapon of the ninja. In his left hand he held the kama, which looked like a small scythe. Attached to it was a long chain with an iron ball at the end of it intended for whipping at his opponents.

He began to spin it in his right hand and whipped it at the Witch. She ducked the first strike, but when the second strike came she caught the chain and allowed the ball to wrap around her tiny arm. With strength greater than her size suggested she yanked the chain, pulling him closer. Azriel moved to strike her with the other end of the weapon when he felt a burning sensation in his hand, causing him to release it with a yell of surprise. A hand wrapped around his throat and he was brought to his knees by the Witch’s surprising strength. She giggled.

“Time for you to go nighty night!” Azriel began to feel lightheaded as the Witch wrapped both hands around his neck and applied more and more pressure. In a last act of desperation, he reached for the dagger he kept on the side of his right leg. He struggled to gasp for air as he strained to reach his last hope for survival. Finally his hand clasped around the hilt and he drew it and as it did so stabbed the Witch in the thigh. She released him and screamed in pain. He gasped for air and quickly regained himself just as the Witch pulled out the bloody knife from her thigh, her face contorted in rage. Azriel grabbed his discarded Kusarigama and readied himself for another attack. The Witch lifted him with her magic however.

“Oh you are good. But playtime is over!” she shouted as she tossed him into a nearby tree. He grunted as he slumped to the ground, but he couldn’t stay there for if he did he knew she would kill him. He pulled out three of his smoke bombs from a hidden pocket and tossed them at the witch. As soon as they hit the ground they burst and a smokescreen covered the entire area. He used her temporary blindness to his advantage and ran. By the time the smoke cleared, he would be long gone. He could hear her enraged scream as he fled.

Once he was out of the forest he turned back once more and made way for his hideout to plan his next move. He had an idea of who the Witch’s next target might be, and he also knew that he could not complete the assignment on his own. He would get help from the one he knew would be next on the Witch’s hit list, the woman he had met the previous night, Serena Johnson.