FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

[b][u][center]The Demon-Touched

Chapter 2: Learn to Fight

By Draconicon[/center][/u][/b]

Bonolo slept in fits and bursts, always feeling the demon at her back, always feeling something feathered in her sleep that brought her screaming back to the world of the waking. The night seemed to last forever, the stars never shifting as she kept screaming to wakefulness when the dream pushed her there. Every time, it ripped her throat apart that much more, and by morning, she was exhausted and silent.

Her rescuer, the half-scaled, half-fleshed man, finally rose from his resting place when the sun was over the horizon. She groaned as he walked over to her, refusing to open more than one eye as he nudged her with the toe of his boot.

“Mmmph…”

“Time to move.”

“Hurts.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

He pulled her up before she was ready for it, and she almost couldn’t stay on her feet when he let go. She wobbled back and forth, barely able to hold her balance. Exhaustion like this was something that she had never had to deal with before, and it was still hitting her hard.

And so was the detachment of her soul, for that matter. She kept wobbling, feeling her head both to the left and the right, then feeling herself looking down and up, almost like her soul was a second or two behind her movements at any given point. She had to close her eyes just to keep herself from completely losing it.

“It goes away. Eventually. Or you learn to control it.”

She didn’t say anything to that. She just forced herself to reach out, fumbling for him, and managed to take his gloved hand. Half-expecting him to push her away, she was grateful that he instead led her forward. He did...something, she wasn’t sure at first, and he held her differently, lifting her hand into the air.

[i]He got onto his camel,[/i] she thought. [i]He’s up high, now.[/i]

As the stranger pushed a rope between her fingers, she let out a soft sigh of relief. It was still hard for her to breathe properly, but at least she had something to lead her on so that she wasn’t perpetually dizzy.

Except…

Except she almost didn’t need it, she realized. She could still see, even with her eyes closed. It was hazy, not as good as looking through her real eyes, but it was like the other part of her, the detached, loosened soul, could still see even when her eyes were shut. It was like looking over her own shoulder, getting a chunk of the world. It wasn’t as disorienting as walking around with her eyes open, but it was still a bit.

“Does...it...get...easier?” she said, croaking each individual word.

“If you make it easier.”

“How?”

“That’s up to you.”

“...Thanks…”

The stranger said nothing more, and booted his camel. They were off, and she had to focus on keeping up.

If nothing else, the new sort of ‘soul-vision’, for lack of a better term, gave her something to do as they walked along. She had to focus on dealing with the way that it darkened most of the world, only lighting up the part that was nearest to her. Maybe twenty feet away, if she really pushed herself to focus. When she turned her head, her ‘vision’ took a moment or two to follow, which meant that she’d have to be careful with what she was doing if she didn’t want to fall off a cliff or something.

Even so, it was something, and she realized that it wasn’t something that was affected by the early morning dimness, or the harsh light in other directions. It was completely evened out in this strange view, meaning that she wasn’t going to be blinded.

It was a small comfort.

“You were having trouble breathing last night. Are you still struggling?” he asked.

“Some,” she said, nodding.

“That will likely stay for a while. The demon that found you was one of those that stays to the heights, most of the time. It’s built for the skies, for the thin air.”

“Why...would...that...hurt?”

“Because there’s too much of it down here. If you take it too fast, or too slow, then you’re taking in more than you can use, and it hurts.”

“...Great…”

She shook her head blindly, and continued to follow.

They reached the foot of the great mountains that divided her desert from the lands to the north. Bonolo still didn’t know where they were going in the north, only that they were chasing down the man that had summoned the demon that killed the warriors of her tribe. Leaving her people behind was the last thing that she wanted to do, but with what the stranger had told her about the new demon parts of her, she would only be a danger to them, drawing in other monsters that would see her dead, or worse, changed completely.

The Desert Kingdom had been safe from demons for many years. She was not going to help bring them back.

And more, the offer to be the one to stab out the summoner’s eye, to take some vengeance for what he had done to her father and her people, was more appealing than she cared to admit. The rage that burned in her chest for what had happened, what had been done, was nearly enough to clear the pain from a wrongly-judged breath.

Nearly. She still hunched over from it.

They climbed in silence after that, walking the paths of rock and gravel up the sides of the mountain. The higher they went, the more comfortable Bonolo felt, until she started to breathe without thinking, without measuring. She turned her head, looking down through her soul-vision, and she realized that there was no fear for her there, no sudden chill as she realized that she was hundreds of feet above where she had been just that morning.

[i]Things change...and they change quickly…[/i]

As they climbed, she slowly started to walk with one eye open. It was still disorienting, but despite the discomfort, she knew that she had to start doing something. She could see to a degree with the soul-vision, but it wasn’t the same as seeing things with her own eyes. Details weren’t as strong, and she couldn’t see as far ahead as she could with her own eyes. She had to get used to it, or it would be her downfall, somehow.

The sun continued to rise, and when it stood over the mountains above them, the stranger called a rest. They stopped at a plateau along the path, the camel allowed to come to a halt and kneel for a rest itself, and her guide dismounted.

“Sit. Rest. We’ll take an hour and then continue when the sun’s not glaring down on us as much.”

“Thank...you.”

“How’s your throat?”

“...No...better…”

“Well, you were screaming all night.”

“...”

She sat down with the mountainside against her back, crossing her arms over her chest. The feathers were a stark reminder of what had happened, what she had become, and she shivered as she felt that instead of skin. She closed her eyes, only to open them again with a gasp.

The stranger didn’t look at her, but that glowing copy of him did, shaking its head.

“The demon?”

She nodded.

“It will be there for a while. A piece of him is inside you, and it will keep trying to take over.”

“How...fight?” she croaked.

“Willpower, mostly.”

“That...how...you...did...it?”

“Pretty much,” he said with a shrug, taking a few bags off of the camel. “I managed to get away from the demon that tried to turn me, but I heard his voice for...a long time.”

“See...him?”

“Every night.”

“...How...fight?”

“Aside from holding strong?” The stranger shrugged. “Find things that are too important to let go of.”

Bonolo wasn’t sure that she could do that. She pulled her arms in again, crossing them over her chest. At least it was easier to breathe up here. It freed up a bit of thinking space for her to consider what in the hell was going in, and what she could do about it.

She had already given up her people. Unless there was a way to get rid of the demon power inside of her, she couldn’t go back, not without making things dangerous for them. She had already lost her family, taken from her by the demon. There wasn’t much else in her life, when it came right down to it. Everything, from her friends, to her old life, to her people, to…

No.

No, there was one thing.

Bonolo looked down at her hands, remembering how hurt she had felt to see her father dead, how scared she had been when the demon had its claws around her heart. She pulled at that memory, forcing herself to feel it again, dragging it up until her eyes filled with tears, until her shoulders shook.

Fear, sadness...and anger. Underneath all of that, there was anger, and the demon didn’t get to take that from her. He didn’t get to take her chance to make him pay for everything else that he did.

She looked up and saw that the stranger was watching her. He was smiling.

“What?” she asked.

“You found it.”

“How...can...you...tell?”

“You don’t look like crying anymore.”

“...”

“That, and I can feel it.”

“Feel...what?”

“Power.”

Cocking her head to the side, she watched as he shook his head.

“I told you that I’d teach you. I guess now is as good a time as any.”

He finished taking the packs off of his camel before making his way across the plateau. As he took off his glove, she had a chance to see what was different about him.

Scales covered him from his wrist to his fingertips, most of them a dark red, almost blood-like in color. There were different marks across the center of his palm, though, like waving lines of black through the red. He turned his hand around for her, almost like he knew that she’d be staring, and then turned it palm up again.

“A demon changes someone by filling them with magic.”

“I thought...summoning...was done...with magic.”

“No. It’s done by pulling at magic. The summoners pull at the magic that the demons possess, that they’re made of, so that the demons can’t resist doing what they’re told. Of course, it doesn’t always work, and that’s not what we’re talking about right now. Feel.”

He held his hand near her chest, but didn’t quite touch it. She wondered why, at first, but as the seconds ticked by, her eyes slowly widened.

In her village, there was a small oasis in the center. It had currents that fed it from below, more than one, and while you couldn’t see them from the distance, or even by standing by the oasis, you could feel them as they passed by. It was all water, all coming from different places, but you could feel the similarities, track the different currents that were close to each other by the different feel of the water and the pressure.

This felt like that. She could feel a tingle, a pressure coming from his palm, and in contrast, she could feel something coming from inside of her, as well, pouring through her feathers and moving through her chest.

“Is...that…”

“That is the power of a demon,” he said. “All Demon-Touched can feel it. We can know each other by that feeling. And demons can find us by tracking that pressure. They can feel us from a much further distance than we can feel ourselves, but by the same token, we can feel them from much further away than any other mortal can.

“They push their magic into us, because we mortals aren’t supposed to use it. Our bodies don’t like it. Demons do not have souls, but they do have magic; we have souls, but we do not have magic. The more of the magic we take in, the more demonic we become, until we are nothing more and nothing less than one of them.”

“...But...our souls…”

“Are still here, just loosened. And because of that, we can use their power, too.”

Remembering the way that the demon had used its power to try and light the stranger on fire, and how the stranger had used his power to do the same to the demon, Bonolo shivered. That was a dangerous magic, indeed, if it was that destructive. And she didn’t have it in her hands. She had it in her chest.

As she gestured at the feathers, he nodded.

“You will have different powers than me. I can do things with my hands and feet and wings. You...you will have to figure out what your power is, what is lodged there. Most of what I tell you is to keep you focused on using it, on keeping it from overwhelming you.”

“It...will help?”

“It will.”

That was all she needed to know. Bonolo didn’t like the idea of hurting people with the demon magic, but she knew better than to think that the demon magic wouldn’t hurt her. If she could at least control it, keep aware of what it was doing, then there was a chance that it would hurt her less. And more to the point, it would mean that if she ever did use it, she would have less of a chance of hurting someone by accident.

No daughter of a warrior ever got away without learning the basics of the family’s weapons. One could never be sure that a child would listen to the order not to touch them, so they were taught how to handle them if they ever did. She remembered the one time that another girl had been ignored in another family, and remembered how several family members had ended up badly injured after that.

One could hate the weapon, but one had to know how it worked to not hurt someone with it.

“How?”

“Like this.”

He held his hand close to her chest again, waiting for her to nod that she could feel the pressure, the tingling power again. When she did, he tensed up. The power in his hand, the demonic energy in the scales started to twist and change. Rather than being all through his fingers and hand, it pulled in. She could feel it going down his fingers to the palm of his hand, gathering in one small point.

“Once you can feel the power, you can control it, move it, shift it to where you want it to go. That’s the first step. You can’t do anything if there’s not enough power in the right place. If you have to, you can drag it from one side of the body to the other, but anything that the demon power touches that isn’t already changed will become corrupted in the process.”

She nodded, looking at the palm of his hand. With her living eyes, she couldn’t see anything, but through the soul-vision, she saw writhing red creeping out of the scales on his palm, rising up like fumes from distant water. It collected above his hand, barely above it, so close that one could not have slid a piece of parchment between the two.

“And...next?” she asked.

“Next…” He shook his head. “Next, you do what you want to do with it.”

“...That’s...it?”

“It’s all I’ve been able to figure out so far.”

“No...no...shaping...or words?”

He shook his head.

“Just will. The magic is a force, and the force is in you. It has become part of you, like your hands and your feet. Like you tell them what to do, you tell it what to do.”

“Do...demons...do that?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t asked them.”

She nodded, though not without wondering what would happen if one did ask a demon how they used magic. For her, that seemed too simple. The stories of magic had always involved rituals, great spells, things that took time and effort.

This felt too easy.

Looking down at the feathers that had sprouted from her chest, Bonolo rested her fingers against them. This time, she could feel the demonic energy tingling through each little feathered tuft, but more, she could feel it further down, feel it in her chest, beneath her ribs and in her throat. The demon had marked her, and it had marked her good inside rather than outside.

[i]What power can I draw from that?[/i] she wondered. [i]What useful thing can I do with this?[/i]

She didn’t know. But she could feel the power, and that was a start. She’d focus on that, for now, focus on holding it and moving it. If nothing else, she could get a handle on how that worked.

#

The hour passed, and she had started to figure out how to move the power through her feathers to specific ones. It was still a rough understanding of how it worked, but it was the beginning of something.

Just as she was reaching for one feather, though, the stranger cleared his throat. She looked up.

“What?”

“Something’s coming.”

“...I...feel them,” she said, half in shock, half in fear.

“Good. You’re learning,” he said, getting to his feet and pulling his bow from the camel bags. “Keep your guard up.”

“What...are you...doing?”

“They’re coming over the peaks. If they come this way, I don’t want to be unarmed.”

Putting aside the doubt that he was ever truly unarmed from her mind, she watched as he walked to the edge of the plateau, looking up and to the right. He stretched out, and she watched as his soul stretched further, looking into the distance.

She didn’t have to look. She could feel the demonic presences out there.

[i]Is this...is this what he felt, coming to chase the demon from my village?[/i] she wondered. [i]How did he…[/i]

The feeling that she got was a strange mix of shifting emotion and the odd, uncomfortable feeling that came when one saw something change when it shouldn’t. The stomach-turning feeling of a nightmare developing out of a good dream, or the sickening feeling of a conversation going the wrong way, or the missed step in the dark. Those small things, those small feelings that left one feeling ill at heart, combined with sparks of rage, pockets of jealousy, ripples of other, different emotions: that was what she felt, bouncing at the edge of her awareness.

To feel sensation at a distance was a very twisted thing.

She pushed herself back against the rock, knowing better than to get in the way. The stranger pulled one arrow from his hip, putting it to the bow as he strung it up. He didn’t nock the arrow, but waited.

Finally, in the distance, she saw the first one come. An imp rather than a full demon, it was perhaps half her size, but had bat wings, gray skin, and a pair of horns that glowed bright red. They shimmered just above the imp’s head, almost like they were projecting something.

Two more followed, all that she could sense. She hoped that was all. They were already leaving her sick to her stomach.

The stranger nodded to himself, dropping to his knees, one leg stretched forward.

The imps moved closer, and he tracked them across the sky, slowly pulling the arrow into position. He waited until they were only a few dozen feet away, then finally let loose.

Snickt!

The arrow flew, and he was already nocking another when it hit the rear imp in the leg, making it scream. The other two turned, and the stranger pulled the bow higher, sending the next arrow into the lead imp’s back. It stiffened up, started falling.

The middle imp was faster than the others. He turned just in time for the third arrow to go flying, only for the arrow to bounce off of something.

[i]The horns. They...they make a barrier,[/i] she realized. [i]At least, over the vital parts.[/i]

The imp grinned as it shrugged off the attack, pulling itself up to its full miniscule height. It giggled, hissing and shrieking as it called down to them.

“Little slaves that slipped the leash. Come, come, come back. Masters want to have you again. Masters want to put the collar on.”

“Not likely,” the stranger said, getting to his feet. “You want me, come and get me.”

“Hee-hee, no, no, no. No orders to collect, just to give message. Give message, then go.”

“Who sent you, then?”

“Masters sent me.”

“A human master, or a demon one?”

“Both!”

“...I see.”

He took his glove off, and she realized he was going to use his power against the imp. But...could he do that? She had seen him break down the demon, yes, but that one had been helpless. This one had a shield. She watched from her hiding place, saw the red light on the imp’s horns start flaring brighter, a bubbling in the air between the stranger and the imp.

“Heeheehee, can’t touch me. We strong, strong servants.”

“Not strong enough…”

“Hee hee, try and break. Can’t.”

“Are you sure about that?”

The imp was sweating, for sure. She could see the little marks of effort that were showing on the imp’s face, his skin turning shiny, his muscles tensing, twitching nervously. He was holding the barrier, but it was costing him effort, energy. He could turn and leave, or even just flap away before the stranger could get free.

[i]What if he gets away and tells someone?[/i]

The thought alone sent a shiver through her. It would mean that they’d be pursued, that something bigger, more powerful would come after them. No, no, she wasn’t, she couldn’t deal with that.

She gripped at her chest again, running her fingers through her feathers. She found one, gripped it as she pulled the power of the demon into her grip again. It was thick and heavy, tingling against her body, and she tried to think of something, anything.

Feathers were soft, lifted others up. What could she do with feathers? What could she do with -

Thump. Thump. Thump.

The wingbeats of the imp pulled her attention to them, and she wondered how long he’d be able to stay up if they were no longer enough. What if he was no longer light, but heavy? What if the wings were weaker? What if she did something to them?

The feather. What could the feather and power do?

[i]Weak, boney, shriveled. Not true wings, but broken wings,[/i] she thought, imagining the wings on the imp’s back going past the bat-like, leathery shape they already had. She imagined them shriveling up, drying up, the leather membrane between the bony bits snapping from age and abuse. [i]Old and broken, dust and -[/i]

RIIIIP!

Bonolo looked up, shocked to see the work of her imaginings taking form. The imp’s wings ripped, and his smirk was stolen from him as he fell. He hit the side of the mountain and kept rolling, the bones of his wings snapping, and his arms following as he continued to drop further and further down the slope.

Her eyes widened, and her stomach heaved as she realized what she’d done.

#

They were underway shortly after she stopped throwing up. She had no help from that, no ease from the stranger, and she barely had water to wash her mouth before they were moving again. They reached the summit of the mountain shortly after and began their descent down the other side, and silence still held between them.

She didn’t know what he thought about her interference. He hadn’t thanked her, but neither had he berated her. If anything, he seemed to be avoiding talking about it, leaving her in her head with nothing to be said.

And that was the last place she wanted to be.

Even now, she could hear the soft clicking of the bird’s beak in the back of her head, the sound of the demon seeking her, laughing at her. She had used its power, and as angry as she had been, she hadn’t meant to kill. She’d meant to bring it down, to make it easier for...for…

[i]For him to kill it,[/i] she thought, and she winced as she realized that the end result was no different. She just wouldn’t have been responsible for it.

Bonolo kept her eyes doing, refusing to look up as she felt the demon reminding her of what she’d done, feeling like there was something inevitable about the way that it would come for her. Perhaps she should just -

“If you keep moping, I will kick you.”

The stranger’s words cut through her depressed musings, forcing her to look up at him with a glare.

“Why?”

“Because it’ll be easier to keep the demon from taking control up here instead of down there, where it might make a scene.”

“...Is it…”

“If you’re in pain, you’re weak. It can do more to try and take over.”

“Great...can’t be...hurt...can’t be...sad…”

“You can, but it’ll be harder if you are.”

“...How much...further?”

“We’ll reach the bottom of the mountain tomorrow morning. From there, another day or two to the town where the summoner probably is. After that...well, it depends on if he tells me what I expect to hear or not,” the stranger said with a shrug.

She nodded. So, three days until she knew where she was going with her life. The stranger had said she needed to last at least a week before the demon’s attempts to take her body would slow down, would get weaker. Three days from now would take her halfway to that point. She just hoped that it would get easier from here on out.

And in the meantime, she had to practice that magic. If she didn’t learn it, then she would just keep making mistakes. She’d already made one. She didn’t want to make another.

[b][u][center]The End[/center][/u][/b]

Summary: Bonolo is dragged further away from her people, learning more about the Demon-Touched and their powers as she goes.

Tags: no sex, human, corruption, transformed, imp, demon, magic, series, powers, fantasy,