I Tamed The Twin Demons

Chapter 1 — The Dead Man Opened His Eyes

Davea gave a dismissive snort. “I know what happened. You died.”

“Apparently, I disagree.”

“Your disagreement is about to become irrelevant.”

“Look at the circle.”

Neither woman moved at first, and Marco wondered whether he had finally pushed his luck too far. He swallowed his fear and continued before Davea could decide that silencing him permanently was the simplest solution.

“I'm not saying you should trust me. You'd have to be spectacularly stupid to do that. I'm saying something is happening here, and you don't understand it any better than I do.”

Davea's eyes narrowed as she studied him, and for the first time since he had awakened, Marco felt that he had managed to capture her attention.

It wasn't sympathy, and it certainly wasn't trust, but it was something he could work with.

“You killed the man who owned this body. Fine,” he continued, gesturing weakly toward the blood covering his chest. “But now I'm here, and I'm bleeding all over your expensive-looking furniture. If you kill me, you might destroy whatever evidence could explain why.”

Devana's gaze flicked toward the altar, and although the movement was small, Marco noticed it immediately.

“So,” he added, trying to sound more confident than he felt, “unless murder is your only hobby, perhaps we could investigate before you make things worse.”

Davea stared at him with an expression that suggested she was reconsidering several unpleasant ways of ending his existence. “You have a remarkable talent for irritating people who can kill you.”

“It's a gift.”

“Then I shall separate you from it.”

“Davea,” Devana murmured, her tone more serious than before.

Although the armored woman's blade remained against Marco's throat, she no longer pressed it forward. Her sister had approached the altar, and the shift in her attention gave Marco a few precious seconds in which he could breathe without fearing that the next movement would sever an artery.

Devana moved with an almost lazy grace, yet the shadows seemed to make room for her as she crossed the chamber.

When she leaned over Marco, the golden runes embroidered on her robes brightened, casting intricate patterns of light across the stone.

“Interesting,” she whispered.

Marco had begun to hate that word. In his experience, whenever someone described a dangerous situation as interesting, it usually meant that someone else was about to suffer.

Devana extended one pale finger toward the glowing circle, and the moment she touched it, the symbols flashed with blinding intensity.

Marco gasped as something unfolded behind his eyes.

It wasn't a voice, nor was it a vision in the ordinary sense. Instead, it felt as though a hidden window had opened inside his mind, revealing information he had never learned but somehow understood he wasn't supposed to see.

Strange markings appeared against the darkness, their shapes shifting too quickly for him to decipher. Most remained unreadable, but one line burned brighter than the rest, its characters suddenly clear in a way that made his stomach tighten.

Marco stared at the words, trying to understand their meaning before they vanished as abruptly as they had appeared.

He blinked several times, desperately attempting to summon the strange message again, but his mind offered nothing except the lingering sensation that something had noticed him.

“What did you see?” Devana demanded.

Marco turned toward her, uncertain how to answer a question about something he barely understood himself.

That was the problem. He didn't know exactly what he had seen, but he was beginning to suspect that whatever had created the message considered his existence a mistake.

“I saw something,” he admitted.

Davea immediately returned her blade to his throat, her patience apparently exhausted. “Explain.”

“I can't.”

“Try.”

“I'm beginning to think honesty isn't rewarded in this household.”

Davea tightened her grip around the hilt, but before she could respond, Devana went unnaturally still.

“An anchor,” she whispered.

Davea glanced at her sister in confusion. “What?”

“The circle. Look at the inner ring.”

Marco followed their gazes toward the altar, where the symbols had begun rearranging themselves beneath the blood covering the stone. A series of fine lines now converged on a mark directly above his chest, forming a shape that resembled a closed eye.

The curiosity that had animated Devana's expression was gone, replaced by an unease that made her seem suddenly less confident in her surroundings.

“This isn't a resurrection circle,” she said.

Davea frowned at her. “We both know what it is.”

“No. We know what we were told it was.”

A low vibration traveled through the altar, shaking the stone beneath Marco's back and sending a thin layer of dust drifting from the ceiling.

Devana traced the air above the symbols without touching them, and golden light gathered around her fingertips as a series of tiny inscriptions illuminated themselves.

“This was designed to anchor a soul to a living vessel,” she explained, her voice growing quieter as she studied the markings. “Its purpose is to prevent the soul from escaping.”

Davea's expression changed almost imperceptibly, but Marco caught the sudden tension in her features. It wasn't fear of him, exactly. It was fear of what his existence might imply.

“The traitor's soul,” Davea said.

“Perhaps.”

“Perhaps?” Davea repeated sharply.

Devana turned toward Marco, and for the first time, he saw something colder than curiosity in her eyes. She wasn't merely uncertain about what had happened to him; she was beginning to doubt everything she believed about the ritual.

“The body was already dead when we placed it here,” she explained. “The ritual should have contained whatever remained inside it. Nothing else should have been able to enter.”

Marco's mouth went dry as he tried to process the implications of her words. “Could we avoid discussing my internal occupancy as though I'm not standing right here?”

Neither woman acknowledged him.

Davea turned her blade toward her sister, demanding an explanation with a sharp movement of her wrist. “Tell me what you mean.”

Devana studied the mark above Marco's chest for another moment before answering. “Someone—or something—entered this body after the original soul was destroyed.”

Marco felt his stomach twist as the meaning of her words began to sink in. “Entered?”

“Your new occupant,” Devana said quietly, “should not exist.”

“That's comforting.”

“I'm not trying to comfort you.”

“Clearly.”

Devana stepped away from the altar, and for the first time since Marco had awakened, genuine uncertainty crossed her face. It lasted only a moment before her expression hardened again, but that brief hesitation was enough to make Marco realize how badly the situation had changed.

“Whatever you are, you're a threat,” she declared, raising her weapon once more. “We should destroy the body before the ritual spreads.”

Marco's pulse lurched as he watched her lift the blade. “Hold on. You can't just—”

“I can.”

“Maybe I'm harmless!”

“Harmless things do not return from death.”

“Have you considered that I might be the exception?”

“No.”

“Worth asking.”

Davea raised the blade above his chest, and Marco felt his thoughts accelerate as desperation threatened to overwhelm his ability to think clearly.

The circle was flickering faster now, and the strange mark above his heart pulsed in time with his heartbeat, each flash sending a shiver through the stone beneath him.

He couldn't fight her because he could barely sit upright, and he certainly couldn't outrun her. Negotiation was proving difficult, while convincing her that he was merely an ordinary man trapped in an extraordinary nightmare seemed increasingly unlikely.

Still, he had one advantage.

Davea was uncertain, and that uncertainty was the only reason she hadn't killed him yet.

“Davea,” he said, forcing himself to meet her crimson gaze.

She didn't look at him, but the blade paused above his chest. “If I'm a threat, killing me might be the worst thing you can do.”

“Explain.”

“You don't know what happens if this ritual breaks, and neither does your sister. What if killing the body releases whatever the circle is holding?”

Her arm hesitated, and Marco seized the opportunity to press his argument before she could dismiss it.

“You want answers? Keep me alive long enough to find them.”

Davea's eyes burned with an unnatural red light as she stared down at him. “You presume to bargain with me?”

“No. I'm desperately trying to avoid being murdered. There's a difference.”

For a long moment, neither woman moved, and Marco could hear the faint scrape of metal as Davea's grip shifted around the weapon.

Then Devana crouched beside the altar and called to her sister in a softer voice. “Davea, come here.”

Her sister hesitated before lowering the blade slightly and turning toward her. “What is it?”

Devana pointed at the inner ring of the circle, where a new symbol had appeared beneath Marco's bloodied hand. Two circles were now visible, one nested inside the other.

The outer circle was cracked, its broken lines flickering unevenly, while the inner circle remained perfectly whole.

Between them, a narrow line of glowing text had appeared in a language neither woman seemed willing to speak aloud.

Devana's face drained of color as she read the inscription. “That's impossible.”

Devana leaned closer to examine the symbol herself. “What does it say?”

Devana swallowed before answering, her eyes never leaving the glowing markings. “It says the anchor is intact.”

“Then what's the problem?”

Devana finally looked at Marco, and the dread in her expression made his blood run cold. “An anchor is supposed to bind one soul to a body.”

She pointed toward the two circles, her finger trembling slightly as the runes continued to glow beneath them. “This one is binding two.”

A deep, resonant sound rose from beneath the altar, and the stone trembled so violently that Davea stumbled backward, swinging her blade toward the darkness.

The sound came again, stronger this time, sending vibrations through Marco's ribs and making the blood on his chest ripple.

He realized with growing horror that the noise wasn't coming from his heart. It was coming from beneath him.

Devana slowly rose to her feet, her eyes fixed on the altar as every trace of amusement disappeared from her face.

“Davea,” she whispered, “this circle was built to keep something inside a body.”

Davea stared at her, struggling to reconcile the revelation with what she believed she knew about the ritual. “Yes. The dead man's soul.”

Devana's lips parted, but for several seconds, she seemed unable to force the next words out. “Then why does it say there are two?”

The next heartbeat shook the chamber so violently that dust cascaded from the ceiling, and every candle went out at once.

The glowing runes covering the altar turned black, plunging the room into darkness so complete that Marco could no longer see either woman's face.

He lay frozen against the stone, listening as the silence stretched around him and something moved beneath his back.

A faint scratching sound came from the underside of the altar, as though sharp nails were dragging slowly across the stone from the other side.

The scratching stopped, only to begin again a moment later, closer and more deliberate than before.

Then a voice slipped directly into Marco's mind, muffled by layers of rock and ancient magic but unmistakably aware of his presence.

“Move aside, little thief.”

Marco felt the blood drain from his face as the voice continued, its quiet menace far more terrifying than Davea's blade had ever been. “You've been sitting in my body long enough.”