Page 11 of The Devil and His Ghost

Dr. Roberts clasped his hands over his notepad once more and faced Kendyll. “So you say the figure you see is a demon. Why do you think that?”

“Because,” she responded carefully, “he told me that’s what he is.”

“I see,” he replied calmly, jotting down notes about auditory hallucinations. “What else does this demon say to you?”

Kendyll didn’t respond, instead watching me with lips slightly parted while I moved around to the man’s other side. With each small step, the overhead light flickered. The man took in a sharp, almost imperceptible inhale, which he then held as he followed Kendyll’s moving gaze. He glanced out of the corner of his eye in my direction, where her attention landed.

Another small spike in his fear had my own power rising, and I smirked, placing a hand on the back of his chair while resting the other on his desk. I crowded into his space and studied the hair rising on the back of his neck.

“Someone’s getting scared,” I chuckled.

“He says you’re scared,” Kendyll repeated to the doctor.

Dr. Roberts’s shoulders stiffened, and he frowned. “Why would I be scared?”

Kendyll’s eyes narrowed on the doctor, and she suddenly straightened with a swell of confidence. I didn’t have a chance to coach her on a response before she took over with a biting hiss.

“Because you can feel him standing beside you. Because you know I’m telling the truth and have always been telling the truth.”

Dr. Roberts’s erratic heartbeat echoed like the sweetest banging of drums in my ears. His alarm mounted, and he tried to mask it with a disapproving stern frown. “Kendyll, you—”

I snapped my fingers, finally descending the room into total darkness. While the human eye lost the ability to see, I could still peer through the black void, and I watched as Paul gasped and looked around in vain with a panicked furrowed brow. Meanwhile, Kendyll didn’t flinch, her unwavering stare unbothered by the lack of light.

The rush of energy that followed the doctor’s burst of fear had me inhaling deeply, savoring the high of this moment. As I exhaled, I let out a sinister chuckle, and this time, I let the sound out. The malicious laugh bounced around the room in a chilling echo. The color drained from Paul’s face, and he stumbled out of his chair and into the wall, his wide stare looking all around the dark room.

“What’s going on?” the doctor demanded. “Who’s there?”

I leaned in until my lips nearly grazed his ear and whispered, “The demon, Paul.”

“Gah!” he screamed, falling away from me.

He barrelled toward the door of his office, stumbling from the lack of light as he went. My ominous chuckle followed as he grabbed the doorknob, but with a single thought from me, the door remained shut. He bellowed through clenched teeth as his trembling fingers frantically tried the light switch, but no matter how many times he tried it, the room remained dark. He yelled and beat on the door, but with the shadowy shield I cast around the room, all remained calm and quiet for anyone on the other side.

Moving to him, I pressed into his back and taunted, “Are you scared, Paul?”

“No!” he shouted, falling in an effort to get away. He crawled in a trembling, whimpering mess along the floor, knocking into his shelves and desk as he went.

Meanwhile, Kendyll listened to all of this unfold, a small yet satisfied smile on her lips.

Dr. Roberts backed himself into a corner across the room. I took the chance to materialize slightly. My looming dark figure stood within the darkness of the room, and Paul stopped breathing as my golden eyes glowed and narrowed on him.

“This isn’t real,” Dr. Roberts rambled in a shaking mess. He squeezed his eyes shut and covered his face with his hands. “This isn’t real. This isn’t real. This isn’t real!”

I moved in a burst of shadows to crouch right in front of the doctor.

“He doesn’t like it when you say that,” Kendyll admonished with a glance at me.

At the sound of Kendyll’s voice, he dared another look, only to find my glowing eyes and sharpened white canines silhouetted in black right in front of him. He sucked in a petrified breath and begged, “Please! Please! Wh—What do you want?”

I made myself appear bigger among the shadows and stretched my grin as wide as it would go. “Your soul.”

“No!” he sobbed, collapsing into himself like an armadillo.

I wanted to throw my head back on a laugh, but that would ruin the malevolent vibe I was going for. The old threat to a human’s soul worked every time. As if I gave a damn about collecting souls from living people. That wasn’t my job as a Mischief demon. I could collect the souls of ghosts, but I couldn’t claim souls from someone still alive. Not that he needed to know that.

“Please!” Paul gasped. “Have mercy! I’ll do anything!”

Kendyll, no doubt having seen an opening, stood beside me and stared down through the darkness at the doctor. “Sign for my immediate release.”