Page 45 of A Hail From Hell: Vol 1
“Well, if Misty says yes, then yes, it is,” Evan stood up and stepped away from the door. “Welcome home, buddy.”
A screeching woke Evan up in the middle of the night. He groaned into the pillow, murmuring an incoherent curse. Misty was curled against his chest, purring, when she suddenly leapt out of the bed, startling Evan completely awake.
“What? What—what happened?” He blinked around, disoriented, before reaching for the side lamp and slapping it on.
The dog—whom Evan had given a good bath and a blanket at the edge of the bed—was perched up on his hind limbs, scratching at the glass window, his now white fur glistening inthe moonlight. The sound of his nails grating against the glass was creating the eerie screech.
“What is it, buddy?” Evan sat up, rubbing his eyes. “You gotta take a leak?”
Not hearing him, the dog continued scratching at the window, whining anxiously. Maybe he was feeling stuffy in the small room after roaming the open clearings for a long time.
Yawning, Evan dragged himself out of the bed. After contemplating whether to urge the dog towards the front door or let him out the window, he decided to settle for the latter. He could train the dog sometime later when he wasn’t a walking corpse.
As he unlocked the window, a cool breeze fluttered in through the crack. before something cast a shadow across his face.
Evan’s eyes flickered up—
He leapt away. “What the fuck!”
A giant silhouette stood outside the window. A black, humanoid mass with two red dots shining in place of its eyes.
Stumbling back, Evan sucked in a sharp breath, the air turning heavy with the foreign presence of the intruder, along with the scent of damp earth.
Evan’s eyes dropped, then widened when he saw his dog, jumping out through the gap in the window.
“No, no, no—” Evan reached forward, but the dog was gone in a blink, dissolving into the demon’s shadow like mist.
Evan’s hand froze mid-air, mouth gaping. Disbelief clouded his mind momentarily.
Did he just…eat my dog?
After staring at the empty space near the window and not seeing any signs of the dog’s reappearance, his frozen fingers curled into a fist, a pair of dark eyes flashing up at the demon.
“Give him back,” Evan’s voice fell an octave.
The demon cocked his head.
The next second, he slithered in through the window, glass and concrete alike, straight into Evan’s bedroom.
Long raven hair, with a single streak of red threading through it, fluttered around a pale, sharp-edged face. His once-tattered red robes were gone, replaced by a pristine replica with minute designs intricately woven into the borders.
Those scarlet eyes blazed in the dark.
Craning his neck, Evan sized up the dramatically mighty demon.
If he wasn’t fuming over the fact that he’d possibly lost the dog he’d adopted that very afternoon, maybe Evan would’ve been more cautious. More scared.
“Give. Him. Back,” Evan’s skin radiated a soft blue glow as his rising anger flamed his core of spiritual energy, the barrier around it flickering.
If that demon had eaten his dog, Evan was going to resort to some extreme methods with his spiritual powers. Methods he'd rarely used before.
“What?” A low, gravely tone echoed in the room. The demon didn’t seem to be alarmed by Evan’s potential in the slightest as he casually threw the question at him.
Evan gritted his teeth. “My dog.”
“Yourdog?” The demon stared at Evan for a moment before his lips twitched up.
Evan’s nostrils flared in response. “You crazy fuc—”
