A Deal with the Devil

Joanna Nixon finds herself in a precarious situation in which she faces certain death. Only a mysterious visitor can spring her free...for a cost.

The trees tore past Joanna Nixon so fast that their blurred branches made her stomach churn, only adding to the anxiety that ripped at her chest. Every time she felt a buckthorn branch snag at her dress, or when her foot dropped farther than expected--jarring her entire body--she was reminded of the rocking carriage rides that she used to take with her parents. She was reminded of their smiles. The sound of their laughter.

She feared she would never get their blood off of her hands.

The light of the flames that hungrily tore through the Victorian home she had lived in since her birth dimmed as she slipped through the forest. She allowed herself one brief peek over her shoulder, forever committing the last sight of home to memory. She took a deep breath, drinking it all in and freezing it in time as she turned away to continue her frantic escape. As she felt the raised root loop around the top of her foot, it was already too late. She felt her ankle snap, and the noise that came out of her mouth was almost inhuman. The scream ended quickly, however, when her head struck stone and her head began to swim.

The sound echoed out into the vast reaches of the night, and even in her dazed state, Joanna knew that much more than the owls and wolves had heard her cry out. The redcoats would be upon her soon. She pressed her fingers into the dirt, giving every ounce of strength she had left to move herself into a kneeling position. Her arms shook and her vision swayed violently, but she bit her lip against the pain, refusing to look down at the bone she could already feel protruding from the top of her foot. She couldn’t breathe, and she remembered for the first time that she was still wearing the corset she had donned that morning. She struggled to catch her breath, tearing at the strings that bound the corset to her, feeling the knots slip through her fingers time and time again, and she began to weep in helplessness. She couldn’t tell if it was the terror of being caught, violated, and murdered that made her cry so, or if it was that she lacked the strength to protect her family from the same fate.

As the hounds began to howl, the knot finally broke free and the corset came loose. Air flooded into her lungs, and Joanna felt like someone had just blasted every muscle in her body with a shot of that foul, bitter, black sludge that her father sipped every morning with his newspaper. She began to push against the cold ground once more, striving to regain her footing, but as she shifted her legs beneath her the broken ankle sent waves of agony through her body. She began to weep once more as she tried to move, writhing on the dirt path in the dark. She knew that she could afford no wasted time, but every cell in her body begged her to give up. She heard the shrill whinny of horses and she clapped a hand over her mouth to staunch the seemingly unstoppable sobs, slowly dragging herself from the old foraging paths behind their estate, burying herself in the thick brush that surrounded them.

The light of torches rushed past, but she held her hand so tightly over her mouth that her knuckles whitened and her jaw ached. But she would not make a sound. She would not be found. She would survive.

She had to survive.   

‘Jo, dear. Can you hear me?’

She whirled around, rolling onto her back in the underbrush, trying to find the source of the raspy voice. “Who’s there?” she hissed. Despite her best efforts to be quiet, her voice seemed to cut through the branches that surrounded her like a knife. She felt a hand brush across the nape of her neck, and she whirled around once more, feeling the foliage of the berry bushes scraping her skin. Was she going mad? Was she concussed? Perhaps she had hit her head harder than she had thought.

‘Oh, no. Not quite, Jo. Not mad. Not concussed. But believe me when I tell you that is the least of your worries. I’d much rather be mad, myself.’

Her eyes darted to and fro, and she bit her lip so hard she could taste copper. “Please. Please, whoever you are, you have to help me. Please,” she begged, every plea coming a little louder and bringing her a little closer to the racking sobs that would get her caught. “These men are monsters. They want my father’s land. Something about gold beneath the fields, and when he refused to sell it to them, they came back and…and…oh god, they’re all dead,” she wept.

‘Hmm. Yes. Quite terrible, indeed. Have you ever read about monsters Jo?’

“I…I don’t understand. What are you talking--”

The shadows before her seemed to grow blacker and blacker, as if instead of darkness masking the forest around her, it was consuming it. The shadows shifted and stirred like smoke, and when the eyes like glowing embers opened within them, her heart stopped. Her mouth opened to scream, but a bony hand shot from the pit of emptiness and closed around her face so tight that nothing but muffled protest sounded.

            ‘Shhhh. You don’t want your monsters to find you, do you?’ the voice cooed, a vicious laughter piercing through her, even as men raced by seemingly unable to hear her companion. ‘I am going to go out on a limb and say the answer is no.’ The grip on her face loosened, and she breathed heavily, too terrified to move away from the assailant.

“Answer?” she asked.

‘Come now, Jo, keep up. I asked you if you had read about monsters. There are so many things to learn from a good book, you know. So many wonderful things.’

The shadow’s hand reached out once again, falling upon hers, and in the briefest of moments, she felt her heart stop. She saw one of the redcoats holding her mother down, his pants around his ankles, and her screams filling the room. Joanna’s long chestnut hair hung matted around her face, stuck to her sharp, sculpted features by tears, blood, and sweat. Her father’s head rolled into her hands. She heard the laughter of the pretty boy soldier as he wiped the blood off of the knife he had used to dismember the man who had protected her for as long as she could remember. She felt an anger rising in her that she had never felt before. She felt a hatred eating at her chest, burning into her so ferociously that she could have sworn that her dress was aflame.

Then she saw a man she had never seen before. Not exactly a handsome man, though he was comely in his own right. He had long, raven colored hair, thin lips, and a crooked nose. His jaw was slim and hard, feminine and yet masculine all in one, and he was peering out of a window as an army of people approached. Their torches cast an orange glow across both land and sky alike, causing the farming tools they carried to gleam in the dark. His face flashed in her mind, his mouth dripping crimson, and his hands soaked in the same. She saw a coffin--the holy crucifix of her lord emblazoned upon it--and the rich soil that it lay in. The forest that it was buried beneath. The Victorian style home that burned in the background, and the men in red that scoured the woods around it.

As he let her go, she dropped to her knees. Her tears had stopped, and she felt as if every thought that she had ever had vanished. Her mind was completely blank, and all that existed was his voice.

‘Now you know where I sleep. I’ve been watching you for a long time, Jo, and believe me, I am dying to meet you.’ The laughter rose once more, as if there were no greater joy than to hear the sound of his own voice.

Joanna Nixon narrowed her eyes, and clenched her teeth until her gums felt like they would tear. Every empty place in her mind was slowly flooding with the hatred and anger that she had felt when he had touched her hand. As she leveled her gaze, meeting those blazing red orbs, there was nothing but fury burning in her amber eyes.

“What do you want?”

‘Why, to help you of course. I mean, if you want to get specific, I want you to help me much more than I care to help you, but none-the-less, I am most certainly offering you compensation in return for your aid.’

“What compensation?”

‘Blood, my dearest Joanna. Blood. Don’t you want to look into the eyes of your mother’s defiler as he breathes his very last? I can help you do it. All you have to do is say ‘yes’ to my offer. I will give you the power you desire. The strength to destroy your enemies, and you will--”

“Yes.”

‘Whoa now, darling, you haven’t even heard what it is I want in return.’

Joanna’s fists tightened together, and she stood up from her crouched position on the ground. This time not even the pain that pounded against her ankle could keep her bound to the earth. Her amber eyes shone in the light of the torches that canvassed the area, and it was as if the fire of hell was burning within them. She took one last, hard look into the glowing embers that lay within the shadows in front of her, and her face twisted into the visage of hate.

“I don’t care what you ask of me, demon. If you give me the strength to see justice done, I will give you anything you could ever ask of me. Even my life.”

‘You know. I think you might be my favorite, Jo,’ the voice stated, and the hand protruded from the shadows once again, latching onto Joanna’s wrist. ‘But the thing about monsters is, usually to kill one, you need to be one.’

She had a brief moment to see the shadows twist into the semblance of a face--one with a sharp, feminine jaw, and  masculine tone to it--and the horrible grin that lay within it, before a pain that she could never have believed was real coursed through her entire body. She could feel him inside of her as he moved through her veins, and she knew that her soul was lost forever.

Her eyes rolled into the back of her head as the black, smoke-like essence filtered into her blood. She could feel it surging through her body, and she could identify the darkness that it carried immediately. She couldn’t explain how, but she could feel it inside of her like a disease. But…she liked it. She lifted her broken foot into the air and regarded it with an inquisitive look as the bone seemed to pull itself back into her leg. Simple moments later, every trace of the wound had disappeared. A smirk slowly grew across her features, and she bit her lip. A feeling much like pleasure worked its way from her stomach to her spine, tingling all the way up to the nape of her neck. Every moment that passed, she felt the bloodlust claim her, and every small bit more that she wanted to fight against it, she learned she wanted to give in twice as much.

As she found her footing, testing the previously broken limb with a few quick stomps, she almost jumped, hearing a quiet laughter all around her, steadily growing louder and louder. Her eyes darted to and fro, looking for the source of the laughter, until her eyes widened and she closed her mouth, realizing that she had been standing among the trees, laughing maniacally. The torches shifting through the forest all stopped simultaneously, and as the hounds snarls intensified, she knew they were almost upon her. All eyes were now on her. But, in the midst of the moment that could be the end of her life, Joanna felt clarity like she had never experienced before. A smile spread across her lips, and she was surprised to find no room in her mind for fear. She knew, beyond a doubt, that she would live. She knew that the voice she had contracted herself to would deliver exactly what it had promised.

Blood.

The hounds and their masters were the first to arrive, but as the men let their leashes go, the beasts tails sunk between their legs. They took one look at Joanna and her amber eyes, glowing with the light of the sun, and they turned, darting through the trees. The men did not have the same animal instincts that the hounds had, and they stood their ground against the woman moving toward them. She seemed to tower a hundred feet tall as they stared into her eyes, and their numb hands reached for their muskets as they looked at her, but they could not find the will to draw them. Joanna did not recognize either of the men’s faces. They were not her targets.

“Excuse me, but I seem to have gotten myself lost in the woods. I was looking for a fat swine with a golden cross-shaped medal hanging over his heart, and a pretty boy that likes to dawdle around him like a lost puppy. Both, of course, are among your ranks. They took something dear to me, and I need to get it back.”

“Are you outta yer damn mind? I know who you is. The captain’s offered anyone who brings you in a promotion. We jus’ gotta take you back to the town hall an’ let ‘im string ye up,” the first man piped up, though the second was fidgeting, kicking the mud at his feet.

“Well. That, my good men, is exactly what I was looking for. I know a promotion would suit a pair of strong, handsome, men like yourselves, but…aren’t there other things you might want. Things that are a bit more…fun?” she asked, her hand trailing from the crook of her neck to the laces that tied the chest of her dress together.

Her fingers found the strings expertly this time, and as she pulled them away, it left just enough of her dress open so that they would see her breasts tightly pressed together as she leaned ever so slightly forward toward them and licked at her lips. The man who had previously spoken took to the bait almost instantly, but the nervous one lashed out and grabbed him by the arm.

“I--I don’t think that’s a good idea Greaves. S--she don’t s--seem right.”

“What, are you afraid your little weasel won’t quite be enough?”

A soft laughter issued from Joanna as she backed away from the men slowly, going just a little bit further into the undergrowth and away from the main paths that had led the hounds and the men to her in the first place. The other torchbearers had perked back up and were trying to catch the trail of the vanished hounds and their masters, but when they came to the place where the woman’s laughter had originally come from, it would be long empty.

As Joanna edged backwards, the two men followed, the nervous lad being roused by his companions jests. As they rounded a bend, Joanna was waiting for them, her dress slipped down over one shoulder and her dress hiked up just enough so they could see the tops of her thighs.

“Hold this, boy. I’m takin’ this little w***e first,” Greaves stated, grinning as he handed the nervous man his gun and loosened his belt. He failed to see the terror in the younger man’s eyes, and when the redcoat turned, ready to satisfy all of his lusty desires, instead of a woman poised to satisfy him, he was eye to eye with a snarling beast. The hounds that had run from their sides only a few minutes before were standing there now, their eyes seeming to sparkle with a dangerous light. “Whoa now, boy. Easy, now.”

The nervous man fell to his knees in horror as he watched the dog lurch forward and close its jaws around the man’s neck. The black fur around its muzzle gleamed as the blood washed over it in bursts that matched the man’s fading heartbeat, and the second dog rounded behind him, sinking its teeth into the man’s leg and tearing at the meaty thighs of those who had tormented them for so long. Keeping them trapped in a cage and beating them whenever they pleased. The hatred was all the animals could comprehend as they consumed the man piece by piece. When he had stopped resisting, and the animals could sense the chill of death on him, they rounded on the second man, their bloodied mouths gnashing hungrily as they looked at him.

“Now, now, my dears, don’t be so greedy. This one is mine.” Joanna walked out of the trees, blending through the shadows as if she had disappeared and were only now choosing to be seen once more.

She walked between the snarling dogs, placing a hand on the tops of their heads and hushing them quietly. The man was shaking, both his and his superior’s guns were laid down at his sides and he held his hands up in front of him. “Please. Please, I beg of you. D--don’t do this. I…I have a family. A little girl just a few months old, and a wife who needs me. I’m only here so I can make enough money to provide for--”

Joanna placed one finger on the man’s lips and she knelt down in front of him, looking directly into his eyes. She was about to speak when suddenly her vision went black and images swam before her as they had when the demon touched her arm. She saw her home, once again, though this time it was undamaged. The redcoat kneeling in front of her was arguing with his superior. ‘There has to be another way,’ he said, and the plea in his voice was honest. ‘We can’t kill these people just for their land. They’ve done nothing wrong.’ But his pleas fell on empty ears, and the men entered the home to commit their acts of ‘duty’.

She saw him creeping closer to the home, and pushing the door open to enter. He saw everything happening, and he ducked back out of the house, vomiting in the flowerbeds that lay beside their front steps. He stumbled a few feet away and he grabbed a half-finished bottle of whisky that his superior had been drinking a few minutes before. He drank deep, trying to drown out the images that he would never forget, and when he was called upon to take his dogs into the woods, he followed his orders grimly, knowing just what these demons were capable of. She saw his baby girl, staring up at him with sapphire eyes, and his wife placing a gentle hand on his, their smiles genuine and kind.

Joanna felt her consciousness returning, and suddenly she snapped back into her own head, reeling back from the man and watching as he did the same. His eyes were wide and his face slackened with fear. “What are you?” he asked, his lips trembling.

It took Joanna a moment to collect herself, her heart wrenching beneath the loss of her family and the envy she felt for his. But as she looked back to the kneeling redcoat her face seemed to melt into a mask of determination. “I am the hand of justice.”

“Please, I didn’t do it. You know that I didn’t. I wanted to save them.”

“But you did not. You let them die. You saw what your men did to my mother and father, and you let them die!”

“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry. I am a coward, and I deserve your wrath, but I did not know what else I could do.”

“Redemption, then,” Joanna spoke, a smirk breaking her features.

“Redemption?”

“Yes. You’re going to help me get to those men. You’re going to help me kill them.”

“But, that would be treason, milady. I can’t possibly--”

Her left hand was around his throat, and with one simple movement she was standing up. The readcoat’s feet dangled above the ground as she held him high over her head, her eyes burrowing into his. Her left wrist seemed to pulse with a dark, smoky energy and it slithered its way upward toward the man’s face. It inched closer, the black tendrils taking the form of snakes, their mouths opening and closing, their tongues flicking nearer and nearer.

“Alright! I’ll do it! I swear, I’ll do it!”

She dropped the man into the grass and he clawed at his throat, gasping for breath desperately as he coughed and spluttered. When he finally recovered, Joanna had laced her dress back up, and she was waiting for him to stand. When the redcoat rose, Joanna’s hands were outstretched, palms up and her wrists placed together in front of her. The look of confusion upon his face was rewarded with a roll of her eyes as she picked up a length of rope that the man’s friend had been carrying and placed it into his hands, holding her wrists together once more.

“I will be your prisoner, and you will take me to your captain to claim your promotion. When we arrive, you will leave and begin spreading word to your comrades that the captain wishes for everyone to gather together in the town hall.”

“That’s suicide. If I gather every man, there will be two score of them in there with you. No matter what witchcraft you control, you can’t possibly--”

“You worry about getting them there. I will worry about killing them." Even as she spoke the words, she bit her lip, feeling the influence of the darkness that gnawed within her.

 

The doors that led into the town hall were thick--at least half a foot of solid oak--and as they swung open they clattered against the walls with a loud, resounding boom. The room seemed to shudder from the noise, and the few guards that stood within the large hall immediately whipped around to see the frail soldier and the woman he pulled behind him. She kicked and screamed, and clawed to get away, but the man pulled her until they had reached the other side of the room and he hurled her at the feet of the captain.

“I believe this is the girl you were looking for, Captain.”

“Ah, yes. Well done Petershmidt.”

“It’s Peterson.”

“Whatever. I’ll see to it that you get your promotion as soon as I find the time to. Now, please, leave us.”

“My pleasure,” the nervous man stated, a knowing smile on his lips as he bowed to the man he wished he could kill with his own two hands. The regret that had been gnawing at his chest was dissipating even as he turned his back and walked out the front doors, knowing that he had signed the captain’s death sentence.

As the doors to the town hall closed behind Peterson, the captain of the redcoat regiment looked down toward Joanna and he heaved a grievous sigh. “You know, I didn’t want it to come down to this, Joanna. I knew your parents for some time, and they were decent people.”

“Don’t you dare speak of my parents, you slimy cur. I saw what you did to my mother. I was kneeling right there when you forced yourself on her you god damn pig.”

“Regrettable business, to be sure. But I was told to make an example of them. To show the other families what happens when you refuse an offer after you are told it is non-negotiable. Your parents were good people, but they were fools.”

Joanna could feel the heat in her chest once more as the memories flashed before her and her chest seemed it was about to explode. The man’s words began to fade out as she could hear nothing but the blood rushing in her ears, and her eyesight began to blur and turn red. Her teeth ground against each other, and her hands pressed so tightly against the bindings that constrained her that her wrists began to bleed. Her hazy eyes slowly gained focus once more, and when they did he was pointing the musket at her.

“I really am sorry,” he finished, and the explosive noise rang through the town hall as the bullet tore through Joanna’s chest.

Her eyes widened when she felt the pain, like someone had lit a fire inside of her breast and it wouldn’t go out. She could feel the blood pouring down the front of her dress like lava, and as she hit the floor, she cursed the demon who had tricked her with lies of power and justice. As her blood spewed forward across the hall floor, the front doors opened once again, and the men began to pour in. The captain stepped over the girl’s corpse as if he could block it from their sight.

“What the hell are you all doing here?” he bellowed.

“Peterson told us you wanted everyone to gather at the town hall for a meeting regarding how we’re going to notify the town of what’s happened.”

The captain’s eyes scoured the room, and his lips quivered in rage as he saw Peterson’s face between the oak doors as they closed shut. “You god damn fools, I never gave any orders for you to abandon your posts! There could still be witnesses out there!”

“No, Captain,” the woman’s voice cooed.

The man’s face went pale, and he spun on his heel to see Joanna standing up from the ground, her eyes were black as night, and her skin was as white as ivory. She lifted her hands, and the rope dangled beneath her wrists, cut in two by the bullet meant to kill her. It looked as though her left hand was burning�"masked by an inky veil of smoke�"but as the captain watched the substance hovering around her hand seemed to retract, flowing back into her arm and disappearing.

“But, y--you’re d--d--dead.”

“Bingo.”

Joanna’s hand moved so fast that it could barely be seen. Her fingers had been surrounded by the smoke-like substance, and her hand had become black as coal, claws jutting from her fingertips. The hand passed through the captain’s neck like it were passing through water, and the man’s neck seemed to disappear as she slashed through it and his head dropped a few inches onto his shoulders, perfectly placed upon the man’s body as if he never needed a neck in the first place. However, as the body fell backwards, the head bounced across the floor and came to rest at the feet of the other soldiers.

Screams of panic erupted from the group of men as they all took one look at the woman before them and tried to escape the hall. They were, however, met with closed doors. Peterson had used the brief time since his escape to have a pair of horses back their cart laden with grain and ale against the door, and as hard as the men pushed against it, it would not budge. As the screams grew louder and louder, Peterson cupped his hands over his ears and he hugged his knees to his chest, rocking back and forward and uttering prayers under his breath. He prayed for his family and his child. He prayed for himself and the men he had sentenced to death. He prayed so hard that when Joanna’s bloody hands found his shoulders twenty minutes later, he was still clutching his knees and uttering madness.

“The deed is done,” she said, patting his shoulders gently. “The men who defiled the commandments of our lord have been justly punished, and now my parents can be laid to rest. Thanks to you. I owe you much.”

“You owe me nothing, demon. Please, all I want to know is that I will never have to see you again.”

Joanna’s eyes seemed to sting with insult, but she merely nodded her head. “You have my word.”

“Thank you. God, thank you,” he cried, tears spilling from his eyes as he stood frantically and he looked from left to right, as though he had never seen these streets before and after a few moments of confusion he dashed off through the dirt and mud.

‘No respect. You let the man live, and he treats you like some sort of beast, eh?’

“Shut up. I don’t want to hear from you.”

‘Now, now, Jo. Don’t say that. We’ve already had so much fun together. It is what you wanted isn’t it? You did want to kill them, didn’t you?’

“I wanted revenge for my family…there were men in there who didn’t deserve to die. Men who you are responsible for killing, not me.”

‘Oh, how noble of you. Put all the blame on the one who helped you,’ the voice stated, mock hurt dripping from every word. ‘Whatever helps you sleep, I suppose. Just don’t forget, Jo, my dear. Regardless of how many lives you wanted to take. That blood still needs to be paid for.’

“The sooner the better,” she stated, her body sagging with a heavy sigh as she made her way into the fields and prepared for a long night of digging.

Author's Note

This is the second draft of the chapter. I have made a few changes here and there, and thought I might as well update what I had on this site, as I have been doing mostly revisions and further plot development in the planning stages before I move on to the third chapter. I am still very much around, and this story is still in the works. Hope to hear more from you readers out there! Please, tell me what you think, good or bad!

Reviews

[Matthew James Ginn]

You definitely know what your doing. I can see the fun and enjoyment you brought to this chapter. Your voice reigns along with your descriptive pedigree. The story is easy for the reader to understand. If this the beginning of the book, then the chapter grabs attention to any reader with an attention span greater then a fruit fly. So far i am impressed. The effectiveness for the clarity of the main characters thoughts could be worked on. Make it simpler and to the point. May you find what your looking for.

[Joshua W. Harris]

Thank you so much! It is wonderful to hear from someone on how they thought it was, as I can often grow very unsure of my own work, and wasn't getting any feedback quite yet on here.
I appreciate both your praise and your criticism, as I know there are areas to be improved upon, and having a guiding hand to point some of them out is a godsend. I am a beginner novelist, and I have a lot to work, but your encouragement and kind words are definitely a boost to keep me moving forward.

[Matthew James Ginn]

no problem my friend!