Ella Awakened by S. E. Duncan Page A

need to
tell you that while you were ill the Demon took its second victim.  I had
called to check in at work with Carl, and became suspicious when he told me of
a young man who had been brought in.  I went down to the office and laid my
hands on him.  He had been killed by the Demon.  Like Jill, the second victim
was young and athletic.”
    “How are we
going to find him?” Ella asked.
    “If we don’t
find him soon, I don’t think locating him is going to be much of a problem. 
I’m guessing he has a plan.  He’s going for the strongest, healthiest victims
he can find, and he’s sticking to this general area.  Eventually I think he’s
going to come after you and me.  I think he wants to move on, maybe to a world
with more rewarding prey or maybe to return to his own world.  Either way, he’s
not getting the strength he needs from the humans to open a portal and leave. 
It appears that right now he’s just as trapped here as your father and I were.”
    Trapped;
Burke did feel trapped here.  Ella could understand that he and her
father had risked everything to follow the Demon through the portal.  Then
after her father’s death, Burke had been left here alone to try to finish the
job that he and her father had undertaken together.  She wondered how quickly
Burke would jump at the chance to return to Quintar, and would he ask her to go
with him?  If she went she’d be leaving her family and her world just as he had
once left his.
    “So what do
we do?” she asked
    “I’m not
entirely sure; these last few days you have been my priority.  I was surprised
to discover how fast the Demon took his second victim.  I’ve witnessed two
cycles, and he didn’t move this fast before.  I can only guess at the
reasoning.  Maybe he hoped to have the strength to face you before you’d gone
through your awakening.  I really don’t know, Ella.  I’m kind of making this up
as I go along.”
    “This is
pretty frustrating.  What are we supposed to do, go on some kind of Buffy the
Vampire Slayer patrols at night?”
    “No, we’re
not going looking for him.  Not yet anyway.  You need to train first and get
completely comfortable with the sai.  But you’re not exactly going to be able
to run around in broad daylight with the sai strapped to your back.  You need
to become comfortable with throwing a knife.  Knives are quiet weapons;
effective and easily concealed.  We also need to explore your other gifts, like
tracking.  We can work on that some tomorrow.”
    “Speaking of
gifts, you said you could tell how someone died by touching them.  How can you
tell?  Do you just know, or do you get some kind of vision?”
    “The brain
records everything.  When someone passes and I lay my hands on their head, I’m
actually reading the recorded images from just before their death.  I see it
like I’m watching a movie, but I also feel it as if I’m that person.  It’s like
a dream.  I’m actually there, but the dream can’t physically hurt me.  But just
like when you have a dream, it seems so real.  Have you ever woke up suddenly
during a nightmare a little panicked, then you think, Thank God it was only
a dream ?  When I let go and the connection is broken it sometimes takes a
second to realize I’m fine.  It’s not something healers like to go around doing
all the time.  The images become a memory for us.  Every death I’ve seen and
experienced is a part of me, and I’ll never be able to forget them.  It’s not
the same as witnessing a murder, though that would be bad enough.  In addition
to witnessing each death, I’ve lived through them.  Sometimes it must be done,
like when the cause of death is in question; it’s a sure way to find out what
actually happened.  It has been quite beneficial to my job at the medical
examiners.  Even though I can’t let on what or how I know, it often points me
in a certain direction or leads me to something legitimately useful in court,
like a