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𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐄𝐓𝐄𝐄𝐍 : 𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐎𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆

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We got to my house sometime closer to one than we had expected. Something about sitting around a table with good food and good company made time stretch into nearly an hour, well, almost two. We arrived just at one, filing out of Crow's car and into my driveway.

My house stood as it always had. Alone against the dark horizon, the trees like a halo around its roof. The front porch lights were off but there was a small light on inside, thanks to Beatrice turning it on every so often. It wasn't a true light, since the electricity had been shut off but an old lantern positioned behind the closed curtains in the living room. It was as if someone was still living there, keeping the monsters out ever since the incident with Tobias.

I went up the steps first, unlocking the front door and easing it open. It was cold inside from the lack of heat and the abundance of ghosts making their way through the home like I knew they did. It was hard not to when there were cold spots, I just didn't realize at the time.

I opened the door to my guests and allowed them inside. I felt their warmth move past me as they entered, leaving me to turn and close the door and fastening the lock. I could never be so careful. When I turned, both Crow and Blondie were frozen mid step as they entered towards the kitchen and I sighed, blinking to allow the growing gray to consume everything around me like a blanket of fog.

"Nice of you to finally come by," said a voice by the couches and I sighed with a smile.

"Beatrice," I murmured, keeping a hand on my bag where they held my mother's journals, "I meant to visit–" It was a lie, I hadn't. Not since my encounter with Tobias here.

"Surprised you ever remember my name," she said in a sour tone but I couldn't help but notice her creeping smile. "I save you from an intimate death and I don't even get a proper thank you? Or a 'hi, letting you know I survived' chat?" She stood from where she was seated, her dress billowing around her feet as she crossed the room. She reached out with a cold hand, touching her fingers to my side as she murmured, "So close to death that I could've touched you with real hands."

"Whatever you did that night, it saved my life," I said as she drew her hand back. Her hair was pulled back and away from her face today and I wondered what she had found to do that. "Things have gotten...complicated lately."

"You could say that again," she scoffed. She looked around, narrowing her eyes with a sigh. "So, the rumors are true. You're with him."

"What do you mean by rumors?"

"That you're, you know..."

"That I'm what?"

"With him, Blaire."

I rolled my eyes. "God, it's not like that."

A small smile teased at her mouth. "But you wish it was."

"What–"

"Look! You're blushing!" she cooed, playing with me before saying, "I'm glad you and that other girl, the one Pandora didn't like much, are friends now. I assume she's become a trusted ally?"

I nodded. "We didn't give her much of a chance at the beginning of it all." I shrugged, rubbing a hand up my arm. "Me and Pandora, we wanted it to be just us. Well, us and Ace."

"Any word from him?" she asked and I clenched my hands into a fight, clutching at my jacket.

"I..." Shaking my head, I looked away from her. I didn't know what to say and I didn't know what to think. "It's complicated, too."

Beatrice moved so she could catch my eyes again and she frowned. "Whatever you plan on doing tonight, you should think otherwise." She reached out and uncurled my hands with her soft mist. "John will not help you. He doesn't know anything about Pandora and he doesn't want to help you."

"What?"

She let go of my hands. "John Walker is a devil of a boy. He's not trustworthy."

"He's Ace's friend, he's mine–"

"He only care for one thing and that's himself."

I narrowed my eyes slightly, frowning. "What do you know that I don't?"

She moved back towards the couch, running her fingers over the soft armrests. When she looked at me, she did it from over her shoulder. "There's a game being played, Blaire, and you're what they all want. You're the finishing piece and if you bring John here, nothing will ever be the same again."

"Beatrice–"

She shook her head, letting her eyes settle on my two companions. "Keep them close, John is stronger than he seems."

The ghost vanished before I could get another word in and the world moved into swift color, my head spinning. I moved to the wall to steady myself for only a moment as Crow and Blondie went into the kitchen as if nothing had even happened. I breathed through my nose and out of my mouth before following them but I couldn't help but feel Crow's watchful eye.

"Where are we going to be doing this exactly?" asked Blondie as she noticed the opened cereal box Tobias had left open and I was too shocked and traumatized by his death to clean up. I had placed a photograph over the bullet hole and had left in an airy daze.

I smiled, heading over to the stairs with one of the screw drivers from the kitchen drawer in my hand. "Here, obviously."

I bent down carefully on the stair, my head still woozy. I wasn't sure if it was from my bloody surprise this morning or just the unease from both Beatrice and Ace's warnings. It was hard to think of John being bad or even cruel, not when he helped me so much and the same went to Ace as well. But he knew who killed Pandora, he knew and he was holding it out on me for leverage but why would he need to do that? Especially against me?

I used the tool to pull up the floor boards to reveal the trapdoor and I looked behind me to see the confusion pull across Blondie's face as a smile stretched across Crow's eager look.

"I heard that this was here," said Crow, approaching to lean against the railing as I opened the door and felt a small gust of cold air blow back up at me, "your father told me about it but..." He shook his head with a laugh. "I didn't want to believe him."

"Why not?" I asked, resting on my knees.

"It was too hard to believe." He shrugged. "I'm sure you would've felt the same."

"If they ever bothered to tell me anything," I murmured with a sigh, patting my thighs as I thought of what we would need to do.

In the end, we brought down Crow's bag and set up the materials and ingredients against the table I still had down here. Blondie was fascinated the second I helped her down into the tunnel after we set up a few lanterns to keep from working in the dark. As she went down to explore with a little flashlight clutched in her hand, I stayed back to help Crow with the summoning.

It was hard not to notice the blackened marks across the cement from where Amy had died and I kicked my foot against the smudges, wishing they would come up. He had died violently and I wish I could say that I felt bad but I didn't, not when he betrayed me.

"You might need to redraw the devil's trap," Crow said from behind me and I nodded, fiddling with the piece of chalk I had in between my fingers.

I stood on my toes and drew the drawing I shouldn't have known so well, marking it with symbols as Crow described them. It was better than the original and I knew it would be able to hold John better, knowing he was probably more powerful than Amy ever was.

"This is where you killed him, then?" asked Crow from behind me and I didn't bother to turn as I nodded. He continued with, "Amy was never reliable, always jumped back and forth between different sides."

"Wish someone could've told me that before we made a blood promise," I muttered, kicking at some of the scorch marks but to no avail.

"You made one with Amy?"

I nodded.

"Then...how could he have harmed you? It's practically forbidden, well, almost."

I shrugged. "Loophole, I'm guessing." I turned to face him, returning to the table as he added strange ingredients into the bowl I wasn't sure I wanted to know about. "He helped bury me alive, he technically wasn't hurting me. Lack of air would've killed me, not him." I looked over at him and he met my eye as I leaned against the table and cooed, "But at least I had my big, protective demon to save me."

He rolled his eyes. "Thank god you had cell service."

I nodded, gnawing on the inside of my cheek. "I still don't know how that happened."

"Luck?"

I scoffed. "I'm the least lucky person here and you know that."

He cracked a smile and motioned for me to flip the page in the notebook he was reading from and I did so. He added another ingredient that was slimy and had a strange smell as he said, "You saw a ghost earlier, didn't you? When we first came in?" I narrowed my eyes at him and he added, "You were leaning against the wall to steady yourself, Blaire. You had obviously been told something by someone that wasn't living."

I continued to chew on my cheek before finally admitting to what had happened. I told him all that Beatrice had said about not trusting John and bringing him here was a mistake.

"What if he's the one, Blaire?" Crow asked, stopping what he was doing to meet my gaze. "What if he's the devil?"

"He can't be–"

"You need to admit what's been going on," he said, a stern tone in his voice, one of not malice but of a need for realization from my part. "Ace and John, they aren't your friends."

I scowled, crossing my arms and turning from him. I stepped towards the pentagram, keeping my back to him before snapping over my shoulder, "I can't..." I sighed, turning to face him in a swift turn. "I can't admit it, okay?" My tone was softer, desperate, scared. It was how I felt. "I can't allow it to be true, that...that Ace and John are coming for me. That Ace...that they both had something to do with P–" I couldn't even say her name, my lip trembling. I looked down and away from him, my hands balling into fists at my side. "I just can't."

Footsteps from down the tunnel sounded, not close but just enough to remind me that Blondie was still here and it wasn't just me and Crow alone. I wiped at my face and forced a smile.

"We're summoning John to help us defeat the devil," I said, nodding to convince myself more. "With him and a hopefully subdued Conner and Ace, we have a fighting chance. We have more people on our side to help."

"And if he doesn't help?" asked Crow. "If he's mad we summoned him? He doesn't want to be found, Ace and the ghost here said as much."

"We don't have much of a choice, do we?"

He sighed, shaking his head. "We don't, but that doesn't mean it's still a good idea."

"It's our only shot."

"Our only shot at dying if it goes wrong."

"God, you're, like, totally paranoid," scoffed Blondie from behind me. She came to stand by my side, hands on her hips as he jutted her thumb back to the tunnel stretching behind us. "I didn't know how long this thing would be but damn, Blaire, how the hell did you not know this existed all this time?"

I ignored her, stepping forward and back towards the table as Crow smiled at Blondie's comment.

"But, honestly, John can't be the devil," she laughed, moving to look over my shoulder and at the nasty mess brewing inside the bowl. "He might be a dick or a monster, but the devil...he'd have to actually be smart for that." She came around to lean against the wall, a contemplative look now stretching across her face. "But, if there is a devil, like the one we're trying to stop, wouldn't God have brought someone to stop him? Where's our savior? Our Michael?"

Crow smiled softly to himself. "He already has."

"Who?" I asked.

He met my eyes across the table. "He sent you, Blaire."

"Me?" I said as Blondie gasped.

"Come on," she breathed, shaking her head with an amused grin. "It makes sense, doesn't it? Your spooky ghost powers and you being the only necromancer left, Blaire, come on! You're the one we've all been waiting for, how could this not be an act of God? Of some greater power?"

I shrugged, finding it hard to take my eyes off the bowl. "I guess it seems silly to say this but...I really didn't think there was a God, even though we're literally about to fight Satan. I just thought..." I shrugged again. "I don't know what I thought but it wasn't this."

"The world needs a savior, someone to reign in the devil and it's you. The prophecy, the one about the necromancers, it's all been about you," said Crow in a softer voice. "It's hard to believe but...we don't have much of a choice." He motioned for me to walk around to his side of the table and I did so as he said, "But we don't have to worry about that now. All we need to focus on is getting John here and making sure he's not, well, the devil."

"And to see if he can help us," muttered Blondie, stepping forward to watch. "He needs to be accountable. He can't just run off and disappear on us when he decides he wants to play ghost."

I stood next to him and he pointed to my bag and I bent down to grab it, pulling out the journals. He continued to stir the mixture as he said to me, "There should be an incantation in one of the journals."

"Don't you have one, though?" I asked, flipping through the one I knew would hold most of the strange spells.

"Your mother had stronger ones that can be used to bring any demon forth, whether they want to or not," he explained. "And because John doesn't want to be found, it's better safe than sorry."

I nodded, still scanning the pages as Blondie stood hesitantly to my side. I could tell she wanted to touch them, her and Crow both, but I knew it would only end with her scorched fingers and Crow being annoyed. I continued to flip through, running my fingers over the writing as I leaned over the books. It was always so strange to me to be going through these journals, reading her writing, feeling the pages she had cherished so much and knowing she wasn't here.

It wasn't ever going to get easier without her but it was going to keep me going. It gave me a purpose. She didn't die in vain, her death had meaning.

My hands stilled on a random page. "Do you have any idea what the spell looks like?"

Crow thought for a moment, before moving around the table to look over my shoulder as I flipped through the book. I felt his breath on my neck, making small goosebumps rise up and send a shiver down my spine. "Well," he spoke deeply, resting a hand on my shoulder and another on the book to flip the page and I watched his fingers sizzle and burn black, "it's latin."

I glared up at him. "It's latin. That's seriously all you know?" I flipped to a different page. "It's all in latin."

He chuckled, shaking his head. "Cage would have written it and his handwriting, I'm assuming, is much different from your mother's entries."

My glare deepened, of course it would be different, I wanted to snap at him but I held off. "Okay, so I'm looking for latin and bad handwriting, then." I stopped on one of the pages, brows furrowing at the latin. It clearly wasn't my mother's handwriting and I hated that Cage's words tainted her work. His handwriting was so clearly different from her delicate scrawl and I wanted to tear the page free and burn it. I know Cage isn't as bad as I'd like to think but the secrets he'd kept, the lies, all the stories made my blood go cold. I sighed as I looked down at the page, knowing this was it and I looked to Crow as I said just for clarification, "Is this it?"

He looked over, reading the page and I noticed his lips moving as he said it to himself. When he leaned back, he nodded.

"What do I do with this?" I asked. "Do I just...read it and hope it works?"

He shook his head. "You're going to say it as you pour your blood into the bowl."

"My blood?" I said, shocked, as Blondie said in a horrified tone, "Her what?"

"We need the summoner's blood," said Crow with a sigh. "And no, it can't be me."

I frowned. "And why not?"

"I have no intention or need for John here, you're the one who wants him here," he said, "and because of that, the spell will work a lot better than it would if I was saying it."

My brows furrowed into a light glare of annoyance. "Typical."

"Typical?" he laughed, nudging me and I could feel Blondie's eyes on us as he did so. We were standing a little too comfortably close. "What the hell does that mean?"

Blondie answered for me with a grin. "It means that demon's always want us to do their dirty work."

Crow opened his mouth to protest but I was already moving onto the next step. I pulled Spiorad out from my jacket pocket and pointed to the candles he'd put out in the form of a sigil. "I just cut my hand and say these words while you what? Light the candles?"

He nodded, pulling out a lighter from his bag of wonders. "You might have to say the incantation a couple of times for it to work." He cupped his hand around one of the candle wicks lighting it and the soft glow warmed the room in strange moving lights. "Say it with feeling, you've got to mean it."

"Ok, coach," muttered Blondie, smiling at me and I grinned. She looked down at the knife in my hand and said in a shaky voice, "You ready for this?"

I nodded, meeting her eyes. She was worried and she knew I was too, I could feel the nerves eating up my stomach the closer and closer we got. "We need John."

She nodded, echoing my words for reassurance.

"Oh!" she cried, stopping me from my movements. "I almost forgot." She went digging around in her coat pocket as she glared at Crow. "I told you to remind me, how come you forgot too, you big oaf." She pulled a small baggie out and held it out and Crow took it. "Something that belongs to John, as requested."

"What is that?" I asked, eyeing the bag as Crow opened it.

Blondie grinned, clapping her hands together. "Some of his hair!"

Crow dumped it into the mixture and it made a strange sound upon entry. "Do I even want to ask how you got it?"

Her grin grew wider. "Let's just say...Luke knows John never keeps the basement door locked."

And with that, we went back to the matter at hand.

I raised the knife to my palm and took in a soft breath to steady my hand. I dragged the blade against my skin and winced as I sliced through flesh and blood burned to the surface, hot and angry and red. It pooled in the center of my palm and I squeezed my hand into a fist, watching the dark blood stream down the sides of my hand and into the bowl.

When it touched the liquid, it sizzled and smoked. I looked at the journal and quickly began to speak the sacred words as more of my blood dripped like a broken faucet. "Hic te voco, nefande daemon. exi ad me in vocatione mea. Hoc a te peto. Hic voco!"

(I call you here, you heinous demon. Come out to me in my calling. This I ask of you. I call you here!)

I waited expectantly, looking up from both journal and cauldron, waiting for something to happen. When nothing did, I clenched my fist tighter and ignored the stinging pain as my nail dug into the open wound but I needed blood and I needed the stupid spell to work.

"John!" I snarled, shaking my fist over the opening to cast the rest of the droplets into the horrible liquid. "Hic te voco, nefande daemon. exi ad me in vocatione mea. Hoc a te peto. Hic voco! Hic te voco, nefande daemon. exi ad me in vocatione mea. Hoc a te peto. Hic voco!"

We waited just for a second before the candle lights began to move and a static grew in the air, hot and heavy on our skin and in our ears. It built and it built like my eardrums were going to burst when a sudden pop filled the air and the lantern light shattered and the candles nearly blew out as I bent over, clutching at my ears as both Blondie and Crow did the same, the smell of sulfur wafting through the air like a thick invisible fog.

When the ringing in my ears finally died down and I could think and see straight, I peeled my hands from my face and stood. The devil's trap that once stood empty in the tunnel was filled with a single figure dressed in jeans and a flannel. I could recognize him easily and a part of me wished he was wearing his letterman jacket just for old times sake.

"John," I breathed, stepping around the table to come close to the boundary line.

He turned to face me, his features pulled together into a tight frown. Even when he spoke, it was the same voice and manner as always. "Why did you bring me here, Blaire?"

My lips parted and my brows furrowed. He wasn't happy. Oh god, Ace and Beatrice were right. The jagged look in John's eyes told me he was annoyed, irritated to have been bothered.

What a fool you've been, Blaire. What an oblivious fool.

"Glad to see that you're still alive," I said instead, noting the hardness in my tone.

"God, John," breathed Blondie, "we've been worried sick about you."

"Really, Blaire?" John murmuring, gesturing towards the girl behind me. "You involved her? Cassandra, no offense, but you're a little...too daft to be involved in something so important." He looked at me, an eager kind of anger pressing in his face. "She would've been my last choice, she can't keep a secret worth of shit."

"You have no idea what you're talking about," I spat, feeling my nails dig into my palms. This sudden change in him made my heart skip an erratic beat. Didn't he once love her? Didn't he care about any of us? "Cass is more of an asset than you, than anyone. I get why you must think that, since all you've ever done is walk over her so you clearly didn't understand or see how much of a key player she is and how willing she is to help those she likes." I scoffed, letting my own anger and annoyance get the better of me. "But I guess I can see why she wouldn't help you. She clearly didn't like you that much."

Blondie stifled a small laugh.

"You're going to be sorry you ever treated her this shitty," I snapped, shaking my head and bringing a hand up to rub at my forehead. "Did hiding under your rock really give you this much of a sour attitude or are you really not happy to see me?"

"Where the hell have you even been this whole time?" asked Blondie. I noticed a small tremor in her voice, like she was worried about speaking to him or even over stepping but I looked back over my shoulder and gave her a small nod of appreciation.

She should never have been treated that way, especially by a man who didn't know what he truly had. She was so much more than just some jock's arm candy. She had an art with technology that one might overlook and she was braver then she seemed. She would rather come down into the weird girl's secret tunnel than spend an evening with her boyfriend or even at a party. She valued her friends and it shocked me that John didn't care.

He isn't who you think he is. He can't be trusted. He can't–he can't–

"I've been...preparing." He stuffed his hands into his back pockets, almost as if he were at ease with himself here.

"For what?" I asked, feeling the strong urge to reach behind me and take hold of Spiorad. I could feel her pull deep into the slash in my palm, like she was calling to me directly. I took a small step back to rest against the table and in doing so, I reached behind me carefully as John looked past me and at Blondie with a sick look on his face. I felt Spiorad be pushed into my hand and I glanced back, giving Crow a looking approval before turning back.

"For when you're ready to give up," he said simply. "For when you're finally ready to die." He shrugged, scuffing his foot across the ground as if this didn't matter. As if none of this mattered at all to him. Was this just a game? "Ace, Conner, Blood, and even that prick, Hex, from the hospital. We've all been preparing for you."

"Jonathan Blood?" snapped Crow, anger lacing each word. "How the hell did you get one of my men?"

John smiled and the act alone sent a chill down my arms. This wasn't a good idea. This was wrong. This was wrong! "When was he ever yours?" He took a step forward as Crow began to say something else but I held up a hand, eager to see what John would do. He reached the trap line and rebounded lightly against the boundary and I thanked every god I knew that the trap worked. "Wha–?"

I grinned, pointing. "Look up, dumbass."

Slowly his eyes looked up and a scowl most foul poured across his face and I could've sworn I saw flames dancing in his dark eyes. "You smart little bitch."

"Careful what you say," I said, smirking as I stood from my spot against the table and wagged my knife in the air, "or I might officially terminate you."

"I know you, Blaire. You would never hurt me."

You don't know me. I don't know you. We never did.

"You shouldn't assume things, John. It makes an ass out of you and me."

He scoffed, a small disbelieving look coming across his mouth. "I don't remember you always being so...brave. Didn't I have to save your life the last time we saw each other? God," he laughed, shaking his head, "you were such a naive, pathetic little thing then. If Ace and I didn't show up when we did..." He made a croaking noise and dragged his finger across his neck.

"If you're so eager for my death," I snarled, "then why not let Conner kill me that night, huh? What was the point of all this?"

"What?" He smiled. "You don't like the little game of cat and mouse we've been playing?"

"Why the hell would we?" snapped Blondie. "We thought you were fucking dead John, me and Luke had no clue what happened to you! Or to Ace!"

John slammed a hand against the boundary wall, stopping him with an echoing pound. "It's because I should be the one to slit your throat, you miserable little weasels! It should be me not some tainted idiot who doesn't know when to fucking quit when I say so!" He slammed his hand against the wall again and a deranged glint in his eyes sent my stomach turning nervously. "It's because you're mine, Blaire, mine. You don't deserve to have anyone else's dirty hands on you, tainting you further. You're mine to destroy–" He barked out a sudden laugh, the joy never quite reaching his eyes. "You will choke on your own blood in the end. You will bleed yourself dry, all for me–"

"This isn't a game anymore, John," came Crow's snarling voice. "If you think this is just some pathetic plot to scare us, you need to think again you prick–"

"Oh, boohoo!" cried John, making a face. "I'm so scared, Archer. God, what am I ever going to do now that you're here to stop me!" He pounded both hands against the wall and cackled, loud and proud, the sound mimicking the cries of someone dying. "You don't get it, none of you get it!" He bent over, clutching his stomach and I could've sworn there were tears in his eyes. "I thought Cassandra was the idiot but it's you! It's you, Archer." He wiped at his eyes, shaking his head and finally meeting my gaze once again. "I thought better of you, Blaire, I really did. I thought you would've been the first to realize but now that I see it, you're the last. At least your demon bitch finally got it."

I turned, noticing the horror stretching across Crow's face and the identical look on Blondie's as she took a step back to brace herself against the wall. When I turned to face John, my lips parted in some strange shock because I knew I couldn't admit it, not until he said it out loud. I felt sick, a cold sweat taking over me as my hand throbbed and drummed against where I held my blade. Even Spiorad knew, her humming was so dangerous within my palm with knowing and understanding that it made me feel weak in the knees.

I felt a strange static return to my ears, so soft but growing as I whispered in a voice that didn't sound like my own, "Who the hell are you?"

His lips curled upwards into a sickening grin and he spoke in such a horrible voice that I could barely hear it over the growing static. He cocked his head to the side and touched the boundary.

"I'm the devil, and who the fuck are you?"

LMAOOOOOOOOOOO

john........uhhhhhhhhhh oopsie. pls tell me yall saw this coming, like i left hints throughout the first act and up until now.....heheheheheeh

this is about to be the start of a rocky road for blaire and the scooby gang so GET READY!!!

as always, vote/comment and ill kiss you!!!