Earth's Grand Healer

Part 4: Feeding Frenzy

"Samantha!"

Someone was gripping her shoulders. Samantha suddenly felt like she just woke up. Had it all been a dream? She stared into the face of the person who called her name.

"I heard you cry out," Bruce said. "Are you alright?"

Samantha reached up and touched the pearl hidden behind the amulet around her neck. Something else had occurred, but she didn't know what it was. How did she get downstairs? Had she dreamed about going to see Virgil? No, she had been there. She was wearing the amulet that he gave her. She must have run from the room screaming in her own mind, otherwise Tim would have woken up and followed her. Tears welled up in her eyes.

"No," Samantha answered Bruce.

She never felt so helpless, so trapped as this in her life. Oddly enough, Devlin gave her a certain amount of freedom even though she wasn't allowed to leave the island. This was different. She was trapped at the mercy of an unknown demon who wanted her blood.

"Tell me," Bruce said, his voice going deeper and more serious, and yet it was also filled with concern, concern for her.

Samantha could read into that voice that he truly wanted to help her, listen to her, and even protect her, like she was his own daughter. Samantha drew a breath and steadied her nerves. She was the daughter of a man who was master of the oceans and king of Atlantis. And she was the daughter-in-law to the world's greatest detective. How could she not tell him?

'He probably already knows,' Samantha commented to herself. 'But tell him anyway.' Samantha prepared to tell her story. "I think I made a terrible mistake," she said starting out. "When I first arrived at the Manor, I heard this voice compelling me to go outside. There was a full moon that night."

Samantha explained about the ritual and the shedding of her blood each month. In many ways, it safely aided her unexplained cravings for blood, and yet, it didn't last for very long. There were other cravings, other needs, wrapped up into that, needs that only someone like Tim could provide, but at that time Tim was barely 15 then. She wasn't that much older, maybe by a year. They shouldn't have gotten involved like that, not for at least a few more years.

'We were foolish,' Samantha said to herself in the private portion of her mind. 'We could have waited, but it's too late now. I'm Tim's wife, and the mother of his children.'

Thoughts about their whirlwind romance came to Samantha, like birds on the wing. Tim required a special dispensation for them to even get married. With both her parents dead, and Bruce listed as her guardian, it made things easy. Even so, they were still considered minors, and yet, they're lives had changed. They couldn't go back, but she could change the current circumstances.

"I tried to hold back on those cravings as much as I could, but you know what happened."

"Yes, I know."

"I don't think I was alone."

"What do you mean?" Bruce asked.

"I think the bulk of those cravings came from a demon that wants to be released into our world. I did not have them when I was pregnant with the twins, and even afterward."

"I know of one demon," Bruce said. "His name is Etrigon. "He is bound by blood to someone. I will not disclose his name, but Etrigon does fight for good despite him being a demon. It is a complicated arrangement."

"I know what you're hinting at, Bruce," Samantha stated. "This demon is not like that. By freeing her, she will unleash more hunger for my husband. I had not thought about it before, the reason Tim would be so tired after he would be with me during those rituals, but it makes sense now."

"I'm not certain what you mean."

"His aura," Samantha stated. "She's feeding on his aura."

Bruce was taken by surprise.

"I was foolish," Samantha said. "I believed in her compelling words and now she is threatening to release more demons who feed on such things. Tim's aura will not be strong enough to fight them."

"I do not understand. Tim fought against several demons last year. Why can't he not do it, again?"

"The horde won't be afraid of him this time. They will want to feed off of his aura. It would be a feeding frenzy."

"Then we need to find a way to dispel this demon before that happens," Bruce said.

"How do we go about that?"

"We need to find out how this demon was bound to this land in the first place," Bruce instructed. "There are questions that must be answered. The demon might give us some of those answers."

"Please Bruce, don't ask me to communicate with it. Its evil has grown more after discovering my Atlantean heritage. Though I don't know why that is so. Things have changed. I am more aware of its malevolence. She wants revenge for being trapped and she will not stop until she gets it."

Continues with part 5