Chapter 9

Kurtis's body powerfully fell into the hallway and he instantly spotted Lara. Wraiths circled her, their mouths gaped open, greedily waiting to condemn her. Kurtis angrily began toward them, ready to destroy-

His body suddenly fell to its knees as the burning pain in his shoulder returned. The light came once again, faster this time, but brighter than before and equally painful. He screamed in agony.

The demons hurriedly left Lara's side and quickly tried to evade the hallway. She saw Kurtis instantly raise his hand, his mind stopping the demons where they stood. Kurtis's eyes glowed red, identical to the wraiths as he began to yell, more out of hatred than pain. The demons suddenly let out a barbaric shrill of agonizing shrieks, and Lara flung herself to the floor, covering her ears as the demonic screams grew louder, muffling out Kurtis's yells of pain and anger.

Lara watched with disbelief as each of the creatures slowly dissolved before her eyes, until nothing remained but a thin black mist of ash upon the floor.

She slowly uncovered her ears as the room suddenly became calm, and looked at Kurtis with confusion and disbelief. He seemed out of body, as if in a dream as he stared forward, his gaze caught by nothing. She cautiously watched as he suddenly fell away from the trance, his body falling forward, connecting hard with the floor.

Lara quickly steadied herself as she crawled toward him, ready to help. She lifted him up and set his back against the hallway wall. The strange light that had come from him was now faded, but the tattoo on his shoulder glowed like fire. Then it too, returned to its natural black color.

She eyed the marking, wondering what had caused it to destroy the strange creatures. She slowly neared her fingers toward it.

A hand quickly reached out and grabbed her own.

"You don't want to do that." Kurtis's voice quietly spoke. He showed her his hand, blistered and burnt, apparently from his own curiosity. He breathed heavily as sweat ran down his forehead, his eyes closed with exhaustion.

Lara stared at him with sympathy and gratefulness before she slowly helped him up and supported his weight upon her shoulder. She guided the weak man into the living room and carefully sat him on one of the sofas.

She forcefully grabbed his face to keep him from going unconscious; he stared forward as if she wasn't there. Lara caught him as he suddenly fell toward her, and quickly supported him backward once again. She hurriedly ran to the bathroom and grabbed some towels, quickly wrapping one around the huge gash across his chest, another on the old wound at his waist, both bleeding heavily.

Kurtis suddenly shook his head violently, his mind trying to return to him. He saw Lara and started toward her.

"Don't." she quickly instructed. "You'll make it worse."

She continued wrapping his wounds, and wiped the sweat from his face. Once she was finished she cautiously swept the house for any other uninvited guest. After, she returned to him. He seemed to be coming back to reality, and already looked stronger.

"Who-" Lara stopped with correction, "or what where those thing?

"I already told you," Kurtis spoke with confusion, "Wraiths."

"No." Lara returned, shaking her head, recalling the wraith that had attacked them on the train. "These were different, not humans but-"

"They're another type of wraith, they're-" Kurtis explained, but couldn't finish, his breath giving out.

Lara didn't press him further, she accepted his words. "So why haven't we seen them before?"

"They're the same as the ones that attacked me at the museum and on the train," he forced his words through his tiredness, "but those were in human form."

"Human form? Like the blonde woman?"she thought of the name. "Mariana?"

Kurtis nodded. "These things are demons." He spoke lightly. "They have two forms. What you just saw is their demonic form. Their impossible to kill when in this stage. The other is when they posses a person. But you can kill them once they have a physical form."

"Then why do they use humans at all?" she asked. "If it will get them killed then it's pointless."

"To get close to me." he answered as he spastically winced between words. "They can't be recognized as wraiths when they look like humans and could be around us at any time."

"So what keeps them from possessing me?" Lara continued, a look of fear in her eyes.

Kurtis met her glance with a dead silence. He shook his head as he deeply breathed. "Nothing."

He forced himself up even though Lara tried to stop him. He slowly staggered across the room before staring out of the window. Lara could see him grab his stomach wound and grimace. "I thought you said they were impossible to kill." she began with curiosity.

"What do you mean?" he looked back to her, confused.

"Well," she started with a grin, and pointed into the hallway "The ones in there are certainly dead."

"I don't know what happened." Kurtis spoke almost to himself. "This must be something unwritten."

He walked to her, and met her face to face. His strength had returned, and Lara was surprised at how quickly he seemed to recover. She knew that the mysterious tattoo must have aided in the healing just as it had aided in saving his life.

"I didn't do anything." he continued anxiously, nervous-like. He gripped her hand, his own shaking. "A wraith attacked me in my room. I heard you, and tried to help." he paused as his fingers met his temple."I was mad, and then this light came from nowhere, I didn't underst-"

"It's your tattoo." She spoke softly, gripping his shoulder, trying to calm his mind and help him to understand. "You said that Sir. Augustine destroyed the vandals when they killed his family. He killed them because he was angry, and that his rage had spawned the powers." she stared at his eyes and smiled "Maybe the vandals were wraiths, and maybe his anger caused them to die."

He looked at her with amazement, the thought had never occurred to him. She was new to the ancient legends, and already she had put the pieces together.

"You were angry." she continued. "So your gift grew and saved our lives. Just like Augustine." She paused. "What I don't understand is why these things would attack you if they knew about this."

"Maybe they didn't." Kurtis returned. "I've never seen anything like this before. Everything's changing."

"Maybe for the better." Lara spoke with a smile. "You definitely seem to heal fast now." She unwrapped the bandage on his chest to find nothing but the remains of a scar, which also seemed to rapidly fade away.

"I don't understand." he repeated, watching the wound with disbelief. He looked back to Lara, his mouth remaining open with confusion.

She smiled at him, and he stared at her. She was amazing, everything about her was amazing. He felt strange as he thought of her. For once, it actually seemed like she trusted him. He smiled.

Kurtis slowly lent down, moving toward her, coming nearer with every heartbeat. He saw her tempting lips before him, alluring him closer, begging him to kiss her.

He watched with disappearing hopes as she quickly moved away from him.

"Don't." she sternly but quietly said, not wishing to hurt his feelings. She looked deeply at him as she slowly backed away and walked toward to her room. Quietly closing the door with an aura of uncomfortableness.

Lara stared at the floor, contemplating Kurtis's actions. She felt herself exhale loudly as she thought of him. "He's injured Lara." She told herself. "He didn't know what he was doing."

Lara shook her head, wiping Kurtis's attempt to kiss her from her mind. She grabbed her backpack and sorted her things, ready to leave this unsafe place.

Kurtis wanted to slap himself as he watched he leave. He knew that trying to kiss her was the wrong thing to do at that moment, but the urge was unbearable. He felt slightly embarrassed as he watched her return a few moments later, dressed as he remembered her, as though she were raiding some tomb.

She walked to him. "Is there somewhere else we can spend the night?" She asked as if his former actions had never occurred. "It would be foolish to stay here."

"Yeah." Kurtis spoke, with slight embarrassment. "Give me a minute."

Lara watched him continue to his room. He respawned a few minutes later, dressed and packed for what seemed a short trip, though she new it would belong. "Lets go." he spoke as he passed beside her, forcing himself to stay standing as he made his way back out of the house.

Lara followed him outside and quickly mounted the motorcycle he retrieved from under a nearly fallen shed, sitting behind him, wrapping her arms around his waist. After his previous act, she felt even more uncomfortable about riding with him, but she eluded the thoughts and forced herself to smile. She closed her eyes as they drove off in the opposite direction from which they came, towards Villeurbane Airport.