Reaper's Word

Chapter 29: Death by Example

Clair was curious as to where he was going. His mood had just suddenly shifted, and she followed along, there was a rigid set to his shoulders and the air around him was rather angry. As they moved she could start to hear something crashing, and the breaking of glass. There was snarling and shouting.

"How stupid." She said, Didn't they know that the key to surviving was being calm, laying low?

"Very." Isaiah said. He was surprised that she was following him. Normally she made a quick escape.

"Following me?"

"I'm curious." She said."Though it killed the cat." She mumbled under her breath. He'd heard that expression before. Oddly enough I wasn't going to kill her. Slowly he was starting to view her like the hell hounds. Need he explain why that was probably happening?

However she had a set time after which he would have to rid himself of her. Clair was smart, and knew how to hide. That made her dangerous in the possibility of finding an escape. He couldn’t allow that.

Clair was glancing in the rooms they passed. The smell of smoke came to her, and a lot of the rooms were smashed and destroyed. It would seem someone was having a mental break.

"Oh my god." She said. It looked like someone had taken a sledgehammer to the rooms they were passing. One had different art works in it and they were completely destroyed. She saw one of hers on the floor that she left for the house.

"Will they mend?" She asked.

"Everything mends." He answered darkly. "There is a difference however in the reasoning for things to be destroyed and fixed. This is deliberate unneeded destruction." Clair could feel the coldness starting

to seep into her. The house felt cold and angry. The closer they got to the noise the colder it got. To the point that she could see her breath.

Clair stood in the doorway of the piano room where a man really was using a sledge hammer to destroy the windows in the room. She felt several people running from the area terrified. She saw that Zeta was laying dead on the floor. Alpha not far from her also not breathing. Beta was pacing watching the man looking for a moment to attack. This man had lost it, completely lost it. It looked like he'd taken out two hell hounds. He was a bear of a man, and he was wounded too.

The room was destroyed just like the others. All the pianos and instruments in here in pieces. The windows and furniture were in hundreds of shards. Isaiah held out a hand almost casually and the sledgehammer flew into it. Clair didn't even have a second to turn or call out a warning Isaiah moved that fast. To be honest she didn't feel the need to. This place was changing her, and the man had signed his death certificate with his actions today.

Isaiah swung once. Not at full strength but enough to shatter the man's leg and knee as he hit the side of it. He then tossed the sledge hammer like it was a useless tool. The man fell to the floor screaming in pain, he sounded out of his mind. Clair wondered how many had broken like this man had. She was also unsure if she should be here now and backed up.

Isaiah grabbed the ankle of the broken leg and pulled the man no expression on his face. He looked more like a man simply pulling a bag of garbage. Beta had his lips curled back and Clair now saw that he was actually limping. His front right leg bent up and under him. Isaiah pulled the man from the room Clair stayed where she was but Isaiah spoke.

"Clair, follow you'll just have to come in a minute." She sighed looked up at the ceiling. She was losing her mind in a different way, and moved to follow. They went to a room that was not destroyed and large. Kind of like a sitting room. He let go of the man and Isaiah looked at Beta.

"Healing?"

‘Yes a bit more needed.’ He said in his head. Isaiah gave a nod.

"Go to your siblings." He commanded and Beta limped off. Clair moved into the room. The crazed man's screaming was starting to grate on her nerves. Isaiah's eyes went black and he grabbed the man by the throat.

"Shut up before I snap your neck." The man went instantly silent but it looked like he might be trying to scream. Clair once again wondered at Isaiah and his abilities. She was glad they didn't seem to work much on her. Isaiah moved to a desk in the room and pulled out a pen knife. He took it and jabbed it in his own left forearm, pulling up slightly.

"What are you doing?" Clair gasped. He didn't look at her he just tossed the knife and it hit the floor skidding. He walked to the wall and used his right hand to take blood from his left arm with two of his fingers. What the hell was this?

He made a very odd symbol on the wall with his blood and she noted that the hand writing the symbol changed slightly. The skin turning a black blue and his fingers were elongated. Clair watched as the blood seemed to soak into the wall. It was in a crude circle with odd little symbols.

"Clair." He said and made a motion with his hand. She came forward but reluctantly. She stopped next to him.

"Hand."

She raised her right hand and he took it. Pulling her closer and raised it to his mouth. He bit into the center of her palm and she made a painful sound. Anger contorting her face for a moment. He let go and with blood pooling in her palm he forced her hand to the wall.

"That hurt." She said.

"And?" Man he was an asshole, and she was stuck with said asshole so long as she wanted to live.

"Would it really hurt to give a warning first?" She said. "You're not supposed to harm me."

"I'm about to give a warning now. This is an exception to the rule as you will see. Besides you gave me permission before to bite you. You haven't taken it back. Nor have we made a new promise." He let go of her hand and she felt a trickle go down her spine. He moved back to where the man was laying. Isaiah pulled him up off the floor and set him in a chair. He needed a sound smack across the face in her opinion. Both of them.

"I can hear that some in this house are about to do something worse that I don't want to deal with. So I'm going to make a point. I get very tired of repeating myself over and over. The house will bring them at my request. I will be heard this time." Isaiah said to her. He did hear it in their minds. They were thinking they could break the house, open it somehow. That was not going to happen.

He was bringing everyone in the house here to him. It would cost him though, it would give them all one day full immunity from him. Every time he called in this fashion would give them one day. Mo one could resist it either unlike his ability as a reaper to call souls forward. Those in the room already were an exception. They were in the magic. Clair however already had her three weeks and it was really for the man right here. He was going to show them what happened when you didn't follow the rules. Or touch things that belonged to him.

Clair watched as people started to file into the room, looking a little like zombies until they entered. Then they looked horrified. None could leave however, and so they kept a far distance from Isaiah. Twelve people including Clair, were spaced in the room. Two minutes later the hell hounds came in, looking a little worse for the ware but breathing. They moved to sit behind Isaiah and watched the crowd. The doors to the room shut and everyone looked around.

"Because I've done this, called you to me. You all have a full day of immunity from me and mine. So it would do if you'd relaxed and listen to what I have to say." The man in the chair was looking very pale, his mouth a grim line. Isaiah gave a wave of his hand, the man cursed him but didn't start screaming again. novelbin

"I'll explain this once so listen closely."

"All of you," he started, encompassing the group. "Belong to me, to this house. I decide when and how you will die and no one escapes me forever. If I don't take care of you they will." He pointed to the hell hounds.

"It has come to my attention that some in this group feel that you can reverse your condition, it's not so. Even if someone shows up tomorrow and promises to free you, I doesn't work. You signed your contracts and you can't be released from it. Burning this house to the ground, or anything else will not kill me, but it will kill you." The room was silent and Isaiah took a moment to run through their minds and thoughts. Only Clair and an older female weren't readable.

"I won't tolerate destruction of this house or destruction of my property. Nor will the house and if you think you are going to burn it down, it will respond. I can hear what you were planning, or using magic. You think I'm stuck here because I like it? We’re all stuck here. You live longer when you play by the rules." These mortals were ignorantly pathetic if they thought they could change what had been done.

"Is the house alive?" Someone asked looking around. There was an oppressive feeling there. It was cold and a horrible angry feeling pressed in on them.

"Yes. I'm going to set an example right here and now. If you piss me off your death is going to be very painful and drawn out. I like control, and I hate humans that feel they are worth more than they really are. s several of you seem to think."

"We didn't help him do it! He planned to do it no matter what. Destroying the rooms to make them easier to burn." A man said suddenly as Isaiah moved to the one that had been smashing up the house. He took his arm making him hold it up.

"No but you gave him the tools, and hoped sacrificing him you'd burn your way out. I suggest you run the moment your immunity is up. They will hunt you down for what was done to them." He gestured to the hounds who's eyes were narrowed. They remembered the faces.

"Watch closely. I want you to see what I will do to you if you try to fuck with the house, hounds or me again." With that he snapped the man's arm like it was a piece of kindling. The scream that came from him was horrible and most everyone jumped or let out a shocked sound.

"I can't watch this." Clair heard Leanne say very quietly to Carlos. Isaiah looked at her.

"You'll watch if you want to leave the room. If you don't then you've failed to do as I asked by calling you here. Zeta." He said turning his head.

Zeta moved forward, the man had tears in his eyes. He was swearing and cursing. No one was going to step forward and help him. It was quite possibly the most horrible and scaring thing that any of them had ever seen. Isaiah had made his point very clear.

They didn't know if they should be more afraid of him or the hell hounds. Both of them had torn that man apart. Limb from limb and he'd been alive for most of it. His blood coated the floor, and the sound of crunching bones was horrid. The moment that they were able to, everyone fled the room and no one touched anything in the house either.

They were too terrified to. To afraid that if they even accidentally broke something they would be taken apart piece by piece. Their bones smashed and broken while they lay dying there. The worst of it was the expressionless way that he went about it. Like it was just an annoyance having to do what he did to

the man. Isaiah looked down at the hell hounds, blood coated their fur and mouths. Not much remained of the man who'd been there before.

"I think I made my point perfectly clear."

‘We should do it more often. The fear smelled so good.’ Alpha shared via mind a shiver going down his body. Isaiah could feel the house's approval. The atmosphere of the place brightening considerably. This was not a place that mortals ruled. This was a place where monsters had control and liked what they liked.

"It is however going to be a boring day tomorrow. Though mentally toying with them may be fun." Isaiah quipped.

‘Break things around them.’ Beta said sounding excited. ‘How scared they would be then.’ Isaiah liked the way that Beta was thinking. They might not be able to touch them, but they could play with them a whole hell of a lot. Breaking them psychologically.