Inner Demon: The Dark Bloods - Book I ✓

Chapter 11 - Secret Research

11.

Secret Research

February finally came to an end and an uneventful Spring Break arrived and left. May at last came into bloom and with it came the flourishing sensation of senior year’s end and graduation celebrations powdered the small town of Esterwood’s atmosphere. Restaurant advertising boards were filled with bold, black letters reading “Congrats Grads!” and dollar store shelves were bursting with mediocre graduation decorations.

It had all become a routine. Busy days at school dispensed pages of homework that Reyna completed despite the grumpy demon housed within her. Dates with Dante were limited to times before the evenings or during full moons.  Phone calls with Julie always ended with Reyna sighing and saying, “No, I haven’t seen Dan either and I don’t know what happened to him.”

Her social and educational life was repetitious but comfortable; Reyna was most wary when at home. Amon had been acting like an uncle. He would smile at Reyna and ask her about her days, his casual conversation never questioning her about a certain book or demon.

On several occasions he was not even in the house, having borrowed his sister’s car to watch a movie or to eat a lonesome lunch at a mom and pop restaurant. He had returned from one of those outings with a gift for Reyna. It currently sat in her bottom drawer, the slim, white box unopened.

The greater oddity was Mr. and Mrs. Felix. They were too nice. Too cheery. Too oblivious. On one occasion Mrs. Felix had entered her daughter’s unlocked room and walked on her conversing with Mundus’ reflection. Instead of asking who had she been talking to or why the mirror in Reyna’s hand was not reflecting what it should, Mrs. Felix has simply asked if she wanted to go to the mall with her.

Several other close encounters should have led to at least some wisps of suspicion, but Reyna’s parents simply went about their lives as if their daughter’s constant early evening retires were normal.

The moon demon that resided inside of the hectic-filled teenager had also fallen into a retreat of his own. He had become isolated and distant since the night Reyna picked up Amon’s Sakuya’s Collection. For weeks she tried to approach him. Occasionally he would respond with sly humor, but usually bitterness was the only answer she would receive. Words of insult and demands to be left alone lashed out at her phrases of concern. Reyna spend most of her time in the empty silence of his absence.

It was during those periods of withdraws that Reyna would read the book. It’s thick binding and thin pages had provided many long and exhausting reads. She had a spiral next to her each time she read where she would write down summaries of what her readings. Though the same font was printed throughout the entire book, the content was not as uniform. The book was broken under hundreds of separating titles. Some entries recited like a first person story. Other times like a third person account. Then, it would switch to what seemed a journal entry which flowed into omnipresent texts that could have been pulled from history books. It was all about the same general subject though. It talked about demons and human equipped with powers –Mahou the book called it– to kill them. So far about a couple hundred pages into the book, there were only two stories Reyna recognized.

She carried that book and spiral with her wherever she went, including school. Her already deteriorating backpack was magically holding itself together under such weight. The no longer padded straps chafed her shoulders whenever Reyna walked to her classes. She no longer walked to and from school; Dante was her ever reliant ride, and it was who she was presently gazing around for. Reyna was lingering by the front of the building’s glass walls. The other students that lingered with her were a mix of loud chatter, obnoxious laughter, and bubbling emotions.