Lord of the Manor -- Section 10

[A small section, but much better than nothing, and it's time to start posting again. I'm going to try to pick up the pace, but there is a family reunion about to get in the way.

[I need a T-shirt that says something like, "I'd rather be writing." Or, "I look like I'm listening to you, but in my head the story goes on."

[Something like that.]


    "Watch your backs," said Sticks with a broad smile, "and run FAST!" That was all the warning they had before he leapt onto the handle of the broom, sprinted up the shaft, and launched himself into the air, grabbing the leg of a passing creature. Then he was gone into the dark.
    "What was that?" asked Michael, staring after the small man. "What do we DO?"
    Maddie kept her grip on the tray with one hand and put the other on Michael's back. "I think we run fast," she said, and pushed.
    Apparently that was all it took to get the boy moving. Maddie wasn't sure why she thought he was younger than she was--well, duh, obviously it was because of his size--but she wondered how young he really was. Had anyone said? He seemed vulnerable as he led their little charge, both hands gripping the broom. She'd have to show him how to really hold it later. Assuming they got through all this.
    Maddie swiped at her bloody forehead with the back of her hand and kept close behind Michael, trying to look behind and ahead at the same time. It was hard to not look ahead. Actually, it was getting hard to not look behind, too. A group of the creatures, wings pulsing as they hovered, were following them, laughing and chanting. Maddie couldn't quite make out the words, but she thought they were rhyming with 'cut.' One girl-creature with wings that scattered moonlight in rainbows laughed and laughed, snorting in through her nose. They were just out of reach, just too far for Maddie to lunge back and take a swipe at them. Instead, she kept one hand on Michael's backpack and the other firmly around the handle of the tray.
    "I'm never delivering pizza here again," she muttered.
    Michael grunted, swinging the broom in front of him, mostly missing, but connecting far too often with plastic smacks that were answered by high pitched cursing. He was moving ahead with good speed, Maddie thought. But then he slowed. Then he stopped, and Maddie stopped with him.
    "What's going on?" she shouted, her eyes still on the swirling, taunting crowd hovering behind her.
    "I can't get through!" Michael shouted back, and Maddie looked over his head toward the door. At least, she assumed that was where the door was. All she could see was a swirling cloud of black. A feathered black, a webbed black, glints and hints of butterfly wings, or just plain fly wings--but all-in-all it was simply black. She heard snickering behind her and ducked as something caught at her hair. Maddie realized that the creature could just as easily have cut her, clawed at the back of her neck, or her ear, or her legs--why hadn't she worn long pants?--but it hadn't. The creatures knew they'd won, and now they were toying with her.
    "Sticks!" yelled Michael. "Where are you?"
    "Sticks!" chattered the cloud of creatures in front of them, above them, behind them. "Sticks! Sticks? Where ARE you, Sticks? This old man, he played six, he played knick-knack on my Sticks!" More snorting and more laughter.
    Michael swiped again with his broom and gave a startled shout. Maddie turned her head in time to see a cluster of the flying things grab the bristles of the broom, stopping it in mid swing. Then, quick as a bat, one creature with a crazy, iridescent afro scurried down the handle of the broom and swiped at the boy's hands, leaving bloody trails across his knuckles. Michael lost his grip and the broom lifted into the night and was gone.
    Maddie leaped after it, grabbing with her right hand, but too late--and then she was jerked backwards into a tug-o-war over the silver platter, the fingers of her left hand barely hanging onto the handle by their tips. One winged thing grinned, teeth unnaturally bright in the cloud's shadow, and skittered over the tray to give Maddie's hands the same treatment Michael got just seconds before. Maddie's instincts told her to pull away, but her hand wouldn't let go of the tray. The motion around her seemed to slow down, her vision narrowed to a tunnel, seeing only the sharp shine of the creatures claws. She could already feel them raking across her fingers.
    Then Michaels fist lurched into the tunnel of her vision and sent the claws spinning into the darkness. Maddie grabbed the tray handle with both hands and used her bodyweight to slam the tray into the ground. The two things still clinging to the platter didn't let go in time, and sprawled on the ground, stunned. The creatures above them laughed and pointed, mocking their fallen comrades just as much as the two humans they were going to pick to pieces, cut by cut.
    But not yet, apparently. Maddie held up the tray, ready to swing at any bat wings or bird wings or bug wings that flew too close, but none came.
    "Ow," said Michael, shaking his hand. "That demon was HARD."
    "Demons?" said Maddie. "That's what these are? I guess that makes sense--ow! Your hand!"
    Michael had stopped shaking it long enough for them both to get a good look. The back of his had was slick and dark, and the trails left by the claws were ugly, ragged patches of black in black on pale skin.
    "That sucks," said Michael.
    "We need to get you inside," said Maddie.
    Michael nodded, still looking at his hand. "Yeah. Totally. I just don't know how. Do you?"
    "Incoming!" shouted Sticks from above. Maddie jerked her head up in time to see a hole open in the demon-cloud. Down through the gap hurtled a larger demon than most of their tormenters, broad black butterfly wings illuminated by a glow from what seemed to be a crown of flame around the creature's head.
    Maddie and Michael jumped back as the thing crashed to the ground between them with a graceless thump. Standing on the air demon's back was Sticks, a broad grin on his face.
    "One ticket to freedom, delivered at your feet," he said, indicating the groaning demon beneath him with a broad sweep of his arm. "Well, not exactly 'freedom,' but at least a ticket inside."
    “Did you kill him?” asked Michael, shock on his face.
    Sticks blinked at him—Maddie could tell only by the liquid light reflecting off the small demon’s eyes, gone and back, gone and back. “Can’t you hear the groaning?” asked the small bodyguard. “Now hurry and pick him up.”