Ela and Cinder

Prologue

Tom only had to read the last line of the good book section where his wife had underlined.

Tom's Wiccan wife in a raspy dried voice said, "keep reeeeading!"  

Gillian had been telling Tom that all night and into the morning even as her words came over and over through her screams of agony.  Gillian was tied to a chair with thick hemp rope, blood spotted on her torn dress while she was facing kitchen's fireplace.  Her back was arched off the chair to such an extreme that Tom feared she would break.  The fireplace bellowed smoke like a door swelling trying to open from a fire in another room.  Blue and green fire sent out in different directions like a blind snake looking for a rat.

 "I have her heart still Tom." a cool deep but angry voice came from the fire.  "My fingers are tied around her heart string and I will rip it out of her chest if you don't stop."  

Tom started to read his line again and then the voice said, "I am going to chew on her heart in hell where I will wait for you, this witch and your daughter."  Tom didn't know he was going to be a father until that moment.  Tom faltered in his reading as he stumbled on a word he had read over a hundred times that night.

"To open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those having been sanctified by faith in Me." Tom chanted once more. 

 Out of holy water for hours Gillian screamed in pain again and again.  Sunlight started to lum into the kitchen from shut door that leads outside.  "Now Tom", Gillian screamed.  Tears formed in his once thought run dry eyes once again as he remembers what he had to do to finish his wife's plan.  Tom pulls a knife from his pant and cuts his wife's chest.  

The rope that was on his wife's chest loosens and her arms are free.  Salt pouch in one hand and nettles and rose thorns in the other she ripes the salt open and grabs the demon's arm.  Immediately Gillian's hands start to smoke with a greasy popping noise.  Burned demon flesh smell filled the room with the smell of brimstone that made Tom retch and falters again.  The demon yells of pain give strength to Tom one more time.  The strength of the demon is now dragging the unrestraint Gillian into the fire.  

"Read it Tom", she Yells.  

Toms Reads the line again and this time he remembers his love for Gillians and thanks God for the strength.  With a huge kick to the back door the kitchen door slams open to let the purifying morning light poor in just as Gillian's face and most of her body is pulled into the fireplace. 

"Pull me back Tom" she yells and Tom jumped to his wife and wraps his arms around her. 

"I will pull all three of you to hell!" 

Tom braces his foot on the bricks and pulls.  The sunlight fully touches Gillian then her hands where she grips the demon.  Gillian and Tom heave once more and once the light touches just past Gillian's hands the invisible become visible where they see a twisted hoof protruding from Gillian's chest.  The light instantly cuts through the hoof and Gillian and Tom fall to the floor.  The twisted hoof also falls to the floor just in front of the fireplace where they all becomes silent.