Fergus Unfettered

Lizbeth Pendleton raced through the second floor loft and skittered toward the stairs as her father's screams echoed through their penthouse apartment. "Not yet," he wailed plaintively, "please…" his voice trailed off. From the other side of his door, Lizbeth heard her father pleading with two other men to spare his life. "I have six more years, it's in my contract!" He started to protest at whatever was being done to him, punctuated by shrieks as someone on the other side of the door laughed. "Too bad, old man. Our queen runs things different now. If she says your time is up, then it's up." Lizbeth stood shaking as she heard her father's voice racked with sobs. It seemed like hours that she stood there frozen, until finally the sobs subsided and a soft thump had her scurrying back two steps from the door. "What now," one of the voices queried. "Pizza?" "Nah," the other answered. "How about Thai?" "Thai's good," the first responded, as she heard them approaching the door. Lizbeth had enough presence of mind to backpedal quickly to the armchair in the sitting room and dive behind it. She watched helplessly as two figures let themselves out of her father's apartment, one of them whistling as he went. And trailing behind them, the stench of sulfur.

"Ma'am?"

The voice jarred Lizbeth back from her reverie, as she sat staring out of what used to be her father's home office. After the late Mr. Pendleton met his end, his daughter cashed in all his stock in the company he had helped build, and she started putting out feelers for anyone who could shed light on who her father's murderers were. It took a week or so of people thinking she was crazy, suspecting her since she had been home alone with him when he died, and outright asking her if she was on drugs. Finally, the strangest guy she had ever met came along, asking the most ridiculous questions, and through him Lizbeth had finally begun to piece together what had happened. Now he was back with more news, and it did anything but settle her spirits. But it did give her hope.

"Sorry, Garth, sorry," she excused herself. "And when are you going to learn? I'm barely five years older than you. I am not a ma'am."

The tall, gangly man was younger than herself, with an upturned nose that gave him the look of an impish geek boy who should be living in his mother's basement. He was decidedly not a federal agent of any kind. After her father died, and he came around asking questions, introducing himself as Agent Devo, Lizbeth had the family lawyer recommend a PI who did an extensive background check. It came up lacking many answers. Finally, Garth had spilled his entire life story over a large loaded pizza and a single light beer, and the two had struck up a very strange friendship. Now, Elizabeth Ware Pendleton, whose biggest ambition before her father's passing had been to coast through life on interest from her trust fund, and gangly Garth Fitzgerald, a former dentist turned spook hunter, began compiling an exhaustive-and expensive-collection of demon artifacts and lore. The information he had just brought gave her hope for the first time in ages.

"Sorry, I still got that ultra professional side that slips through every now and again. Can't be helped."

Lizbeth stifled an eye roll and waited for him to continue what he had been saying.

"Well, I wanted to tell you in person that I'd tracked down the old contact of Bela Talbot's. He's been selling overseas more since she passed, but he still knows a person or two here and yonder on this side of the pond, and I found a lady in New Hampshire who collects all things angel."

"Including an angel blade, you said."

"Including an angel blade," he nodded. "There was a big battle about three years back-angels slaughtering angels-and those that dropped their blades were scavenged by hunters and collectors after the fight. Picked everything clean."

Her attention waned as he went into detail over how the area had looked like a nuclear blast had gone off in a two-mile radius. She nodded, unhearing as he prattled on, ideas already formulating in her mind over how to use the blade he had secured. Lizbeth, unbeknownst to Garth, had a purpose. When her father pleaded for his life, she froze. While he screamed and begged to be spared, she stood helpless. No more. She would find the demon who laid the trap for her father, and she would see her daddy avenged. He risked everything to see her cared for; he was the only one she had, and he sold his soul to secure her future. She was going to get his soul back, and kill the demon responsible, because now she knew for sure. Demons could be killed.