I received an email recently asking if “The 4th Demon” was the last book in “The Chronicles of Jonathan Steel”. It is NOT. The fact is, 2024 has not been a friendly year for my writing. Back in January, 2024 we went to Walt Disney World for the International Art Festival at EPCOT. The week were gone proved to be another “snowmageddon” in our deep south location here in northwest Louisiana. The temperature plummeted to 9 degrees that Tuesday night.

Three years before, a similar event took place and we had a pipe freeze in the attic above our garage. The ensuing flood took out the garage ceiling. We were at the house when it happened and found it promptly. Now, digging through frozen clay, ice, and snow to find the water turnoff valve was a chore but we managed. I had a cut off valve put in the attic to cut off water to that pipe which supplied only one faucet outside.

Well on that night in January, the cut off valve froze! Wednesday about 6 PM I checked out doorbell camera from our room in Disney World to see if we had lost power. Plenty of power but I saw water running across our front porch into the yard! A friend up the street was kind enough to check and we were able to let him into the house. The pipe had burst AGAIN and had taken out the ceiling over my study! Lots of computer equipment and memorabilia, etc. were taken out by the flood. Our entire first floor was flooded.

We had to fly home the next day (at a huge cost) and were stunned at the amount of damage. Let’s just say that seven months later, we moved back into our house. The months were spent fighting with insurance and struggling with workers not being available for the reconstruction. It took until last week to finally get most of our stuff back into the house. We paid the last check last Friday!

Now, what this has meant is no time, no energy, no possibility of writing intentionally. Everything with my writing and my little publishing company was put on hold. I have been working here and there on the next Jonathan Steel book. Frankly, the extra time has allowed me to plan the story and fill in a lot of gaps. I am currently beginning the final edit on what will become “The 2nd Demon: Tales of the Grimvox”. This will be the next to last book in the series (but hopefully not the last time we hear from Jonathan Steel).

The 2nd Annual Wholesome Book Fair is this weekend as mentioned in my previous post. If you attend, you will meet many of our local authors. And I have left thirty bags for you to load up your books and in each bag is a special coupon to download a free copy of “The Chronicles of Jonathan Steel: Volume 1” featured the first three books in the series. This volume is now available on our website: hopeagainbooks.com for purchase in ebook format only.

Just to give you a little taste of what is to come, here is the first chapter of that upcoming book. To set the stage, at the end of “The 4th Demon” the Crimson Snake has been placed on an island by Max and told to memorize the names of everyone who died on the airplane she sabotaged. The Snake wants to find some kind of redemption. Two months have passed and we find her alone on the island.

Chapter 1

The Crimson Snake touched the photograph of the young man with the fingers of her good hand. Well, it was her only hand. The young man had to be in his teens with long, braided black hair and deep brown skin to match his eyes. She studied the biography beneath the photograph. He is fifteen. Correction, he was fifteen. Until he died in the fiery crash of Swiss Flight number? She winced, realizing she could not remember the number of the Swiss flight she had sabotaged. 

If the young man had lived, what would he be doing now? Playing video games? Texting his friends? Breathing. Living. Or worse, abused by his parents, his siblings, his relatives, as she had been. Pablo Jaurez, she mouthed the name silently.

“Pablo.” She said out loud, allowing the feel of his name to cross her lips. “Am I supposed to say I’m sorry?” The memory of sitting with Max, Vivian, and Raven returned. Max had activated the nannomemes placed in Snake’s tea and had threatened to use them to keep Snake in control. Then she had pointed to this very notebook.

 Max placed the tablet back in her satchel. “This is my insurance policy, Snake. I don’t trust you. No one should. You have done nothing to earn such trust. If you are truly repentant, then you may find redemption. Open the notebook.”

Snake glared at Max hotly and opened the notebook. A plastic sleeve held laminated cards. She pulled one from the sleeve. A photograph of a young girl filled one side of the card. She turned the card over. “Melissa Graff? Do I know her?” She read the name at the top of the card. Below it, more text detailed biographical information about Melissa.

“How could you? She is dead. Perished in the crash of your Swiss flight.” Max said. “There are 225 cards. The rest of the notebook has brief biographies of each victim. The laptop carries videos of those victims. These cards are basically flash cards. Vivian will return in two months. If you have memorized the biography of each of your victims and can give her those details based on the photograph alone, then you will have taken the first step on your journey to redemption.”

Snake closed the notebook, and a tear trickled from her right eye. Max had insisted she get to know every victim who had died in the crash Snake had caused. Pablo was dead because of her actions. The only pathway to redemption was to learn each victim by name and by sight. She touched the tear that ran down her cheek and withdrew it on the tip of her finger. She studied it like it was an alien insect. And she felt something. A deep, down touch of nausea. Or more like butterflies in her stomach! Guilt. She was feeling guilt. Not that she was unfamiliar with the sensation. Guilt had been a powerful motivator in her childhood. That and the need to avoid pain. Now, the guilt had a different shimmer to it. A vibration she had never associated with her victims. All two hundred and something victims. 

“255.” She said.

Snake stood up from the tiny dining table in her one-room hut and walked out underneath the star filled night sky. A cool breeze blew in from the ocean and she walked down to the beach. On the far horizon, lights glittered from the distant shore. She had not set foot off the island for almost three months. As Max promised, food arrived on a regular basis. Zeta, as the young woman was known, arrived on a small boat with supplies. Zeta never spoke a word to Snake, unloading the wheeled supply cart on the tiny dock and taking the empty cart Snake had placed there.

It was close to midnight, and she really needed to get some sleep. Sleep, once a welcome escape, had become more elusive since she had studied the notebook and its 225 victims. Yes, not two hundred and something. They were more than just something. They were people. Her conscience was awakening. She did not like it. Something clattered up the walkway to the hut. She whirled, her senses alert. Instinct for survival kicked in.

Snake slowly made her way up the walkway and stopped beside the outside table. Sitting in the center of the table was a dark, egg-shaped object about a foot tall. She glanced around at the clearing that circled the hut. Silence. No one moved in the darkness. Above her, a cone of light illuminated the table. A drone hovered over the table. It had delivered the strange object. What was it? More of Max’s doings?

Snake sat at the table and regarded the egg with wary eyes. Why was it here? She reached out and touched the pebbly surface with her finger, and an electric shock ran up her arm. She jerked her hand away, and the tingling sensation moved across her chest to her shoulder and down the stump of her missing arm. The tingling sensation became an itch and then a burning sensation. She stood up and her fell chair behind her. The tingling filled the empty air where her arm should have been. Her mouth fell open in astonishment as the tip of her stump swelled and shot outward in a flesh-colored spike that elongated and shaped itself into a forearm and a hand.

Snake held the new arm up to the cone of drone light. Was this really happening? She touched her face with her new hand and she felt the moisture of more tears as they flowed down her cheeks. She laughed and hugged herself with both arms. Both arms! She did not know how, but she did not question this miracle. Yes, it had to be a miracle. Or was it? Months ago, Max had activated the nannomemes, giving her the sensation the missing part of her arm had returned. Max could be playing games with her!

A pale, red light pulsed in the palm of her new hand. She stared at the tiny point of light. “What is this?”

“How does it feel to be whole again?”

Snake whirled. A man stood in the door to her hut. He wore a white, gauzy linen suit with a shirt open at the neck. As he moved into the scattered light from the drone, his turquoise eyes glittered.

Snake tensed. “Jonathan?”

The man froze. He cursed. “Why must I live in the shadow of my brother?”

Snake tensed. If only she had a weapon! “You’re Jeremiah.”

“That would be me.” Jeremiah moved into the cone of light from the drone. His reddish blonde hair hung almost to his shoulders. His eyes now were hooded in shadow.

“How did you get here?” Snake said.

“I could say by boat. But Max has all approaches to this island under heavy surveillance. But she cannot keep me from teleporting.” He smiled. “That’s right! Beam me up, Scotty!”

Snake cursed. “No ride for me, then?”

“Not yet,” Jeremiah said. “But there is hope. It depends on what happens in the next few minutes. Now, back to your new arm.”

Snake looked at her new arm. “You did this?”

“Yes.” He nodded. “Does it surprise you I can do miracles? I can, with the help the most powerful friend in the world.” He grimaced. “Well, second most powerful.”

“Friend? You’re talking about one of Jonathan’s demon adversaries, aren’t you?”

“Sweetie, demons have never been a friend to my brother.” He hissed.

Snake flexed her new hand and planted it seductively on her hip. She studied Jeremiah Stone. “Why are you here?”

“I wanted to make you an offer.”

“Nothing is for free. I get it.” She ran her new hand through her unruly curly hair. “What kind of offer?”

“To be whole again.”

Snake looked at her hand. “To be whole, huh?” She glanced beyond him at the notebook sitting on the table in her hut. “I’m working on that.”

“With one arm.” Jeremiah said. He gestured over his shoulder with an index finger. The notebook flew through the air from within the hut and landed on the table beside the object. “Come on, Snake! You’re not meant for this! Hunched over a notebook studying dead losers? You need to concentrate on the present. Now! Not that notebook.”

Snake studied the pulsing red dot in her palm. “So, what is the catch?”

Jeremiah moved out of the cone of light and sat at the far side of the table. He brushed the notebook aside and put both arms on the table. He pointed at the object with a finger on each hand. “I need your help. That thing needs to be opened. In return, you get a new arm.”

Snake glanced at the egg-shaped object on the table. “This is making no sense.”

Jeremiah sighed and leaned back in the chair. He flicked the index finger of his right hand. Snake’s arm disappeared. She gasped in panic as the flesh below her stump winked out of existence.

“Once you have been restored, it’s hard to go back, isn’t it?” Jeremiah said. He flicked his finger again and her arm was whole.

Snake reached forward with both arms and leaned on the table as her heart raced and her head grew woozy. It had been so long since she had actually felt her missing arm. “Why can’t you open it?”

“Snake, Snake!” Jeremiah stood up and paced around the table. “Come on! Work with me here! Why so many questions?”

She turned and looked into those intense turquoise eyes. “You just took my arm away. I’ve had that done once before by someone who makes you look like a Boy Scout. I don’t take lightly to being manipulated. Truth!”

Jeremiah’s lips slowly turned up in a smile. He rubbed his jaw and walked away. “Truth! Truth can be cheap, Snake. Truth is what I make it.” He paused and looked at her over his shoulder. “Okay, truth! I can’t get the thing to open.”

Snake smiled. “Bargain time, eh?”

“Bargain is you keep your arm. Only if you open it.”

“Where did it come from?”

“I stole it.” Jeremiah crossed his arms. “There, truth.”

“From?”

“The Council of Darkness.”

Snake drew a deep breath and sat in a chair before the strange object. “I hear there are powerful creatures on that council.” At least, Jonathan Steel had said as much.

Jeremiah sat down opposite her with the object between them. “At one time, there were many powerful individuals on the Council of Darkness. Now, there are only two.” He sighed and leaned back. “There are those who want to rebuild the Council, replenish its ranks with less powerful members than before. I am opposed to that and I have a better plan and it all hinges on this.” He gestured to the object.

Snake studied the egg-shaped object. It was ovoid with six sides of pebbly material and tapered from a fat bottom to a small, rounded top. “It looks like a deformed dinosaur egg.”

Jeremiah shrugged. “Just as old as the dinosaurs.”

“And all I have to do is open it? I don’t see any seams. No magic red button to push. No latch.”

“Opening it is simple. Put both hands on either side and it will open. Once your hands no longer touch the egg, you will have fulfilled the side of your agreement.”

“And I can keep my arm?”

“Of course.”

Snake studied her intact arm and flexed her fingers. She ran those fingers through her short hair. She caressed her lips and touched her ears. No prosthetic had ever given her back the true sensation of her real arm. She glanced once at the notebook. Go back to that and she would lose an arm. She could always go back to the notebook after she opened this thing.

“Just sit down and touch it?”

“Yes.”

“I’m going to regret this, aren’t I?”

“You’re going to regret rotting on this island, memorizing the lives of a bunch of dead people. Move on! Carpe diem!” Jeremiah’s eyes gleamed.

Every alarm bell in her head signaled caution. She should NOT do this! Snake glanced at the notebook. Could she continue to wallow in guilt every day? She had done exactly what Max had required, and she had yet to feel even a smidgen of redemption. Only guilt. And Max could never give her back her real arm.

Snake gingerly reached forward toward the egg. The red light pulsed more rapidly in her new hand. Both fingers of both hands touched the pebbly surface on either side of the object. The feeling of electricity ran up her arms again and this time, a seam opened in the object’s front. Green light shot forth and bathed her face in oscillating waves. She gasped as something filled her vision. Something burrowed itself around her eyes and into her brain. She screamed in agony as the contents of the object filled her mind.

Jeremiah stood up and came around the table. He leaned over her paralyzed head and neck. His chilly breath caressed her cheek. “This is the Grimvox. It is the repository of all the deeds of every demon who has ever graced this ghastly mortal realm.”

Snake could barely hear him as voices screeched and screamed in her mind. Images began to unfold and play like an old stuttering movie projector. Jeremiah walked to the other side of the table although she could not see him as her eyes were locked on the contents of the Grimvox.

“The prior Keeper has expired. Her mind was insufficient, and I had the perfect opportunity to being my Keeper to the Grimvox. Now, all those secrets are mine!”

Jeremiah pointed to the notebook. “Bad memories.” He chuckled and pointed to the Grimvox. “Worse memories.” He leaned across the table and touched her cheek, pulling away a tear moistened hand.

“In time, you will no longer weep. In time you will become one with the Grimvox. Your mind will preserve its energy and keep its precious memories from fading. But the only way those hands will release the Grimvox is in death. Sorry. I lied. It’s what we do.”

No! Snake tried to scream, but her mouth would not move. Her voice did not come. She was paralyzed just as she had paralyzed Inspector Goudreaux. All that goes around comes around, she thought weirdly. But the thoughts were fading into the miasma of demonic voices and images. She finally blinked and no more tears came from her eyes. Amid the swirling images, she found the face of Pablo from the notebook float briefly into her awareness. Was he a demon? No! Pablo resided in her memory with the other 224 victims. She latched onto the memory of Pablo with every remaining fiber of her existence.

“There are more.” She thought. “224 more. I need them.” She fought for the memory of each of those dead. Like tiny life rings, they floated out of the madness and she flailed toward them, a woman drowning in a sea of evil. 

“Pablo.” She whispered.