The Outlaw Demon Wails (The Hollows #6)

The Outlaw Demon Wails (The Hollows #6) Page 25

I flipped my splat gun out of my waistband, letting it spin like a gunslinger's pistol before aiming it at the distant door. The scratching there had quit hours ago, shortly after the sound of a large rock hitting the pavement shook the dust from the ceiling. Apparently, the gargoyles were still around. That had made me feel secure enough that I'd managed to grab a few winks a couple of hours ago while Trent stood guard.

The watch - on loan from Ivy - about my wrist said it was twenty minutes to sunrise. Twenty minutes before all hell was going to break loose, and here I was playing gunslinger. Trent would be able to pop out when things got rough with his freaking "magic word," but I had a circle drawn beside the altar for Jenks and me to hide in if worse came to worst. It ought to hold until Newt showed. My spelling supplies to take Al's name were in it, just waiting for the focusing object. I was going to work the curse as soon as Jenks found the demon's DNA. If I didn't survive, at least everyone I cared about would be safe. Hurry up, Jenks.

"Bang," I whispered, then pulled the gun back to me and tucked it in at the small of my back. I was dying to go out and see what had hit the street before the front door. Tired, I glanced at the statue, then Trent sitting slumped with his back against the defiled altar. He had nodded off for a few hours around midnight, trusting I'd keep him safe.

This was taking it right to the wire - and that was assuming I had a ride home. Crap, I was tired of this. The theoretical charm shop Jenks sometimes mocked me with was looking mighty good right now. Sure, I had been all spit and indignant righteousness when I told Trent that Jenks hadn't used my ride home to get to the ever-after, but the last few hours before sunrise were dragging deep across my soul, and I feared that I was living in a fairy tale if I expected Minias to accept that Jenks was a hair scrunchy and deserved a free ride.

Trent felt me looking at him and woke up. His eyes were puffy from the grit and tired, and his face showed his strain. I looked away and stretched for my hat, dropping it onto my head and pulling it low so I couldn't see him. Exhaling, I forced the tension out. Maybe I could figure ley line traveling out if there weren't demons breathing down my neck like the last time. Until Jenks came up with Al's cellular sample, there was nothing else to do. I'd been trying to piece it together all night.

My eyes shut and I made my muscles relax. If Jenks was right, ley lines were what kept the ever-after connected to reality. All I had to do was learn how to use them, and Jenks and I would be home free. Sure. Easy stuff.

Like I had a hundred times already tonight, I reached a thought out to the nearest line but didn't tap it, afraid a demon would sense me doing it. I lingered there, feeling the energy rush past my consciousness like a red-sheened, silver ribbon. It suddenly occurred to me that the energy was flowing one-way, into our reality. Was the ever-after shrinking? Its substance flowing into our reality like water is drawn to puddle up from a small drop into a larger one? Maybe that was why the ever-after was all broken up.

Tension filtered back, tightening my muscles one by one as I tried to remember what it had felt like when I'd been carried along the lines of energy. The thought of Ivy had brought me home once.

My face warmed. Newt had said I loved Ivy more than the church. I wasn't going to deny it, but there were all kinds of love, and how shallow would I be if my anchor to reality was a hunk of real estate? It was the people who were there that made it mean something.

The flush cooled as I remembered the feeling of my soul breaking apart and how Newt had held my consciousness until I had a body again. Had the shift between realities fractured my soul or just my body?

I moved my knees to feel they'd stiffened. My eyes opened, and I stared at the new rings of dust under the chandeliers. I couldn't even smell the burnt amber on me anymore, and that bothered me. I jumped when Trent sat down beside me. I had forgotten he was here. Pulse pounding, I shifted down an inch or two, wondering what he wanted. Getting antsy, was he?

"I, uh, want to thank you," he said, when it was obvious I wasn't going to break the awkward silence.

Surprised, I glanced at Ivy's watch. Tickity-tock, Jenks. "You're welcome."

He pulled his knees up, which made him look odd in his black jumpsuit. "Don't you want to know what for?"

Expression neutral to maintain the facade that everything was going according to plan, I gestured at the broken cathedral. "For keeping you alive on this magic carpet ride?"

He looked at the shattered room. "For stopping my wedding."

Blinking, I cautiously offered, "You didn't love her."

His gaze had dulled, and his hair was white with dust. "I didn't have the chance to find out."

Trent wants to love someone. Curious. "Ceri - "

"Ceri wants nothing to do with me," he stated. He let his knees fall to stretch his legs down the stairs, his usually collected features scrunched up. "Why do I need to marry someone anyway? It's politics, that's all."

I stared, seeing him as a young man in a position of power being asked to marry, have children, live a nice quiet life of hidden intrigue and public showmanship. Poor, poor Mr. Trent. "That didn't stop you with Ellasbeth," I said, pushing for more.

"I don't respect Ellasbeth."

Don't respect or don't fear her? I ran my gaze up from his boots to his cap. "You're welcome," I said. "But I arrested you to put you in jail, not to save you from Ellasbeth." Jenks had helped Quen steal the evidence that Trent had murdered the Weres, and the FIB had to let him go. And yet Trent was taking the last ride out of the ever-after instead of sticking around and helping us bargain for two more trips. Ah, well. It really wasn't his problem, was it.

A faint smile quirked his lips. "Don't tell Quen, but the jail time was worth it."

My smile grew to match his, then faded. "Thank you for bringing Jenks home," I said, then added, "And my shoes. Those are my favorite pair."

Looking askance at me, he almost smiled. "No problem."

"But I don't appreciate you putting my future kids on the demon radar," I said, and his expression became questioning. God, he didn't even know he had done it. I don't know if that made it better or worse. Jaw tight, I added, "Telling Minias my kids will be healthy and possibly able to kindle demon magic?"

His jaw dropped and I clasped my knees to my chest. "Idiot," I muttered. He hadn't even known what he had done.

My gaze slid to my watch, then the foam-covered windows. The light outside would be growing red and sickly, the wind rising. The gargoyles might have been able to keep us safe in here at night, but as soon as the sun rose, they would be dormant. Even worse, not only was I not going to have time to do the spell, I was likely not even going to get the sample. I had a bad feeling Minias would show up the moment he was free. Come on, Jenks.

Trent's boots scraped the decayed carpeting to show the wood underneath. "Sorry."

Yeah. That makes it all better.

"If there's only one trip out, I'll try to get you back," he said suddenly.

Surprise washed through me, almost a hurt, and I jerked my head up. "Excuse me?"

He was staring at the front door, looking as if he had a bad taste in his mouth. "We couldn't have done this without Jenks. If Minias considers him a person, I'll try to arrange two more trips out. If I can."

I took a breath, having forgotten to breathe. "Why? You don't owe us anything."

His lips parted and closed, and he shrugged. "I want to be more than...this," he said, gesturing to himself.

What in hell was going on?

"Don't get me wrong," he said, glancing furtively at me and away. "If it comes to sending you home and being a hero, or being a bastard by sending myself home and saving my species, I'm going to be a bastard. But I'll try to get you home. If I can."

My breath came and went, and I tried to wrap my thoughts around what had changed in him. It had to be Ceri. The woman's complete disdain for Trent was starting to get to him; she didn't excuse his actions and saw right through his surface attempts at making up for his past - thinking the attempts made him worse, not better. Her soul was black, her past filthy with unimaginable deeds, but she carried herself with a noble strength, knowing that though she broke the law with impunity, she was loyal to those she owed allegiance to and loved. And perhaps Trent was seeing it for the first time as a strength, not a weakness.

"She's not going to ever love you," I said, and his eyes closed.

"I know, but someone might."

"You're still a murdering bastard."

His eyes opened, a spot of green in the dusty gray surrounding us. "That's not going to change."

That I could believe. Needing to move, I rose and went to stand before the statue. "Jenks?" I shouted. "We're running out of moonlight!" It was too late to do the curse. We were down to snatch and run.

"You aren't so lily white yourself," Trent said. "Stop throwing stones."

Stiffening, I spun. "I got my demon smut trying to save my butt. Nothing died."

With a soft huff, Trent pulled his knees to himself and turned on the top stair to face me. "Such a nice friendly witch, helping the FIB and little old ladies find their familiars. How many bodies are at your feet, Rachel?"

Heat hit me, and my breath caught. Oh. That. There were bodies in my past. I lived with a vampire who had probably killed people and I willingly accepted that. Kisten's hands hadn't been clean either. Jenks had killed to keep his children alive, and would do so again without thought. I had intentionally killed Peter, though he had wanted to die.

"Peter doesn't count," I said, hip cocked, and Trent shook his head as if I were a child. "You murder people outright," I said indignantly. "You killed three Weres for business last summer and were going to let my friend take the blame. Brett only wanted to belong to something." That it still hurt surprised me.

"We are exactly the same, Rachel. We're both prepared to kill to protect what we care for. It simply comes up a lot more often with me. You murdered a living vampire to protect your way of life. That he wanted to die was simply a pretty bow around it."

"We are nothing alike," I said. "You kill for business and profit. I did what I had to do to keep the balance between the vamps and the Weres." Full of indignant anger, I looked down at him as he sat on the stairs. "Are you saying I shouldn't have?"

Smiling beatifically, Trent said, "No. You did the right thing. Exactly what I would have done. What I'm saying is that the rest of us would appreciate it if you would stop working against the system and start working in it."

"With you?" I said caustically, and he shrugged.

"Your talents, my contacts. I'm going to change the world. You can have a say in it."

Disgusted, I turned my back on him, arms crossed over my chest. Demons were about to chew our noses off, and he was still trying to woo me into working for him. But here I was, doing just that. God, I was such an idiot. "I already have a say in it," I muttered.

"Rache?" came a warbling call from the statue, and my heart jumped. "I got Al's."

I backed up a step, pulse fast when Jenks burst from behind the statue trailing a thin ribbon of gold dust. "I looked for your sample," he said, dropping a pinky-nail-size ampoule of black sludge into my grip. "But you don't have one. I guess you weren't Al's familiar long enough. If Al ever tries to reverse the curse, he's going to have to get a sample from you."

"Thank you," I said, dizzy as I looked at the little drop of nothing in my hand that was Al. I'd risked my life for this. Heart pounding, I looked at Ivy's watch - ten minutes to sunup. I was going to use it now.

"Get Trent's sample," I said, lurching to the circle already scribed out on the wooden floor where the carpet had been burned away. I wasn't going to tap a line and set it unless we were interrupted. At that point, it wouldn't matter if I rang the damned bell.

Trent followed, and I almost smacked into him as he tried to get a look at Al's blood. "That's it?" he said, and I pulled back from his reaching hand. "It's over five thousand years old. It can't be any good."

Jenks's wings snapped aggressively. "It's magic, you big cookie fart. If you can read a DNA sample off a nasty mummified elf corpse, then Rachel can use a five-thousand-year-old drop of blood for a demon curse."

I dropped to my knees inside the circle and set the precious vial aside to brush the dirt from a swath of burned oak.

"What about my sample?" Trent asked, his voice tense, as if we might betray him in the last hour. His eyes were very green, and I watched the emotion pass behind them.

"I haven't been able to find one." Jenks dropped an inch in altitude. "I can't just type in ancient, pre-curse elf. It would help if I had a name."

Trent glanced at me, his face tight with sudden nerves. "Try searching for Kallasea," he said, and I slowed. Kallasea? An older version of Kalamack, perhaps?

"Give me a sec," Jenks said, and darted away.

Nervous as much from what I was doing as from Trent watching me do it, I sent my gaze over my stuff. White candle to serve as my hearth fire - check. Ugly big-ass knife - check. Two candles representing Al and me - check. Bag of sea salt - check. Ungodly expensive piece of magnetic chalk that I wasn't going to use - check. Little five-sided pyramid made out of copper - check. Ceri's written instructions and phonetically spelled Latin curse - rolled up like a scroll and shoved in the bottom of my bag - didn't need it. I had memorized everything while sitting on the steps of the basilica's altar.

Feeling Trent's eyes on me, I pinched the wick of the white candle, muttering, "Consimilis, calefacio," as I let it go. The spindled power in me dropped, making me glad I was lighting one candle to function as a hearth fire instead of lighting the two candles individually by magic. The flame flickered like a spot of purity amid the defiled air, and I held my breath and counted to ten. No demon showed up. Just as I had expected, they wouldn't know I was here as long as I didn't tap a line. I could do the spell.

Trent's hesitant movements just outside my vision stopped. "What are you doing?"

My jaw tightened, but I said nothing as I took my bag of salt and carefully spilled it out into the shape of an elongated figure eight. It was a modified Möbius strip. This curse was one of the few I'd ever seen that didn't use a pentagram, and I wondered if it was a completely different branch of magic. Maybe this wouldn't hurt so much.

"Rachel?" Trent prompted, and I sat back on my heels and puffed a curl that had escaped my hat out of my way.

"I've got ten minutes, and I'm going to do the curse that will keep Al from being summoned out of the ever-after."

"Now?" he said, wonder bringing his manicured eyebrows up. "You said demons could feel you tap a line. They'll be on us in seconds!"

Fingers trembling, I carefully placed the pyramid of copper where the salt lines crossed. "Which is why I'm going to do this without the protection of a circle," I said. "I have enough ever-after spindled inside me to do it." Ceri said I did. I trusted her. Though twisting a curse without a circle had me really, really nervous.

Trent's soft boots shifted in a show of protest, and I ignored him as I dug through the bag looking for the stick of redwood I had forgotten to pull out earlier. "Why are you risking it?" he said. "You're doing a demon curse before the sun comes up. In the ever-after. In a defiled church. Can't you do this when you get home?"

"If I get home," I accused. He was silent, and I set the flat piece of wood beside Al's sample. "If I don't make it, I want to die knowing my friends won't be taking the punishment Al has aimed at me. He'll be trapped in the ever-after." I eyed him. "For ever after."

Trent sat down where he could watch both me and the statue. Satisfied he wouldn't say anything else, I balanced the tongue-depressor-like stick of wood on the pyramid, the two ends hanging over the open loops of the Möbius strip. I was trying really hard not to think about what he had said about twisting a curse this close to sunup. This was bad. I mean, really bad.

"Okay," he said, startling me, and I looked up, incredulous that he thought I was waiting for his permission.

"Well, I'm glad I have your approval." Fingers shaking, I took the red candle for Al and placed it in the loop farthest from me, setting it with the word "alius." The gold one I set in my loop with the word "ipse." Gold. My aura hadn't been its original gold in a long time, but to use a black candle would just about kill me.

I poured a handful of salt into my grip, and after muttering a few words of Latin over it to give it meaning, I mixed it back and forth before dividing it equally and sifting it around the base of each unlit candle with the same words. Quickly, before Trent could distract me, I lit the candles with the hearth candle, again using the same words a final time. They were set three ways with the same strength and were immutable. It was a very secure beginning.

"Who taught you how to light candles with your thoughts?" Trent asked, and I jumped.

"Ceri," I said brusquely. "Will you be quiet, please?" I added, and he stood, stiffly going to stand beside the statue and out of my sight.

I felt my blood pressure drop, and moving slowly so as not to unbalance the stick of redwood, I snapped the tip of the ampoule off and tapped three ruby-black drops from it onto Al's side of the stick. The scent of burnt amber rose, almost chokingly thick. My eyes watered while I fumbled for the ceremonial knife. Almost done. It wasn't that difficult a curse, and hardly any magic was involved. The tough part had been in getting the samples. And I had mine right here.

While Trent watched from behind, I pricked my index finger. My heart pounded at the sudden jolt, and I massaged three drops out to land on my end of the stick. My shaking increased as I pushed out a drop more of blood and smeared it on the red candle. The curse was done but for the invocation. No demon would sense what I had done. I wasn't tapped into any line. The energy would come from the spindle in my chi. I looked at my watch, then Trent. I had to do this. I didn't like it, but I liked my other choices even less. Taking a deep breath, I closed my eyes. "Evulgo," I whispered to start it.

I had used this word before. I had a feeling it was to register the curse, a feeling that strengthened when a wave of disconnection slipped over me and I felt the eerie sensation of being in a large room with hundreds of people, all talking at once and ignoring everyone. My heart was pounding. I could feel the curse strengthening in me, winding its way through my DNA, becoming me, pulsing with the force of an unheard heart. Dizzy, I opened my eyes.

Trent was standing above me. There was a faint glow of yellow surrounding him. I looked at my hands, seeing my aura for the first time without the aid of the scrying mirror. It was beautiful, gold and pure. No smut. I could have cried, seeing it. If only it would last, but I knew it was only because things were in flux.

"Are you okay?" he said, and I nodded. I had to finish this before I chickened out.

Mouth dry, I turned the stick a hundred and eighty degrees to move his sample to my loop and vice versa. "Omnia mutantur," I whispered, invoking the curse.

All things change, I thought, then jumped when a feeling of being peeled out of my skin rippled over me. My hands shook, and when I looked, my aura was gone. It just...wasn't there.

"I had no choice," I said to Trent in explanation - maybe apology - then clenched my gut when the imbalance hit me.

Pain struck deep, doubling me over, and I pushed violently away in a panic. My foot scattered the curse as I curled into a ball, and I smelled extinguished candle.

"Jenks!" Trent shouted. "Something's wrong!"

I couldn't breathe. Bent into myself, I tried to open my eyes. My face scraped against the decaying carpet, and I grunted as I tried to find control. My head felt like it was splitting in two, and I cracked my lids, desperate to see. That made it worse. Oh, God, the imbalance was stronger than anything I'd ever felt before.

"Rache, you okay?" Jenks said, inches from me as he hovered over the carpet.

I got one clean breath in before the pain hit me again. I didn't want it, but the imbalance would kill me if I didn't take it as my own.

"Hold her!" Jenks shouted. "I can't help her, damn it! Trent, hold her before she hurts herself!" he demanded, and I sobbed when I felt Trent's arms go around me to keep me from rolling down the stairs.

"I take it," I gasped, my head exploding and my chest cramping. "I take the damn curse."

Like a light switch cutting off, my muscles quit seizing, and I sucked in a ragged breath of air that tasted like candle smoke. I took another breath, then another, content to simply exist without pain. Slowly my muscles relaxed, leaving only my throbbing head. Trent was sitting behind me with his arms wrapped around me. My face was wet, and Trent let go when I moved to wipe the dampness and carpet off my cheek. Slow and lethargic, I looked at my hand to make sure it had been tears and not blood I wiped away. My head hurt that badly.

"I'm okay," I rasped, and Trent's hold dropped. I heard him slide away and get up. Jenks was watching us from a railing, his face pale and pinched. "Did any demons show up?" I asked him, and he shook his head.

Utterly wiped, I shifted myself farther from Trent, embarrassed and trying to find some semblance of self again. I had done it. Damn it, it hurt so much that it had to have worked. I looked at my hands, both wanting to and fearing I might see an alien aura. They were shaking. My aura was again hidden, and I was too afraid to ask Jenks if it was mine, or Al's, or nonexistent.

I looked at Jenks, and he smiled. "It's yours," he said, and my eyes closed as a lump grew in my throat. I pushed the emotion down. We had a run to finish.

"Do you have Trent's sample?" I asked. "We have to get out of here." I'd cry later over what I had done to myself. Right now, we had to leave.

"It's coming," he said. "I found it under 'Kallasea.' Female elf installed in...three fifty-seven B.C., if I did my subtraction right. They mark everything from when the elves abandoned the ever-after. Your court date wouldn't have come up for five years." The pixy laughed. "That's what organized justice will do to you. Rome didn't fall. It was strangled in red tape."

"Bring it to me!" Trent shouted, and both Jenks and I jumped.

"All right, all right," he muttered as he zipped to the statue. "Don't have a hairy fart."

They mark the years the same as us, I thought, shoving things into my bag and hesitating when I couldn't find Al's sample. Where in hell had it rolled to?

"Got it!" came a faint call, and Jenks burst back out in a glitter of gold sparkles. A new ampoule was in his grip, with a faint amber tint to the glass. Trent gazed hungrily up at him, looking like Rex following a pixy toddler. "Once I had a name, it was as easy as pulling the wings off a fairy," Jenks said smugly. "You got anything sweet in your backpack? I haven't eaten in hours. Damn, I'm as tired as a pixy on his wedding night."

"Sorry, Jenks. I didn't know you were coming, or I would have brought something."

Trent was shaking, the impatient man snatching up his pack and holding out his hand. "I have some chocolate," he said. "Give me the sample and it's yours."

We were going to do it. We were going to get out of here. Provided the curse Trent bought from Minias worked. If it didn't, Jenks and I were really screwed.

Jenks snapped his wings together with a loud crack in anticipation. "Excellent!" he said, then froze in midair. "Uh, Rachel?" he said, every last speck of dust vanishing from him. "I don't feel right."

"Can it wait until we get home?" I said, checking Ivy's watch. Crap. The sun was up.

There was a soft puff of displaced air, and my head jerked up. Someone had just popped in. Shit. But when I scanned the room, it was empty. "Jenks?" I said, feeling cold.

Trent stared at me, one foot on the stairs. "Where's your pixy?"

Had someone cursed him into nothing? I stared at the fading cloud of dust, my heart clenching in fear. "Jenks!"

Trent lurched up onto the stage. "Where's my sample? He's gone! He used the last curse and left us here!"

"No!" I protested. "He wouldn't! How could he? He doesn't even know it!"

"Then why isn't the curse working?" he shouted. "It's not working, Rachel!"

"You're asking me?" I snapped back. "I'm not the one who bargained for it. Maybe we need to go back to where we came in. Don't blame my partner if you made a bad bargain!"

Trent gave me a murderous look. Silent, he took the stairs and headed for the side door.

"Hey!" I shouted. "Where are you going?"

He never slowed. "To put distance between us before someone tracks you down. If surface demons can hide from demons, so can I. I never should have trusted you. Trusting a Morgan killed my family. I'm not going to let it kill me."

The harsh red glare of the sun spilled in when he yanked the door open. Squinting, I glimpsed a flash of purple, prestorm sky. A gust sent my hair flying and atomized the dust circles. Then the door swung shut, cutting off the light and wind.

Heart pounding, I knelt to shove the last of my curse stuff into my bag. "Jenks!" I shouted, clueless as to where he'd gone to. "We gotta go!"

Pulse fast, I ran out after Trent. The light was blinding after the soft glow of electric lights. "Damn it, Trent," I shouted as my feet hit the concrete stoop. "I can't get you home in one piece if you run off like that."

Arms pinwheeling, I skidded to a stop on the narrow landing outside the door. There in the shade of the trees was Minias with three of those demons in red. Trent was slumped on the ground before their feet. He wasn't moving. Crap on toast, they'd known we were here the instant Minias had been slung back home with the sun.

Hand fumbling for my splat gun, I turned to retreat, only to run into Minias's chest.

"No!" I shrieked, but I was too close to do anything, and he pinned my arms to my sides. He was in the sun, and I could see his pupils, slitted like a goat's, and the red of his irises, so deep that it almost looked brown.

"Yes," he said, pinching my arms until I gasped in pain. "What, by the two worlds, have you been doing, Rachel Mariana Morgan?"

"Wait," I babbled. "I can pay. I know stuff. I want to go home!"

Minias sent one eyebrow rising. "You are home."

There was a pop from under the trees, and Minias grimaced as he looked toward it.

"That witch is mine!" came Al's distinctive voice, and Minias wrapped a possessive arm around me. "She's got my mark!" the demon raged. "Give her to me!"

"She wears Newt's mark, too," Minias said. "And I have possession of her."

A ribbon of panic pulled through me. I had to do something. I didn't think Al knew I had his summoning name, or he'd be yammering about that, not the lousy mark he had put on my wrist. I had to get out of here. I had to reach my splat gun.

Grunting in effort, I wiggled and twisted. Minias swung me around. My legs folded awkwardly under me as he slammed my ass onto the concrete. I reached for the cement, trying to find my feet and run at the same time. But Minias put a hand on my shoulder, pinning me. A wave of something flowed from him, and I stiffened as I struggled to breathe through the sensation of every last erg of ley line power being pulled from me. It was the opposite of Al's line-overload punishment, and it felt like rape. I struggled to flee, but his hand on my shoulder pinched harder.

Minias looked down at me, and the scent of amber flowed from him as his gaze took on an inquisitive hue. "Trying to steal Al's name to prevent him from being summoned out was a good idea. Bad idea to attempt to implement, though. No one has ever gotten past that statue."

They didn't know. They didn't know I had done it, and my success gave me a burst of hope. Soon as they figured it out, Al was going to be pissed, but if I could escape, I'd be okay. I could tap a line and hit Minias with it, but he'd probably just pull it out from me again, and my soul was still ringing from his first invasion. If I was going to escape, it'd have to be physically.

Gathering myself, I tried to break free, but he knew what I was going to do before I did it. The moment I had my feet, he simply jerked me off balance, into him. His yellow-clad arm wrapped around me, tightening until I almost couldn't breathe.

At least I can see now, I thought as I spat the hair out of my mouth. The wind was worse with the sun being up, and my hair was gritty and my lips tasted of burnt amber. The red light hurt my eyes. No wonder witches had left to live in an unpolluted world - fleeing a dying ever-after to exist among humans. Stay hidden, Jenks. Wherever you are.

Al was striding out from under the trees, his white-gloved hands in murderous fists. "That witch is mine!" he spat. "I'll fight this all the way through the courts."

"Newt owns the courts," Minias said coolly. "You want the witch, you can buy her like anyone else."

They were going to sell me?

Al stopped at the base of the stairs, frustrated. "My mark came first!"

"And that means what?" Minias sniffed, and a pair of wraparound glasses appeared on his face. "Give me permission to jump you underground through the lines," he said to me. "It's disgusting up here."

My chest hurt, and I wondered if the earth charms in my gun were still good. "No."

From the gray slump that was Trent came a raspy "Never."

One of the demons nudged him with his foot, and a shocking scream burst from Trent, quickly stifled and turned into a ragged gasp of air. Pity filled me as I remembered the agony of Al forcing me to hold more ever-after than I could bear. It felt as if your soul were on fire. Tears warmed my eyes, and I shut them when Trent passed out and the ugly sounds stopped.

"This one at least is mine," Minias said. "Tag him as a novelty and work up a brief history so the collectors will be interested. Don't take a lot of time. Rachel Mariana Morgan will be the high-ticket item."

"You can't auction her off. She's mine! I've been grooming her for over a year," Al threatened, and the tails of his green velveteen coat flapped as he strode up the steps. His chiseled face was hard, and he squinted as if his tinted glasses were ineffective. "I marked her first. Newt's claim is secondary. This is my job!"

My teeth clenched, but I could do nothing when Trent and the demon who had touched him into unconsciousness vanished.

"The courts will decide," Minias said, yanking me out of Al's reach.

Al's strong jaw clenched and his hands turned into fists. I wasn't all that joy-joy about it either, and I struggled when Minias gave me a shake and said, "Let me jump you."

I shook my head, and he shrugged, tapping a line. He was going to try to stun me the same way they had stunned Trent. I felt it coming, and I opened my thoughts to take it, gasping as ever-after energy roared into me. I spindled it, panting with the effort.

Minias's eyebrows furrowed, and he turned to Al. "You ass!" he shouted. "You taught a witch how to spindle a line as well? You lied to the courts? Dali can't help you now."

Al jerked back a step. "I did not," he said indignantly. "They never asked. And I bound her to condition as tight as the elf 's. What is the problem here! I have control of the situation!"

I had two demons fighting over me. Seconds, maybe. I reached for a line. Minias felt it.

"Bloody hell!" he swore. "She's trying to jump!" he shouted, shaking me. "Now how do we contain her?"

I touched the line, willing it to take me, my thoughts on Ivy. But a thick white-gloved fist swung to meet my temple. It ripped me from Minias's grip, and I fell, my hands getting between me and the cement at the last moment, palms scraping. Someone's foot slammed into my gut, and gasping for air, I rolled into the basilica's side door. Unable to breathe, I stared at the ugly red sky and felt the wind on my face.

"Like that," Al snarled. "Leave catching familiars to the experts, Minias."

I felt Minias pick me up, my arms dangling. "Holy sweet spit, she's still not out."

"Then you hit her again," Al said, and another burst of pain sent me into nothing.