The Outlaw Demon Wails (39 page)

Trent blanched at Minias's unheard response. “I'm using Morgan's calling circle,” he said as if answering a question, then followed it up with “Standing beside me.”

A sudden pop of air pressure hurt my eardrums, and I jumped.

Minias had blinked into this side of reality within Trent's circle. A thin hand held his yellow cap onto his head, and his beautiful green-trimmed robe looked loose and undone. His curly hair was in disarray, and with him was the scent of burnt amber and bread hot from the oven.

The demon had his back to me, but I could see his shock when he realized where he was and spun. “By the two worlds colliding,” he swore softly as he looked me up and down. “After sunset and still alive? How did you manage that?”

I shrugged one shoulder as Trent took his hand from the mirror and stood. Her back hunched, Ceri whisked it away.

“You kick your dog one too many times, someone's going to call the animal protection agency,” I said, not liking the servile attitude Ceri had adopted in Minias's presence. “Now
that's
an organization you don't want to piss off.”

Minias's gaze went to my friends clustered together on holy ground, then Trent—who was trying to look calm—then finally back to me. “An audience?”

I shrugged again. “My friends.”

Trent cleared his throat. “This is nice, but we do have a deadline.”

My lips pressed. “Which you just blabbed to him, Trent. Way to go.”

Trent reddened, and Ceri made a telling face. Minias, though, tugged his yellow robe tightly closed and smiled wickedly at the elf.

“I want to bargain with you,” Trent said, casually clasping his hands
behind his back to hide their trembling. “I don't want to know your name; I've asked for your presence, not summoned you; and I'm never going to call you again.”

Minias reached behind himself for the ornate wire-and-cushion chair that had appeared, tugging it closer until he could sit. “I'll believe that when I see it.” His goat-slitted eyes shifted to me, and I forgot to breathe. “Curiosity brought me here. I thought it might have been someone else.” His attention landed on Ceri, then slid away. “What could you possibly want, and why in heaven and hell do you think I will help you? A putrid little elf?”

Without hesitation, Trent said, “I want passage in and out of the ever-after for two people, and asylum while we're there. You don't touch us or tell anyone we're there.”

Minias's eyebrows rose, and he blinked slowly. “You're going to try to kill Al?” he said softly, and I refused to look away or change my expression. There were ways to solve problems other than killing someone, but if that's what he thought we were doing, then no one would be watching the archive. Right?

In a smooth motion, the demon leaned forward. “I can get you there, but nothing will buy my silence. Two trips in and out,” he said speculatively. “You and Ceridwen Merriam Dulciate?”

Trent shook his head, then did a double take to look at Ceri. “You're a Dulciate?” he stammered, and she flushed.

“It means little now,” she murmured, her attention down. Minias cleared his throat, and Trent dragged his gaze from her.

“Me and the witch,” Trent said, still glancing at Ceri.

“I suppose asking for your soul is out of the question?” the demon said, and I looked at the first of the stars starting to show. We could be here all night. But Trent seemed to have found a cavalier attitude and he turned sideways, as if not really caring whether Minias went along with this or not.

“Stanley Saladin has purchased multiple trips from a demon,” he said, his voice carrying an indolent confidence. “Four trips through the lines is not worth my soul, and you know it.”

“Stanley Saladin bought line passages from someone trying to lull him into servitude,” Minias said. “It was an investment, and I'm not looking for a familiar. Even if I was, I'd buy one, not bother raising one up from scratch. And what makes you think your soul is worth anything?”

Trent said nothing, calmly indifferent until Minias asked, “What do you have that's worth your soul, Trenton Aloysius Kalamack?”

A confident smile curved over Trent. I was shocked at his attitude—he was slipping into this demon-bargaining mode far too easily—but Ceri didn't seem surprised. A businessman is a businessman.

“Good.” Trent patted his front for a nonexistent pen. “I'm glad we can talk. I'd like to finish this cleanly, without any marks to be settled at a future date.”

Minias's eyes narrowed, and I blanched. “No,” he said firmly. “I want a mark. I like the idea of you owing me.”

Trent's face went tight. “I can give you the secret of Morgan's parentage—”

My breath hissed in. “You son of a bitch!” I shouted, leaping for him.

“Rachel!” Ceri cried, and I smacked into a front fall when she tripped me.

I scrambled up. My respect for her, not her small hand on my arm, held me back. “That's mine!” I shouted. “You can't buy a trip into the ever-after with my secrets!”

Minias glanced between us. “Add a minor demon mark, and you have your curses.”

“Make it settled at my discretion, not yours,” Trent haggled, and I jerked from Ceri's grip.

“You son of a bitch!” I yelled, getting in his face. The man had the gall to make an innocent face at me, and losing it, I shoved him into Ceri's outer circle.

He stumbled back, hitting it as if it were a wall. There was a shout of protest, and Quen's toes were suddenly edging near the salt ring. He was ticked, and Ivy was behind him, her lips pressed into a thin line, ready to take Quen down if he somehow got through the sheet of ever-after.

“You sorry little pissant!” I shouted, standing over Trent in his little black jumpsuit with my borrowed duster edging his legs. “You pay for my trip with information about me? I could have done that myself! I only agreed to protect you because you were paying my way!”

“Rachel.” Ceri was trying to soothe me, but I'd have none of it. I reached to grab his lapels, and he rolled to his feet. It was fast, and I tried to hide my surprise.

“I'll accept that deal,” Minias said, and I almost screamed.

“Done!” Trent shouted, and Minias grinned. “Back off, Morgan, or I'm taking Ceri with me instead, and you get nothing!”

Seething, I glanced at Ceri. He wouldn't dare. He wouldn't dare ask Ceri to go. I saw her fear, hating Trent all the more for threatening her like that. She'd go if I didn't, if only to try to help her species. “You are foul, Trent,” I said as I backed from him. “This isn't over. When we're done here, we're going to talk.”

“Don't threaten me,” he said, and my blood seemed to burn under my skin. I looked at my mother, shocked to see her being held back by Keasley. Her color was high and she looked one hundred percent pissed. If I didn't make it back, she would make sure Trent would be sorry he had ever put me, and now Takata, in danger. If Trent talked, demons would be coming after him, too.

“Interesting,” Minias said, and I spun back to him. “Rachel Mariana Morgan protecting Trenton Aloysius Kalamack? Trenton Aloysius Kalamack paying Rachel Mariana Morgan's way? This isn't a suicide run to kill Al. What, by the two worlds, are you doing?”

I pulled back to the edge of the circle until it buzzed a harsh warning. Shit, I hadn't realized I had telegraphed so much of our intent. Jaw clenched, I glared at Trent. “Get your cookie-ass in there and get your mark so we can get out of here,” I demanded, and Trent blanched. A moment of satisfaction colored my anger, and I made an ugly face. “Yeah,” I said bitterly. “You're going to wear his mark, and you're going to have to trust that he doesn't just change his mind and cart you off once you're in there with him.”

Ceri frowned. “That's rude, Rachel,” she said. “He's bound by law to leave Trenton alone for the duration.”

“Just like Al's not supposed to hurt me or my family,” I muttered as I backed away from Minias. My legs were shaking from adrenaline as I gestured to Trent to cross over the middle, uninvoked circle and get on with it. The elf got up, brushed himself off, and, with his thin lips pressed tightly, walked over the chalked line with his chin high.

Ceri knelt to touch the line, and a circle of black rose between us and Minias. For a moment, there were three circles, Ceri holding the outer two and Trent holding the innermost one. Then Trent touched his and it fell to put himself and Minias breathing the same air.

Minias smiled, and Trent went ashen. My own heart pounded in the memory of Al doing the same thing to me. Crap, was I trying to feel better about myself by dragging those I envied down to where I was?

“Where do you want it?” the demon asked, and I wondered why, unless it was more degrading to look at it every day knowing you asked for it, rather than have it forced on you. I felt the raised circle on the inside of my wrist, thinking I had to get rid of one of these soon.

His eyes never leaving Minias's, Trent shoved his sleeve up to show a lightly muscled arm, toned and sun-darkened. Minias grabbed his wrist, and Trent flinched at the knife the demon suddenly held, jerking only once as he scribed a circle bisected with a single line into him. I thought I smelled the acidic scent of blood and the rich aroma of cinnamon. I glanced at Ivy—her pupils were dilating as Quen looked at her in disgust.

“Tell me of Rachel's father,” Minias said, his hand still around Trent's wrist. The mark had stopped bleeding, and Trent was staring at it, shocked that it looked old and long healed.

“Give me the way to cross the lines,” he said, his gaze jerking up to Minias's.

The demon's eye twitched. “It's in your head,” he said. “Just say the words of invocation, and you and whoever is with you will cross the lines. Now tell me of Rachel's sire. If I don't think it worth the imbalance of four trips through the lines, I'll simply upgrade your mark and give you a second slash.”

I fidgeted, and my mother shook off Marshal's restraint.
Damn it, Takata. I'm sorry.
Trent was a bastard. I was going to get him for this.

“The man who raised her was human,” he said, staring at Minias. “I found out when he came to my father asking for a cure. I have Morgan's father's medical records, but there's no name on them. I don't know who he is.”

Keasley and Marshal looked shocked that my dad wasn't a witch, but my lips parted in wonder.
Trent had…lied?
My mother was sagging in relief, and I reached behind me until I touched the wall of ever-after, leaning my hand against it for support. He hadn't told. He hadn't told Minias. Trent had lied.

Minias's attention flicked to me and back again. His grip on Trent tightened. “Who's her birth father?” he asked, and Trent's gaze grew wild.

“Ask her,” he said, and my heart seemed to start beating again. “She knows.”

“Not enough,” Minias said, knowing he was lying. “Tell me…or you're mine.”

My fear redoubled. Did he expect me to save his ass by blurting it out?

“The man is alive,” Trent said, that same wild glint in his eye. “He's alive, and Rachel's mother is alive. Morgan's children will survive carrying the ability to kindle demon magic. And I can make more like her.” His smile grew ugly. “Let go of me.”

Minias's gaze flicked to me. With a shove, he let go of Trent and took a step back. “The mark stands as it is.”

Ceri was crying silently, tears trickling down her face as she stood and watched Trent find his composure. Had Trent just assured him that in a few generations they'd have a crop of highly desirable witch familiars available? Ones that could invoke their curses so they wouldn't have to? God help me, he was slime. Utter slime. He had put demon hit-marks on my potential children before they were even born.

I stood where I was and fought to keep from throttling him. He had spared Takata only because he had found a way to hurt me worse. “Can we go now?” I said, hating him.

Minias nodded, and Trent stepped back. The elf set the inner circle to
trap him, and when Ceri dropped hers, he retreated to stand beside us. The scent of burnt amber caught at my throat, and Trent reeked. Knowing Trent's circle would fall when we left, Ceri reinstated the second circle about Minias.

The rising and falling bands of power were making me ill. Minias smiled from behind the two different arcs of reality as if he didn't care that he was going to be trapped in a small circle for thirteen hours until the rising sun freed him. Trent's words must have pleased him to no end.

I picked up my satchel and stood ready. My eyes flicked from Ivy to my mom, and my heart pounded. It was going to be over one way or the other really soon. Afterward, Trent and I were going to chat.

“Be careful,” my mother said, and I nodded, gripping the straps of my bag tighter.

And then Trent tapped a line and said a word of Latin.

The breath was pushed out of my lungs, and I felt myself fall. The curse seemed to shred me into thoughts held together by my soul. A tingling washed through me, and my lungs rebounded, filling with a harsh gritty air.

I gasped, my hands and knees slamming into the grass-covered ground and my hat falling off. Beside me I could hear Trent retching.

Stumbling to my feet, I swallowed the last of my nausea and looked past my blowing curls to the red-stained sky and long grass. I wanted to give Trent a swift kick for putting my future kids on the demon's radar, but figured I could wait until I knew I had a future.

“Welcome to the homeland, Trent,” I muttered, praying we all got back to where we belonged before sunup.

Shaky, I fumbled with the satchel's zipper to find the map and orient myself. It was cold, and I pulled my hat lower as the acidic wind pushed the hair from my face and I scanned the image of a dim wasteland glinting under the red-smeared sky. I half-expected to see the ruins of my church, but there was nothing there. Stunted trees and twisted bushes rose between hummocks of dried grass. A red haze glowed from the bottom of the clouds where Cincy would have stood, but here, on this side of the dry river, it was mostly sad-looking vegetation.

Trent wiped his mouth with a hankie he then hid under a rock. His eyes were black in the red light, and I could tell he didn't like the wind pushing on him. He didn't look cold, though. The man never got cold, which was starting to tick me off.

Squinting, I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and focused on the map. The air stank, and the scent of burnt amber caught deep in my throat. Trent coughed, quickly stifling it. David's duster shifted about my heels, and I was glad I had it, wanting something between me and the greasy-feeling air. It was dark, but the clouds reflecting the glow from the broken,
distant city gave everything a sick look, like the light in a photographer's darkroom.

Arms wrapped around my stomach, I followed Trent's gaze to the twisted vegetation, trying to decide if the red-sheened rocks hiding in the grass were tombstones. Amid the trees was a large, shattered slump of crumbling stone. With a lot of imagination, it could have been the kneeling angel.

Trent looked down at the faint tink of metal at his feet. Bending for a closer look, he thumbed a penlight on. It glowed a sickly red, and I cringed at the revealing light, then leaned so our heads almost touched for a better look. In the scuffed grass was a tiny bell, black with tarnish. It wasn't solid, but made of decorative loops that brought to mind a Celtic knot. Trent's hand reached, and in a wash of adrenaline, I gave him a shove.

“What in hell are you doing?” I all but hissed as he glared at me, and I wished I had hit him hard enough to knock him on his butt. “Don't you ever watch TV? If there is a pretty sparkly thing on the ground, leave it alone! If you pick it up, you're going to release the monster, or fall through a trapdoor, or something. And what is it with the light? You want to tell every demon this side of the ley lines where we are? God! I should have taken Ivy!”

A surprised look replaced Trent's anger. “You can see the light?” he said, and I snatched it from him and clicked it off.

“Duh!” I exclaimed in a whisper.

He yanked it back. “It's a wavelength that humans can't see. I didn't know that witches could.”

Slightly mollified, I backed down. “Well, I can. Don't use it.” I stood and watched in disbelief as he flicked his light on and belligerently picked up the bell. It tinkled faintly, and after knocking the dirt from it, he jingled it again. I could not believe this. Putting a hand on my hip, I glared at the red glow hovering over the broken city miles away. The pure sound was muffled, and he tucked it in a little belt pouch.

“Freaking tourist,” I muttered, then, louder, said, “If you've got your souvenir, let's go.” I nervously stepped to the more certain dark of a twisted tree. It had no leaves, and it looked dead, the cold, gritty wind having scoured all life from it.

Instead of following, Trent pulled a paper from his back pocket. The penlight came on again, and he shone it on a map. A red glow reflected up on his face, and furious, I snatched the light away again.

“Are you trying to get caught?” I whispered. “If I can see it, and you can see it, what makes you think a demon can't?”

Trent's silhouette grew aggressive, but when the distinctive rustle of something small pushing through grass at a run rose over the soughing of wind in the trees, he closed his mouth.

“You had to ring the bell, didn't you?” I asked, pulling him into the shadow with me. “You had to ring the damn bell.” I shivered in David's borrowed coat, and he shook his head in disdain.

“Relax,” he said over the rustling of the closing map. “Don't let the wind spook you.”

But I couldn't relax. The moon wouldn't rise until almost midnight, but the ugly glow in the sky made everything look like a first-quarter moon was shining. I stared at the heaviest glow, deciding that was north. The memory of Ceri's map swam up, and I turned a little to the east. “That way,” I said as I tucked his light in my pocket. “We can look at the map when we find some broken buildings to hide the glare behind.”

Trent tucked the map into his pocket and shrugged his pack over his shoulders. I nervously shifted my bag to my other arm, and we started out, glad to be finally moving if only to warm up. Grass hid the low spots, and I stumbled three times before we'd gone thirty feet.

“How good is your night vision?” Trent asked when we found a reasonably level swath that ran exactly east to west.

“Okay.” I wished I had brought my gloves, and I hid my hands in my sleeves.

Trent still didn't look cold as he stood before me, his cap making his outline radically different. “Can you run?”

I licked my lips, thinking of the uneven footing. I wanted to say “Better than you,” but quashing my irritation, I said, “Not without breaking something.”

The red haze from the clouds lit his slight frown. “Then we walk until the moon rises.”

He turned his back on me and started off at a fast pace. I jumped to keep up. “Then we walk until the moon rises,” I mocked under my breath, thinking that Mr. Elf had no idea of the situation. Wait until he saw his first surface demon. Then he'd put his little scrawny elf ass behind mine where it belonged. Until then, he could find the dips in the grass and snap his freaking ankle.

The wind was a constant push, and my ears ached with it. My head slowly bowed until I had to force myself to look up and past the ever-moving shadow of Trent's back. He kept a constant motion just above my comfortable pace as he ghosted forward with a minimal amount of movement through the waist-high grass and past the occasional tree. Slowly I started to warm up, and watching him, I started questioning my decision to wear David's long leather duster. My legs were protected from the dry ache of the gritty wind, but it set up an unnerving hush against the grass that Trent's jumpsuit barely touched.

Things were no better when we left the grass behind and slipped under the canopy of a mature, twisted forest. The ground vegetation was sparser, but now there were tree roots. We passed what might have once been a lake, currently covered in a thick bramble, the thorns lapping the edge of the forest like waves.

I finally called for a halt when the trees gave way to chunks of concrete and occasional patches of thick grass. Trent stopped his unrelenting pace and turned. The wind was a cool brush against me, and breathless, I pointed to what looked like a crumbling overpass. Without a word, he angled to a slump of rock underneath.

Hand on my side and my thoughts on the water and energy bars Ivy had packed for me, I followed, sinking down beside Trent on the cold rock and glad for something solid behind me. I'd been fighting the feeling of watching eyes since we found the forest. The sound of my satchel's zipper was a striking point of normalcy in the red-smeared existence around us, with its greasy wind and heavy clouds.

Trent held his hand out for his light, and I gave it to him. He turned away to study the map as I scanned the terrain behind us. There had been a twisted silhouette at the dry lake, the vaguely human-looking figure
furtive and fleeting. Trent's cupped hand hid much of the light, and his red-tinted finger traced our probable path from where we arrived to where Ceri had indicated the demons had their access to their database. Why it wasn't in the city bothered me, but she had said they had put it on holy ground to prevent demonic or familiar tampering.

The map Ceri had sketched had an eerie feeling of familiarity, with an undulating line indicating the dry river and marks showing where old bridges crossed. It looked like Cincy and the Hollows. Why not? Both sides of reality had a circle at Fountain Square.

Turning away, I dug in my pack. “You want a drink?” I said softly as I brought out a bottle, and when he nodded, I handed it over. The crack of the plastic seal shot through me, and Trent froze until he was sure the wind was still blowing and the night was still.

In the ugly red light, his eyes were black when they met mine. “Guess what's on the patch of holy ground they store their samples on?” he said, tapping the map and Ceri's star.

I looked at the map, then past him to the crumbling remains we had yet to venture into. In the nearby distance, glowing in the early moonlight, were spires. Really familiar spires.

“No…,” I whispered, tucking a curl back behind an ear. “The basilica?”

The wind ruffled the edges of the map while Trent drank, his throat moving as he downed the water. “What else could it be,” he said as he tucked the empty bottle into his sack. The sound of sliding rock jerked him straight, and my pulse pounded.

Trent clicked off his “special light,” but there not a hundred feet away in the sickly red haze was a twisted, hunched silhouette—staring at us with arms hanging slack at its sides. Its feet were shod, and leggings rose past the thin shins. An elbow-long cape fluttered in the cold wind. It turned a bare head to the east as if listening, then back to us. Waiting? Testing? Trying to figure out if we were food or foe?

A shudder rippled over me that had nothing to do with the steadily dropping temperature. “Put your map away,” I whispered as I eased to my feet. “We need to move.”

I thanked God it didn't follow.

This time, I was in front, tension making me almost glide through the ruins as Trent lagged, tripping on sliding rock and swearing when he slipped as he struggled to keep up with my fear-driven pace. We didn't see any more surface demons, but I knew they were there by the occasional rock slide. I didn't question why I found it easier to navigate the sharper shadows that the red moonlight made on the ruins than the natural slump of tree and grass. All I knew was that our presence had been noted and I didn't want to linger.

My first glimpse of the moon shook me, and I tried not to look again after my first, shocked stare. It had become a sickly, red-smeared orb, bloated and hanging over the broken landscape as if in oppression. The moon had always looked silver the few times I had opened my second sight and gazed into the ever-after from the security of my side of the lines. The clear glow of our moon must have been overpowering the red-smeared ugliness I was looking at now. Seeing it with my feet really on alien soil, coated with red like my soul was coated with demon slime, brought to a sharp clarity just how far from home we really were.

We fell in and out of a slow jog as the terrain permitted, traversing the broken, slumping buildings and the occasional line of trees showing where boulevards once were as we went deeper into the remains of concrete and frost-rimmed lampposts, heading for the spires. I started to wonder if the thin, hunched figures that were becoming increasingly bold were elves or witches that hadn't crossed over. Escaped familiars, perhaps? They had auras, but the glow was loose and irregular, like torn clothing. It was as if their auras had been damaged from trying to live in the toxic ever-after.

Worry tightened my brow as we wove through twisted metal that might have once been a bus stop.
Was I poisoning myself by being here?
And if so, how come Ceri was okay? Was it because she hadn't been allowed to age while a familiar? Or maybe Al had kept her healthy by resetting her DNA to the sample on file? Or maybe she never came up to the surface?

A falling rock slid almost to my feet, and I cut a sharp left, betting that there would be an open street after the broken building in front of me
that would lead right to the basilica. I didn't think we were being corralled. God, I hoped we weren't.

Trent followed very close, and our progress slowed as we slipped through a narrow passage. His breathing was loud, and my shoulders eased when we emerged from the broken alley onto a clear street. Chunks of adjacent buildings littered the way, but little else. At Trent's nervous nod, we started forward, skirting the larger debris that might hide a skinny surface demon.

My gaze rose up the broken spires as we approached. There were only carved gargoyles perched on the lower ledges, not real ones. Whether they'd abandoned the ever-after along with the witches and elves or they had never existed here, I didn't know. Apart from the missing gargoyles, the building looked relatively untouched, much like their version of Fountain Square. I wondered if it was because it was holy, or because they had a vested interest in keeping it intact. Trent halted beside me as I looked appraisingly at the door, then he turned to watch our backs.

“You think a front door is open?” I said, wanting to be inside. Though if it was like the one in reality, the only holy ground was limited to the expanse where the altar was.

A rock slid behind us. Head jerking like a startled deer's, Trent took the stairs two at a time and tried all the doors. None of them opened, and seeing that there were no locks on the outside, I started for the side door. “This way,” I whispered.

He nodded, moving fast as he joined me. I couldn't help the flash of memory of me cold-cocking one of his fiancée's bodyguards on the front steps to get in to arrest Trent. I still thought Trent owed me a thank-you for breaking the wedding up. Him being a drug lord and murderer notwithstanding, being married to that cold fish of a woman would have been cruel and unusual punishment.

Trent took the lead, and I followed at a slower pace, watching the street when another slide of rock echoed through the ruined city. The sickly moon had risen over the buildings, the red glare making holes where there were none and disguising the real ones. My fingers itched. I wanted to unroll the
ever-after in my thoughts and flash enough light to send all the surface demons running, but I had to reserve my spindle to do Ceri's charm. That is, if I didn't need it between then and now to save my skin.