A - Immortal Sea

“We can‟t leave him tied up indefinitely,” she said. Calm, when she felt like screaming. “What are you going to do?”

Morgan turned to face her, every movement taut with leashed frustration. “The demon is fire. He needs air to survive. If the

demon‟s air is cut off, he will die.”

Shock held her still. Her heart pounded. “Then so will Zack.”

Morgan met her eyes. “Yes.”

A single word, sharp and solid as an axe. It cleaved her heart in two.

No. She was a doctor. Zack‟s mother, for God‟s sake. Think. There had been that other doctor, the one who lived here

before. The possessed one. What had Morgan said? “When a demon will not exit its host, the only recourse is to rend its

victim’s body uninhabitable . . . Regina bashed her head in with a table leg . ”

Liz drew a shaky breath. And realized what she had to do.

The latex ties dug into his wrists. The damn things would not tear. Tan was forced to dislocate the boy‟s shoulder simply so

he could reach the ties with his teeth. In a captive corner of his mind, he heard Zack‟s guttural sobs, but pain to his host did not

bother the demon. He gnawed through the bindings on one wrist and then, with his arms free, snapped the joint back into place

with a sickening crunch. Tan did not know how long he would inhabit this body, and he wanted to keep it functional. His to

command, his own little finfolk lordling.

Wouldn‟t that annoy Morgan. The thought made Tan smile even as the one inside him fought his control.

But first they must get away.

Tan could hear the warden‟s voice through the white paneled door, and the woman, arguing. Deciding what to do about

their precious son, no doubt.

Tan twitched sinew and muscle, forcing the boy‟s cooperation as he bent to release his ankles. The clumsiness of his

injured arm made the demon hiss in irritation. Perhaps he would find another body after all. Plenty to choose from, once he

was free. He would quite enjoy . . . sampling. The demon had old scores to settle on this island, if he could get around the

pesky wards. And that girl, the one who occupied so many of the boy‟s thoughts, seemed appetizing. Tan would have her, one

way or the other.

The door swung open. Morgan.

And the woman, but she was human. Female. No threat at all.

Tan jerked the boy to his feet. The warden worried Tan. But Morgan would be hampered by his concern for Zack. The

demon had no such handicap. “You should have tied me tighter, fishface.”

Morgan prowled forward without answering.

Tan frowned. He needed a distraction.

He saw the woman, scurrying behind Morgan, reaching for the soft black bag on the floor of the hall. She did not look at

him. He did not want her in the hall. She was in his way.

The demon grinned and ran his tongue over his borrowed teeth, riffling quickly through his host‟s memories. “Mommy, he

hurt me,” he said in the voice of four-year-old Zack.

The woman stiffened. Morgan circled closer. Tan edged away.

“Help me,” he called like a lost child. “Help me, Mommy.”

For a moment, she squeezed her eyes shut, as if in pain. Stupid bitch. Taking advantage of her blindness, Tan sprang, quick

as a fish in his borrowed body.

But Morgan rushed them, whump , hard, slamming Tan/Zack brutally to the floor. The demon overcame his shock, the

pain, wresting control as they slithered, scrambled, rolled across the living room. Morgan grabbed him, wrapping them in his

brute arms. Tan snapped at his wrist, spat in his face.

“You can‟t hurt me,” he taunted. “Not without hurting your spawn.”

“I do not intend to hurt you,” Morgan said, curiously calm.

Tan exerted himself, wriggling furiously to get away. The body he inhabited was almost a match for the warden‟s. The boy

had inherited his sire‟s height. But the warden had weight on his side.

“And you can‟t end me,” Tan said breathlessly. “So you might as well let me go.”

“No, I can‟t end you,” Morgan said. “But she can.”

“She . . .” Tan twisted the boy‟s head to see.

It was the damn woman, approaching with a syringe in her hand. Bitch, bitch, bitch.

Tan bucked and writhed. Betrayal burst from deep within him. “Mommy, no! Mommy, don‟t hurt me!”

Tears ran down her face. “I‟m so sorry,” she whispered. “But it‟s for the best.”

The demon howled in disbelief as she leaned over them, jabbing the needle deep into his arm. “Murderer! Murderer!

Bitch!”

She squeezed the plunger. Tan tried to reach her, to punish her, to possess her, but she stumbled back, weeping, and

Morgan grabbed him tight. They rolled, thrashing, across the floor, crashing into the coffee table, Morgan on top. Morgan was

crushing the boy‟s chest. He needed air.

Tan needed air.

Something was wrong. The body he inhabited was sluggish. Clumsy. Unresponsive. Tan felt dizzy. Weak. Horrified, he felt

his host‟s breath begin to seize, his heart begin to slow.

“You have five minutes,” Morgan said in the boy‟s ear. “For the drug to take full effect, before this body is useless to you.

Will you stay with it and die?”

He was bluffing, Tan thought frantically. He must be bluffing. He would not sacrifice his own son.

“I hate this,” the woman sobbed. “I hate . . .”

You.

Morgan raised his head to look at her, Hell in his eyes. “I should have kept you safe. I should have kept both of you safe.”

Tan wavered. Was it possible? No, it couldn‟t be. But the boy‟s body was fading, failing him. He could not breathe. He

needed air.

Morgan leaned harder. The boy‟s lungs compressed. Spots danced in the demon‟s blurring vision. His energy flickered.

“Will you come out, Tan?” Morgan taunted. “Will you come out and fight?”

Cold sweat beaded on Morgan‟s brow. Beneath him, the demon stared out of Zachary‟s eyes, a feverish, rabid glow.

Morgan increased his pressure on the boy‟s ribcage, praying he did not crack a rib, expelling a puff of breath that brushed

his cheek like smoke.

And then Zack convulsed and vomited Tan out in a column of flame.

The demon erupted in a blaze of defiance, a fire of hate, leaping for the ceiling, reaching for the door.

Triumph seared Morgan. Heat singed his face, his chest, his arms.

He battled back with cold fury, calling the wind to seal the windows, to shut the door, containing the demon, closing him

in. With grim purpose, Morgan summoned the smothering weight of magic. Power rose in him, smooth and high and hard as a

wave, a great surge of power fueled by love and rage. It gathered inside him, churned inside him, towered inside him, taller

than the demon‟s fire.

He directed the wall of magic down, crashing down on the cowering flame. “Tan, I extinguish you!”

And the demon snuffed out.

Morgan‟s heart pounded. Zachary lay abandoned, twisted on the floor. Fear wrenched Morgan‟s chest. This did not feel

like victory. Elizabeth‟s protest seared his memory. “Then Zack will die . ”

But her use of the drug had deceived the demon. Zachary was heavily sedated. Unconscious, but alive. And Elizabeth was

already scrambling forward, falling on her knees at their son‟s head, her black kit open by her side.