Sarah Brennan - The Demon's Lexicon

Nick recognized this one. She was the woman he’d killed last week as a wolf. Now her eyes were black and turning to fluid, her yellow hair was tangled, and the smell was worse than the sight of her.

Behind him, Jamie said, “I’m not all that accustomed to the walking dead. Is it all right if I cry with terror?”

Nick kept his eyes on the body. He stepped back a few paces, Jamie thankfully having the sense to step back with him, so he could get a proper look at her. She was shuffling rather than walking, hands limp by her sides even though her face was intelligent and purposeful. She was being careful, because this body was almost at its limit.

This was going to be almost too easy.

Nick grinned and waited, shifting the sword hilt in his hands. The body advanced, feet dragged forward by willpower alone, and as she did, her discolored lips twitched into a grin back.

Nick stepped backward again and took one hand off the sword hilt to beckon her on.

She lunged and he swung at the same time, the blow connecting powerfully with her neck. The body spasmed, and Nick had to swing and hit twice more, hacking at the neck, until her head came off. It rolled down that solemn, picture-lined corridor. Her hands clawed feebly at the air, trying to get to Nick, and then stilled.

Nick turned to Jamie before the body hit the floor. “They’re not hard to kill,” he said. “It’s just that most people panic, seeing the dead.”

“Oh, they panic, do they?” Jamie asked in a hollow voice. “I can’t imagine why.”

Nick knelt and wiped his sword clean with the charmed tapestry. Blood was much easier to clean off than the stuff that you got on your sword after killing the dead, and he was rubbing vigorously when he heard the voice.

It came from behind the nearest door.

It was a man’s voice, and it sounded like he was alone. Mae’s plan had worked. They’d caught a magician studying.

“Hellebore and belladonna in a true lover’s knot,” he said, as if he was reading aloud from a book.

This was a magician, all right.

“Get behind me,” Nick ordered again.

It was too good a chance to miss, but it could be a trick. He sheathed his sword and felt in the sheath at his belt for his throwing knife. A throwing knife was tricky; he might have only one shot, and that one from a distance. For a moment he wished for one of Alan’s guns.

The voice went on, quiet and familiar. Nick wondered where he knew it from, and then supposed it might be Gerald. He hoped it was. He wanted a chance to get even with Gerald.

“A child’s tear and a drop of running water blended. All these things make—”

Nick pressed his hand flat against the door, and the heavy slab of oak went back easily, its hinges moving smooth as silk. The swift glide of the door opening showed Nick an enormous room with a vaulted ceiling and a wide, polished expanse of wood floor.

Across the floor a dozen summoning circles were drawn, as if someone had decided to create designs rather than laying down a carpet. The lines for communication and the borders between the worlds cut the floor into gleaming slices. Walking on that floor would be walking into a minefield of magic.

In the center of the minefield was an indoor bonfire. Flames rose high from every line inside the summoning circle at the middle of the room and arched to meet up near the ceiling in a great golden dome.

Under the golden dome was Anzu, looking far more birdlike than he had at the Goblin Market. He had a pair of heavy, dark wings that made him sit hunched forward in the flame, and a sharp, curved beak on a human face. From that predator’s beak a quiet voice issued, sounding as if he was reading from a magician’s book.

“All these things make a trap,” finished Anzu, his beak stretching impossibly into a smile.

Nick stared and then, under the hiss of the fire, he heard a tiny stifled gasp. That was when he realized the trap was behind him.

He spun around, but a magician already had one arm locked around Jamie’s throat and a gun pressed against his temple. He was standing directly behind Jamie, and he was no taller; all Nick could see was the graying top of the magician’s head. Nick hoped for a moment that Jamie would do something magical, but then he realized that Jamie had probably used all his magic getting Mae to the roof.

Magicians didn’t have much power on their own. That was why they used demons.

Jamie was helpless.

If Nick tried to throw the knife at the magician, he would hit Jamie.

Fortunately, there was another option.

Standing beside Jamie and smiling was another magician. This one was familiar. This one was Gerald.

He looked as pleasant and foxy-faced as before, his arms folded and his eyes wide. He looked like the perfect target.

Nick badly wanted to throw the knife, and he would have done it, if the talisman against his chest had not stirred into sudden restless life. The talisman burned, and suddenly the world looked different.

Gerald’s harmless look was another trap. The way Nick’s talisman was reacting, Gerald was already working a spell, something building in the air and ready to be unleashed. It was obvious he had a lot more power than someone his age should. Enough to have hidden all of it before. Enough to make it clear beyond a shadow of doubt that he’d been captured on purpose before. Enough not to bother hiding any of it now as Jamie’s breath came too fast and Nick gripped his knife too tight and the talisman warned him about danger he could not escape.

Nick lowered the knife slightly, and the burning of his talisman eased.

Gerald ducked his head and smiled, for all the world as if he wanted to make friends.

“Should I cut the boy’s throat?” asked the strange magician, who turned out to be a woman.

Nick noted her cool, upper-class voice. He wanted details to remember her by.

“No, Laura,” Gerald ordered. “Wait a minute. I want to see something.”

So Gerald had authority as well as power. Interesting.

“Nick?” Gerald said in a careful tone, as if talking to a pet who showed signs of turning savage. “Would you put down your weapons?”

The magician called Laura snorted. “You must be mad. Why would—”

Nick smiled slowly. “What?” he drawled. “All my weapons?”

“Yes. Put down all your weapons,” Gerald confirmed, in his mild, patient way. “Or we cut Jamie’s throat.”

He’d never liked Jamie all that much anyway.

That was Nick’s first thought. His second thought was that Alan did like Jamie, that Jamie made him laugh, and that there had always been more to Alan’s protectiveness of Jamie than a desire to impress Mae. Blond, sunny Jamie was probably Alan’s idea of a proper brother, a real one, the one he could’ve had if his mother had lived. Alan would want Jamie safe.

Besides, Jamie was Mae’s brother. Nick found he did not want to think about how Mae would look if she learned that Nick had let her little brother die.

Nick would have preferred not to see Jamie die, given the choice, but he hadn’t been given a choice. It was not as if the magicians would let Jamie go if Nick put down his weapons. They would only kill Nick too, and then he would have committed a very noble and totally pointless suicide.

“We won’t hurt you,” Gerald promised.

“Oh, really? On your honor as murderous magicians?”

Laura made a choked-off sound of surprise or indignation, but Gerald kept his eyes trained on Nick’s face.

“Black Arthur doesn’t want you hurt. Do what we ask, and the boy won’t be hurt either.”

“Gerald, this is ridiculous,” said Laura sharply.

It could be true, Nick thought. Even if Arthur had been hunting them for Mum’s charm all this time, he might not want Nick killed. He was Arthur’s son.