Rachel Caine: Kicking It

But the whole place stank of rot and corruption, and I heard the hiss and rustle of disturbed animals. This place would house worse than rats and black widow spiders, though.

Portia was never wrong.

“One thing you ought to know about demons,” Andy said softly, as we moved forward. He had the shotgun in both hands, steady and controlled, and his attention stayed riveted on what was around him. “They ain’t all-powerful. A demon inhabiting a human body has to let it cool off, or it overheats and burns up. If he’s been using Pete Lyons as long as I think, he’ll have to let ol’ Pete rest a spell.”

“Here?” I probably sounded more appalled than I meant to, but . . . ugh.

“Here’s a good spot where he won’t be bothered. Pete’s married, got kids. Can’t trust anybody to leave him alone and unobserved at his home. Here, he’s safe.” Andy did a slow quarter turn, checking out a sound, but it must have been nothing to worry about, because he resumed forward motion. “He’ll have to rest without those boots on. Those are where the demon lives, when it ain’t in him.”

“Destroy the boots, destroy the demon.”

“May not be so easy,” he said. “But that’s the answer. Thing is . . .”

He broke off, because something echoed through the thick, fetid, empty space.

A growl. A thick, harsh one, ratcheting up in ferocity until it sounded like a chain saw howl.

“Thing is,” Andy said with unbelievable calm, “he won’t be unguarded.”

And that was when the devil dog opened its red eyes and stepped out of the shadows ten feet ahead of us.

It was massive— some kind of muscular attack dog breed, but bigger than anything I’d ever seen. Unnaturally bulked up. And those eyes were definitely not something that occurred in nature.

Andy didn’t need to mention that we were in trouble, and he didn’t have time to, either.

As the dog leaped for him, Andy dodged to his right, aimed, and fired both barrels as I dove left. I already had one potion out of my box, and now I dropped the flashlight, threw the potion vial to the gritty marble floor, and stomped on it. The glass shattered, and an explosion of light filled the room, white and clean. It lingered on every surface and angle, and gathered around the black dog as if drawn to him. He shook himself, but the swirls of light just thickened like fog around him.

Andy emptied two more shots into the dog, to no effect, and I opened the potions box, took out two more vials, and tossed them both to him.

He dropped the shotgun, grabbed both bottles out of the air, and smashed them together.

The smell of roses and incense filled the air, and something else, something as sharp as knives and as soft as feathers . . .

And the light around the dog rose up into a column, twisted, spread into wings, and as the dog snarled and snapped at it, it took on a breathtaking form. I could not exactly comprehend it, or see it directly, but the impression of wings and light and the stab of a golden spear burned through my closed eyelids.

The dog gave out a howl that pitched higher and higher into a scream, and rolled over and over on the floor, struggling to free itself.

It ripped loose of the light, and I saw its bloody eyes fix on me.

Beware the dog, Portia had said.

I had nothing else to fight it, but I wasn’t going down easy . . . not even to this hellhound. As Andy dove for the shotgun, I backed up to the wall, braced myself, and as the dog launched itself for my throat, I kicked.

The sole of my work boot met it right in the center of its broad, snarling face.

It yelped, landed awkwardly, and scraped claws on marble as it was pulled back into the blazing, sanctified light.

It went down hard, and lay there, pinned in place by what I could only think was . . . an angel. An avenging one.

Andy didn’t seem too impressed, even by a manifestation of heaven. He walked to me, opened the potions box, found what he was looking for, and poured it into the barrel of his shotgun.

Then he walked back to the pinned demon dog, put the barrel to its head, and fired.

The dog vanished in a cloud of greasy, filthy-smelling smoke. The angel faded with it, as if it couldn’t exist without its opposite; the smell of roses and incense lingered, though, after the terrible stench was gone. “Andy,” I said slowly, “we . . . we didn’t just kill an angel, did we?”

“Can’t kill either one of ’em,” he said. “But they’re both gone. That’s all that counts. Now come on. Lyons will be waking up.” We ran fast, dodging broken benches and fallen ceiling beams. The walls were black with mold, and roaches swarmed in dull hordes ahead of us.

We came to the end of the hall, and there, lying in the center of a ruined rotunda, lay Pete Lyons. He was still in his fine suit, flat on his back on a sleeping bag, and his battered cowboy boots were standing neatly together by his stocking feet.

He was already awake, and as we came to a stop, the circle of stone around him flared with hot red light. It looked poisonous, and Andy halted before he touched it. He extended the shotgun—and it hissed and melted where the metal touched the glow.

“You killed Fido,” Lyons said. He sounded different—hollow, somehow, and weak. Portia had been right; this was where he was vulnerable. But there wasn’t any way to reach him that I could see. The circle was an unbroken dome of crimson around him and the boots. “I’ll fucking eat your eyeballs for snacks.”

“You named it Fido?” Andy said. He tossed the melted shotgun aside, and I set the potions box down between us as he crouched to open it up. “Demons ain’t got much imagination. At least call the damn thing Spot.”

He combed rapidly through our bag of tricks, pulled out something, uncapped it, and poured. The silvery liquid sizzled and vanished on impact. No good.

Lyons was reaching for the boots. We had to break the circle.

Andy drew his pistol and fired. The bullets disintegrated on contact.

I tried another potion, then another.

And then I saw one tucked in way at the back—a mistake, really, jammed in with the high-powered attack potions.

Holly’s Balm: Andy’s calming brew, meant only for bringing peace to troubled souls.

I grabbed it, uncapped it, and poured the fluid on the surface of the red shield . . . and a white streak ran down where it touched the red. It had a glassy shine to it, and I yelled at Andy and pointed.

He fired at it, and the hardened shell . . . shattered. Popped like a red blood bubble, leaving spatter on the walls and on our faces, and it smelled foul. I wiped at it with my sleeve, but didn’t pause as I jumped the line.

Lyons had one boot in his hand and was fitting it on his toes. I almost reached for it, almost, but something stopped me—the memory of that feeling of snakes slithering on my skin. Fangs gleaming and ready to strike. If I touched it, it would own me, too.

Instead, I shifted my weight and kicked, hard. I broke Lyons’s fingers in the process, most likely; the boot flew off to smack against the far wall. I kicked its mate over to join it.

When Lyons tried to crawl after it, Andy stepped up, cocked his pistol, and put it to his head. “I wouldn’t,” he said. As always, he sounded way too calm. “Unless you want to see what’s on your mind, friend.”

Lyons froze, breathing hard, and I grabbed my potion box and ran to the boots.

They were moving. The pointed tips turned to face me, and worked into that battered leather was something living, a reptilian, vile face that stared back at me. Something that needed to go back to hell fast, because I knew it was capable of moving on its own now . . . capable of touching me.