Diana Rowland - Fury of the Demon

Finally the wind died, and I felt the rush of potency that told me the call was complete. I anchored the flows and settled the weird turbulence as much as I could before releasing the portal.

Mzatal knelt in the center of the diagram, head lowered. Bryce stood beside him, bent over at the waist with his hands on his knees. Paul lay sprawled on his back by Mzatal, breathing hard. Jekki, curled in a tight blue ball, lifted his head and gave me a chirrup, then raced upstairs as if the summoning had been a walk in the park.

“Whoa,” Paul moaned. “That was a lot worse than going.”

My attention remained on Mzatal, and I clung to the hope that he was truly rested and recovered. “Good to see you again, sweetheart,” I said.

He lifted his head, opened his eyes, ancient gaze upon me. A smile touched the corners of his mouth. “I have missed you, beloved.”

Potency radiated from him, and his eyes damn near glowed with strength and vitality. My smile widened. “You look good, Boss.” I moved to him, crouched, slid my arms around him. A humming vibration passed through me. Hot damn, was he ever supercharged.

The vibration increased as he wrapped his arms around me, kissed me. Though I felt no threat, I had the sense he was so strong in this moment he could snap me in half with his arms if he chose to. I smiled into the kiss. What the hell had he been up to? Whatever it was, I liked it.

After a moment, he broke the kiss and released me. He laid a hand on the downed Paul’s shoulder briefly, then stood in a smooth movement and held his hand out to me.

I took it, rose from the crouch then looked over Bryce who still stood doubled over beside us. “Thatcher, you look a lot better than the last time I saw you.” I smiled. “I’m Kara Gillian.”

With effort, he pushed himself upright. Medium build, lean and efficient, he wasn’t an overly handsome man, but he was also far from unattractive. His hair was about the same color as mine—boring dull brown—but his hazel eyes held an interesting combination of kind and dangerous . “Ms. Gillian,” he said, extending his right hand. “I owe you my life. And please, call me Bryce.”

I took his hand, shook it. “Not a problem. I’m sure we’ll figure out a fair trade.” I grinned to signal that I wasn’t serious.

Bryce gave me a smile. Nothing toothy but not as subtle as Mzatal’s either. “I’ll see what I can do about that.”

Paul groaned and struggled up into a sitting position.

Bryce moved over to him. “Hey, kid, you okay?”

The young man staggered to his feet, swayed. “Sure,” he said with a gasp that left me doubtful, though I knew Mzatal would address it if Paul had suffered any true harm.

Bryce caught his arm and studied him, a look of concern on his face. “No shitting me. Are you okay?”

Paul dragged in a deeper breath and straightened his shoulders. “Yeah. I’m good. I promise. A little shaky is all.” He gave Bryce a convincingly reassuring smile. “Thanks.”

“Go sit until you’re not shaky anymore,” Bryce ordered and herded Paul toward the futon.

Their interaction spoke volumes of true concern. I breathed a sigh of relief and allowed myself cautious optimism that their relationship was genuine.

Mzatal squeezed my hand, laid his fingers on my cheek. His eyes narrowed. “Beloved, what has happened to you?”

He felt the discord remaining from Farouche’s influence. “I had a run in with Farouche and got zapped by the same sort of thing that affected Paul,” I said, then continued with a summary of the road encounter, trusting he would read the details from me. “It was awful. Ryan cleared the worst of it, but I figure you can get rid of the rest.”

He brought his other hand up in readiness to place on my head, paused, waiting for my consent. That was huge progress from our first days together when he did precisely what he wished whether I liked it or not.

I gave him a smile. “Please do what you can.”

Mzatal cradled my head between his hands, and I felt the subtle whisper of his mental touch. “This is the same energy I cleared from Paul in the warehouse and from Bryce during his healing,” he murmured. He went quiet for a moment, working, and I felt the release of the fear response like the pop of a soap bubble. As a test, I consciously considered kicking Farouche in the balls. Not even a hint of fear in reaction, when a few minutes earlier the thought would have elicited near panic.

I began to smile in relief, then realized that Mzatal remained utterly and impossibly still, even though the Farouche influence was clearly gone.

A wave of dread and worry came to me through the bond. Tensing, I reached up to grip one of his hands. “Boss?” I said, keeping my voice low to not draw the attention of the two men. “What’s wrong?”

His eyes opened, and in them the dread was magnified a hundred-fold. “Rhyzkahl’s virus, the implant in you—its containment was . . . cracked by the incident with Farouche,” he said.

Sick fear threatened to swamp me, but deep breathing kept it at a low simmer. “All right,” I said, rather pleased that I sounded calm. I sure as hell didn’t feel it. “But you can re-contain it, right?”

Mzatal didn’t answer for what was probably a full minute. An eternity of time, while he continued to assess and measure and consider. “I can,” he finally replied. “Though it will require frequent reinforcement now, as it is . . . leaking.” He stroked his thumb over my cheek, visibly holding his own dread in check. “Confusion, or feeling not yourself, would be signs that you are in need of care.”

“Got it,” I said, gave him a light smile I didn’t feel one bit, not with rakkuhr contaminating me like radiation from a faulty nuclear power reactor. “We’ll have to be joined at the hip then, won’t we?” I took a deep breath and released it. “We’ll find Idris, get back to your realm, and then fix this shit once and for all.”

“We will find the means to counter it,” he replied, voice still low yet filled with intensity. “It is still far from coalescing here,” he touched my sternum, “for the final stage.”

My mouth felt as dry as Death Valley. “And if it coalesces?” I knew I’d become Rowan, but would it be like turning on a switch? A gradual morph? Or would I change like a werewolf? WereRowan , I thought somewhat hysterically.

I felt his mental caress, his understanding that I needed to find any shred of humor I could to shield myself from the utter horror of what I faced. “The rakkuhr would crawl sigil to sigil in the order they were created,” he murmured. He slid his hand to my chest, then down my side and to my back, “until it reaches Szerain’s, to finalize with you lost to Rowan.”

I realized I had a death grip on his other hand, and I forced myself to unclench my fingers. “All right,” I said with a slight nod. “If shit starts to get bad, we go back to the demon realm, and you and Elofir can lock it down again.” I didn’t wait for him to confirm or deny that. I didn’t want to dwell on it for an instant longer. “How about I get you caught up on what’s been going on?” I said, and immediately proceeded to fill him in. Idris and the phone call. Everything he said, including the possible StarFire reference. His sister’s death and his mother’s probable role as hostage. Katashi on Earth. The “Rowan” bit at the end of the call, and I now wondered if that had contributed to the crack in the containment of the virus? During the entire summary I consciously remained mentally open to make it easy for Mzatal to read details and nuances. Sometimes that whole no-privacy-around-lords thing was convenient. “Oh, and my aunt—”