Jenna Black - Speak of the Devil

Adam didn’t look happy. “What if we’re wrong? What if Jessica’s just a bitch and Abraham is lurking somewhere else? You can’t exorcize a person who’s not possessed, and if you’ve kidnapped her …”

Why was nothing ever easy? “Do you have any better ideas?”

“I’m planning to go have a chat with her later today. Maybe she’ll let something slip that will make me positive Abraham’s in there.”

I frowned. “You can see auras, can’t you? More easily than an exorcist, I mean?” He’d examined my aura once in the early days, when I was first discovering that I was possessed.

“Yeah, but I need skin-to-skin contact and maybe thirty seconds or so of quiet concentration. I doubt Jessica would allow that even if she’s not possessed. But I’ll see what I can do.”

“And you’ll let me know.”

“Of course.”

The soup was ready now, and Dominic brought it to me on a tray he must have brought with him. I certainly didn’t own such a thing. He saw the suspicious look on my face and smiled.

“Consider it a get-well gift. I expect you to eat most of your meals in bed until you’ve fully regained your strength.”

It felt surprisingly good to be taken care of like this. It was an entirely unfamiliar situation, mainly because I usually pushed people away if they tried to pamper me. Hell, I just push people away, period. But just this once, I allowed myself to revel in it. Even Saul’s undisguised sulking and Adam’s brooding didn’t spoil the mood for me. And when all three of the guys left me so I could get some more sleep, I felt strangely bereft.

I dozed on and off for maybe an hour or two. My head no longer hurt at all, though my mind still felt slow and clouded. My stomach seemed to have recovered fully, growling at me to get more food into my system. I dragged myself to my feet and shambled toward the kitchen, hoping there was more of Dominic’s chicken soup awaiting me in the fridge. And that was when I noticed the envelope, peeking out from under my door.

Every once in a while, I get a premonition that my life is about to take a turn for the worse. I was getting one of those right now. Unfortunately, my premonitions are usually frighteningly accurate.

My appetite vanished as I stared at that envelope. Nothing good ever seemed to come from mysterious envelopes, and I wondered if the universe would mind if I just pretended it didn’t exist.

The envelope was unmarked and unsealed, and inside was a single sheet of white copy paper with a typewritten note. It wasn’t hard to guess who had written it.

The note began with a long list of names, all of which were familiar to me: Adam; Dominic; Diane Kingsley, my mother; Raymond and Edna Griffith, my mom’s parents, who lived in Florida; Andy; Tommy Brewster; Saul; Barbara Paget; Blair Paget; Carl, the overly friendly clerk at the front desk. Even my lawyer, Brandon Cook, and Laura Maguire, whom I barely knew, were on the list.

The rest of the note was brief and to the point. Abraham “requested the pleasure of my presence” at an abandoned building on the Schuylkill River tonight at midnight for some “fun and games.” Failure to show up—alone, of course—would result in the death of one of the people on the list, and a repetition of the invitation until I accepted, or all the people on the list were dead.

My appetite completely forgotten, I trudged back to the couch and closed my eyes. Maybe if I went back to sleep and woke up again, I’d find that the note was just a dream. I sighed. If only!

It seemed that finding my good friend Abraham wasn’t going to be much of a problem after all. It was one of those “Be careful what you wish for” deals.

“I have to go,” I said, speaking as much to Lugh as to myself. I expected him to argue, to command me to summon the cavalry. Instead, he stayed silent so long I thought I’d somehow miraculously managed to resurrect the mental barriers that had once upon a time existed between me and him. But of course, that wasn’t the case.

I agree , Lugh said, right when I’d decided I wasn’t going to hear his voice after all. I was actually startled enough to jump.

“You what?” I asked, thinking maybe I was starting to hallucinate.

I agree that you have to go. Abraham has already proven how little he minds killing people. I think his threat is genuine .

“So do I, but I still didn’t expect you to agree with me that I have to meet him.” Lugh was anything but a coward; however, he was very much aware of how crucial his survival was to the human race. If I died, and Lugh returned to the Demon Realm, Dougal’s followers would summon him into a sacrificial host who would instantly be burned at the stake. No more Lugh, no more opposition to Dougal’s plans.

Even if I were willing to let so many people die in order to protect myself, the fact remains that every member of my council, including my brother and my nephew, is on that list. I am as useless on the Mortal Plain without allies as I would be dead. We have to accept Abraham’s challenge. We have to go .

I’d never expected to have to cast myself as the voice of moderation, but since Lugh didn’t seem to be taking on the role, I was the only other choice.

“I can’t just show up at some derelict building at midnight with no backup,” I said. “That would be like hanging a raw steak around my neck and strolling through the lion exhibit at the zoo.”

Abraham thinks you’re only human. We can use that to our advantage .

“Yeah, great idea. Have you been with me these last three days? You feel everything I feel, right? Do you want another three days of that? Or worse?”

Of course not . His voice took on a dry tone in my mind. Never before you became my host had I experienced any human illness. Reading it in someone’s memory isn’t quite the same as experiencing it myself. I could do without it. However, I think in this case, we’ll just have to risk it .

“Okay, so we turn Abraham’s ambush against him. You take control, surprise the shit out of him, and hope you can take him down without killing his host. Then we exorcize him and send him back to the Demon Realm and he knows I’m possessed. We’ve been trying to avoid that, remember?”

If he were after you because he was part of Dougal’s conspiracy, then I’d be worried. But he’s not politically motivated. He’s just after revenge. If he finds out you’re possessed, he won’t know there’s any special significance to it. He might think you’ve got spectacularly bad luck…

“He’d be right,” I muttered.

… but I seriously doubt that the general population of demons has any idea that Dougal’s making a try for the throne. As far as they know, I’m doing a stint on the Mortal Plain, and my brother is filling in for me while I’m gone. Only his inner circle and mine know he intends to make sure I never return. And trust me when I say that there’s no chance Abraham is part of Dougal’s inner circle. A demon that unstable—and that single-mindedly bent on revenge— would be of no use to my brother .

“So you’re telling me your people don’t even know there’s a war on?”

Right. Because there is no war, at least not yet. A conspiracy, yes. An attempted coup, yes. But not a war. The power of the demon throne travels from a king to his successor, and there is no way to usurp it. Dougal can’t get his hands on the power unless I die or abdicate, so open warfare would be meaningless .

Even in the worst-case scenario, if Abraham somehow knows there’s been an attempt to seize the throne, and that you were once my host, and that you’re not supposed to be hosting me anymore, when he returns to the Demon Realm, it will be as a criminal, a killer. Imagine what would happen if a convicted murderer in the U.S. started blathering to the authorities that there was a conspiracy to overthrow the President and he knew where the leader of the conspiracy was hiding. Who would listen to him?