Ким Харрисон - The Outlaw Demon Wails

"This is crap!" Jenks shouted. "Green fairy crap."

Ivy rubbed her temples. "I have a headache," she breathed, one of the few times she had ever admitted to me that she hurt. "Can you at least take Ceri?"

Ceri's rasp of incoming breath was harsh and quick. "No," I said, touching the woman's shoulder in support. "I'm going alone." Jenks bristled, and I leaned over him. "I'm going alone!" I exclaimed. "I couldn't have gotten the sample without you, Jenks, but this is different. And you taking on a bucket of smut so you can hold my hand while I do this isn't going to happen. Don't you get it!" I almost shouted, starting to shake. "Until I met the two of you, I worked alone, even when I did have backup. I'm damn good at it, and I'm not going to put you in danger if I don't need to, so drop it!"

For a moment, Jenks said nothing, his fists on his hips as he pressed his lips together and frowned up at me. From the window came a high-pitched hush for someone to be quiet. "So how much is your life worth, Rache?" he asked.

I turned away so he couldn't see my eyes. "I killed Kisten," I said. "I'm not going to risk either of you." My jaw clenched, and the hurt swelled. I had killed Kisten—maybe not directly, but it had been my fault.

Ivy's feet scuffed the linoleum, and Jenks went silent. I couldn't love anyone without putting them in danger. Maybe this is why Dad told me to work alone.

Ceri touched my arm, and I sniffed back the misery. "It wasn't your fault," she said, but Ivy's and Jenks's silence said different.

"I know how to do this," I said, shoving the pain down. "I was summoned out—like a demon. I can kindle demon magic—like a demon. I have a name registered in their database—like they all are. Why can't I just claim Trent as mine and bring him home? I know he'd go along with it."

"Oh for the sweet humpin' love of Tink!" Jenks shouted, and even Ivy looked discomfited. Ceri, though, put her elbows on the table and dropped her chin into her cupped palm with a thoughtful look on her face. It was the first hint of hope, and my hands grew damp.

"You can't jump through the lines," she said, as if that were the deciding factor. "How will you get there?"

I fiddled with the bowl of crackers, nervous. I had to make a deal with a demon. Damn it, I had to make another deal with a demon. The difference this time was that I was making this choice with a clear head, not being forced into it with death as the only other option. So I dealt in demons. So the hell what. It didn't make me a bad person. Or stupid. Or rash. It made me dangerous to everyone around me is all. "So I buy a trip," I said softly, knowing I'd never look at demon summoners the same way again. Maybe I'd take them seriously now, instead of writing them off as idiots. Maybe I'd been really wrong to accuse Ceri of not knowing what she was doing.

Ceri sighed, oblivious to my thoughts. "Back to the beginning," she muttered to her legal pad. I looked down at it to see a second pair of eyes, decidedly masculine this time.

"So I buy a trip from Al," I finished.

Ivy jerked, and Jenks took to the air. "No," Jenks said. "He will kill you. He will lie and kill you. He has nothing to lose, Rache."

Which is exactly why it will work, I thought, but didn't say it. Al had nothing to lose, and everything to gain.

"Jenks is right," Ivy said. Somehow she had crossed the kitchen without me seeing and was right over me.

Ceri's expression was thick with alarm. "You said Al is in jail."

I nodded. "They incarcerated him again when they realized I can spindle line energy. But he can still bargain. And I know his summoning name. I can summon him out."

Her pretty little mouth open, Ceri looked at Ivy and then Jenks. "He might kill you!"

"And he might not." Discouraged but seeing no other options, I pushed the legal pad of sketched maps away from me. "I have something he wants, and holding on to it will not do me any good. Giving it to him might get Trent free…."

Ceri gave Ivy a pleading look, and the vampire dragged her chair to the other side of me and sat down. "Rachel," Ivy said, her voice soft and full of pity, "there's nothing you can do. I don't want Trent stuck there any more than you do, but there's no shame in not waging a battle that can't be won."

Jenks stood before me with his head bobbing, but his relief made me even more angry. They weren't listening, and I really didn't blame them. My tension rose, and I scrubbed a hand across my face. "Okay," I said shortly, and Jenks flew backward as I stood. "You're right. Bad idea." I have to get out of here. "Just forget the entire thing," I said, looking over the kitchen for my coat. The foyer…I think.

I headed for the front door with no bag, no wallet, and nothing but my spare keys, which I had stashed in the safe with Ivy's living-will papers. Someone had brought my car home, but I had yet to find my bag.

"Hey!" Jenks said from the table. "Where are you going?"

My pulse hammered, and my steps jarred all the way up my spine. "Eden Park. Alone. I'll be back after sunrise. Unless I'm dragged into the ever-after," I added, sounding dry, sarcastic, and bitter. The clatter of pixy wings following made me tense.

"Rachel—"

"Let her go," Ivy said softly, and he dropped back. "She's never had to deal with a situation there was no way to win. I better call Rynn," she said as she headed down the hall. "Then go to the store to stock up. The shops might be closing for a while. There might be riots if the city has to reorganize the lower power structure. This is going to be a rough week. The I.S. is going to be too busy to pick its collective nose."

I passed through the bat-filled sanctuary thinking I wasn't going to be around to see it.

It was cold, sitting on the top of the bench's back the way I was, my feet on the seat as I looked out from Eden Park over the gray Ohio River and across the Hollows. The sun was near rising, and the Hollows was hazy with a pinkish-gray mist. I was thinking—waiting, really. Just the fact that I was sitting here was a clear indication that the thinking portion of my life was done. Now I had to do something.

So I sat on the top of the bench and shivered in my short leather jacket and jeans, my boots doing little to stop the cold of a November morning. My breath made little puffs that existed about as long as my racing thoughts did: thoughts of my dad, my mom, Takata, Kisten, Trent trapped in the ever-after, Ivy trusting me to fix this, Jenks wanting to be a part of it.

Frowning, I dropped my eyes and brushed a smudge of dirt off my boot. My dad had brought me up here upon occasion. Usually it was when he and my mom were arguing or she had fallen into a funk, during which she would always smile and give me a kiss when I asked what was wrong. Now I wondered if her occasional depression had come from thinking about Takata.

I exhaled, watching the thought leave me like the mist from my breath and vanish into the collective consciousness. My mother had quietly gone off her rocker trying to divorce herself from the reality of bearing Takata's children while being lovingly married to my dad. She had loved them both, and seeing Takata in Robbie and me every day must have been a self-inflicted torture.

"You can't forget anything," I said, watching the words vanish into nothing. "And even if you do, it always comes back to bitch-slap you in the morning."

The cool mist of the coming day was damp and pleasant, and I closed my eyes against the brightening sky. I'd been up way too long.

Turning where I sat, I looked behind me over the narrow parking strip to the two man-made ponds and the wide footbridge spanning them. Past the bridge was a ragged ley line, unnoticeable unless you were really looking. I'd found it while helping Kisten fight off a foreign camarilla trying to kidnap his nephew Audric last year, and I'd forgotten all about it until feeling its discordant resonance through Bis. Though weak, it would be enough.