Ким Харрисон - The Outlaw Demon Wails

My teeth clenched, but I could do nothing when Trent and the demon who had touched him into unconsciousness vanished.

"The courts will decide," Minias said, yanking me out of Al's reach.

Al's strong jaw clenched and his hands turned into fists. I wasn't all that joy-joy about it either, and I struggled when Minias gave me a shake and said, "Let me jump you."

I shook my head, and he shrugged, tapping a line. He was going to try to stun me the same way they had stunned Trent. I felt it coming, and I opened my thoughts to take it, gasping as ever-after energy roared into me. I spindled it, panting with the effort.

Minias's eyebrows furrowed, and he turned to Al. "You ass!" he shouted. "You taught a witch how to spindle a line as well? You lied to the courts? Dali can't help you now."

Al jerked back a step. "I did not," he said indignantly. "They never asked. And I bound her to condition as tight as the elf 's. What is the problem here! I have control of the situation!"

I had two demons fighting over me. Seconds, maybe. I reached for a line. Minias felt it.

"Bloody hell!" he swore. "She's trying to jump!" he shouted, shaking me. "Now how do we contain her?"

I touched the line, willing it to take me, my thoughts on Ivy. But a thick white-gloved fist swung to meet my temple. It ripped me from Minias's grip, and I fell, my hands getting between me and the cement at the last moment, palms scraping. Someone's foot slammed into my gut, and gasping for air, I rolled into the basilica's side door. Unable to breathe, I stared at the ugly red sky and felt the wind on my face.

"Like that," Al snarled. "Leave catching familiars to the experts, Minias."

I felt Minias pick me up, my arms dangling. "Holy sweet spit, she's still not out."

"Then you hit her again," Al said, and another burst of pain sent me into nothing.

My head hurt. Actually, the entire right side of my face hurt, not just my head, a deep, throbbing ache that seemed to come from the bone and pulse in time with my heart. I was slumped facedown on something warm and softly yielding, like the mats at the gym. My eyes were closed, and words whispered at the edge of my awareness, fading into the hum of a distant fan when I concentrated on them.

I shifted my head to get up, slowing when my neck complained. I put a hand to it and pulled my legs under me to find an upright position. The sound of my leather pants scraping the floor was soft, the echoes nonexistent. My eyes opened, but I couldn't see a difference. One hand on my neck, one sort of propping myself up, I tugged David's coat out from under me and took a slow breath. I was wet—my hair damp and the taste of salt water on my lips. The cool certainty of charmed silver rested upon my wrist. Swell.

"Trent?" I whispered. "Are you here?"

There was a rough harrumph, chilling me.

"Good evening, Rachel Mariana Morgan."

It was Al. I froze in panic, trying to see. There was a click six feet in front of me, and I scuttled backward, crying out in surprise when my back hit a wall. Fear was a sharp goad. I tried to rise, and my head hit the ceiling a mere four feet up.

"Ow!" I yelped, falling down and moving like a crab until I found a corner. My pulse hammered, and I strained to see. Everything was black. It was as if my eyes were gone.

Al's low, mocking laugh grew in depth, then faded with a bitter sound. "Stupid witch."

"Stay away," I demanded, pulse hammering and my knees to my chin. I wiped the last of the salt water from my face and pushed my hair back. "You come near me, and I'll make sure you never engender any little demons. Ever."

"If I could touch you," Al said, his accent clear and precise, "you'd be dead. You're in jail, love. Want to be my shower buddy?"

I wiped my face again, slowly letting my knees fall from my chest. "How long?" I asked.

"Have you been here?" Al murmured lightly. "Same as me. All day. How long will you remain? Just until I get out, and then I'll be back. I'm looking forward to joining you in that tiny box of a cell you're in."

Fear slid through me, then was gone.

"Feeling better?" he almost purred. "Come over here by the bars, love, and I'll rub your aching head for you. Rub it right off your skinny little shoulders."

Hatred nearly dripped from his soothing voice, still so elegant and refined. Okay. I was in jail. I knew why I was in jail, but why was Al? Then I winced, wondering if I could have pissed the demon off any more. He'd warned me not to tell anyone I knew how to spindle line energy. And then I went and did it in front of Minias. They had caught Al in a lie of omission, and I didn't think he could put any kind of spin on it to make it look good.

Squinting to try to make the black haze take shape, I began to move with my hand outstretched, making a point of staying far from Al's voice. My ears strained to catch the echo of my breathing against the maybe-walls, but I heard nothing. A soft touch of fabric on my searching fingers jerked me to a stop, then I reached out. It was a warm body that smelled like blood and cinnamon. "Trent?" I whispered worriedly as I crouched closer and sent my hands over him. They had put us there together? "Oh, God. Are you all right?"

"For the moment," he said. "Do you mind not touching me?"

His very awake tone shocked me, and I jerked back. "You're all right!" I exclaimed as the warmth of embarrassment turned to a mild anger. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"What would be the point?"

I eased back and sat cross-legged as I heard him shift. I couldn't see, but I guessed he was leaning into the opposite corner. It was the best place in the cell, seeing as it was farthest from Al. I think.

A shiver rose through me, and I stifled it. Al was there. I was here. I wished I could see. "What are they going to do with us?" I asked Trent. "How long have you been awake?"

A faint exhalation gave evidence of a sigh. "Too long, and what do you think they're going to do with us?"

There was the slosh of water in a plastic bottle, and I grew ten times more thirsty.

"We were caught," Trent said, his gray voice empty of hope. "I woke up here."

Al cleared his throat dryly. "There's a small question being debated right now as to the legality of my claim on you," he said, and I wondered why he bothered, except that he was probably bored and didn't like being ignored. "You had to go and show them that you could spindle energy. They don't even care that I nullified the threat, deciding to drop me here and let me 'think about what I've done.' Soon as I'm summoned out, I'll pop back in, throttle you to death, then throw your dead carcass on Dali's floor and claim I was handling it and they owe me restitution for interfering."

He still didn't know I had his summoning name and couldn't be pulled across the lines, but my brief relief died. What did it matter? He'd find out soon enough. My thoughts flicked to Jenks, and my heart seemed to fall to my gut. We'd been so close. God, I hoped he was okay.

The jiggling of water against plastic drew my hand up, and fumbling, I found the container Trent was extending for me. I didn't bother wiping the top before I took a swig, and I grimaced at the unexpected taste of burnt amber. "Thank you," I said, then gave it back. "This is your water. From your pack. We have our stuff?" My eyes widened in the dark. "Do you have your light?"

I heard Trent shift his feet. "Broken. Yours, too. For the psychological effect, I'm sure, seeing as that's all they did, apart from putting the bands of charmed silver on us and dousing us in salt water."

"Yeah," I said, feeling wet and icky. "I figured that part out." Not bothering to search for my bag, I mentally catalogued what I had shoved into it. Nothing, really. And with the band of charmed silver around my wrist, I couldn't even light the candle. But then my eyebrows rose, and moving carefully, I felt the small of my back. My lips parted when I felt the cool plastic. They left me my splat gun? Pulse fast, I drew it, aiming where I had heard Al's voice. "Maybe," I said as I thumbed the safety off, "they don't think we're a threat."