Angie Fox - The Dangerous Book for Demon Slayers

The officer pursed her lips, plucked a chunk of asphalt out of her hair and started writing on her clipboard.

“Wait.” I said. “I’m sorry about that. You caught me off guard.”

“A demon will catch you off guard.”

True. But it was a completely different mind-set going into a demon attack than it was standing in a blacktop lot next to a growling creature in a ditch while trying to convert feet to meters in my head as the instructor from hell (I should know, I’ve been there) decided whether to let me into town in time to save my uncle’s life.

“Let me try it one more time,” I insisted.

Without waiting for an answer, I hurled a switch star for the target. This time, it flew hard and straight, slicing the target straight down the middle. Ha! I practically did a jig as the switch star arced back to me. I caught the razor-sharp disc on my finger and gave it an extra spin.

Dragon Lady wasn’t amused. She wrote something down on her chart. “Remove your shoes and climb the ladder.”

“Excuse me?”

The Dragon Lady pointed at a rickety ladder at the edge of the lot. I’d barely noticed it because there wasn’t much to see. Made of dark wood, with age-blackened joints, the thing belonged in a museum rather than a testing yard. Besides, it stood about fifteen feet tall, which was higher than I wanted to be.

“Go,” Officer Ly ordered.

“Sure.” I eased off my Harley boots and chanced a look at the wooden ladder. “Why not?” I stuffed my socks inside my boots. I was dating a shape-shifting griffin. He’d taken me flying a lot higher than fifteen feet. Of course, Dimitri would never let me fall.

I gripped the sides of the ladder and planted one bare foot on the bottom rung. The whole contraption wobbled. I ignored it as I climbed another rung, and another.

Dragon Lady reached into her pocket and pulled out a small cloth sack. “Name the Three Truths of the demon slayer.”

Okay, I rolled my shoulders and kept climbing. I knew this question. “The truths: Look to the Outside. Accept the Universe .” I gripped the ladder tighter as she spread a handful of nails—pointy side up—on the ground underneath my ladder. “ Sacrifice Yourself and… what are you doing?”

“This is the levitation test.”

“Wait. Demon slayers can levitate?” My first thought? Nifty ! Followed swiftly by concern—I’d never done that.

Or maybe I had.

I’d certainly broken a fall in hell. But did the rules of physics apply in the underworld?

No question they’d apply here.

“I don’t think I can levitate.” I mean drift to the ground effortlessly? Balance in thin air? Land amid the nails? I could barely walk in high heels.

I rubbed my lips together. Those nails looked really sharp—rusty too. I didn’t even like it when I got my ears pierced. And what business did they have injuring test takers?

“This isn’t fair. I’ll jump, but no nails.”

Didn’t they have the magical budget for something better than nails? Not that I wanted to meet any conjured-up nightmares, but nails?

“I conduct this test per Rule 89d of the Updated and Unabridged 2009 Department of Intramagical Procedures Practical Demon Slaying Exam Manual ,” she said, scowling over her glasses. “If you don’t complete the test, you will fail.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose between my fingers, even as the ladder wobbled. “There’s no way for me to get into Las Vegas without getting this license?”

“No.”

Not unless I wanted to be shot, which she would no doubt enjoy. I winced as I took another look down at the nails.

Son of a sailor.

I held my breath and stepped up onto the top of the ladder, my toes curling over the edge. Fifteen feet wasn’t overly high, but it looked that way from where I stood. I really could break my neck doing this. A slight breeze cooled my ankles as I stared at the nails scattered below. There was no way to land without cracking something or slamming down on at least a dozen nails.

Officer Ly clicked something on her watch. “Go now. Ten seconds.”

Wait. I needed to prepare. “Why do you need to time me?”

“Eight seconds.”

Oh geez. I had to do this. My uncle needed me. My friends were champing at the bit to get into Vegas. They couldn’t face a demon by themselves.

“Five seconds.”

I stared down at the parking lot below and the rusty nails ready to slice me to ribbons. Maybe I could levitate. If not, well, I’d land barefoot on the nails and be no good to anybody.

“Three!”

But I wasn’t going to be good to anybody if I didn’t make it in to Las Vegas. Sacrifice Yourself .

I held my breath, said a prayer and jumped.

I landed hard. Intense, vibrating pain shot through my heels and up the back of my legs. I stumbled forward and pitched shoulder first onto the pavement, teeth rattling at the impact. Hell’s bells . I rolled sideways, the whole left side of my body on fire.

What in the world made me think, consider, dream I could levitate?

Then again, I never thought I could face down a demon until one had appeared on the back of my toilet bowl.

I cradled my shoulder and let the pain come. In a way, I deserved it. I didn’t even like to jump off the high dive and now I suddenly thought I could fly? For most of my thirty years, I’d gone to great lengths to get things right. I studied, I planned—I flossed my teeth twice a day. That’s right. I’d never even had a cavity.

Now in the magical world, all I did was screw up. And crash into things. I stretched my legs, numb from this latest impact. If it wasn’t for a bunch of powers I had no hope of controlling—much less understanding—I’d have been taken out by the demon I’d met in my bathroom, or that werewolf from Memphis, or heck, twenty seconds ago when I thought I had any business vaulting off a rickety ladder onto a bed of nails.

Gritting my teeth, I eased my head back on the warm asphalt and stared up at the cloudless desert sky. Oh for the days when I didn’t feel the need to prove my antigravity capabilities to a tiny Asian woman who may or may not be a dragon.

She frowned down at me, interrupting my view of the heavens. Her oversculpted eyebrows jabbed at me like accusing fingers.

I took a deep breath. It was time to try and salvage this test. Somehow.

“I’m good,” I said to the Dragon Lady, not expecting a response. Careful of the nails strewn everywhere, I pulled myself into a sitting position. Hard to believe I’d missed each and every one of them.

The Dragon Lady scribbled on her clipboard. “Outside magic is illegal.”

“You think what I just did was magical?” I asked, prying a small rock out of my bloodied left shoulder. Dang, that stung.

New rule: no looking at that shoulder until I could do something about it.

“You fail.”

“What?” I braced my hands on the pavement as a new kind of pain punched me in the head. I couldn’t fail. I never failed. “Hold up,” I said, lurching to my feet, ignoring the way my legs threatened to buckle. “I may not be great at levitation, but I aced that target back there.” On the second try, but she didn’t say I only had one chance. My heart stuttered. “This is a matter of life or death.”

She looked at me as if I suggested she dance naked through the street.

“You fail.”

Fail?

“That’s it? That’s all you can say?” It couldn’t possibly be over this fast. “Is there anything I can do? Extra credit? Another test?”

She didn’t even have the courtesy to respond.

“How long until I can take the test again?”