Angie Fox - The Dangerous Book for Demon Slayers

His eyes fluttered and he sniffed. “I don’t know.”

I glanced back at Serena. She’d pulled herself to her knees, glaring at us with red eyes. Gripes! I couldn’t squash her and I doubt she’d be willing to disclose the proper dose of power for a knockout blow.

He shivered.

“Come on, Phil.”

His blue eyes opened and he looked at me the way I’d always wished my parents would. He cleared his throat and on a rasp, said, “Have I ever told you how proud I am of you?”

My heart squeezed. “Not the time.”

Serena slowly rose to her clawlike feet. She took an uneven step forward. “You want your uncle back? You let me go.”

Impossible. Serena was too dangerous. Besides, there had to be another way. I had to break her hold on him.

She began to shimmer. “Give me my power or I leave and take him with me.”

Holy schniekes.

I didn’t want to have to make that choice.

Phil’s fingers closed in around my arm, his grip surprisingly strong. “Help me up. Now.”

I pulled him to his feet. “Do you have your soul?” I asked, my fingers tracing along his chest, like I could feel it. It seemed like he did. I detected a presence, warm and steady. Still, I had to be sure.

“I have it,” Phil said.

He leaned over and kissed me on the cheek before he launched himself into the live wires on the control panel.

“Oh my God! Phil!” His body jerked and sputtered. I dragged him away from the controls, raw electricity shooting up and down my arms. Without my new powers, I had no doubt it would have fried me. Even with them, my limbs burned with shock. I stumbled backward with Phil and we both hit the floor.

Serena cackled. I hit her between her eyes with a jolt of power and rolled my fairy godfather onto his back. I couldn’t even see where the current had entered. My fingers danced up and down his neck, searching for a pulse.

I lowered my shaking fingers. My fairy godfather was dead.

Phil didn’t have to die to get us out of this. There should have been a better way. He’d already sacrificed himself once to try to save me. How many times did my fairy godfather have to give up his life for me?

Heaven above, he actually looked happy. God, I felt like I’d failed him. I could save the entire West Coast, but I couldn’t save my own fairy godfather.

I spent a quiet moment with the man who’d shared my struggles since childhood, the man who’d watched me grow into a demon slayer. He’d trusted me to see this through until the end, bet his life on it. I wouldn’t let him down. Worse, I didn’t know if he was completely free before he died. Serena could have damned him and I’d never know.

“Where is he?” I demanded.

The power churned inside of me. And I thought the dark mark was bad.

Serena skittered away from me like a locust and hissed, struggling to stand.

I zapped her hard. “Tell me where he is!”

She snarled. “You know he’s mine.”

Rage bit me to the core. I didn’t know if she was telling the truth or not. It didn’t matter. She’d never willingly give him back to me and now she was going to die.

I aimed a killer surge at her chest.

She screamed as the blast hit her. The most powerful she-demon to hit the West Coast went up in a shower of blue flame, fighting as her body melted into nothingness. I hit her with a blast to the neck to shut her up. Her head rolled from her body, silent except for the hiss and crackle of the obsidian fire.

The old Lizzie might have felt regret, at least for her suffering as the shell fought and kicked. But I didn’t feel the slightest bit of shame. I enjoyed it.

I stood, marveling at how I could have probably flown if I’d wanted. Black energy raged inside me. I swallowed, fighting back the stark terror, doing my best to ignore my pounding heart. Hand to my chest, I felt Serena’s hellish force merge with my demon slayer powers, twisting together until I could barely distinguish the difference.

I stood above the smoking pit of acid that had been Serena, her power thrumming from my toenails to my fingertips. And that’s when a cold realization struck. Serena might have gotten me after all. I didn’t own her energy. It owned me.

“Lizzie!” Pirate’s voice echoed down the hallway. “I’m here for you, Lizzie!”

Oh no—what was Pirate doing here?

“Stay away!” I leapt over the remains of the demons and slammed the one and only door to the control room. Fear churned in my stomach. And worse—rage. My new powers screamed for an outlet. I released a fraction of it, enough to break the door lock. Instead the keyhole disappeared and the doorknob melted clean off.

No, no, no.

I folded my arms over my chest and swallowed hard, trying not to panic. So I wouldn’t be leaving this room for a while. At least no one else could get in. Not until I could get a handle on this.

“What the hell?” Dimitri pounded on the door.

“You’re alive.” Relief flooded me, followed by a stinging fear. Holy smokes—was I about to fry everyone I loved?

“Lizzie!” Dimitri hollered, rattling the door down to its hinges. “What’s wrong?”

Thank heaven, he sounded like his old self again.

My entire body shaking, I battled the urge to rip the door open and show him exactly what was wrong with me.

“I’m compromised,” I said, opting for the shorter version of I took on demon powers and now I might kill you… and my little dog too .

Dimitri let out a string of curse words while Pirate scratched frantically on the other side of the door.

“What’d they do to you?”

I could practically feel his green eyes boring through the door.

“Nothing.” I did it to them. “I took Serena’s power,” I said, eyes widening as my fingertips began to glow blue. “All of it.”

I was answered in the worst possible way—by silence.

Oh no. I couldn’t do this by myself.

Who was I kidding? I had to do this by myself .

“I think it’s getting worse,” I told him. My hands took on a horrible, tingling pallor. Blue bubbles erupted from each of my fingertips. “Holy shit!”

“What?” Dimitri demanded, smashing into the other side of the door. He ground something against it. “Pirate, go get Gertie. She’s casting wards down by the intake room.”

Sure, they didn’t want any more demons down here, but… “Grandma’s wards won’t find me, will they?” I’d seen her weave them before—she used a trajectory that would fling the lesser evils straight back to hell. Of course it didn’t work on demons, but I had no idea what Grandma’s wards would do to me. I couldn’t get pitched into hell on the back swing, not like this.

“Lizzie, you’re not evil.”

I needed to hear that. Even if I wasn’t sure I believed it.

“Stand back,” Dimitri commanded.

Shaking, I did what he asked. The blue bubbles on my fingertips grew to the size of softballs. Okay, screw the idea of not needing help. “Hurry!”

The entire door fell from its hinges and smacked into the floor in front of me.

Dimitri burst into the room, bronze sword in hand. The poor man still hadn’t found time to replace his shirt. He swallowed hard when he saw me. He ripped the protective rags off of his wrists and clutched my head in his hands.

“Steady, Lizzie,” he said, his fingers mashing into my hair and his breath warm against my face. I couldn’t look at him. My hands, they were getting worse.

He began speaking to me in an ancient language, or maybe it was Greek. His words took on a lilting, almost hypnotic tone. I didn’t know it if it was what he was saying, or how he said it, but I felt a calm invade my body. I gasped for breath. God, it felt good to have him here.